Spectral decomposition of variability in synchronization and continuation tapping: comparisons between auditory and visual pacing and feedback conditions

Spectral analysis was applied to study the variability in human rhythmic synchronization to a visual, auditory or combined auditory-visual metronome of about 2 Hz, as well as the variability in continuation tapping at the same rate with or without visual or auditory feedback. In synchronization, variability was larger in the visual condition than in the auditory and combined conditions, but only below frequencies of about 0.3 Hz. Thus, there seem to be at least two sources of variability in synchronization, one being modality-independent and limited to intervals shorter than 3 s, and the other being modality-dependent and evident as slow "drift", especially in the visual task. In continuation tapping, variability did not depend reliably on the presence or modality of feedback. However, spectral analysis revealed a change in the temporal structure of variability around 0.08 Hz (a period of about 12 s or 24 taps), which roughly agrees with earlier findings reported in the literature.     

The Children of Mothers with Eating Disorders

There is good evidence that children of parents with psychological disorders are themselves at increased risk of disturbances in their development. Although there has been considerable research on a variety of disorders such as depression and alcohol, research on the children of parents with eating disorders has been relatively recent. This paper aims to review the evidence and covers a number of areas, including genetic factors, pregnancy, the perinatal and postpartum period, infancy, and the early years of life, focusing on feeding and mealtimes, general parenting functions, and growth. This is followed by a consideration of psychopathology in the children, parental attitudes to children's weight and shape, and adolescence. What is clear is that although there are numerous case reports and case series, the number of systematic controlled studies is relatively small, and almost nothing has been written about the children of fathers with eating disorders. What is evident from the available evidence is that children of mothers with eating disorders are at increased risk of disturbance, but that the risk depends on a variety of factors, and that difficulties in the children are far from invariable. The paper concludes by summarizing five broad categories of putative mechanisms, based on the evidence to date, by which eating disturbance in parents can influence child development.     

Risk-taking, death anxiety, and dreaming

Dream characteristics of 29 women from a graduate program were correlated with scores on the Sensation-Seeking and Death Anxiety scales. Significant positive correlations were obtained between Sensation Seeking and dream frequency (.38), meaningful dreams (.38), and Openness and depth of dreaming (.39) as well as between Thrill-seeking and dream frequency (.41) and meaningful dreams (.41). Death Anxiety scores positively related to the occurrence of nightmares (.37), representations of death in dreams (.55), and recurring nightmares (.38), but no support was found for a relationship between death anxiety and Sensation Seeking.     

A comparison of intervention for problematic speech using reinforcement with and without preferred topics

Previous research has shown that responding to the appropriate and problematic speech of individuals diagnosed with developmental disabilities with interested and uninterested listener responses, respectively, can promote more appropriate conversational engagement. However, Fisher et al. (2013) also responded to appropriate speech with access to preferred conversational topics. This study examined the influence of listener interest on the problematic speech of 8 participants and tested the additive effects of (Study 1) and participant preference for (Study 2) delivering preferred topics as reinforcement for appropriate speech. Interventions were equally effective with or without arranging access to preferred topics, but a majority of participants demonstrated a preference for intervention with contingent access to preferred topics. Caregivers and speech‐language pathologists rated the intervention procedures as acceptable and changes in participants' speech satisfactory.     

Adult attention and interaction can increase moderate‐to‐vigorous physical activity in young children

Evidence suggests that physical inactivity is prevalent among young children. To combat this, one recommendation for caregivers is to become actively involved in their child's physical activities. However, this general recommendation does not specify how or when a parent should become involved. The purpose of the current study was to conduct a functional analysis to identify a social consequence that would increase the moderate‐to‐vigorous physical activity (MVPA) exhibited by preschool‐aged children, and then to compare the effects of that social consequence when it was provided contingent on MVPA and when provided independent of MVPA. The results of the functional analyses indicated that 3 of 7 children were most active when attention or interactive play was provided contingent on MVPA. Results of the intervention analysis suggested that caregivers of young children should provide attention or interactive play contingent on MVPA when those consequences are identified as reinforcers in a functional analysis.     

Benefits of interhemispheric collaboration can be eliminated by mixing stimulus formats that involve different cortical access routes

Previous studies indicate that the benefits of dividing an information processing load across both cerebral hemispheres outweigh the costs of interhemispheric transfer as tasks become more difficult or cognitively complex. This is demonstrated as better performance when two stimuli to be compared are presented one to each visual field and hemisphere than when both stimuli are presented to the same single hemisphere (an across-hemisphere advantage). Two experiments indicate that this finding does not generalize to complex tasks that require matching numeric quantities represented by two very different visual formats whose processing involves somewhat different cortical areas: digits and dice-like dot patterns. In fact, mixing these stimulus formats consistently produces a within-hemisphere advantage. We propose that, when two simultaneously presented stimuli are presented in sufficiently different visual formats, identification of the two stimuli may take place in parallel, via different cortical access routes and with little or no interference, even when they are presented to the same cerebral hemisphere.