The present research builds upon the extant literature as it assesses psychophysiological factors in relation to empathy, conflict resolution, and romantic relationship satisfaction. In this study, we examined physiological reactivity of individuals in the context of emotionally laden interactions with their romantic partners. Participants (N = 31) completed self-report measures and attended in-person data collection sessions with their romantic partners. Participants were guided through discussions of problems and strengths of their relationships in vivo with their partners while we measured participants' skin conductance level (SCL) and interbeat interval (IBI) of the heart. We hypothesized that participants' level of empathy towards their partners would be reflected by physiological arousal (as measured by SCL and IBI) and relationship satisfaction, such that higher levels of empathy would be linked to changes in physiological arousal and higher relationship satisfaction. Further, we hypothesized that differences would be found in physiological arousal (as measured by SCL and IBI) based on the type of conflict resolution strategy used by participants. Finally, we hypothesized that differences would be found in empathy towards partner and relationship satisfaction based on the type of conflict resolution strategies used by participants. Results partially supported hypotheses and were discussed in light of existing knowledge based on empirical and theoretical sources.

Deception research has focused on identifying peripheral nervous system markers while ignoring cognitive mechanisms underlying those markers. Cognitive theorists argue that the process of deception may involve such constructs as attentional capture, working memory load, or perceived incongruity with memory, while psychophysiologists argue for stimulus salience, arousal, and emotion. Three studies were conducted to assess reaction time (RT) in relation to deception, response congruity, and preparedness to deceive. Similar to a semantic verification task, participants evaluated sentences that were either true or false, and then made truthful or deceptive evaluations of the sentence’s base truth-value. Findings indicate that deceptive responses have a longer RT than truthful responses, and that this relationship remains constant across response type and preparedness to deceive. The authors use these findings in preliminary support of a comprehensive cognitive model of deception.

The current study aimed to investigate the effects of scene context on rapid object recognition using both behavioral and electrophysiological measures. Participants performed an animal/nonanimal go/no-go categorization task in which they had to decide whether or not a flashed scene contained an animal. Moreover, the influence of scene context was manipulated either by retaining, deleting, or phase-randomizing the original scene background. The results of Experiments 1 and 2 showed that participants responded more accurately and quickly to objects appearing with their original scene backgrounds. Moreover, the event-related potential (ERP) data obtained from Experiment 2 showed that the onset latency of the frontal go/no-go ERP difference was delayed for objects appearing with phase-randomized scene backgrounds compared to objects appearing with their original scene backgrounds, providing direct evidence that scene context facilitates object recognition. Additionally, an increased frontal negativity along with a decreased late positive potential for processing objects presented in meaningless scene backgrounds suggest that the categorization task becomes more demanding when scene context is eliminated. Together, the results of the current study are consistent with previous research showing that scene context modulates object processing.

No abstract

Parietal neuronal populations have been found which respond bimodally to visual and somatosensory input regarding one’s own limbs or even perceived haptic input of a false limb (Graziano et al., 2000). Further, neuronal populations have been observed which respond preferentially to visual stimuli presented in spatial congruence with our hands (Graziano 1999). In this study, we examined event-related potentials (ERPs) elicited by laser dots projected onto or above participants’ index and middle fingers during a sustained-attention task. We hypothesized that visual stimuli projected onto the hand would elicit differences in ERP deflections related to sensory gating and categorization in comparison to when projected close to the hand. Participants responded via a footswitch to rare target flashes of light occurring on or directly above the middle finger of the attended hand. We found enhanced amplitudes of the N1 and P3 deflections when the stimuli fell onto the finger tips as opposed to above them. Furthermore, the N1 for unattended stimuli was less suppressed when the lasers were projected onto the fingers. Behaviorally, participants were less accurate to targets when the lasers fell onto the fingers. We conclude that when the lasers appear to “touch” the participants, they act to automatically draw participants’ attention. Thus visual stimuli projected onto the fingers of the ‘unattended’ hand are harder to filter out, leading to decreases in accuracy during task performance.

Unlike patients with neglect, neurological patients with extinction can detect a single event presented at any location. However when shown two brief near-simultaneous stimuli they only report the ipsilesional item. The question of what inter-stimulus delay leads to maximal extinction has clear clinical and theoretical implications. Di Pellegrino and colleagues (1997) report that extinction is maximal when the two stimuli are presented simultaneously, with less extinction when either item has a slight temporal lead. This finding supports traditional clinical diagnosis (which only presents simultaneous events), and is in accord with theories of extinction that entail individuation of objects (e.g., "token" accounts). In contrast, Cate and Behrmann (2002) report that extinction is maximal when the ipsilesional item is presented slightly prior to the contralesional item. This finding appears to support disengage models of attention. Our aim was to reveal whether the difference between these studies reflects different patients, or different methods. Specifically, we note that the stimuli used by Cate and Behrmann were biased both temporally (more ipsilesional first trials) and spatially (more items presented in ipsilesional field). We examined the performance of nine individuals with extinction, and found that maximal extinction was not influenced by temporal biases, but extinction was modulated by the spatial location of stimuli. This finding reconciles previous studies and offers new insight into this syndrome.

No abstract

Further processing of auditory stimuli in free-field is attenuated when participants are in contact with speakers versus not touching them. Studies in the visual domain have found that men and women utilize different strategies for processing spatial information. In the current study, we examined sex-related differences in event-related potentials (ERPs) while men and women performed an auditory discrimination task in peri-personal space when either holding speakers or resting their hands in their laps. We found that males responded more accurately than females to targets in attended locations, and that the sexes exhibited different ERP patterns during task performance. These differences are consistent with existing predictions of female top-down and male bottom-up strategies in spatial processing.