Charting the Developmental Trajectories of Attention and Executive Function in Chinese School-Aged Children

Attention is a complex domain that has reawakened research interest in recent years. There are relatively few studies that have examined age-related changes across different attention subcomponents, such as selection, maintenance, and control, using large samples covering a wide age range. The present study assessed performance in 466 participants in order to identify the ages at which mature performance was reached across differing attention subcomponents. Furthermore, we investigated whether the nature of the attentional demands or task difficulty predicted the age at which stable levels of performance were reached. The results supported the former rather than the latter alternative.     

Characterization of Children's Decision Making: Sensitivity to Punishment Frequency,Not Task Complexity

On a gambling task that models real-life decision making, children between ages 7 and 12 perform like patients with bilateral lesions of the ventromedial prefrontal cortex (VMPFC), opting for choices that yield high immediate gains in spite of higher future losses (Crone &; Van der Molen, 2004 Crone, E. A. and Van der Molen, M. W. 2004. Developmental changes in decision-making: Performance on a gambling task previously shown to rely on ventromedial prefrontal cortex. Developmental Neuropsychology, 25(3): 251–279. [PUBMED][INFOTRIEVE][CROSSREF][Taylor &; Francis Online], [Web of Science ®] , [Google Scholar]). The current study set out to characterize developmental changes in decision making by varying task complexity and punishment frequency. Three age groups (7–9 years, 10–12 years, 13–15 years) performed two versions of a computerized variant of the original Iowa gambling task. Task complexity was manipulated by varying the number of choices participants could make. Punishment frequency was manipulated by varying the frequency of delayed punishment. Results showed a developmental increase in the sensitivity to future consequences, which was present only when the punishment was presented infrequently. These results could not be explained by differential sensitivity to task complexity, hypersensitivity to reward, or failure to switch response set after receiving punishment. There was a general pattern of boys outperforming girls by making more advantageous choices over the course of the task. In conclusion, 7–12-year-old children—like VMPFC patients—appear myopic about the future except when the potential for future punishment is high.     

The Acquisition and Function of Religious Beliefs: A Review and Synthesis of Proximate and Ultimate Perspectives

ABSTRACT

Two main scientific approaches have renewed in the last decade the scientific study of religion: the cognitive and the adaptationist. The former is focused on proximate causes, the latter is looking for ultimate causes of religious beliefs and behaviours. Both approaches are useful and promising. However, in both cases, various important aspects and contexts associated with the origin, acquisition, and transmission of religious beliefs have been neglected. The present paper offers an approach that conjoins both models after reviewing several critical issues, to highlight a distinction between cognitive conditions and structures, on one side; and developments or applications, on the other. As a result greater attention needs to be paid to religious functions and their cultural framework to better understand religion and to explain some current processes, like massive secularization in several areas.     

A Controlled Pilot-Outcome Study of Sensory Integration (SI) in the Treatment of Complex Adaptation to Traumatic Stress

This study tested whether sensory integration (SI) treatment combined with psychotherapy would improve symptom outcome over psychotherapy alone in the treatment of complex posttraumatic stress, as measured by the Disorders of Extreme Stress Not Otherwise Specified (DESNOS) clinical construct in a group of 10 adult patients with histories of childhood abuse. DESNOS symptoms were assessed at three time periods (T1, baseline; T2, after experimental group SI treatment; and T3, after wait-list control group SI treatment) using the Structured Interview for Disorders of Extreme Stress (SIDES). The Sensory Learning Program? (SLP), developed by the Sensory Learning Institute of Boulder, Colorado, was used as the SI treatment modality. Results indicated significant differential improvement for the group treated with SLP in SIDES Total Score (T1/T2 and T2/T3), Self Perception (T1/T2 and T2/T3), Affect Regulation (T2/T3), and Alterations in Meaning (T1/T2).     

Dissociation of sensory facilitation and decision bias in statistical learning

ABSTRACT

The detection of regularities in the sensory environment, known as statistical learning, is an important brain function that has been observed in many experimental contexts. In these experiments, statistical learning of patterned sensory stimulation leads to improvements in the speed and/or accuracy with which subsequent stimuli are recognized. That is, statistical learning facilitates the transformation of sensory stimuli into motor responses, but the mechanism by which this occurs is unclear. Statistical learning could improve the efficiency of sensory processing, or it could bias responses toward particular outcomes. The distinction is important, as these different hypotheses imply different functions and different neural substrates for statistical learning. Here we address this problem by studying statistical learning as a decision-making process, which allows us to leverage the extensive computational literature on this topic. Specifically we describe a method for applying the Diffusion Decision Model (DDM) to isolate different sensory and cognitive processes associated with decision-making. The results indicate that statistical learning improves performance on a visual learning task in two distinct ways: by altering the efficiency of sensory processing and by introducing biases in the decision-making process. By fitting the parameters of the DDM to data from individual subjects, we find that the prominence of these two factors differed substantially across the population, and that these differences were predictive of individual performance on the psychophysical task. Overall, these results indicate that different cognitive processes can be recruited by statistical learning, and that the DDM is a powerful framework for detecting these influences.     

Exercise type relates to inhibitory and error processing functions in older adults

ABSTRACT

This study investigated the association between exercise type and inhibition of prepotent responses and error detection. Totally, 75 adults (M = 68.88 years) were classified into one of three exercise groups: those who were regular participants in open- or closed-skill forms of exercise, and those who exercised only irregularly. The participants completed a Stroop and task-switching tasks with event-related brain potentials (ERPs) recorded. The results revealed that regular exercisers displayed faster reaction times (RTs) in the Stroop task compared with irregular exercisers. The open-skill exercisers exhibited smaller N200 and larger P300a amplitudes in the Stroop task compared with irregular exercisers. Furthermore, the open-skill exercisers showed a tendency of shorter error-related negativity latencies at the task-witching test. The findings suggest that older adults may gain extra cognitive benefits in areas such as inhibition functioning and error processing from participating in open-skill forms of physical exercises.     

Saccadic eye movements as indicators of cognitive function in older adults

Older adults appear to have greater difficulty ignoring distractions during day-to-day activities than younger adults. To assess these effects of age, the ability of adults aged between 50 and 80 years to ignore distracting stimuli was measured using the antisaccade and oculomotor capture tasks. In the antisaccade task, observers are instructed to look away from a visual cue, whereas in the oculomotor capture task, observers are instructed to look toward a colored singleton in the presence of a concurrent onset distractor. Index scores of the Repeatable Battery for the Assessment of Neuropsychological Status (RBANS) were compared with capture errors, and with prosaccade errors on the antisaccade task. A higher percentage of capture errors were made on the oculomotor capture tasks by the older members of the cohort compared to the younger members. There was a weak relationship between the attention index and capture errors, but the visuospatial/constructional index was the strongest predictor of prosaccade error rate in the antisaccade task. The saccade reaction times (SRTs) of correct initial saccades in the oculomotor capture task were poorly correlated with age, and with the neurospsychological tests, but prosaccade SRTs in both tasks moderately correlated with antisaccade error rate. These results were interpreted in terms of a competitive integration (or race) model. Any variable that reduces the strength of the top-down neural signal to produce a voluntary saccade, or that increases saccade speed, will enhance the likelihood that a reflexive saccade to a stimulus with an abrupt onset will occur.     

Episodic future thinking: Linking neuropsychological performance with episodic detail in young and old adults

Episodic future thinking (EFT) has been linked with our ability to remember past events. However, its specific neurocognitive subprocesses have remained elusive. In Experiment 1, a study of healthy older adults was conducted to investigate the candidate subprocesses of EFT. Participants completed a standard EFT cue word task, two memory measures (Verbal Paired Associates I, Source Memory), and two measures of executive function (Trail Making Test, Tower Test). In Experiment 2, healthy young adults also completed an EFT task and neuropsychological measures. The link between neurocognitive measures and five characteristics of EFT was investigated. Specifically, it was found that Source Memory and Trail Making Test performance predicted the episodic specificity of future events in older but not younger adults. Replicating previous findings, older adults produced future events with greater semantic but fewer episodic details than did young adults. These results extend the data and emphasize the importance of the multiple subprocesses underlying EFT.     

The impact of working memory load on task execution and online plan adjustment during multitasking in a virtual environment

Three experiments investigated the impact of working memory load on online plan adjustment during a test of multitasking in young, nonexpert, adult participants. Multitasking was assessed using the Edinburgh Virtual Errands Test (EVET). Participants were asked to memorize either good or poor plans for performing multiple errands and were assessed both on task completion and on the extent to which they modified their plans during EVET performance. EVET was performed twice, with and without a secondary task loading a component of working memory. In Experiment 1, articulatory suppression was used to load the phonological loop. In Experiment 2, oral random generation was used to load executive functions. In Experiment 3, spatial working memory was loaded with an auditory spatial localization task. EVET performance for both good- and poor-planning groups was disrupted by random generation and sound localization, but not by articulatory suppression. Additionally, people given a poor plan were able to overcome this initial disadvantage by modifying their plans online. It was concluded that, in addition to executive functions, multiple errands performance draws heavily on spatial, but not verbal, working memory resources but can be successfully completed on the basis of modifying plans online, despite a secondary task load.