The effects of thematic relations on picture naming abilities across the lifespan

A picture–word interference paradigm tracked patterns of activation during picture naming in 87 individuals (age range 17–80 years old). Distractor words were presented at stimulus onset asynchronies (SOAs) of ?200, ?100, and 0 ms bearing a has a-, location, or no relationship to the picture. Analyses of group naming reaction times revealed significant facilitation effects for both semantic relation types for all age groups. Analyses of temporal patterns of activation revealed significant effects primarily at SOAs of ?200 and ?100 ms. These findings provide evidence that both thematic relations are particularly salient in how semantic knowledge is organized, and that the patterns of effects from these semantic relations remain the same as one ages.     

If merely more words,what is the point? A critical response

A critical response is given to the five articles constituting the special issue theme ‘Critical psychotherapy and counselling: if not now, when?’ The related arguments concerning political justice, professional struggles, new public management, therapeutic language use and ecotherapy are considered concisely and challenges made. Into this discussion is injected a degree of ‘brutalist objection’, along with a recommendation for radical honesty, a confession of depressive realism and hints of nihilism. Psychotherapy, whether traditional or critical, is taken to task for its romantic enmeshment in a hubristic fantasy of infinite relevance and improvement.     

Culture,context and society – The underexplored potential of critical realism as a philosophical framework for theory and practice

This article explains how the meta‐theoretical framework of critical realism addresses methodological issues of concern to social psychologists and social scientists. The article outlines key tenets of critical realism – its notion of the stratified nature of reality and generative mechanisms as powers in natural and social objects that cause things; its notion of knowledge of reality as stratified rather than only empirical; its acceptance of epistemological but not judgmental relativism; and its monist ontology. The article then introduces realist social theory to provide a framework for understanding the society–person connection. It explains how issues relating to culture, context, and society raised in the indigenous psychology English literature might be addressed from a critical realist perspective. Some implications arising from adopting a critical realist perspective in research practice are outlined and social psychologists and social scientists are encouraged to explore the potential of critical realism as a meta‐theoretical framework and new paradigm.     

THE INTERPLAY OF DEDUCTIVE AND INDUCTIVE REASONING IN PSYCHOANALYTIC THEORIZING

Deductive and inductive reasoning both played an essential part in Freud's construction of psychoanalysis. In this paper, the author explores the happy marriage of empiricism and rationalism in Freud's use of deductive reasoning in the construction of psychoanalytic theory. To do this, the author considers three major amendments Freud made to his theory: (i) infant and childhood sexuality, (ii) the structural theory, and (iii) the theory of signal anxiety. Ultimately, the author argues for, and presents Freud as a proponent of, the epistemological position that he calls critical realism.     

A cross‐cultural comparison of verbal learning and memory functions in reading disabled American and Norwegian adolescents

The present study reports the results of a cross‐cultural analysis of the role of phonetic and semantic cues in verbal learning and memory. A newly developed memory test procedure, the Bergen‐Tucson Verbal Learning Test (BTVLT), expands earlier test procedures as phonetic cues are applied in addition to semantic cues in a cued recall procedure. Samples of reading disabled and typically developed adolescents from the US and from Norway were recruited as voluntary participants. The results indicate that the stimulus materials chosen for the memory test are working well in both American and in Norwegian samples, yielding acquisition results comparable to similar list learning procedures, and also yielding high internal consistency across learning trials. The procedure also reliably differentiates between reading disabled samples in both languages, and also yields cross‐cultural differences that seem to reflect differences in transparency and differences in the orthography of the included languages. The BTVLT with its focus on phonetic coding is a promising supplement to established tests of verbal memory for assessment of reading and language impaired individuals.     

The effects of bilingual language proficiency on recall accuracy and semantic clustering in free recall output: evidence for shared semantic associations across languages

Two experiments investigated how well bilinguals utilise long-standing semantic associations to encode and retrieve semantic clusters in verbal episodic memory. In Experiment 1, Spanish-English bilinguals (N?=?128) studied and recalled word and picture sets. Word recall was equivalent in L1 and L2, picture recall was better in L1 than in L2, and the picture superiority effect was stronger in L1 than in L2. Semantic clustering in word and picture recall was equivalent in L1 and L2. In Experiment 2, Spanish-English bilinguals (N?=?128) and English-speaking monolinguals (N?=?128) studied and recalled word sequences that contained semantically related pairs. Data were analyzed using a multinomial processing tree approach, the pair-clustering model. Cluster formation was more likely for semantically organised than for randomly ordered word sequences. Probabilities of cluster formation, cluster retrieval, and retrieval of unclustered items did not differ across languages or language groups. Language proficiency has little if any impact on the utilisation of long-standing semantic associations, which are language-general.     

Misrecollection prevents older adults from benefitting from semantic relatedness of the memoranda in associative memory

Memory for episodic associations declines in aging, ostensibly due to decreased recollection abilities. Accordingly, associative unitization - the encoding of associated items as one integrated entity - may potentially attenuate age-related associative deficits by enabling familiarity-based retrieval, which is relatively preserved in aging. To test this hypothesis, we induced bottom-up unitization by manipulating semantic relatedness between memoranda. Twenty-four young and 24 older adults studied pairs of object pictures that were either semantically related or unrelated. Participants subsequently discriminated between intact, recombined and new pairs. We found that semantic relatedness increased the contributions of both familiarity and recollection in young adults, but did not improve older adults' performance. Instead, they showed associative deficits, driven by increased recollection-based false recognition. This may reflect a “misrecollection” phenomenon, in which older adults make more false alarms to recombined pairs with particularly high confidence, due to poorer retrieval monitoring regarding semantically-related associative probes.     

Tool use in neurodegenerative diseases: Planning or technical reasoning?

Recent works showed that tool use can be impaired in stroke patients because of either planning or technical reasoning deficits, but these two hypotheses have not yet been compared in the field of neurodegenerative diseases. The aim of this study was to address the relationships between real tool use, mechanical problem‐solving, and planning skills in patients with Alzheimer's disease (AD, n = 32), semantic dementia (SD, n = 16), and corticobasal syndrome (CBS, n = 9). Patients were asked to select and use ten common tools, to solve three mechanical problems, and to complete the Tower of London test. Motor function and episodic memory were controlled using the Purdue Pegboard Test and the BEC96 questionnaire, respectively. A data‐transformation method was applied to avoid ceiling effects, and single‐case analysis was performed based on raw scores and completion time. All groups demonstrated either impaired or slowed tool use. Planning deficits were found only in the AD group. Mechanical problem‐solving deficits were observed only in the AD and CBS groups. Performance in the Tower of London test was the best predictor of tool use skills in the AD group, suggesting these patients had general rather than mechanical problem‐solving deficits. Episodic memory seemed to play little role in performance. Motor dysfunction tended to be associated with tool use skills in CBS patients, while tool use disorders are interpreted as a consequence of the semantic loss in SD in line with previous works. These findings may encourage caregivers to set up disease‐centred interventions.     

EVOLUTION,CONTINGENCY, AND CHRISTOLOGY

Christopher Southgate has made important contributions to theodicy and the theory of divine action in light of the contingency in evolution and the suffering of creation. What happens then when one thinks through the implications of contingency for Christology? One can admit that aesthetic and moral judgments are products of a contingent history and yet affirm that they really are valid. Similarly, we argue, one can acknowledge the contingency of Jesus’ existence, actions, and subsequent impact and still maintain that his will was uniquely united with the divine will. Following a critical engagement with the recent work of Keith Ward, we argue that a high Christology is compatible with the actual contingencies of evolutionary and social history, without the necessity of interventionist divine action.     

图词间隔时间影响口语词汇产生中语义效应的机制：图词干扰范式研究

口语词汇产生过程中存在语义抑制和语义促进效应, 可能发生在概念准备和词汇选择或者后词汇水平阶段。本研究采用图画-词汇干扰实验任务, 变化图画与词汇出现点之间的时间间隔(stimulus onset asynchrony, SOA), 运用脑电技术考察口语词汇产生中语义效应发生的时间进程。结果显示, 当SOA为0 ms时表现出语义抑制效应, 语义效应发生在词汇选择阶段(344~418 ms); 当SOA为-400 ms时, 语义效应发生在概念准备阶段(0~76 ms)和词汇选择阶段(274~390 ms); 460~594 ms时间窗口内的语义效应可能表明讲话者对语义信息的自我监测。词汇产生中存在语义促进效应和抑制效应的权衡, 影响了行为结果中语义效应的方向, 上述发现支持了口语词汇产生的词汇竞争假说。