Cognitive inhibition in trichotillomania and obsessive-compulsive disorder

Cognitive inhibition was investigated in 21 trichotillomania (TTM), 21 obsessive-compulsive disorder (OCD) and 26 healthy control (HC) participants using a block cued directed forgetting task. After encoding a word list, participants were instructed to intentionally FORGET these words and to REMEMBER another word list. Both lists included TTM-related and neutral (kitchen-related) words in equal proportions, with the TTM-related words generally of negative valence and the kitchen-related words generally of neutral valence for all participants. A superior free recall of REMEMBER versus FORGET words suggests intact cognitive inhibition. The performance of OCD participants indicated a specific deficit in inhibiting the retrieval of information with negative valence, which was not found in TTM. HC participants, in contrast to TTM and OCD participants, were rather inattentive to negative information. In conclusion, although attention was disproportionately directed towards negative information in both disorders, cognitive inhibition deficits appeared specific to OCD.     

Organizational error management culture and its impact on performance: a two-study replication

The authors argue that a high-organizational error management culture, conceptualized to include norms and common practices in organizations (e.g., communicating about errors, detecting, analyzing, and correcting errors quickly), is pivotal to the reduction of negative and the promotion of positive error consequences. Organizational error management culture was positively related to firm performance across 2 studies conducted in 2 different European countries. On the basis of quantitative and qualitative cross-sectional data from 65 Dutch organizations, Study 1 revealed that organizational error management culture was significantly correlated with both organizational goal achievement and an objective indicator of economic performance. This finding was confirmed in Study 2, using change-of-profitability data from 47 German organizations. The results suggest that organizations may want to introduce organizational error management as a way to boost firm performance.     

Electrophysiological evidence reveals affective evaluation deficits early in stimulus processing in patients with panic disorder

Cognitive and neurobiological accounts of clinical anxiety and depression were examined via event-related brain potentials (ERPs) recorded from patients with panic disorder and healthy controls as they performed an old/new recognition memory task with emotionally negative and neutral words. The emotive connotation of words systematically influenced control subjects' - but not patients' - ERP effects at prefrontal sites in a latency range (to approximately 300-500 ms) generally assumed to reflect greater contribution of automatic than controlled memory processes. This provides evidence for dysfunctional inhibitory modulation of affective information processing in panic disorder. The ERP effects after 700 ms, however, suggest that some patients may adopt conscious strategies to minimize the impact of these early processing abnormalities on overt behaviors.     

"If you and I,if we,in this later day,lose that sacred fire . . .": perspective in political interviews

It is argued in the following that the dialogical complexity of speaker perspective requires a broad empirical analysis. To date, such analyses, particularly of political discourse, have been couched in terms of narrower concepts, such as self-presentation and political positioning or involvement/distancing, and have been typically carried out by means of qualitative methods applied to pronominal usage. The present research applies complementarily both quantitative and qualitative analyses to BBC television interviews of Shimon Peres (January 29, 2001) and of Edward Said (October 18, 2000) by Tim Sebastian in a program entitled HARDtalk. In addition to pronouns, these analyses include a number of other hypothetical indicators of a broad concept of perspective on the part of both interviewer and interviewees: turn-initial words, hesitations, questions, use of yes and no, personal reference utterances (e.g., I think), interjections, number of syllables spoken, and interruptions and overlaps. Quantitative comparisons of interviewer with interviewee revealed important differences on all these measures. Qualitative analyses also confirmed subtle local dynamics of perspective. Accordingly, the findings are interpreted within a general theoretical concept of perspective, derived from Bakhtin's (1981) dialogicity.     

Visual search for dimensionally redundant pop-out targets: parallel-coactive processing of dimensions is location specific

Three visual search experiments investigated redundancy gains for single and dual odd-one-out feature targets that differed from distractors in orientation, color, or both. In Experiment 1, redundant-target displays contained (a) a single target defined in 2 dimensions, (b) dual targets each defined in a different dimension, or (c) dual targets both defined in the same dimension. The redundancy gains, relative to single nonredundant targets, decreased from the first condition on, with violations of J. Miller's (1982) race model inequality (RMI) manifested only in the first 2 conditions. Experiment 2 systematically varied the spatial separation between dual targets each defined in a different dimension. Violations of the RMI were evident only when the 2 targets occupied nearby locations. Experiment 3 provided evidence of RMI violations by dimensionally redundant targets at both precued (likely) and noncued (unlikely) display locations. Taken together, these results suggest that there is coactivation of a common mechanism by target signals in different dimensions (not by signals in the same dimension), that the coactivation effects are spatially specific, and that the coactivated mechanisms are located at a preattentive, perceptual stage of processing.     

Young at heart,old at work? Relations between age, (meta-)stereotypes,self-categorization,and retirement attitudes

The aims of this study were to examine how workers' negative age stereotypes (i.e., denying older workers' ability to develop) and negative meta-stereotypes (i.e., beliefs that the majority of colleagues feel negative about older workers) are related to their attitudes towards retirement (i.e., occupational future time perspective and intention to retire), and whether the strength of these relationships is influenced by workers' self-categorization as an “older” person. Results of a study among Dutch taxi drivers provided mixed support for the hypotheses. Negative meta-stereotypes, but not negative age stereotypes, were associated with fewer perceived opportunities until retirement and, in turn, a stronger intention to retire. Self-categorization moderated the relationships between negative age (meta-)stereotypes and occupational future time perspective. However, contrary to expectations, the relations were stronger among workers with a low self-categorization as an older person in comparison with workers with a high self-categorization in this regard. Overall, results highlight the importance of psychosocial processes in the study of retirement intentions and their antecedents.     

Auditory Distraction by Meaningless Irrelevant Speech: A Developmental Study

The irrelevant sound effect (ISE) typically refers to a disruptive effect of a to‐be‐ignored sound in serial recall tasks, where lists of visually presented items (digits and letters) must be recalled in serial order. Although extensively studied in adults, studies on developmental aspects of the ISE are scarce. The present study aims to increase our understanding of developmental changes of auditory distraction in children beyond serial recall. Two tasks (i.e., word categorization and evaluation of simple mathematical equations) were designed to test retrieval from semantic memory. Proportion correct and reaction times (adjusted for speed–accuracy tradeoff) were measured in 8–9 and 12–13‐year‐olds. Results revealed a developmental change in the susceptibility to auditory distraction. Whereas older children were not affected by background sounds, younger children showed impairment in both proportion correct and adjusted reaction times. Overall, results suggest that attention distraction and immature attention control mechanisms contribute to ISEs in young children. Copyright © 2014 John Wiley & Sons, Ltd.