Does the effect of familiarity on proofreading change with encoding task and time?

The authors examined whether the beneficial effect of text familiarity on proofreading is dependent on the type of encoding operations performed on the text prior to proofreading (i.e., surface vs. deep), and on the time elapsed between encoding and proofreading. In the present study, familiarity, irrespective of the nature of the encoding operations and delay, improved proofreading times, whereas only surface encoding made proofreading more accurate. These results represent a challenge for the transfer-appropriate processing model of memory.     

Exploring the time course of semantic interference and associative priming in the picture–word interference task

The picture–word interference (PWI) task is a widely used technique for exploring effects of semantic context on lexical access. In this task, printed words are superimposed over pictures to be named, with the timing of the interfering word relative to the picture systematically manipulated. Two experiments (N = 24 adults in each) explored the time course of effects of associates (e.g., CARROT superimposed on a picture of a rabbit) versus coordinates (e.g., CHIPMUNK superimposed on a picture of a rabbit) on naming latencies. Associates led to faster picture naming than did unrelated words, with facilitative effects occurring at stimulus onset asynchronies (SOAs, in ms) ranging from –450 to 0. Coordinates led to slower naming latencies, with the interference effect restricted to SOAs of –150 and 0. The overlapping time course of associative priming and coordinate interference provides important constraints on models of lexical access in speech production.     

Distributional reaction time properties in the Eriksen task: marked differences or hidden similarities with the Simon task?

In conflict tasks, the irrelevant stimulus attribute needs to be suppressed for the correct response to be produced. In the Simon task, earlier researchers have proposed that this suppression is the reason that, after an initial increase, the interference effect decreases for longer RTs, as reflected by late, negative-going delta plots. This view has been challenged by observations of positive-going delta plots, even for long RTs, in other conflict tasks, despite a similar necessity for suppression. For late negative-going delta plots to be interpreted as reflecting suppression, a necessary, although maybe not sufficient, condition is that similar patterns should be observed for other conflict tasks. We reasoned that a similar suppression could be present, but hidden, in the Eriksen flanker task. By recording and analyzing electromyograms of the muscles involved in response execution, we could compute delta plots separately for trials that elicited a subthreshold incorrect response activation (partial error). Late negative-going delta plots were observable on partial-error trials, although they were weaker than for the Simon task, reducing the impact of this inversion on the overall distribution. We further showed that this pattern is modulated by time pressure. Those results indicate that mechanisms leading to negative-going delta plots, similar to those observed in the Simon task, are also at play in the Eriksen task. The link between negative-going delta plots and executive online control is discussed.     

What is the impact of the explicit knowledge of sequence regularities on both deterministic and probabilistic serial reaction time task performance?

The aim of this study was to explore the role of prior explicit sequence knowledge by comparing its influence on serial reaction time (SRT) performance with either a deterministic or a probabilistic sequence. The results confirm that, with a deterministic sequence, preliminary explicit learning improves SRT performance. On the other hand, with a probabilistic sequence, the results show no advantage for SRT performance in explicit-learning conditions. In addition, by using the process dissociation procedure (Jacoby, 1991), we show that performance on a subsequent generation task was more sustained by controlled processes for participants in the explicit-learning conditions than for those in the incidental condition. On the whole, these results, showing that the influence of explicit knowledge can be suppressed in certain specific conditions, are consistent with the intervention of both implicit and explicit mechanisms in SRT tasks, and the results also show that their relative influence can be modulated by the particular demands of the task.     

Rats’ acquisition of the ephemeral reward task

The ephemeral reward task provides a subject with a choice between two alternatives A and B. If it chooses alternative A, reinforcement follows and the trial is over. If it chooses alternative B, reinforcement follows but the subject can also respond to alternative A which is followed by a second reinforcement. Thus, it would be optimal to choose alternative B. Surprisingly, Salwiczek et al. (PLoS One 7:e49068, 2012. doi: 10.1371/journal.pone.00490682012) reported that adult fish (cleaner wrasse) mastered this task within 100 trials, whereas monkeys and apes had great difficulty with it. The authors attributed the species differences to ecological differences in the species foraging experiences. However, Pepperberg and Hartsfield (J Comp Psychol 128:298–306, 2014) found that parrots too learned this task easily. We have found that with a similar task pigeons are not able to learn to choose optimally within 400 trials (Zentall et al. in J Comp Psychol 130:138–144, 2016). In Experiment 1 of the present study, we found that rats did not learn to choose optimally in 840 trials; however, in Experiment 2 we added a prior commitment to the initial choice by increasing delay to reinforcement for the choice response from a single lever press to the first lever press after 20 s (FI20 s). In a comparable amount of training to Experiment 1, the rats learned to choose optimally. Although the use of a prior commitment increases the delay to reinforcement, it appears to reduce impulsive responding which in turn leads to optimal choice.     

Prioritizing—The task strategy of the powerful?

Previous research has shown that power increases focus on the main goal when distractor information is present. As a result, high-power people have been described as goal-focused. In real life, one typically wants to pursue multiple goals at the same time. There is a lack of research on how power affects how people deal with situations in which multiple important goals are present. To address this question, 158 participants were primed with high or low power or assigned to a control condition, and were asked to perform a dual-goal task with three difficulty levels. We hypothesized and found that high-power primed people prioritize when confronted with a multiple-goal situation. More specifically, when task demands were relatively low, power had no effect; participants generally pursued multiple goals in parallel. However, when task demands were high, the participants in the high-power condition focused on a single goal whereas participants in the low-power condition continued using a dual-task strategy. This study extends existing power theories and research in the domain of goal pursuit.     

The time course of task switching: A speed—accuracy trade-off analysis

On each trial of this study, participants either switched between or repeated two simple, two-choice tasks involving either letter or digit classifications. Speed-accuracy trade-off (SAT) curves were obtained using the responsesignal method of eliciting speeded responses at various response time lags after the presentation of the stimulus for the second task. The key finding from separate analyses of the three SAT-curve parameters (intercept, rate, and asymp tote) was that the location of the intercept of the SAT function (i.e., the point at which responding rises above chance) was shifted upward for both short and long response-stimulus intervals under task-switch conditions but only when the responses associated with each of the letter-digit stimulus components were incompatible.     

The reminiscence bump in the temporal distribution of the best football players of all time: Pelé, Cruijff or Maradona?

The reminiscence bump is the tendency to recall more autobiographical memories from adolescence and early adulthood than from adjacent lifetime periods. In this online study, the robustness of the reminiscence bump was examined by looking at participants' judgements about the quality of football players. Dutch participants (N = 619) were asked who they thought the five best players of all time were. The participants could select the names from a list or enter the names when their favourite players were not on the list. Johan Cruijff, Pelé, and Diego Maradona were the three most often mentioned players. Participants frequently named football players who reached the midpoint of their career when the participants were adolescents (mode = 17). The results indicate that the reminiscence bump can also be identified outside the autobiographical memory domain.     

The role of task rules and stimulus–response mappings in the task switching paradigm

Switch costs occur whenever participants are asked to switch between two or more task sets. In a typical task switching experiment, participants have to switch between two task sets composed of up to four different stimuli per task set. These 2 (task sets) x 4 (stimuli) contain only 8 different stimulus-response (S-R) mappings, and the question is why participants base their task performance on task sets instead of S-R mappings. The current experiments compared task performance based on task rules with performance based on single stimulus-response mappings. Participants were led to learn eight different S-R mappings with or without fore-knowledge about two underlying task sets. Without task set information no difference between shifts and repetitions occurred, whereas introducing task sets at the beginning led to significant switch costs. Most importantly, introducing task sets in the middle of the experiment also resulted in significant switch costs. Furthermore, introducing task rules at the beginning of the experiment lead to slower RTs when simple stimuli (Experiment 1) had to be processed. This detrimental effect disappeared with more complex stimuli (Experiment 2). Results will be discussed with respect to cognitive control.     

Do the laws of physics forbid the operation of time machines?

We address the question of whether it is possible to operate a time machine by manipulating matter and energy so as to manufacture closed timelike curves. This question has received a great deal of attention in the physics literature, with attempts to prove no-go theorems based on classical general relativity and various hybrid theories serving as steps along the way towards quantum gravity. Despite the effort put into these no-go theorems, there is no widely accepted definition of a time machine. We explain the conundrum that must be faced in providing a satisfactory definition and propose a resolution. Roughly, we require that all extensions of the time machine region contain closed timelike curves; the actions of the time machine operator are then sufficiently “potent” to guarantee that closed timelike curves appear. We then review no-go theorems based on classical general relativity, semi-classical quantum gravity, quantum field theory on curved spacetime, and Euclidean quantum gravity. Our verdict on the question of our title is that no result of sufficient generality to underwrite a confident “yes” has been proven. Our review of the no-go results does, however, highlight several foundational problems at the intersection of general relativity and quantum physics that lend substance to the search for an answer.     

Noogenesis—the fundamental problem of our time

The possibility of long wave economic cycles are considered under both market capitalism and command socialism. Capitalist long waves can be generated by a two‐stage multiplier‐accelerator model and socialist long waves can be generated by an equivalent model strictly for investment cycles. Under certain conditions chaotic dynamics can occur at turning points in both cases. It is argued that a systemic crisis leading to a systemic transformation is most likely to occur at such a point.     

External validation of the computerized, group administrable adaptation of the “operation span task”

One of the most widely used tasks for measuring working memory capacity is the operation span task (OSPAN; Turner & Engle, 1989). This task has almost always been applied individually, and stimuli presentation is controlled by the experimenter. Recently, De Neys, d'Ydewalle, Schaeken, and Vos (2002) improved the administration procedure by designing an automated, group-administrable version of the task (GOSPAN). They found GOSPAN to be reliable, and they also provided evidence on its validity (a significant positive correlation between GOSPAN and OSPAN scores). However, an external test of GOSPAN validity is still lacking. In this work, we present such a validation for the automated version, when the task is administered both individually (Experiment 1) and to groups (Experiment 2). There are abundant previous data on the relation between working memory capacity and reading comprehension. In this work, this relation is studied using an automated OSPAN version to measure working memory capacity. Given that our results are similar to those found using the original OSPAN, our data support the external validity of the automated version of the task. We also tested the reliability of the task and found high internal consistency in both experiments.     

“Smart inhibition”: electrophysiological evidence for the suppression of conflict-generating task rules during task switching

A major challenge for task switching is maintaining a balance between high task readiness and effectively ignoring irrelevant task rules. This calls for finely tuned inhibition that targets only the source of interference without adversely influencing other task-related representations. The authors show that irrelevant task rules generating response conflict are inhibited, causing their inefficient execution on the next trial (indicating the presence of competitor rule suppression[CRS];Meiran, Hsieh, & Dimov, Journal of Experimental Psychology: Learning, Memory and Cognition, 36, 992–1002, 2010). To determine whether CRS influences task rules, rather than target stimuli or responses, the authors focused on the processing of the task cue before the target stimulus was presented and before the response could be chosen. As was predicted, CRS was found in the event-related potentials in two time windows during task cue processing. It was also found in three time windows after target presentation. Source localization analyses suggest the involvement of the right dorsal prefrontal cortex in all five time windows.     

An examination of the continuous distractor task and the “long-term recency effect”

The continuous distractor task has yielded a so-called "long-term recency effect" that appears to call into question the dual-storage explanation of serial position effects in free recall. In this study, we show that the "long-term recency effect" is really a short-term storage effect, resulting from adaptation to the repeated presentation of a particular type of distractor throughout the list. This adaptation, a time-sharing process, permits short-term storage to carry out its normal functions. Experiment 1 shows that an appropriate postlist distractor task does in fact eliminate the "long-term recency effect." This finding supports the assertion that the effect is a product of short-term storage. Experiment 2 demonstrates the benefits and costs of the time-sharing process, relative to standard free recall, for both long-term and short-term storage. The findings support the time-sharing hypothesis. Experiment 3 replicates Experiment 2, with a change in procedure that rules out output interference as a mechanism responsible for the results of Experiment 2. Data are also presented on the development of the adaptation over trials. It is concluded that the adaptation and time-sharing processes need to be included in the dual-storage model of short-term storage.     

Inhibition of return in visual marking? The importance of the interstimulus interval and the type of search task

Four experiments are presented that examine the possibility that inhibition of return (IOR) may occur in visual marking. Previously, Watson and Humphreys (1997), using a cue duration of 750 ms and an interstimulus interval (ISI) of 250 ms, concluded that IOR was not present in visual marking. In the present study, the first experiment examined three ISIs (250 ms, 500 ms, and 750 ms) with a constant stimulus onset asynchrony (SOA, 1000 ms) in a typical cueing paradigm and failed to find IOR with the short ISI. Based on these findings, the second (feature search) and third (conjunction search) experiments tested for IOR by using a visual marking paradigm with a 500 ms ISI. Evidence for IOR was found in the feature search (preview condition similar to half-elements baseline condition) and not in the conjunction search (preview condition similar to the all-elements baseline). The typical preview effect was found in Experiment 4 with a cue duration 1000 ms and no ISI. Overall, these findings indicate that IOR may play a role in visual marking, but only with feature search tasks and long ISIs between displays.     

Is the growth of subjective time in humans a linear or nonlinear function of real time?

The difficulties of deciding whether subjective time grows as a linear or nonlinear function of real time are discussed, and two experiments are presented to address this question. In Experiment 1, people received a 10-s standard duration and then had to judge what proportion other durations (ranging from 1 to 10 s) were of the standard. Counting was prevented by a concurrent task. The relation between judged and actual proportions was linear. In Experiment 2, people were required to average together three tone durations (mean duration 600 ms) and to judge whether subsequently presented comparisons were or were not the average. The spacing of the tone durations had no effect on judgements, suggesting a linear underlying time scale.     

Is the growth of subjective time in humans a linear or nonlinear function of real time?

The difficulties of deciding whether subjective time grows as a linear or nonlinear function of real time are discussed, and two experiments are presented to address this question. In Experiment 1, people received a 10-s standard duration and then had to judge what proportion other durations (ranging from 1 to 10 s) were of the standard. Counting was prevented by a concurrent task. The relation between judged and actual proportions was linear. In Experiment 2, people were required to average together three tone durations (mean duration 600 ms) and to judge whether subsequently presented comparisons were or were not the average. The spacing of the tone durations had no effect on judgements, suggesting a linear underlying time scale.     

Is the allure of self-esteem a mirage after all?

Comments on the original article "Do people's self-views matter? Self-concept and self-esteem in everyday life," by W. B. Swann, Jr., C. Chang-Schneider, and K. L. McClarty. Swann et al argued that people's self-views, and their global self-esteem in particular, yield a suite of behavioral effects that are beneficial to the individual and to society at large. The Swann et al article is the latest link in a debate on the causal utility of self-esteem. Specifically, the article is a reply to a report published by the American Psychological Society Task Force on Self-Esteem (Baumeister, Campbell, Krueger, & Vohs, 2003). As members of that task force, the current authors wish to express their broad agreement with Swann et al. At the same time, in the comment presented here, they clarify pockets of disagreement.