Reading the situation: The relationship between dyslexia and situational awareness for road sign information

Road signs are tools that provide crucial information to drivers about various roadway situations. Therefore, the present study aimed to assess the levels of ‘situation awareness’ held by drivers in relation to these signs. This study also assessed the relationship between dyslexia, road sign comprehension, and road sign situation awareness, thus building on the limited research in this area. Drivers completed measures of road sign comprehension and dyslexia. Drivers then completed three drives on a driving simulator; each followed by a probe containing queries about the perception, comprehension and projection of road signs seen in the preceding drive. Situation awareness was lowest at the level of projection. Further, dyslexia was negatively associated with road sign comprehension, and road sign situation awareness, suggesting that the disorder may be detrimental for multiple forms of road sign processing. Implications are provided in the form of a ‘SAFE’ driver training program that targets a holistic form of road sign processing which takes into account sign meanings in relation to both in-vehicle and outer-vehicle factors; thus encouraging proactive driver behaviour.     

Response to Stuart Kauffman: The Cosmic Mind and NIODA

Non-locality, indeterminacy, the meaning of the Schrödinger equation, and quantum measurements are interpretation issues in quantum mechanics that go beyond our typical view of the world through the classical physics lenses of the mechanistic determinism. In “Cosmic Mind?,” Stuart Kauffman offers an interpretation of the Schrödinger equation and quantum measurements that might support a cosmic mind. Robert John Russell in NIODA uses the indeterminacy to offer a mechanism for God to interact with nature. This response reviews these two interpretations of quantum mechanics with respect to the two-slit and EPR experiments and how these two interpretations of quantum mechanics could solve issues of interpretations.     

The Development and Testing of a New Version of the Cognitive Reflection Test Applying Item Response Theory (IRT)

The cognitive reflection test (CRT) is a short measure of a person's ability to resist intuitive response tendencies and to produce a normatively correct response, which is based on effortful reasoning. Although the CRT is a very popular measure, its psychometric properties have not been extensively investigated. A major limitation of the CRT is the difficulty of the items, which can lead to floor effects in populations other than highly educated adults. The present study aimed at investigating the psychometric properties of the CRT applying item response theory analyses (a two‐parameter logistic model) and at developing a new version of the scale (the CRT‐long), which is appropriate for participants with both lower and higher levels of cognitive reflection. The results demonstrated the good psychometric properties of the original, as well as the new scale. The validity of the new scale was also assessed by measuring correlations with various indicators of intelligence, numeracy, reasoning and decision‐making skills, and thinking dispositions. Moreover, we present evidence for the suitability of the new scale to be used with developmental samples. Finally, by comparing the performance of adolescents and young adults on the CRT and CRT‐long, we report the first investigation into the development of cognitive reflection. Copyright © 2015 John Wiley & Sons, Ltd.     

Probabilistic Inferences Under Emotional Stress: How Arousal Affects Decision Processes

Many models of decision making neglect emotional states that could affect individuals' cognitive processes. The present work explores the effect of emotional stress on people's cognitive processes when making probabilistic inferences. Two contrasting hypotheses are tested against one another: the uncertainty‐reduction and attention‐narrowing hypotheses of how emotional stress affects decision making. In the experimental study, emotional stress was induced through the use of highly aversive pictures immediately before each decision. Emotional state was assessed by both subjective (state anxiety, arousal, and pleasantness ratings) and objective (skin conductance) measures. The results show that emotional stress impacts decision making; in particular, emotionally aroused participants seem to have focused on the most important information and selected simpler decision strategies relative to participants in a control condition. The results are in line with the attention‐narrowing hypothesis and suggest that emotional stress can impact decision making through limited predecisional information search and the selection of simpler decision strategies. Copyright © 2015 John Wiley & Sons, Ltd.     

Eye‐tracking Social Preferences

We hypothesize that if people are motivated by a particular social preference, then choosing in accordance with this preference will lead to an identifiable pattern of eye movements. We track eye movements while subjects make choices in simple three‐person distribution experiments. We characterize each choice in terms of three different types of social preferences: efficiency, maxi‐min, and envy. For the characterization, we use either the choice data or the eye movement data. The evidence indicates that distributional choices are broadly consistent with the choice rule implied by eye movements. In other words, what subjects appear to be interested in when you look at their choices corresponds to what they appear to be interested in when you look at their eye movements. This correspondence lends credibility to the behavioral relevance of social preferences models. Copyright © 2015 John Wiley & Sons, Ltd.     

情景知觉中的信息界定:从主观预期到“惊奇”算法

情景信息加工是情景知觉研究领域内的核心问题。然而,不同的研究者对"情景信息"的界定并不相同。在过去80多年的时间里对情景信息的界定先后经历了研究者主观确定、观察者评估、基于情景物理特征的计算模拟等方法。Itti和Baldi等人通过比较先验概率和后验概率之间的差异,提出了"惊奇"理论。文章介绍了真实情景知觉研究中"惊奇"理论的应用及进展,并指出"惊奇"算法的拓展及界定、情景知觉过程中的注意转换与"惊奇"的关系,以及社会情景知觉中的"惊奇"应用可能是未来相关领域需要进一步探索的问题。     

西汉孟喜改列卦序中的哲学思想

孟喜为西汉象数易的创建人,其易学后人称之为“卦气”。卦气乃结合“学”与“术”成一结构庞大的思想体系。就学而言,乃承受先秦伏、文、孔三圣的易学精神;就术而言,乃用于当时流行的占断灾异、吉凶及祸福。然而后世易学界受儒学重经思想的影响,多轻视象数,以“术家”视孟喜。作者兹特提出孟氏卦气中对于六十四卦卦序之排列。并详作象敷之解析,以见孟氏易学实具有学术思想之价值。     

结构因素对阅读保持影响的研究

本研究探讨文章阅读过程中结构因素对文章信息保持的影响作用。包括两个实验。实验 1探讨阅读文章结构是否清晰及主体对文章结构是否有清晰的把握对文章信息保持的影响效果。结果表明 ,阅读的文章结构越清晰 ,主体对文章结构把握能力越强 ,越能促进文章的信息保持。实验 2进一步探讨文章的结构清晰及主体对文章结构的清晰把握促进的是何种信息的保持。结果证明 ,结构清晰与否促进的是文章的主要信息的保持 ,而对文章的细节性信息促进作用不大。本研究结果表明 ,文章的结构因素对阅读保持有促进作用 ,主要是促进文章的主要信息的保持。     

Anxiety and Threat Perception Abnormalities in Normal Children

The current study examined the relationship between childhood anxiety and threat perception abnormalities. Children (N = 105) were exposed to stories reflecting three types of anxiety: social anxiety, separation anxiety, and generalized anxiety. From children's reactions to the stories, a number of threat perception indices were derived. Children's level of anxiety was assessed by means of questionnaires and a structured diagnostic interview. Results indicated that high levels of anxiety, as measured by questionnaires and interview, were accompanied by a high frequency of threat perception, high ratings of threat, a high frequency of threatening interpretations, high levels of negative feelings and cognitions, and an early detection of threat. Furthermore, results seemed to suggest that threat perception abnormalities were mediated by children's general level of anxiety rather than by levels of specific anxiety symptoms.     

The Failure to Use Gender Information in Parsing: A Comment on van Berkum, Brown, and Hagoort (1999)

We critically review the empirical evidence published by van Berkum, Brown, and Hagoort (1999a, b) against syntax-first models of sentence parsing. According to van Berkum et al., discourse factors and word gender information are used instantaneously to guide the parser. First, we note that the density of the experimental trials (relative to fillers) and the slow presentation rate of the van Berkum et al. design seem likely to have elicited the use of tactics involving rapid reanalysis of the material. Second, we present new data from a questionnaire study showing that the grammatical gender information of a relative pronoun in Dutch is often completely ignored, even during the wrap-up phase at the end of the sentence.