Cognition and Perception Commons^™

Factor Structure Of The Cpt-Ii, Mary Vertinski

UNLV Theses, Dissertations, Professional Papers, and Capstones

The current study investigates the factor structure of the Conners' Continuous Performance Test-II (CPT-II) in four pediatric samples of participants: (a) patients with traumatic brain injury, (b) healthy controls, (c) patients with various clinical diagnoses, and (d) all of the previously mentioned subjects combined. Confirmatory factor analyses (CFA) were used to investigate a one-, three- and four-factor model fit of the data. None of the models examined were an adequate fit for the data; however, it appears that the four-factor model seemed to be the best fitting of the models examined. Failure to find reasonably adequate fit precluded further analyses.

Longer Gestation Among Children Born Full Term Influences Cognitive And Motor Development, Emma V. Espel, Laura M. Glynn, Curt A. Sandman, Elyssia Poggi Davis

Psychology Faculty Articles and Research

Children born preterm show persisting impairments in cognitive functioning, school achievement, and brain development. Most research has focused on implications of birth prior to 37 gestational weeks; however, the fetal central nervous system continues to make fundamental changes throughout gestation. Longer gestation is associated with reduced morbidity and mortality even among infants born during the period clinically defined as full term (37–41 gestational weeks). The implications of shortened gestation among term infants for neurodevelopment are poorly understood. The present study prospectively evaluates 232 mothers and their full term infants (50.4% male infants) at three time points across the first postnatal …

Reliability Of Eyewitness Reports To A Major Aviation Accident, Dave English, Michael Kuzel

International Journal of Aviation, Aeronautics, and Aerospace

There is a paucity of studies on the reliability of eyewitness reports to aviation crashes. We examine witness statements to a widely observed major airline accident to determine if reported accident investigator distrust of details in eyewitness reports is supported by empirical evidence. The extensive archival witness record (N > 300) of a wide-body airliner crash in clear daylight conditions is subjected to statistical analysis to test eyewitness reliability. Even with over 200 witnesses within a three square kilometre (1.6 square mile) area answering a binary observation question, the variance is sometimes high enough to preclude forming statistically significant conclusions …

Positive Affect Facilitates Task Switching In The Dimension Change Card Sort Task: Implications For The Shifting Aspect Of Executive Functions, Hwajin Yang, Sujin Yang

Research Collection School of Social Sciences

Using the modified Dimensional Change Card Sort task, we examined the influence of positive affect on task switching by inspecting various markers for the costs, including restart cost, switch cost and mixing cost. Given that the executive-control processes that underlie switching performance—i.e., inhibition or shifting—are distinct from the component processes that underlie non-switching performance—i.e., stimulus evaluation, resource allocation or response execution—we hypothesised that if positive affect facilitates task switching via executive-control processes, rather than via component processes, positive affect would reduce both switch and restart costs, but not mixing cost, because both switch and restart costs rely on executive processes, …

“Me & My Brain”: Exposing NeuroscienceʼS Closet Dualism, Liad Mudrik, Uri Maoz

Psychology Faculty Articles and Research

Our intuitive concept of the relations between brain and mind is increasingly challenged by the scientific world view. Yet, although few neuroscientists openly endorse Cartesian dualism, careful reading reveals dualistic intuitions in prominent neuroscientific texts. Here, we present the “double-subject fallacy”: treating the brain and the entire person as two independent subjects who can simultaneously occupy divergent psychological states and even have complex interactions with each other—as in “my brain knew before I did.” Although at first, such writing may appear like harmless, or even cute, shorthand, a closer look suggests that it can be seriously misleading. Surprisingly, this confused …

Mixed-Case Format And Lexical Decision Performance: Initial Uppercase Is Special, Julia C. Harvey Azzolina, Lois M. Rotuno, April D. Butler Waltonen, Albert F. Smith

Undergraduate Research Posters 2014

Previous research has shown that there are phenomena that may require a route to word identification by means other than through letters. For example, in a lexical decision task, in which an experimental participant is asked to determine if a string of letters is a word or not, responses to items in a MIXed caSE format are slower than to items in PURE UPPERCASE or pure lowercase formats. In this experiment, we investigated the effect of different mixed-case formats on lexical decision performance, focusing on the type and location of the case transition. Twenty-four students participated in a lexical decision …

Public Management In Political Institutions: Explaining Perceptions Of White House Chief Of Staff Influence, José Villalobos, Justin Vaughn, David Cohen

Selected Works Temporary Series

The notion that public managers influence organizational performance is common in public administration research. However, less is known about why some managers are better at influencing organizational performance than others. Furthermore, relatively few studies have systematically examined managerial influence and scholars have yet to investigate either quantitatively or systematically managerial influence in the White House. Utilizing original survey data collected from former White House officials who served in the Reagan, George H.W. Bush, and Clinton administrations, this study applies empirical public management theory to examine for the first time the key determinants that shape perceptions of chief of staff managerial …

Public Management In Political Institutions: Explaining Perceptions Of White House Chief Of Staff Influence, José Villalobos, Justin Vaughn, David Cohen

Departmental Papers (PS)

The notion that public managers influence organizational performance is common in public administration research. However, less is known about why some managers are better at influencing organizational performance than others. Furthermore, relatively few studies have systematically examined managerial influence and scholars have yet to investigate either quantitatively or systematically managerial influence in the White House. Utilizing original survey data collected from former White House officials who served in the Reagan, George H.W. Bush, and Clinton administrations, this study applies empirical public management theory to examine for the first time the key determinants that shape perceptions of chief of staff managerial …

Kinematic Effects In Large Transport Aircraft, Shem Malmquist, Dennis A. Vincenzi Ph.D., Dahai Liu Ph.D.

International Journal of Aviation, Aeronautics, and Aerospace

The control of an aircraft relies on sensory feedback. It follows that any aspect that could create a situation where that feedback is faulty can lead to unintended outcomes. The size of very large jet aircraft can result in kinematic effects that impact the perceptions of the flight crew. Due to the large amount of inertia involved, coupled with aerodynamic factors, when the aircraft pitch (θ) is initially changed, the short term actual motion of the aircraft, as viewed from the center of gravity, remains relatively unchanged. As a consequence of aircraft design, this results in the flight deck changing …

The Use Of Hemifield Eye-Patching For Modifying The Perceptual-Attentional Bias In Healthy Individuals, Randall L. Miller

Seton Hall University Dissertations and Theses (ETDs)

Healthy individuals do not perceive the left and right sides of space equally, showing a leftward spatial bias on visuospatial tasks. This bias may be more attributed to a perceptual-attentional (PA) component than a motor-intentional (MI) component. While monocular eye patching alters this spatial bias via modification of PA but not MI, hemifield eye patches that occluded the left or right half of the visual field have been shown to be more effective at modifying spatial bias, but only in patients with spatial neglect. Furthermore, it is unclear whether hemifield patching affects PA, MI, or both. The goal of the …

Prism Adaptation Effects On The Attentional Window, Michelle C. Rosenthal

Seton Hall University Dissertations and Theses (ETDs)

Prism adaptation, a visuomotor adaptation procedure that employs a lateral shift of the visual field, has been widely shown to affect lateral biases in the distribution of spatial attention in healthy individuals. The effects of prism adaptation on the size of the attentional window, the limited area of the visual field we attend to and extract information from without moving our eyes, are not fully elucidated. In this study, I investigated the effects of prism adaptation on the size of the attentional window in healthy young adults. This was accomplished via a useful field of view task, which measures the …

Alternate Forms Reliability For Written Expression Probes, Ashley Carey

Masters Theses & Specialist Projects

The use of Curriculum-Based Measurement (CBM) in schools continues to increase, as it is a useful brief assessment of students’ basic academic skills. CBM measures are used for multiple tasks such as identifying students at-risk, creating local norms, monitoring students’ progress during interventions, and assisting with special education eligibility determinations. Much of the research has focused on CBM in the areas of math and reading. Relatively few studies have examined the area of CBMWritten Expression. Even fewer studies exist exploring the reliability among alternate writing forms. This study determined alternate form reliability coefficients for written expression probes at the second, …

Short-Term Visual Deprivation, Tactile Acuity, And Haptic Solid Shape Discrimination, Charles E. Crabtree

Masters Theses & Specialist Projects

The visual cortex of human observers changes its functionality in response to visual deprivation (Boroojerdi et al., 2000). Behavioral studies have recently documented enhanced tactile abilities following a short period of visual deprivation (Facchini & Aglioti, 2003; Weisser, Stilla, Peltier, Hu, & Sathian, 2005). The current study investigated the effects of visual deprivation on two unique tactile tasks. While Facchini and Aglioti observed significant effects of visual deprivation, neither Wong, Hackeman, Hurd, and Goldreich (2011) nor Merabet et al. (2008) observed these effects. Corroborating these more recent results, no difference in grating orientation discrimination performance was observed between the sighted …

Visual Cues Effects On Temperature Perception, Carrie Anne Balcer

All NMU Master's Theses

The purpose of this study was to measure reaction times (RTs) when a conflict arises between the visual feedback and the temperature of an object. This study focused on the quantifiable RTs along with the qualitative feedback of the participants. It was hypothesized that when the information of the visual and temperature stimuli are incongruent (blue-warm or red-cold), the RTs will be slower than when they are congruent (blue-cold or red-warm). We suggest that vision could convey temperature perception in an independent but complimentary manner. We utilized the Oculus Rift to create a virtual environment that allowed us to control …

Human Centered Design Applied To Perceptual Paradigms, Jonathan T. Fancher

All NMU Master's Theses

This thesis gives three examples of projects that apply knowledge from areas such as human centered design, computer science, and psychology to study sensation and perception. All three of these projects were created to gather information on how humans interact with their surrounding environment and the world. For instance the first area of discovery included the way humans interact within their perceptual and personal space through an interactive table. The second project looks at exploring the neural mechanisms that affect Haptic Hallucinations by creating a device that can give the feeling of bugs crawling on or below the surface of …

The Motivation To Comply With Internal Or External Moral Expectations: Is Just One Motivation Enough?, Huey Woon Lee

Dissertations and Theses Collection (Open Access)

Although researchers have shown how the need to reduce internal discrepancies between one’s current level of morality and one’s moral standard and the need to reduce negative social judgment drive pro-social behaviors, it remains unclear if the presence of both these motivations has additive effects on pro-social behaviors. I propose that the answer is no: people operate on a sufficient motivation principle when deciding to behave prosocially, that is, they should be equally prosocial whether one or both motivations are present. I further argue that individual differences in public (PUSC) and private (PRSC) self-consciousness affect people’s attention to the two …

Holding A Stick At Both Ends: On Faces And Expertise, Assaf Harel, Dwight J. Kravitz, Chris I. Baker

Psychology Faculty Publications

Ever since Diamond and Carey's (1986) seminal work, object expertise has often been viewed through the prism of face perception (for a thorough discussion, see Tanaka and Gauthier, 1997; Sheinberg and Tarr, 2010). According to Wong and Wong (2014, W&W), however, this emphasis has simply been a response to the question of modularity of face perception, and has not been about expertise in and of itself. It is precisely this conflation of questions of expertise and modularity, the consequent focus on FFA, and the detrimental effect this had on the field of object expertise research that we discussed as part …

Dreams And Learning, Cody Mebane Gibbons

Symposium

Project Summary: This study is being done to test one aspect of how paying attention to one’s dreams may influence our waking lives. The idea was inspired by research linking the brain processes involved in long-term memory storage to qualities of dreaming, as well as the potential for learning in lucid dreams. It is hypothesized that the more conscious one is of one’s dreams and dream world, the better one will be at learning. In order to test this, the dreaming ability of 300 Cal Poly students will be analyzed via dream questionnaires with the purpose of seeing if any …

Child Life Specialists’ Facilitation Of Family-Centered Care: The Importance Of Sibling Support, Carissa L. Lane

Psychology and Child Development

Certified Child Life Specialists’ understanding of family-centered care, and their beliefs and practices involving siblings of chronically/critically ill children were examined using an online survey. Participants were Certified Child Life Specialists recruited form the Child Life Council Forum. Relationships between utilization of certain words and support programs offered to siblings, were examined. Findings revealed a relationship in one area of coded language and support program for siblings, but not the other. Findings also revealed that all CCLS believe in the inclusion of siblings during the treatment process, however they are offered less support services than parents. Diverse results regarding multiple …

Incarceration And Reintegration: How It Impacts Mental Health, April M. Marier, Alex Alfredo Reyes

Electronic Theses, Projects, and Dissertations

ABSTRACT

Background: Previous criminal justice policies have been non-effective leading to overpopulated prisons and unsuccessful reintegration. There is a lack of effective supportive and/or rehabilitative services resulting in high rates of recidivism and mental health implications. Objective: This study investigated the perceived impact that incarceration and reintegration with little to no supportive and/or rehabilitative services has on the mental health status of an individual. The emphasis was on participant perception and not on professional reports because of underreporting and lack of attention to mental health in the criminal justice system. Methods: Focus groups in the Inland Empire and Coachella Valley …