Dementia and the Neurovirulence of HIV-1

Infection with human immunodeficiency virus type 1 (HIV-1) leads rapidly to infection of the brain and subsequent neuropsychological impairment, including subclinical impairment, minor cognitive-motor disorder, and HIV-1-associated dementia (HAD). This article reviews HAD and the factors involved in its pathogenesis; the effectiveness of antiretroviral therapy; the prevalence of HIV-1 and subtypes; and the role of chemokines and cytokines as the capstones associated with neuropathology due to inflammation.     

Intercultural Understanding through Intergroup Dialogue between Japanese and Chinese University Students

This study had two purposes: (1) to develop university classes in which students can participate in intercultural dialogue by exchanging letters focusing on a topic about everyday norms implicit in each culture, and (2) to examine how students develop their intercultural understanding through participating in these classes. Twenty-two Japanese and six Chinese university students (each group in their own country) participated in three class sessions. At the beginning of the first class, students were given a dialogue theme that focused on cultural differences. The selected theme was mobile phone use while riding on public transportation, as this practice is prohibited in Tokyo but not in Beijing. Students discussed their opinions in small groups, wrote questions to their counterparts in the other country, and then reflected on and discussed the answers received. Analysis of the Japanese students’ written reflections showed that their understanding of different cultural values and beliefs changed from one based only on a Japanese cultural perspective to one that respected the relativity of cultural norms. The results suggested that the arousal of negative emotions when students are exposed to the perspectives of other cultures is closely related to their understanding of cultural relativity.     

Categorical and dimensional perceptions in decoding emotional facial expressions

We investigated whether categorical perception and dimensional perception can co-occur while decoding emotional facial expressions. In Experiment 1, facial continua with endpoints consisting of four basic emotions (i.e., happiness–fear and anger–disgust) were created by a morphing technique. Participants rated each facial stimulus using a categorical strategy and a dimensional strategy. The results show that the happiness–fear continuum was divided into two clusters based on valence, even when using the dimensional strategy. Moreover, the faces were arrayed in order of the physical changes within each cluster. In Experiment 2, we found a category boundary within other continua (i.e., surprise–sadness and excitement–disgust) with regard to the arousal and valence dimensions. These findings indicate that categorical perception and dimensional perception co-occurred when emotional facial expressions were rated using a dimensional strategy, suggesting a hybrid theory of categorical and dimensional accounts.     

Selecting a Relevant Mental State in Young Children’s Persuasion

Previous studies have found that understanding another person’s mental states is a requirement for effective responding to that person. This study examined whether effective responding also requires selecting a relevant mental state of another person. Using a hypothetical persuasion paradigm, we investigated if late 4- and 5-year-olds (N = 120) could present information to counter a receiver’s opposition. For example, a boy is attempting to persuade his mother to let him have a bird. If the mother objects to her son having the bird because bird is noisy, then the boy should ask her to have a quiet bird. Presenting appropriate information (e.g., a quiet bird) was found to be more difficult when the person had plural beliefs (e.g., a bird would be clean and noisy) and children had to select the source of opposition (e.g., a bird would be noisy). This suggests that selecting an appropriate mental state of another person is necessary for effective responding. Contingency and developmental analyses revealed that children could present appropriate information only when they could select the source, indicating that the ability to select an appropriate mental state is a key factor in responding effectively to others.     

The effect of retinal size on the perception of distance in photographs

The effect of the retinal size of a target on the perception of absolute distance to a single target and relative distance between near and far targets was examined with photographic displays including two persons. Retinal size was systematically varied by varying the focal length of the camera lens, the display size, and the viewing distance. The results showed that, although the relationship between the perceived absolute distance and retinal size was not inversely proportional, the perceived absolute distance decreased with an increase in retinal size. This was more evident when the retinal size was changed by varying the focal length. These results suggest that the determinants of the perceived absolute distance were not only the retinal size of the target but also its ratio to the overall display. The results also showed that the perceived relative distances were little influenced by retinal size, but were strongly dependent on the size ratio of the two targets in the display.     

An effect of linguistic experience: The discrimination of [r] and [l] by native speakers of Japanese and English

To test the effect of linguistic experience on the perception of a cue that is known to be effective in distinguishing between [r] and [l] in English, 21 Japanese and 39 American adults were tested on discrimination of a set of synthetic speech-like stimuli. The 13 “speech” stimuli in this set varied in the initial stationary frequency of the third formant (F3) and its subsequent transition into the vowel over a range sufficient to produce the perception of [r a] and [l a] for American subjects and to produce [r a] (which is not in phonemic contrast to [l a ]) for Japanese subjects. Discrimination tests of a comparable set of stimuli consisting of the isolated F3 components provided a “nonspeech” control. For Americans, the discrimination of the speech stimuli was nearly categorical, i.e., comparison pairs which were identified as different phonemes were discriminated with high accuracy, while pairs which were identified as the same phoneme were discriminated relatively poorly. In comparison, discrimination of speech stimuli by Japanese subjects was only slightly better than chance for all comparison pairs. Performance on nonspeech stimuli, however, was virtually identical for Japanese and American subjects; both groups showed highly accurate discrimination of all comparison pairs. These results suggest that the effect of linguistic experience is specific to perception in the “speech mode.”     

Incidental memory in dogs (Canis familiaris): adaptive behavioral solution at an unexpected memory test

Memory processing in nonhuman animals has been typically tested in situations where the animals are repeatedly trained to retrieve their memory trace, such as delayed matching to sample, serial probe recognition, etc. In contrast, how they utilize incidentally formed memory traces is not well investigated except in rodents. We examined whether domestic dogs could solve an unexpected test based on a single past experience. In Experiment 1, leashed dogs were led to 4 open, baited containers and allowed to eat from 2 of them (Exposure phase). After a walk outside for more than 10?min, during which time the containers were replaced with new identical ones, the dogs were unexpectedly returned to the site and unleashed for free exploration (test phase). Eleven out of 12 dogs first visited one of the containers from which they had not eaten. In Experiment 2, two containers had food in them, one had a nonedible object, and the last one was empty. Dogs visited all 4 containers and were allowed to eat one of the food rewards in the Exposure phase. In the test phase, unleashed dogs first visited the previously baited container from which they had not eaten significantly more often than chance. These results demonstrate that in an unexpected, test dogs may retrieve “what” and “where” information about seen (now invisible) items from incidental memory formed during a single past experience.     

The spirit of giving: Mennonite narratives about charitable contributions

Many charitable contributions in the USA are religiously motivated. Based on an analysis of the discussions about charitable contributions among three Mennonite groups in south-central Pennsylvania, this article examines members' complex decision-making processes about giving. Most recent studies of such donations among Christians emphasise the importance of a sense of sacrifice and the demonstration of one's religious commitment through giving. This article, however, suggests that giving decisions cannot be fully understood without considering members' pragmatic, but also sometimes conflictive views on appropriate religious contributions. The three groups in this article differ considerably in the ways in which their beliefs affect their decisions about contributions. While one group prioritises their immediate church community, another group emphasises systematic monetary contributions for evangelical activities and the third stresses the relationship between their financial decisions and the broader social and economic context in which church members are situated.     

Development and validation of a facial expression database based on the dimensional and categorical model of emotions

ABSTRACT

The present study describes the development and validation of a facial expression database comprising five different horizontal face angles in dynamic and static presentations. The database includes twelve expression types portrayed by eight Japanese models. This database was inspired by the dimensional and categorical model of emotions: surprise, fear, sadness, anger with open mouth, anger with closed mouth, disgust with open mouth, disgust with closed mouth, excitement, happiness, relaxation, sleepiness, and neutral (static only). The expressions were validated using emotion classification and Affect Grid rating tasks [Russell, Weiss, & Mendelsohn, 1989. Affect Grid: A single-item scale of pleasure and arousal. Journal of Personality and Social Psychology, 57(3), 493–502]. The results indicate that most of the expressions were recognised as the intended emotions and could systematically represent affective valence and arousal. Furthermore, face angle and facial motion information influenced emotion classification and valence and arousal ratings. Our database will be available online at the following URL. https://www.dh.aist.go.jp/database/face2017/.     

Categorical and dimensional perceptions in decoding emotional facial expressions

We investigated whether categorical perception and dimensional perception can co-occur while decoding emotional facial expressions. In Experiment 1, facial continua with endpoints consisting of four basic emotions (i.e., happiness-fear and anger-disgust) were created by a morphing technique. Participants rated each facial stimulus using a categorical strategy and a dimensional strategy. The results show that the happiness-fear continuum was divided into two clusters based on valence, even when using the dimensional strategy. Moreover, the faces were arrayed in order of the physical changes within each cluster. In Experiment 2, we found a category boundary within other continua (i.e., surprise-sadness and excitement-disgust) with regard to the arousal and valence dimensions. These findings indicate that categorical perception and dimensional perception co-occurred when emotional facial expressions were rated using a dimensional strategy, suggesting a hybrid theory of categorical and dimensional accounts.