Volitional Action Research Articles

Distinct neural networks for the volitional control of vocal and manual actions in the monkey homologue of Broca's area.

The ventrolateral frontal lobe (Broca's area) of the human brain is crucial in speech production. In macaques, neurons in the ventrolateral prefrontal cortex, the suggested monkey homologue of Broca's area, signal the volitional initiation of vocalizations. We explored whether this brain area became specialized for vocal initiation during primate evolution and trained macaques to alternate between a vocal and manual action in response to arbitrary cues. During task performance, single neurons recorded from the ventrolateral prefrontal cortex and the rostroventral premotor cortex of the inferior frontal cortex predominantly signaled the impending vocal or, to a lesser extent, manual action, but not both. Neuronal activity was specific for volitional action plans and differed during spontaneous movement preparations. This implies that the primate inferior frontal cortex controls the initiation of volitional utterances via a dedicated network of vocal selective neurons that might have been exploited during the evolution of Broca's area.

Подготовка учителей для инклюзивного билингвального образования: опыт организации лаборатории для преодоления границ между специализациями

Teacher education programs prepare candidates for bilingual, English as a second language, or special ed¬ucation as separate professionals. This creates challenges when teaching bilingual children with disabilities. There is a need to cross boundaries combining expertise and preparing teachers for children’s uniqueness. Re¬sponding to this need, the researchers organized a change laboratory with 14 professors and two State Depart¬ment of Education consultants. The study explored boundary expressions and their relationship to the larger activity. It also looked at the learning that took place during boundary crossing efforts. Boundaries were identi¬fied around bilingual teacher preparation, cross-disciplinary programmatic, and paradigmatic aspects. While boundary crossing at the intrapersonal level and at the interpersonal level were important, the need to engage multiple institutions was centered. In addition, the discussion manifested that for inclusive bilingual education teacher preparation, there was a need to go beyond the institutional level to reach to policy makers and address the sociopolitical resistance against bilingual education. Throughout the study, participants engaged primarily in the epistemic learning actions of analyzing and modeling. Through volitional actions, the participants real¬ized a renewed object for their activity. This study widens the understanding of possibilities for taking shared educational responsibility through boundary crossing between professionals in preparation programs.

Psychopathology as an Arbitrator in Subjectivity Paradigms Controversy

The article examines the classical and non-classical paradigms of subjectivity. The subject is the origin of thought and action, this is the Self that makes decisions. Philosophy has studied the problem of the subject since Modern times. Classical paradigms include Cartesian, transcendental, phenomenological and existential ones. They do not yet question the subject's ability to think and act independently. The non-classical paradigms are subdivided into the continental branch and the analytical philosophy branch. The continental branch begins with the psychoanalysis of J. Lacan and continues in postmodern. In the analytical branch, the first non-classical paradigm was logical behaviorism, and then D. Dennett's paradigm. In non-classical paradigms, either the subject has no center, or the subject itself does not exist. In Lacan, thinking is driven by language, the play of signifiers. Lacan’s idea was accepted by the postmodern. In non-classical paradigms, there is no central instance of subjectivity, that is, an instance of decision-making. An example is D. Dennett's theory of consciousness, in which drafts of thoughts appear and are fixed if they turn out to be appropriate. However, it is demonstrated using the material of psychopathology, that consciousness without a governing instance is characteristic of a schizophrenic state. In schizophrenia, the mental ability to control one's own thoughts is lost, the feeling of belonging of thoughts to the subject is disturbed, the Kantian transcendental unity of apperception is weakened. Will is the energetic component of thinking. Without the volitional action of central control, the entropy of thinking increases. Thus, we can conclude that the subject normally has a central instance for managing thinking and its organization.

In Search of Lost Weather: Temporal Reflexivity and Ecological Awareness in Participatory Performance

This article argues that temporal reflexivity in participatory performance practices can support the agency of participants by inviting them to compare past and future imaginings to inform creative action in the present. In contrast with contemporary forms of immersive performance which valorise the immediacy of presence, the article argues that immersive atmospheres that focus perception on the immanent moment of now can restrict creative volition. This proposition is developed with reference to Spinoza’s theory of affects which suggests that being driven by the affects of the present can render the human body passive. An alternative aesthetics of temporal reflexivity is presented through discussion of participatory performance projects using live action role-play drama that were designed and facilitated by the author during 2017-2018. Insights drawn from these projects suggest that a depth perspective on time can heighten participants’ awareness of relational connections within the atmospheric conditions of their play and expand their creative capacities to make their own atmospheres. The latter part of the article draws on Gregory Bateson’s theories of ecology to conclude that temporal reflexivity can enhance ecological awareness, enabling individuals to undertake volitional action to purposefully shape the atmospheres, or ecologies, that they play, and live, within.

КОМПОНЕНТИ ТА ПОКАЗНИКИ ПРИЙНЯТТЯ РІШЕННЯ КОМАНДИРОМ В УМОВАХ НЕВИЗНАЧЕНОСТІ

Introduction. The article examines the components and indicators of a commander's decision-making in conditions of uncertainty: emotional-volitional, cognitive and value-motivational, which play a decisive role in the commander's decision-making. The main functions implemented by the components, the consideration of which will predetermine the effectiveness of the implementation of this solution in a combat situation and in a situation of uncertainty, have been determined. Purpose. The purpose of the article is to determine the components and indicators that influence the decision of the commander in conditions of uncertainty. Methods. To achieve this goal, we used methods of analysis, comparison and generalization. Originality. The systematic analysis of the commander's decision-making in conditions of uncertainty allowed us to identify three main components that have specific characteristics and play a decisive role in the commander's decision-making in conditions of uncertainty: emotional-volitional component; cognitive component; value-motivational component. The main functions implemented by the components in decision making are identified. The main functions of emotional and volitional component are to control and regulate the volitional actions of the individual, associated with overcoming difficulties and barriers to decision-making, with the implementation of choices, including in situations of uncertainty. The main functions of the cognitive component of the decision-maker are: analysis of the characteristics of the situation (uncertainty, risk); analysis of available information and tracking insufficient for the implementation of the choice of solutions; analysis of barriers, difficulties of choice and personal resources to overcome them; rational assessment of the effectiveness of the choice, its implementation and consequences. The main functions of the value-motivational component are the control and regulation of motives, inclinations and actions of the individual in the choice and its successful implementation. The value-motivational component provides at the appropriate level of maintaining the activity of the commander and his focus on finding a choice and achieving goals in decision-making. Conclusion. Thus, the harmonious combination and interaction of all three components allows the commander to function effectively and facilitates the achievement of the goal in decision-making in conditions of uncertainty. In accordance with the identified components, further research in decision-making by commanders, we see in the definition of approaches and selection of psychodiagnostic tools to study the psychological features of decision-making commander in conditions of uncertainty and extreme situations.

Increasing Students' Long-Term Well-Being by Mandatory Intervention - A Positive Psychology Field Study.

Is it possible to help students experience increased well-being that proceeds by volitional actions from mandatory participation in interventions? The aim of this field study was to better understand the influence of expectancy, motivation, and well-being experiences during a positive activity intervention on long-term behavior change and long-term well-being. The study included 59 students enrolled in a course that included choosing a positive activity that they would plan for and implement in their lives for 6 weeks. The participants answered questionnaires before (pre-measure) and after the intervention (short-term measure), as well as an unannounced follow-up questionnaire 6 months later (long-term measure). Overall, the results indicate the importance of coexisting intrinsic motivation and high expectancy in the outcome and that the key driver of sustained volitional behavior change and experiencing long-term increased well-being is to experience increased well-being during the intervention. The results of the study show that it is possible to help students experience increased well-being that proceeds by volitional actions. The study shows that a mandatory positive activity intervention, including free choice of activity and course of action, can induce new long-term behaviors and long-term increased well-being.

Perception of Extreme Advertising by Young People (by the Example of Adrenaline Rush Commercials)

The article proves scientific and social importance of studying the impact of advertising on young people, and presents the results of an empirical research into peculiarities of young people’s perception of two popular Adrenaline Rush commercials that demonstrate extreme sportsmanship. Basing on the postulates of psychosemiotics and narrative psychology, the author makes a complex psychological analysis of the two promoting narratives. The study shows that the commercials have a high suggestive potential. The slogan “There’s nothing you can’t do!” addressed to the target audience is provocative and, according to the research hypothesis, is able to stimulate young people’s need for risky behavior, which they may demonstrate not in sports, but in life in the form of antisocial conduct. The empirical research involved a survey of 94 respondents including 70 university students and 24 senior pupils. Having watched each commercial, they tried to determine a potential volition action of the character by estimating on 1-10 scale every of the 50 variants to finish the sentence “He can do it”. The factor analysis of the numerical data enables the author to point out six factors that form semantic categories of potential actions, namely, the common, the humanist, the antisocial, the extreme, betrayal, and power. It is inferred that both commercials extensively stimulate readiness for antisocial conduct, and senior pupils are more affected than students are. Young people do not think critically when they hear the pitch for risky behavior, so, in their minds, the risk zone expands into the area of social destruction.

Item-Specificity and Intention in Episodic Memory.

Schmidt et al.’s (2020) PEP model accurately reflects the complexity of task switching based on bottom-up assumptions and episodic memory, re-evaluating the contribution of commonly presumed top-down processes. Extending it to long-term bindings and their item-specific effects could eludicate puzzling findings regarding the independence of long-term bindings between stimuli, responses, and task-specific categorizations as well as the relation between short-term and long-term bindings. Moreover, ideomotor theories of action control provide a bottom-up basis of incorporating volition and intentional action into the PEP model which is currently restricted to stimulus-based action.

Communication in Crises: How Dialogues Mediate Actions

Personnel from the armed forces, police, and health services are subject to split-second bias when interacting in crises, however, when it comes to communication and negotiations, deep knowledge about the dialogues is still unexplored. Our objective in this article is to achieve a better understanding of how emergency personnel use dialogue to mediate other peoples’ actions in critical situations, and how the new knowledge can help these professionals to increase their impact. Our research has been guided by the following research question: When in a crisis, how do emergency personnel’s utterances function as auxiliary stimuli to mediate other peoples’ higher-order thinking and voluntary action? Using a multiple case study design, emergency personnel from the armed forces, the police and the health services in Norway shared their experience from crises, encompassing three cases: (1) The Coaching in Crossfire, (2) The Axe Desperado and (3) The Still Face. Analysis of the qualitative data revealed the following findings, divided into five categories: (1) Unlocking Situations, (2) The Chain of Utterances, (3) The Impact of Auxiliary Stimulus, (4) The Mediation of Higher Mental Functions and (5) Renewed Volitional Action. We discuss our findings in the light of established perspectives associated with expertise, relations, emotions, and the Pygmalion Effect. Our research improves the knowledge on the potential of dialogue as a shared relational process, even when people are in a crisis situation. Thus, our research has practical implications for emergency personnel in relation to crisis management, as well as for human relations when a crisis suddenly occurs.

Double stimulation in healthcare emergencies: fostering expansive, collective tool use through simulation-based continuing professional education

ABSTRACT This paper explains how simulation-based continuing professional education can enable professionals to overcome significant challenges in healthcare practice. It focuses on pedagogies that address conflicts of motives experienced by teams at work by promoting collective use of protocols and an auxiliary motive to collaborate in agile, relational practices. Data relating to a simulation programme (PROBE) associated with reduced injuries in emergency birth situations are examined. The concept of double stimulation informs analysis of simulated scenarios and linked debriefs. PROBE transforms a commonly used protocol from a memory tool used by individuals to an ‘in-between’ tool used expansively and collectively across the birthing team. Crucial to this are diverse epistemic levels of mediation that enable teams to resolve conflicted, high-stakes situations through fluid, responsive interactions. Indications in the data that PROBE pedagogies foster transformative agency among health professionals are highlighted and discussed. The paper thus adds to understanding of how double stimulation as a principle of volitional action can be put to work in continuing professional education.

From volitional action to transformative agency: double stimulation in services for families with young children

ABSTRACT This article examines how transformative agency arises in families where parents are struggling with aspects of caring for young children. The mechanisms of how volitional action develops into transformative agency in everyday settings are not well understood. A fine-grained analysis of change is presented in the case of a parent who resolved difficulties relating to her daughter’s feeding. This case is situated within a broader dataset relating to diverse Australian parenting support services. Through double stimulation, parents used multiple auxiliary tools to construct new motives, enabling them to expand understandings and develop new possibilities for action. Evidence of transformative agency was apparent in longer trajectories in which the conditions of parenting were transformed. Relationships between expansive learning, double stimulation, and transformative agency are conceptualized dialectically, offering fresh insights into the dynamics of transformative agency ‘in the wild’.

An integrated analytical framework for analysing expansive learning in improved cook stove practice

Abstract This paper reveals relationships between four analytical frameworks, boundary interaction, reflexivity, transformative agency, and Sannino's reformulated Vygotskian double stimulation model in an Integrated Analytical Framework (IAF) used to analyse expansive learning processes via Boundary Crossing Change Laboratory Workshops in the development of will and volitional actions. I show how transformation emerges from expansive learning processes using two Transformative Pathways in Improved Cook Stove (ICS) practice in Chapita Village case study in Malawi. Introduction of ICSs in the traditional cooking practice generated conflict of motives within subjects of interacting activity systems. I used Cultural Historical Activity Theory (CHAT) to identify and analyse the conflict of motives using socio-cultural historical analysis and analysis of contradictions around learning, promotion, and utilisation of the ICS. Expansive learning processes triggered and supported participants' development of transformative agency, leading to collaborative decision implementation that transformed their activities via expressions of the IAF. The IAF demonstrates how transformation can also be analysed within CHAT framework beyond transformative agency tools. The paper provides a theoretically informed approach to analysis and recommends testing the IAF with different data sets for theory advancement as it consolidates frameworks, which are key in learning for sustainability and transformation of human activities.

СПЕЦИФІКА СХИЛЬНОСТІ ДО РИЗИКУ У ВІКОВІ КРИЗОВІ ПЕРІОДИ ОНТОГЕНЕЗУ

The problem of the specifics of risk propensity in age crisis periods of ontogenesis is analyzed in the article. The theoretical and methodological analysis of approaches to the study of the problem of risk in psychology, as well as the selection of its specific levels have been described. The generalization of different approaches made it possible to note that the problem of risk is a multifaceted phenomenon and is considered from two directions: as positive which is characterized by a certain driving force of progress in general and personal development, in particular, and as negative which lead to regression, loss, etc. Based on the selected approaches, as well as the results of the research, the authors will follow the understanding of risk as a specific emotional and volitional action that activates various mental functions that are aimed at overcoming a dangerous situation. The aim is to reveal the severity of risk and to identify certain dominant levels in the age crisis periods of ontogenesis. The latter include crises of adolescence (13-16), early adulthood (30-35) and midlife (45-50). The complex of psychodiagnostic techniques, both the author's development and other researchers have been used to identify certain levels of risk propensity. It has been empirically shown that excessive, high, medium and moderate risk is more evident in adolescent crisis; excessive, high and low risk – in the crisis of early adulthood; high, moderate and low risk – in the midlife crisis. It has been found that the dominance of the affective factor, which is expressed in the emotional non-acceptance of the situation of uncertainty, excitement and confidence in the situation of uncertainty, anger and embarrassment in a situation of danger and personal anxiety is most typical in the adolescent crisis. The dominance of motivational and regulatory risk factor, namely indicators of the pursuance of perfection and benefits, focus on action during the planning and implementation of activities, engagement with life events, achievement motivation is typical in early adulthood crisis. The dominance of the cognitive risk factor, where the most important are the abilities to quickly solve creative tasks and to be tolerant to uncertainty is typical in midlife crisis.

INTENTIONAL LEXICAL MEANINGS
 AS AN OBJECT OF RESEARCH

The article studies the linguistic research corpus, devoted to the expression of the meaning «volitional action» by means of the semantic structure of the lexical units representing the notion «intention». The main aim of the paper is to systematize
 the comprehensive data on the topic under study, coined since the early XXth century to the present day both in Russian linguistics and abroad. Analytical description
 of the theoretical sources is based on the five following criteria: the criterion of motivation for singling out a research object from the reality continuum, the criterion of terminology, the criterion of methodology, the criterion of categorial
 features of the object, the criterion of semantic individuality discriminating parts of the object. The research results in the conclusion that the approaches to lexical volition
 are isomorphic in terms of the most essential criteria – those of motivation for singling out a research object, methodology applied to it and its categorial features. Thus, in the papers considered the rationale for studying intentional lexical meanings
 is their anthropocentricity, the universal method of surveying them is componential analysis; the studied categorial features include intentionality, prospectivity, purposefulness, and agentivity. The controversies in the authors’ perspectives are also brought to light and treated as an object of new research, requiring the respective theoretical corpus, systematized in the present paper.

Agent-dependent modulation of corticospinal excitability during painful transcutaneous electrical stimulation

Pain has an inhibitory effect on the corticospinal excitability that has been interpreted as an evolutionary mechanism, directed to down-regulate cortical activity in order to facilitate rapid protective spinal reflexes. Here, we focused on the link between defensive mechanisms and motor system and we asked whether voluntary actions can modulate the corticospinal excitability during painful stimulations. To this aim, we manipulated the volition-related aspects of our paradigm by comparing conditions in which either the participant (self-generated action) or the experimenter (other-generated action) pressed the button to deliver painful high-intensity transcutaneous electric shocks to the right digit V. MEPs to TMS were recorded from the FDI and APB muscles of the stimulated hand. A compelling agent-dependent modulation of the corticospinal excitability was found, showing, in self-generated compared to other-generated actions, a significantly lower inhibitory effect, as measured by greater MEP amplitude. This finding suggests a top-down modulation of volitional actions on defensive mechanisms, promoting the view that predictive information from the motor system attenuates the responses to the foreseeable adverse events generated by one’s own actions as compared to unpredictable events generated by someone else’s actions.

Protecting Decision-Making in the Era of Neuromodulation

How humans make decisions is one of the primary domains of inquiry in psychology. Our ability to make decisions leads to direct consequences in our lives and defines one aspect of autonomous function. Among clinicians and researchers, the pursuit of effective cognitive enhancements and treatments that could directly or indirectly influence our decision processes has become widespread, since many of the neural circuits that we stimulate are involved in autonomous decision-making. Given rapid scientific developments, it is prudent to consider how neuromodulation could affect a person’s ability to make choices and manage trade-offs between decision outcomes. In light of this dilemma, we offer a framework based in decision neuroscience that separates brain networks into decision-making core, volitional action, and moderating systems. This framework bridges bioethics and cognitive neuroscience to provide heuristics for the neural basis of autonomous decision-making. In doing so, we provide a general call to predict and weight risks and benefits of different degrees and kinds with regard to decision-making as increasingly precise neuromodulation techniques emerge.

The Experience of Persons with Parkinson’s Disease: a Hermeneutic-Phenomenological Exploration

Abstract This study seeks to understand the subjective experience or lived world typical of patients with Parkinson’s disease (PD). It uses qualitative methodology, grounded in a hermeneutic-phenomenological perspective, to consider lived experience in a small sample of 7 individuals (4 published accounts, 3 subjects interviewed in depth). The analysis identified four themes that appear to be characteristic of the experience of PD: A) Denial, B) Emotion and symptom expression, C) Volitional and spontaneous action, and D) Alteration of temporal perspective. Concepts from existential-phenomenological philosophy (including the notions of “bad faith,” reflective versus pre-reflective experience, being-in-itself versus being-for-itself, and temporality) were used to reflect upon these themes to achieve a synthetic account of the subjective experience of PD. The findings of the study are compared to other findings in the phenomenological literature, and suggestions for further research are posed.

Pre-service teachers’ decision-making: Efforts to mediate learning with bilingual children with disabilities

Using Cultural Historical Activity Theory, this study explores how seven teacher candidates described the learning difficulties that bilingual children with disabilities experienced while learning in a bilingual afterschool program. This study also analyzes the volitional actions the candidates took as they aimed to achieve the fine balance between affording opportunities for compensation within “desirable difficulty” and ensuring there were no remaining barriers. We found that the candidates’ decision-making process, guided compensation, was highly complex and collective, and identified three forms of guided compensation: Cultivated, Renegotiated, and Pursued. We offer implications of these findings for researchers, teacher educators, and pre-service teachers.

Professional Self-Realization of Law Enforcement Officers at the Stage of Professional Training

The key concepts that assist to reflect the essence of the process of professional self-realization of police officers have been determined. The professional self-realization of the personality, which is determined by the value and sensory, intellectual and motivational features of the personality, has been studied. Modeling the experience of professional self-realization is the support of the personality for self-development of intellectual and volitional actions. This process is most productive in adolescence – at the time of completion of the development of readiness to choose a particular profession, defining oneself in a possible professional role. The main point of the studied process is the search for a professional image of “oneself”. It has been noted that the key stages of professional self-realization’s formation are: choice of educational institution, place of work (professional self-determination), subsequent choice of the type and direction of activity, formation within the chosen profession, professional growth, which reflects the effectiveness of professional self-realization. Thus, successful self-realization within the profession is based on a reasonable choice of place of study and future profession, continuous professional self-growth and self-development within labor activity, as well as satisfaction with the way of professional life and career. It has been studied that the development of the value sphere of the personality of law enforcement officers contributes to the optimization of their behavior and self-realization in such spheres of life as profession, family life, relationships, hobbies. The motivational component is one of the basic in the system of moral regulation of activities and behavior of professionals and includes a positive attitude to the chosen type of professional activity, the desire for self-realization and achievement, moral and professional attitudes and interests. Motivation acts as a link between the true goals, ideals, beliefs of the cadet and the actions, deeds, decisions he makes. The author has proved the expediency of forming value regulators of behavior and motivational sphere of future law enforcement officers in higher educational institutions with specific learning conditions, which may increase the efficiency of professional activity and self-realization of police officers in modern conditions.

Zen Buddhist and Christian Views of Causality: A Comparative Analysis

This article presents a new approach to Japanese Zen Buddhism, alternative to its traditional views, which lack exact definitions of the relation between the meditator and the Buddha’s ultimate cause, dharma. To this end, I offer a comparative analysis between Zen Buddhist and Christian views of causality from the medieval to early modern periods. Through this, human causation with dharma in the Zen Buddhist meditations can be better defined and understood. Despite differences between religious traditions in deliberating human causal accounts, there are parallel ways of thinking and practicing between Christian and Buddhist meditators. Firstly, I reconstruct three sorts of Christian scholastic theories of creaturely causality: conservationism (realist or active view of our volitional action), occasionalism (passive view), and concurrentism (interactive view). Secondly, Zen Buddhist doctrines are introduced by placing particular emphasis on dharma as causal agency. Focusing on the Japanese Zen practice of meditation (zazen), finally I expound two theories of human causality: Sōtō Zen quasi-occasionalism following Master Dōgen’s teaching of enlightenment (satori), and Rinzai Zen quasi-concurrentism given the meditator’s interactive kōan practice. Hence, my comparative analysis explains why religious beings are causally active, passive, or interactive in relation to the first agency, God or dharma, whereby systematically establishing alternative definitions of human causality in Zen Buddhism.