Do age and linguistic background alter the audiovisual advantage when listening to speech in the presence of energetic and informational masking?

We examined how the type of masker presented in the background affected the extent to which visual information enhanced speech recognition, and whether the effect was dependent on or independent of age and linguistic competence. In the present study, young speakers of English as a first language (YEL1) and English as a second language (YEL2), as well as older speakers of English as a first language (OEL1), were asked to complete an audio (A) and an audiovisual (AV) speech recognition task in which they listened to anomalous target sentences presented against a background of one of three masker types (noise, babble, and competing speech). All three main effects were found to be statistically significant (group, masker type, A vs. AV presentation type). Interesting two-way interactions were found between masker type and group and between masker type and presentation type; however, no interactions were found between group (age and/or linguistic competence) and presentation type (A vs. AV). The results of this study, while they shed light on the effect of masker type on the AV advantage, suggest that age and linguistic competence have no significant effects on the extent to which a listener is able to use visual information to improve speech recognition in background noise.     

A model of top-down gain control in the auditory system

To evaluate a model of top-down gain control in the auditory system, 6 participants were asked to identify 1-kHz pure tones differing only in intensity. There were three 20-session conditions: (1) four soft tones (25, 30, 35, and 40 dB SPL) in the set; (2) those four soft tones plus a 50-dB SPL tone; and (3) the four soft tones plus an 80-dB SPL tone. The results were well described by a top-down, nonlinear gain-control system in which the amplifier’s gain depended on the highest intensity in the stimulus set. Individual participants’ identification judgments were generally compatible with an equal-variance signal-detection model in which the mean locations of the distribution of effects along the decision axis were determined by the operation of this nonlinear amplification system.     

Safeguarding good scientific practice: New institutional approaches in Germany

After summarising three recent case histories of alleged scientific misconduct in Germany, the efforts of the Deutsche Forschungsgemeinschaft (German Research Council) and the Hochschulrektorenkonferenz (German Rectors' Conference) to promote academic and procedural safeguards in favour of professional self-regulation in science and scholarship are described in outline.     

The medical traumatic stress toolkit

Children and their parents who are exposed to medical life-threat due to illness or injury are at risk for developing symptoms of posttraumatic stress. However, the prevention, detection, and treatment needed are often not available in the acute care settings of the hospital. The National Child Traumatic Stress Network and the Substance Abuse and Mental Health Services Administration have created a set of materials for use by hospital health providers and families that is available for download free from the National Child Traumatic Stress Network website, www.nctsn.org.     

Distinct and common cortical activations for multimodal semantic categories

If semantic representations are based on particular types of perceptual features, then category knowledge that arises from multimodal sensory experiences should rely on distinct and common sensory brain regions depending on the features involved. Using a similarity-based generation-andcomparison task, we found that semantic categories activated cortical areas associated with taste and smell, biological motion, and visual processing. Fruit names specifically activated medial orbitofrontal regions associated with taste and smell. Labels for body parts and clothing activated lateral temporal occipitoparietal areas associated with perceiving the human body. More generally, visually biased categories activated ventral temporal regions typically ascribed to visual object recognition, whereas functional categories activated lateral frontotemporal areas previously associated with the representation of usage properties. These results indicate that semantic categories that are distinguished by particular perceptual properties rely on distinct cortical regions, whereas semantic categories that rely on similar types of features depend on common brain areas.     

"It's magic!" The effects of presentation modality on children's event memory, suggestibility, and confidence judgments

The current study investigated the influence of presentation modality (live, video, and slide show) on children's memory, suggestibility, recognition, and metamemorial monitoring processes. A total of 270 children in three age groups (5- and 6-year-olds, 7- and 8-year-olds, and 9- and 10-year-olds) watched a magic show and were questioned about it 1 week later. The live show yielded more correct answers to nonleading questions, higher resistance to misleading questions, and better recognition memory than did the video condition, which in turn resulted in better performance than did the slide show. Although presentation modality raised the general level of memory performance, the effects were equally strong in all age groups and did not affect memory phenomena such as the size of the misinformation effect and confidence judgments.     

Does self-consciousness mediate the relation between self-talk and self-knowledge?

Building on Morin's understanding of the relations among self-talk, self-consciousness, and self-knowledge, this study examined the hypothesis that functional and dysfunctional self-consciousness mediate between self-talk and self-knowledge. A self-report questionnaire including 10 scales assessing different aspects of Self-talk, Self-consciousness, and Self-knowledge was administered to 200 German undergraduate university students (95 women, 105 men). Mediation analysis showed that the observed negative relationship between Self-talk and Self-knowledge was mediated by Dysfunctional Self-consciousness, while Functional Self-consciousness acted like a supressor variable. The discussion focuses on limitations of the present measures of Self-talk.     

Oppression and discrimination among lesbian,gay, bisexual,and Transgendered people and communities: a challenge for community psychology

Lesbian, gay, bisexual, and transgendered (LGBT) people continue to experience various forms of oppression and discrimination in North America and throughout the world, despite the social, legal, and political advances that have been launched in an attempt to grant LGBT people basic human rights. Even though LGBT people and communities have been actively engaged in community organizing and social action efforts since the early twentieth century, research on LGBT issues has been, for the most part, conspicuously absent within the very field of psychology that is explicitly focused on community research and action–Community Psychology. The psychological and social impact of oppression, rejection, discrimination, harassment, and violence on LGBT people is reviewed, and recent advances in the areas of LGBT health, public policy, and research are detailed. Recent advances within the field of Community Psychology with regard to LGBT research and action are highlighted, and a call to action is offered to integrate the knowledge and skills within LGBT communities with Community Psychology's models of intervention, prevention, and social change in order to build better theory and intervention for LGBT people and communities.     

A Multimethod Exploration of the Friendships of Children Considered Socially Withdrawn by Their School Peers

Friendships of children considered socially withdrawn by their school peers were investigated within a population of elementary school children. Reciprocal friends were identified by a friendship nomination procedure; social withdrawal was assessed by peer nominations. Trained graduate students rated videotapes of dyads of friends (n = 58 dyads, of which 29 contained at least one withdrawn child) for selected features of friendship quality. In addition, each friend within a dyad provided ratings of the quality of the relationship. The videotaped data showed the withdrawn children to be somewhat restricted in their verbal communication with their friends, and less competitive with their friends, than were friends in a comparison group. In dyads consisting of one withdrawn and one nonwithdrawn child, the withdrawn child perceived the relationship as characterized by greater closeness and helpfulness than did the nonwithdrawn friend. Despite some signs of inhibited behavior within the friendship context, withdrawn children seem to have access to close friendships of high quality.