A short history of ideo-motor action

The ideo-motor theory, which is currently receiving heightened interest in cognitive psychology, looks back on a long history. Essentially two historical roots can be presented. A British one, initiated by Laycock (1845) and Carpenter (1852), which was developed in order to explain ideo-motor phenomena by means of cerebral reflex actions. A second and older root is the German one by Herbart (1816, 1825), Lotze (1852), and Harless (1861), which considered the ideo-motor principle a fundamental mechanism of all intentional human behaviour. Both roots converged in James' (1890) Principles of Psychology before they fell into oblivion due to the dominance of behaviorism in the first half of the 20th century. The few empirical ideo-motor studies of the early 20th century are briefly described. Finally, similarities and differences in the history of the ideo-motor theory are delineated and a perspective is given covering research questions that could be examined in the future.     

Early development of subcortical regions involved in non-cued attention switching

This study examined the cognitive and neural development of attention switching using a simple forced-choice attention task and functional magnetic resonance imaging Fourteen children and adults made discriminations among stimuli based on either shape or color. Performance on these trials was compared to performance during blocked trials requiring all color or all shape discriminations. Magnetic resonance echo planar images were acquired during performance of the task. Both children and adults showed robust bilateral activity of the caudate nucleus when switching attention between color and shape discriminations that correlated negatively with mean response latency on these trials. However, neither switching costs nor caudate activity correlated with age, suggesting early development of the underlying neural circuitry involved in switching between salient stimulus sets. Overall, children and adults differed in performance and patterns of brain activity on the task, with adults responding more accurately and faster than children, and recruiting more prefrontal and parietal regions. These results suggest an important role of subcortical regions (i.e. caudate nucleus) in non-cued attention switching, with increasing recruitment of cortical regions with age.     

Adult attachment and the perception of emotional expressions: probing the hyperactivating strategies underlying anxious attachment

According to adult attachment theory, individual differences in attachment-related anxiety reflect variation in individuals' vigilance to cues relevant to appraising and monitoring the availability and responsiveness of significant others. To investigate this assumption, the authors adopted a morph movie paradigm in which participants were shown movies of faces in which an emotional facial expression changed gradually to a neutral one (Study 1) or a neutral expression changed to an emotional one (Studies 2-4). Participants were asked to judge the point at which the emotional expression had disappeared or emerged, respectively. Individuals who were highly anxious with respect to attachment were more likely to perceive the offset (Study 1) as well as the onset (Studies 2 and 3) of the facial expressions of emotion earlier than other people. Moreover, this heightened state of vigilance may have led to poorer accuracy in judging facial expressions of emotion (Study 3), an effect that was reversed when anxious individuals were required to watch the movies for the same length of time as less anxious participants (Study 4). The results indicate that variation in attachment anxiety reflects, in part, differences in vigilance to cues of social and emotional significance.     

Relation of attitude toward body elimination to parenting style and attitude toward the body

The purpose was to estimate the relation of attitude toward body elimination in 93 college students (27 men and 66 women), to authoritarian personality features, participants' perception of their mothers' parenting style, and attitudes toward cleanliness, sex, and family nudity. Subjects were administered the Body Elimination Attitude Scale, the Four-item F Scale, the Parental Authority Questionnaire Pertaining to Mothers, and the items "Sex is dirty," "Cleanliness is next to godliness," and "Children should never see other family members nude." Larger scores for disgust toward body elimination were associated with authoritarian personality characteristics, being less likely to describe mother's parenting style as authoritative (open communication) and more likely to describe it as authoritarian and lower scores for tolerance for family nudity. Implications for further research were suggested.     

The self and action in theory of mind research

Research on children's developing theories of mind has contributed to our understanding of the developmental relation of self and action (1) by exploring the relation of the development of self knowledge to the development of knowledge of others' minds and (2) by investigating the relation between theory of mind development and the development of action control. We argue that evidence on theory of mind reasoning in children with deficient action control (ADHD-diagnosed children) is especially relevant to the second issue and we present some first evidence supporting the bi-directional hypothesis, that is, the view that theory of mind leads to improved action control which in turn supports the ability to represent mental states on-line.     

I like her, because I like myself: self-evaluation as a source of interpersonal attitudes

Two experiments tested the hypothesis that self-evaluation can serve as a source of interpersonal attitudes. In the first study, self-evaluation was manipulated by means of false feedback. A subsequent learning phase demonstrated that the co-occurrence of the self with another individual influenced the evaluation of this previously neutral target. Whereas evaluative self-target similarity increased under conditions of negative self-evaluation, an opposite effect emerged in the positive self-evaluation group. A second study replicated these findings and showed that the difference between positive and negative self-evaluation conditions disappeared when a load manipulation was applied. The implications of self-evaluation for attitude formation processes are discussed.     

Exploratory factor analysis and psychometric properties of the Valencia Scale on attitudes and beliefs toward hypnosis

Exploratory factor analysis and psychometric properties of the valencia scale on attitudes and beliefs toward hypnosis. Therapist version. This investigation examines the psychometric properties and factor structure of the Valencia Scale on Attitudes and Beliefs toward Hypnosis-Therapist version. Data from 775 professional psychologists belonging to the Spanish Association of Psychologists were used for the exploratory factor analysis (EFA). Retest included data from 426 participants who answered to the test. The EFA revealed eight factors (Fear, Memory, Help, Control, Collaboration, Interest, Magic and Marginal). Each factor showed good internal consistency and reliability, similar to the client version of this scale. ANOVA indicate that some variables (having scientific knowledge, having received practical information on hypnosis, to use hypnosis, and to show interest in receiving more theoretical and practical information on hypnosis), tend to reduce inadequate beliefs and negative attitudes toward hypnosis. Our results provide the basis for carrying out confirmatory factor analysis and studies of convergent validity on the scale, and of the sensitivity of the scale to change.     

The strategic regulation of children's memory performance and suggestibility

We report two empirical studies that investigated previously reported benefits of a high accuracy motivation, and thus a high threshold, for children's and adults' event recall and for their ability to resist false suggestions. In the studies, 6-, 7-, and 8-year-olds, as well as adults, were shown a brief video about an event and were later asked unbiased and misleading questions about it. In Study 1, participants were either (a) given the typical accuracy instructions (including the option to answer with "I don't know"), (b) reminded of the accuracy instructions during the interview, or (c) immediately given feedback and a token for every correct answer. The results showed that the reminders were ineffective in stimulating strategic control behavior in children, independent of age. In Study 2, the confounding effects of feedback and incentives were disentangled by contrasting (a) free report, (b) feedback only, (c) incentives only, and (d) feedback plus incentives. Analyses on recall performance and suggestibility revealed that both feedback and incentives are necessary to increase children's accurate memory reports.     

The evolution and function of adult attachment: a comparative and phylogenetic analysis

Although the evolutionary functions of attachment in infant-caregiver relationships are undisputed, it is unclear what functions--if any--attachment serves in adult romantic relationships. The objective of this research was to examine the evolution and function of adult attachment (i.e., pair bonding) by applying comparative and phylogenetic methods to archival data collected on 2 diverse samples of mammalian species. The authors found that species exhibiting adult attachment were more likely than others to be characterized by paternal care, developmental immaturity or neoteny, small social groups, and small body sizes. The authors also used phylogenetic techniques to reconstruct the evolution of adult attachment and test alternative evolutionary models of the comparative correlates of pair bonding. Phylogenetic analyses suggested that the relationship between paternal care and adult attachment may be a functional one (i.e., due to convergent evolution) but that the relationship between neoteny and adult attachment may be due to homology (i.e., shared ancestry). Discussion focuses on the potential of comparative and phylogenetic methods for advancing the science of social and personality psychology.