A frog in your throat or in your ear? Searching for the causes of poor singing

Singing is a cultural universal and an important part of modern society, yet many people fail to sing in tune. Many possible causes have been posited to explain poor singing abilities; foremost among these are poor perceptual ability, poor motor control, and sensorimotor mapping errors. To help discriminate between these causes of poor singing, we conducted 5 experiments testing musicians and nonmusicians in pitch matching and judgment tasks. Experiment 1 introduces a new instrument called a slider, on which participants can match pitches without using their voice. Pitch matching on the slider can be directly compared with vocal pitch matching, and results showed that both musicians and nonmusicians were more accurate using the slider than their voices to match target pitches, arguing against a perceptual explanation of singing deficits. Experiment 2 added a self-matching condition and showed that nonmusicians were better at matching their own voice than a synthesized voice timbre, but were still not as accurate as on the slider. This suggests a timbral translation type of mapping error. Experiments 3 and 4 demonstrated that singers do not improve over multiple sung responses, or with the aid of a visual representation of pitch. Experiment 5 showed that listeners were more accurate at perceiving the pitch of the synthesized tones than actual voice tones. The pattern of results across experiments demonstrates multiple possible causes of poor singing, and attributes most of the problem to poor motor control and timbral-translation errors, rather than a purely perceptual deficit, as other studies have suggested.     

Is there a chaplain in your clinic?

As medical care continues to move outside the hospitals, clients with spiritual needs are more often to be found in clinics and doctors' offices than inpatient settings. Chaplains in partnership with physicians can contribute to healing in outpatient centers. A study of one group of clinic patients indicates that an outpatient setting may be a better place to address spiritual needs than a hospital setting. Pastoral interventions are acceptable to many clients, who according to statistics are already using alternative therapies to augment traditional medical care. Paul A. Mandziuk, M. Div., a priest of the Missionaries of La Salette, is a chaplain at Saint Louis University Health Sciences Center in St. Louis, MO, and serves on the leadership council of the National Association of Catholic Chaplains.     

It’s in your nature: a pluralistic folk psychology

I suggest a pluralistic account of folk psychology according to which not all predictions or explanations rely on the attribution of mental states, and not all intentional actions are explained by mental states. This view of folk psychology is supported by research in developmental and social psychology. It is well known that people use personality traits to predict behavior. I argue that trait attribution is not shorthand for mental state attributions, since traits are not identical to beliefs or desires, and an understanding of belief or desire is not necessary for using trait attributions. In addition, we sometimes predict and explain behavior through appeal to personality traits that the target wouldn’t endorse, and so could not serve as the target’s reasons. I conclude by suggesting that our folk psychology includes the notion that some behavior is explained by personality traits—who the person is—rather than by beliefs and desires—what the person thinks. Consequences of this view for the debate between simulation theory and theory theory, as well as the debate on chimpanzee theory of mind are discussed.     

Why does a red snake in the grass capture your attention?

It has been suggested that affective stimuli automatically capture attention; this preferential processing is thought to be related to the evolutionary significance of affective stimuli. However, recent evidence suggests that perceptual salience alone might explain why some affective stimuli are more likely to influence attentional processes in certain contexts. In this study, we manipulated affective and perceptual salience to better understand how affective information is processed and how it impacts attentional processes in different contexts. We used stimuli that are both affectively and perceptually salient, while varying the task requirement to encourage the processing of perceptually salient (Experiment 1) or affectively salient (Experiment 2) information. This design made it possible to observe independent and interdependent relationships between perceptual and affective salience. The results showed that when the task encouraged the processing of perceptually salient information, affective salience did not influence task performance. In contrast, when the task encouraged the processing of affectively salient information, affectively salient information impaired task performance. The findings suggest that the affective nature of the stimuli does not always influence attentional processes.     

Who are your Neighbors? Neighbor Relationships and Subjective Well-Being in Japan

Supportive relationships with neighbors have been shown to positively predict indicators of subjective well-being. Using data from the 2010 Japanese General Social Survey, we examine how neighbor relationships predict subjective well-being. Japan presents an interesting case to examine this question when considering its highly institutionalized neighborhood associations. We find that controlling for the safety and amenity aspects of the neighborhood environment, supportive neighbor relationships significantly increase men and women’s life satisfaction, but such relationships have a significant positive effect only on men’s happiness. The effects of neighborhood relationships on life satisfaction and happiness are significantly larger for men. Moreover, we find that the social and safety aspects of the neighborhood reinforce each other to increase life satisfaction also only for men. Implications of the gendered pattern of these results are discussed for future research on the association between neighbor relationships and subjective well-being in Japan and beyond.

     

Do the colors of your letters depend on your language? Language-dependent and universal influences on grapheme-color synesthesia in seven languages

Grapheme-color synesthetes experience graphemes as having a consistent color (e.g., “N is turquoise”). Synesthetes’ specific associations (which letter is which color) are often influenced by linguistic properties such as phonetic similarity, color terms (“Y is yellow”), and semantic associations (“D is for dog and dogs are brown”). However, most studies of synesthesia use only English-speaking synesthetes. Here, we measure the effect of color terms, semantic associations, and non-linguistic shape-color associations on synesthetic associations in Dutch, English, Greek, Japanese, Korean, Russian, and Spanish. The effect size of linguistic influences (color terms, semantic associations) differed significantly between languages. In contrast, the effect size of non-linguistic influences (shape-color associations), which we predicted to be universal, indeed did not differ between languages. We conclude that language matters (outcomes are influenced by the synesthete’s language) and that synesthesia offers an exceptional opportunity to study influences on letter representations in different languages.     

Can mindfulness modify your thoughts? A study in the context of social phobia

IntroductionSocial phobia is said to be the commonest anxiety disorder (Furmark, 2002). Cognitive Behavior Therapy appears to be the most recommended form of psychological treatment for this condition (Federoff & Taylor, 2001; Willutzki et al., 2012). Dismantling studies have raised doubts regarding the utility of cognitive restructuring in bringing about decrease in symptoms (Barrera et al., 2016; Pompoli et al., 2018). Mindfulness, a ‘third-wave’ concept, seems to contradict the philosophy of ‘restructuring’ with its apparent stress on non-judgmental observation (Hayes, 2004). This approach postulates that acceptance of cognitions and emotions as therapeutic in contrast to traditional cognitive behavior therapy approach, which advocates restructuring and modifications of cognitions.ObjectiveThe current study attempted to study the ‘restructuring’ effects of mindfulness in persons with social phobia.MethodThirty-nine clients with a primary diagnosis of social phobia (ICD – 10) participated in the Mindfulness Integrated Cognitive Behavior Therapy (MICBT) program, which consisted of eight sessions. MINI International Neuropsychiatry Interview Plus, Liebowitz Social Anxiety Scale, Fear of Negative Evaluation, Meta Cognitions Questionnaire and Five-Facet Mindfulness Questionnaire were administered pre and post of the therapeutic program.ResultsThe results demonstrated that MICBT had a significant effect on reducing the scores on fear of negative evaluation and bringing about changes in metacognitions.ConclusionMindfulness could be sufficient as a therapeutic strategy to bring about changes in the cognitions of clients with social phobia without using cognitive restructuring.     

When's your birthday? The self‐reference effect in retrieval of dates

Material encoded with reference to the self is better remembered. One interpretation of this effect is that the self operates to organise retrieval of memories. We were motivated to find out whether this organisational principle extended to everyday information and for material not explicitly related to the self. Participants generated friends' birthdays from memory and then gave their own birthday. We found that participants were particularly likely to recall birthdays from on or around the date of their own birthday. Thus, memory for birthdays clusters around self‐relevant information, even when there is no specific attempt to recall self‐related material. Birthdays clustered somewhat around the time of testing, important dates in the calendar, and for a close other, but not to the extent of the participants' birthdays. We suggest this is a demonstration of the organisational structure of the self in memory. Copyright © 2010 John Wiley & Sons, Ltd.     

How much was your shopping basket? Working memory processes in total basket price estimation

Although much attention has been paid to recall of a single price, research is lacking in understanding the process of how consumers estimate the total price of a shopping basket. Drawing on research on numeric cognition, memory processes, and mental accounting, we show in five studies that the accuracy of total price estimation as well as the timing of such estimation is systematically influenced by several factors. We find that the length (in syllables) of the prices in the basket and the attention that consumers pay to the prices influence the accuracy of the calculation of the total basket price. Furthermore, our studies also show that the timing of the calculation is influenced by the nature of the items in the basket (i.e., unrelated vs. complementary items).     

“Even if it didn't happen,it's true”: The fantasy of geopolitics in the “post-truth” era

In times when notions of political facts and objective truth are significantly challenged and undermined, this paper seeks to re-examine “old” questions of ideology by paying attention to economies of knowledge deemed fake and (officially) discredited. Using the “docu-fiction” film “Houston, We Have a Problem!” as a grounding point for examining the topological relationship between reason and fantasy inherent in geopolitics, I explore the contradictions within the film's production and reception, as it offers a powerful and complex account of illusion and reality that form our geopolitical worlds. The paper argues for geopolitics as a fantasy, where the fantasy is conceived as a material process, one placed firmly within the field of social practice and productive of social reality itself. The emotional grip of the fantasy is explored through humor, fun and laughter as forms of emotional purchase of geopolitics. To that end, this paper seeks to expand the field of popular geopolitics by offering a psychoanalytically-informed account of the emotional and affective economies involved in the production of geopolitical ideologies, and proceeds to explore how such fantasies of geopolitics continue to inform our contemporary social reality of “alternative facts” and “post-truth” politics.     

Knowing your audience affects male–male interactions in Siamese fighting fish (Betta splendens)

Aggressive interactions between animals often occur in the presence of third parties. By observing aggressive signalling interactions, bystanders may eavesdrop and gain relevant information about conspecifics without the costs of interacting. On the other hand, interactants may also adjust their behaviour when an audience is present. This study aimed to test how knowledge about fighting ability of an audience affects aggressive interactions in male Siamese fighting fish. Subjects were positioned between two dyads of non-interacting males and allowed to observe both dyads shortly before the view to one of the dyads was blocked, and the dyads were allowed to interact. Subjects were subsequently exposed to an unknown opponent in the presence of either the winner or the loser of the seen or unseen interaction. The results suggest a complex role of the characteristic of an audience in the agonistic behaviours of a subject engaged in an interaction. The presence of a seen audience elicited more aggressive displays towards the opponent if the audience was a loser. This response was different in the presence of an unseen audience. Subjects then directed a higher aggressiveness against their opponent if the audience was a winner. These results also suggest a potentially more complex and interesting process allowing individuals to gain information about the quality and threat level of an unknown audience while it is interacting with a third party. The importance of information acquisition for an individual to adapt its behaviour and the role of communication networks in shaping social interactions are discussed.     

It’s All in your Head: a Solution to the Problem of Object Coincidence

Philosophia - It is uncontroversial that artifacts like statues and tables are mind-dependent. What is controversial is whether and how this mind-dependence has implications for the ontology of...     

Breaking the habit: Does fracturing your wrist change your travel and driver behaviour?

When someone breaks their wrist it presents a disruption to everyday routine. Some of this is as a result of having to change travel patterns. This paper investigates the changes people make to their travel behaviour in the light of an unexpected change in their situation caused by fracturing their wrist and wearing a forearm plaster cast. One hundred and eleven participants, approached as they were having their plaster cast removed, completed a questionnaire addressing travel behaviour change, driver safety and information provision covering their time in a plaster cast (typically an average of 5–6 weeks). Eighteen percent of participants drove during the time they had a forearm plaster cast on. All reported they felt safe in doing so and that wearing the plaster cast did not compromise safety, though it was uncomfortable and compensatory behaviours took place. Risk and affective scales did not predict whether participants drove in a cast, suggesting that practical and utilitarian, rather than psychosocial, reasons were the motivation for driving in a plaster cast. Eighty-two percent found other ways of travelling without using their car. Participant’s use of buses and trains, walking and taking lifts were all increased and overall, across all modes of transport, participants travelled fewer miles but made more journeys. There was a reduction in cycling, especially for those who drove in a cast, suggesting cyclists who broke their wrist changed to driving while their arm was in a cast. Information provision did not affect whether someone drove or not. Implications for providing travel information to help people avoid car use while their forearm is in a cast and maintaining behaviour change afterwards are discussed.     

Does your trust in strangers or close acquaintances promote better health? Societal residential mobility matters

ABSTRACT

Some studies indicated that different types of trust are qualitatively different psychological experiences, which may lead to different health outcomes. The present study examined the effect of two types of trust, i.e., generalized trust and interpersonal trust, on promoting physical health and subjective well-being in regions varying in societal residential mobility. The data from a nationally representative sample, including 10,968 participants from 28 provinces/municipalities in China, were analyzed. The results showed that the negative relationship between generalized trust and depressed mood was stronger in the regions with higher societal residential mobility whereas the positive relationship between interpersonal trust and physical health and the negative relationship between interpersonal trust and depressed mood were stronger in the regions with lower societal residential mobility. These results highlight the importance of socio-ecological characteristics in understanding the adaptive functions of different types of social capital on health outcomes. (143 words; max: 150 words)