Cultural modulations of space–time compatibility effects

The representation of elapsing time may require spatial attention. In certain circumstances, this spatial representation develops from left to right. This is suggested by a performance advantage in responding short with the left hand and long with the right hand (spatial–temporal association between response codes [STEARC]). The present study tests whether one possible determinant of the directionality of the STEARC effect is cultural. In particular, we investigated whether reading/writing habits can affect STEARC direction by administering a visual time judgment task to Italian participants, who were exposed to a left-to-right reading/writing system, and Israeli participants, who mainly used a right-to-left system. The Italian participants showed a left-to-right STEARC effect, while this effect was not present in the Israeli group. The study demonstrates that cultural habits can influence the way in which spatial attention supports the representation of time, similar to the pattern found in other nonspatial domains such as numbers.     

Regulatory mode orientations and well‐being in an organizational setting: the differential mediating roles of workaholism and work engagement

This paper examines the relationships between two independent regulatory mode orientations, locomotion and assessment, and well‐being in organizational contexts. Results from a sample of 320 employees revealed that locomotion was negatively associated with burnout and psychological strain whereas assessment was positively associated with burnout and strain. The effects of locomotion and assessment on burnout and strain were mediated by workaholism and work engagement. Both locomotion and assessment predicted greater workaholism; however, locomotion was positively associated whereas assessment was negatively associated with work engagement. In turn, workaholism predicted greater burnout and strain, and work engagement predicted less burnout and strain. Implications for employee health and organizational success are discussed.     

Prose Reading in Neglect

Prose reading has been shown to be a very sensitive measure of Unilateral Spatial Neglect. However, little is known about the relationship between prose reading and other measures of neglect and its severity, or between prose reading and single word reading. Thirty participants with a first stroke in the right hemisphere and clear symptoms of spatial neglect in everyday life were assessed with tests of prose reading (text in one column book-like, and in two columns magazine-like), single words reading, and a battery of 13 tests investigating neglect. Seventy percent of these participants omitted words at the beginning of the text (left end), showing Prose Reading Neglect (PRN). The participants showing PRN differed from those not showing PRN only for the overall severity of neglect, and had a lesion centred on the insula, putamen and superior temporal gyrus. Double dissociations emerged between PRN and single word reading neglect, suggesting different cognitive requirements between the two tests: parallel processing in single word reading vs. serial analysis in text reading. Notably, the pattern of neglected text varied dramatically across participants presenting with PRN, including dissociations between reading performance of one and two columns text. Prose reading proved a complex and unique task which should be directly investigated to predict the effects of unilateral neglect. The outcome of this study should also inform clinical assessment and advises given to patients and care-givers.     

Review of Haydée Faimberg,The telescoping of Generations: Listening to the Narcissistic Links between Generations,London and New York,Routledge, 2005

Abstract

The V Nordic Conference of IFPS, Sweden January 23-24,1993

Activities of The Postgraduate Psychoanalytic Society October 1992-June 1993     

Spatial clustering and hierarchical coding in immediate serial recall

Four experiments are reported that demonstrate the benefits of clustering by spatial proximity in spatial serial recall and provide support for the notion that hierarchical coding underpins the retention of clustered sequences in spatial working memory. Sequences segregated by spatial clusters increased serial recall performance at different levels of sequence length in a variation of the Corsi test and produced a faster initial response time (RT), which indicates that they afforded data reducing processes. RT at cluster boundary increased in parallel with the number of items forming the clusters, suggesting that subroutines of different length were responsible for the ordering of items within clusters of different size. Evidence for hierarchical coding was also obtained in a serial recognition task, indicating this type of representation pertains to the retention of the sequences rather than exclusively to the organisation of the motor plan for the reproduction of the sequences.     

Effects of stimulus–stimulus short-term memory associations in a Simon-like task

The Simon effect refers to faster responding when an irrelevant stimulus location corresponds with the response to a relevant stimulus attribute than when it does not. We investigated whether a memory-based Simon-like effect would occur when the irrelevant spatial attribute was associated with the stimulus during a prior task. In a first task, an association between colour and location was formed by requiring participants to count the occurrences of two colour stimuli, each of which was always presented in a left or right location. In a second task, the colour stimuli were presented centrally and mapped to left and right keypresses, with the mapping being inconsistent or consistent with the prior colour-location associations. A Simon-like effect was evident at the start of the second task, with performance being better when the established colour–position associations were consistent with the colour–response mapping than when they were not. This result indicates that stimulus–stimulus short-term memory associations formed during the first task transferred to the second task. For the remainder of the second task, the data showed a more conservative speed–accuracy criterion for the inconsistent condition than for the consistent condition, though a processing efficiency measure suggested that the prior stimulus–stimulus short-term associations may also continue to directly influence performance. Results suggest that simple declarative knowledge, as represented by stimulus–stimulus STM links, exerts less persistent transfer effects than procedural knowledge as provided by stimulus–response STM links.     

Living on the edge: strategic and instructed slowing in the stop signal task

The stop signal task is widely adopted to assess motor inhibition performance in both clinical and non-clinical populations. Several recent studies explored the influence of strategic approaches to the task. In particular, response slowing seems to be a strategic approach commonly adopted to perform the task. In the present study, we compared a standard version with a strategic version of the task, in which participants were explicitly instructed to slow down responses. Results showed that the instructed slowing did not affect the main inhibition measure, thus confirming the robustness of the stop signal index. On the other hand, it apparently changed the nature of the task, as shown by the lack of correlation between the standard and the strategic versions. In addition, we found a specific influence of individual characteristics on slowing strategies. In the standard version, adherence to task instructions was positively correlated with compliant traits of personality. Despite instructions to maximize response speed, non-compliant participants preferred to adopt a slowing strategy in the standard version of the task, up to a speed level similar to the strategic version, where slowing was required by task instructions. Understanding the role of individual approach to the task seems to be crucial to properly identify how participants cope with task instructions.     

A puzzle about belief updating

In recent decades much literature has been produced on disagreement; the puzzling conclusion being that epistemic disagreement is, for the most part, either impossible (e.g. Aumann (Ann Stat 4(6):1236–1239, 1976)), or at least easily resolvable (e.g. Elga (Noûs 41(3):478–502, 2007)). In this paper I show that, under certain conditions, an equally puzzling result arises: that is, disagreement cannot be rationally resolved by belief updating. I suggest a solution to the puzzle which makes use of some of the principles of Hintikka’s Socratic epistemology.