Crowding, Attention and Consciousness: in support of the inference hypothesis

One of the most important topics in current work on consciousness is what relationship it has to attention. Recently, one of the focuses of this debate has been on the phenomenon of identity crowding. Ned Block has claimed that identity crowding involves consciously perceiving an object that we are unable to pay attention to. Others have offered different interpretations, emphasising the role of cognitive inference over conscious perception. In this paper, we draw upon a range of empirical findings to argue against Block’s interpretation of the data. We also argue that current empirical evidence strongly supports one particular version of the inference hypothesis . Finally, we consider the additional evidence Block gives in favour of his view, and argue that it fails to establish his position.Leverhulme Trust; Isaac Newton Trust; Royal Institute of Philosophy; Swiss National Science Foundation; FW

How do Smart watches influence the market of luxury watches with particular regard of the buying-reasons.

Ya no es necesario mirar el reloj de pulsera para saber la hora exacta. Los teléfonos inteligentes, el reloj del ordenador o el reloj del automóvil nos informan también sobre la hora. La gente paga miles de euros por un reloj de lujo, aunque podría comprar relojes mucho más económicos, que además cumplen la función de indicar la hora exacta. Hace unos años, los relojes inteligentes entraron en el mercado y ahora la gente puede obtener además datos como la distancia que recorren a pie por día o controlar su sueño... La pregunta es: ¿cómo reaccionarán los clientes de relojes de lujo? La intención de esta tesis, entre otros objetivos, es establecer los diferentes tipos de razones por las que los consumidores tienden a comprar relojes de lujo. Las diferentes razones pueden ser explicadas con la ayuda de modelos y variables psicológicas que facilitan la comprensión de los motivos del comportamiento de compra. En el estudio se trata de explicar la importancia y el significado de identidad de la marca con referencia a la compra de relojes inteligentes y relojes de lujo, iden-tificando los beneficios y características de los relojes inteligentes, que se entienden como productos sustitutivos de los relojes de lujo. Además, se pretende explicar las razones de compra de los relojes inteligentes en comparación con los motivos para comprar relojes de lujo, y averiguar si el cliente típico de relojes de lujo tiene los mismos motivos y razones de compra que el cliente de relojes inteligentes. A través del análisis de la teoría de la actitud y la teoría de la congruencia, con referencia al comportamiento de compra y su influencia en la elección de marca, se establece un modelo de ecuación estructural que responde a los objetivos mencionados. La intención es obtener una comprensión profunda del efecto psico-lógico de las marcas para poder explicar la toma de decisiones de compra de este tipo de productos. Para ello, se han realizado estudios empíricos basados en cues-tionarios anónimos sobre las marcas Apple Watch y Rolex. Se comprueba que la influencia de la intención de elección de marca es mayor en Apple, en comparación con los clientes de Rolex. La norma subjetiva tiene la mayor relevancia con referencia a la intención de elección de marca en Rolex. Además, la congruencia real no es positivamente relevante con respecto a la in-tención de elegir relojes de la marca Rolex; de hecho, la congruencia real del cliente de Rolex es insignificante en comparación con la congruencia ideal. Con referencia a Apple Watch, la congruencia ideal juega el papel más im-portante para la intención de la elección de la marca. La personalidad de la marca del Apple Watch está más cerca del ideal de la persona de prueba, en comparación con la persona de prueba de Rolex. Según este estudio, la congruencia funcional no tiene relevancia positiva con referencia a la intención de elección de marca de Apple Watch. Los criterios rele-vantes para la congruencia funcional para la muestra que se aplican en este estudio son: cómo de bien está fabricado el producto, si es un producto duradero, cómo de alta es la calidad del material de fabricación y cómo se percibe el diseño del producto. Estos criterios,Administración y Dirección de Empresa

The elephant in the room: Inconsistency in scene viewing and representation.

We examined the extent to which semantic informativeness, consistency with expectations and perceptual salience contribute to object prioritization in scene viewing and representation. In scene viewing (Experiments 1-2), semantic guidance overshadowed perceptual guidance in determining fixation order, with the greatest prioritization for objects that were diagnostic of the scene's depicted event. Perceptual properties affected selection of consistent objects (regardless of their informativeness) but not of inconsistent objects. Semantic and perceptual properties also interacted in influencing foveal inspection, as inconsistent objects were fixated longer than low but not high salience diagnostic objects. While not studied in direct competition with each other (each studied in competition with diagnostic objects), we found that inconsistent objects were fixated earlier and for longer than consistent but marginally informative objects. In change detection (Experiment 3), perceptual guidance overshadowed semantic guidance, promoting detection of highly salient changes. A residual advantage for diagnosticity over inconsistency emerged only when selection prioritization could not be based on low-level features. Overall these findings show that semantic inconsistency is not prioritized within a scene when competing with other relevant information that is essential to scene understanding and respects observers' expectations. Moreover, they reveal that the relative dominance of semantic or perceptual properties during selection depends on ongoing task requirements. (PsycINFO Database Recor

Magnetic Resonance Imaging of synovitis without the use of intravenous gadolinium.

Synovitis is an important feature in arthritis and is commonly visualised using contrast enhanced magnetic resonance imaging (MRI). Currently, the reference standard for assessing synovitis is gadolinium enhanced MRI which requires an intravenous injection and carries significant potential risks such as nephrogenic systemic fibrosis. Removing the necessity for using gadolinium will reduce these risks and result in greater patient acceptance of MRI investigation of synovitis. The aims of this thesis were to investigate the use of MRI imaging sequences and include them in a novel non-contrast MRI protocol, The COSMOS protocol (contrast-obviated MRI scanning of synovitis) to identify synovitis in the knees of patients with osteoarthritis. Potential sequences, both qualitative and quantitative, that could be included in the COSMOS protocol were identified initially through (i) a comprehensive review of the literature and (ii) review of historic images within a large research centre. The sequences were then trialled, optimised and then assessed on a large cohort of patients with knee osteoarthritis in order to determine the protocol’s suitability to identify synovitis without contrast. The results of the new COSMOS protocol show that it is feasible and practical to delineate synovitis in the knee using MRI without the use of intravenous gadolinium contrast. The characteristics of the tissues within the knee can be measured using magnetisation transfer ratio and T1 values to provide empirical differentiation of structures. The identification of a distinct range in T1 values for synovitis provided data that was exploited to produce a further inversion recovery sequence that was optimised to supress synovitis in patients with knee osteoarthritis (OA). While further work is required to validate the COSMOS protocol, this thesis has demonstrated that it is possible to image synovitis without intravenous gadolinium contrast agents in a cohort of patients with a clinical diagnosis of OA knee

Investigation of smart work zone technologies using mixed simulator and field studies

Safety is the top concern in transportation, especially in work zones, as work zones deviate from regular driving environment and driver behavior is very different. In order to protect workers and create a safer work zone environment, new technologies are proposed by agencies and deployed to work zones, however, some are without scientific study before deployment. Therefore, quantitative studies need to be conducted to show the effectiveness of technologies. Driving simulator is a safe and cost-effective way to test effectiveness of new designs and compare different configurations. Field study is another scientific way of testing, as it provides absolute validity, while simulator study provides relative validity. The synergy of field and simulator studies construct a precise experiment as field study calibrates simulator design and validates simulator results. Two main projects, Evaluation of Automated Flagger Assistance Devices (AFADs), and Evaluation of Green Lights on Truck-Mounted Attenuator (TMA), are discussed in this dissertation to illustrate the investigation of smart work zone technologies using mixed simulator and field studies, along with one simulator project investigating interaction between human driven car and autonomous truck platoon in work zones. Both field and simulator studies indicated that AFADs improved stationary work zone safety by enhancing visibility, isolating workers from immediate traffic, and conveying clear guidance message to traffic. The results of green light on TMAs implied an inverse relationship between visibility/awareness of work zone and arrow board recognition/easy on eyes, but did not show if any of the light configurations is superior. Results anticipated for autonomous truck platoon in work zones are drivers behave more uniformly after being educated about the meaning of signage displayed on the back of truck, and performance measured with signage would be more preferable than those without signage. Applications of statistics are extension of studies, including experimental design, survey design, and data analysis. Data obtained from AFAD and Green Light projects were utilized to illustrate the methodologies of data analysis and model building, which incorporated simulator data, biofeedback and survey response to interpret the relationship among driver perspective and mental status, and driving behavior. From the studies conducted, it could be concluded that mixed simulator and field study is a good fit for smart work zone technologies investigation. Simulators provide a safe environment, flexibility and cost-effectiveness, while field studies calibrate and validate simulator setup and its results. The collaboration of two forms of study generates legitimate and convincing results for investigations. Applying statistical methodologies into transportation simulator and field studies is a good way to make experiment and survey design more rational, and the statistical methods are applicable for further data analysis.Includes bibliographical reference

Characterisation of adherent microbubbles for molecular targeted ultrasound

Molecular imaging is a field of medicine which can offer great potential for both diagnostic and therapeutic purposes. Within this field contrast enhanced ultrasound displays the possibility of making molecular imaging a cost effective viable tool in an increasingly diverse set of clinical situations. One of the current challenges associated with this technique is how one differentiates the signal for adherent microbubbles from those produced by the bulk non-adherent population. The first part of this thesis acoustically examines the response of single microbubbles under the effects of adhesion and compares the response observed with that of the MBs non-adherent counterpart. It was found experimentally that differences could be observed in both the 2nd harmonic signals generation and in the stability over repeated exposure. These differences could be utilised as the basis for discretisation imaging strategies. The second section of this thesis attempts to characterize these differences in terms of current theoretical models. A more comprehensive modelling strategy is utilised for the fitting of increasingly complex theoretical models. Good agreement was found with the outputs of this fitting procedure with previously reported parameters. Further detail could also be observed in the form of various size/resonance effects which have not previously been reported. There was little observed difference between the parameters extracted for the adherent and non-adherent MBs although it was suggested that the effective elasticity of an adherent MB could be elevated in comparison to its non-adherent counterpart in the region of resonance. Efforts will be required to control and account for some of the variability observed in MB response before this can be stated definitively however.Open Acces

Cognitive modelling of attentional networks: efficiencies, interactions, impairments and development

According to the attention network theory, attention is viewed as an organ system comprising specialised networks that carry out functions of alerting, orienting and executive control. The Attention Network Test (ANT) is a simple and popular experiment that measures the efficiencies and interactions of these three subcomponents of attention in a single task, and has been used for adults, children and attention deficit patients. In this thesis, cognitive modelling is used as a research tool to simulate the performance of subjects on the ANT, as well as variations of the ANT using ACT-R 6.0 cognitive architecture. All models are validated against human data using various goodness-of-fit criteria at multiple measures of the latency, accuracy and efficiency of the three networks. Once the simulation of healthy human performance on the ANT is established, modifications inspired by psychology literature are made to simulate the performance on ANT by children and patients affected with Alzheimer‘s disease (AD) and mild traumatic brain injury (mTBI). The implementation of networks, their interactions and impairments in the models are shown to be theoretically grounded. Based on the simulation results and the understanding gained through model processes, a number of novel predictions are made, behaviour of the networks and a few discrepancies in human data are explained. The model predicts that in the case of Alzheimer‘s disease, the orienting network may be impaired and cueing may have a positive effect on conflict resolution. Also, in the case of mTBI, it was predicted that the validity effect may be impaired only in the earlier weeks after the injury. For children, a possible relationship between processing speed and mechanism of inhibitory control is predicted. It is posited that there is not always a 'global clock' that controls processing speed and further different processes may be running with different processing times

Engineering data compendium. Human perception and performance, volume 3

The concept underlying the Engineering Data Compendium was the product of a research and development program (Integrated Perceptual Information for Designers project) aimed at facilitating the application of basic research findings in human performance to the design of military crew systems. The principal objective was to develop a workable strategy for: (1) identifying and distilling information of potential value to system design from existing research literature, and (2) presenting this technical information in a way that would aid its accessibility, interpretability, and applicability by system designers. The present four volumes of the Engineering Data Compendium represent the first implementation of this strategy. This is Volume 3, containing sections on Human Language Processing, Operator Motion Control, Effects of Environmental Stressors, Display Interfaces, and Control Interfaces (Real/Virtual)