编码强度对字体大小效应的影响

本研究采用3个实验考察编码强度对字体大小效应的影响,探讨由于知觉特征而引发的元认知错觉的内在产生机制(实验1)与有效的矫正措施(实验2和实验3)。结果发现:(1)大字体词语的知觉流畅性显著优于小字体,并且贝叶斯多层中介分析结果表明,知觉流畅性对字体大小效应起部分中介作用(实验1);(2)随着编码强度的增加,由字体大小引起的学习判断错觉逐渐消失(实验2和实验3)。以上结果表明,刺激的知觉特征(字体大小)对个体学习判断的影响,随编码强度激活线索的增加而逐渐减弱。这一结果为真实教学情境中提高学习者的编码强度,进而削弱学习判断对知觉特征线索的依赖,并准确地监测自身的学习进程提供了科学依据。     

The weight of expectation: Implicit,rather than explicit,prior expectations drive the size–weight illusion

In the size–weight illusion, small objects feel heavier than identically weighted larger objects. This illusion is thought to be a consequence of how one's prior expectations can influence conscious perception—lifters expect the large object to outweigh the small object and subsequently experience it as feeling lighter than they expected it to be. Here, we directly examined how a familiar object's identity can affect how heavy someone expects it to be, and how these expectations will influence subsequent perceptions of heaviness. We describe two novel weight illusions induced with familiar objects. In one condition, participants judged the weight of a set of similar-size objects with very different natural weights (a polystyrene sphere, a tennis ball, and a cricket ball), which had all been adjusted to weigh the same amount as one another. In this condition, participants experienced a small, but reliable, weight illusion, with the lightest looking ball feeling heavier than the heaviest looking ball. In the other condition, participants judged the weights of a different set of balls, which were different sizes, but similar natural weights, to one another (a golf ball, a foam soccer ball, and an inflated beach ball). Again, participants experienced a perceptual illusion, but in the opposite direction. Surprisingly, participant's perceptions matched, rather than contrasted with, their explicit expectations such that, even though they expected the golf ball to outweigh the beach ball they perceived the golf ball as feeling heavier than the beach ball. The effect of object mass appeared to dominate the effect of conscious expectations, suggesting that contrasting expectations of heaviness are not necessary to experience weight illusions and that current models of this robust perceptual effect must be revised.     

Is There a Dark Side of Positive Illusions? Overestimation of Social Competence and Subsequent Adjustment in Aggressive and Nonaggressive Children

This study examined (a) the links between children's overly positive perceptions about the relations with the peer group and with their best friend to subsequent behavioral, emotional, and social adjustment, and (b) whether these links are moderated by children's aggression. Using a short-term longitudinal design, the study was based on a sample of 819 4th- to 6th-graders (427 girls) from low to average SES families. Results showed that positive illusions about their social relations with classmates and with friends were related to an increase in children's peer-rated social preference and fostered the stability of children's dyadic friendships, regardless of children's level of aggression. In addition, overestimation of social competence with the peer group and overestimation of friendship quality were both related to a decrease in children's depressive feelings. Extreme overestimation as well as extreme underestimation of social competence with the peer group was also related to an increase in children's aggression. This latter result, however, was only true for children who were highly aggressive to begin with. The theoretical and practical implications of these results are discussed.     

Meaning Beyond Heroic Illusions? Transcendence in Everyday Life

Ernest Becker's theory of human evil is as devastating as it is incisive since he identifies the uniquely human capacity for transcendence as the source of evil. Anticipating our own death, we turn to elaborately constructed heroic illusions that give us meaning and the promise of immortality while treating those with different ideologies as opponents. This article summarizes Becker's interpretation of evil and discusses how transcendence is understood by contemporary thinkers such as Karl Rahner. It concludes by examining breakthroughs in personal relationships as transcendent experiences that are deeply meaningful but do not involve the construction of others as enemies.     

The moderating role of early traumatic experiences on the association of schizotypal traits with visual perception

The findings on the association of schizotypal traits with the perception of visual illusions are scarce and inconsistent and have not taken into consideration potential effects of childhood traumatic experiences, a risk factor for schizophrenia-spectrum conditions. Thus, the present study addressed the question of potential moderating effects of early traumatic experiences on the association between different aspects of schizotypal traits with the perception of the Müller-Lyer and Navon's Hierarchical Letters (NHL) illusions. The study revealed that (a) increased suspiciousness was associated with increased liability to the Müller-Lyer illusion, when the exposure to traumatic events was high, whereas the opposite pattern was true when the exposure to traumatic events was low; (b) negative schizotypy was associated with more accurate global perception, and high disorganized schizotypy was associated with superior accuracy when target letters were present during the NHL illusion, when early traumatic experiences were at lower levels; and (c) high negative, disorganized, and total schizotypy were associated with lower accuracy when target letters were present in the NHL paradigm, when early traumatic experiences were at higher levels. The findings of the study suggest that early traumatic events differentially moderate the relationship between various aspects of schizotypal traits and visual perceptual processing.     

Afterimages: a tool for defining the neural correlate of visual consciousness

Our visual system not only mediates information about the visual environment but is capable of generating pictures of nonexistent worlds: afterimages, illusions, phosphenes, etc. We are "aware" of these pictures just as we are aware of the images of natural, physical objects. This raises the question: is the neural correlate of consciousness (NCC) of such images the same as that of images of physical objects? Images of natural objects have some properties in common with afterimages (e.g., stability of verticality) but there are also obvious differences (e.g., images maintain size constancy, whereas afterimages follow Emmert's Law: when seen while screens at different distances are observed, an afterimage looks larger, the greater the distance of the screen). The differences can be explained by differences in the retinal extent of images and afterimages, which favors the view that both have the same NCC. It seems reasonable to assume that before neural activity can produce awareness, all the computations necessary for a veridical representation of, e.g., an object, must be completed within the neural substrate and that information characteristic of a particular object must be available within the NCC. Given these assumptions, it can be shown that no retinotopic (in a strict sense) cortical areas can serve as the NCC, although some type of topographic representation is necessary. It seems also to be unlikely that neurons classified as cardinal cells alone can serve as NCC.     

Altered bodily self‐consciousness in multiple sclerosis

In this study, we assessed the impact of multiple sclerosis (MS) on bodily self‐consciousness (BSC) using the Rubber Hand Illusion. Patients with MS showed a dissociation between body ownership and self‐location: they did report an explicit ownership of the rubber hand, but they did not point towards it, showing a defective ability of localizing body parts in space. This evidence indicates that MS may affect selective components of BSC, whose impairment may contribute to, and even worsen, the functional disability of MS.     

Pain,Care, and the Body: A Response to de Vignemont

Frédérique de Vignemont argues on the basis of several empirical counterexamples that Bain and Klein are wrong about the relationship between pain and bodily care. I argue that the force of the putative counterexamples is weak. Properly understood, the association between pain and care is preserved in a way that is consistent with both de Vignemont's own views and the empirical facts.     

HYPOCHONDRIA: A REVIEW OF ITS PLACE IN PSYCHOANALYTIC THEORY

After identifying Freud's fundamental contributions to the concept of hypochondria, the author undertakes a brief review of the term's trajectory within the Anglophone and Francophone psychoanalytic literature. Notions of defense, anxiety, and representation as they relate to corporeal experience are discussed. The author illustrates these main axes with which to read hypochondria with clinical material drawn from the analysis of a woman in whom somatic manifestations were especially pervasive.     

Toward a constructive eschatology: An appraisal of Veli-Matti Kärkkäinen's contributions

Faced with diverse cultural challenges to hope, a constructive eschatology should do justice to the entire reality and develop a robust future-oriented hope that helps to transform the present. In this regard Veli-Matti Kärkkäinen has made a significant contribution, especially in dialogue with natural sciences and other faith traditions, to retrieve the cosmic dimension of Christian hope, as well as to address liberationist and ecofeminist critiques of some distorted hopes. After recommending distinctive features of Kärkkäinen's constructive proposal, I suggest advancing it further by combining the phenomenological insight into the lived body with the concept of temporal holism.