Cognitive demands of error processing associated with preparation and execution of a motor skill

Maxwell et al. [Maxwell, J. P., Masters, R. S. W., Kerr, E., & Weedon, E. (2001). The implicit benefit of learning without errors. The Quarterly Journal of Experimental Psychology, 54A, 1049–1068. The implicit benefit of learning without errors. The Quarterly Journal of Experimental Psychology, 54A, 1049–1068] suggested that, following unsuccessful movements, the learner forms hypotheses about the probable causes of the error and the required movement adjustments necessary for its elimination. Hypothesis testing is an explicit process that places demands on cognitive resources. Demands on cognitive resources can be identified by measuring probe reaction times (PRT) and movement times. Lengthened PRT and movement times reflects increased cognitive demands. Thus, PRT and movement times should be longer following errors, relative to successful, movements. This hypothesis was tested using a motor skill (golf putting). Furthermore, the association between error processing and the preparation and execution phases of movement was examined. The data confirmed that cognitive demand is greater for trials following an error, relative to trials without an error. This effect was apparent throughout learning and in both the preparatory and execution phases of the movement. Cognitive effort also appeared to be higher during movement preparation, relative to movement execution.     

The experience of receiving scholarship aid and its effect on future giving: a listening guide analysis

Why are there so many people who receive scholarship aid who do not give back to the schools that gave it? Social exchange theories grounded in the assumption of direct reciprocity have long been the framework used within higher education to understand donative behavior. As a result, conventional wisdom within higher education holds that recipients of scholarship aid will later donate money to the institution that provided it. However, the philanthropic data show that most aid recipients do not, in fact, give back. This study probes the underlying factors for this phenomenon by using the Listening Guide, a voice-centered relational method of discovery, to analyze and interpret interviews with 10 scholarship recipients. By providing a more robust understanding of the experience of receiving, the findings challenge some of the most basic psychological and sociological assumptions about giving and generosity within higher education.     

预知任务转换的内源性准备和外源性调节

采用ERP探究在预知条件下任务转换的神经机制。使用“任务转换”实验范式,以汉字（名词/动词）或数字（奇数/偶数）的归类为任务。被试执行任务重复（AA,BB,…）或在两个任务间转换（AB,BA,…）,每个任务序列为连续的两个任务（任务1,任务2）。结果发现,任务1中,在刺激呈现后300ms左右,数、词的转换序列与重复序列出现显著差异;在中央区,320ms左右,任务1中转换序列比重复序列、任务2中转换任务比重复任务都产生一个更为负走向的波。这些结果表明,在预知条件下,简单任务转换的内源性准备可能开始于任务1呈现后300ms左右;内源性准备和外源性调节可能都反映了认知冲突过程,此认知冲突可能是转换代价的主要来源     

TRIADIC INSTRUCTION OF CHAINED FOOD PREPARATION RESPONSES: ACQUISITION AND OBSERVATIONAL LEARNING

This research examined whether constant time delay would be effective in teaching students with moderate mental retardation in triads to perform chained tasks and whether observational learning would occur. Three chained snack preparation tasks were identified, and each student was directly taught one task. The other 2 students observed the instruction. The instructed student told the observers to watch and to turn pages of a pictorial recipe book. The teacher provided frequent praise to the instructed student based on performance and to the observers for watching the instruction and turning pages. A multiple probe design across students and tasks was used to evaluate the instruction. The results indicated that each student learned the skill he or she was taught directly, and the observers learned nearly all of the steps of the chains they observed. The implications for classroom instruction and future research in observational learning are discussed.     

Dispositional inference from effects of actions: Effects chosen and effects forgone

One hundred and forty-six subjects made comparative judgments as to which of two hypothetical actors they were most confident possessed a choice-related trait, and which was most extreme on that trait dimension. Each actor was portrayed as making a choice from a set of actions; the choice sets varied independently in the number of effects eliminated by the choice and in the number of effects remaining after choice. Results confirmed Jones and Davis' (1965) hypothesis that correspondence would be inversely related to the number of effects remaining after choice. In addition, correspondence was directly related to number of effects eliminated by the choice when effects remaining did not differ. When given both sources of information, subjects preferred to use information from effects remaining.     

Police and prosecution systems: An evaluation of a police criminal case preparation program

Program evaluation can provide objective information relevant to decisions on program maintenance. A program to address problems in the preparation of criminal investigation reports in a metropolitan police department was evaluated. The program permanently altered environmental conditions under which reports were prepared to facilitate performance. Police officers, who had previously prepared reports without assistance, visited the Case Preparation Room to prepare reports with assistance from office personnel. Compared to reports prepared without assistance, reports prepared in the Case Preparation Room documented more case elements required by the state legal code for criminal prosecution, were completed in fewer days following arrests, and received higher ratings from Assistant District Attorneys. Operation of a permanent program available to approximately 945 officers proved a practical solution to improving the preparation of criminal investigation reports.     

The Role of Teachers' Social-Emotional Competence in Their Beliefs About Peer Victimization

One hundred fifty preservice teachers and 25 in-service teachers were surveyed to examine whether mental representations of relationships, confidence about managing bullying, empathy toward victims, and emotional expressiveness were associated with their peer victimization-related beliefs. Teachers' confidence about managing bullying was positively associated with their prosocial peer beliefs. In addition, the belief that the distress that children experience as a result of being victimized should be dismissed was negatively related to teachers' positive representations. Teachers' reports of positive emotional expressiveness were negatively related to normative, assertive, avoidance, and dismissive victimization-related beliefs and positively related to prosocial peer beliefs. In contrast, teachers' reports of negative emotional expressiveness were negatively related to prosocial peer beliefs and avoidance victimization-related beliefs. In-service teachers reported slightly higher positive expressiveness than preservice teachers did. Minority teachers reported higher scores for positive expressiveness, empathy, and lower negative classroom expressiveness than nonminority teachers did. Implications of these findings for practice are discussed.     

Families left behind at the source of migration: implications for career guidance practitioners

Issues surrounding migration are receiving unprecedented attention at the global, regional, as well as national levels. However, a review of the literature shows that there is more focus on international migration compared to internal migration. Further, there is more emphasis on issues related to the migration destination rather than those at the source of migration. Using the cultural preparation process model as a framework, this paper aims to understand the career and livelihood planning needs of those who are left behind. The left-behind families of pine resin tappers in the Changar region of the Indian Himalayas are presented as a case study to draw the attention of career guidance and counselling professionals to this unattended population.     

Premarital Counseling

Abstract

A number of different approaches to premarital counseling have been developed to better prepare couples for marriage. A variety of these of approaches will be described here, including those used in churchsettings, where the majority of premarital counseling is performed. A brief summary of the premarital counseling research will also be presented, including what research suggests are important ingredients to designing effective premarital counseling approaches.     

Muscular Fatigue and the Learning and Performance of a Motor Control Task

Four groups of 12 female college students performed a pursuit-rotor task during learning under one of four conditions of exercising the muscles of the limb used in the task: (a) no muscular exercise, (b) low-fatiguing, (c) medium-fatiguing, and (d) high-fatiguing muscular exercise. All four groups were tested 48 hr later on the same pursuit-rotor task with no exercise interpolated between the ten 20-sec trials. Differences in the performances among the four groups were not statistically significant on either the first or the second day alone or when the data of the two days were combined. The data appear to support the hypothesis of an inverted-U or inverted-J model relating performance (and learning) to muscular fatigue in motor-control tasks.