Semantic control of selective attention

Summary It is argued that at least three modes of information processing should be distinguished: (1) sensory preprocessing; (2) activation and inhibition of knowledge structures, which run parallel and are unlimited in terms of capacity; (3) activated knowledge structures are used to make behavioral decisions. Decision processes are assumed to be sequentially organized because at any moment only one unit of the activated knowledge can be taken into account. Selective attention mainly refers to the third mode of processing. In this paper, potential rules are investigated that may determine what part of the activated knowledge influences making decisions about behavior. An intuitively plausible speculation about a rule of this kind is that activated knowledge is taken into account in the order of its activation level. Certain phenomena in selective attention are related to the operation of the rule, and some data are presented that seem to favor the validity of the rule's operation in the processing of multi-element visual displays.     

Preference,Expectations, and Attributional Bias: Two Field Studies1

Two quasi-experiments were conducted to test the relationship among a perceiver's preference, expectations, and causal attributions for an event, when the outcome of the event ran for and counter to expectation and preference. Following the 1976 Superbowl, fans of Dallas and Pittsburgh and fans with no preference were asked to attribute causality for a series of game events, counterbalanced for (un)favorability for each team. Following the 1976 Presidential election, fans of Carter and Ford were asked to attribute causality for the election outcome and estimate its repeatability and mutability. Both studies revealed that fans exhibit a biased attributional pattern, offering more credit to their own side for their successes than to the opponents for their successes. Furthermore, fans see their side's successes as replicable and their side's failures as nonreplicable. The implications of the data patterns for real world manifestations of attributional bias are discussed.     

Reliability and validity of two widely-used worry questionnaires: self-report and self-peer convergence

The reliability and validity of the Penn State Worry Questionnaire (PSWQ) and the Worry Domains Questionnaire (WDQ) were examined with self-ratings from a non-clinical sample of 148 students in a test-retest design across four weeks. Ratings from three well-acquainted peers were also obtained. With internal consistencies and test-retest correlations of at least 0.85, the present study confirmed the high reliability of the questionnaires. Moreover, both measures demonstrated substantial convergent validity: Average agreement among peers was 0.42 (PSWQ) and 0.47 (WDQ) and aggregated self-peer agreement was 0.55 (PSWQ) and 0.49 (WDQ). Self-peer agreement was not biased by social desirability. These findings challenge views that worry is an unreliable and unobservable phenomenon.     

Verlorenes Objekt, Trennung und Anerkennung

Zusammenfassung. Die Verarbeitung von Trennungserfahrungen ist für die Psychoanalyse ein zentrales Anliegen. Trennungserfahrungen spielen in verschiedenen analytischen Konzepten eine Rolle. Zun?chst mu? daher gekl?rt werden, welche verschiedenen Dimensionen des Themas „Trennung” in der psychoanalytischen Theorie ausgearbeitet worden sind. Da? Trennungen verarbeitet werden k?nnen, ist an bestimmte Voraussetzungen geknüpft. Die Folgen von Trennungserfahrungen sind v.a. aus einer intrapsychischen Perspektive beschrieben worden. Diese Betrachtungsweise mu? durch eine intersubjektive erg?nzt werden. Klinische Konzepte früher Trennungspathologien und die neuere S?uglingsforschung weisen auf die Bedeutung der intersubjektiven Perspektive für die Psychoanalyse hin. Intrapsychische und intersubjektive Perspektive schlie?en einander nicht aus, sondern verschr?nken sich miteinander. Wesentlich für dieses Wechselspiel ist der Begriff der Anerkennung, der in Anlehnung an Benjamin eingeführt wird. Er ist hilfreich, um die ethischen Implikationen der psychoanalytischen Trennungsmodelle zu bedenken.

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The lost object, separation and recognition. About the foundation of psychoanalytic therapy and psychoanalytic ethics concerning the experience of separation

Summary. There exists not only one psychoanalytic concept of ”separation”. Instead, it covers a wide range of psychoanalytic constructs, such as separation in Mahler’s terms, object loss, castration, the Lacanian model of psychic representation and so forth. The first aim of the present paper is to clarify the various concepts. As will be shown, most psychoanalytic concepts focus on the intrapsychic dimension of separation processes. Nevertheless, the working through of separation experiences is bound to intersubjective experiences as can be shown in reference to the clinical concepts on very early interpersonal pathology and to the contemporary research on infantile development. The intersubjective and intrapsychic perspectives do not contradict, but supplement each other. J. Benjamin has introduced the term ”recognition” into the psychoanalytic debate. Recognition is a major link between the two perspectives. It is helpful to outline the ethical consequences that can be drawn from the psychoanalytic concepts on ”separations”.

     

Stimulus-response compatibility and sequential learning in the serial reaction time task

The serial reaction time (SRT) task is a commonly used paradigm to investigate implicit learning. In most studies the settings originally introduced by Nissen and Bullemer are replicated, i.e., subjects respond to a visuo-spatial sequence of stimulus locations by pressing spatially compatible arranged keys. The present experiment was designed to explore to what degree the sequential learning observed under these conditions depends on the use of locational sequences. Under otherwise identical conditions, first the S-R compatibility was reduced by using symbols instead of locations as stimuli, and second, the connectibility, i.e, the ease of connecting successive stimuli into coherent pattern, was varied. Effects on reaction times (RT) in the SRT task and on explicit memory in a generation task were evaluated. The results indicate that the connectibility of the stimuli has no effect at all and that S-R compatibility influences only the general RT level but does not seem to modify the learning process itself. Thus, the data are more consistent with the notion that learning is based primarily on the sequence of responses rather than on the sequence of stimuli. Moreover, a post hoc classification of subjects with regard to the amount of explicit sequence knowledge they have acquired reveals a striking modification of the general result: The RT difference between responses to locations and symbols vanishes in the course of learning for the complete explicit knowledge group. In order to account for this effect, we presume that the response control of these subjects shifts from stimuli to motor programs, so that RTs become increasingly independent of the stimuli used.     

Smells like sib spirit: kin recognition in three-spined sticklebacks (<Emphasis Type="Italic">Gasterosteus aculeatus</Emphasis>) is mediated by olfactory cues

The ability to recognise kin has been demonstrated in several animal species. However, the mechanisms of kin recognition often remain unknown. The most frequently discussed sensory modalities to recognise kin are visual, olfactory and acoustical cues. Three-spined sticklebacks (Gasterosteus aculeatus) are able to differentiate between kin and non-kin when presented visual and olfactory cues combined. To elucidate, which cues they use to recognise kin female sticklebacks were given the choice between two identical computer animations of courting stickleback males. Next to one animation, water conditioned by a brother was added, while near the other, water from an unrelated male was added. In half of the experiments, the brother was familiar while in the other half he was unfamiliar to the female. Both scenarios were carried out with both outbred and inbred fish. The results showed that the females adjusted their choice behaviour according to relatedness. Furthermore, they were able to recognise both familiar as well as unfamiliar brothers. Inbreeding did not affect this ability. Hence, three-spined sticklebacks are able to recognise their relatives using olfactory cues alone. The cognitive mechanisms underlying this ability were independent from familiarity and not impaired by inbreeding.