Neuropsychological and neurophysiological effects of strengthening exercise for early dementia: a pilot study

Research demonstrates a positive effect of aerobic exercise on cognitive functioning in older adults. Unfortunately, aerobic exercise is often contraindicated for older adults due to cardiovascular and functional limitations. Low-intensity strengthening exercise may offer a practical alternative, but the neuropsychological benefits and potential neurophysiological mechanisms are less well understood. The current study evaluated the effects of a 10-week strengthening exercise intervention on cognitive functioning and EEG in a sample of 13 older adults with early dementia, and 9 normative controls. Results revealed beneficial effects of strengthening exercise on verbal memory coupled with frontal beta and delta power asymmetries and N200 amplitude asymmetry. Results point to increased cognitive efficiency following 10 weeks of strengthening exercise. The findings suggest it is feasible to conduct a strengthening intervention with early dementia patients, and to gather neuropsychological and neurophysiological data to evaluate outcomes. Strengthening exercise may serve as a useful alternative to aerobic exercise.     

Dogs demonstrate perspective taking based on geometrical gaze following in a Guesser–Knower task

Currently, there is still no consensus about whether animals can ascribe mental states (Theory of Mind) to themselves and others. Showing animals can respond to cues that indicate whether another has visual access to a target or not, and that they are able to use this information as a basis for whom to rely on as an informant, is an important step forward in this direction. Domestic dogs (Canis familiaris) with human informants are an ideal model, because they show high sensitivity towards human eye contact, they have proven able to assess the attentional state of humans in food-stealing or food-begging contexts, and they follow human gaze behind a barrier when searching for food. With 16 dogs, we not only replicated the main results of Maginnity and Grace (Anim Cogn 17(6):1375–1392, 2014) who recently found that dogs preferred to follow the pointing of a human who witnessed a food hiding event over a human who did not (the Guesser–Knower task), but also extended this finding with a further, critical control for behaviour-reading: two informants showed identical looking behaviour, but due to their different position in the room, only one had the opportunity to see where the food was hidden by a third person. Preference for the Knower in this critical test provides solid evidence for geometrical gaze following and perspective taking in dogs.     

The use of person–organization fit and person–job fit information in making selection decisions

Two policy-capturing studies were conducted to investigate how person–organization (PO) fit and person–job (PJ) fit information are weighted and combined when hiring decision makers evaluate job candidates, and how the process is influenced by the position’s characteristics. Regarding the combining process, we detected a nonlinear, conjunctive rule in which a low level of PJ fit was paid more attention, the levels of PO fit and PJ fit interacted, and candidates with moderate levels of PO fit and PJ fit were preferred over those with high and low levels. Regarding the weighting process, we found that PO fit was weighted more heavily for a permanent position, and PJ fit for a fixed-term and/or a knowledge-intensive position. In addition, the position’s contract duration (permanent vs. fixed-term) and task elements (managerial vs. knowledge-intensive) interacted in influencing the weighting of PO fit and PJ fit.     

Effects of repetition priming on recognition memory: testing a perceptual fluency-disfluency model

Five experiments explored the effects of immediate repetition priming on episodic recognition (the "Jacoby-Whitehouse effect") as measured with forced-choice testing. These experiments confirmed key predictions of a model adapted from D. E. Huber and R. C. O'Reilly's (2003) dynamic neural network of perception. In this model, short prime durations pre-activate primed items, enhancing perceptual fluency and familiarity, whereas long prime durations result in habituation, causing perceptual disfluency and less familiarity. Short duration primes produced a recognition preference for primed words (Experiments 1, 2, and 5), whereas long duration primes produced a preference against primed words (Experiments 3, 4, and 5). Experiment 2 found prime duration effects even when participants accurately identified short duration primes. A cued-recall task included in Experiments 3, 4, and 5 found priming effects only for recognition trials that were followed by cued-recall failure. These results suggest that priming can enhance as well as lower familiarity, without affecting recollection. Experiment 4 provided a manipulation check on this procedure through a delay manipulation that preferentially affected recognition followed by cued-recall success.     

Die Therapie-Vorbereitungsgruppe

There are different kinds of pretraining for psychotherapeutic treatment. They have two objectives: to get future patients in the right frame of mind for the imminent psychotherapy by informing them about the treatment, and to support therapists while clarifying the indication and selecting patients. Pretherapy training for group psychotherapy is frequently offered in Anglo-American countries. So far empirical studies have only partly been able to prove the supposed positive effects of pretraining on process and outcome of psychotherapy treatment, particularly as the studies showed profound flaws with regard to methods and pretraining concepts. The “Therapie-Vorbereitungsgruppe” presented here is a pretherapy training group in the run-up to inpatient group psychotherapy at a German university clinic. In Germany, such groups are rarely offered. The “Therapie-Vorbereitungsgruppe” consists of weekly meetings of therapists of a psychotherapeutic ward and applicants for inpatient treatment. Ward members introduce the applicants into the concept of treatment and the treatment setting and they explore the psychological background of each of the applicants. Besides economical the concept has clinical and therapeutic advantages. Future inpatients get a realistic view of the treatment, they can build up a relationship to other inpatients and to therapists, and besides waiting for the admission to the clinic is made more bearable. Therapists are helped with their decision on the admission. The concept has proved itself in clinical practice for many years. The empirical proof of its effectiveness and a comparison with other, similar concepts fall due.     

Configural features in the context of upright and inverted faces

When faces are turned upside down, recognition is known to be severely disrupted. This effect is thought to be due to disruption of configural processing. Recently, Leder and Bruce (2000, Quarterly Journal of Experimental Psychology A 53 513-536) argued that configural information in face processing consists at least partly of locally processed relations between facial elements. In three experiments we investigated whether a local relational feature (the interocular distance) is processed differently in upside-down versus upright faces. In experiment 1 participants decided in which of two sequentially presented photographic faces the interocular distance was larger. The decision was more difficult in upside-down presentation. Three different conditions were used in experiment 2 to investigate whether this deficit depends upon parts of the face beyond the eyes themselves; displays showed the eye region alone, the eyes and nose, or the eyes and nose and mouth. The availability of additional features did not interact with the inversion effect which was observed strongly even when the eyes were shown in isolation. In experiment 3 all eyes were turned upside down in the inverted face condition as in the Thatcher illusion (Thompson, 1980 Perception 9 483-484). In this case no inversion effect was found. These results are in accordance with an explanation of the face-inversion effect in which the disruption of configural facial information plays the critical role in memory for faces, and in which configural information corresponds to spatial information that is processed in a way which is sensitive to local properties of the facial features involved.     

Adaptive processing of fractions — Evidence from eye-tracking

Recent evidence indicated that fraction pair type determined whether a particular fraction is processed holistically, componentially or in a hybrid manner. Going beyond previous studies, we investigated how participants adapt their processing of fractions not only to fraction type, but also to experimental context. To examine adaptation in fraction processing, we recorded participants' eye-fixation behaviour in a fraction magnitude comparison task.     

On progress,values, and Marx

Marx, like many of his contemporaries, uncritically assumed that humanity develops from primitive beginnings to ever more perfect stages. In his theory of human development he measured progress by two main standards: the decrease of all forms of dependence, and the increase of universality in man's relations to nature and to his fellow man. In our century, not only have new structures of power and dependence emerged, but successive movements have also been generated to restore the more ordered and limited relationships of the past. If belief in progress is nowadays no longer self-evident, such a state of affairs can help us reflect on the conditions necessary to realize the values which determined Marx's categorical imperative, or his insistence that we overthrow all relations by which man is made a debased and enslaved being. One of these conditions is the voluntary limitation of our needs: the need to use material goods without regard for others, the need to build up or maintain security even at the cost of violence, and the need to restrict the circle of those with whom we identify to our own particular culture, race, class or ways of thinking and acting.