Effect of divided attention on explicit and implicit aspects of recall

If subjects have to form word images before spelling a word from the image, results of a repetition of the spelling test reveal a reliable priming effect: Old words can be spelled faster than comparable control words, reflecting a form of implicit memory. We investigated whether this kind of repetition priming remains stable under conditions of divided attention in the study phase. The subjects had to spell meaningful words, meaningless non-words, and non-words that were meaningful with a backward spelling direction (troper, for example). In the testing stage, recognition judgments as a form of explicit memory were required, too. Divided attention in the study phase had a negative effect on explicit memory, as revealed by performance on the recognition task, but had little effect on implicit memory, as revealed by performance on the repetition of the spelling test. A further dissociation between implicit and explicit memory showed up as meaningful words were recognized much better than non-words, whereas implicit memory was uninfluenced by the meaningfulness variable. The disadvantage of backward spellings was not reduced with non-words (like troper) spelled backwards. Finally, we analyzed the relations between spelling times and recognition judgments and found a pattern of dependency for non-words only. Generally, the results are discussed within processing-oriented approaches to implicit memory with a special emphasis on controversial findings concerning the role of attention in different expressions of memory.     

The Temporal Dimension of Social Episodes: Position Effect in Time Judgments of Unfilled Intervals

An experiment was conducted to test the prediction, derived from field theory, that unfilled intervals at the core of a social episode (in-process) are perceived to last longer than unfilled intervals at the beginning (preprocess) or toward the end of the social episode (postprocess). As expected, individuals who judged in-process unfilled intervals overestimated their duration and judged them to last longer than individuals who judged preprocess or postprocess unfilled intervals. Moreover, this finding was observed in both immediate and delayed time duration estimates, and the overestimation effect for in-process intervals was stronger in the remote than in the immediate estimates. Relations to prior research on delays in services and implications for the management of services are discussed.     

The influence of sex bias upon compliance with expert power

The present study evolved from the belief that sex bias influences the degree of expert power which the expert has in relation to the perceiver. Therefore, the influence of level of expertise, sex of the expert, sex of the influencee, and sex domination of the expert's occupation upon compliance was examined. Separate experiments were conducted for the male- and female-dominated occupations. Subjects' degree of compliance was measured by their responses to three recommendations contained in an in-basket. The three-way analyses of variance revealed that only expertise significantly affected subjects' degree of compliance. Results are discussed in terms of the presence of outside recognition of competence and legitimate power.     

Life and job satisfaction: Is the job central?

The nature of the causal relationship between life and job satisfaction in a sample of males and females working in a variety of jobs was investigated. Results suggest that the life satisfaction causes job satisfaction hypothesis is more tenable than the reverse.     

Eine neue Wahrnehmungstäuschung

Zusammenfassung Die Grenze des durch beide Arme bestimmten menschlichen Doppelgreifraumes hat die Gestalt einer Kugeldoppelhaube. Alle Punkte dieser Grenzfläche sind durch Greifbewegung gleich bequem (noch) erreichbar, wobei der Doppelarm als einheitliches Greif organ aufzufassen ist. Es besteht für diese Fläche nach allen Richtungen Gleichheit der Greifentfernung. Durch Spiegel-Hand-Versuche kann man nunmehr zeigen, daß alle Punkte dieser Grenzfläche bei visueller Wahrnehmung auch vom Auge aus gleichweit entfernt erscheinen, obwohl dies geometrisch schon wegen der exzentrischen Lage des Auges keineswegs der Fall ist. Die Grenze des Doppelgreifraumes nimmt beim Aufbau des menschlichen Sehraumes eine Schlüsselstellung ein.Man kann an dem beschriebenen Phänomen mit Aussicht auf Erfolg neue psychische Grundgesetze aufspüren. Versuche mit sogenannten Contergankindern können hierzu neue Aufschlüsse liefern.

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Summary The periphery delimiting the space circumscribed by the motional range of both human arms takes the shape of a double truncated sphere. All points of this periphery may still be reached with equal ease by a mere gripping motion (regarding, for the purposes of this study, the two arms as a single prehensile organ), and peripheral equidistance of reach exists in all directions. By means of tests in which the outstretched hand is expediently reflected in a mirror it can now be demonstrated that in visual perception (due to the above-mentioned motional equidistance) the entire double-spherical periphery appears equidistant also from the vantage-point of the eye, even though geometrically this is by no means the case. The periphery of the bilateral space of prehension, therefore, assumes a key position in the configuration of space as perceived by the human eye.The phenomenon opens views fowards new basic psychic laws. Also experiments with thalidomide children may provide new insights.

     

Testing Damasio's somatic marker hypothesis with psychopathic individuals: risk takers or risk averse?

Damasio and colleagues (A. R. Damasio, 1994; A. R. Damasio, D. Tranel, & H. Damasio, 1990) have theorized about a possible relationship between somatic markers and the behavior of psychopathic individuals (Ps), but, to date, there are no published data regarding the proposed relationship. The authors assessed 86 Caucasian and 71 African American male offenders using R. D. Hare's (1991) Psychopathy Checklist--Revised and used a modified version of Bechara and colleagues' (A. Bechara, A. R. Damasio, H. Damasio, & S. W. Anderson, 1994; A. Bechara, H. Damasio, D. Tranel, & A. R. Damasio, 1997) gambling task to test the hypothesis that Ps would, consistent with the somatic marker hypothesis, fail to become risk averse. Results indicated that level of anxiety, but not psychopathy, was predictive of response choices. Several limitations and implications of the study are noted.     

Winning or Losing Against an Opposite-Sex Peer on a Gender-Based Competitive Task

Two studies with heterosexual female and malecollege students explored the effects on mood and bodyimage resulting from a negative versus a positiveoutcome in a competitive interaction. In study 1,participants either succeeded or failed in comparison to anopposite-sex confederate on a gender-neutral task ofanagram solution. Study 2 added the dimension of thegender stereotypicality of the task by creatingempirically derived feminine (beauty aid knowledge) andmasculine (tool construction knowledge) conditions. Theresults indicated that women's anger significantlyincreased following the masculine task, regardless of the outcome. A marginally significantthree-way interaction resulted for the depressionmeasure: Females who won at the masculine task hadhigher levels of depression than males in thiscondition, and higher levels than both males and females inthe masculine-lose condition. In contrast, males who“won” on the feminine task had higher levelsof depression than females in this condition, and higher levels than both males and females who lost onthe feminine task. Discussion centers on the potentialusefulness of the gender-stereotypicality measure forfuture research and the need for followup work to replicate the current findings.     

Which kind of attention is captured by cues with the relative target colour?

Most theories of visual search maintain that attention is selectively tuned to the attributes of the search target (e.g., orange). Conversely, according to the relational account, attention is biased to the relative feature of the target (e.g., redder). However, previous studies that supported the relational account mainly measured mean response times. Hence, the results might not reflect early, perceptual mechanisms (e.g., signal enhancement) but later, decision-based mechanisms (channel selection). The current study tested the relational account against feature-specific theories in a spatial cueing task, in which the targets were backward-masked, and target identification accuracy was measured. The first experiment corroborated earlier results, demonstrating that relational effects are due to signal enhancement. In the second experiment, we chose highly discriminable colours along the blue–red continuum, and obtained results that were more consistent with broad feature-specific rather than relational tuning. The implications of these findings for current theories of attention are discussed.