Acquisition Of New Information Research Articles

Information flow principles for plasticity in foraging robot swarms

An important characteristic of a robot swarm that must operate in the real world is the ability to cope with changeable environments by exhibiting behavioural plasticity at the collective level. For example, a swarm of foraging robots should be able to repeatedly reorganise in order to exploit resource deposits that appear intermittently in different locations throughout their environment. In this paper, we report on simulation experiments with homogeneous foraging robot teams and show that analysing swarm behaviour in terms of information flow can help us to identify whether a particular behavioural strategy is likely to exhibit useful swarm plasticity in response to dynamic environments. While it is beneficial to maximise the rate at which robots share information when they make collective decisions in a static environment, plastic swarm behaviour in changeable environments requires regulated information transfer in order to achieve a balance between the exploitation of existing information and exploration leading to acquisition of new information. We give examples of how information flow analysis can help designers to decide on robot control strategies with relevance to a number of applications explored in the swarm robotics literature.

Choice reversal in management decisions: the seductive force of new information

The way in which objectively similar information is presented influences the direction of choice and decisions. Therefore, the sequential order in which information is presented to managers may have a relevant impact on how this information is perceived and evaluated. This study examines the consequences of information pursuit on judgment and decision making (JDM) in managerial decision making. In four experimental JDM-scenarios information pursuit was realised by a step-by-step approach with a time delay in which one group had the option of waiting for additional, non-instrumental information. Results indicate that the acquisition of new information, even if it is non-instrumental, leads to choice reversals (in one out of two scenarios) or to choice enhancement (in one out of two scenarios). In line with social psychology theories, we argue that the mental costs of information gathering lets participants believe that this information is more relevant than the already known facts. Our findings contribute to managerial JDM literature and indicate that cognitive dissonance and self-affirmation can significantly impact choices and decisions during information pursuit.

Differences in learning and memory of host plant features between specialist and generalist phytophagous insects

Insects are able to learn from experience acquired in their natal habitat, thereby obtaining adaptive advantages. However, the acquisition of new information could involve defects in retrieving previously learned information (i.e. forgetting), a process known as retroactive interference, which diminishes learning capacities. In this study, we evaluated the learning capacity and the impact of retroactive interference during host searching by ecological specialist and generalist phytophagous insects. We examined whether the generalist aphid, Myzus persicae s. str., and the tobacco-specialized subspecies, Myzus persicae nicotianae differ in (1) learning capacity, or (2) retroactive interference during host selection, and (3) whether the learning-associated foraging gene (for) is differentially expressed. Differences in learning capacity and retroactive interference were assessed in bioassays using rearing hosts and alternative hosts followed by choices between or transferences to rearing or alternative hosts. During the pre-alighting phase of host searching, the generalist aphid showed attraction to the alternative host after 12 h of experience, while the specialist showed no attraction to the alternative host regardless of the amount of time on the plant. The retroactive interference experiments showed that when aphids were exposed to an alternative host for different periods, odour attraction to the rearing host persisted in the generalist after 72 h of experience on the alternative host, whereas in the specialist the attraction to the rearing host was lost after 12 h of experience on the alternative host. During the post-alighting phase of host searching, both taxa performed better on their rearing hosts, but in the specialist aphid, a short period on the alternative host reversed this behaviour. In addition, the specialist showed lower levels of gene for expression, which could be associated with the differences in learning performance. Herein we present further evidence of differences in learning capacities between a specialist and a generalist aphid, which may influence the process of host searching and evolution of ecological specialization.

DIGITAL TOOLS IN ACQUISITION OF THEMES ABOUT ETHNICALLY VARIED CULTURE ENVIRONMENT OF LATGALE

The object of the particular research is involvement of students in informative stockbuilding of a regional museum during research practice. The aim of the research is to carry out evaluation of this form of involvement and its advantages: using discourse analysis (Jean Liotard); putting forward particular indicators; as well as applying several communication theories (Nikolai Nikishin, Yuri Lotman, Peter van Mensch); and regarding virtual museum as a special communication system based on non-verbal communication of visitors with exhibits. Possible benefits of the museum in this evaluation are of minor importance. The most significant aspect is to reveal student's (museum employee’s during the research practice) as 'sender’s' role in cognition and non-verbal communication with the addressee or the museum visitor. It is demonstrated in coordinated and still independent work, frequently oriented towards self-initiative, creative solutions based on particular knowledge and simultaneously initiating acquisition of new information, as well as promoting development of skills. These skills include communicating with an interviewee; carrying out content analysis of media text, identifying features of stereotypical thinking; creating brief but still informatively capacious description of an exhibit. The use of digital tools during the study process is completely related to scientific activities of academic staff in the implementation of research projects oriented towards innovations as well as provision of stable feedback. If the research is carried out in tight relationship of scientists and students; everyone wins: students help academic staff (thus create conditions for their own research), carry out creative work, make own discoveries, because materials necessary for research are already collected and accordingly supplied; while academic staff develops students' professional competences by coordinating practical work, following their theoretical knowledge, skills and abilities, promoting creative solutions and thus educate new generation of scientists tempered in performing preparatory actions and open for innovations, elaboration and implementation of own creative research projects.

The Challenges of Adult Education in the Modern World

In the modern world humans need to be able to deal with uncertainty and to give up what is not functional. Thus, informational learning, which is meant as the acquisition of new information by addition, hardly answers this challenge. The learners need to not only acquire new knowledge, but they also need to assess and change their assumptions regarding an issue at hand, at this point transformative learning occurs.One of the methods through which transformative learning could be unearthed is the contact with art (aesthetic experience) which offers a variety of meanings and symbols that may allow the learners to articulate delicate meanings on a certain issue which may not be easily approached through rational argumentation.

Olfactory memory networks: from emotional learning to social behaviors.

EDITORIAL article Front. Behav. Neurosci., 17 February 2015Sec. Learning and Memory Volume 9 - 2015 | https://doi.org/10.3389/fnbeh.2015.00036

Nuclear factor kappa B-dependent Zif268 expression in hippocampus is required for recognition memory in mice

Long-term memory formation requires gene expression after acquisition of new information. The first step in the regulation of gene expression is the participation of transcription factors (TFs) such as nuclear factor kappa B (NF-кB), which are present before the neuronal activity induced by training. It was proposed that the activation of these types of TFs allows a second step in gene regulation by induction of immediate-early genes (IEGs) whose protein products are, in turn, TFs. Between these IEGs, zif268 has been found to play a critical role in long-term memory formation and reprocessing after retrieval. Here we found in mice hippocampus that, on one hand, NF-кB was activated 45min after training in a novel object recognition (NOR) task and that inhibiting NF-кB immediately after training by intrahippocampal administration of NF-кB Decoy DNA impaired NOR memory consolidation. On the other hand, Zif268 protein expression was induced 45min after NOR training and the administration of DNA antisense to its mRNA post-training impaired recognition memory. Finally, we found that the inhibition of NF-кB by NF-кB Decoy DNA reduced significantly the training-induced Zif268 increment, indicating that NF-кB is involved in the regulation of Zif268 expression. Thus, the present results support the involvement of NF-кB activity-dependent Zif268 expression in the hippocampus during recognition memory consolidation.

ChemInform Abstract: New Advances in the Use of Infrared Absorption Spectroscopy for the Characterization of Heterogeneous Catalytic Reactions

AbstractReview: 511 refs.

Age-dependent social learning in a lizard.

Evidence of social learning, whereby the actions of an animal facilitate the acquisition of new information by another, is taxonomically biased towards mammals, especially primates, and birds. However, social learning need not be limited to group-living animals because species with less interaction can still benefit from learning about potential predators, food sources, rivals and mates. We trained male skinks (Eulamprus quoyii), a mostly solitary lizard from eastern Australia, in a two-step foraging task. Lizards belonging to 'young' and 'old' age classes were presented with a novel instrumental task (displacing a lid) and an association task (reward under blue lid). We did not find evidence for age-dependent learning of the instrumental task; however, young males in the presence of a demonstrator learnt the association task faster than young males without a demonstrator, whereas old males in both treatments had similar success rates. We present the first evidence of age-dependent social learning in a lizard and suggest that the use of social information for learning may be more widespread than previously believed.

Introduction to Simulating the Past

This is the introduction to a special issue of Journal of Archaeological Method and Theory focusing on modelling and simulation in archaeology. Archaeology is a discipline based on abductive reasoning, where the premises do not guarantee the conclusions. In other words, hypotheses in archaeology are generated on the basis of an incomplete set of observations, and the discovery or the acquisition of new information can modify the previously developed hypotheses. Abductive reasoning is a useful tool for developing explanations that are adequate to describe an J Archaeol Method Theory DOI 10.1007/s10816-014-9209-8

New advances in the use of infrared absorption spectroscopy for the characterization of heterogeneous catalytic reactions

Infrared absorption spectroscopy has proven to be one of the most powerful spectroscopic techniques available for the characterization of catalytic systems. Although the history of IR absorption spectroscopy in catalysis is long, the technique continues to provide key fundamental information about a variety of catalysts and catalytic reactions, and to also offer novel options for the acquisition of new information on both reaction mechanisms and the nature of the solids used as catalysts. In this review, an overview is provided of the main contributions that have been derived from IR absorption spectroscopy studies of catalytic systems, and a discussion is included on new trends and new potential directions of research involving IR in catalysis. We start by briefly describing the power of Fourier-transform IR (FTIR) instruments and the main experimental IR setups available, namely, transmission (TIR), diffuse reflectance (DRIFTS), attenuated total reflection (ATR-IR), and reflection-absorption (RAIRS), for advancing research in catalysis. We then discuss the different environments under which IR characterization of catalysts is carried out, including in situ and operando studies of typical catalytic processes in gas-phase, research with model catalysts in ultrahigh vacuum (UHV) and so-called high-pressure cell instruments, and work involving liquid/solid interfaces. A presentation of the type of information extracted from IR data follows in terms of the identification of adsorbed intermediates, the characterization of the surfaces of the catalysts themselves, the quantitation of IR intensities to extract surface coverages, and the use of probe molecules to identify and titrate specific catalytic sites. Finally, the different options for carrying out kinetic studies with temporal resolution such as rapid-scan FTIR, step-scan FTIR, and the use of tunable lasers or synchrotron sources, and to obtain spatially resolved spectra, by sample rastering or by 2D imaging, are introduced.

Investigating children’s Why-questions: A study comparing argumentative and explanatory function

Questions represent a crucial tool of interaction between parents and children from a very early age. This study aims to investigate which function – argumentative or explanatory – most characterizes Why-questions asked by children to their parents in a natural setting such as mealtimes at home. Why-questions asked by 13 children – eight girls and five boys aged between three and seven years – coming from 10 middle- to upper-middle-class Swiss and Italian families with a high socio-cultural level were analyzed. In the corpus, the explanatory function largely characterizes children’s Why-questions. Questions we observed play fundamentally an educational role, since they favor the acquisition of new information and the transmission from parents to children of parental behavioral models (social behavior). The argumentative Why-questions, less frequently asked by children in our sample, are also important from an educational point of view. By these questions children challenge their parents to make clear the reasons behind their opinions, suggestions, rules and prescriptions, which are often largely implicit. Altogether, the results of this study indicate that both the explanatory and argumentative types of children’s Why-questions have a knowledge-seeking function, that is, children asking such questions are seeking knowledge of something.

The Neuromechanism Underlying Language Analogical Reasoning: Evidence from An ERP Study

Analogical reasoning as the mechanism of acquisition of new information by inspection of specific instances, is clearly at the heart of advanced human cognitive capabilities and creativity. Especially, language analogical reasoning, as an important part of everyday discourse, is the most common one. Only a few brain imaging studies have used verbal analogies to explore the neural substrates of analogical thinking. Nevertheless, hemodynamic techniques have excellent spatial resolution but poor temporal resolution; hence, these results could not clearly reflect different substeps of analogical processes. Compared with hemodynamic techniques, event-related potentials (ERPs), as an electromagnetic technique, are sensitive to the time course of cognitive processes. However, there has no ERP study on this matter so far. Using the A:B::C:D paradigm, this study investigated the neuromechanism underlying language analogical reasoning by ERPs. Six hundred two-character Chinese noun words were chosen from the Contemporary Chinese Dictionary (the fifth edition) to serve as experimental stimuli. One hundred fifty trials consisting of four noun words were used in three analogy tasks with three semantic relations: metaphor, category and isomorphism, each analogy task had 50 trials. Fourteen undergraduate students participated in the study. Subjects were asked to judge whether one word pair was semantically analogous to another word pair. The EEG was recorded from 64 scalp channels using electrodes mounted in an elastic cap. ERPs were calculated for a 3200 ms epoch including a 200 ms pre-stimulus baseline. Results showed that the schema induction stage elicited N400 and P300 components, which possibly attributable to semantic processing of word pairs and the formation of a relational category. The analogy mapping stage elicited a N400, which might indicate the semantic retrieval of the antecedent word of target domain. The N400 was then followed by a late negative component (LNC), which might indicate the processing of analogical transfer the schema from the source domain to the target domain and reasoning the suitable answer. The study also compared processing of the analogy mapping under different conditions. The results showed that the amplitude of LNC component was smaller and distributed over anterior scalp sites when the relations of analogy mapping were simpler, while the amplitude of LNC component was larger and widely distributed when the relations of analogy mapping were complex. The results suggest that the substages of analogical reasoning, schema induction, analogy mapping, are complex processes. The processing of the analogy mapping stage is close with the LNC component. The amplitude and scalp distribution of the LNC are modulated by the complexity degree of the relations of analogy mapping.

The major achievements and future directions of the development of instrumental physiotherapy

During the recent years, the multifaceted investigations have been conducted with the purpose of the development and practical application of novel therapeutic and health-promoting technologies with the use of the methods of instrumental physiotherapy. To name but a few, these include optimization of pulsed impacts, realization of immunomodulatory action of various physical factors, introduction of new physico-pharmacological modalities and neurotropic physiotherapy, the use of laser Doppler flowmetry for the estimation of the effectiveness of physiotherapeutic treatment, and elucidation of the influence of physical factors on microcirculation. At present, the main lines along which physiotherapy develops include acquisition of new information necessary to formulate the theoretical basis for instrumental physiotherapy, comprehensive estimation of the influence of the new and traditional preformed physical factors on the general health-maintaining mechanisms (adaptation, compensation), investigations into pathogenesis of various diseases, development of effective therapeutic and health-promoting modalities with the elaboration of indications and contraindications for their prescription, elucidation of the possibility and expediency of joint or combined application of various physical factors. The great importance is attached under present-day conditions to the development of personalized approaches to the choice of physiotherapeutic modality for the treatment of concrete patients on an individual basis taking into consideration the known predictors of efficiency of a given method. One of the most rapidly developing directions is regenerative physiotherapy, i.e., a multidisciplinary branch of biomedicine that studies the mechanisms of action and the effectiveness of natural preformed physical factors for the restoration of damaged tissues and disturbed functions of the organs. Of special value are investigations devoted to the elucidation of the possibilities for the combined application of cellular technologies and physiotherapeutic techniques. However, very much remains to be done for the creation of the scientific basis of biologically controlled (feedback-regulated) physiotherapy. Much attention should be given to the creation of new up-to-date physiotherapeutic instrumentation to be employed for the development of innovative technologies designed to enhance the therapeutic effectiveness of health-promoting, curative, and prophylactic measures in wide clinical practice.

No Trade-Off between Learning Speed and Associative Flexibility in Bumblebees: A Reversal Learning Test with Multiple Colonies

Potential trade-offs between learning speed and memory-related performance could be important factors in the evolution of learning. Here, we test whether rapid learning interferes with the acquisition of new information using a reversal learning paradigm. Bumblebees (Bombus terrestris) were trained to associate yellow with a floral reward. Subsequently the association between colour and reward was reversed, meaning bees then had to learn to visit blue flowers. We demonstrate that individuals that were fast to learn yellow as a predictor of reward were also quick to reverse this association. Furthermore, overnight memory retention tests suggest that faster learning individuals are also better at retaining previously learned information. There is also an effect of relatedness: colonies whose workers were fast to learn the association between yellow and reward also reversed this association rapidly. These results are inconsistent with a trade-off between learning speed and the reversal of a previously made association. On the contrary, they suggest that differences in learning performance and cognitive (behavioural) flexibility could reflect more general differences in colony learning ability. Hence, this study provides additional evidence to support the idea that rapid learning and behavioural flexibility have adaptive value.

Surprised at all the entropy: hippocampal, caudate and midbrain contributions to learning from prediction errors.

Influential concepts in neuroscientific research cast the brain a predictive machine that revises its predictions when they are violated by sensory input. This relates to the predictive coding account of perception, but also to learning. Learning from prediction errors has been suggested for take place in the hippocampal memory system as well as in the basal ganglia. The present fMRI study used an action-observation paradigm to investigate the contributions of the hippocampus, caudate nucleus and midbrain dopaminergic system to different types of learning: learning in the absence of prediction errors, learning from prediction errors, and responding to the accumulation of prediction errors in unpredictable stimulus configurations. We conducted analyses of the regions of interests' BOLD response towards these different types of learning, implementing a bootstrapping procedure to correct for false positives. We found both, caudate nucleus and the hippocampus to be activated by perceptual prediction errors. The hippocampal responses seemed to relate to the associative mismatch between a stored representation and current sensory input. Moreover, its response was significantly influenced by the average information, or Shannon entropy of the stimulus material. In accordance with earlier results, the habenula was activated by perceptual prediction errors. Lastly, we found that the substantia nigra was activated by the novelty of sensory input. In sum, we established that the midbrain dopaminergic system, the hippocampus, and the caudate nucleus were to different degrees significantly involved in the three different types of learning: acquisition of new information, learning from prediction errors and responding to unpredictable stimulus developments. We relate learning from perceptual prediction errors to the concept of predictive coding and related information theoretic accounts.

Investigating the Mechanisms of Cultural Acquisition

High-fidelity copying is critical to the acquisition of culture. However, young children’s high-fidelity imitation can result in overimitation, the copying of instrumentally irrelevant actions. We present a series of studies investigating whether adults too overimitate. Experiment 1 found that adults do overimitate, even when evaluation pressures were reduced (Experiment 2) and when participants were faced with a time pressure involving a monetary reward (Experiment 3). Only when participants were presented with a demonstration by someone they believed to be a fellow participant (Experiment 4) did less than half of them overimitate. Thus, overimitation appears to be a robust, adaptive process allowing the acquisition of new information in unfamiliar settings.

Choice Reversal in Management Accounting – A Quasi Experimental Demonstration

In a quasi-experimental study (n= 53), using a between-subject design, I found evidence that the acquisition of new information, even if it is non-instrumental, frequently leads to choice reversals (in 3 out of 4 cases). As expected, participants (graduate students and accounting professionals) extensively engaged in information acquisitiveness, and often weighted the latest cue most heavily in conducting a typical management accounting task (e.g. fraud detection, investment decision making). This finding is particularly important since information acquisition and evaluation is an activity done by management accountants on a daily basis. Interestingly, the effect is robust both in conditions where the information was free, and where the information was said to be costly. So it appears that the mere existence of new facts lets participants believe that this information had a higher importance compared to the known facts. The theoretical implications and practical relevance of the results are discussed.

Morphological processing in reading acquisition: A cross-linguistic perspective

Word identification, which is the retrieval of the linguistic constituents (phonological, semantic) of a word, plays a central role in children's reading development. This development includes the automatization of word decoding and the attainment of fluent reading levels, both essential for skilled reading with comprehension (Perfetti, 1992; Stanovich, 2000; Verhoeven & van Leeuwe, 2009). In learning to read, children first acquire elementary decoding skills, and then gradually apply these skills with greater accuracy and speed, leading to an increasingly automated process of that recognizes multiletter units (consonant clusters, syllables, and morphemes) and whole words (Ehri, 2005). Automatic word recognition enables the devotion of mental resources to the meaning of a text and thus allows readers to use reading as a tool for the acquisition of new information and knowledge (Perfetti, 1998; Stanovich, 2000).

Cholinergic control of visual categorization in macaques

Acetylcholine (ACh) is a neurotransmitter acting via muscarinic and nicotinic receptors that is implicated in several cognitive functions and impairments, such as Alzheimer’s disease. It is believed to especially affect the acquisition of new information, which is particularly important when behavior needs to be adapted to new situations and to novel sensory events. Categorization, the process of assigning stimuli to a category, is a cognitive function that also involves information acquisition. The role of ACh on categorization has not been previously studied. We have examined the effects of scopolamine, an antagonist of muscarinic ACh receptors, on visual categorization in macaque monkeys using familiar and novel stimuli. When the peripheral effects of scopolamine on the parasympathetic nervous system were controlled for, categorization performance was disrupted following systemic injections of scopolamine. This impairment was observed only when the stimuli that needed to be categorized had not been seen before. In other words, the monkeys were not impaired by the central action of scopolamine in categorizing a set of familiar stimuli (stimuli which they had categorized successfully in previous sessions). Categorization performance also deteriorated as the stimulus became less salient by an increase in the level of visual noise. However, scopolamine did not cause additional performance disruptions for difficult categorization judgments at lower coherence levels. Scopolamine, therefore, specifically affects the assignment of new exemplars to established cognitive categories, presumably by impairing the processing of novel information. Since we did not find an effect of scopolamine in the categorization of familiar stimuli, scopolamine had no significant central action on other cognitive functions such as perception, attention, memory, or executive control within the context of our categorization task.