Bowers et al. counter deep neural networks (DNNs) as good models of human visual perception. From our color perspective we feel their view is based on three misconceptions: A misrepresentation of the state-of-the-art of color perception; the type of model required to move the field forward; and the attribution of shortcomings to DNN research that are already being resolved.

In recent times, international comparative studies on managers’ beliefs regarding ethical/unethical leadership have increased in number. These studies focus on both Eastern and Western countries. However, although these previous studies focused on the effects of national culture, they did not pay sufficient attention to the effects of institutions. Moreover, these studies covered only a few countries. Despite Japan’s strong influence on the world economy, it has not been included in previous studies on ethical leadership. Thus, to reveal unexplored factors—particularly cultural (...) and institutional factors—and to determine the generalizability of previous findings, this study used a qualitative research method to examine Japanese business managers’ beliefs about ethical/unethical leadership. The data revealed the convergence and divergence in beliefs regarding ethical/unethical leadership between managers in Japan and in other countries. The analysis identified mostly the same themes of ethical/unethical leadership as found in other countries albeit with different distributions. In addition, We identified new themes that may be specific to Japan or that were neglected in previous studies. Moreover, this study suggests the necessity of considering each society’s history of business ethics and current ethics-related institutional contexts in ethical/unethical leadership studies. (shrink)

Previous empirical studies have shown that perceptions of organizational politics are negatively related to individuals’ affective commitment. The key contribution of this study was that it found the interactive moderating effects of political skill and quality of leader–member exchange (LMX) on the relationship between perceptions of organizational politics and affective commitment. Our results indicated that politics perception affective commitment relationship was weaker when both political skill and quality of LMX are high. When only political skill is high and the quality (...) of LMX is low, or LMX quality is high but political skill is low, the negative relationship between politics perception and affective commitment was not mitigated. Limitations and implications for future research are discussed. (shrink)

Davide and Benedetto Ghirlandaio’s close association with their brother Domenico has made it difficult to individuate their own artistic styles and evaluate their contributions to the Ghirlandaio workshop. Benedetto’s artistic character is particularly elusive, since the Nativity in the church of Notre-Dame in Aigueperse, Auvergne, is the only work firmly attributed to him. This paper proposes a reconstruction of Benedetto’s career by reassessing the works once ascribed to a painter known as the Master of the Saint Louis Madonna. Most of (...) these paintings, centred on the eponymous work in the Saint Louis Art Museum, have been incorporated into Davide’s oeuvre. Stylistic analysis, however, reveals their distinct artistic character and uncovers numerous points of comparison with the Aigueperse Nativity. On that basis they are reattributed here to the young Benedetto in his initial Florentine period. This identification is also corroborated by an analysis of his sojourn in France between 1486 and 1493, where he developed his technical skills and his interest in Netherlandish painting, possibly through the interaction with the Master of Moulin. The paper then goes on to an examination of his activities after his return to Florence, and the ways in which he integrated his experience gained in France into the late Ghirlandaio workshop style. Benedetto’s artistic development revealed by this reconstruction suggests a rich cross-fertilisation within the Florentine workshops in the late fifteenth century, with particular focus on the artists around the Verrocchio workshop in the early 1480s and those who participated in the Ghirlandaio workshop after Domenico’s death. Also, as Benedetto was one of the few Italian painters who worked north of the Alps, the reappraisal of his career offers insights into the ways in which travelling artists could interact with local artistic environments and develop their own styles. (shrink)

This research examines the possibility of developing a new corporate social responsibility (CSR) auditing system based on the analysis of current CSR literature and interviews conducted with a number of interested and knowledgeable stakeholders. This work attempts to create a framework for social responsibility auditing compatible with an existing commercially successful environmental audit system. The project is unusual in that it tackles the complex issue of CSR auditing with a scientific approach using Grounded Theory. On the evidence discovered to date (...) in the literature review and the interviews, CSR seems to be perceived by many as the social strand of sustainable development. However, there is far less agreement regarding its measurement. Both the literature review and the interview analysis indicate that developing an applied CSR auditing procedure will be a challenging task. This is principally due to the lack of formal study of this complex subject, which, despite the widespread debate it has engendered, still lacks a single and broadly accepted definition. The concepts developed from the findings of this research, together with the key factors identified in a literature review of CSR, were developed into a prospective CSR audit protocol. (shrink)

The simultaneous recording of brain activity in two or more people, termed hyperscanning, is an emerging field of research investigating the neural basis of social interaction. Hyperscanning studies of adult–infant dyads have great potential to provide insights into how social functions develop. In particular, taking advantage of functional near-infrared spectroscopy for its spatial resolution and invulnerability to motion artifacts, adult–infant fNIRS may play a major role in this field. However, there remains a problem in analyzing hyperscanning data between adult and (...) young populations. Namely, there are intrinsic differences in hemodynamic time latencies depending on age, and the peak latency of the hemodynamic response function is longer in younger populations. Despite this fact, the effects of such differences on quantified synchrony have not yet been examined. Consequently, the present study investigated the influence of intrinsic hemodynamic differences on wavelet coherence for assessing brain synchrony, and further examined the statistical removal of these effects through simulation experiments. First, we assumed a social signal model, where one counterpart of the dyad sends a social signal to the other, which eventually results in simultaneous brain activation. Based on this model, simulated fNIRS activation sequences were synthesized by convolving boxcar event sequences with HRFs. We set two conditions for the event: synchronized and asynchronized event conditions. We also modeled the HRFs of adults and infants by referring to previous studies. After preprocessing with additional statistical processing, we calculated the wavelet coherence for each synthesized fNIRS activation sequence pair. The simulation results showed that the wavelet coherence in the synchronized event condition was attenuated for the combination of different HRFs. We also confirmed that prewhitening via an autoregressive filter could recover the attenuation of wavelet coherence in the 0.03–0.1 Hz frequency band, which was regarded as being associated with synchronous neural activity. Our results showed that variability in hemodynamics affected the analysis of inter-brain synchrony, and that the application of prewhitening is critical for such evaluations between adult and young populations. (shrink)

November 4th-5th, 2012 at Kyoto University. Organizers: Hisashi Nakao & Pierre-Alain Braillard.

Two studies aimed to examine cultural differences in social support provision, with or without solicitation, in Japan and the United States. In Study 1, we replicated a previous study with Japanese university students. We found that the Japanese participants did not provide social support when it was not solicited, as compared with when it was solicited. Furthermore, in Study 2, participants were asked to respond to a questionnaire regarding a hypothetical stressful situation experienced by a close other and to indicate (...) their willingness to provide support. We confirmed our hypothesis that Japanese participants hesitate to provide unsolicited support to close others, even when they recognize that the close others are in need, whereas the American participants do not hesitate to provide such support. Contrastingly, regarding solicited support, the Japanese and Americans were equally ready to provide support, as hypothesized. The cultural difference in social support resides in the provision of unsolicited support. These results suggest that differences in culturally appropriate responses to needy people are responsible for the difference in the provision of unsolicited vs. solicited social support. (shrink)

立法・法改正論争が盛んな現代日本の法理論の背後にあるものを理解するため、幕末から新憲法までの法思想の道筋を辿る。.

In the division problem with single-peaked preferences, an allocation rule is strategy-proof for same tops if no one can gain by reporting a false preference relation having the true peak. This new condition is so weak that it is implied by strategy-proofness and tops-only. We show that the uniform rule is the only rule satisfying this mild property under efficiency and envy-freeness. We then analyze how largely the preference domain can be extended with admitting a rule satisfying the three axioms, (...) and show that the single-plateaued domain is the unique such maximal domain. (shrink)

The sophisticated function of the central nervous system (CNS) is largely supported by proper interactions between neural cells and blood vessels. Accumulating evidence has demonstrated that neurons and glial cells support the formation of blood vessels, which in turn, act as migratory scaffolds for these cell types. Neural progenitors are also involved in the regulation of blood vessel formation. This mutual interaction between neural cells and blood vessels is elegantly controlled by several chemokines, growth factors, extracellular matrix, and adhesion molecules (...) such as integrins. Recent research has revealed that newly migrating cell types along blood vessels repel other preexisting migrating cell types, causing them to detach from the blood vessels. In this review, we discuss vascular formation and cell migration, particularly during development. Moreover, we discuss how the crosstalk between blood vessels and neurons and glial cells could be related to neurodevelopmental disorders. (shrink)

The purposes of this study are (a) to establish a measurement for evaluating conversational impressions of group discussions, and (b) to make an exploratory investigation on their interactional processes which may affect to form those impressions. The impression rating and factor analysis undertaken first give us four factors concerning conversational impressions of “focus group interviews (FGIs)”: conversational activeness, conversational sequencing, the attitudes of participants and the relationships of participants. In relation to the factors of conversational activeness and conversational sequencing in (...) particular, the microanalysis of four selected topical scenes from our database further shows that the behavior of the moderator and the interviewees is organized not independently but with reference to each other. The study thus emphasizes the importance of the integration of quantitative and qualitative approaches towards human interactions. (shrink)

環境生態学、生態心理学、発達心理学、建築計画学、文化人類学、家族社会学、理論社会学に視座する気鋭の研究者たちが、現代の人間経験に切実に含まれる問題群の具体から、他者、行為、物、環境などの諸言説を根底的 に問い直し、来るべき人間科学の構築をめざして、執筆と横断的な討論を重ねた共同論作。.