{"title":"Perfectly Competent to Perform? Re-examining the Metatheoretical Basis of Generative Grammar","authors":"D. Bickerton","doi":"10.1556/JCEP.1.2003.3-4.2","DOIUrl":"https://doi.org/10.1556/JCEP.1.2003.3-4.2","url":null,"abstract":"Behind every theory lies a metatheory, a set of assumptions about the nature of the objects under study, forming a framework within which the theory must operate, and hence largely determining the major focuses of that theory. Here I want to re-examine some of the assumptions that bear most directly on the nature of the object, language, that the theory of generative grammar is meant to explain. Obviously, prior assumptions about the nature of any object of study are unavoidable and not in themselves undesirable. It is impossible to address any topic unless one has at least preliminary notions of what one is dealing with. However, such assumptions can easily form an opaque box, forcing examination of the topic from a particular perspective, and prohibiting examination from any other perspective. The assumptions I shall examine here include the competence-performance distinction, the distinction between E-language and I-language, and the notion that language is (almost) perfect.","PeriodicalId":89409,"journal":{"name":"Journal of cultural and evolutionary psychology","volume":"72 1","pages":"167-190"},"PeriodicalIF":0.0,"publicationDate":"2003-09-01","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"75744412","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":0,"RegionCategory":"","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}
{"title":"Verbal Humor as Coping: Some Evolutionary and Cultural Insights","authors":"J. Ujlaky","doi":"10.1556/JCEP.1.2003.3-4.5","DOIUrl":"https://doi.org/10.1556/JCEP.1.2003.3-4.5","url":null,"abstract":"In this study the most important theories about the evolutionary and cultural approaches of humor and laughter are considered. Gender differences and their explanation are also highlighted regarding gossip and humor. Politics has a huge impact on people's everyday lives and their views about the world. Political jokes can provide us with a shaded picture about these implicit views which help us find solutions for intergroup conflicts.","PeriodicalId":89409,"journal":{"name":"Journal of cultural and evolutionary psychology","volume":"25 1","pages":"227-238"},"PeriodicalIF":0.0,"publicationDate":"2003-09-01","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"80098632","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":0,"RegionCategory":"","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}
{"title":"SOCIAL IDENTITY STRUCTURE: THE CASE OF RELIGIOUS -ZIONIST COMMUNITIES IN ISRAEL","authors":"Bilha Paryente, E. Orr","doi":"10.1556/JCEP.1.2003.3-4.4","DOIUrl":"https://doi.org/10.1556/JCEP.1.2003.3-4.4","url":null,"abstract":"The present manuscript has four goals: 1. the description of findings regarding the structure of social identity of parents and their adolescent children under the condition of permanent internal conflict, in religious-Zionist communities in the settlements and within the Israeli official borders before 1967 (the Green Lines); 2. validation of this identity structure by the Schwartz value model; 3. the examination of the differences between family members in the strength of their identity; and 4. the examination of the differences between settlers vs. non-settlers in the strength of their identity. A sample consisting of 1328 participants were administered an original Identity and Conflict Questionnaire, and the Schwartz portrait value questionnaire. In partial agreement with our predictions, a SSA statistical procedure uncovered a circumflex-like identity structure, which consisted of four semantic regions: 1. most of the items were situated in one semantic region, and were identified as religious-settle...","PeriodicalId":89409,"journal":{"name":"Journal of cultural and evolutionary psychology","volume":"43 1","pages":"205-226"},"PeriodicalIF":0.0,"publicationDate":"2003-09-01","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"80666641","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":0,"RegionCategory":"","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}
{"title":"Epidemiology of representations, social representations and narratives","authors":"J. Laszlo","doi":"10.1556/JCEP.1.2003.3-4.3","DOIUrl":"https://doi.org/10.1556/JCEP.1.2003.3-4.3","url":null,"abstract":"The paper suggest an integration between naturalistic explanation of cultural phenomena (Dowkins 1976, 1998; Pleh 2003; Sperber 1985, 1990, 1996), which are based on causal laws in dissemination of information and social representations theory (Moscovici 1961, 1984, 2000), which is primarily interested in social dynamics of evolving and upholding representations in human groups. It argues that such an integration would lead to a better understanding of both the evolved human psychological architecture as well as cultural and social phenomena. The twin concepts of identity and narrative are suggested to bridge the gap between the two fields.","PeriodicalId":89409,"journal":{"name":"Journal of cultural and evolutionary psychology","volume":"2 1","pages":"191-204"},"PeriodicalIF":0.0,"publicationDate":"2003-09-01","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"82202036","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":0,"RegionCategory":"","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}
{"title":"Examining the Modularity Concept in Evolutionary Psychology: The Level of Genes, Mind, and Culture","authors":"W. Wagner, G. P. Wagner","doi":"10.1556/JCEP.1.2003.3-4.1","DOIUrl":"https://doi.org/10.1556/JCEP.1.2003.3-4.1","url":null,"abstract":"In this chapter we present an overview and critique of the use of the modularity concept in evolutionary biology and psychology. It is shown that, at present, there are heuristic advantages in the modularity concept that allowed to show how a modular organization of genes helps to explain ontogeny and the evolutionary organization of genetic processes while evidence for large scale evolutionary processes leading to genetic modularity is mostly restricted to mathematical modelling. While biological module concepts and the idea of mental modularity are both motivated by evolutionary considerations, there still exists a wide gap between the two. Cognitive modules have been suggested by cognitive scientists and by psychologists, so far with varying success in providing empirical evidence. It is argued that a principal motivation to postulate cognitive modularity was to include evolutionary adaptation processes and their genetic encoding in the explanation of behaviour at the expense of learning. This is shown...","PeriodicalId":89409,"journal":{"name":"Journal of cultural and evolutionary psychology","volume":"8 1","pages":"135-165"},"PeriodicalIF":0.0,"publicationDate":"2003-09-01","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"83667245","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":0,"RegionCategory":"","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}
{"title":"Effect of males' status and facial attractiveness on direct childcare","authors":"Á. Csathó, T. Bereczkei","doi":"10.1556/JCEP.1.2003.2.3","DOIUrl":"https://doi.org/10.1556/JCEP.1.2003.2.3","url":null,"abstract":"In the vast majority of mammalian species, including humans, males provide less direct care to their offspring than females do. However, the theory of sexual selection suggests that the expression of paternal investment involves trade-offs between mating and parental effort associated with reproductive and survival related costs and benefits. In this view, different social and biological factors can distribute males' reproductive investment across parenting and mating behavior. As for social factors, the quality of resources held by males is one of the primary determinants of males' reproductive success. As for biological factors, the physical attractiveness is also highly correlated with males' mating success through enhanced access to females. In the present study the effect of males' socioeconomic status and facial attractiveness on direct childcare was tested on a sample of 81 Hungarian families. The first prediction was that males who possess lower status tend to engage more in direct childcare than ...","PeriodicalId":89409,"journal":{"name":"Journal of cultural and evolutionary psychology","volume":"20 1","pages":"123-130"},"PeriodicalIF":0.0,"publicationDate":"2003-08-01","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"81796483","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":0,"RegionCategory":"","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}
{"title":"Cyclic cultural evolution against the background of long-range progressive trends: information approach","authors":"V. Petrov","doi":"10.1556/JCEP.1.2003.2.1","DOIUrl":"https://doi.org/10.1556/JCEP.1.2003.2.1","url":null,"abstract":"A deductive classification was built for psychological roots of mutability in the sphere of art and culture, focused on two principal “archetypical” evolutionary ideas: progressive development and cyclic phenomena. To make the appropriate empirical investigations objective, due procedures of quantitative measurements were derived, based on the information approach. The main juxtaposition of “analytic” and “synthetic” mechanisms of the information processing occurred tightly connected with the prevalence of left- or right-hemispheric style of activity, respectively. According to the theoretical model, the entire socio-psychological life of society should show periodical “switches” between the above two types of stylistic prevalence. This mutability is correlated with changes of generations, hence it should possess the full period of oscillations of about 40-50 years. Besides, monotonous trends were predicted, i.e., the long-range “synthetic growth” (in each kind of art) needed to compensate the “analytic g...","PeriodicalId":89409,"journal":{"name":"Journal of cultural and evolutionary psychology","volume":"56 1","pages":"85-107"},"PeriodicalIF":0.0,"publicationDate":"2003-08-01","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"90581515","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":0,"RegionCategory":"","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}
{"title":"Ways and transformations of gossip","authors":"Z. Szvetelszky","doi":"10.1556/JCEP.1.2003.2.2","DOIUrl":"https://doi.org/10.1556/JCEP.1.2003.2.2","url":null,"abstract":"The paper takes an interdisciplinary look at gossip, analyzing it as a living phenomenon, embracing all of its aspects. The root of the word gossip is related, in almost all Indo-European languages, to the idea of weaving and webs or nets. Originally, the word did not seem to have the negative connotations it has now, and which it acquired thanks to the offices of religion, ethic and philosophy. When looked upon with a neutral eye, it will reveal itself as a treasury of human wisdom concerning communication, with insights long preceding those the Internet prompted in social psychology. The paper provides general rules for its dissemination based on the needs that gossip fulfils. These needs can be uncovered by examining the processes of the transformation of gossip.","PeriodicalId":89409,"journal":{"name":"Journal of cultural and evolutionary psychology","volume":"16 1","pages":"109-122"},"PeriodicalIF":0.0,"publicationDate":"2003-08-01","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"78932715","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":0,"RegionCategory":"","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}
{"title":"Explaining the \"Magic\" of Consciousness","authors":"D. Dennett","doi":"10.1556/JCEP.1.2003.1.2","DOIUrl":"https://doi.org/10.1556/JCEP.1.2003.1.2","url":null,"abstract":"Is the view supported that consciousness is a mysterious phenomenon and cannot succumb, even with much effort, to the standard methods of cognitive science? The lecture, using the analogy of the magician's praxis, attempts to highlight a strong but little supported intuition that is one of the strongest supporters of this view. The analogy can be highly illuminating, as the following account by Lee Siegel on the reception of her work on magic can illustrate it: “I'm writing a book on magic”, I explain, and I'm asked, “Real magic?” By real magic people mean miracles, thaumaturgical acts, and supernatural powers. “No”, I answer: “Conjuring tricks, not real magic”. Real magic, in other words, refers to the magic that is not real, while the magic that is real, that can actually be done, is not real magic. I suggest that many, e.g., David Chalmers has (unintentionally) perpetrated the same feat of conceptual sleight-of-hand in declaring to the world that he has discovered “The Hard Problem” of consciousness. I...","PeriodicalId":89409,"journal":{"name":"Journal of cultural and evolutionary psychology","volume":"41 1","pages":"7-19"},"PeriodicalIF":0.0,"publicationDate":"2003-04-01","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"80317930","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":0,"RegionCategory":"","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}
{"title":"Sex Differences in Two- and Three-Dimensional Visual-Spatial Abilities: Complementary Models of What and Where Judgments","authors":"K. Phillips, G. Cupchik","doi":"10.1556/JCEP.1.2003.1.4","DOIUrl":"https://doi.org/10.1556/JCEP.1.2003.1.4","url":null,"abstract":"An examination of sex differences in spatial abilities reveals comparative superiority of males and females on mental rotation and location memory tasks, respectively. The existing cross-cultural data focus primarily on male-biased spatial tests and suggests that the sex difference in mental rotation ability is near universal. While cultural pressures can enhance or diminish performance, its magnitude is preserved. Proximate causes, including the organizational and activational effects of hormones, may move these performance distributions closer or further apart. Evolutionary-based theories have focussed mainly on sexual selection versus division of labour as the critical factors in the selection of male-female spatial specializations. A unified model of human spatial judgment is proposed considering fundamental differences between three-dimensional judgments of spatial rotation and two-dimensional judgments associated with spatial location memory. Mental rotation ability is favored when a stationary view...","PeriodicalId":89409,"journal":{"name":"Journal of cultural and evolutionary psychology","volume":"31 1","pages":"53-53"},"PeriodicalIF":0.0,"publicationDate":"2003-04-01","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"89449412","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":0,"RegionCategory":"","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}