Asymmetric cultural effects on perceptual expertise underlie an own-race bias for voices

The own-race bias in memory for faces has been a rich source of empirical work on the mechanisms of person perception. This effect is thought to arise because the face-perception system differentially encodes the relevant structural dimensions of features and their configuration based on experiences with different groups of faces. However, the effects of sociocultural experiences on person perception abilities in other identity-conveying modalities like audition have not been explored. Investigating an own-race bias in the auditory domain provides a unique opportunity for studying whether person identification is a modality-independent construct and how it is sensitive to asymmetric cultural experiences. Here we show that an own-race bias in talker identification arises from asymmetric experience with different spoken dialects. When listeners categorized voices by race (White or Black), a subset of the Black voices were categorized as sounding White, while the opposite case was unattested. Acoustic analyses indicated listeners’ perceptions about race were consistent with differences in specific phonetic and phonological features. In a subsequent person-identification experiment, the Black voices initially categorized as sounding White elicited an own-race bias from White listeners, but not from Black listeners. These effects are inconsistent with person-perception models that strictly analogize faces and voices based on recognition from only structural features. Our results demonstrate that asymmetric exposure to spoken dialect, independent from talkers’ physical characteristics, affects auditory perceptual expertise for talker identification. Person perception thus additionally relies on socioculturally-acquired dynamic information, which may be represented by different mechanisms in different sensory modalities.     

Cocaine addiction and personality: A mathematical model

The existence of a close relation between personality and drug consumption is recognized, but the corresponding causal connection is not well known. Neither is it well known whether personality exercises an influence predominantly at the beginning and development of addiction, nor whether drug consumption produces changes in personality. This paper presents a dynamic mathematical model of personality and addiction based on the unique personality trait theory (UPTT) and the general modelling methodology. This model attempts to integrate personality, the acute effect of drugs, and addiction. The UPTT states the existence of a unique trait of personality called extraversion, understood as a dimension that ranges from impulsive behaviour and sensation‐seeking (extravert pole) to fearful and anxious behaviour (introvert pole). As a consequence of drug consumption, the model provides the main patterns of extraversion dynamics through a system of five coupled differential equations. It combines genetic extraversion, as a steady state, and dynamic extraversion in a unique variable measured on the hedonic scale. The dynamics of this variable describes the effects of stimulant drugs on a short‐term time scale (typical of the acute effect); while its mean time value describes the effects of stimulant drugs on a long‐term time scale (typical of the addiction effect). This understanding may help to develop programmes of prevention and intervention in drug misuse.     

Emotional context at learning systematically biases memory for facial information

Emotion influences memory in many ways. For example, when a mood-dependent processing shift is operative, happy moods promote global processing and sad moods direct attention to local features of complex visual stimuli. We hypothesized that an emotional context associated with to-be-learned facial stimuli could preferentially promote global or local processing. At learning, faces with neutral expressions were paired with a narrative providing either a happy or a sad context. At test, faces were presented in an upright or inverted orientation, emphasizing configural or analytical processing, respectively. A recognition advantage was found for upright faces learned in happy contexts relative to those in sad contexts, whereas recognition was better for inverted faces learned in sad contexts than for those in happy contexts. We thus infer that a positive emotional context prompted more effective storage of holistic, configural, or global facial information, whereas a negative emotional context prompted relatively more effective storage of local or feature-based facial information     

The UK Hybrid Embryo Controversy: Delegitimising Counterpublics

The UK Human Fertilisation and Embryology Act of 1990 was revised in 2008 in response to legal challenges, societal changes and clinical advances since 1990. A provision permitting the creation of animal–human hybrid embryos was the subject of an extremely effective public relations (PR) campaign by embryo scientists and other supporters of such experimentation. In response, science correspondents of the ‘serious’ or ‘quality’ press commented favourably on these PR activities; this validation supplemented key messages in their press releases. The approval conferred on attempts to shape public opinion was explicitly contrasted with the public consultation exercise conducted by the UK Department of Health in 2005. Press coverage of the campaign demonstrated asymmetrical framings of the representativeness of public opinion and scientists' accounts of their proposed research. Scientists' views were represented as objective and therefore a legitimate basis for policymaking, in contrast with subjective views of putatively uninformed or opposed publics. Such opponents were cast as a counterpublic. The public interest was limited to evaluating the science on its own terms, thus pre-empting consideration of the possibility that public interests and scientists' interests may not coincide.     

A Developmental Trajectory in Implicit Memory is Revealed by Picture Fragment Completion

Dissociations between performance on implicit and explicit tasks have often been taken as evidence that different neural structures subserve the two types of memory. One such dissociation involves developmental differences that emerge in explicit tasks, but which appear to be absent in implicit tasks. Such findings are consistent with the idea that implicit memory is subserved by a more primitive system that evolves earlier at both phylogenetic and ontogenetic levels. The present paper reviews previous studies that claimed to find evidence that implicit memory is fully developed in very young children. Issues of measurement error, ceiling effects, and insufficient power brought up questions about those studies with respect to the developmental issue. The present study compares performance on implicit (picture fragment completion) and explicit (free recall and recognition) memory tasks with groups ranging in age from 5–28 years. We find a reliable developmental trend in both implicit and explicit performance in which the former cannot be attributed to the operation ofexplicit memory processes. Thus, we conclude that implicit memory, like explicit memory, develops with age.     

Remembering all that and then some: Recollection of autobiographical memories after a 1-year delay

We have previously shown that repeated retrievals of remote autobiographical memories over the course of one month led to an overall increase in reported detail (Nadel, Campbell, & Ryan, 2007). The current study examined the retrieval of those same memories 1 year later in order to determine whether the level of detail remained stable or whether the memories returned to their original state. Participants reported even more details than they had recalled at least 1 year earlier, including new details that were reported for the first time. This finding was consistent across both multiple and single retrieval conditions, suggesting that the critical factor leading to the increase in recall was the passage of time. These findings provide evidence for long-term effects of repeated retrieval on memory content.     

Motivation for Physical Activity among Hawaiian,Japanese, and Filipino University Students in Hawaii

The purpose is to identify the motivations and barriers to physical activity (PA) among the three largest ethnic groups in Hawaii (Hawaiians/part-Hawaiians, Japanese, and Filipinos). University of Hawai'i students (N = 32, aged 18+) self-identified as one of those ethnicities participated in focus groups. There are more common themes than ethnic-specific variations in factors influencing PA. PA is understood as exercise among all groups; leisure time PA like running and surfing are common activities. Results were more similar among Hawaiian and Japanese than with Filipino participants. The findings offer an opportunity for improving cross-cultural and culture-specific PA interventions for those ethnicities.     

Perpetuating myths: A response to hardy's 1996 coleman griffith address

Abstract

To take someone's ideas seriously enough to question them is a significant form of respect. It builds communities where controversy stimulates thought instead of enmity; what the clash of ideas leads not to victory for one party but to new questions and news answers for everyone. (Nicholls, 1989, p. i)     

Importance of having agreeable friends in adolescence (especially when you are not)

Using the actor–partner interdependence model, we examined whether adolescent's agreeableness, best friend's agreeableness, and the interaction between adolescent‐friend agreeableness are important for interpersonal functioning. Adolescents (N = 158) in fifth to eighth grades who were part of best friend pairs completed personality and friendship measures. Adolescents' adjustment and victimization experiences were assessed by peer nominations. For boys, best friend's agreeableness moderated the relationship between the target boy's agreeableness and overt victimization, relational victimization, and externalizing problems. For girls, best friend's agreeableness moderated the relationship between the target girl's agreeableness and internalizing problems and prosocial skills. This study provides an initial glimpse into how traits of friends can influence outcomes beyond what would be expected from adolescents' personality alone.