Zur Analyse des Bumerang-Effektes

Zusammenfassung In zwei Experimenten wurde mit Hilfe unterschiedlicher sozialer Attitüden und Werthaltungen jeweils die Hypothese geprüft, daß sich Einstellungen nach einstellungskonträrer Agitation in Richtung dieser Agitation oder aber nicht und in Gegenrichtung zur Agitation ändern, je nachdem ob sie weniger oder mehr in allgemeineren Werthaltungen verankert sind. Im Rahmen einer um die Konzeption der Verankerung erweiterten Theorie der kognitiven Dissonanz können damit besser als bisher sogenannte Bumerang-Effekte bei Änderungen von Attitüden erklärt werden.

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Summary In two experiments we tested the following hypothesis concerning social attitudes and value orientations: Attitudes will be changed after counter-attitudinal agitation in the direction of this agitation or in opposite direction depending on their degree of being anchored in general value orientations. With the theory of cognitive dissonance, supplemented by the conception of anchoring, we are now able to explain better than before the so-called boomerang-effects which appear with attitude changes.

     

Routley Star and Hyperintensionality

Journal of Philosophical Logic - We compare the logic HYPE recently suggested by H. Leitgeb as a basic propositional logic to deal with hyperintensional contexts and Heyting-Ockham logic introduced...     

Correction to: Effects of reward magnitude and training frequency on the learning rates and memory retention of the Port Jackson shark Heterodontus portusjacksoni

Animal Cognition - In the original publication of the article, the Fig. 4 was erroneously published.     

Depression Ein prognostischer Faktor bei koronarer Herzkrankheit

Herzinfarktkranke, die an einer Depression leiden, tragen ein erhöhtes Risiko, in den Folgejahren an einem erneuten Infarkt oder anderen Komplikationen der koronaren Herzkrankheit (KHK) zu sterben. Dass eine Depression, die bei 16–23% der KHK-Patienten auftritt, aber auch schon eine unterschwellige depressive Symptomatik einen unabhängigen prognostischen Faktor der KHK darstellt, konnte in mehreren Studien bestätigt werden. Es ist jedoch noch unklar, ob eine Depression ein kausaler Risikofaktor ist, der den Verlauf der KHK ungünstig beeinflusst, oder lediglich ein Risikoindikator (marker), der zwar eine Vorhersage des Verlaufs erlaubt, diesen aber nicht selbst verändert. Als Bindeglieder zwischen einer Depression und dem Verlauf der KHK werden verhaltensbezogene (verminderte Compliance mit Medikation und risikoreduzierenden Verhaltensempfehlungen) und neurobiologische Mechanismen diskutiert. Am besten untersucht ist die Aktivierung des Hypothalamus-Hypophysen-Nebennierenrinden-Systems und die sympathische Aktivierung (vermehrte Kortisol- und Noradrenalin-Sekretion bei Depression mit der Folge einer erhöhten kardiovaskulären Reaktivität). Weitere potenzielle Bindeglieder umfassen eine verminderte Herzfrequenzvariabilität, stressinduzierte Ischämien, erhöhte Thrombozytenaktivierung und immunologische Dysregulationen. Um die Frage zu klären, ob die Depression ein kausaler Risikofaktor ist, sind Interventionsstudien notwendig, in denen eine depressive Störung erfolgreich behandelt und als Konsequenz auch die Sterblichkeit vermindert wird. Hierzu ist die Befundlage allerdings inkonsistent. Während umfassende, multimodale Interventionsprogramme, die auch eine Modifikation der koronaren Risikofaktoren einschlossen, eine Reduktion von Reinfarktrate und Mortalität demonstrieren konnten, hat eine kürzlich publizierte, große randomisierte Interventionsstudie, in der depressive KHK-Patienten entweder kognitive Verhaltenstherapie oder die übliche Behandlung erhielten, keinen Überlebensvorteil für die Patienten der Behandlungsgruppe zeigen können. Abschließend wird die Befundlage zur Optimierung einer integrierten Versorgung von Patienten mit komorbider Depression dargestellt.     

The contribution of the insula to motor aspects of speech production: a review and a hypothesis

Based on clinical and functional imaging data, the left anterior insula has been assumed to support prearticulatory functions of speech motor control such as the "programming" of vocal tract gestures. In order to further elucidate this model, a recent functional magnetic resonance imaging (fMRI) study of our group (Riecker, Ackermann, Wildgruber, Dogil, & Grodd, 200) investigated both overt (aloud) and covert (silent) production of highly overlearned word strings ("automatic speech"), based on the suggestion that "inner speech" might provide a "window" into preparatory motor activities (Jeannerod, 1994). As a control condition, subjects were asked to reproduce a nonlyrical tune. In contrast to hemodynamic responses within motor cortex and cerebellum, activation of the intrasylvian cortex turned out to be bound to overt task performance. Rather than prearticulatory processes, these findings suggest the left insula to contribute to the actual coordination of the up to 100 muscles engaged in articulation and phonation. Conceivably, the association of speech production with intrasylvian cortex might have evolved within the framework of phylogenetically older connections between the insula and limbic structures, on the one hand, and nonspeech functions of the upper midline musculature such as swallowing, on the other. Whereas (overt) speech tasks predominantly elicit activation within left anterior insula, reproduction of a nonlyrical tune yielded an opposite response pattern. Conceivably, the opposite distributional pattern of speaking and singing at the level of intrasylvian cortex reflects operation of the two hemispheres across different time domains ("double filtering by frequency theory": left hemisphere=segmental information, right hemisphere=intonation contours of verbal utterances and musical melodies; ). In line with this suggestion, a further study of our group (Ackermann et al., 2001) provided first evidence that differential hemispheric filtering might be bound to insular cortex.     

The nature and treatment of stuttering as revealed by fMRI A within- and between-group comparison

This article reviews some of our recent functional magnetic resonance imaging (fMRI) studies of stuttering. Using event-related fMRI experiments, we investigated brain activation during speech production. Results of three studies comparing persons who stutter (PWS) and persons who do not stutter (PWNS) are outlined. Their findings point to a region in the right frontal operculum (RFO) that was consistently implicated in stuttering. During overt reading and before fluency shaping therapy, PWS showed higher and more distributed neuronal activation than PWNS. Immediately after therapy differential activations were even more distributed and left sided. They extended to frontal, temporal, and parietal regions, anterior cingulate, insula, and putamen. These over-activations were slightly reduced and again more right sided two years after therapy. Left frontal deactivations remained stable over two years of observation, and therefore possibly indicate a dysfunction. After therapy, we noted higher activations in persons who stutter moderately than in those who stutter severely. These activations might reflect patterns of compensation. We discuss why these findings suggest that fluency-inducing techniques might synchronize a disturbed signal transmission between auditory, speech motor planning, and motor areas.

Educational objectives: The reader will learn about and be able to: (1) identify regions of brain activations and deactivations specific for PWS; (2) describe brain activation changes induced by fluency shaping therapy; and (3) discuss the correlation between stuttering severity and brain activation.     

Sit-and-wait strategies in dynamic visual search

The role of memory in visual search has lately become a controversial issue. Horowitz and Wolfe (1998) observed that performance in a visual search task was little affected by whether the stimuli were static or randomly relocated every 111 ms. Because a memory-based mechanism, such as inhibition of return, would be of no use in the dynamic condition, Horowitz and Wolfe concluded that memory is likewise not involved in the static condition. However, Horowitz and Wolfe could not effectively rule out the possibility that observers adopted a different strategy in the dynamic condition than in the static condition. That is, in the dynamic condition observers may have attended to a subregion of the display and waited for the target to appear there (sit-and-wait strategy). This hypothesis is supported by experimental data showing that performance in their dynamic condition does not differ from performance in another dynamic condition in which observers are forced to adopt a sit-and-wait strategy by being presented with a limited region of the display only.     

Confirmatory factor analysis of the WMS-III in patients with temporal lobe epilepsy

Five competing models specifying the factor structure underlying the Wechsler Memory Scale-Third Edition (D. Wechsler, 1997b) primary subtest scores were evaluated in a sample of patients with intractable temporal lobe epilepsy (N = 254). Models specifying separate immediate and delayed constructs resulted in inadmissible parameter estimates and model specification error. There were negligible goodness-of-fit differences between a 3-factor model of working memory, auditory memory, and visual memory and a nested--more parsimonious--2-factor model of working memory and general memory. The results suggest that specifying a separate visual memory factor provides little advantage for this sample--an unexpected finding in a population with lateralized dysfunction, for which one might have predicted separate auditory and visual memory dimensions.