Dynamic mental representations.

This article pursues the possibility that perceivers are sensitive to implicit dynamic information even when they are not able to observe real-time change. Recent empirical results in the domains of handwriting recognition and picture perception are discussed in support of the hypothesis that perception involves acquiring information about transitions, whether the stimuli are static or dynamic. It is then argued that dynamic information has a special status in mental representation as well as in perception. In particular I propose that some mental representations may be dynamic, in that a temporal dimension is necessary to the representation. Recent evidence that mental representations may exhibit a form of momentum is discussed in support of this claim. (PsycINFO Database Record (c) 2010 APA, all rights reserved)     

Recognizing novel views of three-dimensional objects.

Examined how novel, 3-dimensional shapes are represented in long-term memory and how this might be differentially affected by monocular and binocular viewing in 3 experiments with a total of 141 undergraduates. Exp 1 established that slide projections of the novel objects could be recognized readily if seen in the same orientation as seen during learning. Exps 2 and 3 examined generalization to novel depth rotations of the objects. Results are consistent with a growing body of recent research showing that, at least under certain conditions, the visual system stores viewpoint-specific representations of objects. (French abstract) (PsycINFO Database Record (c) 2010 APA, all rights reserved)     

Mental rotation of representations of two-dimensional and three-dimensional objects.

Empirical and theoretical considerations suggest that representations of three-dimensional objects should be more difficult to rotate mentally than representations of two-dimensional objects. In this study, subjects were asked to make mirror-normal decisions with stimuli that differed in perceived dimensionality and in angle of rotation in the image plane. In a series of four experiments, the time to make mirror-normal decisions increased with increased orientation discrepancy between the stimuli, as found previously in the literature. In every experiment, however, response times were smaller for representations of two-dimensional shapes than for representations of three-dimensional shapes when the stimuli being compared were presented with a large angular discrepancy. Whereas response times increased linearly with orientation when representations of three-dimensional shapes were rotated, the increase in response time for representations of two-dimensional shapes was generally nonlinear. Overall, the evidence suggests that representations of three-dimensional shapes are mentally rotated at the same rate as representations of two-dimensional shapes for angles of rotation between 0° and 60°. For larger angles of rotation, however, the rate of mental rotation is greater for representations of two-dimensional shapes than for representations of three-dimensional shapes. (PsycINFO Database Record (c) 2010 APA, all rights reserved)     

Magnitude comparisons distort mental representations of magnitude.

Many cognitive processes rely on representations of magnitude, yet these representations are often malleable (H. Helson, 1964; J. Huttenlocher, L. V. Hedges, & J. L. Vevea, 2000; A. Parducci, 1965). It is likely that factors that affect these representations in turn affect the psychological processes that rely on them. The authors conducted 4 experiments to investigate whether language-expressible magnitude comparisons distort mental representations of compared magnitudes. Participants compared magnitudes and estimated those magnitudes in a variety of tasks. Exp 1 through 3 demonstrated systematic comparison-induced distortions. Exp 4 demonstrated that comparison-induced distortions might account for the asymmetric dominance effect discussed in the decision-making literature. Potential effects of comparison-induced distortions on other psychological processes (e.g., density effects, order effects, body-size estimation, pain estimation, and consumer decision making) are discussed. (PsycINFO Database Record (c) 2010 APA, all rights reserved)     

Providers' views of HMO mental health services.

112 health maintenance organization (HMO) mental health providers from 19 HMOs were asked to describe the services provided by their mental health department, give demographic data about providers themselves, and rate the services provided as well as their satisfaction with providers' benefits and compensation. More than half of the Ss reported having a private practice in addition to their position at an HMO. The average full-time person doing direct clinical practice reported seeing about 23 clients per week. Other results suggest differences in satisfaction level varying with salary and patient load. (PsycINFO Database Record (c) 2010 APA, all rights reserved)     

Simultaneous and successive processes, language and mental abilities.

Recent research on simultaneous and successive processing is reviewed as these processes relate to certain linguistic functions and mental abilities. In comprehending ambiguous sentences, successive processing appears to be involved in surface structure and underlying structure ambiguities, whereas simultaneous processing is related to lexical ambiguity. Successive processing is also involved in the syntactic organization of expressive speech. Several studies reported here suggest that in reading, successive processing is important for the development of elementary decoding skills, whereas simultaneous processing is related to the development of advanced levels of comprehensive skills. In terms of abilities, simultaneous processing was significantly related to spatial ability, inductive reasoning, and associative memory, while successive processing was significantly related to associative memory. (French summary) (42 ref) (PsycINFO Database Record (c) 2010 APA, all rights reserved)     

A reexamination of the perceptual-to-conceptual shift in mental representations.

The authors discuss the origins of categorical representations in young infants, using recent evidence on the categorization of animals. This evidence suggests that mature conceptual representations for animals derive from the earliest perceptually based representations of animals formed by young infants, those based on the surface features characteristic of each species, including humans. The shift from perceptually to conceptually based representation is a gradual and continuous process marked by initial, relatively simple, perceptually based representations coming to include more and more specific values of common animal properties. Development is thus a process of enrichment by perceptual systems, including that for language, and without the need of specialized processes that alter the nature of human thought and the representation of human knowledge. (PsycINFO Database Record (c) 2010 APA, all rights reserved)     

Young children's awareness of the origins of their mental representations.

A series of studies addressed preschool-age children's ability to identify and remember the epistemic and imaginal origins of their mental representations. Study 1 revealed that children as young as 3 were able to differentiate imaginal from perceptual origins. Study 2 explored children's ability to differentiate representations formed through inference from those formed through imagination and seeing. Results revealed that 3-, 4-, and 5-year-olds differed significantly in their ability to identify and remember the sources of their mental representations. Identifying and remembering inference was the most difficult for all age groups. Results from Study 3 rule out the possibility that incorrect performance in Studies 1 and 2 resulted from an inability to remember the objects used in the tasks. Results from these studies indicate that children as young as 3 are able to differentiate mental representations based on fiction from those based on fact, but that this ability continues to develop throughout the preschool years. (PsycINFO Database Record (c) 2010 APA, all rights reserved)     

The development of representations: The origins of mental life.

Discusses the notion of representation and its role in cognitive theory. The representational theory of mind takes for granted the existence of such representational states and processes as symbol use, belief, meaning, and intention. A sequence of developments is proposed that would have the effect of reworking the elementary sensory-motor schemata present at birth into the propositional representational states that develop in 2–4 yr olds and that operate on the basis of meaning, significance, and intentionality. The theory is used to explain a series of intellectual achievements of young children. (PsycINFO Database Record (c) 2010 APA, all rights reserved)     

The concept of mental representations in light of recent infant research.

Juxtaposes psychoanalytic thought with recent infant research to develop an understanding of the term mental representation. A definition of mental representations as unconscious organizing structures of interactions is proposed as a comprehensive integration of the various points of view on this issue. The psychoanalytic view of representations is presented, along with revisions suggested by extensions of theory within psychoanalysis and developmental research. Several points of divergence are discussed, including the issue of self–object differentiation, the caretaker–child dyad as the focus of analysis, and the capacity within the first year for emergent structures that allow the infant to develop interpersonal expectations. Influences of Piaget's theory of representation on each body of thought are also addressed. (PsycINFO Database Record (c) 2010 APA, all rights reserved)     

Some consequences of changing people's views regarding the nature of mental illness.

Reports the consequences of changing public conceptions of mental illness for the sufferer and his/her family. In 2 identically performed studies with a total of 405 undergraduates, 2 messages (one describing mental illness as a disease and the other as a product of social learning) were effective in changing beliefs. More important, the Ss receiving the disease message thought that a victim of mental illness could do less to help himself than did the Ss receiving the social learning message. In the 3rd study, 38 undergraduate females received similar messages and were given a therapy session. They were then asked to keep a journal for 1 wk and to make an entry in the journal every time a problem similar to one discussed in therapy arose. It was expected that the disease message Ss would feel less able to master the problems and, consequently, would think about them less frequently. The findings confirm the expectation. (PsycINFO Database Record (c) 2010 APA, all rights reserved)     

On having complex representations of things: Preschoolers use multiple words for objects and people.

Applying several names to an entity (polynomy) reflects the ability to categorize entities in different ways. Two experiments demonstrate preschoolers' abilities to apply multiple labels to representational objects and to people. In Experiment 1, 3- and 4-year-olds labeled representational objects and verified labels for story characters. In both tasks children reliably produced or accepted several words per entity and accepted a high percentage of both class-inclusive and overlapping word pairs. These results were replicated in Experiment 2; 3- to 5-year-olds also completed appearance–reality and receptive vocabulary tests. The mean number of words produced in the labeling task was significantly related to receptive vocabulary, but not to appearance–reality performance. The results indicate that preschoolers represent an entity as belonging to multiple categories (e.g., dinosaur and crayon). Implications for cognitive and language development, particularly the appearance–reality distinction and the mutual exclusivity bias, are discussed. (PsycINFO Database Record (c) 2010 APA, all rights reserved)     

Clinical psychologists' theory-based representations of mental disorders predict their diagnostic reasoning and memory.

The theory-based model of categorization posits that concepts are represented as theories, not feature lists. Thus, it is interesting that the Diagnostic and Statistical Manual of Mental Disorders (4th ed.; DSM-IV, American Psychiatric Association, 1994) established atheoretical guidelines for mental disorder diagnosis. Five experiments investigated how clinicians handled an atheoretical nosology. Clinicians' causal theories of disorders and their responses on diagnostic and memory tasks were measured. Participants were more likely to diagnose a hypothetical patient with a disorder if that patient had causally central rather than causally peripheral symptoms according to their theory of the disorder. Their memory for causally central symptoms was also biased. Clinicians are cognitively driven to use theories despite decades of practice with the atheoretical DSM. (PsycINFO Database Record (c) 2010 APA, all rights reserved)     

Younger and older adults' use of mental models as representations for text materials.

Recent work suggests that formation and use of mental models (representations of situations described) is an integral part of discourse comprehension. In an experiment comparing younger and older adults on this aspect of text comprehension, subjects heard readings of a list of sentences and took a forced-choice recognition test. The test contained 2 types of distractors with an equal degree of verbatim similarity to the target sentences. One type described the same situation as the corresponding target sentence; the other did not. If mental models are an integral part of text representation formed at encoding, then a large number of confusions of the first, but not the second, type of distractor with the target sentence would be obtained. Younger and older adults showed this pattern to equal degrees. These data are consistent with those indicating that linguistic competence remains stable over the adult years (cf. L. L. Light, 1988). (PsycINFO Database Record (c) 2010 APA, all rights reserved)     

Leaders as attachment figures: Leaders' attachment orientations predict leadership-related mental representations and followers' performance and mental health.

In 3 studies, the authors examined the contribution of leaders' attachment styles to their leadership motives and beliefs and to followers' outcomes. In Study 1, participants completed measures of attachment orientation, leadership motives, self-representations, and leadership style. Studies 2 and 3 were conducted within Israeli military units either during a leadership workshop or during intensive combat training. Israeli military officers and their soldiers (followers) reported on their attachment styles, and the soldiers reported on the officers' leadership qualities and on the soldiers' own performance and mental health. Leaders' attachment anxiety was associated with more self-serving leadership motives and with poorer leadership qualities in task-oriented situations. Leaders' attachment anxiety also predicted followers' poorer instrumental functioning. Leaders' attachment-related avoidance was negatively associated with prosocial motives to lead, with the failure to act as a security provider, and with followers' poorer socioemotional functioning and poorer long-range mental health. Results are discussed with respect to the value of attachment theory for the study of leadership. (PsycINFO Database Record (c) 2010 APA, all rights reserved)     

Recognizing identical versus similar categorically related common objects: Further evidence for degraded gist representations in amnesia.

Studies have shown lower false recognition of semantically related lure words in patients with global amnesia than in matched controls. This pattern has been interpreted as suggesting that medial temporal and diencephalic structures that are damaged in amnesia and that contribute to veridical memory also contribute to false recognition. It has been argued that whereas controls form and retain a well-organized representation of the semantic gist of studied items, patients with amnesia can retain only a degraded gist representation. However, these studies are subject to an alternative interpretation involving greater source confusions in controls. The authors used a categorized-pictures paradigm to test recognition under conditions in which source confusions were unlikely to occur. Relative to controls, patients with amnesia showed reduced false recognition of categorically related pictorial lures, thereby supporting the notion of degraded gist representations in amnesia. (PsycINFO Database Record (c) 2010 APA, all rights reserved)     

Expectant parents' representations of early attachment relationships: Associations with mental health and family history.

The association between adult representations of early attachment relationships and history of individual and family mental health was examined in a sample of 233 expectant mothers and fathers. As predicted, security of attachment was linked to mental health. Parents classified as Preoccupied were more likely than other parents to report suicidal ideation, whereas parents classified as Unresolved more- often reported suicidal ideation, emotional distress, and substance abuse. With respect to family history, Unresolved and Preoccupied attachment classifications were significantly related to child abuse involving a relative and parental separation or divorce. These findings support theoretical conceptualizations regarding the link between adult attachment and mental health in middle-class American adults. (PsycINFO Database Record (c) 2010 APA, all rights reserved)     

Outdated practitioner views about family culpability and severe mental disorders

Current theories and research about the etiology and treatment of psychotic disorders increasingly point to the importance of biological factors. Accompanying this shift in the etiological literature has been an accumulation of evidence indicating the need to move away from treatment modalities that make families of people with psychotic disorders feel culpable in the causation or perpetuation of their relatives' disorders. The current study reports the development of a reliable and valid scale to assess the extent to which practitioners have made this shift. It also reports two surveys, the findings of which imply grounds for concern about what many practitioners do when working with clients with severe and persistent mental illness and their families.     

Embodied spatial transformations: "Body analogy" for the mental rotation of objects.

The cognitive advantage of imagined spatial transformations of the human body over that of more unfamiliar objects (e.g., Shepard-Metzler [S-M] cubes) is an issue for validating motor theories of visual perception. In 6 experiments, the authors show that providing S-M cubes with body characteristics (e.g., by adding a head to S-M cubes to evoke a posture) facilitates the mapping of the cognitive coordinate system of one's body onto the abstract shape. In turn, this spatial embodiment improves object shape matching. Thanks to the increased cohesiveness of human posture in people's body schema, imagined transformations of the body operate in a less piecemeal fashion as compared with objects (S-M cubes or swing-arm desk lamps) under a similar spatial configuration, provided that the pose can be embodied. If the pose cannot be emulated (covert imitation) by the sensorimotor system, the facilitation due to motoric embodiment will also be disrupted. (PsycINFO Database Record (c) 2010 APA, all rights reserved)