The time course of intentional binding

Stimuli caused by actions (i.e., effects) are perceived earlier than stimuli not caused by actions. This phenomenon is termed intentional binding (IB) and serves as implicit measure of sense of agency. We investigated the influence of effect delay and temporal predictability on IB, operationalized as the bias to perceive the effect as temporally shifted toward the action. For short delays, IB increased with delay (Experiment 1: 200 ms, 250 ms, 300 ms). The initial increase declined for longer delays (Experiment 2: 100 ms, 250 ms, 400 ms). This extends previous findings showing IB to decrease with increasing delays for delay ranges of 250 ms to 650 ms. Further, the hypothesis that IB, that is, sense of agency, might be maximal for different delays depending on the specific characteristics and context of action and effect, has important implications for human-machine interfaces.     

Textures shape the attentional focus: Evidence from exogenous and endogenous cueing

The spatial cueing paradigm (Posner Quarterly Journal of Experimental Psychology 32:3–25, 1980) has often been used to investigate the time course of the deployment of visual attention in space. In a series of eight experiments we investigated whether spatial cues would not only enhance processing of stimuli presented at cued locations, but also enhance processing of the entire texture in which the stimuli were presented. Results showed highest accuracy for responses to stimuli presented at cued locations, a replication of the traditional cueing effect (Posner 1980). Additionally, stimuli presented at uncued locations were responded to with higher accuracy when they were presented inside the same texture as the cued location, as compared with stimuli presented outside the texture with the cued location. To investigate this texture advantage for both automatic and voluntary attention deployment, exogenous and endogenous cues were used. The texture advantage was observed for short interstimulus intervals (ISIs) of 50 and 100 ms for exogenous cues and for a longer ISI of 200 ms for endogenous cues. These findings indicate that the arrangement of task-irrelevant visual stimuli also can have a large impact on the cueing effect. This suggests that visual spatial attention spreads texture-wise across the visual field. Control experiments revealed that the homogeneity within texture elements contributes most to the effect but that the texture advantage is a function of both orientation contrast at the texture border and homogeneity within texture elements.     

Understanding of action-related and abstract verbs in comparison: a behavioral and TMS study

Does the comprehension of both action-related and abstract verbs rely on motor simulation? In a behavioral experiment, in which a semantic task was used, response times to hand-action-related verbs were briefer than those to abstract verbs and both decreased with repetition of presentation. In a transcranial magnetic stimulation (TMS) experiment, single-pulse stimulation was randomly delivered over hand motor area of the left primary motor cortex to measure cortical-spinal excitability at 300 or 500 ms after verb presentation. Two blocks of trials were run. In each block, the same verbs were randomly presented. In the first block, stimulation induced an increase in motor evoked potentials only when TMS was applied 300 ms after action-related verb presentation. In the second block, no modulation of motor cortex was found according to type of verb and stimulation-delay. These results confirm that motor simulation can be used to understand action rather than abstract verbs. Moreover, they suggest that with repetition, the semantic processing for action verbs does not require activation of primary motor cortex anymore.     

The efficiency of encoding: limits of information transfer into memory

We investigated how visual information is best presented to maximize the number of remembered items in a fixed time unit. In a memory task for images depicting real-world objects, we varied the number of images shown simultaneously, the presentation time, and the interstimulus interval (ISI). The viewing phase was followed by a two-alternative forced choice recognition task. We converted the percentage of correct answers into a capacity estimate scaled to a fixed time unit of 1 s to allow for comparisons across conditions. Our results showed that (1) presenting one image very briefly was always more efficient than simultaneously showing multiple images for longer periods; (2) for single images, the maximum encoding rate was fairly constant over a wide range of conditions, at 1.4 objects per second; (3) when testing was done a week later, memory capacity was the same for all conditions, irrespective of the presentation time and ISI at the initial viewing; (4) highly similar distractors led to worse performance than random distractors; and (5) showing an image twice for 100 ms was associated with worse performance than showing the image once, but for 200 ms.     

Attentional biases toward humor: Separate effects of incongruity detection and resolution

Previous research has indicated that the comprehension of humor involves two stages: incongruity detection and incongruity resolution. However, little is known about the temporal parameters of these stages and the degree to which they influence attentional processing. In the current study, 155 participants completed a dot-probe task to examine these questions. On each trial, humor versus control, novel (incongruent but not humorous) versus control, or neutral versus neutral image pairs were presented for 300, 400, or 500 ms. A probe immediately replaced the experimental image (valid trial) or control image (invalid trial). An attentional bias toward humor and novelty by 300 ms was shown by faster probe-detection reaction times (RTs) on valid compared to invalid humor and novel trials for all three exposure times. When compared to the neutral trials, humor and novel stimuli elicited slower RTs, indicating a difficulty in attentional disengagement. An exploratory analysis found that subjective humor ratings predicted the disengagement bias at 500 ms, but not at 400 or 300 ms. These results suggest that incongruity detection biases attention by 300 ms, whereas incongruity resolution may only contribute at 500 ms.     

Life Events may Contribute to Family Communication About Cancer Risk Following BRCA1/2 Testing

We assessed whether certain life events contributed to the communication about cancer risk within families who have undergone BRCA1/2 testing. We also explored what type of resources participants would have valued to help in supporting family communication about genetic information. Two hundred and forty-six individuals (218 women, 28 men) who received a BRCA1/2 genetic test result 3 to 10 years earlier (mean of 6.4 years) participated in a telephone interview. Participants were asked about the occurrence of a number of life events (cancer diagnosis, death, uptake of prophylactic surgery, and providing care to a family member with cancer) in their family since their BRCA1/2 test result disclosure and, for each occurrence, whether it fostered family communication about cancer risk. A total of 182 participants (74 %) reported that they or one of their relatives received a cancer diagnosis, 176 (72 %) reported that someone died in their family, and 73 (30 %) stated that they or one of their relatives undertook a prophylactic surgery. During this period, 109 participants (44 %) also provided care for a family member who had cancer. Among participants who reported these life events, family communication was fostered by these events in proportions varying from 50 % (death) to 69 % (cancer diagnosis). Our results indicate that life events may contribute to family communication about cancer risk. Further research is needed to determine whether these events provide a “window of opportunity” to reach family members, address their needs and concerns about cancer, update family cancer history, and introduce genetic counseling and risk assessment.     

动词的延续性特征及瞬时时间副词对时间转换事件表征的影响

为考察语篇阅读中,汉语动词的延续性特征以及瞬时时间副词对时间转换事件表征的影响,采用探测-判断的语篇实时阅读技术分别进行了两个实验。实验1的结果表明,当描述转换前事件的动词是延续性动词时,短时转换句与瞬时转换句的阅读时间无显著差异;而当描述转换前事件的动词是短暂性动词时,短时转换句的阅读时间明显长于瞬时转换句的阅读时间。实验2的结果表明,当不在时间转换句前添加瞬时时间副词时,长时与短时转换句前探测词的再认时间存在显著差异;而当在时间转换句前添加瞬时时间副词时,长时与短时转换句前探测词的再认时间无显著差异。两个实验结果分别说明,动词的延续性特征和时间转换短句的结合影响了时间转换事件的表征,在长时转换句的前面添加瞬时时间副词缩短了长时转换事件的表征时间。     

Body part representations in verbal semantics

Embodied theories of language propose that word meaning is inextricably tied to—grounded in—mental representations of perceptual, motor, and affective experiences of the world. The four experiments described in this article demonstrate that accessing the meanings of action verbs like smile, punch, and kick requires language understanders to activate modality-specific cognitive representations responsible for performing and perceiving those same actions. The main task used is a word-image matching task, where participants see an action verb and an image depicting an action. Their task is to decide as quickly as possible whether the verb and the image depict the same action. Of critical interest is participants’ behavior when the verb and image do not match, in which case the two actions can use the same effector or different effectors. In Experiment 1, we found that participants took significantly longer to reject a verb-image pair when the actions depicted by the image and denoted by the verb used the same effector than when they used different effectors. Experiment 2 yielded the same result when the order of presentation was reversed, replicating the effect in Cantonese. Experiment 3 replicated the effect in English with a verb-verb near-synonym task, and in Experiment 4, we once again replicated the effect with learners of English as a second language. This robust interference effect, whereby a shared effector slows discrimination, shows that language understanders activate effector-specific neurocognitive representations during both picture perception and action word understanding.     

Associations Between Adolescents’ Family Stressors and Life Satisfaction

Extant literature suggests that family stressors co-occur with elevated adolescent psychopathology. Few studies have examined the relationship between family stressors and life satisfaction, a positive indicator of mental health. The current study explored the relationships between specific family stressors (i.e., low socioeconomic status, disrupted family structure, cumulative major life events, and perceived interparental conflict) and adolescents’ life satisfaction in a sample of 181 middle school students. Participants completed psychometrically sound self-report measures of the aforementioned constructs. Results from a simultaneous regression analysis indicated that the four forms of family stress accounted for 37 % of the variance in life satisfaction; experiencing major life events (β = ?0.31, p < .05) and perceiving interparental conflict (β = ?0.41, p < .05) emerged as unique predictors of life satisfaction. Implications and directions for future research are discussed.     

Ultra-rapid categorisation in non-human primates

The visual system of primates is remarkably efficient for analysing information about objects present in complex natural scenes. Recent work has demonstrated that they perform this at very high speeds. In a choice saccade task, human subjects can initiate a first reliable saccadic eye movement response to a target (the image containing an animal) in only 120 ms after image onset. Such fast responses impose severe time constraints if one considers neuronal responses latencies in high-level ventral areas of the macaque monkey. The question then arises: are non-human primates able to perform the task? Two rhesus macaque monkeys (Macaca mulatta) were trained to perform the same forced-choice categorization task as the one used in humans. Both animals performed the task with a high accuracy and generalized to new stimuli that were introduced everyday: accuracy levels were comparable both with new and well-known images (84% vs. 94%). More importantly, reaction times were extremely fast (minimum reaction time 100 ms and median reaction time 152 ms). Given that typical single units onset times in Inferotemporal cortex (IT) are about as long as the shortest behavioural responses measured here, we conclude that visual processing involved in ultra rapid categorisations might be based on rather simple shape cue analysis that can be achieved in areas such as extrastriate cortical area V4. The present paper demonstrates for the first time, that rhesus macaque monkeys (Macaca mulatta) are able to match human performance in a forced-choice saccadic categorisation task of animals in natural scenes.     

Does temporal contiguity moderate contingency learning in a speeded performance task?

In four experiments, we varied the time between the onset of distracting nonwords and target colour words in a word–word version of the colour–word contingency learning paradigm. Contingencies were created by pairing a distractor nonword more often with one target colour word than with other colour words. A contingency effect corresponds to faster responses to the target colour word on high-contingency trials (i.e., distractor nonword followed by the target colour word with which it appears most often) than on low-contingency trials (i.e., distractor nonword followed by a target colour word with which it appears only occasionally). Roughly equivalent-sized contingency effects were found at stimulus-onset asynchronies (SOAs) of 50, 250, and 450 ms in Experiment 1, and 50, 500, and 1,000 ms in Experiment 2. In Experiment 3, a contingency effect was observed at SOAs of –50, –200, and –350 ms. In Experiment 4, interstimulus interval (ISI) was varied along with SOA, and learning was equivalent for 200-, 700-, and 1,200-ms SOAs. Together, these experiments suggest that the distracting stimulus does not need to be presented in close temporal contiguity with the response to induce learning. Relations to past research on causal judgement and implications for further contingency learning research are discussed.     

Family Contexts: Parental Experiences of Discrimination and Child Mental Health

Research on the mental health correlates of discrimination traditionally has been intra-individual, focusing exclusively on the individual directly experiencing discrimination. A small number of studies have begun to consider the links between parental experiences of discrimination and child mental health, but little is known about potential underlying mechanisms. The present study tested the independent mediating effects of parent mental health and household socioeconomic status on the associations between parental experiences of discrimination (past-year perceived discrimination and perceptions of being unaccepted culturally) and child mental health (internalizing and externalizing symptoms) using a bootstrapping analytic approach. Data were drawn from racial/ethnic minority (n = 383) and White (n = 574) samples surveyed in an urban Midwestern county. For all measures of discrimination and child mental health, findings supported an association between parental experiences of discrimination and child mental health. Whereas parent mental health served as a significant mediator in all analyses, socioeconomic status did not. Mediation findings held for both the White and racial/ethnic minority samples. Results suggest that parental experiences of discrimination and mental health may contribute to child mental health concerns, thus highlighting the role of family contexts in shaping child development.     

The number–time interaction depends on relative magnitude in the suprasecond range

Numerical representations influence temporal processing. Previous studies have consistently shown that larger numbers are perceived to last longer than smaller ones. However, whether this effect is modulated by the absolute or relative magnitudes of the numbers has yet to be fully understood. Here, participants observed single- and double-digit Arabic numerals in separate experimental blocks and reproduced stimulus duration of 600 or 1200 ms. Our results replicated previous findings that the duration of larger numbers was reproduced longer than that of smaller numbers within each digit set. Although the effect of numerical magnitude across single- and double-digit numerals was found when the numerals were presented for 600 ms, the difference was negligible when they were presented for 1200 ms, suggesting that relative magnitude is an important factor in the number–time interaction in the suprasecond range. These results suggest that contextual influence on number–time interaction may depend on the actual stimulus duration.     

Made in America: Perspectives on Friendship in West African Immigrant Families

This qualitative study compared West African immigrant parents’ and adolescents’ perspectives on parental monitoring of adolescents’ peer groups. Parents (n = 31) and adolescent children (n = 25) were interviewed using focus groups and individual interviews, and data were analyzed using a grounded theory approach. Parents expressed a general concern about external influences on their children, particularly their mistrust of their children’s friends. Adolescents reported that they were aware of their parents’ fears and described their attempts to manage their parents’ concerns while simultaneously maintaining friendships with same-ethnic and other-ethnic peers. This study offers both parent and adolescent perspectives in an effort to better understand adolescents’ peer socialization and parental monitoring among West African immigrant families, one of the fastest growing demographic groups in the United States. Recommendations for mental health professions are discussed.     

Summation priming in aphasia: evidence for alterations in semantic integration and activation

The present study used a lexical decision paradigm to study the summation of priming effects in normal and aphasic participants. The amount of priming produced by pairs of definitionally converging associative words was compared to the amount of priming produced by pairs of single associative words and non-words in two experiments in which the ISI between primes and targets varied from 200 ms (Experiment 1) to 600 ms (Experiment 2). Control subjects showed a pattern of additive summation priming at the short ISI and overadditive summation priming at the longer ISI. Broca's aphasics showed overadditive priming at the short ISI and no significant priming at the longer ISI; Wernicke's aphasics showed no significant priming at the short ISI and additive priming at the longer ISI. These results suggest that aphasics differ from normals in their ability to integrate the activation derived from multiple linguistic associations and may provide an account of some of the clinical phenomenology of these patients.     

Mental Disorders, Religion and Spirituality 1990 to 2010: A Systematic Evidence-Based Review

Religion/spirituality has been increasingly examined in medical research during the past two decades. Despite the increasing number of published studies, a systematic evidence-based review of the available data in the field of psychiatry has not been done during the last 20 years. The literature was searched using PubMed (1990–2010). We examined original research on religion, religiosity, spirituality, and related terms published in the top 25 % of psychiatry and neurology journals according to the ISI journals citation index 2010. Most studies focused on religion or religiosity and only 7 % involved interventions. Among the 43 publications that met these criteria, thirty-one (72.1 %) found a relationship between level of religious/spiritual involvement and less mental disorder (positive), eight (18.6 %) found mixed results (positive and negative), and two (4.7 %) reported more mental disorder (negative). All studies on dementia, suicide, and stress-related disorders found a positive association, as well as 79 and 67 % of the papers on depression and substance abuse, respectively. In contrast, findings from the few studies in schizophrenia were mixed, and in bipolar disorder, indicated no association or a negative one. There is good evidence that religious involvement is correlated with better mental health in the areas of depression, substance abuse, and suicide; some evidence in stress-related disorders and dementia; insufficient evidence in bipolar disorder and schizophrenia, and no data in many other mental disorders.     

Preliminary validation study of the 3-min wrist-worn psychomotor vigilance test

The 10-min psychomotor vigilance test (PVT) is a widely used tool to assess behavioral alertness. In operational environments, however, the 3-min version of the PVT is more practicable. Under controlled laboratory conditions, we compared performance on the 3-min PVT on a wrist-worn device with the 3-min PVT on a laptop computer. We conducted two repeated measures experiments (72 participants) to assess the effects of PVT device type (laptop or wrist-worn), backlight on the wrist-worn device (on or off), ambient light (low or normal levels), and interstimulus interval (ISI). First, we compared the wrist-worn PVT (ISI of 2–10 s) with the laptop-based PVT (ISI of 1–4 s). Participants performed six PVT trials counterbalanced for order of ambient light and device type. In both ambient-lighting conditions, the median differences in PVT metrics (reaction time, response speed, and percentage of 355-ms or 500-ms lapses combined with false starts) between the laptop and the wrist-worn PVT with the backlight on were less than 4.5 %. Specifically, the median difference in reaction times was less than 10 ms. However, the standard deviation in most metrics using the wrist-worn PVT was twice that of the laptop. In a second experiment, we compared the wrist-worn and laptop PVTs with the same ISIs (1–4 s) in normal light conditions. The results suggest that PVT data can be collected reliably in the field using the wrist-worn device with the backlight on and an ISI of 2–10 s.     

Mental verb input for promoting children's theory of mind: A training study

An experimental study investigated the effect of the type of mental verb input (i.e., input with think, know, and remember) on preschoolers’ theory of mind development. Preschoolers (n = 72) heard 128 mental verb utterances presented in video format across four sessions over two weeks. The training conditions differed only in the way the mental verbs were presented: the form (statement or question), the referent (first person or other person), and the interaction style (overheard or interactive). Children who overheard the characters discussing the mental states of someone else, either in statement or question form, significantly improved in their false belief understanding. These experimental findings demonstrate mental verb utterances about other people, even when not directed to the child, scaffold children's attention to differing perspectives, thus more efficiently promoting some aspects of their ToM development.     

Positive mental health moderates the association between depression and suicide ideation: A longitudinal study

Background/Objective: Depression and suicide ideation regularly occur together. Yet, little is known about factors that buffer individuals against the development of suicide ideation. The present study investigated, whether positive mental health buffers the association between depression and suicide ideation in a longitudinal study design. Methods: A total of 207 German students (70.3% female; age: M = 26.04, SD = 5.33) were assessed at a baseline evaluation and again twelve months later. Data were collected using self-report questionnaires. Linear hierarchical regression analysis was used to analyze the data. Positive mental health was considered to moderate the impact of depression on suicide ideation – controlling for age and gender. Results: Positive mental health was shown to moderate the impact of depression on suicide ideation: in those students who reported higher levels of positive mental health, depression severity showed no association with suicide ideation over time. Conclusion: Positive mental health seems to confer resilience and should be taken into account, when assessing individuals for suicide risk.     

Producing deceptive actions in sports: The costs of generating head fakes in basketball

Typically, head fakes in basketball are generated to, and actually do, deteriorate performance on the side of the observer. However, potential costs at the side of the producer of a fake action have only rarely been investigated before. It is thus not clear yet if the benefit (i.e., slowed reactions in the observer) of performing a head fake is overestimated due to concurrently arising fake production costs (i.e., slowed performance in the producer of a head fake). Therefore, we studied potential head-fake production costs with two experiments. Novice participants were asked to generate passes to the left or right side, either with or without head fakes. In Experiment 1, these actions were determined by an auditory stimulus (i.e., a 440 Hz or 1200 Hz sinus or jigsaw wave). After an interstimulus interval (ISI) of either 0 ms, 800 ms, or 1500 ms, which served the preparation of the action, the cued action had to be executed. In Experiment 2, passing to the left or right, either with or without a head fake, was determined by a visual stimulus (i.e., a player with a red or blue jersey defending either the right or left side). After an ISI of either 0 ms, 400 ms, 800 ms, or 1200 ms, the cued action had to be executed. In both experiments, we observed higher reaction times (RTs) for passes with head fakes as compared to passes without head fakes for no and an intermediate preparation interval (from ISI 0 ms to 800 ms), but no difference for a long preparation interval (for an ISI of 1200 ms and 1500 ms). Both experiments show that generating fake actions produces performance costs, however, these costs can be overcome by a longer preparation phase before movement execution.