Cognitive Cues Research Articles

The Use of Cognitive Cues for Anticipatory Strategies in a Dynamic Postural Control Task - Validation of a Novel Approach to Dual-Task Testing.

IntroductionDual-task testing is relevant in the assessment of postural control. A combination of a primary (motor) and a secondary (distracting cognitive) tasks is most often used. It remains a challenge however, to standardize and monitor the cognitive task. In this study a new dual-task testing approach with a facilitating, rather than distracting, cognitive component was evaluated.MethodsThirty-one community-dwelling elderly and fifteen young people were tested with respect to their ability to use anticipatory postural control strategies. The motor task consisted of twenty-five repetitive tasks in which the participants needed to exceed their limit of stability in order to touch one out of eight lights. The participants performed three tests. In two of the tests the color cues of the lights allowed the participants to utilize cognitive strategies to plan their next movement and improve their performance time.ResultsThe young performed the baseline motor task test in an average of 29 seconds, while the average time for the elderly was 44 seconds. When comparing the performance time with a leading cue to the time with no cue, the young group improved their performance time significantly better than the elderly did: young: 17% (5), elderly: 5% (8); p<0.001. Similar differences were seen with a more complicated leading cue: young: 12% (5), elderly: 4% (9); p<0.01. The reliability of the test showed moderate to substantial agreement (ICC = 0.74), with a small learning effect between two sessions.ConclusionThe dual-task test was sensitive enough to discriminate between elderly and young people. It revealed that the elderly did not utilize cognitive cues for their anticipatory postural control strategies as well as the young were able to. The test procedure was feasible and comprehensible for the participants, and it may be relevant to standardize a similar test for an alternative dual-task approach in the clinical setting.

Survey finds improvement in cognitive biases that drive overtreatment of asymptomatic bacteriuria after a successful antimicrobial stewardship intervention

Lack of guideline knowledge and cognitive biases are barriers that drive overtreatment of catheter-associated asymptomatic bacteriuria (ASB). We explored whether providers' knowledge and attitudes toward management of ASB differed before and after a multifaceted guidelines implementation intervention, reported elsewhere. We surveyed providers' knowledge of guidelines, cognitive-behavioral constructs, and self-reported familiarity with the relevant Infectious Diseases Society of America guidelines. The survey was administered to providers in the preintervention (n = 169) and postintervention (n = 157) periods at the intervention site and postintervention (n = 65) at the comparison site. At the intervention site, the mean knowledge score increased significantly during the postintervention period (from 57.5%-69.9%; P < .0001) and fewer providers reported following incorrect cognitive cues (pyuria and organism type) for treatment of ASB. The knowledge of guidelines was higher in the postintervention sample after adjusting for provider type in the multiple linear regression analysis. Cognitive behavioral constructs (ie, self-efficacy, behavior, social norms, and risk perceptions) and self-reported familiarity with the guidelines also significantly improved during the postintervention period. We identified and targeted specific barriers that drive overtreatment of ASB. Guideline implementation interventions targeting cognitive biases are essential for encouraging the application of ASB guidelines into practice.

Development and Validation of Cognitive Rehearsal as a Training Strategy for Arthroscopic Surgery

Objectives:Surgical performance is a highly intellectual activity that involves the processing of perceptual information from the five senses. Strategies to process, organize, and retain this perceptual information may benefit learning techniques. Once such strategy, cognitive rehearsal, is the activity where a skill is rehearsed in memory prior to the actual performance. This study aimed to develop and validate a cognitive rehearsal strategy for arthroscopic knee surgery in orthopaedic residents. We hypothesized that this training tool will lead to increased comfort and confidence with arthroscopic surgery performance.Methods:An expert surgeon was filmed performing an arthroscopic ACL reconstruction using patellar bone-tendon-bone autograft. An instructional training video was then created incorporating the extracorporeal and arthroscopic footage with voice over and subtitles. Following the surgery, cognitive recall of the procedure was conducted with the surgeon to identify key visual, cognitive, and kinesthetic cues to develop a mental imagery script to enhance rehearsal of arthroscopic surgery. Orthopaedic residents from two academic training programs were invited to participate. Demographic information including training level, previous musical experience, organized sports participation, and preferred learning style was collected. The training session consisted of a relaxation exercise, instructional video of an expert performing the procedure, learning the mental imagery script, and rehearsing the procedure out loud with a partner. The residents’ ability to rehearse the procedure was assessed before and after the training session with a modified version of a previously validated questionnaire, and a post-training session survey was administered to define which components of the rehearsal seemed most beneficial. Statistical analysis included a reliability analysis for internal consistency, and a nonparametric Wilcoxon test to compare the composite cognitive rehearsal scores of the junior and senior residents. A nonparametric Mann-Whitney test was used to evaluate performance of each group before and after the training session on each item of the questionnaire.Results:53 of 62 (85%) residents completed the demographics survey prior to the training session, while 44 of 62 (71%) residents were available to complete the training exercise. A Cronbach alpha of 0.9494 for the pre-training (n=44) and 0.9394 (n=44) for the post-training suggested that the cognitive rehearsal questionnaire was internally consistent, allowing for the reliable summation of individual items to a composite score. The median composite cognitive rehearsal scores of the junior residents significantly improved from 24 pre- to 42 post-training exercise (p = 0.002). Senior resident median composite scores improved after training from 38 pre- to 46 post-exercise (p = 0.041). Those with previous musical training and kinetic / visual learners performed better during the training session. Both groups found the entire process valuable.Conclusion:This is the first study to develop and validate cognitive rehearsal as a low cost, high touch training strategy for arthroscopic surgery in orthopaedic residents. Cognitive rehearsal holds promise as a training tool for mastery of executive routine, performance quality, and increasing knowledge, comfort, and confidence for both junior and senior residents learning arthroscopic surgery.

Snack intake is reduced in the presence of a visual cognitive construal cue

Snack intake is reduced in the presence of a visual cognitive construal cue

The emotional arousal and cognitive load cues in liar's nonverbal behavior

The emotional arousal and cognitive load cues in liar's nonverbal behavior

Age-Related Differences in Response to Music-Evoked Emotion Among Children and Adolescents with Autism Spectrum Disorders.

While research regarding emotion recognition in ASD has focused primarily on social cues, musical stimuli also elicit strong emotional responses. This study extends and expands the few previous studies of response to music in ASD, measuring both psychophysiological and behavioral responses in younger children (ages 8-11) as well as older adolescents (ages 16-18). Compared to controls, the ASD group demonstrated reduced skin conductance response to music-evoked emotion. Younger groups, regardless of diagnosis, showed greater physiological reactivity to scary stimuli than to other emotions. There was a significant interaction of age group and diagnostic group in identifying scary music stimuli, possibly evidencing disrupted developmental trajectories in ASD for integrating physiological and cognitive cues that may underlie symptoms of anxiety.

Sensory and Hedonic Evaluation in Response to Food-Cue Exposure: The Case of Juicing Demonstration of Fresh Oranges

This study evaluated whether observing the orange squeezing (juicing) process can influence consumers’ sensory evaluations and hedonics of different forms of orange juice. The juicing process delivers cognitive (freshness) and physical (olfactory/visual) food cues. Three forms of orange juice were used in the experiment: fresh squeezed, not-from-concentrate, and from-concentrate. Participants were divided into two groups, with only one group observing the juicing process using a specially designed table-top juicer. Sensory evaluations of participants who did not observe the juicing process were not significantly different with the exception of color. The demonstration of the juicing process primed consumers to identify and evaluate fresh squeezed orange juice in terms of color, aroma, flavor, sweetness, and acidity. The results of an ordered logistic model indicated that consumer acceptance of orange juice was significantly linked to internal attributes such as flavor, sweetness, acidity, and pulp, and the acceptances were not significantly different by juice forms. This implied that food cues from the juicing process can affect human sensory evaluation of the cued food, but the food cues may not overwhelm, in particular when attributes of alternatives are almost homogeneous.

Cognitive Cues are More Compelling than Facial Cues in Determining Adults' Reactions towards Young Children

Previous research has demonstrated the significant influence that both children's facial features (Lorenz, 1943) and children's cognitive expressions (Bjorklund, Hernández Blasi, and Periss, 2010) have on adults' perception of young children. However, until now, these two types of cues have been studied independently. The present study contrasted these two types of cues simultaneously in a group of college students. To this purpose, we designed five experimental conditions (Consistent, Inconsistent, Mature-Face, Immature-Face, and Faces-Only) in which we varied the presentation of a series of mature and immature vignettes (including two previously studied types of thinking: natural thinking and supernatural thinking) associated with a series of more mature and less mature children's faces. Performance in these conditions was contrasted with data from a Vignettes-Only condition taken from Bjorklund et al. (2010). Results indicated that cognitive cues were more powerful than facial cues in determining adults' perceptions of young children. From an evolutionary developmental perspective, we suggest that facial cues are more relevant to adults during infancy than during the preschool period, when, with the development of spoken language, the verbalized expressions of children's thoughts become the principal cues influencing adults' perceptions, with facial cues playing a more secondary role.

A novel cognitive cueing approach to gait retraining in Parkinson’s disease: A pilot study

Background: Parkinson’s disease (PD) impairs gait performance, which can lead to falls and decreased quality of life. This study examined the feasibility of implementing a novel home-based intervention designed to elicit gait improvement in individuals with PD. Methods: Five participants with PD completed a two-week home-based gait retraining intervention designed around guided video feedback. Semi-structured interviews were conducted postintervention and two months postintervention to acquire feedback from the participants about their experience with the intervention. Spatiotemporal parameters of gait and functional mobility were assessed pre and postintervention and at two months postintervention. Results: Participants reported high levels of usability and expressed they believed that the intervention improved their gait and led to a fortified sense of ability and revived sense of empowerment. Comparisons of spatiotemporal and mobility parameters of gait identified that improvements occurred between preintervention and postintervention—step length (x = 10.7%), gait velocity (x = 15.1%), and TUG scores (x = 9.8%)—and between preintervention and two months postintervention—step length (x = 3.9%), gait velocity (x = 9.9%), and TUG scores (x = 4.2%). Conclusions: Guided home-based video training has potential to be an effective treatment strategy for improving gait impairment among individuals with PD.

Real-World Deception and the Impact of Severity

Previous research has shown that language varies between deceivers and truth tellers. These linguistic differences serve as the foundation to automated text-based deception detection methods. However, few studies have analyzed linguistic cues to deception in real-world environments. Here, we present an analysis of linguistic cues to deception in person-of-interest statements recorded following crimes on a military base. Using automated cue extraction and MANOVA, the analysis indicates that quantity, diversity, nonimmediacy, and cognitive processing cues differ between truthful and deceptive statements. Additionally, this study introduces an exploratory measure of incident severity used to analyze how language changes in both deceivers and truth tellers as situational severity increases.

Can a prescribed turnout conditioning program reduce the differential between passive and active turnout in pre-professional dancers?

Preliminary and speculative findings are reported on the benefits of a prescribed turnout conditioning program (TCP) designed to facilitate pre-professional dancers' active use of natural turnout potential. While of some debate, it is reported in the literature that many dancers use less turnout than what is available to them when measured passively. Key muscles required to achieve full turnout were the focus of the TCP, and exercises were introduced in a manner that, theoretically, should stimulate appropriate activation patterns for proper turnout biomechanics. A group of female pre-professional dancers (13 to 17 years old, training 20 to 25 hours a week, N = 16) were measured before and after the 7-week program for total passive turnout, total active turnout, passive hip external rotation, and tibial torsion. Statistically and functionally significant improvements were found in both static total active turnout (standing in first position on a large piece of paper) and dynamic total active turnout (standing in first position on rotational Balanced Body discs). These results indicate that the TCP was effective in improving active turnout, thereby reducing the differential between passive and active turnout in pre-professional ballet dancers. Implications are discussed for dancer-specific turnout conditioning programs, the role of cognitive imagery cueing, and emphasis on the importance of quantity with quality in the conditioning and teaching of active turnout.

The influence of imagery vividness on cognitive and perceptual cues in circular auditorily-induced vection.

In the absence of other congruent multisensory motion cues, sound contribution to illusions of self-motion (vection) is relatively weak and often attributed to purely cognitive, top-down processes. The present study addressed the influence of cognitive and perceptual factors in the experience of circular, yaw auditorily-induced vection (AIV), focusing on participants imagery vividness scores. We used different rotating sound sources (acoustic landmark vs. movable types) and their filtered versions that provided different binaural cues (interaural time or level differences, ITD vs. ILD) when delivering via loudspeaker array. The significant differences in circular vection intensity showed that (1) AIV was stronger for rotating sound fields containing auditory landmarks as compared to movable sound objects; (2) ITD based acoustic cues were more instrumental than ILD based ones for horizontal AIV; and (3) individual differences in imagery vividness significantly influenced the effects of contextual and perceptual cues. While participants with high scores of kinesthetic and visual imagery were helped by vection “rich” cues, i.e., acoustic landmarks and ITD cues, the participants from the low-vivid imagery group did not benefit from these cues automatically. Only when specifically asked to use their imagination intentionally did these external cues start influencing vection sensation in a similar way to high-vivid imagers. These findings are in line with the recent fMRI work which suggested that high-vivid imagers employ automatic, almost unconscious mechanisms in imagery generation, while low-vivid imagers rely on more schematic and conscious framework. Consequently, our results provide an additional insight into the interaction between perceptual and contextual cues when experiencing purely auditorily or multisensory induced vection.

Cortical information flow during inferences of agency.

Building on the recent finding that agency experiences do not merely rely on sensorimotor information but also on cognitive cues, this exploratory study uses electroencephalographic recordings to examine functional connectivity during agency inference processing in a setting where action and outcome are independent. Participants completed a computerized task in which they pressed a button followed by one of two color words (red or blue) and rated their experienced agency over producing the color. Before executing the action, a matching or mismatching color word was pre-activated by explicitly instructing participants to produce the color (goal condition) or by briefly presenting the color word (prime condition). In both conditions, experienced agency was higher in matching vs. mismatching trials. Furthermore, increased electroencephalography (EEG)-based connectivity strength was observed between parietal and frontal nodes and within the (pre)frontal cortex when color-outcomes matched with goals and participants reported high agency. This pattern of increased connectivity was not identified in trials where outcomes were pre-activated through primes. These results suggest that different connections are involved in the experience and in the loss of agency, as well as in inferences of agency resulting from different types of pre-activation. Moreover, the findings provide novel support for the involvement of a fronto-parietal network in agency inferences.

Affective coding: the emotional dimension of agency.

The sense of agency (SoA) (i.e., the registration that I am the initiator and controller of my actions and relevant events) is associated with several affective dimensions. This makes it surprising that the emotion factor has been largely neglected in the field of agency research. Current empirical investigations of the SoA mainly focus on sensorimotor signals (i.e., efference copy) and cognitive cues (i.e., intentions, beliefs) and on how they are integrated. Here we argue that this picture is not sufficient to explain agency experience, since agency and emotions constantly interact in our daily life by several ways. Reviewing first recent empirical evidence, we show that self-action perception is in fact modulated by the affective valence of outcomes already at the sensorimotor level. We hypothesize that the “affective coding” between agency and action outcomes plays an essential role in agency processing, i.e., the prospective, immediate or retrospective shaping of agency representations by affective components. This affective coding of agency be differentially altered in various neuropsychiatric diseases (e.g., schizophrenia vs. depression), thus helping to explain the dysfunctions and content of agency experiences in these diseases.

Recycling Is Good! – Sharing Knowledge from One Individual to Another in a Multiple-Cue Judgment Task

The cognitive models exemplar memory and cue abstraction was examined in two experiments in a multiple-cue judgment task with verbalization to see how the models was affected by verbalization and h ...

Promoting online deliberation quality: cognitive cues matter

This research aims to contribute to the theory and practice of e-participation, looking specifically at ways to enhance the deliberative quality of political discussions in online forums. Building on theories of information processing and social norms, we suggest that particular visual banners may be integrated in an online forum, and serve as cues that prime participants to think about the context as a place of public deliberation. In turn, we hypothesize that these cues would promote the deliberative quality of the discussion. To test our hypotheses, we conducted a controlled experiment where cues were integrated as visuals banners alongside the content of an online discussion forum. Content analysis of forum comments (N = 476) included measures for reasoned opinion expression as well as indicators of listening and respecting others’ opinions. Findings support the study's hypotheses that deliberative cues matter for online deliberation. We discuss the findings and outline directions for future research.

The Changing Nature of Labor Unrest in China

A qualitative shift is underway in the nature of labor protest in China. Contrary to prior literature that characterized strikes as being largely defensive in nature, the authors suggest that since 2008, Chinese workers have been striking offensively for more money, better working conditions, and more respect from employers. They explain these developments using a “political process” model that suggests economic and political opportunities are sending “cognitive cues” to workers that they have increased leverage, leading them to be more assertive in their demands. Such cues include a growing labor shortage, new labor laws, and new media openness. Their argument is supported by a unique data set of strikes that the authors collected, two case studies of strikes in aerospace factories, and interviews with a variety of employment relations stakeholders.

Emotional Intelligence and Mismatching Expressive and Verbal Messages: A Contribution to Detection of Deception

Processing facial emotion, especially mismatches between facial and verbal messages, is believed to be important in the detection of deception. For example, emotional leakage may accompany lying. Individuals with superior emotion perception abilities may then be more adept in detecting deception by identifying mismatch between facial and verbal messages. Two personal factors that may predict such abilities are female gender and high emotional intelligence (EI). However, evidence on the role of gender and EI in detection of deception is mixed. A key issue is that the facial processing skills required to detect deception may not be the same as those required to identify facial emotion. To test this possibility, we developed a novel facial processing task, the FDT (Face Decoding Test) that requires detection of inconsistencies between facial and verbal cues to emotion. We hypothesized that gender and ability EI would be related to performance when cues were inconsistent. We also hypothesized that gender effects would be mediated by EI, because women tend to score as more emotionally intelligent on ability tests. Data were collected from 210 participants. Analyses of the FDT suggested that EI was correlated with superior face decoding in all conditions. We also confirmed the expected gender difference, the superiority of high EI individuals, and the mediation hypothesis. Also, EI was more strongly associated with facial decoding performance in women than in men, implying there may be gender differences in strategies for processing affective cues. It is concluded that integration of emotional and cognitive cues may be a core attribute of EI that contributes to the detection of deception.

Voice-associated static face image releases speech from informational masking.

In noisy, multipeople talking environments such as a cocktail party, listeners can use various perceptual and/or cognitive cues to improve recognition of target speech against masking, particularly informational masking. Previous studies have shown that temporally prepresented voice cues (voice primes) improve recognition of target speech against speech masking but not noise masking. This study investigated whether static face image primes that have become target-voice associated (i.e., facial images linked through associative learning with voices reciting the target speech) can be used by listeners to unmask speech. The results showed that in 32 normal-hearing younger adults, temporally prepresenting a voice-priming sentence with the same voice reciting the target sentence significantly improved the recognition of target speech that was masked by irrelevant two-talker speech. When a person's face photograph image became associated with the voice reciting the target speech by learning, temporally prepresenting the target-voice-associated face image significantly improved recognition of target speech against speech masking, particularly for the last two keywords in the target sentence. Moreover, speech-recognition performance under the voice-priming condition was significantly correlated to that under the face-priming condition. The results suggest that learned facial information on talker identity plays an important role in identifying the target-talker's voice and facilitating selective attention to the target-speech stream against the masking-speech stream.

A taxonomy of mobile phone consumers: insights for marketing managers

Amid less attention to the market segmentation of innovations through positioning innovations in the minds of consumers, the paper explores consumer innovativeness, need for emotion, and prestige price sensitivity to develop a taxonomy of mobile phone consumers. The study analyses survey data of 416 consumers using factor analysis and cluster analyses indicating interesting findings. Four distinct clusters emerge, namely cognitive adopters, prestige-seeking emotional innovators, emotional adopters, and prestige-seeking cognitive innovators. Findings reveal that prestige-seeking emotional innovators and prestige-seeking cognitive innovators have relatively higher level of innovativeness and prestige price sensitivity, but at the same time differ between them in terms of their level of need for emotion. The paper contributes to knowledge by suggesting that marketing constructs such as consumers' sensitivity to the prestige cue of prices as well as consumers' need for emotion are used to cluster mobile phone consumers. The taxonomy is highly relevant to marketing managers as it gives insights into potential additional bases for segmentation, positioning, and marketing communication strategy targeting innovative consumers through cognitive and/or emotional cues.