Social representations of organ donors and non‐donors

This paper illustrates the empirical investigation of social representations by means of photographs as stimulus material and the technique of correspondence analysis to study the resulting data. The research was part of a campaign carried out to promote organ donation in Malta. The study tries to find out whether a public communication campaign could change perceptions. Five focus groups were held before the campaign and another five, two months after the campaign. Part of the data collected through these focus groups was analysed using correspondence analysis. The results showed that before the campaign, donors were generally perceived to be either young or important people or public personalities. After the campaign, donors were perceived more to be ordinary family people, educated, generous and religious. On the other hand, before the campaign, non‐donors were seen as conservative, uncouth and uncaring, whereas after the campaign non‐donors were generally perceived to be older, uninformed and uneducated people. Copyright © 2005 John Wiley & Sons, Ltd.     

Close coupling between eye movements and serial attentional refreshing during multiple-identity tracking

Multiple-identity tracking (MIT) is a dynamic task in which observers track multiple moving objects of distinct identities and then report the location of each target object. The present study examined participant’ eye movements during MIT in order to investigate the relationship between eye movements and attentional performance during the task. The results showed that fixations were predominately directed to individual targets during tracking. When successfully landed on targets, the fixations dwelled for longer duration; otherwise, they were terminated quickly. As the attentional demands for processing the targets increased, fixations landed on the targets more frequently while fixations outside targets decreased both in number and duration. The attentionally more demanding targets were fixated more frequently than the attentionally less demanding ones. The most recently fixated target was tracked with higher performance, while the tracking accuracy for the more previously fixated targets gradually decreased. Taken together, the results indicate that fixations are tightly coupled with attention during MIT, switching serially from target to target for refreshing each object representation to facilitate the tracking of identities and locations of multiple targets.     

TV heroes: The impact of rhetoric and deeds

Two experiments examined the influence of children's cartoons and their prosocial messages on the behavior and judgments of kindergarten, second, and fourth grade children. Three conditions or types of programs were used: purely prosocial (moral lesson but no aggression); and purely aggressive (no moral lesson). Behavioral, evaluative, and comprehension measures were taken. All children were able to distinguish the protagonist and antagonist. Older children grasped the implications of the stories but younger children, especially those in the prosocial/aggressive condition, did not. Scores of children in the prosocial/aggressive condition were significantly lower on message comprehension than those of subjects in the purely prosocial condition. Implications for the relationship of behaviors (prosocial actions) to judgments, portrayal of aggressive heroes on television programs, and the acceptance of aggression as normative behaviors, are discussed.     

A measure for the assessment of eating disorders: reliability and validity studies of the Rating of Anorexia and Bulimia interview - revised version (RAB-R)

The Rating of Anorexia and Bulimia interview (RAB) is a Swedish semi-structured interview for clinical and research purposes for a wide range of eating disorder symptoms and related psychopathology. The objectives were to evaluate the reliability and validity of a revised RAB version (RAB-R). The RAB-R was assessed in terms of internal consistency, inter-rater and test-retest reliability, and criterion and convergent validity. Samples included a clinical sample of eating disorder patients (n = 71) and a sample of randomly drawn female controls (n = 31). The RAB-R showed satisfactory internal consistency, inter-rater and test-retest reliability, correlated well with related measures, and discriminated between patients and normal controls. We conclude that the RAB-R is a promising interview instrument and continued evaluation should focus on comparing subgroups of eating disorder patients with other clinical groups.     

Down But Not Yet Out: Depression,Political Efficacy,and Voting

Depression is one of the most common health problems in the developed world. Previous research has primarily investigated the relationship between depression and voting, largely overlooking its cognitive foundations. We turn to political efficacy as a key political attitude and precondition for political engagement. We build on research into the cognitive aspects of depression to construct arguments linking depression, political efficacy, and voting. Using cross-sectional (European Social Survey) and longitudinal (U.K. Household Longitudinal Study) data, we find evidence for a negative relationship between depression and political efficacy, that depression reduces external but not necessarily internal political efficacy, and for an accumulation effect of depression on (external) political efficacy. We also show that political efficacy is a crucial mechanism for the depression–voting gap. Our research has important implications for political representation.     

Quantified Hintikka-style epistemic logic

This paper contains a formal treatment of the system of quantified epistemic logic sketched in Appendix II of Carlson (1983). Section 1 defines the syntax and recapitulates the model set rules and principles of the Appendix system. Section 2 defines a possible worlds semantics for this system, and shows that the Appendix system is complete with respect to this semantics. Section 3 extends the system by an explicit truth operatorT it is true that and considers quantification over nonexistent individuals. Section 4 formalizes the idea of variable identity criteria typical of Hintikkian epistemic logic.     

Bodily maps of emotions across child development

Different basic emotions (anger, fear, disgust, happiness, sadness, and surprise) are consistently associated with distinct bodily sensation maps, which may underlie subjectively felt emotions. Here we investigated the development of bodily sensations associated with basic emotions in 6‐ to 17‐year‐old children and adolescents (n = 331). Children as young as 6 years of age associated statistically discernible, discrete patterns of bodily sensations with happiness, fear, and surprise, as well as with emotional neutrality. The bodily sensation maps changed from less to more specific, adult‐like patterns as a function of age. We conclude that emotion‐related bodily sensations become increasingly discrete over child development. Developing awareness of their emotion‐related bodily sensations may shape the way children perceive, label, and interpret emotions.     

Low-noise microvolt level calibrator for measurement of performance of biosignal recording systems

A calibrator, the noise level of which is below the noise level generated in the preamplifier system, was needed for testing and development of a multichannel recording system. A multichannel preamplifier head assembly was used for recording cortical, subcortical, and cerebellar slow potentials and multiunit activity in freely moving cats and restrained rabbits. An inexpensive, battery-powered, lownoise voltage signal generator for calibration of the preamplifiers is described. The circuit provides a square-wave output at a frequency of 10 or 1000 Hz, and the peak-to-peak (p-p) amplitude can be selected at 10, 100, or 1000µV. The measured output noise of the calibrator is below 2µV (p-p, 0.1–6000 Hz). The frequency and amplitude values can be easily adapted for different purposes by changing a few component values. An amplified (gain 1,000×) test output for direct oscilloscope monitoring is included in the calibrator circuit.     

Sex differences in the patterning of adult roles as a determinant of sex differences in occupational achievement

A sample of 4,035 men and women from the Project TALENT high school class of 1963 cohort was examined to determine the extent to which sex differences in the patterning of adult roles contribute to observed sex differences in occupational achievement. Men and women were found to differ in the comparative timing, ordering, and continuity of educational, occupational, marital, and procreational roles in early adulthood. These differences in role patterns explained only a small portion of the observed sex differences in occupational attainment, as sex appeared to be a strong direct determinant of both role patterns and attainment. However, some aspects of the patterning of these roles appeared to have an independent influence on occupational attainment; in these instances, the patterns associated with lower earnings were more likely to have been followed by women. Further investigation of the impact of variations in the patterning of adult roles on women's (and men's) occupational achievement is recommended.This work was supported by Grant MH29509 from the National Institute of Mental Health.     

The effect of severe carotid occlusive disease and its surgical treatment on cognitive functions of the brain

Surgery of a high-grade carotid stenosis is evidence-based stroke prevention. Also cognitive effects are reported after carotid endarterectomy (CEA): both deterioration and improvement, the former attributed to perioperative complications and the latter often to learning effect. By imaging, brain perfusion and diffusion changes were shown in subjects with a high-grade stenosis undergoing CEA. We wanted to find out if the cognition of patients undergoing CEA display postoperative worsening or true improvement in association with findings in serial MR imaging. The patients had a poorer overall cognition than healthy matched controls. The cerebral hemisphere ipsilateral to the stenosis had higher diffusion and more sluggish perfusion leading to perfusion deficits. These asymmetries were abolished by CEA. Postoperatively, the patients showed a trend for cognitive worsening, most often attentional, but over months, the group performance improved similarly to the controls. Still, lower baseline perfusion was associated with a greater cognitive improvement, most clearly in executive functions. Consequently, despite the risk for transient decline, true cognitive benefit by CEA seems possible.