Noise increment detection in children 1 to 3 years of age

Studies using burst comparison procedures to examine age-related changes in intensity discrimination have reported that the ability to discriminate differences in intensity does not reach maturity until late childhood. In the present study, developmental changes in intensity discrimination were examined in 1- to 3-year-old children, using an increment detection paradigm. Children and adults detected increments in a continuous standard presented at three levels ranging from 35 to 55 dB SPL. Adults were also tested at lower levels of the standard in order to permit age comparisons at equivalent sensation levels. Standard stimuli were two-octave bands of noise centered at either 400 or 4000 Hz, and increments were 200 msec in duration. Discrimination performance improved significantly with both age and level of the standard. For all age groups, performance was significantly better for high- than for low-frequency stimuli, but frequency-dependent differences in increment thresholds did not vary reliably with age. Age differences were largest at low levels of the standard. At the highest level (approximately 30 dB nHL), children's difference limens for both low- and high-frequency noise bands were adultlike by 3 years of age. These results suggest that the developmental time course of increment detection is more rapid than that previously reported in burst comparison studies.     

Cue abstraction and exemplar memory in categorization

In this article, the authors compare 3 generic models of the cognitive processes in a categorization task. The cue abstraction model implies abstraction in training of explicit cue-criterion relations that are mentally integrated to form a judgment, the lexicographic heuristic uses only the most valid cue, and the exemplar-based model relies on retrieval of exemplars. The results from 2 experiments showed that, in lieu of the lexicographic heuristic, most participants spontaneously integrate cues. In contrast to single-system views, exemplar memory appeared to dominate when the feedback was poor, but when the feedback was rich enough to allow the participants to discern the task structure, it was exploited for abstraction of explicit cue-criterion relations.     

Evaluating the interdependence of aging-related changes in visual and auditory acuity,balance, and cognitive functioning

High proportions of shared age-related variance are found among measures of perceptual acuity, balance, muscle strength, and cognitive capabilities in age-heterogeneous, cross-sectional studies. Reliance on cross-sectional studies is problematic, however, because associations may arise from age-related mean trends. Narrow age-cohort samples provide an alternative basis for testing hypotheses regarding associations among rates of change. Cross-domain associations were evaluated in combined 75-year-old cohort samples from Denmark, Finland, and Sweden. In general, no consistent associations were found across sensory, balance, strength, and cognitive domains. These findings indicate that the effects of aging on sensory acuity, balance, and cognitive functioning are likely to be largely independent, multidimensional, and complex at the level of the individual.     

Analysis of response class hierarchies with attention-maintained problem behaviors

We replicated a method for clarifying inconclusive functional analysis outcomes via an extinction analysis of separate topographies of problem behavior with 2 participants. Results suggested that both mild and severe problem behaviors belonged to the same response class. An analysis of response latency was consistent with a response class hierarchy hypothesis, indicating that mild problem behavior nearly always occurred prior to severe topographies of problem behavior.     

Whose Life Task Is It Anyway? Social Appraisal and Life Task Pursuit

The study uses a social contextual framework to examine how others are represented in individuals' life task appraisals and how such appraisals are related to strategies to pursue those life tasks. The extent to which life tasks nominated by 81 college students (45 females) were appraised as shared with others and pursued collaboratively was examined through a questionnaire. Participants listed five life tasks, indicated if each life task was theirs alone, indirectly shared (others were impacted by their life task pursuit), or directly shared (another person might also nominate the life task as theirs) with others in their lives, described three activities used to pursue their life tasks, and coded how others were involved inthese activities. Results indicated that the majority of college students' life tasks were appraised as involving others, that directly shared appraisals were found more frequently in the relationship domain, and that directly shared appraisals were associated with collaborative life task pursuit strategies. In addition, appraising life tasks as directly shared did not appear to reflect aspects of anxiety or compensation. A content analysis of the strategies coded as involving other individuals revealed diverse ways in which others are involved in life task pursuit ranging from active engagement of others to cognitive strategies where others are implied. The findings have implications for research on life tasks and other goal structures in that the structures may involve the social context in adaptive ways.     

Does humor in radio advertising affect recognition of novel product brand names?

The authors proposed that item selection during shopping is based on brand name recognition rather than recall. College students rated advertisements and news stories of a simulated radio program for level of amusement (orienting activity) before participating in a surprise recognition test. Humor level of the advertisements was varied systematically, and content was controlled. According to signal detection analysis, humor did not affect the strength of recognition memory for brand names (nonsense units). However, brand names and product types were significantly more likely to be associated when appearing in humorous advertisements than in nonhumorous advertisements. The results are compared with prior findings concerning humor and recall.     

Effectiveness of an ACT‐based rehabilitation program for the treatment of chronic fatigue: Results from a 12‐months longitudinal study

Acceptance and Commitment Therapy (ACT) is potentially effective for treating chronic fatigue. Given the paucity of studies on this topic, we aimed to assess long‐term trajectories of primary (fatigue, quality of life and functional abilities) and secondary outcomes (anxious and depressive symptoms) of an ACT‐based rehabilitation program for patients with chronic fatigue. Further, we examined if changes in potential process variables (psychological inflexibility, metacognitive beliefs, and cognitive and behavioral responses to symptoms) during ACT predicted change in all outcomes across follow‐up. One‐hundred ninety‐five workers on sick leave (mean age: 43.61 ± 9.33 years; 80.5% females) with a diagnosis of chronic fatigue were enrolled in a manualized, 3.5‐week intensive return‐to‐work rehabilitation program based on ACT. All completed a battery of questionnaires at pre‐, post‐treatment, 6 and 12 months follow‐up. We found significant longitudinal changes in most primary and secondary outcomes from pre‐ up to 12 months follow‐up. All process variables significantly decreased from pre‐ up to 12 months follow‐up, and pre‐to‐post changes in fear avoidance beliefs were most often associated with a greater change in outcomes across follow‐up. Depressive symptomatology showed a similar trajectory of change to fatigue, meaning that scores were correlated at each time point and tended to converge over time. This suggests that both symptoms influence each other substantially over a year following the treatment. Concluding, results lend support to the effectiveness of an ACT‐based rehabilitation program for patients with chronic fatigue and provide preliminary evidence for the role of process variables and depressive symptomatology on subsequent change in outcomes.     

Compassion protects against vital exhaustion and negative emotionality

Motivation and Emotion - We investigated (i) the predictive relationships of compassion with negative emotionality (a marker of susceptibility to stress) and vital exhaustion (a marker of chronic...     

Questions of Athletic Excellence and Justice in Sport

This essay delineates and analyzes two kinds of questions that sport ethicists tend to ask: (1) questions about athletic excellence and (2) questions about justice. To pass ethical judgements when delving into questions concerning athletic excellence, sportspeople rely largely on a sport’s internal values, primary skills, or sport-specific athletic excellences. In contrast, questions about justice do not and should not include the reference or application of principles derived from the nature of a sport. Instead, sportspeople must refer to general theories, most often based on the rights and obligations of fellow citizens. There are multiple benefits to pointing out this distinction. First, it can help sportspeople and sport philosophers recognize the normative standards most appropriate within specific debates. Second, the distinction may explain why some disputes in sport philosophy remained unresolved. Finally, and perhaps most significantly, an awareness of the differences between these types of questions enables us to pose a further query. To which of the two discourses about sport ethics should sport philosophers lend the majority of their efforts? By adopting Susan Okin’s analysis of the role of morality in families, this paper suggests that questions about justice in sport carry greater moral import and should be resolved prior to questions of athletic excellence.