Emotional after‐effects on the P3 component of the event‐related brain potential

Agrowing body of literature indicates that affective states can influence cognitive processes. The core assumption of Ellis and Ashbrook's (1988) model explaining these emotional after‐effects on cognition is that the emotional state regulates the allocation of processing resources. A negative emotional state is supposed to pre‐empt capacity normally allocated to the cognitive task at hand. This is assumed to occur because the negative emotional state leads to an increase in intrusive, irrelevant thoughts, which compete with relevant cognitive activities and thus result in a lack of attention given to relevant features of the task to be performed. In the present study, the hypothesis that negative emotions lead to a reduced information‐processing capacity and that this is observable on a very basic level of information processing is tested. Therefore, 102 participants were assigned to three independent groups, each inducing one of a negative, a positive, or a neutral mood by means of a 3‐minute video‐clip. Shortly after the video‐clip, two acoustical stimuli with increasing information were presented, while the P3 component of the event‐related brain potential on these stimuli was measured as a psychophysiological indicator of cognitive resource allocation. In addition, the expenmental manipulation was checked by assessing subjective and external mood ratings as well as cortical alpha activity. Results show that the videos did in fact induce positive, neutral, or negative mood. Moreover, even when controlling for video‐related unspecific cortical arousal, a significant emotional after‐effect was found on the P3 component of the event‐related brain potential, indicating reduced information‐processing capacity, particularly in the negative mood condition. The reported data support Ellis and Ashbrook's model of emotional after‐effects on cognitive processes. As those effects were observable after an event that did not demand a high amount of cognitive resources, this suggests that even tasks that do not heavily engage central processing resources and are not likely to be influenced by cognitive strategies, seem to be affected by a negative emotional state.     

Transition Discontinuities and the Biographical Shaping of Early Work Careers

Because of the restructuring of work and deregulation of the labor market school-to-work transitions have been predicted to become destandardized. These structural changes will finally also erode Germany's renowned dual system of apprenticeship training. From an economic-structural point of view it is likely that young persons' social integration and biographical plans can no longer rely on this occupation-driven transition arrangement. Based on a quantitative and qualitative longitudinal study with young adults in two German labor-market regions, this exploratory study shows that the dual system not only trains for certain occupations, but also socializes for the contingencies of the labor market. The results are interpreted in the new conceptual framework of self-socialization, which links individual agency with social contexts across the life course in terms of a biography-environment fit. Applied to transition discontinuities and shifting contexts of career development, processes of self-socialization are reflected in different modes of biographical agency in the shaping of early employment careers. Self-initiated and enforced discontinuous employment and occupational change are mediated by various constellations of occupational contexts and modes of biographical agency. The study suggests that for young adults the dual system still provides skills and orientations for coping with career discontinuity.     

The Jagannath Temple and Online Darshan

Darshan—the act of seeing the divine in an image—is an important form of worship for most Hindus. Darshan is now available via the Internet. In this article I consider the possible significance of online darshan for the important Jagannath Temple in Puri in the Indian State of Orissa and for devotees of the Hindu god Jagannath who resides there. From this case study I conclude that online darshan does not necessarily bring about a decline in the importance of temples and their deities. This challenges those globalisation theorists who claim that local sites decline in importance as a result of advanced communications technologies and instead supports Roland Robertson's theory of ‘glocalization’. I further conclude that despite this, online darshan is an important development for devotees of Jagannath, because it allows access to the deity which may previously have been difficult or even impossible for most of the year. I also consider online darshan in general and suggest that the glocalization processes that it is giving rise to are worthy of future research.     

The effects of dynamic assessment procedures on Raven Matrices performance,visual search behavior,test anxiety and test orientation

The effects of dynamic testing procedures on Raven Coloured Matrices performance, visual scanning procedures, test anxiety, and orientation to the test situation were assessed. The subjects were 72 third-grade children. The results supported the hypotheses of the study showing that (1) dynamic assessment procedures involving either verbalization or elaborated feedback lead to higher levels of Raven Matrices performance; that (2) dynamic assessment modifies visual search behaviors; and that (3) dynamic assessment reduces test anxiety and negative orientation to the testing situation. The results are interpreted as offering construct validation to the assessment approaches used.     

Psychometric Evaluation of an Alternate Scoring for the Remote Associates Test

The Remote Associates Test (RAT; Mednick, 1962; Mednick & Mednick, 1967) is a commonly employed test of creative convergent thinking. The RAT is scored with a dichotomous scoring, scoring correct answers as 1 and all other answers as 0. Based on recent research into the information processing underlying RAT performance, we argued that the dichotomous scoring may lead to a loss of potentially relevant information. Thus, we proposed an alternate scoring based on semantic similarity between the answer given by the participant and the correct solution using Latent Semantic Analysis (LSA; Landauer & Dumais, 1997). We evaluate the psychometric properties of the alternate LSA scoring and found evidence of construct validity for the LSA scoring which was comparable to findings for the standard scoring, but not better as we would have expected. Thus, our expectations that LSA-based scoring of the RAT counteracts potential information loss were not met. However, LSA based scorings appear to be a promising alternative for hardly solvable RAT items. We conducted additional analyses comparing different RAT item types with regard to their validity as well as evaluating the information uniquely contained in the LSA scoring. Implications of all finding for existing research using RAT items are discussed.     

Erfolg und Mißerfolg im Leistungswetteifer des imbezillen Kindes

Zusammenfassung Vergleicht man imbezille Kinder, die nicht bildungsfähig sind, aufgrund ihres Intelligenzalters (nicht ihres Lebensalters!) mit geistig normalen Kindern, so ist bei einer denkbar einfachen Wetteifertätigkeit der gleiche Entwicklungsverlauf leistungsmotivierten Erlebens und Verhaltens zu beobachten.Sobald die kognitive Struktur des Früher -oder Späterfertigwerdens erfaßt werden kann — was spätestens von einem Intelligenzalter von 3;6 Jahren ab der Fall ist —, wetteifern erstens imbezille wie normale Kinder, zeigen sie zweitens charakteristischen Erfolgs- und Mißerfolgsausdruck mit seinen alterstypischen Veränderungen, sowie drittens einen entwicklungstypischen Wandel a) in den Versuchen zur Bewältigung von Mißerfolg und leistungsthematischen Konflikten und b) in zunehmender Konflikthaftigkeit und realistischerer Beurteilung bei der Vorhersage des eigenen Erfolges. Lediglich in der Ausdauer beim Wetteifern sind die nach Lebensalter älteren Schwachsinnigen den geistig Normalen überlegen, was mit gewissen Voraussagen Lewins übereinstimmt.Die Befunde unterstreichen, daß nicht ein affektiver oder ein körperlich-biologischer, sondern der kognitive Entwicklungsstand entscheidend ist für die Genese der Leistungsmotivation und deren Entwicklungsverlauf. Befunde und Schlußfolgerungen anderer Autoren, die die Fähigkeit des Imbezillen zum Erleben von Erfolg und Mißerfolg in Frage stellen, werden diskutiert.     

Sensitive maintenance: a cognitive process underlying individual differences in memory for threatening information

Dispositional styles of coping with threat influence memory for threatening information. In particular, sensitizers excel over repressors in their memory for threatening information after long retention intervals, but not after short ones. We therefore suggested that sensitizers, but not repressors, employ active maintenance processes during the retention interval to selectively retain threatening material. Sensitive maintenance was studied in 2 experiments in which participants were briefly exposed to threatening and nonthreatening pictures (Experiment 1, N = 128) or words (Experiment 2, N = 145). Following, we administered unannounced recognition tests before and after an intervening task that generated either high or low cognitive load, assuming that high cognitive load would impede sensitizers' memory maintenance of threatening material. Supporting our hypotheses, the same pattern of results was obtained in both experiments: Under low cognitive load, sensitizers forgot less threat material than repressors did; no such differences were observed under high cognitive load.     

Estimation of Effect Heterogeneity in Rare Events Meta-Analysis

Psychometrika - The paper outlines several approaches for dealing with meta-analyses of count outcome data. These counts are the accumulation of occurred events, and these events might be rare, so...     

Associations between type of treatment and illness-specific locus of control in type 1 diabetes patients

Abstract

This study examined differences in diabetes-specific locus of control beliefs of 82 insulin-treated Type I diabetes patients undergoing either conventional therapy (CT), intensified conventional therapy (ICT) or continuous subcutaneous insulin infusion (CSII). Compared to CT with its adherence to a strict regimen, ICT and CSII allow a much greater flexibility in timing of meals and daily activities. On the other hand, such flexibility requires a much more active role of the patient. The hypotheses of higher internality and lower powerful others locus of control beliefs in ICT and CSII patients than in CT patients could be supported for powerful others locus of control only. A one-year follow-up replicated this finding. Furthermore, high powerful others locus of control was associated with low diabetes-related knowledge and poor glycaemic control. The relevance of the patients' experience with the respective treatment is examined in view of the results and implications for studies on the feasibility of diabetes regimens are discussed.