Visual discrimination learning in rats with lesions of superior colliculus: Door-push and approach errors in modified jumping stand

It has been suggested that, for some species, lesions of the superior colliculus affect visual discrimination learning, but only in certain conditions: (a) when problems are first learnt only after operation, or (b) when discriminanda require detailed scanning, or (c) when “approach” responses to the discriminanda are measured, rather than the response of actually touching them. These suggestions were examined in rats learning visual discriminations in a modified jumping-stand apparatus, after sustaining large lesions of the superior colliculus (and in some cases also of the pretectum). The lesions produced open-field hyperactivity and reduced exploration, indicating effective tectal damage, but the rats learnt a series of difficult discriminations in a door-push task as fast as normal rats, and they did not make more approach errors. Their main abnormality in the discrimination apparatus was that they looked less often between the stimulus doors before stepping across to one of them from the central platform. It is suggested that in rats, as in other animals, lesions of the superior colliculus disrupt the control of scanning head and eye movements; in rats, however, such disruption need not affect discrimination learning (at least in some kinds of apparatus), possibly because the retina of the rat has a relatively poorly developed area centralis.     

Evidence for multiple strategies in off-beat tapping with anisochronous stimuli

There is a large body of evidence relating to the ways that people tap in time with sounds, and perform error correction in order to do this. However, off-beat tapping is less well investigated than on-beat tapping. The current study involves coordinating with a stimulus sequence with underlying isochrony and systematic deviations from this isochrony that increase or decrease in magnitude to look at people’s capacity to error-correct when performing off-beat synchronisation with a set of sounds. Participants were instructed to ‘tap between the tones’ but ‘try to maintain regularity’. While analysis using typical methods suggested a form of error correction was occurring, a series of more complex analyses demonstrated that participants’ performance during each trial can be classified according to one of four different strategies: maintaining a regular pulse, error correction, phase resetting, and negative error correction. While maintaining a regular pulse was the preferred strategy in conditions with increasingly isochronous stimuli, the majority of trials are best explained by other strategies, suggesting that participants were generally influenced by variability in the stimuli.     

Will They or Won’t They? Secret Telling in Interpersonal Interactions

This study investigated predictors of within-gender secret telling. Eighty-eight participants were exposed to either a “positive” or a “negative” secret about another individual. Just under 20% of participants told the secret. Conscientiousness, secret condition, empathy, and the conscientiousness by secret condition interaction had effects on the rate of secret telling, χ² (5,82) = 17.78, p = .003, AIC = 80.60. Conscientiousness had a negative effect on secret telling among participants that told the “negative” secret.     

Chimpanzees demonstrate individual differences in social information use

Studies of transmission biases in social learning have greatly informed our understanding of how behaviour patterns may diffuse through animal populations, yet within-species inter-individual variation in social information use has received little attention and remains poorly understood. We have addressed this question by examining individual performances across multiple experiments with the same population of primates. We compiled a dataset spanning 16 social learning studies (26 experimental conditions) carried out at the same study site over a 12-year period, incorporating a total of 167 chimpanzees. We applied a binary scoring system to code each participant’s performance in each study according to whether they demonstrated evidence of using social information from conspecifics to solve the experimental task or not (Social Information Score—‘SIS’). Bayesian binomial mixed effects models were then used to estimate the extent to which individual differences influenced SIS, together with any effects of sex, rearing history, age, prior involvement in research and task type on SIS. An estimate of repeatability found that approximately half of the variance in SIS was accounted for by individual identity, indicating that individual differences play a critical role in the social learning behaviour of chimpanzees. According to the model that best fit the data, females were, depending on their rearing history, 15–24% more likely to use social information to solve experimental tasks than males. However, there was no strong evidence of an effect of age or research experience, and pedigree records indicated that SIS was not a strongly heritable trait. Our study offers a novel, transferable method for the study of individual differences in social learning.     

The Negative Shadow Cast by Positive Psychology: Contrasting Views and Implications of Humanistic and Positive Psychology on Resiliency

Resiliency is the ability to survive, or even thrive, during adversity. It is a key construct within both humanistic and positive psychology, but each sees it from a contrasting vantage. Positive psychology decontextualizes resilience by judging it as a virtue regardless of circumstance, while humanistic psychology tends to view it in a more holistic way in relationship to other virtues and environmental affordances, clarifying how resiliency can actually be either a virtue or a vice depending upon circumstances. Adolf Hitler is presented as an example of a resilient person who would not be seen as virtuous, and the US Army Comprehensive Soldier Fitness study training warfighters in resiliency illustrates possible ethical problems with a decontextualized view of resiliency.     

The Impact of Childhood Abuse on Women's and Men's Perceived Parenting: Implications for Practitioners

Three hundred eighty-eight women and two hundred ninety-six men, all parents, provided intake data at a university family therapy clinic. Among self-report items completed were questions relating to childhood abuse, perceived parenting, depressive feelings, hardiness, and current relationship functioning. Results indicated that physical abuse in childhood for women significantly influenced perceptions of their relationships with children; abuse was not significantly associated with later parenting for men. Childhood physical abuse for women and sexual abuse for men were significantly associated with hardiness, which was significantly associated with feeling depressed and perceived parenting for both genders. Race, income level, and substance abuse were not significant predictors or mediators in the model. Results suggest more gender similarities than differences when considering the association between retrospective, self-reported childhood abuse and later views of perceptions of parenting. The results suggest clinicians assess for and foster hardiness in clients that experienced childhood abuse and struggle with parenting issues as adults.