This study examined cognitive and temperamental predictors of susceptibility to orientation illusions, using adjustment tasks based on the Poggendorff and Z & ouml;llner figures. Cognitive predictors included field dependence-independence and the efficiency of Posner's attentional networks (alerting, orienting, and executive control), while temperamental traits were assessed within Strelau's Regulative Theory of Temperament. A total of 161 participants aged 20-33 years took part in the study. Susceptibility to the Poggendorff illusion was associated only with lower alerting network efficiency. In contrast, susceptibility to the Z & ouml;llner illusion was linked to both cognitive and temperamental factors: a field-dependent cognitive style combined with moderate or high Endurance, and an efficient orienting network combined with high Briskness. The findings support a multifactorial, illusion-specific account of susceptibility to orientation illusions, demonstrating that attentional, cognitive-style, and temperamental characteristics jointly contribute to individual differences in illusion strength.
One way to develop theories of forgetting in short-term memory is to introduce novel sources of distraction. A recent study reported a vibrotactile changing-state effect, suggesting that a sequence of irrelevant vibrations can disrupt visual-verbal serial recall if it contains variation. The present study aimed to replicate and extend this finding. But Experiment 1 found no evidence of a vibrotactile changing-state effect in visual-verbal serial recall. The effect was also absent in a direct replication of the original report (Experiment 4) and with a visual-spatial serial recall task (Experiment 2). Experiment 3 implemented further variation in vibrotactile properties, varying the timing, strength and spatial location of vibrations, yet produced no disruption. A Bayesian random-effects meta-analysis across all available experiments further supported the null hypothesis. These results suggest that the previously reported effect may reflect a false positive, and contribute to theory refinement by identifying potential boundary conditions for vibrotactile distraction.
Rapid globalisation has resulted in an increased prevalence of non-native accented speech (NNAS) in the classroom. The current study sought to replicate previously observed effects of unfamiliar NNAS on learner recall and anxiety, and to examine if working memory (WM) ability would moderate these effects. Native English-speaking participants were randomly assigned to one of two learning conditions (NNAS or native-accented speech) and watched four lecture videos. Participants were quizzed after each video and were given a language anxiety scale. Finally, participants were given an auditory version of the digit span task. Participants had lower recall scores and reported experiencing higher levels of anxiety in the NNAS condition. In the second experiment, a significant effect of WM ability on recall and anxiety and a moderation effect of WM ability on anxiety was observed. These results have implications for distance education and further expand knowledge relating cognitive factors to understanding unfamiliar NNAS.
MFT activity is thought to reflect generalized deployment of cognitive control. Thus, varied behavioral changes that occur in nature could be underlied by changes in MFT. Within the tetrahedral framework, we examine how both stimulus-locked and response-locked MFT power and related ERPs change in response to real-world nature (Study 1) and nature imagery (Study 2). Study 1 uses a within-subjects design. Participants sat in an urban environment while EEG was recorded during a Flanker Task, then completed the same testing while immersed in nature, and again in the urban environment. Study 2 employed the same design, but subjects were randomized into nature or urban images. In Study 1, N2 amplitude increases after exposure but MFT outcomes do not change. No significant effects emerged for Study 2. Taken together, our results do not provide evidence of MFT as a generalized biomarker for cognitive changes in nature.
While content effects on syllogistic conditional reasoning have been studied extensively, context effects have mostly been studied in the form of pragmatic interpretation of premises. In this study, we propose to study the influence of context as a modulator of retrieval of alternative antecedents, which are known to determine responses on Affirmation of the consequent syllogisms ("If P then Q. Q is true. Therefore, P is true."; Markovits, H., & Vachon, R. (1990). Conditional reasoning, representation, and level of abstraction. Developmental Psychology, 26(6), 942-951). To do so, we embedded syllogisms having few or many alternative antecedents into short stories in which added information either activated or inhibited an alternative. Our results showed that participants used suggested information as expected, where activation of an alternative especially aided participants to reject the conclusion on problems with few alternatives, and inhibition of an alternative especially increased conclusion acceptance on problems with many alternatives. Results are discussed in relation to semantic retrieval theory and the broader effect of context on reasoning processes.
Mental rotation (MR) is the ability to imagine objects rotating mentally. In egocentric MR, participants view a human figure with a lateral feature and decide whether it appears on the right or left side. The task likely requires mentally simulating a change in one's own perspective. Because mental and motor rotations are linked and MR ability relates to postural stability, the present study investigates whether postural control is modulated during egocentric MR. 108 participants stood on a force plate, performing a dual-task egocentric MR paradigm with human figures rotated around the x-, y-, or z-axis. CoP-parameters were analysed using a two-factor repeated-measures ANOVA with within-subject factors "axis of rotation" and "rotation angle". Robust axis- and angle-dependent effects were observed, with particularly pronounced differences for rotations around the z-axis. These findings indicate that postural stability may be influenced by embodied perspective-taking during egocentric MR, providing preliminary behavioural evidence supporting embodiment theory.
This study investigated the influence of negative emotions on strategy selection using eye movements. Participants were asked to find the better estimates of two consecutive two-digit multiplication problems (e.g. 86 & times; 21) in each trial. They could choose between a rounding-down (i.e. doing 80 & times; 20 = 1600) or a rounding-up (i.e. doing 90 & times; 30 = 2700) strategy on each problem. The first problem in a trial appeared on emotionally neutral pictures and the second problem on neutral or negative pictures. Negative pictures increased repetitions of strategies across successive problems, even when the better strategy differed across problems. Eye movements indicated that participants spent less time on unit digits and longer on decade digits under emotionally negative pictures compared to neutral pictures. This suggests that they spent less time efficiently encode crucial problem features for better strategy selection. These findings shed important lights on how attentional capture by negative emotions influences strategy selection during arithmetic problem-solving.
Attention Restoration Theory (ART) suggests that exposure to natural environments can restore attentional resources. While several studies have explored the cognitive benefits of nature, the neural processes underlying ART remain underexplored. We used electroencephalography (EEG) to measure the P300 component, a widely studied event-related brain potential. We hypothesized that exposure to nature would increase the amplitude of the P300, suggesting replenishment of attentional resources. In Study 1, we found a significant increase in P3b amplitude after an immersive nature trip compared to before the trip, indicating increased attentional engagement. In Study 2, participants were randomly assigned to view either nature or urban images. We did not find a significant time by condition interaction for either subcomponent of the P300; however, we did observe a significant increase in P3b amplitude after viewing the images. Our findings indicate that real-world nature and environmental images may produce changes in this brain component.
Chronic Pain (CP) significantly impairs quality of life, making it critical to understand the psychological factors that contribute to its onset and persistence. This study investigated interpretation biases (IB) and memory biases (MB) in 153 individuals (CP = 77; non-pain controls = 76). Participants completed tasks assessing IB using ambiguous scenarios, and MB via surprise short-term recall and delayed recognition (after one month) of pain/illness-related information. Results indicated no significant group differences in IB or short-term memory bias recall, and no significant associations between IB, recall, and recognition in either group. However, signal detection analyses revealed that individuals with CP showed significantly reduced long-term memory bias recognition sensitivity for pain-related stimuli. These findings suggest that CP may selectively disrupt later-stage memory processes for pain-related information, supporting a temporally differentiated account of cognitive bias in CP. This highlights the need to refine existing theoretical models and frameworks.
Learning a second language (L2) as an adult involves integrating new vocabulary into an established first language system. A common challenge in this process is the acquisition of translation-ambiguous words, which have two or more translations across languages. These words are more difficult to learn (Degani & Tokowicz, 2010) and process (Lax & eacute;n & Lavaur, 2010) than translation-unambiguous words, even for highly proficient bilinguals (Boada et al., 2013). This study investigated whether the translation-ambiguity disadvantage extends to adult L2 learners encountering words with varying levels of orthographic similarity between translations (i.e. ranging from noncognates to partial and complete cognates). Results showed that the translation-ambiguity disadvantage was most pronounced for words with higher orthographic similarity, where translation-ambiguous words were associated with lower accuracy and a speed-accuracy trade-off. These findings highlight the complexity of L2 vocabulary learning, emphasizing the role of orthographic similarity and translation ambiguity on the L2 learning process.
This study examined age-related differences in emotional conflict control using a self-relevance-modulated Stroop task with 35 older and 35 young adults. Results showed no age differences in Stroop interference (proactive control) or self-relevance modulation. However, conflict adaptation (reactive control) diverged significantly: older adults adapted to low self-relevance negative conflicts but not positive ones, whereas young adults showed stronger adaptation to positive conflicts. In high self-relevance conditions, older adults adapted to positive but not negative conflicts, while young adults exhibited greater overall adaptation. Proactive control remained stable across ages, but older adults' reactive control was moderated by self-relevance and valence-enhanced for negative conflicts with low self-relevance and positive conflicts with high self-relevance. These findings suggest aging alters reactive but not proactive control mechanisms, with self-relevance serving as a valence-specific modulator.
Deception impairs memory for the truth, a phenomenon known as the memory-undermining effect. This study investigated how consequence severity modulates this effect. Ninety-eight participants were randomly assigned to truth-telling or deception conditions, with severity of consequences (high vs. low) manipulated within-subjects. Memory was assessed using item, source and destination memory tests, alongside memory and belief ratings. The results replicated the memory-undermining effect, showing deception-impaired source and destination memory. However, consequence severity did not significantly modulate this effect on objective memory measures such as error rates or scores. Interestingly, a significant interaction emerged in subjective memory and belief ratings during the source memory test: low-severity consequences showed significant differences between truth-telling and deception groups, whereas no such differences were found in high-severity conditions. These findings suggest that deception robustly impairs objective memory across domains, while the influence of consequence severity appears limited to subjective memory experiences rather than objective performance.
"A bullet!" you exclaim. "(sic)(sic)(sic)(sic)" Mandarin Chinese speakers would say, inserting the obligatory classifier (sic) between the numeral and noun. More than simply syntactic placeholders, classifiers subtly encode perceptual noun features (e.g. (sic) conveys a small, round shape). Is it then plausible a bullet might seem more spherical to Mandarin vs non-Mandarin speakers? We investigated whether Mandarin speakers' judgment of linguistic and non-linguistic stimuli aligns with classifier categories when tested in their native (Exp.1, N= 400) and second language (Exp.2, N= 400). Participants initially viewed single stimuli (e.g. "pistachio"), then selected the most similar of two targets. One target shared classifier with the initial stimulus (e.g. "bullet"), while the other was more semantically related (e.g. "oil"). Mandarin speakers consistently selected shared-classifier targets more frequently than English controls, particularly when completing the task in English. Our results reveal classifier-aligned categorisation, implying that perception may mirror language.
