Enhanced development of auditory change detection in musically trained school‐aged children: a longitudinal event‐related potential study

Adult musicians show superior auditory discrimination skills when compared to non‐musicians. The enhanced auditory skills of musicians are reflected in the augmented amplitudes of their auditory event‐related potential (ERP) responses. In the current study, we investigated longitudinally the development of auditory discrimination skills in musically trained and nontrained individuals. To this end, we recorded the mismatch negativity (MMN) and P3a responses from children who play a musical instrument and age‐matched children with no musical training at ages 7, 9, 11, and 13. Basic auditory processing was investigated by recording ERPs in the Multi‐Feature Paradigm that included frequency, duration, intensity, location, and gap deviants. The detection of musically more relevant sound changes was examined in an oddball paradigm with major chords as standards and minor chords as deviants. The musically trained children showed larger increase in MMN and P3a amplitudes with age for the chord deviants than the control children. There was also a strong trend (p = .054) for larger increase in MMN amplitude in the musically trained children for the location deviant. As no group differences in response amplitudes were evident at the early stages of the training, our results suggest that the superior neural auditory discrimination in adult musicians is due to training and not pre‐existing differences between musicians and non‐musicians.     

Power and Personality Perception in Real‐Life Hierarchical Relationships

The present study examined how Big Five personality ratings of the same target individuals differ as a function of the power relation between the target and the judge. Our targets were 37 employees with leadership duties from two large organizations. The targets' subordinates (N = 352), peers (N = 186), and superiors (N = 62) constituted our groups of judges. The targets and judges also provided self‐reports of personality. Subordinate judges showed higher consensus but not higher self‐other agreement than peer or superior judges. Furthermore, the targets were judged as more extraverted, more emotionally stable, less agreeable, and less open to experience by their subordinates than by their superiors. The results suggest that (i) observer consensus, but not self‐other agreement or assumed similarity varies as a function of real‐life power; (ii) the effects of power on mean trait scores are mostly congruent with the previously observed effects of power on behaviour and on stereotypes. Copyright © 2012 John Wiley & Sons, Ltd.     

Foreign and domestic company attractiveness to host national employees in Japan: A person–organization fit and image theory perspective

This study contributes to research on organizational attractiveness and human resource management (HRM) by drawing on image theory to examine the effect of organizational characteristics (foreign vs. domestic company country‐of‐origin, HRM practices, organizational culture, and work environment) on organizational attractiveness perceptions by host country national (HCN) employees. Drawing on person–organization fit theory, we also examine the moderating effects of HCNs' demographic characters (age and gender), work‐related skills (English proficiency and international experience), and value orientations (individualism and risk aversion) between the relationship of these organizational characteristics and organizational attractiveness. A between‐subject scenario‐based experiment with 800 HCN employees in Japan suggest that not the company country‐of‐origin, but the local adaptation of organizational culture, HRM practices, and work environment influence HCNs' organizational attractiveness perceptions. HCNs' demographic characteristics, work‐related skills, and value orientations had moderating effects between these organizational characteristics and organizational attractiveness perceptions.     

Theory of mind ability in high socially anxious individuals

Background/Objectives: Research has demonstrated an association between social anxiety and impaired Theory of Mind (ToM). We assess whether ToM deficits occur even at a subclinical level of social anxiety and whether group differences in ToM performance are consistent with interpretation bias. We also explore potential reasons as to why socially anxious individuals may perform differently on ToM tasks.

Methods/Design: Undergraduate participants high (HSA; n?=?78) and low (LSA; n?=?35) in social anxiety completed a task of ToM decoding, the Reading the Mind in the Eyes (MIE), a task of ToM reasoning, the Movie for the Assessment of Social Cognition (MASC), and a post-task questionnaire about their experience completing the MASC.

Results: HSAs performed marginally worse than LSAs on the MIE on neutrally valenced trials, and their pattern of errors may be consistent with a negative interpretation bias. HSAs and LSAs did not differ overall in performance on the MASC, though HSAs reported experiencing more confusion and distress than LSAs during the task, and this distress was associated with more MASC errors for HSA participants only. These results provide insight into the nature of ToM ability in socially anxious individuals and highlight important avenues for future research.     

Examining methodological variation in response inhibition: The effects of outcome measures and task characteristics on age-related differences

This study addressed methodological issues common to developmental studies on response inhibition. Age-related differences were investigated using two Stroop-like tasks with different levels of complexity and comparing different outcome measures in a sample of 340 children and adolescents aged 7–15 years. First, speed and accuracy of task performance were examined; the results showing that improvement in speed continued until age 13 in both the basic naming task and the two inhibition tasks. Improvement in accuracy was less consistent and continued until age 9 or 13 years. Second, two different algorithms were employed to control for the effects of basic processes in inhibition tasks. The difference algorithm indicated age-related differences similar to those for speed. The ratio algorithm, however, suggested earlier deceleration of development of response inhibition at 9 or 11 years of age. Factors related to the cognitive requirements and presented stimuli also had an effect on the results. The present findings shed light on the inconsistencies in the developmental studies of response inhibition and demonstrated that the selection of outcome measures and task characteristics are critical because they affect the way development is depicted.     

TENSIONS IN INTELLIGENT DESIGN'S CRITIQUE OF THEISTIC EVOLUTIONISM

“Intelligent Design” (ID) is a contemporary intellectual movement arguing that there is scientific evidence for the existence of some sort of creator. Its proponents see ID as a scientific research program and as a way to build a bridge between science and theology, while many critics see it merely as a repackaged form of religiously motivated creationism: both bad science and bad theology. In this article, I offer a close reading of the ID movement's critique of theistic evolutionism and argue that this critique is ultimately in tension with the movement's broader thought.     

Eine “kantianische utopie” in Russland: Erich Solov’ëv

A Kantian Utopia in Russia: Erikh Solov’ëv. The article deals with Erikh Solov’ëv (b. 1934), a historian of philosophy who is one of the best Soviet and post-Soviet exponents of Kant. In several of his works and articles, published in the 1990s, Solov’ëv has attempted to apply the ideas of Kant’s social philosophy to post-Soviet realities. Kant is important above all as a theoretician of a free subjectivity, human rights, and a critic of paternalism in social life. Several Kantian motives came to the fore during the perestrojka when the Marxist “class approach” was abandoned and “all-human” values (ob??e?elove?eskie tsennosti) entered into the discussion. Later, Solov’ëv attempted to develop Kantian guidelines for a post-Soviet society, including moral norms for businessmen in the new Russia, but these attempts bore the distinct hallmark of social utopianism.