Relationships between perceptual defence reactions and subjective tendencies in the phenomenal representation of facial displays of affect

The present study examines if non-veridical reports of a stimulus-motif presented below the threshold for correct recognition are related to subjective tendencies in the ordinary perception of thermatically related stimuli. Sixty-four subjects were tested with the standard picture of Kragh's Defence Mechanism Test (DMT) which reflects a theme of aggression and threat. Stimulus-inadequate report of the picture-motif were related to the subject's phenomenal representation of video-recorded facial displays of anger, fear, sadness, and joy. The results demonstrate a correspondence between the individual's perceptual distortions, eliminations, or additions to the threatening subliminal stimulus and his or her phenomenal representation of the supraliminal affective stimuli.     

Moral in whose eyes? Cross-cultural differences in moral decision making and behaviour

All people want to feel that they are morally adequate. People tend to evaluate their moral adequacy by judging their behaviour through their own eyes (first-person perspective) or the eyes of others (third-person perspective). People in all cultures use both perspectives, but there may be cultural variations in which perspective takes precedence. By conducting two studies, we explore the way people in face cultures are more likely to secure their moral self-regard through the eyes of others (vs. their own eyes), whereas the opposite is true in case of people from dignity cultures. Study 1 found that people from face culture (Korean participants) cheated to a lesser extent when others were invoked (vs. not invoked), but people from dignity culture (American participants) were not affected by this priming. Study 2 found that moral intentions were more strongly influenced by what participants perceived others to do in moral situations in face (vs. dignity) cultures. In contrast, moral intentions were found to be more strongly influenced by what they believed they should do in moral situations in dignity (vs. face) cultures.     

Personality development in old age relates to physical health and cognitive performance: Evidence from the Berlin Aging Study II

We examine how late-life personality development relates to overall morbidity as well as specific performance-based indicators of physical and cognitive functioning in 1,232 older adults in the Berlin Aging Study II (aged 65–88 years). Latent growth models indicated that, on average, neuroticism and conscientiousness decline over time, whereas extraversion and openness increase and agreeableness remains stable. Higher morbidity and worse grip strength were associated with higher neuroticism. Lower grip strength was further associated with lower openness, attenuated increases in extraversion, decreases in agreeableness and accelerated declines in conscientiousness. Moreover, those with poor perceptual speed reported higher neuroticism and lower conscientiousness. We also found age- and gender-differential associations between physical health and cognitive performance with levels of and changes in personality.     

On-court position and handedness in visual anticipation of stroke direction in tennis

ObjectivesIn racket sports, players integrate information picked up from their opponent's kinematics and contextual cues like on-court position into shot outcome anticipation. In view of suggested difficulties with anticipating left-handed opponents' action intentions, here we examined whether an opponent's handedness interacts with position-dependency in visual anticipation.Design and methodFollowing a 2 (Group) x 2 (Handedness) x 2 (Position) x 3 (Temporal Occlusion) factorial design, 20 tennis players and 20 non-players predicted directional outcome of temporally manipulated point-light animations of identical left- and right-handed forehand groundstrokes performed near vs. far from the court's midline.ResultsTennis players' response selection was mostly affected by an opponent's on-court position, particularly at an early stage of a hitting movement. Opponents' handedness affected response selection similarly in both groups (i.e., bias towards down-the-line predictions against left-handed strokes occluded at racket-ball-contact), but it did not interact with on-court position.ConclusionsFindings highlight that on-court position, and opponents' handedness to some extent as well, appears relevant for skilled visual anticipation in tennis.     

Instruction-driven processing in human perceptual learning

We conducted a series of experiments to determine the relative contribution of unsupervised versus controlled mechanisms to the intermixed-blocked effect. In Experiment 1, participants received pre-exposure instructions prompting a search for differences between stimuli, in keeping with past studies, and the intermixed-blocked effect was observed. In the remaining experiments, participants did not receive the aforementioned instructions, but instead were instructed either to simply observe the stimuli (Experiment 2) or in relation to a masking task (Experiment 3). None of the latter experiments produced an intermixed-blocked effect, suggesting that the effect found in Experiment 1 was driven by the instructions to search for differences, consistent with a controlled processing account of the effect. Moreover, we tested a prediction assuming the operation of a search strategy against one assuming the operation of a short-term habituation mechanism and found evidence more consistent with the search strategy hypothesis. We formulate a new account of the intermixed-blocked effect in humans based on an instruction-driven search and discuss how the account could explain many findings in the human literature.     

Identification of Matrices in Science and Engineering

Engineering science is a scientific discipline that from the point of view of epistemology and the philosophy of science has been somewhat neglected. When engineering science was under philosophical scrutiny it often just involved the question of whether engineering is a spin-off of pure and applied science and their methods. We, however, hold that engineering is a science governed by its own epistemology, methodology and ontology. This point is systematically argued by comparing the different sciences with respect to a particular set of characterization criteria. This revised version was published online in August 2006 with corrections to the Cover Date.     

Justification of interpersonal aggression in Japanese,American, and Spanish students

Six hundred and thirty‐two university students of both sexes—242 Japanese (137 males and 105 females), 190 Spanish (71 males and 119 females), and 200 American (100 males and 100 females)—completed a questionnaire that examined their attitudes toward various kinds of aggression directed at other people in different situations that ranged from self‐defense to a method of overcoming communication problems. Factor analysis revealed three factors: physical aggression (killing, torture, and hitting), direct verbal aggression (shouting and rage), and indirect verbal aggression (being ironic and hindering). The basic factor structure of the Japanese, the Spanish, and the USA samples was similar. In all samples, men showed a higher justification of physical aggressive acts in any situation and of indirect verbal aggression in nondefensive circumstances. Cultural differences were found in the degree of justification of the three factors: in all kinds of situations, Japanese students showed a lower justification of indirect verbal aggression but a higher justification of direct verbal aggression than USA and Spain samples. Physical aggression in defensive situations is justified more by Americans than by Japanese and Spanish students. These findings suggest the existence of a common basic moral code about physical aggressive acts, but there seems to be a cultural influence on moral codes concerning verbal aggressive acts. Oriental cultures, with an interdependent construal of self, seem to be more permissive of direct verbal aggression compared with Western cultures, but they have less tolerance for indirect verbal aggression. There were practically no significant differences between American and Spanish scores. Aggr. Behav. 25:185–195, 1999. © 1999 Wiley‐Liss, Inc.     

The sound of motion in spoken language: visual information conveyed by acoustic properties of speech

Language is generally viewed as conveying information through symbols whose form is arbitrarily related to their meaning. This arbitrary relation is often assumed to also characterize the mental representations underlying language comprehension. We explore the idea that visuo-spatial information can be analogically conveyed through acoustic properties of speech and that such information is integrated into an analog perceptual representation as a natural part of comprehension. Listeners heard sentences describing objects, spoken at varying speaking rates. After each sentence, participants saw a picture of an object and judged whether it had been mentioned in the sentence. Participants were faster to recognize the object when motion implied by speaking rate matched the motion implied by the picture. Results suggest that visuo-spatial referential information can be analogically conveyed and represented.     

Visual laterality responses to different emotive stimuli by red-capped mangabeys, Cercocebus torquatus torquatus

Hemispheric asymmetry in emotional perception has been put forward by different theories as the right hemisphere theory or the valence theory. But no consensus was found about the role played by both hemispheres. So, in order to test the different theories, we investigated preferential use of one eye in red-capped mangabeys, at the individual as well as at the group level. In this study we investigated the influence of the emotional value of stimuli on the direction and strength of visual preference of 14 red-capped mangabeys. Temporal stability of the bias of use of a given eye was evaluated by comparing our current results to those obtained 2.5 months previously. Two experimental devices, a tube and a box, tested five different stimuli: four food types varying in palatability and a neutral stimulus. The subjects’ food preferences were evaluated before testing the laterality. The mangabeys used their left eyes predominantly at the group level for the tube task. The majority of the subjects showed a visual preference at the individual level for the box task, but this bias was not present at the group level. As the palatability of the stimuli increased, the number of lateralized subjects and the number of subjects using preferentially their left eye increased. Similarly, the strength of laterality was related to food preference. Strength of laterality was significantly higher for subjects using their left eye than for subjects using their right eye. Preferential use of a given eye was stable over short periods 2.5 months later. Our data agree with reports on visual laterality for other species. Our results support the valence theory of a hemispheric sharing of control of emotions in relation to their emotional value.     

Spatial representations elicit dual-coding effects in mental imagery

Spatial aspects of words are associated with their canonical locations in the real world. Yet little research has tested whether spatial associations denoted in language comprehension generalize to their corresponding images. We directly tested the spatial aspects of mental imagery in picture and word processing (Experiment 1). We also tested whether spatial representations of motion words produce similar perceptual-interference effects as demonstrated by object words (Experiment 2). Findings revealed that words denoting an upward spatial location produced slower responses to targets appearing at the top of the display, whereas words denoting a downward spatial location produced slower responses to targets appearing at the bottom of the display. Perceptual-interference effects did not obtain for pictures or for words lacking a spatial relation. These findings provide greater empirical support for the perceptual-symbols system theory ( Barsalou, 1999, 2008 ).