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Rapid attentional biases to threat-associated visual features: the roles of anxiety and visual working memory access
Get PDFThreat-related information strongly biases attention, particularly for high anxious individuals. It is less clear though what the consequences of attentional capture by threat are, and how this influences subsequent visual processing. This study examined how capture by threat influences visual search when attributes related to a threat reappear as task-irrelevant information. In Experiment 1, participants completed a search task preceded by task-irrelevant face cues on each trial expressing neutral, happy, or angry emotions. Faces were filtered to appear in different colors, where this color could match a non-emotional distractor object in the upcoming search display. While the color of neutral/happy face cues had no impact on performance, there was evidence that angry face colors delayed reaction times when this color reappeared, driven by a positive correlation between costs and individual differences in trait anxiety. Experiment 2 assessed whether this phenomenon would be more readily observed when designating face cues task-relevant. When participants attended to and memorized faces for occasional probe trials, color biases were now evident irrespective of the emotional valence of face cues and unaffected by trait anxiety levels. These results suggest that task-irrelevant threat stimuli are granted privileged depth of processing by high anxious individuals, triggering biased attention towards features related to this object. Such biases are not dependent on threat per se, occurring for other objects voluntarily processed to similar depth regardless of personality factors. This highlights that anxiety-related phenomena, such as delayed disengagement of spatial attention from threat, may stem from task-irrelevant visual working memory representation
Atypical action updating in a dynamic environment associated with adolescent obsessive-compulsive disorder
Get PDFBackground: Computational research had determined that adults with obsessive–compulsive disorder (OCD) display heightened action updating in response to noise in the environment and neglect metacognitive information (such as confidence) when making decisions. These features are proposed to underlie patients’ compulsions despite the knowledge they are irrational. Nonetheless, it is unclear whether this extends to adolescents with OCD as research in this population is lacking. Thus, this study aimed to investigate the interplay between action and confidence in adolescents with OCD.
Methods: Twenty-seven adolescents with OCD and 46 controls completed a predictive-inference task, designed to probe how subjects’ actions and confidence ratings fluctuate in response to unexpected outcomes. We investigated how subjects update actions in response to prediction errors (indexing mismatches between expectations and outcomes) and used parameters from a Bayesian model to predict how confidence and action evolve over time. Confidence–action association strength was assessed using a regression model. We also investigated the effects of serotonergic medication.
Results: Adolescents with OCD showed significantly increased learning rates, particularly following small prediction errors. Results were driven primarily by unmedicated patients. Confidence ratings appeared equivalent between groups, although model-based analysis revealed that patients’ confidence was less affected by prediction errors compared to controls. Patients and controls did not differ in the extent to which they updated actions and confidence in tandem.
Conclusions: Adolescents with OCD showed enhanced action adjustments, especially in the face of small prediction errors, consistent with previous research establishing ‘just-right’ compulsions, enhanced error-related negativity, and greater decision uncertainty in paediatric-OCD. These tendencies were ameliorated in patients receiving serotonergic medication, emphasising the importance of early intervention in preventing disorder-related cognitive deficits. Confidence ratings were equivalent between young patients and controls, mirroring findings in adult OCD research
Relating psychiatric symptoms and self-regulation during the COVID-19 crisis
Get PDFDisruptions of self-regulation are a hallmark of numerous psychiatric disorders. Here, we examine the relationship between transdiagnostic dimensions of psychopathology and changes in self-regulation in the early phase of the COVID-19 pandemic. We used a data-driven approach on a large number of cognitive tasks and self-reported surveys in training datasets. Then, we derived measures of self-regulation and psychiatric functioning in an independent population sample (N = 102) tested both before and after the onset of the COVID-19 pandemic, when the restrictions in place represented a threat to mental health and forced people to flexibly adjust to modifications of daily routines. We found independent relationships between transdiagnostic dimensions of psychopathology and longitudinal alterations in specific domains of self-regulation defined using a diffusion decision model. Compared to the period preceding the onset of the pandemic, a symptom dimension related to anxiety and depression was characterized by a more cautious behavior, indexed by the need to accumulate more evidence before making a decision. Instead, social withdrawal related to faster non-decision processes. Self-reported measures of self-regulation predicted variance in psychiatric symptoms both concurrently and prospectively, revealing the psychological dimensions relevant for separate transdiagnostic dimensions of psychiatry, but tasks did not. Taken together, our results are suggestive of potential cognitive vulnerabilities in the domain of self-regulation in people with underlying psychiatric difficulties in face of real-life stressors. More generally, they also suggest that the study of cognition needs to take into account the dynamic nature of real-world events as well as within-subject variability over time
A decade of legal argumentation mining: datasets and approaches
Get PDFThe growing research field of argumentation mining (AM) in the past ten years has made it a popular topic in Natural Language Processing. However, there are still limited studies focusing on AM in the context of legal text (Legal AM), despite the fact that legal text analysis more generally has received much attention as an interdisciplinary field of traditional humanities and data science. The goal of this work is to provide a critical data-driven analysis of the current situation in Legal AM. After outlining the background of this topic, we explore the availability of annotated datasets and the mechanisms by which these are created. This includes a discussion of how arguments and their relationships can be modelled, as well as a number of different approaches to divide the overall Legal AM task into constituent sub-tasks. Finally we review the dominant approaches that have been applied to this task in the past decade, and outline some future directions for Legal AM research
Revised species delimitation in the giant water lily genus Victoria (Nymphaeaceae) confirms a new species and has implications for its conservation
Get PDFReliably documenting plant diversity is necessary to protect and sustainably benefit from it. At the heart of this documentation lie species concepts and the practical methods used to delimit taxa. Here, we apply a total-evidence, iterative methodology to delimit and document species in the South American genus Victoria (Nymphaeaceae). The systematics of Victoria has thus far been poorly characterized due to difficulty in attributing species identities to biological collections. This research gap stems from an absence of type material and biological collections, also the confused diagnosis of V. cruziana. With the goal of improving systematic knowledge of the genus, we compiled information from historical records, horticulture and geography and assembled a morphological dataset using citizen science and specimens from herbaria and living collections. Finally, we generated genomic data from a subset of these specimens. Morphological and geographical observations suggest four putative species, three of which are supported by nuclear population genomic and plastid phylogenomic inferences. We propose these three confirmed entities as robust species, where two correspond to the currently recognized V. amazonica and V. cruziana, the third being new to science, which we describe, diagnose and name here as V. boliviana Magdalena and L. T. Sm. Importantly, we identify new morphological and molecular characters which serve to distinguish the species and underpin their delimitations. Our study demonstrates how combining different types of character data into a heuristic, total-evidence approach can enhance the reliability with which biological diversity of morphologically challenging groups can be identified, documented and further studied
Memoirs of the plague: lawfare
Get PDFThis is an entry into a collective journal of the twenty-first century years of plague. It introduces the notion of ‘lawfare’ by way of the contemporary case concerning Lula da Silva and Brazil’s fall from grace. The latter is presented as an instance of violence in the international context, the managerial attitude to global disasters and, indeed, a plague. It chronicles the social struggles around the case and on that basis builds a somewhat playful manifesto for a new relationship between legal scholarship, the law school and the imaginary of permanent catastrophe and plague
Curating visual archives of sex: a roundtable discussion
No full textIn this roundtable, four curators of exhibitions showcasing sexual archives and histories—with a particular focus on queer and trans experiences—were asked to reflect on their experiences working as scholars and artists across a range of museum and gallery formats. The exhibitions referred to below were: Bring Your Own Body: Transgender between Archives and Aesthetics, curated by Jeanne Vaccaro (discussant) with Stamatina Gregory at The Cooper Union, NYC in 2015 and Haverford College, PA in 2016; Odarodle: An imaginary their_story of naturepeoples, 1535-2017, curated by Ashkan Sepahvand (discussant) at the Schwules Musem (Gay Museum) in Berlin, Germany, in 2017; Queer, curated by Ted Gott, Angela Hesson, Myles Russell-Cook, Meg Slater (discussant), and Pip Wallis at the National Gallery of Victoria, Melbourne, Australia, in 2021-2022; and TransTrans: Transatlantic Transgender Histories, curated by Alex Bakker, Rainer Herrn, Michael Thomas Taylor, Annette F. Timm (discussant) at the Schwules Musem in Berlin, Germany, in 2019-2020, adapting an earlier exhibition shown at the University of Calgary, Canada in 2016
No evidence for sex differences in tactile distance anisotropy
Get PDFPerceptual illusions of the distance between two touches have been used to study mental
representations of the body since E. H. Weber’s classic studies in the 19th century. For example, on many body parts tactile distance is anisotropic, with distances aligned with body width being perceived as larger than distances aligned with body length on several skin regions. Recent work has demonstrated sex differences in other distortions of mental body representations, such as proprioceptive hand maps. Given such findings, I analysed the results of 24 experiments, conducted by myself and my colleagues, measuring tactile distance anisotropy on the hand dorsum in both women and men. The results showed clear, and highly consistent anisotropy in both women and men, with no evidence for any sex difference
Future entrepreneurs: exploring paradigms in the entrepreneurial learning experience
Get PDFThis chapter presents the multi-dimensional approach to the teaching of entrepreneurship at Birkbeck, University of London in the UK. It is approached by presenting the curricular and extra-curricular programmes as a series of juxtaposed paradigms. The term “paradigm” is here used as conceptualising ways of thinking about the entrepreneurial learning experience, from the perspective of the content of the programmes and how the students learn. Birkbeck students' learning experience includes academic modules as well as hybrid modules which combine theory and hands-on practice.
Book synopsis: Higher Education Institutions (HEIs) around the world are being pressured to become more entrepreneurial. However, the concept of an entrepreneurial university has remained elusive, including ideas that range from supporting students and staff with new ventures to encouraging partnerships between academics and entrepreneurs. New research is needed on strategies and practices that can be implemented by universities in order to become more innovative and supportive.
Strategies for the Creation and Maintenance of Entrepreneurial Universities uses findings from a major EU-funded five country project (THEI2.0) focused on enhancing the implementation and impact of the EU-OECD’s HEInnovate tool to offer valuable strategies to help universities become more entrepreneurial, especially in the current COVID-19 and post-COVID-19 environments. This book’s core value lies in the fact that it draws on real experiences and practices of those in this field, articulates key takeaway messages, and suggests potential strategies and actions to create impact. Covering topics such as campus incubation, policy strategies, and regional development, this book acts as an essential resource for senior academic leaders, academic managers, entrepreneurship/entrepreneurial educators, incubation center managers, technology transfer managers, researchers, students, and administrators seeking to make their university more entrepreneurial, maintain their entrepreneurial status, critically reflect on their current level of entrepreneurialism, explore new opportunities to enhance their entrepreneurial reputation, or implement strategies to consolidate their entrepreneurial endeavors within the current challenging environment
The metal–silicate partitioning of carbon during Earth's accretion and its distribution in the early solar system
Get PDFCarbon is an essential element for the existence and evolution of life on Earth. Its abundance in Earth’s crust and mantle (the Bulk Silicate Earth, BSE) is surprisingly high given that carbon is strongly siderophile (metal-loving) at low pressures and temperatures, and hence should have segregated almost completely into Earth’s core during accretion. Estimates of the concentration of carbon in the BSE lie in the range 100-260 ppm and are much higher than expected based on simple models of core–mantle differentiation. Here we show through experiments at the putative conditions of Earth’s core formation 24 (49–71 GPa and 3600–4000 K) that carbon is significantly less siderophile at these conditions than at the low pressures (≤ 13 GPa) and temperatures (≤ 2500 K) of previous large volume press studies, but at least an order of magnitude more siderophile than proposed recently based on an experimental approach that is similar to ours. Using our new data along with previously published results, we derive a new parameterization of the pressure–temperature dependence of the metal–silicate partitioning of carbon. We apply this parameterization in a model that combines planet formation and core-mantle differentiation that is based on astrophysical N-body accretion simulations. Because differentiated planetesimals were almost completely depleted in carbon due to sublimation at high temperatures, almost all carbon in the BSE was added by the accretion of fully-oxidized carbonaceous chondrite material from the outer solar system. Carbon is added to the mantle continuously throughout accretion and its concentration reaches values within the BSE range (e.g. 140±40 ppm) at the end of accretion. The corresponding final core and bulk Earth carbon concentrations are 1270±300 ppm and 495±125 ppm respectively
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