The Effect of an Unconscious Auditory Stimulus on Pilot Performance under Varying Instrument Flying Conditions

Human error remains a significant contributing factor with respect to accidents in civil air transportation. It is therefore crucial to establish avenues by which performance on the flightdeck can be enhanced under conditions of distress. The purpose of this study was to examine whether an unconscious auditory stimulus (UAS) could enhance pilot performance under varying instrument flight (IFR) conditions on the aircraft flightdeck. Forty IFR student pilots underwent two eight-minute simulated flights, whereupon they were presented with different IFR weather conditions. During the trial, the experimental group listened to a UAS, whereas the control group listened to white noise (WN). Performance was measured based on the deviation from the localizer (LOC), the glide slope (GS), and the air speed (AS). It was hypothesized that the UAS would assist in enhancing pilot performance under varying IFR weather conditions, and that overall good weather conditions would degrade performance less than poor weather conditions. The results of this experiment did not support the hypotheses. Possible explanations are presented in the discussion section

Exploring the effect of subliminal single-word and multiple-word primes on working memory performance

This PhD thesis focused on subliminal priming, that is, the presentation of information below conscious awareness (Vernon, 2009), which has been shown to influence both cognitive and affective behaviours. Information can be presented subliminally using both ‘Single-Word’ and ‘Multiple-Word’ written primes, although the two prime types have not yet been compared. Currently there is no reported optimal procedure for the presentation of subliminal stimuli, thus such a comparison could guide future research concerning prime choice. Hence, this thesis empirically compared the effects produced by Single-Word and Multiple-Word primes in a series of experiments. In Experiment 1 96 participants were subliminally stimulated with one of six alternative primes, three Single-Word primes (cognitive: intelligent; affective: one; neutral-control: walking), and three Multiple-Word primes (cognitive: I am intelligent; affective: mommy and I are one; neutral-control: people are walking), and their performance measured on a range of cognitive (e.g., working memory, intelligence, selective attention) andaffective (e.g., mood and state anxiety) tasks. Results of Experiment 1 showed no clear change in participants’ intelligence, selective attention, mood, or state anxiety. However, post hoc analysis found participants’ significantly improved their working memory performance following exposure to all positive (e.g., cognitive and affective) subliminal primes, regardless of prime type (i.e., Single-Word and Multiple-Word). Experiment 2 followed this up by exploring the effect of subliminal priming on working memory performance. Sixty participants were primed with one of the six subliminal stimuli to assess whether the non-differential effect between prime types found in Experiment 1 was due to the varied length of time between the end of subliminal exposure and the onset of the task. Results found all participants’ performance improved regardless of prime type and prime content and thus was concluded to reflect a practice effect. Experiment 3 considered that the absence of any subliminal priming may have been due to participants’ potential lack of motivation to attain the goal of improving working memory. Hence, 106 participants were primed with one of the six subliminal stimuli and their motivation to achieve this goal was enhanced using falsepositive feedback on performance and reading a false article extract highlighting the benefit of a good working memory. Results found, despite increased motivation to improve working memory, that subliminal priming did not have any effect on performance. Experiment 4 considered whether the specific content of the subliminal stimuli, the short prime-target stimulus onset asynchrony (SOA), or the type of task could be accountable for the null results. Thus, in addition to enhancing participant motivation, the content of the stimuli were refined to become more task-relevant, the prime-target SOA was extended from 14ms to 514ms to allow more time for unconscious processing. Eighty-three participants were primed with one of four subliminal stimuli; two Single-Word primes (memory-specific: remember; neutralcontrol: walking) and two Multiple-Word primes (memory-specific: I can remember well; neutral-control: people are walking), and performance was measured using two working memory tasks. Results found all participants’ performance improved on both working memory tasks regardless of prime type and prime content and was concluded to reflect a practice effect. Finally, a meta-analysis conducted on the data from the Conceptual Span Task from all four experiments confirmed an improvement on performance over time but no evidence of any subliminal priming effects. Overall, this thesis found it was not possible to establish a difference between the two prime types, although findings indicate that subliminal priming may not be able to improve performance of the phonological loop component of working memory

An evaluation of the role of irrational cognitions in depression

Beck's (1979) cognitive theory of depression states that irrational beliefs about the self, the world, and the future are typical characteristics of persons prone to depression. These beliefs are hypothesized to be latent until activated by a stressor, at which point they lead to depression. Prior research has firmly established the presence of such schemas in the actively depressed person. No evidence of depressotypic schemas, however, has been found among depression-prone persons who are currently asymptomatic (e.g., remitted depressives). The apparent absence of such schemas in the latter group might be due to inadequate assessment procedures. Since the schemas are hypothesized to be latent, it follows that they might only be revealed under special assessment conditions

Social Cognition for Human-Robot Symbiosis—Challenges and Building Blocks

The next generation of robot companions or robot working partners will need to satisfy social requirements somehow similar to the famous laws of robotics envisaged by Isaac Asimov time ago (Asimov, 1942). The necessary technology has almost reached the required level, including sensors and actuators, but the cognitive organization is still in its infancy and is only partially supported by the current understanding of brain cognitive processes. The brain of symbiotic robots will certainly not be a “positronic” replica of the human brain: probably, the greatest part of it will be a set of interacting computational processes running in the cloud. In this article, we review the challenges that must be met in the design of a set of interacting computational processes as building blocks of a cognitive architecture that may give symbiotic capabilities to collaborative robots of the next decades: (1) an animated body-schema; (2) an imitation machinery; (3) a motor intentions machinery; (4) a set of physical interaction mechanisms; and (5) a shared memory system for incremental symbiotic development. We would like to stress that our approach is totally un-hierarchical: the five building blocks of the shared cognitive architecture are fully bi-directionally connected. For example, imitation and intentional processes require the “services” of the animated body schema which, on the other hand, can run its simulations if appropriately prompted by imitation and/or intention, with or without physical interaction. Successful experiences can leave a trace in the shared memory system and chunks of memory fragment may compete to participate to novel cooperative actions. And so on and so forth. At the heart of the system is lifelong training and learning but, different from the conventional learning paradigms in neural networks, where learning is somehow passively imposed by an external agent, in symbiotic robots there is an element of free choice of what is worth learning, driven by the interaction between the robot and the human partner. The proposed set of building blocks is certainly a rough approximation of what is needed by symbiotic robots but we believe it is a useful starting point for building a computational framework

Targeting the automatic: Nonconscious behaviour change using technology

Digital interventions have great potential to support people to change their behaviour. However, most interventions focus on strategies that target limited conscious resources, reducing their potential impact. We outline how these may fail in the longer-term due to issues with theory, users and technology. We propose an alternative: the direct targeting of nonconscious processes to achieve behaviour change. We synthesise Dual Process Theory, modern habit theory and Goal Setting Theory, which together model how users form and break nonconscious behaviours, into an explanatory framework to explore nonconscious behaviour change interventions. We explore the theoretical and practical implications of this approach, and apply it to a series of empirical studies. The studies explore nonconscious-targeting interventions across a continuum of conscious attention required at the point of behavioural action, from high (just-in-time reminders within Implementation Intentions) to medium (training paradigms within cognitive bias modification) to low (subliminal priming). The findings show that these single-nonconscious-target interventions have mixed results in in-the-wild and semi-controlled conditions. We conclude by outlining how interventions might strategically deploy multiple interventions that target the nonconscious at differing levels of conscious attention, and by identifying promising avenues of future research

BEYOND THE BATON An Investigation of the Intangibles of Conducting

How does one conductor create a completely different musical result from another, despite comparable levels of technical proficiency? How do conductors inspire the musicians before them? What intangible forms of communication are in operation whilst conducting? Can they be identified and explored? Can they be taught? Conducting can be understood to be an exchange of energy and innate leadership. The physical technique of conducting may be the means to communicate musical data such as style, dynamics, tempo and articulation, however the essence of the art of conducting exists beyond (and often despite) the technique. Pedagogical approaches to conducting teach the technique, however it appears that there is not an accepted method to teach communication skills that are beyond the technique and therefore students of the art of conducting are expected to develop these skills on their own. My research explores the existing knowledge related to conducting from a broad range of disciplines. Using a phenomenographical approach, participating musicians were interviewed to gain an understanding of the experiences and perceptions of conducting from a variety of perspectives. Understanding how musicians experience conductors’ intentions as they are subliminally communicated provides a unique insight into their reception of those intentions. The outcome of this research includes a hypothesis of what might be done to assist in teaching the intangible elements of instrumental conducting based on insights uncovered through analysis of the collected data