Can the components of a cognitive model predict the severity of generalized anxiety disorder?

Over the past decade, a number of well-controlled studies have supported the validity of a cognitive model of generalized anxiety disorder (GAD) that has four main components: intolerance of uncertainty, positive beliefs about worry, negative problem orientation, and cognitive avoidance. Although these studies have shown that the model components are associated with high levels of worry in nonclinical samples and with a diagnosis of GAD in clinical samples, they have not addressed the question of whether the model components can predict the severity of GAD. Accordingly, the present study sought to determine if the model components are related to diagnostic severity, worry severity, and somatic symptom severity in a sample of 84 patients with a primary diagnosis of GAD. All model components were related to GAD severity, although positive beliefs about worry and cognitive avoidance were only modestly associated with the severity of the disorder. Intolerance of uncertainty and negative problem orientation had more robust relationships with the severity of GAD (and with worry severity, in particular). When participants were divided into Mild, Moderate, and Severe GAD groups, intolerance of uncertainty and negative problem orientation distinguished the Moderate and Severe GAD groups from the Mild GAD group, even when age, gender, and depressive symptoms were statistically controlled. Overall, the results lend further support to the validity of the model and suggest that intolerance of uncertainty and negative problem orientation are related to the severity of GAD, independently of sociodemographic and associated clinical factors. The theoretical and clinical implications of the findings are discussed.     

Does cognitive science show belief in god to be irrational? The epistemic consequences of the cognitive science of religion

The last 15 years or so has seen the development of a fascinating new area of cognitive science: the cognitive science of religion (CSR). Scientists in this field aim to explain religious beliefs and various other religious human activities by appeal to basic cognitive structures that all humans possess. The CSR scientific theories raise an interesting philosophical question: do they somehow show that religious belief, more specifically belief in a god of some kind, is irrational? In this paper I investigate this question and argue that CSR does not show that belief in god is irrational.     

Is there coherence among the cognitive components of gender acquisition?

This study examined the relationships among five measures that assess various cognitive components of the child's acquisition of gender. At around 2 years of age, children were given a task assessing their ability to accurately label as a boy or a girl some head-and-shoulders pictures of boys and girls. At 4 years of age, these children were given tasks measuring (1) the degree to which they found gender a salient parameter of categorization, (2) the amount of gender-related knowledge they could display (SERLI-SRD), (3) the degree to which their preferences were gender-typed (SERLI-SRP) and (4) the accuracy of their memory for gender-typed information. There was no consistent pattern of relationship among the children's scores on these five tools for measuring gender acquisition. Our findings suggest that gender is a multidimensional construct in children's development, and thus these results challenge the undimensional manner in which gender is repeatedly addressed in developmental theory and research.This research was funded in part by a federal biomedical research grant (No. 2507RR07080) awarded to the first author from the Department of Psychology at the University of Oregon, and by Grant No. RO1HD175751 from the National Institute of Child Development awarded to the third author.We wish to thank Margo Lane, Rachel Robertson, Jacqui Oucalt, Laura Baker, Dale Roberts, and the teachers, parents, and assistants of the Child Research Laboratory at the University of Oregon in Eugene, Oregon, for their invaluable contribution to this research.     

On the inconclusiveness of “crucial” cognitive tests of dissonance versus self-perception theories

Several recent experiments are claimed to have tested conflicting predictions of cognitive dissonance and self-perception theories. It is argued that these claims fail to take into account the capacity of each formulation to account adequately for results “predicted” by the other. This argument is then continued, at a metatheoretical level, to reach the conclusion that the two theories are not capable of producing unequivocally contradictory predictions of cognitive consequences of experimental procedures.     

Aesthetic principles and cognitive emotion appraisals: How much of the beauty lies in the eye of the beholder?

Although the aesthetic properties of a product have often been linked to consumers’ emotional responses, theory and empirical evidence are yet to fully explain how and why aesthetic properties of a product evoke an emotional response. Drawing on an eclectic literature, we propose hypotheses connecting aesthetic principles with the subconscious cognitive appraisals associated with emotions. Specifically, we empirically test the relationships between the aesthetic principle of harmony and cognitive appraisals (attentional activity and pleasantness), while exploring the moderating role of typicality. Our results suggest that harmony and typicality interact to affect appraisals of pleasantness and attentional activity. Specifically, consumers tend to prefer designs that balance the levels of attentional resources needed and pleasantness in visually evaluating the design. This work advances the growing literature in product design and aesthetics by providing an understanding of the mechanisms through which aesthetic principles might prompt emotional responses in consumers.     

Acute exercise and children’s cognitive functioning: What is the optimal dose of cognitive challenge?

Acute bouts of exercise have the potential to benefit children’s cognition. Inconsistent evidence on the role of qualitative exercise task characteristics calls for further investigation of the cognitive challenge level in exercise. Thus, the study aim was to investigate which “dose” of cognitive challenge in acute exercise benefits children’s cognition, also exploring the moderating role of individual characteristics. In a within-subject experimental design, 103 children (M_age = 11.1, SD = 0.9, 48% female) participated weekly in one of three 15-min exergames followed by an Attention Network task. Exergame sessions were designed to keep physical intensity constant (65% HR_max) and to have different cognitive challenge levels (low, mid, high; adapted to the ongoing individual performance). ANOVAs performed on variables that reflect the individual functioning of attention networks revealed a significant effect of cognitive challenge on executive control efficiency (reaction time performances; p = .014, ƞ²_p = .08), with better performances after the high-challenge condition compared to lower ones (ps < .015), whereas alerting and orienting were unaffected by cognitive challenge (ps > .05). ANOVAs performed on variables that reflect the interactive functioning of attention networks revealed that biological sex moderated cognitive challenge effects. For males only, the cognitive challenge level influenced the interactive functioning of executive control and orienting networks (p = .004; ƞ²_p = .07). Results suggest that an individualized and adaptive cognitively high-challenging bout of exercise is more beneficial to children’s executive control than less challenging ones. For males, the cognitive challenge in an acute bout seems beneficial to maintain executive control efficiency also when spatial attention resources cannot be validly allocated in advance. Results are interpreted referring to the cognitive stimulation hypothesis and arousal theory.     

Dual-task-related gait changes in the elderly: does the type of cognitive task matter?

Dual-task-related gait changes among older adults while they perform spoken verbal tasks have been reported frequently. The authors examined whether the type of walking-associated spoken verbal task matters for dual-task-related gait changes in 16 older adults classified as transitionally frail. Mean stride time increased significantly when they walked and performed an arithmetic or a verbal fluency task compared with when they only walked (p < .001), whereas the coefficients of variation increased significantly only when they walked and performed the arithmetic task (p = .005) but not the verbal fluency task (p = .134). Those findings suggest that stride time variability under a dual-task condition depends on the type of walking-associated spoken verbal task.     

What are the cognitive costs of racism? A reply to Gendler

Tamar Gendler argues that, for those living in a society in which race is a salient sociological feature, it is impossible to be fully rational: members of such a society must either fail to encode relevant information containing race, or suffer epistemic costs by being implicitly racist. However, I argue that, although Gendler calls attention to a pitfall worthy of study, she fails to conclusively demonstrate that there are epistemic (or cognitive) costs of being racist. Gendler offers three supporting phenomena. First, implicit racists expend cognitive energy repressing their implicit biases. I reply, citing Ellen Bialystok’s research, that constant use of executive functioning can be beneficial. Second, Gendler argues that awareness of a negative stereotype of one’s own race with regard to a given task negatively affects one’s performance of that task. This phenomenon, I argue, demonstrates that those against whom the stigma is directed suffer costs, but it fails to demonstrate that the stigmatizers suffer cognitively. Finally, Gendler argues that racists are less competent when recognizing faces of other races than when recognizing faces of their own race because, in the first instance, they encode the race of the face (taking up cognitive space that could have been used to encode fine-grained distinctions), whereas in the second instance they encode no race. I argue that in-group/out-group categorization rather than racism is the cognitive cost. I conclude that Gendler has failed to demonstrate that there are cognitive costs associated with being a racist.     

Does the direction and magnitude of cognitive change depend on initial level of ability?

Longitudinal change in five cognitive abilities was investigated to determine if the direction or magnitude of change was related to the individual's ability level. Adults between 18 and 97 years of age performed three versions of 16 cognitive tests on two occasions separated by an average of 2.7 years. In order to control for influences associated with regression toward the mean, level of ability was determined from scores on the first version of the cognitive tests on the first occasion, and across-occasion change was examined on the second and third versions. Change in every cognitive ability was significantly more negative with increased age. However, there was little indication of ability-dependent change in any of the five cognitive abilities, either in differences between composite scores, or in estimates of latent change. Although there are reasons to expect cognitive change to be less negative at either high or low levels of ability, these data suggest that neither the direction nor magnitude of change is related to initial ability when influences of regression toward the mean are controlled.     

When nothing is “off the record”: Exploring the theoretical implications of the continuous recording of cognitive process in memory

This theoretical paper explores the idea of acropetal memory; arguing that representations emanating from all stages of processing an individual stimulus can be registered in memory and potentially available for recall. I describe Lansdale (1998) HELM model of location memory as a suitable candidate theory within which to implement and test this idea. An exemplar model, HELM-2, is presented and examined against available data. This model provides a satisfactory account of the data and an elegant solution to some interesting puzzles. It also suggests that some retrieval failure can be attributed to interference from representations of a stimulus derived from early stages of processing and that this has much broader implications for modelling encoding, forgetting, and false memory.     

Functioning of cognitive codes in autobiographical memory and the self—Is the self visual?

The main goal was to test the relationship between types of cognitive codes (perceptual–imaginative and verbal–propositional) and autobiographical memory. The purpose of this research was to evaluate whether there are independent processes serving the self, depending on separate cognitive codes. Sixty adult participants completed the NEO-FFI inventory using two kinds of procedure: perceptual–imaginative code or verbal–propositional code. Both quantitative and qualitative methods were used for analysis. The study has shown the dynamic of the self, depending on two cognitive perspectives. The results indicate that the reflection of the self in autobiographical memory brings different knowledge about the self and its motives.     

Do film cuts facilitate the perceptual and cognitive organization of activitiy sequences?

Film depictions of activities possess two kinds of structures--namely, the structural features of the depicted activities themselves and a formal structure defined by film cuts. The former structure is used by everyday observers for perceptually and cognitively unitizing the continuous flow of events into comprehensible entities. It seems conceivable that cuts can serve a similar unitizing purpose for film viewers. For each of two different activity sequences, two film versions were produced. Throughout each film version, cuts were placed either at breakpoints or at nonbreakpoints. In a 2 x 2 (activity sequence x film version) factorial design, 40 subjects segmented the film during viewing and recalled the film content after viewing in a detailed protocol. Segmentation behavior depended primarily on the occurrence of breakpoints and was largely unaffected by the occurrence of cuts. Cuts accompanying a breakpoint lead to more detailed recall protocols for these sections of the film.     

Developmental and cognitive perspectives on humans’ sense of the times of past and future events

Mental time travel in human adults includes a sense of when past events occurred and future events are expected to occur. Studies with adults and children reveal that a number of distinct psychological processes contribute to a temporally differentiated sense of the past and future. Adults possess representations of multiple time patterns, and these representations take several different forms. Memory for the times of past events is built upon reconstruction of temporal locations, impressions of distances in the past, and order-codes. The times of future events are understood primarily as locations in represented time patterns, but propositions active in memory contain information that particular events are coming soon. Young children have difficulty distinguishing the past–future status of some events, showing that basic memory processes do not make the distinction clear. Concepts of the past and future may be required for differentiating these two categories of experience.     

The dual role of ‘emergence’ in the philosophy of mind and in cognitive science

The concept of emergence is widely used in both the philosophy of mind and in cognitive science. In the philosophy of mind it serves to refer to seemingly irreducible phenomena, in cognitive science it is often used to refer to phenomena not explicitly programmed. There is no unique concept of emergence available that serves both purposes.     

Does the cognitive reflection test measure cognitive reflection? A mathematical modeling approach

We used a mathematical modeling approach, based on a sample of 2,019 participants, to better understand what the cognitive reflection test (CRT; Frederick In Journal of Economic Perspectives, 19, 25–42, 2005) measures. This test, which is typically completed in less than 10 min, contains three problems and aims to measure the ability or disposition to resist reporting the response that first comes to mind. However, since the test contains three mathematically based problems, it is possible that the test only measures mathematical abilities, and not cognitive reflection. We found that the models that included an inhibition parameter (i.e., the probability of inhibiting an intuitive response), as well as a mathematical parameter (i.e., the probability of using an adequate mathematical procedure), fitted the data better than a model that only included a mathematical parameter. We also found that the inhibition parameter in males is best explained by both rational thinking ability and the disposition toward actively open-minded thinking, whereas in females this parameter was better explained by rational thinking only. With these findings, this study contributes to the understanding of the processes involved in solving the CRT, and will be particularly useful for researchers who are considering using this test in their research.     

Children’s higher order cognitive abilities and the development of secondary memory

The relations between higher cognitive abilities and immediate and delayed recall were studied in 57 children (6–16 years of age). The participants were tested repeatedly on free recall of a supraspan list (Children’s Memory Scale), and their fluid ability was also assessed (Woodcock&#x2014;Johnson III Spatial Relations). Consistent with Unsworth and Engle’s (2007) account of the relation between memory and higher order cognition, the children’s fluid ability was significantly correlated with retrieval from secondary memory, regardless of whether it was measured using immediate or delayed recall. Multiple regression analyses provided further support for this view, revealing that measures of immediate and delayed retrieval from secondary memory accounted for the same variance in the children’s fluid ability.     

Explorations of anticipatory behavioral control (ABC): a report from the cognitive psychology unit of the University of Würzburg

The report comprises recent theoretical considerations, experimental research, and simulations which all aim at a clarification of anticipatory mechanisms of behavioral control.