Attentional modulation of perceptual comparison for feature binding

We investigated the neural correlates of attentional modulation in the perceptual comparison process for detecting feature-binding changes in an event-related functional magnetic resonance imaging (fMRI) experiment. Participants performed a variant of a cued change detection task. They viewed a memory array, a spatial retro-cue, and later a probe array. Their task was to judge whether the cued item had changed between the two arrays. Change type was manipulated to be a color-location binding or a color feature change. The retro-cue onset time in the retention interval was manipulated to be early or late. As a consequence of strong inter-item competition, we found strong prefrontal activation for late cues when contrasting the binding-change with the color-change condition. In contrast, we observed a comparable behavioral and neural effect between the two types of change detection when retro-cue was presented early. More importantly, we demonstrated a significant inter-regional correlation between the prefrontal and parietal regions in both binding- and color-change conditions for late cues. In addition, extensive prefrontal-parietal-visual functional connectivity was showed for detecting binding changes in the late-cueing condition. These results support the critical role in prefrontal-parietal-visual functional coupling for resolving strong inter-item competition during the comparison process in the binding-change condition. We provide direct evidence that attention modulates neural activity associated with perceptual comparison, biasing competition in favour of the task-relevant information in order to detect binding changes.     

奖励和惩罚在注意控制过程中的优化和分离：眼动研究

通过两个眼动实验考察金钱奖励和惩罚引起的动机对个体在不同空间线索条件下注意控制加工的影响。实验1采用朝向/反向眼跳范式, 被试通过内源性线索提供心理准备的情况下做出简单的朝向眼跳以及需要抑制优势反应的反向眼跳。结果发现, 相比无奖惩条件, 奖励条件下朝向眼跳任务的正确率更高, 惩罚条件下反向眼跳任务的正确率更高; 两种眼跳任务中有奖惩条件下的眼跳峰速度均比无奖惩条件高。实验2采用Go/No-go任务, 进一步探讨了由副中央凹加工外源性边缘线索从而不能提供充分心理准备的情况下奖励和惩罚对注意控制的影响。结果发现, 奖励条件下Go反应的眼跳潜伏期更短, 惩罚条件下No-go反应正确率更高, 眼跳峰速度在两种条件下均比无奖惩条件高。以上结果表明, 奖励和惩罚均能够促进个体的注意控制, 但二者的加工过程是分离的, 奖励能够改善趋近行为, 惩罚则能够显著促进抑制控制行为, 且奖励和惩罚在注意控制加工过程中具有不同的作用模式, 奖励能够更早唤醒注意控制系统从而更快地促进行为的发生与执行, 惩罚则能够通过调节注意资源促进以目标为导向的行为中对优势反应的抑制。     

Ethical Problems in Planning for and Responses to Pandemic Influenza in Ghana and Malawi

Ethical problems are addressed in various ways within countries in planning for and response to pandemic influenza. Here we report on a qualitative study, in which 46 policymakers in Malawi and Ghana were interviewed on how they identified and resolved ethical problems. The study results revealed that ethical problems involving conflicts of values and choices were raised in reference to the extent and role of resources (inequities) and nature of public health interventions (intrusive measures), including the extent and processes of decision making, reasoning, and justification. There is a need for an ethical framework within pandemic preparedness plans to resolve and avert these problems.     

Maternal Employment and Family Socioeconomic Status: Unique Relations to Maternal Stress,Parenting Beliefs,and Preschoolers’ Adjustment in Taiwanese Families

With the rapid increase in women’s labor force participation in Asia, a greater understanding of the impact of maternal employment on parenting and child development in Asia is much needed. The present study examined the concurrent relations between maternal employment status and family characteristics (e.g., socioeconomic status/SES, family structure) in Taiwanese families, and the unique relations of maternal employment and family SES to maternal stress, parenting beliefs, and preschoolers’ socioemotional adjustment. In a school-based sample of 511 preschoolers (age range?=?4–6 years, 52.9% girls), their mothers, and teachers in Taipei and Taitung, mothers reported their employment status, family characteristics, perceived stress and parenting beliefs. Mothers and teachers rated preschoolers’ adjustment. Results showed that compared to unemployed mothers in Taiwan, employed mothers were more likely to come from families with higher SES and fewer children, and nuclear (vs. extended) families. Structural equation modeling was used to test the hypothesized model. Mothers from lower-SES families reported higher stress and higher endorsement of coercive parenting, and lower endorsement of authoritative parenting than mothers from higher-SES families. Controlling for SES, employed mothers endorsed higher coercive parenting than unemployed mothers. Mothers’ endorsement of authoritative parenting was associated with better child adjustment by mothers’ (but not teachers’) reports, whereas maternal stress and coercive parenting were associated with poorer child adjustment (by mothers’ reports only). In sum, maternal employment was intricately associated with family SES in Taiwanese families, and the two contextual factors shape parenting and child adjustment in different processes.     

Tackling Germany’s Demographic Skills Shortage: Permanent Settlement Intentions of the Recent Wave of Labour Migrants from Non-European Countries

Confronted with structural demographic challenges, during the last decade European countries have adopted new labour migration policies. The sustainability of these policies largely depends on the intentions of migrants to stay in their country of destination for the long term or even permanently. Despite a growing dependence on skilled labour migrants, very little information exists about the dynamics of this new wave of migration and existing research findings with their focus on earlier migrant generations are hardly applicable today. The article comparatively tests major theoretical approaches accounting for permanent settlement intentions of Germany’s most recent labour migrants from non-European countries on the basis of a new administrative dataset. Although the recent wave of labour migrants is on average a privileged group with regard to their human capital, fundamentally different mechanisms are shaping their future migration intentions. In contrast to neo-classical expectations, a first path highlights economic factors that determine temporary stays of a creative class benefiting from opportunities of an increasingly international labour market. Instead, socio-cultural and institutional factors are the decisive determinants of a second path leading towards permanent settlement intentions. Three main factors—language skills, the family context and the legal framework—make migrants stay in Germany, providing important implications for adjusting and strengthening labour migration policies in Europe.     

Shared minds: How mothers and infants co-construct early patterns of choice within intentional communication partnerships

The qualitative research method of case study inquiry is employed to investigate different patterns observed in early communicative interactions between two infants and their mothers. These mothers and babies were similar in significant ways: Both mothers were observed to be competent, well-functioning adults and reported no communicative or parenting dysfunction: both infants were evaluated as developing normally in terms of their cognitive level and acquisition of communication behaviors. However, a difference was observed between the dyads in their effectiveness in contributing to the infants' development as intentional communicators. The extent to which an infant and mother “share minds” is proposed as accounting for the observed difference. This phenomenon of “shared minds” is examined by observing the process of choice co-construction engaged in by mothers and infants during communication. It is concluded that characteristics of these early co-constructions influence the way in which the young child begins to act with intention and to interpret him- or herself and others as intentional communicative beings. © 1997 Michigan Association for Infant Mental Health     

Depressive Symptoms Among Delinquent Youth: Testing Models of Association with Stress and Support

The high prevalence of depression among incarcerated youth indicates a need to better understand factors that contribute to depression within this vulnerable subgroup. Previous research in general community samples has suggested that high levels of stress and low levels of parental support are associated with depression in young people, but it is unclear whether or how they might be associated with depression among incarcerated youth who are already vulnerable. Using a sample of 228 adolescents (aged 13–18 years) who were detained in the juvenile justice system, stress and support were modeled as independent main effects and as interactive risk factors in relation to depressive symptoms. More stressful life events and less caregiver support were each independently associated with depressive symptoms, but no evidence was found for the buffering hypothesis in this sample. Stressful life events were more strongly associated with depressive symptoms among boys compared to girls.     

先前知识对初中学生学习家族相似性类别的影响研究

采用特征—主题的类别学习范式,考察了先前知识对初中学生学习具有家族相似性结构人工类别的影响。结果表明:基于先前知识的主题关系对初中学生的类别学习有显著促进;初中学生在基于已有知识的类别学习中更多地获得了知识关联特征的信息,同时也能对机械特征保持敏感。