Associative priming and conflict differentially affect two processes underlying cognitive control: Evidence from reaching behavior

Psychonomic Bulletin & Review - Previous research has indicated that two components of reaching behavior, initiation time and reach curvature, exhibit distinct patterns of trial sequence...     

Semantics for the Logic of Essence

This paper provides a possible worlds semantics for the system of the author's previous paper The Logic of Essence. The basic idea behind the semantics is that a statement should be taken to be true in virtue of the nature of certain objects just in case it is true in any possible world compatible with the nature of those objects. It is shown that a slight variant of the original system is sound and complete under the proposed semantics.     

Effects of Stimulant Medication Treatment on Mothers' and Children's Attributions for the Behavior of Children with Attention Deficit Hyperactivity Disorder

Participants were 55 children with attention deficit hyperactivity disorder (ADHD) who were receiving ongoing treatment with stimulant medications and their mothers, and 31 children with ADHD who were beginning stimulant medication and their mothers. Mothers and children offered attributions for child behaviors that occurred when the child was medicated and not medicated. Mothers rated child compliance and prosocial behavior as more global and stable when the child was medicated and rated noncompliance, ADHD symptoms, and oppositional behavior as more externally caused, less global and stable, but more controllable by the child when the child was medicated. Children rated both their compliance and noncompliance as more controllable in the medicated condition. On a forced-choice measure, both mothers and children selected ability, effort, and task attributions for compliance more in the not-medicated condition, and pill-taking attributions more in the medicated condition. This was reversed for noncompliance, which was attributed more to effort, task, or ability in the medicated condition and more to not taking a pill in the not-medicated condition. The potential risks and benefits for parent–child interactions and children's self-perceptions of these medication-related differences in attributions are discussed.     

Nonconscious influence of masked stimuli on response selection is limited to concrete stimulus-response associations

A pattern-masked arrow negatively biased the "free choice" between 2 manual responses or between 2 vocal responses. This apparently nonconscious influence occurred only when the free-choice trials were intermixed randomly with other trials that terminated in fully visible arrows, which directed a response of the same modality (manual vs. vocal) as that involved in the free-choice test trials. This indicates that recent conscious processing of the association between specific stimuli and specific responses is needed to activate the nonconscious influence of masked arrows on response selection. Because this influence occurred only when a concrete association was activated, it appears not to be based on deep comprehension of the stimuli and instead is attributable to simple stimulus-response bonds.     

Last but not least

When two three-letter words are flashed up in sequence, observers cannot tell whether the top halves of the words are the same or different. It follows that words, like faces, are processed holistically, not as a set of separate features.     

Two versions of the negative compatibility effect: comment on Lleras and Enns (2004)

A. Lleras and J. T. Enns demonstrated a negative influence of a masked arrow that is attributable to the perceptual interaction between the arrow and the mask when these have properties in common (in this case diagonal lines). Although the present analysis is in agreement that this type of perceptual interaction can occur, it also demonstrates that this is not the only way a masked arrow can produce a negative influence. The most critical finding is that a negative influence occurred even when the arrow and mask did not share the common properties that would be needed for this type of perceptual interaction. This illustrates the version of the negative compatibility effect that was studied by S. T. Klapp and L. B. Hinkley (2002) and others.     

Psychotherapy process: the missing link: comment on Westen, Novotny, and Thompson-Brenner (2004)

In this comment, J. S. Ablon and C. Marci argue that focusing on the empirical validation of manualized treatment packages misses important information about what is efficacious about a given treatment. Psychotherapy process has demonstrated that treatments may promote change in ways other than their underlying theories claim. Manualized therapies may appear distinct despite important similarities in dyadic interaction. These functional similarities in the emergent transactional process between therapist and patient may help explain the difficulty demonstrating differential outcomes across brands of brief therapy. Rather than focus on treatment packages targeting patient symptomatology, the authors recommend a shift in focus to the empirical validation of change processes coconstructed by therapist and patient in naturalistic settings.