Adaptive Memory: Remembering With a Stone-Age Brain

ABSTRACT— If memory evolved, sculpted by the processes of natural selection, then its operating characteristics likely bear the "footprints" of ancestral selection pressures. Psychologists rarely consider this possibility and generally ignore functional questions in their attempt to understand how human memory works. We propose that memory evolved to enhance reproductive fitness and, accordingly, its systems are tuned to retain information that is fitness-relevant. We present evidence consistent with this proposal, namely that processing information for its survival relevance leads to superior long-term retention—better, in fact, than most known memory-enhancement techniques. Even if one remains skeptical about evolutionary analyses, adopting a functional perspective can lead to the generation of new research ideas.     

Effects of object complexity and type on the gaze behavior of children with pervasive developmental disorder

The looking behavior of children with pervasive developmental disorder (PDD) and age- and IQ-matched normal control children was studied using infrared oculography. Stimuli varying in complexity and topic were presented to test whether children with PDD have specific abnormalities in looking behavior to complex stimuli and/or to faces. All children showed more and longer fixations on the complex objects than on the simple objects, especially the complex nonsense figure, but group differences were not found. The results show no evidence for specific abnormalities in looking behavior to either faces or to complex stimuli in high functioning children with PDD.     

The Relevant Equivalence Property

The pure implicational and the multiplicative fragments of arange of propositional relevant (and other) logics are shownto have the property that any two formulas equivalent in sucha logic are constructed from exactly the same propositionalvariables – as opposed to merely having (as the definitionof relevance itself would require) some propositional variablein common.     

Impaired discriminative fear-conditioning resulting from elevated fear responding to learned safety cues among individuals with panic disorder

Classical fear-conditioning is central to many etiologic accounts of panic disorder (PD), but few lab-based conditioning studies in PD have been conducted. One conditioning perspective proposes associative-learning deficits characterized by deficient safety learning among PD patients. The current study of PD assesses acquisition and retention of discriminative aversive conditioning using a fear-potentiated startle paradigm. This paradigm was chosen for its specific capacity to independently assess safety- and danger learning in the service of characterizing putative anomalies in each type of learning among those with PD. Though no group difference in fear-potentiated startle was found at retention, acquisition results demonstrate impaired discriminative learning among PD patients as indexed by measures of conditioned startle-potentiation to learned safety and danger cues. Importantly, this discrimination deficit was driven by enhanced startle-potentiation to the learned safety cue rather than aberrant reactivity to the danger cue. Consistent with this finding, PD patients relative to healthy individuals reported higher expectancies of dangerous outcomes in the presence of the safety cue, but equal danger expectancies during exposure to the danger cue. Such results link PD to impaired discrimination learning, reflecting elevated fear responding to learned safety cues.     

Single and double alternation learning in rats: The role of set size and correction

In many experiments, rats have evidenced extreme difficulty mastering alternation patterns. In three experiments, we explored rats’ ability to learn double alternation patterns and possible reasons behind their past difficulties with such patterns. In Experiment 1, rats learned single and double alternation patterns. In the second and third experiment, we explored the role of correction and interference from stimulus set size on rats’ learning of double alternation patterns. Our results showed that rats easily learned both single and double alternation patterns and that stimulus set size had no noticeable effect on learning double alternation patterns. Findings additionally evidenced that correction played an important role in rats’ learning double alternation patterns.     

对归纳推理贝叶斯模型的检验

作者用实验比较检验特征归纳的贝叶斯模型、关联相似性模型、基于特征的归纳推理模型和相似性覆盖模型这四种模型。以大学生为被试的实验结果表明：1）在强关联强度一致时,被试的归纳推理基本符合贝叶斯模型和关联相似性模型的预测,在弱关联强度一致时,不符合这四种模型预测;2）在关联强度不一致时,关联强度效应不符合贝叶斯模型的预测;3）在关联强度一致时,贝叶斯模型和关联相似性模型的预测结果是一致的,不能区分两个模型。实验结果较多地支持贝叶斯模型和关联相似性模型。     

Cardiac modulation of startle: Effects on eye blink and higher cognitive processing

Cardiac cycle time has been shown to affect pre-attentive brainstem startle processes, such as the magnitude of acoustically evoked reflexive startle eye blinks. These effects were attributed to baro-afferent feedback mechanisms. However, it remains unclear whether cardiac cycle time plays a role in higher startle-related cognitive processes, as well. Twenty-five volunteers responded first by ’fast as possible’ button pushes (reaction time, RT), and second, rated perceived intensity of 60 acoustic startle stimuli (85, 95, or 105 dB; 50 ms duration; binaural; instantaneous rise time), which were presented either 230 or 530 ms after the R-wave, and eye blink responses were measured by EMG. RT was divided into evaluation and motor response time according to previous research. Increasing stimulus intensity enhanced startle eye blink, intensity ratings, and RT components. Eye blinks and intensity judgments were lower when startle was elicited at a latency of R + 230 ms, but RT components were differentially affected: the evaluative component was attenuated, and the motor component was accelerated when stimuli were presented 230 ms after the R-wave. We conclude that the cardiac cycle affects the attentive processing of acoustic startle stimuli.     

惯用语理解的多种心理机制

惯用语是比喻性表达的一种。对惯用语句法分析导致其字面意义的通达,对惯用语语义分析导致其比喻意义的通达,两种加工存在矛盾。针对这种矛盾,研究者提出惯用语理解的非建构观点、建构观点和关联理论假说。非建构观点认为对惯用语的理解是比喻意义的直接提取;建构观点认为对惯用语的理解词素发挥重要作用;关联理论假说认为对惯用语的理解是寻求词素和整词最大程度的语义关联,以及语用过程中信息交流的最优功效。大量研究表明,不能简单的将惯用语加工的心理机制纳入统一模型内,惯用语加工受到材料和语用等诸多因素的影响,惯用语理解遵循多种心理加工机制。     

Using logical relevance for question answering

We propose a novel method of determining the appropriateness of an answer to a question through a proof of logical relevance rather than a logical proof of truth. We define logical relevance as the idea that answers should not be considered as absolutely true or false in relation to a question, but should be considered true more flexibly in a sliding scale of aptness. This enables us to reason rigorously about the appropriateness of an answer even in cases where the sources we are getting answers from are incomplete or inconsistent or contain errors. We show how logical relevance can be implemented through the use of measured simplification, a form of constraint relaxation, in order to seek a logical proof than an answer is in fact an answer to a particular question. We then give an example of such an implementation providing a set of specific rules for this purpose.     

Relevance and argumentation: How bald can you get

This paper is concerned with vagueness in language, its relation to logico-philosophical questions on the one hand, and to so-called syncategorematic terms and their linguistic use on the other hand. It attempts to show that it is not language itself which is vague but rather the way we use it.