预设路径模型及其在认知心理学研究中的应用

预设路径模型(Fixed-links modeling)是在结构方程模型框架下发展出的用于分析心理学实验数据的统计模型。该类模型的主要特征是根据前期理论基础和实验设计,通过预先设定模型中显变量与潜变量之间的因素载荷矩阵实现对显变量方差的拆分。因素载荷矩阵的设定主要基于实验水平与所表征的心理过程之间的关系,选取相应函数来表征不同实验水平之间的变化趋势。该模型在表征工作记忆、注意和学习的内部加工过程及揭示不同认知过程的具体联系中发挥了重要作用。     

Avoiding the effect of item wording by means of bipolar instead of unipolar items: An application to social optimism

Scales including positively and negatively worded items usually show an impaired degree of homogeneity. The transformation of unipolar positively and negatively worded items into bipolar items can avoid this disadvantageous effect. The precondition for this transformation is that each pair of items refers to the same topic. It is this topic that serves as the heading of the bipolar item. This scale construction method is demonstrated in the items of the social optimism scale (Schweizer & Schneider, 1997) that comprises unipolar items. The investigation of both the original and the transformed scales in a sample of 808 participants revealed equivalence and a high quality for both scales. Results of an additional sample confirmed the validity of both social optimism scales. Copyright © 2009 John Wiley & Sons, Ltd.     

The structure of the relationship between attention and intelligence

The relationship between attention and general intelligence was investigated considering the different types of attention: alertness, sustained attention, focused attention, attentional switching, divided attention, attention according to the supervisory attentional system, attention as inhibition, spatial attention, attention as planning, interference, attention as arousal, and attention according to the assessment tradition. In a sample of 197 participants the relationship of attention and intelligence was investigated by means of structural equation modeling. The results revealed that each type of attention was substantially related to intelligence on the latent level. Furthermore, a high degree of overlap in predicting intelligence was observed for the various types of attention. Comprehensive models based on resources theory and Posner's dimensions were also investigated. The best model of the relationship between attention and intelligence included two first-order and one second-order latent variables of attention and one of intelligence. It predicted 32% of the variance of intelligence.     

Les objets connectés et applications de santé : étude exploratoire des perceptions,usages (ou non) et contextes d’usage

In a contemporary context of major health challenges, the market of digital technologies has increasingly developed in past years. This article aims to explore main profiles of use in relation to connected objects and health apps, as well as attitudes related to uses, non-uses and contexts of use. Therefore, our objective is to contribute to the scientific debate by proposing an empirical study in psychology that focusses on the perspectives of consumers and non-consumers of these technologies in the French-speaking part of Switzerland. To do this, a survey was conducted among participants of a large public health exhibition (n = 760). According to our results, the majority of respondents declare not having a connected object/health app and a third of non-users does not intend to acquire such technologies. Also, there is a trend among younger generations to have a connected object/health app. Concerning the contexts of use, such technologies are employed to self-track physical activity and eating practices. The degree of satisfaction of such use is rather high. Given these results, our analyses point out a divide within our sample, between individuals who seem resistant and declare not willing to have this kind of technology and those who use it in the long run. These results cast new light upon concrete uses and contexts of use among consumers and non-consumers of connected objects/health apps beyond techno-scientific promises that prevail today in our societies.     

A syntactical approach to modality

Conclusion The systems T _N and T _M show that necessity can be consistently construed as a predicate of syntactical objects, if the expressive/deductive power of the system is deliberately engineered to reflect the power of the original object language operator. The system T _N relies on salient limitations on the expressive power of the language L _N through the construction of a quotational hierarchy, while the system T _Mrelies on limiting the scope of the modal axioms schemas to the sublanguage L _infM ⁺, which corresponds exactly with the restrictive hierarchy of L _N. The fact that L _infM ⁺ is identical to the image of the metalinguistic mapping C ⁺ from the normal operator system into L _M reveals that iterated operator modality is implicitly hierarchical, and that inconsistency is produced by applying the principles of the modal logic to formulas which have no natural analogues in the operator development. Thus the contradiction discovered by Montague can be diagnosed as the result of instantiating the axiom schemas with modally ungrounded formulas, and thereby adding radically new modal axioms to the predicate system.The predicate treatment of necessity differs significantly from that of the operator in that the cumulative models for the predicate system are strictly first-order. Possible worlds are not used as model-theoretic primitives, but rather alternate models are appealed to in order to specify the extension of N, which is semantically construed as a first-order predicate. In this manner, the intensional aspects of modality are built into the mode of specifying the particular set of objects which the denotation function assigns to N, rather than in the specification of the basic truth conditions for modal formulas. Intensional phenomena are thereby localised to the special requirements for determining the extension of a particular predicate, and this does not constitute a structural modification of the first-order models, but rather limits the relevant class of models to those which possess an appropriate denotation function.     

Cognitive bias of optimism and its influence on psychological well-being.

An investigation of the cognitive bias observed in optimism and the influence of optimism on psychological well-being was conducted. The cognitive bias was assumed to be related to the repressive style of information processing, represented by the trait scale of the State-Trait Anxiety Inventory and the Social Desirability scale. Optimism and well-being were measured by the Life Orientation Test and the Social Optimism scale as well as by the Life Satisfaction and Depression scales, respectively. These scales were applied to a sample of 200 individuals. Trait Anxiety and Social Desirability led to a high multiple correlation with the Life Orientation Test (R = .54) and a moderate multiple correlation with the Social Optimism scale (R = .30). Higher correlations were obtained for the expectation of a positive than of a negative future. Both the Life Orientation Test and the Social Optimism scale contributed to the high multiple correlation with psychological well-being (R = .52).     

Item-Position Effect in Raven’s Matrices: A Developmental Perspective

ABSTRACT

This study examined whether there is a developmental difference in the emergence of an item-position effect in intelligence testing. The item-position effect describes the dependency of the item’s characteristics on the positions of the items and is explained by learning. Data on fluid intelligence measured by Raven’s Standard Progressive Matrices (SPM) and data on working memory tasks were collected from both primary school age children (7–8 years old) and secondary school age adolescents (12–13 years old). The item-position effect of SPM was represented and separated from the ability component by the fixed-links model. The results indicated a clear age difference: whereas the item-position effect was observed in the adolescents, it was not found in the primary school children. In addition, separating the item-position effect detected in the adolescents from the ability component led to a larger correlation with working memory than otherwise. These results suggest that age differences in intelligence test performance may not only reflect differences in the general ability but also in the sources of the item-position effect.     

The Prediction of Students’ Academic Performance With Fluid Intelligence in Giving Special Consideration to the Contribution of Learning

The present study provides a new account of how fluid intelligence influences academic performance. In this account a complex learning component of fluid intelligence tests is proposed to play a major role in predicting academic performance. A sample of 2, 277 secondary school students completed two reasoning tests that were assumed to represent fluid intelligence and standardized math and verbal tests assessing academic performance. The fluid intelligence data were decomposed into a learning component that was associated with the position effect of intelligence items and a constant component that was independent of the position effect. Results showed that the learning component contributed significantly more to the prediction of math and verbal performance than the constant component. The link from the learning component to math performance was especially strong. These results indicated that fluid intelligence, which has so far been considered as homogeneous, could be decomposed in such a way that the resulting components showed different properties and contributed differently to the prediction of academic performance. Furthermore, the results were in line with the expectation that learning was a predictor of performance in school.     

Emotional working memory capacity in posttraumatic stress disorder (PTSD)

Participants with a lifetime history of posttraumatic stress disorder (PTSD) and trauma-exposed controls with no PTSD history completed an emotional working memory capacity (eWMC) task. The task required them to remember lists of neutral words over short intervals while simultaneously processing sentences describing dysfunctional trauma-related thoughts (relative to neutral control sentences). The task was designed to operationalise an everyday cognitive challenge for those with mental health problems such as PTSD; namely, the ability to carry out simple, routine tasks with emotionally benign material, while at the same time tackling emotional laden intrusive thoughts and feelings. eWMC performance, indexed as the ability to remember the word lists in the context of trauma sentences, relative to neutral sentences, was poorer overall in the PTSD group compared with controls, suggestive of a particular difficulty employing working memory in emotion-related contexts in those with a history of PTSD. The possible implications for developing affective working memory training as an adjunctive treatment for PTSD are explored.     

Musical instrument naming impairments: the crucial exception to the living/nonliving dichotomy in category-specific agnosia

In category-specific agnosia (CSA) patients typically have more trouble naming animals, fruits, and vegetables than tools, furniture, and articles of clothing. A crucial exception to this living vs nonliving rule involves the category of musical instruments. Patients with problems naming living objects often repeatedly fail to name musical instruments. In CSA it is crucial to equate living and nonliving object lists on object name frequency, complexity, and familiarity. The present study shows, however, that even the most rigorously controlled object lists can lead to erroneous conclusions if nonliving stimuli contain an overrepresentation of musical instruments. Naming capabilities of a herpes encephalitis patient were assessed using matched lists of living and nonliving objects and showed no indication of category-specific deficits. When exemplars were separated into biological objects, musical instruments and man-made artifacts, strong category-specificity emerged: artifact naming was flawless whereas musical instrument and biological object naming were both severely impaired. It is concluded that CSA is a veridical phenomenon but that our understanding of CSA is limited by adhering to the spurious living/nonliving distinction.