Tailoring the Mode of Information Presentation: Effects on Younger and Older Adults' Attention and Recall of Online Information

Previous studies have mainly focused on tailoring message content to match individual characteristics and preferences. This study investigates the effect of a website tailored to individual preferences for the mode of information presentation, compared to 4 nontailored websites on younger and older adults' attention and recall of information, employing a 5 (condition: tailored vs. text, text with illustrations, audiovisual, combination) × 2 (age: younger [25–45] vs. older [≥65] adults) design (N = 559). The mode‐tailored condition (relative to nontailored conditions) improved attention to the website and, consequently, recall in older adults, but not in younger adults. Younger adults recalled more from nontailored information such as text only or text with illustrations, relative to tailored information.     

Emotional intensity in episodic autobiographical memory and counterfactual thinking

Episodic counterfactual thoughts—imagined alternative ways in which personal past events might have occurred—are frequently accompanied by intense emotions. Here, participants recollected positive and negative autobiographical memories and then generated better and worse episodic counterfactual events from those memories. Our results suggest that the projected emotional intensity during the simulated remembered/imagined event is significantly higher than but typically positively related to the emotional intensity while remembering/imagining the event. Furthermore, repeatedly simulating counterfactual events heightened the emotional intensity felt while simulating the counterfactual event. Finally, for both the emotional intensity accompanying the experience of remembering/imagining and the projected emotional intensity during the simulated remembered/imagined event, the emotional intensity of negative memories was greater than the emotional intensity of upward counterfactuals generated from them but lower than the emotional intensity of downward counterfactuals generated from them. These findings are discussed in relation to clinical work and functional theories of counterfactual thinking.     

An artificial intelligent counter

This article, using a counter as an example, explores a novel approach in constructing a cognitive system. The system is a paired memory system of “left and right brain” consisting of a number of memory units. The “left brain” is dedicated to the cognitive process of symbols, and the “right brain” to the representation of the symbols. The left and right subsystems are connected by bundles of internal communication signals. The paired memory system can learn facts and generalize concepts. Its cognitive capability is realized through the communication among these memory units at different cognitive levels within the system. The key claims in this paper are supported by empirical findings and theoretical principles. An AI counter is built and demonstrated in terms of concept learning and responding.     

Dissociation and memory suppression: A comparison of high and low dissociative individuals’ performance on the Think–No Think task

The present study examined whether high and low dissociative individuals differ in their ability to keep target stimuli out of their awareness (suppression) and how this relates to their memory of those targets during a later cued recall task. The prediction was that high dissociators display a general inability to focus attention and that their distractibility undermines successful suppression, thereby enhancing memory for suppressed items. College students with high (n = 35) and low (n = 33) scores on the Dissociative Experiences Scale participated in a Dutch version of Anderson and Green’s (2001) Think–No Think (TNT) task. Overall, a significant suppression effect emerged. However, no differences between high and low dissociators were observed. Thus, the present results do not confirm that dissociation is linked to heightened distractibility.     

学习障碍儿童社会技能缺失成因假说

研究者一直试图探讨学习障碍与社会技能缺失之间的联系,从而揭示导致学习障碍儿童社会技能缺失的原因。这一研究领域出现了四种假说：因果假说、共存假说、相关假说和同病率假说。     

Is scent‐enhanced memory immune to retroactive interference?

Research shows that scent enhances memory for associated information. Current debate centers around scent's immunity to “retroactive interference,” i.e., reduced memory for earlier-learned information after exposure to additional, subsequently-learned information. This paper demonstrates that scent-enhanced memory is indeed prone to retroactive interference, but that some of the information lost is restored using a scent-based retrieval cue. Two process explanations for interference effects are proposed, with the evidence providing more support for an inhibition rather than a response competition explanation. The results enhance our understanding of the encoding and retrieval of olfactory information from long-term memory, and reasons why interference occurs.     

Event completion: event based inferences distort memory in a matter of seconds

We present novel evidence that implicit causal inferences distort memory for events only seconds after viewing. Adults watched videos of someone launching (or throwing) an object. However, the videos omitted the moment of contact (or release). Subjects falsely reported seeing the moment of contact when it was implied by subsequent footage but did not do so when the contact was not implied. Causal implications were disrupted either by replacing the resulting flight of the ball with irrelevant video or by scrambling event segments. Subjects in the different causal implication conditions did not differ on false alarms for other moments of the event, nor did they differ in general recognition accuracy. These results suggest that as people perceive events, they generate rapid conceptual interpretations that can have a powerful effect on how events are remembered.