Anxiety and Avoidance in Close Relationships Are Associated With Responses to Negative and Positive Stimuli.

Humans tend to assign valence to objects, people, and events in the environment, but there are individual differences in the evaluation of the affective nature of these environmental stimuli. This exploratory study investigated how individual differences in anxiety and avoidance in close relationships are associated with the emotional appraisal of valenced and neutral stimuli. Participants evaluated negative, neutral, and positive stimuli for emotional valence in an image classification task. There was a positivity offset across all participants, in that neutral stimuli were evaluated as more positive than negative. Individuals higher on the Experiences in Close Relationships-Anxiety subscale showed a negativity bias in reaction times and ratings: they had faster response times to negative than to positive stimuli and had a greater tendency to evaluate positive stimuli as "negative." Individuals higher on the Experiences in Close Relationships-Avoidance subscale gave more positive ratings of negative stimuli and more negative ratings of positive stimuli, which may suggest a general blunted response to emotional stimuli. Findings are discussed in the context of the literature on individual differences and emotional appraisal of stimuli.

Cognitively demanding stimuli can acquire positive valence.

Generally, people tend to avoid stimuli that require mental effort; effort can generate negative emotions. However, employing mental effort can also promote positive emotions, given a successful outcome. We investigated whether the level of cognitive effort associated with stimuli will elicit positive or negative emotions. In Experiment 1, participants performed a gender Stroop task during the association phase. The actors from the Stroop task expressed emotionlessness, while half of the actors were displayed in the mostly incongruent (MI) condition and the rest in the mostly congruent (MC) condition. In the transfer phase, we used the same actors for the emotion discrimination task, and the actors expressed a positive emotion half of the time and a negative emotion for the other half. For the MI actors, participants responded faster to positive emotion than to negative emotion, but this difference was not significant for the MC actors. In Experiment 2, the association phase involved a task switching paradigm in which half of the actors were presented in the mostly switching (MS) condition and the other in the mostly repetition (MR) condition. In the transfer phase, the same individuals' faces were used for emotion discrimination. For the MS actors, but not the MR actors, the responses were faster to positive emotion than to negative emotion. Our results imply that stimuli associated with more cognitive effort (i.e., MI and MS stimuli) may be perceived as more positive after a successful outcome of a task, although future research is required to replicate these findings.

Stimuli with a positive valence can facilitate cognitive control.

In the process of interacting with people and objects, humans assign affective valence. By using an association-transfer paradigm, the current study investigated whether the emotion associated with a stimulus would have an impact on cognitive control outcomes. During the association phase of two experiments reported here, participants identified the emotion expressed by an actor's face as either positive (i.e., smiling) or negative (i.e., frowning). Half of the actors expressed positive emotions (MP) on 80% of trials, while the other half expressed negative emotions (MN) on 80% of trials. We tested the cognitive effect of these associations in two experiments. In the transfer phase of Experiment 1, the same actors from the association phase were shown with neutral expression during a gender Stroop task, requiring participants to identify the gender of the face while ignoring a gender word (congruent or incongruent) that was imposed upon the face. The Stroop effect was significant for the MN faces, but the effect disappeared for the MP faces. In the transfer phase of Experiment 2, the emotionless faces were presented in a task-switching paradigm, in which participants identified the age (i.e., old or young) or the gender depending on the task cue. The task switch cost was smaller (though significant) for the MP faces than for the MN faces. These results suggest that, relative to social stimuli associated with negative expressions, social stimuli associated with positive expressions can promote better cognitive control and inhibit distractor interference in goal-oriented behavior.

Perceived conflict may be negative but resolved conflict is not.

The current study investigated how exposure to a conflict stimulus influences the judgment of a subsequent stimulus's valence. We used an affective priming paradigm, presenting a color Stroop stimulus as a prime and a face as a target for an emotion recognition task. When the task for the prime was passive viewing (Experiment 1), congruent primes resulted in faster responses to emotionally positive targets than negative targets. However, this positivity bias disappeared following incongruent primes. In Experiment 2, instead of passive viewing, participants were asked to indicate the congruency of the prime, and the positivity bias was significant following the congruent prime but not following the incongruent prime. In Experiments 3 and 4, participants performed the conventional Stroop task on the prime, therefore resolving the conflict when the prime was incongruent. Experiment 3 adopted an equal proportion of congruent and incongruent primes. Experiment 4 adopted twice as many congruent primes as incongruent primes. In both experiments, the positivity bias was not significant regardless of the congruency of the prime. These results suggest that detecting conflict may interfere with positive affect or promote negative affect, therefore reducing the positivity bias. Once the conflict is resolved, however, the negative valence may disappear.

Peripheral vascular access for therapeutic plasma exchange: A practical approach to increased utilization and selecting the most appropriate vascular access.

BACKGROUND: Therapeutic plasma exchange (TPE) is used in the treatment of many diseases. At present, peripheral vascular access (PVA) is an underutilized method of vascular access in TPE. It should be considered more frequently due its relatively low risk for adverse events, particularly infections. METHODS: The Advancing Vascular Access in Apheresis Working Group met in December 2017 for an extensive review and discussion of vascular access for TPE and developed a "road map" providing detailed information regarding clinical situations in which PVA-based TPE would and would not be appropriate. RESULTS: The road map is consistent with current recommendations that PVA should be used in combination with TPE whenever possible. PVA should be considered for patients who do not have existing central lines and who are stable. The patient should have peripheral veins that will allow for adequate treatment and must be able to comply with the process of achieving and maintaining peripheral access. There should be expert clinical assessment of veins, and this evaluation may include ultrasound and/or near infrared evaluation. Conditions that would prompt a switch from PVA to an alternate method of venous access include loss of venous access, patient preference, or development of a requirement for very frequent treatment over a long period of time. CONCLUSIONS: While PVA is not suitable for all patients requiring TPE, it has significant safety advantages over other approaches and should be employed whenever possible.

Neutral but not in the middle: cross-cultural comparisons of negative bias of "neutral" emotional stimuli.

Previous studies have shown that the perception of neutral emotion stimuli can be negative rather than absolutely neutral. In the current study, we examined the negative bias of both neutral faces and scenes, cross-culturally between East Asians (e.g. Koreans) and Caucasian Americans. In all experiments, participants performed a Go/No-go task, by either executing or withholding a response toward neutral stimuli presented in the context of positive or negative stimuli. Differentiating neutral stimuli from negative stimuli was less accurate, measured in d', than doing so from positive stimuli. This negative bias was evident with both faces (Experiments 1 and 2) and scenes (Experiment 3). In all experiments, while both ethnic groups demonstrated significant negative biases, there was a subtle modulation of the bias by cultural background. For example, for Korean faces and IAPS scenes, Koreans showed a mitigated negative bias and Caucasian Americans demonstrated a greater negative bias. However, for Caucasian faces, bias was comparable between the two groups. With the possibility of cultural modulation, the prevalent negative bias of neutral emotion questions the validity of the neutrality assumption of the neutral emotion. The study discusses the necessity of methodological and theoretical reconsiderations for the utilisation of neutral emotion stimuli.

Brain activation covaries with reported criminal behaviors when making risky choices: A fuzzy-trace theory approach.

Criminal behavior has been associated with abnormal neural activity when people experience risks and rewards or exercise inhibition. However, neural substrates of mental representations that underlie criminal and noncriminal risk-taking in adulthood have received scant attention. We take a new approach, applying fuzzy-trace theory, to examine neural substrates of risk preferences and criminality. We extend ideas about gist (simple meaning) and verbatim (precise risk-reward tradeoffs) representations used to explain adolescent risk-taking to uncover neural correlates of developmentally inappropriate adult risk-taking. We tested predictions using a risky-choice framing task completed in the MRI scanner, and examined neural covariation with self-reported criminal and noncriminal risk-taking. As predicted, risk-taking was correlated with a behavioral pattern of risk preferences called "reverse framing" (preferring sure losses over a risky option and a risky option over sure gains, the opposite of typical framing biases) that has been linked to risky behavior in adolescents and is rarely observed in nondisordered adults. Experimental manipulations confirmed processing interpretations of typical framing (gist-based) and reverse-framing (verbatim-based) risk preferences. In the brain, covariation with criminal and noncriminal risk-taking was observed predominantly when subjects made reverse-framing choices. Noncriminal risk-taking behavior was associated with emotional reactivity (amygdala) and reward motivation (striatal) areas, whereas criminal behavior was associated with greater activation in temporal and parietal cortices, their junction, and insula. When subjects made more developmentally typical framing choices, reflecting nonpreferred gist processing, activation in dorsolateral prefrontal cortex covaried with criminal risk-taking, which may reflect cognitive effort to process gist while inhibiting preferred verbatim processing. (PsycINFO Database Record

How Fuzzy-Trace Theory Predicts True and False Memories for Words, Sentences, and Narratives.

Fuzzy-trace theory posits independent verbatim and gist memory processes, a distinction that has implications for such applied topics as eyewitness testimony. This distinction between precise, literal verbatim memory and meaning-based, intuitive gist accounts for memory paradoxes including dissociations between true and false memory, false memories outlasting true memories, and developmental increases in false memory. We provide an overview of fuzzy-trace theory, and, using mathematical modeling, also present results demonstrating verbatim and gist memory in true and false recognition of narrative sentences and inferences. Results supported fuzzy-trace theory's dual-process view of memory: verbatim memory was relied on to reject meaning-consistent, but unpresented, sentences (via recollection rejection). However, verbatim memory was often not retrieved, and gist memory supported acceptance of these sentences (via similarity judgment and phantom recollection). Thus, mathematical models of words can be extended to explain memory for complex stimuli, such as narratives, the kind of memory interrogated in law.

How Reasoning, Judgment, and Decision Making are Colored by Gist-based Intuition: A Fuzzy-Trace Theory Approach.

Fuzzy-trace theory distinguishes verbatim (literal, exact) from gist (meaningful) representations, predicting that reliance on gist increases with experience and expertise. Thus, many judgment-and-decision-making biases increase with development, such that cognition is colored by context in ways that violate logical coherence and probability theories. Nevertheless, this increase in gist-based intuition is adaptive: Gist is stable, less sensitive to interference, and easier to manipulate. Moreover, gist captures the functionally significant essence of information, supporting healthier and more robust decision processes. We describe how fuzzy-trace theory accounts for judgment-and-decision making phenomena, predicting the paradoxical arc of these processes with the development of experience and expertise. We present data linking gist memory processes to gist processing in decision making and provide illustrations of gist reliance in medicine, public health, and intelligence analysis.

Educating Intuition: Reducing Risky Decisions Using Fuzzy-Trace Theory.

Risky decision-making, especially in adolescence, is a major public health problem. However, fuzzy-trace theory suggests that bad outcomes are preventable by changing thinking, and, therefore, feelings, about risks. The theory aligns with new findings and has been shown to be effective in experiments on sexual risk-taking, medication adherence, and genetic testing. Despite the vulnerabilities of the adolescent brain, decision processes can be modified by applying evidence-based theory.

How to Successfully Incorporate Undergraduate Researchers Into a Complex Research Program at a Large Institution.

One feature of the Laboratory for Rational Decision Making at Cornell University is the integration of a large number of undergraduate students into a relatively elaborate research program. We describe our thorough screening process, laboratory structure, and our expectations for undergraduate researchers in our lab. We have a structure in place that helps maintain organization and enhance productivity, including scheduled weekly and monthly meetings, and selecting undergraduate and graduate team leaders to lead each research project. We discuss how it is important to encourage students to aim high and have a good attitude toward learning and problem solving. We emphasize that both initiative and teamwork are important in a large research laboratory. We also discuss the importance of giving students responsibility in connection with research projects-our undergraduate researchers engage in data analysis, interpretation of results, and have a high-level understanding of theory.

Gist Representations and Communication of Risks about HIV-AIDS: A Fuzzy-Trace Theory Approach.

As predicted by fuzzy-trace theory, people with a range of training­from untrained adolescents to expert physicians­are susceptible to biases and errors in judgment and perception of HIV-AIDS risk. To explain why this occurs, we introduce fuzzy-trace theory as a theoretical perspective that describes these errors to be a function of knowledge deficits, gist-based representation of risk categories, retrieval failure for risk knowledge, and processing interference (e.g., base-rate neglect) in combining risk estimates. These principles explain how people perceive HIV-AIDS risk and why they take risks with potentially lethal outcomes, often despite rote (verbatim) knowledge.For example, people inappropriately generalize the wrong gist about condoms' effectiveness against fluid-borne disease to diseases that are transferred skin-to-skin, such as HPV. We also describe how variation in processing in adolescence (e.g., more verbatim processing compared to adults) can be a route to risk-taking that explains key aspects of why many people are infected with HIV in youth, as well as how interventions that emphasize bottom-line gists communicate risks effectively.

Development of Risky Decision Making: Fuzzy-Trace Theory and Neurobiological Perspectives.

Developmental differences in mental representations of choices, reward sensitivity, and behavioral inhibition (self-control) explain greater susceptibility to risk taking. Ironically, relying on precise representations in reasoning promotes greater risk taking, but this reliance declines as adolescents mature. This phenomenon is known as a developmental reversal; it is called a reversal because it violates traditional developmental expectations of greater cognitive complexity with maturation. Fuzzy-trace theory (FTT) predicts reversals by proposing two types of mental representation (gist and verbatim), and that risk takers rely more on verbatim processing when making decisions. In this article, we describe the main tenets of FTT and explain how it can account for risky decision making. We also explore the neural underpinnings of development and decision making in the context of distinctions from FTT. FTT's predictions elucidate unanswered questions about risk taking, providing directions for research.

The effect of working memory capacity on conflict monitoring.

The conflict adaptation effect, a reduced interference effect upon the detection of a conflict signal (e.g., following an incongruent trial), has been interpreted as evidence for active regulation of top-down cognitive control. We hypothesized that the extent of conflict adaptation should be related to individuals' working memory capacity (WMC), which has been repeatedly demonstrated to reflect the level of cognitive control. Using the Simon task, in Experiment 1, we quantified the conflict adaptation ratio (CAR) transiently as the ratio of the conflict effect following an incongruent trial to the conflict effect following a congruent trial, controlling for the reaction time that often correlates with WMC. We observed that the CAR varied from highly negative with low WMC scores to near-zero with high WMC scores. This result suggests that high WMC individuals, when detecting conflict, adjust the level of cognitive control optimally so that their performance is less susceptible to the presence of a distractor. In Experiment 2, we quantified the CAR in a sustained manner as the ratio of the conflict effect from predominantly incongruent blocks to the conflict effect from predominantly congruent blocks. Again, the CAR varied from negative to zero as WMC increased. These results suggest that WMC may reflect, in addition to the ability to maintain a level of control, the ability to adjust the level of control appropriately to the contextual demands.