@article{YangWangYanetal.2012, author = {Yang, Jiongjiong and Wang, Aobing and Yan, Ming and Zhu, Zijian and Chen, Cheng and Wang, Yizhou}, title = {Distinct processing for pictures of animals and objects Evidence from eye movements}, series = {Emotion : a new journal from the American Psychological Association}, volume = {12}, journal = {Emotion : a new journal from the American Psychological Association}, number = {3}, publisher = {American Psychological Association}, address = {Washington}, issn = {1528-3542}, doi = {10.1037/a0026848}, pages = {540 -- 551}, year = {2012}, abstract = {Many studies have suggested that emotional stimuli orient and engage attention. There is also evidence that animate stimuli, such as those from humans and animals, cause attentional bias. However, categorical and emotional factors are usually mixed, and it is unclear to what extent human context influences attentional allocation. To address this issue, we tracked participants' eye movements while they viewed pictures with animals and inanimate images (i.e., category) as focal objects. These pictures had either negative or neutral emotional valence, and either human body parts or nonhuman parts were near the focal objects (i.e., context). The picture's valence, arousal, position, size, and most of the low-level visual features were matched across categories. The results showed that nonhuman animals were more likely to be attended to and to be attended to for longer times than inanimate objects. The same pattern held for the human contexts (vs. nonhuman contexts). The effects of emotional valence, category, and context interacted. Specifically, in images with a negative valence, focal animals and objects with human context had comparable numbers of gaze fixations and gaze duration. These results highlighted the attentional bias to animate parts of a picture and clarified that the effects of category, valence, and picture context interacted to influence attentional allocation.}, language = {en} } @article{YanZhouShuetal.2012, author = {Yan, Ming and Zhou, Wei and Shu, Hua and Kliegl, Reinhold}, title = {Lexical and sublexical semantic preview benefits in chinese reading}, series = {Journal of experimental psychology : Learning, memory, and cognition}, volume = {38}, journal = {Journal of experimental psychology : Learning, memory, and cognition}, number = {4}, publisher = {American Psychological Association}, address = {Washington}, issn = {0278-7393}, doi = {10.1037/a0026935}, pages = {1069 -- 1075}, year = {2012}, abstract = {Semantic processing from parafoveal words is an elusive phenomenon in alphabetic languages, but it has been demonstrated only for a restricted set of noncompound Chinese characters. Using the gaze-contingent boundary paradigm, this experiment examined whether parafoveal lexical and sublexical semantic information was extracted from compound preview characters. Results generalized parafoveal semantic processing to this representative set of Chinese characters and extended the parafoveal processing to radical (sublexical) level semantic information extraction. Implications for notions of parafoveal information extraction during Chinese reading are discussed.}, language = {en} } @article{YanRisseZhouetal.2012, author = {Yan, Ming and Risse, Sarah and Zhou, Xiaolin and Kliegl, Reinhold}, title = {Preview fixation duration modulates identical and semantic preview benefit in Chinese reading}, series = {Reading and writing : an interdisciplinary journal}, volume = {25}, journal = {Reading and writing : an interdisciplinary journal}, number = {5}, publisher = {Springer}, address = {Dordrecht}, issn = {0922-4777}, doi = {10.1007/s11145-010-9274-7}, pages = {1093 -- 1111}, year = {2012}, abstract = {Semantic preview benefit from parafoveal words is critical for proposals of distributed lexical processing during reading. Semantic preview benefit has been demonstrated for Chinese reading with the boundary paradigm in which unrelated or semantically related previews of a target word N + 1 are replaced by the target word once the eyes cross an invisible boundary located after word N (Yan et al., 2009); for the target word in position N + 2, only identical compared to unrelated-word preview led to shorter fixation times on the target word (Yan et al., in press). A reanalysis of these data reveals that identical and semantic preview benefits depend on preview duration (i.e., the fixation duration on the preboundary word). Identical preview benefit from word N + 1 increased with preview duration. The identical preview benefit was also significant for N + 2, but did not significantly interact with preview duration. The previously reported semantic preview benefit from word N + 1 was mainly due to single- or first-fixation durations following short previews. We discuss implications for notions of serial attention shifts and parallel distributed processing of words during reading.}, language = {en} } @article{WarschburgerKroeller2012, author = {Warschburger, Petra and Kr{\"o}ller, Katja}, title = {Childhood overweight and obesity: maternal perceptions of the time for engaging in child weight management}, doi = {10.1186/1471-2458-12-295}, year = {2012}, language = {en} } @article{WarschburgerKroeller2012, author = {Warschburger, Petra and Kr{\"o}ller, Katja}, title = {"Childhood overweight and obesity maternal perceptions of the time for engaging in child weight management"}, series = {BMC public health}, volume = {12}, journal = {BMC public health}, number = {12}, publisher = {BioMed Central}, address = {London}, issn = {1471-2458}, doi = {10.1186/1471-2458-12-295}, pages = {8}, year = {2012}, abstract = {Background: There is an increasing awareness of the impact of parental risk perception on the weight course of the child and the parent's readiness to engage in preventive efforts, but only less is known about factors related to the parental perception of the right time for the implementation of preventive activities. The aim of this study was to examine parental perceptions of the appropriate time to engage in child weight management strategies, and the factors associated with different weight points at which mothers recognize the need for preventive actions. Methods: 352 mothers with children aged 2-10 years took part in the study. We assessed mothers' perceptions of the actual and preferred weight status of their child, their ability to identify overweight and knowledge of its associated health risks, as well as perceptions of the right time for action to prevent overweight in their child. A regression analysis was conducted to examine whether demographic and weight related factors as well as the maternal general risk perception were associated with recognizing the need to implement prevention strategies. Results: Although most of the parents considered a BMI in the 75th to 90th percentile a valid reason to engage in the prevention of overweight, 19\% of the mothers were not willing to engage in prevention until their child reached the 97th percentile. Whereas the child's sex and the identification of an elevated BMI were significant predictors for parents' recognition of the 75th percentile as right point to engage in prevention efforts, an inability to recognize physical health risks associated with overweight silhouettes emerged as a significant factor predicting which parents would delay prevention efforts until a child's BMI reached the 97th percentile. Conclusion: Parental misperceptions of overweight and associated health risks constitute unfavorable conditions for preventive actions. Feedback on the health risks associated with overweight could help increase maternal readiness for change.}, language = {en} } @article{TschentscherHaukFischeretal.2012, author = {Tschentscher, Nadja and Hauk, Olaf and Fischer, Martin H. and Pulverm{\"u}ller, Friedemann}, title = {You can count on the motor cortex finger counting habits modulate motor cortex activation evoked by numbers}, series = {NeuroImage : a journal of brain function}, volume = {59}, journal = {NeuroImage : a journal of brain function}, number = {4}, publisher = {Elsevier}, address = {San Diego}, issn = {1053-8119}, doi = {10.1016/j.neuroimage.2011.11.037}, pages = {3139 -- 3148}, year = {2012}, abstract = {The embodied cognition framework suggests that neural systems for perception and action are engaged during higher cognitive processes. In an event-related fMRI study, we tested this claim for the abstract domain of numerical symbol processing: is the human cortical motor system part of the representation of numbers, and is organization of numerical knowledge influenced by individual finger counting habits? Developmental studies suggest a link between numerals and finger counting habits due to the acquisition of numerical skills through finger counting in childhood. In the present study, digits 1 to 9 and the corresponding number words were presented visually to adults with different finger counting habits, i.e. left- and right-starters who reported that they usually start counting small numbers with their left and right hand, respectively. Despite the absence of overt hand movements, the hemisphere contralateral to the hand used for counting small numbers was activated when small numbers were presented. The correspondence between finger counting habits and hemispheric motor activation is consistent with an intrinsic functional link between finger counting and number processing.}, language = {en} } @article{TsaiKlieglYan2012, author = {Tsai, Jie-Li and Kliegl, Reinhold and Yan, Ming}, title = {Parafoveal semantic information extraction in traditional Chinese reading}, series = {Acta psychologica : international journal of psychonomics}, volume = {141}, journal = {Acta psychologica : international journal of psychonomics}, number = {1}, publisher = {Elsevier}, address = {Amsterdam}, issn = {0001-6918}, doi = {10.1016/j.actpsy.2012.06.004}, pages = {17 -- 23}, year = {2012}, abstract = {Semantic information extraction from the parafovea has been reported only in simplified Chinese for a special subset of characters and its generalizability has been questioned. This study uses traditional Chinese, which differs from simplified Chinese in visual complexity and in mapping semantic forms, to demonstrate access to parafoveal semantic information during reading of this script. Preview duration modulates various types (identical, phonological, and unrelated) of parafoveal information extraction. Parafoveal semantic extraction is more elusive in English; therefore, we conclude that such effects in Chinese are presumably caused by substantial cross-language differences from alphabetic scripts. The property of Chinese characters carrying rich lexical information in a small region provides the possibility of semantic extraction in the parafovea.}, language = {en} } @article{StreblowSchiefeleRiedel2012, author = {Streblow, Lilian and Schiefele, Ulrich and Riedel, Stefanie}, title = {Evaluation of the Revised Reading Competence and Reading Motivation Training (LEKOLEMO) for the lower secondary school level}, series = {Zeitschrift f{\"u}r Entwicklungspsychologie und p{\"a}dagogische Psychologie}, volume = {44}, journal = {Zeitschrift f{\"u}r Entwicklungspsychologie und p{\"a}dagogische Psychologie}, number = {1}, publisher = {Hogrefe}, address = {G{\"o}ttingen}, issn = {0049-8637}, doi = {10.1026/0049-8637/a000058}, pages = {12 -- 26}, year = {2012}, abstract = {Inspired by the results from the PISA study and based on previous intervention programs, the reading competence training LEKOLEMO (Program for Fostering Reading Literacy and Reading Motivation) for 7th-grade students was developed. The training differs from existing programs in two aspects: (1) It comprises tasks pertaining to the PISA reading dimensions retrieving information, text-related interpretation, and reflection and evaluation, and (2) explicitly aims at fostering reading motivation. The present study examined the revised version of LEKOLEMO in a sample of 235 seventh graders. The results confirmed the effectiveness of LEKOLEMO and showed significant effects of medium size on reading competence at the follow-up test. However, effects on intrinsic reading motivation and on self-concept of reading were small and unstable.}, language = {de} } @article{StadlerOttSpringeretal.2012, author = {Stadler, Waltraud and Ott, Derek V. M. and Springer, Anne and Schubotz, Ricarda I. and Sch{\"u}tz-Bosbach, Simone and Prinz, Wolfgang}, title = {Repetitive TMS suggests a role of the human dorsal premotor cortex in action prediction}, series = {Frontiers in human neuroscienc}, volume = {6}, journal = {Frontiers in human neuroscienc}, number = {2}, publisher = {Frontiers Research Foundation}, address = {Lausanne}, issn = {1662-5161}, doi = {10.3389/fnhum.2012.00020}, pages = {11}, year = {2012}, abstract = {Predicting the actions of other individuals is crucial for our daily interactions. Recent evidence suggests that the prediction of object-directed arm and full-body actions employs the dorsal premotor cortex (PMd). Thus, the neural substrate involved in action control may also be essential for action prediction. Here, we aimed to address this issue and hypothesized that disrupting the PMd impairs action prediction. Using fMRI-guided coil navigation, rTMS (five pulses, 10Hz) was applied over the left PMd and over the vertex (control region) while participants observed everyday actions in video clips that were transiently occluded for 1s. The participants detected manipulations in the time course of occluded actions, which required them to internally predict the actions during occlusion. To differentiate between functional roles that the PMd could play in prediction, rTMS was either delivered at occluder-onset (TMS-early), affecting the initiation of action prediction, or 300 ms later during occlusion(TMS-late), affecting the maintenance of anongoing prediction. TMS-early over the left PMd produced more prediction errors than TMS-early over the vertex. TMS-late had no effect on prediction performance, suggesting that the left PMd might be involved particularly during the initiation of internally guided action prediction but may play a subordinate role in maintaining ongoing prediction. These findings open a new perspective on the role of the left PMd in action prediction which is in line with its functions in action control and in cognitive tasks. In the discussion, there levance of the left PMd for integrating external action parameters with the observer's motor repertoire is emphasized. Overall, the results are in line with the notion that premotor functions are employed in both action control and action observation.}, language = {en} } @article{ShakiFischerGoebel2012, author = {Shaki, Samuel and Fischer, Martin H. and Goebel, Silke M.}, title = {Direction counts A comparative study of spatially directional counting biases in cultures with different reading directions}, series = {Journal of experimental child psychology}, volume = {112}, journal = {Journal of experimental child psychology}, number = {2}, publisher = {Elsevier}, address = {San Diego}, issn = {0022-0965}, doi = {10.1016/j.jecp.2011.12.005}, pages = {275 -- 281}, year = {2012}, abstract = {Western adults associate small numbers with left space and large numbers with right space. Where does this pervasive spatial-numerical association come from? In this study, we first recorded directional counting preferences in adults with different reading experiences (left to right, right to left, mixed, and illiterate) and observed a clear relationship between reading and counting directions. We then recorded directional counting preferences in pre-schoolers and elementary school children from three of these reading cultures (left to right, right to left, and mixed). Culture-specific counting biases existed before reading acquisition in children as young as 3 years and were subsequently modified by early reading experience. Together, our results suggest that both directional counting and scanning activities contribute to number-space associations.}, language = {en} }