Experimental comparison of dyspnea and pain

Dyspnea and pain are similarly unpleasant, alarming physical sensations, but studies examining both sensations in combination are lacking. In the present study, dyspnea was induced in 7 healthy volunteers by breathing through inspiratory resistive loads and the effects were compared with those of a heat pain stimulus. End-tidal partial pressures of carbon dioxide (PET_CO2), inspiratory time (Ti), breathing frequency (f), experienced unpleasantness, and intensity were measured. No difference was observed between dyspnea and pain in experienced intensity and unpleasantness (p >.05). During dyspneic stimulation, slightly higherTi was found than for pain (p<.08). PET_CO2 showed slight increases during the dyspneic versus the baseline and painful conditions (ΔPET_CO2=1.5 and 1.3 mmHg, respectively;p<.01 andp<.05). This study shows that the effects of dyspnea and heat pain can be compared within one experiment; both stimuli can be presented with similar intensity and unpleasantness, which is a prerequisite for comparing responses to them. The changes in PET_CO2 between our conditions were minimal, allowing an application of the present design to future fMRI studies.     

Stimulus size matters: do life-sized stimuli induce stronger embodiment effects in mental rotation?

Against the background of the embodied cognition approach this experiment investigated the influence of motor expertise on object-based vs. egocentric transformations in a chronometric mental rotation (MR) task using images of either the own or another person’s body as stimulus material. The present study aimed to clarify two issues: (1) whether stimulus size (life size vs. small) is able to induce embodiment effects and (2) which role self-awareness processes play when using stimuli of the own body. The same design was conducted twice using both small stimuli (Study 1) and life-size human figures (Study 2). Using life-sized figures in Study 2 resulted in an explicit advantage of self-related stimuli and improved performance for motor experts compared to non-motor experts in both object-based and egocentric transformations. In conclusion, these results suggest that life-sized figures do indeed induce stronger embodiment effects in MR.     

Parafoveal preview effects from word <Emphasis Type="Italic">N</Emphasis> + 1 and word <Emphasis Type="Italic">N</Emphasis> + 2 during reading: A critical review and Bayesian meta-analysis

The use of gaze-contingent display techniques to study reading has shown that readers attend not only the currently fixated word, but also the word to the right of the current fixation. However, a critical look at the literature shows that a number of questions cannot be readily answered from the available literature reviews on the topic. First, there is no consensus as to whether readers also attend the second word to the right of fixation. Second, it is not clear whether parafoveal processing is more efficient in languages such as Chinese. Third, it is not well understood whether the measured effects are confounded by the properties of the parafoveal mask. In the present study, we addressed these issues by performing a Bayesian meta-analysis of 93 experiments that used the boundary paradigm (Rayner, Cognitive Psychology, 7, 65–81. doi: 10.1016/0010-028590005-5, 1975). We describe three main findings: (1) The advantage of previewing the second word to the right is modest in size and likely is not centered on zero; (2) Chinese readers do seem to make more efficient use of parafoveal processing, but this is mostly evident in gaze durations; and (3) there are interference effects associated with using different parafoveal masks that roughly increase when the mask is less word-like.     

Group interventions for patients with cancer and HIV disease: Part I: Effects on psychosocial and functional outcomes at different phases of illness

Group interventions for individuals facing cancer or HIV disease have drawn considerable attention among researchers and clinicians over the past 20 years. There is growing evidence that group services may be helpful, but which interventions are most effective for participants at which phases in the trajectory of disease has been less clear. Moreover, professionals working in different intervention settings (e.g., primary prevention vs. clinical care) and different disease sites (cancer vs. HIV disease) often have little awareness of relevant advances in other fields. Efforts to integrate findings in the literature may accelerate research and advance the standard of clinical care. The current article, the first in a series of four special reports, critically evaluates the efficacy of group interventions led by professional or trained facilitators for individuals confronted by cancer or HIV, across the spectrum of illness from elevated risk through advanced disease. We examine psychosocial and functional outcomes for different interventions directed toward different patient subgroups, trace common themes, highlight limitations, and offer recommendations for further research.     

Group interventions for patients with cancer and HIV disease: Part II. Effects on immune, endocrine, and disease outcomes at different phases of illness

There has been great interest in the potential impact of group interventions on medical outcomes. This article reviews the effects of professionally-led groups on immune activity, neuroendocrine function, and survival among patients with cancer or HIV disease. We examine findings concerning different types of group services at different phases of illness. Results are mixed, but the most prominent changes in immune and endocrine activity were associated with structured group interventions for patients with early-stage disease. These findings offer provocative illustrations of relevant mind-body interactions, but their clinical importance has yet to be demonstrated empirically. Group interventions have not been tied consistently to improved survival rates for patients with advanced cancer; few studies as yet have focused on survival outcomes among patients with early-stage cancer or HIV disease.     

Group interventions for patients with cancer and HIV disease: Part III. Moderating variables and mechanisms of action

Growing evidence supports the value of group interventions for individuals who are at risk for or have developed cancer or HIV disease. However, information is more limited concerning how these services can be delivered in an optimal manner, and what processes contribute to their benefits. Parts I and II of this review examined the efficacy of different interventions for individuals at different phases of illness, ranging from primary prevention to late-stage disease, in both psychosocial and biological domains. The current paper examines some of the factors other than phase of illness that might influence group treatment effects (e.g., intervention parameters, participant characteristics), and explores mechanisms of action.     

Visual search across the life span

Gains and losses in visual search were studied across the life span in a representative sample of 298 individuals from 6 to 89 years of age. Participants searched for single-feature and conjunction targets of high or low eccentricity. Search was substantially slowed early and late in life, age gradients were more pronounced in conjunction than in feature search, and all age groups were uniformly affected by eccentricity manipulations. However, developmental and aging trends were distinctly asymmetrical: Children's performance was particularly affected by the mere presence of distractors; whereas in late life, performance was particularly impaired on target-absent trials and with increasing numbers of distractors. The implications for life span theories of cognitive and attentional development and for cognitive-speed and inhibitory-control accounts are discussed.     

Contiguity and contingency in action-effect learning

According to the two-stage model of voluntary action, the ability to perform voluntary action is acquired in two sequential steps. Firstly, associations are acquired between representations of movements and of the effects that frequently follow them. Secondly, the anticipation or perception of an acquired action effect primes the movement that has been learnt to produce this effect; the acquired action-effect associations thus mediate the selection of actions that are most appropriate to achieve an intended action goal. If action-effect learning has an associative basis, it should be influenced by factors that are known to affect instrumental learning, such as the temporal contiguity and the probabilistic contingency of movement and effect. In two experiments, the contiguity or the contingency between key presses and subsequent tones was manipulated in various ways. As expected, both factors affected the acquisition of action-effect relations as assessed by the potency of action effects to prime the corresponding action in a later behavioral test. In particular, evidence of action-effect associations was obtained only if the effect of the action was delayed for no more than 1 s, if the effect appeared more often in the presence than in the absence of the action, or if action and effect were entirely uncorrelated but the effect appeared very often. These findings support the assumption that the control of voluntary actions is based on action-effect representations that are acquired by associative learning mechanisms.     

Transformations in the couplings among intellectual abilities and constituent cognitive processes across the life span

Abstract— Two-component theories of intellectual development over the life span postulate that fluid abilities develop earlier during child development and decline earlier during aging than crystallized abilities do, and that fluid abilities support or constrain the acquisition and expression of crystallized abilities. Thus, maturation and senescence compress the structure of intelligence by imposing age-specific constraints upon its constituent processes. Hence, the couplings among different intellectual abilities and cognitive processes are expected to be strong in childhood and old age. Findings from a population-based study of 291 individuals aged 6 to 89 years support these predictions. Furthermore, processing robustness, a frequently overlooked aspect of processing, predicted fluid intelligence beyond processing speed in old age but not in childhood, suggesting that the causes of more compressed functional organization of intelligence differ between maturation and senescence. Research on developmental changes in functional brain circuitry may profit from explicitly recognizing transformations in the organization of intellectual abilities and their underlying cognitive processes across the life span.