nodeGame: Real-time,synchronous, online experiments in the browser

nodeGame is a free, open-source JavaScript/ HTML5 framework for conducting synchronous experiments online and in the lab directly in the browser window. It is specifically designed to support behavioral research along three dimensions: (i) larger group sizes, (ii) real-time (but also discrete time) experiments, and (iii) batches of simultaneous experiments. nodeGame has a modular source code, and defines an API (application programming interface) through which experimenters can create new strategic environments and configure the platform. With zero-install, nodeGame can run on a great variety of devices, from desktop computers to laptops, smartphones, and tablets. The current version of the software is 3.0, and extensive documentation is available on the wiki pages at http://nodegame.org.     

Selective attention as a protagonist in contemporary workplace stress: implications for the interruption age

Background and Objectives: The ubiquity of instant messages and email notifications in contemporary work environments has opened a Pandora's Box. This box is filled with countless interruptions coming from laptops, smartphones, and other devices, all of which constantly call for employees’ attention. In this interruption era, workplace stress is a pervasive problem. To examine this problem, the present study hypothesizes that the three-way interaction among the frequency with which interrupting stimuli appear, their salience, and employees’ deficits in inhibiting attentional responses to them impacts mental workload perceptions, ultimately leading to stress. The study, further, probes a related form of self-efficacy as a potential suppressor of interruption-based stress. Design: The study used a 2 (low vs. high frequency) × 2 (low vs. high salience) mixed model design. Methods: The 128 subjects completed a test of their inhibitory deficits and rated their mental workload perceptions and experiences of stress following a computer-based task. Results: Inhibitory deficits and increased interruption salience can alter the perception of mental workload in contemporary work environments for the worse, but interruption self-efficacy can help offset any resulting interruption-based stress. Conclusions: This study extends the literatures on work interruptions as well as on stress and coping in the workplace.     

辩证思维在重症急性胰腺炎治疗中的运用

重症急性胰腺炎的治疗水平在近几十年已有了很大的发展,但是SAP的死亡率依然居高不下,严重威胁患者生命。这类患者的病情复杂,需要运用多种治疗方法进行综合救治。从多种治疗方法中选择合适的方法并进行合理的治疗很难准确把握,需要我们用哲学的思维来看待胰腺炎的诊治,辩证地对其进行有针对性的治疗,从而提高重症急性胰腺炎的治疗水平。     

Can smartphones be used to bring computer-based tasks from the lab to the field? A mobile experience-sampling method study about the pace of life

Researchers are increasingly using smartphones to collect scientific data. To date, most smartphone studies have collected questionnaire data or data from the built-in sensors. So far, few studies have analyzed whether smartphones can also be used to conduct computer-based tasks (CBTs). Using a mobile experience-sampling method study and a computer-based tapping task as examples (N = 246; twice a day for three weeks, 6,000+ measurements), we analyzed how well smartphones can be used to conduct a CBT. We assessed methodological aspects such as potential technologically induced problems, dropout, task noncompliance, and the accuracy of millisecond measurements. Overall, we found few problems: Dropout rate was low, and the time measurements were very accurate. Nevertheless, particularly at the beginning of the study, some participants did not comply with the task instructions, probably because they did not read the instructions before beginning the task. To summarize, the results suggest that smartphones can be used to transfer CBTs from the lab to the field, and that real-world variations across device manufacturers, OS types, and CPU load conditions did not substantially distort the results.     

The Sustainable Development Goals: a plan for building a better world?

Despite some clear positives, the draft text of the Sustainable Development Goals does not fulfill its self-proclaimed purpose of inspiring and guiding a concerted international effort to eradicate severe poverty everywhere in all of its forms. We offer some critical comments on the proposed agreement and suggest 10 ways to embolden the goals and amplify their appeal and moral power. While it may well be true that the world's poor are better off today than their predecessors were decades or centuries ago, to judge whether this is moral progress, we must bring into view what was possible then and what is possible now. We may well find that there have never been so many people avoidably subjected to life-threatening deprivations as there are today, and if this is the case, we should insist that our governments end this oppression immediately through appropriate institutional reforms to be prominently outlined in their post-2015 agenda.     

Guiding drivers towards safer driving speed: Exploiting visual dominance in speed adaptation

Inappropriate speed is a main cause of accidents. Drivers are often unaware of potential risks due to inadequate speed. To prevent dangerous situations, we need to understand perceptual factors influencing human speed perception. Due to the prominent role of vision in driving, we examined the effect of visuo-spatial stimuli on speed based on the optic flow. While developing an adaptive infrastructure measure to reduce speed, we conducted two consecutive studies, a driving simulator study and a field test to investigate findings further. In both studies, we placed lights on two sides of a highway exit and either illuminated them statically or activated them in a way that they appeared to be moving towards the driver. We expected drivers to slow down more when seeing static light stimuli compared to a baseline without lights. We also expected drivers to decrease speed more in conditions with oncoming lights compared to a baseline, and to static lights, due to distorted speed perception. The first study in a static driving simulator revealed no difference between conditions. In the field test, both static lights and lights moving towards the driver led to a speed reduction compared to a baseline but did not differ from one another. Lights in general led to lower driving speed, potentially due to their warning character, but we found no difference between the light conditions, suggesting that the effect might not be based on the optic flow. Future research should investigate the relationship between driven and perceived speed more closely.     

The effect of sound on visual apparent movement

Twelve subjects found the longest possible interstimulus interval (ISI) at which they perceived continuous apparent motion of one light instead of partial motion or succession between two lights. In the visual condition, two lights only were presented. In the bimodal conditions, binaurally presented tones were presented synchronously with the lights, and the lights and tones were either spatially congruent (in phase) or incongruent (180 degrees out of phase). Bimodal presentations lowered the upper ISI threshold for the perception of visual apparent motion, and the reduction was greater when the tones and lights were spatially congruent. The threshold reduction may be caused by a perceptual inference about localization of the lights in space or by a change in visual persistence.     

Effects of informational prompts on energy conservation in college classrooms

A multiple-baseline design was used with two target classroom groups (n = 28 and 27) in a study to reduce electrical energy waste in college classrooms. A dittoed letter, signed by a faculty member, was sent to each professor in the prompt condition. In the letter the professor was informed that he or she taught prior to an unscheduled period and was asked to turn off lights following the class. The results showed that after the prompt, the percentage of rooms with lights turned off increased by 13% and 6% in each target group. A further analysis of the 10 classrooms that had the lowest baseline rates of turning lights off indicated a 30% increase after the prompt. This study indicates that a minimum prompt procedure was effective in reducing electrical energy waste. The further significance of these results are also discussed.     

Mixed signals: stimulus‐response compatibility and car indicator light configuration

The amber indicator lights on cars are designed to enable road users to efficiently predict the driver's next manoeuvre. Among other factors (e.g. luminance), the spatial configuration of these lights facilitates their interpretation (e.g. the right indicator flashes for right turns). However, several modern models of car confound this relationship by placing indicators medially relative to the headlights. Hence, the left indicator is placed to the right of the left headlight, for example. In two computer‐based experiments, the object‐based incompatibility that arises from this latter configuration resulted in slower, more erroneous responses to the indicated direction than for the standard configuration. These data act as a reminder to car designers that indicators, which are inherently a safety feature, should be designed with how fluently they can be processed by the human visual system in mind and not just for aesthetic appeal. Copyright © 2007 John Wiley & Sons, Ltd.     

Axiological Absolutism and Risk1

Consider the following claim: given the choice between saving a life and preventing any number of people from temporarily experiencing a mild headache, you should always save the life. Many moral theorists accept this claim. In doing so, they commit themselves to some form of ‘moral absolutism’: the view that there are some moral considerations (like being able to save a life) that cannot be outweighed by any number of lesser moral considerations (like being able to avert a mild headache). In contexts of certainty, it is clear what moral absolutism requires of you. However, what does it require of you when deciding under risk? What ought you to do when there is a chance that, say, you will not succeed in saving the life? In recent years, various critics have argued that moral absolutism cannot satisfactorily deal with risk and should, therefore, be abandoned. In this paper, we show that moral absolutism can answer its critics by drawing on—of all things—orthodox expected utility theory.     

Parental decision-making: infant engagement with smartphones

Smartphones have become a ubiquitous part of life, and as a result, many children are engaging with smartphones beginning in infancy. Little is known regarding the thought processes used by parents in deciding when and how to allow their infants to engage with smartphones. Using a sample of twelve parents with infants younger than one year, this qualitative study examines parental smartphone use, their perspectives regarding use by their young children, and what sources informed their decision-making about allowing their infants to use a smartphone. Results found that the smartphone has become such a common part of everyday life that choices to use a smartphone around, and with, infants has become one that is nearly automatic. These research data showed that most parents are largely unaware of guidelines for childhood screen time provided by the American Academy of Pediatrics and the World Health Organization. Given our current knowledge that smartphone use can have a significant impact on the cognitive development of young children, this topic is an important area of future research.     

Fingerprint recognition system based on modified multi-connect architecture (MMCA)

Fingerprinting is the most widely used and recognised biometric technology for human authentication. Fingerprint authentication has a proven record as highly secure and convenient as compared to passwords. Hence, fingerprint sensing has come to berecognized as a common and product-differentiating feature in smartphones, tablets and PCs. This paper proposes to develop a Fingerprint recognition system for authentication of personsby using a new technique, termed as ‘associative memory with modify multi-connect architecture’. This, in turn, may pave the way to develop more efficient Fingerprint systemshaving accuracy and lesserprocessing time. Further, with application of additional tranches of associative memory, such systems in the future will acquirepotential to perform highly complex operations and save memory. In this paper, three databases viz., FVC (2004) database, internal database and International NIST database 4 are used. FVC (2004) database contains 640 fingerprint patterns, while internal database contains 2500 different fingerprint patterns; and the International NIST database 4 consists of 2000 pairs of fingerprint patterns. The proposed fingerprint recognition system has an average accuracy of 99.56% and a pattern recognition processing time of approximately 30 s.     

Momentary task-values and expectations predict engagement in science among Finnish and Chilean secondary school students

While expectancy-value-cost theory predicts that students' task values play an important part in academic engagement, these associations have rarely been tested in science education and are even less studied in authentic classroom situations. The present study examined to what extent momentary task-values, expectations and costs are associated with students' momentary academic engagement in science classes. Momentary academic engagement was operationalised as energy (give up), dedication (grit) and absorption (flow) components of engagement. Finnish (N = 5891 beeps, 307 students) and Chilean (N = 1931 beeps, 157 students) secondary school students participated in the study using Experience Sampling Method via smartphones. When signalled, students responded to questions via smartphones concerning their momentary task values, expectations, costs and components of engagement in the current activity. The research questions were analysed with multilevel path modelling. The results showed that, for both samples task-values, expectations and costs were related to energy, dedication and absorption components of engagement in science classes. High momentary task-values were positively associated with momentary flow and grit; high momentary expectations were positively associated with high grit and low giving up in both samples; and high momentary challenge showed as increases in feelings of giving up.     

Results of neurophysiologic studies in ophthalmic migraine

The influence in 8 of our patients with ophthalmic migraine of photic driving with sine-like flashing lights on EEG background activity was checked and the visually evoked potentials following the application of diffused simple light stimuli were analyzed using the recovery cycle technique. The results indicate a slightly increased tonic activity of the structures of the mesencephalic formatio reticularis, such as may be produced by slight functional disturbances. Some vegetative secondary symptoms of migraine attacks and some of the changes in EEG observed in patients with ophthalmic migraine are explicable by such an abnormality.     

When the Arrow Came before the Trolley: Jewish Aspects of the Trolley Problem

In 2014 Bruers and Breckman addressed a series of subsidiary questions arising from the trolley problem and their answers. In this article I describe ancient and precedent treatments of some of these issues over thousands of years as found in Jewish literature and the original solutions that have been proposed throughout history by Jewish philosophers and legal scholars. I address questions that have been posed to Jewish halakhic authorities when two obligations clash — whether one may save the lives of many at the cost of killing an individual — and discuss whether this is permitted in order to save lives or forbidden owing to the prohibition of murder. I also present new problems that have been introduced into the halakhic and philosophical discussions around the trolley problem in Jewish literature.     

Development of intersensory function: age-related differences in stimulus selection of multimodal compounds in rats as revealed by Pavlovian conditioning.

Preweanling and adult rats were exposed to Pavlovian stimulus pairings with lights, tones, and light-tone compounds as conditional stimuli (CSs). Tone intensity was varied. As was found in previous studies using flavor CSs, odor CSs, or both, in which significant overshadowing or potentiation occurred to an element of a compound, overshadowing was less likely and potentiation more likely for preweanlings than for adults. Several experiments supported the view that these effects reflect an age-related difference in the controlling properties of stimuli: Young rats are more disposed to encode multimodal compounds on the basis of amodal intensity, whereas their elders are more likely to encode modality-specific properties of light and sound. Differential reinforcement in the presence of lights, tones, and light-tone compounds made preweanlings' stimulus selection appear more adultlike and may be a cause of development of intersensory function.