Belief-biased representations of textual information in bilinguals: Language as a source characteristic

When pursuing a controversial socio-scientific issue, readers are expected to construct balanced representations that include overlapping and opposing information. However, readers’ mental representations are often biased towards their prior beliefs. Previous research on such text-belief consistency effects have been conducted mostly in monolingual contexts. The present study investigated whether document language, as a source characteristic, moderates text-belief consistency effects at the situation-model and text-base representation levels. Eighty-seven bilingual readers—selected from a larger initial sample—read two documents on the global spread of English. The documents were either presented in participants’ first (Persian) and second (English) languages, or one was presented in Persian and the other one in English. A recognition task was used to assess situation-model strength and text-base strength. Overall, participants built stronger situation models for the belief-consistent information as opposed to belief-inconsistent information. However, document language moderated the text-belief consistency effect. When both texts were presented in English, the text-belief consistency effect was smaller than when both texts were presented in Persian. For the combination of English and Persian texts, the text-belief consistency effect was enlarged when the belief-consistent text was presented in English and the belief-inconsistent text in Persian but disappeared when the text-belief consistent text was presented in Persian and the belief-inconsistent text in English. These results suggest that document language can serve as a strong credibility cue that can eliminate belief effects, at least when the document language and the controversial issue are inherently related.

Operation-Specific Lexical Consistency Effect in Fronto-Insular-Parietal Network During Word Problem Solving

The practice of mathematical word problem is ubiquitous and thought to impact academic achievement. However, the underlying neural mechanisms are still poorly understood. In this study, we investigate how lexical consistency of word problem description is modulated in adults' brain responses during word problem solution. Using functional magnetic resonance imaging methods, we examined compare word problems that included relational statements, such as “A dumpling costs 9 dollars. A wonton is 2 dollars less than a dumpling. How much does a wonton cost?” and manipulated lexical consistency (consistent: the relational term consistent with the operation to be performed, e.g., more—addition/inconsistent: e.g., less—addition) and problem operation (addition/subtraction). We found a consistency by operation interaction in the widespread fronto-insular-parietal activations, including the anterior insula, dorsoanterior cingulate cortex, middle frontal gyrus, and intraparietal sulcus, such that inconsistent problems engaged stronger activations than consistent problems for addition, whereas the consistency effect was inverse for subtraction. Critically, these results were more salient in the less successful problem solvers than their more successful peers. Our study is the first to demonstrate that lexical consistency effects on arithmetic neural networks are modulated during reading word problem that required distinct arithmetic operations. More broadly, our study has strong potentials to add linkage between neuroscience and education by remediating deficits and enhance instruction design in the school curriculum.

The Consistency Effects of the Clean Metaphor of Moral Concept and Dirty Metaphor of Immoral Concept

Morality is clean, while immorality is dirty, and these metaphors use concrete clean and dirty experiences to express moral and immoral concepts; specifically, they are the clean metaphor of moral concept and dirty metaphor of immoral concept. The present study used event-related potentials (ERPs) to explore the consistency effects of the clean metaphor of moral concept and dirty metaphor of immoral concept, the experiment recorded the reaction times (RTs) and ERP waves in a metaphor consistency condition and a metaphor inconsistency condition. The behavioral results showed that the RTs in the metaphor consistency condition were significantly faster than the RTs in the metaphor inconsistency condition. The ERP results showed that the P300, N400, and late negative component (LNC) amplitudes were higher in the metaphor inconsistency condition than in the metaphor consistency condition.

A review of computational models of word recognition and pronunciation

How do we recognize words and assign a pronunciation? Computational models provide a formal description of the mechanisms and principles that guide the reading process. I review and evaluate the Interactive-Activation Model (IAM), Dual Route Cascaded (DRC) model, the Parallel Distributed Processing (PDP) model, and the Connectionist Dual Processing (CDP) model, as well as LEX, a variant of the MINERVA model of memory. I evaluate each model’s ability to account for consistency effects, serial effects, syllable effects, and phonological effects. Consistency effects pose a problem for the rule-based pronunciation of the DRC. Serial effects pose a problem for the purely parallel PDP models. Phonological effects pose a problem for all models save CDP. All models suffer from the distribution problem, weakening each model’s ability to learn spelling-to-sound relationships. LEX is the only model that handles polysyllabic words. As none of the models provide a complete answer to the question of ‘how do we read?’, ‘how do we pronounce?’, or ‘how do we recognize words?’, I outline a set of principles as guidelines for future model development. Models of reading should learn, include a visual attention mechanism, be sensitive to phonology, and account for meaning and spelling in addition to recognizing words and pronouncing them.

Question-Order Effects in the Evaluation of Political Institutions in Decentralized Polities

This research studies question-order effects in the evaluation of political institutions in socially heterogeneous regions within decentralized countries. Split-ballot experiments were embedded in 3 representative surveys fielded in the Spanish region of Catalonia. Significant consistency effects were spotted in all samples. Respondents who first evaluated the relatively less valued institutions of one governmental level assessed less favorably the relatively better rated institutions of the other level. Clear evidence of the reverse effect was present only in 1 of the experiments. In addition, heterogeneous question-order effects emerged among the 2 distinct national communities coexisting in Catalonia. The article suggests a mechanism beneath this sort of question-order effects and further proposes and empirically tests a remedial solution.