Normative data on a battery of neuropsychological tests in the Han Chinese population

In order to develop normative data of a battery of neuropsychological tests in the mainland Chinese population, we examined the performance of 15 neuropsychological tests in 465 healthy subjects (231 males and 234 females) in a population‐based cohort study. The years of education were ranged between 1 and 23 years, and ages were ranged between 16 and 75 years old. The 15 neuropsychological tests cover five domains of neurocognitive functions including attention and speed of information processing, memory and learning, verbal function, visual constructive abilities, and executive function. We also assessed the effects of gender, age, educational attainment on the performance of these neuropsychological tests. The results showed that, as expected, educational attainment and age are the two main factors affecting performance in these tests. Educational attainment has the strongest predictive effect on all tests, while the majority of tests selected in this study are also affected by age at examination to varying degrees. The presented normative data will be useful for future studies in related clinical research, and be of value in transcultural neuropsychological studies.     

脑功能成像的新方法——功能性近红外光谱技术（fNIRS）

功能性近红外光谱技术（functional near-infrared spectroscopy, fNIRS）利用血液的主要成分对600-900nm近红外光良好的散射性,从而获得大脑活动时氧合血红蛋白和脱氧血红蛋白的变化情况。目前该技术开始运用于自然情境下的高级认知、发展心理学、异常心理学等多个领域的研究。该技术具有造价较低、便携性好,无噪音、无创性和对实验过程中被试动作不会过份敏感等优点,但也存在空间分辨率不高和校正算法有待进一步完善等方面的不足。未来fNIRS的研究可以与fMRI等其他成像技术进行结合,开展婴幼儿和特殊人群的认知神经科学研究以及自然情境下大脑认知的神经机制研究。     

大学生自我怜悯问卷的修订及信效度研究

目的:对Neff编制的自我怜悯量表进行修订和信效度检验。方法:总共对440名大学生进行了问卷预测与正式测验,使用SPSS13.0和LISREL8.70软件对数据进行分析。结果:①修订后的量表包含6个维度、26个条目。②各维度和量表的同质信度在0.64-0.87之间;探索性因素分析表明各条目对所属因子有中度以上的负荷,抽取的6个因子解释了总方差的55.09%。验证性因素分析的拟合优度指数、相对拟合优度指数、非标准化拟合优度指数为0.85-0.94,近似误差均方根为0.059。结论:大学生自我怜悯量表的信效度符合心理测量学要求。     

Patterns of adolescent bullying behaviors: physical, verbal, exclusion, rumor, and cyber

Patterns of engagement in cyber bullying and four types of traditional bullying were examined using latent class analysis (LCA). Demographic differences and externalizing problems were evaluated across latent class membership. Data were obtained from the 2005-2006 Health Behavior in School-aged Survey and the analytic sample included 7,508 U.S. adolescents in grades 6 through 10. LCA models were tested on physical bullying, verbal bullying, social exclusion, spreading rumors, and cyber bullying behaviors. Three latent classes were identified for each gender: All-Types Bullies (10.5% for boys and 4.0% for girls), Verbal/Social Bullies (29.3% for boys and 29.4% for girls), and a Non-Involved class (60.2% for boys and 66.6% for girls). Boys were more likely to be All-Types Bullies than girls. The prevalence rates of All-Types and Verbal/Social Bullies peaked during grades 6 to 8 and grades 7 and 8, respectively. Pairwise comparisons across the three latent classes on externalizing problems were conducted. Overall, the All-Types Bullies were at highest risk of using substances and carrying weapons, the Non-Involved were at lowest risk, and the Verbal/Social Bullies were in the middle. Results also suggest that most cyber bullies belong to a group of highly aggressive adolescents who conduct all types of bullying. This finding does not only improve our understanding of the relation between cyber bullying and traditional bullying, but it also suggests that prevention and intervention efforts could target cyber bullies as a high-risk group for elevated externalizing problems.     

Coincident orientation of objects and viewpoint-dependence in scene recognition

Viewpoint-dependence is a well-known phenomenon in which participants' spatial memory is better for previously experienced points of view than for novel ones. In the current study, partial-scene-recognition was used to examine the effect of coincident orientation of all the objects on viewpoint-dependence in spatial memory. When objects in scenes had no clear orientations (e.g., balls), participants' recognition of experienced directions was better than that of novel ones, indicating that there was viewpoint-dependence. However, when the objects in scenes were toy bears with clear orientations, the coincident orientation of objects (315 degrees), which was not experienced, shared the advantage of the experienced direction (0 degrees), and participants were equally likely to choose either direction when reconstructing the spatial representation in memory. These findings suggest that coincident orientation of objects may affect egocentric representations in spatial memory.     

Neural control of fundamental frequency rise and fall in Mandarin tones

The neural mechanisms used in tone rises and falls in Mandarin were investigated. Nine participants were scanned while they named one-character pictures that required rising or falling tone responses in Mandarin: the left insula and right putamen showed stronger activation between rising and falling tones; the left brainstem showed weaker activation between rising and falling tones. Connectivity analysis showed that the significant projection from the laryngeal motor cortex to the brainstem which was present in rising tones was absent in falling tones. Additionally, there was a significant difference between the connection from the insula to the laryngeal motor cortex which was negative in rising tones but positive in falling tones. These results suggest that the significant projection from the laryngeal motor cortex to the brainstem used in rising tones was not active in falling tones. The connection from the left insula to the laryngeal motor cortex that differs between rising and falling tones may control whether the rise mechanism is active or not.     

Pathogens promote matrilocal family ties and the copying of foreign religions

Within the same pathogen-stress framework as proposed by Fincher & Thornhill (F&T), we argue further that pathogen stress promotes matrilocal rather than patrilocal family ties which, in turn, slow down the process of modernity; and that pathogen stress promotes social learning or copying, including the adoption of foreign religions.     

公立医院补偿机制改革之政府补偿方式探讨

从公立医疗服务准公共产品特性和医疗服务的性质两个方面,强调了政府对公立医院补偿的必要性和合理性,并指出了政府补偿中存在财政补偿不足、缺乏补偿标准、监管不力等问题.同时,针对政府补偿现状提出了加大政府对公立医院的投入;设计科学合理的公立医院财政补偿制度;加强对公立医院财政投入资金的监管等政策建议.     

Automatic attention towards face or body as a function of mating motivation

Because women?s faces and bodies carry different cues of reproductive value, men may attend to different perceptual cues as functions of their long-term versus short-term mating motivations. We tested this hypothesis in three experiments on 135 male and 132 female participants. When influenced by short-term rather than long-term mating motivations, men?s attention was captured by (Study 1), was shifted to (Study 2), and was distracted by (Study 3) the waist/hip area rather than the face on photographs of attractive women. Similar effects were not found among the female participants in response to photographs of attractive men. These results support the evolutionary view that, similar to the attentional selectivity found in other domains of life, male perceptual attention has evolved to selectively capture and hold reproductive information about the opposite sex as a function of short-term versus long-term mating goals.     

Different spatial terms in navigation system for Chinese drivers

There has been some research on the comparison of spatial frame of reference system (FoRs) preferences between different areas in China. The goal of this research was to find out whether different habits could affect the performance in driving with the navigation system, with a dual-task experimental paradigm applied. Forty participants from South and North China (10 male and 10 female in each area group) were required to finish spatial term judgment task while playing simulated driving game. The results showed that Southern participants responded more quickly to relative FoRs terms than absolute terms during driving, but there was no significant difference between these two kinds of terms for Northerners--similarly to their habits. All participants' driving actions were disturbed by the spatial term judgment. Unexpectedly, the male participants drove better when responding to relative terms than absolute terms, while female performed conversely. These findings would be useful in navigation systems design for Chinese.