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Fast lemons and sour boulders: Testing crossmodal correspondences using an internet-based testing methodology.
According to a popular family of hypotheses, crossmodal matches between distinct features hold because they correspond to the same polarity on several conceptual dimensions (such as active-passive, good-bad, etc.) that can be identified using the semantic differential technique. The main problem here resides in turning this hypothesis into testable empirical predictions. In the present study, we outline a series of plausible consequences of the hypothesis and test a variety of well-established and previously untested crossmodal correspondences by means of a novel internet-based testing methodology. The results highlight that the semantic hypothesis cannot easily explain differences in the prevalence of crossmodal associations built on the same semantic pattern (fast lemons, slow prunes, sour boulders, heavy red); furthermore, the semantic hypothesis only minimally predicts what happens when the semantic dimensions and polarities that are supposed to drive such crossmodal associations are made more salient (e.g., by adding emotional cues that ought to make the good/bad dimension more salient); finally, the semantic hypothesis does not explain why reliable matches are no longer observed once intramodal dimensions with congruent connotations are presented (e.g., visually presented shapes and colour do not appear to correspond).
Increased functional connectivity with puberty in the mentalising network involved in social emotion processing.
This article is part of a Special Issue "Puberty and Adolescence". There is increasing evidence that puberty plays an important role in the structural and functional brain development seen in adolescence, but little is known of the pubertal influence on changes in functional connectivity. We explored how pubertal indicators (salivary concentrations of testosterone, oestradiol and DHEA; pubertal stage; menarcheal status) relate to functional connectivity between components of a mentalising network identified to be engaged in social emotion processing by our prior work, using psychophysiological interaction (PPI) analysis. Female adolescents aged 11 to 13years were scanned whilst silently reading scenarios designed to evoke either social emotions (guilt and embarrassment) or basic emotions (disgust and fear), of which only social compared to basic emotions require the representation of another person's mental states. Pubertal stage and menarcheal status were used to assign participants to pre/early or mid/late puberty groups. We found increased functional connectivity between the dorsomedial prefrontal cortex (DMPFC) and the right posterior superior temporal sulcus (pSTS) and right temporo-parietal junction (TPJ) during social relative to basic emotion processing. Moreover, increasing oestradiol concentrations were associated with increased functional connectivity between the DMPFC and the right TPJ during social relative to basic emotion processing, independent of age. Our analysis of the PPI data by phenotypic pubertal status showed that more advanced puberty stage was associated with enhanced functional connectivity between the DMPFC and the left anterior temporal cortex (ATC) during social relative to basic emotion processing, also independent of age. Our results suggest increased functional maturation of the social brain network with the advancement of puberty in girls.
Grooming and social cohesion in primates: A comment on Grueter et al.
Grueter et al. have recently claimed that grooming time in primates is best explained by terrestriality, which they take to be a proxy for hygiene demand. We suggest that their results arise from a confound between terrestriality and other aspects of sociality, combined with a number of conceptual and sampling problems. © 2013 Elsevier Inc.
Interventions for improving numerical abilities: present and future
Low numeracy skills have a negative impact on the employment prospects and mental and physical health of individuals, and on the economic status of countries. Clearly, this is a high priority area where efficient strategies for intervention can lead to a better outcome, especially when implemented at an early age. We discuss here present and future directions for intervention. The development of such interventions has been based on the study of numerical difficulties through methods ranging from standardized tests to behavioral measures to neuroimaging. The intervention techniques range from group-based interventions targeted at strengths and weaknesses in specific components of arithmetic, to educational computer-games, to non-invasive brain-stimulation. We discuss the principles behind each method, the current evidence, and future directions.
The Sound of Temperature: What Information do Pouring Sounds Convey Concerning the Temperature of a Beverage
We report a series of three experiments designed to assess the extent to which people can infer the temperature of water on the basis of the sound that can be heard when it is poured from one vessel into another. Experiment 1 demonstrates that people can tell whether water is hot or cold solely on the basis of the sound that it makes when poured into a receptacle made from one of four different materials (glass, porcelain, paper and plastic). Experiment 2 reveals the existence of an implicit association between the pouring sounds and the notion of a particular temperature (hot or cold). Finally, experiment 3 demonstrates that the perception of temperature can be changed by artificially modifying the sonic properties of the sound that hot and cold water makes when poured into a receptacle. Potential applications for these results in terms of sensory marketing and modernist dining are discussed. © 2013 Wiley Periodicals, Inc.
Trauma-Focused Cognitive Behavior Therapy for Posttraumatic Stress Disorder and Acute Stress Disorder
This chapter discusses the trauma-focused cognitive behavioral treatment (CBT) procedures for posttraumatic stress disorder (PTSD) and acute stress disorder (ASD). The treatment procedures for PTSD and ASD are same. Cognitive therapy for PTSD (CT-PTSD) is designed for people who have experienced or witnessed situations of extreme threat, usually involving threat to life or physical integrity (e.g., assault, severe accident, disaster, or sexual abuse). PTSD shows a substantial comorbidity with mood disorders, other anxiety disorders, substance use disorders, and somatization. The chapter also describes how treatment may have to be adapted if comorbid conditions need to be addressed. Although treatment guidelines recommend trauma-focused psychological treatments as the first-line treatments for PTSD, they acknowledge a role for medication. This edition first published 2013 © 2013 John Wiley & Sons, Ltd.
Effect of different angles of knee flexion on leg extensor power in healthy individuals.
OBJECTIVES: To investigate the effect of fixed flexion knee deformity on leg extensor power as measured by the Nottingham leg extensor power rig. DESIGN: Cross-sectional observational study. SETTING: Orthopaedic hospital. PARTICIPANTS: A convenience sample of 135 adult participants. MAIN OUTCOME MEASURES: leg extensor power normalised for body weight, UCLA activity scale. RESULTS: Power values at 0° FF were found to be significantly less than power values at 15° FF [difference 0.21W/kg SD .36], and power values at 15° FF were significantly less than those at 30° FF [difference 0.31W/kg SD .43; P<0.001) in both right and left legs. Age and activity levels were moderately negatively correlated, with UCLA score decreasing with increasing age (-0.343, P<0.0005). No significant correlation was found between activity levels measured on the UCLA and power on the LEP. CONCLUSIONS: Given the large range of pre-operative maximal extension, the validity of testing each patient at their own maximal range of pre-intervention extension and then at the same angle post-intervention is questionable. In studies assessing change in power following an intervention, the end point angle should be standardised between individuals. In future studies investigating leg extensor power on the LEP rig pre and post intervention, it could be more appropriate to standardise the angle of FF to 30°, with individuals who are unable to achieve this position excluded from the study.
The Child PTSD Symptom Scale: an update and replication of its psychometric properties.
The psychometric properties of the child PTSD Symptom Scale (CPSS) were examined in 2 samples. Sample 1 (N = 185, ages 6-17 years) consisted of children recruited from hospitals after accidental injury, assault, and road traffic trauma, and assessed 6 months posttrauma. Sample 2 (N = 68, ages 6-17 years) comprised treatment-seeking children who had experienced diverse traumas. In both samples psychometric properties were generally good to very good (internal reliability for total CPSS scores = .83 and .90, respectively). The point-biserial correlation of the CPSS with posttraumatic stress disorder (PTSD) diagnosis derived from structured clinical interview was .51, and children diagnosed with PTSD reported significantly higher symptoms than non-PTSD children. The CPSS demonstrated applicability to be used as a diagnostic measure, demonstrating sensitivity of 84% and specificity of 72%. The performance of the CPSS Symptom Severity Scale to accurately identify PTSD at varying cutoffs is reported in both samples, with a score of 16 or above suggested as a revised cutoff.
Clique size and network characteristics in hyperlink cinema. Constraints of evolved psychology.
Hyperlink cinema is an emergent film genre that seeks to push the boundaries of the medium in order to mirror contemporary life in the globalized community. Films in the genre thus create an interacting network across space and time in such a way as to suggest that people's lives can intersect on scales that would not have been possible without modern technologies of travel and communication. This allows us to test the hypothesis that new kinds of media might permit us to break through the natural cognitive constraints that limit the number and quality of social relationships we can manage in the conventional face-to-face world. We used network analysis to test this hypothesis with data from 12 hyperlink films, using 10 motion pictures from a more conventional film genre as a control. We found few differences between hyperlink cinema films and the control genre, and few differences between hyperlink cinema films and either the real world or classical drama (e.g., Shakespeare's plays). Conversation group size seems to be especially resilient to alteration. It seems that, despite many efficiency advantages, modern media are unable to circumvent the constraints imposed by our evolved psychology.
Early auditory processing in area V5/MT+ of the congenitally blind brain.
Previous imaging studies of congenital blindness have studied individuals with heterogeneous causes of blindness, which may influence the nature and extent of cross-modal plasticity. Here, we scanned a homogeneous group of blind people with bilateral congenital anophthalmia, a condition in which both eyes fail to develop, and, as a result, the visual pathway is not stimulated by either light or retinal waves. This model of congenital blindness presents an opportunity to investigate the effects of very early visual deafferentation on the functional organization of the brain. In anophthalmic animals, the occipital cortex receives direct subcortical auditory input. We hypothesized that this pattern of subcortical reorganization ought to result in a topographic mapping of auditory frequency information in the occipital cortex of anophthalmic people. Using functional MRI, we examined auditory-evoked activity to pure tones of high, medium, and low frequencies. Activity in the superior temporal cortex was significantly reduced in anophthalmic compared with sighted participants. In the occipital cortex, a region corresponding to the cytoarchitectural area V5/MT+ was activated in the anophthalmic participants but not in sighted controls. Whereas previous studies in the blind indicate that this cortical area is activated to auditory motion, our data show it is also active for trains of pure tone stimuli and in some anophthalmic participants shows a topographic mapping (tonotopy). Therefore, this region appears to be performing early sensory processing, possibly served by direct subcortical input from the pulvinar to V5/MT+.
Crossmodal interactions in the perception of expressivity in musical performance.
In musical performance, bodily gestures play an important role in communicating expressive intentions to audiences. Although previous studies have demonstrated that visual information can have an effect on the perceived expressivity of musical performances, the investigation of audiovisual interactions has been held back by the technical difficulties associated with the generation of controlled, mismatching stimuli.With the present study, we aimed to address this issue by utilizing a novel method in order to generate controlled, balanced stimuli that comprised both matching and mismatching bimodal combinations of different expressive intentions. The aim of Experiment 1 was to investigate the relative contributions of auditory and visual kinematic cues in the perceived expressivity of piano performances, and in Experiment 2 we explored possible crossmodal interactions in the perception of auditory and visual expressivity. The results revealed that although both auditory and visual kinematic cues contribute significantly to the perception of overall expressivity, the effect of visual kinematic cues appears to be somewhat stronger. These results also provide preliminary evidence of crossmodal interactions in the perception of auditory and visual expressivity. In certain performance conditions, visual cues had an effect on the ratings of auditory expressivity, and auditory cues had a small effect on the ratings of visual expressivity.
Goal neglect and knowledge chunking in the construction of novel behaviour.
Task complexity is critical in cognitive efficiency and fluid intelligence. To examine functional limits in task complexity, we examine the phenomenon of goal neglect, where participants with low fluid intelligence fail to follow task rules that they otherwise understand. Though neglect is known to increase with task complexity, here we show that - in contrast to previous accounts - the critical factor is not the total complexity of all task rules. Instead, when the space of task requirements can be divided into separate sub-parts, neglect is controlled by the complexity of each component part. The data also show that neglect develops and stabilizes over the first few performance trials, i.e. as instructions are first used to generate behaviour. In all complex behaviour, a critical process is combination of task events with retrieved task requirements to create focused attentional episodes dealing with each decision in turn. In large part, we suggest, fluid intelligence may reflect this process of converting complex requirements into effective attentional episodes.
Attention sharpens the distinction between expected and unexpected percepts in the visual brain.
Attention, the prioritization of goal-relevant stimuli, and expectation, the modulation of stimulus processing by probabilistic context, represent the two main endogenous determinants of visual cognition. Neural selectivity in visual cortex is enhanced for both attended and expected stimuli, but the functional relationship between these mechanisms is poorly understood. Here, we adjudicated between two current hypotheses of how attention relates to predictive processing, namely, that attention either enhances or filters out perceptual prediction errors (PEs), the PE-promotion model versus the PE-suppression model. We acquired fMRI data from category-selective visual regions while human subjects viewed expected and unexpected stimuli that were either attended or unattended. Then, we trained multivariate neural pattern classifiers to discriminate expected from unexpected stimuli, depending on whether these stimuli had been attended or unattended. If attention promotes PEs, then this should increase the disparity of neural patterns associated with expected and unexpected stimuli, thus enhancing the classifier's ability to distinguish between the two. In contrast, if attention suppresses PEs, then this should reduce the disparity between neural signals for expected and unexpected percepts, thus impairing classifier performance. We demonstrate that attention greatly enhances a neural pattern classifier's ability to discriminate between expected and unexpected stimuli in a region- and stimulus category-specific fashion. These findings are incompatible with the PE-suppression model, but they strongly support the PE-promotion model, whereby attention increases the precision of prediction errors. Our results clarify the relationship between attention and expectation, casting attention as a mechanism for accelerating online error correction in predicting task-relevant visual inputs.
Neural Network Modelling of Hierarchical Motor Function in the Brain
This chapter discusses computer modelling of hierarchical motor function in the brain. The focus is on dynamical models that utilise biologically plausible neural network architectures with local associative synaptic learning rules. The chapter begins with a review of our own laboratory’s work in this area. We present a series of hierarchical motor models and relate these to various areas of brain function. This is followed by a discussion of the limitations of these models and directions for future research.
Crossmodal correspondences between odors and contingent features: odors, musical notes, and geometrical shapes.
Olfactory experiences represent a domain that is particularly rich in crossmodal associations. Whereas associations between odors and tastes, or other properties of their typical sources such as color or temperature, can be straightforwardly explained by associative learning, other matchings are much harder to explain in these terms, yet surprisingly are shared across individuals: The majority of people, for instance, associate certain odors and auditory features, such as pitch (Belkin, Martin, Kemp, & Gilbert, Psychological Science 8:340-342, 1997; Crisinel & Spence, Chemical Senses 37:151-158, 2012b) or geometrical shapes (Hanson-Vaux, Crisinel, & Spence, Chemical Senses 38:161-166, 2013; Seo, Arshamian, et al., Neuroscience Letters 478:175-178, 2010). If certain odors might indeed have been encountered while listening to certain pieces of music or seeing certain geometrical shapes, these encounters are very unlikely to have been statistically more relevant than others; for this reason, associative learning from regular exposure is ruled out, and thus alternative explanations in terms of metaphorical mappings are usually defended. Here we argue that these associations are not primarily conceptual or linguistic, but are grounded in structural perceptual or neurological determinants. These cases of crossmodal correspondences established between contingent environmental features can be explained as amodal, indirect, and transitive mappings across modalities. Surprising associations between odors and contingent sensory features can be investigated as genuine cases of crossmodal correspondences, akin to other widespread cases of functional correspondences that hold, for instance, between auditory and visual features, and can help reveal the structural determinants weighing on the acquisition of these crossmodal associations.