69 research outputs found
Affect Intensity and Subjective Ratings of Emotional Pictures and Sounds
Affect intensity refers to the intensity with which people experience their emotional response. Individual
differences in affect intensity are supposed to be related to the strength of the response to emotional stimuli. Previous studies
showed that participants with high affect intensity responded to emotional stimuli with stronger or more intense affective
reactions than participants scoring low in affect intensity However, previous studies are mainly limited to the impact of affect
intensity on consumer responses to advertising appeals or are limited to the use of life events descriptions as emotional stimuli.
No previous studies used behavioural measures of the emotional response to standardized stimuli, varying in terms of arousal.
In the present study the predictive value of affect intensity, measured by a self-report questionnaire, the Affect Intensity
Measure (AIM), on the emotional response to standardized pictures and sounds has been investigated. In particular, the
predictive value of affective intensity measured by the AIM, using both the total AIM total score and the four subscales scores,
on subjective arousal ratings of different categories of standardized emotional pictures and sounds was assessed on a
nonclinical sample. The total AIM score has been found to be predictive for subjective arousal scores for low unpleasant
pictures while, using the AIM subscales scores, results showed that the Negative Reactivity subscale was predictive for arousal
scores to high negative pictures and sounds. These findings seem to show that the use of the total AIM score can obscure the
relationships between specific features of affect intensity and other variables. Moreover, the present results didn’t show a
general effect of affect intensity on behavioural responses to emotional standardized stimuli but an emotion specific effect for
high negative stimuli
Interaction effect: Are you doing the right thing?
How to correctly interpret interaction effects has been largely discussed in scientific literature. Nevertheless, misinterpretations are still frequently observed, and neuroscience is not exempt from this trend. We reviewed 645 papers published from 2019 to 2020 and found that, in the 93.2% of studies reporting a statistically significant interaction effect (N = 221), post-hoc pairwise comparisons were the designated method adopted to interpret its results. Given the widespread use of this approach, we aim to: (1) highlight its limitations and how it can lead to misinterpretations of the interaction effect; (2) discuss more effective and powerful ways to correctly interpret interaction effects, including both explorative and model selection procedures. The paper provides practical examples and freely accessible online materials to reproduce all analyses
Enhancing the Potential of Creative Thinking in Children with Educational Robots
This observational study analyzes the effectiveness of the non-humanoid
robot Ozobot as interactive-tool for school- children to enhance their potential of
creative thinking. Based on the socio-constructivist theoretical background,
referring to the zone of proximal development and the socio-cognitive conflict, the
study compares three experimental condition (Ozobot Single Work, Ozobot Pair
Work, and Control Group) of a problem-solving task with a robot (programming the
robot to perform a given route in a preconfigured labyrinth). 171 children (85
females, 86 males), aged between 9 (IV class) and 10 years (V class) of two centralnorthern
Italy primary schools, participated in the study. Children were randomly
assigned to one of the three group conditions. Results show that children who
performed the task alone with the educational robot (Ozobot Single Work)
significantly improved their potential of creative thinking, compared both to those
who perform the task in pair with the educational robot (Ozobot Pair Work) and to
the control group. No gender differences occur
Preliminary evidence on machine learning approaches for clusterizing students’ cognitive profile
Assessing the cognitive abilities of students in academic contexts can provide valuable insights for teachers to identify their cognitive profile and create personalized teaching strategies. While numerous studies have demonstrated promising outcomes in clustering students based on their cognitive profiles, effective comparisons between various clustering methods are lacking in the current literature.
In this study, we aim to compare the effectiveness of two clustering techniques to group students based on their cognitive abilities including general intelligence, attention, visual perception, working memory, and phonological awareness. 292 students, aged 11–15 years, participated in the study.
A two-level approach based on the joint use of Kohonen's Self-Organizing Map (SOMs) and k-means clustering algorithm was compared with an approach based on the k-means clustering algorithm only. The resulting profiles were then predicted via AdaBoost and ANN supervised algorithms.
The results showed that the two-level approach provides the best solution for this problem while the ANN algorithm was the winner in the classification problem.
These results laying the foundations for developing a useful instrument for predicting the students’ cognitive profile
Preliminary Validation of the CI-FRA Checklist: A Simple Screening Tool for Measuring the Early Signs of Reading and Spelling Disorders in Italian Primary Students
Although several screening tests for recognizing early signs of reading and spelling
difficulties have been developed, brief and methodologically grounded tools for teachers
are very limited. The present study aimed to lay the foundation for a new screening tool
for teachers: the Checklist for early Indicators of risk Factors in Reading Ability (CI-FRA).
The proposed checklist consists of 20 items, based on a 7-point Likert scale, and it
investigates five domains: reading, writing, attention, and motor skills. Six hundred sixtyseven
children were evaluated by 40 teachers during the first year of primary school
and, longitudinally, in the second year. Exploratory factor analysis and confirmatory
factor analysis (CFA) were applied to verify structural validity. Concurrent validity was
assessed by Spearman correlation to analyze the link between CI-FRA and reading and
spelling standardized tests and cognitive tests. Reliability was assessed by Cronbach a
and interclass correlation coefficient. The CFA reported a three-factor structure as the
optimal solution, including language (reading and writing), visuospatial attention, and fine
motor skills subscales. Good reliability, good internal consistency, and acceptable test\u2013
retest indices were found. Concurrent validity was confirmed by significant correlations
between CI-FRA total score and standardized reading and spelling test, as well as
by correlations between CI-FRA subscales and neuropsychological standardized test
scores. Preliminary evaluation of sensitivity by receiver operating characteristic curves
showed that the CI-FRA score has particularly high sensitivity and specificity for word
reading speed deficit. In conclusion, the results confirm that CI-FRA is a theoretically
grounded and statistically valid tool that could help the teachers to screen for early
signs of reading and spelling difficulties
Internalizing Symptoms in Developmental Dyslexia: A Comparison Between Primary and Secondary School
Although the relationship between developmental dyslexia (DD) and the risk of
occurrence of internalizing symptomatology has been widely investigated in the extant
literature, different findings have been reported. In this study, two experiments with two
general purposes are presented. The first study investigates whether the differences
in the severity of internalizing symptoms between DD and controls are greater in
students attending secondary school than in those attending primary school. Sixtyfive
DD and 169 controls attending primary and secondary school took part in the
first study. The diagnosis of dyslexia was obtained from standardized reading tests;
internalizing symptom severity was assessed with the Self Administrated Psychiatric
Scales for Children and Adolescents questionnaire. The results showed that adolescents
with dyslexia had an increased level of self-perceived anxiety, depression and somatic
symptoms, whereas no significant differences between DD and controls emerged
in childhood. In the second study, a cohort of adolescents attending secondary
school (DD = 44; controls = 51) was closely analyzed to clarify whether contextual
and subjective factors could contribute toward exacerbating the risk of internalizing
symptomatology at that age. Internalizing symptom severity was assessed with the
Child Behavior Checklist, Youth Self Report questionnaire, decision-making factors
were measured with the Melbourne Decision Making Questionnaire, and student\u2019s
quality of life was gaged using the Clipper test. The results showed that high levels
of internalizing symptoms in DD were associated with a low level of self-esteem and the
tendency to react to problematic situations with hyperactivation. By contrast, positive
relationships with peers were associated with low symptom severity. In conclusion, the
intensified internalizing symptoms that could emerge in adolescents in association with
the presence of dyslexia are predicted by social protective and risk factors that are
associated with symptom severity. Accordingly, the results suggest that remediation
programs for dyslexia should include implementing motivation strategies, self-esteem
enhancement activities and building peers networks that, starting in childhood, can
prevent the appearance of internalizing symptoms
Circadian Activity Rhythm in Early Relapsing-Remitting Multiple Sclerosis
While relapsing-remitting is the most prevalent course of multiple sclerosis, the prognostic/predictive markers of the worsening of symptomatology are still debated. With reference to other diseases, the study of the circadian activity rhythm, according to the theoretical framework of the two-process model of sleep regulation and applying functional linear modeling, proved to be useful to identify a possible marker. The usefulness of the study of circadian activity rhythm in multiple sclerosis is strengthened by recent findings indicating a potential involvement of circadian factors in the multifactorial etiopathology of the disorder. The aim of the present study was to verify whether circadian activity rhythm of early relapsing-remitting multiple sclerosis patients presents specific alterations, through functional linear modeling. Thirty-five relapsing-remitting multiple sclerosis patients (24 females; mean age ± SD = 31.51 ± 7.74) and 35 healthy controls (24 females; mean age ± SD = 31.29 ± 8.02) were enrolled. They wore an actigraph around the non-dominant wrist for one week. Relapsing-remitting multiple sclerosis patients showed a peak in motor activity around 5:00 a.m., higher than that of healthy controls. The timing of the peak in motor activity in the patients could be explained according to the hyperactive hypothalamus-pituitary-adrenal axis and higher cortisol awakening response reported in these patients
Time Course of Motor Sleep Inertia Dissipation According to Age
Sleep inertia (SI) refers to a complex psychophysiological phenomenon observed after morning awakening that can be described as the gradual recovery of waking-like status after a night of sleep. The time course of SI dissipation in an everyday life condition is little studied. The present study aims to investigate the SI dissipation in motor activity, as a function of age, upon spontaneous morning awakening after a usual night-time sleep. To this end, we performed a retrospective study in a naturalistic setting in a wide life span sample: 382 healthy participants (219 females) from middle childhood (9 years old) to late adulthood (70 years old). Participants were required to wear the actigraph on the non-dominant wrist for at least seven consecutive nights. Results show that SI of motor activity is dissipated in 70 min. Mean motor activity in such a time window was significantly modulated by age: lower age corresponded to higher motor activity
Validity of the Perceived Physical Ability Scale for Children: An Actigraphic Study
This study aimed to provide evidence of the validity of the Perceived Physical Ability Scale
for Children against an external-objective criterion of the 24 h motor activity pattern assessed through
actigraphy. A total of 107 children (60 females; mean age 10.25 ± 0.48) were originally enrolled.
Children wore the actigraph model Actiwatch AW64 (Cambridge Neurotechnology Ltd., Fenstanton,
UK) for seven days, 24 h per day, around the non-dominant wrist. At the beginning of the actigraphic
recording, participants filled in the Perceived Physical Ability Scale for Children. Functional Linear
Modeling was used to examine variation in the 24 h motor activity pattern according to the total score
in the Perceived Physical Ability Scale for Children. Higher physical self-efficacy was significantly
related to greater levels of motor activity in the afternoon. Overall, this pattern of results supports the
validity of the Perceived Physical Ability Scale for Children against the external-objective criterion of
the 24 h motor pattern. The Perceived Physical Ability Scale for Children could represent a promising
endpoint for studies assessing the effectiveness of physical activity promotion interventions
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