Aristotle, Phenomenology, and the Mind/Body Problem

Author(s): Valeria Bizzari / Language(s): English Issue: 1/2017

The mind-body relationship is a fundamental issue that has interested philosophers from very different schools of thought. Nowadays we can observe several positions being taken on this topic — my aim is to emphasize the phenomenological perspective on the mind-body relationship and, in particular, the role of Aristotelian thought in the contributions of philosophers such as Husserl and Merleau-Ponty. This paper consists of three different parts: in the first part, I will briefly sketch out a phenomenological account of the living body in Husserl and Merleau-Ponty; in second part, I will try to find parallels between phenomenology and Aristotle’s philosophy. Finally, I will argue for an Aristotelian reading of schizophrenia, a pathology that seems to be caused by a disruption of the corporeal Self

Against Lewis on ‘Desire as Belief’

Author(s): Douglas Ian Campbell / Language(s): English Issue: 1/2017

David Lewis describes, then attempts to refute, a simple anti-Humean theory of desire he calls ‘Desire as Belief’. Lewis’ critics generally accept that his argument is sound and focus instead on trying to show that its implications are less severe than appearances suggest. In this paper I argue that Lewis’ argument is unsound. I show that it rests on an essential assumption that can be straightforwardly proven false using ideas and principles to which Lewis is himself committed.

Following Desire as the Ethical Postulate of Psychoanalysis

Author(s): Bogna Choińska / Language(s): English Issue: 1/2017

One of the most controversial theses of Jacques Lacan is his conviction that a very specific relationship links ethics and desire. The aim of the article is to present what this new relationship consists in, and, further on, to outline the weaknesses of this concept, which does not take into account the existence of the sovereign good as a category available to cognition. According to my thesis, Lacan believes that the ethics of Supreme Good, or simply traditional ethics of goods, leads the human subject to remain, voluntarily (and perhaps thoughtlessly), within the Imaginary dimension. The idea of the ethical postulate will be treated here not so much as something applied during psychoanalysis, but as a general clue as to how people should behave.

Grounding Reichenbach’s Pragmatic Vindication of Induction

Author(s): Michael Shaffer / Language(s): English Issue: 1/2017

This paper has three interdependent aims. The first is to make Reichenbach’s views on induction and probabilities clearer, especially as they pertain to his pragmatic justification of induction. The second aim is to show how his view of pragmatic justification arises out of his commitment to extensional empiricism and moots the possibility of a non-pragmatic justification of induction. Finally, and most importantly, a formal decision-theoretic account of Reichenbach’s pragmatic justification is offered in terms both of the minimax principle and of the dominance principle.

Socjologia pary. Wprowadzenie

Author(s): Magdalena Żadkowska,Joanna Mizielińska,Agata Stasińska,Marta Olcoń-Kubicka,Filip Schmidt,Joanna Jasińska,Mateusz Halawa,Jacek Gądecki / Language(s): Polish Issue: 3/2018

W stronę socjologii pary: propozycja paradygmatu teoretyczno-badawczego

Author(s): Filip Schmidt,Joanna Mizielińska,Agata Stasińska,Marta Olcoń-Kubicka,Magdalena Żadkowska,Joanna Jasińska,Mateusz Halawa / Language(s): Polish Issue: 3/2018

The article, which opens the thematic section on the sociology of intimate couples, offers a theoretical and research program for the studies of intimate life. Its core is the conceptualization of intimate relations as different forms of closeness, love and care embedded in everyday practices. An intimate couple is presented in a relational, not normative, intersectional and processual approach. The article consists of two parts. The first explains why the category of intimate couple is useful in partially replacing and partially complementing such categories as family, individual, and household. The second part focuses on benefits the theory of social practice brings to the research on intimate couples, with the emphasis on silent and habitual knowledge, carnality and emotionality, materiality, symbolism and the context of practices. The presented theoretical and research program that synthesizes the trends from several sociological areas, both practical and theoretical, has been elaborated on the basis of a number of research projects undertaken in Poland.

Editorial

Author(s): Mirosław Pawlak / Language(s): English Issue: 3/2018

How I see it: An exploratory study on attributions and emotions in L2 learning

Author(s): Sachiko Nakamura / Language(s): English Issue: 3/2018

Learners’ attributions have received increasing attention in second/foreign language (L2) learning. Studies have shown that how learners attribute their performance influences not only their self-efficacy, motivation, and goal attainment but also their emotions (Hsieh, 2012; Hsieh & Kang, 2010; Hsieh & Shallert, 2008; Weiner, 2000, 2014). This exploratory study investigated how Japanese adult learners of L2 English attributed changes in their L2 learning attitudes and motivation through a 10-week TOEIC preparation program. It also examined emotions expressed in their attributional statements and the differences between learners with lower and higher L2 proficiency. A content analysis of open-ended questionnaire responses suggested eight attributional categories: perceived L2 improvement, enjoyment, positive feelings, increased L2 exposure, realization of L2 needs and importance, effective L2 instruction, and praise from the teacher for positive changes in attitudes and/or motivation and perceived inefficient L2 skills for negative changes in attitudes and/or motivation. Enjoyment was an emotion the most frequently mentioned by both groups while other emotions, such as joy, happiness, and disappointment, were expressed only by the beginner learners. These results offer important implications for L2 pedagogy and prospects for further research in the area.

Using Q methodology to investigate pre-service EFL teachers’ mindsets about teaching competences

Author(s): Kay Irie,Stephen Ryan,Sarah Mercer / Language(s): English Issue: 3/2018

This paper reports on a study investigating the mindsets of 51 pre-service teachers at an Austrian university using Q methodology. Despite the recent growth in interest in the concept of mindsets, little research has addressed the mindsets of teachers – most of it focusing on the mindsets of learners – and the research that does investigate teachers tends to focus on beliefs about learning or intelligence. This study offers a new perspective by focusing on teachers’ beliefs about their own teaching competences. A further aim of the study is to expand the methodological repertoire in language education researchers. This study considers the potential of Q methodology, a research approach used widely in social sciences and education, but, as yet, rare in this field. The data indicate that the most common mindset among the pre-service teachers is one based around a strong belief in the learnability of the more technical aspects of teaching, while interpersonal skills tend to be regarded as more of a natural talent fixed within the individual. One practical implication of this finding is that teacher education programmes may need to pay more attention to explicitly developing the interpersonal side of teaching. A further finding was that teacher mindsets are constructed through individuals’ management of various sets of implicit theories and tend not to conform to the established dichotomous model of mindsets.

L2 Spanish apologies development during short-term study abroad

Author(s): Todd A. Hernández / Language(s): English Issue: 3/2018

The present study examined the apologies of 18 study abroad (SA) students during a short-term SA experience in Madrid, Spain. Apologies were assessed with a discourse completion task (DCT) consisting of five vignettes that varied across three variables: relative social status of the interlocutor, relative social distance, and seriousness of the offense. Based on performance ratings assigned to them by two native Spanish speakers, the students made significant gains in pragmatic appropriateness from pretest to posttest, on two out of the five individual vignettes, and on the five combined vignettes. Examination of the students’ apologies before and after SA further revealed that they increased several strategies during their time abroad. Despite these gains, other aspects of the SA group’s performance remained the same or, in some cases, moved in the opposite direction of the target norm. Moreover, the students also demonstrated continued overreliance on routine, formulaic expressions on the posttest DCT while underusing some important target-like mitigation strategies. Given the study’s findings, the researcher offers recommendations for teaching pragmatics before and during the SA experience.

Expressing authorial self in research articles written by Polish and English native-speaker writers

Author(s): Katarzyna Hryniuk / Language(s): English Issue: 3/2018

This cross-linguistic and cross-cultural, corpus-based study explores the notion of writer identity expressed through self-reference. The study examines how writers from two cultural regions – Polish and Anglo-American – construct a credible representation of themselves in writing. That is, it investigates the differences and similarities in the frequency of use, and the role of first person pronouns and determiners, in the corpora of 40 research articles in the area of applied linguistics – 20 written by Polish authors in English, published in Polish institutions, and 20 by native English speakers, published in Anglophone journals. Additionally, the frequency of use and the role of nominal lexical items referring to the writers, such as the author(s) and the researcher(s), are explored. The location of pronouns, determiners and the lexical items in the IMRD structure (Introduction-Method-Results-Discussion) is also researched, as certain types of pronouns and determiners were expected to occur in the given sections, depending on their functions. The results clearly show that there is a striking difference between the use of pronouns and determiners in the texts written by the two groups of writers. The findings carry important implications for formulating clearer instructions and developing appropriate writing strategies by novices writing for publication in EFL.

A higher-education teaching module for integrating industry content and language through online recruitment advertisements

Author(s): Dietmar Tatzl / Language(s): English Issue: 3/2018

Empirical evaluations of practical teaching units integrating content and language in higher education are rare and deserve more attention. The current article aims to narrow this gap by providing an empirical study of an integrating content and language in higher education (ICLHE, Smit & Dafouz, 2012) teaching module. It investigates the effectiveness of a content-based English for specific purposes module in tertiary aeronautical engineering education, which incorporates recruitment advertisements as online resources. The study adopted a mixed-methods approach and surveyed three aeronautical engineering student groups (N = 141) over three consecutive years on their perceptions of the module’s learning outcomes. This longitudinal survey was complemented by a teacher-assessed writing task and a qualitative content analysis of online recruitment advertisements (N = 80) in a self-built corpus. All three year groups rated the 10 questionnaire statements on a 5-point Likert scale rather equally, thus suggesting a similar perception of academic achievement stemming from the module’s completion. This student view was supported by the results of the writing assignment. In short, the module’s effectiveness was corroborated both quantitatively and qualitatively, which identifies this teaching concept as a feasible way forward.

English medium instruction: Comparing teacher beliefs in secondary and tertiary education

Author(s): Jessica G. Briggs,Julie Dearden,Ernesto Macaro / Language(s): English Issue: 3/2018

Learning content through the medium of a second language is a form of education which is growing rapidly in both secondary and tertiary educational phases. Yet, although considerable research now exists on these phases of education viewed separately, virtually no comparisons have been made between the two phases. This study compared beliefs about English medium instruction (EMI) held by 167 secondary and tertiary EMI teachers from 27 countries. Teachers’ beliefs were elicited in four key areas: EMI teachers’ goals, EMI policy, benefits and drawbacks to students, and challenges to teachers. The findings indicate that secondary teachers felt more strongly that EMI provides students with a high quality education. More secondary than tertiary teachers reported an institutional policy on the English proficiency level required of teachers to teach through EMI, yet in neither phase was there evidence of adequate support to reach a required proficiency level. Teachers deemed EMI beneficial to advancing students’ English but felt that EMI would affect academic content, with no clear difference between the phases. Our conclusions indicate that EMI is being introduced without thorough institutional stakeholder discussion and therefore without clear policies on levels of teacher expertise. Neither is there evidence of a dialogue between phases regarding the challenges faced by EMI teachers and students.

Review of Uncovering English-medium instruction: Glocal issues in higher education; Authors: Branka Drljača Margić, Irena Vodopija-Krstanović; Publisher: Peter Lang, 2017; ISBN: 9781787070578; Pages: 142

Author(s): Jelena Djigunovic / Language(s): English Issue: 3/2018

Review of Second language pronunciation assessment: Interdisciplinary perspectives; Editors: Talia Isaacs, Pavel Trofimovich; Publisher: Multilingual Matters (Second Language Acquisition series), 2017; ISBN: 9781783096848 (hbk), 9781783096831 (pbk),

Author(s): Ewa Waniek-Klimczak / Language(s): English Issue: 3/2018

Serbian Adaptation of the Positive and Negative Affect Schedule (PANAS): Its Facets and Second-Order Structure

Author(s): Ljiljana Mihić,Zdenka Novović,Petar Čolović,Snežana Smederevac / Language(s): English Issue: 4/2014

Although the PANAS is widely used in affect research there are some controversies regarding its structure. Two related studies were reported providing evidence that a Serbian adaptation of the PANAS represents a valid and reliable measure of self-reported affect. Study 1 (N = 455), showed that its psychometric properties and correlates obtained in a Serbian sample are highly comparable to those reported in the American validation study. Additionally, a hierarchical structure of specific affects within the PANAS was explored via a second-order confirmatory analysis. Results showed that Joviality, Self-Assurance, and Attentiveness can be regarded as lower-order factors of Positive Affect, whereas Fear, Self-Disgust, and Hostility seem to represent lower-order factors of Negative Affect. Study 2 (N = 87) demonstrated differential momentary activations of the identified lower-order factors in the real-life situation of taking an exam. The construct validity of the specific subscales was supported. Among the subscales, Self-Disgust had inadequate psychometric properties.

Evaluation of Paintings: Effects of lectures

Author(s): Ivan Stojilović,Slobodan Marković / Language(s): English Issue: 4/2014

This study investigated the influence of lectures about the Renaissance and abstract art on ratings of paintings from these two periods in art history. The study included two sessions. In the first, 72 naive participants rated the representational and abstract paintings. In the second session participants were divided into three groups: one received a lecture on Renaissance art, one attended a lecture on abstract art, and one group attended no lecture. Afterwards, the three groups rated a new, parallel set of paintings. Three first-order factors were extracted: Aesthetic experience, Relaxation tone, and Arousal. However, the higher-order General Aesthetic Experience factor explained a much higher amount of variance than the first-order factors, indicating its strong and generalized influence on naïve participants’ experience with artworks. After the lecture on abstract art the participants rated paintings, especially abstract, as more aesthetically pleasing than the participants who attended the lecture on Renaissance art or the group without a lecture. Proposed explanation for this is that the naïve observers` ratings of abstract paintings are more susceptible to the influence of style-related information. When rating abstract artwork naïve observers may be significantly influenced by additional information gathered outside of the artwork.

The Effect of Texture on Face Identification and Configural Information Processing

Author(s): Eva Alica Tzschaschel,Malte Persike,Bozana Meinhardt-Injac / Language(s): English Issue: 4/2014

Shape and texture are an integral part of face identity. In the present study, the importance of face texture for face identification and detection of configural manipulation (i.e., spatial relation among facial features) was examined by comparing grayscale face photographs (i.e., real faces) and line drawings of the same faces. Whereas real faces provide information about texture and shape of faces, line drawings are lacking texture cues. A change-detection task and a forced-choice identification task were used with both stimuli categories. Within the change detection task, participants had to decide whether the size of the eyes of two sequentially presented faces had changed or not. After having made this decision, three faces were shown to the subjects and they had to identify the previously shown face among them. Furthermore, context (full vs. cropped faces) and orientation (upright vs. inverted) were manipulated. The results obtained in the change detection task suggest that configural information was used in processing real faces, while part-based and featural information was used in processing line-drawings. Additionally, real faces were identified more accurately than line drawings, and identification was less context but more orientation sensitive than identification of line drawings. Taken together, the results of the present study provide new evidence stressing the importance of face texture for identity encoding and configural face processing.

Da li je intrinzička motivacija profesionalnog izbora značajna za kasniji profesionalni razvoj nastavnika?

Author(s): Milica Marušić-Jablanović / Language(s): Serbian Issue: 4/2014

The nature of teachers’ professional choice motivation has been proved important for the later professional development. The goal of the present research was to determine the role of the intrinsic motivation in the participants’ decision to become teachers, as well as to establish the importance of intrinsic motivation for their later professional development. We have conducted a quantitative research, within a sample consisted of 118 secondary school teachers, by application of survey method (instrument– questionnaire in the form of Likert-type scale). Statistical analysis has consisted of: hierarchical cluster analysis, descriptive statistics, factor analysis and rank correlation. It was established that the intrinsic motivation takes precedence over the extrinsic motivation in the process of professional choice determination. We have also confirmed the hypothesis claiming that the level of intrinsic motivation correlates with the indicators of professional behavior. Besides, the level of intrinsic motivation is better predictor of the enthusiasm and growth then of the career frustration (Fessler, 1995). Our results are in favor of the teacher education system, where the candidates apply and prepare for the teacher profession from the beginning of the initial education.

Implicitne teоrije kreаtivnоsti nаstаvnikа osnоvne škоle: studijа slučаjа

Author(s): Jelena Pavlović,Slavica Maksić / Language(s): Serbian Issue: 4/2014

Prikazani su rezultati ispitivanja implicitnih teorija kreativnosti nastavnika jedne škole. Istraživanje je imalo za cilj razumevanje nastavničkih uverenja o kreativnosti i njenom razvoju. Korišćena je metodologija studije slučaja, u kojoj su kombinovani kvalitativni i kvantitativni podaci. U prvoj fazi istraživanja primenjen je upitnik, a udrugoj je organizovana fokus grupa. Rezultati prve fazeukazuju da se kreativnost vidi kao kreativna osoba, dok su manifestacije kreativnosti na osnovnoškolskom uzrastu češće viđene kao kreativni proces. Doprinos škole razvoju kreativnosti učenika vidi se najviše u nastavnim i vananstavnim aktivnostima. Rezultati druge faze potvrđuju ključnu ulogu nastavnika u podsticanju kreativnosti, ali upućuju na niz prepreka, koje se odnose na ograničavajući nastavni plan i program, nedovoljna materijalna i finansijska sredstva i nedovoljno ili neadekvatno vrednovanje kreativnosti u društvu. Rad ukazuje na mogućnosti za definisanje pravaca daljeg razvoja implicitnih teorija kreativnosti ka uvažavanju različitih gledišta i izgrađivanju razvojnih shvatanja kreativnosti.