Know thy agency in predictive coding: Meta-monitoring over forward modeling

Though the computation of agency is thought to be based on prediction error, it is important for us to grasp our own reliability of that detected error. Here, the current study shows that we have a meta-monitoring ability over our own forward model, where the accuracy of motor prediction and therefore of the felt agency are implicitly evaluated. Healthy participants (N = 105) conducted a simple motor control task and SELF or OTHER visual feedback was given. The relationship between the accuracy and confidence in a mismatch detection task and in a self-other attribution task was examined. The results suggest an accuracy-confidence correlation in both tasks, indicating our meta-monitoring ability over such decisions. Furthermore, a statistically identified group with low accuracy and low confidence was characterized as higher schizotypal people. Finally, what we can know about our own forward model and how we can know it is discussed.     

Response-mediated spatial priming despite perfectly valid target location cues and intervening response events

Attentional effects are often inferred from keypress reaction time (RT) studies when two sequentially presented stimuli, appearing at the same location, generate costs or benefits. The universality of these attentional attributions is challenged by data from perceptual discrimination tasks, which reveal that location repetition benefits and costs depend on whether a prior response repeats or switches, respectively. According to dual-stage accounts, these post-attentional effects may be abolished by making responses in between two target stimuli or by increasing target location certainty, leaving only attentional effects. Here, we test these accounts by requiring responses to stimuli in between targets and by increasing target location certainty with 100% valid location cues. Contrary to expectations, there was no discernible effect of cueing on any repetition effects, although the intervening response diminished stimulus-response repetition effects while subtly reducing location-response repetition effects. Despite this, there was little unambiguous evidence of attentional effects independent of responding. Taken together, the results further highlight the robustness of location-response repetition effects in perceptual discrimination tasks, which challenge whether there are enduring attentional effects in this paradigm.     

Episodic emotions of Tshivenda cultural community mothers towards their adolescent children’s pregnancies

This study explored Tshivenda mothers’ emotional reactions to the learning of unplanned pregnancies of their adolescent daughters. Ten purposively selected mothers with early parent adolescent children were informants (age range = 40 to 55 years). They responded to semi-structured face-to-face interviews on their reactions to the learning of the pregnancies of their daughters. The interview data were thematically analysed. Findings suggest the mothers experienced anger and embarrassment, objective and subjective burdens supporting their early parent daughter, and fears for the health of their mother-to-be daughters. The mothers reported to cope with pregnancy of their daughters by religion supplication, acceptance and social support, as well as open communication with their adolescent daughters about the pregnancies.     

The effects of meaningful irrelevant speech and road traffic noise on teachers' attention, episodic and semantic memory

The aim of the present experiment was to examine the effects of meaningful irrelevant speech and road traffic noise on attention, episodic and semantic memory, and also to examine whether the noise effects were age-dependent. A total of 96 male and female teachers in the age range of 35-45 and 55-65 years were randomly assigned to a silent or the two noise conditions. Noise effects found in episodic memory were limited to a meaningful text, where cued recall contrary to expectations was equally impaired by the two types of noise. However, meaningful irrelevant speech also deteriorated recognition of the text, whereas road traffic noise caused no decrement. Retrieval from two word fluency tests in semantic memory showed strong effects of noise exposure, one affected by meaningful irrelevant speech and the other by road traffic noise. The results implied that both acoustic variation and the semantic interference could be of importance for noise impairments. The expected age-dependent noise effects did not show up.     

Child-Directed Interaction: Prediction of Change in Impaired Mother–Child Functioning

The first phase of parent–child interaction therapy (PCIT), called child-directed interaction, teaches parents to use positive and differential social attention to improve the parent–child relationship. This study examined predictors of change in mother and child functioning during the child-directed interaction for 100 mother–child dyads. The children were 3–6-years-old and diagnosed with oppositional defiant disorder. After establishing that significant improvements occurred in mother report of child disruptive behavior, parenting stress, and parenting practices, these three variables were combined to form a latent impaired mother–child functioning construct. Structural equation models were examined using maternal demographic and psychosocial variables as predictors of impaired mother–child functioning before and after the child-directed interaction. Mothers’ self-reported daily hassles and depressive symptomatology predicted 74% of variance in impaired mother–child functioning before treatment. Mothers’ report of social support predicted impaired mother–child functioning after the child-directed interaction, with 57% of the variance accounted for in this longitudinal model. These findings suggest the importance of improving maternal social support during the initial phase of PCIT.

Integration of syntactic and semantic information in predictive processing: cross-linguistic evidence from German and English

Two visual-world eyetracking experiments were conducted to investigate whether, how, and when syntactic and semantic constraints are integrated and used to predict properties of subsequent input. Experiment 1 contrasted auditory German constructions such as, The hare-nominative eats ... (the cabbage-acc) versus The hare-accusative eats ... (the fox-nom), presented with a picture containing a hare, fox, cabbage, and distractor. We found that the probabilities of the eye movements to the cabbage and fox before the onset of NP2 were modulated by the case-marking of NP1, indicating that the case-marking (syntactic) information and verbs' semantic constraints are integrated rapidly enough to predict the most plausible NP2 in the scene. Using English versions of the same stimuli in active/passive voice (Experiment 2), we replicated the same effect, but at a slightly earlier position in the sentence. We discuss the discrepancies in the two Germanic languages in terms of the ease of integrating information across, or within, constituents.     

The Primary and Secondary Factors That Promote Destructive Personalities

The ability of behavioral scientists to assist society deal competently with destructive behavior relies upon a recognition of its causes. Despite the pervasiveness of violence in American society, the roots of destructiveness are still poorly understood. Five primary and five secondary factors found in the developmental histories of people who have become involved in serious destruction are identified and discussed. The confluence of these factors in the steps toward destructive acts are traced.     

老年人情景记忆更新的改变：竞争记忆的回溯性干扰

记忆更新是获取新知识的一种重要能力。大量研究显示老年人情景记忆受损,但鲜有研究探讨老年人情景记忆更新模式的改变。研究在匹配了老年人和年轻人编码程度的前提下,探讨情景记忆更新的老化效应及其潜在的认知机制。我们对AB-AC记忆更新范式进行了创新,同时考察了在项目改变和位置改变条件下的老化效应,并在测试阶段纳入诱饵选项,进一步排除编码程度带来的影响。研究结果显示年轻人能对A-B和A-C记忆分离存储,而老年人更多地受到回溯性记忆干扰,即在A-B测试中出现C的闯入,并且该干扰效应显著地大于诱饵刺激带来的影响。研究结果表明,在年轻人和老年人编码程度匹配的情况下,年轻人的记忆更新通过记忆分化来实现,而老年人更多地受到竞争记忆的回溯性干扰。