Effects of pointing movements on visuospatial working memory in a joint-action condition: Evidence from eye movements

Previous studies showed that (a) performing pointing movements towards to-be-remembered locations enhanced their later recognition, and (b) in a joint-action condition, experimenter-performed pointing movements benefited memory to the same extent as self-performed movements. The present study replicated these findings and additionally recorded participants’ fixations towards studied arrays. Each trial involved the presentation of two consecutive spatial arrays, where each item occupied a different spatial location. The item locations of one array were encoded by mere visual observation (the no-move array), whereas the locations of the other array were encoded by observation plus pointing movements (the move array). Critically, in Experiment 1, participants took turns with the experimenter in pointing towards the move arrays (joint-action condition), while in Experiment 2 pointing was performed only by the experimenter (passive condition). The results showed that the locations of move arrays were recognized better than the locations of no-move arrays in Experiment 1, but not in Experiment 2. The pattern of eye-fixations was in line with behavioral findings, indicating that in Experiment 1, fixations to the locations of move arrays were higher in number and longer in duration than fixations to the locations of no-move arrays, irrespective of the agent who performed the movements. In contrast, no differences emerged in Experiment 2. We propose that, in the joint-action condition, self- and other-performed pointing movements are coded at the same representational level and their functional equivalency is reflected in a similar pattern of eye-fixations.

Out from the Curtains of Secrecy: Private University Police and State Open Records Laws

The role of police officers on college campuses has grown in the past 40 years from that of “glorified custodians” to full-fledged police officers, often with powers to search, detain, arrest, and even to use deadly force. Yet most state open records laws have not kept up, failing to require disclosure of records about crimes reported to or arrests made by sworn police officers at private universities. This article provides a full national picture by identifying the statutes and analyzing the cases to address whether state open records laws apply to private university police. It then suggests that the “functional equivalency test” provides courts a method to require transparency at these police departments.

Femur

This chapter provides a detailed description of the Sterkfontein hominin femora and additional comparative and functional interpretations of these fossils, all of which are incomplete but still provide important information. While some have postulated that the differences among Sterkfontein femora reflect taxonomic differences, we regard these as large and small versions of the same general morphology. Multiple taxa may have been present at Sterkfontein; we just do not see evidence for it in the femora. However, while the distal femur of Australopithecus africanus is similar to that found in A. afarensis, the proximal femur is not. Sterkfontein Member 4 femora have relatively longer and more compressed femoral necks than their east African comparators, and a large femoral head to femoral neck ratio. Whether these subtle morphological differences reflect differences in substrate use, reflect differences in locomotor kinematics, or result in functional equivalency remains unclear.

Headings in Thomas Brussig’s novel «Am kürzeren Ende der Sonnenallee» and their reproduction in the ukrainian translation

The paper explores the peculiarities of headings in Thomas Brussig’s novel «Am kürzeren Ende der Sonnenallee» and the means of reproducing their functions in the Ukrainian translation. The problems of equivalency and subjective transformations in connection with author’s style are investigated. Headings as strong positions are important elements of texts architectonic and specific communicative unities. We distinguish many functions such as nominative, informative, expressive, emotive functions which dominate according to the genre and style of texts. Scientists pay much attention to such aspects as semantics, classification, structure and functions of headings. Different types of headings need different ways of their translation. Equivalents in the functions are more important than formal equivalency. The informative expository headings are easy to reproduce in translation by using the same descriptive models. In the novel there are only a few topic-identifying headings where the content is explained, so that the translation has the functional equivalency with the original. It is more difficult when headings have intertextual character and contain many allusions instead of direct content description. Brussig’s chapter headings only partially reflect the text content and let the reader interpret it in different way. It depends on general cultural context (cultural lacunes) and background knowledge if all the intertextual elements can be understood. That’s why it often seems necessary to choose the explanatory headings while translating. They make headings more transparent but there is no ambiguity and disappointed expectation due to the original. In the article has been shown how the associations connected with song names, literary quotes, polysemantic words attract the attention of readers and influence the interpretation of chapter content and which effects disappear by translation. In the Ukrainian translation all the headings have an informative part containing the words «a story about» as a marker for content. The choice of topic-identifying headings for translation causes great differences in the interpretation of chapters because of predictability missing in the original. It is especially undesirable when other associations appear by reading of the translation. The variation in the length of the text section corresponds to a difference in the scope of the information in the translation. In long chapters there are many acts and events but the translator chooses subjectively only one of them for heading content. In this case the heading has a strong steering role for the reader and the functional equivalency is lost.

Arm swapping autograft shows functional equivalency of five arms in sea stars

Extant echinoderms show five-part radial symmetry in typical shape. However, we can find some asymmetry in their details, represented by the madreporite position not at the center, different skeletal arrangement in two of the five rays of sea urchins, and a circular cavity formed by two-end closure. We suspect the existence of any difference in hidden information between the five. In our hypothesis, deep equivalency makes no issue in function even after exchanging the position of rays; otherwise, this autograft causes some trouble in behavior or tissue formation. For this attempt, we firstly developed a method to transplant an arm tip to the counterpart of another arm in the sea star Patiria pectinifera. As a result, seven arms were completely implanted—four into the original positions for a control and three into different positions—with underwater surgery where we sutured with nylon thread and physically prevented nearby tube feet extending. Based on our external and internal observation, each grafted arm (i) gradually recovered movement coordination with the proximal body, (ii) regenerated its lost half as in usual distal regeneration, and (iii) formed no irregular intercalation filling any positional gap at the suture, no matter whether two cut arms were swapped. We here suggest a deep symmetry among the five rays of sea stars not only in morphology but also in physiology, representing an evolutionary strategy that has given equal priority to all the radial directions. Moreover, our methodological notes for grafting a mass of body in sea stars would help echinoderm research involving positional information as well as immunology.