Inhibitory Control and Source Monitoring: A Developmental Investigation into Memory for Recently Witnessed Events

Research has demonstrated that younger children experience difficulty monitoring the source of information and, accordingly, have disproportionately more difficulty accurately recalling details of witnessed events. Within age variability in memory performance, however, suggests that chronological age may not be the only nor the best predictor of source monitoring ability. The present study examined whether inhibitory control (IC) better accounts for variations in the ability to monitor the source of retrieved information than chronological age. Ninety-five children aged 4 to 10 years engaged in a source monitoring task designed to evaluate their ability to accurately identify what information they had witnessed the prior week. Participants further completed measures of IC and other cognitive tasks (receptive vocabulary, memory span, verbal fluency). Exploratory factor analyses revealed three distinct types of IC processes (distractor interference, resistance to PI, prepotent inhibition), indicating that the IC measures administered did not all tap the same unified construct. Participants across ages and IC ability successfully identified witnessed events, and experienced difficulty rejecting the items they previously confabulated. Multiple regression analyses further indicated that IC predicted substantial variance in the ability to reject events that were not witnessed or discussed, while age and the cognitive variables only added a small non-statistically- significant amount of variance above this. IC further predicted variance in the ability to reject events that were not witnessed or discussed once controlling for age and the cognitive variables. The current findings provide evidence suggesting that: 1) measures of IC should not be assumed to assess the same underlying processes; and 2) distractor interference and prepotent inhibition abilities specifically contribute to the ability to reject information that was not witnessed or discussed during source monitoring tasks. This provides further evidence that the development of IC is an important aspect of source monitoring ability in children

Encouraging female entrepreneurship in Jordan: environmental factors, obstacles and challenges

The number of female entrepreneurs and their contribution to the economy is steadily rising. Yet research suggests that female entrepreneurs face more challenges and barriers than their male counterparts. This is expected to be even more prevalent in Islamic contexts, which are characterised by conservative and patriarchal societies. In this research, 254 female business students from a private and a public university responded to a questionnaire that gauges their perceptions about potential barriers to entrepreneurship in Jordan and whether the business education they are receiving helps to prepare them for future entrepreneurial activity. Our results help to form a basis on which a deeper understanding of the phenomena can be achieved through more in depth future research. Among the main environmental factors that worry potential female entrepreneurs are the weakness of Jordanian economy, lack of finance, fear of risk, gender inequality and inability to maintain a work and private life balance. Our results also show that students are really not aware of the opportunities available to them and are unable to make a proper assessment. We call on both universities and the Jordanian government to put more emphasis on practical entrepreneurial education and encouraging women to play a much more active role within the workforce

Implausibility inhibits but does not eliminate false autobiographical beliefs

The role of the plausibility of suggested events in the formation of false autobiographical beliefs and memories has long been debated. In two studies, the shape of the relationship between presuggestion personal plausibility and the development of postsuggestion false beliefs was examined. Participants rated personal plausibility and autobiographical belief for childhood events. They later received a suggestion that an unlikely event occurred during their childhood and provided postsuggestion ratings. The best fit was a curvilinear relationship between plausibility and belief, with the lowest risk for false belief at the plausibility scale floor. Above this threshold, the risk for false belief increased sharply and remained similar across all other levels of plausibility. A minority of those who initially viewed the event as highly implausible showed increased beliefs; this was accompanied by large increases in personal plausibility. We conclude that only extreme implausibility inhibits suggestion-induced false autobiographical beliefs, unless suggestions cause increases in plausibility ratings. © 2012 Canadian Psychological Association