The relative contributions of rods and cones in sensory memory under photopic and scotopic conditions

Brief presentations of letter arrays were probed by bar markers within or outside the fovea after various time delays. Figural information presented to the foveal region was retained better under a photopic condition than information in the parafoveal region, but under a scotopic condition parafoveal information demonstrated superior retention. However, decay rates over time of all functions were similar, demonstrating that figural information in the rods and cones decays at similar rates.     

Induction by reinforcer schedules.

Traditional strategies for determining whether a reinforcer schedule enhances the occurrence of an activity are reviewed and critically evaluated. A basic assumption underlying these strategies is that it is possible to isolate the effect of reinforcer intermittency on schedule induction. It is concluded that this is not, in fact, possible. An alternative approach is proposed that emphasizes the inductive effects of the reinforcer schedule as a unit and the effects of particular aspects of the reinforcer schedule (e.g., interreinforcer interval, repetition of the reinforcer, reinforcer magnitude).     

Henry Freund: 1896–1982

Dr. Henry Freund was one of the foremost authorities on stuttering in Europe, and his contributions on the psychology of the disorder continued after emigrating to this country. He was a neurologist and psychiatrist, as well as a speech pathologist. He died in 1982, and in this posthumous paper he describes his career and personal experiences, while undergoing therapy from the most famous European speech pathologists of his time. He also offers some cogent comments about current therapies and future needs.     

Two stages in postcategorical filtering and selection

Memory &; Cognition - In a modified Stroop paradigm, Kahneman and Henik (1981) varied the spatial location of incompatible color words in relation to the position of the ink color to be named. A...     

Smoking and academic performance

Smokers and nonsmokers were compared on three aspects of academic achievement. Although exactly the same percentage of smokers and nonsmokers passed the first-year university examination, smokers obtained significantly higher marks. Similarly, smokers achieved significantly higher marks in their final year examinations in comparison with nonsmokers. Finally, a comparison of the tutorial essay marks of the smokers and nonsmokers again showed that smokers obtained significantly higher marks than nonsmokers. These data are consistent with the idea that ambitious students adopt smoking in the belief that it will help them study and sustain concentration.     

Selective association learning in the rat: Generality of response system

Three experiments with rats examined the possibility that the cue-consequence specificity effect is not mediated by the conditioning of selective associations, but instead reflects the selective behavioral expression of taste-illness and exteroceptive-shock conditioning. Experiment 1 showed that the selective aversion performance could be obtained despite the use of locomotor withdrawal from the CS as the index of conditioning. Experiment 2 compared the response profiles of animals conditioned with footshock or illness to presentation of a saccharin or noise CS. During the test with the noise CS, lithium-conditioned subjects did not differ from control rats on any of several behavioral categories, but shock-conditioned rats showed high levels of freezing in response to the noise cue. During the saccharin test, lithium-treated rats engaged in behaviors such as chin wiping, head shaking, and gaping; these behaviors were rarely or never seen in shock-conditioned rats or controls, whose behavioral profiles during the saccharin test were almost identical. Experiment 3, using a blocking design, found that a noise-lithium pairing did not attenuate subsequent conditioning of a saline-lithium association, nor did a saccharin-shock pairing interfere with conditioning of a noise-shock association. These results confirm that the cue-consequence specificity effect is mediated by the selective associability of taste with illness and of exteroceptive cues with footshock.     

Message of Pope Francis to the 11th Assembly of the World Council of Churches

This is the text of the message of greetings of His Holiness Pope Francis to the 11th Assembly of the World Council of Churches, meeting in Karlsruhe, Germany, from 21 August to 8 September 2022.