A reversal in the direction of detection asymmetry: effects of spatial density,spatial regularity,and retinal eccentricity

We analyzed detection asymmetry, using openand closed squares as target and contextelements. It was found that varying density, regularity, and target eccentricity not only can modulate the amount of asymmetry, but also can produce a reversal in the direction of the asymmetry. The results suggest that the different stimuli are processed with different grains of analysis,consisting of in some cases, single elements and their properties and, in other cases, larger units of the stimulus array and more globalproperties. A detection task that can utilize the properties that are available with a given grain of analysis would show an advantage over a task for which the given grain of analysis is not as favorable, resulting indetection asymmetry in one direction or another.     

Recognition memory for source and occurrence: The importance of recollection

Previous recognition memory studies indicate that when both recollection and familiarity are expected to contribute to recognition performance (e.g., discriminating studied items from nonstudied items) the dual-process and the unequal-variance signal detection models provide comparable accounts of performance. When familiarity is not expected to be useful (e.g., when items from two equally familiar sources are discriminated between), the dual-process model provides a significantly better account of performance. In the present study, source recognition was tested under conditions in which familiarity could have been used to perform a list-discrimination task; participants were required to discriminate between strong studied items, weak studied items, and new items. The dual-process model provided a better account of performance than did the unequal-variance model. Moreover, the results indicated that the unequal-variance assumption in a single-process signal detection model was not a valid substitution for recollection and that recollection was used to make recognition judgments even when assessments of familiarity were useful.     

Auditory verb recognition in developmental language impairment

This research addresses the issues of frequency and regularity in auditory verb recognition and their importance for the organization of the mental lexicon in DLI francophones. A primed auditory lexical decision task probes reaction times and response accuracy in DLI and control participants on frequent and infrequent, and regular and irregular, inflected forms of verbs. Results show no priming for inflectionally related forms as well as strong frequency effects in DLI participants. These findings lend additional support to the hypothesis that developmental language impairment is a deficit in lexical representation.     

Effects of right and left hemisphere damage on performance of the "Right Hemisphere Communication Battery"

A Hebrew adaptation of Gardner and Brownell's (1986) "Right Hemisphere Communication Battery" (HRHCB) was administered to 27 right brain-damaged (RBD) patients, 31 left brain-damaged (LBD) patients, and 21 age-matched normal controls. Both patient groups showed deficits relative to controls and overall there was no difference between the two patient groups. A factor analysis of patients' scores on the HRHCB yielded two interpretable factors, a verbal and a nonverbal one. These factors were not lateralized. Performance of patients on the HRHCB correlated significantly and positively with performance on most tests of basic language functions, measured with a Hebrew adaptation of the "Western Aphasia Battery" (HWAB) and with other cognitive functions measured with standardized neuropsychological tests. There were stronger correlations of HRHCB with subtests of the HWAB in LBD patients and with nonlanguage cognitive tests in RBD patients. In the LBD group, HRHCB subtests' scores correlated negatively with lesion extent in frontal and temporal perisylvian regions. Such localization was not observed in RBD patients. The results argue against selective right hemisphere (RH) involvement in the RHCB, alleged to measure pragmatic aspects of language use, and show, instead, bilateral involvement. The results also argue against a modular organization of these functions of language use, especially in the RH.     

Derivation by prefixation in Slovenian: two aphasia case studies

The present study is concerned with two Slovenian-speaking patients who were asked to produce, in various tasks, verbs, nouns, and adjectives derived by prefixation with prepositions. Despite differences due to their specific linguistic difficulties, both patients' performance was characterized by the differential processing of prefixes and remaining components of complex words. Prepositions in prefixation were mostly preserved, and less frequently substituted, regardless of the numerous errors produced in the remaining portion of the words. These errors seem clearly determined by the morphological structure of the words and therefore appear to be authentic morphological errors. These findings contribute to the theoretical debate on mental lexical representation, speaking in favor of a morphological decomposition in processing of prefixed complex words at different processing levels.     

Do orthographic cues aid language recognition? A laterality study with French-English bilinguals

Sixteen French-English late bilinguals performed a speeded language recognition task on lateralized words that were either marked or unmarked for language on the basis of digram frequency. Response latencies were faster to orthographically marked than unmarked words, particularly in the second language (English). Furthermore, L2 marked words were responded to faster than L1 marked words. These effects were especially prominent for words presented in the left visual field. It is suggested that subjects made use of different strategies in performing the task of language recognition task, with a perceptual search strategy deployed to identify orthographically marked words, resulting in an L2 advantage for such words, and a lexical search strategy deployed for unmarked words, resulting in an L1 advantage for such words.     

Processing of temporal duration information in working memory after frontodorsal tumour excisions

This study aimed to test the hypothesis that impairments of temporal duration processing after frontal lobe lesions reflect deficits in executive monitoring functions rather than a domain-specific deficit in the maintenance of duration information in working memory. Patients with frontodorsal lesions, clinical controls with post-central lesions, and healthy controls performed recognition and classification tasks, which should allow for testing maintenance and monitoring functions, respectively. Results showed mild non-selective impairments of the frontal patients on both temporal and spatial recognition tasks, but a marked selective degradation on temporal classification while performance on spatial classification was unimpaired. This suggests that maintenance of duration information in working memory after frontal lesions is basically preserved but that, depending on executive task characteristics, there is a specific deficit in the strategic organization of this type of information.     

Adaptation to disability: applying selective optimization with compensation to the behaviors of older adults with osteoarthritis

This research extends the use of P. B. Baltes and M. M. Baltes's (1990) theory of selective optimization with compensation (SOC) in an effort to conceptually integrate the adaptational behaviors of 248 older adults with disability arising from osteoarthritis. The authors also studied the relationship of SOC to age, illness variables, disability, illness perceptions, and support. The results highlight the variability and plasticity of older adults' efforts to manage disability, with most efforts aimed at compensation and optimization rather than selection. The benefit of using SOC to study adaptation to chronic illness and disability is discussed.