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Eye-movement changes in Visual Imagery: Differences knowledge or skills representation? 2014, 37(5): 1039-1046.  Abstract ( )   PDF (7728KB) ( )   Visual imagery is an important visuo-spatial representation, which has the same mental storage characteristics with visual perception (Romke, Kosslyn, & Hamel, 1997), sharing the same brain mechanisms with visual perception (Kosslyn, Thompson, & Alpert, 1997; Ganis, Thompson & Kosslyn, 2004). As is known to all, fixation is the primary source of visual perception information, and eye movement is very important to visual perception. So, does eye movement also play an important role in the visual imagery processing? There are two contrasting accounts for the phenomenon. The functional account hypothesizes that the encoding of each eye fixation during perception process participates, as an index in the location of the space in the subsequent image generation. Recently, researchers found that subjects who fixed their gaze centrally during perception did the same spontaneously during imagery. The subjects who are free to explore during perception, but maintaining central fixation during imagery, showed decreased ability to recall the pattern. They concluded that the eye scan paths during visual imagery reenact those of perception of the same visual scene and eye movements during mental imagery are not epiphenomenal but assist the process of image generation (Brandt & Stark, 1997; Laeng & Teodorescu, 2002). Actually, whether regular eye movements promote the representation processing relies on the level of eye movement regularity of change that regular change task information accessibility of visual imagery would cause. If task information accessibility level change inevitably leads to eye movement regularity changes, it can be inferred that eye movements play a functional role in visual imagery. Based on the experimental paradigm of imagery evoked by speech, the effect of information access of motor imagery eye-movement was investigated. Experiment 1 with no triple jump professional skills and knowledge of the sport is also low cognitive level students were tested , the results show that with the increase of the level of representation of task information accessible, eye gaze point average duration shorter the average saccade distance increases and the average saccade time becomes longer, which is the existing research results are consistent; knowledge learning and skills training to characterize the level of the experimental characterization of the appearance of two pairs of manipulation tasks were carried out in the experimental task knowledge and professional skills training to learn human subjects, results showed that subjects with the acquisition of knowledge and skills to improve the ability to characterize the level of fixation task information accessible in different levels of representation between the average duration, average saccade distance and average saccade time difference will disappear, but knowledge and learning and skills characterize differences in average saccade time differences, skills -based subjects whose average saccade time should be shorter than the knowledge of learning subjects, reached critical levels significantly, no difference in the average fixation duration and average saccade distance. Related Articles | Metrics

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Effects of Encoding task on Source Memory: An Event-Related Potentials Study 2014, 37(5): 1047-1054.  Abstract ( )   PDF (8071KB) ( )   Item memory and source memory are two important aspects of episodic memory. Source memory is defined as the time, place and background information of the object that we should remember. In event-related potentials (ERPs) researches, when participants were asked to retrieve additional information about a studied stimulus in a source memory test, there are two kinds of old/new effects: early old/new effect and late old/new effect. The early old/new effect which appears across widespread regions of the scalp, but maximal at centroparietal scalp sites is observed from around 200 to 400 ms after stimulus onset. The later old/new effect over prefrontal cortex (PFC) begins around 700 to 800 ms after stimulus onset. It is well established that source memory retrieval engages later old/new effect more than simple item memory. Some researchers think that the early old/new effect which depend on the integrity of the medial temporal lobe and diencephalon indexes successful item recognition, and the late old/new effect reflects the executive process. Thus，this late-onset PFC old/new effect play an important role in source retrieval. So far, it is still not clear why source retrieval places greater demands on prefrontal cortex than old/new recognition judgements. In the current experiment, using event-related potentials technique, we explored the effects of encoding task on source memory and its neural correlates. Seventeen college students (7 male, 10 females) took part in our experiment. Stimuli were 640 digitized pictures in which an object was superimposed on a background. During the study phase, subjects were received two kinds of tasks. For one kind of task, they were asked to make judgments about the adaptability between items and backgrounds. For the other, they were received a size-judgment task, i.e., whether the items (object) were larger or smaller than the CRT monitor. In the subsequent test phase, there were four categories stimuli (“old/ old”, “old/ new”, “new/old”, “new/ new”). Subjects were told to determine whether the picture was “completely old” “part old” or “completely new”. The ERPs for “completely old” and “completely new” were averaged separately. We supposed that the early old/new effect were greater for congruity-judgment task than size-judgment task, and the prefrontal old/new effect was insensitive to encoding task and manipulation of difficulty. The behavioral results showed that, in the study phase, the reaction times of congruity-judgment task were slower than size-judgment task. In the test phase, the source accuracy of congruity-judgment task was reliably better than that of size-judgment task for the “completely old” and “part old” conditions while the reaction times of congruity-judgment task for “completely old” condition were significantly faster than that of size-judgment task. The ERPs results showed that early and late old/new effect were observed under both encoding conditions. It was found that during about 600~700ms after stimulus onset, the amplitude of ERPs of congruity-judgment task was more positive than that of size-judgment task at FPz, and the same pattern also appeared from 700~800ms, at Pz and P4. Based the above results, conclusions could be drawn that (1) early ERP old/new effect and late prefrontal ERP old/new effect may index two important processes in source memory retrieval; (2) the influence of encoding task on source memory was mainly manifested at the more posterior brain cortex; (3) the late prefrontal old/new effect did not co-vary with the retrieval difficulty. This research promoted our understanding the neural mechanism of retrieval process of episodic memory. Related Articles | Metrics

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Biological Motion and Its Application in the Study of Social Cognitive Impairments 2014, 37(5): 1055-1059.  Abstract ( )   PDF (5246KB) ( )   Human beings are remarkably sensitive to recognizing the motion of biological entities in complex visual scenes, even when it is depicted with a handful of point-lights attached to the head and major joints. A number of studies demonstrated that biological motion contains not only form and motion information, but also include many sorts of socially relevant information about an agent such as identity, gender, emotions, intentions and so on. One could recognize the biological motion as himself or his friends without face and other familiar cues, the visual experience of observing others’ action and the movement experience executed by participant himself or herself could influence the identity perception. Observers are more familiar with their own biological motion. Motion information alone could make one to distinguish anger, happiness, surprise or other mental states automatically, social context would improve the ability of emotion perception of biological motion and different display conditions will also influence the processing progress, for example the inversion display will decrease the emotion perception. People react differently to social and non-social motion. Eye movements researches revealed a spontaneous, fast and durable bias of overt visual-spatial attention favor for the perception of social motion and a different visual scanpath for social bigological motion compared to non-social stimulus. These findings constitute a basis for the investigation of a ‘social intention’ bias in perception of human biological motion. The other interesting thing is observer could estimate whether the biological motion walkers are walking backward or forward to the observer, but the perception was affected by facing bias. The observer could also change his or her behavior in social interaction according to the social information, while concrete content of each dimension and their relationship between each other are still under exploring. On the other hand, action cognition is very important to social cognition for human being and animals. There has been many researches have confirmed that there is an inner connection between visual biological motion processing and deficits in social cognition. Individuals with autistic spectrum disorders always have social cognition impairments, but there are contradictory conclusion between young children, adolescents and adults with autism on their performance of biological motion pilot task. Brain imaging data revealed a decreasing brain activity in the superior temporal sulcus which is very important in the processing of biological motion. The perception of biological motion also affected in the people with schizophrenia. Williams syndrome individuals exhibit intact or even enhanced social skills, and they are reported to be unimpaired on biological motion tasks. Down syndrome and other genetic conditions with distinct profiles of social cognitive impairments, whether biological motion processing is intact in these disorders are essential to proclaim the hypothesis that intact biological motion processing may be considered a fundamental basis for preserved social cognition. Future research should shed light on functional brain mechanisms associated with impairments in social information derived from biological motion, in order to provide more evidence whether biological motion could be a hallmark of social cognition and whether it could be applied in the diagnosis and treatment. Related Articles | Metrics

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The Precondition and Mechanism of Anchoring Effect 2014, 37(5): 1060-1063.  Abstract ( )   PDF (3822KB) ( )   Anchoring effect–the assimilation of a numeric estimate to a previously provided standard–is typically described as robust and persistent, which affects human’s decision under uncertainty. Basic anchoring effect was caused by a simple number. The researches of anchoring effect will help us understand the negative impact of this heuristic in decision making and explore effective ways to reduce the bias. There have been numerous researches on anchoring effect, however, the precondition of anchoring effect, whether basic anchoring effect exist and the mechanism of it were not clear to this day and there has been considerable controversy. In order to investigate these problems, we conducted two experiments. In the first experiment, we exploited a mixed design to explore whether attention to the anchor was the precondition of anchoring effect, with anchor levels (high, low, non) as within-subject variable and presentation time (15ms, 45ms, 75ms, 1000ms) as between-subject variable. We recruited 120 college students to participate our experiment, there were 45 boys and 75 girls. The results showed that in 15ms condition, there was not anchoring effect, whereas in 75ms and 1000ms conditions, both observed anchoring effect, which demonstrated that attention to the anchor not comparison was very important to anchoring effect. In addition, in 45ms condition, participants were aware of low anchors but not high anchors, and we observed anchoring effect only in the low anchor condition. In sum, whether the anchor was high or low, anchoring effect was observed only if participants were awareness to the anchor. Therefore, attention to the anchor is the precondition of anchoring effect. What’s more, results also confirmed that basic anchoring effect was not fragile as previous researches indicated. With increased time to pay attention to anchors, the anchoring effect grew larger, which provided initial evidence supported Numeric Priming Account. The second study started from the conflict of the Selective Accessibility Account and the Numeric Priming Account, we set pairs of anchors which had identical semantic meaning but different presentations, such as 5 kilograms and 5000 grams. According to the Selective Accessibility Account, both anchors were semantically resemble, so there would be the same anchoring effect; whereas according to the Numeric Priming Account, anchoring effect was dependent on the absolute number of anchor, so 5 kilograms would lead to lower estimation and 5000 grams would lead to higher estimation. Results of 20 students showed that high and low anchors lead to different anchoring effect, which supported the Numeric Priming Account. In sum, this research shed light on the precondition of anchoring effect and provide evidence to the mechanism controversy of basic anchoring effect. Only when participants are aware of anchors, there would be anchoring effect, and the magnitude of it rely on the degree of attention to the anchors. In terms of explaining the basic anchoring effect, the Numeric Priming Account is more suitable. More studies were needed such as the development of anchoring effect in life span, which will enable us to understand this effect deeply and thoroughly. Related Articles | Metrics

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Perception of Vocal Emotion in Chinese and Polish Undergraduates 2014, 37(5): 1064-1068.  Abstract ( )   PDF (4221KB) ( )   A lot of researchers paid more attention to recognizing emotions that conveyed by visual information, for example, facial expressions. However, people can often understand others’ emotions and intentions by isolated speech cues, in the absence of visual cues. During speech communication, listeners form an impression about the speaker’s emotion state according to changes in pitch, loudness, rhythm, and voice quality (emotional prosody).Wang, Su, and He (2012) found that children were more incline to rely on prosody cues to identify the emotion of the speaker when the prosody and semantic cues were contradictory (e.g. a sad event was expressed by a happy prosody cue). Elfenbein and Ambady (2002) indicated that recognition accuracy was higher when emotions were both expressed and perceived by members of the same cultural group, which was called in-group advantage. Individuals from different cultural backgrounds recognize facial expressions involving universal principle. Evidence of cross-cultural agreement in recognizing emotions from a speaker’s vocal expressions has less been reported. . To explore whether vocal emotion expressions varied across cultures, 42 participants (21 Chinese university students, 21 Polish university students) were asked to judge five emotions (happiness, fear, anger, sadness and neutral) and give an emotional intensity evaluation among 3 options (slight, medium and strong) of a Chinese man and a Chinese woman from cues that conveyed by expressing neutrally semantic sentences in different prosody. A correct response to judging each type of emotion was scored with 1 and an incorrect response with 0. Giving a slight level of emotional evaluation was scored with 1, giving a medium level of emotional evaluation was scored with 2, and giving a strong level of emotional evaluation was scored with 3. The total score range of judging five emotions expressed by a man or a woman was from 0 to 5 separately. And the total score range of giving emotional intensity evaluation of four emotions expressed by a man or a woman was from 0 to 15 respectively. We conducted two repeated measures ANOVAs with scores of correct judging emotions and scores of emotional intensity evaluation as dependent variables separately, and with type of cultures (China and Poland), the sex of auditory materials (a man and a woman) and type of emotions (happiness, fear, anger, sadness and neutral) as within-subject independent variables. The results indicated that Chinese listeners performed significantly better than Polish listeners both in emotional category perception and in emotional intensity evaluation. All the participants scored higher in perceiving a woman’s vocal cues than in perceiving a man’s. Fear was the easiest emotion to be identified, while neutrality was the most difficult one. From the results, it was suggested that in-group advantage existed. Related Articles | Metrics

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The strategies in past temporal discounting Yang-Mei 2014, 37(5): 1069-1072.  Abstract ( )   PDF (3805KB) ( )   This study examined the strategies participants used to make preference choices in past temporal discounting tasks. The research participants included 33 healthy Chinese college students. Ten past temporal distances, from two weeks to 50 years, were chosen. After completing the experiment task in the delay paradigm, a questionnaire survey assessed the strategies participants used to make preference decisions. This study examined the strategies participants used to make preference choices in past temporal discounting tasks. The subjects included 33 college students. Ten past temporal distances, from two weeks to 50 years, were chosen. After completing the experiment task in the delay paradigm, a questionnaire survey assessed the strategies participants used to make preference decisions. Indifference points were calculated into the rate of past temporal discounting using UAUr(t1,t2). The content analysis of the questionnaire responses revealed that the anticipated benefit of past rewards in the present contributed to the changed rate of past temporal discounting, which caused the dominant strategies to change with increasing past temporal distance. Related Articles | Metrics

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Neural Correlates of the interference effect of a Mixed Prospective Memory You-zhen CHEN Yuan Hong Li-Xian YANG 2014, 37(5): 1073-1078.  Abstract ( )   PDF (4518KB) ( )   Prospective memory (PM) refers to the task of remembering to perform an intended action at some point in the future. PM is divided into event-based prospective memory (EBPM) and time-based prospective memory. However, there are other forms of complicated PM in real life, one of which is that intended action is based on target event (i.e., PM target) and the time of PM targets occurrence is known. This form of PM is called mixed time-based and event-based prospective memory (MPM). There is no research on the neural correlates of this form of MPM. This study aimed to examine brain activity related to MPM with event-related potentials (ERPs) technique. Fifteen junior undergraduates (eight female, seven male) aged 18-22 years (M=19.7) participated as paid volunteers. A typical paradigm for studying prospective interference effect was used in this experiment. Three conditions were tested. In the baseline condition subjects had no PM task and merely performed 1-back task. In one PM condition subjects were told when the PM target would occur (named MPM condition), whereas in the other PM condition, when the PM target would occur was unknown (named EBPM condition). The reaction time of PM in the MPM condition was significantly faster than that in EBPM condition, and the accuracy of PM in the MPM condition was significantly higher than that in EBPM condition. Reaction time and the neural correlates of 1-back task of the three conditions were also analyzed. As subjects were told that PM targets appeared after 10 minutes in the MPM condition and they could estimated that the target time interval was in the third block. To examine whether subjects’ processing strategy and the neural correlates changed before and after entering the third block, all tasks were examined by two time intervals. The first and second block was named non-target time interval and the third block was named target time interval. Results showed that the reaction time of 1-back task in baseline was significantly faster than that in all blocks of the EBPM condition but only faster than that in the target time of the MPM condition, which means preparatory attentional process was engaged in PM target persistently in all blocks of the EBPM condition, whereas selectively engaged only in the target time interval in the MPM condition. No prospective interference effect existed in the non-target time interval in the MPM condition. ERP data showed that the waveforms of 150-400ms after stimulates occurred were significantly smaller for the baseline than the EBPM in all blocks and MPM condition in the target time interval. The topographical maps suggested that the components reflected activation mainly in the frontal lobe. The waveforms of 200-300ms of MPM condition in the non-target time interval were greater than that in the baseline, and the topographical maps also suggested that the components reflected activation mainly in the frontal lobe. The results might suggest that MPM was in a high activation state in brain when it was out of working memory. The results indicated that frontal lobe was engaged in monitoring PM targets persistently in EBPM condition, and selectively engaged in the target time interval in the MPM condition. Related Articles | Metrics

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The Self-reference Effect in False Memory 2014, 37(5): 1079-1083.  Abstract ( )   PDF (4679KB) ( )   An extensive literature has demonstrated that encoding information in a self-referential manner enhances subsequent memory performance. This self-reference effect is generally elicited in multiple paradigms. Klein and Loftus (1988) developed a dual-processing explanation of self-referent encoding. They emphasized that both elaborative and organizational processes are involved in the self-referential facilitation in true memories. However, a number of prior research has demonstrated that organizational processes could induce high level of false memories. With two experiments, the present study used Deese-Roediger-McDermott paradigm to examine the potential influence of self-reference on false recognition. Across two experiments, participants were instructed to remember lists of words and complete a following recognition test immediately. In study phase, list words were presented to participants one by one in the center of the screen at the rate of one word per 1.5 s paired with different cues. In experiment 1, participants viewed DRM lists in blocked design, with one third of DRM lists paired with participants’ own name (self-referential condition), another one third of DRM lists paired with the name of a well-known individual (other-referential condition), and the last paired with a colored block (neutral condition). Participants were told to remember both the words and cues. In experiment 2, all list words were presented randomly to participants in interleaved design. In test phase, participants were asked to make judgments on whether or not the test items were presented before and a R/K judgment on each test item. The results showed that, when studied in a self-referential manner, the list words were better remembered than in other-referential and neutral conditions. Most importantly, the false recognitions of critical lures were higher in self-referential condition than other-referential and neutral conditions. When list words were presented in a random order, self-referential effect in false memory decreased significantly. In other words, disrupting organizational process reduced false memories cross all conditions, but self-referential effect in false memory did reliably exist. In addition, both for true memory and false memory, recollection in self-referential condition was significantly higher than other-referential and neutral conditions, whereas there were no differences in familiarity across three conditions. The results demonstrate that self-reference could facilitate both true memory and false memory in DRM paradigm. The influence of self-reference on false memory could be interpreted through the promoted organizational process between studied items and critical lures. The dissociation between recollection and familiarity suggests that recollection and familiarity are two independent systems, and recollection might play a more important role in self-reference processing than familiarity. Related Articles | Metrics

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submission--Automatic Processing of Large Number Based on Stroop Effect and SNARC Effect Lin-Cheng HU 2014, 37(5): 1084-1091.  Abstract ( )   PDF (6379KB) ( )   In recent years, in number cognitive domain numerical Stroop paradigm was used to study the relationship of numerical semantic and numerical physical size in number process. In addition to Stroop effect, SNARC effect was also an important index of number automatic processing. Based on existing findings, this study conducted two experiments to explore whether large numbers could be activated automatically. By using Stroop effect as index , the first experiment explored whether the number of numeral and number semantic could produce interference and facilitation; the second experiment explored whether the number(i.e., quantity of asterisks) represented spacially by using SNARC effect as index. Experiment 1 was divided into two parts. In first part subjects were asked to compare the numerical semantic of standard stimulus with that of comparing stimuli, but to ignore the numbers of numeral. The second part took the reverse procedure. The results indicated that the main effect of task type was not significant, F(1, 19) = .030，p>.01, the main effect of Stroop effect ( between accord and disaccord ) was significant, F(1, 19) = 83.838，p < .001. The results suggested that the response speed of numeral semantic comparison was influenced by the number of numeral. In detail, under accord condition (i.e. smaller numeral matched with less numerals, bigger numeral matched with more numerals), response was quicker, otherwise, response was slower. Stroop effect of numeral semantic comparison was about 15 ms (461ms and 476 ms respectively). In the task of numeral number comparison, the response was influenced by numeral semantic, under accord condition, response was quicker, under disaccord condition, response was slower. Stroop effect of numeral number comparison was about 24 ms (459ms and 483 ms respectively). Average error rate was analyzed by repetitive measure ANOVA. Main effect of task type was significant, F(1, 19) = 1521.000，p=.000，the error rate of numeral semantic comparison was less than that of numeral number comparison (3.7% and 4.9% respectively). Main effects of Stroop effect was significant, F(1, 19) = 12705.575，p= .000, error rate of accord condition was less than that of disaccord condition (2.6% and 6.0% respectively). All the stimuli of experiment 2 were composed of starlet pictures, all of which covered equal area but the numbers of starlet within them were different. Experiment 2 included two parts, all of wich completed the same task: comparing the starlet numbers of comparison stimuli with that of standard stimulus, but the key-pressing rules were reverse. Data analyzing indicated that the main effect of number presentation order was very significant, F(1, 20) = 31.421，p <.001，the average response time of from less to more was 478ms，Std=14.9；the average response time of from more to less was 509ms，Std=17.1. SNARC effect was significant, F(1, 20) =9.514，p < .01. Under accord condition, the average response time was 469ms, Std=14.2; under disaccord condition, the average response time was 519ms, Std=20.7. SNARC effect was about 50ms. Average error rate was analyzed by repetitive measure ANOVA. The main effect of number present order was not significant, F(1, 20) = 2.913，p>.05. SNARC effect was significant, F(1, 20)=5.969，p<.05. Error rate of accord condition was 4.3%，Std=.008，error rate of disaccord condition was 6.1%，Std=.009. To sum up, experiment 1 found that Stroop effect exists in both numeral number comparison task and number semantic comparison task. Experiment 2 found that there exists SNARC effect in number comparison task. An presentation order effect was also found, that is to say, when the numerals' semantic of standard was smaller than that of comparison simuli, Rts were faster, otherwise Rts were slower. References | Related Articles | Metrics

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The Impact of Specific Emotions on Trust 2014, 37(5): 1092-1099.  Abstract ( )   PDF (7244KB) ( )   　　 Although theoretical work has identified a number of factors that may influence trust, only few studies investigated affective influences on trust and didn’t reach a consistent conclusion. According to Appraisal-Tendency Approach to Affect and Judgment, emotions are associated with specific appraisals reflecting the core meaning of the event that elicits each emotion and determining the influence of specific emotions on social judgment. The certainty appraisal, which means understanding what is happening in the current situation, and feeling able to predict what will happen next, is indicated by various literatures being related to processing. Emotions characterized by certainty appraisals promote heuristic processing, whereas emotions characterized by uncertainty appraisals result in systematic processing. The relationship between certainty and information processing implies that certainty may mediate the relationship between trust and specific emotions. Thus, we hypothesize that individuals in emotions associated with high certainty may rely more on “trustworthy cues” to make trust decisions compared with individuals in emotions associated with low certainty. 　　 In Experiment 1, 133 participants (66 men and 67 women, Mage=9.44±1.42) were randomly assigned to one of four conditions in a 3 (emotions: happiness (positive, high certainty) vs anger (negative, high certainty) vs sadness (negative, low certainty) × 2 (settings: trustworthy vs untrustworthy) between-subjects factorial design. Participants watched a video to induce one type of emotion before finishing the Trust Game. Target trust was manipulated by providing participants with the results of a “trustworthiness scale” that the target had purportedly just completed. In Experiment 2, group boundaries were made to activate people’s trust and distrust schemas based on the recognition that ingroup members were generally perceived as more trustworthy than outgroup members. 153 participants (78 men and 75 women, Mage=19.55±1.27) in happy, angry or sad emotions completed the Trust Game with either ingroup partners or outgroup partners. The group boundary was set depending on whether the partner in the Trust Game was from the same A / non-A province (ingroup or outgroup). The results of Experiment 1 showed that participants experiencing happy and angry emotions provided more money to a trustworthy partner than an untrustworthy partner (thappiness（39）=2.65，p<.05；tanger（42）=3.32，p<.01). The participants experiencing sad emotion showed no significant difference in their trust (tsadness（46）=1.11, p>.05). Besides, participants in happy and angry emotion provided more money to a trustworthy partner than did participants in sad emotion(thappiness-sadness（45）=2.46，p<.05 , tanger-sadness（46）=3.14，p<0.01;thappiness-anger（39）=-0.41, p>.05 ), but not to an untrustworthy partners(F（2,63）=1.25，p>.05).The results of Experiment 2 showed that participants experiencing happy and angry mood provided more money in an ingroup setting compared to an outgroup setting (thappy（52）=2.32，p<.05; tanger（46）=2.43，p<.05). In contrast, the amount of money given by people in sad emotion did not differ(tsadness（49）=-1.77, p>.05). Happy and angry participants gave more money to a trustworthy partner than sad participants (F（2,73）=4.07, p<.05；thappiness-sadness（49）=2.61, p<.05 , tanger-sadness（47）=2.46, p<.01;thappiness-anger（50）=.06, p>.1) but not to an untrustworthy partners(F（2,74）=1.81, p>.05). 　　The present research suggested that when there are available cues about the trustworthiness of the target, the certainty appraisal of emotion has an effect on individuals’ trust behavior . In situations with available cues that promoted trust, people in emotions associated with certainty appraisals increased their trust; but the trust behavior of individuals in emotions associated with uncertainty appraisals was not affected.have different influences on trust on two occasions: When there is information associated with trustworthiness of the trustee, individuals misattribute their mood to trust judgment at hand and misattributed emotions influence trust in the direction of the emotion’s control dimension. However, when there are available cues suggesting the trustworthiness of the trustee, individuals experiencing emotions characterized by high certainty may rely more on “trustworthy cues” to make trust decisions compared with individuals experiencing emotions characterized by low certainty because emotions characterized by certainty appraisals promote heuristic processing, whereas emotions characterized by uncertainty appraisals result in systematic processing. 　　Two experiments were conducted which were designed with two conditions—whether there are cues associated with trust or distrust. In Experiment 1, 105 participants were recruited and randomly assigned to the two conditions. Before playing the trust game in which participants would allocate the money they owned freely to the other player and the money they allocated were used as the measurement of trusting behavior. Participants’ emotions characterized by other-person control (gratitude) or personal control (pride) were induced by recalling past experiences. In Experiment 2, 142 participants were recruited and were randomly assigned to one of the conditions from a 3（emotion：happiness, sadness, anger）× 2 （cues：high trustworthy, low trustworthy）design. Happiness and anger are both characterized by high certainty but differ in valence while sadness is characterized by low certainty. Participants were asked to complete a “trustworthiness” inventory and were told the computer would compute their scores of the inventory. During the waiting period participants watched a video aiming at inducing an emotion. Before playing the trust game, participants in the trustworthy and untrustworthy conditions were informed that their partner either had a high or low score on the trustworthiness scale. 　　Results of Experiment 1 showed that emotions characterized by other-person control (gratitude) influenced trust significantly more than emotions characterized by personal control (pride). Result of Experiment 2 indicated that compared with cues promoting distrust, when cues promoting trust about the trustee were available, participants in emotions characterized by high certainty (happy and anger) showed higher trust; while participants in an emotion characterized by low certainty (sadness) showed no difference in trust. 　　These findings shed light on the relation between specific emotions and trust. It suggests that emotions with different characteristics have different influence on trust, when cues associated with trust are not available, affect as information models works, while heuristic-reliance models takes effect when cues about the trustee are available. Related Articles | Metrics

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The Processing Mechanism of Double Negative Sentences imperative and Rhetorical Question 2014, 37(5): 1100-1104.  Abstract ( )   PDF (10551KB) ( )   Researches on Negation are an essential part for the exploring of language understanding. Various researches on Negation are frequently related to the processing and mechanism. Psychologists have proposed some convincing theories, among which propositional theory and experiential-simulations view are especially well known. Double negative sentence is a very special negative sentence, for its sentence structure is not in concord with its semantic representation. It expresses an affirmative meaning with a negative form. Using sentence-picture-verification paradigm and the isolated sentences with contradictory redicates and pictures for the experimental materials, this research aimed to investigate the influence upon sentence processing which is made by two factors: the processing of double negative words and the inconsistence between the sentence structure and the semantic representation. This research offered new experimental evidence for propositional theory and experiential-simulations view, by designing two behavioral experiments. Experiment 1 used imperative sentences to examine the processing of double negative words under different modes of sentence presentation. At the same time it also investigated the differences among three kinds of sentences. The experiment used three factors mixed design. Setence presentation is a between-subjects factor and other two variables, including sentence types and sentence-figure matching relationships, are within-subjects factors. Using sentence-picture-verification paradigm, with isolated sentences appearing before pictures, this experiment demanded the participants to judge whether the pictures are consistent with the semantic representation. Stimulus presention and the recording of behavioral data (reaction time and accuracy) were controlled by E-prime 1.1. The main results were as follows: a main effect of sentence presentation emerged, that is, participants reacted more quickly when the sentences appeared as a whole than when the sentences appeared part by part. This didn’t conform to propositional theory. In addition, an interaction between sentence types and matching relationship was observed in the early state of understanding (250ms). Affirmative sentences and double negative sentences reached the match effect, the advantaged effect of actual state. This didn’t conform to two-step-simulation hypothesis. Experiment 2 used rhetorical questions to observe the differences among the processings of three kinds of sentences with different modes of sentence presentation. Meanwhile, it also investigated the influence made by the discord of the sentence structure and the semantic meaning upon the sentence processing. The procedure and design are the same as Experiment 1. However, the experimental materials were changed by rhetorical questions. The result showed that in the early state of understanding (250ms), negative rhetorical questions had match effect, while affirmative rhetorical questions and double negative rhetorical questions didn’t. It implied that the processing of negative rhetorical questions is the same as affirmative imperative sentences and double negative imperative sentences which are one-step stimulation. While unlike affirmative imperative sentences and double negative imperative sentences, the processing of affirmative rhetorical questions and double negative rhetorical questions are not one-step stimulation. When the sentence structures are inconsistent with semantic meaning, readers are more influenced by the sentence semantic. From the results, three conclusions of this research were drawn: (1) The processing of double negative words was global, which was in discord with propositional theory. (2) During the early state of understanding (250ms), the processing of double negative imperative sentences and negative rhetorical questions are the same, which is one-step simulation, representing the actual state of affairs. This didn’t conform to two-step-simulation hypothesis. (3) When the sentence structures are inconsistent with semantic meaning, readers are more influenced by the sentence semantic. In sum, our results sugest that, in the explanations of the processing of double negative mechanism, propositional theory emphasized the sentences structure, ignoring the semantic meaning while two-step-simulation hypothesis based on experiential-simulations view emphasized the semantic meaning, ignoring the sentences structure. Therefore, these two explanations were reasonable and unilateral at the same time. Related Articles | Metrics

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Is Consciousness a Necessary Condition of Episodic Memory? li guangzheng Lijuan Wang 2014, 37(5): 1105-1110.  Abstract ( )   PDF (6136KB) ( )   Episodic memory has been defined as the memory for personal experiences in time and place. For the purpose that whether consciousness is a necessary condition of episodic memory formation, the current research discussed that episodic memory could be formed under the unconscious condition. This survey opens a new window towards understanding the human’s episodic memory. 　　We first introduced the episodic memory system proposed by Tulving. According to the view of Tulving, episodic memory is a recently evolved in the phylogenetically history, late developing and early deteriorating in the development history of the individual, past-oriented memory system, and probably unique to humans. Later, he pointed out that episodic memory had three characteristics such as auto-noetic awareness, self, and sense of subjective time, which referred to a person’s awareness of his existence and identity in subjective time extending from the personal past through the present to the future and allowed us to be aware of the subjective time in which events happened. 　　Then, this study discussed that episodic memory could be formed under the unconscious condition. In these parts, we described a wide range of unconscious episodic memory in visual and verbal processing, amnesia patients, infant and animals research. In the respect of static visual and verbal, the previous study indicated that rapid encoding and flexible representation could be formed in unconscious condition, and the brain areas which rapid encoding and flexible representation depended on could be adjusted by the unconscious process. In the perspective of dynamic visual, the early study concluded that there was a motor system in addition to the use of verbal mediation and a visual-sensory modality in the processing of episodic memory and the encoding of motor tasks was nonstrategic in some respects. The research in amnesia patients indicated that amnesia patients with hippocampus damaged not only missed the explicit declarative memory, but also lose the unconscious memory needed rapid encoding and flexible representation, which also belongs to the component of episodic memory. According to the view of Tulving, the young infants and animals should not have the ability to form episodic memory. However, recent studies demonstrated that both young infants and animals possess some of the properties of episodic memory. The above discussion indicated that episodic memory could be formed under the unconscious condition. 　　Finally, based on the analysis of the development of episodic memory which exhibited the natural and social properties in the evolution history, the current research manifested that the advanced, conscious episodic memory in human being was generated in leaps, which relied on the foundation of low and unconscious episodic memory. Accordingly, the episodic memory in human beings had the low and unconscious attributes and showed qualitatively distinct from the unconscious episodic memory in animals. The future research should not only pay attention to the natural properties of episodic memory, but also focus on its social attributes, so as to explore a new model for episodic memory research which integrated from the low processing to the advanced processing. Related Articles | Metrics

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The Neural Representation of Parents in the Self-Concept 2014, 37(5): 1111-1116.  Abstract ( )   PDF (6253KB) ( )   Self-concept refers to a complex but organized dynamic mental structure, which is composed by all convictions of one individual’s intrinsic characteristics. Others, especially close others play a vital role in the composition of self-concept. Parents offer a vast and varied experience to the individual growth, and parents have more influence than others on the personality development of adolescent. The intimate relationships between individual and their parents can shape and create one’s self-concept by evolving their shared elements. Therefore, individuals’ representations of the information about their parents play an important role on the conformation of their self-concept. How does an individual represent information related to his or her parents? There are two main viewpoints about self-with-other representation: shared representation and special representation. Shared representation means that the brain activation of self-representation and other-representation has a certain overlap. Individuals integrate the information of others into their self-concept. In this process, the representation of others became an integral part of the self. Special representation means that the individual is independent from others. Representation of others and representation of self are comparatively independent. The representation structure and the activated brain regions of these two representation process are separated. The style of self-with-other representation depends to a large extent on the relationship types and closeness between self and others. Parents are the most important close others of an individual, so the representation of their information may share most overlap parts with self-representation. Previous studies have discussed the unique neural representation of parents from two aspects. One used others’ (strangers’, celebrities’ and friends’) faces as a reference, to discuss the specific neural mechanism of parents’ face recognition. The processing of face involved the neural representation in the perceptual field. The other used a trait judgment task to examine the neural mechanism of the judgment and memory about parents’ traits. The judgment and recollection of parents’ traits related to the neural representation in the mental domains. No matter what kind of information, the self-with-parent representation is more inclined to the shared representation. Individual differences exist in the neural representations of parents. It could be elaborated from the perspective of numerous neuroscience researches on differences in genders and cultures. Markus and Kitayama (1991) proposed the theory of self-construal to explain these two differences. The interdependent self focuses on the fundamental relatedness of individuals to each other. It emphasizes attending to and fitting in with others, and harmonious interdependence with them. Also the independent self seeks to maintain their independence from others by discovering and expressing their unique inner attributes. The interdependence self represents parents’ information more inclined to the shared representation than the independent self does. However some problems still remain unsolved. Future research should emphasize on the primary brain area as well as their functions. It should also aim to find a unified theory for the neural representation of parents’ information. At the end, other factors should also be considered when conducting research, such as the family structure and the attachment types. Related Articles | Metrics

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Effect of Maternal Depression on Toddlers’ Internalizing Behavior Problem : Moderated Mediating Effect 2014, 37(5): 1117-1124.  Abstract ( )   PDF (7319KB) ( )   　　Depression and parenting stress are common phenomenon in postpartum women. Both of them increase risks for the development of psychopathology in the children. Risks of maternal depression on children might be transmitted through four mechanisms, such as heritability of depression, innate dysfunctional neuroregulatory mechanisms, parenting and stressors. Maternal depression is related to children’s behavior problem, such as negative affect, heightened emotionality, anxiety. Parenting stress can be seen as resulting from a perceived discrepancy between demands pertaining to parenthood and personal resources. Such stress can be experienced in several areas of life connected to parenting. More parenting stress could predict children’s anxiety, depression and so on. Therefore, this study aimed at exploring the possible relationship between maternal depression and maternal parenting stress by using a cross-lagged design, and construct a moderated mediation model in which parenting stress mediated the relationship between maternal depression and toddlers’ internalizing problem behavior, and this mediation effect was moderated by mother’s education. 　　A sample of 298 mothers and their six month infants was recruited in the longitudinal study for 8 months. Mothers were asked to complete Edinburgh Postnatal Depression Scale, Parenting Stress Index in Time 1 and Time 2, and complete the Infant-Toddler Social and Emotional Aseessment in Time 2. The results indicated that: (1) Time 1 maternal depression could predict Time 2 maternal parenting stress after controlling mother’s education and Time 1 maternal parenting stress (β=.136，p<.05) . However, Time 1 maternal parenting stress could not predict Time 2 maternal depression after controlling mather’s education and Time 1 maternal depression (β=-.098，p>.05) . (2) Maternal parenting stress played partial mediating effect between maternal depression and toddlers’ internalizing problem behavior. That is, maternal depression not only had a direct influence on toddlers’ internalizing problem behavior, but also aggravated toddlers’ internalizing problem behavior through mothers’ parenting stress. This mediation effect was moderated by mother’s education. For low education mothers, parenting stress significantly predicted toddlers’ internalizing problem behavior (β=.376，p<.001); For high education mothers, parenting stress couldn’t predict toddlers’ internalizing problem behavior significantly (β=.052，p>.05). 　　All in all, these findings highlighted the mediation effect of maternal parenting stress and moderated effect of mother’s education in the relationship between maternal depression and toddlers’ internalizing problem behavior. Mothers’ high education could significantly reduce the negative effect of maternal parenting stress on toddlers’ internalizing problem behavior. It is important to pay more attention to depressed mothers, and give them much help on their daily life and parenting practices. All these help will be beneficial to children’s mental development. In one word, these results has important theoretical and reference value to maternal parenting. Related Articles | Metrics

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The Characteristics of Family Innovation Environment and Their Effects on Everyday Creative Behavior: The Mediating Role of Personality 2014, 37(5): 1125-1131.  Abstract ( )   PDF (5931KB) ( )   Adolescence is a significant period for creativity development. Family environment was the most important factor to cultivate individuals’ creativity. The first goal of the current study was to demonstrate the characteristics of family innovation environment in China; otherwise, our second goal was to explore the underlying mechanism through which the family innovation environment was associated with adolescents’ everyday creative behaviors. We conducted a semi-structured interview with 17 high creative students and a pretest on 467 students to identify the content of the family innovation environment at the beginning of our study; then in order to investigate the relationship between family innovation environment and adolescents’ creative behavior, we recruited 1117 adolescents to administer the following questionnaires: Adolescents’ Family Innovation Questionnaires, Williams Prefer Measurement Forms(WPMF), Middle School Students’ Everyday Creative Behavior Questionnaires and Peer Nomination of Everyday Creative Behavior. K-Means Cluster and structural equation modeling statistical method were adopted for data analysis. The results showed that: (1) Family innovation environment was constituted with 4 factors, which specifically named family emotional atmosphere, parental creative behavior, parental education philosophy and autonomy permitted. (2) Three types of family innovation environment was identified in the present sample: general, inhibitory and innovative. Students from innovative family scored significantly higher than other two types on everyday creative behavior. (3) Significant positive correlations were found among family innovation environment, creative personality, and everyday creative behavior by both self-report and peer nomination. (4) Creative personality completely mediated the relationship between family innovation environment and peer nomination of creativity, and partial mediated the relationship between family innovation environment and self-reported everyday creative behavior. Therefore, we concluded that family emotional atmosphere, parental creative behavior, education philosophy and autonomy permitted were the crucial elements of family innovation environment. More importantly, creative personality has a significant mediating effect on family innovation environment and everyday creative behavior. These results could contribute the creativity cultivation practice for youths. However, the limitations of the current study could not be ignored. First, participants in our study were recruited from model middle school in Beijing, which would restrict the explanation range of our results; Second, no control group was involved in the semi-structure interview to explore the contents of the family innovation environment. These issues should be taken good care of in the future studies. Related Articles | Metrics

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From One-Heart to Half-Hearted: the Media Multitasking Behaviors of Teenagers LIU Chen Zong-Kui ZHOU 2014, 37(5): 1132-1139.  Abstract ( )   PDF (7552KB) ( )   The internet has significantly changed teenager’s media behaviors today, especially the Media Multitasking Behavior. Media Multitasking can be defined as using multiple media tools or engaging in multiple media tasks at the same time. It does have same impacts on teenager’s cognitive development, academic achievement, social interaction, problem behavior, and so on. This paper will attempt to describe this popular media phenomenon in teenagers. Firstly, the definition of Media Multitasking Behavior has been introduced with the summarization of its relative theoretical basis .There have three theories which can be employed to explain media multitasking: 1, Use & Gratification Theory ;2, Self-Determination Theory, 3,The Limited Capacity Theory. Then the paper introduce three simple but useful measurements of Media Multitasking, one is based on numbers of media tools(MUQ) and the other is based on media time. The last but not least is SPD, which includes the MUQ. To explore which factors could strengthen teenager’s media multitasking behavior, this paper firstly generalizes the influence factors of Media Multitasking from previous research and concludes three factors : the media tools or media behavior itself, the unique of teenagers groups which include physical features and personality, the media environment. Since media impacts teenagers a lot that there have numerous researches to support .What’s the unique influences of Media Multitasking Behavior? Through a comprehensive review of previous research, three aspects have been brought up:1, the cognition results and academic performance of teenagers, in this aspect, there have two different opinions which one think media multitasking is impaired teenager’s cognitive process and academic performance and the other insist there have same different influences; 2, the social interactions of teenagers, in this aspect, many researchers think media is associated with negative social interaction, and so does media multitasking, although teenagers always choose one social media task at least, what we cannot deny is that social media behavior in media multitasking does bring emotional satisfaction to teenagers; 3 some researches have found high media multitasking teenagers will have more problem behaviors, maybe these teenagers have lower information threshold to media content than their companion, obviously, they are more suspect to negative or violent information. The conclusion points out that it is necessary to strengthen the research on the impact of emerging media such as smart-phone to the media multitasking, gender difference in media multitasking, ecology measurement of media multitasking and the positive influence of media multitasking in the future. Reasons are as follows，Firstly, since smart-phone、i-pad have become more and more popular, teenagers can use their media everywhere and anytime, which can accelerate media multitasking, and maybe have same complicated influences. Second, although man is influenced deeply in media than woman, it seems the influences is turned around in media multitasking behaviors. This is worth to notice because researches have point out women are more involved in media multitasking behaviors. Third, how to measure media multitasking behaviors more ecological and authentic is still a problem to future research. At last but not least, as an irresistible trend , media multitasking behaviors need more positive research to leverage its power. Related Articles | Metrics

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Retrieval-Induced Forgetting：The effects of Item Strength and Test Order on 2014, 37(5): 1140-1147.  Abstract ( )   PDF (7388KB) ( )   Retrieval-induced forgetting (hereafter, RIF) is defined as the repeated retrieval practice of some materials induces the forgetting of the other materials. Currently, two main theories have been put forward to explain the phenomenon of RIF. The inhibition theory assumes that this forgetting results from the inhibitory processes that function to resolve interference during retrieval. The interference theory proposes that this forgetting is the consequence of interference functioning during the last test phase. Although a bulk of studies was carried out to distinguish these two influential theories, there were still some controversies to be resolved. The present study aimed to examine how the item strength and test order impacted on the RIF. On the basis of this, the debate related with the two theories as mentioned above was discussed in depth. In the present study, sixty-four undergraduates were tested separately. All the forty-eight category-exemplar word pairs were presented once at a time for all the participants. Then, they were instructed to recall half of the exemplars from the half categories which had been studied in the previous phase according to the retrieval cues. By convention, three types of items were produced by the retrieval practice: the practiced exemplars were referred as Rp+ item; the unpracticed exemplars from practiced categories were defined as Rp-item; and the exemplars from unpracticed categories were referred as Nrp item. After an appropriate 2-minute distracter task, participants were shown a category-plus-initial-letter cue and were requested to recall all the exemplars which had been studied before. The results showed that, the retrieval accuracy for the Rp+ items was significantly higher than that for the Nrp items, and this effect was not modulated by the item strength and the test order. Moreover, the RIF was merely observed on the strong items, but not for the weak items. Even when the output effect occurred from the test order were effectively controlled, the strong items still triggered the RIF apparently. Overall, the present results indicated that the effect of RIF was affected by the item strength and the test order. Based on this，we argued that, the inhibitory theory of RIF was supported to some extent. Related Articles | Metrics

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Social Support and Deliberate Rumination Mediate the Relationship Between Gratitude and Post-traumatic Growth in Adolescents at 4.5 Years After Wenchuan Earthquake 2014, 37(5): 1148-1153.  Abstract ( )   PDF (5387KB) ( )   The aftermath of traumatic events differs from person to person. Although some people show negative results, many people report positive results such as Post-traumatic Growth(PTG). PTG refers to positive changes that result from individual struggle to deal with trauma and its psychological consequences. It contains three aspects such as perceived changes in self, changed sense of relationship with others, and changed philosophy of life. Recently, the overwhelming majority of research paid emphasis on the influencing factors of PTG, particularly the exploration of the development of PTG. But there are fewer researchers pay attention to the effect of emotion on PTG, and also fewer researchers explored the mechanism that’s development of PTG. According to the broaden-and-build theory of positive emotions, the gratitude can play an important role in the development of PTG. Based on the theory,many researchers carried out study in the relation of gratitude to PTG, and found that gratitude have predicted positively to PTG. Although theoretical and empirical studies researchers agreed that gratitude had effects on PTG, few studies have explored the role of others factors in the relationship between gratitude and PTG. According to relevant theories, the social support and deliberate rumination plays an important role in the process of gratitude affecting PTG. For this reason, the current study incorporate deliberate rumination and social support into the exploration of relationships between gratitude and PTG and the internal mechanism how gratitude affect PTG was also taking into much account . The current study used gratitude questionnaires, social support questionnaires, the event related rumination inventory and posttraumatic growth inventory to investigate 354 adolescents (165males, 189 females) of grade 8, 9 in junior schools and 11, 12 in senior high schools of Wenchuan county four and a half years after the Wenchuan earthquake. The main results were as following: (1) the level of gratitude, social support and PTG were medium, but the level of deliberate rumination was low. The most important was that all the variables have significantly positive relation. (2) Social support and deliberate rumination mediate partly the relationship between gratitude and PTG. On the one hand, gratitude can affect the PTG directly. On the other hand, gratitude can affect the PTG positively through social support and deliberate rumination, respectively. In addition, gratitude can affect the PTG positively via the indirect way which social support influences deliberate rumination. These results have some practical implications. That is, it necessary to improve adolescent gratitude level, and help them to gain more social support and promote them to more deliberate rumination to traumatic event, in turn guide adolescents to positive thought on self, other and world after trauma, ultimately promote the development of PTG. Related Articles | Metrics

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the Development of Junior High School Students’ Guilt and the Influence of Guilt on Their Fair Behavior 2014, 37(5): 1154-1159.  Abstract ( )   PDF (5801KB) ( )   In recent years, guilt has gradually become one of the hotspots of psychology as a self-conscious emotion. As a barometer of morality, the developmental characteristics of guilt have great effect upon the individual’s mental health. In this research, the developmental characteristics of junior high school students’ guilt and the influence of guilt on their fair behavior were investigated. First of all, the guilt scenario stories were collected and verified from two groups which were randomly selected from junior high school students (90 in group 1, 107 in group 2) as the measure materials for developmental characteristics of guilt in the following study. The materials included two kinds of scenario (family vs. peer) and each scenario contained three stories. Following each story, there were five questions which intended to find out the developmental characteristics of junior high school students’ guilt. After a series of tests, we found that the measure materials’ content validity was 0.81 and its internal consistency coefficient was 0.86. All of them indicated that the questionnaire of guilt had good reliability and validity and it could be used as measure tool of the following study. Then in study 1, the guilt scenario stories which had been collected and verified were used to investigate the developmental characteristics of guilt of 335 junior high school children from 7-9 grades. The results were as follows: The score of junior high school children’s guilt showed a gradually decreasing trend with the growth of grade, M=4.43, SD=.62; M=4.37, SD=.59; M=4.30, SD=.51. The score of guilt of girls was significantly higher than boys, F(1,317)=14.37, p=.000＜.001, η2=.04. The score of guilt without judgment was significantly higher than that with the judgment of teachers. The score of guilt in the family scenario was significantly higher than that in the peer scenario. Both the score of guilt without judgment and with peer judgment in the family scenario were significantly higher than that in the peer scenario. In study 2, we used dictator game to explore fair behavior of 120 junior high school children (evenly divided between boys and girls), with situation and emotional state as independent variables. The results were as follows: The score of guilt of the emotional arousal group was significantly higher than that of the control group, t(1,118)=-9.86, p=.000＜.001, 1-β=.99. It meant that the guilt emotional arousal method was effective. In the guilt arousal group, the number of tokens that junior high school students assigned to the partner was more than that to themselves in two person situation, but there was not significant difference in the control group. The number of tokens that they assigned to the partner, to themselves and to the third person was decreasing in turn in three person situation, but there was not significant difference from the control group. The research shows that junior high school students’ guilt can promote their fair behavior in two person situation, but it has not significant influence on their fair behavior in three person situation. Related Articles | Metrics

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The Development of Self-Regulated Learning of Junior School Students 2014, 37(5): 1160-1166.  Abstract ( )   PDF (5129KB) ( )   A great number of studies of self-regulated learning show that motivational value, self-efficacy, meta-cognition, and cognition strategy can significantly influence self-regulation and academic achievement. The emphases of theses researches were not the same. Their main difference lies in the relationship between achievement goals and self-efficacy, and their influence on students’ academic achievements. To construct a more comprehensive developmental mode of self-regulated learning, we integrate the theory of volitional strategy by Corno and Kanfer and the research result of Zimmerman about the influence of resource management strategy on cognitive strategy with the three types of relationships from previous studies. The purpose of this study is to establish self-regulated learning mode, then discusses the rule and effect of meta-cognition, cognition strategy, self- efficiency, the control of motivation and emotion strategy and resource management strategy as well as other factors in different grades. In total, 775 students from eight junior schools in Beijing were sampled. We used a localized self-regulated learning questionnaire of junior school students in this research. Four sub-questionnaires were included, namely motivational strategy questionnaire; meta-cognition, cognition and resource management strategy questionnaire; goal-learning strategy questionnaire; motivational and emotional control questionnaire. Using collective testing method, we guided the participants to finish the questionnaires according to the instructive words. To avoid common method variance, two waves of survey were administered with the interval of two weeks. For academic achievements, Math and Chinese scores of the participants in mid-term and final examinations during the past year were taken into account. All these data were analyzed by the softwares of SPSS16 and Amos4.0. Structural equation model (SEM) was employed to analyze the data. The results indicated that the development paths of variables including motivation, cognition, behavior and academic achievement are different in the self-regulated learning development modes of different grades. The effects of self-efficacy and learning strategies are significant in lower grades; for higher grades, meta-cognition, learning strategies, motivational emotion volition and resource management strategy have evident effects. In summary, students of different grades in junior schools present different kinds of development modes of self-regulated learning. This study establishes a self- regulated learning mode by using questionnaires, within which it discusses the rule and function of meta-cognition, cognition strategy, self-efficiency, motivational emotion strategy and resource management strategy as well as other factors in different grades. Our findings clearly shows that the development mode of students’ self-regulated learning changes along with the grade growth. The effects of the variables composing these modes on students’ academic performances also change as grade grows. Self-efficacy plays an especially significant role in students’ academic performance, both directly and indirectly in each period; cognitive strategy has evident effect on the study of lower grades students; the effect of meta-cognition increases as students’ grade grows; volitional control in motivation and emotion take the function of regulation, guaranteeing the completion of tasks in an indirect way. Keywords: Junior School Students; Self-regulated learning; Mode of Self-regulated learning development Related Articles | Metrics

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The Transition of Aggressive Patterns among Youth: an Application of Latent Transition Analysis Peng Wu Jing-Jun CHEN 2014, 37(5): 1167-1173.  Abstract ( )   PDF (6991KB) ( )   Many researchers investigated adolescent aggressive behavior, in consideration of the negative consequences and psychological problems that aggression will cause. Some researches have been done to show the development of aggressive behavior among adolescence or children, others explored the relationship between aggression and personality, cognitive factors or parenting. With regard to the development of aggression, statistics analysis that deal with continuous variables prevailed researches. Some conclusions was made through regression, ANOVA, HLM or LGM. But researchers early stressed that patterns of aggression should be more important issue and aggressive researchers should explore the transitions of the patterns. We can recognize and intervene the aggressive behavior more comprehensively and adequately if we find the pattern of aggression. Despite several conclusions have been come through analyzing continuous variables, these conclusions are singular and tedious. In more specific terms, the researches adopted continuous variables can indicate the quantitative relationship or the change on the degree or the frequency of aggression. The current aggression research needs some conclusion from the perspective of categorical variables. Such study can show the pattern of aggression behavior. The latent class model and latent transition model that are new analysis method in psychological study, fortunately, can deal with the categorical variate and present the qualitative relationship and change. This study describes patterns of youth aggression and change in aggression profiles. 276 participants attend this longitudinal study. Aggression behaviors and friendship quality were assessed. Through recoding the aggressive scores, we get a set of dichotomous variables that indicated whether specific aggression behaviors is present or not. Latent class analysis was used to determine the aggressive pattern of youth, and latent transition analysis was used to examine the conditional probabilities of transitions in class membership between adjoin time. The results indicate that there are three aggressive patterns in adolescence and the transition of the patterns was rather steady. Three aggression patterns were defined as high aggressive, low aggressive and mixture pattern, respectively. The high aggressive pattern indicated that there are common more frequent behaviors in three aggression forms. On the contrary, there are common less frequent behaviors in three aggression forms. The mixture pattern is a special one where there weren’t consistent frequency in there aggression behavior. That is to say, some aggressive forms presented high frequency and even more frequent behavior than the high aggressive pattern. Meanwhile, other aggressive forms presented low frequency and even less frequent behavior than the low aggressive pattern. The majority of youth remained high aggressive and low aggressive pattern. There are high probability that low aggressive pattern transited to high aggressive pattern, mixture pattern transited to low aggressive pattern or high aggressive pattern. Importantly, there is gender difference in the conditional probabilities of transition of aggressive patterns. The girls maintain mixture and low aggressive pattern more steady than boys. Conflict resolution can predict positively the stability of low aggressive pattern and predict negatively the stability of high aggressive pattern. In future, more factors can influence the class and the transition probability should be added to the study for undrstanding the adolescent aggression in-depth and comprehensively. Related Articles | Metrics

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A Multi-level Research on Class-teachers’ Influence on Students in Terms of Affective Quality in Primary and Middle Schools WANG junshan Liu Wei 2014, 37(5): 1174-1179.  Abstract ( )   PDF (5292KB) ( )   It is of great significance to pay close attention to and cultivate individual’s affective quality under the background of developing a harmonious society and, some major investigations offer a general picture about the development of students’ affective quality in primary and middle schools. Though students’ affective quality is influenced by many factors from schools, families and society , the role school education plays should be given top priority. In school education, classes are the basic units for students , and class-teachers play an essential role of educating. Therefore, it is typical and necessary to explore the effects of class-teachers’ affective quality on students. Affective quality of primary and middle school Class-teachers refers to the positive and mental characteristic that is relatively stable and essential and in accordance with their working features. It is developed by teachers in practice and influenced by various factors before and after they start working. Class-teachers with different affective quality have different impacts on students, while the degree of the impact should be founded on empirical evidence. . For the fact that there is a nested relation between each individual and his class, it is more scientific and reasonable to adopt the method of hierarchical linear model on the study. By means of the stratified sampling, the research samples 12 schools and 178 classes from a district in Shanghai and the subjects are students (4921 ) and their class-teachers. The survey instruments include Questionnaire on Youth’s Affective Quality, Questionnaire on Class-teachers’ Affective Quality in the Primary and Middle Schools and Questionnaire on Class Atmosphere. Questionnaire on Youth’s Affective Quality is selected works, which consists of six sub-questionnaires, fifteen sub-dimensions and 57 items. Class-teachers’ Affective Quality in the Primary and Middle Schools is made by the teachers themselves and consists of six sub-questionnaires, nineteen sub-dimensions and 78 items. Questionnaire on Class Atmosphere is adapted compilation ,which consists of five dimensions and 23 items. All the questionnaires have good reliability and validity and, the consistency reliability of these questionnaires are 0.93 ,0.96 and 0.92 respectively. The data are analyzed by means of SPSS21.0 and the results are as follows: 1) There are obvious discrepancies among different classes on students’ affective quality. 2) On the level of each individual, the class atmosphere ( relationship between teachers and students, inner experience, relationship among classmates, class discipline , class environment )felt by students predicts significantly students’ affective quality. 3) On the level of classes, affective quality of class-teachers predicted significantly the difference of students from different classes, but it does not reveal the same effect on teacher- student relationship, inner experience, and class discipline . This investigation supplies crucially important first-hand material on how to improve the affective quality of students as well as the influence from class-teachers and class atmosphere. Related Articles | Metrics

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The Research Situation and Development Tendency of School Bonding 2014, 37(5): 1180-1184.  Abstract ( )   PDF (5074KB) ( )   School bonding refers to the “connections” that youth have with their schools and various aspects of their academic lives. It focuses on three dimensions: attachment to school, attachment to personnel and school commitment, generally reflecting the sense of belonging and identity, school safety, feeling like that they are part of the school and are cared for by others at the school. The relevance of school bonding to students’ lives is highlighted in studies showing that school connectedness makes a unique contribution to student outcomes even after considering family and peer connectedness. So it is generally accepted that school connectedness is associated with better academic outcomes and fewer behavioral and emotional problems and it exerts a profound effect in promoting student development and preventing health risk behaviors. This paper mainly reviews conceptualizations, measurements and influence factors of school bonding, and also intends to offer recommendations for the future research. Hirschi’s social control theory was one of the first comprehensive conceptualizations of school bonding, he initially outlined four elements of social bonds: attachment, commitment, involvement and belief. But Social Development Theory describes connectedness as the result of a process that begins with the student’s perception of opportunities for involvement with others and their social environment. Although researchers have different opinions of school bonding, it’s also having some consistent themes, such as student’s sense of belonging, teacher support, fair and effective discipline. Self-report is the most often used method in the assessment of school bonding. This paper mainly introduces some representative scales, such as Effective School Battery Scale, Psychological Sense of School Membership Scale and so on. Discussion of the scales will focus on the dimensions assessed and the depth and complexity of assessment. The article also discussed the influence factors of school bonding, these influences could be grouped under several domains including teacher care, peer relations, broader school relationships, school disciplinary policies and practices, activities within the school’s guidance and counseling program, opportunities for talent development. In general, the main can be divided into three major factors, namely, school characteristics, individual characteristics and family background factors. Although a fairly consistent pattern emerged for most of the expected relations in school bonding, the research in this area can be further strengthened. The first major area is in the conceptualization of school bonding. Criteria should involve the inclusion of multiple dimensions and depth of dimension assessment. The development of a standardized measure of school bonding will be helpful in establishing and enforcing these criteria. The lack of empirical studies that focus specifically on positive outcomes is another area for improvement. Despite the tendency of research to focus on negative life outcomes for prevention efforts, more studies looking at the ability of school bonding to promote and strengthen positive life outcomes are needed. Finally, more information regarding developmental moderators of school bonding is clearly needed. Although there are good theoretical arguments, empirical studies comparing school bonding across developmental stages would add to the knowledge base. Improving what is known about the developmental variables associated with increases, decreases, and stability in school bonding is likely to provide clues about how to enhance quality of life for youth. Related Articles | Metrics

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The Effect of Words Position on the Allocation of Study Time under Different Learning Goals 2014, 37(5): 1185-1189.  Abstract ( )   PDF (4615KB) ( )   As one of the important indicators that reflect how learners adjust and control their study, study time allocation is an important issue in the field of meta-memory study. How people allocate study time? Agenda-Based Regulation proposed by Ariel, Dunlosky and Bailey(2009), assumes that learners construct and execute agendas which play a core role in study time allocation. According to the ABR (Agenda–Based Regulation) framework, “learners develop an agenda on how to allocate time to various study items and use this agenda when selecting items for study. Like many other theories of regulation, the ABR model assumes that study regulation is goal-oriented” A critical assumption is that when learners develop an agenda, they do so to maximize the likelihood of obtaining their goals efficiently. An agenda or plan—describes the criteria used to decide which items to select for study or how long to study a given item, and the criteria are chosen based on any number of learner characteristics and task constraints. Given that both agenda construction and execution occur within the focus of attention, capacity limitations can influence effective agenda use. Learners who have deficient central-executive processes may have difficulties constructing and executing agendas. Such difficulties would arise when learners do not inhibit task-irrelevant thoughts or when the number of relevant task constraints and agenda criteria exceeds their capacity. In either case, agenda-relevant information would not be maintained in the focus of attention, which in turn would compromise goal attainment. Even a relatively simple agenda may be difficult to execute when goal-irrelevant information arises internally or from the environment. When the limits of the central executive have been exceeded, habitual responses may gain control of Study time allocation. Habitual responses are triggered by the stimulus environment and are not voluntarily controlled. At present, the research on study time allocation focuses on two aspects: intrinsic mechanism and influencing factors of study time allocation. This study aims to reveal the effect of words position on study time allocation, that is, words position has effect on the study time allocation. It further explores the relationship between the effect of words position on study time allocation and ABR, so as to provide theory basis for the intervention and guidance of study time allocation. Using Metcalf’s paradigm, one experiment was conducted in present research to examine the effect of words position on study time allocation in condition of different learning goals. The result revealed that in condition of high learning targets, the words position effect on study time allocation was found. Learners tended to learn the items on the left firstly, then the items in the middle, finally the items on the right. However, in condition of low learning targets, there is no words position effect on study time allocation. Learners gave preference to easy items, followed by medium-difficulty items and finally difficult items. These and other outcomes have shown that the agenda-driven and habitual response are two cognitive mechanisms that affect the allocation of study time, and people will be use agenda-driven or habitual reaction to the allocation of study time, with minimal effort to achieve learning goals. Related Articles | Metrics

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Implicit Strategy Generates from Practice: its Genetic Process and Application De-Ming SHU Dian-Zhi LIU 2014, 37(5): 1190-1196.  Abstract ( )   PDF (5603KB) ( )   In the field of learning, strategy is usually defined as a specific conscious processing adopted by individuals. However, recent studies on implicit learning have found that strategies can be acquired unconsciously. The present study aims to investigate the using of implicit strategy in adults and its detailed genetic process evidenced in both behavioral and ERP data. Adapted from Siegler and Svetina’s study（2006）, in the present study, the experimental process was consisted of 8 sections. Algorithm problems (e.g., “27 +15”, “45 +17”, “67 +74”, “44 +52” and “33 +21”, all were in white font with a black background) were presented randomly or pseudo-randomly with a visual angle of 4.70°×1.24°. The presentation of the algorithm problems lasted 1000ms, following a fixation time of 500ms. The implicit strategy in section 1, 2, 3, 4, and 7 was set as that “if the sum of two numbers is even or larger than 100, then it is the target”. Notably, section 5 was designed to test whether the abovementioned implicit strategy had been generated from the previous 4 section training. Section 6 was set as the practice section for a new implicit strategy, while section 8 was designed to test the application of this new implicit strategy. In the 1-5 sections of the experimental process, the subjects were asked to press a key as soon as possible if the sum of the addition algorithm was greater than 90 and less than 100. In the sections 6 to 8, the subjects were asked to press a key as soon as possible if the sum of the addition algorithm was greater than 80 and less than 90. In the results, both behavioral and ERP data revealed regular changes in the subjects following repeated practice. In the behavioral data, the main effects of Section on error rate (p < .01) and response time (p < .05) were significant. Post-hoc analysis showed that both error rate and reaction time varied across experimental sections, with a significant increase in section 5 and a significant decrease in section 7. In the ERP data, a significant main effect of Section on P200 peak latency was found [F(7,112)=2.53, p< .05], with the post-hoc paired comparisons revealing a significant difference between section 4 and 5 (p< .05). Marginally significant main effects of Section on the peak to peak amplitude of P200 and N100 (p= .067) were also found. Averaged P200 and N100 peak value increased over section 1 to 4, while decreased in section 5. This pattern was contrary to the pattern of reaction time and error rate over section 1 to 5. Additionally, a significant main effect of Section (p < .01) was found on the peak latency of N400. The results support the hypotheses that implicit strategies can be generated and applied unconsciously through practice in adults. The generic process of implicit strategy can not only be revealed in the traditional behavioral data such as reaction time and error rate, but also shown in task-induced ERP components, such as P200 and N400 peak latency, P200 peak value, and N400 peak value. The results also suggest that an implicit strategy generated in a specific condition can only be partly transferred to a new condition. Similar to explicit strategies, implicit strategies are deficient in the process of utilization and transfer. Related Articles | Metrics

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Emotional competence: a new research perspective of teachers’ emotion lian rong 2014, 37(5): 1197-1203.  Abstract ( )   PDF (6948KB) ( )   Abstract：Increasing researches indicates that the emotional competence（EC）of teachers is important to students, teaching, even the teacher themselves. Firstly, the teacher who has high EC will boost his/her students’ learning and personal development. Secondly, this kind of teacher has a good teaching effect. Finally, high EC has a positive effect both on teachers’ work and life. The purpose of this study is to review the limited literature on teachers’ EC. First of all, a multi-perspective on concept is described. Emotional intelligence（EI）is a similar term with EC, there is not an apparent distinction between EI and EC however. The use of the two terms can be divided into three kinds recently: the first kind of researchers regard EI and EC as two different concepts; the second one concern that the two terms have the same connotation, but they have favorite term respectively; the third kind of scholars propose a convergence of EI and EC. After this, the existing literatures on correlation between EC and some working variables and EC intervention are reviewed. The correlational study is a main content in this field, and the relevant variables involve teachers’ burnout, job satisfaction, self-efficacy, life satisfaction, achievement motivation and moral reasoning, etc. Above all of them, the relevant researches between teachers’ EC and teachers’ burnout, job satisfaction and self-efficacy are introduced. First of all, many studies find that teachers’ EC has a negative correlation with job burnout, and one component of EC——emotion regulation ability plays the most important role in it. Besides, a research from Hong Kong finds that the effect of EC on burnout has a temporal relation. Emotional exhaustion, influenced by emotional appraisal and positive regulation, was causally prior to depersonalization and personal accomplishment, but personal accomplishment could develop relatively independently from the burnout components through the influence of positive utilization of emotions. On the contrary, it finds a positive correlation between both EC and job satisfaction and EC and self-efficacy. It means that the higher EC, the higher job satisfaction and self-efficacy. The latent reasons behind them are analyzed in this part. To the study of the intervention of teachers’ EC, three problems are listed: the study of teachers’ EC achieves increasing attention, the intervention is often overlooked however; there is a dispute over the extent to which the intervention can improve, some find an increase after intervention, however some find little effect; there is little standardized intervention program of teachers’ EC, and it is difficult to put it into effect. Finally we recommend two intervention program——“The Emotionally Intelligent Teacher” and mindfulness and meditation. At the end of the study, three problems of current studies are posed: first, the non-unified concept hinders the progress of relevant study for the reason that it’s difficult to compare results among different researches; second, we advise a multiple perspective over correlational variables which should include both cognitive and non-cognitive variables, rather than a single visual angle on non-cognitive variable; finally, the scientificity of intervention is expected to improve in the future. Related Articles | Metrics

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Internalized Homophobia and Subjective Well-being among Young Gay Men: The Mediating Effect of Self-esteem and Loneliness 2014, 37(5): 1204-1211.  Abstract ( )   PDF (7406KB) ( )   Nowadays, as the topic of homosexuality becomes more public, mental health of homosexuals gains more and more attention. Scholars paid close attention to the impact of social prejudice on gay men and lesbians’ mental health, and they posited that homosexuals have high prevalence of mental disorders. Internalized homophobia refers to the gay person’s direction of negative social attitudes toward the self. It stems from social prejudice, and it reflects the degree to which a gay man internalized anti-homosexual sentiments of heterosexual society. So it is rooted in culture and it isn’t a personal trait. Minority stress model posits that internalized homophobia is an inner stressor which requires individuals to mobilize all kinds of resources to adapt, so it is a significant predictor of one's mental health, and there exists many factors which play the mediating role between them. However, there were still some limitations in previous researches. Firstly, no study explored the impact of Chinese culture on young gay men's internalized homophobia; Secondly, researches about the relations between internalized homophobia and positive psychological adaption were limited; At last, it is necessary to understand gay men's mental health from more general psychological process. This research is aimed at achieving three goals: (1) Explore the level of Chinese young gay men’s internalized homophobia. (2)Investigate the relations between internalized homophobia and subjective well-being. (3)Examine self-esteem and loneliness’s mediating roles between internalized homophobia and subjective well-being. A total of web-based sample of 249 young gay men were enrolled. They were 16-30 years old and all of them were the generation after 80s or 90s. Internalized homophobia was assessed with Internalized Homophobia Scale (for male respondents), this research indicated that Chinese version of IHP has acceptable reliability and validity. It consists of 8 items. Each item is administered with 1-5 point ranging from “strongly disagree” to “strongly agree”. Self-esteem was examined by the Rosenberg Self-esteem Scale which comprises 10 items. Loneliness was assessed with UCLA Loneliness Scale (the third version) which consists of 20 statements. Subjective well-being was rated by Affect Balance Scale and Life Satisfaction Scale. They comprise 20 items and 5 items respectively. The results indicated that: (1)The degree of Chinese young gay men internalized homophobia was a litter lower than moderate level, and a large proportion of young gay men had no internalized homophobia;(2) Internalized homophobia was negatively correlated with positive affect and life satisfaction, and it was positively correlated with negative affect; (3) Self-esteem and loneliness played a completely mediating role in the relations between internalized homophobia and subjective well-being; (4)Internalized homophobia had an effect on loneliness through self-esteem, and it also had an effect on subjective well-being through loneliness. These findings highlight that young gay men doesn’t necessarily exist high mental disorders, and they remind us that there exists some common psychological mechanisms between homosexuals and the average people. Moreover, much can be done to improve young gay men’s subjective well-being from the perspective of attitudes toward their own sexual orientation, and general psychological process such as self-esteem and loneliness should also be considered. The present study contributes to promote our understanding of psychological characteristics of Chinese young gay men, and it is beneficial to improve young gay men’s mental health. Related Articles | Metrics

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Social Class and Prosocial Behavior: The Moderating Effects of Return Prediction 2014, 37(5): 1212-1219.  Abstract ( )   PDF (8133KB) ( )   An individual’s social class is a context rooted in both the material substance of social life (wealth, education, work) and the individual’s construal of his or her class rank, and is a core aspect of how he or she thinks of the self and relates to the social world. In psychological science, research has shown that social class influences a lot of domains that include language (Bernstein, 1971), aesthetic preferences (Snibbe &Markus, 2005), subjective well-being (Diener & Suh, 1997; Howell & Howell, 2008), physical health (Adler et al., 1994; Gallo & Matthews, 2003), and cognitive performance (Nisbett, 2008). It suggests that social class can shape the individual’s basic psychological processes and behaviour. In recent years, there have been quite a few researches on social class and prosocial behavior, but the results are controversial (Dovidio, Piliavin, Schroeder, & Penner, 2006; Sober & Wilson, 1998; Piff, Kraus, C?té, Cheng, & Keltner, 2010; Piff, Stancato, C?té, Mendoza-Denton, & Keltner, 2012 ; Stellar, Manzo, Kraus, & Keltner, 2012). Based on these findings, we argued that social class differences in prosocial behavior were associated with return prediction. To test the hypothesis mentioned above, the present study recruited 40 subjects who were all adults. Researchers made the experiment online, which was a 2 (social class: upper, lower) × 2 (return prediction: higher, lower) mixed-design, in which social class was a between-subjects variable, and explored the participants of different social classes in two return prediction inductions (high, low), the prosocial behavior variation, and the interaction. Firstly we filtered the subjects of 2 types based on their occupations. The simulation experiment is adapted from the famous “dictator game,” a single-trial economic game that yields a behavioral measure of generosity (Forsythe, Horowitz, Savin, & Sefton, 1994; Fowler & Kam,2007). In this game, participants were informed that they had been paired with an anonymous partner seated in a different room (Forsythe et al., 1994; Fowler & Kam, 2007). Participants were given 10 points and told that their task was to decide how many of these points they wanted to keep for themselves and how many (if any) they wanted to transfer to their partner. Participants were further told that their partner would have no strategic input into the game’s outcome, that their responses in the game would remain anonymous. They played this game with two different experiment assistants respectively. Every time before the game, the participants were informed that how many points does the experiment assistant give on average in the past experiments. Their gifts of the study would depend on how many points they had remaining. In the dictator game, higher allocations reflect higher levels of altruism in that they represent participants’ willingness to sacrifice their own material interests in favor of the well-being of their partner. The results indicated that: (1) different social classes have main effect on the prosocial behavior; (2)the main effect of return prediction was significant; (3)the interaction of social class and prosocial behavior is significant. There were no significant differences between social classes in higher return prediction, we found significant differences between social classes in lower return prediction. These findings not only high light the importance of the return prediction in social class differences in prosocial behavior, but also have important contributions to developing strategies in dealing with people． Related Articles | Metrics

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The Effect of Social Support and Personality on the Relaitionship Between Chinese Migrant Workers’ Income and Their Subjective Well-being 2014, 37(5): 1220-1224.  Abstract ( )   PDF (4483KB) ( )   In China, migrant workers as low income people enter the big cities for higer income since the reform and opening up, because they believe that higher income can bring more subujective well-being. Though most researches have comfirmed that income can increase subjective well-being, especially for low income people, there is a very complicated relation between them. For example, so-called “the paradox of happiness” suggests higher subjective well-being doesn’t necessarily result from higer income. So, some mediators and moderators maybe exist between income and subjective well-being. Previous researches have found that social support and personality are two predominant influence in the causation of subjective well-being, and there is a positive association between income and social support. On the ground of the above reasoning, the current study hypothesized that: (1) migrant workers’ income would directly influence their subjective well-being; (2) Social support would mediate the association between migrant workers’ income and subjective well-being; (3) Personality would moderate the association between migrant workers’ income and subjective well-being, (4) The medating effect of social support could be modeated by personality. Based on a sample of 452 migrant workers, the present study examined the associations between income, subjective well-being, social support and personality. Hierarchical regression analyses were applied to detect the effects of income on subjective well-being as well as the mediating role of social support and the moderating role of personality in the effects of income. Results indicated that after controlling for the effects of migrant workers gender, age and education, income displayed a main effect on subjective well-being. Social support served to mediate the association between income and subjective well-being, and neuroticism, extraversion and agreeableness moderate this association in that low neuroticism, low and middle extraversion and agreeableness predicted a positive association. The mediation of social support was moderated by social identity, i.e., social support was a moderated mediator. These findings suggested that the association between migrant workers’ income and subjective well-being is non-linear and indeterminate, but for most migrant workers, income is a very important factor to increase subjective well-being, especially when they can get social support from their environment. The present study contributes to the current literature and promotes our understanding of “the paradox of happiness” from the perspective of psychology. Related Articles | Metrics

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Man Proposes, God Disposes: Acculturation Strategies and the Effect of Belief in Negotiable Fate among Chinese New Generation of Migrant Workers 2014, 37(5): 1225-1231.  Abstract ( )   PDF (6289KB) ( )   International migration has become a topic of considerable interest to psychologists. At the same time, internal migration (mainly from rural areas to cities within countries) has become a world-wide phenomenon, and is particularly evident in Asia. In many cases, this internal migration has psychological and cultural features that parallel the features of acculturation that are characteristic of international migration (Berry, 2010). Acculturation is the process of cultural and psychological change that follows intercultural contact (Berry, 1997, 2003). This research examines the acculturation of migrant workers in China. High economic growth rate of China create a very large internal migration of workers from rural areas to the large industrial cities, and they were mostly born after 1980, i.e., the new generation of migrant workers. Conforming to the trend of acculturation research which from answering“How Adjusted Are You ?” to answering“How Do You Adjust ?”, one focus of this research is to explore the migrant workers’ acculturation strategies. Due to the Bi-dimensional Model of Acculturation, Berry(1997) proposed four acculturation strategies: Integration, when both cultural maintenance and cross-cultural engagement are valued; Separation, valuing cultural maintenance but not cross-cultural engagement; Assimilation, when cultural maintenance is not valued, but cross-cultural engagement is; and Marginalization, when neither cultural maintenance nor cross-cultural engagement are valued. In addition, rare study discussed which can influence their choice of strategies. Fate concept is an impossible impact factor, wherein, belief in negotiable fate refers to the belief that individuals can negotiate with fate for control, and they do this by exercising personal agency within the limits that fate has determined (Chaturvedi, Chiu, & Viswanathan, 2009). Who believes in negotiable fate tends to engage in active coping, focusing on solving the problem and mobilizing their social resources to achieve their goals (Au et al., 2012). The object of this research is to explore their acculturation strategies, which factors (here mainly refers to four fate concepts) affects their particular policy choice, and the relationship between these strategies and their degree of acculturation and subject well-being. 439 new generation migrant workers from rural areas to Zhuhai city and Ningbo city participated in the study. All participants completed a self-report questionnaire to measure their acculturation strategies (integration, assimilation, separation, and marginalization), fate concept (negotiable fate, control fate, conquerable fate, and dialectical fate), and two life outcomes including degree of acculturation and subjective well-being. The results showed that: (1) the integration is the main used acculturation strategies, and the negotiable fate is the main held fate concept in new generation of migrant workers; (2) the negotiable fate can predict integration strategy positively, predict separation and marginalization strategies negatively; (3) the integration is the best acculturation strategy (and the separation the worst) for achieving better degree of acculturation and wellbeing; (4) the positive effect of negotiable fate on degree of acculturation and wellbeing can be totally mediated by the more use of integration strategy and the less use of separation and marginalization strategies. Similarly, the negative effect of control fate on adaptation is fully mediated by the more use of separation and marginalization strategies. In the future, longitudinal study of acculturation strategies and their correlates would promise to answer a number of theoretically and practically interesting questions. The influencing mechanism of fate concept on acculturation strategies remains to be studied. Meanwhile, researches on the effectiveness of acculturation training may benefit to new generation of migrant workers in China. Related Articles | Metrics

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Employees’ Core Self-evaluation and Life Satisfaction: The Mediating Role of Perceived Social Support 2014, 37(5): 1232-1237.  Abstract ( )   PDF (5632KB) ( )   Life satisfaction reflects people’s life quality from subjective side. However, the existing researches mostly focus on the elderly, adolescents and those with physical or mental disorders, but few researches conducted on normal adults. Core self-evaluation is an advanced concept of personality, composed of four general concepts which are self-esteem, general self-efficacy, emotional stability and internal control. Many researches showed that core self-evaluation can effectively predicted people’s life satisfaction. However, few researches explored the mechanism how core self-evaluation predict people’s life satisfaction. Getting insight into people’s satisfaction of specific field in the life, we hypothesized core self-evaluation can not only directly affect life satisfaction, but also indirectly affect life satisfaction on the basis of the mediating effect of perceived social support, as from different sources, the perceived social support can have different effect. The purpose of this study was to explore the relationship between core self-evaluation and life satisfaction of employees, as well as test the mediating effects of perceived social support from different sources between the core self-evaluations and life satisfaction in different fields. There were 245 employees to participate in this study. CFA and structural equation modeling were used to test the theoretical model. The results indicated that: (1) core self-evaluation directly and positively predicted job satisfaction and self satisfaction; (2) family support fully mediated the relationship between the core self-evaluation and family satisfaction, and partially mediated core self-evaluation and self satisfaction; friend support fully mediated core self-evaluation and friend satisfaction. From the perspective of perceived social support from different sources, this study explored the mechanism how employees’ core self-evaluation predict their life satisfaction in different fields. It has shown that core self-evaluations directly affect non-relational life satisfaction, while indirectly affect relational life satisfaction on the basis of some kind of perceived social support’s mediating effect. It revealed that the different areas of life satisfaction shouldn’t be treated as the same. Greater influence of personality would work for non-relational life satisfaction, but the family harmony, being understood, and other support is significant for relational life satisfaction. The result of this study makes a contribution to further deepen the understanding of the mechanism of how the core self-evaluation effects on life satisfaction, and also can give some advices to increase life satisfaction and subjective well-being of employees. Related Articles | Metrics

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The Affect Heuristic in Judgment and Decision Making 2014, 37(5): 1238-1244.  Abstract ( )   PDF (7359KB) ( )   The affect heuristic refers to that people consult the positive and negative feelings consciously or unconsciously associated with the mental representations of the task in the process of making a judgment or decision. In the current paper, we first introduced the definition and importance of affect heuristic. Then we reviewed studies on the affect heuristic, Summarizes its psychological mechanisms and some factors. At the end of the paper, we gave several suggestions regarding to the directions for future research. Just as imaginability, memorability, and similarity serve as cues for probability judgments (e.g., the availability and representativeness heuristics), affect may serve as a cue for many important judgments. Affect may also serve as a cue for many important judgments and decisions (Kahneman, 2003). Affective responses tend to occur rapidly and automatically. As such, using an overall, readily available affective impression can be quicker and easier—and thus sometimes more efficient—than weighing the pros and cons or retrieving relevant examples from memory, especially when the required judgment or decision is complex or cognitive resources are limited. Researchers have noted that the affect heuristic is widespread in consuming decisions, environment protections, financial investments and justice field. Psychological mechanisms of affect heuristic mainly include affect heuristic model (AHM) and dual-process theory. According to AHM, individual’cognition for risks and gains is always associated with the affect evaluation when judging risks and gains of behaviors. That is, when certain behaviors are perceived “like”, it may be regarded as low-risk and high-income. It may be considered as high-risk and low-income when certain behaviors are perceived “dislike”. Thus AHM shows that in process of cognition for risk behaviors, affect evaluation comes first, and judgment of risks and gains follows. Dual-process theory argues that there are two systems to work in processing information, experiential system and rational system. Experiential system mainly rely on intuitions which need no or less psychological resources, resulting in a faster pace, however, rational system is dependent on reasoning which employ more psychological resources, resulting in a slower pace. Since affect play a direct role in processing information, our brains tend to base a quick determination on affect and experience, which means affect heuristic. Past researches have shown affect heuristic shaped by other factors as well, like individual experience, time pressure, evaluability, counting ability and so forth. There is considerable evidence that judgments and decisions are often based on an affect heuristic. However, we know surprisingly little about why people are more likely to rely on this heuristic (Paulus & Yu, 2012). Future research can employ decision-making task on populations of different evolutionary degree from perspective of evolution and analyze the extent to which the emotion involves in to explore the process of affect heuristic, thus deeply understanding the generation mechanism of affect heuristic. In addition, we can also deeply explore the correlation between areas such as amygdala, hippocampus, ACC, ventromedial striatum and affect heuristic as well as further extending the application of affect heuristic in individual and group. Related Articles | Metrics

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The Influence of Wording effects on the Reliability and Criteria Validity of Personality Tests—— the Core Self-Evaluation Scale (CSES) as an example Zhong-Lin WEN 2014, 37(5): 1245-1252.  Abstract ( )   PDF (6356KB) ( )   When developing self-report questionnaires, researchers usually include negatively worded items to prevent response bias, such as acquiescence, affirmation, and agreement bias. Yet this strategy that blends positively worded items with negatively worded items may lead to the method effect associated with item wording, which is systematic variance caused by the difference between the positive and negative item wording but irrelevant to the intended content. The method effect associated with item wording may lower the correlations between positively and negatively worded items, leading some personality inventories’ one-factor structure poorly fitted. In the applications, however, researchers often overlook the testing and controlling of the wording effects, either directly construct a one-factor model, or calculate the total score as a manifest variable, then conduct correlational studies (e.g., the analysis of mediator and moderator effects). This may not only inaccurately estimate the reliability, but also impact the correlations between the target trait and other variables (refer to the Criterion-Related Validity), resulting in misleading conclusions. From the perspective of statistical analysis, the model with wording effects is a special bifactor model. The target trait is a general factor, which explains the content variance of all the items, and the positively wording effect and negatively wording effect are two group factors, accounting for the method variance among the positively worded items or negatively worded items. Due to the orthogonality of the general factor and group factors, the item response variance can be partitioned into variance explained by the general factor(trait variance), variance explained by group factors(method variance) and error variance, so researchers can compute the homogeneity coefficient and evaluate the impact of the wording effect on a unidimensional measurement model.. Taking the Core Self-Evaluation Scale (CSES) as an example, the current research aimed to explore the impact of wording effects on the reliability and validity of personality tests. A questionnaire including CSES, Positive and Negative Affect Scale (PANAS), and the Satisfaction With Life Scale (SWLS) was administered to 340 “Ant tribe”. Two models were compared: one-factor model, and a bifactor model with a negatively worded group factor. Results suggested that the bifactor model with a negatively wording group factor was the best representive of CSES data, that is, there was a method factor accounting for the method variance among the negatively worded items over and above the general trait factor. Moreover, the impact of negatively wording effects on the reliability and criteria-related validity of CSES was non-ignorable. The ignorance of negatively wording effects might overestimate the homogeneity reliability of CSES, and the correlation between CSE and negative affect, but underestimate the correlations among life satisfaction, positive affect and CSE. How to remove the effect of the contamination? When designing scales, researchers should use neutrally worded items whose valence is least extreme. Moreover, the use of bipolar items instead of unipolar items may get rid of the wording effects to some degree. As for those published personality scales, we have to embrace and control it using the Correlated-Trait Correlated-Method(CTCM) or Correlated-Trait Correlated-Uniqueness(CTCU) method. Researchers should estimate both bifactor and unidimensional models, compare variables’ loadings on the general factor resulting from the bifactor model with those resulting from the unidimensional model, and report the homogeneity coefficient of the bifactor model. If variables’ loadings on the general factor resulting from the bifactor model are compatible with those in the unidimensional model, and the homogeneity coefficient of the bifactor model is large enough (> 0.8), it is reasonable to directly compute the total scores and use the unidimensional model for further analysis. Conversely, it is necessary to include the wording effect into the model for accurate estimates. Related Articles | Metrics

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The Case’s Change Process in Counseling: From the Perspective of Assimilation Model Guang-Rong JIANG Ting LU 2014, 37(5): 1253-1260.  Abstract ( )   PDF (6943KB) ( )   Abstract Assimilation model is a theoretical model concerning the change process of psychotherapy, which put forward by William B. Stiles and colleagues. The model suggested that, in successful psychotherapy, clients followed a regular developmental sequence of resolving the problematic experiences that they brought into treatment. According to the assimilation model, the change process of psychotherapy undergoes eight predictable stages. The presence of the eight stages and their developmental process has been empirically supported by a series of studies which conducted by foreign researchers. To verify the model, a case study of a girl, who gained success of change after 8 sessions, was conducted with assimilation analysis. The client’s name is Li Sha (a pseudonym), she presented with sleeping problems and a lack of motivation at work. After eight sessions, she gained a successful change. Her sleeping problem was alleviated, she could allow herself slow down, and she learned to take care of her needs. In her own words that she has learned to balance the needs of herself and others, do what she could do. Three investigators read and reread transcripts of different sessions of the therapy, tracked 2 major themes, one theme was called “must strong and be perfect — slow down and keep peace” and the other was “must take care of the others, others important than me — take care of my needs”. According to the themes, three investigators excerpted 68 relevant passages, rated each passage according to the Assimilation of Problematic Experiences Scale (APES) and the Markers of Assimilation Manual. To increase the rigor of the qualitative case study methodology, we chose three independent raters who were not familiar with assimilation model rated the passages (taken out of context and randomly ordered). The consensus ratings of the three independent raters were highly correlated with the investigators’ consensus ratings (0.90 and 0.85), so the reliability of the investigators’ ratings was high. The ratings of assimilation tended to increase across the session process (the correlation coefficient were 0.89 and 0.91, respectively), which demonstrated the APES’s construct validity. For the limitation of the length of the article, only the first theme’s passages were presented to illustrate the assimilation process of Li Sha’s problematic voice named “slow down and keep peace” by her dominant voice named “must strong and be perfect”, yielding a more complex and flexible self community. These passages demonstrated the eight predictable stages of resolving the problematic experiences. Consistent with the assimilation model’s conception of successful psychotherapy, the APES ratings for each of Li Sha’s two themes tended to increase across her 8 sessions. The high correlation with the independent raters’ consensus ratings suggested that the investigators’ consensus ratings were not unduly influenced by their theoretical expectations. These results verified and modified the assimilation model again, and lead to more capacity to generalize the model. The results strengthen the efficacy of the model which claiming to be pan-theoretical and to apply to successful psychotherapy in general. Related Articles | Metrics

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Testing the Rice Theory 2014, 37(5): 1261-1262.  Abstract ( )   PDF (1839KB) ( )   Related Articles | Metrics

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The Development and Prospect of Researches on Influencing Factors and Mechanism of Game Decision-Making 2014, 37(5): 1271-1278.  Abstract ( )   PDF (8347KB) ( )   Game decision-making is the behavioral decision-making in the Game context which includes the interdependence interests of two or more participants. In recent years, game decision-making gradually entered into the field of psychology, and attracted more and more attention, has now become a hot topic in decision-making psychology research field. This paper gave a brief review about the influence factors of game decision-making and achievements in studies about neurophysiological mechanism related to game decision-making. Based on the reviews, some suggestions on further research orientation were given. 　　Recently, there are fruitful research results in influencing factors of game decision-making research field. There are many main influencing factors, including age, gender, culture, population size and structure, kinship-proximity-friendship, emotion, justice and equality, reciprocity and trust, personality and value orientation, perspective-taking and probabilistic reasoning, the Territorial Prior-Residence Effect and the Right Cognition Effect. Especially, the scope of the study on emotional influencing factors has extended from specific emotion to emotional expression and emotion management. Focusing on the impact of emotional expression on game decision-making symbolizes a breakthrough in the study of game decision-making in the overseas. For this reason, the interpretation of interpersonal process in dynamic game get further deepen and detail. This research field acquired some important conclusions, such as expressing negative emotions was equivalent to doing the rejection during game decision making. Based on above results, Van Kleef and his colleagues developed a model named Emotion as Social Information Model. They use this model to illustrate people how to process the other’s emotion expression, and explain the interpersonal effect of emotion how to impact on people’s game decision-making. In addition, Right Cognition Effect, which was discovered in bargain game, provides a good explanation for people’s non-rational decision in bargain game. 　　The researches of game decision-making neurophysiological mechanism originates from the research field of Neuroeconomics. The rapid development of researches of game decision-making neurophysiological mechanism not only has provided more objective and reliable data, but also has linked all sorts of theoretical hypotheses to specific brain mechanisms and externally- observable behaviors. It provides a new pathway for research of game decision-making. The neural mechanism researches of game decision-making mainly adopt advanced techniques of brain electrical activity and brain imaging, including fMRI, PET, ERPs and EEG. On one hand, the neural basis evidences of irrational decision-making and social preferences in individual decision making were also found. On the other hand, the neural basis evidences of relationship between game decision-making and related cognition abilities were found. In addition, game decision-making researchers have found the neural basis evidences about the mechanisms of affecting factors. While researchers exploring the related brain areas of game decision-making, the impact of hormones on game decision-making has also caused concern for biochemical mechanisms of game decision-making. Based on the combing and thinking on the existing research results, suggestions for further research orientations of game decision research field were given as follows. First of all, to strengthen the researches on internal mechanism of game decision, and to construct a comprehensive theoretical model. Secondly, to improve research paradigms of game decision, and strengthen the investigation of a variety of paradigms. Thirdly, to strengthen the function mechanism research of related cognition abilities. Fourthly, to strengthen the function mechanism investigation of related emotion abilities. Fifthly, to strengthen the cross-culture and interculture comparison researches about the impacts of language and other influencing factors on game decision-making. The last, to develop the applied and training researches. Because the applied research and training research are sorely lacking in game decision-making research field, although some studies showed that even the young children already had the physical and mental foundation for accepting the game decision cognition abilities training and game strategies education. Related Articles | Metrics