22 research outputs found
Shaping memory consolidation via targeted memory reactivation during sleep
Recent studies have shown that the reactivation of specific memories during sleep can be modulated using external stimulation. Specifically, it has been reported that matching a sensory stimulus (e.g., odor or sound cue) with target information (e.g., pairs of words, pictures, and motor sequences) during wakefulness, and then presenting the cue alone during sleep, facilitates memory of the target information. Thus, presenting learned cues while asleep may reactivate related declarative, procedural, and emotional material, and facilitate the neurophysiological processes underpinning memory consolidation in humans. This paradigm, which has been named targeted memory reactivation, has been successfully used to improve visuospatial and verbal memories, strengthen motor skills, modify implicit social biases, and enhance fear extinction. However, these studies also show that results depend on the type of memory investigated, the task employed, the sensory cue used, and the specific sleep stage of stimulation. Here, we present a review of how memory consolidation may be shaped using noninvasive sensory stimulation during sleep
East Carolina University: Creating a Better Tomorrow: 5th Annual Research & Creative Achievement Week
The Program of the 5th Annual Research and Creative Activity Week is available, with a schedule of events and abstracts for the lectures and presentations. These events took place from April 4-8, 2011, in Mendenhall Student Center on the campus of East Carolina University
NASA Tech Briefs, October 1990
Topics: New Product Ideas; NASA TU Services; Electronic Components and Circuits; Electronic Systems; Physical' Sciences; Materials; Computer Programs; Mechanics; Machinery; Fabrication Technology; Mathematics and Information Sciences; Life Sciences
NASA Tech Briefs, December 1990
Topics: New Product Ideas; NASA TU Services; Electronic Components and Circuits; Electronic Systems; Physical Sciences; Materials; Computer Programs; Mechanics; Machinery; Fabrication Technology; Mathematics and Information Sciences; Life Sciences
NASA Tech Briefs, February 1992
Topics covered include: New Product Development; Electronic Components and Circuits; Electronic Systems; Physical Sciences; Materials; Computer Programs; Mechanics; Machinery; Fabrication Technology; Mathematics and Information Sciences; Life Sciences
A study of two frameworks for supporting the personal development of school leaders: Neuro Linguistic Programming (NLP) and the National Professional Qualification for Headship (NPQH)
This thesis is a study of two training courses and their role in supporting the personal development of school leaders. It compares a Neuro Linguistic Programming (NLP) practitioner course with the National Professional Qualification for Headship (NPQH).
Key drivers for school improvement are the quality and style of the leadership and management of the school (OFSTED reports1993-2008). Furthermore, the most recent development in the literature on leadership (Begley, 2008; Hargreaves, 2008; Boyatzis and McKee, 2005; Looman, 2003) suggests that there is a need for leaders to demonstrate the skills of knowing one’s own feelings and how one might react to events with the ability to understand and recognise emotions in others which are key features of emotional intelligence or inter and intra personal intelligences. Leadership development courses should therefore contain elements which would support the acquisition of these skills. NPQH (the National Professional Qualification for Headship) was the mandatory training for prospective head teachers until 2012.
The research involves in-depth interviews with five leaders in education who have undertaken a full NLP practitioner programme and compares their responses to five leaders who have undertaken the NPQH leadership programme. The interview questions were designed to draw out examples of any changes in the self in both behaviours and perspective as an individual and as a leader, using Transformational Learning as a lens to understand the data. The selection of the ten individuals was based upon purposive sampling with individuals selected because they met a particular criterion; they are leaders in education who have either completed an NLP practitioner course in the past three years or have completed the required NPQH qualification. The structure and content of both courses were also analysed and compared.
The critical review of literature highlights issues surrounding the research basis for claims about NLP, and the data collection and analysis identifies differences between the two cohorts of leaders. This analysis in turn raises questions about the content and structure of leadership training courses and makes recommendations for the future development of NPQH leadership training. The thesis also suggests ways in which the NLP community could demonstrate the effectiveness of NLP with greater rigour and suggests links between content in the training courses and the development of critical self-reflection through the use of reflective journaling
The role of personal mitigating factors in criminal sentencing judgments: an empirical investigation
Criminal sentencers must weight and integrate many different factors to reach a judgment, including aggravating factors that argue for a harsher sentence, and mitigating factors that suggest a more lenient sentence. Personal Mitigating Factors (PMFs) relate to the offender, rather than the offence (e.g., remorse or youth/immaturity). Research shows that discretionary sentencing produces inconsistency and bias and lacks the transparency needed to maintain public trust in justice. Although many jurisdictions have introduced more structured sentencing, the mitigation process remains largely discretionary. Structuring personal mitigation could help produce fairer sentences. Any structured approach must, however, be informed by empirical data, and little is known about how sentencers use PMFs, or how the public judges them. This thesis examined the role of three commonly occurring PMFs: remorse, good character, and addressing addiction.
Study 1 examined sentencers’ use of PMFs in cases of assault and burglary through a statistical analysis of annual sentencing data from the Crown Court in England and Wales. Study 2 used a qualitative analysis of interviews with a small sample of Crown Court judges to further explore the findings of Study 1 and identify topics for future research. Studies 3 and 4 used experimental designs to measure how the three PMFs influenced public judgments about sentencing fairness and choice of sentence length. Study 4’s “idiographic” design permitted evaluation of the variation between individuals’ judgments about PMFs.
The present thesis identified several issues with current sentencing practice, notably the underweighting of multiple co-occurring PMFs, and proposed some practical options for structuring the personal mitigation process. The thesis also identified conflicts between sentencers’ use of PMFs and public judgments, and suggested how the gap between sentencers and the public could be closed. Lastly, the thesis illustrates how methodology from psychology can be used to advance our understanding of criminal sentencing
Beyond beauty : reexamining architectural proportion in the Basilicas of San Lorenzo and Santo Spirito in Florence
This dissertation reexamines the
problem of architectural proportion in the basilica of San Lorenzo in
Florence following a rigorous new methodology that combines
comprehensive measurements and other observations with documentary
evidence, in order to identify the intentions of the basilica’s
fifteenth-century creators. It finds that the proportions of this
basilica are indeed extraordinary, as scholars have long contended, but
for reasons different than previously believed. This dissertation
analyzes the proportions of the basilica with greater quantitative
precision than any previous study has done, and demonstrates that
carefully-crafted sets of proportions expressed in the measurements
constitute mental constructs that communicate non-visual, iconographical
content. It thus reframes the subject of architectural proportion as
part of the rhetorical, rather than visual, structure of architecture.
The sets of proportions identified in this dissertation correspond with
late medieval knowledge and practices pertaining to geometry, number and
arithmetic in so many documented ways that they can be considered
genuine historical artifacts, and thus, sources of historical evidence
themselves. As such, these sets of proportions lead both to several
unconventional new conclusions pertaining to the history of this
basilica, and to a proposed alternative to Rudolf Wittkower’s framework
for the study of medieval and Renaissance architectural proportion.LEI Universiteit LeidenMedieval and Early Modern Studie
Meaning and emotion in Squaresoft\u27s Final Fantasy X: Re-theorising realism and identification in video games
This thesis takes the position that traditional theories of realism and identification misrepresent the relationships between players and videogames, and that a cross·disciplinary approach is needed. It uses Ed Tan\u27s (1997) and Torben Grodal\u27s (1997) analyses of narrative, cognition, and emotion in film as a basis for interrogating existing research on, and providing a working model of, video gameplay. It develops this model through an extended account of Squaresoft\u27s adventure role-playing game Final Fantasy X (FFX) (2001), whose hybrid narrative and game macrostructures foreground many of the problems associated with video games. The chapters respectively address; existing research on video games; how perceptual qualities of the interface determine the reality status of gameplay; how narrative and game codes regulate or retard interest; FFX\u27s henneneutic coding of reality; the dual narrative and game coding of video game characters; the uses and limits of the psychoanalytic concept of identification when analysing video games; how gameplay promotes empathetic emotions towards characters; how players develop empathetic emotions towards themselves; and how the disjunctive quality of play may have un existential quality