A Pioneer Project of a School Psychotechnic Center (1920) / [Un proyecto pionero de un centro de psicotecnia escolar (1920)]

Emilio Mira y López (1896-1964) was the great international figure of Spanish applied psychology in the first half of the 20th century. His work “The selection of drivers for the Bus General Company” (1922) was a key contribution to the development of personnel selection and the evaluation of professional skills in Spain. Another relevant work, but scarcely cited, has been “Initiation of school children in social life. Necessity of establishing vocational guidance schools or institutes. Means for their creation and development”, to which this article is dedicated. Mira’s work consists of three parts (a) the social preparation of the child at school, (b) the need to establish vocational guidance schools or institutes, and (c) the means for its creation and development. Mira makes a distinction between guidance and selection tasks and discusses various practical aspects such as the minimum working hours of such centers, the structure of the guidance process, and the guidance functions of the center. Finally, the article summarizes Mira’s theoretical and practical contribution.(AU)

Emilio Mira y López (1896-1964) ha sido la gran figura internacional de la psicología aplicada española de la primera mitad del siglo XX. Su artículo, “La selección de conductores de la para la Compañía General de Autobuses” (1922) supuso una aportación fundamental para el desarrollo de la selección de personal y la evaluación psicológica de las capacidades profesionales en España. Otro trabajo relevante, pero escasamente citado, ha sido “Iniciación de la infancia escolar en la vida social. Necesidad de establecer escuelas o institutos de orientación profesional. Medios para su creación y desenvolvimiento”, al que está dedicado el presente artículo. El trabajo de Mira consta de tres partes (a) la preparación social del niño en la escuela, (b) la necesidad de establecer escuelas o institutos de orientación vocacional y (c) los medios para su creación y desarrollo. Mira hace una distinción entre las tareas de orientación y selección y aborda varios aspectos prácticos como las horas mínimas de trabajo de esos centros, la estructura del proceso de orientación y las funciones de orientación del centro. Finalmente, el artículo hace un resumen de la aportación teórica y práctica de Mira.(AU)

Humans navigate with stereo olfaction.

Human navigation relies on inputs to our paired eyes and ears. Although we also have two nasal passages, there has been little empirical indication that internostril differences yield directionality in human olfaction without involving the trigeminal system. By using optic flow that captures the pattern of apparent motion of surface elements in a visual scene, we demonstrate through formal psychophysical testing that a moderate binaral concentration disparity of a nontrigeminal odorant consistently biases recipients' perceived direction of self-motion toward the higher-concentration side, despite that they cannot verbalize which nostril smells a stronger odor. We further show that the effect depends on the internostril ratio of odor concentrations and not the numeric difference in concentration between the two nostrils. Taken together, our findings provide behavioral evidence that humans smell in stereo and subconsciously utilize stereo olfactory cues in spatial navigation.

Hippocampal theta phases organize the reactivation of large-scale electrophysiological representations during goal-directed navigation.

Humans are adept in simultaneously following multiple goals, but the neural mechanisms for maintaining specific goals and distinguishing them from other goals are incompletely understood. For short time scales, working memory studies suggest that multiple mental contents are maintained by theta-coupled reactivation, but evidence for similar mechanisms during complex behaviors such as goal-directed navigation is scarce. We examined intracranial electroencephalography recordings of epilepsy patients performing an object-location memory task in a virtual environment. We report that large-scale electrophysiological representations of objects that cue for specific goal locations are dynamically reactivated during goal-directed navigation. Reactivation of different cue representations occurred at stimulus-specific hippocampal theta phases. Locking to more distinct theta phases predicted better memory performance, identifying hippocampal theta phase coding as a mechanism for separating competing goals. Our findings suggest shared neural mechanisms between working memory and goal-directed navigation and provide new insights into the functions of the hippocampal theta rhythm.

Effectiveness of Acupuncture for Alzheimer's Disease: An Updated Systematic Review and Meta-analysis.

Acupuncture has reportedly improved memory and cognitive impairment in both animal and clinical studies. It may be an effective treatment for Alzheimer's disease (AD). The purpose of this meta-analysis was to review the effectiveness of acupuncture for the treatment of AD. Eight databases were searched for articles published up to and including July 2017, and 13 studies fulfilling the inclusion criteria were identified. The main outcomes assessed were clinical efficacy rate, Mini-Mental State Examination score, Ability of Daily Living Scale score, Alzheimer's Disease Assessment Scale-Cognition score, Hasegawa's Dementia Scale (HDS) score, and adverse events. The methodological quality of the articles was assessed using Cochrane's risk of bias. All the studies compared the efficacy of acupuncture with that of medication, and were published in Chinese journals. Meta-analysis revealed that acupuncture yielded positive results as determined via all the indexes scored except the HDS (95% CI -0.26 to 0.90, Z=0.35, P=0.73). Only one of the studies reported adverse events associated with acupuncture and medication. The rate of adverse events in the medication group was 13%. In most of the studies assessed in the current meta-analysis, acupuncture alone was better than conventional western medicines for the treatment of AD.

Effect of Navigation Problems, Assessment Location, and a Practice Test on Driving Assessment Performance for People with Alzheimer's Disease.

BACKGROUND: People with Alzheimer's disease may be required to undertake clinical and on-road assessments to determine fitness to drive. The manner in which on-road assessments are conducted with drivers who do and do not have navigational problems may affect the outcome. OBJECTIVES: Investigate the effect of 1) navigational difficulties, 2) location of assessment (un/familiar area) and assessment order, and 3) undertaking a second assessment (practice), on passing an on-road driving assessment. METHODS: Forty-three drivers undertook an Occupational Therapy-Driver Assessment Off Road Assessment (OT-DORA) Battery which included the Drive Home Maze Test (DHMT). Participants with/without a history of navigational problems were randomly allocated into three groups: 1) Unfamiliar/then familiar area assessment; 2) Unfamiliar/unfamiliar; 3) familiar/unfamiliar. An on-road assessment protocol was used including over 100 expected behaviors at nominated points along the directed route. For familiar area assessments, the driver self-navigated from their home to shops and services. A pass/fail decision was made for each assessment. RESULTS: A generalized linear mixed effects model showed neither location, nor practice affected passing the on-road assessment. Participants with navigational problems were six times less likely to pass regardless of route familiarity and direction method, and the DHMT was a significant negative predictor of passing. CONCLUSION: Drivers with Alzheimer's disease who have navigational problems and are slow to complete the DHMT are unlikely to pass an on-road assessment. However, navigation and maze completion skills may be a proxy for an underlying cognitive skill underpinning driving performance.

Incidental learning of allocentric and egocentric strategies by both men and women in a dual-strategy virtual Morris Water Maze.

In studies of human navigation, an underlying assumption is that, by nature, navigators are proficient with and strongly biased toward using only one strategy, either allocentric (cognitive mapping) or egocentric (stimulus-response based). Further, research often suggests that males are allocentric navigators whereas females are egocentric navigators. We tested these binary assumptions using two versions of a virtual Morris water maze (MWM). The Dual-strategy maze could be solved using either an allocentric or an egocentric strategy. Preferred strategy was tested by alternating test and probe trials. Two "Forced-strategy" probe trials tested navigators' ability to use their non-preferred strategy. Participants then completed the Place maze that was best solved using an allocentric strategy. In the Dual-strategy maze, there was no particular order of acquisition of a preferred strategy and a quarter of participants switched strategies; this switching was bilateral (from egocentric to allocentric and vice-versa). Navigators were most competent in the use of their preferred strategy. Importantly, navigators did learn (incidentally) information related to their non-preferred strategy and were capable of using that strategy. This pattern of results was shown for both males and females, although females did show a stronger preference for egocentric navigation than did males. We concluded that navigators can use all environmental information available to them and that the tendency to view people as innately allocentric or egocentric navigators does not allow for more nuanced investigations of navigational ability. Such investigations would better inform research into deficits in spatial ability in clinical populations.

How much is remembered as a function of presentation modality?

According to a widespread claim used for teaching recommendations, students remember 10% of what they read, 20% of what they hear, 30% of what they see, and 50% of what they see and hear. Clearly, the percentages cannot be correct, and there is no empirical evidence for the ordering. To investigate the ordering, in a navigation paradigm, subjects were given messages instructing them to move in a grid of four stacked matrices by clicking a computer mouse. Three modalities were compared presented either once, see (visual arrows), hear (auditory words), read (visual words); twice in succession, see-see, hear-hear, read-read; or in two different successive modalities, see-hear, hear-see, see-read, read-see, hear-read, read-hear. Better performance was found for messages presented twice than once, but messages in the two modalities were not always better than twice in one modality. For the twice-presented messages, performance varied as a function of the second modality, with see best and read worst. However, the ordering for the first modality was not reliable and was inconsistent with the widespread claim. Thus, the widespread claim is clearly wrong, not only in its percentages, but also because of its lack of generality.

Dissociable spatial memory systems revealed by typical and atypical human development.

Rodent lesion studies have revealed the existence of two causally dissociable spatial memory systems, localized to the hippocampus and striatum that are preferentially sensitive to environmental boundaries and landmark objects, respectively. Here we test whether these two memory systems are causally dissociable in humans by examining boundary- and landmark-based memory in typical and atypical development. Adults with Williams syndrome (WS)-a developmental disorder with known hippocampal abnormalities-and typical children and adults, performed a navigation task that involved learning locations relative to a boundary or a landmark object. We found that boundary-based memory was severely impaired in WS compared to typically-developing mental-age matched (MA) children and chronological-age matched (CA) adults, whereas landmark-based memory was similar in all groups. Furthermore, landmark-based memory matured earlier in typical development than boundary-based memory, consistent with the idea that the WS cognitive phenotype arises from developmental arrest of late maturing cognitive systems. Together, these findings provide causal and developmental evidence for dissociable spatial memory systems in humans.

Sex differences in associations between spatial ability and corpus callosum morphology.

Rotating mental representations of objects is accompanied by widespread bilateral brain activations. Thus, interhemispheric communication channels may play a relevant part when engaging in mental rotation tasks. Indeed, links between mental rotation and dimensions of the corpus callosum-the brain's main commissure system-have been reported. However, existing findings are sparse and inconsistent across studies. Here we set out to further characterize the nature of any such links, including their exact location across the corpus callosum. For this purpose, we applied an advanced image analysis approach assessing callosal thickness at 100 equidistant points in a sample of 38 healthy adults (19 men, 19 women), aged between 22 and 45 years. We detected a sex interaction, with significant structure-performance relationships in women, but not in men. Specifically, better mental rotation performance was linked to a thicker female corpus callosum within regions of the callosal splenium, posterior midbody, and anterior third. These findings may suggest sex differences in problem solving strategies where in women, more than in men, stronger interhemispheric connectivity-especially between occipitoparietal, frontal, and prefrontal regions-is associated with improved task performance. © 2018 Wiley Periodicals, Inc.

A dataset on human navigation strategies in foreign networked systems.

Humans are involved in various real-life networked systems. The most obvious examples are social and collaboration networks but the language and the related mental lexicon they use, or the physical map of their territory can also be interpreted as networks. How do they find paths between endpoints in these networks? How do they obtain information about a foreign networked world they find themselves in, how they build mental model for it and how well they succeed in using it? Large, open datasets allowing the exploration of such questions are hard to find. Here we report a dataset collected by a smartphone application, in which players navigate between fixed length source and destination English words step-by-step by changing only one letter at a time. The paths reflect how the players master their navigation skills in such a foreign networked world. The dataset can be used in the study of human mental models for the world around us, or in a broader scope to investigate the navigation strategies in complex networked systems.

Interbrain cortical synchronization encodes multiple aspects of social interactions in monkey pairs.

While it is well known that the primate brain evolved to cope with complex social contingencies, the neurophysiological manifestation of social interactions in primates is not well understood. Here, concurrent wireless neuronal ensemble recordings from pairs of monkeys were conducted to measure interbrain cortical synchronization (ICS) during a whole-body navigation task that involved continuous social interaction of two monkeys. One monkey, the passenger, was carried in a robotic wheelchair to a food dispenser, while a second monkey, the observer, remained stationary, watching the passenger. The two monkeys alternated the passenger and the observer roles. Concurrent neuronal ensemble recordings from the monkeys' motor cortex and the premotor dorsal area revealed episodic occurrence of ICS with probability that depended on the wheelchair kinematics, the passenger-observer distance, and the passenger-food distance - the social-interaction factors previously described in behavioral studies. These results suggest that ICS represents specific aspects of primate social interactions.

Cognitive map recall test: A new specific test to assess topographical disorientation.

Topographical disorientation, the inability to orient in a well-known environment, is a very incapacitating syndrome. Despite its relatively high frequency after a right cerebral lesion, there is currently no specific neuropsychological test to assess it. We propose a completely new test, with preliminary normative data, assessing the subjects' ability to recall allocentric spatial information from their cognitive map. The subjects are asked to mentally compare distances and directions between landmarks in their familiar environment. This necessitates creating an individual version of the test tailored to every participant's knowledge. This task was proposed to 53 patients with a right lesion and a control group (N = 133). We evaluated performance at comparing distances and directions, and the impact of sociodemographic variables (age, gender, and education). Results show that a right cerebral lesion leads to difficulties in evoking and comparing allocentric spatial information, and more specifically in judging directions. Furthermore, the results show an impact of age, but not gender nor education, on recalling information from a cognitive map. Although there are some intrinsic difficulties (for example in creating patient-specific versions of the test), preliminary normative data indicate that this original test is workable and provides important information in assessing topographical disorientation in clinical practice.

Low-frequency theta oscillations in the human hippocampus during real-world and virtual navigation.

Low-Frequency Oscillations (LFO) in the range of 7-9 Hz, or theta rhythm, has been recorded in rodents ambulating in the real world. However, intra-hippocampus EEG recordings during virtual navigation in humans have consistently reported LFO that appear to predominate around 3-4 Hz. Here we report clear evidence of 7-9 Hz rhythmicity in raw intra-hippocampus EEG traces during real as well as virtual movement. Oscillations typically occur at a lower frequency in virtual than real world navigation. This study highlights the possibility that human and rodent hippocampal EEG activity are not as different as previously reported and this difference may arise, in part, due to the lack of actual movement in previous human navigation studies, which were virtual.

Variability of the mental representation of the cochlear anatomy during cochlear implantation.

The aim of this study was to assess the mental representation of the insertion axis of surgeons with different degrees of experience, and reproducibility of the insertion axis in repeated measures. A mastoidectomy and a posterior tympanotomy were prepared in five different artificial temporal bones. A cone-beam CT was performed for each temporal bone and the data were registered on a magnetic navigation system. In these five temporal bones, 16 surgeons (3 experts; >50 cochlear implant surgery/year; 7 fellows with few cochlear implant experience, and 6 residents) were asked to determine the optimal insertion axis according to their mental representation. Compared to a planned ideal axis, the insertion axis was better determined by the experts with higher accuracy (axial: 7° ± 1.5°, coronal: 6° ± 1.5°) than fellows (axial: 14° ± 1.7°, coronal: 13° ± 1.7°; p < 0.05), or residents (axial: 15° ± 1.5°; p < 0.001, coronal: 17° ± 1.9°; p < 0.001). This study suggests that mental representation of the cochlea is experience-dependent. A high variation of the insertion axis to the scala tympani can be observed due to the complexity of the temporal bone anatomy and lack of landmarks to determine scala tympani orientation. Navigation systems can be used to evaluate and improve mental representation of the insertion axis to the scala tympani for cochlear implant surgery.

Route learning in Korsakoff's syndrome: Residual acquisition of spatial memory despite profound amnesia.

Korsakoff's syndrome (KS) is characterized by explicit amnesia, but relatively spared implicit memory. The aim of this study was to assess to what extent KS patients can acquire spatial information while performing a spatial navigation task. Furthermore, we examined whether residual spatial acquisition in KS was based on automatic or effortful coding processes. Therefore, 20 KS patients and 20 matched healthy controls performed six tasks on spatial navigation after they navigated through a residential area. Ten participants per group were instructed to pay close attention (intentional condition), while 10 received mock instructions (incidental condition). KS patients showed hampered performance on a majority of tasks, yet their performance was superior to chance level on a route time and distance estimation tasks, a map drawing task and a route walking task. Performance was relatively spared on the route distance estimation task, but there were large variations between participants. Acquisition in KS was automatic rather than effortful, since no significant differences were obtained between the intentional and incidental condition on any task, whereas for the healthy controls, the intention to learn was beneficial for the map drawing task and the route walking task. The results of this study suggest that KS patients are still able to acquire spatial information during navigation on multiple domains despite the presence of the explicit amnesia. Residual acquisition is most likely based on automatic coding processes.