Affective personality differences in neural processing efficiency confirmed using fMRI

To test for a relation between individual differences in personality and neural-processing efficiency, we used functional magnetic resonance imaging (fMRI) to assess brain activity within regions associated with cognitive control during a demanding working memory task. Fifty-three participants completed both the self-report behavioral inhibition sensitivity (BIS) and behavioral approach sensitivity (BAS) personality scales and a standard measure of fluid intelligence (Raven’s Advanced Progressive Matrices). They were then scanned as they performed a three-back working memory task. A mixed blocked/ event-related fMRI design enabled us to identify both sustained and transient neural activity. Higher BAS was negatively related to event-related activity in the dorsal anterior cingulate, the lateral prefrontal cortex, and parietal areas in regions of interest identified in previous work. These relationships were not explained by differences in either behavioral performance or fluid intelligence, consistent with greater neural efficiency. The results reveal the high specificity of the relationships among personality, cognition, and brain activity. The data confirm that affective dimensions of personality are independent of intelligence, yet also suggest that they might be interrelated in subtle ways, because they modulate activity in overlapping brain regions that appear to be critical for task performance.     

Infant-directed speech produced by fathers with symptoms of depression: effects on infant associative learning in a conditioned-attention paradigm

Infant-directed (ID) speech produced by fathers who varied in their number of self-reported symptoms of depressed was analyzed for differences its ability to promote infant voice-face associative learning. Infants of fathers with elevated scores on the Beck Depression Inventory-II (BDI-II) showed significantly poorer learning than did infants of fathers with non-elevated BDI-II scores when their fathers' ID speech served as a conditioned stimulus for a face reinforcer in a conditioned-attention paradigm. Fathers with elevated BDI-II scores produced ID speech with marginally significantly lower F0 variability than fathers with non-elevated BDI-II scores. However, F0-related cues were uncorrelated with infant learning. Overall, fathers' ID speech contained significantly less F0 modulation than did mothers' ID speech. These findings show that paternal depression, like maternal depression, adversely affects infant learning in a conditioned-attention paradigm.     

The newsworthiness of suicide

There is a paucity of studies examining which suicides are considered news-worthy. By combining data on media reports of individuals' suicides with routinely collected suicide data, it was found that 1% of Australian suicides were reported over a 1-year period. There was evidence of over-reporting of suicides by older people and females, and those involving dramatic methods. Reported suicides fell into three groups: suicides reported in a broader context; suicides by celebrities; and suicides involving unusual circumstances/methods. The data suggest a need for media professionals and suicide experts to work together to balance newsworthiness against the risk of copycat behavior.     

An Evaluation of the Two-Factor Model of Emotion: Clinical Moderators Within a Large,Multi-Ethnic Sample of Youth

The two-factor model of emotion clarifies the complexities of the relationship between anxiety and depression through their varying associations with positive and negative affect. Although this model’s structure has been validated in community samples of children, little research has evaluated the model among clinically referred youth. The present investigation aimed to confirm the two-factor model of emotion within a sample of clinically-referred children (N?=?879) and to investigate potential moderators of the model’s relationships within that group. Structural equation modeling demonstrated excellent fit for the two-factor model, and moderating effects for the model structure were found related to age and diagnostic category. These results support the model’s usefulness in describing patterns of psychopathology and temperament for clinically referred children and suggest the potential for a unified treatment approach to internalizing psychopathology.     

Heterosexual Allies? Understanding Heterosexuals’ Alliance with the Gay Community

Prevailing wisdom is that increased visibility of gay men and lesbians reduces levels of sexual prejudice, but less is known about who is more likely to ally with the gay community and how interaction with the gay community influences attitudes toward gay men and lesbians. Using data from 873 heterosexual college students in the US, we examine how alliance with the gay community, a typology which combines measures of personal contact and community contact, relates to attitudes towards gay men and lesbians. Membership in each alliance category differed by gender, race/ethnicity, size of place, traditional gender role and authoritarian attitudes, religiosity, and political conservatism. Approximately one-third of the sample are allies of the gay community with both personal contact and community contact and lower levels of sexual prejudice. By contrast, another 30 % of the sample has no contact (personal or community) and higher levels of sexual prejudice toward the gay community. We conclude that more complex models of heterosexual contact with gay community are more useful than dichotomous models for understanding differences in attitudes towards gay men and lesbians.     

Philosophy and its children: logic,computation, and the emergence of natural and social science

Philosophical Studies - The middle chapters of Soames’s The World Philosophy Made (comprising his accounts of developments in logic, computation, linguistics, probability and decision theory,...     

Neural representations in human spatial memory

Ekstrom et al. report the responses of single neurons recorded from the brains of human subjects performing a spatial navigation task in virtual reality. They found cells encoding the subject's current location, view and destination. These data, and related findings in animals, directly reveal some of the representations underlying spatial cognition. They highlight the potential for cognitive psychology and systems neuroscience to combine to provide a neuronal-level understanding of human behaviour.     

The Role of Sexual Compulsivity,Impulsivity, and Experiential Avoidance in Internet Pornography Use

The Psychological Record - Previous research has found that a significant proportion of individuals who use Internet pornography (IP) report that their use is problematic in some area of...