Measuring coherence

This paper aims to contribute to our understanding of the notion of coherence by explicating in probabilistic terms, step by step, what seem to be our most basic intuitions about that notion, to wit, that coherence is a matter of hanging or fitting together, and that coherence is a matter of degree. A qualitative theory of coherence will serve as a stepping stone to formulate a set of quantitative measures of coherence, each of which seems to capture well the aforementioned intuitions. Subsequently it will be argued that one of those measures does better than the others in light of some more specific intuitions about coherence. This measure will be defended against two seemingly obvious objections.     

Learning your way around town: how virtual taxicab drivers learn to use both layout and landmark information

By having subjects drive a virtual taxicab through a computer-rendered town, we examined how landmark and layout information interact during spatial navigation. Subject-drivers searched for passengers, and then attempted to take the most efficient route to the requested destinations (one of several target stores). Experiment 1 demonstrated that subjects rapidly learn to find direct paths from random pickup locations to target stores. Experiment 2 varied the degree to which landmark and layout cues were preserved across two successively learned towns. When spatial layout was preserved, transfer was low if only target stores were altered, and high if both target stores and surrounding buildings were altered, even though in the latter case all local views were changed. This suggests that subjects can rapidly acquire a survey representation based on the spatial layout of the town and independent of local views, but that subjects will rely on local views when present, and are harmed when associations between previously learned landmarks are disrupted. We propose that spatial navigation reflects a hierarchical system in which either layout or landmark information is sufficient for orienting and wayfinding; however, when these types of cues conflict, landmarks are preferentially used.     

Theoretical terms and the Principle of the Benefit of Doubt

The Principle of the Benefit of Doubt dictates that, whenever reasonably possible, we interpret earlier-day scientists as referring to entities posited by current science. Putnam has presented the principle as supplementary to his Causal Theory of Reference in order to make this theory generally applicable to theoretical terms. The present paper argues that the principle is of doubtful standing. In particular, it will be argued that the principle lacks a justification and, indeed, is unjustifiable as it stands.     

Tuning the developing brain to emotional body expressions

Reading others' emotional body expressions is an essential social skill. Adults readily recognize emotions from body movements. However, it is unclear when in development infants become sensitive to bodily expressed emotions. We examined event‐related brain potentials (ERPs) in 4‐ and 8‐month‐old infants in response to point‐light displays (PLDs) of happy and fearful body expressions presented in two orientations (upright and inverted). The ERP results revealed that 8‐month‐olds but not 4‐month‐olds respond sensitively to the orientation and the emotion of the dynamic expressions. Specifically, 8‐month‐olds showed (i) an early (200–400 ms) orientation‐sensitive positivity over frontal and central electrodes, and (ii) a late (700–1100 ms) emotion‐sensitive positivity over temporal and parietal electrodes in the right hemisphere. These findings suggest that orientation‐sensitive and emotion‐sensitive brain processes, distinct in timing and topography, develop between 4 and 8 months of age.     

Boosting wisdom: distance from the self enhances wise reasoning, attitudes, and behavior

Although humans strive to be wise, they often fail to do so when reasoning over issues that have profound personal implications. Here we examine whether psychological distance enhances wise reasoning, attitudes and behavior under such circumstances. Two experiments demonstrate that cueing people to reason about personally meaningful issues (Study 1: Career prospects for the unemployed during an economic recession; Study 2: Anticipated societal changes associated with one's chosen candidate losing the 2008 U.S. Presidential election) from a distanced perspective enhances wise reasoning (dialecticism; intellectual humility), attitudes (cooperation-related attitude assimilation), and behavior (willingness to join a bipartisan group).     

Culture, attention, and emotion

This research provides experimental evidence for cultural influence on one of the most basic elements of emotional processing: attention to positive versus negative stimuli. To this end, we focused on Russian culture, which is characterized by brooding and melancholy. In Study 1, Russians spent significantly more time looking at negative than positive pictures, whereas Americans did not show this tendency. In Study 2, Russian Latvians were randomly primed with symbols of each culture, after which we measured the speed of recognition for positive versus negative trait words. Biculturals were significantly faster in recognizing negative words (as compared with baseline) when primed with Russian versus Latvian cultural symbols. Greater identification with Russian culture facilitated this effect. We provide a theoretical discussion of mental processes underlying cultural differences in emotion research.     

Hide-and-seek around the centre of interest: The dead zone of attention revealed by change blindness

Three experiments examined spatial allocation of attention during active search for visual changes. In all experiments, there were three conditions of change location related to a centre of interest: (1) Central (most attended location itself), (2) near, and (3) far marginal change. In Experiment 1, participants showed the slowest search and the largest number of undetected changes in near condition. Moreover, they misidentified near changes more frequently than central and far ones. In Experiment 2, participants had to search for marginal changes in the presence of a once noticed central change that summoned additional attention to a central location. It resulted in further search slowing for near changes. In Experiment 3, participants searched for one of two concurrent marginal changes in the presence of a central one. They detected far changes about 2.3 times more frequently than near ones. Taken together, these results support the notion of “dead zone of attention” surrounding attentional focus. Several speculations about the nature of dead zone are discussed.     

A randomized clinical trial of Behavioral Activation (BA) therapy for improving psychological and physical health in dementia caregivers: Results of the Pleasant Events Program (PEP)

Dementia caregiving is associated with elevations in depressive symptoms and increased risk for cardiovascular diseases (CVD). This study evaluated the efficacy of the Pleasant Events Program (PEP), a 6-week Behavioral Activation intervention designed to reduce CVD risk and depressive symptoms in caregivers. One hundred dementia family caregivers were randomized to either the 6-week PEP intervention (N = 49) or a time-equivalent Information-Support (IS) control condition (N = 51). Assessments were completed pre- and post-intervention and at 1-year follow-up. Biological assessments included CVD risk markers Interleukin-6 (IL-6) and D-dimer. Psychosocial outcomes included depressive symptoms, positive affect, and negative affect. Participants receiving the PEP intervention had significantly greater reductions in IL-6 (p = .040), depressive symptoms (p = .039), and negative affect (p = .021) from pre- to post-treatment. For IL-6, clinically significant improvement was observed in 20.0% of PEP participants and 6.5% of IS participants. For depressive symptoms, clinically significant improvement was found for 32.7% of PEP vs 11.8% of IS participants. Group differences in change from baseline to 1-year follow-up were non-significant for all outcomes. The PEP program decreased depression and improved a measure of physiological health in older dementia caregivers. Future research should examine the efficacy of PEP for improving other CVD biomarkers and seek to sustain the intervention's effects.