Auditory and cognitive performance in elderly musicians and nonmusicians

Musicians represent a model for examining brain and behavioral plasticity in terms of cognitive and auditory profile, but few studies have investigated whether elderly musicians have better auditory and cognitive abilities than nonmusicians. The aim of the present study was to examine whether being a professional musician attenuates the normal age-related changes in hearing and cognition. Elderly musicians still active in their profession were compared with nonmusicians on auditory performance (absolute threshold, frequency intensity, duration and spectral shape discrimination, gap and sinusoidal amplitude-modulation detection), and on simple (short-term memory) and more complex and higher-order (working memory [WM] and visuospatial abilities) cognitive tasks. The sample consisted of adults at least 65 years of age. The results showed that older musicians had similar absolute thresholds but better supra-threshold discrimination abilities than nonmusicians in four of the six auditory tasks administered. They also had a better WM performance, and stronger visuospatial abilities than nonmusicians. No differences were found between the two groups\u2019 short-term memory. Frequency discrimination and gap detection for the auditory measures, and WM complex span tasks and one of the visuospatial tasks for the cognitive ones proved to be very good classifiers of the musicians. These findings suggest that life-long music training may be associated with enhanced auditory and cognitive performance, including complex cognitive skills, in advanced age. However, whether this music training represents a protective factor or not needs further investigation

Inferential false memories for emotional events

The research that is described in the present dissertation is motivated by two general questions. First, it investigates whether inference-based false memories are less likely for emotional than non-emotional events, consistently with the general notion that emotional material is better remembered and is associated to fewer memory distortions (Kensinger & Schacter 2005; Kensinger, 2007). Second and most important question, it examined whether the potential “protective” effect of emotional material against false memories could be disrupted or even reversed under certain conditions, investigating the effects of both experimental manipulations and individual differences. To examine these two questions, I created a false memory paradigm that is based on pictorial scripted material, following the example of Hannigan and Reinitz (2001; see also Lyons et al., 2010, and Mirandola et al., 2012, for a more recent application), but adapting it to include emotionality as a factor. A more detailed description of the paradigm will be provided in the introductory section of Experiment 1, and an example of the material is shown in the Appendix A. In Experiment 1, I examined the effect of post-encoding elaboration of pictorial scripted material on the production of inferential false memories for negatively emotional vs. neutral events. Two groups of undergraduate students were administered an incidental memory test after having freely recalled the scripted material or having completed distracting tasks. In particular, it was examined: a) how the probability of committing inferential false memories concerning negative vs. neutral events varied in the two groups; b) whether negative events were actually re-elaborated to a greater extent compared to neutral events. In Experiments 2 and 3, I focused on the effect of sub-clinical symptoms of internalizing disorders on the production of inferential false memories for emotional vs. neutral events. In particular, in Experiment 2 I compared a group of young adults with high levels of internalizing symptoms (both depression and anxiety) with a group of young adults with medium to low levels of internalizing symptoms. In Experiment 3, I expanded the findings of the previous experiment by adding a positively valenced condition within the scripted material, and by focusing on a group of individuals with a “purely anxious” trait, that is with a high level of trait anxiety but medium to low level of depression symptoms. In Experiments 4 and 5, I focused on the role played by working memory (WM; Baddeley, 2000) capacity on the production of inferential false memories for neutral vs. positive and negative events. In particular, in Experiment 4 I examined the role played by WM capacity at the level of individual differences, while in Experiment 5 the results were replicated and expanded using an experimental condition that was intended to artificially manipulate WM capacity available during the encoding phase. As for the general conclusions, it was shown that emotional scripted events (both negative and positive) are normally protected against inferential false memories (and especially against causal errors) compared to neutral scripted events. Importantly, however, this does not hold true in any condition; indeed, especially in the case of negative events, the “protective” effect is disrupted – and sometimes even reversed – under certain conditions, which include post-encoding elaboration of viewed material, strong presence of internalizing symptoms at the sub-clinical level (and especially of trait anxiety), and low or reduced capacity of WM during the encoding

Entia Non Sunt Multiplicanda … Shall I look for clusters in my cognitive data?

Unsupervised clustering methods are increasingly being applied in psychology. Researchers may use such methods on multivariate data to reveal previously undetected sub-populations of individuals within a larger population. Realistic research scenarios in the cognitive science may not be ideally suited for a successful use of these methods, however, as they are characterized by modest effect sizes, limited sample sizes, and non-orthogonal indicators. This combination of characteristics even presents a high risk of detecting non-existing clusters. A systematic review showed that, among 191 studies published in 2016–2020 that used different clustering methods to classify human participants, the median sample size was only 322, and a median of 3 latent classes/clusters were detected. None of them concluded in favor of a one-cluster solution, potentially giving rise to an extreme publication bias. Dimensionality reduction techniques are almost never used before clustering. In a subsequent simulation study, we examined the performance of popular clustering techniques, including Gaussian mixture model, a partitioning, and a hierarchical agglomerative algorithm. We focused on their ability to detect the correct number of clusters, and on their classification accuracy. Under a reasoned set of scenarios that we considered plausible for the cognitive research, none of the methods adequately discriminates between one vs two true clusters. In addition, non-orthogonal indicators lead to a high risk of incorrectly detecting multiple clusters where none existed, even in the presence of only modest correlation (a frequent case in psychology). In conclusion, it is hard for researchers to be in a condition to achieve a valid unsupervised clustering for inferential purposes with a view to classifying individuals

Reliability of the g factor over time in Italian INVALSI data (2010-2022): What can achievement-g tell us about the Flynn effect?

Generational intelligence test score gains over large parts of the 20th century have been observed to be negatively associated with psychometric g. Recent reports about changes in the cross-temporal IQ trajectory suggest that ability differentiation may be responsible for both changes in g as well as increasingly (sub)domain specific and inconsistent trajectories. Schooling is considered to be a main candidate cause for the Flynn effect, which suggests that school achievement might be expected to show similar cross-temporal developments. In the present study, we investigated evidence for cross-temporal changes in achievement-based g in a formal large-scale student assessment in Italy (i.e., the INVALSI assessment; N = 1,900,000). Based on data of four school grades (i.e., grades 2, 5, 8, and 10) over 13 years (2010-2022), we observed little evidence for changes in achievement g in general. However, cross-temporal trajectories were differentiated according to school grade, indicating cross-temporal g decreases for lower grade students whilst changes for higher grade students were positive. These findings may be interpreted as tentative evidence for age-dependent achievement-g differentiation. The presently observed achievement g trajectory appears to be consistent with recently observed evidence for a potential stagnation or reversal of cognitive test score gains

The Morra game as a naturalistic test bed for investigating automatic and voluntary processes in random sequence generation

Morra is a 3,000-years-old hand game of prediction and numbers. The two players reveal their hand simultaneously, presenting a number of fingers between 1 and 5, while calling out a number between 2 and 10. Any player who successfully guesses the summation of fingers revealed by both players scores a point. While the game is extremely fast-paced, making it very difficult for players to achieve a conscious control of their game strategies, expert players regularly outperform non-experts, possibly with strategies residing out of conscious control. In this study, we used Morra as a naturalistic setting to investigate the necessity of attentive control in generation of sequence of items and the ability to proceduralize random number generation, which are both a crucial defensive strategy in Morra and a well-known empirical procedure to test the central executive capacity within the working memory model. We recorded the sequence of numbers generated by expert players in a Morra tournament in Sardinia (Italy) and by undergraduate students enrolled in a course-based research experience (CRE) course at Lawrence Technological University in the United States. Number sequences generated by non-expert and expert players both while playing Morra and in a random number generation task (RNGT) were compared in terms of randomness scores. Results indicate that expert players of Morra largely outperformed non-experts in the randomness scores only within Morra games, whereas in RNGT the two groups were very similar. Importantly, survey data acquired after the games indicate that expert players have very poor conscious recall of their number generation strategies used during the Morra game. Our results indicate that the ability of generating random sequences can be proceduralized and do not necessarily require attentive control. Results are discussed in the framework of the dual processing theory and its automatic-parallel-fast vs.controlled-sequential-slow polarities

PRDA: An R package for Prospective and Retrospective Design Analysis

The paper describes the PRDA package available at https://cran.r-project.org/web/packages/PRDA/ . PRDA is an R package performing prospective or retrospective design analysis (see Gelman & Carlin, 2014 and Altoè et al., 2020) to evaluate inferential risks (i.e., power, Type M error, and Type S error) in a study considering Pearson’s correlation between two variables or mean comparisons (one-sample, paired, two-sample, andWelch’st-test). Prospective Design Analysis is performed in the planning stage of a study to define the required sample size to obtain a given level of power. Retrospective Design Analysis, instead, is performed when the data have already been collected to evaluate the inferential risks associated with the study. PRDA, additionally, offers the possibility to conduct a prospective/retroprospective design analysis taking into account for the uncertainty about the hypothetical value of effect size. In fact, hypothetical effect size can be defined as a single value according to previous results in the literature or experts indications, or by specifying a distribution of plausible values

Oral language interventions can improve language outcomes in children with neurodevelopmental disorders: A systematic review and meta-analysis

Background Young people who fail to develop language as expected face significant challenges in all aspects of life. Unfortunately, language disorders are common, either as a distinct condition (e.g., Developmental Language Disorder) or as a part of another neurodevelopmental condition (e.g., autism). Finding ways to attenuate language problems through intervention has the potential to yield great benefits not only for the individual but also for society as a whole. Objectives This meta-analytic review examined the effect of oral language interventions for children with neurodevelopmental disorders. Search Methods The last electronic search was conducted in April 2022. Selection Criteria Intervention studies had to target language skills for children from 2 to 18 years of age with Developmental Language Disorder, autism, intellectual disability, Down syndrome, Fragile X syndrome, and Williams syndrome in randomised controlled trials or quasi-experimental designs. Control groups had to include business-as-usual, waiting list, passive or active conditions. However, we excluded studies in which the active control group received a different type, delivery, or dosage of another language intervention. Eligible interventions implemented explicit and structured activities (i.e., explicit instruction of vocabulary, narrative structure or grammatical rules) and/or implicit and broad activities (i.e., shared book reading, general language stimulation). The intervention studies had to assess language skills in receptive and/or expressive modalities. Data Collection and Analysis The search provided 8195 records after deduplication. Records were screened by title and abstract, leading to full-text examinations of 448 records. We performed Correlated and Hierarchical Effects models and ran a retrospective power analysis via simulation. Publication bias was assessed via p-curve and precision-effect estimate. Main Results We examined 38 studies, with 46 group comparisons and 108 effects comparing pre-/post-tests and eight studies, with 12 group comparisons and 21 effects at follow-up. The results showed a mean effect size of d = 0.27 at the post-test and d = 0.18 at follow-up. However, there was evidence of publication bias and overestimation of the mean effects. Effects from the meta-analysis were significantly related to these elements: (1) receptive vocabulary and omnibus receptive measures showed smaller effect sizes relative to expressive vocabulary, grammar, expressive and receptive discourse, and omnibus expressive tests; and (2) the length of the intervention, where longer sessions conducted over a longer period of time were more beneficial than brief sessions and short-term interventions. Neither moderators concerning participants’ characteristics (children's diagnosis, diagnostic status, age, sex, and non-verbal cognitive ability and severity of language impairment), nor those regarding of the treatment components and implementation of the language interventions (intervention content, setting, delivery agent, session structure of the intervention or total number of sessions) reached significance. The same occurred to indicators of study quality. The risk of bias assessment showed that reporting quality for the studies examined in the review was poor. Authors’ Conclusions In sum, the current evidence base is promising but inconclusive. Pre-registration and replication of more robust and adequately powered trials, which include a wider range of diagnostic conditions, together with more long-term follow-up comparisons, are needed to drive evidence-based practice and policy.publishedVersio

Dyslexia treatment studies: A systematic review and suggestions on testing treatment efficacy with small effects and small samples

Funder: Università degli Studi di PadovaAbstract: Poor response to treatment is a defining characteristic of reading disorder. In the present systematic review and meta-analysis, we found that the overall average effect size for treatment efficacy was modest, with a mean standardized difference of 0.38. Small true effects, combined with the difficulty to recruit large samples, seriously challenge researchers planning to test treatment efficacy in dyslexia and potentially in other learning disorders. Nonetheless, most published studies claim effectiveness, generally based on liberal use of multiple testing. This inflates the risk that most statistically significant results are associated with overestimated effect sizes. To enhance power, we propose the strategic use of repeated measurements with mixed-effects modelling. This novel approach would enable us to estimate both individual parameters and population-level effects more reliably. We suggest assessing a reading outcome not once, but three times, at pre-treatment and three times at post-treatment. Such design would require only modest additional efforts compared to current practices. Based on this, we performed ad hoc a priori design analyses via simulation studies. Results showed that using the novel design may allow one to reach adequate power even with low sample sizes of 30–40 participants (i.e., 15–20 participants per group) for a typical effect size of d = 0.38. Nonetheless, more conservative assumptions are warranted for various reasons, including a high risk of publication bias in the extant literature. Our considerations can be extended to intervention studies of other types of neurodevelopmental disorders

The Role of Attention in Immediate Emotional False Memory Enhancement

Two experiments examined the effect of reduced attentional resources on false memory production for emotionally valenced stimuli using the Deese/Roediger-McDermott (DRM) paradigm. Prior research has demonstrated that emotional information is often better remembered than neutral information and that enhanced memory for emotional information is dependent on either automatic or controlled neural processing (Kensinger & Corkin, 2004). Behavioral studies designed to reduce attention resources at encoding have supported neuroimaging findings that indicate high arousal negative stimuli rely more on automatic processing but positive high arousal stimuli rely more on controlled processing. No study has yet examined the attentional resources required to produce emotionally valenced false memories. In Experiment 1, negative, positive, and neutral DRM lists were studied under full or divided attention (DA) conditions, and in Experiment 2, negative and neutral DRM lists were studied under fast (20ms) or slow (2000ms) presentation conditions. Under DA and speeded presentation conditions, higher false memory recognition rates were found for negative compared to positive (Experiment 1) and neutral (Experiments 1 and 2) critical lures. This is the first demonstration of which we are aware that suggests negative false memories are associated with automatic neural processing, whereas positive and non-valenced neutral false memories are associated with more controlled processing

Inferential false memories for emotional events

The research that is described in the present dissertation is motivated by two general questions. First, it investigates whether inference-based false memories are less likely for emotional than non-emotional events, consistently with the general notion that emotional material is better remembered and is associated to fewer memory distortions (Kensinger & Schacter 2005; Kensinger, 2007). Second and most important question, it examined whether the potential “protective” effect of emotional material against false memories could be disrupted or even reversed under certain conditions, investigating the effects of both experimental manipulations and individual differences. To examine these two questions, I created a false memory paradigm that is based on pictorial scripted material, following the example of Hannigan and Reinitz (2001; see also Lyons et al., 2010, and Mirandola et al., 2012, for a more recent application), but adapting it to include emotionality as a factor. A more detailed description of the paradigm will be provided in the introductory section of Experiment 1, and an example of the material is shown in the Appendix A. In Experiment 1, I examined the effect of post-encoding elaboration of pictorial scripted material on the production of inferential false memories for negatively emotional vs. neutral events. Two groups of undergraduate students were administered an incidental memory test after having freely recalled the scripted material or having completed distracting tasks. In particular, it was examined: a) how the probability of committing inferential false memories concerning negative vs. neutral events varied in the two groups; b) whether negative events were actually re-elaborated to a greater extent compared to neutral events. In Experiments 2 and 3, I focused on the effect of sub-clinical symptoms of internalizing disorders on the production of inferential false memories for emotional vs. neutral events. In particular, in Experiment 2 I compared a group of young adults with high levels of internalizing symptoms (both depression and anxiety) with a group of young adults with medium to low levels of internalizing symptoms. In Experiment 3, I expanded the findings of the previous experiment by adding a positively valenced condition within the scripted material, and by focusing on a group of individuals with a “purely anxious” trait, that is with a high level of trait anxiety but medium to low level of depression symptoms. In Experiments 4 and 5, I focused on the role played by working memory (WM; Baddeley, 2000) capacity on the production of inferential false memories for neutral vs. positive and negative events. In particular, in Experiment 4 I examined the role played by WM capacity at the level of individual differences, while in Experiment 5 the results were replicated and expanded using an experimental condition that was intended to artificially manipulate WM capacity available during the encoding phase. As for the general conclusions, it was shown that emotional scripted events (both negative and positive) are normally protected against inferential false memories (and especially against causal errors) compared to neutral scripted events. Importantly, however, this does not hold true in any condition; indeed, especially in the case of negative events, the “protective” effect is disrupted – and sometimes even reversed – under certain conditions, which include post-encoding elaboration of viewed material, strong presence of internalizing symptoms at the sub-clinical level (and especially of trait anxiety), and low or reduced capacity of WM during the encoding.La presente è motivata da due quesiti di fondo. Primo, se i falsi ricordi inferenziali siano generalmente meno frequenti nel caso di eventi emotivi che di eventi non-emotivi, coerentemente con l’evidenza prevalente che il materiale emotivo riduce le distorsioni di memoria (Kensinger & Schacter 2005; Kensinger, 2007). Secondo e più importante quesito, ho esaminato se questo eventuale effetto “protettivo” viene moderato da particolari condizioni, considerando sia differenze individuali che l’effetto delle manipolazioni sperimentali. Nell’Esperimento 1 mi sono concentrato sugli effetti della rielaborazione del materiale dopo la codifica. È noto che ripetere più volte il materiale dopo la codifica aumenta la probabilità di commettere falsi ricordi, a causa della tendenza a “ricostruire” il ricordo basandosi sul “nucleo” del significato del materiale studiato (Roediger & McDermott, 1995; Gallo, 2006). Ho ipotizzato che ciò sarebbe accaduto anche per gli eventi presentati in forma di script, specialmente nel caso degli errori di “gap-filling”. Inoltre, ho ipotizzato che gli eventi emotivi sarebbero stati più suscettibili all’aumento di falsi ricordi dovuto alla rielaborazione, dato che essi, per la loro salienza, vengono richiamati alla mente più facilmente e più spesso (Christianson & Engelberg, 1999; Walker, Skowronksi, Gibbons, Vogl, & Ritchie, 2009); si sa inoltre che la rielaborazione degli aspetti emotivi degli eventi conduce a maggiori falsi ricordi (Drivdahl, Zaragoza, & Learned, 2009). I risultati ottenuti su un campione di studenti universitari hanno mostrato che, mentre i partecipanti che venivano distratti durante l’intervallo di ritenzione (partecipanti di controllo) erano relativamente protetti dagli errori causali per eventi negativi rispetto agli eventi neutri, i partecipanti che venivano invitati a ripensare e a ricostruire ciò che avevano visto (partecipanti sperimentali) presentavano il pattern opposto. Inoltre, coerentemente con le ipotesi, si è osservato un aumento generalizzato degli errori di “gap-filling” nel gruppo sperimentale. L’accuratezza invece non differiva. Negli Esperimenti 2 e 3 mi sono concentrato sugli effetti dei sintomi di disturbi emotivi a livello sub-clinico. Precedenti ricerche hanno mostrato che le persone che soffrono di disturbi emotivi in generale commettono più falsi ricordi per materiale negativo (per es. Howe & Malone, 2011; Joormann, Teachman, & Gotlib, 2009). Un’ipotesi è che ciò sia dovuto a una maggiore attivazione di base dei concetti negativi nelle persone con depressione (Howe & Malone, 2011). Tuttavia, un limite dei precedenti studi è che hanno utilizzato il paradigma DRM, per cui non è chiaro se lo stesso accada anche per altri tipi di falsi ricordi. Inoltre, non è chiaro cosa accada a livello sub-clinico (è infatti possibile che disturbi sufficientemente intensi da raggiungere una soglia clinica presentino effetti specifici, diversi da quelli del corrispondente tratto nella popolazione generale), cosa accada nel caso di sintomi d’ansia (un’altra condizione che comporta un bias di memoria e un’elaborazione preferenziale per il materiale emotivo; Mitte, 2008), e con il materiale positivo. Negli Esperimenti 2 e 3 i partecipanti sono stati selezionati tramite ampi screening su studenti di scuola superiore tra i 17 e i 19 anni d’età, utilizzando il questionario Q-Pad (Sica, Chiri, Favilli, & Marchetti, 2011). Nell’Esperimento 2 ho selezionato partecipanti che avevano elevati punteggi (oltre l’80esimo percentile) sia nella scala di ansia che in quella di depressione, mentre nell’Esperimento 3 ho selezionato partecipanti che avevano elevati punteggi di ansia ma punteggi di depressione attorno o sotto la mediana. In entrambi gli esperimenti, i gruppi di controllo erano composti da giovani che si collocavano attorno o sotto la mediana sia nella scala di ansia che in quella di depressione. Nell’Esperimento 2 si è mostrato che i partecipanti con forti tratti internalizzanti hanno maggiore probabilità di commettere falsi ricordi per gli antecedenti causali quando la conseguenza è negativa rispetto a quando è neutra, mentre i partecipanti di controllo presentavano l’effetto opposto (erano quindi protetti dal materiale negativo). Nell’Esperimento 3 sono stati replicati i risultati precedenti, e si è mostrato che l’effetto è specifico per l’ansia (cioè si trova anche quando i livelli di depressione corrispondono alla media della popolazione o sono al di sotto). Inoltre, si è mostrato che l’effetto è specifico per il materiale negativo (e non si trova per il materiale positivo). Gli Esperimenti 2 e 3 hanno mostrato che anche i sintomi internalizzanti a livello sub-clinico implicano elevati livelli di falsi ricordi per materiale negativo, che questo fenomeno si può trovare anche nel caso specifico dell’ansia di tratto, e che è ristretto al materiale negativo. Inoltre, è interessante notare che l’elemento critico, cioè l’antecedente causale, non è emotivamente carico di per sé, ma è collegato ad eventi emotivi. Per questo l’ipotesi della pre-attivazione dei concetti negativi nel caso dei disturbi emotivi (Howe & Malone, 2011) in questo caso non può essere applicato. La spiegazione potrebbe piuttosto avere a che fare con una sovra-elaborazione del materiale negativo negli individui con alti livelli di ansia e di depressione (si veda Gotlib & Joormann, 2010). In effetti, è interessante notare che il quadro dei risultati negli Esperimenti 2 e 3 assomiglia a quello dell’Esperimento 1 (con i partecipanti con forti tratti internalizzanti che si comportano in modo simili a quelli che hanno rielaborato il materiale). Negli Esperimenti 4 e 5 mi sono concentrato sul ruolo della Memoria di Lavoro (ML; Baddeley, 2000, 2012). Si sa che la ML ha un ruolo cruciale nel “binding”, cioè nell’unire assieme i diversi aspetti di un ricordo, il che che permette di creare delle rappresentazioni vivide di un evento (Mitchell, Jonhson, Raye, & Greene, 2004), e dunque di evitare i falsi ricordi (Peters, Jelicic, Verbeek, & Merckelbach, 2007). Tuttavia, non è chiaro cosa succeda nel caso del materiale negativo. Si sa che il materiale negativo tende a interferire con la capacità di controllo della ML, riducendone la prestazione (Osaka, Yaoi, Minamoto, & Osaka, 2013). Di conseguenza, il materiale negativo dovrebbe portare a maggiori falsi ricordi, tuttavia di solito si osserva l’opposto (Kensinger, 2007). È dunque possibile che il materiale negativo abbia sia effetti “protettivi” (dati da una maggiore distintività e da una più accurata codifica; Kensinger & Corkin, 2004) che effetti “avversi” (interferendo con il controllo della ML) nei confronti dei falsi ricordi. Anche se normalmente prevalgono gli effetti protettivi, gli effetti avversi potrebbero emergere quando le capacità di base di ML sono ridotte. Nell’Esperimento 4 un ampio gruppo di studenti universitari è stato sottoposto al paradigma dei falsi ricordi inferenziali emotivi in condizioni di base, e la loro capacità di ML è stata misurata tramite un apposito compito attivo (De Beni, Palladino, Pazzaglia, & Cornoldi, 1998). I risultati hanno mostrato una interazione significativa tra capacità di ML e valenza del materiale sulla produzione di falsi ricordi. In particolare mentre i falsi ricordi per eventi positivi e neutri non erano particolarmente legati alla ML, quest’ultima sembrava avere un effetto protettivo sui falsi ricordi per eventi negativi. Per chiarire meglio il quadro dei risultati è stato condotto l’Esperimento 5. In questo esperimento metà dei partecipanti (gruppo sperimentale) doveva visionare il materiale mentre conduceva un doppio compito inteso ad interferire con la componente dell’esecutivo centrale della loro ML (Baddeley, 2000). I risultati hanno mostrato che la probabilità di commettere falsi ricordi era complessivamente più alta nel gruppo sperimentale rispetto a quello di controllo (si notava anche una generale caduta nell’accuratezza). Tuttavia, questo incremento nei falsi ricordi era più grande nel caso negli eventi negativi che in quello degli eventi positivi o neutri, confermando così l’importanza di avere una buona capacità di ML per essere protetti contro gli errori inferenziali nel caso degli eventi negativi. In conclusione, attraverso cinque esperimenti ho mostrato come, in genere, gli eventi emotivi (sia positivi che negativi) siano protetti dagli errori inferenziali (specialmente dagli errori di causa) a confronto con gli eventi neutri. Ciò è coerente con la letteratura. La cosa più importante, però, è che questo non succede in qualsiasi condizione. Esistono condizioni, soprattutto nel caso degli eventi negativi, nelle quali questo effetto “protettivo” è annullato o perfino capovolto. Tali condizioni includono la rielaborazione del materiale visto, la forte presenza di sintomi internalizzanti, anche a livello sub-clinico (e specialmente di ansia di tratto), e basse o ridotte capacità di ML al momento della codifica