The effects of different intensity levels of background noise on dichotic listening to consonant-vowel syllables

It has previously been shown that the right ear advantage in dichotic listening to consonant-vowel syllables is affected if a background noise is presented at the same time as the dichotic stimuli. What is not known is, however, if there is also an effect of varying the intensity level of the background noise. We therefore presented conversation or traffic noise background noise simultaneously with the dichotic syllable stimuli to healthy adult subjects. The intensity of the background noises varied between 50-65 dB in steps of 5 dB. The results showed that the right ear correct reports decreased, while left ear correct reports increased as a consequence of increasing background noise intensity. The effects were also stronger for the right ear, and for the traffic background noise condition, particularly at the two highest intensity levels. The results are discussed in terms of alertness and attentional mechanisms.     

Desert,Harm Reduction,and Moral Education: The Case for a Tortfeasor Penalty

Those found liable for negligently injuring others are required to compensate them, but current practices permit most tort feasors to spread the costs of their liability burdens through the purchase of insurance. Those found guilty of criminal offences, however, are not allowed to shift the burdens of their sentences onto others. Yet the reasons for not allowing criminal offenders to shift such burdens – harm reduction, retribution, and moral education – also appear to retain some force in relation to negligent tort feasors. Arguments for and against limiting the abilities of negligent tort feasors to spread such costs, thus imposing a penalty on them, are discussed. The conclusion reached is that further consideration of such a penalty is warranted. This revised version was published online in August 2006 with corrections to the Cover Date.     

我国非瓣膜病房颤抗凝的现状与思考

心房纤颤增加缺血性脑中风4倍～5倍,抗凝治疗可减少60％的缺血性脑中风,但是同时会增加出血的风险,尤其是脑出血。我国是脑中风,特别是出血性脑中风的高发国家,所以对于房颤抗凝的临床决策往往偏保守,造成我国房颤患者抗凝比例很低。本文就如何在我国房颤患者中进行抗凝提出意见。     

When vaccinating against information reduction works and when it does not work

Practice not only affects how information is processed, but also which information is processed. The Information-Reduction Hypothesis (i.e. Haider & Frensch, 1996) holds that — with practice — irrelevant task information (i.e. information that is not logically needed to correctly perform the task) is discarded from processing. Recently, Gaschler and Frensch (2007) have demonstrated that Information Reduction is not affected by the frequency with which individual task configurations are presented: well-practiced and little-practiced irrelevant task configurations are discarded at the same point in time during practice; Information Reduction is thus an item-general phenomenon. These findings suggest that Information Reduction is at least in part a consequence of top-down, voluntary control. In the present research, we ask how tasks can be constructed such that Information Reduction is avoided. Our results show that item-general Information Reduction is observed even when it leads to severe processing costs (i.e. errors). On the whole, the present results are in line with models of skill acquisition incorporating top-down modulation (e.g. Haider & Frensch, 2002) and are incompatible with purely data-driven accounts of skill acquisition (e.g. Logan, 1988; Nosofski & Palmeri, 1997; Palmeri, 1997; Rickard, 2004).     

Some fear-potentiating effects of fluprazine hydrochloride in mice

The fear-potentiating effects of fluprazine hydrochloride were explored in a series of five experiments. The drug was found to strongly inhibit entry into a novel open field, exploration of a complex maze, or approach to a novel object placed in the animal's home cage. Time sampling techniques were used to assess drug effects on frequencies of immobility, activity, and grooming and rearing responses prior to and for 70 min after footshock. There were no group differences during the 10 min immediately following shock but the groups diverged steadily in immobility, activity, and grooming for the remainder of the observations. Post-shock activity and grooming responses increased steadily towards baseline values among control mice but remained at low levels or declined among drug-treated mice. Immobility responses declined steadily among control mice but increased substantially among the fluprazine-treated mice throughout post-shock observations. Pairs of male mice treated with fluprazine were also found to maintain greater intermouse distances in a novel linear runway than pairs of undrugged adult males, juvenile males, or male-female pairs. It is suggested that fluprazine hydrochloride both potentiates fear and alters its time course in addition to interfering in some way with normal olfactory processes.     

Withdrawal,matching, withdrawal-matching,and variable-matching strategies in reducing attack-instigated aggression

Several studies have investigated strategies that a participant in dyadic aggression may use to reduce the aggression of the other participant. In one set of these studies the subject is instigated to aggression by an opponent who sets maximum shocks for the subject to receive during the first block of six trials. Following attack-instigation, opponents shift to withdrawal and matching strategies for 18 trials. The withdrawal strategy is an abrupt shift to the lowest levels of shock possible. The matching strategy is the exact matching by an opponent of the shock set by the subject on the previous trial. With these procedures the withdrawal strategy has been the most effective method to reduce aggression. These results led to the suggestion that the effectiveness of the withdrawal strategy may be due to immediate, unambiguous communication by the opponent of his willingness to reduce attack. This hypothesis was tested in the present study by creating a matching condition modified to include immediate, unambiguous communication of willingness to reduce attack. In this withdrawal-matching condition the opponent followed attack with two trials of the lowest levels of shock before shifting to a matching strategy. Although the withdrawal-matching strategy did not lead to shock settings that were significantly lower than the matching strategy, there was evidence that subjects interacting with withdrawal-matching opponents did reduce their shock settings from block 1 to block 4 more rapidly than subjects interacting with matching opponents. A variable matching strategy was also used to provide a more realistic analogy of matching in the mundane world. While subjects with variable-matching opponents also did not set shock levels during blocks 2, 3, and 4 that were significantly lower than the matching strategy, there was evidence that subjects in this condition reduced their shock levels more rapidly than subjects with matching opponents. Although the effects were not as strong as expected, the results do provide some support for the interpretation that the effectiveness of the withdrawal strategy may be due to unambiguous communication of willingness by the opponent to reduce his or her aggression. The effectiveness of the variable-matching strategy was attributed to interrupting the tendency of the subject and his or her opponent to match each other's responses. Consistent with earlier attack-instigated aggression studies, the withdrawal strategy in the present study led to a rapid reduction in aggression.     

Choice between reliable and unreliable reinforcement alternatives revisited: Preference for unreliable reinforcement

Pigeons' choices between a reliable alternative that always provided food after a delay (i.e., 100% reinforcement) and an unreliable one that provided food or blackout equally often after a delay (i.e., 50% reinforcement) was studied using a discrete-trials concurrent-chains procedure modified to prevent choice between alternatives following a blackout outcome. Initial links were fixed-ratio 1 schedules, and terminal links were fixed-time schedules. Stimuli presented during the terminal-link delays were correlated with the food and blackout outcomes. In Experiment 1, terminal-link durations were varied. With short terminal links (i.e., 10 s), 6 of 8 subjects showed strong preference for the 50% side. As terminal-link duration increased to 30 s, preference, regardless of direction, became less extreme. In Experiment 2, the side-key location of the 50% and 100% alternatives was reversed for 3 subjects. Preference for the 50% alternative reoccurred following the key reversal. When a 5-s separation was subsequently interposed between the initial and terminal links for both alternatives, all birds reversed to a preference for the 100% side. In general, the strong preference for the 50% side was qualitatively consistent with the expectation that the procedure enhanced the conditioned-reinforcement effectiveness of the food-associated terminal-link stimulus on the 50% side. Implications of the results for various accounts of choice of the 50% alternative are discussed.     

不同刺激强度训练后一日龄小鸡的记忆形成

一日龄小鸡,分别接受不同浓度的回避性刺激物邻氨基苯甲酸甲酯（ＭｅＡ）训练,间隔一定时间后测试记忆保持。主要结果为：５％和２０％ＭｅＡ训练,分别使动物记忆保持１５分钟和５０分钟左右,相当于记忆形成多阶段模型中的ＳＴＭ和ＩＴＭ阶段。４０％ＭｅＡ训练,记忆保持到训练后８－１０小时,相当于不依赖新糖蛋白合成的ＬＴＭ形成的早期阶段。只有６０％以上浓度的ＭｅＡ训练才使记忆保持至少２４小时。上述结果提示,利用弱化训练的方法,不仅可以将ＳＴＭ,ＩＴＭ和ＬＴＭ分离开,而且可把ＬＴＭ形成的早期阶段分离出来独立研究,增加了对ＬＴＭ新的理解,为进一步探讨记忆形成机制提供了一条新的途径。     

Preference for signaled over unsignaled shock schedules: Ruling out asymmetry and response fixation as factors

Experiment 1 tested whether a “symmetrical” choice procedure yields results different from those previously reported using the “unidirectional” standard changeover procedure (e.g., Badia & Culbertson, 1972). Subjects could change at any time from unsignaled to signaled shock by pressing a lever and from signaled to unsignaled shock by pressing a second lever. Results were identical to those of the standard procedure and showed that the standard procedure is fully adequate. Experiment 2 tested whether choice of high density signaled shock over low-density unsignaled shock (Badia, Coker, & Harsh, 1973) resulted from initial training with equal-density schedules. Subjects were trained and tested with signaled shock twice as dense as unsignaled shock. Three of four subjects strongly preferred the signaled condition, thus ruling out carry-over and “response fixation” as alternative explanations.     

Effectiveness of negative-thought-reduction, meditation, and placebo training treatment in reducing anger

Twenty-nine highly angry subjects who obtained high scores on Spielberger's Trait component of State-Trait Anger Scale went through a thought-listing procedure to determine their negative self-statements in response to high, medium, and low anger-arousing situations. It was found that subjects made more negative self-statements in response to a high anger-arousing situation compared to the medium and low anger-arousing situations. The subjects were divided into four groups. Subjects in one group were trained to reduce their negative thoughts, subjects in a second group were trained to meditate, subjects in the third group were asked to imagine the high anger-arousing situations (placebo procedure), and subjects in the fourth group were given no treatment. It was found that the subjects in the Negative-thought-reduction, Meditation and Placebo groups showed improvement in trait anger, anger aroused through high-anger situations, anger scores across a wide variety of situations, unconstructive coping, and anger measured through physiological symptoms. The gains made through intervention were maintained at a 6-week follow-up. The No-treatment Group showed no significant change in anger scores across a wide variety of situations, unconstructive coping, and physiological symptom scores but showed a small but significant improvement in trait anger and in anger aroused by high-anger situations.