Capacity demands of phoneme selection in word production: new evidence from dual-task experiments

Three dual-task experiments investigated the capacity demands of phoneme selection in picture naming. On each trial, participants named a target picture (Task 1) and carried out a tone discrimination task (Task 2). To vary the time required for phoneme selection, the authors combined the targets with phonologically related or unrelated distractor pictures (Experiment 1) or words, which were clearly visible (Experiment 2) or masked (Experiment 3). When pictures or masked words were presented, the tone discrimination and picture naming latencies were shorter in the related condition than in the unrelated condition, which indicates that phoneme selection requires central processing capacity. However, when the distractor words were clearly visible, the facilitatory effect was confined to the picture naming latencies. This pattern arose because the visible related distractor words facilitated phoneme selection but slowed down speech monitoring processes that had to be completed before the response to the tone could be selected.     

Iterated Belief Change and the Recovery Axiom

The axiom of recovery, while capturing a central intuition regarding belief change, has been the source of much controversy. We argue briefly against putative counterexamples to the axiom—while agreeing that some of their insight deserves to be preserved—and present additional recovery-like axioms in a framework that uses epistemic states, which encode preferences, as the object of revisions. This makes iterated revision possible and renders explicit the connection between iterated belief change and the axiom of recovery. We provide a representation theorem that connects the semantic conditions we impose on iterated revision and our additional syntactical properties. We show interesting similarities between our framework and that of Darwiche–Pearl (Artificial Intelligence 89:1–29 1997). In particular, we show that intuitions underlying the controversial (C2) postulate are captured by the recovery axiom and our recovery-like postulates (the latter can be seen as weakenings of (C2)). We present postulates for contraction, in the same spirit as the Darwiche–Pearl postulates for revision, and provide a theorem that connects our syntactic postulates with a set of semantic conditions. Lastly, we show a connection between the contraction postulates and a generalisation of the recovery axiom. Portions of this paper were originally presented at ECAI 2002.     

Overcoming the winner's curse: an adaptive learning perspective

The winner's curse phenomenon refers to the fact that the winner in a common value auction, in order to actually win the auction, is likely to have overestimated the item's value and consequently is likely to gain less than expected and may even lose (i.e., it is said to be “cursed”). Past research, using the “Acquiring a company” task has shown that people do not overcome this bias even after they receive extensive feedback. We suggest that the persistence of the winner's curse is due to a combination of two factors: variability in the environment that leads to ambiguous feedback (i.e., choices and outcomes are only partially correlated) and the tendency of decision makers to learn adaptively. We show in an experiment that by reducing the variance in the feedback, performance can be significantly improved. Copyright © 2007 John Wiley & Sons, Ltd.     

Locus of control, self-control, and family income as predictors of young children's mathematics and science scores

Locus of control, self-control, and family income were investigated as possible predictors of 138 young children's mathematics and science scores. The children, 60 boys and 78 girls, ranging from 4 to 8 years of age (M = 5.4, SD = 1.3) were administered the Stephens-Delys Reinforcement Contingency Interview Scale, the Self-control Rating Scale, the Comprehensive Mathematics Inventory, and a science test based on the work of D. K. Dickinson. Analysis showed mathematics scores were positively related to income, locus of control, and science scores. Mathematics and science scores were negatively related to lack of self-control. Also, science scores were positively related to locus of control. Multiple regression analysis with mathematics as the dependent variable indicated income had the greatest predictive value followed by self-control and locus of control. The multiple regression model of science was also significant, with locus of control having the greatest influence followed by self-control.     

Toward international normative reference data for the comprehensive system

We build on the work of all the authors contributing to this Special Supplement by summarizing findings across their samples of data, and we also draw on samples published elsewhere. Using 21 samples of adult data from 17 countries we create a composite set of internationally-based reference means and standard deviations from which we compute T-scores for each sample. Figures illustrate how the scores in each sample are distributed and how the samples compare across variables in eight Rorschach Comprehensive System (CS; Exner, 2003) clusters. The adult samples from around the world are generally quite similar, and thus we encourage clinicians to integrate the composite international reference values into their clinical interpretation of protocols. However, the 31 child and adolescent samples from 5 countries produce unstable and often quite extreme values on many scores. Until the factors contributing to the variability among these samples are more fully understood, we discourage clinicians from using many CS scores to make nomothetic, score-based inferences about psychopathology in children and adolescents.     

Introduction to the JPA special supplement on International Reference Samples for the Rorschach Comprehensive System

This Introduction provides an overview to the JPA Special Supplement on International Reference Samples for the Rorschach Comprehensive System (CS; Exner, 2001). It contains a history of this project and a table including all of the lead authors, their country and the type and size of their sample. Suggestions for conducting this type of research are offered, including information on normative vs. nonpatient samples, inclusion/exclusion criteria, the use of collateral instruments, and concerns relative to representativeness. Reliability and coding concerns are addressed, and information on the Popular response in Japan are reviewed. Finally, trends within and across the data are highlighted.     

The Relevant Equivalence Property

The pure implicational and the multiplicative fragments of arange of propositional relevant (and other) logics are shownto have the property that any two formulas equivalent in sucha logic are constructed from exactly the same propositionalvariables – as opposed to merely having (as the definitionof relevance itself would require) some propositional variablein common.