Accumulating evidence for the unique social, behavioral, and physical health benefits of positive emotion and related well-being constructs has led to the development and testing of positive psychological interventions to increase emotional well-being and enhance health promotion and disease prevention. PPIs are specifically aimed at improving emotional well-being and consist of practices such as gratitude, savoring, and acts of kindness. The purpose of this narrative review was to examine the literature on PPIs with a particular focus on positive emotion outcomes. (...) We evaluated the evidence on the effects of PPIs on positive emotion specifically, and discussed the range of evidence regarding the relative responsiveness of emotion measures to PPIs in order to gain a better understanding of the specific emotional pathways through which PPIs influence psychological and physical well-being. We conclude with recommendations for best evaluating effects of PPIs on positive emotion outcomes. (shrink)

The increasing complexity of human subjects research and its oversight has prompted researchers, as well as institutional review boards, to have a forum in which to discuss challenging or novel ethical issues not fully addressed by regulations. Research ethics consultation services provide such a forum. In this article, we rely on the experiences of a national Research Ethics Consultation Collaborative that collected more than 350 research ethics consultations in a repository and published 18 challenging cases with accompanying ethical commentaries to (...) highlight four contexts in which REC can be a valuable resource. REC assists: 1) investigators before and after the regulatory review; 2) investigators, IRBs, and other research administrators facing challenging and novel ethical issues; 3) IRBs and investigators with the increasing challenges of informed consent and risk/benefit analysis; and 4) in providing flexible and collaborative assistance to overcome study hurdles, mediate conflicts within a team, or directly engage with research participants. Institutions that have established, or plan to establish, REC services should work to raise the visibility of their service and engage in open communication with existing clinical ethics consult services as well as the IRB. While the IRB system remains the foundation for the ethical review of research, REC can be a valuable service for investigators, regulators, and research participants aligned with the goal of supporting ethical research. (shrink)

Of the various loci of systematic theology that call for sustained philosophical investigation, the doctrine of sanctification stands out as a prime candidate. In response to that call, William Alston developed three models of the sanctifying work of the Holy Spirit: the fiat model, the interpersonal model, and the sharing model. In response to Alston’s argument for the sharing model, this paper offers grounds for a reconsideration of the interpersonal model. We close with a discussion of some of the implications (...) of one’s understanding of the transforming work of the Holy Spirit for practical Christian spirituality. (shrink)

Teleosemantics explains mental representation in terms of etiological history: a mental state’s representational contents are the result of natural selection, or some other selection process. Critics have argued that the “swampman” thought experiment poses a counterexample to teleosemantics. In several recent papers, Papineau has argued that a merely possible swampman cannot serve as a counterexample to teleosemantics, but has acknowledged that actual swampmen would pose a problem for teleosemantics. In this paper, I argue that there are real-world cases of swampman-like (...) representation, in the form of functional tetrachromacy. People with functional tetrachromacy are born with four types of cones in each eye, rather than the usual three, and as a result can represent a wider variety of colors than the average person. I argue that the functional tetrachromat’s additional color representations are not the result of a selection process. Functional tetrachromacy is therefore a real-world case of mental representation without an etiological history, and therefore poses a genuine counterexample to teleosemantics. (shrink)

This article investigates the influence of innovation on the relationship between corporate strategy and social issues. Specifically, we employ firm-level data for a large sample of U.K. companies drawn from a diverse range of industrial sectors to investigate, given innovation, the determinants of both the probability that the innovation brings reduced environmental impacts and/or improved health and safety, and the strength of this effect. In this connection, we find evidence of a dichotomy between product and process innovations, and roles for (...) firm size, industrial sector, a foreign market presence, access to various information sources (e.g. universities and government research organisations) and the extent to which activities are constrained by regulation. Furthermore, we find a tendency for the influences of many of these factors to vary between older and newer firms. (shrink)

The purpose of this article is to understand how academic integrity educational tutorials are administered across Canadian higher education. Results are shared from a survey of publicly funded Canadian higher education institutions, including universities and colleges, across ten provinces where English is the primary language of instruction. The survey contained 29 items addressing institutional demographic details, as well as academic integrity education questions. Results showed that academic integrity tutorials are inconsistent across Canadian higher education, with further differences evident within the (...) university and college sectors. (shrink)

In the USA, civic involvement in adolescence includes political and nonpolitical activities. Given that identities can motivate behavior, how do political and moral identities relate to civic activity choices? In this study, high school students (N = 1578) were surveyed about their political and nonpolitical civic actions and their moral and political identities. Overall, students were more involved in service than they were in political activities. Hierarchical regression analyses were used to investigate the relation between identity and involvement, controlling for (...) known correlates of involvement: sex, ethnicity, parent education, peer civic engagement, parent civic engagement and school civic opportunities. Moral and political identity were positively related to overall involvement. Political identity was positively related to political involvement, but was not related to nonpolitical service. Moral identity was positively related to service and expressive-political involvement, but negatively related to traditional-political involvement. Findings are discussed in light of civic and moral education initiatives. (shrink)

The argument that nurses should be Marxists is made by looking at the primary areas of nursing activity in turn, giving an example of how capitalist economic relations negatively impact upon that activity, and providing a Marxist explanation of the reasons why it has that impact. In relation to the nursing activity of health promotion, it is argued that capitalism's generation of social inequality undermines the health of the population. In relation to curative activities, the focus is on how capitalism's (...) reckless pursuit of profit has subverted the sustainability of bactericidal interventions. The argument in relation to comforting and assistive care is that the ownership and control of health services by capitalist corporations undermines therapeutic relationships. Finally, in relation to supportive care, it is contended that capitalism's requirement for a disciplined workforce can compromise healthcare professionals’ support of employees. It is concluded that if nurses aspire to have some control over their activities, then it is a good idea for them to avail of Marxism's capacity to identify the socio‐economic mechanisms by which capitalism affects nursing care. (shrink)

This paper examines Aquinas's contention that the virtues are necessarily connected, in such a way that anyone who fully possesses one of them, necessarily possesses them all. It is argued that this claim, as Aquinas develops it in the "Summa Theologiae", is more complex, interesting, and plausible than it is often taken to be. On his view, the cardinal virtues can be said to be connected in two senses, corresponding to the two senses in which certain virtues can be said (...) to be cardinal, namely, as general qualifications of all virtuous action and as particular normative ideals having a specific content. This distinction suggests, in turn, that Aquinas's claim that the virtues are connected should be understood as a psychological thesis about what is characteristic of the virtuous person's distinctive way of acting, as well as a thesis about the interrelationships among the different cardinal virtues considered as discrete normative ideals. So understood, Aquinas's claim that the virtues are connected is seen to be a necessary implication of his metaphysically grounded theory of human action. At the same time, it enables him to offer an interpretation of the complexities of moral discourse that is illuminating and at least prima facie plausible, taken on its own merits. (shrink)

The Medical Innovation Bill continues its journey through Parliament. On 23 January 2015, it was debated for the final time in the House of Lords and with one final amendment, the House moved to support the Bill, which then moved to the House of Commons on 26 January. It will be debated again on 27 February 2015. The Bill’s purpose is to encourage responsible innovation in medical treatment. Although this goal is laudable, it is argued that the Bill is unnecessary (...) and has the potential to undermine the very cause it aims to advance. More useful for encouraging responsible innovation is the continued education of health-care professionals on how the law already supports practitioners who look to improve care through responsible innovation. (shrink)

Although previous studies have found that video games induce stress, studies have not typically measured all salient indicators of stress responses including stress appraisals, cardiovascular indicators, and emotion outcomes. The current study used the Biopsychosocial Model of Challenge and Threat (Blascovich & Tomaka, 1996) to determine if video games induce a cardiovascular stress response by comparing the effects of threat and challenge appraisals across two types of video games that have shown different cardiovascular outcomes. Participants received challenge or threat appraisal (...) instructions, and played a fighting game (Mortal Kombat) or a puzzle game (Tetris). Study outcomes were heart rate variability, systolic and diastolic blood pressure, and positive and negative emotion ratings measured before, during and after gameplay. Results indicated that threat appraisal instructions increased negative emotion ratings and decreased heart rate variability, but not blood pressure, which is an essential marker for cardiovascular stress responses. Increased blood pressure and decreased heart rate variability was associated with fighting game players when compared with the puzzle game players, indicating a cardiovascular stress response; however, fighting game players also reported higher positive emotion ratings. Based on the study findings, video games do not induce stress responses like mental stressors used in previous research, demonstrating that the interactive player experience in video gaming may have more complex effects on stress outcomes. Future research should comprehensively measure biopsychosocial stress indicators and multiple emotional states over time to fully examine the relationship between video games and stress. (shrink)

This is a “bottom-up” paper in the sense that it draws lessons in defining disciplinary categories under study from a series of empirical studies of interdisciplinarity. In particular, we are in the process of studying the interchange of research-based knowledge between Cognitive Science and Educational Research. This has posed a set of design decisions that we believe warrant consideration as others study cross-disciplinary research processes.

This paper provides a philosophically informed survey of transhumanism and ‘posthumanism(s)’ on education. It has two primary aims: (1) bringing clarity to the widespread confusion surrounding even the most basic theoretical contents and terminology of transhumanism (TH) and ‘critical posthumanism’ (CPH), the two dominant forms of posthumanism in academic and popular discourse, and (2) descriptively surveying the discourses of TH and CPH on education. The first section contains description of TH’s and CPH’s basic theoretical contents, brief histories of TH and (...) CPH, and a proposal for sorely needed standard terminology. The second section surveys the TH and CPH literature on education, emphasizing the way education typically is technologized by THs and politicized by CPHs. The conclusion considers possibilities for alternative forms of ‘posthumanism.’. (shrink)

Adversity provides a chance to reckon with, and properly attend to, our limitations. Appreciating one’s limitations is crucial for humility; and developing humility enhances wisdom.

In lieu of an abstract, here is a brief excerpt of the content:140 BOOK REVIEWS The Church: The Universal Sacrament of Salvation. By JoHANN AUER. Translated from the German by Michael Waldstein. Washington, D.C.: The Catholic University of America Press, 1993. Pp. 541. $24.95 (paper). The Church, Community of Salvation: An Ecumenical Ecclesiology. By GEORGE H. TAVARD. Collegeville, Minnesota: The Liturgical Press, 1992. Pp. 264. $18.95 (paper). These two works represent two recent and very different attempts by contemporary Catholic ecclesiologists (...) to present a comprehensive or systematic theology of the church. I shall deal with the specifics of each work separately. Johann Auer (1910-1989) was professor of dogmatics and the history of dogma at the University of Bonn when in 1983 he first published his Die Kirche: Das allgemeine Heilssakrament. This present work is an English translation of that German text which was Volume VIII in a comprehensive, nine-part, dogmatic survey, with volumes addressing the traditional dogmatic themes: God, Creation, Christ, Grace, Eucharist, Sacraments, Church and Eschatology. Joseph Ratzinger was co-editor with Auer of the original series. And while Auer authored the first eight volumes, Ratzinger authored the final volume on eschatology. We have seen this kind of dogmatic survey in English before in the comparable six-volume work of Michael Schmaus called Dogma (1968). As with Schmaus's work, this dogmatic survey is intended as a series of textbooks for theology students and thus its method is to survey each dogmatic theme focusing upon three elements, the biblical foundation for the theme, the historical development of this theme, and finally its systematic inner coherence or integral rational development. In this volume, Auer accomplishes all three tasks in exemplary fashion and with a depth of treatment Schmaus never aimed at approaching. Auer's The Church is divided into eighteen chapters organized into four thematic sections bearing the titles, " Pathways towards the Proper Understanding of the Church," " Pathways towards a Theological Concept of the Church taken from Biblical Images," "Manifestations of the Church's Being, Life and Activity in the Light of its Sacramental Structure," and "The Church's Tasks and Its Ways to Self-Realization in the World." Under these titles are treated all the traditional themes expected of a comprehensive ecclesiology: the origin and authority of the church, its mission and ministries, biblical images, organizational BOOK REVIEWS 141 models and dogmatic marks of the church, ecumenism, the place of the Blessed Virgin Mary among the People of God, relations between church and state. Auer's consideration of each of these themes is marked by his thorough knowledge of the sources and his skillful handling of these materials. Even so, Auer's work is hardly beyond criticism. For example, arguably the heart of the book is the author's 213-page treatment of the history and theology of the ministries which comprises Part III, "Manifestations of the Church's Being, Life and Activity...." I want to call this section masterful because of the vastness of the enterprise (the development of the ministries over almost two thousand years) and the wealth of careful distinctions Auer brings to his treatment of so much material. To choose among the riches here one might single out Auer's treatment of the two principles of democracy and hierarchy and the numerous collegial forms for participative governance and administration that have been created or once existed in the church and have been revived since Vatican II (pp. 157-173). This is a stimulating but balanced discussion, blending historical material with more immediate and urgent concerns. But there are also some serious weaknesses in the larger section. For example, while extended attention is given to the offices of bishop and pope (almost a hundred pages on the papal office alone), comparatively little attention is given to the role of presbyters (four pages) and the laity. As for the latter, though Auer considers "The Question of the Secular Office of the Laity," he never addresses the question of the religious office of the laity, that is, their ministry in the church and not just to the world. He broaches this theme in his section on " Vocations or Charisms, Ministries and Offices or Commissionings " (pp. 179-194), but all too quickly he concludes this section... (shrink)

In this paper, I evaluate the claim that the equivalence of multiple intensionally distinct definitions of random sequence provides evidence for the claim that these definitions capture the intuitive conception of randomness, concluding that the former claim is false. I then develop an alternative account of the significance of randomness-theoretic equivalence results, arguing that they are instances of a phenomenon I refer to as schematic equivalence. On my account, this alternative approach has the virtue of providing the plurality of definitions (...) of randomness with conceptual unity and a rationale for certain investigations that are carried out in the field. (shrink)

The key point of the book, ideally as well as practically, is to realize that there may be something potentially significant, and politically significant, in the very act of making such connections, of understanding the supposedly trite and trivial world of the everyday against a broader political backcloth.

Lively, comprehensive, and contemporary, The Voice of Reason: Fundamentals of Critical Thinking covers three principal areas: thought and language, systematic reasoning, and modes of proof. It employs highly accessible explanations and a multitude of examples drawn from social issues and various academic fields, showing students and other readers how to construct and criticize arguments using the techniques of sound reasoning. The Voice of Reason examines the traditional elements of the field and also explores new ground. The first section of the (...) book elucidates the relationship between thought and language, explaining how words function. It discusses meaning, connotation, vagueness, ambiguity, and definition, identifying the linguistic elements that can produce mistakes in thinking. The next section describes the rules of systematic reasoning, examining such topics as truth, relevance, and adequacy; deductive logic (categorical, hypothetical, and disjunctive); and induction (cause and effect, analogy, generalization, and hypothesis). Sixteen fallacies in thinking are also described through extensive illustrations and applications. The final section of the book offers a unique study of what constitutes proof in several different areas--including politics, advertising, law, and social issues--as well as in the academic disciplines of literature, science, history, and ethics. The author describes the various rules of evidence, using essays by major figures in each field as examples. An ideal text for courses in critical thinking, informal logic, and reasoning and writing, The Voice of Reason offers numerous pedagogical features including a host of examples; assignments, exercises, and puzzles at both the halfway point and at the end of each chapter; cartoons and quotations throughout; and practical applications of theoretical concepts. An extensive Instructor's Manual contains answers to the exercises that appear throughout the text. (shrink)

Dallas Willard's five monographs devoted to Christian spirituality constitute a unified body of work that together present a comprehensive account of the nature and means of spiritual formation in Christ. This paper approaches Willard's corpus chronologically for the purpose of culling the central components of Willard's understanding of spiritual formation. This is not meant to be a review or summary of Willard's writings, but rather an analytical study of Willard's work and is an implicit call for further second-order scholarly reflection (...) on the Willardian corpus. (shrink)

This paper argues that according to Aquinas, the appetites require habits in order to function in order to complete the natural intentional structure of the appetite. In order to move the agent to act, the appetites must incline towards some specific good identified through sensory perception or reason. But human appetites, in contrast to the passions of non-rational animals, do not spontaneously incline towards particular objects. They must be shaped through processes of rationally governed formation, including in the case of (...) the will processes of practical induction, in order to incline towards specific objects in the needed way. (shrink)

What the Tortoise Taught Us offers a lively, concise journey through western philosophy that explores the lives of major philosophers, their ideas, and how their thinking continues to influence our lives today.