A negative order-repetition priming effect: inhibition of order in unattended auditory sequences?

A novel negative priming (NP) effect is reported in which serial recall for a sequence of visually presented digits was poorer if the same sequence was presented as an irrelevant auditory sequence on the previous trial (Experiments 1 and 2). The effect was enhanced when attention was divided between the to-be-repeated auditory sequence and the concurrent to-be-remembered (TBR) sequence (Experiment 3). When the TBR sequences were also presented auditorily, NP arose only when the repeated TBR sequence was in the same voice as the previous irrelevant sequence; a voice mismatch produced positive priming (Experiment 4). The results suggest that the order of auditory events is registered preattentively and that inhibition may be applied to the acoustic transitions between irrelevant events.     

Learning myopia: an adaptive recency effect in category learning

Recency effects (REs) have been well established in memory and probability learning paradigms but have received little attention in category earning research. Extant categorization models predict REs to be unaffected by learning, whereas a functional interpretation of REs, suggested by results in other domains, predicts that people are able to learn sequential dependencies and incorporate this information into their responses. These contrasting predictions were tested in 2 experiments involving a classification task in which outcome sequences were autocorrelated. Experiment 1 showed that reliance on recent outcomes adapts to the structure of the task, in contrast to models' predictions. Experiment 2 provided constraints on how sequential information is learned and suggested possible extensions to current models to account for this learning.     

When parallel processing in visual word recognition is not enough: new evidence from naming

Low-frequency irregular words are named more slowly and are more error prone than low-frequency regular words (the regularity effect). Rastle and Coltheart (1999) reported that this irregularity cost is modulated by the serial position of the irregular grapheme-phoneme correspondence, such that words with early irregularities exhibit a larger cost than words with late ones. They argued that these data implicate rule-based serial processing, and they also reported a successful simulation with a model that has a rule-based serial component—the DRC model of reading aloud (Coltheart, Rastle, Perry, Langdon, & Ziegler, 2001). However, Zorzi (2000) also simulated these data with a model that operates solely in parallel. Furthermore, Kwantes and Mewhort (1999) simulated these data with a serial processing model that has no rules for converting orthography to phonology. The human data reported by Rastle and Coltheart therefore neither require a serial processing account, nor successfully discriminate among a number of computational models of reading aloud. New data are presented wherein an interaction between the effects of regularity and serial position of irregularity is again reported for human readers. The DRC model simulated this interaction; no other implemented computational model does so. The present results are thus consistent with rule-based serial processing in reading aloud.     

The psychological effects of Hurricane Andrew on ethnic minority and Caucasian children and adolescents: a case study

The impact of Hurricane Andrew on 212 African American, Caucasian, and Hispanic elementary and middle school children was examined at 6 months postdisaster. Using self-report instruments, this case study examined the predictive utility of several hypothesized mediators of children's reactions to disaster. Results showed higher levels of intrusive symptomatology for girls and for elementary school children as compared with their middle school counterparts. No differences were found with reference to race. The lack of findings concerning race is addressed, as well as implications for future studies.     

The ‘redefinition of death’ debate: Western concepts and western bioethics

Biomedicine is a global enterprise constructed upon the belief in the universality of scientific truths. However, despite huge scientific advances over recent decades it has not been able to formulate a specific and universal definition of death: In fact, in its attempt to redefine death, the concept of death appears to have become immersed in ever increasing vagueness and ambiguity. Even more worrisome is that bioethics, in the form of principlism, is also endeavouring to become a global enterprise by claiming neutrality. It appears that the discourse within both disciplines have similarly manipulated the boundaries of death to include the “dying”. This paper argues that the redefinition of death debate in biomedicine reveals a concept of personhood which is profoundly western in origin and which is in accordance to the concept adhered to within principlism. Biomedicine and bioethics do not appear to acknowledge the limitations of their own world view and hence lack an understanding of their applicability and appropriateness in diverse social and cultural contexts; a situation which adds credence to claims as to the hegemonic and imperialistic nature of all such global enterprises. Ms. Jones is an intensive care clinical nursing specialist. Dr. Kessel is a public health physician and medical ethicist.     

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Pastoral Psychology -