Social interaction deficits and conversational inadequacy in Williams syndrome

Research on social communication skills in individuals with Williams syndrome has been inconclusive, with some arguing that these skills are a relative strength and others that they are a weakness. The aim of the present study was to investigate social interaction abilities in a group of children with WS, and to compare them to a group of children with specific language impairment and a group of typically developing children. Semi-structured conversations were conducted and 100-150 utterances were selected for analysis in terms of exchange structure, turn taking, information transfer and conversational inadequacy. The statistical analyses showed that the children with WS had difficulties with exchange structure and responding appropriately to the interlocutor's requests for information and clarification. They also had significant difficulties with interpreting meaning and providing enough information for the conversational partner. Despite similar language abilities with a group of children with specific language impairment, the children with WS had different social interaction skills, which suggests that they follow an atypical trajectory of development and their neurolinguistic profile does not directly support innate modularity. (c) 2005 Elsevier Ltd. All rights reserved.

Deception-detection and machine intelligence in practical Turing tests

Deception-detection is the crux of Turing’s experiment to examine machine thinking conveyed through a capacity to respond with sustained and satisfactory answers to unrestricted questions put by a human interrogator. However, in 60 years to the month since the publication of Computing Machinery and Intelligence little agreement exists for a canonical format for Turing’s textual game of imitation, deception and machine intelligence. This research raises from the trapped mine of philosophical claims, counter-claims and rebuttals Turing’s own distinct five minutes question-answer imitation game, which he envisioned practicalised in two different ways: a) A two-participant, interrogator-witness viva voce, b) A three-participant, comparison of a machine with a human both questioned simultaneously by a human interrogator. Using Loebner’s 18th Prize for Artificial Intelligence contest, and Colby et al.’s 1972 transcript analysis paradigm, this research practicalised Turing’s imitation game with over 400 human participants and 13 machines across three original experiments. Results show that, at the current state of technology, a deception rate of 8.33% was achieved by machines in 60 human-machine simultaneous comparison tests. Results also show more than 1 in 3 Reviewers succumbed to hidden interlocutor misidentification after reading transcripts from experiment 2. Deception-detection is essential to uncover the increasing number of malfeasant programmes, such as CyberLover, developed to steal identity and financially defraud users in chatrooms across the Internet. Practicalising Turing’s two tests can assist in understanding natural dialogue and mitigate the risk from cybercrime.

Outwitted by the hidden: unsure emotions

In this paper the authors consider natural, feigned or absence of emotions in text-based dialogues. The dialogues occurred during interactions between human Judges/Interrogators and hidden entities in practical Turing tests implemented at Bletchley Park in June 2012. The authors focus on the interactions that left the Interrogator unable to say whether they were talking to a human or a machine after five minutes of questioning; the hidden interlocutor received an ‘unsure’ classification. In cases where the Judge has provided post-event feedback the authors present their rationale from three viva voce one-to-one Turing tests. The authors find that emoticons and other visual devices used to express feelings in text-based interaction were missing in the conversations between the Interrogators and hidden interlocutors.

Plato's legacy : How to do philosophy

Although it has its origins earlier, philosophy as we know it in the West took its shape from the Socrates of Plato's Dialogues. It is not implausible to regard the Dialogues as heuristic devices designed for engaging in philosophical inquiry. As such, they would model the process of philosophical inquiry as well as illustrate the common pitfalls or errors to avoid when engaging in such inquiry. So it will not be surprising to see Socrates, the character of the Dialogues, modeling questionable, even poor, inquiry techniques as well as good; admonishing other characters for poor technique and reminding them of lessons they should have learned earlier in their tuition. Plato presumably would expect students reading and role-playing a Dialogue to recognise when and where such instances occur. It is instructive then to take a close look at one of the longer dialogues featuring Socrates engaging in such inquiry, not with an untutored interlocutor, but with a professional, the sophist Protagoras, in order to identify the features of the inquiry itself. For this will reveal something of what Plato conceived to be the activity of philosophy to which we are the heirs. The Protagoras can be read as an illustration (not a definition) of how to do philosophy. And to aid this reading, I propose to focus on the logical form of the inquiry, the moves made by the characters and the techniques displayed, rather than the adequacy of the substantive arguments they mount.

A cultura nacional e as negociações internacionais : um comparativo entre executivos brasileiros e italianos

Esta dissertação aborda o tema da negociação comercial internacional e a influência da cultura nacional. Justifica-se a importância deste estudo pelo aumento da competitividade internacional, não somente no aspecto comercial, mas também no que se refere à competitividade pessoal. Este tema proporciona à academia e às empresas, especialmente aos negociadores, relevantes aspectos teóricos e demonstra uma realidade prática, apresentando importantes considerações à devida preparação da negociação. No atual contexto, conhecer as diferenças culturais, respeitando-as e possuir informações sobre o possível comportamento do interlocutor tornam-se um diferencial estratégico para a empresa e para o negociador e, como conseqüência, minimiza o choque cultural, proporcionando melhores resultados na negociação.Para responder às questões desta pesquisa, o objetivo geral consiste em analisar a existência de diferenças culturais entre executivos brasileiros e italianos nas negociações comerciais internacionais. Esta é uma pesquisa de caráter exploratório - descritivo, com uma abordagem multimétodo: o qualitativo e o quantitativo. O primeiro consiste em entrevistas em profundidade, que proporcionaram importantes contribuições à formulação do instrumento de pesquisa: o questionário, sendo que através deste foram coletadas as informações da etapa quantitativa. A aplicação do questionário deu-se no sul do Brasil, nos estados do Rio Grande do Sul, Santa Catarina e Paraná e no norte da Itália, nas regiões do Vêneto, da Lombardia e de Trento, totalizando uma amostra de 200 respondentes (100 executivos em cada país). A presente pesquisa está estruturada seguindo a ordem teórica, ou seja, a negociação comercial internacional, a cultura nacional e os valores pessoais. De forma geral, os resultados obtidos demonstram as diferenças culturais na negociação comercial internacional, proporcionando um “retrato” das características culturais do executivo italiano e brasileiro, segundo as dimensões culturais propostas por Hofstede (1997), e os valores pessoais, identificados pela Escala de Valores de Rokeach (RVS) (1973).

Perfil discursivo e interativo de pessoas com doença de alzheimer

O discurso dos indivíduos com Doença de Alzheimer (DA) é descrito como desorganizado e vazio, apresentando um grande número de termos indefinidos e frases sem significado (Obler, Albert & Helm-Estabrooks, 1985). Além disso, estudos apontam a ausência de elementos importantes para a compreensão do discurso pelo interlocutor (Ripich & Terrel, 1988). Essas características discursivas refletem uma dificuldade evidente na produção do discurso, especialmente nos níveis pragmáticos e semânticos do processamento. O objetivo desta pesquisa foi investigar a coerência e os déficits no manejo do conhecimento de pessoas com DA em três tarefas de discurso, comparando as relações dessas características com habilidades cognitivas. Participaram do estudo 8 idosos com DA no estágio GDS 4, 10 com DA no estágio GDS 5 e 16 idosos do grupo controle sem DA. Os discursos foram analisados a partir de uma tarefa sem pistas informativas, uma tarefa com pistas informativas e uma tarefa com pistas visuais Os participantes foram avaliados com testes neuropsicológicos relacionados à compreensão verbal, memória semântica, memória episódica e memória de trabalho. Os resultados demonstraram que participantes com DA apresentaram escores de coerência global mais baixos do que idosos sem D.A. Idosos com DA também apresentaram maiores dificuldades de manejo do conhecimento do que idosos normais. As características discursivas de participantes com DA correlacionaram-se com suas habilidades cognitivas. Os grupos GDS 4 e GDS 5 diferiram com relação à coerência local (na tarefa com pistas visuais) e ao déficit no manejo do conhecimento (na tarefa com pistas informativas). Os desempenhos discursivos dos participantes com DA diferiram significativamente entre as tarefas autobiográficas e a tarefa com pistas visuais. Esses dados podem contribuir para ampliar e aprofundar os métodos de detecção precoce, avaliação e intervenção das desordens discursivas de pessoas com DA.

Os bichos de muita antigüidade : anticonvenções do contar em Guimarães Rosa

Ao longo do processo de evolução por que passou a forma literária que conhecemos por Conto, fica evidente que cada vez mais este se distanciou de suas origens: a oralidade, a essência popular, que agrega o maravilhoso. Este estudo discute algumas questões relativas à gênese do Conto, aspectos relacionados à nomenclatura; conceito; origem e suas fronteiras, objetivando caracterizar ou melhor definir essa Forma tão avessa a caracterizações definitivas. O ponto de partida é a relação de oposição entre Forma simples x Forma artística. Tomamos Guimarães Rosa como paradigma, pois o autor resgata, em sua obra, aspectos referentes às formas ancestrais de contar, atualizando-os. Como contista, a partir do aproveitamento dos temas e das formas populares, características das narrativas de tradição oral, que utilizam com freqüência o elemento maravilhoso, o autor tece seu próprio contar. Seu feitio, porém, não se assemelha ao dos compiladores, mercê de um trabalho minucioso e artesanal com a palavra, o qual acaba por atribuir à tessitura do texto uma especificidade que intriga, encanta e convida ao jogo. Estudamos essa atualização do conto popular de tradição oral na obra de Guimarães Rosa à luz da Metalingüística bakhtiniana, utilizando os contos Famigerado e Um moço muito branco, de Primeiras estórias; Como ataca a sucuri, de Tutaméia; e Meu tio o Iauaretê, de Estas Estórias, como exemplos desse fato, pois cremos que sua teoria ajuda a esclarecer os aspectos da obra rosiana que dizem respeito ao discurso. Malgrado a investigação a que se lançou Mikhail Bakhtin ter sido empreendida a partir do romance, acreditamos que sua teoria possa ser aplicada à narrativa curta, já que trata basicamente das relações dialógicas entre narrador e interlocutor. A direção que tomamos em nossa análise, diz respeito, justamente, ao discurso na obra do autor mineiro, sobretudo às formas de citação desse discurso, fator relevante em seu fazer literário.

O corpo tornado voz : a experiência pedagógica da peça radiofônica

Este trabalho apresenta o rádio, mais especificamente a peça radiofônica, como uma experiência pedagógica para atores que assim ampliam seu repertório e tornam a voz protagonista da ação. Entendendo a linguagem radiofônica como linguagem artística e o rádio como um meio expressivo, o estudo pretende um conhecimento vocal voltado para o efeito da voz, sua dimensão temporal e espacial e o estatuto de corpo que ela assume nessas condições. Traz a perspectiva da pedagogia do ator, considerando o ouvinte como interlocutor, sem o que a ação do ator não se concretiza. Utiliza como objeto de pesquisa, a investigação O trabalho do ator voltado para um veículo radiofônico, realizada no âmbito do Departamento de Arte Dramática, Instituto de Artes da Universidade Federal do Rio Grande do Sul, e busca sistematizar para o exercício radiofônico as práticas desenvolvidas pelos atores em seu processo de criação. Para tanto, articula diálogos com as vozes e idéias de Rudolf Arnheim, Werner Klippert, Eduardo Meditsch, Constantin Stanislavski, João Francisco Duarte Junior e Jorge Larrosa, entre outros. Como desdobramento, mostra a possibilidade de promover a oralidade e o exercício radiofônico como expressões individuais e como experiências criativas coletivas e pedagógicas, em atividades para a sala de aula em todos os níveis de ensino, para a oficina e para a ação cultural. Demarca, ainda, a busca por uma expressão radiofônica contemporânea, uma linguagem que faça sentido hoje, abrindo espaço para a escuta ainda que num mundo coberto de imagens.

Differences in the perception of interest representation: a comparision of Brasília and Brussels lobbying activity

The research topic of this paper is focused on the analysis of how trade associations perceive lobbying in Brussels and in Brasília. The analysis will be centered on business associations located in Brasília and Brussels as the two core centers of decision-making and as an attraction for the lobbying practice. The underlying principles behind the comparison between Brussels and Brasilia are two. Firstof all because the European Union and Brazil have maintained diplomatic relations since 1960. Through these relations they have built up close historical, cultural, economic and political ties. Their bilateral political relations culminated in 2007 with the establishment of a Strategic Partnership (EEAS website,n.d.). Over the years, Brazil has become a key interlocutor for the EU and it is the most important market for the EU in Latin America (European Commission, 2007). Taking into account the relations between EU and Brazil, this research could contribute to the reciprocal knowledge about the perception of lobby in the respective systems and the importance of the non-market strategy when conducting business. Second both EU and Brazilian systems have a multi-level governance structure: 28 Member States in the EU and 26 Member States in Brazil; in both systems there are three main institutions targeted by lobbying practice. The objective is to compare how differences in the institutional environments affect the perception and practice of lobbying, where institutions are defined as ‘‘regulative, normative, and cognitive structures and activities that provide stability and meaning to social behavior’’ (Peng et al., 2009). Brussels, the self-proclaimed "Capital of Europe”, is the headquarters of the European Union and has one of the highest concentrations of political power in the world. Four of the seven Institutions of the European Union are based in Brussels: the European Parliament, the European Council, the Council and the European Commission (EU website, n.d.). As the power of the EU institutions has grown, Brussels has become a magnet for lobbyists, with the latest estimates ranging from between 15,000 and 30,000 professionals representing companies, industry sectors, farmers, civil society groups, unions etc. (Burson Marsteller, 2013). Brasília is the capital of Brazil and the seat of government of the Federal District and the three branches of the federal government of Brazilian legislative, executive and judiciary. The 4 city also hosts 124 foreign embassies. The presence of the formal representations of companies and trade associations in Brasília is very limited, but the governmental interests remain there and the professionals dealing with government affairs commute there. In the European Union, Brussels has established a Transparency Register that allows the interactions between the European institutions and citizen’s associations, NGOs, businesses, trade and professional organizations, trade unions and think tanks. The register provides citizens with a direct and single access to information about who is engaged in This process is important for the quality of democracy, and for its capacity to deliver adequate policies, matching activities aimed at influencing the EU decision-making process, which interests are being pursued and what level of resources are invested in these activities (Celgene, n.d). It offers a single code of conduct, binding all organizations and self-employed individuals who accept to “play by the rules” in full respect of ethical principles (EC website, n.d). A complaints and sanctions mechanism ensures the enforcement of the rules and addresses suspected breaches of the code. In Brazil, there is no specific legislation regulating lobbying. The National Congress is currently discussing dozens of bills that address regulation of lobbying and the action of interest groups (De Aragão, 2012), but none of them has been enacted for the moment. This work will focus on class lobbying (Oliveira, 2004), which refers to the performance of the federation of national labour or industrial unions, like CNI (National Industry Confederation) in Brazil and the European Banking Federation (EBF) in Brussels. Their performance aims to influence the Executive and Legislative branches in order to defend the interests of their affiliates. When representing unions and federations, class entities cover a wide range of different and, more often than not, conflicting interests. That is why they are limited to defending the consensual and majority interest of their affiliates (Oliveira, 2004). The basic assumption of this work is that institutions matter (Peng et al, 2009) and that the trade associations and their affiliates, when doing business, have to take into account the institutional and regulatory framework where they do business.

Guia para representação de coleção viva temática de plantas medicinais em jardins botânicos

O cenário mundial que foi se desenhando na segunda metade do século XX, relacionado às questões do ambiente e cujos reflexos se fizeram sentir no estado das espécies vivas, despertou as autoridades a pensarem em ações estratégicas garantidoras da vida. Dessa preocupação emergiu o compromisso assumido por jardins botânicos, voltado para o desenvolvimento de programas de conservação da diversidade vegetal e educação ambiental, capazes de promover mudanças na forma de pensar as questões relacionadas com o ambiente. As coleções vivas em jardins botânicos se colocam como instrumentos e cenário para trabalhar questões ambientais, promovendo debates e discussões sobre questões que afetam a vida. Neste sentido, a coleção medicinal, por sua constituição, facilita o trabalho construtivo, as articulações e conexões necessárias para despertar interesse do público através do reconhecimento dos seus significados da vida cotidiana. A experiência na condução da coleção, a observação ostensiva e o desenvolvimento de atividades evidenciaram o potencial da coleção medicinal como lugar de experiência, que permite trabalhar com uma diversidade de grupos: o público em geral, grupos comunitários, de saber popular, comunidade científica na área da medicina, da farmácia, da divulgação científica, da educação ambiental, da etnobotânica e da biologia. Assim, um guia contemplando os itens que facilitam o trabalho do curador é uma maneira de estimular a representação dessa tipologia de coleção em jardins botânicos e, por conseguinte, permitir que seu jardim desempenhe o papel de interlocutor entre ciência e sociedade e venha a ser protagonista da mudança para uma nova forma de relação com os recursos naturais.

Renovando os sentidos: percepção e escrita etnográfica na etnomusicologia

MENDES, Jean Joubert Freitas. Renovando os sentidos: percepção e escrita etnográfica na etnomusicologia. In: ANPPOM, 17. Rio de Janeiro, 2005. Anais... Rio de Janeiro: UFRN/ANPPOM, 2005.

Literatura e educação :ação argumentativa na discussão de histórias

The focus of this thesis is the discussion of stories from the fairy tales genre in reading classes of Children´s Literature. Its main purpose is to investigate the argumentative action in the mediation pedagogic process.The evidence from this study is that the argumentative action is a fundamental component of teacher´s mediation as far as story discussion is concerned. The concept of mediation in this thesis comes from principles of interacionist Psychology articulated with THE theory of argumentation. It is understood that argumentative action is a process that objectives to obtain and to intensify the interlocuter´s adhesion through speech. The analysis of the story discussion activity is based on Psycholinguistic, particularly on the study of prevision ability; on the Theory of reception with special reference to the theory of the aesthetic effect, which considers the reader´s reactions and reader´s replies to the text; and on sociocognitive conflict study highlighting conflicts modalities brought up by the discussion of texts. The corpus analysed is composed by discussion episodes of stories from reading classes of Children´s Literature realized through participative observation.The subjects were children aged five-six years old from a public pre-school located in Natal-RN, Brazil. The study highlights mediation acts of argumentative nature such as direct question; illustrations from the book; rereading that were used by the teacher-researcher in story discussion. Among its conclusions it is revealed that argumentative action in stories discussion favors and intensifies the agreement of children´s to the activity. It increases the interaction between text and reader; it favours children´s organization and explicitation of their thoughts. The analysed material shows children´s exposing their ability to argue when having adequade scaffolding by an argumentative mediator the teacher

Uma ecologia de base complexa

This thesis objective systemize and discuss the ecological knowledge constructed by means of tradition knowledge with basis in a complex ecology (MORIN, 2002b). The conception of tradition knowledge (ALMEIDA, 2001c) corresponds to a diversity of knowledgement, of men and women, constructed from heteroclite elements of the geographic way, making use of analogies and homologies which serves as the base for this scientific inquiry. These knowledge are extremely related the context where these people are inserted. To construct an ecology of complex base is to understand that the reality is not given previously, and that its construction assumes indissociability among the elements that composes it, that is, between nature and society, material and immaterial elements. To incorporate the disorder, the uncertainty, the unpredictable and the auto-echo-organization as guide principles of a new ecology, constitutes in a new vision of the biological science and the scientific ecology in direction to a science of complexity. The work focuses the ecological knowledge of the Piató lagoon, municipality of Açu, in the State of Rio Grande do Norte, having as interlocutor of this boarding Mr. Francisco Lucas da Silva (known in the local as Chico Lucas), fisherman and agriculturist, who was born, and lives until today, in the community of Areia Branca, around the lagoon. Having for base the method as strategy (MORIN, 2001a), the research construction was performed through the realization of more than 10 trips carried out between the years of 2005 and 2007. In these trips the ecological aspects of the environments such as, the flora and the fauna, as well as the environmental impacts on the lagoon, were obtained in recorded dialogues and interviews with Chico Lucas, which were later transcripts. The information from there showed a natural and social complex reality, little known by Cartesian science, since it brings a wealth of details of daily life full, over all, for tradition knowing of the people that had lived there and the ones who remain living there. The thesis looks to understand the strategies of thought and the knowledge production referring to traditional knowing and its ability of interchange between different cognitive operators. The ecological knowledge that emerges of these knows reveals a systemic perception of the environment, presenting the beings and phenomena in its peculiarities and its degrees of complexity, but immutable in its indissociability

Compreensão de natureza e formação do biólogo

Most knowledge and techniques developed by mankind since ancient times had the main purpose to study and understand the various phenomena of Nature. Science, like one of these narratives, works as a translation, transcribing what, is systematically observed. Within the set of transformations on the modern sciences, the dialogue with related areas became quite narrow and, occasionally, functional, and the dialogue with non-related areas, in turn, does not takes place by any matters. The focus of this research is the teaching of Biological Sciences, and the undergraduate courses as strategic places to disseminate a broad understanding of Nature, that broadens the conceptual relations between different disciplinary axes, previously fragmented. In order to do so, I take a four-way metaphorical approach as a methodological construction base. Three of them proposed by Joël de Rosnay, represented by artifacts: The Telescope, The Microscope and the Macroscope. And finally, a proposition that complements the approach, that i named The Naked Eye. In Telescope, which allows a more general construct of a phenomenon, I discuss the teaching of Biological Sciences in Brazil. In the microscope, which allows us to analyze in detail a scenario, I construct a rank of the major courses in biological sciences and propose a discussion on the understanding of nature on the undergraduate programs. In Macroscope, who allows, at the same time, zoom in and out to the phenomenon observed, I call for a transdisciplinary dialogue, based on the authors Ilya Prigogine, Basarab Nicolescu, Henri Atlan and Bruno Latour, which can certainly contribute to the curriculum of the Biologists training programs, that builds knowledge pertinent to a complex observation of Nature. I complete the set of the quaternary reading and understanding of the world from the Naked Eye, as the first strategy of perception in our species. For this, I invite the philosopher of Nature Chico Lucas da Silva as my interlocutor