The perceived onset time of self- and other-generated actions

Awareness of actions is partly based on the intentions accompanying them. Thus, the awareness of self- and other-generated actions should differ to the extent that access to own and other's intentions differs. Recent studies have found a brain circuit (the mirror-neuron system) that represents self- and other-generated actions in an integrated fashion. This system does not respond to actions made by nonagents, such as machines. We measured the estimated onset time of actions that subjects either executed themselves or observed being executed by someone else or by a machine. In three experiments, the estimates of the machine actions always differed from those of self- and other-generated actions, whereas the latter two were indistinguishable. Our results are consistent with the view that intentions are attributed to others but not to machines. They also raise the interesting possibility that people attribute intentions to themselves in the same way as they do to others.     

A diffusion model analysis of adult age differences in episodic and semantic long-term memory retrieval

Two experiments investigated adult age differences in episodic and semantic long-term memory tasks, as a test of the hypothesis of specific age-related decline in context memory. Older adults were slower and exhibited lower episodic accuracy than younger adults. Fits of the diffusion model (R. Ratcliff, 1978) revealed age-related increases in non-decisional reaction time for both episodic and semantic retrieval. In Experiment 2, an age difference in boundary separation also indicated an age-related increase in conservative criterion setting. For episodic old-new recognition (Experiment 1) and source memory (Experiment 2), there was an age-related decrease in the quality of decision-driving information (drift rate). As predicted by the context-memory deficit hypothesis, there was no corresponding age-related decline in semantic drift rate.     

Domain specificity in experimental measures and participant recruitment: an application to risk-taking behavior

We challenge the prevailing notion that risk taking is a stable trait, such that individuals show consistent risk-taking/aversive behavior across domains. We subscribe to an alternative approach that appreciates the domain-specific nature of risk taking. More important, we recognize heterogeneity of risk profiles among experimental samples and introduce a new methodology that takes this heterogeneity into account. Rather than using a convenient subject pool (i.e., university students), as is typically done, we specifically targeted relevant subsamples to provide further validation of the domain-specific nature of risk taking. Our research shows that individuals who exhibit high levels of risk-taking behavior in one content area (e.g., bungee jumpers taking recreational risks) can exhibit moderate levels in other risky domains (e.g., financial). Furthermore, our results indicate that risk taking among targeted subsamples can be explained within a cost-benefit framework and is largely mediated by the perceived benefit of the activity, and to a lesser extent by the perceived risk.     

How something can be said about telling more than we can know: on choice blindness and introspection

The legacy of Nisbett and Wilson’s classic article, Telling More Than We Can Know: Verbal Reports on Mental Processes (1977), is mixed. It is perhaps the most cited article in the recent history of consciousness studies, yet no empirical research program currently exists that continues the work presented in the article. To remedy this, we have introduced an experimental paradigm we call choice blindness [Johansson, P., Hall, L., Sikström, S., &; Olsson, A. (2005). Failure to detect mismatches between intention and outcome in a simple decision task. Science, 310(5745), 116–119.]. In the choice blindness paradigm participants fail to notice mismatches between their intended choice and the outcome they are presented with, while nevertheless offering introspectively derived reasons for why they chose the way they did. In this article, we use word-frequency and latent semantic analysis (LSA) to investigate a corpus of introspective reports collected within the choice blindness paradigm. We contrast the introspective reasons given in non-manipulated vs. manipulated trials, but find very few differences between these two groups of reports.     

Looking for foes and friends: perceptual and emotional factors when finding a face in the crowd

In a face-in-the-crowd setting, the authors examined visual search for photographically reproduced happy, angry, and fearful target faces among neutral distractor faces in 3 separate experiments. Contrary to the hypothesis, happy targets were consistently detected more quickly and accurately than angry and fearful targets, as were directed compared with averted targets. There was no consistent effect of social anxiety. A facial emotion recognition experiment suggested that the happy search advantage could be due to the ease of processing happy faces. In the final experiment with perceptually controlled schematic faces, the authors reported more effective detection of angry than happy faces. This angry advantage was most obvious for highly socially anxious individuals when their social fear was experimentally enhanced.     

Neuropsychological correlates of Greek alcoholic patients who report memory disturbances

We studied 40 male and 37 female (M age=63 yr.) Greek alcoholic patients and an equal number of control subjects. Both groups were evaluated with the Mini-Mental State Examination, the Syndrome Short Test, the Verbal Fluency Test (Category & Letter), the Clock Test, and the Digit Span (Forward and Backward from the Wechsler Adult Intelligence Scale-Revised). Alcoholic patients had statistically significant lower scores on MMSE, Verbal Fluency Test, and Digit Span, and higher scores on the Syndrome Short Test, while positive correlations were found among MMSE, Verbal Fluency Test, Clock Test, Digit Span-Backward, and age. These findings point to frontal lobe dysfunction in Greek alcoholic patients which is not different from that shown in patients from diverse ethnic and cultural backgrounds.     

Life after Kant: Natural purposes and the autopoietic foundations of biological individuality

This paper proposes a basic revision of the understanding of teleology in biological sciences. Since Kant, it has become customary to view purposiveness in organisms as a bias added by the observer; the recent notion of teleonomy expresses well this as-if character of natural purposes. In recent developments in science, however, notions such as self-organization (or complex systems) and the autopoiesis viewpoint, have displaced emergence and circular self-production as central features of life. Contrary to an often superficial reading, Kant gives a multi-faceted account of the living, and anticipates this modern reading of the organism, even introducing the term self-organization for the first time. Our re-reading of Kant in this light is strengthened by a group of philosophers of biology, with Hans Jonas as the central figure, who put back on center stage an organism-centered view of the living, an autonomous center of concern capable of providing an interior perspective. Thus, what is present in nuce in Kant, finds a convergent development from this current of philosophy of biology and the scientific ideas around autopoeisis, two independent but parallel developments culminating in the 1970s. Instead of viewing meaning or value as artifacts or illusions, both agree on a new understanding of a form of immanent teleology as truly biological features, inevitably intertwined with the self-establishment of an identity which is the living process.     

Treatments that weaken Pavlovian conditioned fear and thwart its renewal in rats: implications for treating human phobias

In experiments using a total of 144 albino rat subjects, the authors assessed the ability of fear-weakening treatments to prevent fear renewal (relapse). Conditioned suppression of operant behavior served as the measure of fear in an A-B-A (acquisition-treatment-test) renewal paradigm. In Experiment 1, 100 nonreinforced exposures to a feared cue during treatment (extinction) did not reduce fear renewal relative to 20 exposures. In Experiment 2, explicitly unpaired (EU) treatments thwarted both renewal and reacquisition. In Experiment 3, conditioned inhibition (CI) and differential conditioning (DC) treatments weakened renewal and resisted both reacquisition and a form of reinstatement. In Experiment 4, EU, DC, and CI treatments all thwarted renewal. Evidence suggested that the ability of the treatments to do so reflected the combined effects of transfer of extinction across treatment and test contexts and habituation to the unconditioned stimulus.     

Food Fight! The Swedish Low-Carb/High Fat (LCHF) Movement and the Turning of Science Popularisation Against the Scientists

Science popularisation is widely recognised as having its ‘political uses’ and as serving as a conventional means for buttressing the epistemic authority of the institutions of science in society. By separating the work of producing new knowledge from its dissemination, popularisation promotes public understanding and appreciation of science placed beyond public reach and influence. However, simply by insisting upon such a separation, so popularisation remains vulnerable to ‘capture’ by skilled and resourceful communicators intent on turning it against the established authority of scientists. This is a phenomenon which can be analysed in relation to the communicative strategies pursued by a collection of general practitioners, diabetics and self-styled dietary experts in Sweden championing a low-carbohydrate/high fat (LCHF) dietetics akin to the Diet Revolution initiated by Robert Atkins in the early 1970s. By dedicating themselves to achieving an overwhelming public presence in the propagation of simplified accounts of dietary science, the LCHF movement has been able to fashion science popularisation into a weapon capable of being turned back upon established dietary expertise in Sweden. In this effort they have proceeded on two fronts; firstly by debunking established dietary advice for failing to live up to idealised standards of ‘sound science’, and secondly, by effectively mobilising the personal testimony and endorsements of dieters themselves in order to publicly confirm the authenticity and trustworthiness of the LCHF regimen.