Laboratoire Psychologie de la Perception

Introduction : Eco-anxiety is a rising concern among the population due to the impacts of climate change on our environment. This anxiety can lead to mental and emotional stress, potentially affecting individuals' mental health. Objectives : To investigate the social representation of this societal phenomenon and its intergenerational differences. Methods : The structuring of the social representation was conducted using the hierarchical verbal association method, a prototypical analysis, and a similarity analysis. Results : The findings suggest that, on one hand, eco-anxiety is subject to a structured social representation and, on the other hand, there is variability in this representation based on the generation to which one belongs at the time of the study. Conclusion : The representation of eco-anxiety is structurally different across generations, highlighting a greater significance of this phenomenon for the younger cohorts. Communication strategies and awareness campaigns about the impacts of climate change on our societies can benefit from considering these differences.

This paper intends to analyze the question of the embodied subjectivity in Emmanuel Levinas’s work, starting from a specific point of view: the controversial reception of Husserl’s phenomenology. In the early period of his confrontation with Husserl, Levinas criticizes the excess of theoreticism in transcendental idealism. However, he then seems to discover right inside of it the conditions to bring the philosophical debate out of the limits of knowledge theory. This is when he recognizes the important role played by the body in the husserlian description of the act of sense-giving (Sinngebung). Though, while praising Husserl for his conception of sensibility – as the “Commentaires nouveaux” clearly show – Levinas actually proceeds to an original rethinking of the meaning of incarnation, beyond the purity of the ego, and the supposed “property” of the flesh.

This study investigated the potential for the development of a new perceptual experience through sustained training with a sensory augmentation device. For this purpose, we developed (1) a new sensory augmentation device, the NaviEar, and (2) a battery of tests for automaticity in the use of the device. The NaviEar translates cardinal direction into sound. Because the signal of this device is comparatively simple and easy to interpret it should facilitate automatization of use. The test battery assesses different effects of automaticity (interference, rigidity of responses, dynamic integration) assuming that automaticity is a necessary criterion to show the emergence of perceptual feel, i.e. the sensory quality of a percept. We measured performance in simple training tasks, administered the tests for automaticity, and assessed subjective reports through a questionnaire. Results suggest that the NaviEar is easy and comfortable to use and has a potential for applications in real-world situations; but 5-day training with the NaviEar does not reach levels of automaticity that are indicative of perceptual feel. We propose that the test battery for automaticity may be used as a benchmark test for the possibility of perceptual feel in sensory augmentation and in sensory substitution.

The aim of this present study is to investigate the influence of three learning contexts on the development of motor creativity of young footballers (8–9 years old). In team sport, creativity is a fundamental issue because it allows players to adapt in an environment of high social uncertainty. To carry out this work, we suggest a method for assessing motor creativity into ecological situations based on the analysis of praxical communications. Creativity originates from an interaction between divergence and convergence. In our case, the number of communications (fluidity) and the diversity of updated communications (flexibility) are our divergence indicators. Convergence, understood as the ability to make good decisions, is assessed by two expert judges (R > 0.90). Sixty boys’ football players (M = 8.67; SD = 0.3) coming from three football clubs participated in this research. The study lasted 2 years. Each year, a team of 10 players from each club participated in the research twice a week for 32 weeks (8 months), these groups attended different training sessions: (a) the control group (n = 20) followed a classical learning; (b) the decoding group (n = 20) attended training focused on learning the praxemes of football; (c) the traditional sporting games group (n = 20) followed a training session that was jointly focused on praxemes and the practice of traditional sporting games. The motor creativity of players and groups was assessed both at the beginning and at the end of the year during football matches. Compared to the control group, in the post-test, the group with the highest fluidity is the decoding group (p < 0.001) and the one with the highest fluidity is the traditional sporting games group. The latter group is also the one with the best convergence (p < 0.001). The results showed that traditional games can help develop players’ creative abilities. This research invites us to investigate the complementarity between the different offered training.

Deux réflexions générales introduisent cet article sur les relations de l’enfant en situation de handicap avec ses pairs à l’école. La première part de l’idée que « grandir c’est se séparer ». La seconde concerne les sentiments contradictoires que suscite l’enfant « différent » et le « regard monstrueux » qui est souvent porté sur lui. L’auteure expose alors un cas clinique montrant comment, chez une petite fille fragilisée par des relations précoces difficiles, l’apparence physique va susciter des réactions violentes de la part des autres enfants à l’école. Les entretiens qu’elle a menés avec des enseignants exerçant en section d’enseignement général et professionnel adapté ( segpa) ou en unité localisée pour l’inclusion scolaire ( ulis) lui permettent de présenter ensuite leurs observations sur les relations de l’enfant porteur d’un handicap avec ses pairs (valides ou handicapés) au collège et à l’école primaire. L’auteure s’attarde ensuite sur la cour de récréation, lieu ouvert à la décharge motrice et au débordement pulsionnel qui peuvent être inquiétants pour un enfant fragile. Quelles sont les stratégies que ce dernier sera amené à développer ? Enfin est exposée une approche constructive des bêtises qui peuvent contribuer au développement de l’autonomie et de la construction de soi.

How the perception of shadows, studied by vision scientists and visual artists, reveals the inner workings of the visual system. In The Visual World of Shadows, Roberto Casati and Patrick Cavanagh examine how the perception of shadows, as studied by vision scientists and visual artists, reveals the inner workings of the visual system. Shadows are at once a massive problem for vision—which must distinguish them from objects or material features of objects—and a resource, signaling the presence, location, shape, and size of objects. Casati and Cavanagh draw up an inventory of information retrievable from shadows, showing their amazing variety. They present an overview of the visual system, distinguishing between measurement and inference. They discuss the shadow mission, the work done by the visual brain to parse, and perhaps discard, the information from shadows; shadow ownership, the association of a shadow with the object that casts it; shadow labeling, the visual system's ability to tell shadows from nonshadows; and the shadow concept, our knowledge about shadows as a category. Casati and Cavanagh then apply the theoretical apparatus they have developed for shadows to other phenomena: illumination, reflection, and transparency. Finally, they examine the art of the shadow, paying tribute to artists' exploration of shadow, analyzing a series of artworks (reproduced in color) from a rich and fascinating art historical corpus.

Artificial grammar learning (AGL) paradigms have proven to be productive and useful to investigate how young infants break into the grammar of their native language(s). The question of when infants first show the ability to learn abstract grammatical rules has been central to theoretical debates about the innate vs. learned nature of grammar. The presence of this ability early in development, that is, before considerable experience with language, has been argued to provide evidence for a biologically endowed ability to acquire language. Artificial grammar learning tasks also allow infant populations to be readily compared with adults and non-human animals. Artificial grammar learning paradigms with infants have been used to investigate a number of linguistic phenomena and learning tasks, from word segmentation to phonotactics and morphosyntax. In this review, we focus on AGL studies testing infants' ability to learn grammatical/structural properties of language. Specifically, we discuss the results of AGL studies focusing on repetition-based regularities, the categorization of functors, adjacent and non-adjacent dependencies, and word order. We discuss the implications of the results for a general theory of language acquisition, and we outline some of the open questions and challenges.