What aspects of face processing are impaired in developmental prosopagnosia?

Developmental prosopagnosia (DP) is a severe impairment in identifying faces that is present from early in life and that occurs despite no apparent brain damage and intact visual and intellectual function. Here, we investigated what aspects of face processing are impaired/spared in developmental prosopagnosia by examining a relatively large group of individuals with DP (n = 8) using an extensive battery of well-established tasks. The tasks included measures of sensitivity to global motion and to global form, detection that a stimulus is a face, determination of its sex, holistic face processing, processing of face identity based on features, contour, and the spacing of features, and judgments of attractiveness. The DP cases showed normal sensitivity to global motion and global form and performed normally on our tests of face detection and holistic processing. On the other tasks, many DP cases were impaired but there was no systematic pattern. At least half showed deficits in processing of facial identity based on either the outer contour or spacing of the internal features, and/or on judgments of attractiveness. Three of the eight were impaired in processing facial identify based on the shape of internal features. The results show that DP is a heterogeneous condition and that impairment in recognizing faces cannot be predicted by poor performance on any one measure of face processing.     

Determinants of Readiness for Out-group Social Contact: Dominance Relations and Minority Group Motivations

Findings that members of minorities are more ready for social contact with members of dominant groups than vice versa have been attributed to a motivation of minorities to integrate into the larger society. We theorize that minorities hold opposing motivations—to integrate vs. to maintain unique group identity—the balance of which determines readiness for out-group contact. Study 1 examined readiness for out-group contact among three groups of Israeli teachers—Jews (dominant group), Muslim Arabs, and Christian Arabs (minorities). According to sociohistorical analyses, Muslim Arabs are more activated to maintain uniqueness and less motivated to integrate than are Christian Arabs. Study 2 examined recent Russian immigrants to Israel (minority) and veteran Israelis (dominant). Individual differences in motivation to integrate vs. maintain minority group identity were measured among immigrants. In both studies, the balance of motivations predicted minority group readiness for contact with the dominant group.     

Pattern of psychological fitness as related to pattern of physical fitness among older adults

The purpose of the present study was to investigate psychological fitness as well as physical fitness among late middle-aged normal men and women before, during, and after a 12-wk. physical activity program. Heart-rate of each subject was measured on a graded treadmill four times, and four psychological measures were taken: self-esteem, body-image, trait-anxiety, and well-being. Improvement of fitness was gradual and significant for both sexes, whereas no effects of time or sex were found on the first three psychological measures. Significant differences in pattern of change between women and men on well-being confirm previous findings that women report more depression and less satisfaction than men and thus are more sensitive to change.     

Microinfusion of the D1 receptor antagonist, SCH23390 into the IL but not the BLA impairs consolidation of extinction of auditory fear conditioning

In auditory fear conditioning, repeated presentation of the tone in the absence of the shock leads to extinction of the acquired fear response. Both the medial prefrontal cortex (mPFC) and the basolateral amygdala (BLA) are involved in extinction. Here we examined this involvement by antagonizing D1 receptors in both regions, in the rat. We microinfused the D1 receptor antagonist, SCH23390, into the infra-limbic part of the mPFC (IL) or BLA at different time points. SCH23390 mircoinfused into the IL either before extinction acquisition or following short extinction training resulted in impairment of extinction consolidation. Microinfusion of SCH23390 into the BLA, prior to acquisition of extinction caused impairment in acquisition of extinction without affecting extinction consolidation. This is supported by the results showing that microinfusion of SCH23390 into the BLA following a short-training session did not affect consolidation. These results further strengthen the role of mPFC in consolidation of extinction while highlighting the role of the D1 receptors in this process.     

Skills Practice in Dialectical Behavior Therapy for Suicidal Women Meeting Criteria for Borderline Personality Disorder

Dialectical Behavior Therapy (DBT) is an evidence-based practice for borderline personality disorder (BPD) and suicidal behavior that has been replicated with a variety of populations. Patients’ practice of behavioral skills taught in the group skills training component of DBT may be partly responsible for the positive treatment outcomes according to the skills deficit model of BPD that underlies DBT. This study was designed to examine the type and frequency of skills practiced by DBT patients. Participants were 49 women, who met criteria for BPD and current and chronic suicidal behavior, receiving 1 year of standard DBT as part of a clinical trial. Skills were recorded on the daily diary cards completed by participants each week and reviewed by their individual therapists. Results indicated that the majority of participants reported practicing skills most days throughout treatment. Crisis survival and mindfulness skills were practiced most frequently in our sample. Hierarchical linear modeling demonstrated that skills practice increased as a function of time in therapy. Directions for future research are discussed.     

Hasidism in Tsarist Russia: Historical and Social Aspects

It is difficult to ascribe to Hasidism sets of distinctive regional characteristics, because Hasidism transcended both communal and national boundaries. Aware of this problem, the authors of this article seek to characterize Hasidism in Russia, while eschewing the essentialist assumption that Hasidism in Russia had a Russian character. The article describes Hasidism in Tsarist Russia from several perspectives. From an internal Jewish perspective, it discusses features of dynasties of hasidic leaders and the courts they lived in. This is followed by a discussion of relations between hasidic centers (the courts) and hasidic peripheries (the local communities). Relations between Hasidism and the Russian administration are also analyzed, as are the various ways in which hasidim in Russia adapted to the challenges of modernity, while hasidic leaders in Galicia and Hungary were usually more hostile towards modernization. Finally, the article describes the consequences of the upheavals of the First World War, Bolshevik Revolution, and the Civil Wars that followed. During these dramatic events and in their aftermath, the majority of the hasidic leaders in Russia moved to other places in Europe, America, and Palestine, and only some of them remained under the Soviet regime.     

Value priorities and subjective well‐being: direct relations and congruity effects

Two studies investigated relations of value priorities to measures of subjective well‐being. Samples of students and adults, from Israel and former East and West Germany (N=1261), participated in Part I. Hypothesized direct relations of nine types of values to well‐being, based on ‘healthy’ values from the psychotherapy literature, relations of values to needs, self‐determination theory, and the emotional resources needed to pursue various values were tested in each sample. Achievement, self‐direction, stimulation, tradition, conformity and security values correlated with affective well‐being, as predicted, but not with cognitive well‐being. Part II tested the hypothesis that well‐being depends upon congruence between personal values and the prevailing value environment. Results largely supported specific hypotheses regarding the values conducive to positive and negative well‐being among students of business administration (n=40) and psychology (n=42). Hypotheses were derived from the social sanctions, environmental affordances for value attainment, and internal value conflicts likely to be experienced in each department. Copyright © 2000 John Wiley & Sons, Ltd.     

Psychoacoustic abilities as predictors of vocal emotion recognition

Prosodic attributes of speech, such as intonation, influence our ability to recognize, comprehend, and produce affect, as well as semantic and pragmatic meaning, in vocal utterances. The present study examines associations between auditory perceptual abilities and the perception of prosody, both pragmatic and affective. This association has not been previously examined. Ninety-seven participants (49 female and 48 male participants) with normal hearing thresholds took part in two experiments, involving both prosody recognition and psychoacoustic tasks. The prosody recognition tasks included a vocal emotion recognition task and a focus perception task requiring recognition of an accented word in a spoken sentence. The psychoacoustic tasks included a task requiring pitch discrimination and three tasks also requiring pitch direction (i.e., high/low, rising/falling, changing/steady pitch). Results demonstrate that psychoacoustic thresholds can predict 31% and 38% of affective and pragmatic prosody recognition scores, respectively. Psychoacoustic tasks requiring pitch direction recognition were the only significant predictors of prosody recognition scores. These findings contribute to a better understanding of the mechanisms underlying prosody recognition and may have an impact on the assessment and rehabilitation of individuals suffering from deficient prosodic perception.