The effect of life stress on depression is moderated by a repeat length variation in the transcriptional control region of the serotonin transporter gene, which renders carriers of the short variant vulnerable for depression. We investigated the underlying neural mechanisms of these epigenetic processes in individuals with no history of psychopathology by using multimodal magnetic resonance-bas...

Biological systems grow, live, adapt, and reproduce, characteristics that are not truly encompassed by any existing computing system. If one considers life on Earth since its very beginning, three levels of organization can be distinguished: phylogeny, ontogeny, and epigenesis. Machines that combine evolutionary mechanisms (Phylogeny), developmental processes (Ontogeny), and learning algorithms...

Studies employing event-related brain potentials (ERPs) and functional magnetic resonance imaging (fMRI) were designed to study the effects of different types of language experience on the development and organization of neural systems important in language processing. Comparisons of cerebral organization in normally hearing, monolingual English speakers with that observed in hearing and deaf l...

This paper outlines the epigenetic logic of the emergence and elaboration of symbolization. The account is based upon considerations arising from the study of the ontogenesis and phylogenesis of symbolic communication, abstraction from which yields generalizations regarding the necessary developmental pre-requisites for the capacity for symbolization and the processes of the elaboration of symb...

In response to the commentaries on our paper (Spencer et al., 2009) we summarize what a developmental systems perspective offers for a twenty-first century science of development by highlighting five insights from developmental systems theory. Where applicable, the discussion is grounded in a particular example-the emergence of ocular dominance columns in early development. Ocular dominance col...

UNLABELLED This paper examines the data on which the Demands and Capacities Model (DCM) is based with the purpose of identifying areas where future research might determine consilience among genetic influences at the physiological, behavioral, and cultural levels. The determination of consilience across different levels would tend to validate the genetic influence on stuttering, but more import...

The work presented here aims at understanding the nature, epigenesis and function of personality types (here called behavioral profiles) in birds, focusing on a wild bird species, the great tit (Parus major). Lines bidirectionally selected for exploration show a wide array of social and non-social behavioral differences, and also some differences in physiological parameters. Line differences in...

Consciousness: Instead of considering the problematic dualistic approach of the mental separate and distinct from the physical world, the theory proposed here includes a single concept. This single concept is a process Representations are consequently only the interpretation given by an external observer to part of the events due to the unfolding of this type of process. This “activation” can o...