Effects of resource demanding processing on context memory for context-related versus context-unrelated items

In two experiments, context memory was compared between conditions of higher versus lower cognitive load. The ease of the item–context binding was manipulated using words whose meaning was preexperimentally related versus unrelated to context (colour). Experiment 1 showed that an item generation task may lead to a decrease in memory for font colour without enhancing item recognition. Experiment 2 used a dual-task paradigm, that is, participants performed a concurrent task during the study phase of the memory task. The divided-attention condition decreased both item and context memory. However, in both experiments, the influence of resource demanding conditions on context memory was apparent only when the item–context binding process was not facilitated by preexperimental associations.     

Assessing the validity of multinomial models using extraneous variables: An application to prospective memory

The class of multinomial processing tree (MPT) models has been used extensively in cognitive psychology to model latent cognitive processes. Critical for the usefulness of a MPT model is its psychological validity. Generally, the validity of a MPT model is demonstrated by showing that its parameters are selectively and predictably affected by theoretically meaningful experimental manipulations. Another approach is to test the convergent validity of the model parameters and other extraneous measures intended to measure the same cognitive processes. Here, we advance the concept of construct validity (Cronbach & Meehl, 1955 Cronbach, L. J. and Meehl, P. E. 1955. Construct validity in psychological tests. Psychological Bulletin, 52: 281–302. [Crossref], [PubMed], [Web of Science ®] , [Google Scholar]) as a criterion for model validity in MPT modelling and show how this approach can be fruitfully utilized using the example of a MPT model of event-based prospective memory. For that purpose, we investigated the convergent validity of the model parameters and established extraneous measures of prospective memory processes over a range of experimental settings, and we found a lack of convergent validity between the two indices. On a conceptual level, these results illustrate the importance of testing convergent validity. Additionally, they have implications for prospective memory research, because they demonstrate that the MPT model of event-based prospective memory is not able to differentiate between different processes contributing to prospective memory performance.     

Fear and Disgust Responding to Heterogeneous Blood-Injection-Injury Stimuli: Distinctions from Anxiety Symptoms

Discrepancies exist in the literature regarding the unique role of disgust in Blood-Injection-Injury (BII) phobia. The present study attempts to clarify the discrepancy using a sample of analogue BII phobics (n = 40) and nonphobics (n = 40) who completed a series of questionnaires and were exposed to blood, mutilation, and injection pictures. The findings revealed that BII phobics reported greater disgust and contamination fears than nonphobics after controlling for anxious symptoms. When rating phobia-relevant pictures, BII phobics responded with greater fear and disgust than nonphobics after controlling for baseline anxiety scores. Furthermore, disgust was the dominant emotional response for BII phobics for the blood and mutilation stimuli. However, no differences were found between fear and disgust within the BII group when rating injection stimuli. The implications of these findings for better understanding the potential unique role of disgust in the etiology, maintenance, and treatment of BII phobia are discussed.

Revisiting the factor structure of the 12-item Disgust Propensity and Sensitivity Scale – Revised: Evidence for a third component

The 12-item Disgust Propensity and Sensitivity Scale – Revised (DPSS-12) is widely used to assess the tendency for an individual to respond with disgust (i.e., disgust propensity) and how bothered an individual is by the experience of disgust (i.e., disgust sensitivity). However, heterogeneous items included in the DPSS-12 call into question the adequacy of its two-factor structure. The current study examined the factor structure of the DPSS-12 using two large, nonclinical student samples. Exploratory factor analyses revealed three lower order factors: (1) disgust propensity, (2) disgust sensitivity, and (3) self-focused/ruminative disgust. Confirmatory factor analyses supported the three-factor solution and demonstrated that the model fit better than a unidimensional or two-factor model. Further, a modified two-factor model that excluded the third factor provided a better fit than the original two-factor model. Additionally, the third domain explained a significant portion of the total variance, and evidenced a distinctive pattern of association with relevant constructs including obsessional symptoms. These data suggest the need to refine our knowledge about the latent structure of disgust reflected by this measure.     

Disgust Sensitivity and Psychopathological Symptoms: Distinctions from Harm Avoidance

The present study examined the relationship between disgust sensitivity and symptoms of somatization, obsessive-compulsive disorder (OCD), interpersonal sensitivity, depression, anxiety, anger/hostility, phobic anxiety, paranoid ideation, and psychoticism in a community sample. Participants (n = 121) completed the Disgust Scale-2, the Symptom Checklist-90, and the harm avoidance subscale of the Temperament and Character Inventory. Disgust sensitivity was found to be correlated with a broad range of psychopathological symptoms. However, results also indicated that these correlations were partially mediated by harm avoidance. That is, when controlling for levels of harm avoidance, the association between disgust sensitivity and psychopathological symptoms was either substantially reduced or became nonsignificant. These findings suggest that the tendency towards behavioral inhibition to avoid punishment and non-reward may partially account for the association between disgust sensitivity and a broad range of psychopathological symptoms.

Disgust Sensitivity and Anxiety Disorder Symptoms: Psychometric Properties of the Disgust Emotion Scale

Recent research has implicated disgust sensitivity in the etiology of specific anxiety disorders. The Disgust Emotion Scale (DES) is a newly developed measure that was designed to improve the assessment of disgust sensitivity. The present study examines the psychometric properties of the DES. Exploratory factor analysis in Study 1 revealed five factors of disgust towards: (1) rotting foods, (2) blood and injection, (3) smells, (4) mutilation and death, and (5) small animals. The DES demonstrated adequate internal consistency and convergent validity. Significant positive correlations were found between the five factors of the DES and blood-injection-injury fears and obsessive-compulsive disorder symptoms. Confirmatory factor analysis in Study 2 provided support for the five-factor model. However, there was indication of item overlap within the factors. These findings suggest that the DES is a reliable measure of disgust as it relates to specific anxiety disorder symptoms.     

Disgust sensitivity and the HEXACO model of personality

In the current investigation, we test for relationships between three domains of disgust sensitivity (pathogen, sexual, and moral disgust) and the six dimensions of the HEXACO personality model in a large, demographically diverse Dutch sample. Our results extend upon previous investigations into the relationship between disgust sensitivity and personality in two important ways. First, in contrast with most previous investigations into disgust sensitivity, we measure sensitivities to sexual and moral disgust, two domains that elicit self-reports of disgust and facial expressions of disgust. Second, in contrast with the few investigations that have tested for relationships between sensitivities to sexual and moral disgust and Five Factor Model personality dimensions, we use the HEXACO personality model. We find that honesty–humility, a personality dimension assessed in the HEXACO model but not the Five Factor Model, accounts for unique variance in sensitivities to sexual and moral disgust, but not sensitivity to pathogen disgust. Other relationships between disgust sensitivity and personality are discussed, as are implications for understanding the fitness-relevant tradeoffs potentially underlying disgust sensitivity and personality.     

The role of recollection in source memory: an examination of schizophrenia patients and their first-degree relatives

Source recognition memory deficits have repeatedly been observed in people with schizophrenia (SZ), and have also recently been observed in their first-degree relatives. These deficits have been hypothesized to result, at least in part, from impairments in the conscious recollection process. Although other processes are clearly also affected in SZ, it has been proposed that impairments in the conscious recollection process could be a parsimonious explanation for the source memory deficits observed in their relatives. Here, we tested 25 patients with SZ and 34 of their non-affected parents, as well as two groups of matched healthy controls, on a short-term associative memory task that shares the characteristics of standard source recognition tasks but minimizes the need for recollection of stored information from memory. This task was administered in order to determine if deficits can still be observed in these people when involvement of the conscious recollection process is minimized. We observed deficits on our short-term source memory task in people with SZ, but their first-degree relatives did not share this deficit. These results support the idea that multiple memory processes supporting associative/source memory are affected in SZ, whereas the source memory deficits previously observed in relatives of SZ seem specific to tasks that rely on the conscious recollection process.     

Generation difficulty and memory for source

The role of the word predictability from sentence context for reality monitoring and external source monitoring was examined in two experiments. In a reality-monitoring task, discrimination of an internal source was better in the hard than in the easy condition. It is probable that extra cognitive operations engaged during word generation in the hard condition were effective cues for reality-monitoring judgements. In contrast, in an external source-monitoring task (recognition memory of item's colour), the hard condition resulted in worse source memory for generated words than did the easy condition. This result is consistent both with an item–context trade-off hypothesis and a processing hypothesis. Greater effort involved at the time of generation might limit resources available for encoding of an external source. It is also possible that for generated words, the hard condition promoted conceptual processing instead of perceptual processing; therefore the item's colour was not effectively encoded.     

Individual differences in disgust sensitivity and health-related avoidance: Examination of specific associations

This present study examined the specificity of disgust sensitivity in predicting health-related anxiety and behavioral avoidance. Participants (n = 60) completed self-report measures of disgust sensitivity, health anxiety, anxiety, and depression. They then completed three randomly presented health-related behavioral avoidance tasks (BATs) that consisted of potential exposure to the common cold, the flu, and mononucleosis. Results indicated that disgust sensitivity was significantly associated with anxious and avoidant responding to the health-related BATs. This association also remained largely intact after controlling for gender, anxiety, depression, and health anxiety. These findings indicate that disgust sensitivity has a specific and robust association with health-related anxiety and avoidance commonly observed among those with excessive health anxiety and obsessive compulsive disorder. The unique role of disgust sensitivity in relation to health anxiety is discussed in the context of a disease-avoidance model.     

How you lie affects what you remember

We investigated how telling different types of lies may impact memory. Participants studied pictures of objects, and later lied and told the truth about these and new objects once or multiple times by describing them or by denying they had seen them. Forty-eight hours later, participants were tested on their source memory. Results revealed that participants had good memory for having falsely described a never-seen object, but relatively poor memory for having falsely denied seeing a studied object. These results suggest that telling certain types of lies may make a person more likely to forget having lied. In addition, repeated truthful denials of having seen a picture paradoxically increased false memories for having seen it. Thus, telling the truth does not always prevent the possibility of memory distortion.     

Characteristics of Blood-Injection-Injury Fears in People Receiving Intravenous Chemotherapy

Blood-Injection-Injury (BII) phobia is associated with distress and avoidance in response to blood, injury, or receiving injections. BII phobia can therefore create problems for those receiving medical procedures such as chemotherapy. The prevalence rate of BII in the general population has been estimated to be less than 5% but as many as 19% of outpatients receiving chemotherapy surveyed by Carey and Harris (Behaviour Change 22:5–90, 2005) reported BII concerns. This study examined the extent and characteristics of BII concerns among outpatients receiving chemotherapy for the first time (n = 124). Almost 17% of the sample had scores on the Mutilation Questionnaire comparable to samples with clinical BII phobia. Those assigned to a high BII concern group based on Mutilation Questionnaire scores reported higher somatic and fainting responses to BII stimuli and elevated disgust sensitivity, compared to groups selected for low BII concerns. Females had significantly higher Mutilation Questionnaire scores than males. Thus, the BII concerns of outpatients receiving chemotherapy appear qualitatively similar to the concerns reported by clinical BII phobia samples and analogue student samples. We suggest that the standard inclusion of a brief, reliable screening measure of BII concerns for outpatients scheduled for chemotherapy, coupled with brief, effective interventions to reduce BII-related distress, may be warranted.     

Source and destination memory: Two sides of the same coin?

Whereas source memory involves remembering from whom you have heard something, destination memory involves remembering to whom you have told something. Despite its practical relevance, destination memory has been studied little. Recently, two reports suggested that generally destination memory should be poorer than source memory, and that it should be particularly difficult for older people. We tested these predictions by having young and older participants read sentences to two examiners (destination encoding) and listen to sentences read by two examiners (source encoding), under intentional (Experiment 1) or incidental encoding (Experiments 2 and 3). Only in Experiment 3 (in which cognitive demands during destination encoding were increased) was destination memory significantly poorer than source memory. In none of the experiments were older adults inferior to the young on destination or source memory. Destination- and source-memory scores were significantly correlated. Item memory was consistently superior for sentences that had been read out loud (during destination encoding) versus those that had been heard (during source encoding). Destination memory needs not always be poorer than source memory, appears not to be particularly impaired by normal ageing and may depend on similar processes to those supporting source memory.     

Coordination Processes of Mental Transformations of Patterns: Practice and Transfer Effects

Regulation and monitoring of successful performance in complex tasks requires decisions regarding which processes to engage in and in what order. Coordination of these activities appears to be a separable aspect of the demands imposed on working memory by cascaded serial processes (Carlson & Lundy, 1992). In the experiments presented here, subjects indicated whether symbolically suggested transformation rules (rotation, reflection) correctly described the difference between two patterns of filledin squares within a 3x3 matrix. Two experiments were carried out with different levels of practice and common transfer tasks. Our aim was to provide evidence for an executive coordinating mechanism on the basis of differential practice and transfer effects. The following results were obtained: (1) Coordination complexity (Mayr & Kliegl, 1993) has a nonadditive effect on transformation time at all levels of practice, suggesting that a substantial deal of time is spent on processes other than executing transformations. (2) Performance on the transfer task indicated that the practised coordination skill was generalised under the conditions of the experiment. Level of practice influenced the transfer pattern, showing more specificity in transfer after extended practice. Taken together, the nonadditive effect as well as the transfer effect suggest that coordination cost reflects separable processing demand. The results constrain the type of interaction between the visual working memory system and the central control component of multicomponent working memory models (Baddeley, 1989).     

Differential effects of cue specificity and list length on the prospective and retrospective prospective-memory components

Event-based prospective memory (PM) refers to the ability to remember to perform an intended action at an appropriate moment that is indicated by some cue. It has been shown that increasing the number of PM cues as well as decreasing the cues' specificity can impair PM performance. Although both manipulations result in similar detrimental effects to PM accuracy, they may affect different underlying cognitive processes. To test this hypothesis, we manipulated both the number of cues and cue specificity and found the expected detrimental effects on PM accuracy. Analyses with the multinomial model of PM, which considers false PM responses and accounts for guessing biases, imply that the cue-list-length manipulation affected cue singularisation as well as intention retrieval, whereas cue specificity selectively affected intention retrieval. These results are original evidence that the performance decrements from the two manipulations have different cognitive underpinnings.