Improving computer skill training: behavior modeling, symbolic mental rehearsal, and the role of knowledge structures

Effective computer skill training is vital to organizational productivity. Two experiments (N = 288) demonstrated that the behavior modeling approach to computer skill training could be substantially improved by incorporating symbolic mental rehearsal (SMR). SMR is a specific form of mental rehearsal that establishes a cognitive link between visual images and symbolic memory codes. As theorized, the significant effects of SMR on declarative knowledge and task performance were shown to be fully mediated by changes in trainees' knowledge structures. The mediational role of knowledge structures is expected to generalize to other training interventions and cognitive skill domains. Our findings have the immediate implications that practitioners should use SMR for improving the effectiveness of computer skill training.     

Observing and engaging in purposeful actions with objects influences estimates of their size

A ladle was recalled as being taller by participants who observed tedious removal of sand from it with a small teaspoon than by those who observed removal with a larger spoon. A second experiment showed that the number of darts thrown in order to hit a target correlated negatively with memory estimates of the size of the target, a finding replicated in a third experiment with size estimates made while the target was visible. The first two experiments suggest that the way an object is used can influence memory of its size. The third experiment supports the hypothesis that in vivo size estimation of familiar objects may employ a mechanism that derives size from memory and that size memory can be distorted by the way an object was used.     

What do letter migration errors reveal about letter position coding in visual word recognition?

Dividing attention across multiple words occasionally results in misidentifications whereby letters apparently migrate between words. Previous studies have found that letter migrations preserve within-word letter position, which has been interpreted as support for position-specific letter coding. To investigate this issue, the authors used word pairs like STEP and SOAP, in which a letter in 1 word could migrate to an adjacent letter in another word to form an illusory word (STOP). Three experiments show that both same-position and adjacent-position letter migrations can occur, as well as migrations that cross 2 letter positions. These results argue against position-specific letter coding schemes used in many computational models of reading, and they provide support for coding schemes based on relative rather than absolute letter position.     

Test-retest reliability of fMRI during nonverbal semantic decisions in moderate-severe nonfluent aphasia patients

Cortical reorganization in poststroke aphasia is not well understood. Few studies have investigated neural mechanisms underlying language recovery in severe aphasia patients, who are typically viewed as having a poor prognosis for language recovery. Although test-retest reliability is routinely demonstrated during collection of language data in single-subject aphasia research, this is rarely examined in fMRI studies investigating the underlying neural mechanisms in aphasia recovery. The purpose of this study was to acquire fMRI test-retest data examining semantic decisions both within and between two aphasia patients. Functional MRI was utilized to image individuals with chronic, moderate-severe nonfluent aphasia during nonverbal, yes/no button-box semantic judgments of iconic sentences presented in the Computer-assisted Visual Communication (C-ViC) program. We investigated the critical issue of intra-subject reliability by exploring similarities and differences in regions of activation during participants' performance of identical tasks twice on the same day. Each participant demonstrated high intra-subject reliability, with response decrements typical of task familiarity. Differences between participants included greater left hemisphere perilesional activation in the individual with better response to C-ViC training. This study provides fMRI reliability in chronic nonfluent aphasia, and adds to evidence supporting differences in individual cortical reorganization in aphasia recovery.     

Amodal processing of visual speech as revealed by priming

This study investigated the linguistic processing of visual speech (video of a talker's utterance without audio) by determining if such has the capacity to prime subsequently presented word and nonword targets. The priming procedure is well suited for the investigation of whether speech perception is amodal since visual speech primes can be used with targets presented in different modalities. To this end, a series of priming experiments were conducted using several tasks. It was found that visually spoken words (for which overt identification was poor) acted as reliable primes for repeated target words in the naming, written and auditory lexical decision tasks. These visual speech primes did not produce associative or reliable form priming. The lack of form priming suggests that the repetition priming effect was constrained by lexical level processes. That priming found in all tasks is consistent with the view that similar processes operate in both visual and auditory speech processing.     

Emotions, personality, and health: introduction to the special issue

Our intent in this introduction to the special issue on Emotions, Personality, and Health is to alert readers to the logic underlying the editors' choices of topics for the issue and to provide a brief summary of its contents. We discuss how the 10 articles fit together to provide a mosaic of diverse approaches to the study of emotion. Collectively, these articles show ways that emotion research may be integrated with personality theory to inform us about the psychological dimensions of health and illness.     

Stress priming in picture naming: an SOA study

This study investigates whether or not the representation of lexical stress information can be primed during speech production. In four experiments, we attempted to prime the stress position of bisyllabic target nouns (picture names) having initial and final stress with auditory prime words having either the same or different stress as the target (e.g., WORtel-MOtor vs. koSTUUM-MOtor; capital letters indicate stressed syllables in prime-target pairs). Furthermore, half of the prime words were semantically related, the other half unrelated. Overall, picture names were not produced faster when the prime word had the same stress as the target than when the prime had different stress, i.e., there was no stress-priming effect in any experiment. This result would not be expected if stress were stored in the lexicon. However, targets with initial stress were responded to faster than final-stress targets. The reason for this effect was neither the quality of the pictures nor frequency of occurrence or voice-key characteristics. We hypothesize here that this stress effect is a genuine encoding effect, i.e., words with stress on the second syllable take longer to be encoded because their stress pattern is irregular with respect to the lexical distribution of bisyllabic stress patterns, even though it can be regular with respect to metrical stress rules in Dutch. The results of the experiments are discussed in the framework of models of phonological encoding.     

Body image variability: the influence of body-composition information and neuroticism on young women's body dissatisfaction

The current studies consider the effect of body size, body composition feedback, and the moderating influence of neuroticism (N) on three measures of body dissatisfaction (BD) in young women. In Study One, normal-sized subjects who were given false feedback indicating that they were either fatter or leaner than average showed heightened BD compared to groups who received either accurate or no feedback about body size. There was no evidence of a moderating effect of N. In Study Two, thinner-than-average subjects who received accurate body-size feedback showed greater satisfaction than a control group receiving no information. For heavier than average subjects, feedback only increased BD for those low on N. Although these results show mixed support for N as a moderator, they are the first to show an effect of body composition information on BD.     

Event-related brain potential markers of high-language proficiency in adults

The central issue addressed is whether there are electrophysiological markers for high-language proficiency in adults. Event-related brain potentials (ERPs) were recorded in 19 young adults who demonstrated either "normal" or "high" language proficiency. ERPs were obtained during a sentence-processing task and analyzed for specific response components elicited by different word types. The ERPs in the normal and high-language proficiency groups were similar for early sensory related processing but differed in the later components thought to be more closely related to lexical access and post-lexical processing. The findings for the ERP waveforms suggest that adults with high-language proficiency show slightly faster lexical access over left anterior brain regions for closed class items, and a reduced reliance on contextual information contained in sentences.