Theory in the social sciences should have three major functions. First, it should aid in the codification of our existing concrete knowledge. It can do so by providing generalized hypotheses for the systematic reformulation of existing facts and insights, by extending the range of implication of particular hypotheses, and by unifying discrete observations under general concepts. Through codification, general theory in the social sciences will help to promote the process of cumulative growth of our knowledge. Second, general theory in the social sciences should be a guide to research. By codification it enables us to locate and define more precisely the boundaries of our knowledge and of our ignorance. Third, general theory as a point of departure for specialized work in the social sciences will facilitate the control of the biases of observation and interpretation which are at present fostered by the departmentalization of education and research in the social sciences.

For thousands of years mankind lived just like the animals And then something happened that unleashed the power of his imagination He learned to talk Pink Floyd I Introduction I-A What is a Cognitive Map? Cognitive maps or Cause maps were first used in 1948 by Edward C. Tolman. The idea however, of cognitive maps dates back to 1913, where Trowbridge carried out investigations in cognitive maps, which he called "imaginary maps". His primary interest was to investigate why some people were more easily confused when performing orientation tasks than were others. Though several definitions for cognitive maps exist, an attempt to define them precisely is inadequate. Research still continues. However, for a peripheral understanding of the psychological element that lies at the root of cognitive maps, they may be defined as under: 1. A cognitive map is a mental device that codes and simplifies the way our spatial environment is arranged. 2. A cognitive map is a neural mechanism which enables its user to solve navigation and orientation tasks as if using a real map of the environment.-Mallot Current theories suggest that humans as well as "higher developed" mammals have cognitive maps to map their environment into their brain, keeping a geometrical relationship. It is quite hard to find out how cognitive maps in humans and animals work, and even to prove their existence.

1. The original rough formulation of the expectancy theory is difficult to distinguish from the alternative stimulus-response doctrines. Part of this difficulty results from the fact that implicit in this rough formulation, is a definition of the matrix "x expects a goal at location L," which makes it equivalent to the matrix "x runs down the practiced path," when certain conditions are fulfilled. Because of this difficulty, we have rejected this definition. 2. We have suggested instead a definition of the matrix "x expects a goal at location L" which makes it equivalent to the matrix "x runs down the path which points directly to the location L," when certain conditions are fulfilled. 3. To determine whether rats will run down such a path, whenever the original path is blocked, we have run 56 female rats in a situation which conformed to these conditions. 4. Thirty-six percent of the rats chose the path which pointed directly towards the location of the goal. The remaining rats were distributed over the other paths in a chance fashion. 5. We have concluded (1) that rats do learn to expect goals in specific locations, (2) that there are important similarities between this behavior and human symbolic behavior, and (3) that these similarities justify our using the word 'expectation' as a name for the disposition to short-cut when the original patch is blocked.

Motivation:Epilepsy is a multifaceted complex disorder that requires a precise understanding of the classification, diagnosis, treatment and disease mechanism governing it. Although scattered resources are available on epilepsy, comprehensive and structured knowledge is missing. In contemplation to promote multidisciplinary knowledge exchange and facilitate advancement in clinical management, especially in pre-clinical research, a disease-specific ontology is necessary. The presented ontology is designed to enable better interconnection between scientific community members in the epilepsy domain.Results:The Epilepsy Ontology (EPIO) is an assembly of structured knowledge on various aspects of epilepsy, developed according to Basic Formal Ontology (BFO) and Open Biological and Biomedical Ontology (OBO) Foundry principles. Concepts and definitions are collected from the latest International League against Epilepsy (ILAE) classification, domain-specific ontologies and scientific literature. This ontology consists of 1879 classes and 28 151 axioms (2171 declaration axioms, 2219 logical axioms) from several aspects of epilepsy. This ontology is intended to be used for data management and text mining purposes.Availability and implementation:The current release of the ontology is publicly available under a Creative Commons 4.0 License and shared via http://purl.obolibrary.org/obo/epso.owl and is a community-based effort assembling various facets of the complex disease. The ontology is also deposited in BioPortal at https://bioportal.bioontology.org/ontologies/EPIO.Supplementary information:Supplementary data are available at Bioinformatics Advances online.

An analysis of psychological and sociological variables into independent, intervening, and dependent variables, the interrelations between these variables, and a list of the types of theoretical and research problems that result from combining these variables is presented. (PsycINFO Database Record (c) 2006 APA, all rights reserved)