Age of acquisition affects early orthographic processing during Chinese character recognition

Three experiments investigated age of acquisition (AoA) effects on early orthographic processing during Chinese character recognition. In Experiment 1, we measured the accuracy of identification of brief masked characters, accuracy was higher for early compared to late acquired characters. In Experiment 2, the visual duration threshold (VDT) was measured for both early and late acquired Chinese characters. The results showed that early acquired characters were successfully identified at shorter display durations than late acquired characters. Significant AoA effects were also found in Experiment 3, using a lexical decision task requiring mainly orthographic processing (discriminating real Chinese characters from orthographically illegal and unpronounceable characters). In summary, three experiments provide converging empirical evidence, for AoA effects on the early orthographic processing stages of Chinese character recognition. These results suggest that AoA effects during word identification go beyond the phonological or semantic processing stages. These results aslo provide cross-linguistic evidence for an AoA effect on early perceptual processing during identification.     

Complete Extensions in Argumentation Coincide with 3-Valued Stable Models in Logic Programming

In this paper, we prove the correspondence between complete extensions in abstract argumentation and 3-valued stable models in logic programming. This result is in line with earlier work of [6] that identified the correspondence between the grounded extension in abstract argumentation and the well-founded model in logic programming, as well as between the stable extensions in abstract argumentation and the stable models in logic programming.     

Individual attitudes and perceived social norms: Reports on HIV/AIDS‐related stigma among service providers in China

This study examined HIV/AIDS‐related stigma among Chinese service providers by comparing their personal attitudes toward people living with HIV/AIDS with their perception of social norms related to people living with HIV/AIDS. We randomly selected three provincial hospitals, four city/prefecture hospitals, 10 county hospitals, 18 township health clinics, and 54 village clinics from Yunnan, China. Doctors and nurses were randomly sampled proportionally to the doctor–nurse ratio of each hospital or clinic. Lab technicians were over‐sampled in order to include an adequate representation in the analysis. A total of 1,101 service providers participated in a voluntary, anonymous survey where demographic characteristics, individual attitude and perceived social norms toward people living with HIV/AIDS, discrimination intent at work, general prejudicial attitude and knowledge on HIV/AIDS were measured. A majority of the sample demonstrated a similarity between their personal views and what they thought most people in society believe. Multiple logistic regressions revealed that participants who were younger or reported personal contact with people living with HIV/AIDS were significantly more likely to report personal attitudes toward the population that were more liberal than their perceived social norms. Holding a more liberal personal attitude toward people living with HIV/AIDS than perceived social norms was significantly and negatively related to the level of discrimination intent at work, perceived discrimination at interpersonal level and the level of general prejudicial attitude toward people living with HIV/AIDS. Results underscored the importance of understanding social norms and personal attitudes in studying HIV‐related stigma and called for the incorporation of existing human capital into future HIV stigma reduction programs.     

Inhibitory response capacities of bilateral lower and upper extremities in children with developmental coordination disorder in endogenous and exogenous orienting modes

This study was designed to investigate separately the inhibitory response capacity and the lateralization effect in children with developmental coordination disorder (DCD) in the endogenous and exogenous modes of orienting attention. Children with DCD on the lower extremities (DCD-LEs), along with age-matched controls, completed four tasks that involved various applications of asynchronous stimuli to the feet or hands at various intervals. The results demonstrated that children with DCD-LEs had a significantly longer reaction time than the controls for all tasks, and were not alert to the appearance of the target. However, they displayed a deficit in volitional shifts of attention (endogenous mode), but not in automatic dislocation of attention (exogenous mode), whenever they performed the tasks with either their lower or their upper-limbs-even 6 months after the initial study. These findings confirm the deficit in the inhibitory response capacity in terms of volitional movement of attention by children with DCD. Additionally, the negative effect of lateralization on the bilateral extremities was not present in children with DCD-LEs. Significantly differences in response ability were detected only between the dominant and non-dominant sides of upper-limbs, but not between the lower-limbs, suggesting a future avenue for further experimentation on bilateral extremities.     

略谈“八大山人”与净明道的关系

"八大山人"是清代著名的艺术家,擅长绘画与书法.他的本名为朱耷,是明太祖朱元璋的十世孙,因见证明王朝灭亡,故曾看破红尘而出家隐居;其书画中"八大山人"的落款,既似"哭之",又似"笑之",由此而得称绝笔.本人近读民国延寿居士编<青云谱志>,从中得知"八大山人"实际上就是净明道(又称"净明忠孝道")之青云谱(又作"青云圃")道院的兴建者朱道朗,且此人还开创了净明道的一个支派--青云派①,详如下.     

试论哈特法律与道德划界限度的思想

自然法学派认为法律和道德之间有必然的联系,法律存在的依据和检验的标准是道德,因此二者之间不能分离。实证法学派认为法律和道德之间没有必然的联系,道德不能成为法律存在的依据,更不能成为审视法律是否有效的判准。传统的实证法学否认法律和道德之间的任何联系,主张绝对划界,以哈特为首的新分析主义实证法学认为法律和道德尽管没有必然联系,但有偶然联系的事实,因此主张相对划界,并承认最低限度内容的自然法。哈特提出法律和道德之间的相对划界既有历史遗传的因素,又是对其所处现实的理性选择。     

Is self‐esteem a universal need? Evidence from The People's Republic of China

In a provocative article, Heine et al. concluded that self-esteem needs are less important in collectivistic, East Asian countries than in individualistic, Western ones. Their conclusion was based, in part, on evidence that: (i) self-esteem scores are less positively biased in Japan than in Western countries; and that (ii) low self-esteem is less predictive of psychological distress in Japan than in Western countries. The present research examined whether these cultural differences occur in another collectivistic culture: The People's Republic of China. Two meta-analyses were conducted. Study 1 found that, for young and old alike, self-esteem was positively biased, with most participants reporting high levels of self-esteem. Study 2 found that low self-esteem in China is associated with three indicators of psychological distress: depression, anxiety and low subjective well-being. These findings are consistent with results in Western samples and suggest that high self-esteem may indeed be a universal psychological imperative.     

Precedence-effect-induced enhancement of prepulse inhibition in socially reared but not isolation-reared rats

Attention to a prepulse presented shortly before a startling stimulus enhances prepulse inhibition (PPI) of startle in normal people, but not in schizophrenics. Fear conditioning for the prepulse enhances PPI in socially reared, but not isolation-reared, rats. In humans, selective attention to acoustic signals against masking can be facilitated by precedence-effect-induced perceived spatial separation between the signal and the masker. This study investigated whether perceived spatial separation between a prepulse and a noise masker enhances PPI in socially reared rats and isolation-reared rats. The results show that both PPI and conditioning-induced PPI enhancement were larger in socially reared rats than in isolation-reared rats. More important, in socially reared, but not isolation-reared, rats, a further PPI enhancement was induced by precedence-effect-induced perceived separation between a prepulse and a masker only after the prepulse became fear conditioned. Thus, perceived separation facilitates normal rats’ attention to a conditioned prepulse and enhances PPI. Isolation rearing impairs rats’ ability to attend to ecologically significant acoustic events.     

心理理论和语言发展的关系

大量的研究表明心理理论和语言之间存在着密切的关系,但具体关系如何,一直存在争议。文章介绍了心理理论和语言关系的新近研究,着重阐述了目前关于二者关系的两种观点： （1）心理理论和语言发展之间不仅是早期揭示的一般相关关系,而是可能存在着因果关系——或以语言为因,或以心理理论为因;（2）心理理论和语言都受第三种因素影响,如执行功能和生长环境,但这些因素是究竟如何影响心理理论和语言发展的,还需深入探讨。文章最后对该领域今后的研究提出了新的见解和思路,包括对不同语言能力间的比较研究,对二者关系的跨文化研究和毕生取向研究等     

内源性注意和外源性注意的ERP研究

内源性注意和外源性注意反映注意指向与集中的自上而下和自下而上的加工。大量事件相关电位的ERP研究考察了内源性注意和外源性注意的神经活动机制。内源性注意诱发了早期N1成分和晚期P300成分,是否诱发P1成分的研究结果不尽一致;外源性注意加强了N1成分、P1成分以及P300成分。研究还表明内源性注意和外源性注意是两种独立的注意系统,以不同的方式影响着脑内的信息加工