Refine
Has Fulltext
- yes (19) (remove)
Year of publication
- 2021 (19) (remove)
Document Type
- Postprint (13)
- Doctoral Thesis (6)
Is part of the Bibliography
- yes (19) (remove)
Keywords
- embodied cognition (3)
- adolescents (2)
- Anaphern (1)
- Ausbildungsforschung (1)
- Authentizität (1)
- Baby- und Kleinkind (1)
- Boundary-Paradigma (1)
- Developmental psychology (1)
- Duchenne muscular dystrophy (1)
- EEG (1)
Institute
- Department Psychologie (19) (remove)
BACKGROUND: The orbitofrontal cortex (OFC) is implicated in depression. The hypothesis investigated was whether the OFC sensitivity to reward and nonreward is related to the severity of depressive symptoms.
METHODS: Activations in the monetary incentive delay task were measured in the IMAGEN cohort at ages 14 years (n = 1877) and 19 years (n = 1140) with a longitudinal design. Clinically relevant subgroups were compared at ages 19 (high-severity group: n = 116; low-severity group: n = 206) and 14.
RESULTS: The medial OFC exhibited graded activation increases to reward, and the lateral OFC had graded activation increases to nonreward. In this general population, the medial and lateral OFC activations were associated with concurrent depressive symptoms at both ages 14 and 19 years. In a stratified high-severity depressive symptom group versus control group comparison, the lateral OFC showed greater sensitivity for the magnitudes of activations related to nonreward in the high-severity group at age 19 (p = .027), and the medial OFC showed decreased sensitivity to the reward magnitudes in the high-severity group at both ages 14 (p = .002) and 19 (p = .002). In a longitudinal design, there was greater sensitivity to nonreward of the lateral OFC at age 14 for those who exhibited high depressive symptom severity later at age 19 (p = .003).
CONCLUSIONS: Activations in the lateral OFC relate to sensitivity to not winning, were associated with high depressive symptom scores, and at age 14 predicted the depressive symptoms at ages 16 and 19. Activations in the medial OFC were related to sensitivity to winning, and reduced reward sensitivity was associated with concurrent high depressive symptom scores.
Electrical muscle stimulation (EMS) is an increasingly popular training method and has become the focus of research in recent years. New EMS devices offer a wide range of mobile applications for whole-body EMS (WB-EMS) training, e.g., the intensification of dynamic low-intensity endurance exercises through WB-EMS. The present study aimed to determine the differences in exercise intensity between WB-EMS-superimposed and conventional walking (EMS-CW), and CON and WB-EMS-superimposed Nordic walking (WB-EMS-NW) during a treadmill test. Eleven participants (52.0 ± years; 85.9 ± 7.4 kg, 182 ± 6 cm, BMI 25.9 ± 2.2 kg/m2) performed a 10 min treadmill test at a given velocity (6.5 km/h) in four different test situations, walking (W) and Nordic walking (NW) in both conventional and WB-EMS superimposed. Oxygen uptake in absolute (VO2) and relative to body weight (rel. VO2), lactate, and the rate of perceived exertion (RPE) were measured before and after the test. WB-EMS intensity was adjusted individually according to the feedback of the participant. The descriptive statistics were given in mean ± SD. For the statistical analyses, one-factorial ANOVA for repeated measures and two-factorial ANOVA [factors include EMS, W/NW, and factor combination (EMS*W/NW)] were performed (α = 0.05). Significant effects were found for EMS and W/NW factors for the outcome variables VO2 (EMS: p = 0.006, r = 0.736; W/NW: p < 0.001, r = 0.870), relative VO2 (EMS: p < 0.001, r = 0.850; W/NW: p < 0.001, r = 0.937), and lactate (EMS: p = 0.003, r = 0.771; w/NW: p = 0.003, r = 0.764) and both the factors produced higher results. However, the difference in VO2 and relative VO2 is within the range of biological variability of ± 12%. The factor combination EMS*W/NW is statistically non-significant for all three variables. WB-EMS resulted in the higher RPE values (p = 0.035, r = 0.613), RPE differences for W/NW and EMS*W/NW were not significant. The current study results indicate that WB-EMS influences the parameters of exercise intensity. The impact on exercise intensity and the clinical relevance of WB-EMS-superimposed walking (WB-EMS-W) exercise is questionable because of the marginal differences in the outcome variables.
While previous research underscores the role of leaders in stimulating employee voice behaviour, comparatively little is known about what affects leaders' support for such constructive but potentially threatening employee behaviours. We introduce leader member exchange quality (LMX) as a central predictor of leaders' support for employees' ideas for constructive change. Apart from a general benefit of high LMX for leaders' idea support, we propose that high LMX is particularly critical to leaders' idea support if the idea voiced by an employee constitutes a power threat to the leader. We investigate leaders' attribution of prosocial and egoistic employee intentions as mediators of these effects. Hypotheses were tested in a quasi-experimental vignette study (N = 160), in which leaders evaluated a simulated employee idea, and a field study (N = 133), in which leaders evaluated an idea that had been voiced to them at work. Results show an indirect effect of LMX on leaders' idea support via attributed prosocial intentions but not via attributed egoistic intentions, and a buffering effect of high LMX on the negative effect of power threat on leaders' idea support. Results differed across studies with regard to the main effect of LMX on idea support.
Background: A growing body of research has documented negative effects of sexualization in the media on individuals’ self-objectification. This research is predominantly built on studies examining traditional media, such as magazines and television, and young female samples. Furthermore, longitudinal studies are scarce, and research is missing studying mediators of the relationship. The first aim of the present PhD thesis was to investigate the relations between the use of sexualized interactive media and social media and self-objectification. The second aim of this work was to examine the presumed processes within understudied samples, such as males and females beyond college age, thus investigating the moderating roles of age and gender. The third aim was to shed light on possible mediators of the relation between sexualized media and self-objectification.
Method: The research aims were addressed within the scope of four studies. In an experiment, women’s self-objectification and body satisfaction was measured after playing a video game with a sexualized vs. a nonsexualized character that was either personalized or generic. The second study investigated the cross-sectional link between sexualized television use and self-objectification and consideration of cosmetic surgery in a sample of women across a broad age spectrum, examining the role of age in the relations. The third study looked at the cross-sectional link between male and female sexualized images on Instagram and their associations with self-objectification among a sample of male and female adolescents. Using a two-wave longitudinal design, the fourth study examined sexualized video game and Instagram use as predictors of adolescents’ self-objectification. Path models were conceptualized for the second, third and fourth study, in which media use predicted body surveillance via appearance comparisons (Study 4), thin-ideal internalization (Study 2, 3, 4), muscular-ideal internalization (Study 3, 4), and valuing appearance (all studies).
Results: The results of the experimental study revealed no effect of sexualized video game characters on women’s self-objectification and body satisfaction. No moderating effect of personalization emerged. Sexualized television use was associated to consideration of cosmetic surgery via body surveillance and valuing appearance for women of all ages in Study 2, while no moderating effect of age was found. Study 3 revealed that seeing sexualized male images on Instagram was indirectly associated with higher body surveillance via muscular-ideal internalization for boys and girls. Sexualized female images were indirectly linked to higher body surveillance via thin-ideal internalization and valuing appearance over competence only for girls. The longitudinal analysis of Study 4 showed no moderating effect of gender: For boys and girls, sexualized video game use at T1 predicted body surveillance at T2 via appearance comparisons, thin-ideal internalization and valuing appearance over competence. Furthermore, the use of sexualized Instagram images at T1 predicted body surveillance at T2 via valuing appearance.
Conclusion: The findings show that sexualization in the media is linked to self-objectification among a variety of media formats and within diverse groups of people. While the longitudinal study indicates that sexualized media predict self-objectification over time, the experimental null findings warrant caution regarding this temporal order. The results demonstrate that several mediating variables might be involved in this link. Possible implications for research and practice, such as intervention programs and policy-making, are discussed.
Skilled reading requires information processing of the fixated and the not-yet-fixated words to generate precise control of gaze. Over the last 30 years, experimental research provided evidence that word processing is distributed across the perceptual span, which permits recognition of the fixated (foveal) word as well as preview of parafoveal words to the right of fixation. However, theoretical models have been unable to differentiate the specific influences of foveal and parafoveal information on saccade control. Here we show how parafoveal word difficulty modulates spatial and temporal control of gaze in a computational model to reproduce experimental results. In a fully Bayesian framework, we estimated model parameters for different models of parafoveal processing and carried out large-scale predictive simulations and model comparisons for a gaze-contingent reading experiment. We conclude that mathematical modeling of data from gaze-contingent experiments permits the precise identification of pathways from parafoveal information processing to gaze control, uncovering potential mechanisms underlying the parafoveal contribution to eye-movement control.
During sentence reading the eyes quickly jump from word to word to sample visual information with the high acuity of the fovea. Lexical properties of the currently fixated word are known to affect the duration of the fixation, reflecting an interaction of word processing with oculomotor planning. While low level properties of words in the parafovea can likewise affect the current fixation duration, results concerning the influence of lexical properties have been ambiguous (Drieghe, Rayner, & Pollatsek, 2008; Kliegl, Nuthmann, & Engbert, 2006). Experimental investigations of such lexical parafoveal-on-foveal effects using the boundary paradigm have instead shown, that lexical properties of parafoveal previews affect fixation durations on the upcoming target words (Risse & Kliegl, 2014). However, the results were potentially confounded with effects of preview validity.
The notion of parafoveal processing of lexical information challenges extant models of eye movements during reading. Models containing serial word processing assumptions have trouble explaining such effects, as they usually couple successful word processing to saccade planning, resulting in skipping of the parafoveal word. Although models with parallel word processing are less restricted, in the SWIFT model (Engbert, Longtin, & Kliegl, 2002) only processing of the foveal word can directly influence the saccade latency.
Here we combine the results of a boundary experiment (Chapter 2) with a predictive modeling approach using the SWIFT model, where we explore mechanisms of parafoveal inhibition in a simulation study (Chapter 4). We construct a likelihood function for the SWIFT model (Chapter 3) and utilize the experimental data in a Bayesian approach to parameter estimation (Chapter 3 & 4).
The experimental results show a substantial effect of parafoveal preview frequency on fixation durations on the target word, which can be clearly distinguished from the effect of preview validity. Using the eye movement data from the participants, we demonstrate the feasibility of the Bayesian approach even for a small set of estimated parameters, by comparing summary statistics of experimental and simulated data. Finally, we can show that the SWIFT model can account for the lexical preview effects, when a mechanism for parafoveal inhibition is added. The effects of preview validity were modeled best, when processing dependent saccade cancellation was added for invalid trials. In the simulation study only the control condition of the experiment was used for parameter estimation, allowing for cross validation. Simultaneously the number of free parameters was increased. High correlations of summary statistics demonstrate the capabilities of the parameter estimation approach. Taken together, the results advocate for a better integration of experimental data into computational modeling via parameter estimation.
Spinal muscular atrophy (SMA) and Duchenne muscular dystrophy (DMD) both are rare genetic neuromuscular diseases with progressive loss of motor ability. The neuromotor developmental course of those diseases is well documented. In contrast, there is only little evidence about characteristics of general and specific cognitive development. In both conditions the final motor outcome is characterized by an inability to move autonomously: children with SMA never accomplish independent motoric exploration of their environment, while children with DMD do but later lose this ability again. These profound differences in developmental pathways might affect cognitive development of SMA vs. DMD children, as cognition is shaped by individual motor experiences. DMD patients show impaired executive functions, working memory, and verbal IQ, whereas only motor ability seems to be impaired in SMA. Advanced cognitive capacity in SMA may serve as a compensatory mechanism for achieving in education, career progression, and social satisfaction. This study aimed to relate differences in basic numerical concepts and arithmetic achievement in SMA and DMD patients to differences in their motor development and resulting sensorimotor and environmental experiences. Horizontal and vertical spatial-numerical associations were explored in SMA/DMD children ranging between 6 and 12 years through the random number generation task. Furthermore, arithmetic skills as well as general cognitive ability were assessed. Groups differed in spatial number processing as well as in arithmetic and domain-general cognitive functions. Children with SMA showed no horizontal and even reversed vertical spatial-numerical associations. Children with DMD on the other hand revealed patterns in spatial numerical associations comparable to healthy developing children. From the embodied Cognition perspective, early sensorimotor experience does play a role in development of mental number representations. However, it remains open whether and how this becomes relevant for the acquisition of higher order cognitive and arithmetic skills.
Detecting and categorizing particular entities in the environment are important visual tasks that humans have had to solve at various points in our evolutionary time. The question arises whether characteristics of entities that were of ecological significance for humans play a particular role during the development of visual categorization.
The current project addressed this question by investigating the effects of developing visual abilities, visual properties and ecological significance on categorization early in life. Our stimuli were monochromatic photographs of structure-like assemblies and surfaces taken from three categories: vegetation, non-living natural elements, and artifacts. A set of computational and rated visual properties were assessed for these stimuli. Three empirical studies applied coherent research concepts and methods in young children and adults, comprising (a) two card-sorting tasks with preschool children (age: 4.1-6.1 years) and adults (age: 18-50 years) which assessed classification and similarity judgments, (b) a gaze contingent eye-tracking search task which investigated the impact of visual properties and category membership on 8-month-olds' ability to segregate visual structure. Because eye-tracking with infants still provides challenges, a methodological study (c) assessed the effect of infant eye-tracking procedures on data quality with 8- to 12-month-old infants and adults.
In the categorization tasks we found that category membership and visual properties impacted the performance of all participant groups. Sensitivity to the respective categories varied between tasks and over the age groups. For example, artifact images hindered infants' visual search but were classified best by adults, whereas sensitivity to vegetation was highest during similarity judgments. Overall, preschool children relied less on visual properties than adults, but some properties (e.g., rated depth, shading) were drawn upon similarly strong. In children and infants, depth predicted task performance stronger than shape-related properties. Moreover, children and infants were sensitive to variations in the complexity of low-level visual statistics. These results suggest that classification of visual structures, and attention to particular visual properties is affected by the functional or ecological significance these categories and properties may have for each of the respective age groups.
Based on this, the project highlights the importance of further developmental research on visual categorization with naturalistic, structure-like stimuli. As intended with the current work, this would allow important links between developmental and adult research.
The olfactomotor system is especially investigated by examining the sniffing in reaction to olfactory stimuli. The motor output of respiratory-independent muscles was seldomly considered regarding possible influences of smells. The Adaptive Force (AF) characterizes the capability of the neuromuscular system to adapt to external forces in a holding manner and was suggested to be more vulnerable to possible interfering stimuli due to the underlying complex control processes. The aim of this pilot study was to measure the effects of olfactory inputs on the AF of the hip and elbow flexors, respectively. The AF of 10 subjects was examined manually by experienced testers while smelling at sniffing sticks with neutral, pleasant or disgusting odours. The reaction force and the limb position were recorded by a handheld device. The results show, inter alia, a significantly lower maximal isometric AF and a significantly higher AF at the onset of oscillations by perceiving disgusting odours compared to pleasant or neutral odours (p < 0.001). The adaptive holding capacity seems to reflect the functionality of the neuromuscular control, which can be impaired by disgusting olfactory inputs. An undisturbed functioning neuromuscular system appears to be characterized by a proper length tension control and by an earlier onset of mutual oscillations during an external force increase. This highlights the strong connection of olfaction and motor control also regarding respiratory-independent muscles.
Previous studies have not considered the potential influence of maturity status on the relationship between mental imagery and change of direction (CoD) speed in youth soccer. Accordingly, this cross-sectional study examined the association between mental imagery and CoD performance in young elite soccer players of different maturity status. Forty young male soccer players, aged 10-17 years, were assigned into two groups according to their predicted age at peak height velocity (PHV) (Pre-PHV; n = 20 and Post-PHV; n = 20). Participants were evaluated on soccer-specific tests of CoD with (CoDBall-15m) and without (CoD-15m) the ball. Participants completed the movement imagery questionnaire (MIQ) with the three- dimensional structure, internal visual imagery (IVI), external visual imagery (EVI), as well as kinesthetic imagery (KI). The Post-PHV players achieved significantly better results than Pre-PHV in EVI (ES = 1.58, large; p < 0.001), CoD-15m (ES = 2.09, very large; p < 0.001) and CoDBall-15m (ES = 1.60, large; p < 0.001). Correlations were significantly different between maturity groups, where, for the pre-PHV group, a negative very large correlation was observed between CoDBall-15m and KI (r = –0.73, p = 0.001). For the post-PHV group, large negative correlations were observed between CoD-15m and IVI (r = –0.55, p = 0.011), EVI (r = –062, p = 0.003), and KI (r = –0.52, p = 0.020). A large negative correlation of CoDBall-15m with EVI (r = –0.55, p = 0.012) and very large correlation with KI (r = –0.79, p = 0.001) were also observed. This study provides evidence of the theoretical and practical use for the CoD tasks stimulus with imagery. We recommend that sport psychology specialists, coaches, and athletes integrated imagery for CoD tasks in pre-pubertal soccer players to further improve CoD related performance.