Dynamics of Word Comprehension in Infancy: Developments in Timing, Accuracy, and Resistance to Acoustic Degradation

Online comprehension of naturally spoken and perceptually degraded words was assessed in 95 children ages 12 to 31 months. The time course of word recognition was measured by monitoring eye movements as children looked at pictures while listening to familiar target words presented in unaltered, time-compressed, and low-pass-filtered forms. Success in word recognition varied with age and level of vocabulary development, and with the perceptual integrity of the word. Recognition was best overall for unaltered words, lower for time-compressed words, and significantly lower in low-pass-filtered words. Reaction times were fastest in compressed, followed by unaltered and filtered words. Results showed that children were able to recognize familiar words in challenging conditions and that productive vocabulary size was more sensitive than chronological age as a predictor of children's accuracy and speed in word recognition.     

Graph coloring, minimum-diameter partitioning, and the analysis of confusion matrices

It is well known that minimum-diameter partitioning of symmetric dissimilarity matrices can be framed within the context of coloring the vertices of a graph. Although confusion data are typically represented in the form of asymmetric similarity matrices, they are also amenable to a graph-coloring perspective. In this paper, we propose the integration of the minimum-diameter partitioning method with a neighborhood-based coloring approach for analyzing digraphs corresponding to confusion data. This procedure is capable of producing minimum-diameter partitions with the added desirable property that vertices with the same color have similar in-neighborhoods (i.e., directed edges entering the vertex) and out-neighborhoods (i.e., directed edges exiting the vertex) for the digraph corresponding to the minimum partition diameter.     

Explaining Jury Verdicts: Is Leniency Bias for Real?

Laboratory research suggests juries that begin deliberation with a strong majority (i.e., 2/3 or more) usually end up choosing the verdict favored by this majority, whereas those without a strong majority generally acquit or hang. We tested the robustness of these findings in the field by examining trial and deliberation correlates of jury verdicts using data from 79 criminal jury trials held in Indiana. As expected, several trial characteristics and the first-vote preference distribution were related to jury verdicts. However, there was no evidence of leniency bias—75% of those juries without a 2/3 majority on the first deliberation vote ended up convicting. Contributions of the study, limitations, and alternative explanations for the observed severity bias are discussed.     

Orientation-specific aftereffects to mentally generated lines

After staring at a pattern of tilted lines, subsequent lines appear to be tilted in the opposite direction (direct tilt aftereffect, TAE). In a previous fMRI study we have demonstrated a direct TAE solely induced by the mental imagination accompanied by adaptation of orientation-selective neurons located in the extrastriate cortex, supporting the assumption of a perception-like coding of mental images. In this study we enlarge and specify the evidence for a perception-like coding of orientation-imagination. First, we replicated the previously detected direct TAE induced by line imagination with altered design-variations to control possible perceptual task confounds. Second, we tried to induce two other orientation-specific aftereffects: indirect TAE and contrast-threshold elevation aftereffect by mental imagery. The results replicate a robust direct TAE by mental imagery and by visual stimulation, with no influence of attentional resource allocation or perceptual task confounds. We could not induce an indirect TAE, but observed a perception bias in the opposite direction of the indirect TAE. The mental imagery of lines induced no orientation-selective contrast-threshold elevation aftereffect. In general, mental imagery seems to influence visual perception, indicating that perceptual resources are used by mental imagery. However, the utilisation of visual resources seems to be somewhat different from utilisation by perception.     

A behavior-based circuit model of how outcome expectations organize learned behavior in larval Drosophila

Drosophila larvae combine a numerically simple brain, a correspondingly moderate behavioral complexity, and the availability of a rich toolbox for transgenic manipulation. This makes them attractive as a study case when trying to achieve a circuit-level understanding of behavior organization. From a series of behavioral experiments, we suggest a circuitry of chemosensory processing, odor-tastant memory trace formation, and the "decision" process to behaviorally express these memory traces--or not. The model incorporates statements about the neuronal organization of innate vs. conditioned chemosensory behavior, and the types of interaction between olfactory and gustatory pathways during the establishment as well as the behavioral expression of odor-tastant memory traces. It in particular suggests that innate olfactory behavior is responsive in nature, whereas conditioned olfactory behavior is captured better when seen as an action in pursuit of its outcome. It incorporates the available neuroanatomical and behavioral data and thus should be useful as scaffold for the ongoing investigations of the chemo-behavioral system in larval Drosophila.     

Visual crowding: a fundamental limit on conscious perception and object recognition

Crowding, the inability to recognize objects in clutter, sets a fundamental limit on conscious visual perception and object recognition throughout most of the visual field. Despite how widespread and essential it is to object recognition, reading and visually guided action, a solid operational definition of what crowding is has only recently become clear. The goal of this review is to provide a broad-based synthesis of the most recent findings in this area, to define what crowding is and is not, and to set the stage for future work that will extend our understanding of crowding well beyond low-level vision. Here we define six diagnostic criteria for what counts as crowding, and further describe factors that both escape and break crowding. All of these lead to the conclusion that crowding occurs at multiple stages in the visual hierarchy.     

Do materialism,intrinsic aspirations,and meaning in life predict students’ meanings of education?

Though there is a deep literature on factors that predict college attendance and on the effects of college attendance on students’ development, there has been little research on what education actually means to students themselves. This study was conducted to examine whether materialism, intrinsic aspirations, and the search for meaning in life predicted a set of ten meanings that students are known to associate with their education. Multiple regression analyses indicated that students who were high on materialism viewed their education as an opportunity to gain independence, a chance to establish relationships, and a source of stress. Individuals high on intrinsic aspirations were more likely to see education as a time for career preparation, gaining independence, exploring future life directions, learning, engaging in personal growth, establishing social relationships, and learning skills to make a difference in the world, but they were less likely to view education as an escape from future responsibilities. As expected, the findings also revealed that individuals who sought meaning in life viewed education as a way to gain independence, explore life directions, engage in personal growth, establish relationships, learn skills that will help change the world, and escape future responsibilities.     

The impact of task-irrelevant emotional stimuli on attention in three domains

Whether task-irrelevant emotional stimuli facilitate or disrupt attention performance may depend on a range of factors, such as emotion type, task difficulty, and stimulus duration. Few studies, however, have systematically examined the influence of these factors on attention performance. Sixty-three adults, scoring within a normative range for mood and anxiety symptoms, completed either an easy or difficult version of an attention task measuring three aspects of attention performance: alerting, orienting, and executive attention. Results showed that in the easy task only, threatening versus nonthreatening task-irrelevant emotional faces facilitated orienting regardless of stimulus duration. These effects were no longer significant during the difficult condition. When the easy and difficult conditions were examined together, duration effects emerged such that stimuli of longer durations lead to greater interference, although effects were nonlinear. Findings illustrate that threat-relevant emotional stimuli facilitate attention during tasks with low cognitive load, but underscore the importance of considering a range of task parameters. Results are discussed in the context of adaptive and maladaptive emotion-attention interactions.     

West vs. West like East vs. West? A comparison between Italian and US American context sensitivity and Fear of Isolation

Easterners tend to process information more holistically than Westerners. Kim and Markman (J Exp Soc Psychol 42(3):350–364, 2006) suggest that these differences are rooted in higher chronic levels of Fear of Isolation (FOI) for those cultures that process information more holistically. The goal of this study was to determine if these differences and their suggested cause could be found with two different Western cultures. Testing Italian (IT) and US American (US) adults, we found that IT participants processed information more holistically and had a higher chronic level of FOI than US participants; furthermore, the manipulation of FOI affected context sensitivity more for IT than for US participants. The results demonstrate that IT participants were more similar to previous research with Eastern populations than with Western populations (Kim and Markman in J Exp Soc Psychol 42(3):350–364, 2006) and indicate a within-Western culture difference for reasoning styles and support the hypothesis that this difference is due to different chronic levels of FOI.