Climate change: Time to Do Something Different

Copyright: © 2014 Page and Page. This is an open-access article distributed under the terms of the Creative Commons Attribution License (CC BY). The use, distribution or reproduction in other forums is permitted, provided the original author(s) or licensor are credited and that the original publication in this journal is cited, in accordance with accepted academic practice. No use, distribution or reproduction is permitted which does not comply with these termsThere is now very little, if any, doubt that the global climate is changing and that this is in some way related to human behaviour through unsustainable preferences in lifestyle and organisational practices. Despite the near conclusive evidence of the positive relationship between greenhouse gas emissions and global warming, a small proportion of people remain unconvinced. More importantly, even among the much larger number of people who accept a link between human behaviour and climate change, many are inactive, or insufficiently active, in attempting to remedy the situation. We suggest this is partly because people are unaware both of how their day-to-day behaviours connect with energy consumption and carbon emissions, and of the behavioural alternatives that are available to them. This, we believe, is a key reason why individual lifestyles and organisational practices continue in an unsustainable way. We also suggest that the psychologists and behavioural researchers who seek to develop a better understanding of people’s relationship with, and reaction to, environmental issues, might also be on track to suffer a similar blindness. They risk becoming fixed on investigating a limited range of established variables, perhaps to the detriment of alternative approaches that are more practically oriented though, so far, less well explored empirically. In this article, we present the FIT framework as an alternative perspective on the variables that might underpin pro-environmental activity and behaviour change. After briefly reviewing the related literature, we outline that framework. Then we present some early empirical data to show its relationship to a range of pro-environmental indices. We follow with a discussion of the framework’s relevance in relation to pro-environmental behaviour change and make proposals for future research.Peer reviewedFinal Published versio

The irrelevant sound effect: What needs modelling and a tentative model

Original article can be found at: http://www.informaworld.com/smpp/title~content=t713683590 Copyright Informa / Taylor and Francis GroupThis paper reviews the literature on the irrelevant sound effect and concludes that, contrary to some claims, the data consistently show that irrelevant sound and articulatory suppression are not functionally equivalent. We evaluate the contribution of Larsen and Baddeley (in press) and briefly discuss additional data in support of their position. We perform an error analysis on data from their third experiment and simulate detailed aspects of those data using our primacy model of immediate serial recall. Our model is briefly related to a number of fndings in the literature on irrelevant sound.Peer reviewe

Order or Disorder? Impaired Hebb Learning in Dyslexia

'This article may not exactly replicate the final version published in the APA journal. It is not the copy of record.' Original article can be found at : http://psycnet.apa.org/ Copyright American Psychological AssociationThe present study offers an integrative account proposing that dyslexia and its various associated cognitive impairments reflect an underlying deficit in the long-term learning of serial-order information, here operationalized as Hebb repetition learning. In nondyslexic individuals, improved immediate serial recall is typically observed when one particular sequence of items is repeated across an experimental session, a phenomenon known as the Hebb repetition effect. Starting from the critical observation that individuals with dyslexia seem to be selectively impaired in cognitive tasks that involve processing of serial order, the present study is the first to test and confirm the hypothesis that the Hebb repetition effect is affected in dyslexia, even for nonverbal modalities. We present a theoretical framework in which the Hebb repetition effect is assumed to be a laboratory analogue of naturalistic word learning, on the basis of which we argue that dyslexia is characterized by an impairment of serial-order learning that affects language learning and processing.Peer reviewedFinal Accepted Versio

Linking working memory and long-term memory: A computational model of the learning of new words

The nonword repetition (NWR) test has been shown to be a good predictor of children’s vocabulary size. NWR performance has been explained using phonological working memory, which is seen as a critical component in the learning of new words. However, no detailed specification of the link between phonological working memory and long-term memory (LTM) has been proposed. In this paper, we present a computational model of children’s vocabulary acquisition (EPAM-VOC) that specifies how phonological working memory and LTM interact. The model learns phoneme sequences, which are stored in LTM and mediate how much information can be held in working memory. The model’s behaviour is compared with that of children in a new study of NWR, conducted in order to ensure the same nonword stimuli and methodology across ages. EPAM-VOC shows a pattern of results similar to that of children: performance is better for shorter nonwords and for wordlike nonwords, and performance improves with age. EPAM-VOC also simulates the superior performance for single consonant nonwords over clustered consonant nonwords found in previous NWR studies. EPAM-VOC provides a simple and elegant computational account of some of the key processes involved in the learning of new words: it specifies how phonological working memory and LTM interact; makes testable predictions; and suggests that developmental changes in NWR performance may reflect differences in the amount of information that has been encoded in LTM rather than developmental changes in working memory capacity. Keywords: EPAM, working memory, long-term memory, nonword repetition, vocabulary acquisition, developmental change

Green behaviour change : HOT topics

Climate change is a psychological problem. A rather stark statement maybe, but one which is, we think, defensible. To be sure, the mitigation of the effects of climate change poses very great technological challenges. However, the fact is that technologies that are widely available today are capable of making a very large dent in the carbon dioxide emissions that are thought to underlie the problem. To give just one of a plethora of possible examples: according to DEFRA, the average family car in the UK emits around 215g CO2 per kilometre; by contrast, the most fuel-efficient family car currently available emits around 90g CO2 per kilometre and, with the advent of plug-in hybrids over the next two years, this figure is likely to be further reduced to around 65g. For those (like the UK Government) seeking a 70-80 per cent cut in carbon emissions from private cars, the problem therefore is not a technological one but a behavioural one: how can we get people to adopt existing low-carbon technologies in their everyday lives

What can't functional neuroimaging tell the cognitive psychologist?

Original article can be found at: http://www.cortex-online.org/ Copyright Masson S.p.A.In this paper, I critically review the usefulness of functional neuroimaging to the cognitive psychologist. All serious cognitive theories acknowledge that cognition is implemented somewhere in the brain. Finding that the brain "activates" differentially while performing different tasks is therefore gratifying but not surprising. The key problem is that the additional dependent variable that imaging data represents, is often one about which cognitive theories make no necessary predictions. It is, therefore, inappropriate to use such data to choose between such theories. Even supposing that fMRI were able to tell us where a particular cognitive process was performed, that would likely tell us little of relevance about how it was performed. The how-question is the crucial question for theorists investigating the functional architecture of the human mind. The argument is illustrated with particular reference to Henson (2005) and Shallice (2003), who make the opposing case.Peer reviewe

Paying Attention to Relevant Dimensions : A Localist Approach

Michael Page, ‘Paying Attention to Relevant Dimensions: A Localist Approach’, in Robert M. French and Jacques P. Sougne, eds., Connectionist models of learning, development and evolution, Proceedings of the 6th Neural Computation and Psychology Workshop, 16 – 18 September 2000, Liege, Belgium. ISBN 1852333545.Localist models of, for example, the classification of multidimensional stimuli, can run into problems if generalization is attempted when many of the stimulus dimensions are irrelevant to the classification task in hand. A procedure is suggested by representations that focus on the relevant dimensions only. These permit good generalization which would be lacking in a simple exemplar-based model.Non peer reviewe

Connectionist modelling in psychology : a localist manifesto

Over the last decade, fully distributed models have become dominant in connectionist psychological modelling, whereas the virtues of localist models have been underestimated. This target article illustrates some of the benefits of localist modelling. Localist models are characterized by the presence of localist representations rather than the absence of distributed representations. A generalized localist model is proposed that exhibits many of the properties of fully distributed models. It can be applied to a number of problems that are difficult for fully distributed models, and its applicability can be extended through comparisons with a number of classic mathematical models of behaviour. There are reasons why localist models have been underused, though these often misconstrue the localist position. In particular, many conclusions about connectionist representation, based on neuroscientific observation, can be called into question. There are still some problems inherent in the application of fully distributed systems and some inadequacies in proposed solutions to these problems. In the domain of psychological modelling, localist modelling is to be preferred.Peer reviewedFinal Published versio