Chemical diffusion by vacancy pairs in intermetallic compounds with the B2 structure

This paper is concerned with the implications of vacancy-pair mechanisms on chemical diffusion in intermetallic compounds with the B2 structure. The discussion specifically includes the so-called triple-defect mechanism. It is shown that the vacancy-pair mechanism cannot contribute to chemical diffusion in the intermetallic compound at the stoichiometric composition AB. Focusing on the triple-defect mechanism we extend it to non-stoichiometric compositions by including isolated antistructural atoms. By means of Monte Carlo simulation we show that the efficiency of the triple-defect mechanism in providing for chemical diffusion increases linearly with increasing antistructural atom composition but the efficiency remains relatively low unless the composition is highly non-stoichiometric.     

Kinetics of photoinduced changes in Ag nanoparticles deposited on an indium tin oxide surface

An enhancement of the UV-visible optical absorption spectra of Ag nanoparticles (NPs) deposited on indium tin oxide (ITO) surfaces of different resistance by a seed-mediated growth technique is presented. A bicolour coherent beam, obtained from a pulsed Nd:YAG laser providing a 1060-nm fundamental wavelength and a double-frequency one at 530?nm, was used. A significant change in the optical density is observed for Ag NPs on low-resistance ITO surfaces (≈4?Ω/square), while almost nothing occurs with high-resistance (≈50?Ω/square surfaces). The spectral position of the maximal absorption at 440?nm is almost preserved in both cases. This result is explained in terms of a local photoinduced static field and surface-plasmon polaritons interacting with photoexcited phonons. A grating effect, arising from the coherent bicolour light forming a superstructure as for quantum crystals, could be another contribution.     

Explaining Impossible Phenomena: Object Permanence Beliefs and Memory Failures in Adults

In three experiments, adult subjects' explanations of the observed nonpermanence of a physical object and their recollections of the order of the events during the experiment were obtained and analysed. The data showed that in order to conserve their strong beliefs in object permanence subjects systematically distorted the real temporal succession of events preceding the phenomenon. The frequency of the distortions depended on the salience of the nonpermanence phenomenon (“disappearance” versus “appearance” of the physical object) and on the time interval between the events whose temporal order was reversed, but not on subjects' nationality (English versus German), gender, type of reproduction (immediate versus delayed), role in the experiment (subject versus observer), and degree of prompting in questioning.     

Danegeld remembered: Taxing further the coin head illusion

Abstract

Two experiments studied memory for the appearance of a Danish 20 kroner coin. The coin bears the portrait of Queen Margrethe II in profile, facing to the right. Previous studies have examined memory for British coins, which similarly bear a right-facing portrait of Queen Elizabeth II. They have revealed the occurrence of a mnemonic illusion, in that British people tend to believe the portrait faces left. This finding has been attributed to the occurrence of a joint coin-stamp schema. British stamps bear a left-facing profile of the Queen, and it is possible that information from the stamp predominates in the formation of the schema. In the case of Denmark, however, stamps bear a full-face portrait of the Queen. Nevertheless, the present experiments showed that the Coin Head Illusion is also found in Denmark. That is, the number of participants recalling the Queen's head as facing to the right was significantly below even the chance level of 50%. Further, this result occurred both for residents of Denmark and for visitors to Denmark. These findings suggest that the bias underlying the Coin Head Illusion may be a more general one than that envisaged by the joint coin-stamp schema hypothesis.     

Functional focal retrograde amnesia: Lost access to abstract autobiographical knowledge?

We describe three patients exhibiting an acute reversible amnesia characterised by an impaired recollection of past events with preserved anterograde memory, thus consistent with a focal retrograde amnesia (FRA). This occurred after variable events: state of fugue, road accident, post-traumatic headache. Retrograde amnesia affected autobiographical memory so severely as to cover all of the patients' lives and to erase knowledge of their own identity. The retrieval of public events was variably affected, ranging from normality to severe impairment. No lesions were found on neuroimaging, and neurophysiological findings were unimpressive. FRA subsided in a few days, leaving a gap for the onset. The hypothesis of a psychogenic amnesia is considered, but overcoming the organic/psychogenic dichotomy the episodes appear as examples of “functional” memory inhibition, potentially triggered by different conditions, including events classifiable as psychic trauma. The clinical and neuropsychological traits of functional FRA are discussed. According to a current theory of autobiographical memory, the memory profile may be explained by a lost access to abstract autobiographical knowledge. Given some analogies with the more common transient global amnesia, a mechanism of spreading depression may also be hypothesised for functional FRA.     

A Tale of Two Traditions in Applied Sport Psychology: The Heyday of Soviet Sport and Wake-Up Calls for North America

This paper is the second of two essays designed to acquaint English-speaking readers with the work of Avksenty Tcezarevich Puni (1898–1986), one of the fathers of Russian sport psychology. In our previous essay “The Russian origins of sport psychology: a translation of an early work of A. Tc. Puni” (Ryba, Stambulova, & Wrisberg, 2005 Ryba, T. V., Stambulova, N. B. and Wrisberg, C. A. 2005. The Russian origins of sport psychology: A translation of an early work of A. Tc. Puni. Journal of Applied Sport Psychology, 17: 157–169. [CSA][Taylor & Francis Online], [Web of Science ®] , [Google Scholar]), we discussed Puni's innovative ideas of psychological preparation of athletes based on his classic paper “Psychological preparation of athletes for a competition” that was published in 1963. In that essay, we grounded Puni's pioneering work within the specific socio-political and historical context of his era by providing a brief overview of his life (including extensive explanatory footnotes) in pre- and post-Socialist Revolution Russia. In this paper, we attempt to further historicize the work of Puni on the psychological preparation of athletes by discussing his ground-breaking model of Psychological Preparation for a Competition (PPC) and contrasting that work with the activity of sport psychology consultants taking place in North America during the same time period (i.e., 1960s and 1970s). In a concluding section, we will discuss some of the lessons sport psychology consultants have learned in the decades since Puni developed his model and suggest some ways future models might expand on Puni's view of the provision of psychological assistance for athletes.     

Does the Need for Role Clarity Moderate the Relationship between Role Ambiguity and Athlete Satisfaction?

The purpose of the present study was to investigate the need for role clarity as a potential moderator of the role ambiguity–satisfaction relationship among interdependent sport athletes. Competitive “Junior B” ice hockey players (N = 112) representing eight teams completed the Role Ambiguity Scale, five subscales of the Athlete Satisfaction Questionnaire, and a measure of need for role clarity at approximately the mid-point of their competitive season. Correlational findings indicated that greater role ambiguity was associated with lower athlete satisfaction. However, consistent with the moderator hypothesis, the relationships between role ambiguity and various manifestations of satisfaction were only evident for those athletes who had a higher need for role clarity. Implications of the results are discussed and several avenues for application and future research are suggested.     

Bias and learning in temporal binding: Intervals between actions and outcomes are compressed by prior bias

It has consistently been shown that agents judge the intervals between their actions and outcomes as compressed in time, an effect named intentional binding. In the present work, we investigated whether this effect is result of prior bias volunteers have about the timing of the consequences of their actions, or if it is due to learning that occurs during the experimental session. Volunteers made temporal estimates of the interval between their action and target onset (Action conditions), or between two events (No-Action conditions). Our results show that temporal estimates become shorter throughout each experimental block in both conditions. Moreover, we found that observers judged intervals between action and outcomes as shorter even in very early trials of each block. To quantify the decrease of temporal judgments in experimental blocks, exponential functions were fitted to participants’ temporal judgments. The fitted parameters suggest that observers had different prior biases as to intervals between events in which action was involved. These findings suggest that prior bias might play a more important role in this effect than calibration-type learning processes.