Correlations between Dual-Pathway White Matter Alterations and Language Impairment in Patients with Aphasia: A Systematic Review and Meta-analysis

Neuropsychology Review - While converging evidence suggests linguistic roles of white matter tracts, detailed associations between white matter alterations of dual pathways and language abilities...     

Attentional characteristics of different types of individuals with high self-esteem in self-threatening situations

The high self-esteem (HSE) heterogeneity hypothesis provides a new research perspective for investigating differences in the quantity and quality of different types of self-esteem. The present study adopted the emotional Stroop paradigm and the odd-one-out search task to explore how individuals with different types of self-esteem process social information in self-threatening situations. The results showed that individuals with different types of self-esteem had an attentional bias toward negative information and had different attentional biases toward angry faces in self-threatening situations. Individuals with fragile HSE and low self-esteem showed facilitated attention to angry faces and had difficulty drawing attention away from them; secure HSE individuals only showed difficulty disengaging attention from angry faces.

     

Integrated learning communities as a peer support initiative for first year university students

Peer Mentoring schemes tend to be developed as retention strategies, however, they can also serve other purposes (psychosocial or career-related). However, evidence of the effectiveness of these presents mixed results and less is known about the horizontal peer support schemes which may help students capitalize on existing peer relationships. We developed an integrated learning communities (ILC) peer support scheme, building on the theoretical principles of social identity theory, which we embedded within our existing teaching framework and designed functional activities. Collective activities were undertaken to promote the processes of social identity with the intention that these may foster social and academic integration experiences. This intervention was undertaken with an entire cohort of first year undergraduate psychology students. We conducted semi-structured interviews with a self-selected sample of these students (N = 17). Thematic analysis revealed two main themes, each with two sub-themes. These were: “Divergent Experiences” with the sub-themes of “dependent on people” and “types of support”, and “Good idea in principle” with the sub-themes of “Theory ≠ Practice” and “Dependent on student engagement”. Although identifying with a peer group was not transparent in the interviews, the existence of a peer support scheme was perceived positively by students which might explain the success of the newly developed student-led Psychology Society. Indeed, this Psychology Society can provide a lasting framework for further amplification of the student voice. We conclude that our embedded ILC was both feasible and potentially valuable, but it is crucial for the peer support approach to have transactional significance.     

Gibbons exploit information about what a competitor can see

Animal Cognition - How much nonhuman animals understand about seeing has been the focus of comparative cognition research for decades. Many social primates (and other species) are sensitive to cues...     

Insensitivity to reward shifts in zebrafish (Danio rerio) and implications for assessing affective states

Animal Cognition - Theory and empirical findings predict that individuals in a negative affective state are more sensitive to unexpected reward loss and less sensitive to unexpected reward gain...     

The modified star graph and the petal diagram: two new visual aids for discrete alternative multicriteria decision making

Many studies have looked into the provisions of visual aids to multicriteria decision making. However, most of them have separated the display of alternative profiles and criteria weight information into two displays. This makes the analysis of the relationship between the criteria and alternatives and the effect of changing the criteria weights on the decision difficult. In this study, displays that can incorporate the display of both alternative profiles and criteria weight information for discrete alternative multicriteria decision-making problems are examined. The simple additive model is the multicriteria analysis method used. The result is two new visual aids for representing data of multicriteria decision-making problems, the modified star graph and the petal diagram. This paper discusses the two displays and compares their strengths and weaknesses. The results of a preliminary test conducted to evaluate the effectiveness of the displays are also included. © 1998 John Wiley & Sons, Ltd.     

十斋日补说

对十斋日的来源及地藏菩萨十斋日,法国学者苏远鸣与中国学者张总、王承文等已进行了卓有成效的研究,但他们于佛教对十斋日的具体接受过程还缺乏深入的考察。本文就此提出补说。认为:佛教徒对十斋日的态度经过了由拒斥到吸收的过程;在统治者推行十斋日,以及民众修习实践的压力下,十斋日在盛唐、至少是中唐时期已进入佛教经典,至少在中唐时期已被信奉者归之于佛教;佛教徒对十斋日的改造使其反而取代了道教十斋日,在民众信仰生活中占据了主导地位;而目前将敦煌遗书中的十斋日统称为《地藏菩萨十斋日》是不恰当的,后者乃《地藏菩萨本愿经》吸收十斋日所产生的结果,而它的称谓,似也应以写本中用得较多的《地藏菩萨经十斋日》为准。     

Antecedents and Outcomes of Perceived Locus of Causality: An Application of Self-Determination Theory

We extended self-determination theory by examining personality antecedents and self-regulatory consequences of perceived locus of causality (PLOC), which is the extent to which individuals perceive their actions as caused by internal or external reasons. We theorized that personality would influence PLOC and that individuals with internal PLOC would engage in more self-regulatory activities, which would in turn predict performance and enjoyment. We used structural equation modeling with data collected from 260 students at 4 time points to test our hypotheses. The model fit the data well. Although personality had direct effects on the self-regulatory activities of effort and meta-cognitive strategies, in addition to the indirect effects via PLOC, tests confirmed that including the indirect effects produced the best-fitting model.     

Sensitivity of the 16 PF Motivational Distortion Scale to response bias

The shortened versions of the 16 PF (Forms C or D) were given to 227 college students (who took Form D twice), 33 prisoners (who took Forms C and D), and 95 substance abusers (who took Form C twice). All were asked to answer honestly, then retake these tests to appear in a better light. Significant differences in Motivational Distortion scores were found between test and retest in each group.     

Relationship between collectivism and corruption in American and Chinese books: A historical perspective

Previous research on the relationship between collectivism and corruption has not investigated their co‐variation over time. In this study, we use Google Ngram Viewer to track the frequency of words related to collectivism and corruption in American books (1800–2000) and in Chinese Books (1970–2008). The results demonstrate that a positive association between the usage of these terms during the periods in both Chinese and American books, with changes in words related to collectivism preceding changes in words related to corruption in American books. The theoretical and practical implications are also discussed.