The Impact of Testing on the Formation of Children's and Adults' False Memories

Witnesses are frequently questioned immediately following a crime. The effects of such testing on false recall are inconclusive: Testing may inoculate against subsequent misinformation or enhance false memory formation. We examined whether different types of processing can account for these discrepancies. Drawing from Fuzzy‐trace and Associative‐activation theories, immediate questions that trigger the processing of the global understanding of the event can heighten false memory rates. However, questions that trigger the processing of specific details can inoculate memories against subsequent misinformation. These effects were hypothesized to be more pronounced in children than in adults. Seven/eight‐, 11/12‐, 14/15‐year‐olds, and adults (N = 220) saw a mock‐theft film and were tested immediately with meaning or item‐specific questions. Test results on the succeeding day replicated classic misinformation and testing effects, although our processing hypothesis was not supported. Only adults who received meaning questions benefited from immediate testing and, across all ages, testing led to retrieval‐enhanced suggestibility. © 2016 The Authors. Applied Cognitive Psychology Published by John Wiley & Sons, Ltd.     

Cognitive and affective Theory of Mind in mild to moderate Alzheimer's disease

Theory of Mind (ToM) allows one's own and others' cognitive and emotional mental states to be inferred. Although many patients with Alzheimer's disease (AD) display impaired social functioning as their disease progresses, very few studies have investigated ToM in AD. Those that have done so suggest that patients' ToM deficits are the consequence of other cognitive impairments. The aim of this study was thus to investigate changes in both the cognitive and the affective dimensions of ToM in AD, using tasks designed to circumvent the patients' comprehension difficulties. Sixteen mild to moderate AD patients and 15 healthy controls matched on age, sex and education level underwent cognitive (preference judgment and first‐ and second‐order false belief) and affective (Reading the Mind in the Eyes) ToM assessments. Comprehension of false belief stories was verified and an additional neuropsychological examination was undergone. We observed impaired performances by AD patients on all the ToM tasks. While working memory and executive functioning impairments contributed to the deterioration in the more complex aspects of cognitive ToM abilities as highlighted by a correlation analysis, we failed to observe any comprehension difficulties in patients who performed poorly on simple cognitive ToM tasks, which suggests that AD truly affects cognitive ToM.     

Multigroup confirmatory factor analysis and structural invariance with age of the Behavior Rating Inventory of Executive Function (BRIEF)—French version

The parent and teacher forms of the French version of the Behavioral Rating Inventory of Executive Function (BRIEF) were used to evaluate executive function in everyday life in a large sample of healthy children (N = 951) aged between 5 and 18.

Several psychometric methods were applied, with a view to providing clinicians with tools for score interpretation. The parent and teacher forms of the BRIEF were acceptably reliable. Demographic variables (such as age and gender) were found to influence the BRIEF scores. Confirmatory factor analysis was then used to test five competing models of the BRIEF's latent structure. Two of these models (a three-factor model and a two-factor model, both based on a nine-scale structure) had a good fit. However, structural invariance with age was only obtained with the two-factor model.

The French version of the BRIEF provides a useful measure of everyday executive function and can be recommended for use in clinical research and practice.     

Predictors and outcomes of joint trajectories of callous-unemotional traits and conduct problems in childhood

Callous-unemotional (CU) traits are associated with antisocial and delinquent behaviors in children and represent a potential risk factor for adult psychopathy. However, there is a paucity of longitudinal research that explores the development of these traits, their longitudinal association with conduct problems (CP), and their psychosocial predictors and outcomes. Using a large sample of children followed longitudinally from the Twins Early Development Study (N=9,578), we described the joint developmental trajectories of CU traits and CP during childhood (between ages 7 and 12) and examined the child- and family-level predictors (4 years old) and concomitant outcomes (12 years old) associated with the trajectories. The developmental trajectories were characterized with teachers' ratings of CU traits and CP from ages 7 to 12. Using general growth mixture modeling, we identified four trajectories of CU traits (stable high, increasing, decreasing, and stable low) and two trajectories of CP (high and low). Compared with the children who followed a low trajectory of CU traits and CP, those who followed a high trajectory of CU traits and CP had more negative child- and family-level predictors at 4 years (including CP, hyperactivity, negative parental discipline, and chaos in the home). Children with high or increasing levels of CU traits and concomitant high levels of CP presented the most negative outcomes at 12 years (including hyperactivity, peer problems, emotional problems, and negative parental feelings). Children with high CU traits and concomitant high levels of CP in childhood should be prioritized for targeted intervention.     

Eye movements,the perceptual span,and reading speed

The perceptual span or region of effective vision during eye fixations in reading was examined as a function of reading speed (fast readers were compared with slow readers), font characteristics (fixed width vs. proportional width), and intraword spacing (normal or reduced). The main findings were that fast readers (reading at about 330 wpm) had a larger perceptual span than did slow readers (reading about 200 wpm) and that the span was not affected by whether or not the text was fixed width or proportional width. In addition, there were interesting font and intraword spacing effects that have important implications for the optimal use of space in a line of text.     

Transcranial Doppler Ultrasonography Monitoring of Cerebral Hemodynamics During Performance of Cognitive Tasks: A Review

The examination of blood flow velocity (BFV) changes during the performance of mental tasks is one of the applications of transcranial Doppler (TCD) ultrasonography. The purpose of this review is to summarize the results of the functional TCD literature, to investigate the effects of methodological differences between studies, and to provide guidelines for future research. It is concluded that larger series of more homogeneous groups concerning age and handedness, and stricter criteria for subject selection and laboratory setting are required. The implication of quantitative and qualitative performance measures and psychological parameters (motivation, anxiety, and task anticipation) could also yield important information. We recommend future agreement upon a more standardized methodology. TCD promises to be a useful tool to provide further insight into the cerebral organization and temporal reactivity of the human brain.     

Diurnal cycle of salivary cortisol in older adult men and women with subjective complaints of memory deficits and/or depressive symptoms: relation to cognitive functioning

In populations of young and older adults, it has been shown that individuals may be categorized into one of three diurnal subgroups when salivary cortisol levels are assessed over a 2-day period and compared for their consistency across days: a typical subgroup, a flat subgroup, and an inconsistent subgroup. Interestingly, recent studies have reported that the typical subgroup represents the majority of the young and older adult population, a finding that is difficult to reconcile with previous studies showing increased cortisol levels in older adults with depression or cognitive impairments. In order to assess whether a typical diurnal cortisol profile is representative across different subgroups of older adults, we assessed diurnal cortisol cycle representation in a sample of older adults with subjective complaints of depression and/or memory problems. Furthermore, given the robust relationship between cortisol and cognitive function, the present study examined the association between the three diurnal subgroups and cognitive performance. Forty-two older individuals were recruited on the basis of reporting subjective complaints of either memory problems and/or depressive mood. Participants were asked to sample their saliva over a 2-day period and were then asked to undergo a neuropsychological evaluation that taps into short-term memory, declarative memory and language. The results showed that 69% of the sample presented a Flat cycle of salivary cortisol over a 2-day period while 19% presented an inconsistent pattern and 12% presented a typical pattern. Participants in the flat subgroup were significantly impaired on letter verbal fluency. Furthermore, a relationship was found between diurnal cortisol subgroup representation and subjective complaint profile. These findings show that older adults with complaints of memory problems and/or depressive symptoms do not present the typical profile of the diurnal cortisol cycle, and they provide a preliminary view of how diurnal cortisol profile relates to cognitive function during human aging.     

Episodic autobiographical memory in depression: Specificity, autonoetic consciousness, and self-perspective

Autobiographical memory (AM) and the self are closely linked. AM retrieval in depression is characterized by a lack of specificity, suggesting an impairment of episodic AM. Autonoetic consciousness and self-perspective, which are critical to episodic AM, have never been addressed in depression. Twenty-one depressed inpatients and 21 matched controls were given an episodic AM task designed to assess positive and negative memories regarding specificity, autonoetic consciousness (remember/know procedure), and self-perspective (field/observer procedure). For specificity, "remember", and "field" responses, ANOVAs revealed a main group effect and a group x valence interaction. Between groups, patients showed lower scores than controls for positive memories. Within groups, patients showed greater scores for negative memories, and controls showed greater scores for positive memories. There is a global episodic AM impairment of positive memories in depression regarding specificity, autonoetic consciousness, and self-perspective. Our results suggest new cognitive interventions to improve the self-relevance of positive memories in depression.