Can we imagine how objects look from other viewpoints?

Many psychologists who study cognition believe that perception achieves object-centered representations that make it possible to extract representations of how the object would appear from differing viewpoints. Others believe we can achieve representations of how an object would appear by a process of visualization or mental rotation. We report experiments in which the subject tries to imagine how three-dimensional novel wire objects would appear from positions other than the one they are in. Subjects are unable to perform this task unless they make use of strategies that circumvent the process of visualization. It is suggested that the linear increase in time required to succeed in mental rotation tasks as a function of the angular discrepancy between the figures compared is the result of increasing difficulty rather than of the time required for rotation.     

Eye movement as a cue to figure motion in anorthoscopic perception

When a figure moves behind a narrow aperture in an opaque surface, if it is perceived as a figure, its shape will often appear distorted. Under such anorthoscopic conditions, the speed or direction of the object's motion is ambiguous. However, when the observer simultaneously tracks a moving target, a figure is always perceived, and its precise shape is a function of the speed or direction of tracking. The figure is seen as moving with the speed or in the direction of the target. Thus, it is argued that eye movement serves as a cue to the figure's motion, which, in turn, determines its perceived length or orientation.     

Loneliness, social interaction, and sex roles

Forty-three male and 53 female college seniors maintained the Rochester Interaction Record for 2 weeks, providing information about every social interaction of 10 minutes or more. Subjects then completed the revised UCLA (University of California, Los Angeles) Loneliness Scale and the Personal Attributes Questionnaire, measuring sex-role orientation. For both sexes, loneliness was negatively related to the amount of time spent with females and to the meaningfulness of interaction with males and females. However, meaningfulness with males was more important than meaningfulness with females. Femininity was negatively related to loneliness for both sexes and partially mediated the above relationships. There were sex differences, however, in the extent to which variables overlapped in predicting loneliness. For example, a large group of nonlonely males was characterized both by having meaningful relationships with males and by spending time with females, whereas a second group of nonlonely males was characterized simply by having meaningful relationships with males. The largest group of nonlonely females was characterized simply by having meaningful relationships with males, but another sizable group was characterized simply by spending time with females. Females doing both accounted for very little of the variance.     

Ability evaluation by proxy: role of maximal performance and related attributes in social comparison

Four experiments tested the effects of information about a proxy's related attributes and maximal effort in social comparisons of ability. In Study 1, a proxy's prior performance at maximal effort exerted systematic effects on participants' personal performance predictions for a novel task. When information about the proxy's effort was ambiguous (Study 2). information about related attribute similarity was used in the formulation of performance predictions. In Studies 3 and 4, 2-way interaction terms revealed that participants used related attribute information in generating performance predictions when the proxy's maximum effort was unknown. However, related attribute information was disregarded when proxy's maximum effort was unambiguous. Results were consistent with the proxy comparison model of ability self-evaluation (L. Wheeler, R. Martin, & J. Suls, 1997).     

Cognitive neuroscience of episodic memory encoding

This paper presents a cognitive neuroscientific perspective on how human episodic memories are formed. Convergent evidence from multiple brain imaging studies using positron emission tomography (PET) and functional magnetic resonance imaging (fMRI) suggests a role for frontal cortex in episodic memory encoding. Activity levels within frontal cortex can predict episodic memory encoding across a wide range of behavioral manipulations known to influence memory performance, such as those present during levels of processing and divided attention manipulations. Activity levels within specific frontal and medial temporal regions can even predict, on an item by item basis, whether an episodic memory is likely to form. Furthermore, separate frontal regions appear to participate in supplying code-specific information, including distinct regions which process semantic attributes of verbal information as well as right-lateralized regions which process nonverbal information. We hypothesize that activity within these multiple frontal regions provides a functional influence (input) to medical temporal regions that bind the information together into a lasting episodic memory trace.     

An extended comparator hypothesis account of superconditioning

Three conditioned taste aversion experiments with rats investigated superconditioning. In each experiment, alternate exposures of 2 flavor compounds with a common element (i.e., AB/AS) were administered to establish an inhibitory relationship between the 2 unique elements, B and S, and prior to testing, S was paired with lithium chloride (LiCl). In Experiment 1, pairings of a neutral cue (X) with S in compound with B after the AB/AS exposures resulted in superconditioning between X and S. Extinction of the common element (A) just before the S-LiCl pairing attenuated both the inhibitory relationship between B and S (Experiment 2) and superconditioning between X and S (Experiment 3). These observations suggest that superconditioning consists of enhanced performance rather than enhanced associative acquisition.     

Different rates of forgetting following study versus test trials

Two experiments investigated recall following two study conditions, (1) repeated test: a study trial followed by multiple recall trials, and (2) repeated study: multiple study trials with no tests. At a retention interval of 5 minutes, repeated study produced a higher level of recall than repeated test. When the retention interval was extended, forgetting was much more rapid in the study condition, with the repeated test manipulation leading to higher recall at an interval of 7 days. We conclude that study and test trials have different effects upon memory, with study trials promoting memory acquisition, and test trials enhancing the retrieval process itself, which protects against subsequent forgetting.     

Reinventing the University Through the Teaching of Diversity

University reform encompasses an increased emphasis on the social and emotional development of students. In particular, the development of caring, empathy, and community are emphasized. This team of psychology professors approaches the task of university reform by presenting both its philosophy of diversity inclusion and specific inclusion strategies as means of promoting enhanced development of our students. Although the discipline of psychology is used as an example, the philosophical argument and the strategic approaches may be applied to other disciplines.     

A grouping interpretation of the modality effect in immediate probed recognition

In a series of experiments on immediate probed recognition for eight 3-digit numbers, it was shown that if the target modality involved auditory components and the effect of the similarity of the modality of the probe to that of the targets was controlled, unequivocal evidence was obtained for an auditory superiority effect (modality effect) for hit rates for the final items of the list. Moreover, false-alarm rates were significantly lower following targets with an auditory component than they were following silently seen targets. It is argued that this pattern of hits and false alarms is consistent with the idea that targets that have an auditory component yield memory representations that are better grouped as units than are those for targets that are only silently seen; in particular, if a new probe has a first digit that accidentally matches the first digit of a target item, it is more likely that the subject will mistakenly identify this new probe as old (give a false alarm) if the target has only been partially encoded because it was only silently seen.