The short and long of it: neural correlates of temporal-order memory for autobiographical events

Previous functional neuroimaging studies of temporal-order memory have investigated memory for laboratory stimuli that are causally unrelated and poor in sensory detail. In contrast, the present functional magnetic resonance imaging (fMRI) study investigated temporal-order memory for autobiographical events that were causally interconnected and rich in sensory detail. Participants took photographs at many campus locations over a period of several hours, and the following day they were scanned while making temporal-order judgments to pairs of photographs from different locations. By manipulating the temporal lag between the two locations in each trial, we compared the neural correlates associated with reconstruction processes, which we hypothesized depended on recollection and contribute mainly to short lags, and distance processes, which we hypothesized to depend on familiarity and contribute mainly to longer lags. Consistent with our hypotheses, parametric fMRI analyses linked shorter lags to activations in regions previously associated with recollection (left prefrontal, parahippocampal, precuneus, and visual cortices), and longer lags with regions previously associated with familiarity (right prefrontal cortex). The hemispheric asymmetry in prefrontal cortex activity fits very well with evidence and theories regarding the contributions of the left versus right prefrontal cortex to memory (recollection vs. familiarity processes) and cognition (systematic vs. heuristic processes). In sum, using a novel photo-paradigm, this study provided the first evidence regarding the neural correlates of temporal-order for autobiographical events

Remembering beauty: Roles of orbitofrontal and hippocampal regions in successful memory encoding of attractive faces.

Behavioral data have shown that attractive faces are better remembered but the neural mechanisms of this effect are largely unknown. To investigate this issue, female participants were scanned with event-related functional MRI (fMRI) while rating the attractiveness of male faces. Memory for the faces was tested after fMRI scanning and was used to identify successful encoding activity (subsequent memory paradigm). As expected, attractive faces were remembered better than other faces. The study yielded three main fMRI findings. First, activity in the right orbitofrontal cortex increased linearly as a function of attractiveness ratings. Second, activity in the left hippocampus increased as a function of subsequent memory (subsequent misses b low confidence hits b high confidence hits). Third, functional connectivity between these orbitofrontal and hippocampal regions was stronger during the encoding of attractive than neutral or unattractive faces. These results suggest that better memory for attractive faces reflects greater interaction between a region associated with reward, the orbitofrontal cortex, and a region associated with successful memory encoding, the hippocampus

How Does Reciprocity Affect Undergraduate Student Orientation towards Stakeholders?

5987Nowadays, students are more aware of the impact of companies on their stakeholders and the need for properly handling their expectations to operationalize corporate social responsibility. Nevertheless, little is known about how certain individual traits may relate to their stance on the issue. This exploratory research contributes to stakeholder theory by analysing the e ect of the individual’s decision-making process, including the consideration of their social preferences, on their orientation toward stakeholder management. Here, we draw upon a theoretical model for resource-allocation decision-making consisting of reciprocal and non-reciprocal components. Our data, from undergraduate students enrolled in di erent degrees, were collected through a questionnaire and two social within-subject experiments (ultimatum and dictator games). Thus, our results show that the presence of a reciprocal component when decisions are made is positively linked to an instrumental orientation toward stakeholders. In addition, a greater non-reciprocal component in the decision-making process corresponds to a more normative orientation.S

Cross-Hemispheric Collaboration and Segregation Associated with Task Difficulty as Revealed by Structural and Functional Connectivity

Although it is known that brain regions in one hemisphere may interact very closely with their corresponding contralateral regions (collaboration) or operate relatively independent of them (segregation), the specific brain regions (where) and conditions (how) associated with collaboration or segregation are largely unknown. We investigated these issues using a split field-matching task in which participants matched the meaning of words or the visual features of faces presented to the same (unilateral) or to different (bilateral) visual fields. Matching difficulty was manipulated by varying the semantic similarity of words or the visual similarity of faces. We assessed the white matter using the fractional anisotropy (FA) measure provided by diffusion tensor imaging (DTI) and crosshemispheric communication in terms of fMRI-based connectivity between homotopic pairs of cortical regions. For both perceptual and semantic matching, bilateral trials became faster than unilateral trials as difficulty increased (bilateral processing advantage, BPA). The study yielded three novel findings. First, whereas FA in anterior corpus callosum (genu) correlated with word-matching BPA, FA in posterior corpus callosum (splenium-occipital) correlated with face-matching BPA. Second, as matching difficulty intensified, crosshemispheric functional connectivity (CFC) increased in domain-general frontopolar cortex (for both word and face matching) but decreased in domain-specific ventral temporal lobe regions (temporal pole for word matching and fusiform gyrus for face matching). Last, a mediation analysis linking DTI and fMRI data showed that CFC mediated the effect of callosal FA on BPA. These findings clarify the mechanisms by which the hemispheres interact to perform complex cognitive tasks

Del modelo de desarrollo económico al paradigma del desarrollo humano: una apuesta al papel del arte y las humanidades en el pensamiento de Martha Nussbaum

This document encapsulates the thinking emanating from the permanent seminar: "Resignification of the Humanities in Higher Education" held at the Center for Humanities and Social Sciences at the University of Santo Tomas, Bucaramanga, Colombia, held this time in the reading book: Not for profit: Why democracy needs the humanities, from the Martha C. Nussbaum (2010). Allows a critical approach to the situation of the humanities and the arts in democracies, silent and gradually permeated by the models of economic development, while eliciting a careful review of the role of the humanities in the context of higher education and moves the action from the humanities at the university.Este documento condensa las reflexiones derivadas del seminario permanente, “Resignificación de las Humanidades en la Educación Superior”, realizado por los profesores del Departamento de Humanidades de la Universidad Santo Tomás, Bucaramanga, Colombia, a través de la lectura del libro Sin fines de lucro: por qué la democracia necesita de las humanidades, de Martha Nussbaum (2010). Desde una mirada crítica, se revisa el papel de las humanidades y las artes en el aporte a las democracias que están permeadas, silenciosa y progresivamente, por los modelos de desarrollo económico. Plantea así, una revisión cuidadosa del papel de las humanidades en el contexto de la educación superior

Inmigración y vivienda: determinantes en la compra de vivienda por los inmigrantes en España.

En primer lugar, se estudian las características de los inmigrantes que llegan a España según su origen desde los diferentes continentes. En segundo lugar, se estudia el tipo de acceso a la vivienda del inmigrante y su movilidad residencial. Finalmente, se analizan los factores que influyen en la propensión de los inmigrantes a la compra de vivienda en España a través de un modelo econométrico

Análisis de los determinantes de la transparencia en Responsabilidad Social Corporativa desde la perspectiva del buen gobierno

pp. 272-295Este trabajo estudia la relación existente entre el gobierno corporativo y la transparencia en materia de responsabilidad social corporativa (RSC). Se utiliza una muestra de 38 empresas españolas cotizadas en el IBEX35 en el periodo 2005-2010 y un modelo donde se consideran conjuntamente variables relativas a la estructura de propiedad y al Consejo de administración. Los análisis de regresión realizados mediante un pool de datos utilizando la opción cluster concluyen que son las variables relativas al Consejo de administración las que influyen de manera significativa en la transparencia en RSC. En concreto, cuanto mayor sea el número de mujeres miembros del Consejo y cuanto menor sea el tamaño del Consejo de administración, mayor será la transparencia de las empresas sobre las actividades de naturaleza social que llevan a cabo.S

Neural mechanisms of context effects on face recognition: automatic binding and context shift decrements

Abstract ■ Although people do not normally try to remember associa

Neural correlates of confidence during item recognition and source memory retrieval: evidence for both dual-process and strength memory theories

Abstract ■ Although the medial-temporal lobes (MTL), PFC, and parietal cortex are considered primary nodes in the episodic memory network, there is much debate regarding the contributions of MTL, PFC, and parietal subregions to recollection versus familiarity (dual-process theory) and the feasibility of accounts on the basis of a single memory strength process (strength theory). To investigate these issues, the current fMRI study measured activity during retrieval of memories that differed quantitatively in terms of strength (high vs. low-confidence trials) and qualitatively in terms of recollection versus familiarity (source vs. item memory tasks). Support for each theory varied depending on which node of the episodic memory network was considered. Results from MTL best fit a dual-process account, as a dissociation was found between a right hippocampal region showing high-confidence activity during the source memory task and bilateral rhinal regions showing highconfidence activity during the item memory task. Within PFC, several left-lateralized regions showed greater activity for source than item memory, consistent with recollective orienting, whereas a right-lateralized ventrolateral area showed low-confidence activity in both tasks, consistent with monitoring processes. Parietal findings were generally consistent with strength theory, with dorsal areas showing low-confidence activity and ventral areas showing high-confidence activity in both tasks. This dissociation fits with an attentional account of parietal functions during episodic retrieval. The results suggest that both dual-process and strength theories are partly correct, highlighting the need for an integrated model that links to more general cognitive theories to account for observed neural activity during episodic memory retrieval.