Two kinds of adaptation in the constancy of visual direction and their different effects on the perception of shape and visual direction

Adaptation in the constancy of visual direction can be obtained under two radically different conditions, called eye-movement adaptation and field adaptation. Adaptation resulting from these conditions and from a “normal” condition was measured with a newly developed estimation test. Eye-movement adaptation was found to cause an alteration of compensatory eye movements. It apparently consists of a changed evaluation of eye movements, as demonstrated by two different pointing tests. A form test where the shape of a large oblong is set to look square also confirmed this interpretation. After field adaptation, a pointing test did not register a change, but an adaptation effect could be measured with a forward direction test. This test and a square test where no eye movements were permitted proved to be specific to field adaptation; they measured no effect after eye-movementadaptation. The normal adaptation condition Was apparently equivalent to the eye-movement adaptation condition. Its effect could be measured only with a pointing test. When we changed the normal adaptation condition so that frequent saccades were made during head turning, strong effects were measured with the two tests that were specific to field adaptation.     

Stimulus and response factors in mirror-image discrimination

Two choice-reaction time studies assessed the influence of stimulus-response mapping, stimulus complexity, and stimulus alignment on adults’ discrimination of mirror-image and nonmirror-image stimulus pairs. Half the subjects in Experiment 1 were instructed to treat nonmiiTor pairs as “same” and mirror pairs as “different”; the other half responded in the opposite manner. The first group responded more quickly to nonmirror pairs, while the second group responded more quickly to mirror pairs. This result, which held for horizontal stimuli (side by side) as well as for vertical stimuli (one above the other), confirms the importance of experiential factors in mirror-image “confusions. “ In Experiment 2. stimuli were drawn from a population of patterns whose complexity could be objectively defined. In general, the more complex the pattern, the slower the response and complexity seemed to influence the qualitative nature of pattern processing. In both experiments, subjects responded more quickly to horizontal stimuli than to vertical stimuli.     

Reactive and proactive aggression: Similarities and differences

The purpose of the current study was to elaborate the nomological net surrounding the constructs of reactive (RA) and proactive aggression (PA). Typically examined in the context of children, the current study utilized a sample of 211 young adults to examine the relations between reactive and proactive aggression and measures of general personality and social information processing, as well as maladaptive behavioral correlates such as crime, substance use, and riskier sex. Both raw and residualized scores were examined. Using raw scores, the primary differences between RA and PA were related to Neuroticism (i.e., RA more strongly related) and externalizing behaviors (i.e., PA more strongly). The authors comment on the similarity of findings when using raw scores and the divergence of findings using residualized scores and argue for a cautious interpretation of differences based on residualized scores. The authors conclude that the role of Neuroticism warrants further exploration as a means for understanding the heterogeneity of aggressive behavior.     

Acting intentionally and the side-effect effect

The concept of acting intentionally is an important nexus where theory of mind and moral judgment meet. Preschool children's judgments of intentional action show a valence-driven asymmetry. Children say that a foreseen but disavowed side effect is brought about "on purpose" when the side effect itself is morally bad, but not when it is morally good. This is the first demonstration in preschoolers that moral judgment influences judgments of whether something was done on purpose (as opposed to judgments of purpose influencing moral judgment). Judgments of intentionality are usually assumed to be purely factual. That these judgments are sometimes partly normative-even in preschoolers-challenges current understanding. Young children's judgments regarding foreseen side effects depend on whether the children process the idea that the character does not care about the side effect. As soon as preschoolers effectively process the theory-of-mind concept "not care that P," children show the side-effect effect.     

How (and where) does moral judgment work?

Moral psychology has long focused on reasoning, but recent evidence suggests that moral judgment is more a matter of emotion and affective intuition than deliberate reasoning. Here we discuss recent findings in psychology and cognitive neuroscience, including several studies that specifically investigate moral judgment. These findings indicate the importance of affect, although they allow that reasoning can play a restricted but significant role in moral judgment. They also point towards a preliminary account of the functional neuroanatomy of moral judgment, according to which many brain areas make important contributions to moral judgment although none is devoted specifically to it.     

The police officer's dilemma: using ethnicity to disambiguate potentially threatening individuals

Using a simple videogame, the effect of ethnicity on shoot/don't shoot decisions was examined. African American or White targets, holding guns or other objects, appeared in complex backgrounds. Participants were told to "shoot" armed targets and to "not shoot" unarmed targets. In Study 1, White participants made the correct decision to shoot an armed target more quickly if the target was African American than if he was White, but decided to "not shoot" an unarmed target more quickly if he was White. Study 2 used a shorter time window, forcing this effect into error rates. Study 3 replicated Study 1's effects and showed that the magnitude of bias varied with perceptions of the cultural stereotype and with levels of contact, but not with personal racial prejudice. Study 4 revealed equivalent levels of bias among both African American and White participants in a community sample. Implications and potential underlying mechanisms are discussed.     

Military training and personality trait development: does the military make the man, or does the man make the military?

Military experience is an important turning point in a person's life and, consequently, is associated with important life outcomes. Using a large longitudinal sample of German males, we examined whether personality traits played a role during this period. Results indicated that personality traits prospectively predicted the decision to enter the military. People lower in agreeableness, neuroticism, and openness to experience during high school were more likely to enter the military after graduation. In addition, military training was associated with changes in personality. Compared with a control group, military recruits had lower levels of agreeableness after training. These levels persisted 5 years after training, even after participants entered college or the labor market. This study is one of the first to identify life experiences associated with changes in personality traits. Moreover, our results suggest that military experiences may have a long-lasting influence on individual-level characteristics.     

Word superiority in word detection

Observers searched for a single precued word or its nonword anagram under conditions of rapid serial visual presentation (RSVP). A word advantage was found over a wide range of presentation rates (32-160 msec/frame), under yes-no as well as forced choice conditions, and with both one or two input “channels.” These results suggest that word superiority in word detection occurs at a perceptual locus.