Vocabulary and automatic attention: The relation between novel words and gaze dynamics in noun generalization

Words direct visual attention in infants, children, and adults, presumably by activating representations of referents that then direct attention to matching stimuli in the visual scene. Novel, unknown, words have also been shown to direct attention, likely via the activation of more general representations of naming events. To examine the critical issue of how novel words and visual attention interact to support word learning we coded frame-by-frame the gaze of 17- to 31-month-old children (n = 66, 38 females) while generalizing novel nouns. We replicate prior findings of more attention to shape when generalizing novel nouns, and a relation to vocabulary development. However, we also find that following a naming event, children who produce fewer nouns take longer to look at the objects they eventually select and make more transitions between objects before making a generalization decision. Children who produce more nouns look to the objects they eventually select more quickly following the naming event and make fewer looking transitions. We discuss these findings in the context of prior proposals regarding children's few-shot category learning, and a developmental cascade of multiple perceptual, cognitive, and word-learning processes that may operate in cases of both typical development and language delay.

Research Highlights

• Examined how novel words guide visual attention by coding frame-by-frame where children look when asked to generalize novel names.
• Gaze patterns differed with vocabulary size: children with smaller vocabularies attended to generalization targets more slowly and did more comparison than those with larger vocabularies.
• Demonstrates a relationship between vocabulary size and attention to object properties during naming.
• This work has implications for looking-based tests of early cognition, and our understanding of children's few-shot category learning.

     

Representante-representativo,représentant-représentation,ideational representative: Which one is a Freudian concept? On the translation of Vorstellungsrepräsentanz in Spanish,French and English1

The Freudian expression Vorstellungsrepräsentanz ( Freud, 1915b, 1915c ), which is rendered in the Standard Edition as ideational representative, is commonly translated in Spanish as representante-representativo and in French as représentant-représentation, among other renderings. An interdisciplinary conceptual inquiry, which applies linguistic semantics to the evaluation of the available Spanish and French renderings, concludes that this compound expression should be translated in these languages as representante ideativo and représentant idéatif, respectively, renderings which happen to correspond to Strachey’s translation into English in the SE. In contrast to most Spanish and French translations, this proposal conforms to the semantic principle of compositionality. On the one hand, it provides a suitable translation of the two parts of the compound. Thus it renders Vorstellung as idea, with the classical meaning of image or mental representation, which can be traced back to Hume’s empiricist philosophy, and it renders Repräsentanz as representative, with the meaning of delegate. On the other hand, its linguistic form preserves the attributive meaning relationship which exists between both concepts in the original German expression. Against the background of these semantic considerations, a theoretical question concerning Freudian metapsychology is discussed: the drive has a psychic representative, but is there a (mental) representation of the drive?     

双任务协调、任务呈现方式影响成人算术策略执行:估算证据

前人研究显示中央执行影响算术策略的执行。双任务协调作为中央执行的执行功能之一,是否会影响个体的策略执行?采用选择\无选法与改进的心理不应期范式,探讨随机/固定呈现方式下,双任务协调对算术策略执行的影响。结果表明:双任务协调影响策略执行,双反应策略执行效能显著差于单反应;任务呈现方式影响策略执行,固定方式优于随机方式;任务呈现序列影响策略执行反应时,数字先呈现的估算策略执行效能显著差于图形先呈现。总之,双任务协调、任务呈现方式影响算术策略执行,固定方式引起更明显的双任务协调代价。     

Assessing competencies of trainee sport psychologists: An examination of the ‘structured case presentation’ assessment method

ObjectivesThere is virtually no literature on how to assess competencies of applied sport psychologists. We assessed casework of applied sport psychology students and compared written case report assessment (WCRA) with structured case presentation assessment (SCPA) on reliability and acceptability (e.g., validity, transparency, feedback function and preference of methods, as perceived by students and assessors).DesignA quantitative, comparative study of two assessment methods.MethodParticipants were 11 students, nine supervisors and three exam committee members. A number of 18 cases were evaluated with both WCRA by the supervisor and SCPA by two exam committee members. Ten of these cases were also evaluated with WCRA by exam committee members. Interrater reliability measures were calculated and compared for the different assessment methods. Participants' perception of the validity, transparency, and feedback function of the methods, and the preferences for assessment methods were surveyed with a brief questionnaire.ResultsSCPA by the exam committee resulted in higher interrater reliability than WCRA by supervisor and exam committee. The feedback function of SCPA seemed superior to WCRA by either supervisor or exam committee. For assessment by the exam committee, the perceived validity and transparency of SCPA seemed higher than of WCRA. Students and exam committee had the highest preference for SCPA by supervisor and exam committee.ConclusionsOverall it can be concluded that, for assessment by the exam committee, structured case presentations provided a more reliable and acceptable method of assessment than written case reports only.     

Opportunities for learning and social interaction in infant sitting: Effects of sitting support,sitting skill,and gross motor delay

The development of independent sitting changes everyday opportunities for learning and has cascading effects on cognitive and language development. Prior to independent sitting, infants experience the sitting position with physical support from caregivers. Why does supported sitting not provide the same input for learning that is experienced in independent sitting? This question is especially relevant for infants with gross motor delay, who require support in sitting for many months after typically developing infants sit independently. We observed infants with typical development (n = 34, ages 4–7 months) and infants with gross motor delay (n = 128, ages 7–16 months) in early stages of sitting development, and their caregivers, in a dyadic play observation. We predicted that infants who required caregiver support for sitting would spend more time facing away from the caregiver and less time contacting objects than infants who could sit independently. We also predicted that caregivers of supported sitters would spend less time contacting objects because their hands would be full supporting their infants. Our first two hypotheses were confirmed; however, caregivers spent surprisingly little time using both hands to provide support, and caregivers of supported sitters spent more time contacting objects than caregivers of independent sitters. Similar patterns were seen in the group of typically developing infants and the infants with motor delay. Our findings suggest that independent sitting and supported sitting provide qualitatively distinct experiences with different implications for social interaction and learning opportunities.

Highlights

• During seated free play, supported sitters spent more time facing away from their caregivers and less time handling objects than independent sitters.
• Caregivers who spent more time supporting infants with both hands spent less time handling objects; however, caregivers mostly supported infants with one or no hands.
• A continuous measure of sitting skill did not uniquely contribute to these behaviors beyond the effect of binary sitting support (supported vs. independent sitter).
• The pattern of results was similar for typically developing infants and infants with gross motor delay, despite differences in age.