Do alcoholic Korsakoff's syndrome patients acquire affective reactions?

In this study we report two experiments that investigate the acquisition of affective reactions. In Experiment 1, unfamiliar melodies were played to Korsakoff's syndrome patients and alcoholic and nonalcoholic control subjects who were matched with them according to age and education. Following a retention interval of 5 min, subjects received a preference test on old and new melodies. Korsakoff's syndrome patients showed the same increase in preference for old melodies as a consequence of prior exposures as control subjects did, but their recognition of melodies was significantly impaired in comparison with controls. In Experiment 2, the same subjects saw photographs of two men. Fictional biographical information depicted one as a "good guy" and the other as a "bad guy." After a retention interval of approximately 20 days, Korsakoffs recalled virtually none of the biographical information; however, 78% preferred the good guy, and impression ratings were less favorable for the bad guy. Korsakoff patients developed preferences and impressions even though they did not have voluntary access to the information on which the preferences were based. However, their impression ratings were less extreme than those of controls. The pattern of results of the two studies is discussed in terms of Johnson's (1983) MEM model of memory.     

Alcoholism: A conflict of models

Adherents to the traditional model of alcoholism explain alcoholic behavior as a consequence of alcoholism. Alcoholism is identified as an unseen, unmeasured entity inherent in alcoholics. This concept parallels the thinking of Copernicus, Kepler, Galileo, and Newton, who believed in an unseen, unmeasurable creator behind the physical world. These traditional approaches contrast with the emergent model of alcoholism and twentieth-century scientific thought. Emergent scientific model adherents explain alcoholic behavior without resort to unseen factors. Since the traditional and emergent scientific models begin with different assumptions, model adherents experience communication difficulties. Future developments with determine which model will dominate the field of alcohol studies and treatment.     

Spiritual issues in mental health care

Religious and spiritual issues in mental health are explored in the context of four conceptual models: the medical, the nursing, the humanistic, and the pastoral. This is done by looking at each model in terms of content, diagnostic focus, language and treatment goals, and primary qualities in the health provider.The models are illustrated by case studies gathered from a multidisciplinary setting. The discovery that each model can incorporate the religious and spiritual dimension in mental health care, but that each model does this in distinctive ways, is a key point.     

Electromyographic activity over facial muscle regions can differentiate the valence and intensity of affective reactions

Physiological measures have traditionally been viewed in social psychology as useful only in assessing general arousal and therefore as incapable of distinguishing between positive and negative affective states. This view is challenged in the present report. Sixteen subjects in a pilot study were exposed briefly to slides and tones that were mildly to moderately evocative of positive and negative affect. Facial electromyographic (EMG) activity differentiated both the valence and intensity of the affective reaction. Moreover, independent judges were unable to determine from viewing videotapes of the subjects' facial displays whether a positive or negative stimulus had been presented or whether a mildly or moderately intense stimulus had been presented. In the full experiment, 28 subjects briefly viewed slides of scenes that were mildly to moderately evocative of positive and negative affect. Again, EMG activity over the brow (corrugator supercilia), eye (orbicularis oculi), and cheek (zygomatic major) muscle regions differentiated the pleasantness and intensity of individuals' affective reactions to the visual stimuli even though visual inspection of the videotapes again indicated that expressions of emotion were not apparent. These results suggest that gradients of EMG activity over the muscles of facial expression can provide objective and continuous probes of affective processes that are too subtle or fleeting to evoke expressions observable under normal conditions of social interaction.     

Ethical issues related to the artificial heart

This paper is a general survey of ethical issues related to the artificial heart. It begins by looking at the history of funding of the artificial heart program through the National Institute of Health in 1965. Attention is paid to the problem of the lack of planning related to social, ethical, economic, and legal implications. The paper then deals with three areas of ethical concerns. They are those issues relating to the experimental versus therapeutic benefits, the cost, and public involvement with a private interest.     

Spontaneous alternation behavior in animals: A review

Factors affecting spontaneous alternation behavior (SAB) in animals, for example, age, gender and species studied; type of apparatus and cues employed; and neuro-anatomical, neuro-chemical and motivational status of the organism, were reviewed. Despite a myriad of experiments showing interesting main effects of such variables, little research has been performed assessing the interactive affects of these factors on alternation behavior. For example, psychologists test rats in central nervous system (CNS) lesion studies, whereas psychopharmacologists tend to assess SAB in mice. Most importantly, studies have not been reported investigating the possible interactions among species, brain lesions and drugs. This is an unfortunate omission since several important alternation models include propositions relating to cholinergic and/or serotonergic coding in the hippocampus. Examination of behavioral studies revealed the primary cue for alternation among invertebrates to be body turn, whereas vertebrates rely primarily on directional and odor cues. Reference to the seeking of stimulus change remains the most compelling motivational account of why animals manifest this ubiquitious and reliable behavior pattern. This review and the unpublished studies were supported by Research Grants MH16962, MH21288, and MH36491 from the National Institute of Mental Health and the Wake Forest University Research and Publication Fund.     

Representation of linear orders

Two binary classification tasks were used to explore the associative structure of linear orders. In Experiment 1, college students classified English letters as targets or nontargets, the targets being consecutive letters of the alphabet. The time to reject nontargets was a decreasing function of the distance from the target set, suggesting response interference mediated by automatic associations from the target to the nontarget letters. The way in which this interference effect depended on the placement of the boundaries between the target and nontarget sets revealed the relative strengths of individual interletter associations. In Experiment 2, students were assigned novel linear orders composed of letterlike symbols and asked to classify pairs of symbols as being adjacent or nonadjacent in the assigned sequence. Reaction time was found to be a joint function of the distance between any pair of symbols and the relative positions of those symbols within the sequence. The effects of both distance and position decreased systematically over 6 days of practice with a particular order, beginning at a level typical of unfamiliar orders and converging on a level characteristic of familiar orders such as letters and digits. These results provide an empirical unification of two previously disparate sets of findings in the literature on linear orders, those concerning familiar and unfamiliar orders, and the systematic transition between the two patterns of results suggests the gradual integration of a new associative structure.     

Awe and guilt: Desirability and feasibility appeals in social media green campaigns

As the world has become increasingly concerned about environmental plastic pollution, private and public sectors remain devoted to creating effective green marketing campaigns on social media platforms. Drawing upon construal level theory and appraisal tendency theory, this research examines the interaction effect of green ad appeals and two distinct emotions—awe and guilt—on consumers' social media engagement and pro-environmental intentions. The findings from two experimental studies demonstrate that when individuals experience awe, desirability (vs. feasibility) message appeals generate stronger engagement in social media green campaigns. In contrast, it was found that when individuals experience guilt, feasibility (vs. desirability) message appeals enhance social media engagement and pro-environmental behaviors more effectively. This research offers novel theoretical contributions to the existing body of literature and provides practical insights by suggesting that awe and guilt act as moderators leading to greater consumer responses when used with matching social media messages promoting green campaigns.     

The mood effect: How mood,disclosure language and ad skepticism influence the effectiveness of native advertising

This research investigated the interplay between mood, disclosure language, and ad skepticism on consumers' recognition and evaluation of native advertising. During two online experiments, participants first received a mood manipulation and then read an article-style native advertisement. Results from both studies indicated that participants were more likely to recognize a native ad with an explicit rather than an implicit disclosure label, and a negative mood was more likely than a positive mood to drive participants to recognize the native ad. More importantly, participants in a positive mood evaluated a native ad with an implicit disclosure more favorably than an ad with an explicit disclosure. By contrast, participants in a negative mood responded more positively to a native ad with explicit disclosure compared to an ad with implicit disclosure. Study 2 demonstrated that the interaction between mood and disclosure language was further moderated by individuals' levels of ad skepticism. These results are believed to provide meaningful theoretical and practical implications to the field of native advertising and consumer behavior.     

Family mental health during the COVID-19 pandemic: Changes in parent-adolescent internalizing symptoms in the United States

The current paper examined the temporal linkage of internalizing symptoms among parent-adolescent dyads during the beginning of the COVID-19 pandemic, and whether COVID-19-related concerns were associated with parent-adolescent linkage of symptoms. Using a 5-week survey-based study, parent-adolescent dyads filled out weekly surveys measuring COVID-19 concerns and internalizing symptoms. Parent and adolescent depressive symptoms did not change over time; however, adolescents experienced decreases in anxiety. Parent-adolescent dyads exhibited linkage in depressive symptoms but not anxiety symptoms. However, linkage in anxiety symptoms varied by parent's COVID-related stress. Study findings provide insight into how COVID-19 disruptions impacted family well-being during adolescence.