Development of a facial-expression database of Chinese Han,Hui and Tibetan people

Recently, cross-cultural facial-expression recognition has become a research hotspot, and a standardised facial-expression material system can significantly help researchers compare and demonstrate the results of other studies. We developed a facial-expression database of Chinese Han, Hui and Tibetan ethnicities. In this study, six basic human facial expressions (and one neutral expression) were collected from 200 Han, 220 Hui and 210 Tibetan participants who lived in these regions. Four experts on each ethnicity evaluated the facial-expression images according to the expressions, and only those achieving inter-rater agreement were retained. Subsequently, 240 raters evaluated these images according to the seven emotions and rated the intensity of the expressions. Consequently, 2980 images were included in the database, including 930 images of Han individuals, 962 images of Hui individuals and 1088 images of Tibetan individuals. In conclusion, the facial-expression database of Chinese Han, Hui and Tibetan people was representative and reliable with a recognition rate of over 60%, making it well-suited for cross-cultural research on emotions.     

睡眠不足对人际交互的影响及其认知神经机制

睡眠不足会对人的认知、情感和人际交互产生诸多影响。这种影响在社会情绪层面表现为个体情绪共情和认知共情的减少,易激惹性与愤怒情绪的增加;在社会行为层面则表现为亲社会行为的减少和攻击行为的增加。在睡眠不足状态下,情绪系统和认知系统功能连接的减弱可能是这些变化的潜在机制。未来应结合生态效度较高的睡眠操作手段,系统考察睡眠不足如何导致各种高级社会情绪的改变,以及这些社会情绪的变化如何导致社会行为的变化。     

Brain weights correlate with behavioral parameters in individual inbred mice housed in a common and enriched environment

Fifty 8-week-old Balb/c mice were individually identified and housed together in a large and enriched environment for 5 months. Maze and open field exploration, response to an aversive noise, swimming, and induced grooming tests were applied to each mouse in an initial search for possible relationships between brain morphology and spontaneous behavior in isogenic individuals living in a complex social and physical environment. The tasks generated 39 quantitative behavioral indices which include locomotion, rearing, still, and grooming bout frequencies, latencies, total, and mean bout durations. At the end of the tests, the 7-month-old mice were sacrificed and the fresh weights of their whole brain, cerebellum, brain stem, diencephalon, telencephalon, and prosencephalon were rapidly obtained. Behavioral data have wide variations and do not adjust to normal population distributions. Means of the same parameter differ between tests. A Spearman correlation matrix of all data yielded many significant correlations between indices of the same task which can be interpreted in terms of time budget and sequence probability. Significant correlations between indices of different tests suggest diverse emotionalities, exploratory strategies, and motor skills. The correlations between body and brain weights and among separate brain regions were not significant. There were several low but significant correlations between brain weights and behavioral indices. Such correlations, the resulting factors, and significant behavioral differences between mice with large and small brains suggest that mice displaying low motor activity in novel environments have larger brains and forebrain/hindbrain ratios than mice with high activity, and that animals with high scores of some specific behaviors have larger brain areas physiologically related to such behaviors.(ABSTRACT TRUNCATED AT 250 WORDS)     

The Relation of Altruistic Orientation to Human Relationships and Moral Judgment in Chinese People

The altruistic orientation and moral judgment of 811 Chinese subjects were studied. Three hypotheses were examined: (1) The altruistic orientation of an actor at any level of moral judgment is larger to a recipient of closer relationship in any situation; (2) an actor at a higher level of moral judgment would be more willing to sacrifice their life for any recipient than an actor at a lower level of moral judgment; (3) an actor at a higher level of moral judgment would be less willing to: (a) Give up rescuing a stranger and turn to rescue close relatives or best friends; or (b) help close relatives or best friends by covering up their crime than an actor at a lower level of moral judgment. The empirical findings supported clearly the aforementioned hypotheses.     

儿童理解数量词“几个”、“很多”的发展特点

本工作采用了一种研究儿童理解不精确量词的经验方法,初步探讨了四岁至十岁儿童理解数量词“几个”、“很多”的发展特点。结果提示:儿童对两个数量词的理解与实验给出的论域(数量范围)关系密切;数量词“几个”比“很多”较早被年幼儿童所理解。其发展特点:四岁至十岁儿童在[0,10],[0,20]范围上,均能较好理解“几个”;六岁以上儿童只能在[0,10]的范围上理解“很多”的词义;四岁儿童则表现出把“很多”与“全部”混同。     

主观轮廓与明度对比的实验研究

本实验以被试的反应时为指标,用速示器呈现实验刺激,通过系统改变诱导区域的面积和反射率对主观轮廓知觉进行了研究。实验结果表明:随着主观轮廓图形诱导面积的减小和诱导部分反射率的增加,明度对比减弱,被试的反应时增加,并且各反应时之间存在显著差异。这表明诱导部分的面积和反射率都以明度对比为中介引起了主观轮廓知觉的系统改变。这说明视觉系统中侧抑制引起的明度对比在主观轮廓知觉中起重要作用。     

The psychological cost of waiting

The study of any problem involving waiting situations invariably assumes that people dislike having to wait. The analysis of queueing problems usually prescribes that some costs should be associated with the time people spend waiting to be served. These are usually considered to be of an economic nature, though the existence of other costs of a psychological nature is accepted. It is generally accepted that after having to wait for a certain amount of time, anxiety and stress start to build up in an individual, due both to the sense of waste and the uncertainty involved in a waiting situation. This work provides a theoretical basis for analysing this building up process as it occurs during the waiting period. It is proved that, under very general conditions, the resulting psychological stress accumulated during the process is a marginal increasing function of the waiting time, and some strategies to minimise it are developed. The results obtained give theoretical support to the usual assumptions underlying the development of systems to provide “real time” information to people in waiting situations. This is especially important in the operation of public transportation systems. The results also provide theoretical support to the “convex” treatment usually given to the waiting cost function in queueing problems.     

Social structure features in three inbred strains of mice, C57Bl/6J, Balb/cj, and NIH: a comparative study

Some features of social living were investigated in three inbred strains of mice: C57Bl/6j, Balb/cj, and NIH. Five social behaviors--Aggression, Submission, Allogrooming, Social Rest and Rest Alone, as well as Wheel Running Activity--were recorded 2 h daily for a week, in 26 groups of seven male mice living in an enriched environment. Dominants and subordinates among strains shared some behavioral characteristics, but strain contributions upon social structure were also detected. Similarities among strains included the appearance of a single dominant mouse per group rated as the most aggressive, besides from being the animal presented with most Submissions. Allogrooming was more frequent among subordinates than among dominants and subordinates. Differences among strains were that agonistic behavior among subordinates was higher in the Balb/cj and NIH groups than in the C57Bl/6j mice. NIH mice were recorded in Rest Alone more often than mice from the other strains. C57Bl/6j dominants showed higher rates of Wheel Running Activity than subordinates.     

Three-dimensional perspective drawing of two-dimensional functions with microcomputers

In this paper, we present a BASIC program for Apple II series computers that allows the user to obtain perspective drawings of two-dimensional functions of known analytical expression. Also, we outline a procedure for obtaining perspective representations of two-dimensional arrays of data using the same program. The program should run on any computer with graphics mode with only slight modifications in the graphics commands.