Excitotoxic lesions of the parafascicular nucleus produce deficits in a socially transmitted food preference

The parafascicular (PF) nucleus, a posterior component of the intralaminar nuclei of the thalamus, is considered to be an essential structure in the feedback circuits of basal ganglia-thalamo-cortical systems that critically participate in cognitive processes. To study the PF contribution to processing of behaviorally significant information during specific episodes of learning, we investigated the effects of damaging the PF nucleus in the acquisition of a natural form of social olfactory learning, the socially transmitted food preference (STFP) task. This task is a non-spatial paradigm that exhibits some of the characteristics of relational memory because it requires that animals use information obtained in one episode to guide later behavior in different circumstances. Adult male Wistar rats were submitted to pretraining bilateral N-methyl-D-aspartate (0.15 M, pH 7.4) lesions of the PF (0.4 microl/side, 0.2 microl/min). The behavioral effects of PF lesions were compared to vehicle- and sham-operated control groups and two retention delays were considered in separate groups: immediately (Lesion-I, Vehicle-I, and Sham-I groups) and 24h after training (Lesion-24, Vehicle-24, and Sham-24 groups). PF lesions produced delay-independent impairments in the STFP suggesting that this nucleus might modulate the acquisition of this odor-odor association task. Results are discussed in the context of medial prefrontal cortex deafferentation induced by PF damage.     

Singing can facilitate foreign language learning

This study presents the first experimental evidence that singing can facilitate short-term paired-associate phrase learning in an unfamiliar language (Hungarian). Sixty adult participants were randomly assigned to one of three “listen-and-repeat” learning conditions: speaking, rhythmic speaking, or singing. Participants in the singing condition showed superior overall performance on a collection of Hungarian language tests after a 15-min learning period, as compared with participants in the speaking and rhythmic speaking conditions. This superior performance was statistically significant (p < .05) for the two tests that required participants to recall and produce spoken Hungarian phrases. The differences in performance were not explained by potentially influencing factors such as age, gender, mood, phonological working memory ability, or musical ability and training. These results suggest that a “listen-and-sing” learning method can facilitate verbatim memory for spoken foreign language phrases.     

‘We Are All the Same,We All Are Mestizos’: Imagined Populations and Nations in Genetics Research in Colombia

In Colombia, as in other Latin American countries, current population genetics research is based on the understanding that Colombians constitute a mestizo nation, given the admixture process that took place between Africans, Amerindians, and Europeans during colonial times. The mestizo is a pervasive category used by geneticists to conduct, organise, and publish research studies that deal with the continent's peopling process and the genetic makeup of its contemporary population(s). It is also the dominant imaginary for the Colombian population and a key nation-building ideology. By tracing how this category moves and is used across four Colombian genetics laboratories, it is possible to discern that despite its apparently clear-cut boundaries, the mestizo is contingent, contested, and flexible, allowing for multiple understandings and usages. This flexibility and multiplicity are visible in the quantification of genetic ancestry, the divisions of geographical location, and the understanding of gender. Such understandings allow one to think about a homogeneous nation (inclusive) that is simultaneously heterogeneous (exclusive); they provide multiple but not necessarily contradictory possibilities of being mestizo, allowing the coexistence of images of the nation that could otherwise seem contradictory; and they permit navigation around contested terms such as race, while simultaneously thinking of mixed races or racialised individuals. Finally, these flexible and multiple constructions of the mestizo (re)produce various subjects as ‘other’, whether they are women, the Indigenous, the black/dark, or the poor.     

Is the fluency of language outputs related to individual differences in intelligence and executive function?

There has been little research on the fluency of language production and individual difference variables, such as intelligence and executive function. In this study, we report data from 106 participants who completed a battery of standardized cognitive tasks and a sentence production task. For the sentence production task, participants were presented with two objects and a verb and their task was to formulate a sentence. Four types of disfluency were examined: filled pauses (e.g. uh, um), unfilled pauses, repetitions, and repairs. Repetitions occur when the speaker suspends articulation and then repeats the previous word/phrase, and repairs occur when the speaker suspends articulation and then starts over with a different word/phrase. Hierarchical structural equation modeling revealed a significant relationship between repair disfluencies and inhibition. Conclusions focus on the role of individual differences in cognitive ability and their role in models and theories of language production.     

“Honey, you’re jumping about”—Mothers’ scaffolding of their children's and adolescents’ life narration

Research on mother–child reminiscing as a socializing practice for autobiographical memory is extended from early childhood and the narrating of single events to adolescence and the narrating of an entire life story. To explore whether the development of the life story in adolescence depends on qualities of the narrator or on the brevity of the narrated life, and whether mothers adapt their scaffolding strategies in co-narrations of the child's life to the child's zone of proximal development, 16 mother–child pairs (child's ages 8, 12, 16, and 20 years) both co-narrated and individually narrated the child's life. As expected, only the coherence of the children's, but not the mothers’, narratives varied with the child's age. Also, mothers supported temporal structuring more in younger children and arguments about personality and its development more in adolescents.     

Cognitive inhibition and working memory in attention-deficit/hyperactivity disorder

Studies of cognitive control in attention-deficit/hyperactivity disorder (ADHD) have emphasized the ability to suppress motor responses (i.e., behavioral inhibition) rather than the ability to actively suppress prepotent mental representations (i.e., cognitive inhibition). Further, working memory deficits are suspected in ADHD, yet their distinction from cognitive inhibition is unclear. Two hundred and eighty-eight adolescent and adult participants, 115 of whom met criteria for ADHD and 173 of whom were for non-ADHD comparison, completed a sentence processing task that required the suppression of an incorrect interpretation and a working memory task. The results failed to support cognitive inhibition problems in ADHD. Moreover, the ability to reanalyze sentences with a temporary misinterpretation was at least partially related to working memory performance. The results challenge a unitary inhibition problem in ADHD and suggest inhibition problems do not extend to cognitive suppression in this age range.     

Classification statistical techniques: an applied and comparative study

The aim of this article is to assess and compare three classification statistical techniques--logistic regression, discriminant analysis and classification trees--to identify the personality characteristics associated with the risk of suffering from ischemic cardiovascular acute episodes (ICAE). The sample comprised 313 participants, men and women, aged from 36 to 80. Participants were divided into two groups: a clinical group of patients (n = 143) who were diagnosed as suffering from ICAE, and a control group (n = 170). Both groups were equated in gender, age, socio-economic and educational level. In view of the comparative study of the analytical procedures, we recommend classification trees as the best choice, as it was the most accurate for the individuals in the clinical group, a simple data analysis and a meaningful clinical interpretation. The predictive validity analysis of the MCMI-II allowed the construction of a reduced version made up of 9 personality scales from the 22 scales in the original version. Thus, we could identify the patients with a higher probability of suffering from ICAE, and additionally, generate an empirical model comprising seven and five personality profiles associated, respectively, with the increase and the decrease of the probability of suffering from ICAE.     

Possible Selves in Adolescence: Development and Validation of a Scale for their Assessment

Possible selves (PSs) have a significant role in adolescents' development. For this reason, it is of great importance to have adequate measures to operationalize them. The aim of this work is to present the construction and validation of a scale to assess PSs at the end of high school in multiple domains. Participants were adolescents (n = 320) of both sexes (female = 51.3%) from high-schools in Buenos Aires City, Argentina (age, M = 14.9, SD = 1.5). The scale was developed based on a literature review and a previous qualitative study. Expert judges' assessment revealed that it has good content validity. The scale's structure was studied with exploratory factor analysis and a 5-factor structure with theoretical meaning was found. Spearman's correlations between current and future self-perceptions show evidence of convergent validity. Mann-Whitney U test shows that the scale can discriminate by sex and age. The scale shows adequate to very good internal consistency. These results show that the scale has adequate psychometric properties to assess PSs in Argentine adolescents. The advantages of this scale relative to existing measures of PSs are discussed. Scale development allows us to know more about how adolescents think they will be during a significant life transition such as the end of high school. This is particularly important for planning interventions that focus on motivation and behavior regulation.     

Assessing reading comprehension with narrative and expository texts: Dimensionality and relationship with fluency,vocabulary and memory

Reading comprehension assessment should rely on valid instruments that enable adequate conclusions to be taken regarding students' reading comprehension performance. In this article, two studies were conducted to collect validity evidence for the vertically scaled forms of two Tests of Reading Comprehension for Portuguese elementary school students in the second to fourth grades, one with narrative texts (TRC‐n) and another with expository ones (TRC‐e). Two samples of 950 and 990 students participated in Study 1, the study of the dimensionality of the TRC‐n and TRC‐e forms, respectively. Confirmatory factor analyses provided evidence of an acceptable fit for the one‐factor solution for all test forms. Study 2 included 218 students to collect criterion‐related validity. The scores obtained in each of the test forms were significantly correlated with the ones obtained in other reading comprehension measures and with the results obtained in oral reading fluency, vocabulary and working memory tests. Evidence suggests that the test forms are valid measures of reading comprehension.