时序知觉影响因素与思考

时序知觉是在几十毫秒到几百毫秒内, 对事件的同时性、非同时性和顺序性的知觉。对时序知觉的影响因素的探索可分为自下而上和自上而下两种研究取向。自下而上的研究探讨刺激的物理特征、被试的生物学特征, 以及实验方法对时序知觉的影响。而自上而下的研究探讨因果信念、情绪、文化对时序知觉的影响。今后的研究还应结合行为实验与神经科学技术, 深入探讨时序知觉的两种加工方式是分离的还是同时进行的, 以及揭示控制时序加工的脑区。     

中国人的时间知觉广度

时间知觉是社会结构和文化传统的映射,具有深刻的社会文化意涵。本文聚焦时间知觉广度这一概念,探讨中国人的时间知觉广度及其对自我连续性和社会变化观等心理过程的影响。通过综合讨论诸多实验发现提出,中国人具有较大的时间知觉广度,包括具有显著的过去取向和未来取向。较大的时间知觉广度提升了中国人跨时间的自我连续性,并且影响着中国人看待世事变化的变化观,这些特点又进一步影响到其它心理过程,例如对苦难和幸福的解读,在股票市场中的决策等。在一定程度上,这些特点可能是中国人在应对不确定性和重大危机时表现出更强的心理韧性和复原力的心理基础。本研究还指出中国人时间知觉广度具有独特的文化意义,包括整体性思维、过去现在未来互嵌互动和双向延展、与自我连续性和社会结构相关联以及具有道德属性等。基于此,本研究提出了时间知觉广度的文化心理比较模型,并分析了时间知觉广度对自我同一性和文化同一性的影响结果。希望本文能为进一步研究“中国人应对历史危机的心理特征与行为表现”提供科学依据。     

A gendered approach to workforce participation patterns over the life course for an Australian baby boom cohort

Population ageing and its future implications for governments and individuals have been central to much policy debate and research targeted to retain older people in the workforce. This study identified workforce participation patterns across the adult life course for women and men entering later life, and explored the influences of various early and adult life socio-demographic circumstances. Data were collected from 1261 men and women aged 60 to 64 years in the Life History and Health (LHH) Survey (a sub-study of the Sax Institute's 45 and Up Study, Australia) in 2010–11. LHH provides detailed information on personal histories of paid work, socio-economic resources from childhood (number of books and father's occupation) and adult life factors such as educational attainment, marital histories, childcare and informal caring. Latent class analysis (LCA) was undertaken to identify patterns of workforce participation for participants across their adult life. Significant gender differences were confirmed. Further analysis (LCA with covariates) showed that women who reported having books during childhood, and those who had post-school qualification, were more likely to have mostly been in paid work and less likely to have not been in paid work; while ever partnered women had significantly higher odds of increasing part time work over time. Men who had reported ever having had informal caring activities were likely to have had decreasing participation in paid work over time, and were highly likely to be not in paid work after 55 years. Ever partnered status was protective for being in paid work for men. These findings indicate the need for gender-specific policies and strategies to enable continued workforce participation throughout adult life and into later working years, particularly for people who had fewer social or economic opportunities earlier in life.     

Is separation anxiety in adolescents and parents related to parental differentiation of self?

The current study examined the relationship between separation anxiety in adolescents after their transition to middle school, on the one hand, and differentiation of self and separation anxiety in their parents, on the other hand. The sample included 88 adolescents from northern Israel, together with their biological parents. Adolescents' separation anxiety was found to be negatively associated with maternal I-position (IP). In terms of gender differences, mothers' levels of emotional reactivity and fusion with others were higher than fathers', while fathers' levels of IP and emotional cut-off were higher than mothers'. Furthermore, parents' levels of differentiation of self were negatively correlated with their own levels of separation anxiety. The study found an absence of gender differences in separation anxiety, both for parents and adolescents. Also, parents' separation anxiety was not related to adolescents' separation anxiety. The results indicate that differentiation of self among mothers is a significant characteristic in understanding adolescents' separation anxiety. On a practical level, this study has the potential to increase the awareness of teachers, school counsellors and psychologists of those familial sources that promote and increase adolescents' separation anxiety.     

Contrived motivating operations alter delay‐discounting values of disordered gamblers

The present study required 9 disordered gamblers to make hypothetical selections between smaller and larger amounts of money at varying delays. Participants were also required to respond to the task given the contrived hypothetical conditions of earning twice or half as much as they did at their current jobs. The results demonstrated how participants’ delay discounting was altered via contrived motivating operations, strengthening the argument that discounting may be a state variable.     

The Temporal Dynamics of Regularity Extraction in Non‐Human Primates

Extracting the regularities of our environment is one of our core cognitive abilities. To study the fine‐grained dynamics of the extraction of embedded regularities, a method combining the advantages of the artificial language paradigm (Saffran, Aslin, & Newport, 1996 ) and the serial response time task (Nissen & Bullemer, 1987 ) was used with a group of Guinea baboons (Papio papio) in a new automatic experimental device (Fagot & Bonté, 2010 ). After a series of random trials, monkeys were exposed to language‐like patterns. We found that the extraction of embedded patterns positioned at the end of larger patterns was faster than the extraction of initial embedded patterns. This result suggests that there is a learning advantage for the final element of a sequence that benefits from the contextual information provided by previous elements.     

Prospective duration judgments: The role of temporality and executive demands of concurrent tasks

It is known that concurrent non-temporal tasks shorten reproduced temporal durations in prospective duration judgments. Two experiments were carried out, one comparing a concurrent temporal task to a minimally demanding concurrent task (Experiment 1) and one comparing an executive concurrent (Simon) task with a less demanding non-executive concurrent task (Experiment 2). An effect of the concurrent task type on temporal reproductions was found. Furthermore, a duration length effect was found, where longer durations were underestimated more than shorter durations. This effect tended to be stronger for the experiments that included a concurrent task that demanded high attention.