Suchergebnisse

International organisations' (IOs) legitimacy in global educational governance is commonly seen as a function of their regulative or normative power. By contrast, this paper stresses the increasing importance of scientific research and policy-relevant knowledge and its strategic production, dissemination and transfer by IOs. The article examines knowledge work at OECD, UNESCO and World Bank based on novel data from publication analyses, archival work and a number of interviews. Drawing on sociological institutionalism and constructivist international relations scholarship, this study is interested in the rationales, resources and capacities for knowledge production, the strategies of dissemination and transfer as well as the implications of science production for IOs' position and relevance in global governance. Findings emphasise the authority of science as the primary source of legitimacy – and even survival – in an increasingly crowded and competitive field of global education governance.

Secularism in France is both a state principle and a cultural construct, that enforces a State neutrality towards religion. Recent studies have witnessed the emergence of a lay design called? New Secularism ' (NS) that is used to legitimise expression of prejudice towards North African minorities. However, none have been able to yet eliminate links between NS and Social Dominance Orientation (SDO), which would further corroborate the beliefs ' s role as prejudice justification. Using Social Representations Theory, we created a Secularism questionnaire and used it in a cross sectional survey (N? =? 261) that also covered SDO and Generalised prejudice measures. In order to test social representation of Secularism ' s legitimising function, we derive the hypothesis that NS will Mediate the link between SDO and express prejudice from a Social Dominance perspective. Results support our Prediction and are discussed in light of intergroup status quo legitigation processes and their links with social representations. ; Secularism in France is both a state principle and a cultural construct, that enforces a State neutrality towards religion. Recent studies have demonstrated the emergence of a lay conception called ?New Secularism' (NS) that is used to legitimize expression of prejudice towards North African minorities. However, none have been able to yet demonstrate links between NS and Social Dominance Orientation (SDO), which would further corroborate those beliefs' role as prejudice justification. Using Social Representations Theory, we created a Secularism questionnaire and used it in a cross sectional survey (N?=?261) that also included SDO and Generalized Prejudice measures. In order to test social representation of Secularism's legitimizing function, we derived the hypothesis that NS will mediate the link between SDO and expressed Prejudice from a Social Dominance perspective. Results support our predictions and are discussed in light of intergroup status quo legitimization processes and their links with social ...

International audience By looking for properties of consciousness, cognitive neuroscience studies have dramatically enlarged the scope of unconscious cognitive processing. This emerging knowledge inspired the development of new approaches allowing clinicians to probe and disentangle conscious from unconscious cognitive processes in non-communicating brain-injured patients both in terms of behaviour and brain activity. This information is extremely valuable in order to improve diagnosis and prognosis in such patients both at acute and chronic settings. Reciprocally, the growing observations coming from such patients suffering from disorders of consciousness provide valuable constraints to theoretical models of consciousness. In this review we chose to illustrate these recent developments by focusing on brain signals recorded with EEG at bedside in response to auditory stimuli. More precisely, we present the respective EEG markers of unconscious and conscious processing of two classes of auditory stimuli (sounds and words). We show that in both cases, conscious access to the corresponding representation (e.g.: auditory regularity and verbal semantic content) share a similar neural signature (P3b and P600/LPC) that can be distinguished from unconscious processing occurring during an earlier stage (MMN and N400). We propose a two-stage serial model of processing and discuss how unconscious and conscious signatures can be measured at bedside providing relevant information for both diagnosis and prognosis of consciousness recovery. These two examples emphasize how fruitful can be the bidirectional approach exploring cognition in healthy subjects and in brain-damaged patients.

A qualitative study investigating the experiences and effects on practice of Eritrean healthcare professionals studying for a postgraduate degree by distance learning is reported. The programme is delivered via online learning together with in-country teaching visits. Two focus group discussions with 19 postgraduate students were conducted. Online learning is challenging due to intermittent connectivity and power cuts, but students have developed their own solutions to overcoming these difficulties. Thematic analysis generated four themes. Students who are embedded within the Eritrean context are experiencing a process of self-development, both academic and personal. This self-growth is facilitating the development of resilience and confidence building, enabling students to have a positive influence on health service provision, thus impacting on the Eritrean context. Students are developing life-long skills that will support the continuing development of healthcare systems in Eritrea long after they have completed their distance learning programme.

In the first census of 1790, the Census formally counted Free White Males, Free White Females, All Other Free Persons, and Slaves (as three-fifths of a person). The census racial categories have changed multiple times over the centuries, and still has yet to add many more to accommodate the growing culture in America. It wasn't until the year 2000 where individuals were able to mark off more than one box for their racial identity. Today, the census gives us statistics on neighborhoods, race crime rates, population count, college demographics, and more. However, if the majority of American individuals cannot place themselves in the correct categories, how accurate are the racial statistics in our country?

International audience This study focuses on the representation of coastal risks (marine erosion and submersion), in a highly topical context relating to global environmental changes, and more specifically on the consequences of the increasing attraction of coastal areas. Through a psycho-socio-environmental approach, we sought to identify how inhabitants of coastal municipalities in a so-called "at risk" area represent the coastal risk of their surroundings. A survey by questionnaire was carried out to compare inhabitants of the risk zone defined in the Risk Prevention Plan – RPP [Plan de Prévention des Risques] with those living outside this zone. The main results reveal that inhabitants are very attached to their living environment, which appears to them to have more advantages than constraints. When asked to describe risks to their town, inhabitants mention coastal risk the most often. A social representation of coastal risks then appears, objectified through marine submersion. This makes it possible to understand the ambivalence of a discourse in which the sea is both a danger and a source of pleasure. These results are discussed in the light of cognitive polyphasia.

Using household surveys for 24 countries over a 10-year period, this paper investigates why the elderly are more averse to open immigration policies than their younger peers. The analysis finds that the negative correlation between age and pro-immigration attitudes is mostly explained by a cohort or generational change. In fact, once controlling for year of birth, the correlation between age and pro-immigration attitudes is either positive or zero in most of the countries in the sample. Under certain assumptions, the estimates suggest that aging societies will tend to become less averse to open immigration regimes over time.

International audience Background : In up to 5% of pregnancies, ultrasounds screenin detects a " soft marker" (SM) that places the foetus at risk for a severe abnormality. In most cases, prenatal diagnostic work-up rules out a severe defect. We aimed to study the effects of false positive SM on maternal emotional status, maternal representations of the infant, and mother-infant interaction. Methology and Principal Findings : Utilizing an extreme-case prospective case control design, we selected frome a group of 244 women undergroing ultrasound, 19 pregnant women whose foetus had a positive SM screening and reassuring diagnostic work up, and 19 controls without SM matched for age and education. In the third trimester of pregnancy, within one week after delivery, and 2 months postpartum, we assessed anxiety, depression and maternal representations; Mother-infant interactions were videotaped during feeding within one week after delivery and again at 2 months postpartum and coded blindly using Coding Interactive behavior (CIB) scales. Anxiety and depression scores were significantly higher at alla ssessment points in the SM group. Maternal representations were also observd in the SM groyp. These dyads showed greater dysregulation, lower maternal sensitivity, higher maternal intrusive behaviour and higher infant avoidance. Multivariate analysis showed that maternal representation and depression at third trimester predicted mother-infant interaction.Conclusion : False positive ultrasound screenings for SM are not benign and negatively affect the developping maternal-infant attachment. Medical efforts should be directed to minimize as much as possible such false diagnoses, and to the psychological adverse consequences.

The publication of surveys on the feeling of hostility towards minorities, and specifically towards "gypsies", raises deep ethical and regulatory issues. The low level of acceptance towards these groups, once measured, may justify naturalised and deterministic views of the exclusion of the most marginal groups. The article explores different strategies for presenting data, which aim to make them more contextualised (comparison in space and time, social composition of those who express a more favourable opinion on social integration policies; views of Roma leaders on stereotypes affecting them). The article concludes with a reflection on the importance of a relational approach which, while capitalising on public opinion research, seeks to limit the logical blindness effects that some survey results may create (.). ; La pubblicazione di sondaggi sul sentimento di ostilità nei confronti di minoranze, e nello specifico verso gli «zingari», pone questioni deontologiche e normative profonde. Il basso livello di accettazione verso questi gruppi, una volta misurato, può giustificare visioni naturalizzate e deterministe dell'esclusione dei gruppi più marginali. L'articolo esplora diverse strategie di presentazione dei dati, che puntano a una loro maggiore contestualizzazione (comparazione nello spazio e nel tempo, composizione sociale di chi esprime un'opinione maggiormente favorevole a politiche sociali di integrazione; opinioni dei leader rom sugli stereotipi che li riguardano). L'articolo si conclude con una riflessione sull'importanza di un approccio relazionale che, pur valorizzando la ricerca sull'opinione pubblica, tenti di limitare gli effetti di cecità logica che alcuni risultati di sondaggi possono creare (.).

International audience ; The effects of propaganda are analyzed in an opinion dynamics model in which, under certain conditions, individuals adjust their opinion as a result of random binary encounters. The aim of this paper is to study under what conditions propaganda changes the opinion dynamics of a social system. Four different scenarios are found, characterized by different sensitivities to the propaganda. For each scenario the maximum efficiency of propaganda is attained following a given strategy that is here outlined. Introduction.-The link between physics and sociology is historically profound. At the end of the XVII century, when G. Galilei and I. Newton gave birth to classical physics, philosophers proposed to apply similar deterministic laws to the broad fields of political and social sciences [1-3]. This idea was further strengthened by the discovery of universal demographic constants involving parameters strongly affected by individual free will or happenstance, such as the number of weddings, crimes and deaths [4]. The philosopher A. Comte, then introduced "social physics", a foundation of modern sociology which studies social dynamics using deter-ministic laws [5, 6]. As a typical social system is composed of a high number of individuals, statistics is the key tool for a quantitative study. Opinion dynamics is one of the fields of sociology that has interested physicists the most in the latest years. Opinion dynamics models can be divided into two large classes. The first class is represented by models based on binary opinions [7-11], in which social actors update their opinions as a result of social influence, often according to a kind of majority rule. The other class of opinion dynamics models considers the opinion as a continuous variable [12-17]. In this paper we focus on the latter and investigate the effect of propaganda. Indeed, we consider a model where agents adjust continuous opinions as a result of random binary encounters whenever their difference in opinion is below a given ...

International audience ; The effects of propaganda are analyzed in an opinion dynamics model in which, under certain conditions, individuals adjust their opinion as a result of random binary encounters. The aim of this paper is to study under what conditions propaganda changes the opinion dynamics of a social system. Four different scenarios are found, characterized by different sensitivities to the propaganda. For each scenario the maximum efficiency of propaganda is attained following a given strategy that is here outlined. Introduction.-The link between physics and sociology is historically profound. At the end of the XVII century, when G. Galilei and I. Newton gave birth to classical physics, philosophers proposed to apply similar deterministic laws to the broad fields of political and social sciences [1-3]. This idea was further strengthened by the discovery of universal demographic constants involving parameters strongly affected by individual free will or happenstance, such as the number of weddings, crimes and deaths [4]. The philosopher A. Comte, then introduced "social physics", a foundation of modern sociology which studies social dynamics using deter-ministic laws [5, 6]. As a typical social system is composed of a high number of individuals, statistics is the key tool for a quantitative study. Opinion dynamics is one of the fields of sociology that has interested physicists the most in the latest years. Opinion dynamics models can be divided into two large classes. The first class is represented by models based on binary opinions [7-11], in which social actors update their opinions as a result of social influence, often according to a kind of majority rule. The other class of opinion dynamics models considers the opinion as a continuous variable [12-17]. In this paper we focus on the latter and investigate the effect of propaganda. Indeed, we consider a model where agents adjust continuous opinions as a result of random binary encounters whenever their difference in opinion is below a given ...

A life-course perspective is a complex approach to researching the life of an individual or group or certain processes used in various disciplines (Börsch-Supan et al., 2013), especially in sociology, demography, psychology, and economics. The life course perspective seeks to connect the historical context that determines an individual's life with personal history (key events of his or her life) (Edmonston, 2013; Holman and Walker, 2020). The paper explains the differences among how the life-course perspective, lifecycle perspective and life-span perspective approach research topics. More specifically, this paper aims to evaluate the advantages and disadvantages of research on aging (quality of life of older people) and migration (quality of life of migrants) from the perspective of life course by reviewing some of the most important papers addressing it, both theoretically and/or practically. In the first of the five chapters of the paper, Introduction, the author explains why the perspective of life course is an interesting research approach to selected topics in Croatia. Together with the other countries of Central and Eastern Europe, Croatia has experienced a strong increase in the share of the elderly population and significant migration in the last thirty or so years. The major causes of accelerated demographic aging are an increase in life expectancy and a decrease in fertility. The main causes of migration are significant political, social and economic changes in the "old" and "new" EU countries. These are changes in the socio-political and economic systems of the former socialist countries on the one hand, and the expansion of the EU resulting in the opening of the labour market and the possibility of "new" labour migration within Europe on the other. Due to the wars in the Middle East, there is also the issue of dealing with large refugee waves. The life-course perspective is particularly applicable to research on population aging, the assessment of the quality of life and the degree of integration of immigrants in the destination country. The second chapter, Life Perspective and Aging, explains various theoretical approaches to older people (Hagestad and Dannefer, 2001). The institutional approach largely addresses the socio-economic status and roles of the elderly, for example, retirement (Blane et al., 2004; Wanka, 2019). The cultural perspective often deals with negative stereotypes related to aging and formulating different approaches to the elderly (Hagestad and Dannefer, 2001). In order to achieve a holistic approach to aging and old age, various perspectives should be integrated, and aging should be interpreted as a reflection of interrelated events during an individual's life: historical, environmental and personal. Such a more complex approach involving changes and events throughout an individual's life is a life cycle perspective (Godley and Hareven, 2001) considered within a particular historical context. Although it is widely accepted, some authors (Giele and Elder, 1998; Edmonston, 2013) explain the limitation of the term "life cycle" by advocating the phrase "life course". In doing so, they explain life course as a complex relationship between socially shaped events and the roles an individual assumes during life. According to them, this differs from the concept of a life cycle in that the events and roles that make up an individual life experience do not necessarily continue at certain stages of life, as is suggested by the word "cycle". In addition to the concept of a life cycle, researchers of aging and the quality of life of older people (Fuller-Iglesias, Smith and Antonucci, 2009) also theoretically compare the perspective of life course and the life span perspective without opposing them. Both advocate a view of aging as a long-lasting, multidimensional, continuous, and dynamic process. Life theories deal with the processes and pathways of development and aging as a lifelong process of an individual while life theories deal with differences in socially conditioned events, changes, roles and experiences in the lives of individuals (Fuller-Iglesias, Smith and Antonucci, 2009: 3–5) among certain parts of society (groups). An individual's daily life is explained by processes and relationships that determine the broader context and how others experience it. Interpersonal relationships with other members of society play a significant role in an individual's lifestyle and quality of life, regardless of his or her age or migration (in)experience. The life course perspective seeks to explain the impact of different processes on groups of people and individual experiences at each life stage but also the relationship between events from different stages of life. The third chapter, Life Perspective and Biographical Method, discusses the need to return to more significant use of qualitative and interpretative methods, as well as the interest in using a biographical perspective, due to a better understanding of aging and quality of life in old age as well as migration reasons and integration of immigrants in the country of immigration. By telling their life story, a person clarifies the personal understanding of changes in the immediate (personal circle) and the wider environment (society). They also describe how individual members of the group to which the individual feels affiliated, for example, the generation of older people in a particular environment (islands) (Podgorelec, 2008) or immigrants, experienced changes in society during life (older people) or a personal migrant experience and to what extent the changes experienced affect their lives (Amit and Litwin, 2010; Podgorelec, Gregurović and Klempić Bogadi, 2019). Biographical research is especially useful in monitoring the development of an individual's career, the impact of migration (on a personal level, but also in terms of community development), the way people face new experiences and changes during aging or migration and how they adapt (especially to various losses: employment, health and functional status, life partners, friends etc.). The fourth chapter, Life and Migration Perspective, explains certain characteristics of migration and migrants, especially when moving to the country of immigration. Thus, Jasso (2003: 334) grouped them into characteristics that affect adaptation – age, gender, country of origin, level of education (Finney and Marshall, 2018; Podgorelec, Klempić Bogadi and Gregurović, 2020); degree of success – from assimilation, acculturation and adaptation to integration into the receiving society (Berry, 1990; Amit, 2012; Amit and Bar-Lev, 2014; Podgorelec, Gregurović and Klempić Bogadi, 2019) or failure – giving up and returning to the country of origin or moving to a third country; the success of migrants in childhood or the second generation of migrants (childhood and schooling in the country of immigration) (Pivovarova and Powers, 2019); demographic and economic effects on societies of origin and immigration – studies of loss and gain (relocation of qualified migrants, artists, entrepreneurs) (Gregurović, 2019), remittances (Nzima, Duma and Moyo, 2017), etc. Migrants choose to move at various ages and are motivated by various reasons (Kennan and Walker, 2013). Migration is a process that affects both social environments – that of the origin of the migrant as well as the immigration environment, even if the migrant migrates within a certain country (Čipin, Strmota and Međimurec, 2016; Finney and Marshall, 2018) and assuming that social and cultural differences between places of resettlement are not significant (Amit, 2012; Podgorelec, Gregurović and Klempić Bogadi, 2019). Edmonston (2013: 3) relies on the work of Elder (1994, 1998) in explaining the benefits of using a life-course perspective in (im)migration research. He connects four topics that Elder considers crucial in the analysis of life course: the interconnectedness of individual lives and historical time, planning and selection of important events in an individual›s life, the connection of an individual›s life with others (family, friends, work environment) and action (effect) of social institutions during life. The connection between the general approach to the life course analysis (Elder, 1994, 1998) and the previously mentioned groups of topics in migration research is noticeable already at the first glance (Jasso, 2003). Each of the topics can be supported by various examples in Croatian society. In the last chapter, instead of a conclusion, the author states that by reviewing a part of the literature on aging and migration, it is possible to deduce that, although fundamentally separate processes, observed from a life-course perspective, they share similar trajectories, transitions, turning points and timing (Edmonston, 2013). Thus, research into the quality of life of older people must be grounded in the theoretical construction of aging and the historical context, relying on collected data on the individual's important life events (life story) and judgments of experiences by both respondents and researchers. A life-course perspective that measures the impact of social, political and economic conditions on the life of an individual and/or a group is an interesting and complex approach to researching selected dimensions of migrants quality of life, given that migration always takes place in a particular historical context by influencing the social environment – countries of origin and countries of immigration. Public policies that support the organisation of care for the elderly, facilitate adaptation and promote the integration of migrants harmonise all sections of society and affect the life satisfaction of the general population.

Today we have to ask ourselves in depth: ¿What do you mean when you talk about university? Indeed, in the first instance it refers to a building or an academic community that seeks its professional training in order to "go out" to exercise what has been learned in the institution. But, in the strictest sense, its main characteristic can be deepened: the Santo Tomás University assumes as a primary objective to train people with critical sense, impregnated with Christian human values based on responsibility for society, respect for God, for others and towards themselves. Students passionate about science, knowledge, intellectual dynamism, truth (in the style of Tomás de Aquino: Facientes veritatem), through the three substantive functions of Higher Education: learning, research and social commitment. The USTA cannot be foreign to the socio-economic problems of the population, rather, it brings to society competent generations within the social, economic and political development of the Boyacá region, and local (Tunja) and, on all, through the quality of its managers, administrators, teachers, students, and its infrastructure, guarantors of development and progress. For this, teaching methods that should be anchored in modern or scientific psychology, such as experimental psychology, should be implemented. This is how the teacher enters into a secondary role in teaching. (Tamara, 2018, p. 142). That is why the USTA, through the Department of Humanities and Comprehensive Training, gladly presents Volume 12 (No. 24) of the Quaestiones Disputatae Magazine: Topics under discussion, an example that reflects on this occasion a set of articles that respond to student culture, to the construction of discourse as the basis for a generation of new knowledge in Higher Education, encouraging the combination of science based on geotechnics with pedagogy, understanding the world through reading, teaching English from the context of each student, neuroscience from anthropology, and God's initiative through Revelation. Let's recap and further clarify the initial problem of this editorial's problems: If the University is not a place for dialogue, for a true encounter between science, reason and faith, ¿where will young people seek the truth? ; Hoy cabe preguntarse muy a fondo: ¿Qué se entiende cuando se habla de universidad? Efectivamente, en primera instancia hace referencia a un edificio o a una comunidad académica que busca su formación profesional con el fin de 'salir' a ejercer lo aprendido en la institución. Pero, en el sentido más estricto, se puede profundizar en su característica principal: la Universidad Santo Tomás asume como objetivo primordial formar personas con sentido crítico, impregnadas de valores humanos cristianos basados en la responsabilidad por la sociedad, el respeto hacia Dios, al prójimo y hacia sí mismas. Estudiantes apasionados por la ciencia, el conocimiento, el dinamismo intelectual, la verdad (al estilo de Tomás de Aquino: Facientes veritatem), a través de las tres funciones sustantivas de la Educación Superior: aprendizaje, la investigación y el compromiso social. La USTA, no puede ser ajena frente a las problemáticas socio-económicas de la población, antes bien, aporta a la sociedad generaciones competentes dentro del desarrollo social, económico y político de la región de Boyacá, y local (de Tunja) y, sobre todo, por medio de la calidad de sus directivos, administrativos, docentes,estudiantes, y de su infraestructura, garantes de desarrollo y progreso. Para ello se debía implementar métodos de enseñanza que deberían anclarse en la psicología moderna o científica, como la psicología experimental, es así como el docente entra a ejercer un papel secundario dentro de la enseñanza. (Tamara, 2018, pág. 142). De hecho, la USTA está basada en la educación y pedagogía de santo Tomás de Aquino como paradigma referencial de la formación de los estudiantes: "Hay que ver, en efecto, la educación como un proceso de formación y de acceso al pensamiento crítico problematizador" (USTA, 2010: p. 30). A su vez promueve en el estudiante el diálogo entre la fe y la razón, como plus y/o 'valor agregado' de su formación integral. Es por ello que la USTA, por medio del Departamento de Humanidades y Formación integral, gustosamente presenta el Volumen 12 (No. 24) de la Revista Quaestiones Disputatae: Temas en debate, ejemplar en que refleja en esta ocasión un conjunto de artículos que responden a la cultura estudiantil, a la construcción del discurso como base para una generación de nuevo conocimiento en la Educación Superior, incentivando la combinación de la ciencia basada en la geotecnia con la pedagogía, la comprensión del mundo a través de la lectura, la enseñanza del inglés a partir del contexto de cada estudiante, la neurociencia desde la antropología, y la iniciativa de Dios a través de la Revelación. Recapitulemos y puntualicemos aún más la pregunta inicial problémicas de este editorial: ¿Si la Universidad no es un lugar de diálogo, de verdadero encuentro entre ciencia, razón y fe, ¿dónde buscarán los jóvenes la verdad? ; Aujourd'hui, nous nous demandons très profondément: qu'entendons-nous par le terme université? En effet, il s'agit en premier lieu d'un bâtiment ou d'une communauté académique qui recherche une formation professionnelle afin de «sortir» d'exercer ce qui a été appris dans l'institution. Mais au sens, le plus strict, on peut approfondir sa principale caractéristique: l'université Santo Tomás a pour objectif principal de former des personnes ayant un sens critique, imprégnées de valeurs humaines chrétiennes fondées sur la responsabilité de la société, le respect de Dieu, le prochain et envers elles-mêmes. Former des étudiants passionnés par les sciences, les connaissances, le dynamisme intellectuel, la vérité (à la manière de Thomas d'Aquin: Facientes veritatem), à travers les trois fonctions fondamentales de l'enseignement supérieur: l'apprentissage, la recherche et l'engagement social. L'Université Santo Tomás (USTA) ne peut pas être étrangère aux problèmes socioéconomiques de la population, elle contribue plutôt à rendre la société compétente en générations dans le développement social, économique et politique de la région de Boyacá, et locale (de Tunja), et surtout, par la qualité de ses directeurs, de son personnel administratif, de ses enseignants, de ses étudiants et de son infrastructure,garants du développement et du progrès. Pour cela, il convient de mettre en oeuvre des méthodes pédagogiques qui devraient être ancrées dans la psychologie moderne ou scientifique, telle que la psychologie expérimentale, ce qui permet à l'enseignant de jouer un rôle secondaire dans l'enseignement. (Tamara, 2018, p. 142). En fait, l'université Santo Tomás est basée sur l'éducation et la pédagogie de saint Thomas d'Aquin en tant que paradigme de référence pour la formation des étudiants: "Il est nécessaire de voir, en effet, l'éducation comme un processus de formation et d'accès à la pensée critique problématisante" (USTA, 2010: p.30). En même temps, il favorise chez l'étudiant le dialogue entre foi et la raison, en tant qu ´un plus et / ou «valeur ajoutée» de leur formation intégrale. C'est pourquoi l'USTA, par le biais du Département des sciences humaines et de la formation intégrée, présente avec plaisir le volume 12 (n ° 24) de la revue Quaestiones Disputatae: Sujets à débattre, c´est un exemplaire qui reflète à cette occasion une série d'articles qui répondent à la culture étudiante, à la construction du discours comme base d'une génération de nouvelles connaissances dans l'enseignement supérieur. Ces articles encouragent la combinaison de la science basée sur la géotechnique avec la pédagogie, la compréhension du monde à travers la lecture, l'enseignement de l'anglais à partir du contexte de chaque étudiant, le neuroscience à partir de l'anthropologie et l'initiative de Dieu à travers la révélation. Récapitulons et précisons un peu plus la problématique initiale de cette éditorial: Si l'université n'est pas un lieu de dialogue, de véritable rencontre entre la science, la raison et la foi, donc on se demande où les jeunes rechercheront-ils la vérité? ; Hoje devemos nos perguntar muito profundamente: o que se quer dizer quando falamos de uma universidade? Com efeito, em primeira instância, refere-se a um edifício ou a uma comunidade acadêmica que busca sua formação profissional para "sair" e exercer o que foi aprendido na instituição. Mas, no sentido mais estrito, pode-se aprofundar em sua característica principal: a Universidade de Santo Tomás assume como objetivo primordial formar pessoas de sentido crítico, imbuídas de valores humanos cristãos baseados na responsabilidade social, respeito a Deus, ao próximo e para se mesmos. Estudantes apaixonados pela ciência, o conhecimento, o dinamismo intelectual, a verdade (no estilo de Tomás de Aquino: Facientes veritatem), através das três funções substantivas do Ensino Superior: aprendizagem, pesquisa e compromisso social. A USTA, não pode ser alheia aos problemas sócio-econômicos da população, mas antes, contribui para a sociedade de gerações competentes dentro do desenvolvimento social, econômico e político da região de Boyacá, e local (de Tunja) e, em tudo, através da qualidade de seus diretores, pessoal administrativo, professores, alunos e sua infra-estrutura, garantes do desenvolvimento e progresso. Para isso, devem ser implementados métodos de ensino que devem estar ancorados na psicologia moderna ou científica, como a psicologia experimental, e é assim que o professor assume um papel secundário no ensino. (Tamara, 2018, p. 142). De fato, a USTA baseia-se na educação e na pedagogia de São Tomás de Aquino como paradigma de referência para a formação dos estudantes: "De fato, a educação deve ser vista como um processo de formação e acesso à problematização do pensamento crítico" (USTA, 2010: p.30). Ao mesmo tempo, promove no aluno o diálogo entre fé e razão, como mais e / ou "valor agregado" de sua formação integral. É por isso que a USTA, através do Departamento de Humanidades e Treinamento Integral, apresenta de bom grado o volume 12 (n. 24) da Revista Quaestiones Disputatae: Tópicos em debate, exemplar em que reflete nesta ocasião um conjunto de artigos que respondem à cultura estudantil, à construção do discurso como base para uma geração de novos conhecimentos no Ensino Superior, estimulando a combinação da ciência baseada na geotecnia com a pedagogia, a compreensão do mundo através da leitura, o ensino de Inglês do contexto de cada aluno, neurociência da antropologia e a iniciativa de Deus através da Revelação. Recapitulemos e pontuemos ainda mais a questão inicial problemática deste editorial: Se a Universidade não é um lugar de diálogo, de verdadeiro encontro entre ciência, razão e fé, onde os jovens buscarão a verdade?

The conceptual framework of neoclassical economics posits that individual decision-making processes can be represented as maximization of some objective function. In this framework, people's goals and desires are expressed through the means of preferences over outcomes; in addition, in choosing according to these objectives, people employ subjective beliefs about the likelihood of unknown states of the world. For instance, in the subjective expected utility paradigm, people linearly combine their probabilistic beliefs and preferences over outcomes to form an expected utility function. Much of the parsimony and power of theoretical economic analysis stems from the striking generality and simplicity of this framework. At the same time, the crucial importance of preferences and beliefs in our conceptual apparatus in combination with the heterogeneity in choice behavior that is observed across many economic contexts raises a number of empirical questions. For example, how much heterogeneity do we observe in core preference or belief dimensions that are relevant for a broad range of economic behaviors? If such preferences and beliefs exhibit heterogeneity, then what are the origins of this heterogeneity? How do beliefs and preferences form to begin with? And how does variation in beliefs and preferences translate into economically important heterogeneity in choice behavior? This thesis is organized around these broad questions and hence seeks to contribute to the goal of providing an improved empirical understanding of the foundations and economic implications of individual decision-making processes. The content of this work reflects the deep belief that understanding and conceptualizing decision-making requires economists to embrace ideas from a broad range of fields. Accordingly, this thesis draws insights and techniques from the literatures on behavioral and experimental economics, cultural economics, household finance, comparative development, cognitive psychology, and anthropology. Chapters 1 through 3 combine methods from experimental economics, household finance, and cognitive psychology to investigate the effects of bounded rationality on the formation and explanatory power of subjective beliefs. Chapters 4 through 6 use tools from cultural economics, anthropology, and comparative development to study the cross-country variation in economic preferences as well as its origins and implications. The formation of beliefs about payoff-relevant states of the world crucially hinges on an adequate processing of incoming information. However, oftentimes, the information people receive is rather complex in nature. Chapters 1 and 2 investigate how boundedly rational people form beliefs when their information is subject to sampling biases, i.e., when the information pieces people receive are either not mutually independent or systematically selected. Chapter 1 is motivated by Akerlof and Shiller's popular narrative that from time to time some individuals or even entire markets undergo excessive belief swings, which refers to the idea that sometimes people are overly optimistic and sometimes overly pessimistic over, say, the future development of the stock market. In particular, Akerlof and Shiller argue that such "exuberance" or excessive pessimism might be driven by the pervasive "telling and re-telling of stories". In fact, many real information structures such as the news media generate correlated rather than mutually independent signals, and hence give rise to severe double-counting problems. However, clean evidence on how people form beliefs in correlated information environments is missing. Chapter 1, which is joint work with Florian Zimmermann, provides clean experimental evidence that many people neglect such double-counting problems in the updating process, so that beliefs are excessively sensitive to well-connected information sources and follow an overshooting pattern. In addition, in an experimental asset market, correlation neglect not only drives overoptimism and overpessimism at the individual level, but also gives rise to a predictable pattern of over- and underpricing. Finally, investigating the mechanisms underlying the strong heterogeneity in the presence of the bias, a series of treatment manipulations reveals that many people struggle with identifying double-counting problems in the first place, so that exogenous shifts in subjects' focus have large effects on beliefs. Chapter 2 takes as starting point the big public debate about increased political polarization in the United States, which refers to the fact that political beliefs tend to drift apart over time across social and political groups. Popular narratives by, e.g., Sunstein, Bishop, and Pariser posit that such polarization is driven by people selecting into environments in which they are predominantly exposed to information that confirms their prior beliefs. This pattern introduces a selection problem into the belief formation process, which may result in polarization if people failed to take the non-representativeness among their signals into account. However, again, we do not have meaningful evidence on how people actually form beliefs in such "homophilous" environments. Thus, Chapter 2 shows experimentally that many people do not take into account how their own prior decisions shape their informational environment, but rather largely base their views on their local information sample. In consequence, beliefs excessively depend on people's priors and tend to be too extreme, akin to the concerns about "echo chambers" driving irrational belief polarization across social groups. Strikingly, the distribution of individuals' naivete follows a pronounced bimodal structure - people either fully account for the selection problem or do not adjust for it at all. Allowing for interaction between these heterogeneous updating types induces little learning: neither the endogenous acquisition of advice nor exogenously induced dissent lead to a convergence of beliefs across types, suggesting that the belief heterogeneity induced by selected information may persist over time. Finally, the paper provides evidence that selection neglect is conceptually closely related to correlation neglect in that both cognitive biases appear to be driven by selective attentional patterns. Taken together, chapters 1 and 2 show that many people struggle with processing information that is subject to sampling issues. What is more, the chapters also show that these biases might share common cognitive foundations, hence providing hope for a unified attention-based theory of boundedly rational belief formation. While laboratory experimental techniques are a great tool to study the formation of beliefs, they cannot shed light on the relationship between beliefs and economically important choices. In essentially all economic models, beliefs mechanically map into choice behavior. However, it is not evident that people's beliefs play the same role in generating observed behavior across heterogeneous individuals: while some people's decision process might be well-approximated by the belief and preference-driven choice rules envisioned by economic models, other people might use, e.g., simple rules of thumb instead, implying that their beliefs should be largely irrelevant for their choices. That is, bounded rationality might not only affect the formation of beliefs, but also the mapping from beliefs to choices. In Chapter 3, Tilman Drerup, Hans-Martin von Gaudecker, and I take up this conjecture in the context of measurement error problems in household finance: while subjective expectations are important primitives in models of portfolio choice, their direct measurement often yields imprecise and inconsistent measures, which is typically treated as a pure measurement error problem. In contrast to this perspective, we argue that individual-level variation in the precision of subjective expectations measures can actually be productively exploited to gain insights into whether economic models of portfolio choice provide an adequate representation of individual decision processes. Using a novel dataset on experimentally measured subjective stock market expectations and real stock market decisions collected from a large probability sample of the Dutch population, we estimate a semiparametric double index model to explore this conjecture. Our results show that investment decisions exhibit little variation in economic model primitives when individuals provide error-ridden belief statements. In contrast, they predict strong variation in investment decisions for individuals who report precise expectation measures. These findings indicate that the degree of precision in expectations data provides useful information to uncover heterogeneity in choice behavior, and that boundedly rational beliefs need not necessarily map into irrational choices. In the standard neoclassical framework, people's beliefs only serve the purpose of achieving a given set of goals. In many applications of economic interest, these goals are well-characterized by a small set of preferences, i.e., risk aversion, patience, and social preferences. Prior research has shown that these preferences vary systematically in the population, and that they are broadly predictive of those behaviors economic theory supposes them to. At the same time, this empirical evidence stems from often fairly special samples in a given country, hence precluding an analysis of how general the variation and predictive power in preferences is across cultural, economic, and institutional backgrounds. In addition, it is conceivable that preferences vary not just at an individual level, but also across entire populations - if so, what are the deep historical or cultural origins of this variation, and what are its (aggregate) economic implications? Chapters 4 through 6 take up these questions by presenting and analyzing the Global Preference Survey (GPS), a novel globally representative dataset on risk and time preferences, positive and negative reciprocity, altruism, and trust for 80,000 individuals, drawn as representative samples from 76 countries around the world, representing 90 percent of both the world's population and global income. In joint work with Armin Falk, Anke Becker, Thomas Dohmen, David Huffman, and Uwe Sunde, Chapter 4 presents the GPS data and shows that the global distribution of preferences exhibits substantial variation across countries, which is partly systematic: certain preferences appear in combination, and follow distinct economic, institutional, and geographic patterns. The heterogeneity in preferences across individuals is even more pronounced and varies systematically with age, gender, and cognitive ability. Around the world, the preference measures are predictive of a wide range of individual-level behaviors including savings and schooling decisions, labor market and health choices, prosocial behaviors, and family structure. We also shed light on the cultural origins of preference variation around the globe using data on language structure. The magnitude of the cross-country variation in preferences is striking and raises the immediate question of what brought it about. Chapter 5 presents joint work with Anke Becker and Armin Falk in which we use the GPS to show that the migratory movements of our early ancestors thousands of years ago have left a footprint in the contemporary cross-country distributions of preferences over risk and social interactions. Across a wide range of regression specifications, differences in preferences between populations are significantly increasing in the length of time elapsed since the respective groups shared common ancestors. This result obtains for risk aversion, altruism, positive reciprocity, and trust, and holds for various proxies for the structure and timing of historical population breakups, including genetic and linguistic data or predicted measures of migratory distance. In addition, country-level preference endowments are non-linearly associated with migratory distance from East Africa, i.e., genetic diversity. In combination with the relationships between language structure and preferences established in Chapter 4, these results point to the importance of very long-run events for understanding the global distribution of some of the key economic traits. Given these findings on the very deep roots of the cross-country variation in preferences, an interesting - and conceptually different - question is whether such country-level preference profiles might have systematic aggregate economic implications. Indeed, according to standard dynamic choice theories, patience is a key driving factor behind the accumulation of productive resources and hence ultimately of income not just at an individual, but also at a macroeconomic level. Using the GPS data on patience, Chapter 6 (joint work with Thomas Dohmen, Armin Falk, David Huffman, and Uwe Sunde) investigates the empirical relevance of this hypothesis in the context of a micro-founded development framework. Around the world, patient people invest more into human and physical capital and have higher incomes. At the macroeconomic level, we establish a significant reduced-form relationship between patience and contemporary income as well as medium- and long-run growth rates, with patience explaining a substantial fraction of development differences across countries and subnational regions. In line with a conceptual framework in which patience drives income through the accumulation of productive resources, average patience also strongly correlates with aggregate human and physical capital accumulation as well as investments into productivity. Taken together, this thesis has a number of unifying themes and insights. First, consistent with the vast heterogeneity in observed choices, people exhibit a large amount of variation in beliefs and preferences, and in how they combine these into choice rules. Second, at least part of this heterogeneity is systematic and has identifyable sources: preferences over risk, time, and social interactions appear to have very deep historical or cultural origins, but also systematically vary with individual characteristics; belief heterogeneity, on the other hand, is partly driven by bounded rationality and its systematic, predictable effects on information-processing. Third, and finally, this heterogeneity in beliefs and preferences is likely to have real economic implications: across cultural and institutional backgrounds, preferences correlate with the types of behaviors that economic models envision them to, not just across individuals, but also at the macroeconomic level; subjective beliefs are predictive of behavior, too, albeit with the twist that certain subgroups of the population do not appear to entertain stable belief distributions to begin with. In sum, (I believe that) much insight is to be gained from further exploring these fascinating topics.

"We all recognize that climate change is a supremely important issue of our time, which requires both trans-national and trans-generational collaboration and shared responsibility. What we haven't yet fully appreciated, argues political philosopher Henry Shue, are the ethical considerations surrounding the fact that the next one or two decades will determine whether climate change, which already has led us to dangerous effects, will surge into inescapably disastrous effects. The people alive today thus represent a pivotal generation in human history. For the past two centuries humans have undermined our climate at an increasing rate, in ways that the present generations are the first to fully understand, and the last to be able to reverse. But our responsibility for decisive and immediate action rests on three special features of the relation of our present to the future, that many have failed to realize (1) future generations face dangers greater than ours even if we act robustly, (2) the worsening dangers for future generations are currently without limit, and (3) a less robust effort by us is likely to allow climate change to pass critical tipping points for severely worse and potentially unavoidable future dangers. Shue, a renowned scholar of ethics, politics and international relations who has been studying the ethics of climate change for the last two decades, guides us through what our ethical responsibilities to others are, both across the world but especially over time, and what those commitments require us to do in addressing the climate change crisis, now and forcefully"--