Functional Differences Between Upright and Rotated Images

In Experiment I subjects imaged an alphanumeric character either upright or upside-down, and triggered a test display character. Their task was to decide as quickly as possible whether the test character was NORMAL or MIRRORED. On 72% of the trials the test was at the orientation imaged. Reaction time (RT) was then about 200 ms longer in the upside-down image condition. This difference reduced with practice. On the remaining trials the orientation of the test character differed from that of the prepared image. For upright images RT increased monotonically with the angular difference in orientation between test and image. For upside-down images RT did not increase monotonically with angular difference as there was a wide dip around the upright. Further experiments suggested that upside-down images can be rotated, but at considerably slower rates than upright ones, and that the apparent rates of rotation for upside-down images are dependent upon the width of the sector tested. These results indicate that visual short-term memory (STM) and long-term memory (LTM) are distinct; that the process of mental rotation does not operate directly upon LTM; and that functionally, upright and rotated images may differ in important ways.     

Interaction of genetics and separation in canine hyperkinesis and in differential responses to amphetamine

A model of childhood hyperkinesis, using the Telomian-beagle hybrid dog, is described, demonstrating the interactions of genetics and separation in the development of this syndrome and in the favorable responses of some of these dogs to amphetamine. This work represents the collaboration of three laboratories, utilizing chiefly methods of inhibitory training. Inducing separation distress enhanced the resistance to inhibitory training and the favorable responses to amphetamine.     

Intracranial cannulation of small animals

Special difficulties are encountered when attempting to provide intracranial cannulation of small animals that have floating or fragile skull bones. The technique described was developed for mice but seems applicable to other species. The cannula system is inexpensive and easy to use. A wound clip anchor seems superior to either skull screws or bonded acrylic, producing less damage to the brain and no necrosis of bone or tissue on the wound margin. Patency data up to 25 days is presented, and the system is as efficacious as other techniques.     

A method for the analysis of complex avian song repertoires

A new method for the analysis of complex avian song repertoires is introduced. The method consists of sending a tape-recorded bird-song signal through five narrow band-pass filters and then to a five-channel high-speed pen recorder. A coding method that allows a researcher to convert the output from the pen recorder to numbers for later analysis by computer is described.     

Instructions and decision times of size-constancy responses

The current study investigated the effect of instructions and stimulus discriminability on size-constancy responses and decision times in a task allowing separate evaluation of the effects of instructions and of dimensional choices by the subjects in the size-constancy task. Objective, perspective, or distance matches were influenced both by the instructions given the subject and by the relative discriminability of the stimuli in each dimension, so that subjects did not always successfully follow their instructions. Decision times were found to be fastest with perspective rather than objective or apparent instructions, but times taken to produce objective and perspective matches did not differ. Apparently, both objective and perspective judgments are available to the perceiver before a response is made, but instructions affect postperceptual response times.     

Fechner’s paradox reflects a nonmonotone relation between binocular brightness and luminance

Twenty subjects judged the brightness of binocularly fused targets whose monocular luminances were varied independently. On each trial, the left eye was presented with one of two relatively high luminances and the right eye was presented with one of 15 luminances from the range in which Fechner’s paradox is effective. The objective of the experiment was to determine whether the psychophysical function over this range was nonmonotonic and Ll-shaped, as implied by several models of binocular brightness, or monotone increasing, but discontinuous at zero right-eye luminance. The functions associated with both left-eye intensities were found to be nonmonotone. Both minima were near the upper bound of the mesopic range.     

Dynamic visual noise and the stereophenomenon: Interocular time delays,depth, and coherent velocities

Attention, Perception, & Psychophysics - This study concerns the stereophenomenon obtained with binocular viewing of dynamic visual noise with a neutral density filter over one eye. Such a...     

The memory drum theory after twenty years: comments on Henry's note

The difference between the Henry "memory-drum" theory and our version is that ours includes, an additional assumption that, after programming has occurred, the resultant representation can be stored in short-term memory. Otherwise, the essential ideas are the same in the two theories. Implications of the presently available data for the distinction between the theories are discussed. Regardless of how one evaluates our added assumption, it is clear that the essential insight of the Henry theory has fared very well in the 20 years since the theory first appeared in print.     

A set-theoretic random utility model of choice behavior

A random utility model of choice was developed by combining the basic ideas of the well-known theories of Thurstone and Restle. The new model has exactly the same number of free parameters as Tversky's Elimination-by-Aspects model. Furthermore, both models were found to fit, with equal accuracy, the data reported by Rumelhart and Greeno, and Tversky. It was concluded that although the two theories are not identical, they may be difficult to discriminate empirically.     

Relations between level of ego development and adjustment pattern in adolescents

The present study was designed to assess the relation between Loevinger's hierarchy of ego development stages, measured by the Washington University Sentence Completion Test, and adjustment patterns as measured by the Minnesota Multiphasic Personality Inventory. A total of 150 high school students between the ages of 14 and 15, 75 boys and 75 girls, served as subjects. It was hypothesized that certain adjustment patterns were more prevalent at certain points of the ego development hierarchy than at others, specifically: (a) hypochondriasis and psychopathic deviance at the ego stages below conformity; (b) hysteria at the conformist ego level; and (c) obsessive-compulsiveness and paranoia at the ego stages above conformity. All of these hypotheses, except that regarding psychopathic deviance, were supported by the data. One unpredicted relationship, a tendency for depression to be most characteristic of the conformist ego group, was found.