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School attacks are attracting increasing attention in aggression research. Recent systematic analyses provided new insights into offense and offender characteristics. Less is known about attacks in institutes of higher education (e.g., universities). It is therefore questionable whether the term “school attack” should be limited to institutions of general education or could be extended to institutions of higher education. Scientific literature is divided in distinguishing or unifying these two groups and reports similarities as well as differences. We researched 232 school attacks and 45 attacks in institutes of higher education throughout the world and conducted systematic comparisons between the two groups. The analyses yielded differences in offender (e.g., age, migration background) and offense characteristics (e.g., weapons, suicide rates), and some similarities (e.g., gender). Most differences can apparently be accounted for by offenders’ age and situational influences. We discuss the implications of our findings for future research and the development of preventative measures.
In the present study, we manipulated different types of information available in the parafovea during the reading of Chinese sentences and examined how deaf readers make use of the parafoveal information. Results clearly indicate that although the reading-level matched hearing readers make greater use of orthographic information in the parafovea, parafoveal semantic information is obtained earlier among the deaf readers. In addition, a phonological preview benefit effect was found for the better deaf readers (relative to less-skilled deaf readers), although we also provide an alternative explanation for this effect. Providing evidence that Chinese deaf readers have higher efficiency when processing parafoveal semantics, the study indicates flexibility across individuals in the mechanisms underlying word recognition adapting to the inputs available in the linguistic environment.
The present study explored the perceptual span (i.e., the physical extent of an area from which useful visual information is extracted during a single fixation) during the reading of Chinese sentences in 2 experiments. In Experiment 1, we tested whether the rightward span can go beyond 3 characters when visually similar masks were used. Results showed that Chinese readers needed at least 4 characters to the right of fixation to maintain a normal reading behavior when visually similar masks were used and when characters were displayed in small fonts, indicating that the span is dynamically influenced by masking materials. In Experiments 2 and 3, we asked whether the perceptual span varies as a function of font size in spaced (German) and unspaced (Chinese) scripts. Results clearly suggest perceptual span depends on font size in Chinese, but we failed to find such evidence for German. We propose that the perceptual span in Chinese is flexible; it is strongly constrained by its language-specific properties such as high information density and lack of word spacing. Implications for saccade-target selection during the reading of Chinese sentences are discussed.
In humans and in foveated animals visual acuity is highly concentrated at the center of gaze, so that choosing where to look next is an important example of online, rapid decision-making. Computational neuroscientists have developed biologically-inspired models of visual attention, termed saliency maps, which successfully predict where people fixate on average. Using point process theory for spatial statistics, we show that scanpaths contain, however, important statistical structure, such as spatial clustering on top of distributions of gaze positions. Here, we develop a dynamical model of saccadic selection that accurately predicts the distribution of gaze positions as well as spatial clustering along individual scanpaths. Our model relies on activation dynamics via spatially-limited (foveated) access to saliency information, and, second, a leaky memory process controlling the re-inspection of target regions. This theoretical framework models a form of context-dependent decision-making, linking neural dynamics of attention to behavioral gaze data.
Recent research illuminated the links between Agency, Communion, trait emotional intelligence (TEL), and internalizing mental health difficulties (IMHDs). However, for a more complete picture, unmitigated Agency and Communion have also to be considered. Drawing on a sample of N = 405 female occupational therapists, the present study examined (a) the factorial validity of the German TEI Questionnaire Short Form, (b) the relations of TEL to Agency. Communion, and their unmitigated variants, and (c) a multiple predictor-TEI-IMHDs mediation model. The factor structure suggested by TEI theory fitted approximately to the data. Agency and Communion related positively and both unmitigated traits related negatively to TEL. Indirect effects via TEL on IMHDs emerged for all four traits. The results help to integrate TEI within the Agency-Communion framework and suggest that TEL is an important intervening variable that helps to clarify the links of agentic and communal traits to mental health. (C) 2014 Elsevier Ltd. All rights reserved.
This is the first attempt at characterizing reading difficulty in Hindi using naturally occurring sentences. We created the Potsdam-Allahabad Hindi Eyetracking Corpus by recording eye-movement data from 30 participants at the University of Allahabad, India. The target stimuli were 153 sentences selected from the beta version of the Hindi-Urdu treebank. We find that word- or low-level predictors (syllable length, unigram and bigram frequency) affect first-pass reading times, regression path duration, total reading time, and outgoing saccade length. An increase in syllable length results in longer fixations, and an increase in word unigram and bigram frequency leads to shorter fixations. Longer syllable length and higher frequency lead to longer outgoing saccades. We also find that two predictors of sentence comprehension difficulty, integration and storage cost, have an effect on reading difficulty. Integration cost (Gibson, 2000) was approximated by calculating the distance (in words) between a dependent and head; and storage cost (Gibson, 2000), which measures difficulty of maintaining predictions, was estimated by counting the number of predicted heads at each point in the sentence. We find that integration cost mainly affects outgoing saccade length, and storage cost affects total reading times and outgoing saccade length. Thus, word-level predictors have an effect in both early and late measures of reading time, while predictors of sentence comprehension difficulty tend to affect later measures. This is, to our knowledge, the first demonstration using eye-tracking that both integration and storage cost influence reading difficulty.
Research has shown that learning disabilities are associated with internalizing problems in (pre) adolescents. In order to examine this relationship for math disability (MD), math achievement and internalizing problem scores were measured in a representative group of 1,436 (pre) adolescents. MD was defined by a discrepancy between math achievement and IQ. Internalizing problems were measured through a multi-informant (parents, teachers, self-report) approach. The results revealed that MD puts (pre) adolescents at a higher risk for internalizing problems. External and self-ratings differed between boys and girls, indicating that either they show distinct internalizing symptoms or they are being perceived differently by parents and teachers. Results emphasize the importance of both a multi-informant approach and the consideration of gender differences when measuring internalizing symptomatology of children with MD. For an optimal treatment of MD, depressive and anxious symptoms need to be considered.
While the influence of spatial-numerical associations in number categorization tasks has been well established, their role in mental arithmetic is less clear. It has been hypothesized that mental addition leads to rightward and upward shifts of spatial attention (along the "mental number line"), whereas subtraction leads to leftward and downward shifts. We addressed this hypothesis by analyzing spontaneous eye movements during mental arithmetic. Participants solved verbally presented arithmetic problems (e.g., 2 + 7, 8-3) aloud while looking at a blank screen. We found that eye movements reflected spatial biases in the ongoing mental operation: Gaze position shifted more upward when participants solved addition compared to subtraction problems, and the horizontal gaze position was partly determined by the magnitude of the operands. Interestingly, the difference between addition and subtraction trials was driven by the operator (plus vs. minus) but was not influenced by the computational process. Thus, our results do not support the idea of a mental movement toward the solution during arithmetic but indicate a semantic association between operation and space.
Justice sensitivity captures individual differences in the frequency with which injustice is perceived and the intensity of emotional, cognitive, and behavioral reactions to it. Persons with ADHD have been reported to show high justice sensitivity, and a recent study provided evidence for this notion in an adult sample. In 1,235 German 10- to 19-year olds, we measured ADHD symptoms, justice sensitivity from the victim, observer, and perpetrator perspective, the frequency of perceptions of injustice, anxious and angry rejection sensitivity, depressive symptoms, conduct problems, and self-esteem. Participants with ADHD symptoms reported significantly higher victim justice sensitivity, more perceptions of injustice, and higher anxious and angry rejection sensitivity, but significantly lower perpetrator justice sensitivity than controls. In latent path analyses, justice sensitivity as well as rejection sensitivity partially mediated the link between ADHD symptoms and comorbid problems when considered simultaneously. Thus, both justice sensitivity and rejection sensitivity may contribute to explaining the emergence and maintenance of problems typically associated with ADHD symptoms, and should therefore be considered in ADHD therapy.
Background: Medical training is very demanding and associated with a high prevalence of psychological distress. Compared to the general population, medical students are at a greater risk of developing a psychological disorder. Various attempts of stress management training in medical school have achieved positive results on minimizing psychological distress; however, there are often limitations. Therefore, the use of a rigorous scientific method is needed. The present study protocol describes a randomized controlled trial to examine the effectiveness of a specifically developed mindfulness-based stress prevention training for medical students that includes selected elements of cognitive behavioral strategies (MediMind).
Methods/Design: This study protocol presents a prospective randomized controlled trial, involving four assessment time points: baseline, post-intervention, one-year follow-up and five-year follow-up. The aims include evaluating the effect on stress, coping, psychological morbidity and personality traits with validated measures. Participants are allocated randomly to one of three conditions: MediMind, Autogenic Training or control group. Eligible participants are medical or dental students in the second or eighth semester of a German university. They form a population of approximately 420 students in each academic term. A final total sample size of 126 (at five-year follow-up) is targeted. The trainings (MediMind and Autogenic Training) comprise five weekly sessions lasting 90 minutes each. MediMind will be offered to participants of the control group once the five-year follow-up is completed. The allotment is randomized with a stratified allocation ratio by course of studies, semester, and gender. After descriptive statistics have been evaluated, inferential statistical analysis will be carried out with a repeated measures ANOVA-design with interactions between time and group. Effect sizes will be calculated using partial.-square values.
Discussion: Potential limitations of this study are voluntary participation and the risk of attrition, especially concerning participants that are allocated to the control group. Strengths are the study design, namely random allocation, follow-up assessment, the use of control groups and inclusion of participants at different stages of medical training with the possibility of differential analysis.