Identity (Philosophical concept)

Only The Body Remembers is a collection of poems, lyric essays, and short stories
that explore several subjects, including love (both romantic and familial), loss, grief,
sexuality, identity, and obsession. The primary thematic thread that binds this collection
together is somatic memory -- the way the body records experiences, and the strong
emotional charge these recorded experiences carry.

The current research investigated the effects of competition on empathy and
prosociality in two studies. Study 1 aimed to explore associations between competition
and prosociality by asking participants to play a computer puzzle game that was either
high or low on competitiveness, and then to complete measures of empathy, perspective
taking, compassionate love and willingness to sacrifice for a romantic partner. Study 1
found a marginally significant difference across conditions for perspective taking, a
marginally significant gender interaction for perspective taking, and a significant gender
by condition interaction for compassionate love, in support of hypotheses that
competition reduces prosocial responses in men. Study 2 addressed methodological
limitations from Study 1 and examined the effect across a broader range of relationship
contexts, including close friends. Results for Study 2 did not replicate the marginally significant effect for perspective taking seen in Study 1, but found a significant
interaction between gender and condition predicting perspective taking. Significant
findings in line with prior research emerged for dominance and commitment, indicating
that higher dominance and lower commitment were associated with less empathy and
prosociality. Overall, results do not consistently support the hypothesized effect of
competitive situations on prosocial and empathic behavior, although results of
exploratory analyses suggest potential moderated or conditional effects.

How one behaves after interacting with a friend may not be the same as before
the interaction began What factors a ect the formation of social interactions
between people and, once formed, how do social interactions leave lasting changes on
individual behavior? In this dissertation, a thorough review and conceptual synthesis
is provided Major features of coordination dynamics are demonstrated with
examples from both the intrapersonal and interpersonal coordination literature that
are interpreted via a conceptual scheme, the causal loops of coordination dynamics
An empirical, behavioral study of interpersonal coordination was conducted to
determine which spontaneous patterns of coordination formed and whether a remnant
of the interaction ensued ("social memory") To assess social memory in dyads, the
behavior preceding and following episodes of interaction was compared In the
experiment, pairs of people sat facing one another and made continuous flexion-extension finger movements while a window acted as a shutter to control
whether partners saw each other's movements Thus, vision ("social contact") allowed
spontaneous information exchange between partners through observation Each trial consisted of three successive intervals lasting twenty seconds: without social contact
("me and you"), with social contact ("us"), and again without ("me and you")
During social contact, a variety of patterns was observed ranging from phase coupling
to transient or absent collective behavior Individuals also entered and exited social
coordination differently In support of social memory, compared to before social
contact, after contact ended participants tended to remain near each other's
movement frequency Furthermore, the greater the stability of coupling, the more
similar the partners' post-interactional frequencies were Proposing that the
persistence of behavior in the absence of information exchange was the result of prior
frequency adaptation, a mathematical model of human movement was implemented
with Haken-Kelso-Bunz oscillators that reproduced the experimental findings, even
individual dyadic patterns Parametric manipulations revealed multiple routes to
persistence of behavior via the interplay of adaptation and other HKB model
parameters The experimental results, the model, and their interpretation form the
basis of a proposal for future research and possible therapeutic applications

Self-concept clarity and grit are important constructs in the self-concept and selfregulation
domains. Though distinct in their focus on identity and goal processes, self-concept
clarity and grit similarly emphasize the extent to which self-views and goal-perseverance are
strong, clear, consistent, and unshakeable. We hypothesized self-knowledge and goalperseverance
may be mutually reinforcing given the role of self-knowledge in directing goal
pursuit, and of goal pursuit in structuring the self-concept. The present study tested this
hypothesis in the form of whether self-concept clarity and grit reciprocally influence one other
across time, and was conducted using a daily diary design with 97 college-aged participants
across several weeks. Data were analyzed using multilevel cross-lagged panel modeling. Results
indicated daily self-concept clarity and grit both had positive influences on each other across
time, while controlling for their previous values. The reciprocal influences were also symmetric:
self-concept clarity and grit had equally strong influences on each other. The results of the present
study are the first to indicate the existence of reinforcing feedback loops between self-concept
clarity and grit, and to demonstrate that fluctuations in self-knowledge trigger fluctuations in goal
resolve, and vice versa. The results suggest the two are, in part, both causes and consequences of
one another.

Within the Caribbean, the islands of Guadeloupe and Martinique are unusual: they are French overseas departments and thus also European Union members. As such, they must assimilate to French national culture even though their heterogeneous populations, mainly descendants of exploited imported labour, have their own unique island identity. Their heavy economic dependence on France and the effects of modernization and globalization pose further identitarian challenges for them. Franco-Antillean literature clearly reflects this long-standing identity confusion. This thesis explores two very recent novels— Toxic Island by Guadeloupean Ernest Pépin and L’Empreinte à Crusoé by Martinican Patrick Chamoiseau— and their divergent stylistic treatments of individuation. Both are inspired by Édouard Glissant’s theories of Relation and Tout- Monde; both engage questions of language, orality, the island space, race, the subject of alterity and the role of the arts and artists in identity formation. Yet both are also marked by distinctly unique forms of ambivalence.

Children exhibit neotenous, or physically immature, features, such as a large
rounded head relative to body size, adult-sized eyes, round cheeks, a small chin, and a
short narrow nose. Bowlby (1969) and others (Eibl-Eibesfeldt, 1989; Hrdy, 2005)
propose that, in species whose young depend on care from an adult, these features could enhance offspring survival. Lorenz (1943) argued that adult humans are particularly attracted to these features, and that these characteristics, which he termed
Kindchenschema or “baby schema,” trigger a cognitive system that processes and reacts specifically to infantile features for the purpose of enhancing motivation to engage in caretaking behaviors. The goal of the studies proposed here is to examine the behavioral, attentional, and emotional effects of baby schema.

Prosocial behavior can be defined as any behavior that an individual engages in to
benefit another (Eisenberg, Fabes, & Spinrad, 2006). Prosociality is not one homogenous trait, however, but is made up of three specific types of behavior: helping, cooperating, and sharing (or, more accurately, donating) (Tomasello, 2009). Although helping and cooperating are important to understanding prosocial development, giving behaviors might be particularly informative when trying to understand prosociality in young children as it poses a distinct problem for younger children (Tomasello, 1998). Research on proximate causes of prosocial behavior state that these behaviors are influenced by emotions of empathy (Batson, 1991), theory of mind, or understanding of social norms of ownership (Blake & Rand, 2010). Research on more ultimate causes of prosociality suggest that these behaviors evolved due to mechanisms or kin selection (Hamilton, 1964) and inclusive fitness (Trivers, 1971), and is evident by the effect of social category and relatedness on donations in resource- allocation games (Gummerum et al., 2009). Research with children using resource- allocations games, such as the dictator game, are sparse, but typically find that children donate more as they get older, and that out-group receive fewer allocations than in-group members (Moore, 2009). This research also highlight the importance of anonymity and its effect on prosociality. When tested using an anonymous design, children donate less and some children don’t donate at all (Benenson et al., 2007).
Using an anonymous dictator game, children’s giving behaviors were examined
across in- group, out-group, and family members. Thirty-five children (12 3-year-olds (7
male), 13 4-year-olds (8 male), and 10 5-year-olds (7 male) completed the experiment.
Each child participated in each condition, as well as measures of theory of mind and
ownership understanding. Children’s empathy scores were attained from a parent questionnaire regarding children’s empathic behaviors. Results revealed that some children did not donate any stickers at all; seven in total, and that these children differed significantly from those that gave on measures of empathy. Of those that donated, 3-year-old children donated significantly more than 5-year-old children (F(1,3) =3.64, p < .05). This is contrary to previous findings which find that giving increases across age., The was no main effect for Recipient, and no significant interaction between Age and Recipient. Five-year-olds scored significantly higher on measures of ownership understanding (F(2, 25) = 4.36, p< .05), suggesting that understanding of social norms of ownership may be partially responsible for their decrease in overall giving.