Collateral effects of behavioral parent training on families of children with developmental disabilities and behavior disorders

We evaluated collateral effects of behavioral parent training (BPT) on families with children who have developmental disabilities and behavior disorders. We compared 18 BPT graduates to 18 similar families waiting for service. The BPT graduates reported significantly less (i) child behavior problems, (ii) disruption to child and family quality of life due to child problem behavior, and (iii) stress related to limits on family opportunities and child physical limitations, up to 5 years after discharge. On a self‐efficacy scale, the graduates reported being more effective child behavior change agents in not only stopping child problem behavior, but also in preventing new occurrences and teaching the child appropriate behavior. These results suggest that BPT has persistent beneficial effects on children and parents. The findings reflect the program's focus on teaching parents how to use functional assessment derived positive teaching strategies to replace child problem behavior. Copyright © 2002 John Wiley & Sons, Ltd.     

Control over location-based response activation in the Simon task: behavioral and electrophysiological evidence

In 4 Simon experiments the authors examined control over 2 routes of sensorimotor processing: response priming in the unconditional route and response selection via the conditional route. The Simon effect diminished as the frequency of noncorresponding trials increased. Location-based response priming was observed only when the stimulus followed a corresponding event but not after a noncorresponding trial. Therefore, the unconditional route appears to be suppressed whenever the task context indicates priming as potentially disadvantageous. Moreover, the task-irrelevant stimulus location was used for response selection as a function of correspondence probability. Although exact repetitions of stimulus-response sequences caused a marked speed-up of responses, this 3rd mechanism is independent of unconditional route suppression and frequency-based adjustments in the conditional route.     

On the nature and message of the Lotus Sūtra in the light of early Buddhism and Buddhist scholarship (towards the beginnings of Mahāyāna)

The aim of this paper is to compare the contents of the Lotus Sūtra and the style of presentation of its message with the thrust of the Buddha's teachings as they are preserved in the early Buddhist sources, particularly the Sutta Piaka of the Pāli Canon, and also in the Pāli commentarial literature. In the process it attempts to identify in the early sources the precedents of some of the bold statements in the Lotus Sūtra which appear as complete innovations, but may be elaborations of elements contained in Pāli sources in germinal form. Despite the difference in style, language and mythological imagery, the conclusion is that both the Sutta Piaka and the Lotus Sūtra express in their respective manners the true spirit of the Buddhist message. Attention is drawn also to the striking parallels between the Buddhist picture of the multiple universe and modern cosmological theories.     

Effects of additional tasks on language perception: an event-related brain potential investigation

The authors investigated effects of task and overlapping processing load on semantic processing. In 3 experiments the brain potential component N400 was elicited by synonymous and nonsynonymous spoken noun pairs that were to be classified according to semantic relatedness. The time course of the N400 component to the nouns was delayed, and its amplitude was reduced when additional tasks had to be performed. The delay increased with temporal overlap and was more pronounced for language-related than for spatial additional tasks. Delays of N400 were also caused by a compatibility manipulation in the additional tasks. Theoretical accounts of the observed interference of overlapping tasks with language perception in terms of attentional shifts were discarded. Explanations in terms of resource sharing and single channel processing are discussed.     

Typography and color: Effects of salience and fluency on conscious recollective experience

Within one experiment the central assumptions of the distinctiveness/fluency account of recollective experience were tested and contrasted with predictions of processing theory. To manipulate perceptual salience, the typography of words was varied. Effects of conceptual salience were induced by a variation of word color. In the study phase participants generated different word or object images according to presented words. To manipulate perceptual and conceptual fluency one test group underwent a priming procedure in the test phase, consisting of a recognition test, whereby some primes were identical to the target words typographically or by color and others were not. Additionally, all participants were asked to make judgments of recollective experience (remember, know, guess) after the old/new decisions. The results of the data analyses confirm the distinctiveness/fluency account. Words written in an unusual typography or color were judged significantly more often as "remembered" than normal words. The priming procedure uncovered some effects of fluency on reaction times: old/new decisions took less time if prime and target words were perceptually or conceptually identical.     

The impact of orbital prefrontal cortex damage on emotional activation to unanticipated and anticipated acoustic startle stimuli

Damage to the orbital prefrontal cortex has been implicated in selectively diminishing electrodermal autonomic nervous system responses to anticipated punishing stimuli (e.g., losing money; Bechara, Damasio, & Damasio, 2000), but not to unanticipated punishing stimuli (e.g., loud noises; Damasio, Tranel, & Damasio, 1990). We extended this research by examining the effects of orbitofrontal damage on emotional responses to unanticipated and anticipated acoustic startles and collecting a more extensive set of physiological measures, emotional facial behavior, and self-reported emotional experience. Consistent with previous research, patients showed intact physiology to an unanticipated startle but failed to show appropriate anticipatory cardiovascular responses (patients’ heart rates decreased, controls’ increased). In addition, patients displayed more surprise facial behavior and reported marginally more fear than did controls in response to the unanticipated startle. Thus, orbitofrontal damage may compromise the ability to anticipate physiologically the onset of aversive stimuli, despite intact or enhanced emotional responses when such stimuli occur unexpectedly.     

The effect of intentional expectancy on mental processing: a chronopsychophysiological investigation

Expected events are processed faster than unexpected ones. Previously, we have reported evidence that passive expectancies determined by the preceding event sequence mainly affected the duration of motoric processes. Here we examined the effects of instructed, intentional expectancies in a two-choice reaction time (RT) task. As predicted, RTs were shorter for expected than unexpected events. Onset of the lateralized readiness potential as an index of selective response activation, and the latency of the P300 component of the event-related potential, reflecting the duration of perceptual processing, indicated that intentional expectancy affected the time demands for central processing but did not influence the duration of early perceptual or motoric processes. Together the present and our previous results provide evidence that different kinds of expectancy can be distinguished by their locus of action within the information processing system.     

Age-related slowing in face and name recognition: evidence from event-related brain potentials

Age-related slowing in recognizing famous names and faces was investigated with event-related brain potentials (ERPs). In a group of young adults, item repetition induced early (220-340 ms) and late (400-700 ms) ERP modulations, apparently signaling the access to, respectively, domain-specific representations of faces and names and domain-general semantic knowledge about the persons. These repetition effects and other ERP components were then used as process-specific time markers in middle-aged and elderly participants. For both faces and names, the elderly participants' responses were slowed, but repetition priming in reaction times was not. The ERP latencies suggested that most of the age-related slowing occurred in the access to domain-specific representations and during response decision, whereas sensory and perceptual processing was largely spared.     

Die Bestimmung einer Unterschiedsschwelle für Gefühle

Zusammenfassung Eine Unterschiedsschwelle für Gefühle kann bestimmt werden, wenn man hierfür (abweichend von den Verfahren der Wahrnehmungspsychologie) nicht Reizgrößen, sondern physiologische Veränderungen, die mit Gefühlen korreliert sind, zugrunde legt. Es ist demnach die Frage zu stellen, bei welchem Grad einer solchen körperlichen Veränderung im Durchschnitt auch eine emotionale merklich wird.Als physiologische Variable wurden die Schwankungen des Hautwiderstandes (sog. psychogalvanische Reaktion) gewählt, da diese in enger Beziehung zum Auftreten von Gefühlen stehen. Im Experiment wurden Reizwörter optisch dargeboten, die von den Vpen hinsichtlich der Größe der Gefühlsbetonung paarweise miteinander zu vergleichen und zu beurteilen waren. Gleichzeitig wurden die bei der Darbietung der Reizwörter auftretenden Hautwiderstandsänderungen in Direktschreibung registriert. Zur Auswertung wurden die Flächen der Widerstandsänderungen in einem Näherungsmaß bestimmt. Aus den zusammengehörigen Widerstandsreaktionen wurden dann sowohl die Flächendifferenzen als auch die Flächenverhältnisse gebildet und mit den Urteilen der Vpen in Beziehung gesetzt.Die Bestimmung der Korrelation zwischen der radizierten Flächendifferenz der Widerstandsänderungen und der Beurteilung des Gefühlswertes des Reizwortpaars ergab: Die Tatsache, daß die Wortpaare um so eindeutiger beurteilt wurden, je größer die ihnen zugeordneten Flächendifferenzen waren, bestätigte zunächst die Hypothese, daß eine Unterschiedsschwelle für Gefühle in Einheiten eines physiologischen Korrelats angegeben werden kann.Aus den gewonnenen Meßwerten (Flächendifferenzen und Flächenverhältnisse) und den zugehörigen Urteilen wird alsdann die Bestimmung der Unterschiedsschwelle auf der Basis von 50% und von 75% richtiger Urteile an Hand verschiedener Methoden demonstriert.Eine weitere Aufgabe besteht darin, aus einer größeren Anzahl von Ergebnissen eine Maßeinheit für Gefühle abzuleiten.