The contribution of autobiographical significance to semantic memory

We examined the importance of autobiographical significance (AS) in the representation and organization of semantic memory by examining which famous people are most likely to be associated with specific personal memories and whether or not this AS can be distinguished from other factors, such as familiarity. Norming studies with 45- to 55-year-old and 65- to 80-year-old participants suggested that AS is distinct from familiarity and that it interacts closely with emotional salience. Furthermore, in a set of experiments, we tested the hypothesis that AS is an important organizing principle in long-term episodic and semantic memory by contrasting performances on tests of recall, recognition, fame judgment, and speeded reading for famous names judged to be of either high or low personal relevance. Participants demonstrated a performance advantage (i.e., enhanced memory and faster responding) for autobiographically significant famous names, regardless of whether their own judgments or others' judgments were used to classify the names. The implications of these findings for models of semantic memory are discussed.     

Effects of syntactic category assignment on lexical ambiguity resolution in reading: an eye movement analysis

Readers' eye movements were monitored as they read sentences containing lexically ambiguous words whose meanings share a single syntactic category (e.g., calf), lexically ambiguous words whose meanings belong to different syntactic categories (e.g., duck), or unambiguous control words. Information provided prior to the target always unambiguously specified the context-appropriate syntactic-category assignment for the target. Fixation times were longer on ambiguous words whose meanings share a single syntactic category than on controls, both when prior context was semantically consistent with the subordinate interpretation of a biased ambiguous word (Experiment 1) and when prior context was semantically neutral as to the intended interpretation of a balanced ambiguous word (Experiment 2). These ambiguity effects, which resulted from differences in difficulty with meaning resolution, were not found when the ambiguity crossed syntactic categories. These data indicate that, in the absence of syntactic ambiguity, syntactic-category information mediates the semantic-resolution process.     

Inferred goals in narratives: evidence from self-paced reading,recall, and eye movements

Three convergent methodologies were used to investigate the generation and reinstatement of goals not explicitly stated in a text. Readers read paragraphs adapted from J. S. Huitema, S. Dopkins, C. M. Klin, & J. L. Myers's (1993) study, which conveyed a character's goal early in the text. The goal was either stated explicitly or implied. An event was described later in the text that was either consistent or inconsistent with the goal. Line-by-line reading data, recall for the narratives, and eye-movement data were collected. Evidence is presented that readers infer a character's goal online at the time the information is presented, and the inferred goal functions like an explicitly stated goal in online comprehension processes and in the resulting memory representation.     

Apparent distance of sounds recorded in echoic and anechoic chambers

With miniature microphones inserted into the external ear canals of a model and the sound source 90 degrees to left of midline, low-pass, and broadband noise bursts were picked up and recorded on magnetic tape. The bursts were generated in two highly contrasting acoustic environments: an anechoic and an echoic chamber. The taped sounds were played back monaurally and binaurally via headphones to 16 listeners seated in an acoustically neutral setting. They were instructed to estimate the distance of the stimuli. Apparent distances of bursts recorded in the echoic or reverberant chamber far exceeded those recorded in the anechoic chamber. It mattered not whether the sounds were presented monaurally or binaurally. What did influence distance estimates dramatically was the frequency composition of the stimuli. Low-pass sounds recorded in either acoustic environment were consistently judged to be further removed than high-pass sounds recorded in the same setting. They were also more likely to appear from behind the listener. In our moment-to-moment transaction with the acoustic environment, distant sounds generally have less acoustic energy in the higher audio frequency. We suggest that this lifetime of auditory experience influenced our listeners' scale of relative distance.     

The relational-interdependent self-construal and relationships

Three studies describe the development and validation of a measure of the relational-interdependent self-construal, which is defined as the tendency to think of oneself in terms of relationships with close others. Study 1 reports the development, psychometric properties, and tests of validity of this new measure. Individuals who scored high on the Relational-Interdependent Self-Construal (RISC) Scale characterized their important relationships as closer and more committed than did individuals who scored low on this measure (Study 1) and were more likely to take into account the needs and wishes of others when making decisions (Study 2). In Study 3, using a dyadic interaction paradigm with previously unacquainted participants, the partners of persons who scored high on the RISC scale viewed them as open and responsive to their needs and concerns; these perceptions were related to positive evaluations of the relationship.     

Estradiol enhances the induction of homosynaptic long-term depression in the CA1 region of the adult, ovariectomized rat

An ovarian steroid-dependent cycle of synaptogenesis and synapse shedding occurs naturally in the hippocampus of the adult female rat. The newly formed axospinous synapses in CA1 may differ functionally from extant axospinous synapses, e.g., in terms of their modifiability. Here we assess whether estradiol alters the induction of homosynaptic long-term depression of the Schaffer collateral-CA1 synapses in vitro. Sprague-Dawley rats were bilaterally ovariectomized and, beginning 6-8 days later, received a series of injections of either 17beta-estradiol or sesame oil sc. Field potentials were recorded in hippocampal slices. In estradiol-treated animals, asynchronous, low-frequency stimulation led to significant long-term depression of the activated synapses in CA1 s. radiatum and no change of the inactive synapses in s. oriens. In contrast, this conditioning stimulation did not significantly alter any CA1 responses in oil-treated control animals. Subsequent high-frequency conditioning stimulation significantly potentiated the activated s. radiatum synapses in both estradiol- and oil-treated animals. Thus, given the stimulation conditions used here, estradiol enables the induction of homosynaptic long-term depression at the CA3-CA1 synapses in adult females.     

Suggestion and psychoanalytic technique

The role of the analyst's suggestive influence on the course and outcome of psychoanalytic treatment is explored, and traditional and newer perspectives on analytic technique are contrasted. The intersubjective critique of the neutral, objective analyst in relation to suggestion is examined. The inevitable presence and need for suggestive factors in analysis, and the relationship of suggestion to transference susceptibility, are emphasized. The manner in which the analysis of suggestive factors is subsumed in transference analysis as part of traditional technique is highlighted.     

Prediction of serial perpetrator residence: Part I—Induction of models utilising spatio-temporal routing functions and investigative information

This article presents a new framework for the geographic profiling problem which assesses and integrates the travel environment of road networks; beliefs and assumptions formed through the investigation process about the perpetrator; and information derived from the analysis of evidence. Each piece of information is evaluated in conjunction with functions which gather real-time travel information, including both time and distance of likely perpetrator travel, and is then used to update prior beliefs about the potential base of operation of the perpetrator. A novel approach was developed to generate geographic profiles given different amounts of information about the perpetrator: a centrographic strategy for when only the victim dump sites are known; a perpetrator trek strategy for instances where both victim encounter and dump sites are available; and a formal evidence-driven model which leverages and integrates available information and evidence relevant to the case for the development of a geographic profile. A follow-up article will evaluate these models through a comprehensive application to the Yorkshire Ripper investigation (see Part II).