POVERTY AND PROSPERITY VIEWED BY THE VIDZEMES TEACHERS

This article analyses the opinions about the difference between poverty and prosperity among the teachers, it seeks to find the border between these phenomena; it summarizes the teachers' ideas of how to diminish poverty and use one's own money effectively in times of prosperity. By using the open ended questionnaire the results of 1 teacher groups from schools of 2 Latvian districts were analyzed. Summarizing the results one can conclude that the interviewed teachers with the word "poverty" and "prosperity" understand material things. Teachers associate money the means of living which is acquired by working and earning. None of the respondents admitted that they would ask for help, look for support and receive the social benefits or would seek for the cause of poverty within themselves in case of experiencing poverty. In case of becoming prosperous the teachers will meet all their needs and then be ready to share with others. Almost all teachers' answers disclosed that they will spend money rather than invest it and make accumulation or accruals. The interviewed teacher did not make any original proposal to resolve poverty issue. The main boundary between poverty and wealth is the amount of money which allows or does not allow meeting their own needs and desires thus ensuring certain way of life or life style. The second boundary is the place of living and appearance. Essential boundary is also emotional comfort or discomfort, a happy relationship or lack of it. It should be noted that this study only shows the trend since a very specific selection of respondents was involved. However, it allows making the assumption that teachers had a healthy attitude towards money and hardly any teacher had a negative attitude towards money or prosperity, however, everybody believed that poverty can be avoided by working and earning money. Thus it is possible to conclude that the teachers of this selection don't hold the "ideology of low-income people"

ASSOCIATION BETWEEN PATHOLOGICAL PERSONALITY TRAITS AND DEFENSE MECHANISMS IN HEALTHY SAMPLE: A PILOT STUDY RESULTS

This article aims to define what kind of relationship exists between pathological traits and defense mechanisms. Primary data, collected from 14th until 30th of March in 2017, was used in this research. Thirty participants (57 % males) in the age of early adultness (from 25 to 39 years, M = 29.9, SD = 3.33) filled in two questionnaires: The Multidimensional Clinical Personality Inventory (Perepjolkina, Koļesņikova, Mārtinsone, Stepens, 2017) and Defense mechanisms questionnaire (Subbotina, 2017). Six of eight analyzed defense mechanisms (repression, regression, rationalization, displacement, denial and psychological projection) showed statistically significant correlation with at least one pathological personality trait both on facet and on domain level. Some weak (p .05) correlations were found between some personality traits and two left defense mechanisms: reaction formation and sublimation. Most of correlations were with neurotic defenses according to Vaillant (1992) classification, in particular with repression and displacement. All together 26 traits correlated with neurotic defenses. With other defenses, just a few traits correlated – three traits with mature defenses, two traits with immature defenses and two with psychotic defenses. Received results need to be validated in the future studies and may be useful for clinical psychologists for better understanding of their clients

A Case Study on the Development of Math Competence in an Eight-year-old Child with Dyscalculia : Shared Intentionality in Human-Computer Interaction for Online Treatment Via Subitizing

Studies in the field of neuroscience have shown that the neural network responsible for numeracy overlaps with the visual and spatial processing regions. Other studies in psychology also highlighted an association of visual-spatial processing with mathematical competence at the early stages of development. These findings suggest that research on the size of the focal area of attention (consciousness) can contribute to understanding the development of numeracy. In this case study, we verified the hypothesis of developing numeracy in children by training the rapid apperception of a few items called “subitizing.” Shared intentionality promotes cognition from the onset. Therefore, in this study, we investigated this interaction modality to give an eight-year-old girl an insight into expanded apperception of an array in "subitizing" for improving her numerical competence. The child was stimulated to apperceive more objects while performing “subitizing” tasks with the mother. The course of treatment consisted of the four regimes of human-computer interaction based on rapid exposure to several pictures with a few dots. Simultaneously, this human-computer interaction also stimulated shared intentionality in the mother-child dyad for developing the child’s rapid apprehension of these small quantities. The outcome of this intervention was an increase in the size of the focal point of attention (consciousness) and the development of numerical competence, where an association was established between the expanding apperception and the developing numeracy.publishersversionPeer reviewe

Neuronal Coherence Agent for Shared Intentionality : A Hypothesis of Neurobiological Processes Occurring during Social Interaction

Funding Information: No foundation that funded this research. Publisher Copyright: © 2021 by the author.The present interdisciplinary study discusses the physical foundations of the neurobiological processes occurring during social interaction. The review of the literature establishes the difference between Intentionality and Intention, thereby proposing the theoretical basis of Shared Intentionality in humans. According to the present study, Shared Intentionality in humans (Goal-directed coherence of biological systems), which is the ability among social organisms to instantly select just one stimulus for the entire group, is the outcome of evolutionary development. Therefore, this interaction modality should be the preferred, archetypal, and most propagated modality in organisms, attributed to the Model of Hierarchical Complexity Stage 3. This characteristic of biological systems facilitates the training of the new members of the group and also ensures efficient cooperation among the members of the group without requiring communication. In humans, Shared Intentionality contributes to the learning of newborns. The neurons of a mature organism may teach the neonate neurons regarding the fitting reactions to the excitatory inputs of the specific structural organization. This enables the neonate neurons to develop a Long-Term Potentiation that links particular stimuli with specific embodied sensorimotor neural networks. The present report discusses three possible neuronal coherence agents that could involve quantum mechanisms in cells, thereby enabling the distribution of the quality of goal-directed coherence in biological systems (Shared Intentionality in humans). Recently reported case studies conducted online with the task of conveying the meaning of numerosity to the children of age 18–33 months revealed the occurrence of Shared Intentionality in mother-child dyads in the absence of sensory cues between the two, which promoted cognitive development in the children. The findings of these case studies support the concept of physical foundations and the hypothesis of the neurophysiological process of social interaction proposed in the present study.publishersversionPeer reviewe

Empirical Evidence of Shared Intentionality : Towards Bioengineering Systems Development

Publisher Copyright: © 2023 by the author.This article is the expanded conference paper that reports the results of a psychophysiological research study on shared intentionality conducted in 24 online experiments with 405 subjects (208 recipients and 197 contributor-confederates). In this research, we created a bioengineering system for assessing shared intentionality in human groups by modeling mother-neonate dyad properties in subjects during intellectual testing. In this model, only the mother (contributor-confederate) knows the correct stimulus and shares this knowledge with the neonate (participant-recipient). For modeling mother-neonate dyad properties in subjects, the bioengineering system induces interpersonal dynamics in the subjects by stimulating their interactional synchrony, emotional contagion and neuronal coherence. The system collects data by confronting recipients' performance in "primed" and "unprimed" conditions of confederates. These informed contributors know correct responses only in the "primed" condition and confidently respond on "primed" items. Specifically, in 13 online experiments in mother-child dyads, evidence showed a recipients' performance increase of 48–394%, P-value < 0.001 (62 recipients and 54 confederates) in the “primed” condition of confederates; and in 7 experiments in primary group adults, it showed a performance increase of 143–300%, P-value < 0.002. In experiments in the secondary group, evidence showed a recipients' performance increase only with the UL3 items (a translation of an unfamiliar language, 20 recipients from 41 subjects in experiment No.12). In 3 experiments in 207 secondary group subjects, non-semantic tasks–SL3 (synthetic language) and US3 (two-color unintelligible symbols)–did not stimulate the effect. We also analyzed data confronting the outcome of recipients' performance in the "primed" condition and random value (possible recipients' responses by chance). Comparing the outcomes of these two data collecting methods as well as the sample size of the experiments allow for discussing the research method's validity and reliability. The article also shows four factors' domains that contribute to shared intentionality magnitude.Peer reviewe

A New Perspective on Assessing Cognition in Children through Estimating Shared Intentionality

This theoretical article aims to create a conceptual framework for future research on digital methods for assessing cognition in children through estimating shared intentionality, different from assessing through behavioral markers. It shows the new assessing paradigm based directly on the evaluation of parent-child interaction exchanges (protoconversation), allowing early monitoring of children’s developmental trajectories. This literature analysis attempts to understand how cognition is related to emotions in interpersonal dynamics and whether assessing these dynamics shows cognitive abilities in children. The first part discusses infants’ unexpected achievements, observing the literature about children’s development. The analysis supposes that due to the caregiver’s help under emotional arousal, newborns’ intentionality could appear even before it is possible for children’s intention to occur. The emotional bond evokes intentionality in neonates. Therefore, they can manifest unexpected achievements while performing them with caregivers. This outcome shows an appearance of protoconversation in adult-children dyads through shared intentionality. The article presents experimental data of other studies that extend our knowledge about human cognition by showing an increase of coordinated neuronal activities and the acquisition of new knowledge by subjects in the absence of sensory cues. This highlights the contribution of interpersonal interaction to gain cognition, discussed already by Vygotsky. The current theoretical study hypothesizes that if shared intentionality promotes cognition from the onset, this interaction modality can also facilitate cognition in older children. Therefore in the second step, the current article analyzes empirical data of recent studies that reported meaningful interaction in mother-infant dyads without sensory cues. It discusses whether an unbiased digital assessment of the interaction ability of children is possible before the age when the typical developmental trajectory implies verbal communication. The article develops knowledge for a digital assessment that can measure the extent of children’s ability to acquire knowledge through protoconversation. This specific assessment can signalize the lack of communication ability in children even when the typical trajectory of peers’ development does not imply verbal communication.publishersversionPeer reviewe

Comparison of adolescent's values : Riga and Vidzeme region

The determination of individual values is the first step in the process of the personal development. Thus, the main purpose of this research is to investigate the difference between value hierarchies of Riga students and rural students and their subjective opinions about factors affecting them and compare the results with the values of previous generations. It is a pilot study with a comparative cross-sectional design. The study was carried out in several schools of Latvia in 2018: 2 schools of Riga and 2 rural schools of Vidzeme region. Participants were 11th and 12th grade students: 50 from Riga, 50 from rural schools. The research of values was based on the M. Rokeach value ranking test. It is found that the individual hierarchies of values in one group context differ more than hierarchies of adolescent groups of various years and different backgrounds. There are no significant differences related to the terminal and instrumental values between adolescents of Riga and rural areas: love, cheerfulness and education are more important for Riga students, but rural students prefer responsibility, obedience, capability. Some values have not been influenced by time or socio-economic and political situation, but some values have increased or decreased their significance with years.publishersversionPeer reviewe

A New Computer-Aided Method for Assessing Children's Cognition in Bioengineering Systems for Diagnosing Developmental Delay

This pilot study (n = 19) examines fidelity rates of the new computer-aided method of diagnosing cognitive development delay in 3-to-6-year-old children. The small-scale research repeats the methodological components of the previous two studies, only changing the data collection process by introducing the baseline value (BV). Experimental data show a significant increase of 9.4 times in the shared intentionality magnitude in neurodivergent children. The results support the hypothesis that the bioengineering system (computer-mother-child) can encourage shared intentionality in the dyad by emulating the mother-newborn communication model. The outcome shows the association between the shared intentionality magnitude and children's diagnosis. However, the bioengineering diagnostic paradigm and the new BV method still need more evidence since the pilot study observes the effect in a small sample size. The pilot study evaluates the fidelity rates of this new BV method through nine markers. It shows the feasibility (with the limitations) of testing this new BV method in further research with a large sample size.Peer reviewe

Computerized Assessment of Cognitive Development in Neurotypical and Neurodivergent Children

This study aims to observe the differences in the shared intentionality magnitude in mother-child dyads with neurotypical (NT) children and neurodivergent (ND) children aged 3-6 years. The quality of shared intentionality in infancy is associated with cognitive development. Our results showed that ND children scored six times higher (on average) in quiz-test than NT children. Children with difficulties in interaction (ND children) are more likely to use shared intentionality in conversation than NT children. We believe that this knowledge can contribute to developing computerized assessment methods which can diagnose developmental disabilities in such children.publishersversionPeer reviewe

Characteristics of Personal Value-Meaning Systems of Latvian Youths in 1998, 2005, 2010 and 2015: A Comparative Study

Research of personal values is one of the most important tasks in the context of social and economic changes of the society. The purpose of this research was to compare the values and the level of disintegration of personal value-meaning systems of Latvian youths in different periods of socio-economic development of Latvian society. The research was conducted in 1998 and repeated in 2005, 2010 and in 2015. All participants were students of 11th or 12th grade. To provide a measure of value-meaning systems the M. Rokeach technique modified by E.B. Fantalova was used. The results revealed that there were differences in ratings of importance and attainability of values as well as in levels of discrepancy between importance and attainability of values of Latvian youths in different periods of socio-economic development of Latvian society.