The attentional blink: Increasing target salience provides no evidence for resource depletion. A commentary on Dux, Asplund, and Marois (2008)

The authors have argued elsewhere that the attentional blink (AB; i.e., reduced target detection shortly after presentation of an earlier target) arises from blocked or disrupted perceptual input in response to distractors presented between the targets. When targets replace the intervening distractors, so that three targets (T1, T2, and T3) are presented sequentially, performance on T2 and T3 improves. Dux, Asplund, and Marois (2008) argued that T3 performance improves at the expense of T1, and thus provides evidence for resource depletion. They showed that when T1 is made more salient (and presumably draws more resources), an AB for T3 appears to reemerge. These findings can be better explained, however, by (1) the relationship between T1 and T2 (not T1 and T3) and (2) differential salience for T3 in the long-lag condition of Dux et al.’s study. In conclusion, the Dux et al. study does not present a severe challenge to input control theories of the AB.     

乙脑患儿血清神经元特异性烯醇化酶、S-100蛋白、髓鞘碱性蛋白测定及其临床意义

为了解流行性乙型脑炎（乙脑）患儿血清神经元特异性烯醇化酶（NSE）、S-100蛋白（S-100）、髓鞘碱性蛋白（MBP）含量变化及其临床意义,用酶联免疫吸附法检测100例乙脑患儿血清NSE、S-100、MBP含量变化。结果显示,乙脑组患儿血清NSE、S-100、MBP含量与对照组比较显著增高（P均〈0．01）,增高程度与病情严重程度相平行（P〈0．01）。因此,血清NSE、S-100、MBP含量测定对乙脑患儿脑损伤严重程度及临床预后判断有重要参考价值。     

An in-depth look at scholastic success: Fluid intelligence,personality traits or emotional intelligence?

The aim of the present study was to take an in-depth look at the role of fluid intelligence, personality traits and emotional intelligence (both ability-based and self-reported) in predicting scholastic success, verifying the existence of incremental validity of emotional intelligence with respect to fluid intelligence and personality variables. One hundred twenty-four students attending the last two years of high school were administered: the Advanced Progressive Matrices, the Eysenck Personality Questionnaire Revised Short Form, the Mayer-Salovey-Caruso Emotional Intelligence Test, the Bar-On Emotional Quotient Inventory: Short. The results demonstrate the influence exercised by fluid intelligence, personality and emotional intelligence on scholastic success, underlining, in particular, the role of emotional intelligence defined according to the ability-based model.     

Links between social information processing in middle childhood and involvement in bullying

The aim of this study was to investigate the way in which bullies, victims, bully/victims, and those not involved process social information. A peer nomination measure of bullying and victimization was administered twice over an interval of one year. The sample consisted of 236 (126 girls and 110 boys) children at the beginning of the study (T1) and 242 children one year later (T2) (mean age: 8 years). To test how children responded when provoked, both spontaneously and after prompting, we used provocation scenarios, and to test their attributional interpretations we used ambiguous scenarios. The results showed that children not involved in bullying responded in an assertive way to provocation more often than bullies and victims, but not more than bully/victims. In general, aggressive answers diminished after prompting and irrelevant answers increased. Appealing for the help of an adult or a peer was the strategy most often chosen. When the intent of the perpetrator was ambiguous, bully/victims attributed more blame, were angrier, and would retaliate more than those not involved. Partly similar results were obtained when stably involved children were compared with those unstably involved. Suggestions for intervention are presented. Aggr. Behav. 29:116–127, 2003. © 2003 Wiley‐Liss, Inc.     

Attachment in foster children associated with caregivers' sensitivity and behavioral problems

This study focused on attachment of foster children by examining factors associated with attachment relationships of children raised from birth by the same parents. The sample included 61 children between 26 to 88 months of age and their foster caregivers. Attachment security and caregiver sensitivity were coded on the basis of, respectively, a home‐observation (Attachment Q‐Set) and a laboratory procedure (Three boxes). Other measures included caregiver reports of child externalizing and internalizing behavior problems and symptoms of attachment disorder, including inhibited and disinhibited attachment as well as secure base distortions. For a subsample of children, teacher ratings of behavior problems also were available. Foster parent sensitivity was positively associated with attachment security, but only if symptoms of disordered attachment were partialled out. Symptoms of inhibited and disinhibited attachment as well as secure base distortions were positively related to parent reports of externalizing and internalizing behavior problems whereas attachment security was negatively related to teacher reports of externalizing behavior problems. Attachment theoretical tenets appeared valid with foster parent–child relationships, except for children with symptoms of attachment disorder.     

Visuospatial priming of the mental number line

It has been argued that numbers are spatially organized along a "mental number line" that facilitates left-hand responses to small numbers, and right-hand responses to large numbers. We hypothesized that whenever the representations of visual and numerical space are concurrently activated, interactions can occur between them, before response selection. A spatial prime is processed faster than a numerical target, and consistent with our hypothesis, we found that such a spatial prime affects non-spatial, verbal responses more when the prime follows a numerical target (backward priming) then when it precedes it (forward priming). This finding emerged both in a number-comparison and a parity judgment task, and cannot be ascribed to a "Spatial-Numerical Association of Response Codes" (SNARC). Contrary to some earlier claims, we therefore conclude that visuospatial-numerical interactions do occur, even before response selection.     

Apparent motion by edge discontinuities

When the eyes move vertically across a jagged diamond, a local shift (LS) of edge discontinuities and a global shape distortion (GD) (ie expansion/contraction opposite to that expected by the aperture effect) are perceived. These phenomena cannot be accounted for by a local motion signals integration rule based either on the intersection of constraint lines or on the velocity vector summation. The threshold for GD perception and the salience of LS and GD (1 to 10 scale) were measured in two experiments by different methods and displays. In experiment 1 we induced GD through mimicking LS with a kinetic pattern constituted of a set of circular illusory apertures revealing drifting gratings. The point of subjective equality for compression/expansion was reached for gratings the linear extrapolations of which form an angle of 94.4 degrees. In experiment 2 observers followed a dot moving along the vertical elongation axis of a static jagged diamond (with 70 degrees or 90 degrees angles), varying in the shape (triangular, wave, square), frequency, and amplitude of edge discontinuities. GD scores were correlated with LS scores that were inversely related to frequency/amplitude ratios of triangular edge discontinuities. Data are partially accounted for by averaging neighbouring local motion-capture vectors. Results prove that there are strong interrelations between phenomena in which visual motion affects visual localisation and phenomena involving apparent deformation of global shape.     

Accompagnement médical et communautaire dans un essai de prévention biomédicale : vers une nouvelle forme d’éducation ?

The recent implementation of innovative biomedical preventive approaches to combat the continued high prevalence of HIV among certain populations, has refocused attention on the question of support in the management of treatment adherence. What distinguishes these approaches from classic research on similar themes is that the populations concerned are not HIV positive. The objective of this study was to assess participant and physician satisfaction with medical and community support provided in the ANRS-IPERGAY trial. As part of this trial, individual interviews were conducted with physicians and with HIV-negative participants involved in the trial. Collective interviews and focus groups were also conducted with the participants. A content thematic analysis was performed on the full two corpuses’ data, with the aim of investigating discourse themes regarding the support offered as part of the trial. The discourse analysis of the HIV-negative participants and physicians underlined their satisfaction with many aspects of the medical and community support provided during the trial. The results were interpreted with respect to new forms of patient education necessary for the implementation of the medicalized prevention.