Evaluating risk propensity using an objective instrument

Risk propensity is the stable tendency to choose options with a lower probability of success, but greater rewards. Its evaluation has been approached from various perspectives: from self-report questionnaires to objective tests. Self-report questionnaires have often been criticized due to interference from voluntary and involuntary biases, in addition to their lack of predictive value. Objective tests, on the other hand, require resources that make them difficult to administer to large samples. This paper presents an easy-to-administer, 30-item risk propensity test. Each item is itself an objective test describing a hypothetical situation in which the subject must choose between three options, each with a different gain function but equivalent in expected value. To assess its psychometric fit, the questionnaire was administered to 222 subjects, and we performed a test of its reliability as well as exploratory factor analysis. The results supported a three-factor model of risk (Sports and Gambling, Long-term Plans, and Loss Management). After making the necessary adjustments and incorporating a global factor of risk propensity, confirmatory factor analysis was done, revealing that the data exhibited adequate goodness of fit.     

Acculturative stress in Latin-American immigrants: an assessment proposal

The aim of this paper was to develop an instrument to assess levels of stress experienced by Latin-American immigrants in their acculturative process in Spain. A sample of 692 immigrants from Latin America, aged 20 to 63 years, took part on this study (54.9% males and 45.1% females). A 24-item questionnaire with high reliability (.92) was elaborated. Six factors related to acculturative stress were found: 1) discrimination and rejection; 2) differences with the out-group (native Spaniards); 3) citizenship problems and legality; 4) problems concerning social relationships with other immigrants; 5) nostalgia and longing; and 6) family break-up. Our findings show that participants have a high level of stress related to nostalgia and longing, family break-up, and the perception of discrimination and rejection by natives. The usefulness of the instrument and its applications and restrictions are discussed.     

Psychosocial correlates of condom use and their relationship with worry about STI and HIV in native and immigrant adolescents in Spain

The goal of this study was to analyze how worry about sexually-transmitted infections (STI) and HIV influences attitudes and self-efficacy towards condom use, HIV-related knowledge, HIV-perceived susceptibility and HIV-misconceptions in a multicultural sample in Spain. The sample was composed of 3,051 adolescents aged between 14 and 19 years old who lived in Spain. Of these, 67.7% were native Spaniards and the remaining 32.3% were Latin American immigrants. Results showed that worry about STI and HIV has a direct influence on condom use self-efficacy and HIV-knowledge and HIV-perceived susceptibility. Native Spanish adolescents showed higher positive attitudes towards condom use, greater HIV-knowledge and HIV-perceived susceptibility, and lower negative attitudes towards condoms use and HIV-misconceptions than Latin American adolescents. In the discussion, the importance of worry about STI and HIV is highlighted as a mediator variable that can predict risky sexual behavior and is related to cultural origin.     

Latin-American immigrant women and mental health: differences according to their rural or urban origin

Spain is one of the EU countries that receive most immigrants, especially from Latin America. The process of migration implies a high level of stress what may have repercussions for the mental health of immigrants. The purposes of this study were: (a) to determine whether the degree of mental health of immigrant women differs according to their rural or urban origin, (b) to compare the mental health of immigrant women with that of the female normative sample of host population (Spain). A sample of 186 Latin American immigrant women (142 from urban areas and 44 from rural areas) was recruited in Barcelona by means of a consecutive case method. A structured interview and the SCL-90-R were administered. The results indicated that the immigrant women from rural origin reported higher levels of psychological symptomatology than those from urban areas. Immigrants reported higher levels of psychological symptomatology than the native female population and in most of the psychological symptoms exceeded 90% of the native Spanish population. Migration is a powerful stressor which may lead to psychological distress. Being female of rural origin and being in an illegal situation is related with an increase in symptomatology.     

On the usefulness of 'what' and 'where' pathways in vision

The primate visual brain is classically portrayed as a large number of separate 'maps', each dedicated to the processing of specific visual cues, such as colour, motion or faces and their many features. In order to understand this fractionated architecture, the concept of cortical 'pathways' or 'streams' was introduced. In the currently prevailing view, the different maps are organised hierarchically into two major pathways, one involved in recognition and memory (the ventral stream or 'what' pathway) and the other in the programming of action (the dorsal stream or 'where' pathway). In this review, we question this heuristically influential but potentially misleading linear hierarchical pathway model and argue instead for a 'patchwork' or network model.     

Cortical electrophysiological network dynamics of feedback learning

Understanding the neurophysiological mechanisms of learning is important for both fundamental and clinical neuroscience. We present a neurophysiologically inspired framework for understanding cortical mechanisms of feedback-guided learning. This framework is based on dynamic changes in systems-level oscillatory synchronization, reflecting changes in synaptic plasticity between stimulus-processing and motor areas that are modulated in a top-down fashion by different areas of the prefrontal cortex. We make new and testable predictions for how large-scale cortical networks support learning from feedback. Testing these predictions may provide new insights into the basic mechanisms underlying learning and how these mechanisms may be impaired in clinical disorders in which feedback learning is compromised.     

Micro-analysis of infant looking in a naturalistic social setting: insights from biologically based models of attention

A current theory of attention posits that several micro-indices of attentional vigilance are dependent on activation of the locus coeruleus, a brainstem nucleus that regulates cortical norepinephrine activity (Aston-Jones et al., 1999). This theory may account for many findings in the infant literature, while highlighting important new areas for research and theory on infant attention. We examined the visual behaviors of n = 16 infants (6-7 months) while they attended to multiple spatially distributed targets in a naturalistic environment. We coded four measures of attentional vigilance, adapted from studies of norepinergic modulation of animal attention: rate of fixations, duration of fixations, latency to reorientation, and target 'hits'. These measures showed a high degree of coherence in individual infants, in parallel with findings from animal studies. Results also suggest that less vigilant infants showed greater habituation to the trial structure and more attentiveness to less salient stimuli during periods of high attentional competition. This pattern of results is predicted by the Aston-Jones model of attention, but could not be explained by the standard information processing model.     

Age-related differences in brain electrical activity during extended continuous face recognition in younger children, older children and adults

To examine the development of recognition memory in primary-school children, 36 healthy younger children (8-9 years old) and 36 healthy older children (11-12 years old) participated in an ERP study with an extended continuous face recognition task (Study 1). Each face of a series of 30 faces was shown randomly six times interspersed with distracter faces. The children were required to make old vs. new decisions. Older children responded faster than younger children, but younger children exhibited a steeper decrease in latencies across the five repetitions. Older children exhibited better accuracy for new faces, but there were no age differences in recognition accuracy for repeated faces. For the N2, N400 and late positive complex (LPC), we analyzed the old/new effects (repetition 1 vs. new presentation) and the extended repetition effects (repetitions 1 through 5). Compared to older children, younger children exhibited larger frontocentral N2 and N400 old/new effects. For extended face repetitions, negativity of the N2 and N400 decreased in a linear fashion in both age groups. For the LPC, an ERP component thought to reflect recollection, no significant old/new or extended repetition effects were found. Employing the same face recognition paradigm in 20 adults (Study 2), we found a significant N400 old/new effect at lateral frontal sites and a significant LPC repetition effect at parietal sites, with LPC amplitudes increasing linearly with the number of repetitions. This study clearly demonstrates differential developmental courses for the N400 and LPC pertaining to recognition memory for faces. It is concluded that face recognition in children is mediated by early and probably more automatic than conscious recognition processes. In adults, the LPC extended repetition effect indicates that adult face recognition memory is related to a conscious and graded recollection process rather than to an automatic recognition process.     

Saved by the blush: being trusted despite defecting

This study examined whether blushing after a sociomoral transgression remediates trustworthiness in an interdependent context. Participants (N = 196) played a computerized prisoner's dilemma game with a virtual opponent who defected in the second round of the game. After the defection, a photograph of the opponent was shown, displaying a blushing or a nonblushing face. In a subsequent Trust Task, the blushing opponent was entrusted with more money than the nonblushing opponent. In further support of the alleged remedial properties of the blush, participants also indicated that they trusted the blushing opponent more, expected a lower probability that she would defect again, and judged the blushing opponent more positively.