Neurophysiological measures of involuntary and voluntary attention allocation and dispositional differences in need for cognition

Need for cognition (NFC) refers to stable individual differences in the intrinsic motivation to engage in and enjoy effortful cognitive endeavors and has been a useful predictor of dispositional differences in information processing. Although cognitive resource allocation conceptualized as cognitive effort is assumed to be the key mediator of NFC-specific processing, to date no research has systematically addressed its underpinnings. Using a neurocognitive paradigm and recording event-related potentials associated with bottom-up and top-down-driven aspects of attention, the present research contributes to filling this gap. In Study 1, high-NFC individuals showed larger P3a amplitudes to contextually novel events, indicating greater involuntary (automatic) attention allocation. This effect was replicated in Study 2, where NFC also was positively correlated with the P3b to target stimuli, indicating voluntary (controlled) processes of attention allocation. Thus, our findings provide first evidence for neurophysiological correlates of NFC and can improve the understanding of NFC-specific processing.     

Similarities and differences in contingency experiences of 3-month-olds across sociocultural contexts

In this study we analyzed similarities and differences in the contingency experiences of 159 three-month-olds from 6 sociocultural contexts. Across contexts, caretakers responded with similar overall contingency levels, vocalizations provided the dominant response as well as the most salient signal, and there was a relative signal-response correspondence. With two exceptions, infants in all samples most often got responses addressing their sense of hearing, followed by the sense of touch and then sight. In response to nondistress vocalizations, infants from independent contexts (Berlin, Los Angeles) experienced more contingent responses addressing their sense of sight than infants from autonomous-related (Beijing, Delhi, urban Nso from Cameroon) or interdependent contexts (rural Nso). Rural Nso infants experienced more contingent responses addressing their sense of touch than infants from all other but the Los Angeles sample. These results support the interpretation of contingent responsiveness as a part of the intuitive parenting program that manifests differentially depending on culture-specific emphases on distal and proximal caretaking.     

Where are the Gender Differences? Male Priming Boosts Spatial Skills in Women

The effects of gender stereotype activation by priming on performance in a spatial task were investigated among a mixed adult sample (including students) of 161 men and women (mean age?=?31.90) from Austria (Europe). They were assigned to one of four experimental groups according to gender and stereotype activation condition. After a male or female gender stereotype activating task, participants worked on a test assessing mental rotation (three-dimensional cube test, Gittler 1990). A significant main effect of priming on the performance in the mental rotation task emerged. Cohen’s d showed a pronounced gender difference emerging only in the female priming condition (d?=?.59), whereas it disappeared in the male priming condition (d?=?.01).     

Development of coronal stop perception: bilingual infants keep pace with their monolingual peers

Previous studies indicate that the discrimination of native phonetic contrasts in infants exposed to two languages from birth follows a different developmental time course from that observed in monolingual infants. We compared infant discrimination of dental (French) and alveolar (English) place variants of /d/ in three groups differing in language experience. At 6-8 months, infants in all three language groups succeeded; at 10-12 months, monolingual English and bilingual but not monolingual French infants distinguished this contrast. Thus, for highly frequent, similar phones, despite overlap in cross-linguistic distributions, bilingual infants performed on par with their English monolingual peers and better than their French monolingual peers.     

Paranoia and conspiracy thinking of Jews, Arabs, Germans, and Russians in a Polish sample

The study examined the relationship between paranoia and conspiracy thinking of Jews, Arabs, Germans, and Russians among 50 university student volunteers using Fenigstein and Vanable's Paranoia Scale for nonclinical populations and the Conspiracy Beliefs Scale. The scores for conspiracy stereotypes of all the nationalities were positively correlated with paranoia.     

Conspiracy stereotyping and perceptions of group entitativity of Jews, Germans, Arabs and homosexuals by Polish students

The relationship among conspiracy stereotypes and perceived entitativity (the degree to which a collection of persons are perceived as being bonded together in a homogeneous entity) of Jews, Germans, Arabs, and homosexuals was examined. 63 volunteer university students answered the Conspiracy Beliefs Scale and the Group Entitativity Scale. The conspiracy stereotypes of all the categories were positively correlated with scores for perceived entitativity. The perception of entitativity seems to be an important factor in conspiracy stereotyping and therefore in intergroup relations.     

Champ or chump: strategic utilization of dual social identities of others

The Jamaican‐born, Canadian sprinter, Ben Johnson, won the gold medal at the 1988 Olympics, but afterward was disqualified for steroid use. At the time Johnson's identity in the Canadian media appeared to shift—he was ‘Canadian’ after winning the gold medal but ‘Jamaican’ after disqualification. We tested this hypothesis via an archival study of a newspaper database of Canadian newspapers. The results confirmed the speculation. In the second study with Canadian research participants, the nationality of a fictional athlete was experimentally manipulated. He either possessed Canadian‐ American (shared) or Belgian‐American (non‐shared) identity. The athlete's performance outcome at an Olympic event was also manipulated. In the shared identity condition the athlete was perceived as more Canadian when he won than when he lost. There were no significant differences in nationality judgment when neither of the athlete's dual nationalities was Canadian. Results regarding perceptions of similarity paralleled the nationality‐ratings results. Findings from these two studies illustrate an interesting extension of BIRGing and CORFing strategies in which multiple social identities of others are used strategically to include or exclude others from the in‐group. Copyright © 2007 John Wiley & Sons, Ltd.     

Acute predator stress impairs the consolidation and retrieval of hippocampus-dependent memory in male and female rats

We have studied the effects of an acute predator stress experience on spatial learning and memory in adult male and female Sprague-Dawley rats. All rats were trained to learn the location of a hidden escape platform in the radial-arm water maze (RAWM), a hippocampus-dependent spatial memory task. In the control (non-stress) condition, female rats were superior to the males in the accuracy and consistency of their spatial memory performance tested over multiple days of training. In the stress condition, rats were exposed to the cat for 30 min immediately before or after learning, or before the 24-h memory test. Predator stress dramatically increased corticosterone levels in males and females, with females exhibiting greater baseline and stress-evoked responses than males. Despite these sex differences in the overall magnitudes of corticosterone levels, there were significant sex-independent correlations involving basal and stress-evoked corticosterone levels, and memory performance. Most importantly, predator stress impaired short-term memory, as well as processes involved in memory consolidation and retrieval, in male and female rats. Overall, we have found that an intense, ethologically relevant stressor produced a largely equivalent impairment of memory in male and female rats, and sex-independent corticosterone-memory correlations. These findings may provide insight into commonalities in how traumatic stress affects the brain and memory in men and women.     

Social support group attendance is related to blood pressure, health behaviours, and quality of life in the Multicenter Lifestyle Demonstration Project

Changes in coronary risk factors, health behaviours, and health-related quality of life (HRQOL) were examined by tertiles of social support group attendance in 440 patients (21% females) with coronary artery disease. All patients participated in the Multicenter Lifestyle Demonstration Project (MLDP; eight hospital sites in the USA), an insurance-covered multi-component cardiac prevention program including dietary changes, stress management, exercise and group support for 1 year. Significant improvements in coronary risk factors, health behaviours, and HRQOL were noted at 1 year. Several of these improvements (i.e. systolic blood pressure, health behaviours, HRQOL) were related to social support group attendance, favoring those who attended more sessions. The associations between support group attendance to systolic blood pressure and to four HRQOL subscales (bodily pain, social functioning, mental health, and the mental health summary score) remained significant when controlling for changes in health behaviours, but dropped to a non-significant level for the HRQOL subscales 'physical functioning', 'general health' and 'role-emotional'. These results suggest an independent relationship of social support group attendance to systolic blood pressure while improvements in quality of life may be in part due to improved health behaviours facilitated by increased social support group attendance.     

Goal-driven attentional capture by invisible colors: Evidence from event-related potentials

We combined event-related brain potentials (ERPs) and behavioral measures to test whether subliminal visual stimuli can capture attention in a goal-dependent manner. Participants searched for visual targets defined by a specific color. Search displays served as metacontrast masks for preceding cue displays that contained one cue in the target color. Although this target-color cue was spatially uninformative, it produced behavioral spatial cuing effects and triggered an ERP correlate of attentional selection (i.e., the N2pc component). These results demonstrate that target-color cues captured attention, in spite of the fact that cue localization performance assessed in separate blocks was at chance level. We conclude that task-set contingent attentional capture is not restricted to supraliminal stimuli, but is also elicited by visual events that are not consciously perceived.