A novel indirect method for capturing involuntary musical imagery under varying cognitive load

Involuntary musical imagery (INMI), i.e the internal experience of a repetitive musical fragment, is one of the most ubiquitous forms of spontaneous cognition. Findings regarding the relationship between INMI and cognitive load are conflicting. In the present study, 200 participants watched and evaluated two non-dialogue, music-only film trailers. Subsequently, they either closed their eyes for 5 min (baseline), or engaged in one of three dot tasks of varying challenge and attentional demand (low, medium, and high cognitive load). Finally, they completed a novel “Mind Activity Questionnaire”, which allows for indirect INMI sampling rather than direct questioning. The same questionnaire was completed 24 hours later. Overall, a significant negative linear trend was found. At baseline, 65% of people reported experiencing INMI. This rate decreased to 32.5% in the low load condition with further reductions observed in the medium and high conditions, which did not differ significantly from each other. INMI frequency and duration followed the same pattern as the induction rates. In the 24-hour follow-up, 21% of participants reported INMI experiences. This study supports the hypothesis that INMI occurrence, frequency, and duration relate to spare cognitive capacity and demonstrates an ecologically valid laboratory paradigm for covertly inducing and documenting INMI experiences.     

Motor expertise and performance in spatial tasks: A meta-analysis

The present study aimed to provide a summary of findings relevant to the influence of motor expertise on performance in spatial tasks and to examine potential moderators of this effect. Studies of relevance were those in which individuals involved in activities presumed to require motor expertise were compared to non-experts in such activities. A final set of 62 effect sizes from 33 samples was included in a multilevel meta-analysis. The results showed an overall advantage in favor of motor experts in spatial tasks (d = 0.38). However, the magnitude of that effect was moderated by expert type (athlete, open skills/ball sports, runner/cyclist, gymnast/dancers, musicians), stimulus type (2D, blocks, bodies, others), test category (mental rotation, spatial perception, spatial visualization), specific test (Mental Rotations Test, generic mental rotation, disembedding, rod-and-frame test, other), and publication status. These findings are discussed in the context of embodied cognition and the potential role of activities requiring motor expertise in promoting good spatial performance.     

Do we reflect while performing skillful actions? Automaticity,control, and the perils of distraction

From our everyday commuting to the gold medalist’s world-class performance, skillful actions are characterized by fine-grained, online agentive control. What is the proper explanation of such control? There are two traditional candidates: intellectualism explains skillful agentive control by reference to the agent’s propositional mental states; anti-intellectualism holds that propositional mental states or reflective processes are unnecessary since skillful action is fully accounted for by automatic coping processes. I examine the evidence for three psychological phenomena recently held to support anti-intellectualism (choking under pressure, expertise-induced amnesia, and expert confabulation) and argue that it supports neither traditional candidate, but an intermediate attention-control account, according to which the top-down, intention-directed control of attention is a necessary component of skillful action. Only this account recognizes both the role of automatic control in skilled action and the need for higher-order cognition to thread automatic processes together into a unified, skillful performance. This applies to bodily skillful action in general, from the world-class performance of experts to mundane, habitual action. The attention-control account stresses that, for intentions to play their role as top-down modulators of attention, agents must sustain the intention’s activation; hence, the need for reflecting throughout performance.     

认知负荷视角下的知识反转效应

知识反转效应研究始于20世纪90年代中期, 在认知负荷的框架下对学习者先备知识与教学方法有效性之间的交互作用进行研究, 其研究范式起源于能力倾向与教学处置交互作用模型。认知负荷理论认为知识反转效应的产生是由于高先备知识者接受冗余教学而产生了额外的认知负荷, 动机理论却认为, 高先备知识者由于冗余的认知加工而产生的负荷可能是一种动机资源负荷。在优化外在认知负荷与相关认知负荷的教学设计中发现了大量知识反转效应的实验证据, 其教学的启示意义在于需要随着学习者领域知识的不断变化适宜性地调整教学方法。未来需要在完善研究方法、拓展研究领域的基础上, 整合研究成果以建立效应发生与发展的理论模型。     

创造力与能力、专长及胜任力关系评述

创造力的实质及其培养问题,一直处于心理学家研究的视野当中。本文试图对创造力与能力、专长及胜任力等相关概念的关系作以简要评述,以期获得对创造力更深刻的理解。     

Effects of general-case training, instructions, rehearsal, and feedback on the reduction of sight-reading errors by competent musicians

We used general-case training, instructions, rehearsal, and feedback to teach 3 advanced flute students to improve their sight-reading skills. Training resulted in systematic decreases in note errors, rhythm errors, repetitions, and hesitations for each participant. The procedures and outcomes were socially validated through subjective evaluation by the participants and music teachers not involved with the study.     

The effect of expertise on the relation between implicit and explicit attitude measures: An information availability/accessibility perspective

Three experiments investigate expertise as a moderator of the relationship between implicit and explicit attitude measures. Prior research suggests that greater expertise leads to stronger implicit–explicit relations; however, a cognitive view of expertise can also predict a weaker implicit–explicit relation. Our framework helps to resolve that seeming contradiction on the basis of the availability/accessibility of attributes versus attitudes in explicit attitude measures. We show that object specificity and contextual factors (e.g., instructions and prior evaluations in a survey) differentially affect the availability/accessibility of global attitudes and attribute information for novices versus experts, thus determining how expertise moderates the implicit–explicit relation.     

面孔识别异族效应的研究

异族效应是面孔识别过程中一种非常稳定的现象,表现为对本族面孔的识别与再认成绩显著高于异族面孔.脑成像研究也证实了这两类面孔在神经表征上的差异.关于该效应主要有知觉经验说与社会分类说两种理论解释,但围绕着其心理机制仍然存在着很多争议然,未来的研究需要考虑族群认同等社会-人格因素对于异族效应的影响,并注意考察本族面孔与异族面孔有提取阶段可能存在的神经活动的差异.