Editorial: Face Perception across the Life-Span

Face perception is a highly evolved visual skills in humans. This complex ability develops across the life-span, steeply rising in infancy, refining across childhood and adolescence, reaching highest levels in adulthood and declining in old age. As such, the development of face perception comprises multiple skills, including sensory (e.g., mechanisms of holistic, configural and featural perception), cognitive (e.g., memory, processing speed, attentional control), and also emotional and social (e.g., reading and interpreting facial expression) domains. Whereas our understanding of specific functional domains involved in face perception is growing, there is further pressing demand for a multidisciplinary approach toward a more integrated view, describing how face perception ability relates to and develops with other domains of sensory and cognitive functioning. In this research topic we bring together a collection of papers that provide a shot of the current state of the art of theorizing and investigating face perception from the perspective of multiple ability domains. We would like to thank all authors for their valuable contributions that advanced our understanding of face and emotion perception across development

Complementary and competing factor analytic approaches for the investigation of measurement invariance

Sample-related invariance is an important topic in psychometric research. The generalizability of findings in a broad range of application samples requires equivalence of interpretations based on the measurement outcomes across respective samples. Contextual factors like gender, age, culture, ethnicity, socio-economical status etc. may affect the meaning and interpretation of psychological measures. Sample-related invariance is frequently investigated using Multiple-Group Mean and Covariance Structure (MGMCS) analyses. This method builds upon natural or artifical categories of contextual variables. Many contextual variables are continuous variables and their categorization is associated with an information loss and potentially overly simplistic data analyses. We present and discuss two complementary analytical approaches – Latent Moderated Structural (LMS) Equations and Local Structural Equation Models (LSEM). Both approaches allow treating contextual factors as continuous variables and are appropriate to detect non-linear relations. The use of these methods is exemplified based on real data. We investigated measurement equivalence of a battery of cognitive tests across age (N = 448; age range 18-82 years). Based on a higher-order factor model of cognitive abilities factorial equivalence could be established – contradicting the age-dedifferentiation hypothesis. Advantages and disadvantages of MGMCS, LMS, and LSEM and further implementations beyond aging-research are discussed

Examining age-related shared variance between face cognition, vision, and self-reported physical health: a test of the common cause hypothesis for social cognition

The shared decline in cognitive abilities, sensory functions (e.g., vision and hearing), and physical health with increasing age is well documented with some research attributing this shared age-related decline to a single common cause (e.g., aging brain). We evaluate the extent to which the common cause hypothesis predicts associations between vision and physical health with social cognition abilities specifically face perception and face memory. Based on a sample of 443 adults (17–88 years old), we test a series of structural equation models, including Multiple Indicator Multiple Cause (MIMIC) models, and estimate the extent to which vision and self-reported physical health are related to face perception and face memory through a common factor, before and after controlling for their fluid cognitive component and the linear effects of age. Results suggest significant shared variance amongst these constructs, with a common factor explaining some, but not all, of the shared age-related variance. Also, we found that the relations of face perception, but not face memory, with vision and physical health could be completely explained by fluid cognition. Overall, results suggest that a single common cause explains most, but not all age-related shared variance with domain specific aging mechanisms evident

An illustration of local structural equation modeling for longitudinal data:Examining differences in competence development in secondary schools

In this chapter, we discuss how a combination of longitudinal modeling and local structural equation modeling (LSEM) can be used to study how students’ context influence their growth in educational achievement. LSEM is a nonparametric approach that allows for the moderation of a structural equation model over a continuous variable (e.g., socio-economic status; cultural identity; age). Thus, it does not require the categorization of continuous moderators as applied in multi-group approaches. In contrast to regression-based approaches, it does not impose a particular functional form (e.g., linear) on the mean-level differences and can spot differences in the variance-covariance structure. LSEM can be used to detect nonlinear moderation effects, to examine sources of measurement invariance violations, and to study moderation effects on all parameters in the model. We showcase how LSEM can be implemented with longitudinal of the National Educational Panel Study (NEPS) using the R-package sirt. In more detail, we examine the effect of parental education on math and reading competence in secondary school across three measurement occasions, comparing LSEM to regression based approaches and multi-group confirmatory factor analysis. Results provide further evidence of the strong influence of the educational background of the family. This chapter offers a new approach to study inter-individual differences in educational development.</p

Examining moderators of vocabulary acquisition from kindergarten through elementary school using local structural equation modeling

Parental socio-economic status (SES) is often found to be associated with children's language competence in the first decade of life. To examine the effect of SES on children's vocabulary development, as well as potential compensatory effects of schooling and learning-related activities, we examined the joint and unique effects of parental education, occupational status, and learning environment at home on children's receptive vocabulary competence and growth in early childhood. We used latent growth curve models to assess pre-school receptive vocabulary and growth across primary school. Analyses were based on data from the German National Educational Panel Study (NEPS), a large-scale longitudinal study assessing vocabulary competence and family background from Kindergarten to the 3rd grade of elementary school. To examine the moderating effects of parental education, occupational status, and learning environment at home, we used local structural equation modeling. Results revealed a moderate to strong positive association between parental education and children's receptive vocabulary competence, which fully explained the effect of occupational status on this language skill. With the exception of the activity of reading aloud, we found no effect of learning environment at home. Initially lower performing children showed steeper growth trajectories across school, but rank-orders were relatively stable across time. In summary, the results suggest large initial differences in receptive vocabulary between children from different educational backgrounds, which are reduced, but not fully overcome across elementary school

Semántica y sintaxis de los dativos de interés del castellano

Nuestra propuesta consiste en que, para que el personaje introducido por el dativo ?digamos, el hablante? sea interpretado como afectado por el evento descrito en el enunciado, es necesario que exista entre él y un argumento o actante de la oración algún vínculo emotivo. Por lo tanto, el dativo de interés establece una relación con algún actante de la oración y, como consecuencia de ello, se produce el involucramientoafectación del hablante respecto de todo el evento. Para el caso de (1), se trataría de que el personaje introducido por el dativo me tiene un vínculo emotivo con Longa o con Irma1 y es por eso que todo el evento le afecta. En otras palabras, el hablante tiene un vínculo emotivo con alguno de los dos actantes de la oración y, por lo tanto, la oración sería sutilmente ambigua según con quién se establece el vínculo.Tesi

Insights into the structure of the active site of the O-2-tolerant membrane bound [NiFe] hydrogenase of R. eutropha H16 by molecular modelling

Dieser Beitrag ist mit Zustimmung des Rechteinhabers aufgrund einer (DFG geförderten) Allianz- bzw. Nationallizenz frei zugänglich.This publication is with permission of the rights owner freely accessible due to an Alliance licence and a national licence (funded by the DFG, German Research Foundation) respectively.Structural models for the Ni-B state of the wild-type and C81S protein variant of the membrane-bound [NiFe] hydrogenase from Ralstonia eutrophaH16 were derived by applying the homology model technique combined with molecular simulations and a hybrid quantum mechanical/molecular mechanical approach. The active site structure was assessed by comparing calculated and experimental IR spectra, confirming the view that the active site structure is very similar to those of anaerobic standard hydrogenases. In addition, the data suggest the presence of a water molecule in the second coordination sphere of the active centre.DFG, EXC 314, Unifying Concepts in Catalysi

Understandability of Hybrid Process Models Using DCR Graphs

While the understandability of process models has been extensively investigated for different process modeling notations, it has not been yet broadened to cover hybrid models. This paper proposes a new research model to investigate the understandability of hybrid model representations using a variety of psycho-physiological measurements including eye tracking and galvanic skin response (GSR) together with verbal data analysis. The aim of this research is to ensure a smooth integrationof hybrid modelling technologies in public administrations by investigating the way end-users (i.e., case workers) rely on the different parts of the hybrid process model representation in DCR Graphs, i.e., the graph, the textual annotations describing the law, and the simulation tools to interpret the process model

Individual Differences in the Speed of Facial Emotion Recognition Show Little Specificity but Are Strongly Related with General Mental Speed: Psychometric, Neural and Genetic Evidence

Facial identity and facial expression processing are crucial socio-emotional abilities but seem to show only limited psychometric uniqueness when the processing speed is considered in easy tasks. We applied a comprehensive measurement of processing speed and contrasted performance specificity in socio-emotional, social and non-social stimuli from an individual differences perspective. Performance in a multivariate task battery could be best modeled by a general speed factor and a first-order factor capturing some specific variance due to processing emotional facial expressions. We further tested equivalence of the relationships between speed factors and polymorphisms of dopamine and serotonin transporter genes. Results show that the speed factors are not only psychometrically equivalent but invariant in their relation with the Catechol-O Methyl-Transferase (COMT) Val158Met polymorphism. However, the 5-HTTLPR/rs25531 serotonin polymorphism was related with the first-order factor of emotion perception speed, suggesting a specific genetic correlate of processing emotions. We further investigated the relationship between several components of event-related brain potentials with psychometric abilities, and tested emotion specific individual differences at the neurophysiological level. Results revealed swifter emotion perception abilities to go along with larger amplitudes of the P100 and the Early Posterior Negativity (EPN), when emotion processing was modeled on its own. However, after partialling out the shared variance of emotion perception speed with general processing speed-related abilities, brain-behavior relationships did not remain specific for emotion. Together, the present results suggest that speed abilities are strongly interrelated but show some specificity for emotion processing speed at the psychometric level. At both genetic and neurophysiological levels, emotion specificity depended on whether general cognition is taken into account or not. These findings keenly suggest that general speed abilities should be taken into account when the study of emotion recognition abilities is targeted in its specificity