Interactions Between Exogenous Auditory and Visual Spatial Attention

Six experiments were carried out to investigate the issue of cross-modality between exogenous auditory and visual spatial attention employing Posner's cueing paradigm in detection, localization, and discrimination tasks. Results indicated cueing in detection tasks with visual or auditory cues and visual targets but not with auditory targets (Experiment 1). In the localization tasks, cueing was found with both visual and auditory targets. Inhibition of return was apparent only in the within-modality conditions (Experiment 2). This suggests that it is important whether the attention system is activated directly (within a modality) or indirectly (between modalities). Increasing the cue validity from 50% to 80% influenced performance only in the localization task (Experiment 4). These findings are interpreted as being indicative for modality-specific but interacting attention mechanisms. The results of Experiments 5 and 6 (up/down discrimination tasks) also show cross-modal cueing but not with visual cues and auditory targets. Furthermore, there was no inhibition of return in any condition. This suggests that some cueing effects might be task dependent.     

To be at the tail of the lions or the head of the foxes?

Agents seeking an opportunity for profit often have to compete with others who pursue the same opportunity. When having to choose between a number of opportunities differing in their value and if individuals differ in their chances of outperforming others, the choice can be cognitively and emotionally demanding. We explore choice between opportunities using stylized Lions–Foxes games. In such a game, each of three players, with different odds of beating others, has to choose one of two contests that offer different rewards. After game theoretically analyzing the games, which we have experimentally employed, we report four experiments that vary in choice elicitation (repeated play or strategy method), in players' matching (random strangers or partners) and in rewards. Regarding contest choices, we found the choice of the higher value (and seemingly more prestigious) contest to be positively related to winning odds, contrary to what four out of the five (mixed, partially mixed, or pure) equilibria predict. Participants started out rather optimistic, with a large majority choosing the higher value option, but with experience, they approached the only viable of two pure strategy equilibria. Still, mixing continued via reacting to past play and outcome, apparently balancing dissatisfaction from choosing either contest.     

The role of visuo-spatial abilities in environment learning from maps and navigation over the adult lifespan

Visuo-spatial abilities have an important role in environment learning. The aim of the present study was to explore whether these abilities relate to spatial recall after learning an environment from a map or a video, and irrespective of the learner's age (from youth to old age). The study involved 431 participants from 25 to 84 years old, who were assessed for their visuo-spatial working memory, object-based mental rotation, and perspective-taking abilities. Then, they learned environments from a map and a video, and performed pointing, map drawing, and route repetition tasks after learning from each type of input. The resulting path models showed that age related to visuo-spatial abilities and (in some cases) to spatial accuracy, too. After accounting for age, visuo-spatial abilities also related to spatial recall performance, whatever the type of learning input, especially in pointing tasks and, to a lesser degree, in map drawing and route repetition tasks. Overall, the relationship between individual visuo-spatial abilities and environment learning relates to the learning input and the type of task used to assess recall. This relationship was found in a large and diverse sample of participants ranging from youth to old age.     

Creative Potential and Multicultural Experiences: The Mediating Role of Creative Self-Efficacy

In two studies, one in Mexico and another one in Germany, we examined the indirect influence of self-reported multicultural experience on creative potential, through its influence on creative self-efficacy, and its direct influence on creative personal identity. In both studies, business students from Mexico and Germany completed a battery of questionnaires assessing creative self-efficacy (with two different operationalizations), creative personal identity, multicultural experiences, and a divergent thinking task designed to generate ideas to solve two different business problems. Structural equation modeling was used to test our hypotheses. Results from both studies found a positive relationship between self-reported multicultural experiences and creative personal identity. Similarly, multicultural experiences had an indirect, positive relationship with originality scores from a divergent thinking task, through its influence on creative self-efficacy. Hence, the positive influence of multicultural experience on creative potential, through creative self-efficacy, was established in two countries and with different operationalizations, trait like versus state like, of creative self-efficacy. The implications of the results were discussed.     

Behavioral and Psychological Symptoms that Predict Cognitive Decline or Impairment in Cognitively Normal Middle-Aged or Older Adults: a Meta-Analysis

Neuropsychology Review - Epidemiological studies have revealed that behavioral and psychological (or non-cognitive) symptoms are risk factors for cognitive decline in older adults. This study aimed...     

Perceived mattering in stepfamilies: A social relations model analysis

The current study examined the respective role of stepfamily members' individual characteristics and their dyadic relationships in stepfamily members' perceptions of mattering to one another. Parents, stepparents, and adolescents from 86 stepfamilies participated. Applying social relations model analyses, several trends emerged regarding the relative importance of individual and dyadic factors. Parents' and adolescents' reports of mattering to one another were mainly driven by individual factors, whereas relational factors were important to understand the reports of mattering in which the stepparent was one of the dyad members. These findings contribute to stepfamily research by highlighting that stepfamily members' sense of belonging is at least partly a function of the interpersonal adaptation between the stepparent and other family members.     

Focal lung pathology detection in radiology: Is there an effect of experience on visual search behavior?

In radiology, 60% to 80% of diagnostic errors are perceptual. The use of more efficient visual search behaviors is expected to reduce these errors. We collected eye-tracking data from participants with different levels of experience when interpreting chest X-rays during the completion of a pathology-detection task. Eye-tracking measures were assessed in the context of three existing visual search theories from the literature to understand the association between visual search behavior and underlying processes: the long-term working memory theory, the information-reduction hypothesis, and the holistic model of image perception. The most experienced participants (radiology residents) showed the highest level of performance, albeit their visual search behaviors did not differ from the intermediate group. This suggests that radiology residents better processed the represented information on the X-ray, using a visual search strategy similar to the intermediate group. Since similar visual search resulted in more information extraction in the radiology residents compared with the intermediates, we suggest that this result might support the long-term working memory theory. Furthermore, compared with novices, intermediates and radiology residents fixated longer on areas that were more important to avoid missing any pathology, which possibly confirms the information-reduction hypothesis. Finally, the larger distances between fixations observed in more experienced participants could support the holistic model of image perception. In addition, measures of generic skills were related to a lower time cost for switching between global and local information processing. Our findings suggest that the three theories may be complementary in chest X-ray interpretation. Therefore, a unified theory explaining perceptual-cognitive superiority in radiology is considered.

     

Stagnation and generativity: structure, validity, and differential relationships with adaptive and maladaptive personality

Erikson's concepts of stagnation and generativity were investigated in two studies. Study 1 (N=457) yields two important results. First, it revealed that a model in which stagnation and generativity load on a separate dimension showed a significantly better fit to the data than a one-dimensional model. Second, the stagnation and generativity measures were valid predictors of parental behavior. In Study 2 (N=191), the relationships between stagnation and generativity and the dimensions underlying comprehensive measures of personality were investigated. It was found that stagnation was strongly related to Neuroticism, Extraversion, and Openness to Experience, whereas generativity bore strong relationships with Extraversion, Conscientiousness, and Openness to Experience. In the discussion, stagnation is distinguished from several related variables and a profile of the stagnant individual is constructed and compared with the generative individual. Finally, the interaction between stagnation and generativity in producing specific outcomes is discussed.     

Crossmodal temporal discrimination: assessing the predictions of a general pacemaker-counter model

In this study, an extended pacemaker-counter model was applied to crossmodal temporal discrimination. In three experiments, subjects discriminated between the durations of a constant standard stimulus and a variable comparison stimulus. In congruent trials, both stimuli were presented in the same sensory modality (i.e., both visual or both auditory), whereas in incongruent trials, each stimulus was presented in a different modality. The model accounts for the finding that temporal discrimination depends on the presentation order of the sensory modalities. Nevertheless, the model fails to explain why temporal discrimination was much better with congruent than with incongruent trials. The discussion considers possibilities to accommodate the model to this and other shortcomings.