How Visual Expertise Changes Representational Geometry: A Behavioral and Neural Perspective

Many people develop expertise in specific domains of interest, such as chess, microbiology, radiology, and, the case in point in our study: ornithology. It is poorly understood to what extent such expertise alters brain function. Previous neuroimaging studies of expertise have typically focused upon the category level, for example, selectivity for birds versus nonbird stimuli. We present a multivariate fMRI study focusing upon the representational similarity among objects of expertise at the subordinate level. We compare the neural representational spaces of experts and novices to behavioral judgments. At the behavioral level, ornithologists (n = 20) have more fine-grained and task-dependent representations of item similarity that are more consistent among experts compared to control participants. At the neural level, the neural patterns of item similarity are more distinct and consistent in experts than in novices, which is in line with the behavioral results. In addition, these neural patterns in experts show stronger correlations with behavior compared to novices. These findings were prominent in frontal regions, and some effects were also found in occipitotemporal regions. This study illustrates the potential of an analysis of representational geometry to understand to what extent expertise changes neural information processing.

Trait Rumination and Social Anxiety Separately Predict Stress Induced Rumination and Hemodynamic Responses

We aimed to investigate the stress-reactive rumination response to social stress and its association with social anxiety and trait rumination. From previous investigations we know that people with a certain vulnerability to rumination show increased stress-reactive rumination. However, up to date the possible influence of social anxiety to this relationship is still unclear. Therefore, we reanalyzed the data of two of our previous studies assessing healthy low and high trait ruminators and depressed patients performing the Trier Social Stress Test (TSST). We measured cortical oxygenation using functional Near-Infrared Spectroscopy (fNIRS) as well as different behavioral outcome measures (subjective stress levels, negative affect, state rumination). On a behavioral level, we found an influence of both, social anxiety and trait rumination, on state rumination, even when correcting for the other factor, respectively, implying two potentially independent factors of influence. On a neural level, we observed reduced activation in socially anxious subjects in the right inferior frontal gyrus (IFG), as well as time-dependent changes in the left IFG and in the right dorsolateral prefrontal cortex. Results indicate a specific role of social anxiety, at least on a behavioral level, and therefore implicate a crucial factor to be considered in the treatment of depression.

A survey of Indonesian otolaryngologist behavior in medical service during the CoVid-19 pandemic

ABSTRACTBackground: World Health Organization (WHO) announced a newly discovered virus that first identified in Wuhan, China on December 2019, namely SARS-CoV-2 as the cause of corona virus disease (COVID-19) which had become global pandemic. Doctors as medical practitioners are categorized as vulnerable group to be infected by corona virus, and many otorhinolaryngologists had been infected and even died in performing medical services. Among the causative factors why otorhinolaryngologists could get infected by corona virus is their behavior. Purpose: To assess the behavioral level of otorhinolaryngologists in medical services during Covid-19 pandemic. Method: Descriptive study with a cross sectional design. Research samples were otorhinolaryngologists in Indonesia who met the inclusions criteria. The samples were selected by consecutive sampling method, and got obtained 1299 subjects. Behavioral level was assessed from 3 aspects: knowledge, attitude, and practice, which were comprised of 12 questions. Result: It was found that 461 respondents had a good behavioral level (35.5%), 677 respondents had moderate levels (52.1%) and 161 respondents had low level (12.4%). There was a statistically significant correlation between knowledge with behavioral level, attitude with behavioral level, and practice with behavioral level (p=0.001). Conclusion: The study of behavioral level of otorhinolaryngologists in medical service during Covid-19 pandemic obtained the highest number was moderate level 677 respondents (57.2%), and there was a statistically significant correlations between the variable of knowledge with behavioral level, the variable of attitude with behavioral level, and the variable of practice with behavioral level (p=0.001).

Focusing on Resilience and Renewal From Stress: The Role of Emotional and Social Intelligence Competencies

Individuals are subject to stressful events from daily chronic stress to traumatic life-changing experiences and the resulting impairment. Efforts to reduce stress or stressors are misdirected. Instead, bouncing back or recovering from such experiences, often called resilience is a far more potent way to ameliorate the ravages of chronic stress and move to a state of renewal, thriving and flourishing. Because we infect each other with stress or renewal through emotional contagion, each person's ability to manage their own emotions as well as those of others and their relationships becomes key to health. These capabilities are called emotional and social intelligence. At the trait level, they are personal dispositions but at the behavioral level they are patterns of behavior we call emotional and social intelligence competencies (ESI). This paper is a review addressing the role of emotional and social intelligence competencies in resilience. By focusing on the behavioral level of ESI, designs for more precise research and practical applications as to how to develop ESI and resilience are offered.

Relationship between Memory Load and Listening Demands in Age-Related Hearing Impairment

Age-related hearing loss has been associated with increased recruitment of frontal brain areas during speech perception to compensate for the decline in auditory input. This additional recruitment may bind resources otherwise needed for understanding speech. However, it is unknown how increased demands on listening interact with increasing cognitive demands when processing speech in age-related hearing loss. The current study used a full-sentence working memory task manipulating demands on working memory and listening and studied untreated mild to moderate hard of hearing ( n = 20 ) and normal-hearing age-matched participants ( n = 19 ) with functional MRI. On the behavioral level, we found a significant interaction of memory load and listening condition; this was, however, similar for both groups. Under low, but not high memory load, listening condition significantly influenced task performance. Similarly, under easy but not difficult listening conditions, memory load had a significant effect on task performance. On the neural level, as measured by the BOLD response, we found increased responses under high compared to low memory load conditions in the left supramarginal gyrus, left middle frontal gyrus, and left supplementary motor cortex regardless of hearing ability. Furthermore, we found increased responses in the bilateral superior temporal gyri under easy compared to difficult listening conditions. We found no group differences nor interactions of group with memory load or listening condition. This suggests that memory load and listening condition interacted on a behavioral level, however, only the increased memory load was reflected in increased BOLD responses in frontal and parietal brain regions. Hence, when evaluating listening abilities in elderly participants, memory load should be considered as it might interfere with the assessed performance. We could not find any further evidence that BOLD responses for the different memory and listening conditions are affected by mild to moderate age-related hearing loss.

Training and Transfer of Cue Updating in Older Adults Is Limited: Evidence From Behavioral and Neuronal Data

Cognitive control processes, such as updating task-relevant information while switching between multiple tasks, are substantially impaired in older adults. However, it has also been shown that these cognitive control processes can be improved by training interventions, e.g., by training in task switching. Here, we applied an event-related potential (ERP) approach to identify whether a cognitive training improves task-preparatory processes such as updating of relevant task goals. To do so, we applied a pretest-training-posttest design with eight training sessions. Two groups of older adults were either trained in task switching (treatment group) or in performing single tasks (control group) and we compared their performance to a group of untrained younger adults. To foster cue updating in the treatment group, we applied a cue-based switching task in which the two task cues were randomly selected prior to target presentation so that participants had time to prepare for the upcoming task. In contrast, the control group also received task cues but those were redundant as only one task had to be performed. We also examined whether training in cue updating during task switching can be transferred to a similar cognitive control task measuring updating of context information, namely a modified version of the AX-Continuous Performance Task (AX-CPT). The results revealed training-specific improvements in task switching, that is, a larger improvement in blocks requiring switching in comparison to single tasks at the behavioral level. In addition, training specific-effects were also found at the neuronal level. Older adults trained in cue updating while switching showed a reduction in mixing costs in the cue-related P3, indicating an improvement in preparatory updating processes. Additionally, P3 topography changed with training from a very broad to a parietally focused scalp distribution similar to the one found in younger adults. However, we did not obtain training-specific improvements in context updating in the AX-CPT neither at the behavioral level nor at the neuronal level. Results are discussed in the context of the ongoing debate on whether transfer of cognitive training improvements is possible.

Neural Representation of Auditory Speech Processing in Age-Related Hearing Impairment

Age-related hearing loss has been associated with increased recruitment of frontal brain areas during speech perception to compensate for the decline in auditory input. This additional recruitment may bind resources otherwise needed for understanding speech. However, it is unknown how increased demands on listening interact with increasing cognitive demands when processing speech in age-related hearing loss. The current study used a full-sentence working memory task manipulating demands on working memory and listening and studied untreated mild to moderate hard of hearing (n = 20) and normal-hearing age-matched participants (n = 19) with functional MRI. On the behavioral level, we found a significant interaction of memory load and listening condition; this was, however, similar for both groups. Under low, but not high memory load, listening condition significantly influenced task performance. Similarly, under easy but not difficult listening conditions, memory load had a significant effect on task performance. On the neural level, we found increased responses under high compared to low memory load conditions in the left supramarginal gyrus, left middle frontal gyrus and left supplementary motor cortex regardless of hearing ability. Furthermore, we found increased responses in the bilateral superior temporal gyri under easy compared to difficult listening conditions. We found no group differences nor interactions of groups with memory load or listening conditions. This suggests that memory load and listening conditions interacted on a behavioral level, however, only the increased memory load was reflected in increased neural responses in frontal and parietal brain regions. Hence, when evaluating listening abilities in elderly participants, memory load should be considered as it might interfere with the assessed performance. We could not find any further evidence that neural mechanisms of auditory speech processing are affected by mild to moderate age-related hearing loss.

ASPEK VISCERAL DAN BEHAVIORAL PADA KAIN TENUN SUTERA

ABSTRAK Pemberdayaan IKM merupakan salah satu dari 10 prioritas nasional dalam inisiatif making Indonesia 4.0. IKM tekstil tradisional tersebar di hampir seluruh wilayah nusantara, termasuk di wilayah Garut, Jawa Barat sebagai salah satu penghasil kain tenun sutera. Sebagai sebuah benda desain kain tenun yang dibuat harus sesuai dengan kriteria yang diharapkan oleh pengguna. Penelitian ini diharapkan mampu bermanfaat bagi IKM tekstil tradisional untuk mengidentifikasi karakteristik kain tenun dilihat dari interaksi manusia dan desain pada tahapan visceral dan behavioral, sehingga produk yang dihasilkan sesuai dengan kebutuhan penggunanya. Interaksi pada tahap visceral dapat diukur melalui evaluasi sensori terhadap sifat taktil dengan indera peraba dan tampilan visual kain tenun dengan indera penglihatan, bahkan sifat taktil dan tampilan visual menjadi preferensi pilihan yang penting bagi pengguna saat memilih kain tenun. Sedangkan respon yang muncul setelah penggunaan dalam selang waktu tertentu merupakan bentuk interaksi pada tingkat behavioral. Pengujian data hasil eksperimen dengan Anova satu arah terhadap empat sampel kain tenun sutera Garut yang memiliki perbedaan struktur anyaman menunjukkan bahwa kain tenun dengan anyaman polos dinilai memiliki sifat taktil yang paling baik dan diperkirakan paling nyaman jika dipergunakan sebagai benda pakai. Begitu pula dengan perbedaan tampilan visual kain yang disebabkan oleh aplikasi teknik desain permukaan menjadi preferensi yang penting bagi pengguna saat memilih kain tenun. Lebih lanjut, pengujian korelasi Pearson membuktikan bahwa preferensi pilihan yang diakibatkan oleh sifat taktil dan tampilan visual kain tenun tidak berpengaruh terhadap munculnya bentuk interaksi pada tingkatan behavioral; terkait dengan fungsi, cara penggunaan serta tingkat kenyamanan bagi penggunanya. Kata kunci : behavioral, evaluasi sensori interaksi manusia dan desain, visceral ABSTRACT Small and Medium Enterprises (SME) empowerment is one of 10 national priorities in making Indonesia's 4.0 initiative. Traditional textile SME spreads in almost all regions of Indonesia, including in Garut, West Java as a producer of silk woven. As a design object, woven fabric must be in accordance with the expected criteria by the user. This research is expected to be useful for traditional textile SMEs to identify the characteristics of woven fabric seen from human and design interaction at the visceral and behavioral level, so that the products are in accordance with user requirements. The sensory evaluation of tactile properties of woven fabric by touching and visual appearance assesment are forms of human interaction and design on the visceral level. In fact, both are become main preferences to the user when deciding to buy woven fabrics. While the response that appears after being used in a certain time interval is a form of interaction at the behavioral level. Tactile properties and visual appearance of the woven fabric which can be evaluated subjectively by human senses is a form of human interaction with the design on a visceral level. Analysis of one way anova against four types of woven silk with diffrent structure shows that as textile materials, plain fabrics rated as the best in total handling properties and considered as the most convenient when used as wearable items. According to it’s visual appearance, the type of surface design on fabric be important to the user preferences when choosing fabrics. Pearson correlation testing showed that the preferences of the user's choice posed by the visceral aspect due to the tactile properties of woven fabric and surface design applications had no effect on the appearance of interaction at the level of behavioral aspects associated with the function, useability and the physical responses.Keywords : behavioral, sensory evaluation, visceral