Rules and more rules: The effects of multiple tasks, extensive training, and aging on task-switching performance

Task-switching performance was assessed in young and older adults as a function of the number of task sets to be actively maintained in memory (varied from 1 to 4) over the course of extended training (5 days). Each of the four tasks required the execution of a simple computational algorithm, which was instantaneously cued by the color of the two-digit stimulus. Tasks were presented in pure (task set size 1) and mixed blocks (task set sizes 2, 3, 4), and the task sequence was unpredictable. By considering task switching beyond two tasks, we found evidence for a cognitive control system that is not overwhelmed by task set size load manipulations. Extended training eliminated age effects in task-switching performance, even when the participants had to manage the execution of up to four tasks. The results are discussed in terms of current theories of cognitive control, including task set inertia and production system postulates.     

Academic Achievement Over 8 Years Among Children Who Met Modified Criteria for Attention-deficit/Hyperactivity Disorder at 4–6 Years of Age

The predictive validity of symptom criteria for different subtypes of ADHD among children who were impaired in at least one setting in early childhood was examined. Academic achievement was assessed seven times over 8 years in 125 children who met symptom criteria for ADHD at 4–6 years of age and in 130 demographically-matched non-referred comparison children. When intelligence and other confounds were controlled, children who met modified criteria for the predominantly inattentive subtype of ADHD in wave 1 had lower reading, spelling, and mathematics scores over time than both comparison children and children who met modified criteria for the other subtypes of ADHD. In some analyses, children who met modified criteria for the combined type had somewhat lower mathematics scores than comparison children. The robust academic deficits relative to intelligence in the inattentive group in this age range suggest either that inattention results in academic underachievement or that some children in the inattentive group have learning disabilities that cause secondary symptoms of inattention. Unexpectedly, wave 1 internalizing (anxiety and depression) symptoms independently predicted deficits in academic achievement controlling ADHD, intelligence, and other predictors.     

The Effects of Incentives on Visual–Spatial Working Memory in Children with Attention-deficit/Hyperactivity Disorder

Working memory is one of several putative core neurocognitive processes in attention-deficit/hyperactivity disorder (ADHD). The present work seeks to determine whether visual–spatial working memory is sensitive to motivational incentives, a laboratory analogue of behavioral treatment. Participants were 21 children (ages 7–10) with a diagnosis of ADHD-combined type. Participants completed a computerized spatial span task designed to assess storage of visual–spatial information (forward span) and manipulation of the stored information (backward span). The spatial span task was completed twice on the same day, once with a performance-based incentive (trial-wise feedback and points redeemable for prizes) and once without incentives. Participants performed significantly better on the backward span when rewarded for correct responses, compared to the no incentive condition. However, incentives had no effect on performance during the forward span. These findings may suggest the use of motivational incentives improved manipulation, but not storage, of visual–spatial information among children with ADHD. Possible explanations for the differential incentive effects are discussed, including the possibility that incentives prevented a vigilance decrement as task difficulty and time on task increased.     

Personality in middle childhood: A hierarchical structure and longitudinal connections with personality in late adolescence

Research on the structure of personality in middle childhood, while advancing, is still in the early stages of development. In this study, we employed a group of 1563 twins to elucidate the hierarchical structure of personality in middle childhood and provide connections to established personality traits in adult populations. Our results provide evidence for a higher-order structure of personality in middle childhood that maps on to recent findings in adult populations supporting hierarchical relationships among 2-, 3-, 4-, and 5-factor models of personality. In addition, primary higher-order personality traits rated by parents at age 11 showed substantial predictive validity for analogous traits rated by self at age 17. We discuss our results within the context of developing a convergent hierarchical taxonomy of personality in middle childhood and the importance of multi-informant investigations.     

Survey and behavioral measurements of interpersonal trust

Although many studies treat trust as a situational construct, individual differences can be used to study and predict trusting behavior. We report two studies, the first showing the psychometric properties of a new trust inventory (the Propensity to Trust Survey or PTS), the second study validating this inventory using the standard economic task, the Investment Game. The first study utilized online survey data (N > 8000) to show that the PTS scales were reliable and measured broad constructs related to Big Five personality domains. Trust was related to extraversion and negative neuroticism, and trustworthiness was related to agreeableness and conscientiousness. The second study (N = 90) validated the PTS trust scale as a predictor of behavior in the Investment Game. These findings are evidence that trust and trustworthiness are compound personality traits, and that PTS scales are preferable to general Big Five measures for predicting trusting behavior.     

The End of the Person–Situation Debate: An Emerging Synthesis in the Answer to the Consistency Question

We review the history and current status of the person–situation debate. We propose that the person–situation debate (1) is over and (2) that it ended in a ‘Hegelian’ synthesis. Specifically, we propose the following synthesis resolution: There are multiple types of consistency; behavior is consistent for some of those types and not for others; and personality and traits exist in the forms that produce the consistent behaviors. Incorporating both personality processes and trait structures in research will move personality research forward. In this article, we summarize the advances that the two perspectives have generated by working in opposition; we explain why both sides will suffer from continuing to work independently; and we anticipate several future directions that synthesis‐informed personality research can and should take.     

Evidence for the activation of sensorimotor information during visual word recognition: the body-object interaction effect

We examined the effects of sensorimotor experience in two visual word recognition tasks. Body-object interaction (BOI) ratings were collected for a large set of words. These ratings assess perceptions of the ease with which a human body can physically interact with a word's referent. A set of high BOI words (e.g., mask) and a set of low BOI words (e.g., ship) were created, matched on imageability and concreteness. Facilitatory BOI effects were observed in lexical decision and phonological lexical decision tasks: responses were faster for high BOI words than for low BOI words. We discuss how our findings may be accounted for by (a) semantic feedback within the visual word recognition system, and (b) an embodied view of cognition (e.g., Barsalou's perceptual symbol systems theory), which proposes that semantic knowledge is grounded in sensorimotor interactions with the environment.     

Stability and change in religiousness during emerging adulthood

Understanding the development of religiousness is an important endeavor because religiousness has been shown to be related to positive outcomes. The current study examined mean-level, rank-order, and individual-level change in females' religiousness during emerging adulthood. Genetic and environmental influences on religiousness and its change and stability were also investigated. Analyses were completed with an epidemiological study of 2 cohorts of twins: 1 assessed at ages 14 and 18 and a 2nd at 20 and 25. Mean levels of religiousness decreased significantly with age, while rank-order stability was high. Individual-level change was also evident. Analyses also supported the hypotheses that more change would occur in the younger cohort compared with the older cohort and that more change would occur in religious service attendance than the general index of religiousness. Twin analyses suggested that the heritability of religiousness increased with age, while the shared environmental influences decreased. For the younger cohort, change was genetic in origin, while stability was environmental. In the older cohort, change was influenced by nonshared environment and stability by both genes and family environment.     

Torture and Religious Practice1

Abstract : This essay explores the connection between religious practices and torture with specific reference to the debate in the USA about ‘waterboarding’ as part of the so‐called War on Terror. After isolating some defining features of torture, the essay examines the historical background of waterboarding in the symbolism of Christian baptism and how this symbolism was used during the Inquisition and the Reformation as part of the torture of heretics and others. Mindful of this sordid use of a Christian rite meant to celebrate new life, the essay thereby clarifies Christian responsibility in the political order. That responsibility requires uncovering the religious roots of some forms of torture, resisting their use by the State, and, further, seeking to render current Christian practice both humane and life giving.     

Visual event-related potentials in schizotypal personality disorder and schizophrenia

Schizophrenia (SZ) occurs among a spectrum of disorders with similar characteristics, including schizotypal personality disorder (SPD). Visual processing disturbances have been reported in both disorders, but it is not yet clear which processes are disturbed in both SZ and SPD, suggestive of a common endophenotype, and which appear only in SZ. In order to address this question, the authors evaluated visual event-related potentials (ERPs) elicited during a line-orientation discrimination task in control, SPD, and SZ participants. Visual ERPs allow specification of both the time course and physiological correlates of visual perception and cognition. SZ patients had smaller P100 and P300a amplitudes and prolonged P300b latency compared to the control group. SZ patients also had smaller N160, N200, P300a, and P300b amplitudes compared to the SPD group. SPD participants did not differ from control participants on any ERP measure. These data documented pervasive abnormalities in visual perception and attention in SZ but not in SPD, suggesting that these visual ERP disturbances may not represent a common endophenotype.