Inhibition of return and the attentional set for integrating versus differentiating information.

Cuing a location with an uninformative cue leads to a facilitatory effect at that location shortly afterward and later (about 300 ms) to a negative effect called inhibition of return (IOR). Until recently, it was argued that IOR occurs in detection and localization tasks, but not in discrimination tasks. However, the authors of several recent studies have demonstrated IOR effects in discrimination tasks, although at a later cue-to-target stimulus onset asynchrony (SOA). In this study, the authors examined why IOR occurs at a later SOA in discrimination tasks. In Experiments 1 and 2, different time courses of exogenous cuing effects in detection and discrimination tasks were established. In Experiment 3, the authors examined the role of an attentional set on the time course of exogenous cuing effects by manipulating the proportion of trials in which a distractor is presented in the location opposite the target. A new framework for understanding exogenous cuing effects and their dependence on endogenous attention is proposed.     

Inhibition of return in a selective reaching task: an investigation of reference frames.

Most previous studies of inhibition of return (IOR) have examined reaction time (RT) and accuracy. These effects have been observed via saccades to targets or with key-press responses. In this study the authors examined, for the first time, IOR in components of a selective reaching task in which participants directly reached for and depressed target keys. When the interval between cue and target was 600 ms, robust IOR effects were observed in RT to begin the reach, but no effects were observed in the movement components (movement time to complete the reach and the path of the reach). However, when the cue-target interval was short (200 ms), hand paths deviated toward the cue. The results suggest that although RT measures of IOR appear to reveal perceptual rather than action-based processes, action-based representations may be briefly activated by irrelevant cues, which can be observed via analysis of three-dimensional reach path.     

Nyíri,J.C., Tradition and Individuality: Philosophical Essays, “Synthese Library”; Nyíri,Kristóf,A hagyomány filozófiája (The Philosophy of Tradition); Neumer,Katalin, Gondolkodás,beszéd, írás (Thought,Language, and Writing)

Studies in East European Thought -     

Interactive learning in the paradise fish (Macropodus opercularis): an ethological interpretation of the second-order conditioning paradigm

This study was aimed at the examination of ‘mental construction’ in paradise fish by interactive learning, which is suggested as an alternative hypothesis for backward or second-order conditioning. Avoidance of goldfish was established in paradise fish by presenting a harmless goldfish (a novel stimulus) after an aversive event (mild electric shocks) in the dark compartment of a shuttle tank. It was found that this avoidance depended on context pre-exposure. Experiment 1 was designed to study the effect of mild shocks on shuttling activity in a familiar context. Experiment 2 aimed at establishing fear-conditioning to the goldfish in a higher-order conditioning paradigm. In the course of training, unpaired stimuli were presented in the dark compartment of the shuttle tank in such a manner that the presentation of mild shocks (20 mA) preceded the encounter with a harmless fish (goldfish). Experiment 3 demonstrated the role of context pre-exposure in interactive learning. Results indicate that (1) while 60 mA shocks resulted in avoidance of the dark compartment, the 20 mA mild shocks affected exploratory behaviour; (2) after pre-exposure to the training environment, paradise fish avoided the dark compartment containing goldfish provided that subjects had previously encountered mild, explorative shocks there; (3) this conditioned fear, a ‘mental construction’ of a potential danger, was proved to be transferable to another context and was consequently aimed specifically at the goldfish, a living being, rather than the training context; (4) the pre-exposure to the shuttle tank was an important part of this training procedure, that is, only subjects habituated to the shuttle tank avoided the goldfish. Results are discussed in the framework of the Interactive Learning Hypothesis, which has been developed as an ethological approach to a higher-order conditioning paradigm. Received: 15 January 1999 / Accepted after revision: 18 August 1999     

Are European and American golf players different? Reply to Engelhardt (1997)

Analysis of 1998 statistics for individual performance in the PGA European Tour yielded significant differences between some shot-making skills (drive distance, total driving, greens in regulation, and sand saves) between the top 10 and bottom 10 money winners, replicating (with partially different results) a result found for the 1995 American PGA Tour by Engelhardt.     

The Interactive Origin of Iconicity

We investigate the emergence of iconicity, specifically a bouba‐kiki effect in miniature artificial languages under different functional constraints: when the languages are reproduced and when they are used communicatively. We ran transmission chains of (a) participant dyads who played an interactive communicative game and (b) individual participants who played a matched learning game. An analysis of the languages over six generations in an iterated learning experiment revealed that in the Communication condition, but not in the Reproduction condition, words for spiky shapes tend to be rated by naive judges as more spiky than the words for round shapes. This suggests that iconicity may not only be the outcome of innovations introduced by individuals, but, crucially, the result of interlocutor negotiation of new communicative conventions. We interpret our results as an illustration of cultural evolution by random mutation and selection (as opposed to by guided variation).     

Legal Audiences

This paper approaches legal argumentation from a rhetorical perspective. It discusses the nature of the audiences that are (and should be) targeted by judges in the legal process. Judicial opinions reach diverse groups of people with very different attitudes and expectations: other judges, lawyers, litigants, concerned citizens, etc. One important way in which these groups differ is that some of them are more likely to be persuaded by legalistic, precedent or statute-based arguments, while others expect judges to decide on grounds of justice or equity. So, judges face the challenge of determining whether they should select particular groups for special attention, or whether they have alternative rhetorical means to approach the problem of audience diversity. One strategy that is likely to be recommended by rhetorical scholars is that judges should not try to accommodate the various preferences of their actual readership, but that they should rather invoke an idealized audience or some version of Chaïm Perelman’s universal audience. However, the paper tries to show that the universal audience is of limited value for a discussion about how judges ought to proceed in the face of audience diversity. In particular, the idea of a universal audience does not help judges to make the choice between a legalistic or an equity-based approach to legal decision-making. By showing that this is so, the paper also raises doubts about the common thought that to invoke the universal audience in law is to appeal to natural law (as distinct from written, positive law).     

Anger and sadness in response to an emotionally neutral film: evidence for age-specific associations with well-being

When the association between emotion and well-being is being considered, positive emotions usually come to mind. However, negative emotions serve important adaptive functions and particular negative emotions may be especially adaptive at different stages of adult development. We examined the associations between self-reported negative emotions in response to an emotionally neutral, thematically ambiguous film and subjective well-being among 76 young (age 20-29), 73 middle-aged (age 40-49), and 73 older (age 60-69) adults. Results indicated that higher self-reported anger in response to the film was associated with higher well-being for middle-aged adults, but not for young and older adults. Higher self-reported sadness in response to the film was associated with higher well-being for older adults, but not for young and middle-aged adults. These findings were stronger for cognitive well-being (i.e., satisfaction with life) than for affective well-being (i.e., ratio of dispositional positive to negative affect) and were specific to these emotions (not found for self-reported disgust or fear) and to the emotionally neutral film (not found for sad or disgusting films). Results are discussed in terms of the functions that anger and sadness are thought to serve and the control opportunities afforded in midlife and late life that render these functions differentially adaptive.