# Question
Title: Diagnosis and treatment for Concentration Deficit Disorder?
Sluggish cognitive tempo, sometimes known as Concentration Deficit Disorder, is a syndrome related to (but distinct from) attention deficit hyperactivity disorder (ADHD).

Question: What are the best methods to diagnose and treat Concentration Deficit Disorder?

Do any of the following have scientific support?

1. Electroencephalography (EEG)
2. DNA therapy

# Answer
## This answer covers the diagnosis of Sluggish cognitive tempo

While there is debate about its nature (Brooks, 2014, Silva, n.d.) there is a whole issue of the Journal of Abnormal Child Psychology (Vol. 42, Issue 1 - January 2014) devoted to the subject of *sluggish cognitive tempo* (SCT) and the debate. That issue has renewed interest in the condition (Silva, n.d.).

American Psychological Association (APA) publishes the Diagnostic and Statistical Manual of Mental Disorders (DSM) and is the "go-to" for diagnostic criteria for mental disorders. The latest edition is DSM-5 (APA, 2013). As it stands right now, there is no official definition (as defined by the DSM) of "sluggish cognitive tempo" (SCT) or "concentration deficit disorder" (CDD), but the DSM-5 does mention that concentration deficits frequently occur following mild traumatic brain injury but,

> can occur in brain-injured and non-brain-injured populations, including individuals with PTSD (page 280)

and

> in individuals with acute stress disorder (pages 284 and 286)

Concentration deficits can also occur in depression.

While the Wikipedia article for "sluggish cognitive tempo" states that

> there is no overlap between the official ADHD inattention symptoms \[ADHD-I\] and the SCT symptoms

there is actually a definite overlap.

The DSM-5 states that for a diagnosis of ADHD-I (emphasis mine on symptom category letters),

> Six (or more) of the following symptoms have persisted for at least 6 months to a degree that is inconsistent with developmental level and that negatively impacts directly on social and academic/occupational activities:
> **Note:** The symptoms are not solely a manifestation of oppositional behavior, defiance, hostility, or failure to understand tasks or instructions. For older adolescents and adults (age 17 and older), at least five symptoms are required.
>
> **a**. Often fails to give close attention to details or makes careless mistakes in schoolwork, at work, or during other activities (e.g., overlooks or misses details, work is inaccurate).
> **b**. Often has difficulty sustaining attention in tasks or play activities (e.g., has difficulty remaining focused during lectures, conversations, or lengthy reading).
> **c**. Often does not seem to listen when spoken to directly (e.g., mind seems elsewhere, even in the absence of any obvious distraction).
> **d**. Often does not follow through on instructions and fails to finish schoolwork, chores, or duties in the workplace (e.g., starts tasks but quickly loses focus and is easily sidetracked).
> **e**. Often has difficulty organizing tasks and activities (e.g., difficulty managing sequential tasks; difficulty keeping materials and belongings in order; messy, disorganized work; has poor time management; fails to meet deadlines).
> **f**. Often avoids, dislikes, or is reluctant to engage in tasks that require sustained mental effort (e.g., schoolwork or homework; for older adolescents and adults, preparing reports, completing forms, reviewing lengthy papers).
> **g**. Often loses things necessary for tasks or activities (e.g., school materials, pencils, books, tools, wallets, keys, papenwork, eyeglasses, mobile telephones).
> **h**. Is often easily distracted by extraneous stimuli (for older adolescents and adults, may include unrelated thoughts).
> **i**. Is often forgetful in daily activities (e.g., doing chores, running errands; for older adolescents and adults, returning calls, paying bills, keeping appointments).

Citing Becker, et al (2016), Barkley (2018) and Becker & Barkley (2018), the Wikipedia article lists the following for the symptoms of SCT:

* Prone to daydreaming **DSM criteria b for ADHD-I**
* Easily confused or mentally foggy
* Spacey or inattentive to surroundings **DSM criteria b and c for ADHD-I**
* Mind seems to be elsewhere **DSM criteria c for ADHD-I**
* Stares blankly into space **DSM criteria c for ADHD-I**
* Underactive, slow moving or sluggish
* Lethargic or less energetic
* Trouble staying awake or alert
* Has drowsy or sleepy appearance
* Gets lost in own thoughts **DSM criteria b, c and h for ADHD-I**
* Apathetic or withdrawn, less engaged in activities
* Loses train of thought or cognitive set
* Processes information not as quickly or accurately

While there is an overlap, in criteria, if consensus is achieved for the idea that SCT or CDD exists, there will be a need to officially define a set of criteria which would need to be met, due to the overlap with ADHD-I and the fact that the other symptoms listed can occur with depression.

In the meantime, the

> 13 SCT symptoms that loaded consistently on an SCT factor as opposed to an ADHD factor

put together by Becker et al. (2014) and copied into Wikipedia (listed above) are all we have at the current time for a diagnosis of SCT.

> Although additional measurement work needs to be conducted now that these 13 items have been identified (15-17), it is important to note that parent, teacher, adult self-report, and child self-report ratings scales (18-23), as well as a semistructured clinical interview (24), have been developed that include at least most of these 13 items. Studies using these measures demonstrate that SCT can be reliability assessed, with excellent internal consistency and test-retest reliability, and moderate interrater reliability (14). (Becker & Barkley (2018))

On top of this, whilst research indicates SCT is associated with ADHD-I,

> findings show that SCT is even more prevalent in autism. SCT is most common when autism and ADHD co-occur. Because autism without ADHD is rare (whereas ADHD without autism is not), it is important to assess both SCT and ADHD in children referred for autism evaluations and rule-out autism in children referred for ADHD. SCT may be another neurocognitive problem shared by children with autism and children with ADHD in need of assessment and intervention (Mayes, et al. 2020).

## References

APA. (2013). *Diagnostic and statistical manual of mental disorders (DSM-5®)*. American Psychiatric Pub. https://www.psychiatry.org/psychiatrists/practice/dsm

Barkley, R. A. (2018). *Barkley Sluggish Cognitive Tempo Scale — Children and Adolescents (BSCTS-CA)*. Guilford Publications.

Becker, S. P., Leopold, D. R., Burns, G. L., Jarrett, M. A., Langberg, J. M., Marshall, S. A., ... & Willcutt, E. G. (2016). The internal, external, and diagnostic validity of sluggish cognitive tempo: A meta-analysis and critical review. *Journal of the American Academy of Child & Adolescent Psychiatry, 55*(3), 163-178. https://doi.org/10.1016/j.jaac.2015.12.006

Becker, S. & Barkley, R. A. (2018). Sluggish cognitive tempo (Chapter 15) Banaschewski, T., Coghill, D., & Zuddas, A. (Eds.). *Oxford Textbook of Attention Deficit Hyperactivity Disorder* (pp.147-153). Oxford University Press. https://www.researchgate.net/publication/292148331\_Sluggish\_cognitive\_tempo

Brooks, M. (2014). Sluggish Cognitive Tempo a Distinct Attention Disorder? *Medscape Psychiatry News* https://www.medscape.com/viewarticle/819838

Mayes, S. D., Calhoun, S. L., & Waschbusch, D. A. (2020). Sluggish cognitive tempo in autism, ADHD, and neurotypical child samples. *Research in Autism Spectrum Disorders, 79*, 101678. https://doi.org/10.1016/j.rasd.2020.101678

Silva, M. (n.d.). A Fuzzy Debate About A Foggy Condition *Cincinnati Children's Hospital* https://www.cincinnatichildrens.org/professional/resources/research-horizons/archives/2015/summer/sluggish-cognitive-tempo
> 2 votes

---
Tags: cognitive-psychology, eeg, concentration, cognitive
---


# Question
Title: How do psychologists measure malicious behaviour?
How do psychologists measure malicious behaviour in humans? Is there a definitive definition of what constitutes malicious behaviour? Are there varying scales of malicious behaviour? Is it possible do conduct experiments where malicious behaviour can be reliably observed? E.g. is cheating in a competition against other humans considered malicious? If malicious behaviour is much further along the spectrum than this example, then how can you conduct such an experiment that remains ethical?

# Answer
The Dark Triad maybe what you are seeking.

You have described the behaviours as "malicious", where as the Dark Triad uses the word "malevolent". The Oxford Dictionary advises that these two words are synonyms.

**Reference**

Jones, D. N., & Paulhus, D. L. (2014). Introducing the Short Dark Triad (SD3): A Brief Measure of Dark Personality Traits. Assessment, 21(1), 28–41. https://doi.org/10.1177/1073191113514105
> 4 votes

# Answer
"Malicious behavior" is not a term with a specific definition in psychology; if you search Google Scholar for "malicious behavior" + psychology you receive relatively few results and I see no evidence that those papers are using it as a term, rather they use it as a *description*, that is, the words are used simply in the context of their meaning in English.

Any single study that wishes to investigate malicious behavior would need to define it operationally for that specific study, and it would no doubt depend on the aims and subjects of the study. Malicious behavior in toddlers would almost certainly be defined differently than in adults; malicious behavior in the workplace would be defined differently than malicious behavior in the context of some psychiatric disorder.
> 2 votes

# Answer
Here is a scale on benign and malicious envy. It isn't exactly what you want, but it may contain some citations that are of interest you. I believe they also mention the dark triad, which @Tony Mobbs suggested. Both are worth a look at least. I think the scale is on OSF (osf.io) if you can't access the paper.

https://journals.sagepub.com/doi/abs/10.1177/0146167214564959

Lange, J., & Crusius, J. Dispositional envy revisited: Unraveling the motivational dynamics of benign and malicious envy. *Personality and Social Psychology Bulletin*, 41(2), 284-294. https://doi.org/10.1177/0146167214564959
> 2 votes

---
Tags: experimental-psychology, experiment-design
---


# Question
Title: What is the line between daily conversation and therapy?
For example, Socratic questioning is a skills that is commonly used in therapy. However, if I use it to my friends, does that mean I'm therapize/counsel them? The answer is conflict to me:

* On one hand in a therapeutic relationship the therapist has power (which can be used to exploit the client if they want). And I fail to see how using Socratic questioning can do that. Plus that this technique is probably the most basic and ancient form of conversation (from Socrates' time!)
* On the other hand it is also probably the most basic form of therapy. Beck's cognitive therapy is essentially this

So at the end of the day is Socratic questioning a form of therapy or not? And in general what is the line between daily conversation and therapy? If a non-therapist use therapeutic techniques, would there be any problem? (Assuming they don't need to worry about burn out, and will not exploit anyone)

# Answer
> 1 votes
For the answer to this question, you need to look at the definition of the word ***therapy*** in the context of psychology.

> Therapy is a treatment for psychological problems in which therapists and clients work together to understand problems and come up with plans for fixing them, generally by changing ineffective thoughts, emotions or behaviors (APA, n.d. **\[in the website meta description not in the web content\]**).

The borders between therapy and general socratic questioning between friends/work colleagues is very thin (if at all existent). It can be very therapeutic to feel you can talk to a very good friend or colleague about a problem, but sometimes the situation can be misjudged. With all the best will in the world, sometimes people find it difficult to be non-judgemental of a friend who has confided in them.

Trained therapists, who are registered and licenced, are vetted by their managing bodies to provide a **safe therapeutic environment to their clients, free of judgement and respectful of client autonomy** (Fundamental principles of all codes of ethics — e.g. National Counselling Society (updated June 2020)).

> Therapy provides a **supportive, non-judgemental environment** where you might feel more able to talk openly about your experiences.
>
> Your therapist and you will work together to make changes that you want to achieve to feel a greater sense of happiness, empowerment, or perhaps to feel less affected by particular experiences (Devon Partnership NHS Trust, n.d.).

You said that

> in a therapeutic relationship the therapist has power (which can be used to exploit the client if they want)

Remember that although therapists are in a position of power, if true autonomy is provided, the client has all the power to control the therapeutic relationship.

**Among other big differences including closed vs open questioning**, one big difference between friends/colleagues and a therapist who works within the ethical framework is that a friend/colleague may tell you what they would do or suggest what you should do to deal with a situation.

Respecting client autonomy, a therapist can not and **must not** do that. An ethical therapist will work with the client to work out what options the client has and possible pros and cons associated with those options **in order for the client to choose their own course of action**.

> Psychotherapy is a collaborative treatment based on the relationship between an individual and a psychologist. A psychologist provides a supportive environment that allows you to talk openly with someone who is objective, neutral and nonjudgmental (APA, n.d.).

## References

APA. (n.d.) Therapy. *American Psychological Association*. https://www.apa.org/topics/therapy

Devon Partnership NHS Trust. (n.d.) What are psychological therapies? https://www.dpt.nhs.uk/our-services/psychology-and-psychological-therapies/what-are-psychological-therapies

National Counselling Society (2020). Code of Ethical Practice https://nationalcounsellingsociety.org/about-us/code-of-ethics

---
Tags: therapy, cognitive-therapy
---


title: Does everyone make big mistakes?

text:
# Question
Title: Does everyone make big mistakes?
It is sometimes said that we all make big mistakes. Is this true?

As a starting point, 'big mistake' could be defined as a mistake which we do unconsciously for months, and for which the implications endure for more than a few months.

What is the best approach to recover from 'big mistakes'?

# Answer
I think the simple and obvious answer to this question is "Yes". That is, everyone at some point in their life is likely to make a 'big mistake'.

Regret is the likely emotion felt subsequent to making a 'big mistake' and is a well researched topic as per the references below.

There are countless situations in which an individual is likely to feel the emotion of regret, including: divorce, bankruptcy, loss of a close friend, self-inflicted injury, resigning from employment in a rage, being sentenced to jail etc. (The examples chosen here are likely to reflect instances where the big mistake endures for more than a few months.

Clinical psychology is the profession with specific training for helping individuals move on from their mistakes and overcoming a deep-set emotion of regret.

**References**
> 2 votes

---
Tags: emotion, behavior
---


# Question
Title: Can we be both agreeable and disagreeable at the same time?
Understanding the big five personality traits appears to give the promise of understanding ourselves better. However, it is clear that our behaviour is variable, for example:

* individuals may be highly agreeable (or disagreeable) in the presence of family and close friends yet be the opposite unfamiliar situations.
* anxiety (neuroticism) may not be a problem in familiar situations yet be strong in unfamiliar situations.

**Questions**

1. The Big Five suggests that we behave consistently irrespective of the situation. How can this be true given the apparent differences in behaviour that exist in each situation?
2. How should individuals take this into account in their career choices?

# Answer
Big Five is a **trait theory** built for the specific purpose of quantifying how people *differ*, i.e. the focus in on individual differences. Therefore, we need to have a reliable way of comparing two people on their traits. If we try to compare people's agreeableness in every single situation, we run into the problem you describe: everyone behaves more or less agreeably in different situations. Therefore, to compute a trait, **we assume that we are *averaging* a person's behavior *over a long period of time***, e.g. over a month or a year. If you behave agreeably more times or with more intensity than your friend over the course of a year, we say that you're more agreeable than your friend, but that doesn't mean you'll always *behave* more agreeably than your friend.

Most today agree theorists today agree that traits are somewhat stable but not strong predictors for every situtation; regardless, the *existence* of such differences is significant and what helps us 'understand ourselves better' as you said. Perhaps you should look at Dan P. McAdams for a widely cited model of the 'three levels of personality'.
> 3 votes

# Answer
There are two main theories of behaviour, **trait theory** and **situationism**. What you are referring to is known as situationism. A doyen of trait theory was Raymond Cattell who was the father of modern personality testing (his 16PF test was a forerunner of the Big Five). An assumption of trait theory is that individuals have inherent personality traits and will therefore behave consistently irrespective of the situation. Conversely, situationists suggest that the situation an individual finds themselves in has a significant impact on the individual's behaviour. The extremity of the situationist argument is that individual's do not have personality traits at all and that the situation is sufficient to predict and individual's behaviour. Both trait theorists and the situationists have evidence to support their positions and I think it is generally accepted that the truth lies somewhere in the middle. To resolve the trait theory versus situationism argument are the emerging computational approaches such as cybernetics and system dynamics. Unfortunately, these emerging fields are in their infancy and nothing to report at this time.

All of the above was a long-winded and round-about way of saying that the Big Five is not perfect, but probably the best you can do just at the moment.
> 4 votes

---
Tags: personality, big-five
---


# Question
Title: Why there are four types of temperament?
There are several approaches to categorize personality characteristics into similar amount of types: the four temperament theory, DISC theory, the PAEI model.

Is there any research about possible biological preconditions of mentioned theories?

# Answer
> 2 votes
The four temperament theory is an ancient theory of personality; however, it does appear to have been the dominant theory of personality from 400BCE through to the mid 1800s. New theories of personality emerged with Darwin's observations on emotion and Galton's proposal of the lexical hypothesis. The lexical hypothesis is foundation of many of the current theories of personality, the most popular of which is the five factor model.

More recent temperament theories such as MBTI, DISC have been criticised for a lack of scientific basis and being Barnum tests. Barnum tests are such that everyone is happy with the result, i.e. Are you either intelligent or clever? MBTI and DISC seem to omit the less attractive aspects of humanity, such as: narcissism, anger, anxiety, depression etc. On this basis, research of temperament is infrequent.

A criticism of psychological theories in general (not just temperament theories) is that the neurobiological basis remains unidentified, see here and here. An active area of current science is to establish the neurobiological basis of personality and progress is regularly reported.

# Answer
> 1 votes
Eysenck is a popular theorist who proposed a biological basis for Extraversion, Psychoticism, and Neuroticism. He didn't do a lot of empirical research but his theory has influenced researchers, see Chapman and Weiss.

---
Tags: personality, behavior
---


# Question
Title: What is the scientific term for the expectation, that a personal experience positively deviates from what first- or second-hand experience suggests?
What is the scientific term for the tendency of people to believe, that their expected experience positively deviates from what their first- or second-hand experience suggests?

An example for this effect would be an older European Lady dating a young African man and - despite knowing that many such relationships are dominated by asymmetric economical and romantical interests - believes, that her own relationship will be different. Another example are people who are educated and experienced enough to know how cults work, yet fail to identify the cult they themselves are currently involved in.

Generally, I would say it is a form of self-delusion, or hope, if you want to give it a positive spin - but I am looking for a more specific term for this particular type of self-delusion.

# Answer
Are you referring to the **optimism bias** from a social psychology perspective?

> Your brain has a built-in optimism bias. The phenomenon is also often referred to as "the illusion of invulnerability," "unrealistic optimism," and a "personal fable."
>
> This bias leads us to believe that we are less likely to suffer from misfortune and more likely to attain success than reality would suggest.2 We believe that we will live longer than the average, that our children will be smarter than the average, and that we will be more successful in life than the average. But by definition, we can't all be above average.

Source: VeryWellMind
> 2 votes

---
Tags: perception, bias
---


title: How to handle single trial ERP (P300)

text:
# Question
Title: How to handle single trial ERP (P300)
I am learning to work with EEG data in young and elderly subjects. The goal is to find differences in P300 (amplitude & latency) between both age groups during learning. I analyzed the data based on Grand Averages of both groups. As a confirmatory analysis I've tried to find the P300 peak for each subject individually and I performed analysis based on this peaks. Now I am interested in the variability in P300 latency in each trial, especially in elderly subjects, as the decreased P300 amplitude might be partially explained by averaging of more variable peaks. The single trial data looks very noisy and based on the fixed time window for searching P300 peaks, I am getting very different latencies for each trial. The topographies of single trial data also does not help - some looks ok, but others are just noise. Does someone know, how to handle P300 in single trial EEG data? Are classification methods for BCI going to work for this project?

# Answer
> 1 votes
I remember trying using single-epoch measurements with electroretinogram (ERG) recordings. Basically, ERG responses are electrical potential recordings from the neural activity in the retina. ERGs are usually also obtained using ensemble averages.

The single-sweep ERG amplitude measures were, as expected, also really messy due to random noise and eye movement artifacts that are normally averaged out when using ensemble averages. However, when using all 250 available individual epochs I had at the time, I could still show that ERG amplitudes slowly declined along the duration of the recording. So I took advantage of all available recordings by plotting all available amplitudes against time and performing linear regression. Linear regression is a particularly robust statistical method when a lot of data is available.

In your case, where you basically wish to do an analysis of variance on populations of people, I would try to pool all the data available per subject and determine the standard deviation, or a related variance parameter. Then doing that for all 20 normal subjects will yield a collection of variabilities. This could then be compared to the older population. I can't advice you on the most appropriate statistical test unfortunately, but for a starters you can simply plot the 2 point clouds and compare them visually. If it looks promising, you can do a t-test (which is likely not the most appropriate test, but it will give you a fair indication). If it all looks promising, you have to find a proper analysis of variance to compare the two.

---
Tags: neuroscience, eeg, electrophysiology, signal-processing, p300
---


# Question
Title: Term for the tendency to relate events that occurred in proximity?
What is the correct scientific term for the tendency to wrongfully relate arbitrary observations to a significant event, just because they occurred in temporal or spatial proximity?

Most recently I have observed this error in a discussion about an unsolved killing, where a participant was quite sure that her observation of a black van in a far away town was related to the killing, for the single reason that it occurred around the same time.

# Answer
This is informally referred to as the illusion of causality:

> Illusions of causality occur when people develop the belief that there is a causal connection between two events that are actually unrelated. Such illusions have been proposed to underlie pseudoscience and superstitious thinking, sometimes leading to disastrous consequences in relation to critical life areas, such as health, finances, and wellbeing.

This is a cognitive error in the way humans infer cause and effect.

The example that I'm most familiar with is in medical quackery. Suppose someone is experiencing constipation. They try some advice from friends: Go for a long walk, eat some prunes, massage their stomach, use magnesium supplements. Then they try more questionable solutions: Probiotics, colon hydrotherapy, acupuncture, herbal medicines. At some point during the process, the constipation is relieved, and the patient naturally concludes that whatever treatment immediately preceded this event must have been the cure. They "swear by this treatment" from then on, failing to consider that prior treatments may have needed more time to take effect, that other activities not considered treatments may have affected the results (eg, regular exercise, dietary changes), or simply the mere passage of time.
> 3 votes

# Answer
This is called post hoc ergo propter hoc fallacy.

> Post hoc ergo propter hoc (Latin: 'after this, therefore because of this') is an informal fallacy that states: "Since event Y followed event X, event Y must have been caused by event X."
> 1 votes

---
Tags: perception, terminology, bias, human-error, causal-inference
---


# Question
Title: how does our brain know how to provide the right instructions to pronounce words?
Children learn to speak by hearing others and then trying to pronounce these words.

What I don't understand is: how does their brain know the right instructions to give to the tongue, lips and the vocal cords to produce a sound that is similar to what they hear? How does the brain of child who is trying to pronounce letters for the first time know how to move the tongue to produce 'N' sound, for example?

Why do we find it hard to pronounce foreign letters that doesn't exist in our first language as adults? Does our brain lose the ability to figure out how to pronounce new letters?

# Answer
Children **experiment** and **practice**. They produce sounds and then listen to their own sounds as well as those produced by others around them.

Part of this experiment and practice is the stage of language development referred to as babbling. During babbling, infants work towards producing sounds specific to the language they've been exposed to and gradually develop more and more sophisticated sounds that still (mostly) lack meaning. Infants select and repeat those sounds they make that replicate the language they hear from others.

Periods during development when certain skills are learned preferentially are called critical periods. There are early critical periods in language development after which it is more difficult (but not impossible!) to learn to pronounce new syllables because the practice/experimentation phase is passed.

---

de Boysson-Bardies, B., & Vihman, M. M. (1991). Adaptation to language: Evidence from babbling and first words in four languages. Language, 67(2), 297-319.

Hallé, P. A., De Boysson-Bardies, B., & Vihman, M. M. (1991). Beginnings of prosodic organization: Intonation and duration patterns of disyllables produced by Japanese and French infants. Language and speech, 34(4), 299-318.

Oller, D. K., Wieman, L. A., Doyle, W. J., & Ross, C. (1976). Infant babbling and speech. Journal of child Language, 3(1), 1-11.
> 1 votes

---
Tags: language, brain, language-processing, speech, speech-comprehension
---


# Question
Title: What is the "personality of a relationship" called?
I'm struggling to find this missing word, that I imagine would be part of the psychological literature.

Personality is to an individual what \____________ is to a 1:1 relationship.

Any thoughts? I imagine "Culture" would be the personality equivalent for an organization, but I'm unfamiliar with similar concepts for a 1:1 relationship. Does "culture" apply equally to organizations of size 2?

Many thanks in advance

# Answer
> 2 votes
Perhaps this?

* An individual's personality
* A couple's relationship
* A group's dynamics
* An organisation's culture

# Answer
> 0 votes
Given the blank I would suggest:

* habit

personality is an enduring pattern of relating and responding to life's challenges that has its roots in genetics and experience. Couple's relationship evolves over time and becomes similarly half-intuitive and half-conscious. But I suppose this may be a word that is not "psychological" enough.

---
Tags: social-psychology, personality
---


# Question
Title: What is the scope of the study of Neuroanatomy?
I am now trying to understand the scope of the study of neuroanatomy as the discussion in meta surrounding the question Dorsum sellae, tuberculum sellae and sella turcica which of the 3 is referred to by the adjective sellar? has raised the question on whether the Neurocranium would be studied by Neuroanatomy?

If you apply that logic, in my view 90% - 100% of human anatomy could be under the umbrella of neuroanatomy.

Dermatomes relate to the anatomy of the vertebral regions of the spine. The nerves travel throughout the body, the organs and within the skin.

In my view, neuroanatomy covers the structure and organization of the nervous system which in turn involves the brain, spinal cord and related neural networks throughout the body.

Am I wrong and the whole body (or close to it) is under the umbrella of neuroanatomy?

# Answer
It is the traditional division of anatomy by systems. Neuroanatomy is simply another name for anatomy of the nervous system - both macroscopic and microscopic. As opposed to anatomy of skeleton and muscles, internal organs and topographical anatomy. And of course one remembers the division of macroscopic anatomy and microscopic (which further goes into cytology and histology). So in summary -- yes, the whole body - but just as far as the nerve cells and structures are involved. And please remember - an extremely precise definition here will defy the reason because a lot of these words and divisions are traditional - therefore to be viewed with their own history of use, which may change with time.

Source: Dorland’s Illustrated Medical Dictionary, Sobotta Atlas of Anatomy and Anatomy Textbook. It also helps if one has attended medical school.
> 1 votes

---
Tags: neuroanatomy
---


# Question
Title: Are University Graduated WEIRD people psychologically different to Generally Educated WEIRD people?
A recent question was asking around the subject of WEIRD psychology \[WEIRD standing for **W**estern, **E**ducated, **I**ndustrialized, **R**ich and **D**emocratic — an acronym seemingly coined by Henrich, et al (2010)\] and reading the Wikipedia article to find that out and get some understanding of the subject made me wonder if the concept of WEIRD psychology could have merit.

For the purposes of focus, **let's take one aspect of the WEIRD category — Educated**.

Would a person in Western society, educated at a lower level, be **psychologically** different to someone in Western society educated to the highest possible level?

To be precise in my meaning regarding psychological differences, ignoring the systems of education and assuming:

* nobody in either group are suffering from any psychotic disorders,
* both groups have the same powers of observation, and
* both have equal access to any required reference materials and advice from experts,

is there empirical evidence to suggest that one of the groups cannot form a sound and reasonable argument based on their knowledge of the world around them?

Maybe I am not using the correct search criteria in Google but I can't seem to find any.

## References

Henrich, J., Heine, S. J., & Norenzayan, A. (2010). The weirdest people in the world?. *Behavioral and brain sciences, 33*(2-3), 61-83. doi: 10.1017/S0140525X0999152X. PMID: 20550733.

# Answer
A lot of psychological research takes place in societies that are Western, Democratic, and Industrialized, and that from a global/historical perspective are relatively Educated and Rich.

Of course, within those societies, people vary in their level of education and their socioeconomic status (e.g., wealth, income, financial security, earning potential, etc.).

And education and socioeconomic status have numerous correlates with psychological variables and life outcomes.

E.g., educational attainment is positively correlated with life time income, intelligence, and political views.

There are two obvious explanations for these processes:

* Education changes a person. They acquire general and discipline specific skills. They get exposed to different experiences, career opportunities and so on.
* Psychological characteristics predict interest, access, and success in higher education. For instance, more intelligent people are more likely to be granted access and succeed in higher education.
* Third variables. Factors like family socioeconomic status predict psychological characteristics as well as the probability of pursuing higher education.
> -1 votes

---
Tags: social-psychology, educational-psychology, cross-cultural-psychology, weird-psychology
---


# Question
Title: Can people fake mental illness to gain sympathy?
In the last decade, a lot of famous personalities and celebrities have opened up about suffering from mental disorders, largely depression. This has caused the younger generation to accept and seek help more easily than before, which is good, but my question deals with the authenticity of such claims on social media.

A lot of teenagers choose social media to open up, and enjoy the sympathy it brings from a vast pool of people. But do they even suffer, in the first place? If they do, the obvious choice would be to seek help from doctors, then why social media? If there are people doing this just for sympathy and attention, is there a way to sort out them from genuine claims?

I know that mental disorders have always been there, the facilities available today makes more people come out for help than ever before, and that explains why the numbers are more than the last century. But can there be a chance of an overestimation? Can people fake symptoms of depression, for example?

(*I apologize if this question offends anyone- I tried to make it as passive as I could. Edits to soften the phrasing of the question would be appreciated*.)

# Answer
> 2 votes
Yes,many celebrities have talked about mental illness they have ,or have recovered. Most common is depression,bulimia,anorexia,OCD and sometimes bipolar,PTSD. \[Not shocking since showbiz is majorly concerned about perfection and beauty to the the narrow standards prevalent\].

Sometimes these claims are met with skepticism and then there's a word for it: Sadfishing

The possible reasons could include, obviously is publicity and marketing.

Bad publicity is still publicity, and looking vulnerable and expressing such feelings helps other common people to sympathise, and the star studded life becomes more believable.

And the main point of concern ,regarding whether they are genuine or not, is the fact that the behave ,speak and go on in their lives in a perfectly healthy manner. People expect someone with such a complex list of problems to behave differently ,be "weird" in some way. But from personal experience,people who are suffering have shaped themselves to society's expectations to live up to "I'm fine".

This is also to lack of in depth knowledge of such mental illness or hyperbolic generalizations which most of us will hear or even say ourselves from time to time: "She's a psycho"

or "he cleans his room so much he must have OCD"

But ,we don't know them personally, and everyone has a set of behaviors when behave a kind of people- friends, teachers, parents which is slightly different from our true self.

As for checking if their claims are true ,we would have to look at their medical records etc ,which for obvious reasons is confidential.

Edit: As suggested by Chris Rogers I have added some information about insanity pleas

And here in Wikipedia ,is a short explanation of what conditions can pass an insanity plea.

---
Tags: social-psychology, emotion, psychiatry, depression
---


# Question
Title: Why are most psychological studies not controlling for IQ and personality scores of their respondents?
Consider for exemple the stereotype threat, of which a recent meta-analysis can be found here. People try to assess how can a stereotype might explain a difference between two groups.

However, they almost never control for IQ or Big Five which seems to me to be latent variables with much more explanatory power.

My questions are :

1. Why don't they ever control for these two important factors ?
2. Does it mean that the conclusion of these studies are flawed in some way ?

# Answer
> 4 votes
A quick look at your reference focussed on a meta-analysis of an intervention. Evaluating interventions is mostly about estimating the mean effect of an intervention. So, even if personality or intelligence influences the outcome, this is not directly relevant to evaluating whether on average the intervention has an effect.

In other contexts, controlling for personality and intelligence maybe quite relevant. In general, controlling for personality or intelligence is more relevant (a) where the predictors are conceptually or empirically related to personality or intelligence, and (b) where personality or intelligence is a strong predictor of the outcome of interest.

There are a whole range of psychological constructs that overlap substantially with either personality or intelligence. And in those cases, you do have a body of literature that examines the degree of overlap with personality or intelligence. And there's also literature that examines the incremental prediction of the variable of interest relative to personality.

For example:

* Grit: Is it different from conscientiousness?
* Assessment centers: Do they incrementally predict over and above intelligence?
* Type D personality: Is it more than a composite of neurotcism and extraversion
* Trait emotional intelligence: Is it just a weighted composite of the Big 5
* Ability emotional intelligence: does it predict workplace outcomes over and above intelligence?

Researchers are always confronted with issues of which variables to measures. It is often not practical to measure everything. In particular, intelligence takes quite a bit of time to measure well. So you often get research that doesn't control for these factors. And then later on, other studies come along and fill the gap. There is also a bit of a process "construct proliferation" in psychology. A researcher comes up with a new pet construct. And other researchers point out later on how it's not that different to personality or how it doesn't incrementally predict. A lot of heated debates arise over these things.

Researchers also differ in theoretical orientation and practical concerns. For instance, in industrial/organisational psychology, intelligence and Big 5 personality assessment are very well embedded. So, incremental prediction over and above these factors is a common question for a researchers to ask. In other fields, they may be less grounded in personality or intelligence frameworks.

# Answer
> 0 votes
You only control for factors that have been proven to matter. IQ has not been shown to be significant. So why measure or control IQ variation if there is no evidence of difference.

In fact there is evidence that the activation of stereotype threat confounds cognitive performance and therefore IQ. If a person has their stereotype threat activated, and they perform poorly in an IQ test, is that a fair representation of their cognitive abilities? Many articles and studies prove the confounding ability of stereotype threat and the need to minimise this factor in IQ testing, it seems complex and unfair to apply a measure that is significantly influenced by the stereotype threat factor that you are studying.

\- Stereotypes impair intellectual performance blog

---
Tags: cognitive-psychology, social-psychology, measurement, iq, big-five
---


# Question
Title: Is there a mental illness that almost completely stops you from thinking?
I know the title seems insane, and this is most likely impossible, but *is there a mental illness that almost stops a person from thinking?* By thinking I mean the "talking in your head" thing. I'm not looking for a mental illness that makes them unconscious, but rather a mental illness that keeps them conscious and almost stops them from thinking. I have been saying this a few times, but I feel like it's false, since thinking is a person can't stop thinking if they are alive and conscious(right?). A more realistic question is: "*is there a mental illness that causes one's thinking abilities to severely decline?*"

# Answer
Thinking is mainly supported by the frontal lobes (although the ARAS – the Ascending Reticular Activating System – is essential for its arousal and other cortical areas are essential for its sensory inputs and other associative functions, such as language, spatial orientation, and emotion, which are closely associated with thinking). So, anything that affects the frontal lobes can affect the thinking.

But frontal lobes never stops function if one is still conscious – neurons in the frontal lobes will keep firing as long as there’s a stimulation from the ARAS. So, to literally stop thinking (or all neurons in the frontal lobes stop firing) in still-conscious people is impossible.

However, frontal lobes can be interfered to the degree that the thinking is significantly impaired or retarded and the person seems to stop thinking. This can happen in a varieties of conditions, such as:

**Psychological:** severe emotional overload (e.g., by a sudden loss of something so precious, an unexpected devastating event, or an overwhelming rage), schizophrenia in some stages (e.g. catatonic stage), severe depression

**Pharmacological:** overdosage of antipsychotic, sedative, or other psychoactive drugs

**Pathological:**

* all metalbolic derangements (hypoglycemia, hyponatremia, hypercalcemia, etc.)
* some medical conditions (hypothyroidism, hypocorticolism, hypothermia, etc.)
* frontal lobes disorders: frontal lobe tumor, infarction, hemorrhage, encephalits, dementing diseases
* other causes: post- cerebral contusion, post-ictal stage

At some stages of the above conditions, either before the patients lapse into coma or after they emerge from coma, the patients will appear dazed, muted, unable to think, and unable to respond. That is, apparently, they seem to stop thinking in these conditions.

**References:**

1. Wikipedia. Frontal lobe
2. WebMD. What Is Encephalopathy?
3. Roger F Butterworth. Chapter 38. Metabolic Encephalopathies. Basic Neurochemistry: Molecular, Cellular and Medical Aspects. 6th edition.
4. Wikipedia. \[Delirium\](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Delirium
> 2 votes

# Answer
Thought blocking is a common phenomenon in schizophrenia and other psychotic disorders. The patient experience a short stopping of all thoughts, they report that all thoughts disappear for a short while (seconds, rarely more than 20-30 seconds or so in my experience). This has been described in the psychopathological literature at least since the publication of Fish's Clinical Psychopathology in 1967, but presumably a lot earlier.

I'm not aware of other psychiatric or otherwise pathological conditions in which patients remain conscious and report the loss of thoughts. There are some conditions, as listed by user287279 above, and while it's plausible that there might be a loss of verbal thinking in severe cases of some of them, I have never heard patients report this, neither during the condition nor after recovery.
> 1 votes

# Answer
Well, dementia.

Consciousness is mostly affective. Affective consciousness and emotional response (albeit changed) is preserved in dementia. Cognitive tasks progressively become nearly impossible. Thoughts, if they arise, become unpronounceable or impossible to communicate. In other psychiatric disorders that disrupt thinking - such as major psychoses - some kind of thinking is preserved, even grandiose or very persecutory delusions have some internal logic and mostly can be communicated.
> -1 votes

---
Tags: mental-illness
---


# Question
Title: What is the evidence for the efficacy of Internal Family Systems (IFS) therapy?
I've been reading about Internal Family Systems therapy recently. It's claims seem quite appealing, since it suggests it can do the work of other therapies like psychoanalysis only faster and more directly.

Has it been studied to determine how effective it is? Whether in comparison to to other therapies or not.

# Answer
Internal Family Systems therapy have not been subjected to large rigorous clinical trials. Most of the studies were pilots with no confirmatory studies as yet. I am just repeating the IFS website which best summarises the three existing studies in rheumatoid arthritis, PTSD and depression. I could not find any decent trials in my preliminary search.

A pilot study of 13 patients with PTSD and comorbidities found a 92% improvement after completing 16 sessions.

A randomised trial of 79 patients with rheumatoid arthritis, the 39 patients receiving IFS had reduced pain and depressive symptoms, while improving physical function and self-compassion.

A study of female college students did not find any difference in the 17 students treated with IFS compared with the 15 students treated with usual care of IPT or CBT, which supports IFS's efficacy, but the therapists in the IFS arm mainly only had 1 year of IFS training and experience.

https://ifs-institute.com/resources/research
> 1 votes

---
Tags: therapy, cognitive-therapy
---


# Question
Title: Are there any movies or series involving someone with ADHD?
Aside from How I Met Your Mother, The Simpsons (or Finding Nemo, if that counts, which i don't think it does), are there any movies or series involving someone explicitly stated or highly believed to have ADHD? I can't seem to find any on Google.

There are movies or series about schizophrenia such as A Beautiful Mind, bipolar such as Silver Linings Playbook and then there's this, but I can't seem to find any for ADHD.

---

Of course there are endless speculations on forums everywhere, but these are speculations likely from not properly educated people (e.g. not psychologists).

An example if this question was asking about OCD or Asperger's would be Sheldon Cooper from The Big Bang Theory. The show or creators have never stated any diagnosis, but people highly believe such. Sheldon even has his own article on psychologytoday.

# Answer
The problem with ADHD is that it doesn't really have its own trademark indicator, the way that schizophrenia or Asperger's might. There are several different subtypes of ADHD, and they tend to look different from each other, particularly in the instance of ADHD with hyperactivity and ADHD-PI (primarily inattentive). Even then, there are plenty of disorders that mimic the characteristics of ADHD (such as histrionic personality disorder or sluggish cognitive tempo), and so it is really difficult to tell whether or not a character has ADHD, a mood disorder, an anxiety disorder, or something else entirely.

Furthermore, movies like A Beautiful Mind are autobiographical in nature and tend to focus primarily on the disorder and its deleterious effects on an otherwise prominent individual. This is difficult to do with ADHD, because the symptoms of ADHD are often mistaken for laziness, naïveté, sluggishness, rashness, and a variety of other negative personality traits. On the other hand, disorders like schizophrenia are rarely mistaken for personality traits. It is very clear (in the case of John Nash) that there was something going on almost unrelated to the man himself. Take the description of the movie for example:

> The story begins in the early years of a young prodigy named John Nash. Early in the film, Nash begins to develop paranoid schizophrenia and endures delusional episodes while painfully watching the loss and burden his condition brings on wife Alicia and friends.

You would rarely hear such a description of an individual with ADHD, because ADHD is often early-onset, and so the difference between one's natural personality and a neurodevelopmental disorder is not always clear.

On top of that, characters are often portrayed as having symptoms of ADHD, but it is considered to be a part of their personality used for comedic effect. Other times, their ADHD-like characteristics may be attributed to other disorders, such as the case of Cat Valentine in the Disney Channel show 'Victorious', who suffers from bipolar disorder (as per the show's storyline) yet her characteristics are speculatively more along the lines of ADHD, or even dependent personality disorder. This opens up a can of worms to debate against, however, as characteristics can only serve as **implications** of a disorder, and are not enough to diagnose a person in general. Furthermore, even a professional cannot *diagnose* a character and call it a day, as characters are under the artistic license of the producers and thus there is nothing definitive a professional can say about them.

In terms of characters, it is speculated that Tigger from Winnie the Pooh has classic ADHD (as seen here, though this is largely meant to be humorous). It is also thought that Winnie the Pooh himself has primarily inattentive ADHD. The character Tony Stark of Iron Man is so highly speculated to have ADHD that I have heard him being used as an 'example' of a superhero with ADHD, so that children who struggle with the disorder can feel more confident about their abilities.

In terms of confirmed characters, I know of very little. After further research, I know that the character Lucy Knight of the show 'E.R.' was on Ritalin (a medication used to treat ADHD). I have also repeatedly read that Luna Lovegood of Harry Potter has ADHD-PI, but I think that her character is too broad for any diagnosis. I don't know if Bradley Cooper's character in Limitless has ADHD or not, as the whole plot seems to be akin to the effects of someone unintentionally taking Adderall.

I know that this isn't a movie or show, but Calvin from the comic strip Calvin and Hobbes series is confirmed to have ADHD, as per the creator of the strip and as demonstrated in this comic.

**EDIT**: Forgot to mention this, but the character Michael Scofield of Prison Break is diagnosed with low latent inhibition, which is often used interchangeably with ADHD.
> 8 votes

# Answer
Mommy is about the problems of a mother with his child which is said to have ADHD.

Anyway, I think you will get better answers on https://movies.stackexchange.com/.
> 3 votes

# Answer
several characters from **azumanga daioh!** :) One who's name is **osaka** and **the other I can't remember her name** but I think it starts with a t.

**zim from invader zim,** and probably **GIR** from this show, as well.

**spongebob** probably

**shawn spencer from psych** definitely has adhd, 1,000% (I wish I could be as charismatic as he is, but alas, life is not TV) Gus may be too, but I can't be sure

**tigger from winnie the pooh** (especially the tigger movie, my word. I shed a tear. maybe two.)

other possibles, but not 100%: **stitch from lilo and stitch** (can a dog/alien have adhd?). **Lilo might be too,** but can't be sure. It's been a long time since I've watched that movie. Even if they aren't adhd, its still a great movie for adhders, and really shows the struggle we can go through (family, friend troubles, relationships and not fitting in.....intergalactic troubles.....lol, and just being plain weird).

someone in **The Emporer's new groove**. But I haven't watched it in so long I don't know who's suspect.

marvel's **guardian's of the galaxy (quill(?)** most definitely and probably other characters, like **rocket**. In the second movie it comes more into play for the plot. again, these movies made me cry because they get it.)

probably some characters from **princess bride**, as well.
> 1 votes

# Answer
I am a layperson so take that into account, but I find several characters in anime and manga who resonate with my experiences living with ADHD, and what I've researched about it.

One character especially is Katarina/Catarina Claes from the novels and anime "My Next Life as a Villaines: All Route Lead to Doom."

She zones out, she dives head first into things she finds interesting, she's often hyper and literally climbs trees. She hates things that bore, and she certainly is impulsive.

It was this quote in particular (in her past life) that really spoke to me:

*Acchan... I can't... can't go on. I leave the rest... to you..." With that, my best friend slammed her textbook shut, before dramatically planting her forehead down onto the stack of notes I had printed.*

*"Wh-what are you even saying...? It hasn't even been ten minutes since we started! If you keep this up, you'll drop out of the school system for an entire year!"
"..Nghh... b-but... reading these endless lines in this thick reference book only makes me sleepy... there's no avoiding it. There has to be some sort of curse in this terrible reference book..."
Saying so, my friend sighed deeply. And with that, the High School entrance exam study session ended, in all of ten minutes. Although she was physically capable and did well in sports, she was apparently hopeless in her studies. It wasn't like she was bad at studying - she simply had no interest in it, and was the sort of person who didn't care about matters that bored her.
*

*--My Next Life as a Villainess Vol 2 by Satoru Yamaguchi*

I would love to see an expert's opinion. But the fandom is pretty much united.
> 1 votes

# Answer
"The secret life of Walter Mitty" i'd say. This movie presents splendidly a person who seems to have clear attention deficits without hyperactivity (which would be typical for a subtype of the syndrome or he overcame it with adoloscence.) Additionally he seems to tend to hyperfocus for his work and develops incredible passion for the things he does aside of extensive daydreaming. Both nicely illustrated with a hardly realistic journey and definitely unrealistic associations of his mind while outstanding characters realize his attention is elsewhere.

The movie does not label him with any diagnosis but it struck me how much this character displays features of the nonhyperactive subtype of add.
> 0 votes

---
Tags: abnormal-psychology, adhd, psychology
---


# Question
Title: When a person is unable to recognize their own emotions, what is the name for it?
What is the name for inability to recognize one's own (not other's) emotions?

# Answer
Are you referring to *alexithymia*?

> Alexithymia is defined as a personality construct characterized by the sub-clinical inability to identify and describe emotions in the self. The core characteristics of alexithymia are marked dysfunction in emotional awareness, social attachment, and interpersonal relating. Furthermore, individuals suffering from alexithymia also have difficulty in distinguishing and appreciating the emotions of others, which is thought to lead to un-empathic and ineffective emotional responding.

Source: https://www.disabled-world.com/health/neurology/alexithymia.php
> 3 votes

---
Tags: emotion, terminology
---


# Question
Title: Any studies that assess effects of treatment to individual depression symptoms
As an study/research idea, I have been going through articles about treatment response (mostly SSRI and other antidepressants) related to treating depression, but many studies seem to be mostly reporting changes in total scores (eg BDI or PHQ) whereas I haven't really seen much research analyzing the effect of treatment on symptom level (say on individual questions of those scales), with the exception of specific field of suicidality. Especially given many of the treatments are considered "equally" effective (esp antidepressant mono therapy) it would be of scientific interest to look into more detailed level and see if there's any difference.

Is there any realiable studies/meta-analysis which would report such values, or if not, is there a reason, such as methodological issues, for this?

# Answer
> 3 votes
To my mind, there are several reasons why this isn't the standard procedure. One reason is that Likert-type items are ordinal data, which means that standard statistical methods such as linear regression and t-tests shouldn't be used. Instead, non-parametric tests need to be used, and those generally confer lower statistical power. In contrast, a scale score (the sum of several Likert-type items) is per convention handled as interval data, which means that those standard methods can be used.

Another reason is that this might increase the probability of false positives. If a scale used to measure depression has 17 items and the significance level is set to p \< 0.05, there is a 1 - 0.95^17 = 58 percent chance of at least one false "significant" association between the test group (treatment vs. no treatment) and an item from the scale.

Furthermore, the idea (which is questionable) is that there exists an underlying pathological "depression process" in the brain, which is expressed through different symptoms such as depressed mood, sleep disturbances, loss of interest etc. This is the medical model, and it is analogous to, for instance, pneumonia, in which there is a pathological infectious/inflammatory process in the body caused by bacteria, and giving rise to symptoms such as coughing, fever, etc. From this theoretical point of view, it makes more sense to assess the total score of the depression scales, which is thought to represent the "latent variable" that is the "depression process", rather than just one of the isolated symptoms.

However, there are examples in the literature of the approach you suggest. Below is one example of a meta-analysis of some trials of SSRI for depression. The study is not without flaws in my opinion, so the results should be interpreted with care, but it is an example of the idea you had.

Influence of baseline severity on the effects of SSRIs in depression: an item-based, patient-level post-hoc analysis

# Answer
> 0 votes
Division 12 of the American Psychological Society has a resource that may assist. For a range of diagnoses (including depression), non-pharmaceutical treatments that have demonstrated efficacy are identified. For each treatment, the studies and meta-analyses that were used to support its efficacy are identified. The approaches used in the supporting articles may assist with the methodological aspects of your question.

---
Tags: depression
---


# Question
Title: Will smoking marijuana lightly during teens cause developmental damage to the brain?
If someone were to smoke marijuana lightly during his teens and stop abruptly in his adulthood. Would he suffer from Some type of damage to his short term memory/iq and if so can the damage be reversed?

# Answer
It is impossible to say with any degree of certainty whether a given individual will or will not suffer from any consequences of any amount of marijuana consumption, so we'll have to use the scientific data which can only say something about group-level effects.

It is quite well known that cannabis impairs cognition in the short-term\*, and that the effects may last for at least a while of abstinence in heavy users. What you're asking about is whether there are any lasting and irreversible effects of cannabis on cognition, and this remains a debated and unresolved question in the scientific literature on harmful effects of cannabis. For instance, a recent review find inconsistent evidence for long-term working memory deficits in current heavy users and limited evidence for recovery after abstinence. In the same study, similar results are reported for other areas of cognition.

When it comes to IQ, there are some long-term studies that assess whether there are lasting long-term effects of cannabis on IQ. I believe the first such study was the one published by Meier and colleagues in 2012, in which they reported that among heavy users who had begun using cannabis before the age of 18, there was a lasting decline of IQ from childhood to mid-life with about 8 points, that persisted even after cessation of cannabis use. A similar study was published in 2016 by Mokrysz and colleagues, finding no decline of IQ between ages 8 to 15 in adolescents and pre-teens who had used cannabis during those years. Both studies may be subject to methodological criticism, and to my knowledge, there are no other studies with similar design.

Another issue is whether cannabis impacts brain development and/or causes morphological brain changes. The literature on this topic is also on the whole inconclusive, as shown in a recent review by Kroon and colleagues. However, it should be noted that there is actually some evidence ("limited evidence") for reduction in the volume of prefrontal cortex and hippocampus, which is consistent with animal studies in which especially a reduction of hippocampus volume can be induced under experimental conditions.

In short, the scientific literature in this area is on the whole inconclusive, and while it cannot be ruled out that there might be irreversible negative effects of cannabis on cognition, especially in those who start to use cannabis early and develop a heavy use over long periods of time, there are no hard evidence to support this either.

\*. Though there is also some reports indicating positive effects of cannabis on divergent thinking (i.e. "out of the box"-thinking), which might be considered a positive effect on cognition.
> 2 votes

---
Tags: neuroscience, drugs
---


# Question
Title: What are the observable differences between "pure" antisocial personality disorder and psychopathy?
How to decide whether one has antisocial personality disorder, psychopathy, or both?

What are the traits which non-psychopaths with APD have but psychopaths don't have, or vice versa?

# Answer
Antisocial personality disorder (APD) and psychopathy are not distinct entities, but highly overlapping constructs. APD is the diagnosis currently supported by the latest iterations of the Diagnostic and Statistical Manual of Mental Disorders (DSM-5), and psychopathy is rarely used in clinical contexts today, though the terms are often used interchangeably.

The criteria of APD are centered around antisocial behaviors such as norm violating behavior, impulsivity, aggressiveness, and a lack of remorse. Psychopathy lacks a specific set of criteria, but for instance the often used Hare Psychopathy Checklist (PCL-R)include aspects such as impulsivity, aggressivity, and a greater focus than APD on the lack of empathy and Machiavellianism, that is manipulativeness and callousness.
> 1 votes

---
Tags: abnormal-psychology, personality-disorder
---


# Question
Title: How many answer choices is too many answer choices?
When building a survey, what is the maximum number of response choices in a question? In the interest of reducing cognitive load and/or avoid choice paralysis. I couldn't find any research on this specifically.

# Answer
> 1 votes
Take a look at researches on human Working Memory Capacity (WMC) and it applications in different problems, for instance, here is Elsevier ScienceDirect chapter/paper set related to WMC. Most of the researches depicts that WMC of an adult human is limited to 3-5-7 items, depending of how large and complex these items are.

Therefore, if your survey question is about something minimalistic, like preferable color or time slots, which are quite simple objects to comprehend, you may confidently provide up to 7 answer options. But if your question is asking about behaviour in some imagined environment, and answer options present different complex scenarios in a response to this environment, it's better to limit them to 3-4 options so that respondents would be able to comprehend each option separately and consciously compare it with other ones.

---
Tags: survey
---


title: Is The Chimp Model really a thing?

text:
# Question
Title: Is The Chimp Model really a thing?
I've come across 'The Chimp Model' that sports psychologist Steve Peters advocates for understanding human motivations. While this seems intuitive does it have much credibility in neuroscience? If there's any non-specialist papers I'd be interested.

https://chimpmanagement.com/the-chimp-model/

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=R-KI1D5NPJs

# Answer
> 3 votes
(This isn't a complete answer, as I'm not in a position to comment on the neuroscience, but it should provide some useful background for anyone else who is interested in Peters' work.)

While The Chimp Model is *based* on psychology, is not intended to be an accurate nor detailed representation *of* the science. Rather, it is a conceptual framework that can be used to help people think about and change their behaviour. It provides a metaphor that can help coaches and individuals who want to know a bit more about the way their minds work, and enable them to make changes based on what they have learned. The idea is that it will help people *use* the science, but is not the science itself.

(Compare this to the idea that atoms are little coloured balls: that isn't an accurate representation of modern physics, but it is a useful way to think about many of the properties of matter in many practical situations)

The model divides the mind into three parts.

1. The Chimp. According to the model, this is an independent part of your mind that is not under your control. It works with feelings and impressions, and makes deductions using "emotional thinking".
2. The Human. This is the conscious, thinking, analytical part of your mind that operates on facts and can make logical deductions.
3. The Computer. This is the part of your mind that stores memories, skills and habits. It can do a certain amount of "automatic" thinking.

Peters' ideas are related to the ideas espoused by Daniel Kahneman in his book, "Thinking, Fast and Slow". In this book Kahneman posits that there are two systems at work in the human mind:

1. System 1, which is fast, instinctive and emotional. This system can perform
2. System 2, which is slower, more deliberative, and more logical

Kahneman's work is much closer to "proper" (i.e. academic) psychology than that of Peters, whose motivation is practical rather than scientific.

Both Peters and Kahneman are proponents of a school of thought known as "dual process theory".

---
Tags: motivation, evolution, model
---


# Question
Title: Could you inject external gamma waves into your brain safely?
I've recently taken up the study of neurology, and I was wondering if you could create a device that would input gamma waves into your brain. And if it would be safe. Suppose you had a device that you wore sort of like a headband, and it emitted gamma waves and focused them into your brain. Would this be safe, if at low power? And would it increase focus/awareness?

# Answer
> 1 votes
I am fairly certain that the question is not about electromagnetic gamma light radiation, but rather about the gamma frequency brain waves. While we do not "*inject gamma waves*" we can stimulate brain activity at gamma level frequencies through the use of sensory stimulation that occurs at such a frequency. There has been research done with people who have Alzheimer's and the use of lights that turn off and on at the same frequency as Gamma waves.

Here are the respective wikipedia articles that concern gamma waves vs gamma rays respectively https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Gamma\_wave **vs** https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Gamma\_ray#:~:text=A%20gamma%20ray%2C%20or%20gamma,imparts%20the%20highest%20photon%20energy.

I found the following articles about the use of gamma frequency stimulation in Alzheimer patients.

Here is a link to an article: https://www.nia.nih.gov/news/noninvasive-brain-wave-treatment-reduces-alzheimers-pathology-improves-memory-mice#:~:text=Previously%2C%20researchers%20at%20the%20Massachusetts,also%20boosted%20the%20activity%20of Noninvasive brain wave treatment reduces Alzheimer's pathology, improves memory in mice

Here is an article that mentions the use of sound waves at a gamma frequency too.

https://www.alzforum.org/news/research-news/flash-beep-gamma-waves-stimulate-microglia-memory Flash! Beep! Gamma Waves Stimulate Microglia, Memory

# Answer
> 0 votes
**Q: Could you inject external gamma waves into your brain safely?**

**A:** Yes, nowdays we can inject external gamma waves into the brain safely, and the procedure has been done routinely in many advanced neuroradiosurgical clinics for decades now – it’s called Gamma Knife or Gamma Knife Radiosurgery.

But the procedure isn’t done to increase focus or awareness – there’s no theoretical background or experimental evidence for that. Instead, the procedure is done to precisely remove a pathologic lesion, such as tumor, arterovenous malformation, and epileptic focus.

This procedure is the procedure of choice when the conventional neurosurgery cannot be performed due to fact that the lesion is too deep down in the brain or too near a vital structure (such as in the middle of the brainstem) or that the patient's age or medical conditon wouldn't allow a conventional neurosurgical procedure.

**References:**

1. Gamma Knife
2. Gamma Knife Radiosurgery

---
Tags: brain, brain-waves
---


# Question
Title: How can we overcome positional bias when selecting an option on a screen/document?
I think the question is best described by an example:

> You are at a doctors office and are about to have a conversation about you birth control prescription. Before you can enter you have to decide if you want the female doctor or the male doctor with you in the room. The decision is made on either a sheet of paper or screen listing the female and male doctors name with a checkbox attached.

Depending on which option is listed first or on top the decision is biased towards that option. If for example the male doctor is listed first the patient might feel that selecting the female doctor is out of the ordinary or 'extra work' just for her. The patient might be inclined to choose the first option to avoid any confrontation.

This might be especially true if the patient feels uncomfortable with the topic of the appointment.

In what form could we present the options as to not give any bias as to what the "normal" or expected answer is?

# Answer
You could randomise the order of response options. This wouldn't prevent bias in the individual case, but it would probably remove most bias in aggregate.

I also wonder whether in the case that you present, positional bias has much of an effect.

Equally, you could make "no preference" or something similar, the first option.
> 1 votes

---
Tags: bias, decision-making
---


# Question
Title: What, if anything, sets humans apart from other species?
As I grew up, I was taught that the difference between humans and animals was that human beings have free will and animals do not. The basis is that animals will act accordingly to the nature of their species. I never fully understood this statement and still wonder whether it is a valid claim.

From an evolutionary perspective, we would be regarded as a species at the top of the food chain. The main advantage in our development is our brains.

If we put aside the differences in what human beings are capable of, e.g. making clothes, machinery, etc., is there a real distinction between human beings and other animals? Do we really have free will, or an illusion of free will? Or are we behaving, as other animals, in accordance with the nature of our species?

I know this is a big question and could result in a range of debates over my definitions. So for the sake of clarity, **let's keep this question limited to what defines a human brain as opposed to an animal brain and any evidence that supports any significant difference**, allowing for the fact that the human brain is well-developed (as opposed to, e.g. to our canines).

# Answer
Some articles with some information pertinent to your question, hope this helps:

According to "Human and animal cognition: Continuity and discontinuity" (Premack, 2007), that as several species have skills once thought to be unique to humans, that this suggests that there is a misleading (the article's word) disparity between 'brain' and 'mind'. So the article's focus is on:

> What are the dissimilarities?

When examining 8 aspects, or competencies, including teaching, short-term memory, causal reasoning, planning, deception, transitive inference, theory of mind, and language, the authors found that the similarities to be minor, but the dissimilarities to be very large and that there is no disparity.

Each of these points are discussed in depth in the article (too big for this answer); however, the article's author concludes with a fundamental difference:

> Animal competencies are mainly adaptations restricted to a single goal. Human competencies are domain-general and serve numerous goals. For instance “planning” may be tied to episodic memory, suggesting a broad competence.

Going further, according to "Evolution of the brain and intelligence", (Roth and Dicke, 2005), that a main difference is due to:

> factors that correlate better with intelligence are the number of cortical neurons and conduction velocity, as the basis for information-processing capacity.

and critically (bolding mine):

> The outstanding intelligence of humans appears to result from a **combination and enhancement of properties found in non-human primates**, such as theory of mind, imitation and language, **rather than from ‘unique’ properties**.
> 15 votes

# Answer
It is not that we are just generally smarter then animals, but we posses cognitive tools of a different kind that they don't. Two of them are language and the ability to simulate the future.

Regarding language, there is a wide consensus today that human language has some unique complexities that no animal form of communication has (see Pinker's "The Language Instinct"). It includes intricate syntactical structures and generative engines of vocabulary. Noam Chomsky was the first to argue that language is a universal capability, i.e. every healthy human being would be able to use it, and thus pre-wired into our brains from birth (and by that also debunking the Behavioral assumption that we are born tabula rasa).

The ability to simulate the future is the simply using our imagination to forecast the results of different actions or events. Again, you can every now and then find an animal that seems to know how certain actions will results, but it is always a product of learning from the past, while trying and erring. In contrast, people can imagine how the world would response to certain actions, without encountering a similar situation previously. (I'm sorry, but I can't recall right now a good reference for this. If you insist in the comments, I could run a quick search).

Of course these two features are not all that sets us apart from animals, qualitatively, and there a certainly more that hopefully would be brought in answers of others. However, as I personally see it, these two are special, since they equip us with unique cognitive abilities of a different kind and of dedicated brain machinery (but that's for a different question).
> 9 votes

# Answer
Actually, animals are able to imagine the future, at least to the extent that they use prospective control of their movements. And there are fantastic arguments for animals being self-aware, considering self-related processing as a feature of at least mammals if not many more animals (Northoff and Panksepp, The trans-species concept of self and the subcortical-cortical midline system, 2008).

A core self may be based on an integrating neuronal mechanism that accounts for self-related processing, integrating *exteroception* (perception of the external world via sight, sound, etc.) and *interoception* (perception of internal states of being) with emotional processing all in relation to a goal. It is coordinated action in the world, colored by emotional evaluation of anticipated and realized results. In fact, Solms and Panksepp (The "Id" Knows More than the "Ego" Admits: Neuropsychoanalytic and Primal Consciousness Perspectives on the Interface Between Affective and Cognitive Neuroscience, 2012) make a convincing case for affective consciousness, that attributing a positive or negative value to an experience and the arising movements/behaviors might be the whole point of consciousness.

Similar to other social animals, humans move in ways that reveal their attention, intentions, and feelings (Colwyn Trevarthen – pretty much everything he's written), but there are a few things that are different. Humans have an internal mechanism for time-keeping which Trevarthen describes as the *Intrinsic Motive Pulse*, or the natural flow of energy cycles in our brain that shape our movements and create a sense of time, allowing us to create memories and anticipate the future in unique ways. Rhythms between infants and adults are the same, so that we are able to communicate non-verbally, sharing pulse and quality to create narratives in a "communicative musicality" (Malloch, Mother and infants and communicative musicality, 1999).

Anyway, we begin to make cooperative meaning with one another from the moment we are born; that leads eventually to the transmission of culture, even across generations (Trevarthen, What is it like to be a person who knows nothing?). We make symbols and rituals that fill our world with meaning. Language is a product of the ways in which people are able to create consensual domains (Maturana, Biology of Language, 1978), the root of which is in sympathetic movement (Delafield-Butt and Trevarthen, Theories of the development of human communication, year?).
> 4 votes

# Answer
Our large cortex allows us to produce survival behaviour more sophisticated than any other species. Our basic traits are co-operation, competition and cheating. We excel at all three and can switch in a heartbeat according to the perceived situation. I suggest an evolutionary feedback loop between the traits and cortex size. Cheating, for example, only works if one or more others can be deceived. If their cortex is as large as yours you are less likely to succeed. The traits drive behaviour at every social grouping: family, tribe, nation, economic bloc. Language is only a tool for the traits. However in recent times the aforementioned feedback loop may have stopped working or even reversed. Increasing our species is reshaped by relative levels of fertility and promiscuity more than any other factor. We cannot countenance eugenics. Can we countenance the consequence of that distaste?
> -1 votes

---
Tags: cognitive-psychology, animal-cognition, philosophy-of-mind
---


# Question
Title: Can a brain dead person be revived through a modified defribillator?
Is the analogy of a defribillator for a brain be able to tackle brain deaths ? What are the limitations to this idea?

# Answer
Brain death is defined as the complete and **permanent** loss of brain function (1), or complete, **irreversible** cessation of brain function (2), or **irreversible** cessation of all functions of the whole brain (3). Therefore, according to these definitions, once brain death occurs, it cannot be reversed, and even if one tries to treat this condition by any treatment or intervention (including the suggested brain defibrillation), it will not be successful.

However, it is very important to note that **not all** patients who have loss all functions of the whole brain and appear to be in deep coma have brain death. Some of them have **reversible** causes, such as overdosage of CNS (central nervous system) depressant drugs, severe hypothermia, and severe metabolic (acid-base, electrolyte, endocrine, etc.) abnormalities. (1-3). These patients can be revived and their coma can be reveresed not by some kind of brain defibrillation but by treating the cause. Even in patients who are in coma from non-convulsive status epilepticus and have generalized abnormal electrical discharges in their brains (as can be diagnosed from EEG – electroencephalogram), which may be considered the brain equivalence of the heart fibrillation, the treatment is intravenous antiepileptic drug injection, not any kind of brain defibrillation, to stop the abnormal cerebral discharges. (4)

Thus, one of the utmost important points in diagnosing brain death is to establish that the condition of the patient is **irreversible and permanent**. This can be done by establishing the cause to be an irreversible, destructive, structural disease or condition, such as prolonged cardio-pulmonary arrest, or a large intracerebral hemorrhage or a massive cerebral contusion, both with severe brain edema and herniation compressing the brainstem; and by ruling out reversible causes (mentioned above).

Yet, it is *not that no kind of electrical shock to brain has some role in medical treatment*. Regarding the idea of brain defibrillation, there is indeed a medical intervention that delivers an electrical shock to the brain; the procedure is called electroconvulsive therapy or electroshock therapy. (5,6) But it is not done to revive near-brain-death or other comatose patients but to treat some psychiatric disorders, such as depression, bipolar disorder, and schizophrenia.

**References.**

1. David M. Greer, MD, MA1; Sam D. Shemie, MD2,3; Ariane Lewis, MD4; et al. Determination of Brain Death/Death by Neurologic Criteria. The World Brain Death Project. JAMA. 2020;324(11):1078-1097. doi:10.1001/jama.2020.11586
2. G Bryan Young. Diagnosis of brain death In. Janet L Wilterdink, editor. UpToDate. Sep 02, 2020
3. American Academy of Neurology (AAN) guideline. Update: Determining Brain Death in Adults
4. Raoul Sutter, Stephan Rüegg, Peter W. Kaplan. Epidemiology, diagnosis, and management of nonconvulsive status epilepticus Neurol Clin Pract. 2012 Dec; 2(4): 275–286.
5. Charles Kellner. Overview of electroconvulsive therapy (ECT) for adults. In: David Solomon, editor. UpToDate. Dec 01, 2020.
6. Wikipedia. Electroconvulsive therapy
> 3 votes

---
Tags: brain-waves, experimental-neuroscience
---


# Question
Title: Should I define each and every term while writing an article for a psychology journal?
I am writing a review article on dialectical behavioral therapy. If in the article, there are technical terms related to behavioral therapy, so, should I define each of the terms while writing the article or should I assume that the readers/editor/reviewers of the psychology journal know all these terms. For example: A term, cognitove behavioral therapy (CBT). Should I explain what is CBT or should I assume that readers know this type of term.

# Answer
> 2 votes
This question may be better directed to academia.se.

In the first instance, you should check the editorial requirements of the journal you are targeting. Most journals prescribe that it is mandatory to spell out acronyms with first usage. It is possible that some very specific technical journals will allow common terminology through without being specific.

Your question is interesting in that you have used the acronym CAB for **C**ognitive **B**ehavioural **T**herapy, for which I use the acronym CBT. I personally associate CAB with **C**linical **A**ssessment of **B**ehaviour. Clearly the acronyms CAB and CBT are not as well established as I had understood.

---
Tags: psychology, publication-process, publication
---


# Question
Title: What is the meaning of “the inner leaflet of their lipid bilayer corresponds to the outer leaflet of the plasmalemma.”
The whole quote is, “Their lumen corresponds topologically to the outside of the cell; consequently, the inner leaflet of their lipid bilayer corresponds to the outer leaflet of the plasmalemma.” The “they” corresponds fo the vacuolar apparatus of a cell. My question here is, how is it possible for the inner leaflet of the vacuolar apparatus to lie on the outer leaflets of the plasma membrane? Wouldn’t this mean that the vacuolar apparatus partly lies outsides the cell? Or am I mistaken? The excerpt is from Chapter 4 of *Principles of Neural Science* by Kandel et al.

# Answer
> 2 votes
I don't have Kandel in front of me but I am pretty sure I know what your book is trying to say. The specific language they've chosen for this section is quite odd and I believe old-fashioned, though, which might be leading to your confusion.

---

Transferring membrane-bound material from intracellular organelles to the surface of a cell involves or vice-versa involves *fusing vesicles with the plasma membrane* or *budding vesicles from the plasma membrane*. The process is more or less the same, just in reverse. See the diagram below:

Adapted from https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Golgi\_apparatus#/media/File:0314\_Golgi\_Apparatus.jpg

Notice how the "protein" has its purple plus-shaped domain on the outside of the cellular membrane? If it were to be secreted in a vesicle (as pictured here) or taken up by endocytosis (just imagine the arrows pointing the other way), fusing or pinching the membrane would mean that this "outside" part is actually on the inside of the secretory vesicle, Golgi apparatus, any lysosome/endosome, etc. What stays constant is the part facing the cytosol.

Therefore, you can say that the "inside" of any of these compartments "looks like" the outside of the cell, whereas the outside of these compartments (facing the cytosol) looks like the inside of the cell membrane (also facing the cytosol).

For another intuitive way of thinking about this, imagine you have an inflated balloon. You press a marble into the side of the balloon and pinch inside so now the marble is entirely inside this little bubble inside the whole balloon. It's still covered by "outside balloon", but yet it is inside this little compartment you've created.

For more general thoughts on "topology" (what is referred to by "topologically") see the general mathematical concept: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Topology

---
Tags: neuroscience
---


# Question
Title: Difficulty of expressing thoughts verbally
Some people find it difficult to express their thoughts verbally. They may often feel that their words don't give their thoughts enough justice, and that their thoughts could've been verbalized better.

1. What can the causes for this be?
2. Can it be "cured" or alleviated, maybe by reading, and participating in conversations?

# Answer
This is not a direct answer to the question, but a related construct that may be useful is **alexithymia**.

Alexithymia is a personality construct describing relatively decreased ability to identify and express emotions. Psychometrically, the alexithymia construct has seen extensive use and undergone testing that by and large supported its validity (Bagby, Parker and Taylor, 1994a; Bagby, Parker and Taylor, 1994b). In clinical populations, the causes have been theorized to include anterior cingulate cortex and right hemispheric dysfunction, but the cognitive neuroscientific evidence is currently mixed (Zaidel, 2005).

Unfortunately, I am not aware of any direct parallel for the inability to adequately express thoughts, nor of any direct treatments, and I was not able to find anything in the literature. Hopefully, the alexithymia construct may still be of some use in finding an answer.

## References

* Bagby, R. M., Parker, J. D., & Taylor, G. J. (1994). The twenty-item Toronto Alexithymia Scale—I. Item selection and cross-validation of the factor structure. Journal of psychosomatic research, 38(1), 23-32.
* Bagby, R. M., Taylor, G. J., & Parker, J. D. (1994). The twenty-item Toronto Alexithymia Scale—II. Convergent, discriminant, and concurrent validity. Journal of psychosomatic research, 38(1), 33-40.
* Zaidel, G. T. E. (2005). Alexithymia, interhemispheric transfer, and right hemispheric specialization: a critical review. Psychother Psychosom, 74, 81-92.
> 7 votes

# Answer
This is my opinion. I have no sources for this.

The common concept of thought in Western culture, going back to philosophers of the Enlightenment such as Leibniz, Locke, Hume and Descartes in the 17th and 18th century, is that of rational and, especially ***verbal*** thought. Philosophy and psychology (which grew from philosophy at the end of the 18th and during the 19th century) have maintained this focus on verbal thought and for the most part ignored other forms of thinking.

As an effect, both the general public and scholars think of thought as being in the form of words and, therefore, capable of being expressed in words without any loss of content. Conversely, if you find yourself unable to express your thoughts, you think of yourself and may be perceived as lacking clear thinking or verbal competence.

That, in my opinion, is a misconception.

Because, while there may be people who are very verbal and rational, there are certainly many people who have other things going on in their minds besides words. I, for example, think in images, emotions, body perceptions and other sensory registers. When I consider a problem and its solution, I don't always use words in my mind, and certainly not logic, and if I do, these verbal thoughts are always supplemented by those other kinds of thinking.

But since Western communication largely relies on verbal expression, and since it is difficult to translate many of these non-verbal thoughts into words, the result is that I find it hard to say what I think, and that others find it hard to understand what I mean.

This need not be a problem in face-to-face interaction, though. There is non-verbal communication. You can hug someone, cook them a great meal, or create art. All of which are communication and an expression of thought.

Once you stop thinking of thought and communication as merely verbal, you can begin to find ways of ordering your thinking without translating it into words, and ways of expression that don't rely on words alone.

The statement that "a picture says more than a thousand words" is true, you know.
> 4 votes

# Answer
Introverts Process Information Deeply

Trying to think of exactly the right word is called “word retrieval.” And this can be hard for introverts. In social situations, this may translate to us falling behind fast-talking extroverts. At work, we may come off sounding like we don’t know what we’re talking about, even when we do. In the classroom, we may shrink from raising our hand, because we know it will be challenging for us to put our thoughts into words if we’re called on.

One reason word retrieval can be difficult for introverts is we process information deeply. We chew on ideas, turning them over and over in our minds, analyzing them from every angle. When you’re turned inward reflecting on something — even something as simple as, What should I have for dinner? — it’s hard to talk. Introverts don’t think out loud like extroverts do. We generally do our processing inwardly. Quietly. Without words.

https://introvertdear.com/news/the-science-behind-why-introverts-struggle-to-speak/
> 2 votes

---
Tags: cognitive-psychology, language, communication, metacognition
---


# Question
Title: How to use QUEST in a discrimination task
Similar to the question "How to use a QUEST staircase in 2-AFC”. I also have a question about using QUEST. In fact, I too tried to find an answer in

Psychophysics: A Practical Introduction by Kingdom & Prins; Experimental Design by Cunningham & Wallraven; Visual Psychophysics by Lu & Dosher.

Although I found a script of QUEST, it is just for the detection task, where the threshold is always the upper threshold. I want to study also the lower threshold in the discrimination task. Is anyone can give me some hints?

# Answer
> 1 votes
QUEST is one method of measuring thresholds. There are lots of other procedures including method of constant stimuli, modified up-down staircases, PEST, and ZEST. Each has their own set of requirements and own set of assumptions. If, as you say in the comments, you want to define the JND as the (25% threshold + 75% threshold)/2, then QUEST is probably not the procedure you want to use. The QUEST procedure is designed to optimally find the parameters of a psychometric function. While these parameters can give you the information you want, it is not necessarily the optimum procedure.

As it sounds like you are just learning, you may be better off with the method of constant stimuli. You present stimuli at a variety of levels, record if the answer was correct/incorrect, fit a psychometric function and then read off the values.

# Answer
> 0 votes
I think you may run two Quest procedures. One is used to calculate the 75% threshold and the other one calculating 25% threshold. In this way you can calculate the JND.

---
Tags: experimental-psychology, psychophysics, matlab
---


# Question
Title: Name of the psychological effect that make us see correlation that may not exist
After 51 years, the "Z-340" cypher text from "Zodiac" serial killer has been solved: https://edition.cnn.com/2020/12/11/us/zodiac-killer-cypher-340-code-trnd/index.html

Now that we have the problem and the solution, when I'm watching the cypher text again I'm like *"Ho.. look, look, it's so obvious! The sign must mean this and that and the following letter is transposed according to the sign and if you like at this and that there is a clear relationship between the age of the captain and whatever this thing mean!! Ha! It must be!"*

Even knowing that it's just wishful thinking, I'm still willing it to be true: *"Yeaaah, it's probably, 99.99% sure, just me imagining things.. BUT! That 0.01% doubt, I want it to be true anyway."*

There is a name for this effect. I don't think it's the Barnum effect, it may or may not be a "confirmation bias". What is this effect called?

# Answer
The feeling that the solution is obvious after it is provided is called hindsight bias (aka the "knew-it-all-along phenomenon").

This feeling is informed by the metacognitive sense of surprise, which itself is a form of processing fluency. Basically, when the solution to a problem is first given, it is surprising (lacks fluency), and hence judged as difficult. However, when the solution is known or provided again, it is no longer surprising (has fluency), and hence judged as easy. People often underestimate the difficulty (or predictability) of solutions (or events) after knowing the outcome, due to this bias.

In the example provided in the question however, it is not clear that you actually know the solution, only that you feel that you know the solution after it was solved by someone else. In this case, you really do have a case of wishful thinking.
> 4 votes

---
Tags: cognitive-psychology
---