Newborns’ attention is driven by the translational movement

The present study investigated whether 2-day-old newborns are able to discriminate two translating meaningless Point-Light Displays (PLD) videos, in which the shape of one of them changes compared to that of the other along the trajectory, independently from movement kinematics, and if this ability is present both when stimuli differed at the end or at the beginning of the movement. To manipulate the instant in which along the movement the difference between stimuli was evident, and to maintain every unspecific dissimilarity possibly determining the preference, videos were played in a loop either forward or backwards. In Experiment 1, PLD stimuli moved with natural accelerated-decelerated kinematics; in Experiment 2 they moved at constant velocity. Four groups of newborns were submitted to the preferential looking technique experiments. Results showed that newborns looked longer at natural kinematics and that, irrespective of the type of kinematics, they discriminated the two stimuli only when videos were played forward, that is, only when stimuli differed at the end of the movement. These data suggest that, independently from kinematics, movement translational components induce newborns to allocate attention at the end of the observed movement. Given the strict link between attention and eye movements, we suggest that this effect may bootstrap the system and give rise to proactive gaze, the typical gaze behaviour present during executed and observed goal-directed actions.     

Flooded by a wall of water: parent–child reminiscing about local environment and unwanted changes

This article examines the long-lasting effects of an unwanted place change (i.e., the construction of a dam) on the social representations (SRs) of places and of place-community relationship. The study integrates an SRs approach, generative semiotics, and methods borrowed from research on the social making of autobiographical memory. The aim is to explore whether and how intergenerational family narratives contribute to the transmission of SRs. Parent-child pairs were asked to share episodes linked to the dam. Video-recordings were submitted to thematic content analysis and semiotic analysis. Results show that parents and children associate the dam with a radical transformation: it acts as a performer of separation between the community and its territory. The analysis of interactions gives further insights into the how family and community memories are connected. This first attempt confirms the potentialities of the integrated approach to understanding the processes of intergenerational transmission of social representations, and paves the way to further refinements.     

The capacity to tell a joke: Reflections from work with Asperger children

The capacity to tell a joke is a highly complex interpersonal event that depends upon the maturation of certain developmental achievements which are absent or stunted in children with Asperger's Syndrome. These include the ability to know another's mind, a sense of interpersonal timing and, most notably, a capacity for abstract thinking. The author discusses Freud's ( 1905 ) notion of joke‐work, which is akin to dream‐work, both of which are pathways to forming mental representations. Freud considered joke‐work as a mental activity that operated on the verbal level and the author examines the preverbal dimensions that are rooted in the earliest mother/infant interactions. An extended case discussion of the psychoanalytic treatment of an Asperger boy is offered to illustrate these points and to demonstrate the activity of joke‐work as a means of building mental representations.     

How patients’ representations of cystic fibrosis-related diabetes inform their health behaviours

Background: Although diabetes is a frequent complication of cystic fibrosis (CF), patients’ behaviours tend not to comply with best practice recommendations. Using Leventhal’s Common-Sense Model, we address this issue by exploring patients’ representations of CF-related diabetes (CFRD) to better understand the discrepancy between patients’ expected and observed health behaviours.

Methods: Semi-structured individual interviews were conducted with patients (n = 39) in six CF clinics in Quebec, Canada. These interviews were part of a larger research project on screening and management practices for CFRD.

Results: Illness representations differed between two groups of interviewed patients: (1) one group had either CF without dysglycemia or CF with impaired glucose tolerance; and (2) the other group had CFRD. Both representations were internally consistent and encompassed Leventhal’s five dimensions of illness representation: illness identity, cause, timeline, consequences and control.

Conclusions: Patients require specific information on CFRD. The screening phase could be a crucial time to help patients adjust their representations to fit the reality of CFRD.     

Is Phonological Encoding in Naming Influenced by Literacy?

We examined phonological priming in illiterate adults, using a cross-modal picture-word interference task. Participants named pictures while hearing distractor words at different Stimulus Onset Asynchronies (SOAs). Ex-illiterates and university students were also tested. We specifically assessed the ability of the three populations to use fine-grained, phonemic units in phonological encoding of spoken words. In the phoneme-related condition, auditory words shared only the first phoneme with the target name. All participants named pictures faster with phoneme-related word distractors than with unrelated word distractors. The results thus show that phonemic representations intervene in phonological output processes independently of literacy. However, the phonemic priming effect was observed at a later SOA in illiterates compared to both ex-illiterates and university students. This may be attributed to differences in speed of picture identification.     

The Effect of the Balance of Orthographic Neighborhood Distribution in Visual Word Recognition

The present study investigated whether the balance of neighborhood distribution (i.e., the way orthographic neighbors are spread across letter positions) influences visual word recognition. Three word conditions were compared. Word neighbors were either concentrated on one letter position (e.g.,nasse/basse-lasse-tasse-masse) or were unequally spread across two letter positions (e.g.,pelle/celle-selle-telle-perle), or were equally spread across two letter positions (e.g.,litre/titre-vitre-libre-livre). Predictions based on the interactive activation model [McClelland & Rumelhart (1981). Psychological Review, 88, 375–401] were generated by running simulations and were confirmed in the lexical decision task. Data showed that words were more rapidly identified when they had spread neighbors rather than concentrated neighbors. Furthermore, within the set of spread neighbors, words were more rapidly recognized when they had equally rather than unequally spread neighbors. The findings are explained in terms of activation and inhibition processes in the interactive activation framework.     

The development of the orthographic consistency effect in speech recognition: from sublexical to lexical involvement

The influence of orthography on children's on-line auditory word recognition was studied from the end of Grade 2 to the end of Grade 4, by examining the orthographic consistency effect [Ziegler, J. C., & Ferrand, L. (1998). Orthography shapes the perception of speech: The consistency effect in auditory recognition. Psychonomic Bulletin &Review, 5, 683-689.] in auditory lexical decision and shadowing tasks. Words with rhymes that can be spelled in two different ways (inconsistent) produced longer auditory lexical decision and shadowing times and more errors than did consistent words. A similar consistency effect was also observed on pseudowords. The observation of a general consistency effect, both for words and pseudowords, in lexical decision and in shadowing suggests a widespread influence of orthography in the children's spoken word recognition system. On exactly the same material, with adult listeners we replicated the usual pattern of an orthographic consistency effect restricted to words in lexical decision [Ventura, P., Morais, J., Pattamadilok, C., & Kolinsky, R. (2004). The locus of the orthographic consistency effect in auditory word recognition. Language and Cognitive Processes, 19, 57-95; Ziegler, J. C., & Ferrand, L. (1998). Orthography shapes the perception of speech: The consistency effect in auditory recognition. Psychonomic Bulletin &Review, 5, 683-689]. A reanalysis of the lexical decision and shadowing results of Ventura et al. [Ventura, P., Morais, J., Pattamadilok, C., & Kolinsky, R. (2004). The locus of the orthographic consistency effect in auditory word recognition. Language and Cognitive Processes, 19, 57-95.] confirmed the discrepancy between the effects of orthographic consistency in child readers and adults. A further control experiment showed that orthographic consistency effects were not present in pre-readers. Results are interpreted considering the coexistence in children's reading of a mechanism of automatic access to well-specified orthographic representations of words and the persistence of grapho-phonological decoding procedures.     

Phonological awareness and the use of phonological similarity in letter-sound learning

The effects of the phonological similarity between a letter sound and the sound in a spoken word, and phonological awareness on letter-sound learning were examined. Two groups of 41 kindergartners were taught four letter sounds. First, both groups had to learn the associations between four symbols and four familiar words. Next, both groups were taught the letter sounds that were paired to these same symbols. Each letter sound corresponded to the first sound of the word that was previously associated with that symbol in the phonological similarity group, whereas such a relation was absent in the other group. In addition, measures of vocabulary, letter knowledge, and phonological awareness were administered. Phonological similarity facilitated letter-sound learning. Individual differences in phonological awareness had a strong effect on letter-sound learning even after current letter knowledge was controlled. Unexpectedly, the effects of phonological awareness and the ability to use phonological similarity on letter-sound learning were found to be independent.     

Tracking the acquisition of orthographic skills in developing readers: masked priming effects

A masked priming procedure was used to explore developmental changes in the tuning of lexical word recognition processes. Lexical tuning was assessed by examining the degree of masked form priming and used two different types of prime-target lexical similarity: one letter different (e.g., rlay-->PLAY) and transposed letters (e.g., lpay-->PLAY). The performance of skilled adult readers was compared with that of developing readers in Grade 3. The same children were then tested again two years later, when they were in Grade 5. The skilled adult readers showed no form priming, indicating that their recognition mechanisms for these items had become finely tuned. In contrast, the Grade 3 readers showed substantial form priming effects for both measures of lexical similarity. When retested in Grade 5, the developing readers no longer showed significant one letter different priming, but transposed letter priming remained. In general, these results provide evidence for a transition from more broadly tuned to more finely tuned lexical recognition mechanisms and are interpreted in the context of models of word recognition.     

Representation of principled connections: a window onto the formal aspect of common sense conception

Nominal concepts represent things as tokens of types. Recent research suggests that we represent principled connections between the type of thing something is (e.g., DOG) and some of its properties (k-properties; e.g., having four legs for dogs) but not other properties (t-properties; e.g., being brown for dogs). Principled connections differ from logical, statistical, and causal connections. Principled connections license (i) the expectation that tokens of the type will generally possess their k-properties, (ii) formal explanations (i.e., explanation of the presence of k-properties in tokens of a type by reference to the type of thing it is), and (iii) normative expectations concerning the presence of k-properties in tokens of the type. The present paper investigates the hypothesis that representing principled connections requires representing properties as aspects of being the relevant kind of thing (Aspect Hypothesis). Experiment 1 provides a direct test of the Aspect Hypothesis. Experiments 2 and 3 provide indirect tests of the Aspect Hypothesis. All three experiments provide support for the Aspect Hypothesis. Experiment 4 investigates a prediction of the Aspect Hypothesis concerning the manner in which formal explanations are licensed by principled connections. Finally, Experiment 5 investigates a prediction of the Aspect Hypothesis concerning the nature of the normative expectations licensed by principled connections. Together these results provide strong evidence for the idea that representing principled connections involves representing a property as being an aspect of being a given kind of thing. The results also help clarify the manner in which formal explanation differs from other modes of explanation. Finally, the results of the experiments are used to motivate a proposal concerning the formal structure of the conceptual representations implicated by principled connections. This structure provides a domain-general way of structuring our concepts and embodies the perspective we take when we think and talk of things as being instances of a kind.