Compliance and Problem-Solving Competence in Girls and Boys

The problem-solving abilities of 4- and 5-year old children (N = 208) were assessed to test the hypothesis that high levels of compliance are negatively related to problem solving. Problem-solving competence was examined with a task-specific measure and a standardized measure of general problem-solving performance. Low compliant children performed better on both measures. The role of compliance in the cognitive development of girls and boys is discussed.     

Without Thinking: Impulsive Aggression and Criminal Responsibility

In the U.S. the decision to impose criminal responsibility rests on an assumption about the defendant's decision to engage in proscribed conduct. We punish only those who we believe had the capacity to make a choice. In an increasingly violent world, the criminal law and the assumptions upon which it rests are relentlessly tested. A new generation of neuro-imaging technologies offers to provide insights into structural and functional abnormalities in the brain that may limit the autonomy of many dangerous offenders and unravel the fabric of the criminal justice system. How will the results of these technologies be received by the courts—are they relevant to existing formulations of the prima facie case, the insanity defense, or mitigation of sentence; will changes in the science or the law be required to accommodate this knowledge? The new generation of technologies may appropriately play a role in assessing culpable mental states only if they are also reliable. This short article takes on these and a host of other related questions at the intersection between science, law, and science fiction. Copyright © 2008 John Wiley & Sons, Ltd.     

Age-related changes in memory and in acetylcholine functions in the hippocampus in the Ts65Dn mouse, a model of Down syndrome

Spatial working memory and the ability of a cholinesterase inhibitor to enhance memory were assessed at 4, 10, and 16 months of ages in control and Ts65Dn mice, a partial trisomy model of Down syndrome, with possibly significant relationships to Alzheimer's disease as well. In addition, ACh release during memory testing was measured in samples collected from the hippocampus using in vivo microdialysis at 4, 10, and 22-25 months of age. When tested on a four-arm spontaneous alternation task, the Ts65Dn mice exhibited impaired memory scores at both 4 and 10 months. At 16 months, control performance had declined toward that of the Ts65Dn mice and the difference in scores across genotypes was not significant. Physostigmine (50 microg/kg) fully reversed memory deficits in the Ts65Dn mice in the 4-month-old group but not in older mice. Ts65Dn and control mice exhibited comparable baseline levels of ACh release at all ages tested; these levels did not decline significantly across age in either genotype. ACh release increased significantly during alternation testing only in the young Ts65Dn and control mice. However, the increase in ACh release during alternation testing was significantly greater in control than Ts65Dn mice at this age. The controls exhibited a significant age-related decline in the testing-related increase in ACh release. With only a small increase during testing in young Ts65Dn mice, the age-related decline in responsiveness of ACh release to testing was not significant in these mice. Overall, these results suggest that diminished responsiveness of ACh release in the hippocampus to behavioral testing may contribute memory impairments in Ts65Dn mice.     

The efficiency of biological motion perception

Humans can readily perceive biological motion from point-light (PL) animations, which create an image of a moving human figure by tracing the trajectories of a small number of light points affixed to a moving human body. We have applied ideal observer analysis to a standard biological motion discrimination task involving either full-figure or PL displays. Contrary to current dogma, we find that PL animations can be rich inpotential stimulus information but that human observers are remarkably inefficient at exploiting this information. Although our findings do not discount the utility of PL animation, they do provide a realistic measure of the computational challenge posed by biological motion perception.     

Unrealistic optimism and event threat

Individuals typically exhibit "unrealistic optimism" (UO), the belief that they are less likely than the average person to experience a negative event. This may be because, fearing the event, they try to reassure themselves by distorting their reasoning to conclude that they are at comparatively little risk. If this is so, the greater the "event threat" (i.e., the more serious the event's consequences and/or the greater the likelihood that those consequences will be experienced), the more reassurance should be required, and the greater the UO that should be observed. This prediction was tested in a study in which students (N = 148) were informed about a type of heart disease that could develop in later life due to inadequate diet when young. The risk attributable to diet was stated to be either slight (low-threat condition) or great (high-threat condition). Participants were asked to rate their own risk and that of the average student of developing the disease; question order was counterbalanced. The effects of event threat and question order were found to interact: event threat affected UO in the predicted way, but only when the question about own risk came first. The results are explained in motivational terms. Implications for health education are discussed.     

Intrinsic-Extrinsic Religiosity and University Students' Willingness to Donate Organs Posthumously

This research focuses on the links between intrinsic and extrinsic religious orientations as they relate to willingness to donate organs posthumously. Participants responded to a factual test of their knowledge about organ donation, indicated their degree of willingness to donate organs, and filled out personality inventories measuring their intrinsic and extrinsic orientations. The data indicated a high level of factual knowledge about organ donation. Also, contrary to Allport's (1966) arguments, people with an intrinsic religious orientation were not more likely to donate their organs, nor were people with an extrinsic religious orientation less likely to do so. Instead, it was found that intrinsic religiosity was unrelated to willingness to donate organs and that extrinsics with strong social orientations were more willing to donate their organs. Discussion centers on the need to develop more psy-chometrically sound measures of mature religiosity as a means of conducting a fairer test of Allport's original theorizing about intrinsic religiosity.