Rules vs. analogy in English past tenses: a computational/experimental study

Are morphological patterns learned in the form of rules? Some models deny this, attributing all morphology to analogical mechanisms. The dual mechanism model (Pinker, S., & Prince, A. (1998). On language and connectionism: analysis of a parallel distributed processing model of language acquisition. Cognition, 28, 73-193) posits that speakers do internalize rules, but that these rules are few and cover only regular processes; the remaining patterns are attributed to analogy. This article advocates a third approach, which uses multiple stochastic rules and no analogy. We propose a model that employs inductive learning to discover multiple rules, and assigns them confidence scores based on their performance in the lexicon. Our model is supported over the two alternatives by new "wug test" data on English past tenses, which show that participant ratings of novel pasts depend on the phonological shape of the stem, both for irregulars and, surprisingly, also for regulars. The latter observation cannot be explained under the dual mechanism approach, which derives all regulars with a single rule. To evaluate the alternative hypothesis that all morphology is analogical, we implemented a purely analogical model, which evaluates novel pasts based solely on their similarity to existing verbs. Tested against experimental data, this analogical model also failed in key respects: it could not locate patterns that require abstract structural characterizations, and it favored implausible responses based on single, highly similar exemplars. We conclude that speakers extend morphological patterns based on abstract structural properties, of a kind appropriately described with rules.     

How do children coordinate simultaneous upper and lower extremity tasks? The development of dual motor task coordination

When performing simultaneous clapping with walking or galloping, adults adopt coupled, consistent and stable dual motor task coordination; do developmental trends in this coordination exist? In this study, we measured and compared coupling characteristics, consistency across trials and variability of phasing in 4-, 6-, 8-, and 10-year-olds (n=44) as they also performed the same dual motor task. For walk/clap, children adopted specific coupling patterns like adults by 8 years and with the same consistency by 10 years. Across age, children became less variable in clap and step movements separately and as coupled together. In the gallop/clap, children did not resemble adults in coupling patterns by 10 years but all measures were becoming more consistent across age. We discuss dual motor task coordination as a function of age and task complexity using a "dynamic" perspective within a developmental context.     

Mental health protective factors among flourishing Canadian women university student-athletes

Mental health is an important resource for student-athletes. Flourishing (Keyes, 2002) may be a useful concept for examining aspects of mental health. Therefore, the purpose of this study was to investigate mental health protective factors among flourishing Canadian university student-athletes over the course of their sport season. Initially, 36 Canadian student-athletes completed the Mental Health Continuum – Short Form (Keyes, 2009) and Sport Mental Health Continuum – Short Form (Foster & Chow, 2019). Based on the results from the questionnaires, six women athletes who were identified as flourishing at global and sport levels then participated in the study. Data were generated through individual pre- and post-season semi-structured interviews, and in-season weekly written diaries. Analysis followed guidelines outlined by Smith et al. (2009) for interpretative phenomenological analysis. Results are presented over three stages of the seasons (pre-, in-, and post-season). In the pre-season, participants invested in their flourishing by making positive connections and planning their schedule. In-season, participants discussed facing challenges and tried to maintain flourishing by managing their commitments, communicating with coaches, and looking for positives. In the post-season, the participants attempted to re-invest in their flourishing by reflecting on their season and taking a break from sport. It appeared that the athletes were able to identify potential challenges to their flourishing in sport and use global resources to buffer the impact. These results reveal strategies that may help promote and protect mental health among student-athletes.     

任务转换中惯性激活对内隐记忆的影响：来自ERPs的证据

以往研究认为内隐记忆具有不受干扰影响的自动化加工特征,其证据主要来自于对内隐记忆编码过程的研究。最近已有多项研究发现,内隐记忆受提取过程中的干扰影响,但对这一现象的产生机制目前仍尚无定论。本研究根据任务转换相关理论,通过将go/no-go范式引入干扰任务,探讨提取过程中前置干扰对内隐记忆产生影响的内在机制。结果表明,前置的干扰任务产生惯性激活时,后续的内隐记忆任务会受到影响,即启动效应降低。对惯性激活进行抑制后,随后的内隐记忆则不受影响。并且,在内隐记忆相关的N400成分上得到了与行为数据一致的结果,即在no-go干扰下,获得的N400新旧效应,在go干扰下却未被发现。研究结果证明,提取干扰对内隐记忆的影响主要由干扰任务与内隐记忆任务对认知资源的竞争导致。     

Enhancing Well‐being of Homeless Individuals by Building Group Memberships

There is growing recognition that social isolation and a lack of connectedness with social groups is one of the reasons why the subjective well‐being of homeless individuals is generally worse than the rest of the population. Past research amongst a range of populations suggests that the ability of an individual to take on new group memberships and/or their ability to maintain their memberships in meaningful groups is an important predictor of well‐being. In a mixed method study (N = 119), we examined the extent to which experiences at homeless accommodation form building blocks for the formation of multiple group memberships and to what extent this predicts positive well‐being. Qualitative analysis reveals the importance of feeling connected to the homeless service and supported by homeless accommodation staff. Linking these data to quantitative data from a second wave, we found that these experiences predicted well‐being. These findings provide further support for a strength‐based approach to homelessness, by providing insights into the ways that experiences at homeless accommodation can contribute to the development of multiple group memberships (i.e. social capital), and enhance the well‐being of those experiencing, and exiting, homelessness. Copyright © 2016 John Wiley & Sons, Ltd.     

推理心理研究中的逻辑加工与非逻辑加工评析

本文对西方心理学研究中有关推理心理学争论的两个热点问题之一：逻辑推理与非逻辑推理之争的发展线索和相互关系等问题进行了评述,指出了这两种理论争论中未能注意到的三个问题,并对试图解决这三个问题的“知识和试题双重结构模型”作了简要介绍。     

Perceptual salience of derivational suffixes in visual word recognition

This study analyzes the role of derivational suffixes in visual word recognition, tracking the eye movements of 31 participants in a sentence-reading task in Spanish. Perceptual salience of suffixes was operationalized as the proportion of letters represented by the suffixes with respect to the full words, that is, we relate the number of letters comprising the suffixes to the number of letters in the words in which they appear. The results reveal a significant role in first fixation duration of both word frequency – the more frequent the word, the shorter the fixations, and perceptual salience – the more salient the suffix, the longer the fixations. Moreover, in gaze duration, our results show a main effect of word length – the longer the word, the longer the fixations; word frequency; and significant interactions between word frequency and perceptual salience of suffixes on the one hand – the effect of word frequency is only significant when perceptual salience of suffixes is high, and between word frequency and word length on the other hand – the frequency effect decreases as word length increases. Overall results are interpreted in the light of the dual route models by which full-form and morphological processing interactively cooperate in visual word recognition.     

An affective-experiential perspective on reactions to fair and unfair events: Individual differences in affect intensity moderated by experiential mindsets

The present paper focuses on what psychological processes are driving people’s reactions to fair and unfair events. Specifically, by extending on ideas that people’s reactions to fair and unfair events consist at least partly of affect-related responses, and by adopting the assumption made in cognitive-experiential self-theory that the operation of experiential mindsets is intimately associated with affect-related experiences, we formulate the hypothesis that individual differences in affect intensity will moderate reactions to fair and unfair events. Introducing a novel manipulation of experiential and rationalistic mindsets to the research literature, the findings of two studies indeed reveal that especially for people in experiential (vs. rationalistic) mindsets negative affective reactions to fair and unfair events increase with high (vs. low) scores on affect intensity. Implications for the literature on social justice, experiential mindsets, and affect intensity are discussed.     

Option fixation: A cognitive contributor to overconfidence

The ASC model of choice and confidence in general knowledge proposes that respondents first Assess the familiarity of presented options, and then use the high-familiarity option as a retrieval cue to Search memory for the purposes of Constructing an explanation about why that high-familiarity option is true. The ASC process implies that overconfidence results in part from a tendency to fixate on the high-familiarity option, to the neglect of the other option. If this implication is true, then judgment tasks requiring respondents to evaluate each option independently should result in reduced overconfidence as compared with standard judgment tasks. Two experiments tested this implication, and found that confidence and overconfidence were reduced when respondents evaluated options independently. The findings support the proposal that option fixation contributes to overconfidence, and also clarify the limitations of random error explanations of overconfidence.