Children's mappings of large number words to numerosities

Previous studies have suggested that children's learning of the relation between number words and approximate numerosities depends on their verbal counting ability, and that children exhibit no knowledge of mappings between number words and approximate numerical magnitudes for number words outside their productive verbal counting range. In the present study we used a numerical estimation task to explore children's knowledge of these mappings. We classified children as Level 1 counters (those unable to produce a verbal count list up to 35), Level 2 counters (those who were able to count to 35 but not 60) and Level 3 counters (those who counted to 60 or above) and asked children to estimate the number of items on a card. Although the accuracy of children's estimates depended on counting ability, children at all counting skill levels produced estimates that increased linearly in proportion to the target number, for numerosities both within and beyond their counting range. This result was obtained at the group level (Experiment 1) and at the level of individual children (Experiment 2). These findings provide evidence that even the least skilled counters do exhibit some knowledge of the form of the mapping between large number words and approximate numerosities.     

Positive evidence for Eysenck’s arousal hypothesis: A combined EEG and MRI study with multiple measurement occasions

Eysenck’s arousal hypothesis suggests that introverts have greater cortical activity than extraverts. This prediction was tested in several studies that used the electroencephalogram (EEG) alpha activity to index cortical arousal, but empirical findings are inconsistent. Possibly, external factors of the measurement situation or static factors such as skull thickness may act as nuisance variables on alpha activity and thus mitigate the relation between arousal and extraversion. The aim of the present study was to test the arousal hypothesis with a focus on these methodological issues. Resting EEG was acquired on several occasions of measurement, skull thickness was quantified with anatomical magnetic resonance imaging (MRI), and extraversion was assessed by questionnaire. There was a positive association between alpha activity and extraversion, which was neither affected by external factors nor by skull thickness. This finding is in line with the arousal hypothesis and suggests that external or static factors do not contribute to the inconsistency of empirical findings.     

How to make your own response boxes: A step-by-step guide for the construction of reliable and inexpensive parallel-port response pads from computer mice

Psychological research is based in large parts on response latencies, which are often registered by keypresses on a standard computer keyboard. Recording response latencies with a standard keyboard is problematic because keypresses are buffered within the keyboard hardware before they are signaled to the computer, adding error variance to the recorded latencies. This can be circumvented by using external response pads connected to the computer's parallel port. In this article, we describe how to build inexpensive, reliable, and easy-to-use response pads with six keys from two standard computer mice that can be connected to the PC's parallel port. We also address the problem of recording data from the parallel port with different software packages under Microsoft's Windows XP.     

Intra‐sentential context effects on the interpretation of logical metonymy⋆

Verbs such as enjoy in the student enjoyed the book exhibit logical metonymy: enjoy is interpreted as enjoy reading. Theoreticalwork [Computational Linguistics 17 (4) (1991) 409; The Generative Lexicon, MIT Press, Cambridge, MA, 1995] predicts that this interpretation can be influenced by intra‐sentential context, e.g., by the subject of enjoy. In this article, we test this prediction using a completion experiment and find that the interpretation of a metonymic verb is influenced by the semantic role of its subject. We present a Bayesian model that accounts for the interpretation of logical metonymy and achieves a good fit on our experimental data. We show that the parameters of the model can be estimated from completion data or from corpus data.     

A theoretical analysis of sex differences in same-sex friendships

An investigation of sex differences in same-sex friendships was conducted in terms of the intersection and social penetration model of relationship development, and Bem's theory of sex role orientation. The results indicated that there were significant sex differences in the nature of the same-sex friendships studied. In the terminology of Levinger's (Toward the Analysis of Close Relationships, Journal of Experimental Psychology, 1980, 16, 510–544) intersection model, female same-sex friendships indicated greater involvement. In the terminology of Altman and Taylor's (Social Penetration: The Development of Interpersonal Relationships, New York: Holt, Rinehart & Winston, 1973) social penetration model, female friendships demonstrated greater depth. Overall, the female friendships were of longer duration than those of the males. The differences in involvement and depth were found within each designated level of friendship (causal, good, and close). However, the difference in involvement was moderated by the sex role orientation of the participants, in that the sex difference was greater between sex-typed individuals than between androgynous individuals. An examination of questionnaire subscale intercorrelations indicated that females tended to seek friends to whom they could relate in many different areas, while males tended to develop different relationships to meet different needs.     

The disputation — a special type of cooperative argumentative dialogue

This article consists of three parts, two introductory, in which the limits and the methods of analysis of dialogues are expounded, and the major part, in which the main features of a philosophical theory of disputation are outlined.