Phonological and semantic information in word and nonword reading in a deep dyslexic patient

Deep dyslexia is diagnosed when brain-injured, previously literate adults make reading errors that include hallmark semantic paralexias (e.g., reading HEART as BLOOD) and are also impaired at reading nonwords (e.g., FRIP). The diversity of these symptoms have led most researchers to conclude that there are multiple sources of impairment in this syndrome and that one of the most critical is a failure to process phonological information at a sublexical level. The patient (SD) reported in this study fits the deep dyslexia profile to the extent that she makes several semantically related reading errors. She also shows the classic frequency and image ability effects of the syndrome. However, as we report, she does read some nonwords correctly and she shows a strong advantage for naming when phonemic cues are presented. We discuss the performance of SD, on these preliminary tasks, in terms of a phonological selection impairment.     

Allophonic mode of speech perception in dyslexia

Perceptual discrimination between speech sounds belonging to different phoneme categories is better than that between sounds falling within the same category. This property, known as "categorical perception," is weaker in children affected by dyslexia. Categorical perception develops from the predispositions of newborns for discriminating all potential phoneme categories in the world's languages. Predispositions that are not relevant for phoneme perception in the ambient language are usually deactivated during early childhood. However, the current study shows that dyslexic children maintain a higher sensitivity to phonemic distinctions irrelevant in their linguistic environment. This suggests that dyslexic children use an allophonic mode of speech perception that, although without straightforward consequences for oral communication, has obvious implications for the acquisition of alphabetic writing. Allophonic perception specifically affects the mapping between graphemes and phonemes, contrary to other manifestations of dyslexia, and may be a core deficit.     

Orientational manoeuvres in the dark: dissociating allocentric and egocentric influences on spatial memory

Subjects in a darkroom saw an array of five phosphorescent objects on a circular table and, after a short delay, indicated which object had been moved. During the delay the subject, the table or a phosphorescent landmark external to the array was moved (a rotation about the centre of the table) either alone or together. The subject then had to indicate which one of the five objects had been moved. A fully factorial design was used to detect the use of three types of representations of object location: (i) visual snapshots; (ii) egocentric representations updated by self-motion; and (iii) representations relative to the external cue. Improved performance was seen whenever the test array was oriented consistently with any of these stored representations. The influence of representations (i) and (ii) replicates previous work. The influence of representation (iii) is a novel finding which implies that allocentric representations play a role in spatial memory, even over short distances and times. The effect of the external cue was greater when initially experienced as stable. Females out-performed males except when the array was consistent with self-motion but not visual snapshots. These results enable a simple egocentric model of spatial memory to be extended to address large-scale navigation, including the effects of allocentric knowledge, landmark stability and gender.     

Predicting preschoolers' externalizing behaviors from toddler temperament,conflict, and maternal negativity

Rarely have researchers elucidated early childhood precursors of externalizing behaviors for boys and girls from a normative sample. Toddlers (N = 104; 52 girls) were observed interacting with a same-sex peer and their mothers, and indices of conflict-aggression, emotion and behavior dysregulation, parenting, and child externalizing problems were obtained. Results indicated that boys initiated more conflictual-aggressive interactions as toddlers and had more externalizing difficulties 2 years later, yet girls' (not boys') conflict-aggressive initiations at age 2 were related to subsequent externalizing problems. When such initiations were controlled for, emotional-behavioral undercontrol at age 2 also independently predicted externalizing problems at age 4. Moreover, the relation between conflict-aggressive initiations at age 2 and externalizing problems at age 4 was strongest for dysregulated toddlers. Finally, the relation between age 2 conflict-aggressive initiations and age 4 externalizing problems was strongest for those toddlers who incurred high levels of maternal negativity. These findings illustrate temperament by parenting connections in the development of externalizing problems.     

Citation trends of applied journals in behavioral psychology 1981-2000

One variable with which to evaluate scientific journals is how often their articles are cited in the literature. Such data are amenable to longitudinal analysis and can be used as a measure of a journal's impact on research within a discipline. We evaluated multiple citation measures for a number of applied journals in behavioral psychology from 1981 to 2000. The results indicate a relatively consistent impact across these journals, with some evidence of growth.     

Effects of the terrorist attacks of 9/11/01 on employee attitudes

Much has been stated in the popular press about the effects of the events of 9/11/01 on employee attitudes about work. This study examined a large sample (N = 70,671) of employees of a multinational manufacturer whose annual employee survey data collection was interrupted by the events. After demonstrating measurement equivalence across time and countries, changes in attitudes pre- and post-9/11 were examined. Only negligible differences were found in Job Satisfaction, Supervisor Evaluation, Stress, and Organizational Commitment to Diversity for U.S. employees or for employees worldwide. Demographic differences in response to events were not found. Implications for understanding effects of stressful external events on employee perceptions of work are discussed.     

Mediated priming in the cerebral hemispheres

The present experiment investigates hemispheric differences in mediated priming. Theories of lexical representation have argued for an asymmetrical coding between the right and left hemispheres ([Beeman, 1998]), claiming that the right hemisphere is more diffusely represented compared to the left hemisphere. Thus, the right hemisphere activates a larger semantic field compared to the left hemisphere. Mediated (two-step) priming is an ideal task to examine this representational claim, because of the distant nature of the prime-target pairs. Results showed no difference in the magnitude of priming (both mediated and direct) between the right and left hemispheres. These results suggest that the lexical representation of the two hemispheres is equivalent, not asymmetrical as Beeman suggests.     

Enhanced retention in the passive-avoidance task by 5-HT(1A) receptor blockade is not associated with increased activity of the central nucleus of the amygdala

The effect of blockade of 5-HT1A receptors was investigated on (1). retention in a mildly aversive passive-avoidance task, and (2). spontaneous single-unit activity of central nucleus of the amygdala (CeA) neurons, a brain site implicated in modulation of retention. Systemic administration of the selective 5-HT1A antagonist NAN-190 immediately after training markedly-and dose-dependently-facilitated retention in the passive-avoidance task; enhanced retention was time-dependent and was not attributable to variations in wattages of shock received by animals. Systemic administration of NAN-190 had mixed effects on spontaneous single-unit activity of CeA neurons recorded extracellularly in vivo; microiontophoretic application of 5-HT, in contrast, consistently and potently suppressed CeA activity. The present findings-that 5-HT1A receptor blockade by NAN-190 (1). enhances retention in the passive-avoidance task, and (2). does not consistently increase spontaneous neuronal activity of the CeA-provide evidence that a serotonergic system tonically inhibits modulation of retention in the passive-avoidance task through activation of the 5-HT1A receptor subtype at brain sites located outside the CeA.