Awareness Tasks Research Articles

Awareness and consciousness in humans and animals - neural and behavioral correlates in an evolutionary perspective.

Awareness or consciousness in the context of stimulus perception can directly be assessed in well controlled test situations with humans via the persons’ reports about their subjective experiences with the stimuli. Since we have no direct access to subjective experiences in animals, their possible awareness or consciousness in stimulus perception tasks has often been inferred from behavior and cognitive abilities previously observed in aware and conscious humans. Here, we analyze published human data primarily on event-related potentials and brain-wave generation during perception and responding to sensory stimuli and extract neural markers (mainly latencies of evoked-potential peaks and of gamma-wave occurrence) indicating that a person became aware or conscious of the perceived stimulus. These neural correlates of consciousness were then applied to sets of corresponding data from various animals including several species of mammals, and one species each of birds, fish, cephalopods, and insects. We found that the neural markers from studies in humans could also successfully be applied to the mammal and bird data suggesting that species in these animal groups can become subjectively aware of and conscious about perceived stimuli. Fish, cephalopod and insect data remained inconclusive. In an evolutionary perspective we have to consider that both awareness of and consciousness about perceived stimuli appear as evolved, attention-dependent options added to the ongoing neural activities of stimulus processing and action generation. Since gamma-wave generation for functional coupling of brain areas in aware/conscious states is energetically highly cost-intensive, it remains to be shown which animal species under which conditions of lifestyle and ecological niche may achieve significant advantages in reproductive fitness by drawing upon these options. Hence, we started our discussion about awareness and consciousness in animals with the question in how far these expressions of brain activity are necessary attributes for perceiving stimuli and responding in an adaptive way.

The effect of multi‐tasking training on performance, situation awareness, and workload in simulated air traffic control

AbstractIncreasingly higher demands are being made on the capacity‐limited cognitive capabilities of human operators as they strive to maintain situation awareness (i.e., understanding “what is going on”) and performance in complex tasks. In the current study we asked whether: (a) training administered via a mobile phone‐based app could improve multitasking and (b) improved multitasking in the app would generalize to improved performance and situation awareness in a simulated air traffic control task (ATC). Participants completed the ATC task before and after multiple sessions of app‐based multitasking training or control training. Multitasking on the app improved across training sessions. However, this did not lead to improved performance or situation awareness, or workload reduction, relative to control training on the ATC task. These outcomes indicate that app‐based multitasking training based on repetition of a single training task will not necessarily yield generalizable benefits to human performance in other complex dynamic tasks.

The Role of Proficiency in Kashmiri Language in Phonological Processing Skills: A Cognitive-linguistic Approach

Language reflects the general aspects of human cognition and it works in terms of generalities, i.e. in terms of categories (Cruse, 2000). So, any of the linguistic expressions, whether it’s a phone, word, syllable or a sentence ends up in the representation of a category referring to a something that is usually aimed at sufficing the need for communication. These categories are conceptual or can be referred to as the abstract mental constructs. However, language is not an autonomous cognitive faculty which implies that language is not exactly an innate cognitive module and is not separated from non-linguistic cognitive abilities (Craft & Cruse, 2004). This study reports on the role of proficiency of Kashmiri language in phonological processing of illiterate native Kashmiri speakers. A total number 40 participants (20 Literate; 20 Illiterate), divided into two groups; were tested for Lexical Decision, Random Automatized Naming, Initial Phoneme Deletion, and Final Phoneme Deletion. The results suggested that the performance of both the groups was affected by Literacy and Proficiency in their native language i.e. Kashmiri. The effect of literacy on phonological processing was in consistence with the available literature however, the performance by illiterates was not worked out. This study attempted to find out the reasons for the performance of illiterates, and it was found that the illiterates can perform almost similar to those of literates on phonological awareness tasks because the proficiency in their native language enhances their phonemic and phonological awareness skills. Hence, the proficiency in Kashmir language has a role in phonological processing of illiterates.

Promoting the Sustainable Development of Rural EFL Learners’ Email Literacy through a Facebook Project

Promoting the sustainable development of rural EFL students’ English ability is a vital issue in the general curriculum guidelines of Taiwan’s 12-Year Basic Education. This study aimed to investigate the effects of a Facebook project on developing rural EFL learners’ email literacy in English. There were two participant groups: (1) six university English majors and (2) 12 ninth-graders from a rural junior high school. The instruments included a multiple-choice awareness task (MCT), a written discourse completion task (WDCT), a perception questionnaire, interviews, and teaching journals. The university students first received a training session on email literacy, and then they taught the ninth-graders invitation email-writing through Facebook interactions for eight weeks. The results showed that after the project, the ninth-graders made significant improvements when completing the MCT. As for the quality of their emails, the ninth-graders not only scored significantly higher in the post-test but also made qualitative progress in their invitation emails. Furthermore, both participant groups had positive perceptions of this project and indicated the strengths and weaknesses of their participation. This paper concludes with pedagogical implications for English education in Taiwan.

Machine learning approach for studying the neural underpinnings of dyslexia on a phonological awareness task

Understanding the neural underpinnings of dyslexia is an open and fundamental question in developmental neuroscience. A widely agreed causal risk factor for dyslexia is phonological deficit (PD). However, the causal relationships between PD and dyslexia have been primarily investigated and theorized based on findings derived from behavioral measures. What is missing is evidence of the underlying neurophysiological origins of these relationships. The present study examined whether the performance on a phonological awareness task, namely phoneme elision (PE), differentiated children with dyslexia from their typically developing counterparts at a neural level. We proposed a novel machine-learning-based approach to extract neural activity from EEG to identify neural differences at the group level. Specifically, we formulated an optimization problem to first extract informative EEG components (termed phoneme-related neural-congruency components) by maximizing the congruency in neural activity among typically developing children during phoneme elision. Next, we utilized a machine-learning algorithm to optimally combine the resulting components to differentiate between children with dyslexia and controls. Results showed that the proposed phoneme-related neural-congruency components are predictive about the underlying neuronal differences amongst groups. These results provide empirical evidence towards the neural underpinnings of dyslexia and the potential neural origins of PD as a causal link to dyslexia. Notably, the proposed method could be used to study other behaviorally defined developmental disorders.

Insula Response to Interoception Is Inversely Correlated with Trait Mindfulness, Self-compassion, and Migraine Frequency in Patients with Episodic Migraine

Migraine is a highly prevalent chronic pain disorder that is characterized by sensitization and dysregulation of the central autonomic nervous system. Interoception is the sensing of signals originating from within the body, and is altered in chronic pain conditions including episodic migraine. The relationship between brain mechanisms of interoceptive awareness and clinical measures of migraine severity has not been fully explored. We used functional MRI to investigate whether insula response to interoceptive awareness is associated with clinical and behavioral measures in patients with episodic migraine. In this study, 18 patients with episodic migraine (17 F, 1 M, mean age ± SD: 41.3 ± 13.1 years). All patients underwent a 3-Tesla fMRI scan and completed a novel interoceptive awareness task (TR=2s,). During the task, patients were asked to focus on and rate the intensity of sensation for two interoceptive conditions (heart and lungs), as well as two exteroceptive conditions (sight and sound). Participants completed survey measures related to interoception, mindfulness, self-compassion, and migraine frequency. Bold response to the interoception - exteroception task contrast (z > 3.1, p = 0.05 corrected) included two clusters overlapping with bilateral mid-insula (left center: x=-46,y=-1.5,z=7.4, 2615 voxels, 33% overlap with anatomical insula, right center: x=44,y=7.1,z=3.9, 1332 voxels, 46% overlap with anatomical insula). Significant inverse associations were observed between insula response to interoception and SCS (r = -0.65, p = 0.003), Freiburg Mindfulness (r = -0.68, p = 0.002), and the number of migraine days reported within 30 days prior to the MRI scan (r = -0.64, p = 0.004) (all significant after Bonferroni correction). Patients with episodic migraine showed insula response during a novel interoceptive awareness task, and this response was inversely correlated with recent migraine frequency, and measures of both trait mindfulness and self-compassion. Grant support from NIH NCCIH P01AT009965.

Augmented Reality for Human-Robot Collaboration and Cooperation in Industrial Applications: A Systematic Literature Review.

With the continuously growing usage of collaborative robots in industry, the need for achieving a seamless human–robot interaction has also increased, considering that it is a key factor towards reaching a more flexible, effective, and efficient production line. As a prominent and prospective tool to support the human operator to understand and interact with robots, Augmented Reality (AR) has been employed in numerous human–robot collaborative and cooperative industrial applications. Therefore, this systematic literature review critically appraises 32 papers’ published between 2016 and 2021 to identify the main employed AR technologies, outline the current state of the art of augmented reality for human–robot collaboration and cooperation, and point out future developments for this research field. Results suggest that this is still an expanding research field, especially with the advent of recent advancements regarding head-mounted displays (HMDs). Moreover, projector-based and HMDs developed approaches are showing promising positive influences over operator-related aspects such as performance, task awareness, and safety feeling, even though HMDs need further maturation in ergonomic aspects. Further research should focus on large-scale assessment of the proposed solutions in industrial environments, involving the solution’s target audience, and on establishing standards and guidelines for developing AR assistance systems.

Multi-Robot Path Planning With Due Times

We formulate the problem of multi-robot path planning with due times (MRPP-DT), which is a variant of the classical path planning problem with task due times explicitly considered. The objectives are to obtain collision-free paths with the minimization of maximum lateness, total tardiness or total unit penalties. When task due times are available, formulating the path planning problem as the MRPP-DT is more preferable because of task awareness in path coordination level. This problem is NP-hard to solve optimally for all these three objectives. To solve this problem optimally, we develop integer linear programming (ILP) models for three objectives respectively, and propose reduction-based algorithms. We also extend these algorithms to the problems of anonymous multi-robot path planning with due times. Theoretically, we prove the structure property and computational complexity of these problems, and the completeness of the proposed algorithms. Empirically, we compare their performance on different maps with random obstacles. Computational results demonstrate that these algorithms are suitable for different problem settings, and capable of computing high-quality solutions within allocated time.

The efficacy of grapheme-phoneme correspondence instruction in reducing the effect of orthographic forms on second language phonology

AbstractThe orthographic forms (spellings) of second language (L2) words and sounds affect the pronunciation and awareness of L2 sounds, even after lengthy naturalistic exposure. This study investigated whether instruction could reduce the effects of English orthographic forms on Italian native speakers’ pronunciation and awareness of L2 English sounds. Italians perceive, produce, and judge the same sound as a short sound if it is spelled with one letter and as a long sound if it is spelled with a digraph, due to L1 Italian grapheme-phoneme correspondence (GPC) rules whereby double consonant letters represent long consonants. Totally, 100 Italian learners of English were allocated to two conditions (finaln= 88). The participants in the explicit GPC (EGPC) condition discovered English GPC rules relating to sound length through reflection, explicit teaching, and practice; the participants in the passive exposure condition practiced the same words as the EGPC participants, but with no mention of GPCs. Pre- and postintervention production (delayed word repetition) and phonological awareness (rhyme judgment) tasks revealed no positive effects of the instruction. GPC instruction appears to be ineffective in reducing orthographic effects on L2 phonology. Orthographic effects may be impervious to change, whether by naturalistic exposure or by instruction.

Examining the neural correlates of error awareness in a large fMRI study.

Goal-directed behavior is dependent upon the ability to detect errors and implement appropriate posterror adjustments. Accordingly, several studies have explored the neural activity underlying error-monitoring processes, identifying the insula cortex as crucial for error awareness and reporting mixed findings with respect to the anterior cingulate cortex (ACC). Variable patterns of activation have previously been attributed to insufficient statistical power. We therefore sought to clarify the neural correlates of error awareness in a large event-related functional magnetic resonance imaging (fMRI) study. Four hundred and two healthy participants undertook the error awareness task, a motor Go/No-Go response inhibition paradigm in which participants were required to indicate their awareness of commission errors. Compared to unaware errors, aware errors were accompanied by significantly greater activity in a network of regions, including the insula cortex, supramarginal gyrus (SMG), and midline structures, such as the ACC and supplementary motor area (SMA). Error awareness activity was related to indices of task performance and dimensional measures of psychopathology in selected regions, including the insula, SMG, and SMA. Taken together, we identified a robust and reliable neural network associated with error awareness.

“I Look Mexican, So They Assume I Speak Spanish”: Latinx Teacher Candidates’ Experiences With Raciolinguistic Policing

AbstractThis critical discourse analysis study examines Latinx primary and secondary school teacher candidates’ (TCs) struggles with raciolinguistic ideologies that connect speaking Spanish to being authentically Latinx. Data came from a larger qualitative project, in which these TCs engaged in reflexive language ideology and awareness tasks, as part of an English‐as‐a‐second‐language methods class at a large Hispanic‐serving university in Texas. In this study, we center Latinx TCs’ experiences with and responses to raciolinguistic ideologies framing them as linguistically lacking and/or ethnically inauthentic. Our findings have implications for the ways teacher educators engage Latinx TCs in the interrogation of language ideologies during teacher preparation. We conclude this article by offering pathways for educators to engage Latinx TCs in challenging the practice of marginalizing Latinx individuals via their language practices.

Associations between morphological awareness and literacy skills in German primary school children: the roles of grade level, phonological processing and vocabulary

Studies investigating relations between morphological awareness and literacy in German, a language with a rather transparent but asymmetric orthography, are sparse. Little is known about the role of grade level for these relationships and of their relative strength compared to those between other language-related variables and literacy skills. This cross-sectional study was conducted with German-speaking second-, third- and fourth-graders (n of final sample ≥ 85 per grade). Morphological awareness tasks required the production of inflections, derivations and compounds. Additionally, phonological processing, vocabulary, reading fluency, reading comprehension and spelling were measured. Factor analyses revealed two facets of morphological awareness: morphological fluency and morphological awareness for pseudowords. These were correlated with both reading and spelling skills in all grades. More literacy variables were related to morphological fluency in Grade 4 than in Grades 2 and 3. In regression analyses, variance in literacy skills was predominantly explained by phonological awareness. Morphological awareness did not explain additional variance. The results reveal that different facets of morphological awareness are related to literacy skills in German primary school children. Despite the asymmetry of German orthography, no evidence was found for differences in the association of morphological awareness with spelling versus reading. Phonological processing shows stronger relations with literacy than morphological awareness does. This might indicate that in the transparent German orthography, alphabetic reading and spelling strategies are particularly relevant until the end of Grade 4. Yet, morphological fluency might start to unfold its relevance for reading and spelling near the end of fourth grade in German.

Developmental relations between facets of morphological awareness in Chinese: a latent change score modeling study

AbstractChinese morphological awareness is conceptualized as a multidimensional construct but there is a lack of understanding of how its dimensions are related. Latent change score modeling was used to examine the bivariate relationships of two facets of oral morphological awareness, namely morpheme and structure awareness in Chinese children in grades one through three. Two hundred and three children in China completed morpheme (homonym awareness) and structure awareness (lexical compounding) tasks across the three grades (M = 6.66, SD = .30 at the first time point). Results indicated that growth in structure awareness was predicted in part by previous levels of morpheme awareness, suggesting that morpheme awareness leads the growth of structure awareness. Educational implications are discussed.

Learning effectiveness of 3D virtual reality in hospitality training: a situated cognitive perspective

虚拟现实在酒店培训中的学习效果：一项以情境认知为视角的研究研究目的培训是内部营销的关键维度之一。 虚拟现实 (VR), 一种复制某种环境（真实的或想象的）并模拟在该环境中实质性存在的用户的计算机技术并且允许用户交互, 从培训的角度来看提供独特的机会, 例如允许用户在没有培训的情况下提高他们的技能避免承担损失真实客户的后果或需要实际身处真实环境中。 本研究的重点是比较 VR 酒店培训与现实世界的招待培训的效果。研究设计/方法/途径本研究采用情境认知理论对情境变量（社交互动、位置和任务）的认识对学习和比较 VR 和现实世界实验环境中的旅游培训之间的学习成果进行实证检验。研究发现结果表明, 位置和任务意识增强了认知吸收, 但社会意识不影响认知吸收。 在现实世界和 VR 环境中的训练之间没有显着差异。 最后, 认知吸收对心理模式改变（学习结果）有显著积极作用。研究原创性/价值该结果通过在酒店培训中应用情境认知理论促进了对学习情境重要性的理论理解, 并对旨在成本、地点和时间限制内实现严谨和高效的培训具有重要意义。

The Effects of Syntactic Awareness to L2 Chinese Passage-Level Reading Comprehension.

This study investigated the association between syntactic awareness and L2 Chinese passage-level reading comprehension among 209 Chinese as a second language adult-learners. The participants were administered a character knowledge test, a vocabulary knowledge test, a morphological awareness test, a grammatical judgment and correction test, a word order test, and two reading comprehension tests (multiple-choice questions and cloze test). Partial correlation analyses showed that the participants’ performance in two syntactic awareness tasks were significantly positively correlated with their passage-level reading comprehension. Multiple regression analyses revealed that syntactic awareness made a unique contribution to L2 Chinese reading even when the effects of age, major, gender, length of learning Chinese, character knowledge, vocabulary knowledge, and morphological awareness were controlled for. In addition, the word order knowledge had a stronger predicting power to L2 Chinese reading comprehension compared to the grammatical judgment/correction ability.

Error awareness and post-error slowing: The effect of manipulating trial intervals

Post-error slowing is often considered to be an error-related process that relies upon conscious error recognition, however evidence regarding this relationship is mixed. These inconsistent findings may be explained by the influence of task demands on post-error slowing. The current set of experiments aimed to investigate the role of error awareness in post-error slowing in an error awareness task with up to three dynamic conditions. In each condition, we manipulated the interval between lure trials (infrequent trials that require a different response to target trials) such that they were presented either randomly (standard condition), closely spaced (proximal condition) or widely spaced (distal condition) among target trials. This design attempted to clarify if the relationship between error awareness and post-error slowing is contingent upon task constraints such as trial timing and whether it persists over several trials. Our experiments demonstrate that under dynamic lure interval conditions, error awareness and post-error slowing are only weakly related. Further, post-error slowing was greatest in the standard condition which randomly presented lure trials, while accuracy was lowest in this condition across both experiments. Exclusion of the first post-error trial from both experiments eliminated all effects, indicating that there were only transient differences in post-error reaction time adjustments that were exclusive to the first post-error trial. Our findings thus align with non-functional accounts of post-error slowing and support the notion that post-error slowing and cognitive control can be separate processes that are largely not dependent on error awareness.

Morphological Awareness Performance Profiles of First- Through Sixth-Grade Students.

We examined whether diverse profiles of strengths and weaknesses would emerge when assessing different aspects of morphological awareness in first- through sixth-grade students using a recently developed standardized test, the Morphological Awareness Test for Reading and Spelling (MATRS; Apel et al., 2021). Four thousand fifty-nine first- through sixth-grade students completed the eight morphological awareness tasks of the MATRS. The eight tasks represent the multiple ways that morphological awareness impacts both spoken and written language skills for the English language. Exploratory finite mixture models estimated the number of latent subgroups that best reflected heterogeneity in task-level performance by grade level. Specific profiles were chosen that demonstrated strong reliability and included a set of tasks that were consistent between first- and second-grade students and between third- and sixth-grade students. Different performance profiles emerged when the students completed multiple morphological awareness tasks. At each of the six grades (first through sixth), clusters of students performed differentially on specific tasks. The findings demonstrate that students can differ in patterns of strength and weaknesses of their morphological awareness given a range of tasks that assess different aspects of morphological awareness. The clinical implications of these findings suggest that by identifying students struggling in specific areas of morphological awareness, clinicians can develop and implement specific prescriptive instructional plans.

Reading Comprehension in Both Spanish and English as a Foreign Language by High School Spanish Students.

Several studies have highlighted that reading comprehension is determined by different linguistic skills: semantics, syntax, and morphology, in addition to one’s own competence in reading fluency (accuracy, speed, and prosody). On the other hand, according to the Linguistic Interdependence Hypothesis, linguistic skills developed in one’s own native language (L1) facilitate the development of these skills in a second one (L2). In this study, we wanted to explore the linguistic abilities that determine reading comprehension in Spanish (L1) and in English (L2) in Secondary Education students. To do this, 73 Secondary Education Students (1st and 3rd year) participated in this study. The students carried out a battery of tasks in English and Spanish, all of them related to reading comprehension (expository text) and different linguistic skills, which included syntactic awareness tasks, synonymy judgment tasks (vocabulary), and morphological awareness tasks. The results indicated a positive correlation between linguistic competencies in both languages (indicating a transfer effect between languages), which were determined by school year, with a lower performance in the 1st year than in the 3rd year. Moreover, we found more skills with correlations in English reading comprehension than in Spanish. Finally, reading comprehension in L1 was mainly explained English reading comprehension, while English reading comprehension was predicted by grade, and syntactic awareness, as well as Spanish reading comprehension. This could be explained by the different levels of exposure to L1 and L2 of sample subjects, as the linguistic variables have different influences on the reading comprehension of both languages.

Preschool predictors of learning to read and spell in an additional language: a two-wave longitudinal study in a multilingual context

The study explores whether foundational skills of reading and spelling in preschool (age 5–6) predict literacy skills cross-linguistically in an additional language in Grade 1 (age 6–7). A sample of linguistically diverse preschool children completed tasks of phonological awareness, letter-sound knowledge, verbal-short term memory, rapid automatized naming, and lexical knowledge in the language of preschool instruction Luxembourgish. The children were followed-up in Grade 1 where literacy skills were assessed in the language of schooling, i.e., German, after five months of literacy instruction. German was a non-native language for all children. Longitudinal correlations confirm that individual differences in single word/pseudoword reading and spelling in German in Grade 1 can be predicted by all the foundational literacy skills that were assessed in Luxembourgish. Path analyses showed that phonological awareness in Luxembourgish emerged as the strongest unique predictor of Grade 1 literacy skills in German. The second unique preschool predictor of Grade 1 literacy skills was letter-sound knowledge. Results are consistent with the view that literacy development in an additional language builds upon similar building blocks as literacy acquisition in a first language, at least for languages that are typologically close. However, current findings suggest that respective contributions between predictors and literacy skills in children learning to read in an additional language may vary from patterns observed in studies with children acquiring literacy in their first language.

Povezanost fonološke svesnosti i grešaka u čitanju kod učenika drugog razreda

Reading consists of processing written data which are transmitted by text and thus reading is seen as a complex language skill. A prerequisite for the development of reading skills is developing phonological awareness and forming verbal representations. Success in solving tasks of phonological awareness is a predictor of reading abilities. For those reasons, this research attempts to determine the connection and mutual influence between these abilities. The research is designed as a cross-sectional study and it was conducted at Primary School "Dušan Radović" in Novi Sad from February to March 2020. The research sample consisted of 31 students (19 boys and 12 girls) whose average age was 8 years and 8 month. The included assessment instruments were the Three-dimensional Reading Test - "Samo jedan snežni dan" and the "FONT" test used for assessing phonological awareness. The findings of this research confirm the correlation between phonological awareness and reading errors in second-grade students. On the basis of this research, it can be concluded that there is a significant correlation between phonological awareness and reading ability and that their mutual influence is reciprocal, i.e. the development of one ability is a prerequisite for the development of the second one.