Five studies investigated (a) children’s ability to use the dependent and independent probabilities of events to make causal inferences and (b) the interaction between such inferences and domain-specific knowledge. In Experiment 1, preschoolers used patterns of dependence and independence to make accurate causal inferences in the domains of biology and psychology. Experiment 2 replicated the results in the domain of biology with a more complex pattern of conditional dependencies. In Experiment 3, children used evidence about patterns of dependence and independence to craft novel interventions across domains. In Experiments 4 and 5, children’s sensitivity to patterns of dependence was pitted against their domain-specific knowledge. Children used conditional probabilities to make accurate causal inferences even when asked to violate domain boundaries. The past two decades of research have demonstrated that young children understand cause and effect in a wide range of contexts. By the age of 4, children’s folk physics includes knowledge about the causal relationship between object properties and object motion

Progress towards understanding human behavior has been hindered by discipline-bound theories, dividing our efforts. Fortunately, these separate endeavors are converging and can be effectively integrated. Focusing on the fundamental features of Picoeconomics, Expectancy, Cumulative Prospect Theory, and Need Theory, Temporal Motivational Theory (TMT) is constructed. TMT appears consistent with the major findings from many other investigations, including psychobiology. Potential applications of TMT are numerous, including: consumer behavior, aggression, stock market, and governmental behavior.

The discovery of selective associability of cues in classical (Pavlovian) conditioning has often been treated as an embarrassment to Pavlov, because he has been represented as a proponent of the “equivalence of associability of cues. ” According to that doctrine, except for the influence of differences in stimulus intensity, all environmental stimuli are equally susceptible to becoming conditioned stimuli (CSs) if they are arranged in a suitable time-relation to any effective unconditioned stimulus (US). The current paper asks whether Pavlov explicitly made such a claim and, if not, whether he could have endorsed equivalence of associability. Scientific controversy, the role that “the classics” play in scientific specialties, and the emblematic standing of the founding figures of a discipline or specialty constitute a framework for discussion of Pavlov’s stand on the equivalence of associability. Key Words: Pavlov, history of psychology, Scientific controversy 115

this article.

The scientific study of animal learning began with a division between experimenters who argued that learning should be studied with reference to natural problems confronting the organism (the ecological approach), and those who attempted to isolate learning from its natural context by using arbitrary stimuli, responses, and circumstances (the arbitrary approachl). Although the arbitrary approach dominated subsequent research, it failed to consider the functional organization of stimuli and responses that underlies and precedes learning. This paper outlines and tests a functional behavior system model that emphasizes the contribution of the organism's ecology (selection environment) to learning. According to this model, learned behavior is determined by preorganized probabilistic relations among stimuli, behaviors, and physiological states, as well as by the manipulations of the experimenter. The data reported support the behavior system model as an important addition to traditional approaches to the study of learned behavior. 1 A brief history of the experimental study of learning

Organized groups face a fundamental problem of how to distribute resources fairly. We found people view it as less fair to distribute resources equally when the allocated resource invokes the market by being a medium of exchange than when the allocated resource is a good that holds value in use. These differences in fairness can be attributed to being a medium of exchange, and not to other essential properties of money (i.e., being a unit of account or a store of value). These findings suggest that egalitarian outcomes have a greater likelihood of being accepted as fair when the resources being distributed take the form of in-kind goods rather than of cash transfers.