When-questions: A study of how children linguistically encode temporal information

Sixty children between the ages of 4 and 7 years and 10 adults were presented with a series of stories illustrated by five pictures in a comic strip format. Each story was follwed by either a when-, why-, or control question. With respect to the when-questions, some of the stories involved causally related events while others did not. An analysis of the responses supported the hypotheses that causal relationships play an important role in the development of the ability to encode temporal relationships in response to when-questions.This research was supported by PSCBHE Grant No. 6-62123 from the City University of New York to the second author. The authors greatly appreciate the assistance of the directors, teachers, and children of the Chatsworth Avenue Elementary School, the Larchmont Avenue Church Nursery School, the Larchmont Temple Nursery School, and the Little School in Larchmont, New York. We would also like to thank Dr. Louis Hsu for his advice concerning     

Posture and gaze in early mother–infant communication: synchronization of developmental trajectories

Weekly laboratory observations of free play for 13 middle-income mother–infant dyads, from 1 to 6 months of age, were used to study the synchronization of developmental trajectories between infant postural position and gaze direction. Mothers sat in a straight-backed chair while holding infants on their laps and were free to adjust the infant’s posture. Postural position was coded as upright (supported sitting or standing on the mother’s lap) or other (lying, cradling, or being held close to mother). Gaze was coded as either at mother’s face or away. The age of onset of visually guided reaching was also assessed. Results show that there were longer durations of gazing away when the infant was in an upright position. Over the 5 month period of observation, the dyads began with a pattern of non-upright positions accompanied by gaze at mother. Contrary to previous predictions, the developmental shift in the first 6 months from exclusive gazing at mother’s face to gazing away from mother was not synchronized with the development of reaching, but rather with changes in the infant’s posture to more upright positions. The possible role of postural position in fostering positive emotional communication is discussed.     

The Effectiveness and Trustworthiness of Faith-Based and Other Service Organizations: A Study of Recipients' Perceptions

Drawing on a new community study of more than 2,000 residents of low-income neighborhoods, we examine information about the kinds of service organizations respondents have contacted for assistance and the perceptions of these respondents about the effectiveness and trustworthiness of those organizations. We compare contact with and perceptions of faith-based organizations, nonsectarian organizations, government agencies, hospitals, and churches and employ a method that takes account of respondents' varying portfolios of service providers. The results indicate that the recipients of faith-based organizations resemble those of the public welfare department in the extent of financial need and scope of family problems, and differ significantly from recipients of help from congregations. The results also indicate that recipients' evaluations of the effectiveness and trustworthiness of their portfolio of service organizations are lower when they have sought assistance from public welfare agencies and higher when they have sought assistance from congregations, but are not significantly affected by having contacted faith-based or nonsectarian organizations.     

Who art thou? Personality predictors of artistic preferences in a large UK sample: The importance of openness

The present study examined individual differences in artistic preferences in a sample of 91,692 participants (60% women and 40% men), aged 13–90 years. Participants completed a Big Five personality inventory ( Goldberg, 1999 ) and provided preference ratings for 24 different paintings corresponding to cubism, renaissance, impressionism, and Japanese art, which loaded on to a latent factor of overall art preferences. As expected, the personality trait openness to experience was the strongest and only consistent personality correlate of artistic preferences, affecting both overall and specific preferences, as well as visits to galleries, and artistic (rather than scientific) self‐perception. Overall preferences were also positively influenced by age and visits to art galleries, and to a lesser degree, by artistic self‐perception and conscientiousness (negatively). As for specific styles, after overall preferences were accounted for, more agreeable, more conscientious and less open individuals reported higher preference levels for impressionist, younger and more extraverted participants showed higher levels of preference for cubism (as did males), and younger participants, as well as males, reported higher levels of preferences for renaissance. Limitations and recommendations for future research are discussed.     

Medial prefrontal cortex infusions of bupivacaine or AP-5 block extinction of amphetamine conditioned place preference

The present experiments used reversible lesion techniques and intra-mPFC infusions of the n-methyl d-aspartate (NMDA) receptor antagonist d,l-2-amino-5-phosphonovaleric acid (AP-5) to examine the role of the mPFC in extinction of an amphetamine conditioned place preference (CPP). Following initial training and testing for an amphetamine (2 mg/kg) CPP, adult male Long–Evans rats were given extinction trials that were identical to training, except in the absence of peripheral amphetamine injections. Immediately prior to each extinction trial, rats received intra-mPFC infusions of the anesthetic drug bupivacaine (0.75% solution/0.5 μl), AP-5 (1.25, 2.5, 5.0 μg/0.5 μl), or saline. Following extinction training, rats were given a second CPP test session. Rats receiving intra-mPFC infusions of saline displayed extinction of CPP behavior. In contrast, intra-mPFC infusions of bupivacaine or AP-5 (2.5, 5.0 μg) blocked CPP extinction. The findings indicate (1) the mPFC mediates extinction of approach behavior to drug-associated environmental contexts, and (2) NMDA receptor blockade within the mPFC is sufficient to block extinction of amphetamine CPP behavior.     

Are internet cafés gendered spaces?

This study compared gender differences in the intention and behavior of university students with regard to visiting Internet cafés. The results revealed that males experienced significantly lower social pressure and had more positive attitudes than females. Males had significantly higher perceptions of control, past behavior, intention, and behavior than did females. Additionally, past behavior was the most influential factor in predicting intention and behavior. Two conclusions were drawn: (1) Internet cafés were speculated as a masculine gaming space and thus considered highly gendered. (2) Male and female respondents exhibited similar patterns when predicting their intention and behavior toward visiting Internet cafés.     

Factors influencing player preferences for heroic roles in role-playing games.

Two studies were conducted to investigate whether player personality or social cognition influence preferences for heroic roles in role-playing games (RPG). In Study 1, 149 teenager subjects were categorized into five groups according to the Guilford Personality Inventory. Heroes were clustered into three types based on their attributes. The analysis of variance (ANOVA) results indicated that each personality group did not display distinctive preference for any particular heroic type. However, of the three heroic types teenagers most strongly preferred, Justice Warrior was followed, in order of preference, by Visionary Leader and Saint. In Study 2, the influence of three player social cognition factors (similarity, proximity, and familiarity) on player preference for heroic roles was studied. Multiple regression analysis results indicated that similarity and familiarity predicted player preferences for heroic roles.     

Sequence‐specific procedural learning deficits in children with specific language impairment

This study tested the procedural deficit hypothesis of specific language impairment (SLI) by comparing children's performance in two motor procedural learning tasks and an implicit verbal sequence learning task. Participants were 7‐ to 11‐year‐old children with SLI (n = 48), typically developing age‐matched children (n = 20) and younger typically developing children matched for receptive grammar (n = 28). In a serial reaction time task, the children with SLI performed at the same level as the grammar‐matched children, but poorer than age‐matched controls in learning motor sequences. When tested with a motor procedural learning task that did not involve learning sequential relationships between discrete elements (i.e. pursuit rotor), the children with SLI performed comparably with age‐matched children and better than younger grammar‐matched controls. In addition, poor implicit learning of word sequences in a verbal memory task (the Hebb effect) was found in the children with SLI. Together, these findings suggest that SLI might be characterized by deficits in learning sequence‐specific information, rather than generally weak procedural learning.     

The probabilistic analysis of language acquisition: theoretical, computational, and experimental analysis

There is much debate over the degree to which language learning is governed by innate language-specific biases, or acquired through cognition-general principles. Here we examine the probabilistic language acquisition hypothesis on three levels: We outline a novel theoretical result showing that it is possible to learn the exact generative model underlying a wide class of languages, purely from observing samples of the language. We then describe a recently proposed practical framework, which quantifies natural language learnability, allowing specific learnability predictions to be made for the first time. In previous work, this framework was used to make learnability predictions for a wide variety of linguistic constructions, for which learnability has been much debated. Here, we present a new experiment which tests these learnability predictions. We find that our experimental results support the possibility that these linguistic constructions are acquired probabilistically from cognition-general principles.