Analysis of Eyeblink Activity during Self-Referent Information Processing in Mild Depression

1995 ◽  
Vol 81 (3_suppl) ◽  
pp. 1219-1229 ◽  
Author(s):  
Hideki Ohdra
Keyword(s):  
Information Processing ◽  
Cognitive Load ◽  
Cognitive Effort ◽  
Attentional Resource ◽  
Eyeblink Response ◽  
Discrete Trial ◽  
Mild Depression ◽  
Burst Pattern ◽  
Negative Trait ◽  
Self Reference

This study was designed to assess characteristics of self-referent information processing in mildly depressed persons using the eyeblink response measured in a discrete-trial paradigm. 7 mildly depressed and 9 nondepressed subjects (classified by scores on Beck's inventory) performed a self-reference task for positive and negative trait adjectives. The eyeblink was suppressed before and during presentation of stimuli and a burst pattern of the eyeblink was observed just after exposure. The pattern of the eyeblink burst after trait adjectives could be interpreted to reflect cognitive effort, cognitive load, or amount of attentional resource. Present results suggested that depressed individuals should have less cognitive load or allocate less attentional resource to negative stimuli than to positive ones during self-referent information processing.

scholarly journals Pupillary and microsaccadic responses to cognitive effort and emotional arousal during complex decision making

2020 ◽  
Vol 13 (5) ◽  
Author(s):  
Krzysztof Krejtz ◽  
Justyna Żurawska ◽  
Andrew Duchowski ◽  
Szymon Wichary
Keyword(s):  
Decision Making ◽  
Information Processing ◽  
Cognitive Load ◽  
Large Body ◽  
Emotional Arousal ◽  
Pupillary Response ◽  
Cognitive Effort ◽  
Affective Priming ◽  
Multi Attribute Decision Making ◽  
Processing Effort

A large body of literature documents the sensitivity of pupil response to cognitive load (e.g., Krejtz et al. 2018) and emotional arousal (Bradley et al., 2008). Recent empirical evidence also showed that microsaccade characteristics and dynamics can be modulated by mental fatigue and cognitive load (e.g., Dalmaso et al. 2017). Very little is known about the sensitivity of microsaccadic characteristics to emotional arousal. The present paper demonstrates in a controlled experiment pupillary and microsaccadic responses to information processing during multi-attribute decision making under affective priming. Twenty-one psychology students were randomly assigned into three affective priming conditions (neutral, aversive, and erotic). Participants were tasked to make several discriminative decisions based on acquired cues. In line with the expectations, results showed microsaccadic rate inhibition and pupillary dilation depending on cognitive effort (number of acquired cues) prior to decision. These effects were moderated by affective priming. Aversive priming strengthened pupillary and microsaccadic response to information processing effort. In general, results suggest that pupillary response is more biased by affective priming than microsaccadic rate. The results are discussed in the light of neuropsychological mechanisms of pupillary and microsaccadic behavior generation.

scholarly journals Information Rate in Humans during Visuomotor Tracking

Entropy ◽  
2021 ◽  
Vol 23 (2) ◽  
pp. 228
Author(s):  
Sze-Ying Lam ◽  
Alexandre Zénon
Keyword(s):  
Information Processing ◽  
Information Transfer ◽  
Cost Benefit ◽  
Cognitive Effort ◽  
Task Demands ◽  
Information Rate ◽  
Present Contribution ◽  
Visuomotor Tracking ◽  
Processing Rate ◽  
Choice Tasks

Previous investigations concluded that the human brain’s information processing rate remains fundamentally constant, irrespective of task demands. However, their conclusion rested in analyses of simple discrete-choice tasks. The present contribution recasts the question of human information rate within the context of visuomotor tasks, which provides a more ecologically relevant arena, albeit a more complex one. We argue that, while predictable aspects of inputs can be encoded virtually free of charge, real-time information transfer should be identified with the processing of surprises. We formalise this intuition by deriving from first principles a decomposition of the total information shared by inputs and outputs into a feedforward, predictive component and a feedback, error-correcting component. We find that the information measured by the feedback component, a proxy for the brain’s information processing rate, scales with the difficulty of the task at hand, in agreement with cost-benefit models of cognitive effort.

scholarly journals Notetaking and Writing from Hypertexts in L1 and L2

2008 ◽  
Vol 156 ◽  
pp. 31-50
Author(s):  
Marie-Laure Barbier ◽  
Annie Piolat ◽  
Jean-Yves Roussey ◽  
Françoise Raby
Keyword(s):  
Cognitive Load ◽  
Word Processor ◽  
Cognitive Effort ◽  
Cognitive Resources ◽  
Main Task ◽  
Writing Processes ◽  
Random Intervals ◽  
Paper Condition ◽  
Copy And Paste ◽  
L1 And L2

This study analyzes the cognitive effort and linguistic procedures of sixty students using information taken from an experimental website in L1 (French) and in L2 (English). The students navigated on the website and took notes on paper or with a word processor. A triple-task paradigm was used to estimate the cognitive load of reading, notetaking, and writing processes in L2. The students had to perform two additional tasks while a main task (notetaking, for example) was being carried out. They had to react as fast as possible to sound signals sent out at random intervals. They also had to identify what they were doing at the time the sound signal was heard (reading, notetaking, or writing). The study focuses on the way the students managed their cognitive resources while exploring the website, selecting and writing down the ideas they considered useful, and reconstructing them later when producing their own text. Surprisingly, no difference in cognitive load was observed between L1 and L2. By relying almost exclusively on the copy and paste functions to retrieve information from the website, the participants using a word processor in L2 succeeded in making reading a less costly activity, and they performed similarly to the notetakers in L1. The students’ difficulties in L2 became apparent only in the paper condition. The strategies and linguistic procedures of the students are described and related to the ways teachers can approach the new dimensions of notetaking and writing with a computer.

scholarly journals Testing the Effects of Modality and Narration Style on Patients’ Information Use in a Lung Cancer Treatment Decision Aid

2020 ◽  
Vol 40 (8) ◽  
pp. 990-1002
Author(s):  
Nida Gizem Yılmaz ◽  
Julia C. M. Van Weert ◽  
Ellen Peters ◽  
Birgit I. Lissenberg-Witte ◽  
Annemarie Becker ◽  
...  
Keyword(s):  
Lung Cancer ◽  
Information Processing ◽  
Cognitive Load ◽  
Cancer Treatment ◽  
Older Patients ◽  
Decision Aid ◽  
Treatment Decision ◽  
Decisional Conflict ◽  
Factual Information ◽  
Younger Patients

Background Risk information in patient decision aids (PDAs) is often difficult for older patients to process. Providing audiovisual and narrative information may enhance the understanding and use of health-related information. We studied the effects on patients’ information processing and use of audiovisual and narrative information of an early-stage non–small-cell lung cancer treatment decision aid explaining surgery and stereotactic ablative radiotherapy. We further investigated differences between older and younger patients. Methods We conducted a 2 (modality: textual v. audiovisual) × 2 (narration style: factual v. narrative) online experiment among cancer patients and survivors ( N = 305; Mage = 62.42, SD = 11.68 y). Age was included as a potential modifier: younger (<65 y) versus older (≥65 y) age. We assessed 1) perceived cognitive load, 2) satisfaction with information, 3) comprehension, 4) information recall, and 5) decisional conflict. Analysis of variance was used for data analysis. Results Irrespective of patient age, audiovisual information (compared with textual information) led to lower perceived cognitive load, higher satisfaction with information, and lower decisional conflict (subscale Effective Decision). Narrative information (compared with factual information) led to reduced decisional conflict (subscale Uncertainty) but only in younger patients. Combining audiovisual information with factual information also resulted in lower perceived cognitive load in younger patients as compared with older patients. Limitations Patients who actually face the decision, especially older patients, might be more motivated to process our decision-aid information than the present study participants who responded to a hypothetical situation online. Conclusions Providing participants with audiovisual information, irrespective of their age, improved their processing and use of information in a decision aid. Narratives did not clearly benefit information processing.

Temperament and Attentional Bias in Vocal Emotional Stroop Tasks

2012 ◽  
Vol 26 (2) ◽  
pp. 111-122 ◽  
Author(s):  
Marko Paelecke ◽  
Yvonne Paelecke–Habermann ◽  
Peter Borkenau
Keyword(s):  
Information Processing ◽  
Cognitive Load ◽  
Response Times ◽  
Human Information Processing ◽  
Task Switch ◽  
Vocal Response ◽  
Emotional Stroop ◽  
Affective Quality ◽  
Stroop Tasks

Human information processing is influenced by the affective quality of pleasant and unpleasant stimuli. A widely known example is the emotional variant of the colour–naming Stroop task. Although participants are not instructed to attend to valence, it nevertheless influences response times. We studied how persons differ in ignoring the irrelevant valence of stimuli and how such differences are related to personality traits. In two emotional Stroop tasks using a vocal response mode, participants were instructed to name the colour of unpleasant and pleasant words presented in different physical colours. In Study 2, we introduced a second task to increase the cognitive load. Across both studies, extraversion and approach temperament were associated with higher interferences by pleasant words. Neuroticism and avoidance temperament, however, were associated with higher interferences by unpleasant words only when cognitive load increased because of a task switch. This finding suggests that highly neurotic individuals can mitigate influences of emotional stimuli on information processing under conditions of low cognitive load. Copyright © 2012 John Wiley & Sons, Ltd.

scholarly journals The cognitive economy: The probabilistic turn in psychology and human cognition

2013 ◽  
Vol 36 (3) ◽  
pp. 294-295
Author(s):  
Petko Kusev ◽  
Paul van Schaik
Keyword(s):  
Economic Theory ◽  
Information Processing ◽  
Cognitive Load ◽  
Human Cognition ◽  
Cognitive Economy ◽  
Memory Representations

AbstractAccording to the foundations of economic theory, agents have stable and coherent “global” preferences that guide their choices among alternatives. However, people are constrained by information-processing and memory limitations and hence have a propensity to avoid cognitive load. We propose that this in turn will encourage them to respond to “local” preferences and goals influenced by context and memory representations.

scholarly journals The aesthetic paradox in processing conventional and non-conventional metaphors

2011 ◽  
Vol 1 (2) ◽  
pp. 199-240 ◽  
Author(s):  
Ursula Christmann ◽  
Lena Wimmer ◽  
Norbert Groeben
Keyword(s):  
Cognitive Load ◽  
Cognitive Effort ◽  
Paradoxical Effect ◽  
Processing Demand ◽  
Processing Times ◽  
Emotional Evaluation ◽  
Interpretation Process ◽  
The Aesthetic ◽  
The Relationship ◽  
High Processing

This study focuses on the relationship between cognitive effort and aesthetic-emotional evaluation in the processing of conventional and non-conventional metaphors. We postulate that an increased cognitive load — which is normally perceived as stressful — is evaluated positively when processing non-conventional metaphors. We have called this contradictory suspense ‘aesthetic paradox’. The aesthetic paradox was tested in two studies that differed in degree of processing demand. In study 1 (low processing demand) participants (N = 40) read (non-)conventional metaphors, judged the adequacy of two metaphor paraphrases and assessed their own interpretation process. In study 2 (high processing demand) the same procedure was applied with the exception that participants (N = 40) evaluated the appropriateness of one metaphor paraphrase. The results of both experiments confirm that non-conventional metaphors require longer reading and longer processing times than conventional metaphors, and they confirm the postulated paradoxical effect: the increase of cognitive effort in processing non-conventional metaphors is evaluated positively, provided that a satisfactory interpretation is found.

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