The effects of movement direction and hemispace on estimates of distance traveled

BACKGROUND/HYPOTHESIS: The degree of attention directed to a stimulus and the presence of anisometric representations can alter the perception of the magnitude of a stimulus. We wanted to learn if normal right-handed subjects' estimates of distance traveled are influenced by the right-left direction or hemispace of movements. METHODS: We had blindfolded participants estimate the distance their arm was moved in a rightward or leftward direction, in right and left hemispace. Since we wanted subjects to estimate the distance traveled rather than compute the distance between the start and finish points, the subjects' arms were passively moved in sinusoidal trajectories at a constant speed. RESULTS: Subjects estimated leftward movements as longer than rightward movements, but there was no effect of hemispace. COMMENTS/CONCLUSIONS: People often attend more to novel than routine conditions and therefore participants might have overestimated the distance associated with leftward versus rightward movement because right-handed people more frequently move their right hand in a rightward direction and learn to read and write using rightward movements. Thus, leftward movements might be more novel and more attended than rightward movements and this enhanced directional attention might have influenced estimates of magnitude (distance).     

Dual n-back training increases the capacity of the focus of attention

Working memory (WM) training has been reported to benefit abilities as diverse as fluid intelligence (Jaeggi et al., Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences of the United States of America, 105:6829–6833, 2008) and reading comprehension (Chein & Morrison, Psychonomic Bulletin & Review, 17:193–199, 2010), but transfer is not always observed (for reviews, see Morrison & Chein, Psychonomics Bulletin & Review, 18:46–60, 2011; Shipstead et al., Psychological Bulletin, 138:628–654, 2012). In contrast, recent WM training studies have consistently reported improvement on the trained tasks. The basis for these training benefits has received little attention, however, and it is not known which WM components and/or processes are being improved. Therefore, the goal of the present study was to investigate five possible mechanisms underlying the effects of adaptive dual n-back training on working memory (i.e., improvements in executive attention, updating, and focus switching, as well as increases in the capacity of the focus of attention and short-term memory). In addition to a no-contact control group, the present study also included an active control group whose members received nonadaptive training on the same task. All three groups showed significant improvements on the n-back task from pretest to posttest, but adaptive training produced larger improvements than did nonadaptive training, which in turn produced larger improvements than simply retesting. Adaptive, but not nonadaptive, training also resulted in improvements on an untrained running span task that measured the capacity of the focus of attention. No other differential improvements were observed, suggesting that increases in the capacity of the focus of attention underlie the benefits of adaptive dual n-back training.     

Clinical validation of the trait and state versions of the Food Craving Questionnaire

This is the first study to evaluate the psychometric properties of the Food Craving Questionnaire-Trait (FCQ-T), and Food Craving Questionnaire-State (FCQ-S) measures using a clinically heterogeneous sample of eating disorder patients (N = 177) recruited from seven different outpatient eating disorder treatment centers in Spain. Confirmatory factor analyses (CFAs) corroborated the factor structures of the FCQ-T and FCQ-S. The measures' scores and their factor-derived scale-scores yielded internal consistency reliability indexes that ranged from adequate to excellent. The measures were predictive of eating disorder symptoms. As expected, the FCQ-T was more strongly associated with eating disorder psychopathology than the FCQ-S. The results replicated the psychometric properties of the FCQ-T and FCQ-S in eating disorder populations and could become useful tools in clinical and research settings.     

Sequential tapping interferes selectively with multiple-object tracking: do finger-tapping and tracking share a common resource?

Multiple-object tracking involves simultaneously monitoring positions of a number of target items as they move among distractors. Young adults are capable of tracking only 3-5 items at once. In this study we investigated the origin of this limitation by looking for secondary tasks that interfere with tracking. We compared tracking performance (baseline condition), with performance when participants tapped three fingers in a specific order while tracking (sequential tapping) or articulated three syllables in a specific order while tracking (sequential articulation). The articulation task was used to ensure that the interference produced by sequential tapping was more than would be expected by the executive demands of carrying out any two “attention-demanding” tasks at once. Even though sequential tapping does not require vision or memorizing the positions of external items, it produced significantly more interference than did sequential articulation, as might be expected if tracking and sequential tapping shared a common (limited) resource.     

Prenatal cocaine exposure and infants' preference for novelty and distractibility

The authors used the Fagan Test of Infant Intelligence (J. F. Fagan, L. T. Singer, J. E. Montie, & P. A. Shepherd, 1986) to examine preferences for novelty and to evaluate several indicators of attention (off- and on-task indexes and durations) in 6- and 9-month-old infants who had been prenatally exposed to cigarette smoke only or to cocaine plus other substances. The infants were matched for socioeconomic status. The authors found no group differences in preference for novelty, but the off-task distractibility index and duration were affected by exposure history and showed effects of dosage at the 9-month test time. Infants exposed to cocaine had a higher off-task index and a shorter average off-task look duration than did infants in the other groups. The authors interpreted this pattern of behavior as an indicator of distractibility or stimulation seeking. There were no group differences in measures involving on-task looks or duration at either test time. Correlations between the off-task look index and duration and teratogen use produced moderate correlations at 9 months of age. The authors calculated partial correlations between teratogen exposure and the off-task index at each trimester. Cocaine use during the 1st and 2nd trimesters was significantly correlated with the off-task index at 9 months of age, even when the authors controlled for neonatal measures (e.g., gestational age, birth weight) and during the 1st trimester when they controlled for alcohol and cigarette exposure.     

How Antisocial and Prosocial Coping Influence the Support Process Among Men and Women in the U.S. Postal Service

The influence of antisocial and prosocial copingon the acquisition of social support and on subsequentpsychological distress among 67 male and 47 femalepostal employees was examined allowing genderdifferences in coping to be studied in a single worksetting. Seventy seven percent of the respondents wereEuropean American, 18% were African American, and theremaining 5% were of varying ethnicities including:Asian American and Latin American. Employingstructural equation modeling, women were found to useprosocial coping as a coping response significantly morethan men, and men were found to use antisocial coping as a coping response significantly more thanwomen. Prosocial strategies were related to increasedworkplace social support in both the short-term andlong-term. Antisocial coping strategies were related to less support from co-workers in theshort-term. Contrary to predictions, antisocial copingstrategies were not related to decreased support acrosstime. Finally, increased social support was related to less psychological distress within eachassessment period.     

A comment on Fry's "The role of caring in a theory of nursing ethics

Our response to Sara Fry's paper focuses on the difficulty of understanding her insistence on the fundamental character of caring in a theory of nursing ethics. We discuss a number of problems her text throws in the way of making sense of this idea, and outline our own proposal for how caring's role may be reasonably understood: not as an alternative object of value, competing with autonomy or patient good, but rather as an alternative way of responding toward that which is of value.