The time course of spoken word learning and recognition: studies with artificial lexicons

The time course of spoken word recognition depends largely on the frequencies of a word and its competitors, or neighbors (similar-sounding words). However, variability in natural lexicons makes systematic analysis of frequency and neighbor similarity difficult. Artificial lexicons were used to achieve precise control over word frequency and phonological similarity. Eye tracking provided time course measures of lexical activation and competition (during spoken instructions to perform visually guided tasks) both during and after word learning, as a function of word frequency, neighbor type, and neighbor frequency. Apparent shifts from holistic to incremental competitor effects were observed in adults and neural network simulations, suggesting such shifts reflect general properties of learning rather than changes in the nature of lexical representations.     

Philosophizing with a historiographical figure: Descartes in Degérando’s Histoire comparée des systèmes de philosophie (1804 and 1847)

Abstract

The writings by the ‘state philosophers’ of nineteenth-century France are often seen, either as entirely driven by political or ideological concerns, or reduced to mere history of philosophy. Hence, ironically, those who established the philosophical canon that still now informs philosophy teaching in France were themselves excluded from that canon. Using the heuristic concept of a philosophical figure, this article intends to show how, for these philosophers, historiography represented a seemingly inoffensive, but in reality, extremely efficient means of searching out philosophical alternatives to the institutionally dominant philosophy of Victor Cousin (1792–1867). Focusing on the almost forgotten case of Joseph-Marie Degérando (1772–1842), I show how he used the philosophical figure of Descartes and how he used it to counter Cousin.     

Approximate number sense,symbolic number processing,or number–space mappings: What underlies mathematics achievement?

In this study, the performance of typically developing 6- to 8-year-old children on an approximate number discrimination task, a symbolic comparison task, and a symbolic and nonsymbolic number line estimation task was examined. For the first time, children’s performances on these basic cognitive number processing tasks were explicitly contrasted to investigate which of them is the best predictor of their future mathematical abilities. Math achievement was measured with a timed arithmetic test and with a general curriculum-based math test to address the additional question of whether the predictive association between the basic numerical abilities and mathematics achievement is dependent on which math test is used. Results revealed that performance on both mathematics achievement tests was best predicted by how well children compared digits. In addition, an association between performance on the symbolic number line estimation task and math achievement scores for the general curriculum-based math test measuring a broader spectrum of skills was found. Together, these results emphasize the importance of learning experiences with symbols for later math abilities.     

Attention to low- and high-spatial frequencies in categorizing facial identities, emotions and gender in children with autism

This study was aimed at investigating face categorization strategies in children with autistic spectrum disorders (ASD). Performance of 17 children with ASD was compared to that of 17 control children in a face-matching task, including hybrid faces (composed of two overlapping faces of different spatial bandwidths) and either low- or high-pass filtered faces. Participants were asked to match faces on the basis of identity, emotion or gender. Results revealed that children with ASD used the same strategies as controls when matching faces by gender. By contrast, in the identity and the emotion conditions, children with ASD showed a high-pass bias (i.e., preference for local information), contrary to controls. Consistent with previous studies on autism, these findings suggest that children with ASD do use atypical (local-oriented) strategies to process faces.     

How does Sam feel?: Children's labelling and drawing of basic emotions

This study compares the ability of children aged from 6 to 11 to freely produce emotional labels based on detailed scenarios (labelling task), and their ability to depict basic emotions in their human figure drawing (subsequent drawing task). This comparison assesses the relevance of the use of a human figure drawing task in order to test children's comprehension of basic emotions. Such a comparison has never been undertaken up to now, the two tasks being seen as belonging to relatively separate fields of investigation. Results indicate corresponding developmental patterns for both tasks and a clear‐cut gap between simple emotions (happiness and sadness) and complex emotions (anger, fear, and disgust) in the ability to label and to depict basic emotions. These results suggest that a drawing task can be used to assess children's understanding of basic emotions. Results are discussed according to the development of perceptual skills and the development of emotion conceptualization.     

Associative learning in baboons (Papio papio) and humans (Homo sapiens): species differences in learned attention to visual features

We examined attention shifting in baboons and humans during the learning of visual categories. Within a conditional matching-to-sample task, participants of the two species sequentially learned two two-feature categories which shared a common feature. Results showed that humans encoded both features of the initially learned category, but predominantly only the distinctive feature of the subsequently learned category. Although baboons initially encoded both features of the first category, they ultimately retained only the distinctive features of each category. Empirical data from the two species were analyzed with the 1996 ADIT connectionist model of Kruschke. ADIT fits the baboon data when the attentional shift rate is zero, and the human data when the attentional shift rate is not zero. These empirical and modeling results suggest species differences in learned attention to visual features. Received: 30 May 1998 / Accepted after revision: 13 September 1998     

Expression of the emotions in the drawing of a man by the child from 5 to 11 years of age]

This study examines the development of children's ability to express emotions in their human figure drawing. Sixty children of 5, 8, and 11 years were asked to draw "a man," and then a "sad", "happy," "angry" and "surprised" man. Expressivity of the drawings was assessed by means of two procedures: a limited choice and a free labelling procedure. Emotionally expressive drawings were then evaluated in terms of the number and the type of graphic cues that were used to express emotion. It was found that children are able to depict happiness and sadness at 8, anger and surprise at 11. With age, children use increasingly numerous and complex graphic cues for each emotion (i.e., facial expression, body position, and contextual cues). Graphic cues for facial expression (e.g., concave mouth, curved eyebrows, wide opened eyes) share strong similarities with specific "action units" described by Ekman and Friesen (1978) in their Facial Action Coding System. Children's ability to depict emotion in their human figure drawing is discussed in relation to perceptual, conceptual, and graphic abilities.     

Using item response theory to study the convergent and discriminant validity of three questionnaires measuring cigarette dependence

To determine whether the Cigarette Dependence Scale, the Fagerstr?m Test for Nicotine Dependence, and the Nicotine Dependence Syndrome Scale (NDSS) reliably and correctly assessed both weakly and severely dependent individuals, the authors collected data via Internet from 2,435 current smokers, from 2004 to 2007. They used a 2-parameter item response model to determine the difficulty and discrimination of each question and used correlations between latent scores to assess convergent and discriminant validity. The reliability of all scales was close to or exceeded .70. Both the Cigarette Dependence Scale and the Fagerstr?m Test for Nicotine Dependence had 1 misfitting item. Each NDSS scale had at least 2 misfitting items. The information curve of each of the questionnaires peaked between -2 and 2 and was low at both extremes. All questionnaires had adequate reliability and were more informative for a medium level of the underlying cigarette dependence continuum than for both extremes of this continuum. The correlations between latent scores indicated good convergent validity between questionnaires and low discriminant validity between NDSS subscales, except for Tolerance. This result suggests that nicotine dependence may not be composed of 5 dimensions but may be unidimensional and distinct from reduced sensitivity to the effects of smoking (Tolerance).     

Mixture distribution latent state-trait analysis: basic ideas and applications

Extensions of latent state-trait models for continuous observed variables to mixture latent state-trait models with and without covariates of change are presented that can separate individuals differing in their occasion-specific variability. An empirical application to the repeated measurement of mood states (N=501) revealed that a model with 2 latent classes fits the data well. The larger class (76%) consists of individuals whose mood is highly variable, whose general well-being is comparatively lower, and whose mood variability is influenced by daily hassles and uplifts. The smaller class (24%) represents individuals who are rather stable and happier and whose mood is influenced only by daily uplifts but not by daily hassles. A simulation study on the model without covariates with 5 sets of sample sizes and 5 sets of number of occasions revealed that the appropriateness of the parameter estimates of this model depends on number of observations (the higher the better) and number of occasions (the higher the better). Another simulation study estimated Type I and II errors of the Lo-Mendell-Rubin test.