An aftereffect in judgment of auditory duration

Two experiments were designed to investigate the occurrence of atemporal aftereffect following auditory spatial stimulation. The task required Ss to compare by means of a motorresponse the duration of a test tone presented at a variable interval after stimulation with a standard tone. In both experiments the posttest duration was underestimated relative to the pretest duration, i.e., there was a temporal aftereffect(TAE). A control experiment which involved Ss making estimates of the duration of the test tones, without the presentation of interpolated standard tones, did not show this effect. The temporal aftereffect followed a function analogous to the “distance paradox” forspatial aftereffects.     

The memorizing effort heuristic in judgments of learning: A developmental perspective

Recent work on adult metacognition indicates that although metacognitive monitoring often guides control operations, sometimes it follows control operations and is based on the feedback from them. Consistent with this view, in self-paced learning, judgments of learning (JOLs) made at the end of each study trial decreased with the amount of time spent studying the item, suggesting that JOLs are based on the memorizing effort heuristic that easily learned items are more likely to be remembered. Study 1 extended investigation to primary school children. Whereas for third to sixth graders (9- to 12-year-olds) JOLs decreased with increasing study time (ST), no such relationship was found for first and second graders (7- and 8-year-olds). For both age groups, however, recall decreased with ST, supporting the validity of the memorizing effort heuristic. Self-reports (Study 2) disclosed the belief that recall should tend to increase with ST. The results bring to the fore the importance of mnemonic cues that shape metacognitive feelings even among primary school children. These cues lie in the very feedback that learners gain on-line from task performance rather than in metacognitive knowledge, and their use may also contribute to increased monitoring accuracy with age.     

Shared and distinct cue utilization for metacognitive judgements during reasoning and memorisation

Metacognitive research is dominated by meta-memory studies; meta-reasoning research is nascent. Accessibility – the number of associations for a stimulus – is a reliable heuristic cue for Feeling of Knowing when answering knowledge questions. We used a similar cue, subjective accessibility, for exposing commonalities and differences between meta-reasoning and meta-memory. In Experiment 1, participants faced solvable Compound Remote Associate problems mixed with unsolvable random word triads. We collected initial Judgement of Solvability (iJOS), final JOS (fJOS) and confidence. Experiment 2 focused on confidence, controlling for potential interactions among judgements. In Experiment 3, the participants memorised the same triads and rated Ease of Learning and Judgement of Learning. sAccessibility was associated with all judgements. Notably, it reliably predicted memory judgements and confidence in the provided solutions. However, it was unreliable for judging solvability (iJOS and fJOS). The findings highlight the importance of studying meta-reasoning for exposing the biasing factors in reasoning processes and for getting a broad perspective on metacognitive processes.     

Control over grain size in memory reporting--with and without satisfying knowledge

When answering questions from memory, respondents strategically control the precision or coarseness of their answers. This grain control process is guided by 2 countervailing aims: to be informative and to be correct. Previously, M. Goldsmith, A. Koriat, and A. Weinberg Eliezer (2002) proposed a satisfying model in which respondents provide the most precise answer that passes a minimum-confidence report criterion. Pointing to social-pragmatic considerations, the present research shows the need to incorporate a minimum-informativeness criterion as well. Unlike its predecessor, the revised, "dual-criterion" model implies a distinction between 2 theoretical knowledge states: Under moderate-to-high levels of satisfying knowledge, a grain size can be found that jointly satisfies both criteria--confidence and informativeness. In contrast, under lower levels of unsatisfying knowledge, the 2 criteria conflict--one cannot be satisfied without violating the other. In support of the model, respondents often violated the confidence criterion in deference to the informativeness criterion, particularly when answering under low knowledge, despite having full control over grain size. Results also suggest a key role for the "don't know" response which, when available, can be used preferentially to circumvent the criterion conflict.     

The four-factor model of depressive symptoms in dementia caregivers: a structural equation model of ethnic differences

Previous studies have suggested that 4 latent constructs (depressed affect, well-being, interpersonal problems, somatic symptoms) underlie the item responses on the Center for Epidemiological Studies Depression (CES-D) Scale. This instrument has been widely used in dementia caregiving research, but the fit of this multifactor model and the explanatory contributions of multifactor models have not been sufficiently examined for caregiving samples. The authors subjected CES-D data (N = 1,183) from the initial Resources for Enhancing Alzheimer's Caregiver Health Study to confirmatory factor analysis methods and found that the 4-factor model provided excellent fit to the observed data. Invariance analyses suggested only minimal item-loading differences across race subgroups and supported the validity of race comparisons on the latent factors. Significant race differences were found on 3 of the 4 latent factors both before and after controlling for demographic covariates. African Americans reported less depressed affect and better well-being than White caregivers, who reported better well-being and fewer interpersonal problems than Hispanic caregivers. These findings clarify and extend previous studies of race differences in depression among diverse samples of dementia caregivers.     

Further explorations of perceptual speed abilities in the context of assessment methods, cognitive abilities, and individual differences during skill acquisition

Measures of perceptual speed ability have been shown to be an important part of assessment batteries for predicting performance on tasks and jobs that require a high level of speed and accuracy. However, traditional measures of perceptual speed ability sometimes have limited cost-effectiveness because of the requirements for administration and scoring of paper-and-pencil tests. There have also been concerns about the validity of previous computer approaches to administering perceptual speed tests (e.g., see Mead & Drasgow, 1993). The authors developed two sets of computerized perceptual speed tests, with touch-sensitive monitors, that were designed to parallel several paper-and-pencil tests. The reliability and validity of the tests were explored across three empirical studies (N = 167, 160, and 117, respectively). The final study included two criterion tasks with 4.67 and 10 hours of time-on-task practice, respectively. Results indicated that these new measures provide both high levels of reliability and substantial validity for performance on the two skill-learning tasks. Implications for research and application for computerized perceptual speed tests are discussed.     

A music-based HIV prevention intervention for urban adolescents

OBJECTIVE: This research examines the process of conducting and evaluating a music-based HIV prevention intervention among urban adolescents, and is informed by the information, motivation, behavioral skills (IMB) model. DESIGN: Musically talented opinion leaders were recruited to write, record, and distribute HIV prevention themed music to their peers to increase HIV prevention motivation, behavioral skills, and behaviors. In this 3-month field experiment, participants were 306 students enrolled in health classes at each of three large multiracial urban high schools (one treatment school; two control schools). MAIN OUTCOME MEASURES: Measures of HIV prevention information, motivation, behavioral skills, and behaviors, both pre- and postintervention. RESULTS AND CONCLUSION: Results indicate that the intervention influenced several aspects of HIV prevention motivation, behavioral skills, and condom use and HIV testing behaviors. This research demonstrates that the incorporation of music into HIV prevention interventions for adolescents has the potential to be effective.     

An electrophysiological study of school-aged children with a history of failure to thrive during infancy

Sixty-five subjects, ages 8 to 12, participated in a visual electrophysiological study. Twenty-two of the subjects had received a diagnosis of nonorganic failure-to-thrive (FTT) before the age of three. The remaining 43 subjects had no history of FTT and served as Controls. IQs were obtained with the abbreviated WISC-III, and the Controls were split into two groups, LO IQ and HI IQ, to provide a LO IQ Control group with an average IQ equivalent to the FTT group. Event-related brain potentials (ERPs) were recorded from five scalp locations during a cued continuous performance task (CPT). Subjects had to press a button every time they saw the letter “X” following the letter “A” (50 targets out of 400 stimuli). During the CPT, the FTT subjects made marginally more errors of omission to targets than the LO IQ Control group and significantly more errors of omission than the HI IQ Control subjects. The groups did not differ significantly on errors of commission (false alarms) or reaction times to targets. ERP averages revealed a group difference in amplitude in a late slow wave for the 50 non-X stimuli (false targets) that followed the letter A. This difference was greatest over frontal sites, where the FTT group had a more negative going slow wave than each control group. Late frontal negativity to No Go stimuli has been linked with post-decisional processing, notably in young children. Thus, the FTT subjects may have less efficient inhibitory processes, reflected by additional late frontal activation. *** DIRECT SUPPORT *** A31BB040 00006     

Extending Structural Analyses of the Rosenberg Self-Esteem Scale to Consider Criterion-Related Validity: Can Composite Self-Esteem Scores Be Good Enough?

Although the Rosenberg Self-Esteem Scale (RSES) is the most widely used measure of global self-esteem in the literature, there are ongoing disagreements about its factor structure. This methodological debate informs how the measure should be used in substantive research. Using a sample of 1,127 college students, we test the overall fit of previously specified models for the RSES, including a newly proposed bifactor solution (McKay, Boduszek, &; Harvey, 2014 McKay, M. T., Boduszek, D., &; Harvey, S. (2014). The Rosenberg Self-Esteem Scale: A bifactor answer to a two-factor question? Journal of Personality Assessment, 96, 654–660.[Taylor &; Francis Online], [Web of Science ®] , [Google Scholar]). We extend previous work by evaluating how various latent factors from these structural models are related to a set of criterion variables frequently studied in the self-esteem literature. A strict unidimensional model poorly fit the data, whereas models that accounted for correlations between negatively and positively keyed items tended to fit better. However, global factors from viable structural models had similar levels of association with criterion variables and with the pattern of results obtained with a composite global self-esteem variable calculated from observed scores. Thus, we did not find compelling evidence that different structural models had substantive implications, thereby reducing (but not eliminating) concerns about the integrity of the self-esteem literature based on overall composite scores for the RSES.