Explicit feedback maintains implicit knowledge

The role of feedback was investigated with respect to conscious and unconscious knowledge acquired during artificial grammar learning (AGL). After incidental learning of training sequences, participants classified further sequences in terms of grammaticality and reported their decision strategy with or without explicit veridical feedback. Sequences that disobeyed the learning structure conformed to an alternative structure. Feedback led to an increase in the amount of reported conscious knowledge of structure (derived rules and recollections) but did not increase its accuracy. Conversely, feedback maintained the accuracy of unconscious knowledge of structure (intuition or familiarity-based responses) which otherwise degraded. Results support a dual-process account of AGL. They suggest that implicit learning of the to-be-rejected structure at test contaminates familiarity-based classifications whereas feedback allows competing familiarity signals to be contextualised, which is incompatible with theories that consider familiarity context-insensitive.     

The effects of temporal synchrony on the perceived organization of elements in spatially symmetric and asymmetric grids

Three experiments were conducted to investigate the influence of fast temporally segmented presentations of alternate rows or columns on the perception of grids of either symmetrically or asymmetrically spaced dot-like stimuli. Experiments 1a and 1b demonstrated that observers were able to discriminate between temporally segmented presentations of rows/columns stimuli, but showed a reduced performance in discrimination between non-temporally segmented stimuli and temporally segmented stimuli that were spatially unstructured. Experiment 2 confirmed the influence of temporally segmented presentations of rows and columns using elements whose mean luminance summed to the same as the display background. Experiment 3 demonstrated that the influence of temporal cues reduced when display elements were asymmetrically spaced. The results are discussed in terms of the influence of external spatio-temporal factors on the neural mechanisms of visual grouping.     

Acceptance versus distraction: brief instructions, metaphors and exercises in increasing tolerance for self-delivered electric shocks

The current study compared the effects of an acceptance versus distraction rationale on coping with experimentally induced pain. Eighty participants were randomly assigned to one of five conditions: Full-Acceptance, Full-Distraction, Instruction-only-Acceptance, Instruction-only-Distraction and No-Instructions. Participants completed a simple matching task and were intermittently given the choice either to receive an electric shock and continue, or to avoid the shock and terminate the task. Only the Full-Acceptance strategy (that included experiential exercises and a metaphor) had a significant effect on task tolerance as measured by an increase in the number of shocks delivered post-intervention relative to baseline. In addition, the participants in both of the acceptance conditions showed lower levels of believability in that they were more likely to continue with the task even when reporting more pain. The results support the prediction that acceptance-based interventions work by undermining the behavioural-control functions of pain-related thoughts and feelings, and call for a systematic analysis of how metaphors and exercises work in analogue research.     

Community and health facility influences on contraceptive method choice in the Eastern Cape, South Africa

CONTEXT: Although a growing number of studies have examined how community factors influence contraceptive use, few have explored how such factors affect method choice. METHODS: Data from the 1998 South Africa Demographic and Health Survey and the 1998 Eastern Cape Facility Survey were used to examine community and health facility influences on the method choices of 1,165 women aged 15-49 who lived in the Eastern Cape. Relative risk ratios from multilevel multinomial models assessed how method choice varied between communities. RESULTS: The likelihood of using the pill or a more permanent method rather than the injection rose with the proportion of women in a community who controlled their earnings (risk ratios, 3.2 and 3.8, respectively). In communities with higher proportions of females with only a primary education, women were less likely to use the pill instead of the injection (0.1). Higher doctor staffing levels were associated with a greater likelihood of using the pill or a more permanent method (1.5 and 1.4), and having more expired methods in stock was associated with increased use of a more permanent method (2.1). Several facility factors were associated with a decreased likelihood of using the pill rather than the injection: higher numbers of community health workers in an area and higher numbers of facility nurses who had received training on HIV/AIDS in the last year (0.9 for each). Yet a substantial amount of variation in method choice was not accounted for by these variables. CONCLUSION: Future research should emphasize the collection of community-level data on structural, behavioral and cultural factors to help explain the variation in method choice between communities.     

AppMonitor: A tool for recording user actions in unmodified Windows applications

This article describes AppMonitor, a Microsoft Windows-based client-side logging tool that records user actions in unmodified Windows applications. AppMonitor allows researchers to gain insights into many facets of interface interaction such as command use frequency, behavioral patterns prior to or following command use, and methods of navigating through systems and data sets. AppMonitor uses the Windows SDK libraries to monitor both low-level interactions, such as "left mouse button pressed" and "Ctrl-F pressed," as well as high-level "logical" actions, such as menu selections and scrollbar manipulations. The events recorded are configurable, allowing researchers to perform broad or targeted studies. No user input is required to manage logging, allowing participants to seamlessly conduct everyday work while their actions are monitored. The system currently supports logging in Microsoft Word and Adobe Reader; however, it could be extended for use with any Microsoft Windows-based application. To support other researchers wishing to create multilevel event loggers, we describe AppMonitor's underlying architecture and implementation, and provide a brief example of the data generated during our 4-month trial with six users.