Detoxification at Home: A Brief Solution-Oriented Family Systems Approach

The authors propose an outpatient, solution-oriented, family systems approach to detoxification from alcohol and/or drugs. Research indicates that outpatient detoxification is a viable option, one that will likely be utilized even more frequently as health care costs continue to rise. Nontraditional assumptions about the process of detoxification are suggested that challenge traditional notions about detoxification being only a biomedical, pretreatment event. Criteria are provided for determining the appropriateness of clients for outpatient detoxification and offer information about typical withdrawal symptoms and guidelines for the detoxification environment at home. A case example illustrates the application of this approach in a community mental health program. Suggestions for adapting this approach to various settings are also offered.     

Rapid serial visual distraction: task-irrelevant items can produce an attentional blink

When two sequential targets (T1 and T2) are presented within about 600 msec, perception of the second target is impaired. This attentional blink (AB) has been studied by means of two paradigms: rapid serial visual presentation (RSVP), in which targets are embedded in a stream of central distractors, and the two-target paradigm, in which targets are presented eccentrically without distractors. We examined the role of distractors in the AB, using a modified two-target paradigm with a central stream of task-irrelevant distractors. In six experiments, the RSVP stream of distractors substantially impaired identification of both T1 and T2, but only when the distractors shared common characteristics with the targets. Without such commonalities, the distractors had no effect on performance. This points to the subjects' attentional control setting as an important factor in the AB deficit and suggests a conceptual link between the AB and a form of nonspatial contingent capture attributable to distractor processing.     

Detection of glass patterns by pigeons and humans: implications for differences in higher-level processing

Glass patterns have been used to examine mechanisms underlying form perception. The current investigation compared detection of Glass patterns by pigeons and humans and provides evidence for substantial species differences in global form perception. Subjects were required to discriminate, on a simultaneous display, a random dot pattern from a Glass pattern. Four different randomly presented Glass patterns were used (concentric, radial, parallel-vertical, and parallel-horizontal). Detection thresholds were measured by degrading the Glass patterns through the addition of random noise. For both humans and pigeons, discrimination decreased systematically with the addition of noise. Humans showed detection differences among the four patterns, with lowest thresholds to radial and concentric patterns and highest thresholds to the parallel-horizontal pattern. Pigeons did not show a detection difference across the four patterns. Implications for differences in neural processing of complex forms are discussed.     

Ergopsychometry. New methods in experimental psychodiagnosis of pathologic stress reactions

Ergopsychometry--testing under physiological and/or psychological stress--has proved to be increasingly successful in recent years. In particular in sports psychology, in which only physiological stress had been considered, have experimental results been successfully implemented into practice. The fact that some subjects appear unchanged or even yield better results under stress than under stress-free conditions applies not only to physiological stress, but also holds true for psychological stress. These results have consequences for the experimental psychodiagnoses of pathological stress reactions, e.g., with alcoholics or psychosomatic patients. Proceeding from the above hypothesis we investigated 20 gamma-alcoholics (so-called relieve drinkers) and 20 psychosomatic inpatients under stress-free as well as under stress conditions, according to the ergopsychometric approach. The control group consisted of 23 subjects matched with respect to age, sex, and profession. We used a test battery to assess concentration, memory, and choice-reaction as well as the subjective state of activation, stress-coping-mechanisms, and self-concepts. Essentially, the validity of ergopsychometric designs was confirmed by our results. In accordance with our expectations, 27.5% of the experimental group showed increasing efficiency scores, compared to 56.5% in the control group. Possible explanations for the findings can be derived from the assessment of subjective activity, but not from of the personality questionnaires.     

Untersuchungen und Überlegungen zur Richtungswahrnehmung bei willkürlichen sakkadischen Augenbewegungen

Zusammenfassung Die vorliegende Arbeit hatte das Ziel, die Umstimmung der retinalen Raumwerte während willkürlicher horizontaler Blicksprünge (Sakkaden) zu untersuchen.Die Methodik bestand darin, während oder nach der Augenbewegung kurzzeitig einen ca. 1° großen Lichtreiz (Elektronenblitz) im Gesichtsfeld der Vp zu exponieren, den diese in bezug auf eine kopffeste Skala zu lokalisieren hatte. Die Auslösung des Lichtreizes erfolgte auf elektrookulographischem Weg durch die Augenbewegung selbst.Bei diesen Versuchen traten in systematischer Abhängigkeit vom retinalen Ort des Reizes und von der zwischen Sakkadenbeginn und Reizexposition verstrichenen Zeit deutliche Verlagerungstäuschungen auf. Sie lassen sich am besten interpretieren, wenn man die Umwertungsprozesse als Wanderung eines lokalisatorischen Bezugssystems über ein zentralnervöses Projektionsfeld der Retina auffaßt. Diese Wanderung wird eingeleitet und angeführt durch ein rasches Einschwingen der Koordinate des Zielpunktes der Blickbewegung in die Fovea; in der zielabgekehrten Netzhauptperipherie vollzieht sich die Umwertung wesentlich langsamer. Dabei kann es vorübergehend zu topologischen Veränderungen des Bezugssystems kommen, deren Genese noch unklar ist.Ausgehend von den bislang vorliegenden Ansätzen zur Erklärung der Richtungskonstanz (insbesondere vom Reafferenzprinzip, den Aufmerksamkeitstheorien und der Theorie MacKays) wird ein eigenes Modell entwickelt, in dessen Rahmen die Versuchsergebnisse diskutiert werden.

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Investigations and considerations of directional perception during voluntary saccadic eye movements

Summary This investigation attempts to examine the change of retinal local signs during voluntary horizontal saccadic eye movements. The method used was to expose the S. to a short light stimulus (electronic flash) of approximately one degree angular width during or after a 16 degree eye movement. The stimulus was released by the eye movement itself via the retino-corneal potential. The S.'s task was to localize the stimulus on a fixed luminous scale.Clear translatory illusions occurred in these experiments. They depended systematically on the spot on the retina stimulated, and on the time elapsed between the onset of the saccade and the release of the stimulus. These illusions are best interpreted as due to the shift of a coordinate system across the retinal field. The shift is initiated by the coordinate of the retinal spot on which the target of the eye movement was projected before the saccade began. This coordinate rapidly swings into the fovea. The processes on the retinal hemisphere opposite to the target occur at a much slower rate. Moreover, temporary changes of the topology of the coordinate system may take place during the saccade. Their origin is still unclear.The results of the experiments are discussed in terms of a special model based on the previous explanations of the phenomenon of directional constancy (especially the reafference principle, the attention theories, and MacKays theory).

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Diese Arbeit wurde mit Unterstützung der Deutschen Forschungsgemeinschaft ausgeführt. Wir danken unseren Versuchspersonen für ihre ausdauernde Mitarbeit sowie Frau Dipl.-Psych. Doris Bischof, Herrn Peter Heinecke und Frau Dr. Maria V. Schaetz für ihre Hilfe bei der Durchführung und Auswertung der Versuche.     

Diversity in agonistic behavior of croaking gouramis (Trichopsis vittata,T. schalleri,and T. pumila; Anabantoidei) and the paradise fish (Macropodus opercularis; Anabantoidei)

Agonistic encounters of all three species of the vocalizing genus Trichopsis were observed in order to compare species-specific fighting strategies and the specific investment in acoustics. Additionally, these encounters were compared to agonistic encounters of Macropodus opercularis which was considered to be mute. The aim of this comparison was to investigate if mute fishes stress visual or tactile displays. Within the genus Trichopsis, significant differences among the three species were found in qualitative and quantitative analysis of displays. Frontal display occurred only in Trichopsis vittata, whereas a strong tail-beating while vocalizing was only observed in Trichopsis pumila. Fight duration and the number of sounds and circlings were highest in Trichopsis schalleri. The largest relative distances between circling opponents occurred in T. pumila, the smallest species. Also, the number of attacks was lowest in T. pumila. Fighting assessment seemed to be different in each species. For the first time, sound production has been reported for Macropodus opercularis (infrequently and with extreme low sound pressure levels), but much more investment in visual and tactile displays has been demonstrated. Lowering the branchiostegal membrane and spreading the opercula occurred only in M. opercularis and was never observed in any of the Trichopsis species. The number of attacks was higher in Macropodus than in any Trichopsis species. The relative distance between Macropodus opponents while circling was closest compared to the three Trichopsis species. Visual and contact displays are reduced in extensively vocalizing fish species, like Trichopsis sp., compared to mute or seldom vocalizing species, like Macropodus. © 1996 Wiley-Liss, Inc.     

Perceptual Grouping and Motion Coherence in Visual Search

Search for a conjunction of form and motion is greatly affected by manipulations of phase in the target and nontarget motion sets. To test whether this finding can be best explained by perceptual grouping, we moved a random set of dots in phase or counterphase with target or nontarget motion. Perceptual grouping was found to have a dramatic effect on search performance. We propose that this interaction between perceptual grouping and visual search is governed by three general rules. Our data also provide convincing evidence of the preattentive organization of a visual display into surfaces defined by common motion.     

Orienting in virtual environments: How are surface features and environmental geometry weighted in an orientation task?

We investigated how human adults orient in enclosed virtual environments, when discrete landmark information is not available and participants have to rely on geometric and featural information on the environmental surfaces. In contrast to earlier studies, where, for women, the featural information from discrete landmarks overshadowed the encoding of the geometric information, Experiment 1 showed that when featural information is conjoined with the environmental surfaces, men and women encoded both types of information. Experiment 2 showed that, although both types of information are encoded, performance in locating a goal position is better if it is close to a geometrically or featurally distinct location. Furthermore, although features are relied upon more strongly than geometry, initial experience with an environment influences the relative weighting of featural and geometric cues. Taken together, these results show that human adults use a flexible strategy for encoding spatial information.     

Seeing the light: Adapting luminance reveals low-level visual processes in the attentional blink

It is widely assumed that high-level visual processes subserve the attentional blink (AB). Recent evidence from studies of visual masking during the AB that were designed to directly test the contributions of high-level masking effects, however, have failed to provide empirical support for this position. The implication is that low-level visual processes are crucial to the AB. We tested this idea by manipulating adapting luminance in a standard AB paradigm. Consistent with the involvement of low-level neural mechanisms, the AB effect interacted with adapting luminance such that an AB was revealed only under photopic (light adapted) viewing conditions.