A randomized controlled trial of Internet-based self-help training for recurrent headache in childhood and adolescence

Two different self-help training programs (multimodal cognitive-behavioral training (CBT) and applied relaxation (AR)) presented via the Internet were compared with an educational intervention (EDU) in an RCT. Sixty-five children and adolescents (mean age: 12.7 years) with recurrent headache (at least 2 attacks per month) were each assigned to one of the three treatment conditions. The main outcome variables related to changes in headache frequency, intensity and duration as well as the responder rate (50% reduction of headache frequency) and NNTs. Secondary outcome variables were pain catastrophizing and general well-being (depression, psychopathological symptoms and health-related quality of life). All groups showed significant reduction in headache frequency, duration and pain catastrophizing, but not in headache intensity, depression, psychopathological symptoms or health-related quality of life at post-assessment. NNTs were 2.0 for the comparison CBT and EDU; 5.2 for the comparison of AR and EDU at post-treatment. The highest responder rates at post were from CBT (63%), significantly different compared to AR (32%) and EDU (19%), whereas at follow-up no significant differences were found (CBT: 63%, AR: 56%, EDU: 55%) reflecting in the NNTs.The effects remain stable in headache frequency, pain catastrophizing and psychopathological symptoms across all groups at follow-up assessment. CBT showed the highest within-effect size in headache frequency, duration and pain catastrophizing. The results support the use of Internet programs for pediatric recurrent headache, especially given their accessibility and suitability for children and adolescents. Further studies are needed to improve their quality and efficacy.     

Absorption and spiritual experience: A review of evidence and potential mechanisms

Some people seem to have a ‘talent’ for spiritual experience: they readily sense the presence of supernatural beings, receive special messages from God, and report intense feelings of self-transcendence, awe and wonder. Here we review converging strands of evidence to argue that the trait of 'absorption' captures a general proclivity for having spiritual experiences. Participants scoring highly on the Tellegen Absorption Scale report vivid experiences of hearing God's voice during prayer, intense mystical experiences in response to psychedelics or placebo brain-stimulation, and strong feelings of presence and transcendence when confronted with natural beauty, virtual reality, or music. Several mechanisms may help to explain the relationship between absorption and spiritual experience. We suggest that absorption captures an experiential mindset that intensifies inner and outer sensory experience in ways that reflect both prior expectation and novel sensory engagement. It seems to enable that which must be imagined to feel more real.     

Representationalism and the phenomenology of mental imagery

This paper sketches a phenomenological analysis of visual mental imagery and uses it to criticize representationalism and the internalist-versus-externalist framework for understanding consciousness. Contrary to internalist views of mental imagery imagery experience is not the experience of a phenomenal mental picture inspected by the mind’s eye, but rather the mental simulation of perceptual experience. Furthermore, there are experiential differences in perceiving and imagining that are not differences in the properties represented by these experiences. Therefore, externalist representationalism, which maintains that the properties of experience are the external properties represented by experience, is an inadequate account of conscious experience.     

客体-空间表象和言语认知风格模型及其测量

在言语-表象认知风格模型中, 视觉表象认知风格一直被视为单一的结构, 且在此基础上发展出的各种测量方法均存在效度上的缺陷, 导致了研究者对该认知风格模型的普遍质疑。随着对视觉认知加工研究的深入, 尤其是对视觉客体表象与视觉空间表象在功能和解剖上的双分离的理解, 为进一步区分表象型认知风格提供了理论和实证依据, 进而促进了客体-空间表象和言语(Object-Spatial Imagery and Verbal, OSIV)认知风格模型的提出, 而在此基础上开发的新测量工具(Object-Spatial Imagery and Verbal Questionnaire, OSIVQ)具有良好的信、效度, 有力地支持了OSIV认知风格模型。OSIV认知风格模型及其测量为研究人类的认知风格以及视觉认知拓展了新视野。尽管如此, 两种不同视觉表象子系统并存于个体的视觉表象系统中, 因此, 它们分离的原因、相互作用及其与视觉注意之间的关系有待进一步研究。     

Object imagery and object identification: object imagers are better at identifying spatially-filtered visual objects

Object imagery refers to the ability to construct pictorial images of objects. Individuals with high object imagery (high-OI) produce more vivid mental images than individuals with low object imagery (low-OI), and they encode and process both mental images and visual stimuli in a more global and holistic way. In the present study, we investigated whether and how level of object imagery may affect the way in which individuals identify visual objects. High-OI and low-OI participants were asked to perform a visual identification task with spatially-filtered pictures of real objects. Each picture was presented at nine levels of filtering, starting from the most blurred (level 1: only low spatial frequencies—global configuration) and gradually adding high spatial frequencies up to the complete version (level 9: global configuration plus local and internal details). Our data showed that high-OI participants identified stimuli at a lower level of filtering than participants with low-OI, indicating that they were better able than low-OI participants to identify visual objects at lower spatial frequencies. Implications of the results and future developments are discussed.     

The emergence of motor imagery in children

A total of 80 children (40 5-year-olds and 40 7-year-olds) took part in an experiment to evaluate their capacity to mentally evoke a motor image of their own displacement. Using a chronometry paradigm, movement duration was compared in a task where children were asked to move in order to take a puppet back to its home (actual) and to think about themselves executing the same action (virtual). Movement durations for actual and virtual displacements were obtained in two conditions, where either no information was provided about the weight of the puppet to be displaced (standard situation) or the puppet was described as being heavy (informed situation). A significant correlation between actual and virtual walking durations was observed for 7-year-olds in the informed condition. This result provides evidence for a motor imagery process emerging in 7-year-olds when children are required to think about themselves in action.     

Using Mental Imagery to Enhance the Effectiveness of Implementation Intentions

Past research shows that forming implementation intentions increases the probability of carrying out goals. The present research proposes that mental imagery can strengthen the effects of implementation intentions on goal achievement. Participants were assigned a mundane goal and were randomly assigned to one of two conditions: implementation intentions only or implementation intentions plus mental imagery. Results support the hypothesis that using mental imagery when forming implementation intentions leads to higher rates of goal achievement.     

Sleep-related improvements in motor learning following mental practice

A wide range of experimental studies have provided evidence that a night of sleep may enhance motor performance following physical practice (PP), but little is known, however, about its effect after motor imagery (MI). Using an explicitly learned pointing task paradigm, thirty participants were assigned to one of three groups that differed in the training method (PP, MI, and control groups). The physical performance was measured before training (pre-test), as well as before (post-test 1) and after a night of sleep (post-test 2). The time taken to complete the pointing tasks, the number of errors and the kinematic trajectories were the dependent variables. As expected, both the PP and the MI groups improved their performance during the post-test 1. The MI group was further found to enhance motor performance after sleep, hence suggesting that sleep-related effects are effective following mental practice. Such findings highlight the reliability of MI in learning process, which is thought consolidated when associated with sleep.