Memory deficits before and after temporal lobectomy: Effect of laterality and age of onset

Laterality and age of onset effects on semantic and figural memory were evaluated in 30 right-handed, left speech dominant (amobarbital test) patients with epilepsy before and after temporal lobectomy. There were no effects of focus on WAIS-R IQ scores. Early onset (less than or equal to 5 years) was associated with lower IQ and memory (WMS). Left Temporal (LT) patients showed worse semantic than figural memory preoperatively. Unexpectedly, early onset LT had marked postoperative decline of figural memory, whereas late onset LT patients showed the previously reported worsening of semantic memory. Right Temporal (RT) lobectomy patients, in contrast, improved in both semantic and figural memory regardless of age of onset. A "crowding effect" was suggested by the decline in figural memory following surgery in the early onset LT patients who remained stable or improved in semantic memory. Results indicate the need to incorporate age of onset of seizures into laterality models of memory function following unilateral temporal-hippocampal resection.     

Evaluating a split processing model of visual word recognition: effects of orthographic neighborhood size

The split fovea theory proposes that visual word recognition of centrally presented words is mediated by the splitting of the foveal image, with letters to the left of fixation being projected to the right hemisphere (RH) and letters to the right of fixation being projected to the left hemisphere (LH). Two lexical decision experiments aimed to elucidate word recognition processes under the split fovea theory are described. The first experiment showed that when words were presented centrally, such that the initial letters were in the left visual field (LVF/RH), there were effects of orthographic neighborhood, i.e., there were faster responses to words with high rather than low orthographic neighborhoods for the initial letters ('lead neighbors'). This effect was limited to lead-neighbors but not end-neighbors (orthographic neighbors sharing the same final letters). When the same words were fully presented in the LVF/RH or right visual field (RVF/LH, Experiment 2), there was no effect of orthographic neighborhood size. We argue that the lack of an effect in Experiment 2 was due to exposure to all of the letters of the words, the words being matched for overall orthographic neighborhood count and the sub-parts no longer having a unique effect. We concluded that the orthographic activation found in Experiment 1 occurred because the initial letters of centrally presented words were projected to the RH. The results support the split fovea theory, where the RH has primacy in representing lead neighbors of a written word.     

Display-wide influences on figure–ground perception: The case of symmetry

Past research has demonstrated that convex regions are increasingly likely to be perceived as figures as the number of alternating convex and concave regions in test displays increases. This region-number effect depends on both a small preexisting preference for convex over concave objects and the presence of scene characteristics (i.e., uniform fill) that allow the integration of the concave regions into a background object/surface. These factors work together to enable the percept of convex objects in front of a background. We investigated whether region-number effects generalize to another property, symmetry, whose effectiveness as a figure property has been debated. Observers reported which regions they perceived as figures in black-and-white displays with alternating symmetric/asymmetric regions. In Experiments 1 and 2, the displays had articulated outer borders that preserved the symmetry/asymmetry of the outermost regions. Region-number effects were not observed, although symmetric regions were perceived as figures more often than chance. We hypothesized that the articulated outer borders prevented fitting a background interpretation to the asymmetric regions. In Experiment 3, we used straight-edge framelike outer borders and observed region-number effects for symmetry equivalent to those observed for convexity. These results (1) show that display-wide information affects figure assignment at a border, (2) extend the evidence indicating that the ability to fit background as well as foreground interpretations is critical in figure assignment, (3) reveal that symmetry and convexity are equally effective figure cues and, (4) demonstrate that symmetry serves as a figural property only when it is close to fixation.     

Ethnography in Community Psychology: Promises and Tensions

Community psychology recognizes the need for research methods that illuminate context, culture, diversity, and process. One such method, ethnography, has crossed into multiple disciplines from anthropology, and indeed, community psychologists are becoming community ethnographers. Ethnographic work stands at the intersection of bridging universal questions with the particularities of people and groups bounded in time, geographic location, and social location. Ethnography is thus historical and deeply contextual, enabling a rich, in-depth understanding of communities that is aligned with the values and goals of community psychology. The purpose of this paper is to elucidate the potential of ethnography for community psychology and to encourage its use within the field as a method to capture culture and context, to document process, and to reveal how social change and action occur within and through communities. We discuss the method of ethnography, draw connections to community psychology values and goals, and identify tensions from our experiences doing ethnography. Overall, we assert that ethnography is a method that resonates with community psychology and present this paper as a resource for those interested in using this method in their research or community activism.     

Attentional bias to threat in clinical anxiety states

Abstract

Attentional responses to threat stimuli were assessed in anxious patients, normal controls, and subjects who had recovered from a clinical anxiety state. The main aims of the study were: (1) to replicate MacLeod, Mathews, and Tata's (1986) finding of an attentional bias to threat in currently anxious patients compared with normal control subjects; (2) to assess whether the bias is related to the predominant worries of anxious patients; and (3) to investigate whether the bias is present in recovered anxious patients. The original finding of an anxiety-related attentional bias was replicated. The results indicated that the extent to which anxious patients selectively attended to social threat words was associated with the seventy of their social worries. The attentional responses of the recovered anxious group were not significantly differentiated from those of the currently anxious or normal control groups.     

Anxiety and the allocation of attention to threat

Using a probe detection technique we have recently demonstrated that anxious subjects consistently deploy attention towards threat-related stimuli, whereas non-anxious controls tend to move attention away from such material (MacLeod, Mathews, & Tata, 1986).

The current study employed the same paradigm but attempted to distinguish the role of trait and state anxiety by testing high- and low-trait students when state anxiety was relatively low (12 weeks before a major examination) and again when it was relatively high (one week before this examination). High-trait subjects alone tended to shift attention towards generally threatening material on both test occasions. Results for examination-related stimuli were more complex. Increased proximity to the examination was associated with an increase in attentional bias towards such threat stimuli in high-trait subjects, but with increased attentional avoidance of such stimuli in low-trait subjects. It is suggested that the attentional response to currently relevant stress-related stimuli may be associated with neither trait nor state anxiety alone, but with an interactive function involving both these variables. These results are discussed in relation to existing models of emotion and cognition, and alternative interpretations of the findings are considered.     

Experimental modification of attribution processes

Attributional style is hypothesized to be a causative factor in depression vulnerability; however, no studies to date have examined whether manipulation of attributional style influences depressed mood. The purpose of this study was to determine whether computer-based cognitive bias modification (CBM) procedures could modify attributional style and influence stress vulnerability. Participants were provided with multiple training trials that were intended to promote the use of either a positive or a negative attributional style. Compared with individuals in the negative attributional style condition, individuals in the positive attributional style condition showed decreased tendency to make self-deficient causal attributions for poor performance on a difficult anagram test. Furthermore, individuals in the positive attributional style condition reported less depressed mood in response to this academic stressor. These results suggest that attributional style is not invariable and can potentially be modified with CBM approaches.     

A direct link between gaze perception and social attention

How information is exchanged between the cognitive mechanisms responsible for gaze perception and social attention is unclear. These systems could be independent; the "gaze cueing" effect could emerge from the activation of a general-purpose attentional mechanism that is ignorant of the social nature of the gaze cue. Alternatively, orienting to social gaze direction might be directly determined by the operation of cognitive mechanisms specifically dedicated to gaze perception. This second notion is the dominant assumption in the literature, but there is little direct support for this account. Here, we systematically manipulated observers' perception of gaze direction by implementing a gaze adaptation paradigm. Gaze cueing was reduced only in conditions where perception of specific averted gaze stimuli was impaired (Experiment 1). Adaptation to a pointing stimulus failed to impact gaze cueing (Experiment 2). Overall, these data suggest a direct link between the specific operation of gaze perception mechanisms and the consequential orienting of attention.     

Cognitive predictors of posttraumatic stress symptoms six months following acute coronary syndrome

This study examined patients' illness representations assessed shortly after an acute coronary syndrome (ACS) as predictors of posttraumatic stress symptoms six months later. Illness representations were assessed in ACS patients using standard measures at a home visit three weeks after discharge from hospital. Posttraumatic stress symptoms were assessed at the same time, and again six months later. Patients were aged 61 years on average, the majority being men (89.8%) of white European decent (89%). Greater posttraumatic symptoms at six months were associated with beliefs that the illness would last a long time (timeline), that it had an unpredictable time course (timeline--cyclical), greater consequences, less personal and treatment control, poorer illness coherence and stronger negative emotional representations (emotional upset relating to the illness; p?相似文献