Strategic regulation of cognitive control by emotional salience: A neural network model

We present a neural network model of stimulus processing, which uses a mechanism of adaptive attentional control to regulate the moment to moment deployment of attention according to both the demands of the current task, and the demands of emotionally salient information. This mechanism allows negative emotional information to reduce cognitive control to aid in the detection of threats, which produces a momentary withdrawal from the current task set to allow unbiased processing of available information. The combination of cognitive and emotional regulation of task set allows this model to address inter-trial aspects of emotional interference in colour naming. In particular, we focus on the nature of the emotional interference in colour naming (McKenna & Sharma, 2004) as well as in word reading (Algom, Chajut, & Lev, 2004) and show how this form of interference is functionally distinct from the classic Stroop effect. Our model addresses a range of findings in colour naming and word reading tasks and is informed by recent neuroimaging data concerning the interaction between the anterior cingulate and prefrontal cortices. The model is used to explore the interface between cognition and emotion with a series of predictions, including a qualitative distinction between state and trait forms of anxiety.     

Development and Validation of the Navy Climate Index

Because military work environments have unique contexts, characteristics, and challenges, military policymakers need to understand how personnel perceive the work environment and how this affects individual and organizational outcomes. This study describes the development and testing of the Navy Climate Index (NCI), a new measure comprising items from the Navy-wide Personnel Survey (NPS) that captures eight aspects of psychological climate: advancement/promotion, autonomy/challenge, leadership, communication, fairness, job security, Tempo, and work group. Using NPS data for 3,610 active duty personnel, confirmatory factor analyses support the validity of the NCI. NCI scores were positively associated with job satisfaction, morale, organizational commitment, and retention intentions.     

A Structural Equation Analysis of the Wide Range Assessment of Memory and Learning in a Clinical Sample

A maximum likelihood confirmatory factor analysis was performed by applying LISREL VII to the Wide Range Assessment of Memory and Learning (WRAML) in a clinical sample (N = 271). Analyses were designed to determine which of 10 hypothesized oblique factor solutions could best explain memory as measured by the WRAML. Competing latent variable models were identified in previous studies and monographs on memory. Findings supported a three-factor model including Verbal Memory, Visual Memory, and Attention/Concentration factors. Our results are consistent with previous studies suggesting that attention is an important component of memory as measured by the WRAML. This study replicates previous research in which the Learning Index was not empirically supported.     

Component analysis of verbal versus spatial working memory training in adolescents with ADHD: A randomized,controlled trial

Adaptive training of working memory (WM) using the Cogmed-RM intervention has recently shown some efficacy as an alternative treatment for ADHD, but this intervention may not be optimally designed. A recent component analysis of WM has suggested that maintenance in primary memory (PM) appears to be largely intact whereas recall from secondary memory (SM) appears to be deficient in ADHD relative to age-matched controls. However, extrapolating from basic research, there is reason to believe that Cogmed-RM may target the PM component more than the SM component; though training with spatial exercises may target the SM component more than training with verbal exercises. To investigate, participants diagnosed with ADHD were randomly assigned to either a verbal training condition (n?=?24) or a spatial training condition (n?=?23) using a randomized, controlled design, and both groups were instructed to complete at least 20 days of training. The PM and SM components of WM were assessed immediately before and after training using both verbal and spatial free recall tasks. The main findings showed that both versions of the intervention enhanced the maintenance of information in PM regardless of test modality, but not the recall of information from SM. Therefore, the component of WM that is improved by Cogmed-RM is not the same component of WM that is deficient in ADHD.     

Examining the Effects of Gain-Framed Messages on the Activation and Elaboration of Possible Sport Selves in Middle-Aged Adults

Using an online cross-sectional randomized design, we explored whether messages emphasizing benefits of sport (sport gain-framed messages) would activate and elaborate hoped-for possible sport selves in 40- to 59-year-olds. One group viewed a video containing sport gain-framed messages, and a comparison group completed a sport and physical activity quiz. Results showed that the message group attended to a health and fitness message most frequently and demonstrated more frequent activation of possible selves than the quiz group. The message group's possible selves also contained more elaborate content related to delaying the effects of aging through sport and the social benefits of sport.     

The Unseen Spouse: Pitfalls and Possibilities for the Individual Therapist

Individual therapists often hear a great deal about our patients' spouses or partners, and naturally develop ideas and beliefs about that unseen other and about the causes of any relationship difficulties the patient reports. Not uncommonly, therapists can lose touch with the fact that their impressions of an unseen spouse are constructions that have emerged from the transference/countertransference field, based on only partial or limited information—not veridical truths. They can then talk with the patient about his or her partner or relationship issues in ways that can ultimately do both patient and spouse a significant disservice and perhaps distract from the patient's own issues and analytic goals. This paper discusses several factors that seem to contribute to the development of this problematic dynamic, including various qualities of the transference/countertransference field, and offers suggestions for avoiding or reducing it. Clinical material is used to illustrate key points.     

Perceptual processing of natural scenes at rapid rates: Effects of complexity, content, and emotional arousal

During rapid serial visual presentation (RSVP), the perceptual system is confronted with a rapidly changing array of sensory information demanding resolution. At rapid rates of presentation, previous studies have found an early (e.g., 150–280 ms) negativity over occipital sensors that is enhanced when emotional, as compared with neutral, pictures are viewed, suggesting facilitated perception. In the present study, we explored how picture composition and the presence of people in the image affect perceptual processing of pictures of natural scenes. Using RSVP, pictures that differed in perceptual composition (figure–ground or scenes), content (presence of people or not), and emotional content (emotionally arousing or neutral) were presented in a continuous stream for 330 ms each with no intertrial interval. In both subject and picture analyses, all three variables affected the amplitude of occipital negativity, with the greatest enhancement for figure–ground compositions (as compared with scenes), irrespective of content and emotional arousal, supporting an interpretation that ease of perceptual processing is associated with enhanced occipital negativity. Viewing emotional pictures prompted enhanced negativity only for pictures that depicted people, suggesting that specific features of emotionally arousing images are associated with facilitated perceptual processing, rather than all emotional content.     

Grounding spatial language in the motor system: Reciprocal interactions between spatial semantics and orienting

Shifts of attention that are directed by spatial words are thought to be mediated by a spatial frame of reference. Previous studies have documented a selection cost when visual attention is directed along the left/right axis relative to the above/below axis due to the greater ambiguity of the horizontal endpoints. The present study investigated whether the horizontal endpoints may be more fully disambiguated when “left/right” cues are first enacted by nondivisible, more discrete, modes of orienting such as directional motor responses. This issue was investigated using a repetition priming paradigm in which the effects of prior enactments were measured on the subsequent conceptual control of visual attention. The results of four experiments showed that grounding spatial language in the motor system can enhance the focus of visual attention by disambiguating the endpoints of the horizontal axis. In so doing, the present study extends previous research demonstrating that spatial concepts can influence the spatial distribution of attention by demonstrating that different modes of orienting can also influence the semantics of space. Implications for the premotor theory of attention and grounded theories of cognition are also discussed.     

When learning to classify by relations is easier than by features

Relational reasoning is often considered more resource intensive than feature-based reasoning. This view implies that learning categories defined by relational regularities should be more difficult than learning categories defined by featural regularities. Unfortunately previous studies do not ground featural and relational information in a common perceptual substrate. After addressing this concern, a series of experiments compare learning performance for relation- and feature-based categories. Under certain circumstances we find faster learning for relation-based categories. The results suggest that mechanisms rooted in relational processes (e.g., relative stimulus judgement, analogical comparison) facilitate or hinder learning depending on whether the relational processes highlight or obscure the underlying category structure. Conversely, category learning affects relational processes by promoting relational comparisons that increase the coherence of acquired categories. In contrast to the largely independent research efforts in category learning and analogy research, our findings suggest that learning and comparison processes are deeply intertwined.     

Optimism predicting employees' creativity: The mediating role of positive affect and the positivity ratio

We examine how optimism predicts creativity both directly and through the mediating role of positive affect and the positivity ratio (the ratio between the frequency of positive and negative affective states). Five hundred and ninety five employees reported their positive and negative affect, as well as their optimism. Their creativity was reported by supervisors. The main findings are the following: (1) optimism predicts creativity both directly and through the mediating role of positive affect and the positivity ratio; (2) the relationship between the positivity ratio and creativity is curvilinear, in such a way that an “excessive” ratio is detrimental to creativity. The findings stress the relevance of optimism both for individuals and organizations, and suggest that examining positivity ratios is fruitful in the creativity domain, as it has been in other domains, and that negative affect should not be viewed simply as an obstacle when studying employees' creativity.