Limits of Executive Control: Sequential Effects in Predictable Environments
Cognitive-control theories attribute action control to executive processes that modulate behavior on the basis of expectancy or task rules. In the current study, we examined corticospinal excitability and behavioral performance in a go/no-go task. Go and no-go trials were presented in runs of five, and go and no-go runs alternated predictably. At the beginning of each trial, subjects indicated whether they expected a go trial or a no-go trial. Analyses revealed that subjects immediately adjusted their expectancy ratings when a new run started. However, motor excitability was primarily associated with the properties of the ...
Source: Psychological Science - May 8, 2016 Category: Psychiatry & Psychology Authors: Verbruggen, F., McAndrew, A., Weidemann, G., Stevens, T., McLaren, I. P. L. Tags: Research Reports Source Type: research
Is Seeing Gesture Necessary to Gesture Like a Native Speaker?
We examined this question by studying the speech and gestures produced by 40 congenitally blind adult native speakers of English and Turkish (n = 20/language), and comparing them with the speech and gestures of 40 sighted adult speakers in each language (20 wearing blindfolds, 20 not wearing blindfolds). We focused on speakers’ descriptions of physical motion, which display strong cross-linguistic differences in patterns of speech and gesture use. Congenitally blind speakers of English and Turkish produced speech that resembled the speech produced by sighted speakers of their native language. More important, blind sp...
Source: Psychological Science - May 8, 2016 Category: Psychiatry & Psychology Authors: Özcalıskan, S., Lucero, C., Goldin-Meadow, S. Tags: Research Reports Source Type: research
Touch or Watch to Learn? Toddlers Object Retrieval Using Contingent and Noncontingent Video
The experiment reported here was designed to examine the effect of contingent interaction with touch-screen devices on toddlers’ use of symbolic media (video) during an object-retrieval task. Toddlers (24–36 months old; N = 75) were randomly assigned to watch an animated character hiding on screen either in a no-contingency video (requiring no action), a general-contingency video (accepting touch input anywhere on screen), or a specific-contingency video (requiring touch input on a particular area of interest). After the hiding event, toddlers searched for the character on a corresponding felt board. Across all...
Source: Psychological Science - May 8, 2016 Category: Psychiatry & Psychology Authors: Choi, K., Kirkorian, H. L. Tags: Research Articles Source Type: research
Money Buys Happiness When Spending Fits Our Personality
In contrast to decades of research reporting surprisingly weak relationships between consumption and happiness, recent findings suggest that money can indeed increase happiness if it is spent the "right way" (e.g., on experiences or on other people). Drawing on the concept of psychological fit, we extend this research by arguing that individual differences play a central role in determining the "right" type of spending to increase well-being. In a field study using more than 76,000 bank-transaction records, we found that individuals spend more on products that match their personality, and that people whose purchases better...
Source: Psychological Science - May 8, 2016 Category: Psychiatry & Psychology Authors: Matz, S. C., Gladstone, J. J., Stillwell, D. Tags: Research Articles Source Type: research
Speaking Two Languages for the Price of One: Bypassing Language Control Mechanisms via Accessibility-Driven Switches
How do bilinguals switch easily between languages in everyday conversation, even though studies have consistently found that switching slows responses? In previous work, researchers have not considered that although switches may happen for different reasons, only some switches—including those typically studied in laboratory experiments—might be costly. Using a repeated picture-naming task, we found that bilinguals can maintain and use two languages as efficiently as a single language, switching between them frequently without any cost, if they switch only when a word is more accessible in the other language. Th...
Source: Psychological Science - May 8, 2016 Category: Psychiatry & Psychology Authors: Kleinman, D., Gollan, T. H. Tags: Research Articles Source Type: research
Knowledge Distance, Cognitive-Search Processes, and Creativity: The Making of Winning Solutions in Science Contests
Prior research has provided conflicting arguments and evidence about whether people who are outsiders or insiders relative to a knowledge domain are more likely to demonstrate scientific creativity in that particular domain. We propose that the nature of the relationship between creativity and the distance of an individual’s expertise from a knowledge domain depends on his or her cognitive processes of problem solving (i.e., cognitive-search effort and cognitive-search variation). In an analysis of 230 solutions generated in a science contest platform, we found that distance was positively associated with creativity ...
Source: Psychological Science - May 8, 2016 Category: Psychiatry & Psychology Authors: Acar, O. A., van den Ende, J. Tags: Research Articles Source Type: research
On the Necessity of Distinguishing Between Unintentional and Intentional Mind Wandering
We report the first compelling evidence that an experimental manipulation can have qualitatively different effects on intentional and unintentional types of mind wandering. This result provides clear evidence that researchers interested in understanding mind wandering need to consider the distinction between unintentional and intentional occurrences of this phenomenon. (Source: Psychological Science)
Source: Psychological Science - May 8, 2016 Category: Psychiatry & Psychology Authors: Seli, P., Risko, E. F., Smilek, D. Tags: Research Articles Source Type: research
Motor System Activation Predicts Goal Imitation in 7-Month-Old Infants
The current study harnessed the variability in infants’ neural and behavioral responses as a novel method for evaluating the potential relations between motor system activation and social behavior. We used electroencephalography (EEG) to record neural activity as 7-month-old infants observed and responded to the actions of an experimenter. To determine whether motor system activation predicted subsequent imitation behavior, we assessed event-related desynchronization (ERD) at central sites during action observation as a function of subsequent behavior. Greater mu desynchronization over central sites was observed when...
Source: Psychological Science - May 8, 2016 Category: Psychiatry & Psychology Authors: Filippi, C. A., Cannon, E. N., Fox, N. A., Thorpe, S. G., Ferrari, P. F., Woodward, A. L. Tags: Research Articles Source Type: research
Secure Infant-Mother Attachment Buffers the Effect of Early-Life Stress on Age of Menarche
Prior research indicates that being reared in stressful environments is associated with earlier onset of menarche in girls. In this research, we examined (a) whether these effects are driven by exposure to certain dimensions of stress (harshness or unpredictability) during the first 5 years of life and (b) whether the negative effects of stress on the timing of menarche are buffered by secure infant-mother attachment. Results revealed that (a) exposure to greater harshness (but not unpredictability) during the first 5 years of life predicted earlier menarche and (b) secure infant-mother attachment buffered girls from this ...
Source: Psychological Science - May 8, 2016 Category: Psychiatry & Psychology Authors: Sung, S., Simpson, J. A., Griskevicius, V., Kuo, S. I.-C., Schlomer, G. L., Belsky, J. Tags: Research Articles Source Type: research
The Pandora Effect: The Power and Peril of Curiosity
Curiosity—the desire for information—underlies many human activities, from reading celebrity gossip to developing nuclear science. Curiosity is well recognized as a human blessing. Is it also a human curse? Tales about such things as Pandora’s box suggest that it is, but scientific evidence is lacking. In four controlled experiments, we demonstrated that curiosity could lead humans to expose themselves to aversive stimuli (even electric shocks) for no apparent benefits. The research suggests that humans possess an inherent desire, independent of consequentialist considerations, to resolve uncertainty; whe...
Source: Psychological Science - May 8, 2016 Category: Psychiatry & Psychology Authors: Hsee, C. K., Ruan, B. Tags: Research Articles Source Type: research
Top-Down Processes Override Bottom-Up Interference in the Flanker Task
Distractor interference in the flanker task is commonly viewed as an outcome of unintentional, involuntary processing, a by-product of attention-controlled processing of the target. An important implication of this notion is that the distractors are not subjected to top-down processing of their own. We tested this idea in a modified version of the flanker task, in which letter targets (S or O) were sometimes flanked by ambiguous distractors (a character that could be S or 5 or one that could be O or 0). Distractor interference was dependent on participants’ expectations regarding the category of the distractors (i.e....
Source: Psychological Science - May 8, 2016 Category: Psychiatry & Psychology Authors: Avital-Cohen, R., Tsal, Y. Tags: Research Articles Source Type: research
Recognizing the Presidents: Was Alexander Hamilton President?
Studies over the past 40 years have shown that Americans can recall about half the U.S. presidents. Do people know the presidents even though they are unable to access them for recall? We investigated this question using the powerful cues of a recognition test. Specifically, we tested the ability of 326 online subjects to recognize U.S. presidents when presented with their full names among various types of lures. The hit rate for presidential recognition was .88, well above the proportion produced in free recall but far from perfect. Presidents Franklin Pierce and Chester Arthur were recognized less than 60% of the time. I...
Source: Psychological Science - May 8, 2016 Category: Psychiatry & Psychology Authors: Roediger, H. L., DeSoto, K. A. Tags: Research Articles Source Type: research
Does Causality Matter More Now? Increase in the Proportion of Causal Language in English Texts
The vast majority of the work on culture and cognition has focused on cross-cultural comparisons, largely ignoring the dynamic aspects of culture. In this article, we provide a diachronic analysis of causal cognition over time. We hypothesized that the increased role of education, science, and technology in Western societies should be accompanied by greater attention to causal connections. To test this hypothesis, we compared word frequencies in English texts from different time periods and found an increase in the use of causal language of about 40% over the past two centuries. The observed increase was not attributable t...
Source: Psychological Science - May 8, 2016 Category: Psychiatry & Psychology Authors: Iliev, R., Axelrod, R. Tags: Research Articles Source Type: research
Measuring Intuition: Nonconscious Emotional Information Boosts Decision Accuracy and Confidence
The long-held popular notion of intuition has garnered much attention both academically and popularly. Although most people agree that there is such a phenomenon as intuition, involving emotionally charged, rapid, unconscious processes, little compelling evidence supports this notion. Here, we introduce a technique in which subliminal emotional information is presented to subjects while they make fully conscious sensory decisions. Our behavioral and physiological data, along with evidence-accumulator models, show that nonconscious emotional information can boost accuracy and confidence in a concurrent emotion-free decision...
Source: Psychological Science - May 8, 2016 Category: Psychiatry & Psychology Authors: Lufityanto, G., Donkin, C., Pearson, J. Tags: Research Articles Source Type: research
How You Use It Matters: Object Function Guides Attention During Visual Search in Scenes
How does one know where to look for objects in scenes? Objects are seen in context daily, but also used for specific purposes. Here, we examined whether an object’s function can guide attention during visual search in scenes. In Experiment 1, participants studied either the function (function group) or features (feature group) of a set of invented objects. In a subsequent search, the function group located studied objects faster than novel (unstudied) objects, whereas the feature group did not. In Experiment 2, invented objects were positioned in locations that were either congruent or incongruent with the objects&rs...
Source: Psychological Science - May 8, 2016 Category: Psychiatry & Psychology Authors: Castelhano, M. S., Witherspoon, R. L. Tags: Research Articles Source Type: research
