Publication Type: Conference Paper/Unpublished Manuscript
Abstract: Franz Fanon tells us that he "came into the world imbued with the will to find a meaning in things, [his] spirit filled with the desire to attain the source of the world" and then found that he was "an object in the midst of other objects." The paper expl

Publication Type: Conference Paper/Unpublished Manuscript
Abstract: Research on infants’ reasoning about support events suggests that by 3 to 4 months of age, infants expect an object to fall when released in midair. The present research examined when and how infants learn that an object is stable when released on but not against a platform.

In a series of experiments, we found that 4.5-month-old females and 5.5-month-old males expect a box to fall when released against the side of a platform, and are surprised when it does not. In contrast, 4.5-month-old males respond differently: although they expect the box to fall when released in midair next to the platform, they have no expectation as to whether it should remain stable or fall when released against the platform. Together, these and control results suggest that females precede males by a few weeks (no doubt due to their faster-developing depth perception) in learning that objects are stable when released on but not against platforms. But how do infants identify this variable as relevant to support events?

Our account of infants’ physical reasoning suggests that, as infants watch events, they eventually notice that inert objects released in contact with other inert objects sometimes remain stable and sometimes fall. Because infants’ representations of these events initially only include the basic information “inert object released in contact with other inert object”, they cannot make sense of these outcomes. At this point, infants begin to search for what additional information—or what variable—they should take into account to better predict these outcomes. Eventually, infants detect that objects are stable when released on but not against platforms, and bring to bear their prior knowledge to make sense of this regularity: if an inert object falls downward unless its path is blocked, then a platform can block the path of a falling object when under it, but not when against it.

This interpretation makes several predictions. For example, it suggests that 4.5-month-old females and 5-month-old males should expect a box to fall when released against the side of an inert but not a self-moving platform: self-moving objects can exert forces to block an object’s downward fall (e.g., a hand holding a cup). Indeed, after being shown that a platform is self-moving, infants no longer expect the box to fall when released against it. These and additional results provide support for the interpretation proposed above and more generally for our account of infants’ physical reasoning.

Publication Type: Conference Paper/Unpublished Manuscript
Abstract: Two pole positions can be discerned in respect of objectivity in sociology: the view that sociologists can and should carry out investigations that are not compromised by social or psychological values and the view that objectivity is neither possible or desirable. In this paper I begin with a rejection of value freedom as an unsustainable position, but hold that some form of objectivity is desirable and necessary in investigation. Whilst I accept that objectivity itself is a socially constructed value comprising purpose, differentiation and truth seeking, I nevertheless maintain that these values situated in context can help us to know the social world. However, because objectivity is situated in social context it does not mean that the social forms investigated cannot have real properties. Indeed, I argue, that if epistemological relativism is to be avoided social ‘objects’ must be theorised as real. Social constructions, even though they may be ephemeral, nevertheless have the potential to be objectively known within the context in which they are situated.

Publication Type: Individual Poster
Abstract: Recent research indicates that young infants interpret physical events in accord with a persistence principle, which states that objects exist continuously in space and time, retaining their physical properties as they do so (Baillargeon et al., 2005). There is also growing evidence that young infants sometimes hold different expectations for events involving inert and self-propelled objects (Luo et al., 2005). The present research built on these diverse findings and asked if 4-month-olds take into account whether events involve inert or self-propelled objects when applying the persistence principle.

Infants were assigned to an inert or a self-propelled condition. Infants in the inert condition faced a wide screen with two closed windows located a short distance apart. In the familiarization event, a gloved hand lifted a red column above the screen, between the windows, and then lowered it back behind the screen; next, the hand lifted and lowered a black ball, in the same location as the column. Infants in the self-propelled condition saw a similar familiarization event except that the objects moved up and down by themselves.

Next, all infants saw the same two test events. In one (two-window event), the hand opened the right window in the screen (by pulling a handle that protruded above the screen) to reveal the column, and then closed the window; next, the hand opened the left window to reveal the ball, and then again closed the window. In the one-window event, the hand again opened the right window to reveal the column, but then opened the same window to reveal the ball. The two objects thus appeared in different windows in the two-window event, but in same window, in alternation, in the one-window event.

Infants in the inert condition looked reliably longer at the one- than at the two-window event, whereas those in the self-propelled condition looked about equally at the events. These results suggest that (1) infants in the inert condition recognized that the one-window event violated the persistence principle: the inert column and ball could not occupy the same space behind the same window, and (2) infants in the self-propelled condition could generate an explanation for the one-window event: they inferred that the column and ball switched positions behind the screen when the windows were closed.

These and additional results suggest that young infants take into account whether objects are inert or self-moving when interpreting events in accord with the persistence principle.

Publication Type: Conference Paper/Unpublished Manuscript
Review Method: Peer Reviewed
Abstract: This study proposes that estimates of third person effects (TPE) are not solely dependent on ego-defensive mechanisms. Rather, people use intuitive notions of media dependency when they estimate the influence of media on different groups of others. Using data from a survey of two samples regarding perceptions of influence of media coverage of development towns in Israel, it is demonstrated that the distance of a group from development towns (rather than distance form the self) predicts the magnitude of the expected effects on that group.