Aging increases the energetic demands of episodic memory: a cardiovascular analysis

We hypothesized that older volunteers allocate more attentional resources to memory maintenance than do younger volunteers. Allocation of a resource supporting memory maintenance was inferred from performance and cardiovascular measures. Eighteen 18- to 26-year-old men and eighteen 60- to 79-year-old men performed a serial memory task both as a single task and as a dual task that added simple reaction time stimuli. Items presented early or later in the serial list created relatively low or high memory load. The results suggested that older men allocated greater attention to memory maintenance, particularly during high-memory-load items. They showed a slowing of dual-task reaction time and increased heart rate during high- vs. low-memory-load items. Cardiac and vascular reactions further suggested that memory maintenance is supported by phasic autonomic adjustments and that with age, more of this support is required for adequate maintenance of episodic memory.     

TV commercials as achievement scripts for women

This study suggests that sex stereotypes implicitly enacted, but never explicitly articulated, in TV commercials may inhibit women's achievement aspirations. Men and women (N=180) viewed locally produced replicas of four current, sex-stereotyped commercials, or four replicas that were identical except that the sex roles were reversed, or (control) named their favorite TV programs. All subjects then wrote an essay imagining their lives “10 years from now.” The essays were coded for achievement and homemaking themes. Women who viewed traditional commercials deemphasized achievement in favor of homemaking, compared to men and compared to women who had seen reversed role commercials. The reversed role commercials eliminated the sex difference in net achievement focus. Control subjects were indistinguishable from their same-sex counterparts in the traditional condition. The results identified some social changes needed to make “equality of opportunity” a social reality for women as well as men.     

Aversive smoking therapies: A conditioning analysis of therapeutic effectiveness

Rapid smoking (RS) and a less aversive rapid-puffing (RP) treatment were compared on ability to enhance the impact of a behavioral-counseling (BC) procedure on psychophysiological, attitudinal and behavioral response to cigarettes. Data reveal that both aversive smoking treatments resulted in less smoking once treatment began, reduced smoking in post-treatment taste tests, and superior follow-up performance at 6 months and 1 yr. At 1 yr, RS S s achieved the highest number of days abstinent of any group. Regression analyses showed that Ss' confidence ratings of remaining abstinent were highly predictive of follow-up status, and that these ratings were related to number of cigarettes smoked during treatment and amount of smoking during post-treatment taste tests.     

Perceptual vigilance and defense revisited: evidence against Blum's psychoanalytic theory of subliminal perception.

Blum's (1954) interpretation of psychoanalytic theory leads him to predict that Ss will defend against a threatening stimulus which is just below a recognition threshold and be vigilant toward the same stimulus when it is farther below the same threshold. 7 males and 9 females were presented the same four Blacky pictures, at the same speed and illumination, and using the same procedure as Blum. The results offered no support for the theory of perceptual vigilance or defense. The many weaknesses inherent in Blum's theory and supporting methodology were discussed.