Maastricht University - Open Journals
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Lifting the Fog – Exercises in Analytical Discourse Evaluation
Get PDFThere is a thick and persistent fog hanging over our democracies. When one looks at our political discourse, be it in parliaments, newspapers, or official and unofficial reports, one cannot help noticing that it is not an exchange of well-presented, developed, and structured arguments. Rather, it is full of ambiguous statements, unverified assertions, appeals to inspiring but vague values and speeches that sound somewhat like actual arguments, but are at best only partial arguments-leaving many important premises implicit and unspecified. This fog makes it difficult to evaluate what participants in any given political debate are saying. After all, if it is not clear exactly what people are saying, it is impossible to determine if it makes sense. And if it is not possible to determine whether what participants in a debate are saying makes sense, the decisions that are made on the basis of that debate are also likely to be compromised. For one thing, the decisions are unlikely to be good decisions. After all, in democracy, debate and political discourse are used to consider the pros and cons of certain courses of action. If that discourse is plagued by vagueness, the decisions made are likely to be misguided. Furthermore, foggy discourse makes it difficult to explain in coherent and clear terms why a certain course of action was taken. This undermines the legitimacy of those decisions, and the trust in government. For short, if the moor is full of fog, it is hard to know if you are going the right way, and you are likely to get lost
The Effect of Ethnic Conflict and Political Instability on Import Demand: Evidence from Turkey
Get PDFThe unrest in the city center of Istanbul during the late Spring of 2013 is just one of many in the long list of instability and conflict, events responsible for a presumably underestimated amount of lives during the second half of the 20th century. This paper focuses on the effects on imports of these occurrences. Imports are not only a way to satisfy domestic demand; they also function as an important gate to increased economic growth via importation of more advanced technology. The analysis advances the existing economic literature that incorporates institutional variables into the analysis in two distinct ways. First, internal instability has been the focus, in contrast to previous work that tried to explain changes to macroeconomic variables due to international conflict. Second, the analysis takes into account the endogeneity problem by using the VECM framework. Civil violence, that is, political instability, and ethnic conflict are found to have a positive effect on GDP per capita and import demand per capita. The nature of, and relationship between, civil violence and ethnic conflict in Turkey is pivotal in describing the influence of different macroeconomic variables on the rest of the economy. The VECM framework employed presents another intriguing result which is a characteristic embedded in Turkish ethnic history: there is evidence that ethnic conflict is not significantly endogenous to the economic environment. If the Kurdish problem is indeed the first item on the list that inhibits full-edged Turkish acceptance in the economies and politics of the West, the way to achieve ameliorated relationships between the two ethnicities is mostly through political negotiations, probably via international mediation as the ethnic strife has centuries-old roots
Autocorrelation in Stochastic Models of Dutch Mortality Rates
No full textThis paper studies different stochastic mortality models with respect to its underlying assumptions. The Lee-Carter model, the rank-p SVD approximation model, the Weighted Least Squares model and the Poisson Bilinear model are discussed and applied to a Dutch data set. In an empirical analysis, it is illustrated how to obtain parameter estimates and how mortality rates can be forecasted. In a second step, the paper examines the model’s underlying assumptions on a residual basis. Several tests are employed testing for normality, homogeneity of variance and autocorrelation. The test results seem to invalidate the models applicability due to failure in the underlying assumptions. In particular the crucial assumption of observational independence does not seem to hold, which may result in prediction intervals that are too narrow. Furthermore, a theoretical explanation for autocorrelation is given and an alternative model (multivariate ARIMA model) is proposed, that does not only rely on a weaker set of assumptions, but also requires less computational effort. Comparing the initial models’ estimates with the estimates of the alternative model, it is concluded that all five stochastic mortality models tend to deliver similar estimates
Time your stress if you aim for success: the influence of stress on memory for different memory phases
No full textIn the field of memory research, the influence of stress on memory is still unclear. The aim was therefore to review existing literature on the topic and to determine whether memory is facilitated or impaired by stress. A model is reviewed that hypothesizes that stress improves learning when it is experienced in the context and around the time of the stressful event. This is achieved via catecholamine and non-genomic glucocorticoid actions. Conceptually, the hormones shift the brain into a memory formation mode that facilitates encoding and suppresses the retrieval of irrelevant information. When catecholamine levels have returned to baseline, slow genomic glucocorticoid actions subsequently shift the brain into a memory storage mode where encoding of new irrelevant information will be suppressed to allow successful consolidation of information regarding the stressful event. It was concluded that stress can both enhance and impair memory depending on the timing of the stressful event
Meta Needs in the context of Schema Therapy: Psychometric qualities of a new Meta Needs Questionnaire and relationships with depression, anxiety and schemas
Get PDFSchema Therapy proposes that when core emotional needs are frustrated in childhood, these experiences lead to rigid patterns of thoughts and feelings in important life circumstances, that are known as early maladaptive schemas (Young et al., 2003). Clinical practice recently indicated another type of needs that is more abstract and philosophical, similar to the ones proposed by existential and humanistic psychology. "Meaning in life", "living an authentic life", and "feeling as a part of the world" are some examples (Prochaska & Norcross, 2010), which are also called "Meta Needs" (Maslow, 1971). To provide the groundwork for utilizing the Meta Needs concept in the Schema Therapy practice, a Meta Needs Questionnaire (MNQ) was developed that investigates the satisfaction levels of Meta Needs. The present study explores the psychometric properties of the MNQ. Factor analysis of the items revealed two factors, which were labeled "Authenticity and "Liveliness". Item-analysis showed good to excellent reliability measures of the MNQ, also regarding split-half reliability. Correlations with anxiety and depression were significant, demonstrating construct validity of the scale. As to criterion-related validity, the study confirmed the hypothesis that schemas negatively correlate with attained Meta Needs fulfillment. A possible interpretation of the results is that when core emotional needs are unmet, Meta Needs are also not met, and this state seems to be related to clinical symptoms
Did I forget to remember or did I forget to remember remembering? Accuracy and generalization of meta-memory
No full textA substantial proportion of individuals, who have experienced childhood sexual abuse actually claim having had periods in which they did not recall their abuse (Fivush & Edwards, 2004). By now we know that in some cases it is not the event per se which has been forgotten, but rather people forgot having thought about the event in question at a given time (Schooler, 2001). This forgetting of one’s previous recall (meta-awareness) of an event has been termed forget-it-all-along effect and is not specifically related to traumatic experiences, but also common to our everyday experiences (Parks, 1999). Meta-awareness is one’s consciousness of the contents of subjective experience, which is different from the content of an experience. The aim of this article is to give insight into the role of meta-awareness in locating events backwards in time, i.e., retrospective memory. For this purpose, inaccuracies in different memory judgments will be compared, specifically the ability to judge one’s own prior recall of personal events and the ability to judge the time of occurrence of events reported in the public news. The implications of the findings for the concept of recovered memories will be discussed.
Voluntary false confession: An act of altruism?
No full textWhy would innocent men choose to confess to a crime? In this article, we try to find some answers to this question. In criminal organizations, for example the Mafia, falsely confessing to hinder the work of the police seems to be an existent practice. We argue that Mafiosi have good reasons to view a police interrogation as a possibility for altruistic helping: by confessing, they sacrifice themselves to confuse the police and thus help the criminal organization. In an experimental paradigm, we tested this conceptualization: 61 university students were asked to confess to unintentional property damage. By doing so, they allegedly helped a certain faculty to get a large sum of money from an insurance company. Students who were members of this faculty confessed more often (15 out of 30) than students from other faculties (7 out of 31), even though students could not directly benefit from the insurance fraud. We argue that forces of altruistic helping are at play. The question of altruism and group-membership should be researched further in the context of false confessions and organized crime
An Analysis of the Arguments for the 2010 Salary Increase for Indian Members of Parliament
Get PDFIn 2010, the Indian Members of Parliament increased their salaries threefold, invoking a controversial debate over the justification for the unprecedented hike. The Joint Committee on Salaries and Allowances of Members of Parliament had proposed the increase based on the notion that MPs should earn more than the highest paid regular full-time civil servant whose salary had shortly before been increased – one symbolic rupee more. Yet, the reason why MPs should earn more was not made explicit in the debate. As the salary increase was not well received by the public, it is critical to dissect the argument and work out the possible Warrant structures supporting it. On that basis, the debate can move from unsupported Claims to more profound discussions about diverging visions for the role of MPs and principles guiding Indian society. This analysis is aimed at initiating such a needed turn in debate by reconstructing and evaluating the main arguments put forward for increasing the salary, namely that MPs should be compensated for the time-intensiveness of their work and that their salary should display their higher institutional status as compared to public secretaries