Hemisphere-dependent holistic processing of familiar faces

In two behavioral experiments involving lateralized stimulus presentation, we tested whether one of the most commonly used measures of holistic face processing—the composite face effect—would be more pronounced for stimuli presented to the right as compared to the left hemisphere. In experiment 1, we investigated the composite face effect in a verbal identification task, similar to its original report (Young, Hellawell, & Hay, 1987). Aligning top and bottom halves of composite face stimuli led to performance decreases irrespective of hemifield, indicating holistic processing of comparable magnitude for inputs provided separately to either hemisphere. However, when matching of the same top parts was required in experiment 2, an alignment-dependent performance decrease was found for stimuli presented in the left, but not right visual field. These observations suggest that the right hemisphere dominates in early stages of holistic processing, as indexed by the composite face effect, but that later processes such as face identification and naming are based on unified representations that are independent of input lateralization. Moreover, the composite face effect may not rely on the exact same representation(s) when measured in matching and identification tasks.     

Exploring Socioeconomic Differences in Bedtime Behaviours and Sleep Duration in English Preschool Children

Children's sleep is critical for optimal health and development; yet sleep duration has decreased in recent decades, and many children do not have adequate sleep. Certain sleep behaviours (‘sleep hygiene’) are commonly recommended, and there is some evidence that they are associated with longer nighttime sleep. Parents of 84 British 3‐year‐old children were interviewed about their children's sleep and completed five‐night/four‐day sleep diaries documenting their children's sleep, from which daily sleep duration was estimated. Diaries were validated by actigraphy in a subgroup of children. Sleep hygiene behaviours (regular bedtime, reading at bedtime, falling asleep in bed) were associated with each other, and were more common in the high socioeconomic status compared to the low socioeconomic status group. Parents' reasons for not practicing sleep hygiene included difficulty, inability or inconvenience. Sleep hygiene behaviours were associated with significantly longer child sleep at night but not over 24 h. Longer daytime napping compensated for shorter nighttime sleep in children whose parents did not implement sleep hygiene behaviours. Parents may need to be advised that certain behaviours are associated with longer nighttime sleep and given practical advice on how to implement these behaviours. © 2014 The Authors. Infant and Child Development published by John Wiley & Sons, Ltd.     

Can sleep habits predict driver behaviour?

IntroductionThe role of sleep hygiene (those factors that promote or disrupt effective sleep) on human performance was examined.ObjectiveThe study investigated the relationship between sleep hygiene and crash involvement.MethodMeasures of sleep hygiene and crash involvement were considered for a sample of over 6000 drivers.ResultsIt was found that poorer sleep hygiene was associated with younger age and greater crash involvement. The association between sleep hygiene and crash involvement remained when age and risk taking had been taken into account.ConclusionPoor sleep hygiene is associated with poorer performance as measured by crash involvement.     

Mapping the field of the whole human: Toward a form psychology

The concept of personality has served as the model of the whole human being within modern psychology for most of the 20th century. However, the original reasons for this selection were based on philosophical assumptions that have since come to be rejected by philosophers of science. Other approaches to the whole human have been identified within psychology, as well as philosophy and theology, which can also serve as models of the whole human in psychology, and which highlight additional, distinctly human kinds of psychological wholeness. The value of a number of the most important models will be discussed, and it will be suggested that the concept of form could serve as a higher-order concept for the psychological subdiscipline of the whole human being.     

Weekly work engagement and flourishing: The role of hindrance and challenge job demands

Two studies were conducted to examine how home healthcare nurses stay engaged in their work and maintain their psychological well-being. In Study 1, we hypothesized that nurses would perceive work pressure more as a hindrance demand than as a challenge demand, and that the reverse would be true for emotional demands. We approached 120 home healthcare nurses who filled in a survey. Results of a series of paired sample t-tests supported our hypotheses. In Study 2, we used the JD-R model to hypothesize that weekly job demands can either facilitate or undermine the positive impact of personal resources on work engagement and flourishing, depending on the nature of the job demand (hindrance vs. challenge). A sample of 63 nurses filled in a questionnaire at the end of the working week during three consecutive weeks (N = 3 × 63 = 189 occasions). Results of hierarchical linear modeling showed that emotional job demands strengthened the effect of personal resources on weekly well-being, whereas work pressure undermined this effect. Taken together, the present findings challenge the idea that whether job demands act as hindrances or challenges is the same for all occupations and for all individuals.     

The role of career competencies in the Job Demands — Resources model

This study investigated the role of career competencies as a mediator in the Job Demands — Resources model. Structural equation modeling with data from 305 young employed persons aged 16–30 years showed that career competencies are positively related to job resources and work engagement, but not to job demands and emotional exhaustion. Furthermore, career competencies had a partially mediating effect on the relationship between job resources and work engagement, and job resources had a partially mediating effect on the relationship between career competencies and work engagement. These findings suggest that career competencies may act in a similar way as personal resources in fostering work engagement. Our results underline the importance of combining research on job design and career development, and suggest that career competencies may have a role in stimulating employee wellbeing. Career counselors and HR programs may benefit from this insight by simultaneously increasing job resources and career competencies to increase employee wellbeing.     

“Whow—when I was going to pretend drinking it tasted coke for real!” Second-language learners' out-of-frame talk in peer pretend play: A developmental study from preschool to first grade

Much research has pointed to the importance of out-of-frame negotiations in peer pretend play for preschool children's social, cognitive and literacy development. However, few studies have investigated the longitudinal relations between out-of-frame talk in preschool and children's oral-language skills when entering school, or the pragmatic language competencies second-language learning children have to draw upon to be involved in this planning and negotiating phase of play. In this study, a group of children, who had Turkish as their first language and Norwegian as their second language, was followed for two years, from preschool to first grade, and videotaped in play with peers (N = 15 at age 4, and N = 23 at ages 5 and 6). In the first part of the analysis, relations between out-of-frame talk in preschool and vocabulary skills and story comprehension in first grade were investigated. The second part of the analysis focused on how children developed in regulating their peers through addressing and opposing others in out-of-frame negotiations. The main findings indicate that out-of-frame talk in the preschool years explained variance in oral-language skills in first grade, and that these second-language learners developed to increasingly address and oppose their peers over this two-year period.     

Sleep hygiene behaviours: An application of the theory of planned behaviour and the investigation of perceived autonomy support,past behaviour and response inhibition

This study investigated the sleep hygiene behaviour of university students within the framework of the Theory of Planned Behaviour (TPB [Ajzen, I. (1991). The theory of planned behavior. Organizational Behavior and Human Decision Processes, 50, 179–211.]), and examined the predictive validity of additional variables including perceived autonomy support, past behaviour and response inhibition. A total of 257 undergraduate students from an Australian university were administered two online questionnaires at two time points. At time 1, participants completed the TPB questionnaire and the Go/NoGo task as a measure of response inhibition. A week later at time 2, participants completed a questionnaire measuring the performance of sleep hygiene behaviours. Multiple and hierarchical regression analyses showed that the TPB model significantly predicted intention and behaviour. Although intention and perceived behavioural control were statistically significant in predicting behaviour, past behaviour and response inhibition accounted for more variance when added to the TPB model. Subjective norm was found to be the strongest predictor of intention implying the importance of normative influences in sleep hygiene behaviours. Response inhibition was the strongest predictor of behaviour, reinforcing the argument that the performance of health protective behaviours requires self-regulatory ability. Therefore, interventions should be targeted at enhancing self-regulatory capacity.     

Autobiographical reasoning in life narratives buffers the effect of biographical disruptions on the sense of self-continuity

Personal identity depends on synchronic coherence and diachronic continuity of the self. Autobiographical remembering and autobiographical knowledge as well as the stability of bodily integrity, of social roles, of significant others and of physical and sociocultural environment have been suggested as supporting a pre-reflective sense of self-continuity. Stark biographical discontinuities or disruptions in these areas may destabilise the sense of self-continuity. To test the hypothesis that autobiographical reasoning in life narratives helps to compensate the effects of biographical discontinuities on the sense of self-continuity, life narratives of a lifespan sample with the ages of 16, 20, 24, 28, 44 and 69 (N = 150, 78 female) were investigated. Results confirm that if, and only if there have been biographical disruptions in the past four years, then autobiographical reasoning correlates positively with a sense of self-continuity. The findings contradict the thesis that mere remembering of past episodes is sufficient to maintain a sense of self-continuity under conditions of biographical change.     

Object specificity and personal relevance in long-term visual remembering

The personal relevance of an object is multi-faceted, each facet being capable of contributing to the effects on object memory attributed to personal relevance. An object's status as an individual object (object specificity), rather than just a category of object, is one such facet and its impact on the long-term visual remembering of everyday objects is assessed in two experiments. Images and drawings were produced under generic (e.g., “Please draw a bed”) and personal exemplar (e.g., “Please draw your bed”) instructions, and participants indicated the degree to which the image on which their drawing was based was of a specific object or a generic object. Object specificity induced a sense of time and place for a remembered object, the most recent encounter with the object being most salient. Other aspects of personal relevance collectively facilitated the retrieval of an object's category-irrelevant features (thereby increasing the vividness of the object image), the other objects with which it was seen, and a more general episodic sense of place. Against a broader theoretical perspective, it is proposed that visual episodic memory and visual knowledge are primary sources of information for specific personally relevant objects and generic objects, respectively.