The Journal of Abnormal Child Psychology at 25

This issue, redesigned in a new format, marks the beginning of Volume 25, the beginning of the silver anniversary year of the Journal of Abnormal Child Psychology. Data were compiled from the first 24 volumes to study changes over time, and Pearson correlations were calculated to determine linear trends in the journal's development The number of articles per volume has doubled, from about 25 to 50. In recent years the first authors of articles were more likely to be located outside the U.S. (up from about 5% to about 25%). Also, in recent years the first authors of articles were less likely to be affiliated with nonmedical school university departments and more likely to be affiliated with medical schools or research institutes. An introduction to this special 25th anniversary issue is provided.     

Alcohol intoxication and memory for events: A snapshot of alcohol myopia in a real-world drinking scenario

Alcohol typically has a detrimental impact on memory across a variety of encoding and retrieval conditions (e.g., Mintzer, 2007; Ray & Bates, 2006). No research has addressed alcohol's effect on memory for lengthy and interactive events and little has tested alcohol's effect on free recall. In this study 94 participants were randomly assigned to alcohol, placebo, or control groups and consumed drinks in a bar-lab setting while interacting with a “bartender”. Immediately afterwards all participants freely recalled the bar interaction. Consistent with alcohol myopia theory, intoxicated participants only differed from placebo and control groups when recalling peripheral information. Expanding on the original hypervigilance hypothesis, placebo participants showed more conservative reporting behaviour than the alcohol or control groups by providing more uncertain and “don't know” responses. Thus, alcohol intoxication had confined effects on memory for events, supporting and extending current theories.     

First and second language in the brain: Neuronal correlates of language processing and spelling strategies

This study explores oscillatory brain activity by means of event-related synchronization and desynchronization (%ERS/ERD) of EEG activity during the use of phonological and orthographic-morphological spelling strategies in L2 (English) and L1 (German) in native German speaking children. EEG was recorded while 33 children worked on a task requiring either phonological or orthographic-morphological spelling strategies. L2 processing elicited more theta %ERS than L1 processing (particularly at bilateral frontal and right posterior parietal sites) which might suggest a stronger involvement of semantic encoding and retrieval of the less familiar L2. The highest level of theta %ERS was revealed for the orthographic-morphological strategy in L2 which might indicate a more intense way of lexical retrieval compared to the phonological strategy in L2 and the orthographic-morphological strategy in L1. Analyses moreover revealed that phonological processing (both in L1 and L2) was associated with comparatively strong left-hemispheric %ERD in the upper alpha frequency band.     

The pitch of “real” and “rhetorical” questions directed by a father to his daughter: A longitudinal case study

A longitudinal study of a father and his daughter examined pitch-variation of “real” and “rhetorical” questions. Although the father asked “real” and “rhetorical” questions from the start of the recordings, he did not distinguish them through differential pitch height until the baby was 15 months old.     

Valuable and pernicious collective intellectual self-trust1

Recent years have seen a shift in epistemological studies of intellectual self-trust or epistemic self-trust: intellectual self-trust is not merely epistemologists’ tool for silencing epistemic skepticism or doubt, it is recognized as a disposition of individuals and collectives interesting in its own rights. In this exploratory article I focus on a particular type of intellectual self-trust—collective intellectual self-trust—and I examine which features make for valuable or pernicious collective intellectual self-trust. From accounts of the value of individual intellectual self-trust I take three frameworks for evaluating collective intellectual self-trust: an epistemically consequentialist, a virtue-theoretic and a prudential/pragmatic framework (§2). Then I introduce collective intellectual self-trust (§3). Against this background I explain what is distinctive of valuable collective intellectual self-trust (§4) and pernicious collective intellectual self-trust (§5) within the three frameworks. I close by discussing the relation between the three frameworks and argue that evaluating intellectual self-trust requires a multi-perspectival approach constituted by the three frameworks.     

Interactive effect of long-term mental stress and cardiac stress reactivity on carotid intima-media thickness: the Cardiovascular Risk in Young Finns study

The present study examined the interaction between vital exhaustion and cardiac reactivity and recovery on preclinical atherosclerosis assessed by carotid intima-media thickness (IMT) in young men and women. We measured heart rate (HR), respiratory sinus arrhythmia (RSA), and pre-ejection period (PEP) in response to mental arithmetic and speech tasks. Vital exhaustion and carotid IMT were also measured. Significant associations were observed for men aged 28-37 years, but not for men aged 22-25 years, nor for women in these age groups. It was shown that, among highly exhausted men in the older age group, lower HR reactivity was related to greater IMT. Our results also imply that, among non-exhausted men in this age group, slow HR and RSA recovery after acute stress predicted higher IMT. These results suggest that long-term stress as assessed by vital exhaustion is a risk only if it has resulted in ineffective cardiac stress reactivity. Autonomic imbalance resulting from chronic stress may be the common mechanism linking vital exhaustion and cardiac responsiveness to an increased risk of atherosclerosis.     

Attention during visual secondary tasks in driving: Adaptation to the demands of the driving task

Visual attention in driving with visual secondary task is compared for two visual secondary tasks. N = 40 subjects completed a 1 h test drive in a motion-base driving simulator. During the drive, participants either solved an externally paced, highly demanding visual task or a self paced menu system task. The secondary tasks were offered in defined critical and non-critical driving situations. Eye movement behavior was analyzed and compared for both tasks. Before starting the secondary tasks, eye movement behavior shows a smaller standard deviation of gaze as well as longer fixation durations for both tasks. The comparison between the two tasks indicates that drivers use the possibilities the self paced task offers: during the secondary task, they monitor the driving scene with longer fixations and show a greater standard deviation of gaze position. Furthermore, independently of the type of secondary task, drivers adapt their eye movement behavior to the demands of the situation. In critical driving situations they direct a larger proportion of glance time to the driving task. Last, the relation between glance behavior and collisions is analyzed. Results indicate that collisions go together with an inadequate distribution of attention during distraction. The results are interpreted regarding the attentional processes involved in driving with visual secondary tasks. Based on the similarities and differences between the two secondary tasks, a cognitive approach is developed which assumes that the control of attention during distraction is based on a mental situational model of the driving situation.     

Inviting witnesses to speculate: effects of age and interaction on children's recall

Inviting speculation has been found to increase children's false recall. In this study, kindergartners and third graders saw a clown perform actions alone or in interaction with a child. Two weeks later, the speculation group recalled all actions and was asked to speculate on half the actions. The control group recalled all actions without speculating. Four weeks after the show, all children recalled all actions again. The speculation group gave more false answers to the speculated items than the control group. Surprisingly, older children tended to report as many if not more false responses than younger children, regardless of speculation. In the speculation group, there were fewer false answers for interactions than actions, but false answers did not differ across observation types in the control group. Finally, speculation did not affect free and cued recall differentially.     

Selective Social Belief Revision in Young Children

ABSTRACT

Recent research has shown that from early in development, children selectively form new beliefs in response to information supplied by others. However, little is known about the development of selective revision of existing beliefs in response to socially conveyed information. Such selective social belief revision has been extensively studied by social psychologists in the context of advice-taking. Here, we adapted the methods of this research tradition for studying selective advice-taking in young children and adults. Participants solved a perceptual judgment task, received advice, and subsequently made final decisions. The informational access (perceptual quality) of participants and advisor were experimentally manipulated. Adults revised their judgments systematically as a function of both their own and the advisor’s informational access whereas children based their adjustments only on their own informational access. Two follow-up experiments suggest, however, that this pattern of results in children reflected performance rather than competence limitations: In suitably modified tasks, children did proficiently consider both their own informational situation and that of the advisor in their selective social belief revision.