Publication Type: Conference Paper/Unpublished Manuscript
Abstract: Background and Aims: Although infants are able to acquire simple grammatical rules presented with linguistic stimuli (e.g., Marcus et al., 1999) they fail do so given non-linguistic stimuli such as tones or geometric shapes, suggesting that this rule-learning mechanism may be language specific (e.g., Marcus et al., 2004). However, previous attempts to assess the domain-generality of infant rule learning may not have equated critical features of linguistic and non-linguistic stimuli, such as familiarity and categorizability. It may be difficult for infants to discover the similarities and differences among individual tokens as well as extend their pattern knowledge to include the many exemplars presented during familiarization when the stimuli are relatively novel, or when the stimuli are not ecologically meaningful; the non-linguistic stimuli used in prior non-linguistic rule-learning studies are likely to be unusual to infants along these dimensions. We thus used images of dogs and cats – stimuli likely to be easier for infants to encode and categorize - in a replication of Marcus et al’s (1999) experiments.
Methods: In Experiment 1, 7-month-old infants were habituated to triads of dogs following either an ABA or ABB pattern. We then tested the infants using images of dogs not seen during habituation; half of the test trials followed the pattern seen during familiarization, and half followed a novel pattern (counterbalanced). Experiment 2 was identical to Experiment 1, except that the dog triads used during training and test were organized into AAB and ABB patterns. Experiment 3 was designed to replicate the finding of Experiment 1, using illustrations of cats rather than dogs. We hypothesized that if infants generalized the familiarized patterns beyond the specific animal pictures presented during habituation, they should look longer at the novel test pattern as compared to the familiar test pattern
Key Results: Infants in all three experiments looked longer at the novel test pattern than the familiar test pattern (all p<.01).
Conclusions: These results indicate that infants learned the patterns presented during familiarization and transferred this knowledge to include the new exemplars presented during testing. The results demonstrate that infants can similarly detect and generalize at least some linguistic and non-linguistic rules. We will discuss possible reasons why some types of materials are easier to learn than others.

Publication Type: Conference Paper/Unpublished Manuscript
Abstract: This paper will reflect on the discursive aftermath of two pieces of British legislation: the 1991 Dangerous Dogs Act, which banned the ownership of four breeds of fighting dog; and the 2005 Act which banned the hunting of animals with dogs in England and Wales.

The Acts’ subsequent histories have been similar. Each has been ignored by large numbers of people; there is enthusiastic support for repeal in each case; neither has been zealously policed. There are also differences, which were brought to light in early 2007. After the annual Boxing Day hunts had taken place, without an arrest, the pro-hunt lobby won a vote for repeal in a radio programme. A few days on, a girl was mauled to death by an apparently illegally owned dog, and in the aftermath fourteen dogs, all apparently used for fighting, were impounded in police raids.

The resulting media reporting displayed, and sometimes analysed, obvious contrasts of gender and power, urban and rural, and class. The paper will argue that the real importance of these issues in a world which is subject to rapid urbanisation, in which most sport is corporatised rather than owned by enthusiast-participants, and in which the boundaries of the human and animal are continually being pushed, through the preparation of the body for sport, and through the assault on essential notions of the human which emerge from biotechnologies dedicated to human medical improvement. In the snarl of the dangerous dog we see one of the futures of humanity.

Publication Type: Conference Paper/Unpublished Manuscript
Review Method: Peer Reviewed
Abstract: Recent research has shown that generalized beliefs about
whether one’s nation can trust other nations play an important role in
shaping public opinion about world affairs. Such beliefs serve as
standing decisions to give (or not give) other nations the benefit of
the doubt; thus, they provide citizens who know little about world
affairs with shortcuts for forming judgments in this domain. For
instance, surveys conducted in the year following the terrorist attacks
of September 11, 2001 demonstrated that Americans who generally trusted
other nations were more likely than those who did not to perceive a
wide range of specific nations as friendly and unthreatening, to favor
internationalism as a general principle, to place confidence in
international institutions such as the United Nations and NATO, to
favor humanitarian aid, and to oppose military action against Iraq.
These results, however, came from a period that was particularly
interesting but also brief and unusual. Indeed, the events of 9/11
could have fundamentally altered the nature, causes, and consequences
of citizens’ generalized beliefs about other nations.
With this in mind, the present study examines trends in generalized
beliefs about other nations during the 1990s, as well the causes and
consequences of such beliefs during this decade. Using data from
surveys conducted by the Pew Research Center for the People and the
Press in 1990, 1992, 1994, 1997, and 1999, I show that trust in other
nations was low but increasing during the 1990s—an interesting contrast
to the year after 9/11, when such faith was not only low but also
declining. I also use the data to test (1) whether generalized beliefs
about other nations differed with age and party loyalty during the
1990s, as they did in the post-9/11 period; (2) whether Americans who
were born in another country—or whose parents were born in another
country—were more trusting of other nations than the rest of the
public; and (3) whether those who trusted other nations were more
likely than those who did not to approve of the UN and to support using
American military troops as peacekeepers in Bosnia and Kosovo. The
results broaden our understanding of the process by which people form
generalized beliefs about other nations, as well as our understanding
of the role such beliefs play
in influencing and perhaps informing—or, less optimistically,
distorting—the course of public opinion about international
affairs.

Publication Type: Conference Paper/Unpublished Manuscript
Abstract: Using qualitative data collected during research at a prison located in north-central Ohio, this paper examines the dog program in place at this institution. Specifically, the theoretical contradictions of the disciplinary model of dog training occurring within prison walls. Additionally, this paper will look at discipline models and the idea of humanization, and how (if possible) they can coexist within the institutional setting.

Publication Type: Conference Paper/Unpublished Manuscript
Review Method: Peer Reviewed
Abstract: In this paper, we synthesize literature on the media’s role in the public sphere with work on the agenda-setting and guard-dog functions of mass media. We argue that citizen journalism has reinvigorated notions of the public sphere while posing significant challenges to agenda-setting and guard-dog theories. We highlight the Oscar Grant shooting on New Years Day, 2009 and the subsequent response as a lens through which the emancipatory potential of citizen journalism can be realized.