Aging in cognitive control of social processing: evidence from the attention network test

ABSTRACT

Aging seems to be associated with impairment of attentional network functioning. It is not known whether social information can modulate this age-related decline. We used three variants of Attention Network test to examine the age-related decline of attentional effects in response to stimuli with and without social-cognitive content. Three groups of younger, middle-aged, and older participants performed the ANT, using fish, drawings, or photographs of faces looking to the left or right as target and flanker stimuli. The results showed that both executive attention and alerting were more resistant to the age-related decline with social stimuli and that orienting attention scores showed a progressive increase with age in the presence of this kind of stimuli. These findings underline the importance of social information in modulating and contrasting the age-related decline and support the status of human faces as a special class of visual stimuli for the human attentional systems.     

阈下情绪面孔的注视线索提示效应

采用线索-靶子范式，利用2个预实验和1个正式实验，考察阈下不同情绪面孔的注视线索提示效应。要求被试在具有表情与注视线索的面孔呈现完毕后，快速而准确地对目标的位置进行判断。记录被试反应时间。结果显示，当被试未有意识的觉察到注视线索与面孔表情时，注视线索提示效应存在，并受到表情的调节。表现为：在注视线索有效并伴有恐惧表情时，被试对于目标的判断更加迅速；当比较不同表情下线索无效与线索有效条件下的反应时差异时发现，恐惧表情面孔出现时，线索无效与线索有效条件之间反应时的差异最大。结果表明，阈下情绪刺激能够激发个体更原始的生物性反应；在早期注意阶段，个体对于恐惧信息更加敏感，注意存在负向情绪偏差。     

How to address the caveat of avoiding direct contact: Reducing prejudice towards gay and lesbian people in five Balkan countries

ABSTRACT

In the Balkans, contact with gays and lesbians is typically hostile or avoided. Drawing from probability samples of young people from five Balkan countries (N = 1046), we examined whether it is possible to transfer the effects of contact with other marginalized outgroups (largest ethnic minority in every country, Roma, the extremely poor and physically disabled) to acceptance of gays and lesbians (secondary outgroup), and whether this relationship could be explained by attitude generalization and increased intergroup trust. Path analyses supported the secondary transfer effect: it confirmed that, while controlling for direct contact, contact with other marginalized groups was related to more acceptance of a secondary group; this relationship was mediated by trust. This was found across all primary groups in the combined samples, while the effect varied for different groups in country samples. The results add to the value of intergroup contact as a mean of prejudice-reduction.     

Eye-movements support chronometric imagery performance even when the task is occluded

ABSTRACT

Mental chronometry has often been used to provide a temporal comparison between executed and imagined movements, with smaller discrepancies indicating more accurate image production and better imagery performance. In this study, we examined the importance of retinal and extra-retinal information in the performance of simple, sequential movements. After physical practice of four activities of daily living (Southampton Hand Assessment Procedure), nineteen participants imagined completing the same tasks with: 1) free eye-movements and visible objects, 2) free eye-movements and no visibility of the objects, and 3) constrained eye-movements and visible objects. Results suggested imagery performance was slower/less accurate compared to physical execution when the eyes were constrained. Conversely, chronometric imagery performance was unaffected with free eye movements, even when task-specific visual information was occluded. This study highlights the crucial role that eye-movements play in the regulation of the temporal aspects of imagery even when retinal information is absent, suggesting that temporal sequencing of imagined actions is largely dependent on extra-retinal information sources.     

Text-based E-contact: Harnessing cooperative Internet interactions to bridge the social and psychological divide

ABSTRACT

In order to bridge the psychological and physical divide between different groups, researchers have harnessed the positive elements of the Internet to improve intergroup contact. One new and effective Internet strategy is Electronic- or E-contact. Unlike other contact approaches, E-contact is an experimental intergroup intervention that uniquely accommodates Allport’s contact theory and recategorisation processes, to create a structured, cooperative, synchronous and goal-directed online text interaction between members from different groups. E-contact has been found to successfully improve intergroup relations between Catholics and Protestants in Northern Ireland and Muslims and Catholics in Australia; and reduce bias against lesbian women and gay men, people with schizophrenia, Indigenous Australians, and transgender individuals. This paper discusses the unique engineering and advantages of E-contact interventions in comparison to existing contact strategies, identifies the theories that guide E-contact interventions, provides meta-analytic evidence of its effects, and discusses the strengths, limitations and future directions for E-contact research.     

Interreligious contact and media: introduction

ABSTRACT

Religious pluralisation entails interreligious contacts of different kinds and at various levels. At the same time, an increasing mediatisation affects the perception of and encounter with other religious traditions and their adherents. These relations between interreligious contact and media have not yet been subject to extended research from the study of religion perspective. This issue wants to fill this gap by presenting different case studies and systematising considerations on constellations of interreligious contact/dialogue/encounter and media: specifically (a) the influence of mediated discourses on interreligious contact, (b) media extensions of local and global interreligious dialogue, and (c) the digital – and especially social – media as a platform for interreligious dialogue or encounter. This introduction gives an overview on concepts, questions and topics of this field of research, drawing on the case studies within this special issue.     

Attention AND mentalizing? Reframing a debate on social orienting of attention

ABSTRACT

People spontaneously attend where others are looking. Recently, it has been debated whether such orienting behaviour is supported by domain-general attentional processes, that involve reading the cues’ directional properties, or by processes that involve attributing mental states to agents. In this Opinion, we summarize key evidence for each position and argue that instead of favouring one or the other view, the available data point to an integrated framework in which the attribution of mental states and the operation of domain-general attentional processes both contribute to social orienting. In addition to providing a novel perspective, this view opens several fruitful future research avenues aimed at understanding how the two processes act together to influence cognitions and behaviour.     

Countering anti-Muslim attitudes among Christian and religiously unaffiliated 13- to 15-year-old students in England and Wales: testing the contact hypothesis

ABSTRACT

Drawing on data provided by 5,811 students from schools in England, Wales, and London who self-identified as either ‘no religion’ or as Christian, this study explored the effect of the contact hypothesis (having friends who are Muslims) on scores recorded on the seven-item Scale of Anti-Muslim Attitude (SAMA), after controlling for type of school (with or without a religious character), location (England, Wales, and London), personal factors (sex and age), psychological factors (extraversion, neuroticism, and psychoticism) and religious factors (self-assigned affiliation as Christian, worship attendance, and belief in God). The data demonstrated the positive effect of having friends who are Muslim on lowering anti-Muslim attitudes. The path is then described from educational research to curriculum development in the design of resources that offer young learners vicarious experience of having friends who are Muslims.     

Combining Action Observation and Motor Imagery Improves Eye–Hand Coordination during Novel Visuomotor Task Performance

Abstract

In this study, we compared the effectiveness of concurrent action observation and motor imagery (AO?+?MI), observing with the intent to imitate (active observation; AO), and passive observation (PO) training interventions for improving eye–hand coordination. Fifty participants were assigned to five groups [AO?+?MI, AO, PO, physical practice (PP); control] and performed a visuomotor rotation task, whilst eye movements were recorded. Each participant then performed 20 task trials in a training intervention before repeating the visuomotor rotation task in a post-test. As expected, PP produced the greatest improvement in task performance and eye–hand coordination. However, in comparison to the control group, AO?+?MI training produced a statistically significant increase in both task performance and eye–hand coordination, but no such improvements were found following AO or PO.     

It’s not just “us” versus “them”: Moving beyond binary perspectives on intergroup processes

ABSTRACT

The social psychology of intergroup relations has emerged largely from studies of how one group of people (e.g., whites) think and feel about another (e.g., blacks). By reducing the social world to binary categories, this approach has provided an effective and efficient methodological framework. However, it has also obscured important features of social relations in historically divided societies. This paper highlights the importance of investigating intergroup relationships involving more than two groups and of exploring not only their psychological but also their political significance. Exemplifying this argument, we discuss the conditions under which members of disadvantaged groups either dissolve into internecine competition or unite to challenge the status quo, highlighting the role of complex forms of social comparison, identification, contact, and third-party support for collective action. Binary conceptualizations of intergroup relations, we conclude, are the product of specific sociohistorical practices rather than a natural starting point for psychological research.