Opportunistic competition law enforcement

We analyse the interplay between investigation policies, deterrence and desistance in a model where a competition authority monitors multiple sectors and faces a budget constraint that prevents it from deterring cartels in all sectors simultaneously. Most studies of competition law enforcement treat competition authorities as all-knowing, unwavering and benevolent. They do not behave opportunistically, do not face asymmetric information and choose their actions to optimize social welfare. In this paper, we drop one of these assumptions, and study a competition authority that can not commit to a particular investigation strategy. As a consequence, a competition authority’s decisions to investigate will be driven by the (ex-post) desistance effect instead of the (ex ante) deterrence effect of an investigation policy. The resulting opportunistic behaviour may lead to a suboptimal investigation strategy. We find that, in the absence of commitment, developing a sector specific reward scheme based on the number of captured cartels can improve welfare.

Balancing bistable perception during self-motion

In two experiments we investigated whether bistable visual perception is influenced by passive own body displacements due to vestibular stimulation. For this we passively rotated our participants around the vertical (yaw) axis while observing different rotating bistable stimuli (bodily or non-bodily) with different ambiguous motion directions. Based on previous work on multimodal effects on bistable perception, we hypothesized that vestibular stimulation should alter bistable perception and that the effects should differ for bodily versus non-bodily stimuli. In the first experiment, it was found that the rotation bias (i.e., the difference between the percentage of time that a CW or CCW rotation was perceived) was selectively modulated by vestibular stimulation: the perceived duration of the bodily stimuli was longer for the rotation direction congruent with the subject's own body rotation, whereas the opposite was true for the non-bodily stimulus (Necker cube). The results found in the second experiment extend the findings from the first experiment and show that these vestibular effects on bistable perception only occur when the axis of rotation of the bodily stimulus matches the axis of passive own body rotation. These findings indicate that the effect of vestibular stimulation on the rotation bias depends on the stimulus that is presented and the rotation axis of the stimulus. Although most studies on vestibular processing have traditionally focused on multisensory signal integration for posture, balance, and heading direction, the present data show that vestibular self-motion influences the perception of bistable bodily stimuli revealing the importance of vestibular mechanisms for visual consciousnes

Working with Weirdness:A Response to "Moving Past Mysticism in Psychedelic Science"

Action Contro

Reconceptualizing second-person interaction

Over the last couple of decades, most neuroscientific research on social cognition has been dominated by a third-person paradigm in which participating subjects are not actively engaging with other agents but merely observe them. Recently this paradigm has been challenged by researchers who promote a second-person approach to social cognition, and emphasize the importance of dynamic, real-time interactions with others. The present article's contribution to this debate is twofold. First, we critically analyze the second-person challenge to social neuroscience, and assess the various ways in which the distinction between second- versus third-person modes of social cognition has been articulated. Second, we put forward an alternative conceptualization of this distinction—one that gives pride of place to the notion of reciprocity. We discuss the implications of our proposal for neuroscientific studies on social cognition

Nonreligious Identity in Three Western European Countries : A Closer Look at Nonbelievers' Self-identifications and Attitudes Towards Religion

The growing secularism generates considerable interest in the manifestations of religious unbelief. In this study, conducted in Finland, Denmark, and the Netherland (N = 4404), we asked participants which of the following terms best describes their religious/spiritual identity: religious believer, spiritual but not religious, spiritual seeker, atheist, anti-religious, agnostic, nonbeliever, secular, or other. We also examined the participants' God beliefs and their attitudes toward religion. While connotations of identity terms varied considerably across individuals and countries, the nonreligious identification groups consistently differed in the strength and certainty of God belief, and by the valence, ambivalence, importance, and reflection of the attitudes toward religion. The anti-religious had the most negative and unequivocal attitudes, and the agnostics, seculars, and spiritual seekers had the most uncertain God beliefs. By associating distinct attitude profiles with non-religious self-identification labels, the findings improve our understanding of why people choose a specific label in surveys on non-religiosity.Peer reviewe

Balancing bistable perception during self-motion

In two experiments we investigated whether bistable visual perception is influenced by passive own body displacements due to vestibular stimulation. For this we passively rotated our participants around the vertical (yaw) axis while observing different rotating bistable stimuli (bodily or non-bodily) with different ambiguous motion directions. Based on previous work on multimodal effects on bistable perception, we hypothesized that vestibular stimulation should alter bistable perception and that the effects should differ for bodily versus non-bodily stimuli. In the first experiment, it was found that the rotation bias (i.e., the difference between the percentage of time that a CW or CCW rotation was perceived) was selectively modulated by vestibular stimulation: the perceived duration of the bodily stimuli was longer for the rotation direction congruent with the subject's own body rotation, whereas the opposite was true for the non-bodily stimulus (Necker cube). The results found in the second experiment extend the findings from the first experiment and show that these vestibular effects on bistable perception only occur when the axis of rotation of the bodily stimulus matches the axis of passive own body rotation. These findings indicate that the effect of vestibular stimulation on the rotation bias depends on the stimulus that is presented and the rotation axis of the stimulus. Although most studies on vestibular processing have traditionally focused on multisensory signal integration for posture, balance, and heading direction, the present data show that vestibular self-motion influences the perception of bistable bodily stimuli revealing the importance of vestibular mechanisms for visual consciousness

Imagined own-body transformations during passive self-motion

Spatial perspective taking is a crucial social skill that underlies many of our everyday interactions. Previous studies have suggested that spatial perspective taking is an embodied process that involves the integration of both motor and proprioceptive information. Given the importance of vestibular signals for own-body perception, mental own-body imagery, and bodily self-consciousness, in the present study we hypothesized that vestibular stimulation due to passive own-body displacements should also modulate spatial perspective taking. Participants performed an own-body transformation task while being passively rotated in a clockwise or counter-clockwise direction on a human motion platform. A congruency effect was observed, reflected in faster reaction times if the implied mental body rotation direction matched the actual rotation direction of the chair. These findings indicate that vestibular stimulation modulates and facilitates mental perspective taking, thereby highlighting the importance of integrating multisensory bodily information for spatial perspective taking

Semantics in the Motor System: Motor-Cortical Beta Oscillations Reflect Semantic Knowledge of End-Postures for Object Use

In the present EEG study we investigated whether semantic knowledge for object use is represented in motor-related brain areas. Subjects were required to perform actions with everyday objects and to maintain either a meaningful or a meaningless end posture with the object. Analysis of the EEG data focused on the beta-frequency band, as previous studies have indicated that the maintenance of a posture is reflected in stronger beta-oscillations. Time frequency analysis indicated that the execution of actions resulting in a meaningless compared to a meaningful end posture was accompanied by a stronger beta-desynchronization towards the end of the movement and a stronger subsequent beta-rebound after posture-onset. The effect in the beta-frequency band was localized to premotor, parietal and medial frontal areas and could not be attributed to differences in timing or movement complexity between meaningful and meaningless actions. Together these findings directly show that the motor system is differentially activated during the execution and maintenance of semantically correct or incorrect end postures. This suggests that semantic object knowledge is indeed represented in motor-related brain areas, organized around specific end postures associated with the use of objects