Adoption and maintenance of physical activity: Planning interventions in young, middle-aged, and older adults

Young, middle-aged, and older adults in orthopaedic outpatient rehabilitation (N?=?373) were randomly assigned to either an interviewer-assisted or a standard-care self-administered planning intervention. Physical activity planning consisted of specifying action plans to facilitate action initiation, and coping plans to overcome barriers. The interviewer-assisted condition led to more complete action plans and a longer duration of physical activities up to six months after discharge. Regarding coping planning, older and middle-aged adults benefited more from interviewer-assisted planning while younger adults benefited more from self-administered planning. Planning as such was found to be an effective tool for enactment irrespective of chronological age. The delayed effect of coping planning on enactment suggests that coping planning is important for long-term maintenance.     

Enhanced old–new recognition and source memory for faces of cooperators and defectors in a social-dilemma game

A popular assumption in evolutionary psychology is that the human mind comprises specialized cognitive modules for social exchange, including a module that serves to enhance memory for faces of cheaters. In the present study, participants played a trust game with computerized opponents, who either defected or cooperated. In a control condition, no interaction took place. In a surprise memory test, old–new recognition for faces and source memory for the associated cooperative or non-cooperative behavior were assessed. A multinomial model was used to measure old–new discrimination, source memory, and guessing biases separately. Inconsistent with the assumption of a memory mechanism that focuses exclusively on cheating, the present study showed enhanced old–new discrimination and source memory for both cooperators and defectors. Rarity of the behavior strategies within the experiment modulated source memory, but only when the differences in base rates were extreme. The findings can be attributed to a mechanism that focuses on exchange-relevant information and flexibly adapts to take into account the relative significance of this information in the encoding context, which may be more beneficial than focusing exclusively on cheaters.     

From Religious to Consumption‐Related Routine Activities? Analyzing Ireland's Economic Boom and the Decline in Church Attendance

Using Ireland, which experienced an economic boom in the mid 1990s, as a case study, the negative association between economic growth and religious practice is examined by testing two competing hypotheses. Secularization theory argues that the cultural changes that accompany economic growth lead to a decline in religious values. As religious values diminish, so does attendance at religious services. An alternative explanation is that economic growth increases individual purchasing power and therefore consumption‐related behavior. Consumption supplants religion by providing alternative intermediaries (symbols, infrastructures, and practices) for social behavior, but only marginally affects religious values. Using data from the 1988 to 2005 International Social Survey Programme (ISSP), analyses show that the economic boom in Ireland was clearly associated with a decline in religious attendance, while religious values remained stable. Thus, in Ireland the consequences of economic growth deviate from the predictions of secularization theory and therefore support the consumption argument.     

Autobiographical narratives of deaf and hearing adults: An examination of narrative coherence and the use of internal states

To examine the impact of early linguistic experiences on later verbal report of autobiographical memory, 13 hearing adults and 13 deaf adults born to hearing parents described events that occurred before and after the age of 10 years. The contextual, temporal, and thematic coherence of the narratives was rated. The use of emotional, perceptual, mental, and physiological states was also recorded. There were differences in the coherence of the narratives and use of internal states according to the age at which the events occurred. There were no group differences in coherence, but hearing adults provided longer narratives than deaf adults. When narrative length was controlled, deaf adults included more emotional states than hearing adults. Results suggest that early unavailability of language does not impact the coherence of adults’ narratives, although certain features of linguistic expression specific to ASL may result in greater saturation of emotional states references in autobiographical narratives of deaf adults.     

The onset of childhood amnesia in childhood: A prospective investigation of the course and determinants of forgetting of early-life events

The present research was an examination of the onset of childhood amnesia and how it relates to maternal narrative style, an important determinant of autobiographical memory development. Children and their mothers discussed unique events when the children were 3 years of age. Different subgroups of children were tested for recall of the events at ages 5, 6, 7, 8, and 9 years. At the later session they were interviewed by an experimenter about the events discussed 2 to 6 years previously with their mothers (early-life events). Children aged 5, 6, and 7 remembered 60% or more of the early-life events. In contrast, children aged 8 and 9 years remembered fewer than 40% of the early-life events. Overall maternal narrative style predicted children's contributions to mother–child conversations at age 3 years; it did not have cross-lagged relations to memory for early-life events at ages 5 to 9 years. Maternal deflections of the conversational turn to the child predicted the amount of information children later reported about the early-life events. The findings have implications for our understanding of the onset of childhood amnesia and the achievement of an adult-like distribution of memories in the school years. They highlight the importance of forgetting processes in explanations of the amnesia.     

The effects of action,normality, and decision carefulness on anticipated regret: Evidence for a broad mediating role of decision justifiability

Two distinct theoretical views explain the effects of action/inaction and social normality on anticipated regret. Norm theory (Kahneman & Miller, 1986) emphasises the role of decision mutability, the ease with which one can imagine having made a different choice. Decision justification theory (Connolly & Zeelenberg, 2002) highlights the role of decision justifiability, the perception that the choice was made on a defensible basis, supported by convincing arguments or using a thoughtful, comprehensive decision process. The present paper tests several contrasting predictions from the two theoretical approaches in a series of four studies. Study 1 replicated earlier findings showing greater anticipated regret when the chosen option was abnormal than when it was normal, and perceived justifiability mediated the effect. Study 2 showed that anticipated regret was higher for careless than for careful decisions. Study 3 replicated this finding for a sample holding a different social norm towards the focal decision. Finally, Study 4 found that, when decision carefulness, normality and action/inaction were all specified, only the former showed a significant effect on anticipated regret, and the effect was again mediated by perceived justifiability. Decision justification theory thus appears to provide a better account of anticipated regret intensity in this context than does norm theory.     

Contemporary Neuroscience Humanizes: A Look at Cortical Bilateral Asymmetry and How It Got That Way

Exciting research that has surfaced from a host of neuroscience laboratories is presented, and the assumption that they have little to offer human science considered. This includes the sensory substitution work of Bach-y-Rita (1967 Bach-y-Rita , P. ( 1967 ). Sensory plasticity: Applications to a vision substitution system . Acta Neurologica Scandinavia , 43 , 417 – 426 .[Crossref], [PubMed], [Web of Science ®] , [Google Scholar]), as well as the phantom pain hypothesis of Ramachandran (2011 Ramachandran ( 2011 ). The tell-tale brain . New York , NY : Norton . [Google Scholar]). These studies are considered atop the theoretical and meta-analytical work in the field of neuropsychiatry by McGilchrist (2009 McGilchrist , I. ( 2009 ). The master and his emissary . New Haven , CT : Yale University Press . [Google Scholar]). McGilchrist's inquiry into split-brain patients has resuscitated the once-dubious debate regarding hemispheric differences in the brain. By considering the latter in light of the evidence of neuroplasticity, global differences in right- or left-brain preference may be understood as analogous and reciprocally influential to patterns of thinking. This dynamic relationship between experience and the brain requires a reconsideration of the status of neuroscience as an exclusively reductive enterprise. Indeed, the laboratories seem to be producing results that have become increasingly difficult to reconcile with their biologically reductive commitments. While the neuroscientists are busy sorting out their results, those who do not share said commitments are free to enjoy the implications these results suggest.