Pupil dilation as an index of effort in cognitive control tasks: A review

Pupillometry research has experienced an enormous revival in the last two decades. Here we briefly review the surge of recent studies on task-evoked pupil dilation in the context of cognitive control tasks with the primary aim being to evaluate the feasibility of using pupil dilation as an index of effort exertion, rather than task demand or difficulty. Our review shows that across the three cognitive control domains of updating, switching, and inhibition, increases in task demands typically leads to increases in pupil dilation. Studies show a diverging pattern with respect to the relationship between pupil dilation and performance and we show how an effort account of pupil dilation can provide an explanation of these findings. We also discuss future directions to further corroborate this account in the context of recent theories on cognitive control and effort and their potential neurobiological substrates.     

全球生命伦理学

探讨生命伦理学的起源,并阐述了不同理论支持者的观点,发现无论准确的生命伦理学历史起源是什么,目前生命伦理学已经变成了一种真正的全球现象。它在全世界具有重要的意义,因为人类不仅仅是欧洲人或亚洲人,也是世界公民和一个全球道德共同体的成员。生命伦理学对任何地方、任何人都是重要的,并不是因为它是"拿来"的,而是因为它提供了一个普遍的框架去解释和管理正在经历的变化,这个变化包括了目前所有的国家和文化。然而,这个框架的解释和应用必须依据本土环境。因此,现代生命伦理学具有全球性和本土特征的特点。     

When sanctions fail to increase cooperation in social dilemmas: considering the presence of an alternative option to defect

Previous social dilemma research has shown that sanctioning defection may enhance cooperation. The authors argue that this finding may have resulted from restricting participants to two behaviors (cooperation and defection). In this article, the authors introduce the concept of a "social trilemma" (a social dilemma in which an alternative option to defect is present) and tested the effect of a sanction. The authors show that a sanction only increased cooperation and collective interests in the traditional social dilemma. In a social trilemma, the sanction failed because it caused some people to choose the alternative option to defect. Moreover, the results indicate that this was especially the case when people did not expect fellow group members to cooperate. In this case, the sanction even worked counterproductive because it decreased collective interests. It is concluded that allowing individuals to consider alternative options to defect can reveal the potential detrimental effects of sanctioning systems for the collective.     

Children's coping with in vivo peer rejection: an experimental investigation

We examined children's behavioral coping in response to an in vivo peer rejection manipulation. Participants (N=186) ranging between 10 and 13 years of age, played a computer game based on the television show Survivor and were randomized to either peer rejection (i.e., being voted out of the game) or non-rejection control. During a five-min. post-feedback waiting period children's use of several behavioral coping strategies was assessed. Rejection elicited a marked shift toward more negative affect, but higher levels of perceived social competence attenuated the negative mood shift. Children higher in depressive symptoms were more likely to engage in passive and avoidant coping behavior. Types of coping were largely unaffected by gender and perceived social competence. Implications are discussed.     

Unravelling the motivational yarn: A framework for understanding the instigation of implicitly motivated behaviour resulting from deprivation and positive affect

Research suggests that the motivation to perform specific behaviours can originate in the unconscious. This implicit motivation can generally be traced to two basic sources: Deprivation of essential resources and positive affect attached to the specific behaviour. Yet, whereas previous research has increased our understanding of the emergence of implicit motivation, there is little theoretical analysis and empirical research that addresses how these sources interact in producing motivation. This chapter presents a framework for the comprehension of implicitly motivated behaviour resulting from deprivation and positive affect. The framework consists of two essential components. First, it proposes that mental representations of behaviour direct and prepare individuals to engage in behaviour. Second, it suggests that a reward signal either emanating from deprivation or positive affect acts upon behaviour representations to produce motivated behaviour. We present several findings supporting the framework and discuss these findings in the context of non-conscious goal pursuit and needs.     

Reply to Steele & Ferrer: Modeling Oscillation,Approximately or Exactly?

This article addresses modeling oscillation in continuous time. It criticizes Steele and Ferrer's article “Latent Differential Equation Modeling of Self-Regulatory and Coregulatory Affective Processes” (2011), particularly the approximate estimation procedure applied. This procedure is the latent version of the local linear approximation procedure based on Boker (2001) Boker, S. M. 2001. “Differential structural equation modeling of intraindividual variability.”. In New methods for the analysis of change Edited by: Collins, L. and Sayer, A. 3–28. Washington, DC: American Psychological Association.. [Crossref] , [Google Scholar] and Boker, Neale, and Rausch (2004). It furthermore presents two exact alternative estimation procedures, one using filter techniques and the other using structural equation modeling.     

Happy but still focused: failures to find evidence for a mood-induced widening of visual attention

In models of affect and cognition, it is held that positive affect broadens the scope of attention. Consistent with this claim, previous research has indeed suggested that positive affect is associated with impaired selective attention as evidenced by increased interference of spatially distant distractors. However, several recent findings cast doubt on the reliability of this observation. In the present study, we examined whether selective attention in a visual flanker task is influenced by positive mood induction. Across three experiments, positive affect consistently failed to exert any impact on selective attention. The implications of this null-finding for theoretical models of affect and cognition are discussed.     

Long-term retention of a theatrical script by repertory actors: the role of context.

Four actors were requested to perform Sartre's No Exit after a retention interval of more than 5 months. Their recall of the play was studied either with the spatial and visual contextual cues normally available during a performance or without such cues. Total recall was still considerable, equalling 85%. The number of paraphrases of, and inferences on, the original text was however quite large (32%), suggesting that the actors had learned their lines according to their meaning rather than as a result of rote memorisation. The context manipulation showed that actors' recall is facilitated by the availability of spatial-visual information, but only to a limited extent. The relative importance of textual and contextual cues in the long-term retention of a play is discussed.