A cultural psychological analysis of cultural change

Life experience appears to be transforming in contemporary societies, with changes taking place in Asia being particularly substantial. There is strong public interest in understanding how these changes affect individual psyches. Scientific understanding of this issue, however, has not kept pace with change. Research findings from Western societies, the USA in particular, provide a model for understanding and predicting patterns of cultural change in Asia. However, the applicability of the model in this region requires critical examination. This article presents an overview of the available evidence in this research field, reviewing available psychological research that examines cultural change in the USA, China, Japan, and Australia. This paper's aim is to stimulate interest in this research area within the community of Asian social psychologists as our Asia‐based insights have much to contribute to the fundamental research question at stake, and the nature of the interplay between a changing social ecology, cultural environment, and participating psyches.     

Origins of a theory of mind

Twenty-two pairs of typically developing toddlers (M = 24.32 months) and their mothers were observed in a play-room solving puzzles during 30 min. The target of the observations was hand-taking gesture. Researchers have thought that this gesture is rare among typically developing children and is more frequent among autistic children. Ten in 22 children showed this gesture in only 30 min. They should know “I can not do it by myself, but my mother can do it.” When we can assume that children know others’ mental mechanism, it might be the origins of a theory of mind.     

Emotional fortification: Indulgent consumption and emotion reappraisal and their implications for well‐being

This paper suggests that indulgent consumption could be used as an emotion regulation strategy and that it could have positive implications for well‐being. “Emotional fortification,” where the use of one emotion regulation strategy is correlated with the use of another strategy, is confirmed in this study. People who frequently use emotion reappraisal are more likely to use indulgence than people who use this reappraisal strategy infrequently. Study 1 shows the correlation between indulgence and reappraisal. Study 2 examines the implications of indulgence and reappraisal for life satisfaction and personal well‐being. These findings suggest that indulgence is not always harmful for people and society.     

Detection of invariants by haptic touch across age groups: rod length perception

This study examined the development in the detection of maximum eigenvalues and static moment as invariants, through a task of perceiving rod length without visual information by haptic touch. 34 participants ages 6 to 83 years participated in the experiment. Their exploratory behavior and perceptions of rod length were analyzed by age group (Children: 6 to 12 years old; Young Adult: 21 to 25 years old; Middle Age: 31 to 56 years old; and Older: 65 to 83 years old). A behavior analysis indicated that use of vertical swinging increased for the Young Adult group and decreased with age for the Older group, whereas Children frequently held the rod without wielding. Analysis showed that, by age, differences in coefficients on the maximum eigenvalue and static moment were parallel with an exploratory behavioral change. Finally, the effect of different exploratory behaviors on length perception was discussed.     

Priming race in biracial observers affects visual search for Black and White faces

We examined whether or not priming racial identity would influence Black-White biracial individuals' ability to visually search for White and Black faces. Black, White, and biracial participants performed a visual search task in which the targets were Black or White faces. Before the task, the biracial participants were primed with either their Black or their White racial identity. All participant groups detected Black faces faster than White faces. Critically, the results also showed a racial-prime effect in biracial individuals: The magnitude of the search asymmetry was significantly different for those primed with their White identity and those primed with their Black identity. These findings suggest that top-down factors such as one's racial identity can influence mechanisms underlying the visual search for faces of different races.     

Alzheimer amyloid beta-peptide inhibits the late phase of long-term potentiation through calcineurin-dependent mechanisms in the hippocampal dentate gyrus

The perforant path projecting from the entorhinal cortex to the hippocampal dentate gyrus is a particularly vulnerable target to the early deposition of amyloid beta (Abeta) peptides in Alzheimer's brain. The authors previously showed that brief applications of Abeta at subneurotoxic concentrations suppressed the early-phase long-term potentiation (E-LTP) in rat dentate gyrus. The current study further examines the effect of Abeta on the late-phase LTP (L-LTP) in this area. Using multiple high-frequency stimulus trains, a stable L-LTP lasting for at least 3 h was induced in the medial perforant path of rat hippocampal slices. Bath application of Abeta(1-42) (0.2-1.0 microM) during the induction trains attenuated both the initial and late stages of L-LTP. On the other hand, Abeta(1-42) perfusion within the first hour following the induction primarily impaired the late stage of L-LTP, which resembled the action of the protein synthesis inhibitor emetine. Blockade of calcineurin activity with FK506 or cyclosporin A completely prevented Abeta-induced L-LTP deficits. These results suggest that Abeta(1-42) impaired both the induction and maintenance phase of dentate L-LTP through calcineurin-dependent mechanisms. In the concentration range effective for inhibiting L-LTP, Abeta(1-42) also reduced the amplitude of NMDA receptor-mediated synaptic currents in dentate granule cells via a postsynaptic mechanism. In addition, concurrent applications of Abeta(1-42) with the protein synthesis inhibitor caused no additive reduction of L-LTP, indicating a common mechanism underlying the action of both. Thus, inhibition of NMDA receptor channels and disruption of protein synthesis were two possible mechanisms contributing to Abeta-induced L-LTP impairment.     

Normal recognition of emotion in a prosopagnosic

In the leading model of face perception, facial identity and facial expressions of emotion are recognized by separate mechanisms. In this report, we provide evidence supporting the independence of these processes by documenting an individual with severely impaired recognition of facial identity yet normal recognition of facial expressions of emotion. NM, a 40-year-old prosopagnosic, showed severely impaired performance on five of six tests of facial identity recognition. In contrast, she performed in the normal range on four different tests of emotion recognition. Because the tests of identity recognition and emotion recognition assessed her abilities in a variety of ways, these results provide solid support for models in which identity recognition and emotion recognition are performed by separate processes.     

A primitive memory system for the deployment of transient attention

When transient attention is summoned by the sudden appearance of a large cue, it can be deployed to a small portion of the cue where a target appeared on previous trials (Kristjánsson, Mackeben, & Nakayama, 2001). This result runs counter to the view that transient, or exogenous, attention is summoned automatically and indiscriminately to abruptly appearing stimuli. To further characterize the short-term learning mediating this phenomenon, we report the following results. (1) When there was a consistent relationship between a small identifying portion of the cue and the target, learning occurred rapidly. Thus, transient attention can be summoned to a distinctively colored or distinctively shaped portion of the cue as a consequence of repeated pairing (Experiments 1 and 2). (2) When there was a consistent relation between a given position on the object and its overall color or shape, no learning occurred (Experiments 3 and 4). Thus, transient attention cannot learn a complex relation between target position and shape or color. (3) We confirmed the fast object-centered learning of position shown in Kristjánsson et al. (2001). (4) Explicit knowledge of the cue-target relationship had no effect on the performance of the task. The results provide evidence for the existence of a primitive object-centered learning mechanism beneficial for the rapid deployment of transient attention. The possible role of such a mechanism in the maintenance of representations of the visual environment is discussed.     

Semantic processing of Arabic,Kanji, and Kana numbers: Evidence from interference in physical and numerical size judgments

Two experiments were conducted with the following objectives (1) to replicate the finding of similar semantic representation of Arabic and written-word (Kanji and Kana) numbers with a direct numerical task, (2) to investigate the automatic semantic processing of Arabic and written-word numbers, and (3) to verify whether the assumption of a common semantic representation is valid in an indirect numerical task. Subjects were asked to judge which of two numbers (e.g, 6-8) was larger either in its numerical size (Experiment 1) or in its physical size (Experiment 2) using the three notations. Effects of two factors were analyzed: the congruity between numerical and physical size and the numerical distance. The effects of these factors were very similar across the three notations in Experiment 1, but were drastically different in Experiment 2. The results of Experiment 2 demonstrated the nonsemantic processing of Kana numbers, and suggest that there may be separate semantic representations for Arabic and Kanji numbers.     

Fitting the mind to the world: face adaptation and attractiveness aftereffects

Average faces are attractive, but what is average depends on experience. We examined the effect of brief exposure to consistent facial distortions on what looks normal (average) and what looks attractive. Adaptation to a consistent distortion shifted what looked most normal, and what looked most attractive, toward that distortion. These normality and attractiveness aftereffects occurred when the adapting and test faces differed in orientation by 90° (+45° vs. −45°), suggesting adaptation of high-level neurons whose coding is not strictly retino- topic. Our results suggest that perceptual adaptation can rapidly recalibrate people's preferences to fit the faces they see. The results also suggest that average faces are attractive because of their central location in a distribution of faces (i.e., prototypicality), rather than because of any intrinsic appeal of particular physical characteristics. Recalibration of preferences may have important consequences, given the powerful effects of perceived attractiveness on person perception, mate choice, social interactions, and social outcomes for individuals.