Recall initiation instructions influence how space and time interact in memory.

Recent work has examined the interaction between space and time in memory search, but there is still limited understanding of this relationship. Here, we test the hypothesis that individuals can exert control over how time and space interact in response to subtle differences in task instructions. To test this hypothesis, we analyzed two experiments where participants completed two immediate free recall tasks, a verbal task involving words presented at a central location and a spatial task involving squares presented at different locations. Some participants were free to recall the words or locations spontaneously in any order they preferred. In contrast, another group was subtly biased toward temporal information by instructions to begin recall from the last presented item before recalling the remaining items in any order they wished. Replicating recent work, all conditions showed clear evidence that recall was organized along both the temporal and the spatial dimensions. Extending this work, we found that the subtle change in recall instructions increased the reliance on temporal information in the spatial recall task. Correlational analyses suggest that spatial and temporal information do not compete when participants search memory spontaneously. However, they do compete when instructions favor temporal information. These findings highlight that individuals can exert some cognitive control over how associative dimensions interact during memory search and emphasize the importance of incorporating such processes into theoretical models.

Testing locus coeruleus-norepinephrine accounts of working memory, attention control, and fluid intelligence.

The current set of studies examined the relationship among working memory capacity, attention control, fluid intelligence, and pupillary correlates of tonic arousal regulation and phasic responsiveness in a combined sample of more than 1,000 participants in two different age ranges (young adults and adolescents). Each study was designed to test predictions made by two recent theories regarding the role of the locus coeruleus-norepinephrine (LC-NE) system in determining individual differences in cognitive ability. The first theory, proposed by Unsworth and Robison (2017a), posits two important individual differences: the moment-to-moment regulation of tonic arousal, and the phasic responsiveness of the system to goal-relevant stimuli. The second theory, proposed by Tsukahara and Engle (2021a), argues that people with higher cognitive abilities have greater functional connectivity between the LC-NE system and cortical networks at rest. These two theories are not mutually exclusive, but they make different predictions. Overall, we found no evidence consistent with a resting-state theory. However, phasic responsiveness was consistently correlated with working memory capacity, attention control, and fluid intelligence, supporting a prediction made by Unsworth and Robison (2017a). Tonic arousal regulation was not correlated with working memory or fluid intelligence and was inconsistently correlated with attention control, which offers only partial support for Unsworth and Robison's (2017a) second prediction.

Reexamining the restraint pathway as a conditional process among adolescent girls: When does dieting link body dissatisfaction to bulimia?

The mediational sequence from body dissatisfaction through dieting to bulimia-often referred to as the "restraint pathway"-has been validated in numerous samples of adolescent girls, but the prevalence rate of bulimic pathology pales in comparison to rates of body dissatisfaction and dieting in this risk group. This discrepancy indicates that the restraint pathway may only apply to adolescent girls possessing certain characteristics or experiencing certain circumstances. Accordingly, the current study examined the moderating roles of thin-ideal internalization, interoceptive deficits, and age by using self-report data from a community sample of 353 middle school (n = 115), high school (n = 112), and college girls (n = 126). We found that (a) body-dissatisfied girls who reported high, versus low, thin-ideal internalization engaged in greater dietary restraint; (b) only dieters who reported high interoceptive deficits and were of college age expressed bulimic symptoms; and (c) the mediating effect pertained only to college girls with high interoceptive deficits, but was strongest for those who reported high, versus low, thin-ideal internalization. These results suggest that the restraint pathway's precision may be fine-tuned through greater sensitivity to potentiating factors and developmental context. Theoretical, empirical, and practical implications are discussed.

Unmasking the component-general and component-specific aspects of primary and secondary memory in the immediate free recall task.

The immediate free recall (IFR) task has been commonly used to estimate the capacities of the primary memory (PM) and secondary memory (SM) components of working memory (WM). Using this method, the correlation between estimates of the PM and SM components has hovered around zero, suggesting that PM and SM represent fully distinct and dissociable components of WM. However, this conclusion has conflicted with more recent studies that have observed moderately strong, positive correlations between PM and SM when separate attention and retrieval tasks are used to estimate these capacities, suggesting that PM and SM represent at least some related capacities. The present study attempted to resolve this empirical discrepancy by investigating the extent to which the relation between estimates of PM and SM might be suppressed by a third variable that operates during the recall portion of the IFR task. This third variable was termed "strength of recency" (SOR) in the present study as it reflected differences in the extent to which individuals used the same experimentally-induced recency recall initiation strategy. As predicted, the present findings showed that the positive correlation between estimates of PM and SM grew from small to medium when the indirect effect of SOR was controlled across two separate sets of studies. This finding is important because it provides stronger support for the distinction between "component-general" and "component-specific" aspects of PM and SM; furthermore, a proof is presented that demonstrates a limitation of using regression techniques to differentiate general and specific aspects of these components.

Exploration of an adaptive training regimen that can target the secondary memory component of working memory capacity.

The dual-component model contends that working memory (WM) capacity consists of two components. The first is a flexible attention component that involves the active maintenance of a limited amount of information in primary memory (PM), and the second is a controlled retrieval component that involves a cue-dependent search of secondary memory (SM) for information that has been lost from PM. Recent evidence has suggested that the adaptive WM training regimen known as "Cogmed-RM" is not optimally designed, because it only targets PM abilities, not SM abilities. The present study was conducted to investigate whether Cogmed-RM could be modified to target SM abilities by decreasing the recall accuracy threshold that defines individual ability during training. The main findings suggested that the SM component of WM capacity could be targeted by lowering the recall accuracy threshold. The present findings are important because they suggest that adaptive training regimens can be designed that selectively target specific components of WM capacity, and they raise the possibility that the potency of existing training regimens can be increased.

Body dissatisfaction and disordered eating within the mother-daughter dyad: An actor-partner interdependence approach.

Research on body image and eating within the mother-daughter dyad tends to emphasize the influence that mothers may have on daughters, with little focus on the concomitant influence that daughters may have on mothers. Utilizing the Actor-Partner Interdependence Model (APIM) within a sample of mothers and their daughters within three age ranges (middle school, high school, and college, N = 356 dyads), we examined relations between mother and daughter body dissatisfaction and restrictive eating and bulimic symptoms. Results indicated that mother and daughter body dissatisfaction significantly predicted their own eating pathology (actor effects). Although no significant partner main effects occurred, a notable actor-partner interaction was obtained; mothers' body dissatisfaction significantly predicted higher levels of their own restrained eating only when their daughters were ages 16 and older. In addition, a moderated actor effect was found for bulimic symptoms, such that the relation between a daughter's body dissatisfaction and her own bulimic symptoms became progressively stronger as her age increased. Overall, the findings provide replication of actor effects, with partial support for mutuality of mother and daughter influence.

Space and time in the similarity structure of memory.

Space and time are both essential aspects of human episodic memory. Yet, behavioral studies into the dynamics of recall have focused more on time than space. For instance, it is now well known that temporally contiguous events are more likely to be subsequently recalled than temporally remote events, as measured by the lag-conditional response probability (lag-CRP), which represents the probability of recalling item i + lag after recalling item i. The present study administered both verbal and spatial delayed free recall (DFR) tasks to a sample of 168 participants in order to measure lag-CRPs along both spatial and temporal associative dimensions. Whereas only the temporal lag-CRP could be measured in the verbal DFR task, both temporal and spatial lag-CRPs could be measured in the spatial DFR task. As expected, the results obtained in the verbal DFR task indicated the typical temporal contiguity effect. More importantly, the results obtained in the spatial DFR task indicated significant contiguity effects along both associative dimensions, and the spatial contiguity effect was found to be significantly larger than the temporal contiguity effect. In addition, the relatively small temporal contiguity effect observed in the spatial DFR task was also found to be significantly smaller than the temporal contiguity effect observed in the verbal DFR task. Altogether, the present findings provided novel evidence that spatial and temporal proximity can both cue sequential dependencies between successive recalls. As such, retrieved context models of episodic memory should be expanded to include spatial context as well as temporal context.

Longitudinal examination of maternal psychological control and adolescents' self-competence as predictors of bulimic symptoms among boys and girls.

OBJECTIVE: Because bulimia nervosa is a problem among adolescents, it remains essential to examine its precursors. The specific etiologic chain investigated in this study is such that maternal psychological control first leads to adolescents' lowered self-competence, which in turn predicts bulimic symptoms. METHOD: Self-report data were collected from 58 boys and 73 girls during sixth, seventh, and eighth grades. Participants reported on maternal psychological control, self-competence, and bulimic symptoms. RESULTS: Using structural equation modeling, we tested our hypothesized longitudinal indirect effects model separately for boys and girls. Results indeed indicated that high maternal psychological control in sixth grade led to lowered adolescents' self-competence in seventh grade, which in turn predicted increased bulimic symptoms in eighth grade for both boys and girls. DISCUSSION: This study uncovers one particular process wherein a psychologically controlling parenting style affects adolescents' development of bulimic symptoms, a finding that may be useful to researchers and clinicians.

ADHD reflects impaired externally directed and enhanced internally directed attention in the immediate free-recall task.

Previous attempts to understand the neurocognitive mechanisms underlying attention-deficit/hyperactivity disorder (ADHD) may be limited by the tendency to focus exclusively on "externally directed cognition" (EDC) while ignoring "internally directed cognition" (IDC; Dixon, Fox, & Christoff, 2014. There is clear evidence that ADHD reflects deficiencies in EDC because of weaknesses in modulatory, motivational, and cognitive control constructs, but little is currently known about the integrity of IDC in ADHD. In the present study, we used a verbal episodic memory task involving immediate free recall to assess the integrity of EDC and IDC in a sample of 111 adolescents, 50 with study-confirmed diagnoses of ADHD and 61 without. The ADHD group was found to have significantly worse scores on outcomes that depend on EDC during encoding (serial position), and significantly better scores on outcomes that depend on IDC during retrieval (lag-conditional response probabilities). In addition, model parameters estimating the contribution of EDC and IDC processes were fit to these data using the retrieved context model of memory search. The model suggested that, during encoding, the ADHD group had slower mental context drift, indicative of weaker externally directed attention to the list items, as well as deficiencies in their ability to allocate and sustain attention when the study list first appeared. During retrieval, in contrast, the model suggested that the ADHD group had faster mental context drift indicative of stronger internally directed attention to retrieved context. These findings provide novel evidence that ADHD reflects impaired EDC and enhanced IDC, and they reinforce the clinical relevance of distinguishing EDC and IDC in future studies. (PsycINFO Database Record (c) 2019 APA, all rights reserved).

Parent ratings of working memory are uniquely related to performance-based measures of secondary memory but not primary memory.

INTRODUCTION: Existing evidence suggests that performance- and rating-based measures of working memory (WM) correlate poorly. Although some researchers have interpreted this evidence as suggesting that these measures may be assessing distinct cognitive constructs, another possibility is that rating-based measures are related to some but not all theoretically motivated performance-based measures. The current study distinguished between performance-based measures of primary memory (PM) and secondary memory (SM), and examined the relation between each of these components of WM and parent-ratings on the WM subscale of the Behavior Rating Inventory of Executive Function (BRIEF-WM). Because SM and BRIEF-WM scores have both been associated with group differences in attention-deficit/hyperactivity disorder (ADHD), it was hypothesized that SM scores would be uniquely related to parent-rated BRIEF-WM scores. METHOD: Participants were a sample of 77 adolescents with and without an ADHD diagnosis, aged 11 to 15 years, from a midwestern school district. Participant scores on verbal and spatial immediate free recall tasks were used to estimate both PM and SM capacities. Partial correlation analyses were used to evaluate the extent to which estimates of PM and SM were uniquely related parent-rated BRIEF-WM scores. RESULTS: Both verbal and spatial SM scores were significantly related to parent-rated BRIEF-WM scores, when corresponding PM scores were controlled. Higher verbal and spatial SM scores were associated with less frequent parent-report of WM-related failures in their child's everyday life. However, neither verbal nor spatial PM scores significantly related to parent-rated BRIEF-WM scores, when corresponding SM scores were controlled. CONCLUSION: The current study suggested that previously observed low correlations between performance- and rating-based measures of WM may result from use of performance-based WM measures that do not capture the unique contributions of PM and SM components of WM.

Application of the dual-component model of working memory to ADHD:Greater secondary memory deficit despite confounded cognitive differences.

The dual-component model postulates that working memory capacity consists of two dissociable components: maintenance in primary memory (PM) and retrieval from secondary memory (SM). Recent application of this model to attention-deficit/hyperactivity disorder (ADHD) has revealed that the SM component is more deficient than the PM component across both verbal and spatial modalities. The present study attempts to strengthen this conclusion by addressing two weaknesses in the previous study. First, the present study shows that the SM component continues to be more deficient than the PM component across both modalities under conditions in which (1) all participants were instructed to use the same recall strategy (resulting in the exclusion of fewer participants); and, (2) individual differences in this strategy were controlled. Second, the present study also documents a group difference in word reading efficiency that is confounded with diagnostic status and that might have influenced estimates of PM and SM capacities in the verbal modality. However, although the SM component is more deficient than the PM component in the ADHD group, the magnitude of this interaction does not vary as a function task modality. These findings are interpreted to suggest that the pattern of WM deficiencies observed are part of a causal pathway that can lead to the symptoms of ADHD, as well as to impairments in reading (and intelligence) due to overlapping cue-dependent retrieval mechanisms. These findings provide additional support for the notion that the SM component of WM is an important and neglected target for treatment.

Examining the process by which marital adjustment affects maternal warmth: the role of coparenting support as a mediator.

This study assessed the longitudinal process by which marital adjustment affects change in maternal warmth over time. Change in coparenting support was examined as the potential mechanism by which the marriage affects parenting. Self-report data were gathered from 148 married mothers of first-born 4th graders at 3 time points, over the transition to early adolescence. Path analyses supported the proposed hypothesis, indicating that marital adjustment leads to increased coparenting support, which then leads to increased maternal warmth. Two alternative models of the time-ordered direction of effects among the study variables were ruled out. This study has important implications for the development of parenting interventions targeting the promotion of maternal warmth.

Marital conflict and preadolescent behavioral competence: maternal knowledge as a longitudinal mediator.

The present study considered whether maternal knowledge mediated the relation between overt marital conflict and preadolescent behavioral competence. Four years of self-report data were collected from 133 mothers and their preadolescents, beginning when the preadolescents were in 4th grade. Marital conflict, maternal knowledge, and preadolescent behavioral competence were assessed at all 4 time points in order to apply a stringent methodology for assessing longitudinal mediating patterns. The results indicated that maternal knowledge mediated the relation between marital conflict and preadolescent behavioral competence. Thus, the present study identified one possible process through which marital conflict may affect preadolescent behavior.

In it together: Mother talk of weight concerns moderates negative outcomes of encouragement to lose weight on daughter body dissatisfaction and disordered eating.

Mothers' influence on their daughters is important for understanding girls' disordered eating and body dissatisfaction. Direct maternal encouragement of daughters to lose weight is linked to daughters' development of bulimic symptoms, and additional findings indicate that daughters whose mothers merely talk about dieting and body dissatisfaction are more likely to be diagnosed with an eating disorder. The current study extends such research by examining the interactive contributions of maternal encouragement to lose weight and maternal dieting discussions to the prediction of early adolescent daughters' body dissatisfaction and disordered eating over the middle school period. Participants were 89 adolescent girls who were in the 6th grade at Time 1. Regression analyses were conducted to examine interactive effects of mother encouragement to diet and talk of weight concerns on daughter body dissatisfaction, drive for thinness, and dieting behavior. Results suggest an interactive effect in which mothers' dieting talk may act as a buffer against the negative effects of direct encouragement to lose weight.

Combined cognitive and parent training interventions for adolescents with ADHD and their mothers: A randomized controlled trial.

This study examined the individual and combined effects of two nonpharmacological treatments for attention deficit/hyperactivity disorder (ADHD): Cogmed working memory training (CWMT) for adolescents and behavioral parent training (BPT) for mothers. Ninety-one adolescents (ages 11-15) and their mothers were randomized to one of four CWMT and BPT treatment and active control (placebo) group combinations of 5-week interventions. At pre- and posttest, mothers and teachers completed rating forms, and adolescents completed neuropsychological measures of working memory (WM). Individual intervention effects showed that treatment CWMT significantly improved WM spans, whereas there were no significant differences for treatment or control BPT on reports of parent-related outcomes. Combined treatment effects indicated an overall pattern of greatest improvements for the control CWMT/treatment BPT group, as compared to the other three groups, on adolescent WM deficit, behavioral regulation problems, and global executive deficit. Most significant effects for outcomes were main effects of improvements over time. A combination of CWMT and BPT did not result in increased treatment gains. However, potential effects of combined treatment may have been masked by greater perceived benefits arising from lack of struggle in the nonadaptive, CWMT active control condition. Future combined intervention research should focus on specific, theoretically driven WM deficits among individuals with ADHD, should include possible adaptations to the standard CWMT program, should examine effectiveness of cognitive treatments combined with contextual interventions and should utilize appropriate control groups to fully understand the unique and combined effects of interventions.

Recall initiation strategies must be controlled in training studies that use immediate free recall tasks to measure the components of working memory capacity across time.

There has been great interest in using working memory (WM) training regimens as an alternative treatment for ADHD, but it has recently been concluded that existing training regimens may not be optimally designed because they target the primary memory component but not the secondary component of WM capacity. This conclusion requires the ability to accurately measure changes in primary and secondary memory abilities over time. The immediate free recall task has been used in previous studies to measure these changes; however, one concern with these tasks is that the recall order required on training exercises may influence the recall strategy used during free recall, which may in turn influence the relative number of items recalled from primary and secondary memory. To address this issue, previous training studies have explicitly controlled recall strategy before and after training. However, the necessity of controlling for recall strategies has not been explicitly tested. The present study investigated the effects of forward-serial-order training on free recall performance under conditions in which recall strategy was not controlled using a sample of adolescents with ADHD. Unlike when recall order was controlled, the main findings showed selective improvement of the secondary memory component (as opposed to the primary memory component) when recall order was uncontrolled. This finding advances our understanding of WM training by highlighting the importance of controlling for recall strategies when free recall tasks are used to measure changes in the primary and secondary components of WM across time.

Mother-adolescent conflict as a mediator between adolescent problem behaviors and maternal psychological control.

This study examined mother-adolescent conflict as a mediator of longitudinal reciprocal relations between adolescent aggression and depressive symptoms and maternal psychological control. Motivated by family systems theory and the transactions that occur between individual and dyadic levels of the family system, we examined the connections among these variables during a developmental period when children and parents experience significant psychosocial changes. Three years of self-report data were collected from 168 mother-adolescent dyads, beginning when the adolescents (55.4% girls) were in 6th grade. Models were tested using longitudinal path analysis. Results indicated that the connection between adolescent aggression (and depressive symptoms) and maternal psychological control was best characterized as adolescent-driven, indirect, and mediated by mother-adolescent conflict; there were no indications of parent-driven indirect effects. That is, prior adolescent aggression and depressive symptoms were associated with increased conflict. In turn, conflict was associated with increased psychological control. Within our mediation models, reciprocal direct effects between both problem behaviors and conflict and between conflict and psychological control were also found. Additionally, exploratory analyses regarding the role of adolescent gender as a moderator of variable relations were conducted. These analyses revealed no gender-related patterns of moderation, whether moderated mediation or specific path tests for moderation were considered. This study corroborates prior research finding support for child effects on parenting behaviors during early adolescence.

Maternal Avoidant Coping Mediates the Effect of Parenting Stress on Depressive Symptoms during Early Adolescence.

We examined maternal avoidant coping as a mediator between maternal parenting stress and maternal depressive symptoms during early adolescence. Three years of self-report data were collected from 173 mothers, beginning when mothers' adolescents were in 6th grade and aged 11-13 years. Utilizing longitudinal path analysis, results indicated that avoidant coping at time two mediated the association between parenting stress at time one and depressive symptoms at time three. Additionally, the reverse direction of effects was examined, revealing that the relation between parenting stress and avoidant coping was unidirectional, while the relation between avoidant coping and depressive symptoms was bidirectional. Our results suggest that during early adolescence, mothers who experience more stress in the parenting role are more likely to engage in higher levels of avoidant coping when faced with parenting problems. In turn, a mother's long-term avoidant reactions to parenting problems may predict increases in depressive symptoms. Moreover, our findings of a bidirectional relation between avoidant coping and depressive symptoms suggest that prior levels of depression might serve as a barrier to efficient and effective coping. The present study may inform preventive intervention efforts aimed at decreasing the use of avoidance in response to parenting stressors by increasing adaptive parental coping with stressors, and providing appropriate support and resources for parents.

Change in Parenting Democracy during the Transition to Adolescence: The Roles of Young Adolescents' Noncompliance and Mothers' Perceived Influence.

OBJECTIVE: This study assessed the direct relation between young adolescents' regulated noncompliance and mothers' democratic childrearing practices as well as the potential mediating role of mothers' perceived influence during the transition to adolescence. DESIGN: Three years of self-reported adolescent noncompliance, perceived influence, and parenting democracy were gathered from 166 mothers and their firstborn children (55% female), ages 9 - 11 years at time 1. RESULTS: Longitudinal path analysis indicated a total effect between adolescents' regulated noncompliance and higher maternal democracy. In addition, the total effect was mediated by mothers' perceived influence, such that adolescents' regulated noncompliance at time 1 was associated with greater perceptions of influence at time 2, which, in turn, was associated with greater maternal democracy at time 3. CONCLUSIONS: Mothers with young adolescents who resist in a relatively mature, regulated manner tend to have more positive perceptions of their influence on their emerging adolescents' behavior. In turn, mothers expecting to maintain their influence despite normative adolescent resistance are more likely to use democratic parenting strategies, granting their adolescents more input in decisions.

Who is most likely to fat talk? A social comparison perspective.

Negative talk about food, weight, or the body that occurs commonly among women--fat talk--is gaining increasing attention. Whereas its negative eating pathology and body esteem correlates have received continued empirical validation, what is not yet known is who is most likely to fat talk. We propose that social comparison processes underlie and motivate much of fat talk. In a sample of 143 college women, we found evidence for the role of social comparison. First, having a stronger tendency to socially compare directly predicts fat talk. Second, as a woman's body image concerns increase, her likelihood of engaging in fat talk increases, and this is intensified if she has a greater tendency to socially compare. Finally, social comparison propensity begins to exert its exacerbating effects at surprisingly low levels of body image concern. Results are discussed in terms of the advantages of using a social comparison perspective to better understand fat talk.