In-vehicle fragrance administration as a countermeasure for driver fatigue.

Driver fatigue is a contributing factor in about 10-30% of all fatal crashes. Prevention of fatigue-related crashes relies on robust detection of driver fatigue and application of effective countermeasures. A potential countermeasure is fragrance administration since odors can have alerting effects on humans. The aim here was to investigate if a fragrance incorporating trigeminal components could be used as an in-vehicle countermeasure for driver fatigue. The fragrance was tested in a driving simulator with 21 healthy but sleep-deprived participants. Each participant performed a monotonous driving task twice, once with active fragrance containing a trigeminal component and once with olfactory fragrance, in a cross-over single-blind design. The order of trigeminal/olfactory fragrance was randomized and blinded to the participants. Both fragrances (trigeminal/olfactory) were administered either when the participant fell asleep (defined as eye closure > 3 s) or after approximately 45 min if the participant did not fall asleep. Self-reported sleepiness was assessed using the Karolinska Sleepiness Scale (KSS) every 5 min during driving. Variability in speed and lateral position and line crossing frequency were logged for each drive to measure driving performance. Heart rate measurements (ECG) and eye blinks (EOG) were collected to investigate potential arousing effects of the fragrance and to track objective signs of sleepiness. Mean blink duration, which was used as an objective measure of sleepiness, decreased significantly, after fragrance exposure, as did the frequency of line crossings, but there were no statistically significant differences between the fragrance with trigeminal stimulus and the pure olfactory fragrance. The results are in line with the effects found for other commonly used fatigue countermeasures, like playing loud music. These countermeasures can restore alertness and driving performance for a short while. Whether this is sufficient to support driving performance until the driver can make a safe stop in real traffic remains a topic for future studies.

Implicit and explicit attitudes toward gay men and lesbian women among heterosexual undergraduate and graduate psychology and nursing students.

Objectives: To examine implicit and explicit attitudes toward gay men and lesbian women among heterosexual undergraduate and graduate psychology and nursing students. Methods: Implicit attitudes were measured via the Implicit Association Test and explicit attitudes via the Attitudes Toward Lesbian Women and Gay questionnaire. Main results: All groups held negative implicit attitudes toward gay men and lesbian women. Among undergraduates, nursing students reported holding more negative explicit attitudes toward gay men and lesbian women than psychology students. Conclusion: The curricula in both nursing and psychology studies need to address the medical and paramedical needs and issues of sexual minorities.

Production Improves Visual and Auditory Text Memory in Younger and Older Adults.

INTRODUCTION: The production effect refers to memory benefits for materials that were produced (e.g., read aloud) relative to not produced (e.g., read silently) at study. Previous works have found a production benefit for younger and older adults studying written words and for young adults studying written text. The present study aimed to extend these findings by examining the effect of production on text memory in younger and older adults, in the visual, and in the auditory modalities. METHODS: A group of young adults (n = 30) and a group of older adults (n = 30) learned informational texts, presented either visually or aurally. In each text, half of the sentences were learned by production (reading aloud or writing) and half by no production (reading silently or listening), followed by fill-in-the-blank tests. RESULTS: An overall memory performance was found to be similar for both groups, with an advantage for the auditory modality. For both groups, more test items were filled in correctly when the relevant information appeared in the produced than in nonproduced sentences, showing the learners' ability to use distinctiveness information. The production effects were larger for older than younger adults, in both modalities. DISCUSSION: Since older adults are increasingly engage in learning, it is important to develop high-quality structured learning programs for this population. The current results demonstrate the preserved ability of older adults to successfully memorize texts and may guide planning of such programs. Specifically, since learning via the auditory modality yields superior performance for learners across age-groups, it may be recommended for text learning. Because older adults showed larger benefits from active production of the study material, it may be used to better remember educationally relevant material.

Using Vocal Production to Improve Long-Term Verbal Memory in Adults with Intellectual Disability.

Individuals with intellectual disability (ID) typically show weak long-term memory (LTM) skills. Understanding verbal LTM processes and searching for effective mnemonics in this population is important, to improve intervention programs. The current study aimed to assess verbal LTM abilities of adults with mild ID of mixed etiologies, and to offer a simple memorization technique based on vocal production. Participants (n = 55) learned lists of different study materials (images of familiar and unfamiliar objects, written words, and sentences) by vocal production (saying or reading aloud) or by no-production (looking, listening, or reading silently). Memory tests followed. Better memory was found for vocally produced images of familiar objects, written words, and sentences. The results show that adults with mild ID can benefit from the relative distinctiveness of items at study. Hence, vocalization may be used in educational and therapeutic contexts for this population, improving memory performance.

Visual and auditory verbal long-term memory in individuals who rely on augmentative and alternative communication.

Augmentative and alternative communication (AAC) technologies provide individuals who have complex communication needs with an effective means to communicate. Yet the effect of these technologies on long-term memory is unclear. In addition, little is known regarding the impact of learning modality on memory performance of individuals who rely on AAC. The aim of this study was to explore the effect of AAC technologies on the visual and auditory verbal long-term memory abilities of 12 young persons who relied on AAC and had intact cognitive abilities. Participants performed 2 verbal memory tasks, in which familiar words were visually or aurally (i.e., auditorily) presented. The words were either actively produced using the AAC system or not produced (merely read or heard; a production effect paradigm). Memory tests followed. A production benefit (higher recognition rates for produced than no-produced words) was documented in both the visual and the auditory tasks. These findings support the active production of words via the AAC system as a memory strategy. Such technique may be easily used in everyday situations as well as in educational contexts. The results showcase the cognitive benefits of AAC system usage and provide significant insights into rehabilitation.

Visual and Auditory Verbal Memory in Older Adults: Comparing Postlingually Deaf Cochlear Implant Users to Normal-Hearing Controls.

Purpose The aim of this study was to test whether a group of older postlingually deafened cochlear implant users (OCIs) use similar verbal memory strategies to those used by older normal-hearing adults (ONHs). Verbal memory functioning was assessed in the visual and auditory modalities separately, enabling us to eliminate possible modality-based biases. Method Participants performed two separate visual and auditory verbal memory tasks. In each task, the visually or aurally presented study words were learned by vocal production (saying aloud) or by no production (reading silently or listening), followed by a free recall test. Twenty-seven older adults (> 60 years) participated (OCI = 13, ONH = 14), all of whom demonstrated intact cognitive abilities. All OCIs showed good open-set speech perception results in quiet. Results Both ONHs and OCIs showed production benefits (higher recall rates for vocalized than nonvocalized words) in the visual and auditory tasks. The ONHs showed similar production benefits in the visual and auditory tasks. The OCIs demonstrated a smaller production effect in the auditory task. Conclusions These results may indicate that different modality-specific memory strategies were used by the ONHs and the OCIs. The group differences in memory performance suggest that, even when deafness occurs after the completion of language acquisition, the reduced and distorted external auditory stimulation leads to a deterioration in the phonological representation of sounds. Possibly, this deterioration leads to a less efficient auditory long-term verbal memory.

Chronic Use of Synthetic Cannabinoids Is Associated With Impairment in Working Memory and Mental Flexibility.

BACKGROUND: We have recently shown that chronic use of Synthetic Cannabinoids (SCs) has been associated with mood disorders and impairments in executive functions. There is also evidence indicating that chronic SC users have higher rates of comorbidity with depression and psychotic symptoms. Here, we investigate performance on executive function and emotional processing tasks in regular SC users and a measure of schizotypal traits. METHOD: Thirty chronic SC users, 32 recreational cannabis users, and 32 non-using control participants, without history of mental disorder, or current substance abuse diagnosis (mean age 26 ± 4.27 years; 85 males, 9 females), were tested in addiction treatment centers in Israel. Computerized neurocognitive function tests; the N-back task, Go/No-Go task, Wisconsin Sorting Card-like Task (WSCT), and emotional face recognition task and questionnaires of depression, anxiety and schizotypal traits and symptoms were used. RESULTS: SC users have performed worse than recreational cannabis users and non-cannabis users on the N-back working-memory task (lower accuracy) and the WSCT cognitive flexibility task. SC users showed greater schizotypal traits and symptoms compared with recreational cannabis users and non-user control participants. A positive association was found in cannabinoid-user groups between schizotypal traits and symptoms and cognitive and emotional processing measures. Finally, SC users have scored higher on depression and state-trait anxiety measures than recreational cannabis users or healthy control participants. CONCLUSIONS: Repeated use of SCs is associated with impairment in executive functions and emotional processing. These alterations are associated with depression and schizotypal traits and symptoms. This adds to existing evidence on the long-term consequences of SC drugs and their risks for mental health.

Relationship between hazard-perception-test scores and proportion of hard-braking events during on-road driving - An investigation using a range of thresholds for hard-braking.

Drivers with higher proportion of hard braking events have greater potential to be involved in an accident. In this study, we tested if hard braking events might be accounted for by drivers' hazard perception (HP) ability. Our investigation was based on an original approach. Usually, researchers define hard braking according to a single deceleration threshold (e.g., g<-0.5). In this study, we chose different thresholds for hard braking (-0.25 to -0.6 g) and for each threshold, we examined the linkage between HP test (HPT) scores and the proportion of hard braking events. We hypothesized that this linkage would be stronger if the threshold that defines hard braking is higher. This is because the stronger the braking events, the higher the likelihood that they resulted from later detection of hazards and the lower the likelihood that they resulted from other causes (e.g., road humps). Thirty-three drivers completed an HPT and used a smartphone app that recorded their vehicle kinematics. We estimated the coefficient of HPT score in a series of binomial regression models on the proportion of hard braking events. In accordance with our hypothesis, we found that the coefficient of HPT score changed as a function of the threshold for hard braking. This finding was based on a significant negative Spearman correlation between the coefficients and the threshold and on linear functions that we derived from two binomial models that allowed the coefficient of HPT to vary according to the threshold. Our findings show that hard braking events are related to HP ability and can inform safety interventions in response to excessive proportion of hard braking events. In addition, they demonstrate that using a range of thresholds for hard braking is a practical tool in the study of hard braking events. From a theoretical perspective, our findings provide strong support to hazard perception theory.

The production effect in adults with dysarthria: improving long-term verbal memory by vocal production.

People show better memory for words read aloud relative to words read silently, the Production Effect (PE). Vocalisation at study makes the produced (aloud) words more distinct than the non-produced (silent) words, hence more memorable. Such encoding distinctiveness is related to the additional processing of aloud words that is later used during retrieval. This study investigated the PE in dysarthric adults, characterised by speech production difficulties. Their memory performance (recognition) was compared to a group of healthy adults. Results showed a PE for both groups. The production benefit was significantly larger for the dysarthric adults, despite their overall memory performance being reduced relative to controls. The results demonstrate long-term verbal memory deficits in dysarthria, and suggest that vocalisation (although impaired) may assist in remembering. Hence, vocalisation may be used in intervention contexts with this population, to compensate for memory decrease.

Production Effect in Adults With ADHD With and Without Methylphenidate (MPH): Vocalization Improves Verbal Learning.

OBJECTIVES: Reading aloud (vocal production) enhances memory relative to reading silently, the Production Effect (PE) in memory. Thus, vocalization has been suggested as a mnemonic device. The current study tested the PE in a sample of adults with ADHD and in a control sample, evaluating verbal learning. METHODS: Twenty adults with ADHD and 21 controls learned a list of words, half by reading aloud and half by reading silently. Free recall test followed. The participants with ADHD performed the task twice (in two different sessions in a counterbalanced order), before self-administration of a single dose of methylphenidate (MPH) and 60-min after dosage. RESULTS: PEs were found for all groups. Memory was better for the controls than for the ADHD group (with or without MPH). In the ADHD group, recall rates and the PE were higher with than without MPH. CONCLUSIONS: These results suggest that vocalization yields a larger memory gain with MPH. Possibly, MPH enables the ADHD participants to better shift their attention to the aloud words, enhancing their retrieval rates. Theoretically, these findings stress the role of attention in the PE. (JINS, 2019, 25, 230-235).

The Effect of Presentation Mode and Production Type on Word Memory for Hearing Impaired Signers.

BACKGROUND: Production effect (PE) is a memory phenomenon referring to better memory for produced (vocalized) than for non-produced (silently read) items. Reading aloud was found to improve verbal memory for normal-hearing individuals, as well as for cochlear implant users, studying visually and aurally presented material. PURPOSE: The present study tested the effect of presentation mode (written or signed) and production type (vocalization or signing) on word memory in a group of hearing impaired young adults, sign-language users. RESEARCH DESIGN: A PE paradigm was used, in which participants learned lexical items by two presentation modes, written or signed. We evaluated the efficacy of two types of productions: vocalization and signing, using a free recall test. STUDY SAMPLE: Twenty hearing-impaired young adults, Israeli sign language (ISL) users, participated in the study, ten individuals who mainly use manual communication (MC) (ISL as a first language), and ten who mainly use total communication (TC). DATA COLLECTION AND ANALYSIS: For each condition, we calculated the proportion of study words recalled. A mixed-design analysis of variance was conducted, with learning condition (written-vocalize, written-signed, and manual-signed) and production type (production and no-production) as within-subject variables, and group (MC and TC) as a between-subject variable. RESULTS: Production benefit was documented across all learning conditions, with better memory for produced over non-produced words. Recall rates were higher when learning written words relative to signed words. Production by signing yielded better memory relative to vocalizing. CONCLUSIONS: The results are explained in light of the encoding distinctiveness account, namely, the larger the number of unique encoding processes involved at study, the better the memory benefit.

The impact of different background noises on the Production Effect.

The presence of background noise has been previously shown to disrupt cognitive performance, especially memory. The amount of interference is derived from the acoustic characteristics of the noise; energetic vs. informational, steady-state vs. fluctuating. However, the literature is inconsistent concerning the effects of different types of noise on long-term memory free recall. In the present study, we tested the impact of different noises on recall of items that were learned under two conditions - silent or aloud reading, a Production Effect (PE) paradigm. As the PE represents enhanced memory for words read aloud relative to words read silently during study, we focused on the effect of noise on this robust memory phenomenon. The results showed that (a) steady-state energetic noise did not affect memory, with a recall advantage for aloud words (PE), comparable to a no-noise condition, (b) fluctuating-energetic noise and fluctuating-informational (eight-talkers babble) noise eliminated the PE, with similar recall for aloud and silent items. These results are discussed in light of their theoretical implications, stressing the role of attention in the PE. Ecological implications regarding studying in noisy environments are suggested.

Production on hold: delaying vocal production enhances the production effect in free recall.

The Production Effect (PE) represents superior memory for produced (read aloud) relative to non-produced (silently read) items. Another method of improving memory is taking a test on the study material - the Testing Effect. We evaluated the combined influence of both effects on free recall memory, using delayed vocal production, in which study words were vocally produced only after their disappearance. Such procedure involves an initial instant test since participants had to vocally retrieve the words (rather than read them aloud). In five experiments, participants were presented with study words that they were instructed to learn by no-production (reading silently), immediate production (reading aloud), delayed reading aloud, or delayed vocal production (instant retrieval). The results showed superior recall for delayed production over all other conditions. We suggest that the source of this superiority is the desirable difficulty induced by the addition of the initial test (retrieval effort) to the vocal production. The novel delayed production condition forms a superior mnemonic.

The Effect of Learning Modality and Auditory Feedback on Word Memory: Cochlear-Implanted versus Normal-Hearing Adults.

BACKGROUND: In recent years, the effect of cognitive abilities on the achievements of cochlear implant (CI) users has been evaluated. Some studies have suggested that gaps between CI users and normal-hearing (NH) peers in cognitive tasks are modality specific, and occur only in auditory tasks. PURPOSE: The present study focused on the effect of learning modality (auditory, visual) and auditory feedback on word memory in young adults who were prelingually deafened and received CIs before the age of 5 yr, and their NH peers. RESEARCH DESIGN: A production effect (PE) paradigm was used, in which participants learned familiar study words by vocal production (saying aloud) or by no-production (silent reading or listening). Words were presented (1) in the visual modality (written) and (2) in the auditory modality (heard). CI users performed the visual condition twice-once with the implant ON and once with it OFF. All conditions were followed by free recall tests. STUDY SAMPLE: Twelve young adults, long-term CI users, implanted between ages 1.7 and 4.5 yr, and who showed ≥50% in monosyllabic consonant-vowel-consonant open-set test with their implants were enrolled. A group of 14 age-matched NH young adults served as the comparison group. DATA COLLECTION AND ANALYSIS: For each condition, we calculated the proportion of study words recalled. Mixed-measures analysis of variances were carried out with group (NH, CI) as a between-subjects variable, and learning condition (aloud or silent reading) as a within-subject variable. Following this, paired sample t tests were used to evaluate the PE size (differences between aloud and silent words) and overall recall ratios (aloud and silent words combined) in each of the learning conditions. RESULTS: With visual word presentation, young adults with CIs (regardless of implant status CI-ON or CI-OFF), showed comparable memory performance (and a similar PE) to NH peers. However, with auditory presentation, young adults with CIs showed poorer memory for nonproduced words (hence a larger PE) relative to their NH peers. CONCLUSIONS: The results support the construct that young adults with CIs will benefit more from learning via the visual modality (reading), rather than the auditory modality (listening). Importantly, vocal production can largely improve auditory word memory, especially for the CI group.

Delay discounting, risk-taking, and rejection sensitivity among individuals with Internet and Video Gaming Disorders.

Background and aims There is a previous evidence for impulsivity in individuals with Internet and Video Gaming Disorders. The aim of this study was to examine whether Internet and video game addictions are associated with experiential delay discounting, risk-taking, and sensitivity to social rejection using computerized tasks and questionnaires. Methods Twenty participants (mean age 24, SD = 1.55) with high score on the Problematic Online Gaming Questionnaire (POGQ) were compared with 20 participants (mean age 24.8, SD = 1.34) with low score on the POGQ. They performed on computerized Balloon Analog Risk Task and Experiential Delay discounting Task (EDT), and filled in the sensitivity to social rejection questionnaire. Results Participants with high POGQ scores had lower measures of delay discounting, higher measures of risk-taking, and higher measures of sensitivity to social rejection compared with participants with low POGQ scores. Discussion The results of this study support the previous evidence of risk-taking and provide new evidence for difficulties in delay discounting and sensitivity to social rejection among those who score high on Internet and video games. Conclusions The results suggest that Internet- and video game-addicted individuals seek immediate gratification and cannot wait for later reward. Furthermore, these individuals spend time in the virtual world, where they feel safe, and avoid social interactions presumably due to fears of social rejection.

The Emotional Stroop Task: Assessing Cognitive Performance under Exposure to Emotional Content.

The emotional Stroop effect (ESE) is the result of longer naming latencies to ink colors of emotion words than to ink colors of neutral words. The difference shows that people are affected by the emotional content conveyed by the carrier words even though they are irrelevant to the color-naming task at hand. The ESE has been widely deployed with patient populations, as well as with non-selected populations, because the emotion words can be selected to match the tested pathology. The ESE is a powerful tool, yet it is vulnerable to various threats to its validity. This report refers to potential sources of confounding and includes a modal experiment that provides the means to control for them. The most prevalent threat to the validity of existing ESE studies is sustained effects and habituation wrought about by repeated exposure to emotion stimuli. Consequently, the order of exposure to emotion and neutral stimuli is of utmost importance. We show that in the standard design, only one specific order produces the ESE.

Influence of retrieval mode on effects of production: Evidence for costs in free recall.

Study modality (visual, auditory) of words as well as production mode (reading aloud, writing down) have been shown to influence the production effect (PE). When study words are presented visually, reading them aloud yields superior memory. However, when the same study words are presented aurally, writing them down leads to superior memory. Missing in PE studies is the variable of retrieval mode (written, aloud), which was addressed in the present study. In a pair of experiments, we manipulated the 3 variables-study modality, production mode, and retrieval mode-in a factorial fashion. With visual study, aloud production mode (vocalizing) was found to be superior to written production, in both retrieval modes (written and aloud). However, the difference between the productions was significantly smaller in the aloud retrieval mode relative to the written retrieval mode. With auditory study, written production mode was superior to aloud production mode, in the written as well as in the aloud retrieval modes. Here, the difference between the productions was significantly smaller in the written relative to the aloud retrieval mode. In other words, the difference between productions was smaller for the retrieval mode that matched the superior production. We interpret these findings using a retrieval-cost account. (PsycINFO Database Record

Auditioning the distinctiveness account: Expanding the production effect to the auditory modality reveals the superiority of writing over vocalising.

The production effect (PE) documents the advantage in memory performance for words that are read aloud during study, rather than words that are read silently. Until now, the PE was examined in the visual modality, as the participants read the study words. In the present study, we extended the PE phenomenon and used the auditory modality at study. This novel methodology provides a critical test of the distinctiveness account. Accordingly, the participants heard the study words and learned them by vocal production (saying aloud) or by writing, followed by a free recall test. The use of the auditory modality yielded a memory advantage for words that were written during study over words that were vocally produced. We explain this result in light of the encoding distinctiveness account, suggesting that the PE is determined by the number of different encoding processes involved in learning, emphasising the essential role of active production.