Distinguishing between attributional and mnemonic sources of familiarity: The case of positive emotion bias

Does familiarity arise from direct access to memory representations (a mnemonic account) or from inferences and diagnostic cues (an attributional account)? These theoretically distinct explanations can be difficult to distinguish in practice, as is shown by thepositivity effect, the increase in feelings of familiarity that accompanies positive emotion. Experiment 1 manipulated mnemonic and attributional sources of positivity via word valence and physical expressions of emotion, respectively. Both sources influenced the tendency to call itemsold, but receiver-operating characteristic analysis revealed a change in accuracy only with the mnemonic source. To further contrast the mnemonic and attributional accounts, Experiment 2 varied the ratio of positive to neutral words. A higher proportion of positive words exaggerated the pattern of increasedold judgments and decreased accuracy for positive words, relative to neutral ones, consistent with the mnemonic account but inconsistent with the attributional account.     

When affordances climb into your mind: Advantages of motor simulation in a memory task performed by novice and expert rock climbers

Does the sight of multiple climbing holds laid along a path activate a motor simulation of climbing that path? One way of testing whether multiple affordances and their displacement influence the formation of a motor simulation is to study acquired motor skills. We used a behavioral task in which expert and novice rock climbers were shown three routes: an easy route, a route impossible to climb but perceptually salient, and a difficult route. After a distraction task, they were then given a recall test in which they had to write down the sequence of holds composing each route. We found no difference between experts and novices on the easy and impossible routes, whereas on the difficult route, the performance of experts was better than that of novices. This suggests that seeing a climbing wall activates a motor, embodied simulation, which relies not on perceptual salience, but on motor competence. More importantly, our results show that the capability to form this simulation is modulated by individuals’ motor repertoire and expertise, and that this strongly impacts recall.     

Metaphors and Stories in Cognitive Behavioral Therapy with Children

Despite the recent proliferation of material on cognitive behavioral approaches with children and adolescents and the call for these approaches to be more child-friendly, there is scant attention paid to the use of metaphors with youngsters. This paper emphasizes the value metaphors add to cognitive behavioral therapy with children and adolescents. The advantages which recommend metaphor use for cognitive behavioral therapy with children are delineated. Further, seven guidelines for clinical practice are outlined. Examples of both clinician-generated and patient-generated metaphors are also presented.     

Academic success in adolescence: Relationships among verbal IQ,social support and emotional intelligence

The objective of this study was to examine, by gender, whether emotional intelligence (EI), peer social support, and/or family social support partially mediated the influence of verbal IQ on Grade 10 grade point average (GPA) for 192 students (96 male, 96 female). For male students, EI and peer social support predicted GPA and EI mediated the association between verbal IQ and GPA. For female students, EI, peer social support, and family support predicted GPA but did not mediate the association between verbal IQ and GPA. This study further examined whether subscales of EI (intrapersonal, interpersonal, adaptability, and stress management abilities), peer social support and family social support (emotional, socialising, practical, financial, and advice) added to the prediction of GPA after verbal IQ, gender, and socioeconomic status were controlled. Adaptability, stress management and practical family social support each added to the explanation of variability. None of the peer social support subscales predicted additional variance in GPA.     

Self-motion impairs multiple-object tracking

Investigations of multiple-object tracking aim to further our understanding of how people perform common activities such as driving in traffic. However, tracking tasks in the laboratory have overlooked a crucial component of much real-world object tracking: self-motion. We investigated the hypothesis that keeping track of one’s own movement impairs the ability to keep track of other moving objects. Participants attempted to track multiple targets while either moving around the tracking area or remaining in a fixed location. Participants’ tracking performance was impaired when they moved to a new location during tracking, even when they were passively moved and when they did not see a shift in viewpoint. Self-motion impaired multiple-object tracking in both an immersive virtual environment and a real-world analog, but did not interfere with a difficult non-spatial tracking task. These results suggest that people use a common mechanism to track changes both to the location of moving objects around them and to keep track of their own location.     

Does Outcome Favorability Affect Procedural Fairness as a Result of Self‐Serving Attributions?

In a situation indicating possible pseudo-participation, we examined whether outcome favorability affects perceived procedural fairness and resentment as a result of self-serving attributions for outcomes. Laboratory participants received a production target that was either substantially above (i.e., unfavorable outcome) or substantially below (i.e., favorable outcome) a target they had voiced to a supervisor. As hypothesized, outcome favorability was related to procedural fairness (positively) and resentment (negatively) among participants who lacked persuasive evidence of pseudo-participation. In support of the idea that these effects were a result of self-serving attributions, rather than instrumental concerns, they did not emerge among participants who had persuasive evidence of pseudo-participation.