Contingent Experience Research Articles

Modes of relating to contingency: An exploration of experiences in advanced cancer patients-ERRATUM.

Objective: Throughout their lives, people are confronted with unexpected life events, which can be difficult to incorporate into their life narratives. Such a confrontation can result in an experience of contingency. Different ways of relating to contingency have been described by Wuchterl: denying, acknowledging, and “encounter with the Other.” In the present article, we aim to trace these theoretical distinctions in real-life experiences of patients. Method: We analyzed 45 interviews using the constant comparative method with a directed content analysis approach in the Atlas.ti coding program. The interviews originated from a randomized controlled trial evaluating an assisted reflection on life events and ultimate life goals. Seven spiritual counselors from six hospitals in the Netherlands conducted the interviews from July of 2014 to March of 2016. All 45 patients had advanced cancer. Results: We found four different modes into which relating to contingency can be classified: denying, acknowledging, accepting, and receiving. With denying, patients did not mention any impact of the life event on their lives. In acknowledging, the impact was recognized and a start was made to incorporate the event into their life. In accepting, patients went through a process of reinterpretation of the event. In receiving, patients talked about receiving insights from their illness and living a more conscious life. Significance of results: Our study is the first to investigate the different ways of relating to contingency in clinical practice. The defined modes will improve our understanding of the various ways in which cancer patients relate to their disease, allowing caregivers to better target and shape individual care.

Modes of relating to contingency: An exploration of experiences in advanced cancer patients.

Throughout their lives, people are confronted with unexpected life events, which can be difficult to incorporate into their life narratives. Such a confrontation can result in an experience of contingency. Different ways of relating to contingency have been described by Wuchterl: denying, acknowledging, and "encounter with the Other." In the present article, we aim to trace these theoretical distinctions in real-life experiences of patients. We analyzed 45 interviews using the constant comparative method with a directed content analysis approach in the Atlas.ti coding program. The interviews originated from a randomized controlled trial evaluating an assisted reflection on life events and ultimate life goals. Seven spiritual counselors from six hospitals in the Netherlands conducted the interviews from July of 2014 to March of 2016. All 45 patients had advanced cancer. We found four different modes into which relating to contingency can be classified: denying, acknowledging, accepting, and receiving. With denying, patients did not mention any impact of the life event on their lives. In acknowledging, the impact was recognized and a start was made to incorporate the event into their life. In accepting, patients went through a process of reinterpretation of the event. In receiving, patients talked about receiving insights from their illness and living a more conscious life. Our study is the first to investigate the different ways of relating to contingency in clinical practice. The defined modes will improve our understanding of the various ways in which cancer patients relate to their disease, allowing caregivers to better target and shape individual care.

Cognitive Functions in the Prefrontal Association Cortex; Transitive Inference and the Lateral Prefrontal Cortex

To behave appropriately in a complex and uncertain world, the brain makes use of several distinct learning systems. One such system is called the "model-free process", via which conditioning allows the association between a stimulus or response and a given reward to be learned. Another system is called the "model-based process". Via this process, the state transition between a stimulus and a response is learned so that the brain is able to plan actions prior to their execution. Several studies have tried to relate the difference between model-based and model-free processes to the difference in functions of the lateral prefrontal cortex (LPFC) and the striatum. Here, we describe a series of studies that demonstrate the ability of LPFC neurons to categorize visual stimuli by their associated behavioral responses and to generate abstract information. If LPFC neurons utilize abstract code to associate a stimulus with a reward, they should be able to infer similar relationships between other stimuli of the same category and their rewards without direct experience of these stimulus-reward contingencies. We propose that this ability of LPFC neurons to utilize abstract information can contribute to the model-based learning process.

Die Natur der Werte – eine pragmatistische Perspektive

AbstractValues are neither discovered nor constructed. Pragmatist thinkers, by rejecting both alternatives, are able to develop convincing answers to the question about the place of values in nature. The argument unfolds in three steps: (1)The meaning of the term “naturalism” is differentiated in the light of Pragmatist insights. Deweyan naturalism rejects both scientism and subjectivism and treats values as being developed naturally in the course of ordinary experience. Values are qualities of the interaction-cycle between organism and environment and accordingly as real as atoms and their interactions. (2) Value-experiences integrate receptivity and reflexivity. The desirable is elaborated as the reflective transformation of the factually desired and thus always retains contingent experiences. (3) The human good as articulated in values is always prone to particularistic, exclusionary interpretations. Hence the importance of universal norms as checking-instances (“Prüfinstanzen”, H. Joas) for values. But, conversely, normative universalism remains anaemic without support by actually lived value-orientations.

Beyond Being on Call: Time, Contingency, and Unpredictability Among Family Caregivers for the Elderly

This article explores contingency as a central yet underappreciated feature of care work. It does so by focusing on family elder care and the complex temporal interactions between caregiver, care receiver, and healthcare institutions in the U.S. context. Drawing on in‐depth interviews with 19 family caregivers for an elderly relative, I show that their experience of time is, paradoxically, systematically unpredictable. It is shaped by three dimensions: uncertain futures (not knowing how long, or how much, they will have to care), conflicting rhythms (mediating between the temporalities of institutions and that of the elderly relative), and flooded time (ongoing expectations of interruption). Focusing on caregivers’ experiences of unpredictability highlights their exclusion from broader social temporalities and the obstruction of their possibilities to craft their own futures. I therefore suggest that the experience and management of contingency may constitute its own form of inequality and is a fruitful site for exploring the temporal relations between paid and unpaid labor. Also, sociological theories of time and labor may benefit from foregrounding care work to advance understandings of the complex and hierarchical interactions between multiple temporal orders in post‐Fordist economies.

Toddlers' Word Learning From Contingent and Noncontingent Video on Touch Screens.

Researchers examined whether contingent experience using a touch screen increased toddlers' ability to learn a word from video. One hundred and sixteen children (24-36 months) watched an on-screen actress label an object: (a) without interacting, (b) with instructions to touch anywhere on the screen, or (c) with instructions to touch a specific spot (location of labeled object). The youngest children learned from contingent video in the absence of reciprocal interactions with a live social partner, but only when contingent video required specific responses that emphasized important information on the screen. Conversely, this condition appeared to disrupt learning by slightly older children who were otherwise able to learn words by passively viewing noninteractive video. Results are interpreted with respect to selective attention and encoding.

Blumenberg, Izutsu y la experiencia ante la nada

This work presents an ontological reading of the idea of Apocalypse, i.e., as the experience of the Nothing. Blumenberg’s and Izutsu’s narrative accounts are very different in this respect. The former claims that the Nothing is experienced through absolute vulnerability and the of references. However, this experience is rapidly taken care of and does not last long: The Apocalypse never becomes a definitive state of being. The latter, on the contrary, argues that the experience of contingency can be so real as to unveil world’s and consciousness’s specific features. Izutsu affirms that the Apocalypse truly gives way to “a new Heaven and a new Earth” (Apocalypse 21:

Can research “send me high?” Addressing flow theory

Purpose – The purpose of this study is to find whether undergraduate students in the first discipline-based class can attain flow state while researching. Despite its widespread acceptance and application, flow theory has not been applied to the research process. Moreover, it can further librarians’ knowledge of the importance of affect in information seeking behavior. Design/methodology/approach – Flow is a phenomenological state achieved when skill level is equal to challenge level. Flow experience was operationalized using Z-score analysis as one standard deviation above individuals’ averages. The study used mixed methods including event contingent experience sampling method, Bostick’s library anxiety scale and reflection papers. Following library instruction sessions, undergraduate participants scheduled research consultations with a librarian. Findings – Individual research sessions grew more positive as reflected by Z scores over the semester, with one case of flow. Overall, participants’ library anxiety decreased minimally. Reflection papers reiterated the value of approachability and interest of the librarian, with those who had consultations feeling both increased confidence in their skills and in knowing they had an ally in their research. Research limitations/implications – The original collaborator and pedagogy were not utilized, thereby limiting the scope and sample size. The author was able to collaborate with other faculty. Future research would benefit from a larger sample size and more collaboration. Originality/value – Using flow theory as a model can emphasize the positive aspects of research as interesting and enjoyable, even in the imposed query setting of the classroom, and it can encourage librarians’ display of interest during research consultations.

Transnational perspectives in Simon J. Ortiz’s short fiction

Abstract Contemporary American short stories from Simon J. Ortiz’s Men of the Moon (1999) can be considered a testing ground for conceptualizations of (trans)-national identities from Randolph Bourne’s ‘Transnational America’ (1916) to David Hollinger’s Postethnic America (1995). In these stories the aesthetic concretization of contingent experiences by Native Americans both confirms and critiques the theoretical concepts of postcolonial studies and transnational American Studies. Both Ortiz’s ‘The Way You See Horses’ and ‘Crossing’ unfold the relativity and observer-dependence of individual perception as well as the epistemological awareness and cultural dialectics of Julia Kristeva’s Strangers to Themselves (1991). Actual intercultural and transnational encounters in Ortiz’s stories often spell disaster much more radically than promise. Only three of the stories in Ortiz’s collection, ‘Pennstuwehniyaahtse: Quuti’s Story’, ‘Hiding West of Here’ and ‘To Change Life in a Good Way’, suggest interethnic solidarity. These stories help develop a humanism which expresses itself in the dissociation of foreignness and familiarity in postcolonial and transnational contexts. Ortiz’s short fiction thus functions as a liminal third space which exposes both the fragmentation and potential of time-honoured Native American spiritual convictions. That such spiritualism has partially sunk into oblivion does not spell irrelevance and obsolescence. Paradoxically it turns into the precondition of mutual rapprochements of cultural difference and both intercultural and transnational acceptance. What renders Ortiz’s reassertion of Native American spiritualism humanist is the caution and tolerant awareness of the other that accompanies it.

Hercules, the Hydra, and the 1801 Constitution of Toussaint Louverture

This article considers the 1801 Constitution of Saint-Domingue, which was promulgated by Toussaint Louverture. It argues that this complex and contradictory constitution can be productively considered in the light of Peter Linebaugh and Marcus Rediker's canonical work of Atlantic history, The Many-Headed Hydra. By this method, the presence of both radical emancipatory and anti-democratic currents within the Haitian Revolution is revealed. While the 1801 Constitution bears the influence of the “proletarian hydra” – its unequivocal abolition of slavery codified in law the revolutionary masses’ key demand – it also bears the interests of colonial Atlantic World capital. Finally, it is argued that the 1801 Constitution casts light on two profoundly different conceptions of freedom: a conservative conception emerging from “practical politics”, and the other, a more radical vision borne of the highly contingent experience of the African slave trade and the plantation system in the Americas.

Kontingenzbewältigung als Zügel der Herrschaft

Abstract After the collapse of the Abbasid Empire as a result of the Mongol conquest of Bagdad in 1258, a number of Sunni Muslim scholars perceived the sudden absence of the caliphate, an important Islamic political institution, as an experience of contingency. The emergence of the Mamluk dynasty (1250–1517) in Egypt and Syria caused an additional experience of contingency: the crisis of legitimacy of the Mamluk rulers. Furthermore, the Mamluks and their legal scholars did not assiduously apply the Shariʿa provisions to practical politics – theoretically, however, they accepted it in order to legitimize their rule over the so-called Islamicate regions. In some of his works, the Damascene Muslim scholar Taqī ad-Dīn Aḥmad Ibn Taymīya (d. 1328) faces up to these three experiences of contingency. This article therefore examines how Ibn Taymīya perceived these three phenomena and sheds light on the complex layers of strategies that he uses in order to cope with the experiences of contingency.

„Es erhebt sich Vater gegen Sohn, Sohn gegen Vater, Bruder gegen Bruder, Verwandte gegen Verwandte“

Abstract Gregory of Tours’s oeuvre is one of the few testimonies of the Merovingian Early Middle Ages. The paper illustrates that the experience of contingency and the attempt to overcome it during a time of civil war were the situation in which the ‚Libri historiarum decem‘ originated. Among other things, this becomes apparent in the composition of the ten books. Furthermore, the Merovingian kingship is a recurring motive of the text. The paper illustrates how genealogy, which can be used to conceal disruptions and discontinuities, was instrumentalized to serve as legitimation.

Der Kaiser als Kitt der Gesellschaft

Abstract Rooted in the Turco-Iranian Islamicate context of Transoxania, the Mughal dynasty met different experiences of contingency when establishing a new dominion on the subcontinent. This contribution focusses on the strategies to legitimize domination developed by the Mughals in a context of contingency, examining both the bureaucratic and the ideological sphere. Particular emphasis will be placed on a narratological examination of the ‚Maǧālis-i Ǧahāngīrī‘ by ʿAbd al-Sattār b. Qāsim Lāhōrī and the text‘s narrative strategies to represent the emperor as a kind of ‚insurance against contingencies‘.

Das Ereignis von Edirne (1703)

Abstract The 1703 rebellion, known as the ‚Event of Edirne‘ or as the ‚Event of Feyżullāh Efendi‘, challenged the Ottoman state. It resulted in the killing of the Grand Mufti Feyżullāh Efendi (1639–1703), who had been despised by various insurgent groups at the court for his nepotism, the deposition of the ruling sultan Muṣṭafā II, and the ascension of his brother Aḥmed III to the throne. In his treatise ‚Feyżullāh Efendi Vaḳʿası‘, the court chronicler Muṣṭafā Naʿīmā Efendi (1655–1716) addresses the ruler and important dignitaries with his description of this event. As it was the contemporary custom, the treatise bears strong didactic features. Naʿīmā relied on astrological interpretations in order to explain the cause of the rebellion. This kind of narrative is a particular feature of Naʿīmā‘s modus operandi, on which this article will focus. It examines how Naʿīmā, in his role as the official historiographer, applies this explanation by use of narrative elements, and goes on to examine the institutional significance of astrology in the context of Ottoman court culture. It is obvious that Naʿīmā perceived the rebellion as an experience of contingency. According to his analysis, however, the 1703 rebellion was not the inevitable outcome of mismanagement at court, but could rather have been foreseen years ago by means of astrological calculations. Based on this reasoning, the historiographer was able to provide Ottoman rule with the required continuity, i.e. its legitimization.

Die frühe Sultanatsarchitektur in Nordindien im 12.–14. Jahrhundert als herrschaftspolitisches, identitätsstiftendes Ausdrucksmittel im Spannungsfeld wechselnder Legitimierungsstrategien

Abstract The following paper discusses how the experience and perception of contingency and strategies to cope with it are evident in the architecture of the Muslim ruling class during the early Delhi Sultanate (1190–1320). The discussed building is the most important Friday Mosque in this context, a quasi-visualized symbol of the thematic concept of rulership for the new Muslim political elite. This ruling class established itself in Northern India in the late 12th century within a multi-ethnic, multi-religious and socially heterogeneous society, in which extremely different forms of communication, social hierarchies, worldviews, religious concepts, social norms and perceptions of historical images and experiences met. From the 13th century onwards, the countless immigrants and refugees from Persian-speaking areas had a remarkable influence on the local culture which was already multifaceted due to the various indigenous Northern Indian conceptions of life, faith and perception. Examining the architecture of the mosque as well as its decoration and systems of inscriptions, it will be shown how these almost text-like visual systems where adapted and used by different rulers as part of their diverging strategies of legitimization of their rule and how they created visualized reference systems to promote a coherent, specific historical narrative and a visual experience and language of a meaningful collective past to which all social and religious groups in Northern India could relate.

Herrschaftsbegründung durch Handlung

Abstract At the turn from the 15th to the 16th century, the Mamluk Sultanate experienced a period of succession conflicts when a number of Sultans came to power in rapid sequence. With the ascension of Qānṣawh al-Ghawrī to the throne in 1501, the history of the Sultanate entered into a final phase of relative tranquility. Nevertheless, the previous crisis had proven that the person of the ruler was a highly contingent element in the late Mamluk political landscape. This article will examine how the panegyrist ʿAbd al-Bāsiṭ al-Malaṭī justified Qānṣawh al-Ghawrī’s reign in the light of the previous succession crisis in his unedited work ‚al-Majmūʿ al-bustān al-nawrī li-ḥaḍrat mawlānā al-Sulṭān al-Ghawrī‘. After preliminary theoretical remarks and a contextualization of the author and his work it will be shown that in the text under study, al-Malaṭī mainly described Sultan al-Ghawrī’s deeds and achievements. Accordingly, al-Malaṭī addressed the man-made experience of contingency during the succession crisis by focusing on the intra-mundane actions of the ruler he praised. He thus stepped out of the common tradition of Arabic panegyric works in the later Islamic middle period which usually emphasized the ruler’s immutable moral qualities and virtues and paid much less attention to his individual actions. Moreover, al-Malaṭī’s work is notably devoid of any attempts to legitimize al-Ghawrī’s rule on religious grounds.

Fear expression and return of fear following threat instruction with or without direct contingency experience

Prior research showed that mere instructions about the contingency between a conditioned stimulus (CS) and an unconditioned stimulus (US) can generate fear reactions to the CS. Little is known, however, about the extent to which actual CS–US contingency experience adds anything beyond the effect of contingency instructions. Our results extend previous studies on this topic in that it included fear potentiated startle as an additional dependent variable and examined return of fear (ROF) following reinstatement. We observed that CS–US pairings can enhance fear reactions beyond the effect of contingency instructions. Moreover, for all measures of fear, instructions elicited immediate fear reactions that could not be completely overridden by subsequent situational safety information. Finally, ROF following reinstatement for instructed CS+s was unaffected by actual experience. In summary, our results demonstrate the power of contingency instructions and reveal the additional impact of actual experience of CS–US pairings.

Dynamic expansion of alert responses to incoming painful stimuli following tool use

Peripersonal space is the region closely surrounding our bodies. Within its boundaries, avoidance of threatening objects is crucial for surviving. Here we explored autonomic responses to painful stimuli with respect to the dynamic properties of the peripersonal space in healthy individuals. To this aim, in a series of experiments, we measured the Skin Conductance Response (SCR) to a noxious stimulus approaching and touching the hand, or stopping at different distances (far, near) from it. Results showed that the anticipatory response to an incoming threat is reduced if the stimulus targets a spatial position far away from the body, as compared to a near or bodily location. However, responses to far stimuli change if the boundaries of reachable space are extended further away by active tool use. Noteworthy, SCR is not influenced by a training consisting of a spatial attention task, without active tool use. This evidence sheds novel light on the adaptive role of peripersonal space, showing its importance for the coding of incoming threatening stimuli and its plasticity induced by contingent experience, such as tool use.

The experience of new sensorimotor contingencies by sensory augmentation.

Embedded in the paradigm of embodied cognition, the theory of sensorimotor contingencies (SMCs) proposes that motor actions and associated sensory stimulations are tied together by lawful relations termed SMCs. We aimed to investigate whether SMCs can be learned by means of sensory augmentation. Therefore we focused on related perceptual changes. Subjects trained for 7 weeks with the feelSpace belt mapping information of the magnetic north to vibrotactile stimulation around the waist. They experienced substantial changes in their space perception. The belt facilitated navigation and stimulated the usage of new navigation strategies. The belt's vibrating signal changed to a kind of spatial information over time while the belt's appeal and perceived usability increased. The belt also induced certain emotional states. Overall, the results show that learning new SMCs with this relatively small and usable device leads to profound perceptual and emotional changes, which are fully compatible with embodied theories of cognition.

Contingency: the likely spectrum of injuries based upon a review of three recent undeveloped theatres of operations - CORPORATE, TELIC 1 and HERRICK 4

Contingency operations are by their nature unpredictable and high-risk, with undeveloped logistical support, and medical provision is no exception. Can the contingency experiences of the last three decades help to predict the type of casualties that may be seen in future contingency operations? By reviewing published casualty statistics available from Operations CORPORATE, TELIC 1 and HERRICK 4 it can be demonstrated, unsurprisingly, that gunshot wounds and blast injuries dominate battle injuries, but that disease non-battle injuries also constitute a significant draw on medical provision, particularly gastrointestinal illness in hot environments. Planning for medical support for future contingency operations should anticipate this. Disease non-battle injuries have the potential to render a large proportion of a force combat-ineffective, requiring preventative measures to avoid overwhelming the available medical facilities. When operations occur in populated areas civilian casualties are likely to pose difficulties to medical support, due to issues with onward evacuation and a wider case mix, such as paediatrics.