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.     

The Relationship Between Perceived and Actual Physical Fitness: A Meta-Analysis

The purpose of our study was to meta-analytically estimate the relationship between actual and perceived fitness, and variables that may moderate this relationship (i.e., gender, age, and perceived fitness measure). Computer, hand, and journal literature searches identified 53 potential studies. On review, 28 of these studies met the inclusion criteria of having a perceived and actual (i.e., objective) measure of physical fitness. Using random effects modeling procedures, we found a medium mean effect size of .38 (N = 33 independent effect sizes, p < .001, Fail-Safe N = 4,654). Moderator analyses revealed that younger people had more accurate estimates of their fitness, and standardized perceived fitness measures had significantly larger effect sizes than unstandardized perceived fitness measures. In summary, men and women of all ages accurately perceived their fitness level, with larger effects evidenced for younger people and for studies that used standardized perceived fitness measures. Unfortunately, because most Americans are either low active or sedentary, their perceptions reveal that they are not fit. Research limitations and future directions are discussed.     

Walking and periventricular leukomalacia: locomotor characteristics and brain imaging (MRI)

The aim of the present study was to compare the walking abilities in infants with and without periventricular leukomalacia and to see whether the severity of the brain damage was related to locomotor outcome of the infants at 12 and 18 months. 47 newborns were included in the study based on white matter abnormalities on ultrasound. Magnetic resonance imaging (MRI) recordings during the neonatal period were used to identify and quantify the location and severity of the brain lesions. Locomotor outcome was assessed in terms of disability at 12 and 18 months. The quality of walking, including global and segmental gait parameters, was measured for the infants who could walk independently at 18 months and compared to a group of healthy control infants. The number of children who could walk was related to the extent of white matter abnormalities seen on the neonatal MRI, but the quality of walking was not.     

Sensibiliser les filles à l'orientation vers les métiers scientifiques et techniques. Évaluation d'un dispositif

Girls’s diversification of career choices seem relatively resistant to training program. One explanation of this situation is the lack or even absence of procedures for evaluating this program. The article proposes an evaluation of a training program entitled “female engineer” designed exclusively for high school girls. The objective was to encourage female students guidance in this profession. The results are mixed and are interpreted in terms of cognitive dissonance and upward social comparison. The results also show the need to develop in the same time the training program and his evaluation.     

Exploration of perceptual and motor inhibition in children with traumatic brain injury

Perceptual and motor inhibition were examined using conflict resolution tasks for 12 children with traumatic brain injury and 24 matched controls. Direct comparisons of inhibition performances between the two groups showed a specific and disproportionate impairment of motor inhibition (compared with perceptual inhibition) for the children with traumatic brain injury, which suggests that inhibition processes might be differentially impaired in children after traumatic brain injury.     

Pitch direction ability predicts melodic perception in autism

Individuals with autism spectrum disorders (ASDs) often present atypical auditory perception. Previous work has reported both enhanced low-level pitch discrimination and superior abilities to detect local pitch structure on higher-level melodic tasks in ASD. However, it is unclear how low and high levels of auditory perception are related in ASD or typical development (TD), or how this relationship might change across development and stimulus presentation rates. To these aims, in the present study, children with ASD and TD were tested on a low-level pitch direction discrimination task and a high-level melodic global-local task. Groups performed similarly on both of these auditory tasks. Moreover, individual differences in low-level pitch direction ability predicted performance on the higher-level global-local task, with a stronger relationship in ASD. Age did not affect the relationship between low-level and high-level pitch performance in either ASD or TD. However, there was a more positive effect of age on the high-level global-local task performance in TD than ASD. Finally, there was no effect of stimulus rate on the relationship between low-level and high-level pitch performance in either group. These findings provide a better understanding of how perception is associated across levels of processing in ASD versus TD. This work helps to better understand individual differences in auditory perception and to refine ASD phenotypes.     

The Professional Insertion of Immigrants Born in the Maghreb: Challenges and Impediments for Intervention

Emigration as a means of improving living conditions in a society is viewed positively and is rooted in the will to escape economic and political constraints that seem to present no way out. The unemployment rate has increased in recent years several immigrant groups, especially people from the Maghreb and western Asia. As a result, these groups are significant clientele of employment integration programmes. In line with this observation, this article discusses the following dual objective: outlining the many obstacles Maghrebins face when they arrive in Quebec when integrating into the employment market and discussing the intervention strategies offered.     

Life Satisfaction and Associated Factors Among People Aged 60 Years and Above in Six European Countries

Life satisfaction is a concept frequently used to measure wellbeing of older people. However, there is still a lack of cross-national comparative research investigating factors associated with life satisfaction. There may be unique and common factors associated with life satisfaction across European countries. This study aimed to investigate life satisfaction among people aged 60–89 years in six European countries in relation to health problems, ADL capacity, self-esteem, social and financial resources. A cross-sectional study was performed, including 7,699 people aged 60–89 years, in Sweden, the UK, The Netherlands, Luxemburg, Austria and Italy, participating in the European Study of Adult Wellbeing, using questions from the Older Americans Resources and Services schedule, Multidimensional Functional Assessment Questionnaire, Life Satisfaction Index Z and Rosenberg’s Self-esteem scale. Logistic regression analysis was performed to determine factors associated with life satisfaction in the six national samples. In cases where people were less satisfied with their life it was fairly satisfactory and unsatisfactory social contacts (Odds Ratio (OR) 1.5–13.8), poor financial resources (OR 1.7–15.1), feeling greatly hindered by health problems (OR 2.2–5.4) and self-esteem (OR 2.1–5.1) rather than the ability to perform activities of daily living and the extent of social contacts that gave the greatest risk of low life satisfaction in all the six European countries. There were both common and country-specific factors important for life satisfaction in the six European countries. However, the importance of satisfactory social contacts, financial resources, self-esteem and feeling hindered by health problems seems universal in the six included countries and thus important to target in preventive interventions.