Emotional experience improves with age: evidence based on over 10 years of experience sampling

Recent evidence suggests that emotional well-being improves from early adulthood to old age. This study used experience-sampling to examine the developmental course of emotional experience in a representative sample of adults spanning early to very late adulthood. Participants (N = 184, Wave 1; N = 191, Wave 2; N = 178, Wave 3) reported their emotional states at five randomly selected times each day for a one week period. Using a measurement burst design, the one-week sampling procedure was repeated five and then ten years later. Cross-sectional and growth curve analyses indicate that aging is associated with more positive overall emotional well-being, with greater emotional stability and with more complexity (as evidenced by greater co-occurrence of positive and negative emotions). These findings remained robust after accounting for other variables that may be related to emotional experience (personality, verbal fluency, physical health, and demographic variables). Finally, emotional experience predicted mortality; controlling for age, sex, and ethnicity, individuals who experienced relatively more positive than negative emotions in everyday life were more likely to have survived over a 13 year period. Findings are discussed in the theoretical context of socioemotional selectivity theory.     

The effect of zolpidem on targeted memory reactivation during sleep

According to the active system consolidation theory, memory consolidation during sleep relies on the reactivation of newly encoded memory representations. This reactivation is orchestrated by the interplay of sleep slow oscillations, spindles, and theta, which are in turn modulated by certain neurotransmitters like GABA to enable long-lasting plastic changes in the memory store. Here we asked whether the GABAergic system and associated changes in sleep oscillations are functionally related to memory reactivation during sleep. We administered the GABA_A agonist zolpidem (10 mg) in a double-blind placebo-controlled study. To specifically focus on the effects on memory reactivation during sleep, we experimentally induced such reactivations by targeted memory reactivation (TMR) with learning-associated reminder cues presented during post-learning slow-wave sleep (SWS). Zolpidem significantly enhanced memory performance with TMR during sleep compared with placebo. Zolpidem also increased the coupling of fast spindles and theta to slow oscillations, although overall the power of slow spindles and theta was reduced compared with placebo. In an uncorrected exploratory analysis, memory performance was associated with slow spindle responses to TMR in the zolpidem condition, whereas it was associated with fast spindle responses in placebo. These findings provide tentative first evidence that GABAergic activity may be functionally implicated in memory reactivation processes during sleep, possibly via its effects on slow oscillations, spindles and theta as well as their interplay.

Sleep supports the consolidation of newly acquired memories (Mednick et al. 2011; Klinzing et al. 2019). According to the active system consolidation theory, new memories and their associated neuronal activation patterns become spontaneously reactivated (replayed) following learning in the sleeping brain (Wilson and McNaughton 1994; Diekelmann and Born 2010). These reactivations allow for the redistribution and integration of the memory representations from hippocampal to neocortical sites for long-term storage (Rasch and Born 2007; Klinzing et al. 2019). Memory reactivation during sleep has been proposed to rely on the synchronized interplay of electrophysiological oscillations characteristic of non–rapid eye movement (NREM) sleep, mainly neocortical slow oscillations (SOs, <1 Hz), thalamocortical spindles (9–15 Hz), and hippocampal ripples (80–200 Hz) (Mölle et al. 2009; Staresina et al. 2015; Helfrich et al. 2018; Ngo et al. 2020). Particularly, sleep spindles and their intricate phase coupling to SO have been suggested to be mechanistically involved in memory consolidation processes during sleep (Ulrich 2016; Antony et al. 2019). It has been proposed that memories become reinstated by spindle events, specifically during the up-state of slow oscillations, allowing for the flow of information between different brain sites as well as the induction of lasting structural and functional plastic changes in the learning-associated neuronal networks (Rosanova and Ulrich 2005; Peyrache and Seibt 2020). In addition to sleep spindles, neocortical and hippocampal theta activity (4–8 Hz) is also phase-locked to SO during NREM sleep (Gonzalez et al. 2018; Cox et al. 2019; Krugliakova et al. 2020), and this coupling has been related to memory consolidation during sleep (Schreiner et al. 2018).A number of neuromodulators seem to be involved in the generation of sleep spindles, SO and associated memory processing, most notably GABA (γ-aminobutyric acid), which is the major inhibitory neurotransmitter (Lancel 1999; Ulrich et al. 2018). Sleep spindles and sleep-dependent memory processing can be boosted by targeting the GABAergic system pharmacologically (Mednick et al. 2013). Zolpidem is one of the most frequently used drugs in this regard, binding to GABA_A receptors at the same location as benzodiazepines, thereby acting as a GABA_A receptor agonist (Lemmer 2007). Zolpidem increases the time spent in slow-wave sleep (SWS) and reduces the amount of rapid eye movement (REM) sleep (Kanno et al. 2000; Uchimura et al. 2006; Zhang et al. 2020). Zolpidem also increases the density and power of sleep spindles (Dijk et al. 2010; Lundahl et al. 2012; Mednick et al. 2013; Niknazar et al. 2015; Zhang et al. 2020) as well as the coupling of spindles to SO (Niknazar et al. 2015; Zhang et al. 2020), and it was further found to enhance declarative memory consolidation during sleep, with postsleep performance improvements being associated with higher spindle density and spindle power as well as with SO–spindle coupling (Kaestner et al. 2013; Mednick et al. 2013; Zhang et al. 2020).However, it remains unclear whether the changes in sleep stages, sleep spindles, and SO–spindle coupling after pharmacological manipulation with zolpidem are functionally related to the mechanisms underlying sleep-dependent memory consolidation such as memory reactivation. Over the last few years, targeted memory reactivation (TMR) has been increasingly applied to manipulate memory reactivation during sleep experimentally by presenting learning-associated reminder cues like odors or sounds (Oudiette and Paller 2013; Hu et al. 2020; Klinzing and Diekelmann 2020). TMR biases sleep-related neuronal replay events toward the reactivated memory contents (Lewis and Bendor 2019) and enhances subsequent recall performance (Rudoy et al. 2009; Diekelmann et al. 2011; Schreiner et al. 2015; Cairney et al. 2018). Although a few studies observed modulations of SOs (Rihm et al. 2014), sleep spindles (Cox et al. 2014), and SO–spindle coupling (Bar et al. 2020) with TMR during sleep, studies on the role of specific neurotransmitters and particularly on the role of GABAergic neurotransmission and associated changes in sleep oscillations for targeted memory reactivation are entirely lacking. One previous study tested the effect of pharmacologically increased GABAergic activity by administering the benzodiazepine clonazepam after cued reactivation of a declarative memory during wakefulness (Rodríguez et al. 2013). Clonazepam increased memory performance when it was administered after reactivation with an incomplete reminder cue, suggesting that increasing GABAergic neurotransmission may enhance the restabilization of reactivated declarative memories in humans during wakefulness.In the present study, we tested the effect of modulating GABAergic activity with zolpidem on targeted memory reactivation during sleep and associated changes in sleep spindles as well as SO–spindle and SO–theta coupling. We hypothesized that zolpidem enhances the beneficial effects of targeted memory reactivation on memory performance and that this enhancement is associated with increases in spindle density, spindle power, SO–spindle coupling, and possibly SO–theta coupling, and the amount of SWS. Participants were trained on a memory task including 30 sound–word associations in the evening (Forcato et al. 2020) and received an oral dose of 10 mg zolpidem (n = 11) or placebo (n = 11) after training before a full night of sleep in the sleep lab (Fig. 1). During the night, incomplete reminder cues (sounds + first syllable of the associated words) were played again via in-ear headphones during SWS. The next morning, participants were trained on an interference memory task to probe the stability of the original memory, which was tested 30 min later.Open in a separate windowFigure 1.Experimental design and memory task. (A) All subjects took part in a training session at ∼22.30, were administered with placebo (n = 11) or 10 mg of zolpidem (n = 11) before going to bed at 23:00, and received targeted memory reactivation during the first SWS period. After ∼8 h of sleep, in the morning, subjects learned an interference task and were tested on the original memory task in a testing session 30 min after the interference task. (B) Training: First, subjects were presented with 30 sound–word associations for learning. For each association, the sound was presented first for 2900 msec. The sound then continued accompanied by the word written on the screen and spoken aloud for 1500 msec. After a 4000-msec break, the next association was presented in the same way. After all associations were presented once, participants completed an immediate cued recall test. For each association, the sound was presented for 2900 msec. The sound then continued accompanied by the first syllable of the associated word for 1500 msec. Participants were then given 5000 msec to say the complete word aloud (sound continued during the entire period). Independently of their response, the correct answer was then presented on the screen and via headphones for 1500 msec. Reactivation: Each sound was first presented alone for an average of 2900 msec; the sound then continued accompanied by the first syllable of each word for another 1500 msec. After a 7000-msec break, the next sound–syllable pair was presented until all 30 pairs had been presented once. Testing: Each sound was presented for 500 msec and then the sound continued and subjects had 5000 msec to say the associated word aloud. After a break of 4000 msec, the procedure continued for the rest of the 30 associations. Adapted from Forcato et al. (2020).     

Multidimensional Perfectionism and the Big Five Personality Traits: A Meta‐analysis

Multidimensional perfectionism includes the dimensions perfectionistic concerns and perfectionistic strivings. Many studies have investigated the nomological network of multidimensional perfectionism by relating perfectionistic concerns and perfectionistic strivings to the Big Five personality traits. Results from these studies were largely inconsistent. In the present study, we meta‐analytically integrated 672 effect sizes from 72 samples (N = 21 573) describing relations between multidimensional perfectionism and the Big Five personality traits. Perfectionistic concerns correlated positively with Neuroticism (r = 0.383) and negatively with Extraversion (r = ?0.198), Agreeableness (r = ?0.198), Conscientiousness (r = ?0.111), and Openness (r = ?0.087). Perfectionistic strivings correlated positively with Conscientiousness (r = 0.368), Openness (r = 0.121), Neuroticism (r = 0.090), and Extraversion (r = 0.067) and were unrelated to Agreeableness (r = 0.002). The measures of perfectionistic concerns and perfectionistic strivings moderated most of these relations. Meta‐analytic structural equation modelling allowed controlling each perfectionism dimension for the respective other. This partialling increased all correlations with the exception of the previously positive correlation between perfectionistic strivings and Neuroticism, which ceased to be significant. The findings support the distinction between perfectionistic strivings and perfectionistic concerns and demonstrate how multidimensional perfectionism is situated in the context of broader personality traits. © 2019 European Association of Personality Psychology     

The cross-cultural validity of the Caregiving Experiences Questionnaire (CEQ) among Danish mothers with preschool children

The present study explored the Danish cross-cultural validity of the Caregiving Experiences Questionnaire (CEQ), a new measure of caregiving representations in parent-child relationships. Low-risk Danish mothers (N = 159) with children aged 1.5–5 years completed the CEQ and predictive validity measures of parenting stress and child behavior problems. Exploratory factor analyses supported a four-factor model. Analyses showed significant theoretically meaningful associations between the CEQ scales and predictive validity measures. The current study adds evidence to the cross-cultural validity of the CEQ.     

Understanding of the current police caution (England and Wales) among suspects in police detention

The current police caution (England and Wales) provides information about the right to silence to suspects in police detention. Though earlier studies, involving other populations, suggest that the caution would be too complex for detainees to understand fully, the issue has not previously been investigated directly among police detainees. Comprehension of the caution was investigated among two groups, police station suspects (N = 30) and individuals (N = 24) attending a job centre in the same area, matched for intellectual ability. In both groups, understanding was very limited and did not relate either to their situation at the time of testing or to self‐reported experience of the criminal justice system. Even under optimal experimental conditions, only 11% (six) of the participants were able to demonstrate full understanding of its meaning. Worryingly, though more than 96% (52) claimed to have understood the caution fully after it had been presented to them as it would be by the police, none of them did so. We suggest practical measures to ameliorate the difficulties, but the importance of devising a new, simplified, version of the current caution cannot be over‐emphasized; otherwise, miscarriages of justice are likely to occur. Copyright © 2002 John Wiley & Sons, Ltd.     

Warmth and contingency and their relationship to maternal attitudes toward parenting

In this study, the authors addressed the question of whether maternal parenting behaviors in terms of sensitivity, warmth, and contingency with respect to small infants were equally represented in attitudes toward parenting. Sixty mothers from central Germany with middle-class socioeconomic backgrounds were videotaped with their 1st born 3-month-old infant in a free-play and a caregiving episode in their home. The different maternal parenting components were behaviorally analyzed. Maternal attitudes toward parenting were assessed with self-report measures. The results showed that behavioral sensitivity was significantly associated with attitudes related to contingency, whereas behavioral warmth and contingency were not associated with maternal attitudes. The authors interpreted differential associations as a reflection of intuitive and explicit parenting strategies, with only sensitivity being explicitly represented.     

Learning the unlearnable: the role of missing evidence

Syntactic knowledge is widely held to be partially innate, rather than learned. In a classic example, it is sometimes argued that children know the proper use of anaphoric one, although that knowledge could not have been learned from experience. Lidz et al. [Lidz, J., Waxman, S., & Freedman, J. (2003). What infants know about syntax but couldn't have learned: Experimental evidence for syntactic structure at 18 months. Cognition, 89, B65-B73.] pursue this argument, and present corpus and experimental evidence that appears to support it; they conclude that specific aspects of this knowledge must be innate. We demonstrate, contra Lidz et al., that this knowledge may in fact be acquired from the input, through a simple Bayesian learning procedure. The learning procedure succeeds because it is sensitive to the absence of particular input patterns--an aspect of learning that is apparently overlooked by Lidz et al. More generally, we suggest that a prominent form of the "argument from poverty of the stimulus" suffers from the same oversight, and is as a result logically unsound.     

Relating the perception of visual ensemble statistics to individual levels of autistic traits

Integrating information across the visual field into an ensemble (e.g., seeing the forest from the trees) is an effective strategy to efficiently process the visual world, and one that is often impaired in autism spectrum disorder. Individual differences in sensory processing predict ensemble encoding, providing a potential mechanism for differing perceptual strategies across individuals, and possibly across diagnostic groups exhibiting atypical sensory processing. Here, we explore whether ensemble encoding is associated with traits associated with autism spectrum disorder (ASD). Participants (N=68) were presented with an ensemble display consisting of circles of varying sizes and colors, and were asked to remember the size of the red and blue circles, while ignoring the green circles. Participants were then cued to a target location after a brief delay, and instructed to report the remembered size of the circle they had previously viewed in that location, as ensemble information commonly biases memory for individual objects toward the probed mean of a set of similar objects. The Autism-spectrum Quotient (AQ) was completed to measure each individual’s level of autistic traits. We found that an individual’s level of ensemble perception, measured as their bias toward the probed mean, was negatively associated with a higher level of ASD traits. These results suggest that individuals with higher levels of ASD traits are less likely to integrate perceptual information. These findings may shed light on different perceptual processing within the autism spectrum, and provide insight into the relationship between individual differences and ensemble encoding.     

Correction to: Contextual modulation of prime response retrieval processes: Evidence from auditory negative priming

Attention, Perception, & Psychophysics - The Publisher regrets that two erroneous values were introduced by the typesetter when performing proof corrections.     

The Impact of Stigma and Social Support on Development of Post-traumatic Growth Among Persons Living with HIV

Given high rates of trauma in people living with HIV (PLH) and the health benefits of posttraumatic growth (PTG), understanding how to foster PTG in PLH exposed to trauma could be of interest to clinical psychologists working with this population. The current study examined factors theoretically related to development of PTG in PLH, namely HIV-related stigma, disclosure of HIV status, and emotional support. A sample of 334 HIV-positive adults answered a battery of self-report questionnaires. HIV-related stigma, disclosure to sexual partners, and emotional support were significant predictors of PTG: stigma was associated with lower PTG, whereas disclosure and emotional support were associated with higher PTG. Disclosure and emotional support remained significantly associated with PTG in the model including demographic factors and stigma. These findings highlight the need for development of interventions that can aid PLH in disclosing their HIV status to sexual partners and increasing available social support.