The ideology of neuroscience and intellectual disability: reconstituting the ‘disordered’ brain

During the last two or three decades, neuroscience has changed how we understand brain functioning. This shift, which is re-conceptualizing the relationship between the materiality of the brain and consciousness, is bound to have implications for intellectual disability, which is commonly seen as a condition of the brain. At present, examinations of intellectual disability that deploy techniques and concepts from neuroscience constitute a growing research field that has been welcomed in some quarters of the disability research community. The purpose of this article is to urge for caution as regards this development. I argue that the neuroscience of intellectual disability is embodying ideological propositions that need to be problematized. By theorizing the relationship between biology and politics and examining neuroscientific publications on intellectual disability, I argue that this strand of research is underpinned by a discursive division between normal and pathological, that it therefore constitutes a continuation of understanding intellectual disability as a ‘disorder’ and that any firm separation between the ‘nature’ of intellectual disability and processes of power is inherently problematic. To be able to critically approach the neuroscience of intellectual disability, it is vital that disability researchers problematize the relationship between biology and politics.     

Testing for normally in censored regressions

This paper derives a Lagrange Multiplier test for normality in censored regressions. The test is derived against the generalized log-gamma distribution, in which normal is a special case. The resulting test statistic coincides to some extent with previously suggested score and conditional moment tests. Estimation of the variance is performed by using the matrix of second order derivatives in order to get an easy to use test statistic. Small sample performance of the test is studied and compared to other tests by Monte Carlo experiments.     

Health care reform and older adults: notes from the Polish experience

Poland enacted in 1997 legislation that founded a health care system in which health insurance societies contract with providers to deliver health services to the insured population. Through a review of the new statutes, interviews with key informants, analysis of public opinion polls and surveys of insurance administrators and health care workers, we examined the impact of reform on Poland's older citizens. The findings indicate that older adults are likely to be adversely affected by the inadequacies of insurance premiums as a source of finance, the lack of emergent private medical enterprise, and the failure to eradicate private health in its earlier, black market incarnation.     

Gender and climate action

Population and Environment - It is well-known that men and women differ in their views regarding the severity of climate change, but do they also differ in their support for climate policy and in...     

Leadership as social identity management: Introducing the Identity Leadership Inventory (ILI) to assess and validate a four-dimensional model

Although nearly two decades of research have provided support for the social identity approach to leadership, most previous work has focused on leaders' identity prototypicality while neglecting the assessment of other equally important dimensions of social identity management. However, recent theoretical developments have argued that in order to mobilize and direct followers' energies, leaders need not only to ‘be one of us’ (identity prototypicality), but also to ‘do it for us’ (identity advancement), to ‘craft a sense of us’ (identity entrepreneurship), and to ‘embed a sense of us’ (identity impresarioship). In the present research we develop and validate an Identity Leadership Inventory (ILI) that assesses these dimensions in different contexts and with diverse samples from the US, China, and Belgium. Study 1 demonstrates that the scale has content validity such that the items meaningfully differentiate between the four dimensions. Studies 2, 3, and 4 provide evidence for the scale's construct validity (distinguishing between dimensions), discriminant validity (distinguishing identity leadership from authentic leadership, leaders' charisma, and perceived leader quality), and criterion validity (relating the ILI to key leadership outcomes). We conclude that by assessing multiple facets of leaders' social identity management the ILI has significant utility for both theory and practice.     

Micro-Genetic Development of Timing in a Child

The purpose of this study is to analyze the micro-genesis of a child’s appropriation of timing. The data consist of video observations from a primary classroom with a focus on one child (7 years old) participating in a musical activity. The results show that the teacher scaffolds the child in several steps: from establishing a platform for participation in the activity, via demonstration to explanation. The child goes from being uncoordinated with the teacher to being able to play in time with her. The meta-issue of how to represent developmental processes in research is discussed.     

Trade openness and income inequality: New empirical evidence

We examine how trade openness influences income inequality within countries. The sample includes 139 countries over the period 1970–2014. We employ predicted openness as instrument to deal with the endogeneity of trade openness. The effect of trade openness on income inequality differs across countries. Trade openness tends to disproportionately benefit the relative income shares of the very poor, but not necessarily all poor, in emerging and developing economies. In most advanced economies, trade openness increased income inequality, an effect that is driven by outliers. Our results suggest a strong effect of trade openness on inequality in China and transition countries.