Masked response priming in expert typists

In masked priming tasks responses are usually faster when prime and target require identical rather than different responses. Previous research has extensively manipulated the nature and number of response-affording stimuli. However, little is known about the constraints of masked priming regarding the nature and number of response alternatives. The present study explored the limits of masked priming in a six-choice reaction time task, where responses from different fingers of both hands were required. We studied participants that were either experts for the type of response (skilled typists) or novices. Masked primes facilitated responding to targets that required the same response, responses with a different finger of the same hand, and with a homologous finger of the other hand. These effects were modulated by expertise. The results show that masked primes facilitate responding especially for experts in the S–R mapping and with increasing similarity of primed and required response.     

Rewards of technology: Explaining China’s reverse migration

China rewards Mainlanders with technology who return to China. Among entrepreneurs and scientists, technology is generating today’s reverse migration as the rewards for bringing back technology are significant. Many returnees do not bring the latest international technology; technology that is new for China suffices to create a comparative advantage in the domestic market, making the transfer of technology a key strategy for becoming a successful reverse migrant. This article shows statistically that those who said that they had returned because they possessed a new technology (55% of our sample) were less likely to have a new international technology than a technology that was new only for China. La Chine récompense les Chinois continentaux qui retoument au pays avec des moyens techniques. Les récompenses pour avoir rapporté des éléments technologiques étant significatives, c’est la technologie qui favorise la migration de retour actuelle chez les entrepreneurs et les scientifiques. Nombreux sont les rapatriés qui ne rapportent pas le dernier cri international en technologie; il suffit de revenir avec des moyens techniques qui sont inconnus en Chine pour créer un avantage comparé dans le marché intérieur. Ainsi, le transfert de technologies constitue une strategie privilégiée dans la réussite des rapatriés. Nos statistiques indiquent que chez ceux qui étaient retournés au pays parce qu¡ls y introduisaient une nouvelle technologie (soit 55% de notre échantillon), il était moins probable pour eux d’avoir de nouveaux moyens techniques intemationaux que de moyens techniques qui représentaient une nouveauté en Chine seulement.     

Designing Pareto-optimal selection systems: formalizing the decisions required for selection system development

The article presents an analytic method for designing Pareto-optimal selection systems where the applicants belong to a mixture of candidate populations. The method is useful in both applied and research settings. In an applied context, the present method is the first to assist the selection practitioner when deciding on 6 major selection design issues: (1) the predictor subset, (2) the selection rule, (3) the selection staging, (4) the predictor sequencing, (5) the predictor weighting, and (6) the stage retention decision issue. From a research perspective, the method offers a unique opportunity for studying the impact and relative importance of different strategies for reducing adverse impact.     

Unconscious activation of task sets

Using an explicit task cuing paradigm, we tested whether masked cues can trigger task-set activation, which would suggest that unconsciously presented stimuli can impact cognitive control processes. Based on a critical assessment of previous findings on the priming of task-set activation, we present two experiments with a new method to approach this subject. Instead of using a prime, we varied the visibility of the cue. These cues either directly signaled particular tasks in Experiment 1, or certain task transitions (i.e., task repetitions or switches) in Experiment 2. While both masked task and transition cues affected task choice, only task cues affected the speed of task performance. This observation suggests that task-specific stimulus–response rules can be activated only by masked cues that are uniquely associated with a particular task. Taken together, these results demonstrate that unconsciously presented stimuli have the power to activate corresponding task sets.     

Hitting ability and perception of object’s size: evidence for a negative relation

We examined the relation between motor performance and perception of object’s size in near space. The general task was to repeatedly hit a target by means of pointing movements and to estimate target’s size. In contrast to the results of previous studies, Experiment 1 and Experiment 2 revealed a negative relation between action ability and perceived target size: Participants who hit the target relatively often and whose motor variability was relatively low judged targets to be smaller than did participants whose motor performance was relatively poor. In Experiment 3, the size judgments were made in the presence of the target before, as well as after, pointing movements. The target was judged as smaller when it was easy, rather than difficult, to hit before as well as after the movement. Altogether, these results indicate that under certain conditions, an increased action ability reduces the apparent size of the actions’ target objects.     

Failure mechanism in porous materials under compression: crackling noise in mesoporous SiO2

The failure mechanism of porous materials under uniaxial stress has been investigated experimentally. Microporous SiO₂, Vycor, has been subjected to slowly increasing compressive uniaxial stress with stress rates between 0.2 and 12.2?kPa/s. With increasing stress the strain changes stepwise with acoustic emission correlated with each volume collapse. The acoustic emission followed the characteristics of ‘crackling noise’ with a power law distribution over an exceptionally large interval of 6 decades at the slowest stress rate. The power law exponent is ?1.39. Possible applications in mining industry and others are discussed.     

Unconscious manipulation of free choice in humans

Previous research has shown that subliminally presented stimuli accelerate or delay responses afforded by supraliminally presented stimuli. Our experiments extend these findings by showing that unconscious stimuli even affect free choices between responses. Thus, actions that are phenomenally experienced as freely chosen are influenced without the actor becoming aware of the manipulation. However, the unconscious influence is limited to a response bias, as participants chose the primed response only in up to 60% of the trials. LRP data in free choice trials indicate that the prime was not ineffective in trials in which participants chose the non-primed response as then it delayed performance of the incongruently primed response.     

The impact of anticipated action effects on action planning

Three experiments with a total of 72 participants investigated the assumption that motor actions are planned in terms of their sensorial effects. Participants had to prepare a certain action A that consistently led to a sensorial effect (a tone of certain pitch). Instead of (in Experiment 1) or before (in Experiments 2 and 3) the execution of the prepared action, another response B had to be carried out, which either resulted in the same or in a different auditory effect (a tone of same or different pitch). It was found that a to-be-executed response B was in general initiated more quickly when it resulted in the same effect as a concurrently prepared response A. The results are considered as evidence for the basic notion that the preparation and initiation even of very simple actions is mediated by an anticipation of their reafferences.