Psycholinguistics has provided numerous theories that explain how a person acquires a language, produces and perceives both spoken and written language, including theories of proceduralization. Learners of English as a foreign language (hereafter referred to as EFL learners) often find it difficult to achieve oral fluency, a key construct closely related to the mental state or even mental health of learners. According to previous research, this problem could be addressed by the mastery of formulaic sequences, since the employment of (...) formulaic sequences could often promote oral fluency in the long run, reflected in the positive relationship between formulaic sequence use and oral fluency. However, there are also findings contradicting the abovementioned ones, without adequate explanations. This study aims to explore the roles of formulaic sequences in oral fluency, taking into account the relationship between formulaic sequence use and oral fluency. This study investigated 120 pieces of spoken narratives by Chinese EFL learners, using both quantitative and qualitative methods, combined with artificial intelligence techniques. Results of canonical correlation analysis showed that the frequency of formulaic sequences was significantly related to speed fluency (r = 0.563,p = 0.000) and breakdown fluency (r = 0.360,p = 0.001), while the variety of formulaic sequences was significantly related to repair fluency (r = 0.292,p = 0.035). Case studies further demonstrated that formulaic sequences could contribute to oral fluency development by promoting speed and reducing pausing when retrieved holistically, but they sometimes lost processing advantages when retrieved and processed in a word-by-word manner. The inappropriate use of formulaic sequences also neutralized the facilitative effects of formulaic sequences on repair fluency and could mirror speakers’ occasional tendency to sacrifice repair fluency for the improvement of speed and breakdown fluency when using formulaic sequences. Pedagogical implications were provided accordingly to promote sustainable oral fluency development through the use of formulaic sequences. (shrink)

Although widely studied in other domains, relatively little is known about the metacognitive processes that monitor and control behaviour during reasoning and decision-making. In this paper, we examined the conditions under which two fluency cues are used to monitor initial reasoning: answer fluency, or the speed with which the initial, intuitive answer is produced, and perceptual fluency, or the ease with which problems can be read. The first two experiments demonstrated that answer fluency reliably predicted (...) Feeling of Rightness judgments to conditional inferences and base rate problems, which subsequently predicted the amount of deliberate processing as measured by thinking time and answer changes; answer fluency also predicted retrospective confidence judgments. Moreover, the effect of answer fluency on reasoning was independent from the effect of perceptual fluency, establishing that these are empirically independent constructs. In five experiments with a variety of reasoning problems similar to those of Alter et al., we found no effect of perceptual fluency on FOR, retrospective confidence or accuracy; however, we did observe that participants spent more time thinking about hard to read stimuli, although this additional time did not result in answer changes. In our final two experiments, we found that perceptual disfluency increased accuracy on the CRT, but only amongst participants of high cognitive ability. As Alter et al.’s samples were gathered from prestigious universities, collectively, the data to this point suggest that perceptual fluency prompts additional processing in general, but this processing may results in higher accuracy only for the most cognitively able. (shrink)

Perceptual fluency is the subjective experience of ease with which an incoming stimulus is processed. Although perceptual fluency is assessed by speed of processing, it remains unclear how objective speed is related to subjective experiences of fluency. We present evidence that speed at different stages of the perceptual process contributes to perceptual fluency. In an experiment, figure-ground contrast influenced detection of briefly presented words, but not their identification at longer exposure durations. Conversely, font (...) in which the word was written influenced identification, but not detection. Both contrast and font influenced subjective fluency. These findings suggest that speed of processing at different stages condensed into a unified subjective experience of perceptual fluency. (shrink)

Perceptual fluency is the subjective experience of ease with which an incoming stimulus is processed. Although perceptual fluency is assessed by speed of processing, it remains unclear how objective speed is related to subjective experiences of fluency. We present evidence that speed at different stages of the perceptual process contributes to perceptual fluency. In an experiment, figure-ground contrast influenced detection of briefly presented words, but not their identification at longer exposure durations. Conversely, font (...) in which the word was written influenced identification, but not detection. Both contrast and font influenced subjective fluency. These findings suggest that speed of processing at different stages condensed into a unified subjective experience of perceptual fluency. (shrink)

Children with autism spectrum disorder show marked difficulties in reading comprehension, a complex cognitive skill fundamental to successful daily functioning that is associated with core executive functions. However, the neurophysiological mechanisms underlying reading comprehension deficits in these children remain elusive. Twenty-one right-handed males with high-functioning ASD and 23 age-, IQ-, educational level-, sex- and handedness-matched typically developing individuals underwent a reading comprehension test and the semantic verbal fluency test that tapped core executive functions underlying reading comprehension during concurrent prefrontal (...) functional near-infrared spectroscopy measurement. Participants’ information processing efficiency was also assessed. High-functioning ASD children exhibited general reading comprehension [main effect of group: F = 7.58, p = 0.009], selective verbal fluency deficits [Group × category interaction: F = 4.90, p = 0.032] and slower processing speed. Regarding the hemodynamics of the prefrontal cortex, although ASD individuals showed comparable patterns of PFC brain activation to their healthy counterparts, lower PFC intrahemispheric [main effect of group: F = 11.36, p = 0.002] and interhemispheric [main effect of group: F = 7.79, p = 0.008] functional connectivity were evident during the semantic verbal fluency test. At the whole-group level, poorer reading comprehension performance was associated with poorer performance in the semantic verbal fluency test. Moreover, poorer semantic verbal fluency test performance was associated with slower information processing speed, which is associated with reduced left medial PFC functional connectivity. Abnormal intrahemispheric and interhemispheric prefrontal hypoconnectivity is associated with deficits in executive processes essential for reading comprehension in ASD. Our study has provided important implications for the neuropsychological and neurophysiological mechanisms underlying reading comprehension deficits in ASD. (shrink)

ObjectiveTo compare techniques for computing clustering and switching scores in terms of agreement, correlation, and empirical value as predictors of incident cognitive impairment.MethodsWe transcribed animal and letter F fluency recordings on 640 cases of ICI and matched controls from a national epidemiological study, amending each transcription with word timings. We then calculated clustering and switching scores, as well as scores indexing speed of responses, using techniques described in the literature. We evaluated agreement among the techniques with Cohen’s κ (...) and calculated correlations among the scores. After fitting a base model with raw scores, repetitions, and intrusions, we fit a series of Bayesian logistic regression models adding either clustering and switching scores or speed scores, comparing the models in terms of several metrics. We partitioned the ICI cases into acute and progressive cases and repeated the regression analysis for each group.ResultsFor animal fluency, we found that models with speed scores derived using the slope difference algorithm achieved the best values of the Watanabe–Akaike Information Criterion, but with good net reclassification improvement only for the progressive group. For letter fluency, different models excelled for prediction of acute and progressive cases. For acute cases, NRI was best for speed scores derived from a network model, while for progressive cases, the best model used clustering and switching scores derived from the same network model. Combining variables from the best animal and letter F models led to marginal improvements in model fit and NRI only for the all-cases and acute-cases analyses.ConclusionSpeed scores improve a base model for predicting progressive cognitive impairment from animal fluency. Letter fluency scores may provide complementary information. (shrink)

Simple heuristics exploit basic human abilities, such as recognition memory, to make decisions based on sparse information. Based on the relative speed of recognizing two objects, the fluency heuristic infers that the one recognized more quickly has the higher value with respect to the criterion of interest. Behavioral data show that reliance on retrieval fluency enables quick inferences. Our goal with the present functional magnetic resonance imaging study was to isolate fluency-heuristic-based judgments to map the use (...) of fluency onto specific brain areas that might give a better understanding of the heuristic’s underlying processes. Activation within the claustrum for fluency heuristic decisions was found. Given that claustrum activation is thought to reflect the integration of perceptual and memory elements into a conscious gestalt, we suggest this activation correlates with the experience of fluency. (shrink)

Previous studies suggest that morphological awareness and word detection skills have facilitating roles in reading fluency; however, it is unknown whether they can interplay with each other in such roles. The present study explored the relationships of MA, word detection, and passage reading fluency across ages. In total, 180 Chinese primary and secondary school students, aged from 8.52 to 15.67 years, completed tasks for these aforementioned capacities. After controlling gender, non-verbal intelligence, and reading ability at the word level, (...) the results showed that the participants with higher scores for MA or word detection performed better in passage reading fluency. However, the predictive effect of word detection on reading fluency became weaker as the children became older. The interaction between MA and word detection was positive in younger children, whereas this interaction tended to be negative for older children. The results demonstrated a dynamic interplay between MA and word detection in contributing to passage reading fluency in Chinese children. While it has a positive interaction with word detection on reading fluency in younger children, MA may become a compensator in older children whose word detection skills are less effective in facilitating fluent reading. (shrink)

This study aimed to investigate the relationship between cognitive abilities and age differences in information search and the moderating role of task self-relevance by measuring the decision-making process of participants in both high and low self-relevance decision tasks. The participants were 57 young adults and 65 older adults who viewed five alternatives ☓ five attributes decision matrices in which they needed to open the information cells they wanted to explore by clicking the mouse. Processing speed, verbal fluency, working (...) memory and vocabulary were measured as cognitive abilities. The dependent variables were search engagement (including time-related engagement and frequency-related engagement) and search pattern (calculated based on alternative-based or attribute-based search). Results from a structured equation model showed that age negatively predicted these cognitive abilities (processing speed, verbal fluency, working memory and vocabulary), and positively predicted information searching engagement. Processing speed mediated the impact of age on study time per cell under tasks with both high and low self-relevance; whereas verbal fluency mediates total searching time and searching time per check only when the task is highly self-related, but not in the task with low self-relevance. These results suggested that self-relevance could moderate the mediation effect of verbal fluency on the relationship between age and information searching time, which means that older adults whose verbal fluency was limited need relatively more time to search information to make an informed decision. However, this impact is only sufficient when the decision task is highly self-related and draws more engagement motivation into it. (shrink)

We report on five experiments investigating response choices and response times to simple science questions that evoke student “misconceptions,” and we construct a simple model to explain the patterns of response choices. Physics students were asked to compare a physical quantity represented by the slope, such as speed, on simple physics graphs. We found that response times of incorrect answers, resulting from comparing heights, were faster than response times of correct answers comparing slopes. This result alone might be explained (...) by the fact that height was typically processed faster than slope for this kind of task, which we confirmed in a separate experiment. However, we hypothesize that the difference in response time is an indicator of the cause of the response choice. To support this, we found that imposing a 3-s delay in responding increased the number of students comparing slopes on the task. Additionally a significant proportion of students recognized the correct written rule , but on the graph task they incorrectly compared heights. Finally, training either with repetitive examples or providing a general rule both improved scores, but only repetitive examples had a large effect on response times, thus providing evidence of dual paths or processes to a solution. Considering models of heuristics, information accumulation models, and models relevant to the Stroop effect, we construct a simple relative processing time model that could be viewed as a kind of fluency heuristic. The results suggest that misconception-like patterns of answers to some science questions commonly found on tests may be explained in part by automatic processes that involve the relative processing time of considered dimensions and a priority to answer quickly. (shrink)

Quality of language comprehension determines performance in all kinds of activities including academics. Processing of words initially develops as auditory, and gradually extends to visual as children learn to read. School failure is highly related to listening and reading comprehension problems. In this study we analyzed sex-differences in comprehension of texts in Spanish in three modalities presented to 12–14-years old students, native in Spanish. We controlled relevant cognitive variables such as attention, phonological and semantic fluency and speed of (...) processing. Girls’ comprehension was similar in the three modalities of presentation, however boys were importantly benefited by dual-modality as compared to boys exposed only to visual or auditory text presentation. With respect to the relation of text comprehension and school performance, students with low grades in Spanish showed low auditory comprehension. Interestingly, visual and dual modalities preserved comprehension levels in these low skilled students. Our results suggest that the use of visual-text support during auditory language presentation could be beneficial for low school performance students, especially boys, and encourage future research to evaluate the implementation in classes of the rapidly developing technology of simultaneous speech transcription, that could be, in addition, beneficial to non-native students, especially those recently incorporated into school or newly arrived in a country from abroad. (shrink)

Some theorists, ranging from W. James to contemporary psychologists, have argued that forgetting is the key to proper functioning of memory. The authors elaborate on the notion of beneficial forgetting by proposing that loss of information aids inference heuristics that exploit mnemonic information. To this end, the authors bring together 2 research programs that take an ecological approach to studying cognition. Specifically, they implement fast and frugal heuristics within the ACT-R cognitive architecture. Simulations of the recognition heuristic, which relies on (...) systematic failures of recognition to infer which of 2 objects scores higher on a criterion value, demonstrate that forgetting can boost accuracy by increasing the chances that only 1 object is recognized. Simulations of the fluency heuristic, which arrives at the same inference on the basis of the speed with which objects are recognized, indicate that forgetting aids the discrimination between the objects' recognition speeds. (shrink)

Acoustic speech output results from coordinated articulation of dozens of muscles, bones and cartilages of the vocal mechanism. While we commonly take the fluency and speed of our speech productions for granted, the neural mechanisms facilitating the requisite muscular control are not completely understood. Previous neuroimaging and electrophysiology studies of speech sensorimotor control has typically concentrated on speech sounds (i.e., phonemes, syllables and words) in isolation; sentence-length investigations have largely been used to inform coincident linguistic processing. In this (...) study, we examined the neural representations of segmental features (place and manner of articulation, and voicing status) in the context of fluent, continuous speech production. We used recordings from the cortical surface (electrocorticography (ECoG)) to simultaneously evaluate the spatial topography and temporal dynamics of the neural correlates of speech articulation that may mediate the generation of hypothesized gestural or articulatory scores. We found that the representation of place of articulation involved broad networks of brain regions during all phases of speech production: preparation, execution and monitoring. In contrast, manner of articulation and voicing status were dominated by auditory cortical responses after speech had been initiated. These results provide a new insight into the articulatory and auditory processes underlying speech production in terms of their motor requirements and acoustic correlates. (shrink)

IntroductionParkinson’s disease patients have a significantly higher risk of developing dementia in later disease stages, leading to severe impairments in quality of life and self-functioning. Questions remain on how deep brain stimulation affects cognition, and whether we can individualize therapy and reduce the risk for adverse cognitive effects. Our aim in this systematic review is to assess the current knowledge in the field and determine if the findings could influence clinical practice.MethodsWe have conducted a systematic review according to PRISMA guidelines (...) through MEDLINE and Embase databases, with studies being selected for inclusion via a set inclusion and exclusion criteria.ResultsSixty-seven studies were included in this systematic review according to the selected criteria. This includes 6 meta-analyses, 18 randomized controlled trials, 17 controlled clinical trials, and 26 observational studies with no control arms. The total number of PD patients encompassed in the studies cited in this review is 3677, not including the meta-analyses.ConclusionCognitive function in PD patients can deteriorate, in most cases mildly, but still impactful to the quality of life. The strongest evidence is present for deterioration in verbal fluency, while inconclusive evidence is still present for executive function, memory, attention and processing speed. Global cognition does not appear to be significantly impacted by DBS, especially if cognitive screening is performed prior to the procedure, as lower baseline cognitive function is connected to poor outcomes. Further randomized controlled studies are required to increase the level of evidence, especially in the case of globus pallidus internus DBS, pedunculopontine nucleus DBS, and the ventral intermediate nucleus of thalamus DBS, and more long-term studies are required for all respective targets. (shrink)

According to the Spatial Quantity Association of Response Codes (SQUARC), people hold a mental association between horizontal position and quantity (lower quantities left, higher quantities right). While a large body of research has explored this effect for response speed and judgment accuracy, the affective downstream consequences of the SQUARC remain unexplored. Aiming to address this gap, the present two experiments (pre-registered, total N = 521) investigated whether stimulus arrangements that are compatible with the SQUARC for luminance are affectively preferred (...) to stimulus arrangements that are incompatible. SQUARC-compatible square arrangements (dark-left, bright-right) were preferred over SQUARC-incompatible square arrangements (dark-right, bright-left). The preference for SQUARC compatibility was not moderated by the horizontal orientation of the response scale. Our results confirm the direction of the spatial-luminance association and provide initial support that the cognitive processing of SQUARC compatibility is hedonically marked and appears sufficient to impact affective evaluations. (shrink)

Zeki and co-workers recently proposed that perception can best be described as locally distributed, asynchronous processes that each create a kind of microconsciousness, which condense into an experienced percept. The present article is aimed at extending this theory to metacognitive feelings. We present evidence that perceptual fluency—the subjective feeling of ease during perceptual processing—is based on speed of processing at different stages of the perceptual process. Specifically, detection of briefly presented stimuli was influenced by figure-ground contrast, but not (...) by symmetry or the font of the stimuli. Conversely, discrimination of these stimuli was influenced by whether they were symmetric and by the font they were presented in , but not by figure-ground contrast. Both tasks however were related with the subjective experience of fluency . We conclude that subjective fluency is the conscious phenomenal correlate of different processing stages in visual perception. (shrink)

Background: Parkinson’s disease is a neurodegenerative disease in which the progressive loss of dopaminergic neurons leads to initially sporadic and eventually widespread damage of the nervous system resulting in significant musculoskeletal and cognitive deterioration. Loss of motor function alongside increasing cognitive impairment is part of the natural disease progression. Gait is often considered an automatic activity; however, walking is the result of a delicate balance of multiple systems which maintain the body’s center of mass over an ever-changing base of support. (...) It is a complex motor behavior that requires components of attention and memory to prevent falls and injury. In addition, evidence points to the critical role of salient visual information to gait adaptability. There is a growing understanding that treatment for PD needs to address movement as it occurs naturally and walking needs to be practiced in more complex environments than traditional therapy has provided.MethodsIn this single-blinded randomized-controlled pilot study, an immersive treadmill training was piloted to determine feasibility and preliminary efficacy on gait and cognition in people with PD. Eighteen participants with Hoehn and Yahr stages I-III PD were randomized to either an intervention or a waitlist control group. Following baseline data collection, the intervention group trained for 30 min, three times/week for 4 weeks on a split belt treadmill combined with a first-person immersive video game targeting visuospatial skills and working memory. Assessment was repeated after 4 weeks of training for the experimental group and 1-month after baseline for the control group. Primary motor outcomes were captured with the APDM Opal sensors during 6 MWT, TUG, and TUG Cognitive. Secondary outcomes of cognition were measured with the Montreal Cognitive Assessment, Verbal Fluency and the Symbol Digit Modality Test. Within subject differences were calculated using the Wilcoxon Signed Ranked Test and between subject comparisons were analyzed using the Mann Whitney U-test.ResultsThis novel treadmill training program was well-tolerated with all participants in the intervention group completing 4 weeks of training three times a week without any adverse effects. After immersive cognitive motor training, the experimental group made clinically relevant improvements in gait speed and walking distance during the 6 MWT while members of the control group showed no change or decreased gait speed and walking distance over the 1-month trial. In addition, the experimental group demonstrated significant improvement for the TUG Cognitive and those changes were greater than the control group. The experimental group also improved scores on MoCA and SDMT cognitive outcome measures while the control group did not.ConclusionThe use of immersive gaming technology to engage specific areas of cognition related to gait is feasible in PD. The treadmill training program paired with a customized interactive video game improved walking velocity in addition to non-significant but consistent improvements in other gait measures and cognitive performance in participants with early to mid-stage PD. (shrink)

The ability to generate options for action is crucial for everyday life decision‐making. In this article, we propose and test a model of the cognitive underpinnings of option generation in everyday life situations. We carried out a laboratory study using measures of a wide range of cognitive functions and asked participants (N = 157) to generate options for actions for different everyday life decision‐making scenarios. The results of a latent variable analysis show that the cognitive underpinnings of option generation are (...) consistent across different everyday life situations and, hence, option generation can be conceptualized as a general construct. Moreover, the results of a confirmatory factor analysis reveal that, when controlling for the shared variance among the cognitive processes assessed, verbal fluency, working memory capacity, ideation fluency, and processing speed predicted option generation. These findings suggest that option generation in everyday life situations can be distinguished from other cognitive constructs, such as divergent thinking (in terms of ideas’ originality) and long‐term memory. (shrink)

In this study, we investigated how word- and text-level processes contribute to different types of reading fluency measures. We aimed to increase our understanding of the underlying processes necessary for fluent reading. The sample included 73 Dutch Grade 3 children, who were assessed on serial word reading rate, word-list reading fluency, and sentence reading fluency. Word-level processes were individual word recognition speed and sequential processing efficiency. Text-level processes were receptive vocabulary and syntactic skills. The results showed (...) that word- and text-level processes combined accounted for a comparable amount of variance in all fluency outcomes. Both word-level processes were moderate predictors of all fluency outcomes. However, vocabulary only moderately predicted sentence reading fluency, and syntactic skills merely contributed to sentence reading fluency indirectly through vocabulary. The findings indicate that sequential processing efficiency has a crucial role in reading fluency across various measures besides individual word recognition speed. Additionally, text-level processes come into play when complexity and context availability of fluency measures increases, but the exact timing requires further study. Findings are discussed in terms of future directions and their possible value for diagnostic assessment and intervention of reading difficulties. (shrink)

This study investigates how speed of motion is processed in language. In three eye-tracking experiments, participants were presented with visual scenes and spoken sentences describing fast or slow events (e.g., The lion ambled/dashed to the balloon). Results showed that looking time to relevant objects in the visual scene was affected by the speed of verb of the sentence, speaking rate, and configuration of a supporting visual scene. The results provide novel evidence for the mental simulation of speed (...) in language and show that internal dynamic simulations can be played out via eye movements toward a static visual scene. (shrink)

Olfaction has recently been highlighted as a sense poorly connected with language. Odor is difficult to verbalize, and it has few qualities that afford mimicry by vision or sound. At the same time, emotion is thought to be the most salient dimension of an odor, and it could therefore be an olfactory dimension more easily communicated. We investigated whether sounds imitative of an innate disgust response can be associated with unpleasant odors. In two experiments, participants were asked to make a (...) forced choice between a pseudoword including a disgust sound and a neutral pseudoword, for pleasant and unpleasant odors. Overall, participants chose more disgust pseudowords than neutral pseudowords for unpleasant odors, but this was not the case for pleasant odors. This effect was not driven by a general association between unpleasant sounds and unpleasant odors, but specifically the sounds [x/χ] and [f], thought to reflect physical responses to disgusting odors, as seen in the Polish fu! or the English ugh!. In line with growing evidence that language can encode odor, we provide the first experimental evidence for an association between the sound of a word and odor valence. (shrink)

Do we mentally simulate olfactory information? We investigated mental simulation of odors and sounds in two experiments. Participants retained a word while they smelled an odor or heard a sound, then rated odor/sound intensity and recalled the word. Later odor/sound recognition was also tested, and pleasantness and familiarity judgments were collected. Word recall was slower when the sound and sound-word mismatched. Sound recognition was higher when sounds were paired with a match or near-match word. This indicates sound-words are mentally simulated. (...) However, using the same paradigm no memory effects were observed for odor. Instead it appears odor-words only affect lexical-semantic representations, demonstrated by higher ratings of odor intensity and pleasantness when an odor was paired with a match or near-match word. These results suggest fundamental differences in how odor and sound-words are represented. (shrink)

How can digitised assets of Galleries, Libraries, Archives and Museums be reused to unlock new value? What are the implications of viewing large-scale cultural heritage data as an economic resource, to build new products and services upon? Drawing upon valuation studies, we reflect on both the theory and practicalities of using mass-digitised heritage content as an economic driver, stressing the need to consider the complexity of commercial-based outcomes within the context of cultural and creative industries. However, we also problematise the (...) act of considering such heritage content as a resource to be exploited for economic growth, in order to inform how we consider, develop, deliver and value mass-digitisation. Our research will be of interest to those wishing to understand a rapidly changing research and innovation landscape, those considering how to engage memory institutions in data-driven activities and those critically evaluating years of mass-digitisation across the heritage sector. (shrink)

The date of composition of King Horn has in recent years been moved from ca. 1225 to ca. 1250, or even as late as the 1270s, as more information about the three manuscripts of the poem has become available. Nevertheless, King Horn still seems to lie at, or at least very near, the beginning of the Middle English romance tradition, and it thus holds a special interest as a potential indicator of the way in which that tradition came into existence. (...) This paper explores one key element in King Horn as a step towards a better understanding of both the poem itself and its literary context. (shrink)

The target article by Leech et al. presents a compelling computational theory of analogy-making. However, there is a key difficulty that persists in theoretical treatments of analogy-making, computational and otherwise: namely, the lack of a detailed account of the neurophysiological mechanisms that give rise to analogy behavior. My commentary explores this issue.

We propose an analogy between optical holography and neural behavior as a hypothesis about the physical mechanisms of neural reuse. Specifically, parameters in optical holography (frequency, amplitude, and phase of the reference beam) may provide useful analogues for understanding the role of different parameters in determining the behavior of neurons (e.g., frequency, amplitude, and phase of spiking behavior).

Complex‐trait genetics has advanced dramatically through methods to estimate the heritability tagged by SNPs, both genome‐wide and in genomic regions of interest such as those defined by functional annotations. The models underlying many of these analyses are inadequate, and consequently many SNP‐heritability results published to date are inaccurate. Here, we review the modelling issues, both for analyses based on individual genotype data and association test statistics, highlighting the role of a low‐dimensional model for the heritability of each SNP. We use (...) state‐of‐art models to present updated results about how heritability is distributed with respect to functional annotations in the human genome, and how it varies with allele frequency, which can reflect purifying selection. Our results give finer detail to the picture that has emerged in recent years of complex trait heritability widely dispersed across the genome. Confounding due to population structure remains a problem that summary statistic analyses cannot reliably overcome. Also see the video abstract here: https://youtu.be/WC2u03V65MQ. (shrink)

Odor and color are strongly associated. Numerous studies demonstrate consistent odor‐color associations, as well as effects of color on odor perception and language. Yet, we know little about how these associations arise. Here, we test whether language is a possible mediator of odor‐color associations, specifically whether odor‐color associations are mediated by implicit odor naming. In two experiments, we used an interference paradigm to prevent the verbalization of odors during an odor‐color matching task. If participants generate color associations subsequent to labeling (...) an odor, interfering with verbalization during the task should affect the ability to make color associations. In Experiment 1, contrary to our hypothesis, verbal interference did not affect odor‐color matches. However, since performance accuracy on the verbal interference task was high, it is possible our task did not sufficiently disrupt verbal processing. In Experiment 2, we, therefore, used an active verbal interference task, and still found no difference across interference conditions. Odor naming accuracy, odor familiarity, and odor pleasantness, however, did predict odor‐color matches. This suggests that although color associations are related to semantic factors, they are not generated by recruiting odor labels in the moment. Overall, our results do not provide evidence that language plays an online role in odor‐color associations, instead, they are consistent with the claim that language may have shaped associations during development. (shrink)

Although taste and smell seem hard to imagine, some people nevertheless report vivid imagery in these sensory modalities. We investigate whether experts are better able to imagine smells and tastes because they have learned the ability, or whether they are better imaginers in the first place, and so become experts. To test this, we first compared a group of wine experts to yoked novices using a battery of questionnaires. We show for the first time that experts report greater vividness of (...) wine imagery, with no difference in vividness across sensory modalities. In contrast, novices had more vivid color imagery than taste or odor imagery for wines. Experts and novices did not differ on other vividness of imagery measures, suggesting a domain‐specific effect of expertise. Critically, in a second study, we followed a group of students commencing a wine course and a group of matched control participants. Students and controls did not differ before the course, but after the wine course students reported more vivid wine imagery. We provide evidence that expertise improves imagery, exemplifying the extent of plasticity of cognition underlying the chemical senses. (shrink)

The human experience is shaped by information from different perceptual channels, but it is still debated whether and how differential experience influences language use. To address this, we compared congenitally blind, blindfolded, and sighted people's descriptions of the same motion events experienced auditorily by all participants (i.e., via sound alone) and conveyed in speech and gesture. Comparison of blind and sighted participants to blindfolded participants helped us disentangle the effects of a lifetime experience of being blind versus the task-specific effects (...) of experiencing a motion event by sound alone. Compared to sighted people, blind people's speech focused more on path and less on manner of motion, and encoded paths in a more segmented fashion using more landmarks and path verbs. Gestures followed the speech, such that blind people pointed to landmarks more and depicted manner less than sighted people. This suggests that visual experience affects how people express spatial events in the multimodal language and that blindness may enhance sensitivity to paths of motion due to changes in event construal. These findings have implications for the claims that language processes are deeply rooted in our sensory experiences. (shrink)

During the course of his lengthy career, Edward Schillebeeckx has developed a series of epistemological frameworks which inform his theology. Using the metaphor of “circle” to describe these frameworks, the article will argue that Schillebeeckx in his earlier theology describes experience and knowledge within the framework of an ontological circle of subject and object. In his later work, Schillebeeckx develops a second, hermeneutical circle and finally a critical circle of theory and praxis. Later developments in his thought both depend upon (...) and radically re-interpret the earlier circles of epistemology. Since all theological language and practice must originate within the boundaries of human knowledge and experience, only by this reinterpretation of epistemology, Schillebeeckx argues, can Christian theology begin to meet the challenge of the understanding of faith in the modern and postmodern world. (shrink)

Discourses of recovery and resilience have risen to positions of dominance in the mental health field. Models of recovery and resilience enjoy purchase, in both policy and practice, across a range of settings from self-described psychiatric survivors through to mental health charities through to statutory mental health service providers. Despite this ubiquity, there is confusion about what recovery means. In this article we problematize notions of recovery and resilience, and consider what, if anything, should be recovered from these concepts. We (...) focus on three key issues, i) individualization, ii) the persistence of a deficit model, and iii) collective approaches to recovery. Through documentary analysis we consider these issues across third sector organizations, and public and mental health policy. Firstly, definitional debates about recovery reflect wider ideological debates about the nature of mental health. The vagueness of these concepts and implicit assumptions inherent in dominant recovery and resilience discourses render them problematic because they individualize what are social problems. Secondly, these discourses, despite being seen as inherently liberatory are conceptually dependent on a notion of deficit in that talk of “positives” and “strengths” requires the existence of “negatives” and “weaknesses” for these concepts to make sense. We argue that this does little to substantially transform dominant understandings of psychological distress. Thirdly, these issues combine to impact upon the progressive potential of recovery. It comes to be seen as an individualistic experiential narrative accompaniment to medical understandings where the structural causes of distress are obscured. This in turn impacts upon the potential for recovery to be used to explore more collective, political aspects of emotional distress. Drawing on the work of Fraser, we use this critique to characterize “recovery” as a “struggle for recognition,” founded on a model of identity politics which displaces and marginalizes the need for social, political and economic redistribution to address many of the underlying causes of emotional distress. We conclude by stating that it is only when the collective, structural experiences of inequality and injustice are explicitly linked to processes of emotional distress that recovery will be possible. (shrink)

This paper gives two complete and elementary proofs that if the speed of light over closed paths has a universal value c, then it is possible to synchronize clocks in such a way that the one-way speed of light is c. The first proof is an elementary version of a recent proof. The second provides high precision experimental evidence that it is possible to synchronize clocks in such a way that the one-way speed of light has a (...) universal value. We also discuss an old incomplete proof by Weyl which is important from an historical perspective. (shrink)

On 18–19 May 2018, a symposium was held in the Research Institute of Irish and Scottish Studies at the University of Aberdeen to commemorate the tenth anniversary of the death of Ronald W. Hepburn (1927–2008). The speakers at this event discussed Hepburn’s oeuvre from several perspectives. For this book, the collection of the revised versions of their talks has been supplemented by the papers of other scholars who were unable to attend the symposium itself. Thus this volume contains contributions from (...) eighteen notable scholars of different disciplines, ranging from contemporary aesthetics and art theory through to philosophical approaches to religion, education and social anthropology. It also includes a bibliography of Hepburn’s writings. The essays were first published in two special issues of the Journal of Scottish Thought, vols. 10–11 (2018–2019). -/- Ronald William Hepburn was born in Aberdeen on 16 March 1927. He went to Aberdeen Grammar School, then he graduated with an M.A. in Philosophy (1951) and obtained his doctorate from the University of Aberdeen (1955). His tutor at Aberdeen was Donald MacKinnon (1913– 1994), a Scottish philosopher and theologian, the author of A Study in Ethical Theory (1957) and The Problem of Metaphysics (1974). Hepburn taught as Lecturer at the Department of Moral Philosophy at Aberdeen (1956–60), and he was also Visiting Associate Professor of Philosophy at New York University (1959–60). He returned from the United States as Professor of Philosophy at Nottingham University. In 1964, he was appointed as a Chair in Philosophy at the University of Edinburgh and between 1965 and 1968 he was also Stanton Lecturer in the Philosophy of Religion at the University of Cambridge. From 1975 until his retirement in 1996, he held the Professorship of Moral Philosophy at Edinburgh. He died in Edinburgh on 23 December 2008. His philosophical interests ranged from theology and the philosophy of religion through moral philosophy and the philosophy of education to art theory and aesthetics. Notably, Hepburn is widely regarded as the founder of modern environmental and everyday aesthetics as a result of the influence of papers in the 1960s which pioneered a new approach to the aesthetics of the natural world. (shrink)

A notable feature of classical American pragmatism is its close association with the birth of experimental psychology. In particular, William James’ work as a psychologist influenced, and was influenced by, his pragmatism. This paper seeks to support this reading of the relation between Jamesian psychology and pragmatism, particularly through his “Sentiment of Rationality” and the later contention that the true is the satisfactory. In addition, James’ insights are tested and expanded through reference to contemporary research on processing fluency, as (...) well as concepts of ecological rationality. (shrink)

Predictive processing is an influential theoretical framework for understanding human and animal cognition. In the context of predictive processing, learning is often reduced to optimizing the parameters of a generative model with a predefined structure. This is known as Bayesian parameter learning. However, to provide a comprehensive account of learning, one must also explain how the brain learns the structure of its generative model. This second kind of learning is known as structure learning. Structure learning would involve true structural changes (...) in generative models. The purpose of the current paper is to describe the processes involved upstream of these structural changes. To do this, we first highlight the remarkable compatibility between predictive processing and the processing fluency theory. More precisely, we argue that predictive processing is able to account for all the main theoretical constructs associated with the notion of processing fluency (i.e., the fluency heuristic, naïve theory, the discrepancy-attribution hypothesis, absolute fluency, expected fluency, and relative fluency). We then use this predictive processing account of processing fluency to show how the brain could infer whether it needs a structural change for learning the causal regularities at play in the environment. Finally, we speculate on how this inference might indirectly trigger structural changes when necessary. (shrink)

Statements’ rated truth increases when people encounter them repeatedly. Processing fluency is a central variable to explain this truth effect. However, people experience processing fluency positively, and these positive experiences might cause the truth effect. Three studies investigated positivity and fluency influences on the truth effect. Study 1 found correlations between elicited positive feelings and rated truth. Study 2 replicated the repetition-based truth effect, but positivity did not influence the effect. Study 3 conveyed positive and negative correlations (...) between positivity and truth in a learning phase. We again replicated the truth effect, but positivity only influenced judgments for easy statements in the learning phase. Thus, across three studies, we found positivity effects on rated truth, but not on the repetition-based truth effect: We conclude that positivity does not explain the standard truth effect, but the role of positive experiences for truth judgments deserves further investigation. (shrink)

People can support abstract reasoning by using mental models with spatial simulations. Such models are employed when people represent elements in terms of ordered dimensions (e.g. who is oldest, Tom, Dick, or Harry). We test and find that the process of forming and using such mental models can influence the liking of its elements (e.g. Tom, Dick, or Harry). The presumed internal structure of such models (linear-transitive array of elements), generates variations in processing ease (fluency) when using the model (...) in working memory (see the Symbolic Distance Effect, SDE). Specifically, processing of pairs where elements have larger distances along the order should be easier compared to pairs with smaller distances. Elements from easier pairs should be liked more than elements from difficult pairs (fluency being hedonically positive). Experiment 1 shows that unfamiliar ideographs are liked more when at wider distances and therefore easier to process. Experiment 2 replicates this effect with non-words. Experiment 3 rules out a non-spatial explanation of the effect while Experiments 4 offers a high-powered replication. Experiment 5 shows that the spatial effect spontaneously emerges after learning, even without a task that explicitly focuses on fluency. Experiment 6 employed a shorter array, but yielded no significant results. (shrink)

There is a long history of the science of intelligent machines and its potential to provide scientific insights have been debated since the dawn of AI. In particular, there is renewed interest in the role of AI in research and research policy as an enabler of new methods, processes, management and evaluation which is still relatively under-explored. This empirical paper explores interviews with leading scholars on the potential impact of AI on research practice and culture through deductive, thematic analysis to (...) show the issues affecting academics and universities today. Our interviewees identify positive and negative consequences for research and researchers with respect to _collective_ and _individual use_. AI is perceived as helpful with respect to information gathering and other narrow tasks, and in support of impact and interdisciplinarity. However, using AI as a way of ‘speeding up—to keep up’ with bureaucratic and metricised processes, may proliferate negative aspects of academic culture in that the expansion of AI in research should assist and not replace human creativity. Research into the future role of AI in the research process needs to go further to address these challenges, and ask fundamental questions about how AI might assist in providing new tools able to question the values and principles driving institutions and research processes. We argue that to do this an explicit movement of meta-research on the role of AI in research should consider the effects for research and researcher creativity. Anticipatory approaches and engagement of diverse and critical voices at policy level and across disciplines should also be considered. (shrink)

Research has shown that processing dynamics on the perceiver's end determine aesthetic pleasure. Specifically, typical objects, which are processed more fluently, are perceived as more attractive. We extend this notion of perceptual fluency to judgments of vocal aesthetics. Vocal attractiveness has traditionally been examined with respect to sexual dimorphism and the apparent size of a talker, as reconstructed from the acoustic signal, despite evidence that gender-specific speech patterns are learned social behaviors. In this study, we report on a series (...) of three experiments using 60 voices to compare the relationship between judgments of vocal attractiveness, stereotypicality, and gender categorization fluency. Our results indicate that attractiveness and stereotypicality are highly correlated for female and male voices. Stereotypicality and categorization fluency were also correlated for male voices, but not female voices. Crucially, stereotypicality and categorization fluency interacted to predict attractiveness, suggesting the role of perceptual fluency is present, but nuanced, in judgments of human voices. (shrink)

Hans Reichenbach made a bold and original attempt to ‘vindicate’ induction. He proposed a rule, the ‘straight rule’ of induction, which would guarantee inductive success if any rule of induction would. A central problem facing his attempt to vindicate the straight rule is that too many other rules are just as good as the straight rule if our only constraint on what counts as ‘success’ for an inductive rule is that it is ‘asymptotic’, i.e. that it converges in the limit (...) to the true limiting frequency (of some type of outcome O in a sequence of events) whenever such a limiting frequency exists. In this paper I consider the consequences of requiring speed-optimality of asymptotic methods, that is, requiring that inductive methods must get to the truth as quickly as possible. Two main results are proved: (1) the straight rule is speed-optimal; (2) there are (uncountably) many non-speed-optimal asymptotic methods. A further result gives a sufficient but not necessary condition for speed-optimality among asymptotic methods. Some consequences and open questions are then discussed. (shrink)