# Question
Title: Does Facebook activity predict job performance?
I've seen a little bit of discussion in the media about Facebook being used in selection and recruitment settings. Assuming an employer can gain access to a person's Facebook profile, have any scientific studies been conducted to assess the following questions:

* Does Facebook activity predict job performance?
* If so, what does Facebook activity measure as seen by correlates with existing scales (e.g., personality, intelligence, integrity, etc.)?

# Answer
> 5 votes
### Summary of Kluemper et al 2012

I had a read through the article by Kluemper et al (2012) mentioned in the answer by John Pick. The following summarises some key points.

After discussing the broader context of using social networks to measure personality, Kluemper et al (2012) cited the findings of a couple of existing studies:

> Karl, Peluchette, and Schlaegel (2010) found that social network users high in conscientiousness were less likely to post problematic content (e.g., substance abuse, sexual content), while Amichai-Hamburger and Vinitzky (2010) found a relationship between self-rated extraversion and number of Facebook friends.

The study by Kluemper et al (2012) involved two studies. Each study involved getting ratings on around 250 participants including self-report Big 5 personality and then getting three raters to read through the participant's Facebook profile and then fill out a measure of Big 5 personality. Self-other correlations for the same personality factors ranged from .16 to .44. This supports the idea that Facebook profiles can be used to get at least an approximate measure of personality. It should also be mentioned that these self-other correlations are a fair bit lower than those obtained by Costa and McCrae (1998) when using the NEO, and a single knowledgeable other-rater (e.g., in the r=.5 to .6 range).

Meta-analyses have generally found a positive but weak correlation between Big 5 personality and job performance (e.g., Barrick & Mount, 1991). In combination with the results from Kluemper et al, this may suggest that personality measures extracted from Facebook profiles might predict job performance. However, given the relatively low self-other correlations, this still requires further empirical testing.

Furthermore, extracting Big 5 personality using three raters reflects only one rating strategy. Thus, there are many other useful measures and measurement strategies that could be explored.

### References

* Amichai-Hamburger, Y. & Vinitzky, G. (2010). Social network use and personality. Computers in Human Behavior, 26, 1289–1295.
* Barrick, M. R., & Mount, M. K. (1991). The Big Five personality dimensions and job performance: A meta-analysis. Personnel Psychology, 44, 1– 26.
* Costa, P. T. & McCrae (1988, PDF). Personality in adulthood: A six-year longitudinal study of self-reports and spouse ratings on the NEO Personality Inventory. It's not a meta analysis. N = 167 for spouse ratings.
* Karl, K., Peluchette, J., & Schlaegel, C. (2010). Who’s posting Facebook faux pas? A cross-cultural examination of personality differences. Inter- national Journal of Selection and Assessment, 18, 174–186.
* Kluemper, D. H., Rosen, P. A. and Mossholder, K. W. (2012), Social Networking Websites, Personality Ratings, and the Organizational Context: More Than Meets the Eye?. Journal of Applied Social Psychology. doi: 10.1111/j.1559-1816.2011.00881.x URL

# Answer
> 2 votes
The paper referred to in the OP's media link is free online. It reviews the literature and presents its own new studies as well:

**My takeaway**: Yes, Facebook activity can be used to predict the Big Five personality traits, which, in turn, can predict job performance, but HR people aren't necessarily qualified to make a valid assessment. That, and the usual "but more research is warranted".

---
Tags: performance, io-psychology, measurement, selection-recruitment
---


# Question
Title: Is positive self-talk beneficial for those with low self-esteem?
According to the paper Positive Self-Statements: Power for Some, Peril for Others by Wood (2009) positive self-talk is beneficial when the person has a reasonable level of self-esteem in the statement, but harmful when they don't. The PsychCentral article, "Got Low Self-Esteem? Don’t Ditch the Positive Self-Talk Just Yet" by Summer Beretsky points out a few issues with the methodology:

* Limited sample size
* Short "bursts" rather than more concentrated time to convince themselves
* Not controlling for whether they believe in the statement they are proclaiming

Are there any other studies that deal with these issues?

<sub> Wood, J., Elaine Perunovic, W., & Lee, J. (2009). Positive Self-Statements: Power for Some, Peril for Others Psychological Science DOI: 10.1111/j.1467-9280.2009.02370.x </sub>

# Answer
Just to be clear, Wood et al (2009) summarise their propositions on page 861:

> Thus, we propose that positive self-statements have the potential to make one feel worse if they lie outside one’s latitude of acceptance, are self-discrepant and thereby highlight one’s failures to meet one’s standards, and arouse self-verification motives. We further propose that positive self-statements are especially likely to backfire for the very people they are meant to benefit: people with low self-esteem. Such people, by definition, see themselves as failing to meet standards in more domains or in more important domains than do people with high self-esteem. Moreover, self-verification motives should bias people with low self-esteem to reject positive self-statements, but encourage people with high self-esteem to accept them.

In the literature review, Wood et al cite several articles related to attitude formation and self-relevant feedback. They mention one particular study, where

> Eisenstadt and Leippe (1994) asked participants to identify a trait they would like to possess but believed they lacked. When Eisenstadt and Leippe later told participants that they actually did possess that ideal trait, participants felt worse, rather than better.

### References

* Eisenstadt, D., & Leippe, M.R. (1994). The self-comparison process and self-discrepant feedback: Consequences of learning you are what you thought you were not. Journal of Personality and Social Psychology, 67, 611–626.
* Wood, J., Elaine Perunovic, W., & Lee, J. (2009). Positive Self-Statements: Power for Some, Peril for Others Psychological Science DOI: 10.1111/j.1467-9280.2009.02370.x
> 2 votes

---
Tags: social-psychology, positive-thinking
---


# Question
Title: What are biological primary mathematical skills?
In doing a bit of background reading for this question I came across a section in the book Cognitive Neuroscience: The Biology of the Mind on page 602 stating:

> There are no sex-related differences in biological primary mathematical skills, even in nonhuman primates

And later defines *secondary* mathematical skills as

> the kinds of math taught in schools in the industrialized world

But it doesn't define what *primary* mathematical skills are.

Can anyone explain what is meant by the term?

Cognitive Neuroscience: The Biology of The Mind, 2nd ed. M. S. Gazzaniga, R. B. Ivry, G. R. Mangun.

# Answer
The term seems to come from David C. Geary's 1995 article. Here's the abstract with full-text link below:

> An evolution-based framework for understanding biological and cultural influences on children's cognitive and academic development is presented. The utility of this framework is illustrated within the mathematical domain and serves as a foundation for examining current approaches to educational reform in the United States. Within this framework, **there are two general classes of cognitive ability, biologically primary and biologically secondary**. Biologically primary cognitive abilities appear to have evolved largely by means of natural or sexual selection. Biologically secondary cognitive abilities reflect the co-optation of primary abilities for purposes other than the original evolution-based function and appear to develop only in specific cultural contexts. A distinction between these classes of ability has important implications for understanding children's cognitive development and achievement.

You can read more about David C. Geary's articles on mathematics on his website.

### References

* Geary, D. C. (1995). Reflections of evolution and culture in children's cognition: Implications for mathematical development and instruction. American Psychologist, 50, 24-37. FULL TEXT
> 12 votes

---
Tags: cognitive-psychology, terminology, evolution, mathematical-ability
---


# Question
Title: How can one find out if he/she is brainwashed?
By brainwashed I mean indoctrinated with some political, religious or other type of propaganda.

I assume that you can't be aware of this, because the lack of that awareness is the point of propaganda - to make you believe that something is true/false etc. But there must be a logical way to determine if you are brainwashed. Like "your" arguments following certain patterns maybe?

# Answer
> 9 votes
As Schroedinger's Cat pointed out, there's no clear dividing line between "brainwashing" and the normal processes of growing up in or assimilating into a culture or social group. Even in the case of deliberate, forced procedures, it can be unclear -- for example, the US military has recruits do drills and engage in synchronized practices that we know to affect thoughts, feelings, and beliefs, but most people wouldn't call that brainwashing. However, you could look into military training practices, as well as techniques used by abusive cults, and see if you've been subjected to those at any point in your life. That might answer your question.

Another way would be to think about the criteria you would use to describe a thoroughly un-brainwashed person, and work from there. For example, do you believe that you should be able to cite a preponderance of evidence for all of your beliefs? That you should have a clear and volitional explanation for your life choices? You can then work toward those goals, questioning or changing your beliefs as necessary. Be aware that hardly anyone really meets these criteria! We all absorb cultural values and prejudices, use unconscious heuristics to make decisions, and make choices that we rationalize later. But you could certainly work on moving in a more rationalist direction if you want to.

# Answer
> 6 votes
I think there is a strong argument that everyone is brainwashed, in the sense of having accepted ideas and principles that they cannot provide a-priori justification for. It is something of the definition of a worldview, which we all need to survive.

Even if you take it to the perspective of "have we had our worldview changed by external sources", the answer is also yes, for many people. We have all had a moment of realisation that something we had read or heard is important and significant, and we change our understanding - slowly or quickly - towards an acceptance of that.

The only real definition of brainwashing is whether we have had our worldview changed against our will. That is a far more difficult question. Does watching TV constitute "against our will"? Or reading controversial things on the internet that challenge us?

It is a good question, but I think there needs to be much clearer definition before a clear answer can be arrived at.

# Answer
> 6 votes
This is just lay theorizing, but I would try and find a measure of my attitudes at a certain point in time (e.g., an old journal entry, a blog post, an essay) and compare the reasoning in that to current reasoning. If I identify huge changes in personal ideology between that old bit of material and current thinking, I should perhaps ask a third-party to attempt to objectively determine whether that discrepancy reflects a natural maturation process or something more perverse.

---
Tags: cognitive-psychology, conditioning
---


# Question
Title: Does dream recall disturb the processes of memory consolidation?
Psychology in the time of Freud was occupied with dreams. Relaying these to one's analyst was an important part of treatment.

Fast-forward to less than 100 years later, and we know so much about the importance of sleep in consolidating memories during REM \[1\]\[2\] and slow-wave sleep \[3\] (among countless other references I have omitted).

Let us assume dreaming is largely relegated to REM (ignoring dreams experienced during stage 2 sleep). **If we recall our dreams at a later time then is it detrimental to any subsequent process of memory consolidation?**

If our dream represents a state through which our brain is passing to consolidate memory, what is the effect of recalling that intermediate state and potentially storing it back in long-term memory?

---

### References

1. Ishikawa A, Kanayama Y., et al (2006). Selective rapid eye movement sleep deprivation impairs the maintenance of long-term potentiation in the rat hippocampus. *Eur J Neurosci.,24* (1),243-8.
2. Louie K, Wilson MA. (2001). Temporally structured replay of awake hippocampal ensemble activity during rapid eye movement sleep. *Neuron,29* (1),145-56. FREE PDF
3. Ji D, Wilson MA (2007) Coordinated memory replay in the visual cortex and hippocampus during sleep. *Nat Neurosci, 10*(1),100-7. FREE PDF

# Answer
I am not aware of any study that specifically addresses *dream* recall, but there is a growing literature about "memory reconsolidation" or "post-reactivation plasticity", the idea that memory reactivation (recall) can temporarily return a memory to a state of high fragility and susceptibility to interference, after which a process similar to consolidation makes it more resistent again. Most memory reconsolidation work has been with animals, but there are a few studies with human subjects \[1\]\[2\]. \[3\] is an interesting paper about (re)consolidation of motor memory during slow-wave sleep. \[4\] and \[5\] are good reviews of the field.

\[1\] Hupbach, A., Gomez, R., Hardt, O., & Nadel, L. (2007). Reconsolidation of episodic memories: A subtle reminder triggers integration of new information. Learning & Memory, 14(1-2), 47 -53. doi:10.1101/lm.365707

\[2\] Forcato, C., Burgos, V. L., Argibay, P. F., Molina, V. A., Pedreira, M. E., & Maldonado, H. (2007). Reconsolidation of declarative memory in humans. Learning & Memory, 14(4), 295-303. doi:10.1101/lm.486107

\[3\] Walker, M. P., Brakefield, T., Hobson, J. A., & Stickgold, R. (2003). Dissociable stages of human memory consolidation and reconsolidation. Nature, 425(6958), 616–620. doi:10.1038/nature01930

\[4\] Nader, K., & Hardt, O. (2009). A single standard for memory: the case for reconsolidation. Nature Reviews Neuroscience, 10, 224–234. doi:10.1038/nrn2590

\[5\] Schiller, D., & Phelps, E. A. (2011). Does Reconsolidation Occur in Humans? Frontiers in Behavioral Neuroscience, 5. doi:10.3389/fnbeh.2011.00024
> 15 votes

---
Tags: memory, sleep, dreams
---


# Question
Title: How to classify and understand emotions of people using chat and text messaging lingo and emoticons?
I am looking for scholarly, peer-reviewed articles that discuss natural language processing (NLP) involving chat or text messaging lingo/acronyms and the affect of chat participants based on language and emoticons. Anyone have a good recommendation?

I am already familiar with the recent work involving using Twitter to assess the general mood of society as a means of predicting the stock market. They used the Google-Profile of Mood States (GPOMS) that measures mood as Calm, Alert, Sure, Vital, Kind, or Happy. I am looking for other examples that assess general affect, ideally by applying more scientific psychometric tests to NLP.

I am not trying to use the data for prediction. I am seeking to use machine learning algorithms to classify/categorize conversations.

References:

Bollen, J., Mao, H., Zeng, X-J. (2011). Twitter mood predicts the stock market. *Journal of Computational Science, 2*(1),1-8. \[DOI\]

# Answer
The field that is doing this work you describe is sentiment analysis. From Wikipedia:

> A basic task in sentiment analysis is classifying the polarity of a given text at the document, sentence, or feature/aspect level — whether the expressed opinion in a document, a sentence or an entity feature/aspect is positive, negative, or neutral. Advanced, "beyond polarity" sentiment classification looks, for instance, at emotional states such as "angry," "sad," and "happy."

From an introductory course (lots of good references on this page)

> This work is in the general area of sentiment analysis, opinion extraction or opinion mining, and feature-based opinion summarization from the user-generated content or user-generated media on the Web, e.g., reviews, forum and group discussions, and blogs. In our KDD-2004 (Minqing Hu and Bing Liu. "Mining and summarizing customer reviews." Proceedings of the ACM SIGKDD International Conference on Knowledge Discovery & Data Mining, Seattle, Washington, USA, Aug 22-25, 2004.) paper, we proposed the Feature-Based Opinion Mining model, which is now also called Aspect-Based Opinion Mining (as the term feature here can confuse with the term feature used in machine learning). The output of such opinion mining is a feature-based opinion summary or aspect-based opinion summary. The area is also related to sentiment classification. Our current work is in two main areas, which reflect two kinds of opinions (or evaluations)
>
> * Mining regular (or direct) opinions. Ex: (1). This camera is great. (2). After taking the drug, I got stomach pain.
> * Mining comparative opinions. Ex: Coke tastes better than Pepsi.

In terms of your actual goals, scroll down to extra credit on this page, and you'll find an exercise that goes through a scenario close to what you describe with emoticons.

In terms of peer-reviewed, Chmiel A, Sienkiewicz J, et al (2011). Collective emotions online and their influence on community life, PLoS One, 6(7), e22207. PDF. I'm sure there are others in mainstream NLP journals, but I'm for want of a database that lists them.
> 14 votes

# Answer
I would search under the topic of affective computing especially in *detecting and recognizing emotional information* and then specialize on *NLP* methods in this area.

Here are a few articles of interest:

Visualizing the affective structure of a text document

A model of textual affect sensing using real-world knowledge

Saurus: an emotionally-weighted thesaurus

---

References:

Gouldstone, J., Liu, H., Lieberman, H., Ishii, H. (2006). Saurus: an emotionally-weighted thesaurus. *Computational aesthetics: Artificial intelligence approaches to beauty and happiness*, Technical Report WS-06-04.

Liu, H., Selker, T., Lieberman, H. (2003). Visualizing the Affective Structure of a Text Document. *Proceedings of the Conference on Human Factors in Computing Systems*, CHI 2003, April 5-10, 2003, Ft. Lauderdale, FL, USA. ACM 2003, ISBN 1-58113-637-4, pp. 740-741.

Liu, H., Lieberman, H., Selker, T. (2003). A Model of Textual Affect Sensing using Real-World Knowledge. *Proceedings of the 2003 International Conference on Intelligent User Interfaces*, IUI 2003, January 12-15, 2003, Miami, FL, USA. ACM 2003, ISBN 1-58113-586-6, pp. 125-132. Miami, Florida.
> 7 votes

---
Tags: reference-request, emotion, communication, nlp
---


title: Encoding of abstract concepts in memory

text:
# Question
Title: Encoding of abstract concepts in memory
When you read a book and you want to remember it you can encode the information into mental pictures with associations. This is a technique for remembering the content.

The problem is when you encounter abstract concepts. How would you deal with them to create pictures that are more memorizable?

Is there a branch of memory science dealing with encoding techniques?

This question was inspired by a HowToLearn.com article by Pat Wyman, How To Remember Everything You Read Using Mental Pictures.

# Answer
> 3 votes
Read "Moonwalking with Einstein" by Foer or watch or listen to transcripts of the world's memory experts, such as Ben Pridmore. You'll notice that they have their own special techniques to make abstract concepts more memorable. These individuals have increased difficulty with less concrete themes, however, and it may be best to process the to-be-remembered items not by focusing on imagery but, perhaps, semantic meaning or another sort of deep encoding.

# Answer
> 1 votes
My first psychology professor always encouraged us to try and relate new concepts to concrete examples (hypothetical or real). When that is not possible, I find that elaboration (adding further information that depends on the idea) is a good way to help remember an abstract concept. Of course, both of these methods can be time and effort intensive.

---
Tags: memory, terminology, mnemonic
---


# Question
Title: Can one incubate on a specific idea in one's sleep?
In this question it is described that intentionally *not thinking about a problem* can allow the subsonscious to find an answer to the problem; this is known as *incubation*. I have heard and read it a few times that if you want to solve a tough problem you can read/think about it just before going to bed and let the brain come up with a solution while you sleep. (I can find no references for this at the moment, however. Sorry)

Also, there have been few cases that provided a solution during sleep. (Benzene structure is one which I remember) Is it mere chance or false advertising, or is the brain really capable of incubating on an idea during sleep?

A robotics guy I saw on TED claimed that he used to keep a notebook by the bed, so that he could jot down the ideas if any came to him during sleep.

Can one's brain incubate on an idea while sleeping? Can one train one's brain to incubate on a specific idea during sleep?

# Answer
This study found that REM sleep "enhances the integration of unassociated information for creative problem solving", and to an extent that surpasses the benefits of "quiet rest and non-REM sleep". try a google scholar search for 'psychology sleep incubation'.

Interestingly, the experiment that yielded the first discovery of a neurotransmitter was famously claimed to have been conceived of during a dream and was conducted during the middle of that same night. The scientist, Otto Lowel, had failed to successfully document the same dream nights prior.
> 5 votes

---
Tags: learning, sleep, problem-solving
---


# Question
Title: What are the major structures of the medial temporal lobe?
Basic question here from a behavioral researcher: What are the major structures of the medial temporal lobe (MTL)? Can anyone link to a good diagram of these structures?

# Answer
> 10 votes
The MTL consists of (note that some structures overlap):

* indicates that not all literature includes this component in the MTL

I didn't find a diagram of only the MTL. The best diagrams I found were (not shown here because I don't own the copyright):

### References

> * Brodmann, K. (1909) Vergleichende Lokalisationslehre der Grosshirnrinde in ihren Prinzipien dargestellt auf Grund des Zellenbaues. Leipzig : Johann Ambrosius Barth.
> * Squire, L.R., Stark, C.E.L., & Clark, R.E. (2004) The Medial Temporal Lobe. Annu. Rev. Neurosci. 27:279–306 \[pdf\]

---
Tags: neuroscience, neuroimaging
---


# Question
Title: Where do our memories get stored and how are they retrieved again?
In one of Karl Lashley's 1950 papers, it is pointed out that information is not stored locally in certain area of the brain. Instead, it's stored distributively over the structure of the brain. I'm curious about how, in detail, is it stored in "structure."

So what's the process when neurons try to encode information "distributively"? How do the brain retrieve these distributed information?

# Answer
Long-term potentiation (LTP) is thought to be a major mechanism of long-term learning, in which neurons throughout the brain undergo permanent physiological changes (e.g., migration of AMPA receptors to neuronal terminal buttons) that allow maintenance of the memory trace. A simpler version of this would be the famous aphorism (and oversimplication) regarding Hebbian learning -- "cells that fire together wire together."
> -1 votes

---
Tags: neuroscience, memory, neuroimaging
---


# Question
Title: Is there a term for trying to remember a word, but only remembering its first letter?
This happens to me frequently. I'll say, "Oh you know that guy... uhh... I can't remember his name. But he starts with a 'Z'." You can remember part of the word but not the whole word.

Is there a term for this situation? What causes it?

# Answer
This is called the Tip of the Tongue phenomenon.

> People in a tip-of-the-tongue state can often recall one or more features of the target word, such as the first letter, its syllabic stress, and words similar in sound and/or meaning. Individuals report a feeling of being seized by the state, feeling something like mild anguish while searching for the word, and a sense of relief when the word is found.

It's a very common phenomenon, and it presents itself in several similar forms, as the Wikipedia description notes. Remembering just the first letter is a common form but not the only cue.

There are a couple of suggested causes, but generally the problem is failure to *completely* retrieve information you "know" is in fact there. The Wikipedia article has some information on the general theories.
> 25 votes

---
Tags: memory, terminology, language
---


title: Measuring the adoption of norms

text:
# Question
Title: Measuring the adoption of norms
I'm trying to make a survey and I'm having trouble to find a scale to measure the adoption of norms.

The people who fill in the survey have to think about a situation in which they were ashamed. For example, they stole something, got caught and the entire school knew of it. **I'd like to measure to what extent they have adopted new behavioural norms to handle the situation differently in the future** (e.g., not steal). The most convenient scale would be a likert scale, which is easy to analyse statistically.

I have read dozens of papers about recidivism, norm incorporation, norm adoption, ... but none of them seem to measure how I'd like to do it. My survey has to be backed up by literature, but in this case, after many hours and hours (for the past several weeks) I can't seem to find what I'm looking for. I'm disposing of a university account that has access to most academical papers

When I was looking at recidivism, the scales I found were just asking demographic questions and other questions to assess whether or not the subject would be doing the same crime again. It weren't questions that you could ask to see if the subject had incorporated new social norms. Other research about norm adoption/incorporation just handles the subject as such without assessing it. Maybe there is a common used term for norm incorporation which I can't seem to find (not a native speaker)?

# Answer
Yes -- I would look into the literature of **attitude change**. I think this research would be relevant to your hypotheses. Here's the Wikipedia article for attitude change, and here's a representative paper from that literature that might be useful. At any rate, I don't think the phrase "norm adoption" is the right wording for what you're studying in English. Does this help?
> 5 votes

# Answer
If you have spent hours and hours trying to find a scale, that may or may not exist, I think you need to move forward and think different. You have access to some of the worlds collected knowledge as a student, but can't find anything useful. Either the scale your looking for is not present or it is not enough recognized by the research community to bubble up to the surface as you search.

You have two options. (1) Find another research area, witch would lead to waste of time since you have already spent a lot of time on this research topic. (2) Invent the scale yourself, because that's how we build knowledge. That’s very easy to write, but much harder to invent and implement. Still, you have (probably) already an idea of what to measure and how to do it. If it were my teacher in school they would roll out the red carpet if I even tried to do something this bold.

To make it easy, you can use a nominal scale where you just categorize different adaptations to norm without order. Just make distinct definition of each category, based on knowledge from the papers you have already read. If you are confident that these things can be ordered, use an ordinal scale which can be as simple as (1) adapts norm completely, (2) does not fully adapt the norm and (3) does not adapt norm. This can of course be extended - but the more you divide the ordinal scale, the more crucial is the definition. The good thing about the ordinal scale is that it does not take into account the distance between each element, just the position.

I know that this is not what you expected as an answer to your question, but I want to help you the best way I can. Hope this helps.

---

A good start on measurement: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Level\_of\_measurement
> 3 votes

---
Tags: measurement, methodology, social-psychology, test, norms
---


# Question
Title: How much information on the "Identical Strangers" experiment was actually released?
I am in the process of researching the Nature vs. Nurture debate.

While I was searching for articles on it, I discovered something known as the "Identical Strangers" experiment (that probably was not it's real name, but it is the name of the book that the twins wrote about it). It was an experiment done in the 1960s where 2 identical twins were separated at birth and raised in different homes. The study looked at how they developed.

I noticed when looking it up that there was something that said that details about the full experiment were locked away until 2066. My question is:

**Is there any part of the experiment that has been documented (it can even be from the adopted parents, it doesn't necessarily have to be from the study itself) that is publicly available, or is all of it locked away at Yale University for the next 54 years?**

# Answer
To learn about other twins reared apart, investigate the earlier Minnesota Study of Twins Reared Apart and the ongoing Minnesota Twin Family Study.

To pique your curiosity:

Jim Lewis and Jim Springer stand out in the Minnesota Study of Twins Reared Apart because some of their two histories were strikingly identical; several notable examples:

* 1st wife: "Linda"
* 2nd wife: "Betty"
* Dog: "Toy"
* Cigarette: Salem
* Job: Sherrif's deputy
* built a circular white bench around a tree in the yard

### References

> * Bouchard Jr, T.J., Lykken, D.T., McGue, M., Segal, N.L. & Tellegen, A. (1990) Sources of human psychological differences: the Minnesota Study of Twins Reared Apart. Science 250:223-228. \[pdf\]
> * Holden, C. (1980) Identical Twins Reared Apart. Science, 207:1323-1325. \[extract\]
> 7 votes

---
Tags: reference-request, developmental-psychology, genetics, nature-nurture, twin-study
---


# Question
Title: What are some of the drawbacks to probabilistic models of cognition?
Probabilistic approaches to modelling cognition are increasing in popularity and being encouraged within the field (Chater, Tanenbaum, & Yuille, 2006).

What are some of the arguments against or drawbacks (other than scalability/intractability) to using this approach?

# Answer
Probabilistic approaches of this sort are usually referred to more specifically as the **bayesian** approach and Chater and Tanenbaum are definitely bayesians (I have not read much by Yuille and can't comment). Bayesianism is more than just increasing in popularity and being encouraged; it is considered one of the big-4 approaches to cognitive-modeling, with the other 3 being: connectionism, rule-based, and dynamic systems. The bayesian approach has many positives and produced many great results, but since your question is about the drawbacks I will focus exclusively on that. Two major drawbacks are: neural grounding and rationality.

**Neural grounding** is a weakness that plagues all of the big-4 and cognitive science in general. The idea is that as we build models of the mind, we want to eventually ground them in the brain; this is a standard feature of reductionism. The bayesian approach is often summarized as "probabilities over rules", and suffers from the same difficulty of neural grounding as the rule-based approach did. It is often not clear how the brain implements this sophisticated bayesian inference (but the field is well aware of this problem, and works hard to resolve it). Is this a game killer? Not really, connectionism is often considered the more 'biologically-plausible' alternative, but most popular connectionist models can be just as easily questioned on their biological viability. The issue can also be sidestepped completely by saying that we do wish to address cognition at a different level that biological implementation (sort of how thermodynamics can have laws without the specific grounding provided by statistical mechanics). An example of this on our site is looking for behaviorist interpretations of models (note that decision field theory falls more into the dynamic systems approach, so it isn't a perfect example).

For me, the much more prominent weakness is **rationality**. Bayes rule is inherently rational -- humans are not; a bayesian has to use various hacks to account for human irrationality. Connectionism does not suffer from this drawback, and neither do some exotic approaches like Busemeyer's quantum cognition (I provide a sketch in this answer). If you want to see why models based on classical probability have a difficulty explaining aspects of human irrationality, take a look at Busemeyer, J. R., Wang, Z., & Townsend, J. T. (2006).
> 22 votes

# Answer
Artem gave a very good answer, but I want to add one more weaknesses of probabilistic/Bayesian models: they are not mechanistic. This is related to Artem's point about neural grounding, but is a little different. The issue is that probabilistic models don't really provide insight into the underlying mechanism that produces the observed behavior -- if you ask the question "why does it work?", the Bayesian model's answer is "because cognition is Bayesian" and that's it. Models that allow structure (and behavior) to emerge from interactions of lower-level elements provide more insight into cognitive mechanisms (though not necessarily neural mechanisms). I think (at least some) connectionist and dynamic systems models try to do this. To read more about this, check out:

McClelland, J. L., Botvinick, M. M., Noelle, D. C., Plaut, D. C., Rogers, T.T., Seidenberg, M. S., and Smith, L. B. (2010). Letting Structure Emerge: Connectionist and Dynamical Systems Approaches to Understanding Cognition. *Trends in Cognitive Sciences*, 14, 348-356.
> 13 votes

# Answer
This should perhaps be a comment, but I don't have the reputation. The other two answers mention that a major drawback to the Bayesian approach is its lack of biological plausibility. However, see for instance:

> Bayesian inference with probabilistic population codes
>
> Ma, W.J. and Beck, J.M. and Latham, P.E. and Pouget, A.
>
> *Nature Neuroscience*, 2006

The authors propose a method by which populations of neurons may actually represent probability distributions. I don't know how convincing I find the construction, but it may be worth looking into if you're curious about the subject.

It may also be worth mentioning that while neuroscientists do seem to use the word "Bayesian" to refer generically to probabilistic approaches to reasoning, "Bayesian statistics" or "Bayesian probability" is a bit more than Bayes' rule. By itself, Bayes' rule is just a mathematical identity in probability theory.
> 10 votes

---
Tags: computational-modeling, cognitive-modeling, bayesian
---


# Question
Title: Is Apple's iPhone Retina Display really accurate to human eye resolution?
Apple based their Retina Display on the following claim, as cited by Wikipedia:

> The display has a contrast ratio of 800:1. The screen is marketed by Apple as the "Retina Display", based on the assertion that a display of approximately 300 ppi at a distance of 12 inches (305 mm) from one's eye, or 57 arcseconds per pixel is the maximum amount of detail that the human retina can perceive.

However some have stated that the resolution of the human retina is *significantly* higher than Apple's claim:

> Soneira stated that the resolution of the human retina is higher than claimed by Apple, working out to 477 ppi at 12 inches (305 mm) from the eyes, or 36 arcseconds per pixel.\[44\]

My impression of the human eye's "resolution" has been that it's significantly higher than the "Retina" display.

Is there any objective evidence that supports or refutes Apple's claim that the Retina display matches human eye resolution? Have any studies specifically been done to determine whether humans can differentiate "Retina" displays and higher resolution displays at the same distance?

# Answer
> 5 votes
Until peer-reviewed data on the topic is published, all we have to go on is blog posts from vision and display researchers. The best posts I've seen so far are:

>

To summarize: Some people can see the difference in some cases.

---
Tags: perception, vision, sensation, devices
---


# Question
Title: Biological plausibility of bayesian models of cognition
Inspired by this question: What are some of the drawbacks to probabilistic models of cognition?

I would like to know more about the biological plausibility of Bayesian models of cognition. Is there any neural evidence that rejects Bayesian models of cognition?

# Answer
When performing certain tasks, people’s inferences approximate Bayesian inference to a remarkable degree. For example, when people receive both haptic and visual information about the size of an object, they combine this information in a manner that very closely resembles Bayesian inference, taking account of the uncertainties associated with the visual and haptic information (e.g., Ernst & Banks, 2002). This optimality can be observed in many perceptual (Knill & Pouget, 2004) and sensorimotor (Kording & Wolpert, 2004, 2006) tasks and across a range of information sources (e.g., including prior beliefs and multiple sensory inputs). These findings suggest that there must be biological mechanisms that either implement Bayesian inference or implement something that very closely resembles it.

At the same time, there is no consensus regarding *how* this is done. While there are proposals about how neural populations might perform Bayesian inference (e.g., Ma, Beck, Latham, & Pouget, 2006; Knill & Pouget, 2004; Kover & Bao, 2010), it is difficult to evaluate these proposals at present: the available neuroscientific evidence is quite limited. Moreover, because the most compelling evidence for Bayesian inference is limited to low-level perceptual processes, it is possible that higher-level inferences are implemented by biological mechanisms that do not perform Bayesian inference. Indeed, given the computational difficulty of Bayesian inference in general, it seems all but inevitable that many biological mechanisms will not implement Bayesian inference exactly.

In summary, *some* biological mechanisms must perform something like Bayesian inference, but researchers have only begun to explore how this happens, and the extent to which high-level perception and cognition rely on Bayesian computations remains unclear.

**References**

> Knill, D. C., & Pouget, A. (2004). The Bayesian brain: the role of uncertainty in neural coding and computation. Trends in Neurosciences, 27 (12), 712-719. \[pdf\]
>
> Kording, K. P., & Wolpert, D. M. (2004). Bayesian integration in sensorimotor learning. Nautre, 427, 244-247. \[pdf\]
>
> Kording, K. P, & Wolpert, D. M. (2006). Bayesian decision theory in sensorimotor control. Trends in Cognitive Sciences, 10 (7), 319-326. \[pdf\]
>
> Ma, W. J., Beck, J. M., Latham, P. E., & Pouget, A. (2006). Bayesian inference with probabilistic population codes. Nature Neuroscience, 9 (11), 1432-1438. \[pdf\]
>
> Ernst, M. O., & Banks, M. S. (2002). Humans integrate visual and haptic information a statistically optimal fashion. Nature, 415, 429-433. \[link\]
> 17 votes

---
Tags: neuroscience, computational-modeling, bayesian, theoretical-neuroscience
---


# Question
Title: Free software to run questionnaire based experiments
I am **looking for free software to build experiments that do not heavily rely on accurate timing** (where I use PsychoPy and heard a lot of good things about OpenSesame) but more on an easy way to implement different types of items and response options.

That is, for example, an experiment which starts in presenting some texts to the participants, then some questions contingent on this text and on what participants entered before (potentially more than one question per page with different response options) followed by some standard questionnaires. How would you implement such a study?

---

### Background and motivation

I used to do such things using MediaLab which unfortunately is proprietary software. However, implementing items and questionnaires was easy. You could program a simple html page (even using variables and placeholders) using html forms and MediaLab would present this page using ie engine in fullscreen and collect the responses. Those responses could then be used or handed over to DirectRT for response time experiments.

Currently I am using PsychoPy to control the screen and data collection and code all questionnaires and such stuff per hand using wxPython. It works, but designing questionnairs in wxPython is a lot less handy and more difficult than programming html pages with html forms and definitely nothing for people not too profficient in coding.

Any ideas or hints would be really appreciated.

Note that I read "What's the best program for creating computer based psychology experiments under OS X?", but my question concerns specific implementations. Furthermore, I work on Windows 7.

# Answer
It sounds like you're looking for a platform on which to implement computerized adaptive tests (since subsequent questions are contingent on prior responses).

I found Concerto, which is based in R and MySQL, but allows some flexibility in presentation (it says it uses HTML directly, but you could probably couple it with another language).
> 6 votes

# Answer
You'll want to look into PsychToolbox 3, a very capable Matlab/Octave toolbox intended for running high-precision behavioral psychology experiments. If you don't have access to Matlab, you can use Octave (which is available for Windows 7; see link) to run your experiments.

The toolbox itself is a platform for creating interactive experiments, ranging from simple question-based surveys to highly complex, precision visual displays. For the purpose at hand, I would build a simple function that displays text using PsychToolbox's `DrawText` or `DrawFormattedText` functions and monitors responses using the `Kb*` functions; see the `KbDemo` page for an overview. Each of these has their own demo showing how to use the function (the aptly-named `DrawSomeTextDemo` and `DrawFormattedTextDemo` functions, and the `KbDemo` one mentioned earlier); simply check the source code of the demos to see how they work.

I will mention that PsychToolbox has learning curve, and requires familiarity with Matlab/Octave programming. That being said, with the above functions, it should be pretty easy to create a generic "survey" function which accepts however many lines of text (one question, however many answers), displays them to the user, and monitors and records feedback.
> 5 votes

---
Tags: methodology, software, experimental-psychology
---


# Question
Title: What explains variability in the mean firing rate across biological neurons?
Biological neurons have a trade-off between high information transfer (high firing rate) and energy conservation (low firing rate). One would suspect that the maximization of this function has a single solution, and that the mean firing rate and variability should be similar across all neurons. Yet this is far from the case. Is there a principled computational explanation for this variability?

# Answer
> 5 votes
I am not sure whether the three assumptions on which your question is based are really valid.

(1) Why should a high transformation transfer be linked to a high firing rate? Depending on the role of a single neuron within a group, not firing might carry as much as information as firing.

(2) Energy conservation might not be linked to the behavior of a single neuron, but rather to the organism as a whole. For instance, if the constant firing of a neuron stops your legs from constant (dis-functional) shaking, the energy "wasted" on the firing neuron can lower the energy consumption of the system as a whole.

(3) Although not explicitly stated, your question might suggest that the mean firing rate of a given neuron is relatively constant over time. This is not necessarily the case, as the firing characteristics of neurons are "tuned" over time, depending on its activity. This process is called homeostatic synaptic plasticity and has received much attention recently.

For a review see: Turrigiano GG. (2008) The self-tuning neuron: synaptic scaling of excitatory synapses. Cell. 422-35.

---
Tags: neuroscience, computational-modeling, theoretical-neuroscience
---


# Question
Title: What is the most complex artificial neural network created to date?
A few years ago I wrote a research paper for college on neural networks. At the time IBM's Blue Brain was the clear winner. Some rumor went around that they were close to emulating a brain the complexity of a cat; this has since been debunked.

At the time their research was groundbreaking and previously even emulating the brain of a C. Elegans seemed far-fetched.

Describing the complexity of neural networks is complex but I'll define **number of synapses** or neurons as an easily measurable scale of complexity.

What is the most complex working artificial neural network? What is the relative complexity of this network compared to an animal's brain?

# Answer
> 8 votes
A (probably incomplete) list of ongoing whole brain simulation projects can be found at http://www.artificialbrains.com/. However, based on the information reported on this site, it is sometimes hard do distinguish what already has been achieved and what is still in the planning stage. Nevertheless it gives a good overview to start with.

---
Tags: neural-network, artificial-intelligence
---


# Question
Title: Behaviorist interpretations of decision field theory
Decision field theory is usually presented as a dynamic cognitive model of decision making. However, in its basic form, the theory seems to only be concerned with behavior (decisions) and stimuli (initial set of choice and their associated risk/utilities). In particular, although we can view the dynamics as the change in 'preferences' with time, it is equally easy to view them as actions that would have happened if we forced the decision-maker to stop deliberating at that time point.

In general, I do not see why DFT would force us to prescribe internal mental states to the decision maker and more than a clearly behaviorist model such as Rescorla-Wagner. In other words, it seems like we can interpret DFT (at least as initially presented by Busemeyer and Townsend (1993) without any recent neurological grounding) purely in behaviorist terms, as a behaviorist theory. Hence my question:

**Is there literature that provides purely behaviorist interpretations of decision field theory (or other similar models of decision making)?**

### References

Busemeyer, J. R., & Townsend, J. T. (1993) Decision Field Theory: A dynamic cognition approach to decision making. Psychological Review, 100, 432-459.

# Answer
I am pretty sure that you will not find a paper that tries to give purely behaviorist interpretations of decision field theory (or other similar models of decision making), because that would not make sense at all.

As you noted in your initial question, decision field theory is a *cognitive* model, i.e., it tries to explain overt behavior in terms of internal (mental) states of the organism. Its goal is to *understand* and model decision making and predict behavior (e.g. by making assumptions about the process of information accumulation, the allocation of attention, or about how choice biases might affect information accumulation). Thus, the focus of this theory is not the observed behavior, but rather the mental "mechanisms" it is based on.

Behaviorism has neither the intention, nor the concepts to interpret mental states. A behaviorist's account to decision making would only be concerned with describing the (statistical) relation between stimuli and choices/decisions, neglecting internal states of the organism at all. Therefore you will have a hard time to find a behaviorist's paper commenting on a cognitive models, because the latter are concerned with a topic that rests in the behaviorist's black box.

Nevertheless there will be behavorist's papers about decision making, but this is a whole different question.
> 4 votes

# Answer
I believe you are correct in that the theory could be interpreted as purely behavioristic but there is no such paper that specifically does that. I think this is largely due to the fact that the products of the cognitive revolution are the prime users and purveyors of the theory. Going the other way, DFT is also not a biologically plausible implementation; hence, it is a model that falls into the central -- that is algorithmic -- level of analysis (to use David Marr's terminology).
> 1 votes

---
Tags: reference-request, behaviorism, decision-making, mathematical-psychology
---


# Question
Title: Is learning to do a task automatically an example of intuition?
I'm looking for some examples to understand what people call their intuition at work when making their decisions.

For example:

* We learn to type and then after some time we begin to type by automatically knowing position of alphabet on the keyboard.
* We learn to ride a vehicle and then after some time we ride it without having to think.

Are these the examples of what we call our **intuition**? If not, how do they happen?

# Answer
> 9 votes
No, these are not examples of intuition, but examples of procedural memory (or automaticity). Procedural memory is the ability to perform certain tasks without conscious awareness.

---
Tags: cognitive-psychology, terminology, intuition, automaticity, procedural-memory
---


# Question
Title: What is the study with the dual-task experiment that involved a colour-wheel change detection task?
This may be a long-shot, but I'm looking for a paper that I vaguely remember reading a few years ago. Unfortunately I can't remember many details about the paper or its content, and thus my multiple attempts at keyword searches have failed. I'm posting this question in the hope that someone recognises the few details I do remember.

The paper presented more than one experiment, but the one I'm trying to recall involved a colour wheel/pie displayed in the centre of the screen. The slices of the pie were each a different colour and the colours would change a few times throughout each trial. There were only a small number of slices/colours. The observer's task was to count the number of times the colours changed. While doing this the observer also had to perform another task, for which the stimuli were shown on the rest of the display, in peripheral vision. I can't remember what the other task was, though it may have been a multiple object tracking task or a visual search task. The paper may have been about the effect of attentional load on working memory, though I'm not sure about that.

# Answer
I eventually tracked it down by going through every single result of every possible relevant search I could think of.

Makovski, T., & Jiang, Y. V. (2009). The Role of Visual Working Memory in Attentive Tracking of Unique Objects. Journal of Experimental Psychology: Human Perception and Performance, 35(6), 1687-1697.

It's available for free on the NIH site. It was experiment 4. Figure 5 gives an illustration of the stimuli.
> 5 votes

# Answer
Your description sounds a little bit like Experiment 3 from

Hollingworth, A., Richard, A. M., Luck, S. J. (2008) Understanding the function of visual short-term memory: Transsaccadic memory, object correspondence, and gaze correction. Journal of Experimental Psychology: General, Vol 137(1), 163-181. PDF

See Fig. 7 on page 172 for a picture of the display utilized in this experiment.
> 7 votes

---
Tags: reference-request
---


# Question
Title: Neural networks with biologically plausible accounts of neurogenesis
One of the reasons artificial neural net algorithms like cascade correlation (pdf) have been generating interest is because they start with a minimal topology (just input and output unit) and recruit new hidden units as learning progresses. The draw from cognitive science (especially a lot of developmental psychology work) is an analogy to neuorogenesis (in fact, you will see this analogy mentioned in most papers that use CC-NN).

However, the CC algorithm is not meant as a biologically reasonable algorithm (neither the weight update nor unit recruitment rules are local, for instance), So my question is:

> Are there popular neural network algorithms that start with a minimal topology and recruit new hidden units, and update network weights in a neurobiologically plausible manner?

### Related questions

How are newly created neurons recruited into existing networks?

# Answer
> 14 votes
I don't know of any NN algorithms that match your definition entirely, and I have looked for them (previously and recently). Here are some papers that I think are close or in the direction that you are exploring.

Using theoretical models to analyze neural development (review)

An Instruction Language for Self-Construction in the Context of Neural Networks

Evolved neurogenesis and synaptogenesis for robotic control: the L-brain model

Modeling new neuron function: a history of using computational neuroscience to study adult neurogenesis (review)

The first two links are computational neuroscience papers that discuss relatively complex models of neurogenesis as it relates to neurodevelopment (rather than adult neurogenesis). Some of these models (inlcuding the second paper) do not even involve network activity, and, in their current form, likely none of them are capable or suited for solving practical problems. The third paper is probably closest to what you are looking for (but I don't have access), and the fourth is as its title suggests.

Many network models of neurogenesis focus on neurodevelopment. A fairly obvious conclusion seems to be that the reason for that is that neurogenesis' most important biological role is in neurodevelopment. I have thought alot about using neuroscience to derive NN algorithms that are both biologically plausible and functional, and have considered neurogenesis within that context. My present conclusion is that, outside of neuroevolution, neurogenesis is not currently an ideal focus for NN modeling, because its role in learning and computation seems to be mostly limited to a special case (the hippocampus) that is not well understood (despite its obvious importance).

In regards to cascade correlation, I suspect that a similar effect may be achieved in some biological NNs using only synaptogenesis and synaptic plasticity. Basically, if you have very many neurons and new learning is confined to a minimal number of synapses that are subsequently protected from future modification, then the effect might be the same as always confining new learning to newly-added neurons (as in CC-NN). Such a case would be consistent with these findings, for example. In such a model, it would not be biologically plausible, and perhaps not desirable, for each neuron to be connected with each neuron in the preceding and following layer, and thus a system for determining the pattern of exploratory connections would be required. To do that, one could draw from neurodevelopment models such as the above (in order to bias the targets of synaptogenesis, to seed initial connections of the network, or both) or, alternatively, try to derive algorithms that approximate observed connectivity patterns of biological networks.

# Answer
> 1 votes
I don't know of a particular network model for this job (so my answer will be an incomplete one), but I believe that any Hebbian learning based associative memory can easily be structured to simulate neurogenesis. These unsupervised networks are actually nonlinear dynamic systems that can be understood in terms of their phase spaces. Phase space is the realization of the dynamicity of the network in time. It contains (possibly) several stable states, called minima.

Consider an n-node network. When you add the n+1th node and connect it to the rest of the network via a certain number of connections, what you (hypothetically) see is that the phase space is not reshaped entirely; but it changes smoothly. An important thing to clarify (thanks to Artem Kaznatcheev), is that number n should have a considerably big value. Imagine the extreme case, where n is 1; then the entire structure will be gone.

I am not that good at its mathematics, but in principle, this allows neurogenesis to be simulated on this kind of networks that implement dynamic systems. One can develop algorithms that recruits or removes nodes and connections paralled to training.

How to add nodes: I believe that the answer to this particular question does not effect the neurobiological plausibility of the model. We can even assume that the nodes are there, but not used (due to prior unnecessity), and now we need them and recruit them.

But, as an end note, I must say that I have not developed such a such a metwork before, so I am unable to share my experiences here.

---
Tags: developmental-psychology, computational-modeling, neural-network, theoretical-neuroscience, neurogenesis
---


# Question
Title: How to assess participant awareness of experimental deception without inducing awareness?
I am designing a memory experiment with a deceptive critical trial, wherein an item is swapped without the participant's knowledge.

**What is the best way to determine if the participant has noticed the swap, without actually informing them of it?**

I.e., asking the participant 'did you notice the swap we just made' is rather informative about the possibility of a swap :)

Current thoughts:

1. a statement at the beginning asking them to mention any inconsistencies noticed
2. a direct question directly after the swap, and
3. a direct question at the end of the experiment

I think the first and second are likely to induce noticing (the latter by comparison to earlier memories that otherwise would not have been performed) and the last to potentially under-report.

# Answer
> 8 votes
Procedures like this are often called "funnel debriefing" procedures, and they basically consist of an extended version of what you already had in mind.

You begin with some very general questions about the nature of the experiment (e.g., "Do you have any initial thoughts or reactions about this experiment?"), then move on to some questions that are slightly more specific, but still not fully revealing (e.g., "Why do you think we showed you X?", "Did you notice anything unusual or inconsistent about task Y in the experiment?"), and finally terminate with direct inquiries of awareness (e.g., "Did you notice that we swapped one of the images during task Y?").

These questions may or may not be accompanied by recall or recognition tasks where awareness is gauged through participants' performance on the memory task.

Unfortunately there is typically little or no standardization (at least that I have seen) of how extensive these procedures should be, or for how to score and otherwise handle the results.

# Answer
> 3 votes
You asked for *the best way*, and though it may be impossible to decide upon the best way, there are certainly some good ways.

As you know, experimental design is, in part, an art. If your experiment is novel, you must devise a novel way of testing whether the deception worked. If your experiment is not so novel, you may be able to leverage the technique used in another experiment. Sometimes, converting an overt question into a quantitative question is sufficient to hide the true intent.

Here's how I might run your experiment:

**Beforehand**: "*We're showing each participant `x` sets of pictures, each set containing between 1 and 5 pictures. After each set, we'll ask you how many we showed you.*" The control set should contain between 1 and 5 dissimilar pictures. The experimental set should contain just the 2 similar pictures (i.e., the swap pair).

**After each control set**: "*How many pictures did we show you?*" The answer here determines whether the subject can be relied upon.

**After the experimental set**: "*How many pictures did we show you?*" Subjects who noticed the swap will say `2`; the rest will say `1`.

**Confirmation questions**:

* for subjects who answered `2`: "*What were the differences between the 2 pictures?*"
* for subjects who answered `1`: "*Did anything in that picture change during the time it was shown to you?*" The interviewer's intonation should be neutral to avoid making this a leading question.

You will, of course, refine the questions for your particular experiment.

---
Tags: memory, methodology, experimental-psychology, deception
---


# Question
Title: Is there evidence that STDP is responsible for the ability to infer causation?
Spike timing dependent plasticity (STDP) is a property of synapses that modifies their efficacy based on timing relationships between action potentials in the pre-synaptic and post-synaptic neuron. A pre-synaptic neuron firing in a brief period *before* the post-synaptic neuron fires potentiates the synapse. When the pre-synaptic neuron fires *after* the post-synaptic neuron, the synapse is depressed.

Perceptually, we only really see (or hear, or feel) a sequence of events. To infer causation from that requires some mechanism. Kushnir and Gopnik (2005) claim even children do causal inference, which leads me to believe that it is not merely a skill learned later in life.

My question is, **does any direct or circumstantial evidence exists that links STDP with causal inference**?

### References

Tamar Kushnir and Alison Gopnik (2005) Young Children Infer Causal Strength From Probabilities and Interventions. Psychological Science September 2005 vol. 16 no. 9 678-683 (doi: 10.1111/j.1467-9280.2005.01595.x)

# Answer
Fernando et al. (2008) proposed a neuronal mechanism to copy network topologies from one region of the brain to another which is based on Spike Timing Dependent Placticity (STDP) and argue that the mechanism of neuronal copying is a neuronal implementation of causal inference.

> **Fernando C, Karishma KK, Szathmáry E. (2008) Copying and evolution of neuronal topology. PLoS One 3(11):e3775.** \[Free PDF\]
>
> **Abstract**
>
> We propose a mechanism for copying of neuronal networks that is of considerable interest for neuroscience for it suggests a neuronal basis for causal inference, function copying, and natural selection within the human brain. To date, no model of neuronal topology copying exists. We present three increasingly sophisticated mechanisms to demonstrate how topographic map formation coupled with Spike-Time Dependent Plasticity (STDP) can copy neuronal topology motifs. Fidelity is improved by error correction and activity-reverberation limitation. The high-fidelity topology-copying operator is used to evolve neuronal topologies. Possible roles for neuronal natural selection are discussed.

In the discussion, the proposed relation between STDP and causal inference is addressed in detail:

> \[...\] In the process of thinking about promising mechanisms, we discovered two serendipitous ancillary benefits of copying. The first was that the mechanism of neuronal copying was a neuronal implementation of causal inference \[86\]. The capacity of STDP to capture temporal relations consistent with causality rather than just correlations has been described by several authors \[65\], \[87\], \[88\], \[89\]. However, to our knowledge, STDP has until now not been used in an algorithm to explicitly infer whole causal networks. Considerable attention has been paid recently to the capacity of animals such as New Caledonian crows \[90\], rats \[91\], non-human apes \[91\], children \[92\] and human adults \[92\] to undertake causal reasoning tasks, i.e. tasks in which good performance cannot be well explained by pair-wise associative learning alone. \[...\]
>
> \[68\] Florian RV (2007) Reinforcement Learning Through Modulation of Spike-Time-Dependent Synaptic Plasticity. Neural Computation 19: 1468–1502.
>
> \[86\] Glymour C (2003) Learning, prediction and causal Bayes nets. Trends in Cognitive Sciences 7: 43–48.
>
> \[87\] Abbott L, Nelson SB (2000) Synaptic plasticity:taming the beast. Nature Neuroscience supplement 31178–1183.
>
> \[88\] Bi G-q, Poo M-m (2001) Synaptic Modification by Correlated Activity: Hebb's Postulate Revisited. Annu Rev Neurosci 24: 139–166.
>
> \[89\] Gerstner W, Kistler WM (2002) Mathematical formulations of Hebbian learning. Biol Cybern 87: 404–415.
> 7 votes

---
Tags: neuroscience, learning, theoretical-neuroscience
---


# Question
Title: Difference between "Social Roles" and "Social Groups"
The two terms "Social Roles" and "Social Groups" sound similar and I don't know if these terms are often just used interchangeably.

Is there a specific difference between "Social Roles" and "Social Groups"? Social Groups have group norms. But Social Roles appear to have social norms too. But again, what's the difference between the norms that the two terms have, "Group Norms" and "Social Norms"?

# Answer
> 3 votes
### Background thoughts

The Wikipedia articles on social norms, social groups, and social roles provide a reasonable starting point. Standard sociology textbooks will cover this material.

Let's think of the example of a family.

A particular family with two parents and two children is a social group. We could say that there are social roles for parents (e.g., around setting boundaries, providing a safe environment for the children, etc.) and social roles for children (e.g., learning, having fun, being respectful to parents, etc). We could also describe social norms that operate in the family (e.g., around interaction patterns, styles of dress, eating habits, etc.).

### Difference between "Social Roles" and "Social Groups"

Groups are sets of people. Roles describe a set of features of a position in a social structure. Roles are not a person, but represent a position filled by a person in a social context.

E.g., A family is a group; parent or father or breadwinner is a role.

### Difference between "Group Norms" and "Social Norms"

The term "group norms" is often used to describe the norms (i.e., the expectations and typical ways of acting) that operate in a particular group or set of groups.

E.g., the norms in a particular family or in a set of families in a particular community; the norms in a particular work team

I see the term "social norms" as more general. When used in the context of describing expectations and typical human behaviour, all norms are "social". Thus, social norms can apply to social contexts that transcend any one group (e.g., face the door when waiting in an elevator; don't laugh when attending a funeral service).

---
Tags: terminology, social-psychology, norms
---


# Question
Title: How is the Stanford Prison Experiment connected to Conformity?
I am still not very clear with what the Stanford Prison Experiment conducted by Zimbardo was trying to conclude about from the experiment.

From Wikipedia, it says the conclusion was to:

> demonstrate the impressionability and obedience of people when provided with a legitimizing ideology and social and institutional support. The experiment has also been used to illustrate cognitive dissonance theory and the power of authority.

How does this have any relation or impact on the Conformity theory?

I know that the experiments by Sherif and Asch have concluded the theory of Conformity quite clearly. The Zimbardo's one however seems somewhat implicit. The notes that I read seem to put the Stanford Prison experiment right after the ones by Sherif and Asch. So I believe it should have some relation with the Conformity theory. But I cannot see clearly how is it related to the Conformity theory, particularly in the context of Communications.

# Answer
Zimbardo himself states that both informative and normative conformity played an important role in the Stanford Prison Experiment.

> Source: http://www.lucifereffect.com/guide\_conform.htm
>
> \[...\] Informative conformity often occurs in situations in which there is high uncertainty and ambiguity. In an unfamiliar situation, we are likely to shape our behavior to match that of others. The actions of others inform us of the customs and accepted practices in a situation. Others inform us of what is right to do, how to behave in new situations.
>
> In addition to conforming to the group norms due to lack of knowledge, we also conform when we want to be liked by the group. This type of conformity, called normative conformity, is the dominant form of social conformity when we are concerned about making a good impression in front of a group. Though we may disagree secretly with the group opinion, we may verbally adopt the group stance so that we seem like a team player rather than a deviant.
>
> Both of these pressures impact us everyday, for good or for worse. \[...\] Similarly, in the Stanford Prison Experiment, the subjects who were randomly assigned as guards gradually adopted the behavior of cruel and demanding prison guards because that became the behavioral norm in an alien situation.
> 8 votes

---
Tags: social-psychology
---


# Question
Title: Introductory resources on bayesian modeling for cognitive sciences
On Cross Validated there is a great question about best introductory books for bayesian statistics. Also, Jeromy Anglim blogged recently about use of JAGS, rjags, and Bayesian Modelling, with some very nice collection of tutorials relevant to the above question. Lots of those resources are single-shot tutorials, covering just some limited scope of programming and modelling.

In terms of resources that cover a broader range of topics with some background information and coding tutorials, only two sources stand out from the list:

Those two books could potentially hit the spot in terms of sufficient coverage of basic needs for beginner bayesian acolyte.

**What else do you advise as a simple, practical, compact, and thorough introduction to bayesian modeling for a cognitive scientist?**

# Answer
> 6 votes
+1 to Speldosa's suggestion. Griffiths and colleagues have written several primers on the use of Bayesian models in cogsci. Many of them can be found on Griffiths' website under 'Foundations':

http://cocosci.berkeley.edu/publications.php?topic=Foundations

e.g.

> Perfors, A., Tenenbaum, J.B., Griffiths, T. L., & Xu, F. (2011). A tutorial introduction to Bayesian models of cognitive development. Cognition, 120, 302-321.
>
> Griffiths, T. L., & Yuille, A. (2008). A primer on probabilistic inference. In M. Oaksford and N. Chater (Eds.). The probabilistic mind: Prospects for rational models of cognition. Oxford: Oxford University Press.

# Answer
> 5 votes
### Reading list

As @Jeff has mentioned Tom Griffiths has several useful resources. In particular Tom Griffiths has an extensive reading list that you might find relevant. To quote the summary of the content:

> This list is intended to introduce some of the tools of Bayesian statistics and machine learning that can be useful to computational research in cognitive science. The first section mentions several useful general references, and the others provide supplementary readings on specific topics...

### Other comments

* More broadly, it certainly helps when learning Bayesian statistics to have a good understanding of calculus (integration is key) and probability (distributions, how they are parameterised, etc.).
* John Kruschke's book is quite accessible
* Gelman and Hill is also quite accessible; the focus is multilevel modelling and regression; it covers Bayesian modelling with BUGS. It is very readable and has lots of practical advice. That said, it's doesn't specifically address issues related to cognitive science.

# Answer
> 3 votes
In the fairly recent book "The Cambridge Handbook of Computational Psychology", chapter three is devoted to bayesian modeling. It's written by Thomas Griffiths, Charles Kemp, and Joshua Tenenbaum.

I haven't read this chapter yet myself but will update this answer when I have.

---
Tags: cognitive-modeling, reference-request, mathematical-psychology, statistics, bayesian
---


title: Running on autopilot

text:
# Question
Title: Running on autopilot
Sometimes, people say that they are "running on autopilot", meaning that they are doing the things that they normally do, without any real conscious involvement. I have read that it is not uncommon for people to drive routes that they regularly drive without any conscious memory of it - I have occasionally done this myself, and it is very unnerving.

But how do we do this? How can we achieve the level of co-ordination and reaction that is required to drive a vehicle for a significant period without involving our conscious mind? I realise that we do a lot of things sub-consciously, but it seems that learned tasks like driving should require at least a minimal conscious engagement.

Incidentally, I am not suggesting that this is dangerous in any sense. I don't think it is. I am just surprised as the level of functioning we are capable of achieving sub-consciously.

# Answer
What you describe is the textbook definition of a habit: routines of behavior that are repeated regularly and tend to occur subconsciously. These are triggered by some external (say, being behind the driver's well of a car) or internal (say, being upset) stimuli. This activates chunks of procedural memory, which attempts to carry out a task that was usually associated with the stimuli (keeping the car on the road; eating a cake).

Although chunking is best understood for factual memories, a similar procedure is believed to apply for how procedural memories become a habit. Obviously, this is a highly researched topic, mostly because of the connection to addiction.

A final minor point is to be careful with terminology. Subconscious is a vague term that should typically be replaced by unconscious or preconscious.

---

### Annotated references

Wood, W., & Neal, D.T. (2007) "A new look at habits and the habit-goal interface." *Psychological Review*, 114(4): 843-863. \[pdf\]

* A relatively well know article that shows a model of how habits are shaped and interfere with or aid conscious goals.

Barnes, T.D., Kubota, Y., Hu, D., Jin, D.Z., & Graybiel, A.M. (2005) "Activity of striatal neurons reflects dynamic encoding and recoding of procedural memories." *Nature* 437, 1158-1161 \[pdf\]

* A look at the neurobiology of chunking of procedural memory and habit formation in rats. Stresses how easy it is to reactivate old habits.

Graybiel, A.M. (2008) "Habits, Rituals, and the Evaluative Brain." *Annual Review of Neuroscience* 31: 359-387 \[pdf\]

* Reviews evidence for the involvement of basal ganglia–based circuits in procedural chunking and habit formation. Show that habits form for both overt behaviors (say, backing your car out of the driveway) and cognitive behavior (say, general route planning).

Dehaenea, S., Changeux, J.-P., Naccachea, L., Sackura, J., and Sergent, C. (2006) "Conscious, preconscious, and subliminal processing: a testable taxonomy" Trends in Cognitive Sciences 10(5): 204-211. \[pdf\]

* Explains the difference between unconscious, preconscious, and subliminal and how to test for them.
> 8 votes

# Answer
A more computational explanation can be found in the expectation-based reasoning literature. The theory suggests that people are always generating expectations of what they expect to sense (see/hear/smell/feel etc) in the near future. These expectations are matched against observations. If expectations and observations match, then all is good. When they don't match, cognition is alerted. In this view, predictions flow top-down and errors (discrepancies between the prediction and the observation) flow bottom-up.

Lee, T.S., Mumford, D. (2003) Hierarchical Bayesian inference in the visual cortex. Journal of Optical Society of America, A. . 20(7): 1434-1448.

Hohwy, J., Roepstorff, A., & Friston, K. (2008). Predictive coding explains binocular rivalry: an epistemological review. Cognition, 108(3), 687-701. ELSEVIER SCIENCE BV. Retrieved from http://discovery.ucl.ac.uk/136548/
> 7 votes

# Answer
This phenomenon is called highway hypnosis (also called driving without attention mode or white line fever) and is an example of procedural memory (or automaticity). Procedural memory is the ability to perform certain tasks without conscious awareness.
> 5 votes

# Answer
There is nothing surprising or unusual in this. It is a straightforward application of skilled learning (the driving or whatever), habit formation (route following), and having your conscious attention on something else. Back in the 1990s, when I was doing landscaping, I used to make good use of this effect by consciously reviewing things I had recently read while doing routine work. It can be a problem when you slip into a habitual behavior without realizing it and you end up following an old route and find yourself at the wrong location.

Another reason for not remembering the particular, most recent, trip is that it tends to merge into all the almost identical trips you have made. Several times when this has happened to me, I have been able to reconstruct (how accurately is another question) the most recent trip by trying to remember extremely specific details that often change from trip to trip.

The only specific references I have right now are for habit learning, which I was reading a couple weeks ago, these two are the best general articles on habit learning that I found:

David T Neal, Wendy Wood, and Jeffrey M. Quinn (2006). Habits—A Repeat Performance. Current Directions in Psychological Science Volume 15—Number 4.

Wendy Wood and David T Neal (2007). A New Look at Habits and the Habit–Goal Interface. Psychological Review Vol. 114, No. 4, 843–863.
> 4 votes

---
Tags: consciousness, automaticity, procedural-memory, unconscious
---


# Question
Title: What is the current status of tetrachromacy in humans?
Tetrachromacy is a condition of having four colour channels. There is a hypothesis that some women posses 4 different types of cone cells (each with different opsin responsible for different absorption spectrum) and can process them.

Despite some initial research (e.g. Jameson et al., Richer color experience in observers with multiple photopigment opsin gene (2001)) I have found surprisingly little follow-ups.

**What is the current status of tetrachromacy in humans?** Is it sufficiently confirmed by the experiment, refuted or unresolved?

I am aware that among medical researchers positive 'deviations' can attract less attention than deficits or diseases. Moreover, they may be more prone to methodological mistakes as it is easier to measure deficits against standard criteria.

# Answer
Jordan et al. (2010) tested humans that carry the genetic predisposition for having 4 classes of cone receptors. However, only one of their 24 subjects was able to discriminate three color dimensions, thus, demonstrated tetrachromacy.

> **Jordan G, Deeb SS, Bosten JM, Mollon JD. (2010). The dimensionality of color vision in carriers of anomalous trichromacy. Journal of Vision. 10(8):12.** \[Free PDF\]
>
> **Abstract**
>
> Some 12% of women are carriers of the mild, X-linked forms of color vision deficiencies called "anomalous trichromacy." Owing to random X chromosome inactivation, their retinae must contain four classes of cone rather than the normal three; and it has previously been speculated that these female carriers might be tetrachromatic, capable of discriminating spectral stimuli that are indistinguishable to the normal trichromat. However, the existing evidence is sparse and inconclusive. Here, we address the question using (a) a forced-choice version of the Rayleigh test, (b) a test using multidimensional scaling to reveal directly the dimensionality of the participants' color space, and (c) molecular genetic analyses to estimate the X-linked cone peak sensitivities of a selected sample of strong candidates for tetrachromacy. Our results suggest that most carriers of color anomaly do not exhibit four-dimensional color vision, and so we believe that anomalous trichromacy is unlikely to be maintained by an advantage to the carriers in discriminating colors. However, 1 of 24 obligate carriers of deuteranomaly exhibited tetrachromatic behavior on all our tests; this participant has three well-separated cone photopigments in the long-wave spectral region in addition to her short-wave cone. We assess the likelihood that behavioral tetrachromacy exists in the human population.
> 6 votes

---
Tags: reference-request, vision
---


# Question
Title: Which statistical test should I use when there are multiple latent predictors and multiple latent outcomes?
Which statistical method should I use when Predicting organization commitment (composed of 3 latent variables) using the five factors of personality?

Its a cross-sectional design with survey data. The Personality factors are Five independent factors (derived out of factor analysis) and each factor is measured on a likert scale, same goes for the three components of commitment and they are also measured on a likert type scale.

The studies I have read upto now uses partial correlations and hierarchical regression to link these contructs but I somehow think there has to be a better way.

*Note: this question was originally asked here on Stats.SE, but the moderator there suggested posting it on cogsci.se*

# Answer
I'm guessing you are relating the Big 5 factors of personality to Meyer and Allen's three factor model of commitment (normative, continuance, affective).

You certainly could adopt the simple approach of creating observed composite scores for each variable and reporting the correlation matrix and a set of multiple regressions.

However, the language of your question also suggests that you are interested in modelling latent variables rather than observed variables. This may suggest a structural equation modelling approach may be suitable.

### Benefits of structural equation modelling approach

* You can model your measurement model (i.e., do the observed variables load appropriately on your 8 latent factors; is there an overall higher order commitment factor that represents the three commitment factors)
* You could model relationships between latent factors rather than observed variables (i.e., you can adjust for reliability of measurement); this often aligns analyses more with theoretical interests in psychology.
* You could explore more sophisticated model comparison approaches. One approach I really like involves comparing models with various constraints in either the correlations or regression coefficients between the predictor set (i.e., personality) and the outcome set (i.e., commitment). E.g., one model could constrain all 15 regression coefficients between personality and commitment variables to be the same; another model could say that the relationships are constrained to be equal across commitment variables but different across personality variables.
> 8 votes

---
Tags: personality, statistics, commitment
---


# Question
Title: Are there additional animal studies about superstitions?
> In one particular case, Skinner decided to go random on his hungry pigeons. He dropped food into the box at completely random times, independent of any behavior on the part of the pigeons. But the behavior of the pigeons, he found, didn't stay random. After a few drops of the food, the pigeons began exhibiting certain consistent behavior. One circled counter-clockwise, another spun around in circles; seventy-five percent of them exhibited some kind of odd behavior. Skinner concluded that the pigeons had come to display 'superstitious behavior'. It was like the superstition of gamblers who believe they have a lucky hat. If the gambler wears the hat, they can't lose. If the pigeons circle the cage counter-clockwise, they will bring on food pellets.

from How-pigeons-get-to-be-superstitious....

Seems curious that this wouldn’t have been pursued as an avenue of study with other animals.

**Can anyone find me a citation of such studies and does anyone know if the study has been repeated elsewhere?**

# Answer
For instance, the same behavior was also shown in orang-utan and dog. Already two years after the study by Skinner (1947) mentioned in the news article, Kellogg (1949) gave a review of some of the experimental results, but advocates a less anthropomorphic interpretation:

> **Kellogg, W. N. (1949) 'Superstitious' behavior in animals. Psychological Review, Vol 56(3), 172-175. doi: 10.1037/h0055221**
>
> **Abstract**
>
> The orang-utan and dog as well as the pigeon have shown "superstitious" behavior. It has appeared in conditioning and multiple-choice experiments. Interpreting such behavior as superstitious is mentalistic and anthropomorphic. "An alternate and less complicated interpretation would be that these activities—whether relevant or irrelevant to the solution of the problem—are ordinary instances of the association of a sequence of movements with a reinforcing stimulus."

Interestingly, superstitious behavior is still a topic of interest for research done with humans. See for example the results of a PubMed search with this search term: http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/sites/entrez?db=pubmed&cmd=DetailsSearch&term=%22superstitious+behavior%22&save\_search=true

**References**
Kellogg, W. N. (1949) 'Superstitious' behavior in animals. Psychological Review 56(3), 172-175.
Skinner, B. F. (1947) 'Superstition' in the Pigeon, Journal of Experimental Psychology 38, 168-172.
> 16 votes

---
Tags: reference-request, behaviorism, animal-cognition
---


# Question
Title: How is motivation influenced by chance of reward?
Sometimes, I work on a project where there is a chance that the whole project will become irrelevant before it is finished. I have noticed that even though I believe that the risk of this happening is small, it will significantly influence my motivation sometimes, though not on every project where there is such risk. On the other hand, when gambling, one is willing to do things, when the chance of reward is practically neglectable.

Are there any psychological experiments that can shed some light on why we react irrationally in these situations?

# Answer
> 10 votes
Our subjective estimation of probability is affected by many irrational factors, one of which is the accessibility of exemplars (Availability Heuristic). Since we usually hear about lottery winners, and not so much about those who didn't win, we over-estimate the probability of winning. It may be similar with your estimation of the probability of the project becoming irrelevant - it is affected by how easy it is for you to imagine the project failing, something that can be affected by lots of irrational factors (like how self-confident the project leader is, or even worse, how much you like him/her).

Dan Gilbert has a nice TED talk mentioning the Availability Heuristic in lottery and other similar biases in estimating gains and probabilities.

# Answer
> 5 votes
The prospect theory works/describes two stages in decision making under risk\*.

### Stage 1:

Clustering/grouping of the outcomes based on some heuristic. i.e the group the possible outcomes into groups and then choose a reference point out of these.

### Stage 2:

Now they switch to the expected utility theory,and act as a rational agent that makes a decision based on the expected value.

To quote wikipedia:

> The formula that Kahneman and Tversky assume for the evaluation phase is (in its simplest form) given by
>
> $U = \sum\_{i=1}^n w(p\_i)v(x\_i) = w(p\_1)v(x\_1) + w(p\_2)v(x\_2) + ... + w(p\_n)v(x\_n)$
>
> where $U$ is the overall or expected utility of the outcomes to the individual making the decision, $x\_1, x\_2, ..., x\_n$ are the potential outcomes and $p\_1, p\_2, ..., p\_n$ their respective probabilities. The function $v$ is the value function that assigns a value to an outcome. The function $w$ is a probability weighting function and expresses that people tend to overreact to small probability events, but underreact to medium and large probabilities.
>
> Losses hurt more than gains feel good (loss aversion). This differs greatly from expected utility theory, in which a rational agent is indifferent to the reference point. In expected utility theory, the individual only cares about absolute wealth, not relative wealth in any given situation. The function is a probability weighting function and expresses that people tend to overreact to small probability events, but underreact to medium and large probabilities.

Note that this is constrained by the assumption that the probabilities of outcomes are known.

To apply to your case, with any meaningfulness, you'll have to try to quantify the probability of failure in both cases and also assign a weight to the quantity of upside.

My guess is even though gambling has 50% probability you see the immediate(short time span) big wad of cash as high utility while the upside of finishing the project with a reward over a longer time span seems to reduce/lower the apparent utility.

I'd recommend this algorithm to combat this. I am only trying it myself.

# Answer
> 4 votes
The growing body of research in cognitive psychology is pointing to the fact that we may have overemphasized the processes of the brain as the center for determination of action. We tend to look at the brain in terms of top-down processes but this is far from the case. If you really want a rich and entertaining view of motivation read Damasio's book Descartes Error (1994).

Damasio was the first to postulate the somatic marker hypothesis or the theory that somatic bodily reactions were the source of heuristical choices. Thus, the "gut" reaction truly is a somatic reaction of nerves outside of the CNS influencing the eventual choice of an action. Literally you don't "feel" like taking an action. The somatic marker hypothesis is gaining ground:

* Backed up by research such as inhibiton cost time analysis (e.g. the addition to emotionally more salient words to a go-no-go test increases reaction time cost)
* Look at Eddie Harmon-Jones as an author for experiemnetal and neurological evidence.
* There is evidence that somatic markers are responsible for subliminal cognitive dissonance especially in racial bias. People who were tricked into a biased response were more likely to offer assistance or judge favorably a member of a minority race given the opportunity- again somatic differences re-routing rational decision making.

I know its hard to believe neurons in the intestines might be responsible for your procrastination but if a warm cup of something in your hand makes you more likely to favoriably judge an object then..... Read Damisio, really , you'll like it.

# Answer
> 3 votes
One reason for different outcomes in the 2 cases you highlight may be due to the different regulatory focus (higgins).

Not letting project go scrap is a preventive focus and as such comes with all the baggage that preventive regulatory focus has. One basically wants to avoid an undesired outcome and sees things as loss-nonloss (see the relation with prospect theory).

Winning a lottery on the other hand is a promotional focus- one wants to achieve a desired outcome and sees things in terms of profit-nonprofit.

Now motivation or goal commitment is usually operationalized as commitment = Expectancy X Value.

Consider a preventive focus- the goal is a necessity goal- commitment is constant (say 1 on a 0-1 scale); as expectancy or chance of the outcome changes (the outcome becomes probable) , the Value of the goal adjusts (its no longer that important to work hard to prevent that project from going scrap) , but the commitment remains constant.

Consider a promotional focus - there we get a multiplicative effect of expectancy on value. The moment expectancy is sufficient enough, the goal that is now within reach becomes more valuable and the commitment increases multiplicative and exponentially rather than linearly.

All this has been experimentally demonstrated and is theory backed. In your case the preventive focus of 'project not scrapping' does not increase your commitment to the goal, rather makes the goal seem less valuable as the chances of not scrapping increases. On the other hand gambling is a promotional focus; as you make a hit and falsely believe that you are close to hitting the jackpot , you continue getting sucked into more gambling, and commitment keeps increasing and the value of jackpot also keeps increasing.

---
Tags: motivation, rationality
---


title: How to get rid of subvocalization?

text:
# Question
Title: How to get rid of subvocalization?
When I read a text written in latin alphabet and I want to understand what it means I usually

1. transform each word into spoken word (internal speech) and
2. then I transform it into meaning.

I can't get rid of the first phase and reduce the reading process to the second phase only. In Wikipedia, this internal speech is described as subvocalization.

When I read in chinese I'm able to leave out subvocalization and go directly to the meaning. In many cases I learned only the meanings of symbols without knowing how to pronounce the symbol. I'm leaving out this mental burden and surf through the text without subvocalization. Reading is faster and my mind is in the relaxed state as if watching a movie without speech.

Are their some techniques I can learn to get rid of subvocalization when reading texts written in latin alphabet or cyrillic? Could you cite a few sources researching this skill?

# Answer
> 5 votes
The two legs upon which speed reading rests, in short, are chunking and seeking. Chunking is reading multiple words at once, while seeking allows you to find those chunks quickly and efficiently. The first exercise below will solve your subvocalization problems, but I recommend doing both in order to read text more effectively.

You'll need:

* A computer with internet access for the first exercise
* A stopwatch and notecards (or a flashcard system of any sort) for the second exercise

# Practice Chunking with Spreeder

Many combinations of words can be comprehended simultaneously, which negates the need for subvocalization. Reading multiple words at once is called chunking. A useful tool to drill this skill is Spreeder, which breaks text into arbitrary chunks and displays them a chunk at a time.

1. Go to www.spreeder.com
2. Click to speed read the introduction
3. Click "spreed!"
4. At the bottom right, click "settings" and increase chunk size to 3
5. Increase wpm as desired

# Practice Seeking with flashcards

After you are comfortable speed reading on spreeder at a high level, which should have solved your subvocalization problem, move on to seeking. Spreeder displays chunks right in the middle of the screen, which is predictable. Real world text, however, is not that convenient.

Still, Spreeder can be helpful.

1. "Spreeder" some text with chunk size 3
2. Write those chunks down on your flash cards
3. Pull up or print out the original text
4. Shuffle the flash cards and pull them at random
5. Identify the random chunk in the text as fast as possible
6. Use the stopwatch to time yourself after identifying 10 chunks

Doing this for 15 minutes a day will vastly improve your reading speed.

> *This was the basis of the speed reading course I took at the University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign. I can't cite any research from this coffeehouse, but give it a shot and see for yourself. Personally, I read casually at 500wpm at 90% comprehension and I can read up to 800wpm at 60% comprehension. I've been able to read like this since before the class, though, so feel free to take it with a grain of salt.*

---
Tags: perception, linguistics, reading
---