Brain activation during string playing

This chapter attempts to integrate data from both functional magnetic resonance imaging (fMRI) and electroencephalography (EEG) to elucidate the activation of the cortical areas in musical performance for both execution and imagination of music during string playing. In both fMRI and EEG experiments, playing the music was compared with imagining the music. This allowed separation of the areas mainly involved in motor execution from those involved in imagining, planning, and working memory, thus differentiating musical from purely motor areas.

School-age children show a bias toward fantasy classifications after playing a platform game

We investigated the influence of playing a video game on children’s ability to distinguish between fantasy and reality. School-age children played a platform game for 15 min and then performed a fantasy/reality distinction task in which they were to judge whether images (from the platform game and from other games) were fantasy images or reality images. Unlike those in the control group (who played a memory game), the children in the experimental group showed a response bias toward mistakenly classifying reality images from the video game as fantasy images (as determined by means of an analysis based on signal detection theory). We conclude that playing the video game exerted a short-term influence on children’s ability to distinguish between fantasy and reality.

Legal Aspects of Sino-­African Tied Aid: The Art of Playing with a Legal Grey Area

Sino-African trade has seen a fifty-fold increase in the years 1999 to 2008. In some African regions, particularly in sub-Saharan Africa, China has even replaced the US as the most important trading partner today. But China holds not a single FTA on the African continent, while other major trading partners of African economies rely on an extensive framework of different trade agreements. What is, thus, the legal basis of the recent increase of Sino-African trade? Interestingly, Sino-African trade has seen a particularly strong increase in countries that have entered into tied aid agreements with China. These agreements are commonly known under the term ‘Angola-Model’ and consist of a multifaceted network of barter-trading-systems, aspects of tied aid and concessions for oil and other commodities linked with a state loan. It is likely that these agreements have an impact on the trade-flows between African countries and China. This paper discusses the legal character of this new form of economic cooperation, or modern version of tied aid. Critical legal aspects related to this form of tied aid refer to violation of the principle of most-favoured nation (MFN), illegitimate export subsidies, market access, public procurement and transparency in the international trading system. However, despite the recent outcry of the foremost Western community against the strategy of the Chinese government on the African continent, the practice of the Angola-Model based tied aid is not entirely new, and neither is it against the law. The case of tied aid is situated in a legal grey area that should be examined thoroughly in order to strengthen the international trading system and to support developing countries in their attempt to gain from tied aid arrangements.