Advancing our understanding of intergenerational continuity in antisocial behavior

This commentary reviews the major findings of this set of 4 papers on intergenerational continuity in antisocial behavior; it identifies strengths and remaining challenges, and discusses potential policy implications of the research. As a group, these researchers have raised the methodological bar for future work in this area, using prospective designs with multiple informants and methods to test the influences of G2 parenting and adolescent antisocial behavior in mediating continuity between G1 parenting and G3 early disruptive behavior. The pattern of findings is discussed with respect to gender of G2 and social context. The inherent challenges of conducting intergenerational research are also highlighted, within the context of offering recommendations for improving future intergenerational investigations and their feasibility.     

Seeing double: the role of meaning in alphanumeric-colour synaesthesia

When PD, an alphanumeric-colour synaesthete, is shown black digits or letters, each grapheme elicits a highly specific colour, called a "photism" (e.g., a 2 induces green, a Z induces brown). Previous experiments showed that photisms interfere with video-colour naming when the photism colour and the video colour are incongruent. Here we used coloured ambiguous graphemes that could be interpreted as either digits or letters depending on context (e.g., an ambiguous grapheme was interpreted as a 2 if presented within a block of digit trials, but as a Z if presented within a block of letter trials). Ambiguous graphemes were presented in video colours that were either congruent or incongruent with PD's photisms. Crucially, what was a congruent trial in one context was an incongruent trial in the other context. PD's pattern of response times indicated that identical graphemes could induce differently coloured photisms depending on their interpretation. This suggests that the meaning of graphemes ultimately determines their synaesthetic colour.     

When parallel processing in visual word recognition is not enough: new evidence from naming

Low-frequency irregular words are named more slowly and are more error prone than low-frequency regular words (the regularity effect). Rastle and Coltheart (1999) reported that this irregularity cost is modulated by the serial position of the irregular grapheme-phoneme correspondence, such that words with early irregularities exhibit a larger cost than words with late ones. They argued that these data implicate rule-based serial processing, and they also reported a successful simulation with a model that has a rule-based serial component—the DRC model of reading aloud (Coltheart, Rastle, Perry, Langdon, & Ziegler, 2001). However, Zorzi (2000) also simulated these data with a model that operates solely in parallel. Furthermore, Kwantes and Mewhort (1999) simulated these data with a serial processing model that has no rules for converting orthography to phonology. The human data reported by Rastle and Coltheart therefore neither require a serial processing account, nor successfully discriminate among a number of computational models of reading aloud. New data are presented wherein an interaction between the effects of regularity and serial position of irregularity is again reported for human readers. The DRC model simulated this interaction; no other implemented computational model does so. The present results are thus consistent with rule-based serial processing in reading aloud.     

Acknowledgment of Reviewers

Dedication

Acknowledgment of Reviewers     

Efficacy of telephone-administered cognitive behaviour therapy for obsessive-compulsive spectrum disorders: case studies

Cognitive behaviour therapy is effective for obsessive-compulsive disorder and for obsessive-compulsive spectrum disorders such as trichotillomania. Unfortunately, many people with these disorders, especially those living in rural areas, have limited access to treatment. Telephone-administered cognitive behaviour therapy may help address this problem. In a recent study of telephone treatment for obsessive-compulsive disorder, we found that such treatment was often effective (42% in remission at post-treatment, and 47% in remission at 12-week follow-up). This article presents 2 case reports of the same treatment, applied to obsessive-compulsive spectrum disorders (trichotillomania and compulsive skin picking). Treatment was associated with symptom reduction for both participants, although one subsequently relapsed. Possible reasons for relapse are discussed. The findings encourage further studies to identify the characteristics of people most likely to benefit from telephone treatment for spectrum disorders.     

That’s the way the ball bounces: infants’ and adults’ perception of spatial and temporal contiguity in collisions involving bouncing balls

Three experiments investigated the perception of collisions involving bouncing balls by 7- and 10-month-old infants and adults. In previous research, 10-month-old infants perceived the causality of launching collisions (events in which one object moves along a smooth horizontal trajectory toward a second object, apparently launching it into motion) in relatively simple event contexts. In more complex event contexts, infants failed to discriminate among the events or respond to changes in individual features. Experiments 1 and 2 of the present investigation revealed that 7- and 10-month-old infants attended to spatial and temporal contiguity, but not causality, in collisions involving the movement of bouncing balls. In Experiment 3, both spatiotemporal contiguity and general knowledge about movement trajectories influenced adults’ judgments of causality for these collisions. The present results add to a growing understanding of infants’ event perception as constructive and a function, in part, of the complexity of the event context.     

A Lay Perspective on the Accuracy of Eyewitness Testimony1

To understand more about what laypeople think they “know” about eyewitness testimony, 276 jury-eligible university students were asked to indicate what factors they believe affect the accuracy of eyewitness testimony. In contrast to the large proportion of eyewitness-memory research that concerns system variables, the lay respondents overwhelmingly generated factors related to estimator variables, while system-variable factors such as police questioning and identification procedures were rarely mentioned. Respondents also reported that their own common sense and everyday life experiences were their most important sources of information about the accuracy of eyewitness testimony. Not only do these results clarify the need for further research on the lay perspective of eyewitness testimony, but they also provide some insight into the way in which many jurors might approach cases involving eyewitness evidence.