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This paper discusses the assemblage of over 20,000 glass beads and several kilograms of production waste excavated from Igbo-Olokun, southwest Nigeria. It presents the classificatory model adopted to understand the physical attributes of the assemblage for comparison and to begin developing the first West African glass bead series. While most glass beads in the archaeological context in West Africa are designated 'exotic' with, sometimes, a degree of modification to meet local tastes and values, the assemblage from Igbo-Olokun presents a case of 'total' local production and provides a unique opportunity for the reconstruction of the chaîne opératoire of glass beads in Ile-Ife. Combining results from the classification and the chemical composition of the beads and waste, this paper argues that the Ile-Ife HLHA glass bead forms a series that warrants fuller consideration in West African archaeology. Understanding the production, consumption and broader distribution of this series allows a robust discussion on the 'glass bead roads', i.e. the commercial networks that criss-crossed the West African region. This notion of 'glass bead roads' moves the analysis of archaeological beads away from the realm of mere exotics or objects of personal adornment and places them instead at the centre of discourses of regional interaction, affirming their agency in the early commercial networks in West Africa. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This paper investigates the integration of social justice in mathematics teaching in Pakistani classrooms. It has been widely observed that mathematics lessons usually focus on factual recall and procedural fluency which do not promote students' capability of using mathematics for critical analysis of societal practices. Therefore, critical mathematics education makes an effort to shift the focus of mathematics teaching from procedural fluency to thinking critically about mathematical concepts, understanding the socio-political context of mathematics, and promoting a more inclusive and equitable learning environment. Hence, this approach recognizes that mathematics is not a neutral subject but is influenced by cultural, social, and historical factors. Like many countries, Pakistan also views education as a prerequisite for fighting poverty, improving living standards, and eliminating all forms of discrimination. So, these purposes of education can be better achieved by developing a sense of awareness and importance of social issues among students. Therefore, this action research explored the integration of the concepts of social justice in teaching mathematics. Consequently, the study incorporated a range of mathematical concepts such as percentages, fractions, and decimals to engage students in discussion, debate, and thinking to explore alternatives to address the inequalities prevalent in the society. The study concludes that social justice pedagogy allows students to explore mathematics beyond the classrooms, develop a deeper understanding of mathematical concepts, and acquire knowledge to become critical individuals. Moreover, integrating social justice issues into teaching mathematics has potential to help students develop an awareness of social inequality and a sense of social agency. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Thinking of absence as the object of a photographic image not only invites us to shift our perspective of interpretation but also poses a technological challenge. This article seeks to explore the phenomenon of the journey of absence through pixels, establishing a dialogue between the technical concepts of digital photographic production and philosophical reflections of absence, in order to talk about its behavior in the image with identifiable and concrete instances. As a result, it provides us with a tool that contributes to breaking the paradigm that poses an equivalence between physical presences and historical evidence in the context of visual narratives. By undertaking an archaeological reading of four photographs -- by four different photographers as well as different contexts of conflict--we seek technical analogies to understand how the absence present in the photographed scene inoculates the pixels of the final image. To this end, we propose to extend the notion of the pixel to the journey that unfolds between the capture and the representation of a scene. In this perspective, the pixel is not only an element in the digital storage strategy but also a participant in the whole image process. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Although the issue of innovation is widely recognized in many scientific disciplines, innovators themselves have received scant attention in research literature. The aim of this study is to explore the experience of innovators from the perspective of the social agency paradigm developed by Margaret Archer, which suggests that structural and cultural properties affect individual reflexivity through the accessibility of resources and the beliefs that agents endorse. Data was collected through individual in-depth interviews with Polish innovators, revealing that they function in an entrepreneurial culture with ease in establishing networking relations. However, institutions in the national innovation system continue to reflect post-Soviet hierarchies, creating a division between those who have access to resources and those who do not. The study supports the hypothesis that post-Soviet culture is a factor in determining the low innovation level in Poland. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

In an earlier period of migration studies, young people were overlooked, but scholars later began to study their position and perspective. Within the transnational family they are often studied as "abandoned" in the country of origin or as reunified with parent(s) in the country of immigration. Nevertheless, in both cases parents are seen as decision-makers whether young people will migrate or stay. A different angle provides studies of independent child migration or unaccompanied minors from Africa or Latin America. These young people are capable of developing their agency to the extent that they can migrate alone and neglect negotiation with parents as a result of conflict or different objectives. This article elaborates this topic and shows that growing-up adults from Western Ukraine (15–16 years-old when migrated) are also social agents, capable of triggering their own migration independently of parents as a consequence of experience from short-term stays in the country of immigration, as well as meritocratic principles and distinct generational outlooks. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Copyright of Zeszyty Naukowe KUL is the property of John Paul II Catholic University of Lublin, Wydawnictwo KUL and its content may not be copied or emailed to multiple sites or posted to a listserv without the copyright holder's express written permission. However, users may print, download, or email articles for individual use. This abstract may be abridged. No warranty is given about the accuracy of the copy. Users should refer to the original published version of the material for the full abstract. (Copyright applies to all Abstracts.)

This article reassesses the notion of personal identity over time from a Heideggerian perspective, aiming to bridge the conceptual gap between concerns for personhood and continuity. Traditional approaches, including the psychological and moral approaches to the self, often inadequately address the relationship between personhood and temporal continuity. This article establishes an understanding of personhood as social agency, contending that this perspective encompasses both conceptual dimensions central to the question of personal identity over time. Following an initial exploration of the problem (§ 2), a concept of social agency rooted in Heidegger's notion of Dasein is developed in comparison with alternative conceptions of personhood (§ 3). Subsequently, drawing on Arthur Danto's philosophy of history, Heidegger's perspective on personal identity over time is examined with a focus on historicity (§ 4). Lastly, this account is compared with contemporary views on personhood and identity over time (§ 5) [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The scale of the consequences caused by Russia’s aggression against Ukraine inevitably leads to reflections on the collective responsibility of Russian citizens. The philosophical justification of collective responsibility is still problematic. The main issues under debate are the possibility of the existence of collective social agents and collective guilt as a basis for imposing responsibility. This article proposes to look at the activities of the European Court of Human Rights as a practice of collective responsibility in international law. The activities of the European Court of Human Rights can serve as a practical benchmark for assessing certain theoretical positions. Important historical experience is provided by the practice of holding the international military tribunal in Nuremberg (Germany, November 20, 1945 – October 1, 1946), which had the status of an international court over the military and political leadership of Nazi Germany – known as the Nuremberg Trials. With this practical example of collective responsibility in mind, the study proposes to conduct a selective reverse review of the philosophical views of Hannah Arendt and Karl Jaspers. The study demonstrates that although the reflections of these philosophers were not without certain flaws, Arendt and Jaspers, focusing mainly on different aspects, were able to offer a generally sound justification for collective responsibility. Their proposed justification can serve as a foundation for further developments in this area. The practical significance of this conclusion is that it may give impetus to the development of new legal mechanisms of collective responsibility of the Russians for the consequences of their unjustified aggression against Ukraine. Such collective responsibility has not only legal, but also moral and political dimensions, and is also a component of the so-called social «educational process» (Lernprozess).

Grounded in a conceptual framework incorporating intersectionality, motivation, self-determination, and self-efficacy, this empirical study investigated how individuals' identities, mindsets, and resources in educational environments intentionally cultivated to support their decision-making, development, and connections in the science community, can significantly increase the recruitment, persistence, and success of low-income, academically talented science students from diverse backgrounds. Several factors—academic performance in coursework, self-image, self-agency, financial support, and social integration in the science culture—continue to significantly impact student retention and persistence in STEM disciplines. Many of these factors are negatively affected based on a students' intersecting identities, which can be detrimental to their academic success if not addressed. We found that additional considerations to factor in concerning low-income students from diverse backgrounds that is pertinent to supporting their persistence and success in the postsecondary STEM educational context. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This research analyzes the professional mobility and cultural change of young tseltals from Chiapas, Mexico, men and women, who study at the upper secondary level of Oxchuc, a municipality with important social changes since the fifties of the last century due to the policies of school education at the national level and that currently affect the professional aspirations of young people. The qualitative approach of the research was used, interviews with these young people and an analysis of categories in the tseltal language and identified in the field diary were also produced. This analysis was related to the theoretical concepts of cultural resignification (Molina, 2013), professional mobility (Bonnewitz, 2006), family strategies, capital mobilization (Bourdieu, 2002) and social agency (Sen, 2000a). It is concluded that there is a change of professional aspiration from parents to sons and daughters and a slow professional mobility that have generated a cultural change due to the school education of young people. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The COVID-19 pandemic has hindered the effectiveness of museum management and curatorship, a growing concern for the movement of international heritage conservation. Accordingly, this participatory action research explores the emergence of the Museum of World Languages at Shanghai International Studies University during the COVID-19 pandemic. By drawing insights from Pierre Bourdieu's concepts of symbolic power and social agency in the new museology, this paper explores the educative, social, and political roles of the new language museum and the experiences of student curators with the new language museum. This paper promotes scholarly conversations about the curatorial narration of the language halls, the new coordinator's responsibility, curatorial philosophy, experiential learning, social responsibility, political savvy, and intercultural communication and digital literacy competencies among the student curators. This study enhances the theoretical rigor and provides practical action agendas for diverse stakeholders in higher education administration and museum management beyond the COVID-19 pandemic. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

A study case in a village in Colombia illustrates the contemporary tension between local lifestyle and global/transnational models. Hundreds of petroglyphs, probably made in prehispanic times, started to be widely valued by the local community when large-scale mining companies were attempting to enter into their lands. These petroglyphs have been resignified since then as Cultural heritage, a term coined officially by UNESCO, and adopted and enriched by the local community in order to strengthen their own fight defending their territory against the large-scale mining and other economic activities such as monoculture farming. The process of local resistance is an ongoing process. The community have been working together since then and they have gained relevant achievements in terms of political participation and self-determination for governance linking the cultural, historical, social and environmental issues. In other terms, thanks to the risks they have had to face they have been developing their own economic and social alternatives for living as a way of social resistance. This case, even if it is a sign of people’s agency concerning their sovereignty and autonomy as a political group, it is also an expression of the geopolitics of colonialism that still operates even in the so-called postcolonial times, being the extractivist economy one of its main mechanisms.

Objective: This article describes the increase of publications in the area of psychobiography, thereby analysing the trends in the articles published in the special issue on psychobiography and social agency and activism. It further highlights the specific approaches taken by autobiographers who write psychobiographical accounts of extraordinary individuals and "everyday heroes" in their attempt of creating social impact in specific socio‐cultural groups, societies or even on a global level. Method: This is a conceptional article which comments on the trends presented in this special issue. Results: This article presents a discussion of the special issue and its impact. Conclusions: New trends in psychobiography are discussed and show the way forward for psychobiography. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Copyright of Psychosozial is the property of Psychosozial-Verlag GmbH & Co. KG and its content may not be copied or emailed to multiple sites or posted to a listserv without the copyright holder's express written permission. However, users may print, download, or email articles for individual use. This abstract may be abridged. No warranty is given about the accuracy of the copy. Users should refer to the original published version of the material for the full abstract. (Copyright applies to all Abstracts.)

Since 2017, Committee for Justice has been working on monitoring and verifying human rights violations inside Egyptian prisons and places of detention under its project «Detention Watch». Based on findings of in-depth interviews with 10 relatives of political prisoners during March and September 2022, this article presents the cases of families who are active and inactive social and economic agents representing different groups of the Egyptian population. It focuses on the impact of human rights violations on depoliticizing relatives of political prisoners –wives, parents, and children– and how this affected their efforts to over the economic hardship, as well as their attitudes regarding migration, protesting, and political reconciliation with the regime. In doing so, the article mires to explore the personal, economic, social, and political results of repression and how these have led to increased depoliticization among individuals who are affected indirectly by human rights violations. Received: 20 May 2022 Accepted: 16 November 2022

Grounded in a conceptual framework incorporating intersectionality, motivation, self-determination, and self-efficacy, this empirical study investigated how individuals’ identities, mindsets, and resources in educational environments intentionally cultivated to support their decision-making, development, and connections in the science community, can significantly increase the recruitment, persistence, and success of low-income, academically talented science students from diverse backgrounds. Several factors—academic performance in coursework, self-image, self-agency, financial support, and social integration in the science culture—continue to significantly impact student retention and persistence in STEM disciplines. Many of these factors are negatively affected based on a students’ intersecting identities, which can be detrimental to their academic success if not addressed. We found that additional considerations to factor in concerning low-income students from diverse backgrounds that is pertinent to supporting their persistence and success in the postsecondary STEM educational context.

In this article, we suggest that the study of social interactions and the development of a “sense of agency” in joint action can help determine the content of relevant explanations to be implemented in artificial systems to make them “explainable.” The introduction of automated systems, and more broadly of Artificial Intelligence (AI), into many domains has profoundly changed the nature of human activity, as well as the subjective experience that agents have of their own actions and their consequences – an experience that is commonly referred to as sense of agency. We propose to examine the empirical evidence supporting this impact of automation on individuals’ sense of agency, and hence on measures as diverse as operator performance, system explicability and acceptability. Because of some of its key characteristics, AI occupies a special status in the artificial systems landscape. We suggest that this status prompts us to reconsider human–AI interactions in the light of human–human relations. We approach the study of joint actions in human social interactions to deduce what key features are necessary for the development of a reliable sense of agency in a social context and suggest that such framework can help define what constitutes a good explanation. Finally, we propose possible directions to improve human–AI interactions and, in particular, to restore the sense of agency of human operators, improve their confidence in the decisions made by artificial agents, and increase the acceptability of such agents. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

In this article, we suggest that the study of social interactions and the development of a “sense of agency” in joint action can help determine the content of relevant explanations to be implemented in artificial systems to make them “explainable.” The introduction of automated systems, and more broadly of Artificial Intelligence (AI), into many domains has profoundly changed the nature of human activity, as well as the subjective experience that agents have of their own actions and their consequences – an experience that is commonly referred to as sense of agency. We propose to examine the empirical evidence supporting this impact of automation on individuals’ sense of agency, and hence on measures as diverse as operator performance, system explicability and acceptability. Because of some of its key characteristics, AI occupies a special status in the artificial systems landscape. We suggest that this status prompts us to reconsider human–AI interactions in the light of human–human relations. We approach the study of joint actions in human social interactions to deduce what key features are necessary for the development of a reliable sense of agency in a social context and suggest that such framework can help define what constitutes a good explanation. Finally, we propose possible directions to improve human–AI interactions and, in particular, to restore the sense of agency of human operators, improve their confidence in the decisions made by artificial agents, and increase the acceptability of such agents.

Educational software based on teachable agents hasrepeatedly proven to have positive effects on students’learning outcomes. The strongest effects have been shown forlow-performers. A number of mechanisms have beenproposed to explore this outcome, in particular mechanismsthat involve attributions of social agency to teachable agents.Our study examined whether an expression of high versuslow self-efficacy in a teachable agent would affect low-performing students with respect to their learning outcomesand with respect to a potential change in their own self-efficacy. The learning domain was mathematics, specificallythe base-ten system. Results were that the learning outcomesof low-performers who taught a low self-efficacy agent weresignificantly better than the learning outcomes of low-performers who taught a high self-efficacy agent. There wereno effects from the manipulation of self-efficacy expressed bythe teachable agent on changes of the low-performingstudents’ own self-efficacy.

Background: With the rapid popularization of e‐learning, how to improve online learning has aroused widespread concern. A human‐like pedagogical agent (PA) that displays eye gaze and gestures, is often added to online multimedia lessons to increase social connection and improve learning in e‐learning environments. However, there has been a debate about how PAs affect learning processes and learning outcomes. Objectives: Social agency theory holds that learners can build a social connection with PAs, which affects learning processes and outcomes. This study seeks to reveal how PAs influence learning by exploring the influence of PAs on learning outcomes and brain activity during learning. Methods: College students viewed a multimedia lesson on the process of chemical synaptic transmission either with or without an embodied PA on the left side of the screen that pointed to the graphic as she lectured. During learning students' brain cortical activity was measured by a functional near‐infrared spectroscopy (fNIRS) system, and after learning students completed learning outcomes post‐tests. Results and Conclusions: Consistent with social agency theory, students learning with a PA performed better on learning outcome tests and showed greater brain activity in the social areas of the brain during learning based on fNIRS measures. Implications: By using fNIRS technology, this study provides preliminary new support for the idea that learners engage in social processing during online learning with an embodied PA that leads to improved learning outcomes. Lay Description: What is already known about this topic: With the rapid popularization of e‐learning, how to improve learning effect of online learning has aroused widespread concern.A human‐like pedagogical agent who displaying eye gaze and gestures is often added by educators to increase society and improve learning in the online learning environment.The empirical results are inconsistent on the effect of pedagogical agents on learning and the mechanism of the influence of pedagogical agent on learning is still unclear. What this paper adds: An embodied agent can enhance learners' memorization and understanding of knowledge in the multimedia learning environment.An embodied agent can enhance learners' brain activity related to social information in the multimedia learning environment.The social agency theory has been preliminarily proved, which assumes that the pedagogical agent can prime a social stance in the learner and lead to deeper cognitive processing during learning. Implications for practice and/or policy: Educators should consider embedding embodied pedagogical agents into online instructional materials to increase sociality and improve learning. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This article contributes to an emerging body of scholarship on multimodal composition in the poetry classroom through a study of Finnish lower secondary students' digital videomaking in response to poetry. The study explores students' use of semiotic resources in their interpretive work in transmediating a poem into a digital video, with a particular interest in their use of sound elements. Based on social semiotic theory of multimodality, the analysis shows how the students in a variety of ways used sound elements, together with other semiotic resources, to explore their interpretation of the poetic text. Sound elements in particular became a key resource in the interpretive work, giving the students the opportunity to elaborate on topical issues of interest and importance to them while reinforcing their social agency. The study demonstrates the relevance of sound elements in students' digital composing and explorations of poetry. Furthermore, it reveals how the students showed a capacity as well as a willingness to act, to have influence, and to make substantiated claims for recognition regarding critical issues related to sexuality and society. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Copyright of Archaeologies is the property of Springer Nature and its content may not be copied or emailed to multiple sites or posted to a listserv without the copyright holder's express written permission. However, users may print, download, or email articles for individual use. This abstract may be abridged. No warranty is given about the accuracy of the copy. Users should refer to the original published version of the material for the full abstract. (Copyright applies to all Abstracts.)

This interview with globally distinguished Canadian philosopher and author, John McMurtry, presents dialogue discussing capitalism, asymmetrical power relations, life capital, social theory, common life interest, life value, global problems, market theology, media, values of the market and free market ideology today in relation to public education, academia, intellectual fads and the broader intellectual culture in relation to enabling public understanding of meaning-making and power, totalising market culture, climate, dispossession, health, influence, energy, labour, income, slavery, corporate welfare, neo-liberalism, the global ecosystem, and inequalities of class and power.

本研究旨在運用A. Giddens的「結構化理論」，藉由社會結構和行動之分析概念，探討具有能動性與反思性的高齡者，在終身學習歷程的實踐和挑戰。本研究運用質性深度訪談研究方法，受訪者為65歲以上且已於社區大學連續參與課程超過10年的高齡者。本研究發現包括：一、持續學習的參與，能夠滿足高齡者生命階段的多元需求；二、高齡學習者對於教育機構資源與規則的運用，相當多元化的表現，涵蓋體力、物質和知識勞動；三、高齡者在持續學習的參與上，即使受到家庭或身心條件限制，但進入社區大學場域內仍有不可替代性；四、高齡者學習的意識覺察或轉變歷程，乃由真實的和個人的生活情境為起點；五、高齡者啟動行動的反思監控並運用策略，在其學習歷程中經常展現能動性的作用。 This study utilized A. Giddens’ “structuration theory” to explore, through the analytical concepts of “structure” and “agency,” the practices and challenges faced by active and reflective elderly individuals in their process of lifelong learning. The researcher adopted a qualitative research method using in-depth interviews. Participants were individuals over 65 years of age who had attended community university courses for more than 10 years. The research findings include: (1) Participation in lifelong learning can fulfill a diversity of needs faced by individuals in later stages of their life. (2) Elderly learners demonstrate diverse practices in utilization of the resources and norms of their educational institutions, including physical strength, material labor, and intellectual labor. (3) Despite constraints from family, physical, or psychological factors, participation in community universities remains irreplaceable for of elderly learners’ experience of lifelong learning. (4) The process of gaining awareness and undergoing transformation through learning is based on elderly learners’ authentic and personal life circumstances. (5) Elderly learners initiate reflective monitoring of their actions and employ strategies as active agents in their learning process.

Social network plays an important role in delivering welfare services to increase child well-being especially children in institutional care. A study was conducted to explore the sectors involved in the implementation of the practice of child welfare services network located at Sekolah Tunas Bakti (STB) Marang, Terengganu. The study which is qualitative in its approach utilised Grounded Theory to gather data. A set of interview protocol was designed to guide a series of face-to-face and in-depth interviews among 30 respondents that come from 24 different agencies. The study found more than 50 agencies invovled in preparing, supplying and delivering the needs of food and drink; 37 agencies involved in preparing, supplying and delivering the needs of insurance, shelter, clothes, and other needs; and 10 parties involved in health services. As an overall impact, the study provided implications to the concerned parties such as Social Welfare Department to redouble efforts to form an integrated child welfare network services with various parties including the formal sector, informal sector, voluntary sector, private sector and individuals to improve child well-being; particularly children in institutional care. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Becoming a social agent requires the ability to gain some power over others' actions and perceptions. For that purpose, symbolic practices and language matter, especially when physical means of control are unavailable, ineffective, or illegitimate. Based on an in-depth ethnographic study, I analyze such a process of symbolic empowerment from the viewpoint of very young practitioners: children age 2 to 3 years. I explore the symbolic means through which toddlers seek control over adults, from simple signals, naming, and politeness to basic fictionalization. Children's social backgrounds, not just age and development, inform their tendency to affect adults through words. The content of symbolic practices is determined by preexisting social hierarchies between persons, groups, and institutions. In fact, the crucial challenge for young children is to take advantage of these hierarchies by publicly putting them in line with their own emerging interests. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Enhancing the civic engagement of Latina/os can promote the economic and political advancement of this racial/ethnic group. Employing a critical quantitative longitudinal design with data from UCLA's Cooperative Institutional Research Program (CIRP), this study examines the factors that influence Latina/o college students' social agency, which represents values associated with civic engagement. The study draws from Critical Race Theory, including community cultural wealth. Multiple regression analyses indicate that cultural assets and Latina/os' college experiences shape their commitment to social change. Specifically, Latina/o students draw from various forms of capital (aspirational and spiritual) as they engage in their college environment and experience marginalization and empowerment, which collectively influence their social agency. Also, findings suggest some differences within the monolithic Latina/o group. By understanding the factors that motivate Latina/o students' social agency, colleges and universities can more effectively prepare these future change agents to reduce social, economic, and political inequities. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Confabulation is typically understood to be dysfunctional. But this understanding neglects the phenomenon's potential benefits. In fact, we think that the benefits of non-clinical confabulation provide a better foundation for a general account of confabulation. In this paper, we start from these benefits to develop a social teleological account of confabulation. Central to our account is the idea that confabulation manifests a kind of willful ignorance. By understanding confabulation in this way, we can provide principled explanations for the difference between clinical and non-clinical cases of confabulation and the extent to which confabulation is rational. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Our linguistic communication often takes the form of creating texts. In this paper, we propose that creating texts or 'texting' is a form of joint action. We examine the nature and evolution of this joint action. We argue that creating texts ushers in a special type of joint action, which, while lacking some central features of normal, everyday joint actions such as spatio-temporal collocation of agency and embodiment, nonetheless results in an authentic, strong, and unique type of joint action agency. This special type of agency is already present in creating texts in general and is further augmented in creating texts through digital media. We propose that such a unique type of joint action agency has a transformative effect on the experience of our sense of agency and subjectivity. We conclude with the implications of the proposal for social cognition and social agency. The paper combines research in philosophy of mind with the emerging fields of digital humanities and text technology. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Motivated by inconsistent, underspecified, or otherwise problematic theories and usages of social agency in the HRI literature, and leveraging philosophical work on moral agency, we present a theory of social agency wherein a social agent (a thing with social agency) is any agent capable of social action at some level of abstraction. Like previous theorists, we conceptualize agency as determined by the criteria of interactivity, autonomy, and adaptability. We use the concept of face from politeness theory to define social action as any action that threatens or affirms the face of a social patient. With these definitions in mind, we specify and examine the levels of abstraction most relevant to HRI research, compare notions of social agency and the surrounding concepts at each, and suggest new conventions for discussing social agency in our field.

The presence of other people, whether real or implied, can have a profound impact on our behaviour. However, it is argued that autistic individuals show decreased interest in social phenomena, which leads to an absence of these effects. In this study, the agency of a cue was manipulated such that the cue was either described as representing a computer program or the eye movements of another participant. Both neurotypical and autistic participants demonstrated a social facilitation effect and were significantly more accurate on a prediction task when they believed the cue represented another participant. This demonstrates that whilst autistic adults may show difficulties in interpreting social behaviour this does not necessarily arise from a lack of sensitivity to social agency. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Copyright of Sociedad e Infancias is the property of Universidad Complutense de Madrid and its content may not be copied or emailed to multiple sites or posted to a listserv without the copyright holder's express written permission. However, users may print, download, or email articles for individual use. This abstract may be abridged. No warranty is given about the accuracy of the copy. Users should refer to the original published version of the material for the full abstract. (Copyright applies to all Abstracts.)

Sense of Agency, the phenomenology associated with causing one's own actions and corresponding effects, is a cornerstone of human experience. Social Agency can be defined as the Sense of Agency experienced in any situation in which the effects of our actions are related to a conspecific. This can be implemented as the other's reactions being caused by our action, joint action modulating our Sense of Agency, or the other's mere social presence influencing our Sense of Agency. It is currently an open question how such Social Agency can be conceptualized and how it relates to its nonsocial variant. This is because, compared with nonsocial Sense of Agency, the concept of Social Agency has remained oversimplified and underresearched, with disparate empirical paradigms yielding divergent results. Reviewing the empirical evidence and the commonalities and differences between different instantiations of Social Agency, we propose that Social Agency can be conceptualized as a continuum, in which the degree of cooperation is the key dimension that determines our Sense of Agency, and how it relates to nonsocial Sense of Agency. Taking this perspective, we review how the different factors that typically influence Sense of Agency affect Social Agency, and in the process highlight outstanding empirical questions within the field. Finally, concepts from wider research areas are discussed in relation to the ecological validity of Social Agency paradigms, and we provide recommendations for future methodology. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Increasing the success of Underrepresented Students of Color (USC) in science, technology, engineering, and mathematics (STEM) is a central concern to many researchers, policymakers, and educators. To help understand STEM college student success, many studies have utilized Holland’s (1966, 1973, 1985, 1997) person-environment fit framework applying it uncritically to all students. Using Quantitative Criticalism, this study engages the racial realities of USC while investigating several assumptions of Holland’s theory and their implications for USC pursuing STEM fields. Utilizing a national, longitudinal dataset of 5,564 STEM bachelor’s degree recipients drawn from the Cooperative Institutional Research Program’s 2004 Freshman Survey and 2011 Post-Baccalaureate Survey, this study specifically examines students’ interest in making a positive impact on society through socio-political action, or social agency, which Holland’s typology suggests is incongruent with STEM environments. Findings show that USC may be more likely to be described as “incongruent” with Holland’s classification of STEM environments, that the congruence assumption may not be fully applicable for understanding the long-term success of USC in STEM, and that the social agency of USC did not significantly change over the seven years while white students’ significantly decreased. Implications for broadening participation and promoting equity in STEM fields are discussed.

Existing theories to explain socio-cultural developments in the highly interconnected Roman world have seen significant developments over the past 20 years. But are we any closer in answering three major questions: who, how, and why? In other words, we need a better understanding of the complexity of the mechanisms of social agency and multiple motivational forces that instigate socio-cultural change. Many models appear to underestimate the role of sub-elite agents in instigating change, nor do they take into account simultaneous, often contradictory societal, cultural, religious and economic developments. We are therefore advocating a bottom-up approach whereby multiple experiences, expectations, norms and social pressures shaped the individual social agents in diverse geographical settings in this emerging ‘global world’. To evaluate the potential repercussions of an individual’s actions and decisions, we must use modern sociological approaches that help us to understand, for example, group dynamics.

The authors of Linguistic Bodies appeal to shared know-how to explain the social and participatory interactions upon which linguistic skills and agency rest. However, some issues lurk around the notion of shared know-how and require attention and clarification. In particular, one issue concerns the agent behind the shared know-how, a second one concerns whether shared know-how can be reducible to individual know-how or not. In this paper, I sustain that there is no single answer to the first issue; depending on the case, shared knowhow can belong to the participants of a social activity or to the system the participants bring forth together. In relation to the second issue, I sustain, following the authors, a non-reductive account of shared know-how. I also suggest that responsiveness to others, which is a fundamental element of shared know-how, can be extended by perceptual learning. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]