Launching the effect: Representations of causal movements are influenced by what they lead to

We investigated whether the representation of an observed causal movement is influenced by its observed effect. Subjects watched displays showing collisions between two objects. In this 'launching event' (Michotte, 1946/1963), one of the two objects (Object A) started to move and set a second, initially stationary, object (Object B) into motion, which gave a strong impression of apparent causality. The apparent effectiveness of A's movement was manipulated by varying the velocities of A and B. When the velocity of B was higher than that of A, the effectiveness of the collision was high; when it was smaller it was low. Then, subjects were asked to reproduce the velocity of the causal movement. Reproduced velocity followed the velocity of both Object A and Object B, which supports the hypothesis that the effect of a movement is integrated with its apparent cause. However, when apparent causality was reduced by changing the direction of motion of B or by covering the point of collision, the influence of the effect on the representation of the cause persisted, suggesting that retroactive interference may account for the findings. The interference effect could not be reduced to temporal recency or spatial integration and was not obtained in the reverse temporal order (proactive interference). Rather, the two successive movements were blended in memory.     

Vicissitudes of the Suicidal Impulse in Dreams

ABSTRACT: The author presents several dreams reported by psychosomatic patients which contain an overt or disguised act of suicide. In the latter instances various transformations of the act of suicide had been brought about by the defensive functions of the dreaming ego. Paradoxically, in several of these instances it was the very efforts of the dreaming ego to defend itself which allowed the suicidal impulse to reach its consummation.     

Ear asymmetry in recognition of unfamiliar voices

Female right-handed subjects were presented with a memory set consisting of five unfamiliar female voices. They were then tested with a recognition procedure in which samples of voice, memory set or novel, 2 or 4 sec in duration, were heard in one ear and a competing noise stimulus was heard in the other ear. There was an overall left-ear advantage in accuracy of recognition. This advantage held particularly for identifications of memory-set voices in the second half of trials. Internal analyses indicated that the left-ear advantage could not be attributed to greater retroactive interference during right-ear presentation. Congruent with studies of recognition of unfamiliar faces, the findings suggested right-hemisphere superiority in the recognition of unfamiliar voices.     

Morphologic asymmetries of the face: A review

It has been suggested that asymmetries in the morphological properties of the face contribute to or produce asymmetries in facial emotional expression. Over 50 years of research on hard tissue, soft tissue, and facial surface asymmetries is reviewed here. Generally, it appears that if consistent asymmetry characterizes facial morphology, it is extremely small in magnitude or characterizes regions yet to be examined. In contrast, marked homology and asymmetry in regional size and area has been noted often. At present, it does not appear that asymmetry in facial morphology is associated with facial expressive asymmetry, with the latter more likely to be an outcome of functional brain asymmetry.