Pictorial depth and the Poggendorff illusion

An informal demonstration is offered, which strongly supports previous contentions that, when the elements of a Poggendorff display appear to be arranged in pictorial space such that the two critical line segments are at different heights, an illusory impression of misalignment may occur. A second pair of demonstrations shows, however, that such a height difference is neither a necessary nor a sufficient cause of the illusion. In addition, the harmful effect of adding certain pictorial elements to the standard Poggendorff pattern requires a new understanding.     

Home literacy experiences and literacy acquisition among children in Guangzhou, south China

Sénéchal's research in the West with English- and French-speaking children included positive relations of the development of literacy skills with home literacy experiences. There is a need to extend this research to other countries, especially in China where few studies have been done. This study examined relations of parental reports of formal and informal home literacy variables with Chinese children's vocabulary and written language development. Consistent with previous studies in the West, informal home literacy experiences were associated with Chinese children's vocabulary knowledge, and formal literacy experiences with reading skills. These findings fit previous research which distinguishes formal and informal literacy experiences in relation to children's performance on reading and language skills, and indicates reading to children is less effective for acquisition of print-specific skills.     

开展大学生死亡教育的成效分析

死亡教育既是医学教育应有的内容,同时又是通向其终级目标的一个有效途径,"向死而生"则是死亡教育的核心价值理念.开展死亡教育,能够帮助大学生正确认识死亡,使其自觉地对自我生存境遇进行体察,克服对死亡的恐惧和焦虑,省思生命,明晰生命的真谛,进而超越死亡,展现人性光辉,活出人生意义,这也是死亡教育意义的价值指向.     

急性肺损伤生物标志物研究进展

急性肺损伤是临床常见的呼吸系统急危重症,是多个危险因素直接或间接引起肺部损伤的连续病理过程,低氧血症为其特征,其发病机制复杂,病亡率高,目前临床上仍缺乏有效的早期诊断方法,严重影响了疾病的预后,因此需寻找一个简单有效的诊断方法,如血清生物标志物的测定等来帮助本病的诊断以取得更好的疗效。     

Association of solitary binge drinking and suicidal behavior among emerging adult college students

[Correction Notice: An Erratum for this article was reported in Vol 26(3) of Psychology of Addictive Behaviors (see record 2012-13892-001). In the article, there is an error in the introductory paragraph. The number of students who had seriously considered attempting suicide in the Barrios, Everett, Simon, & Brener (2000) study should have been reported as 11.4%, not 1.4%. Additionally, in the Participants section, data for the study were collected from March 2009 to September 2010, not March 2009 to January 2010 as reported.] Emerging adult college students who binge drink in solitary contexts (i.e., while alone) experience greater depression and suicidal ideation than do students who only binge drink in social contexts, suggesting that they may be at greater risk for suicidal behavior. This study examined the association of a previous suicide attempt, one of the best predictors of future suicide attempts and suicide, and severity of recent suicidal ideation with drinking in solitary and social contexts. Participants were binge drinking, emerging adult (18- to 25-year-old) college students (N = 182) drawn from two studies of college drinkers. A logistic regression analysis revealed that both suicide attempt history and severity of suicidal ideation were significantly associated with a greater likelihood of being a solitary binge drinker as opposed to only a social binge drinker. Students with a previous suicide attempt were nearly four times more likely to be solitary binge drinkers. Multiple regression analyses revealed that suicide attempt history was significantly associated with greater frequency and quantity of drinking in solitary, but not social contexts. Suicidal ideation was significantly associated with drinks per solitary drinking day, but not frequency of solitary drinking once suicide attempt history was accounted for. Given the associations found between solitary binge drinking and a history of suicide attempts, as well as greater severity of recent suicidal ideation, it appears that these students are in need of suicide prevention efforts, including treatment efforts aimed at reducing binge drinking. (PsycINFO Database Record (c) 2012 APA, all rights reserved).     

The Relationship Between Narcissism and Friendship Qualities in Adolescents: Gender as a Moderator

The present study explored the gender characteristics of narcissism as well as its relationship with friendship quality dimensions (i.e., trust & support, validation, and disclosure & communication) among 485 (197 boys and 288 girls) junior high and high school adolescents in a Southwest province in China. Significant gender differences were found, such that boys were more narcissistic than girls,while girls reported higher levels of friendship qualities, including validation and disclosure & communication. To examine gender moderations in the relationships between narcissism and friendship quality dimensions, multiple-group (by boys and girls) structural equation modeling were conducted. The results revealed the significant gender moderations in the associations between narcissism and friendship quality dimensions, while controlling for adolescent grade level. Specifically, narcissism significantly and positively related to the three aspects of friendship qualities (i.e., trust & support, validation, and disclosure & communication) among boys, but was not related to friendship quality among girls. Discussions are provided for an understanding of the current findings in the Chinese cultural context.     

Exposure to nature counteracts aggression after depletion

Acts of self‐control are more likely to fail after previous exertion of self‐control, known as the ego depletion effect. Research has shown that depleted participants behave more aggressively than non‐depleted participants, especially after being provoked. Although exposure to nature (e.g., a walk in the park) has been predicted to replenish resources common to executive functioning and self‐control, the extent to which exposure to nature may counteract the depletion effect on aggression has yet to be determined. The present study investigated the effects of exposure to nature on aggression following depletion. Aggression was measured by the intensity of noise blasts participants delivered to an ostensible opponent in a competition reaction‐time task. As predicted, an interaction occurred between depletion and environmental manipulations for provoked aggression. Specifically, depleted participants behaved more aggressively in response to provocation than non‐depleted participants in the urban condition. However, provoked aggression did not differ between depleted and non‐depleted participants in the natural condition. Moreover, within the depletion condition, participants in the natural condition had lower levels of provoked aggression than participants in the urban condition. This study suggests that a brief period of nature exposure may restore self‐control and help depleted people regain control over aggressive urges.

     

Acculturation, enculturation, and Asian American college students' mental health and attitudes toward seeking professional psychological help

In the present study, we tested a theoretically and empirically derived partially indirect effects acculturation and enculturation model of Asian American college students' mental health and attitudes toward seeking professional psychological help. Latent variable path analysis with 296 self-identified Asian American college students supported the partially indirect effects model and demonstrated the ways in which behavioral acculturation, behavioral enculturation, values acculturation, values enculturation, and acculturation gap family conflict related to mental health and attitudes toward seeking professional psychological help directly and indirectly through acculturative stress. We also tested a generational status moderator hypothesis to determine whether differences in model-implied relationships emerged across U.S.- (n = 185) and foreign-born (n = 107) participants. Consistent with this hypothesis, statistically significant differences in structural coefficients emerged across generational status. Limitations, future directions for research, and counseling implications are discussed.     

中国诗歌的现实主义传统与五四新诗

与西方诗歌相比,中国是个有着更悠久、更强大的现实主义传统.这与中国传统的文化思想有关,更与中国古典诗歌的特点有关.中国诗歌的现实主义直接影响了五四初期的新诗.初期新诗反叛了中国古典诗歌的形式(语言、格式、韵律等),实现了诗体大解放,但却继承了现实主义传统,并在当时的文学思潮、新诗理论观念的氛围中,形成了现代诗歌中最初的现实主义浪潮.     

Working memory representations persist in the face of unexpected task alterations

It is well known that information can be held in memory while performing other tasks concurrently, such as remembering a color or number during a separate visual search task. However, it is not clear what happens to stored information in the face of unexpected tasks, such as the surprise questions that are often used in experiments related to inattentional and change blindness. Does the unpredicted shift in task context cause memory representations to be cleared in anticipation of new information? To answer this question, we ran two experiments where the task unexpectedly switched partway through the experiment with a surprise question. Half of the participants were asked to report the same attribute (Exp. 1?=?Identity, Exp. 2?=?Color) of a target stimulus in both presurprise and postsurprise trials, while for the other half, the reported attribute switched from identity to color (Exp. 1) or vice versa (Exp. 2). Importantly, all participants had to read an unexpected set of instructions and respond differently on the surprise trial. Accuracy on the surprise trial was higher for the same-attribute groups than the different-attribute groups. Furthermore, there was no difference in reaction time on the surprise trial between the two groups. These results suggest that information participants expected to report can survive an encounter with an unexpected task. The implication is that failures to report information on a surprise trial in many experiments reflect genuine differences in memory encoding, rather than forgetting or overwriting induced by the surprise question.