Long-term memory for concepts in a California sea lion (<Emphasis Type="Italic">Zalophus californianus</Emphasis>)

An adult California sea lion (Zalophus californianus) with extensive experience in performing discrimination learning tasks was tested to evaluate her long-term memory for two previously learned concepts. An associative concept, that of equivalence classification, was retested after a retention interval of approximately 1 year. The sea lion had originally shown emergent equivalence classification with nonsimilarity-based classes of stimuli in a simple discrimination repeated-reversal procedure as well as in a matching-to-sample procedure. The 1-year memory test revealed no decrement in classification performance in either procedure. A relational concept, that of generalized identity matching, was retested after approximately 10 years. The sea lion had originally received trial-and-error exemplar training with identity matching-to-sample problems prior to transferring the concept to novel stimulus configurations. In the 10-year memory test, the sea lion immediately and reliably applied the previously established identity concept to familiar and novel sets of matching problems. These are the first reports of long-term conceptual memory in a nonprimate species. The experimental findings are consistent with a variety of observations of sea lions in natural settings, which indicate that natal sites, feeding areas, and individuals may be remembered over long periods of time. Electronic Supplementary Material is available if you access this article at http://dx.doi.org/10.1007/s10071-002-0153-8. On that page (frame on the left side), a link takes you directly to the supplementary material. Electronic Publication     

A computational account of altered error processing in older age: Dopamine and the error-related negativity

When participants commit errors or receive feedback signaling that they have made an error, a negative brain potential is elicited. According to Holroyd and Coles’s (in press) neurocomputational model of error processing, this error-related negativity (ERN) is elicited when the brain first detects that the consequences of an action are worse than expected. To study age-related changes in error processing, we obtained performance and ERN measures of younger and high-functioning older adults. Experiment 1 demonstrated reduced ERN amplitudes in older adults in the context of otherwise intact brain potentials. This result could not be attributed to uncertainty about the required response in older adults. Experiment 2 revealed impaired performance and reduced response- and feedback-related ERNs of older adults in a probabilistic learning task. These age changes could be simulated by manipulation of a single parameter of the neurocomputational model, this manipulation corresponding to weakened phasic activity of the mesencephalic dopamine system.     

Glance analysis of driver eye movements to evaluate distraction

With the increasing use of in-vehicle devices in cars, an understanding of the safety implications of secondary tasks has become crucial. It is now possible to study the effects of many in-vehicle devices and tasks on driving by using head-mounted eye-tracking devices (HEDs) to collect eye positions and pupil diameters, which have been considered indicators of attentional focus. The collection of eye-position and pupil-diameter data of automobile drivers under on-road conditions and while completing various secondary tasks is described in this paper. Drivers were asked to drive on a preselected two-lane road for a total distance of 22 miles while gaze data were recorded using a HED. Longer off-road fixation durations were observed in radio-tuning and rearview mirror checking tasks, but not in the odometer checking task. In addition, the standard deviations of fixation displacements during a cognitive task involving the computation of a date for a meeting were shorter than those observed during normal driving.     

Word naming times and psycholinguistic norms for Italian nouns

The present study describes normative measures for 626 Italian simple nouns. The database (LEXVAR. XLS) is freely available for down-loading on the Web site http://wwwistc.ip.rm.cnr.it/material/ database/. For each of the 626 nouns, values for the following variables are reported: age of acquisition, familiarity, imageability, concreteness, adult written frequency, child written frequency, adult spoken frequency, number of orthographic neighbors, mean bigram frequency, length in syllables, and length in letters. A classification of lexical stress and of the type of word-initial phoneme is also provided. The intercorrelations among the variables, a factor analysis, and the effects of variables and of the extracted factors on word naming are reported. Naming latencies were affected primarily by a factor including word length and neighborhood size and by a word frequency factor. Neither a semantic factor including imageability, concreteness, and age of acquisition nor a factor defined by mean bigram frequency had significant effects on pronunciation times. These results hold for a language with shallow orthography, like Italian, for which lexical nonsemantic properties have been shown to affect reading aloud. These norms are useful in a variety of research areas involving the manipulation and control of stimulus attributes.     

Shepherd Ivory Franz: His contributions to neuropsychology and rehabilitation

Shepherd I. Franz was an important figure in psychology of the last century, and historians of psychology have given recognition to much of his work. However, his experimental work with animals and his pioneer investigations in experimental and clinical neuropsychology have been largely ignored. This article reviews his conceptual, assessment, and treatment contributions, including (1) his pioneering work on the use of learned behavior as a baseline for the study of cerebral ablations, (2) his interest in brain plasticity, (3) his development of comprehensive psychological assessment methods, and (4) his work on the rehabilitation of neurological patients with techniques derived from his animal experiments. His work predated much of what is now part of the conceptual substance of the experimental and clinical neurosciences.     

Similar effects of medial supramammillary or systemic injection of chlordiazepoxide on both theta frequency and fixed-interval respondin

The frequency of theta activity may be important for hippocampal function. Anxiolytic drugs reduce theta frequency and have behavioral effects that are similar to those of hippocampal lesions. The effect of the anxiolytic benzodiazepine chlordiazepoxide (CDP) on theta frequency is partially mediated by the medial supramammillary nucleus (mSuM), part of an ascending theta-activating system. Rats were trained on the hippocampal-sensitive fixed-interval 60-sec schedule (FI60). CDP (5 mg/kg i.p.) released responding suppressed by nonreward, seen as increased leverpressing, and reduced theta frequency concurrently. Microinfusion of CDP (20 μg in 0.5 μl saline) into mSuM had as large effects on both frequency and behavior. Other nuclei mediate the benzodiazepine reduction of theta frequency in the open field and the water maze. But the mSuM appears to be the major, if not sole, nucleus controlling theta frequency and, so, hippocampal-mediated behavioral inhibition in the FI60 lever task.     

Effects of stress on nonassociative learning processes in male and female rats

In this study we assessed habituation and sensitization of the acoustic startle response (ASR) to discern whether intense, inescapable stress affects nonassociative learning differently in male and female rats. Rats were inescapably stressed 2 hours per day over 3 consecutive days. ASR magnitudes were measured at several times post-stress (1, 4, 8, and 15 days after cessation). Females generally showed greater ASR magnitudes (compared to males), but both sexes exhibited short and long-term habituation across the testing days. ASR magnitudes were only affected by stress in male subjects. The effect in males was an increase in short-term sensitization of the ASR on post-stress day-4. The results suggest that stressed males and females react differently to ASR testing, in that stress males appear to develop an exaggerated ASR response over repeated test sessions due to short-term sensitization. The source of the short-term sensitization is discussed with regards to possible stress-induced enhanced contextual learning during ASR testing on post-stress day-1.     

Phonological sensitivity and the acquisition of new words in children

Two studies are reported which aimed to examine the relationship between phonological sensitivity and the acquisition of new words that systematically differed in the familiarity of their sound structures. In the first study measures of phonological sensitivity, phonological short-term memory, vocabulary, and nonverbal ability were administered to forty-one 5-year-old children. Phonological sensitivity was related to the paired-associate learning of phonologically unfamiliar words, but not to the learning of familiar words. In the second study a group of 14 nonreading 5-year-old children received phonological sensitivity training. A control group was trained in semantic categorization. After the training, the phonological sensitivity group did perform better on measures of letter knowledge and phonological sensitivity (rhyme and first-sound categorization) and appeared to learn phonologically unfamiliar words more easily. The findings of both studies suggest that phonological sensitivity can support the acquisition of novel words.     

Substantive unconscious and adjective unconscious: the contribution of Wilfred Bion

The author first provides her readers with a brief summary of some of Freud's ideas, as found throughout his work, on the notion of 'unconscious'. The notion of unconscious as noun is contrasted to the idea of unconscious as adjective, this latter being proposed as a quality, or a state, ever temporary, dynamic, and subject to the constant changes going on in the individual's internal psychic world, as well as to external conditions. After presenting some considerations, the author then contrasts the Kleinian model of the mind to the Freudian, and Wilfred Bion's contribution is discussed at some length. Within Bion's conception of psychic functioning, the model of 'dream' is highlighted and, in this regard, clarifications are sought regarding Bion's view of the unconscious. To conclude, a brief and superficial approximation to the work of Carl Jung is touched upon, although the author admits to knowing little of Jung's positions.