Assessing Deictic Relational Responding in Individuals With Social Anxiety Disorder: Evidence of Perspective-Taking Difficulties

The Psychological Record - The present study uses a relational frame approach (Hayes, Barnes-Holmes, and Roche, 2001) to perspective taking for individuals suffering from social anxiety disorder...     

Prosociality and reciprocity in bottlenose dolphins (Tursiops truncatus)

Animal Cognition - Some moral behaviours, often regarded as reflecting high cognitive abilities (such as empathy, cooperation, targeted helping) are known to only be present in very few species,...     

Formation of prismatic loop alignments in crystals deformed in single slip

In γ-TiAl deformed at room temperature in single slip, prismatic loops ar often organized in a staircase-like configuration, called strings whose generation by cross-slip is facilitated by the dislocation tendency to form screw locks as described recently by Grégori and Veyssière. The present letter is aimed at showing that strings may be encountered in virtually any crystal provided that the two impinging dislocations exhibit significantly different velocities. The crossslip annihilation mechanism of crossed dislocations considered by Tetelman is revisited and shown to evolve into a configuration significantly distinct from that originally predicted.     

Investigation of eating and deviant behaviors in bodybuilders according to their competitive engagement

ABSTRACT

This study investigated eating and deviant behaviors in bodybuilders according to their competitive engagement. Semi-structured interviews were conducted with 16 bodybuilders of different skill levels. Results revealed that dietary strategies and deviations (e.g., disordered eating, doping use, addictive training) developed with competitive commitment. Bodybuilders who intend to engage in competition are in a critical period for the development of deviant behaviors, in relation with increasing drive for muscularity and performance, and coaching pressure. These findings extend the existing literature on deviant behaviors in bodybuilding by providing better insight in the dynamics of development of disordered eating and associated behaviors.     

BACS: The Brussels Artificial Character Sets for studies in cognitive psychology and neuroscience

Written symbols such as letters have been used extensively in cognitive psychology, whether to understand their contributions to written word recognition or to examine the processes involved in other mental functions. Sometimes, however, researchers want to manipulate letters while removing their associated characteristics. A powerful solution to do so is to use new characters, devised to be highly similar to letters, but without the associated sound or name. Given the growing use of artificial characters in experimental paradigms, the aim of the present study was to make available the Brussels Artificial Character Sets (BACS): two full, strictly controlled, and portable sets of artificial characters for a broad range of experimental situations.     

Motor coordination dynamics underlying graphic motion in 7- to 11-year-old children

Using concepts and tools of a dynamical system approach in order to understand motor coordination underlying graphomotor skills, the aim of the current study was to establish whether the basic coordination dynamics found in adults is already established in children at elementary school, when handwriting is trained and eventually acquired. In the study, 45 children and 9 adults volunteered to copy two series of 13 ellipsoid shapes. These shapes were generated by manipulating the relative phase between 0° and 180° of two orthogonal oscillators in two orientations. Findings showed that although children from an early age onward and adults reproduced straight lines precisely (i.e., 0° and 180°), the former drew ellipsoid shapes in a less eccentric fashion than the latter (i.e., ～90° in all children rather than ～60° and 120° in adults). This tendency to write in a rounder fashion persists until 11 years of age, suggesting that the coordination dynamics underlying graphomotor skills and tentatively shaping the coordinated activity involved in adult handwriting appears only later, probably due to increasing constraints on speed.     

The Neural Correlates of Updating Information in Verbal Working Memory

The aim of the present study was to re-examine cerebral areas subserving the updating function of the central executive with a running span task requiring subjects to watch strings of consonants of unknown length and then to recall serially a specific number of recent items. In order to dissociate more precisely the updating process from the storage function, a four-item instead of a six-item memory load was used, contrary to our previous study (Salmon et al., 1996). In addition, a serial recall procedure was preferred to a recognition procedure in order to suppress the use of visuospatial strategies. The most significant increase of rCBF occurred in the left frontopolar cortex (Brodmann's area 10), spreading to the left middle frontal (Brodmann's area 46). Results suggest that frontopolar activation underlies an updating process in working memory.     

Integrating Psychopathology and Personality Disorders Conceptualized by the MMPI–2–RF and the MCMI–III: A Structural Validity Study

Twenty Es administered Rorschachs expecting Ss to give high or low total numbers of responses, high or low animal in relation to human percentages, and one or another extreme of select personality characteristics. Additionally, each tested a control S expecting “nothing remarkable.” Results indicated tester-bias and suggested that within each comparison group, one expectancy condition contributed disproportionately more to the bias effect than did the other. Video tapes of 20 sessions were analyzed to see whether a Bandura modeling paradigm could account for the mediation of bias; i.e., whether Es modeled their expectancies for the benefit of their Ss and whether Ss consequently imitated their models. This was not supported.