ORCA: A picture database of object-scene arrangements for cross-cultural and aging research.

In recent years, cross-cultural research on the modulation of basic cognitive processes by culture has intensified - also from an aging perspective. Despite this increased research interest, only a few cross-culturally normed non-verbal stimulus sets are available to support cross-cultural cognitive research in younger and older adults. Here we present the ORCA (Official Rating of Complex Arrangements) picture database, which includes a total of 720 object-scene compositions sorted into 180 quadruples (e.g., two different helmets placed in two different deserts). Each quadruple contains visually and semantically matched pairs of objects and pairs of scenes with varying degrees of semantic fit between objects and scenes. A total of 95 younger and older German and Chinese adults rated every object-scene pair on object familiarity and semantic fit between object and scene. While the ratings were significantly correlated between cultures and age groups, small but significant culture and age differences emerged. Object familiarity was higher for older adults than younger adults and for German participants than for Chinese participants. Semantic fit was rated lower by German older adults and Chinese younger adults as compared to German younger adults and Chinese older adults. Due to the large number of stimuli, our database is particularly well suited for cognitive and neuroscientific research on cross-cultural and age-related differences in perception, attention, and memory.

Electrophysiological evidence for context reinstatement effects on object recognition memory.

Reinstating the context present at encoding during the test phase generally enhances recognition memory compared with changing the context when specific item-context associations are established during encoding. However, it remains unclear whether context reinstatement improves the performance in differentiating between old and similar items in recognition memory tests and what underlying cognitive processes are involved. Using the context reinstatement paradigm together with event-related potentials (ERP), we examined the context-dependent effects of background scenes on recognition discrimination among similar objects. Participants were instructed to associate intentionally specific objects with background scenes during the encoding phase and subsequently complete an object recognition memory task, during which old and similar new objects were presented superimposed over the studied old or similar new background scenes. Electroencephalogram was recorded to measure the electrophysiological manifestations of cognitive processes associated with episodic retrieval. Behavioral results revealed enhanced performance in differentiating old from similar objects in the old context, as opposed to the similar context condition. Importantly, ERP results indicated a more pronounced recollection-related parietal object old/new effect in the old context compared to the similar context condition. This suggests that the ability to distinguish between old and similar objects in recognition memory is primarily driven by recollection rather than familiarity, particularly when the encoding context is reinstated during the test phase. Our findings are in line with the account that the impact of context reinstatement on object recognition memory is attributable to the enhanced recollection of specific item-context associations during retrieval and provides evidence for the specificity of episodic associative representations.

The effect of shared distinctiveness on source memory: An event-related potential study.

An illusory correlation (IC) is the erroneous perception that two actually uncorrelated categories are correlated. The Shared Distinctiveness Approach (SDA) explains ICs with heightened accessibility of distinctive category combinations in episodic memory. However, empirical evidence for this approach is heterogeneous. In the present event-related potential (ERP) study, we exploited the fact that more distinctive items elicit larger P300 responses than less distinctive items, which potentially predict subsequent memory performance differences for such items. Distinctiveness at encoding was created by presenting words that differed from frequently presented, positive words in valence, font color, or both. We hypothesized that shared distinctiveness (deviation in both color and valence) would lead to an enhanced P300 subsequent memory effect (SME), better source memory performance, and an overestimation of the frequency of shared distinctive items. Behavioral results indicated the presence of shared distinctiveness effects on source memory and frequency estimation. Unexpectedly, memory also was enhanced for positive items in the frequent color. This pattern also was reflected in the P300 for highly positive and negative items. However, shared distinctiveness did not modulate the P300 SME, indicating that the processing of distinctive features might only indirectly contribute to better encoding. This study shows that shared distinctiveness indeed is associated with better source memory and ICs. Because effects were observed for the most frequent and the least frequent category combination, our results imply that the processing of distinctiveness might involve attention allocation to diametrical category combinations, thereby accentuating the differences between the categories.

May the source be with you! Electrophysiological correlates of retrieval orientation are associated with source memory performance.

Successful source memory retrieval is assumed to rely on intact preretrieval processes, such as retrieval orientation (RO). RO is the specialized processing of retrieval cues, depending on the type of information, memory is searched for. In a previous study, a positive frontal slow wave RO ERP effect was interpreted as reflecting memory search for self-relevant information. However, such a functional interpretation is hampered by the use of retrieval strategies as a consequence of which target source information can be indirectly inferred from the correct classification of non-target source information. To overcome this limitation, the present study compared two types of source information (i.e. color or character information) by asking participants to remember details within each source type and thus enforcing the selective retrieval of target information. Consistent with previous research, a positive frontal ERP component (600-800 ms post-stimulus) differentiated between correct rejections in both tasks, probably reflecting memory search for self-relevant information. Moreover, the RO ERP effect was associated with better source memory performance, providing evidence for the beneficial effect of ROs for memory retrieval. This relationship might be covered in memory exclusion tasks due to non-target retrieval.

The event-related potential component P3a is diminished by identical deviance repetition, but not by non-identical repetitions.

Mismatch negativity (MMN) represents an event-related potential (ERP) component which is elicited by deviant sound events in an otherwise regular, repetitive stimulation. The MMN amplitude typically decreases when two identical deviants are presented in direct succession, but it remains stable when the two deviants vary from the standard in different features. Less is known about such repetition effects on another ERP component, the P3a, which usually follows the MMN. In the current study, we investigated how the P3a was affected by identical and non-identical repetitions of sound deviants. The ERP analysis revealed that the P3a amplitudes were strongly diminished when the repeated deviants were identical, but the P3a remained stable when the repeated deviants varied. The findings suggest that not only the deviance detection system, as reflected in the MMN, but also subsequent attention switch systems, as reflected in the P3a, operate independently across different sound features.

Illusory correlations despite equated category frequencies: A test of the information loss account.

Illusory correlations (IC) are the perception of covariation, where none exists. For example, people associate majorities with frequent behavior and minorities with infrequent behavior even in the absence of such an association. According to the information loss account, ICs result from greater fading of infrequent group-behavior combinations in memory. We conducted computer simulations based on this account which showed that ICs are expected under standard conditions with skewed category frequencies (i.e. 2:1 ratio for positive and negative descriptions), but not under conditions with equated category frequencies (i.e. 1:1 ratio for positive and negative descriptions). Contrary to these simulations, our behavioral experiments revealed an IC under both conditions, which did not decrease over time. Thus, information loss alone is not sufficient as an explanation for the formation of ICs. These results imply that negative items contribute to ICs not only due to their infrequency, but also due to their emotional salience.

How does testing affect retrieval-related processes? An event-related potential (ERP) study on the short-term effects of repeated retrieval.

The testing effect is conceptualized as the benefit for remembering items that were studied and tested rather than just studied. Thus far, little is known about the underlying neurocognitive mechanisms. In an event-related potential (ERP) study, we investigated the immediate consequences of testing on recollection processes. During an initial study phase, participants encountered object names together with pictures of the denoted objects ("perceived items") or with the instruction to mentally visualize them ("imagined items"). Directly afterward, they had to differentiate between perceived, imagined, and new items, in two consecutive source memory tests. Half of the studied items were presented in the first run, and all items in the second. Behaviorally, repeated testing led to improved item and source memory, as well as faster reaction times, relative to items that had been tested once. In accordance with these behavioral changes, the left parietal old-new effect (500-900 ms) as the putative correlate of recollection was strongly enhanced by previous testing. An enhancement after testing was also observed for the early portion of the late right frontal old-new effect (700-900 ms). In contrast, old-new effects after 900 ms were not modulated by previous testing. The finding of a stronger left parietal old-new effect for previously tested items suggests that testing leads to an elaboration of memory traces, whereas the faster reaction times are more likely explained in terms of transfer-appropriate processing. The combination of more elaborated memory traces and transfer-appropriate processing provides a tentative explanation for the effectiveness of testing in enhancing retrieval performance.

Not so different after all? An event-related potential study on item and source memory for object-scene pairs in German and Chinese young adults.

In recent years, several cross-cultural studies reported that Westerners focus more on central aspects of a scene (e.g., an object) relative to peripheral aspects (e.g., the background), whereas Easterners more evenly allocate attention to central and peripheral aspects. In memory tasks, Easterners exhibit worse recognition for the central object when peripheral aspects are changed, whereas Westerners are less affected by peripheral changes. However, most of these studies rely on hit rates without correcting for response bias, whereas studies accounting for response bias failed to replicate cultural differences in memory tasks. In this event-related potential (ERP) study, we investigated item and source memory for semantically unrelated object-scene pairs in German and Chinese young adults using memory measures corrected for response bias (i.e., the discrimination index Pr). Both groups completed study-test cycles with either item memory tests or source memory tests. In item memory blocks, participants completed an old/new recognition test for the central object. Source memory blocks entailed an associative recognition test for the association between object and background. Item and source memory were better for intact than for recombined pairs. However, as verified with frequentist and Bayesian analyzes, this context effect was not modulated by culture. The ERP results revealed an old/new effect for the item memory task in both groups which was again not modulated by culture. Our findings suggest that cultural differences in young adults do not manifest in intentional memory tasks probing memory for object-scene pairs without semantic relations when using bias-corrected memory measures.

The first author takes it all? Solutions for crediting authors more visibly, transparently, and free of bias.

With the seventh edition of the publication manual of the American Psychological Association (APA), the APA style now prescribes bias-free language and encourages accessibility even to non-academic audiences. However, even with the newest guidelines, the way we credit authors in psychology remains anachronistic, intransparent, and prone to conflict. It still relies on a sequence-determines-credit approach in the byline, which concurrently is contradicted by the option to consider the last author as the position of the principal investigator depending on the field or journal. Scholars from various disciplines have argued that relying on such norms introduces a considerable amount of error when stakeholders rely on articles for career-relevant decisions. Given the existing recommendations towards a credit-based system, ignoring those issues will further promote bias that could be avoided with rather minor changes to the way we perceive authorship. In this article, we introduce a set of easy-to-implement changes to the manuscript layout that value contribution rather than position. Aimed at fostering transparency, accountability, and equality between authors, establishing those changes would likely benefit all stakeholders in contemporary psychological science.

No evidence for auditory N1 dishabituation in healthy adults after presentation of rare novel distractors.

Previous studies were not able to show that presentation of change stimuli leads to dishabituation of the auditory evoked potential (AEP) component N1 for repeated stimuli. However, these change stimuli were usually themselves repeatedly presented. Here, we tested whether the presentation of non-repeating distractor stimuli ('novels') would lead to N1 dishabituation. The study sample consisted of 18 healthy participants who had to identify auditory target stimuli (´targets´) among repeated standard stimuli and rare novels. AEPs to standards were separately averaged, depending on the preceding stimulus (standards after standards, standards after targets, and standards after novels) and were compared by F statistics and Bayesian t-test. Moreover, N1 repetition effects within recording blocks were analyzed in single trial analyses. The analyses showed that targets elicited significantly larger N1 amplitudes than standards and standards elicited larger N1 amplitudes than novels. In contrast, the N1 amplitude to standards did not vary with the preceding stimulus. The single trial analyses revealed significant, but similar N1 amplitude decreases within the recording blocks for all standards. The current study revealed no evidence for N1 dishabituation, as the N1 amplitude for standards after novels was not increased as compared to the N1 for standards after standards. Thus, stimulus variation had no impact on the N1 of repeated standards, as also suggested by the single trial analyses. The lack of N1 dishabituation is at odds with the assumption that the N1 amplitude decrease after repeated stimulation results from habituation.

Enhanced processing of facial emotion for target stimuli.

It is as yet unresolved to what extent the pre-attentive detection of auditory deviance is modulated by emotion. The current event-related potential study was designed to investigate simultaneously the auditory and the visual mismatch negativity (MMN), as well as the impact of emotion on the auditory MMN. Thirty healthy participants saw sequences of neutral and fearful face stimuli and were instructed to identify easily detectable target faces by button press, whereas simultaneously presented auditory stimuli did not require any behavioral response. Increased N170 and N250 amplitudes to fearful faces indicated a differential processing of the fearful and neutral faces as standards. A visual MMN was clearly elicited by fearful face deviants, but hardly by neutral face deviants. Neither the auditory MMN nor the processing of visual targets was modulated by the facial emotion. However, the N250 modulation by emotion was surprisingly larger in target than in non-target trials. Findings suggest that the pre-attentive detection of auditory deviance as reflected in the auditory MMN is not substantially modulated by emotion induced by visual stimulation. The wide lack of a significant visual MMN to neutral deviants indicates that this deviance detection is not driven by physical stimulus properties (because otherwise the visual MMN to fearful and neutral deviants should have the same magnitude) but strongly by the emotional significance. The behavioral significance of targets apparently led to an enhanced processing of emotional features even though these features were irrelevant for target detection task.

Delay discounting and affective priming in individuals with negative schizotypy.

Previous studies have demonstrated that patients with schizophrenia and individuals with schizotypy experience decreased anticipatory pleasure. However, it is unclear whether this decrease is contributed by altered reward processing at the proximal or distal future. In order to investigate the preference for receiving rewards in the proximal or distal future for individuals with schizophrenia spectrum disorders, individuals with either high or low levels of negative schizotypy performed a delay discounting task under positive, neutral and negative affective priming conditions. Compared with individuals with low levels of negative schizotypy, individuals with high levels of schizotypy exhibited increased delay discounting, preferring to choose immediate but smaller rewards instead of delayed but larger rewards across all three affective priming conditions. Negative affective priming elevated discounting for both groups compared with both the positive and neutral affective conditions. After dividing delayed temporal distance into the proximal and distal future, the results showed that individuals with high levels of negative schizotypy exhibited more preference for immediate but smaller rewards in the distal instead of proximal future compared with controls. Our results suggest that individuals with high levels of negative schizotypy have altered anticipatory reward processing, which is mainly attributed to alterations in representing rewards in the distal future. These findings extend the alterations in representing reward values from schizophrenia patients to schizotypal individuals, and suggest that diminished anticipatory pleasure in schizophrenia spectrum disorders may be due to changes in processing anticipatory rewards in the distal future.

Multisensory temporal binding window in autism spectrum disorders and schizophrenia spectrum disorders: A systematic review and meta-analysis.

Multisensory temporal integration could be compromised in both autism spectrum disorders (ASD) and schizophrenia spectrum disorders (SSD) and may play an important role in perceptual and cognitive impairment in these two disorders. This review aimed to quantitatively compare the sensory temporal acuity between healthy controls and the two clinical groups (ASD and SSD). Impairment of sensory temporal integration was robust and comparable in both patients with SSD (Hedges' g = 0.91, 95%CI[0.62-1.19]; Z = 6.21, p < .001) and ASD (Hedges' g = 0.85, (95%CI[0.54-1.15]; Z = 5.39, p < .001). By further separating studies into unisensory and multisensory (bimodal: audiovisual) ones, subgroup analysis indicated heterogeneous and unstable effects for unisensory temporal binding in the ASD group, but a more consistent and severe impairment in multisensory temporal integration represented by an enlarged temporal binding window in both clinical groups. Such multisensory dysfunction is associated with symptoms like hallucinations and impaired social communications. Future studies focusing on improving multisensory temporal functions may have important implications for the amelioration of schizophrenia and autistic symptoms.

Transcranial direct current stimulation over the left dorsolateral prefrontal cortex modulates auditory mismatch negativity.

OBJECTIVE: To investigate the contribution of the left dorsolateral prefrontal cortex (DLPFC) to attentive and pre-attentive stimulus discrimination via transcranial direct current stimulation (tDCS). METHODS: Novelty- and target-P3 as indexes of attentive stimulus discrimination and the mismatch negativities (MMNs) for duration, intensity, and frequency deviants as indexes of pre-attentive stimulus discrimination were recorded before and after delivering anodal and cathodal tDCS to the left DLPFC. RESULTS: MMN amplitudes for all kinds of deviants decreased from pre- to post-tDCS measurement. For duration and intensity deviants, this pre-post reduction was stronger after anodal tDCS, as compared to the decrease after sham stimulation. No such modulation was found for the MMN to frequency deviants. Neither the novelty-P3 nor the target-P3 was modulated by tDCS. CONCLUSION: The selective MMN decrease after anodal (excitatory) stimulation of the left DLPFC suggests that this region either inhibits the processing of specific auditory changes or modulates the habituation of the MMN to certain kinds of deviances. SIGNIFICANCE: Our finding that left frontal anodal tDCS reduces the MMN to duration and intensity deviants further highlights the contribution of frontal brain regions to MMN generation and extends previous reports of reduced MMNs to frequency deviants after right frontal anodal tDCS.

Characterization and comparison of Cm(III) and Eu(III) complexed with 2,6-di(5,6-dipropyl-1,2,4-triazin-3-yl)pyridine using EXAFS, TRFLS, and quantum-chemical methods.

The complexation of Cm(III) and Eu(III) with 2,6-di(5,6-dipropyl-1,2,4-triazin-3-yl)pyridine (n-C3H7-BTP) in nonaqueous organic solution is studied with extended X-ray absorption spectroscopy. Bond lengths are the same in both complexes. Quantum-chemical calculations performed at different levels support this finding. On the other hand, the Cm.(n-C3H7-BTP)3 complex is formed at much lower ligand-to-metal concentration ratio than the Eu.(n-C3H7-BTP)3 complex, as shown by time-resolved laser-induced fluorescence spectroscopy. This is in good agreement with n-C3H7-BTP's high selectivity for trivalent actinides over lanthanides in liquid-liquid extraction.

EXAFS and time-resolved laser fluorescence spectroscopy (TRLFS) investigations of the structure of Cm(III)/Eu(III) complexed with di(chlorophenyl)dithiophosphinic acid and different synergistic agents.

The complexes of trivalent actinide curium (Cm(III)) with di(chlorophenyl)dithiophosphinic acid ((ClPh)2PSSH) and three different neutral complexing agents as synergists in tert-butylbenzene are studied by EXAFS and time-resolved laser fluorescence spectroscopy (TRLFS). The results are compared with those from the corresponding europium (Eu(III)) complexes. The aim of these investigations is to understand the chemical interactions responsible for the high selectivity of the synergistic systems of (ClPh)2PSSH and neutral complexing agents tri-n-octylphosphine oxide, tributylphosphate and tris(2-ethylhexyl)phosphate for trivalent actinide cations in liquid-liquid extraction. In our structural chemistry study, we find that the inner coordination sphere of extracted Cm(III) and Eu(III) complexes are different. In all complexes the (ClPh)2PSSH is bound to the metal cation in a bidentate fashion and the oxygen donor of the neutral complexing agent used as synergist is directly coordinated to the metal cation. Comparison of the Cm(III) and Eu(III) complexes shows that Cm(III) preferentially binds to the sulfur of (ClPh)2PSSH, whereas Eu(III) is preferentially bound to oxygen. A good selectivity in liquid-liquid extraction is correlated with a high ratio of the sulfur coordination number to oxygen coordination number. This leads to the conclusion that the observed differences in the coordination structure between Cm(III) and Eu(III) complexes play an important role in the selectivity of these extraction systems.