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Desmond and Hancock (2001) proposed that two types of cognitive fatigue can arise depending on the nature of a task: active or passive. The purpose of this study was to use electroencephalographic indices of task engagement and a candidate marker of strain to differentiate these two fatigue states. Participants ( N = 84) performed a generalized flight simulation task for 62 min under either active, passive, or control conditions. Passive fatigue was characterized by reduced EEG engagement and initially elevated and stable ratios of Fz theta to POz alpha power compared to active fatigue. No performance differences were found between the fatigue conditions; however, an overall speed-accuracy trade-off was observed from pre to post fatigue induction. These results support theoretical and empirical distinctions between active and passive fatigue and have potential applications for developing augmented cognition technologies to deliver appropriate fatigue countermeasures in automated operational environments.

The current study evaluated the validity of commercially available electroencephalography (EEG) cognitive state metrics of workload and engagement in differentially experienced air traffic control (ATC) students. EEG and pupil diameter recordings were collected from 47 ATC students (27 more experienced and 20 less experienced) during a high-fidelity, variable workload approach-control scenario. Scenario workload was manipulated by increasing the number of aircraft released and the presence of a divided attention task. Results showed that scenario performance significantly degraded with increased aircraft and the presence of the divided attention task. No scenario performance differences were found between experience groups. The EEG engagement metric significantly differed between experience groups, with less experienced controllers exhibiting higher engagement than more experienced controllers. The EEG workload metric and pupil diameter were sensitive to workload manipulations but did not differentiate experience groups. Commercially available EEG cognitive state metrics may be a viable tool for enhancing ATC training.

Questionnaire instruments have been used extensively by researchers in the literature review for evaluation of various aspects of public transportation. Important implications have been derived from those instruments to improve various aspects of the transport. However, it is important that instruments, which are designed to measure various stimuli, meet criteria of reliability to reflect a real impact of the stressors. Particularly, given the diverse range of commuter characteristics considered in this study, it is necessary to ensure that instruments are reliable and accurate. This can be achieved by finding the relationship between the item’s properties and the underlying unobserved trait, being measured. The item response theory (IRT) refers to measurement of an instrument’s reliability by examining the relationship between the unobserved trait and various observed items. In this study, to determine if our instrument suffers from any potentially associated problems, the IRT analysis was conducted. The analysis was employed based on the graded response model (GRM) due to the ordinal nature of the data. Various aspects of the instruments, such as discriminability and informativity of the items were tested. For instance, it was found while the classical test theory (CTT) confirm the reliability of the instrument, IRT highlight some concerns regarding the instrument. Also, the person fit assessment measure, for instance, highlights some concern regarding respondents answering some of the questions due to lack of interest, choosing answers randomly. Not many studies have examined instruments’ reliability in determining the psychological impacts of public transportation on commuters in the way that was performed here.

Various psychological feelings that commuters might experience due to the shortcomings of a public transport are a major concern for transport policy makers. Those shortcomings would be translated into various negative psychological feelings, which would consequently tarnish the perceived quality of the public transport system in terms of its characteristics, e.g., the perceived quality of the passengers' information system (PIS). A delay has often been defined as the difference between the real arrival of a transport and the scheduled arrival of based on the PIS. The main question this study seeks to answer is how passengers view the PIS while undergoing various psychological negative impacts due to delay? This is especially important when the PIS is not precise. Previous studies on the importance of real-time information mainly focus on the impact of PIS on the satisfaction of commuters, or the reliability of the public transport. However, they rarely consider the negative psychological impacts that delays might have on commuters, and how those negative feelings might be aggravated by providing inaccurate information for the commuters. The proposed study is based on completed questionnaires by 396 passengers waiting for a rail transport in Malaysia; the rail transport was experiencing frequent long delays due to various mechanical malfunctions. In addition, the PIS provided for the passengers were mainly imprecise, and was updated regularly. The relationship between various considered variables, and a related latent factor, were formed by means of factor analysis. The results of internal consistency and validity highlight acceptable factors to be considered for a structural equation modeling (SEM) model. Three latent factors were found to impact the latent factor of PIS. For instance, it was found that the relationship between motion sickness factor and the response of PIS is not by a direct relationship between those two factors, but through the mediation of a latent physiological factor. On the other hand, the impact of the psychological feelings of the commuter by PIS is higher than its physiological effects. The results of this study have an important managerial implication for policy makers that even if the delay is inevitable, an accurate PIS could be provided to reduce the associated negative feelings of delay. Extensive discussion has been had about identification of a best fit model and process of model's parameters' estimation.

This literature review will summarize, compare, and evaluate the reviewed studies addressing and investigating the relationship between concussion and the sports of hockey. We will accomplish this by identifying prevalence rates, recognizing common mechanisms of causation, describing and discussing prevention and care, and summarizing the results to provide implications for further studies. We conclude by indicating the important mental health issues as well as potentially severe and long-lasting impact concussions can and do have on those that receive them as well as on the friends and families of those who sustain a concussion.

Cognitive dissonance (CD) is the discomfort that occurs when two opposing beliefs are held simultaneously. When this conflict arises, one of the opposing beliefs must be altered or dropped in order to reduce the discomfort. The current study examined the relationship between cognitive dissonance and intelligence (using vocabulary subtest scores of the Wechsler Adult Intelligence Scale-Revised IV; WAIS-R IV) and grade point average (GPA) in 103 college undergraduates. The ratings occurred before and after the exam. In order to induce the cognitive dissonance participants were given low fictitious scores and shown a comparatively greater average. Cognitive dissonance was measured by taking the difference of the participants' fairness ratings of the vocabulary subtest. No relationship existed between WAIS-R IV performance and CD scores (r = .01, ns). However, GPA and CD scores were negatively associated (r = -.29, p Keywords: dissonance, intelligence, GPA, college studentsPeople tend to develop a feeling of discomfort when they possess two beliefs that are in opposition (Elliot & Devine, 1994). This internal conflict is referred to as cognitive dissonance (CD; Festinger, 1957). CD is a common occurrence for people and it arises in a multitude of situations. For example, a man and a woman are dating and they have decided they would like to get married and have kids. During their discussion of future plans the man says he was raised religiously and believes the kids should be brought up with the beliefs he was taught. The woman says she was raised without religion and she turned out fine so she thinks the kids should be brought up without any religious beliefs. The man and the woman are both experiencing a cognitive dissonance in which the desires and conflicts are:The Man:1. Wants to marry and have children with the woman he is dating.2. Wants to raise his children with the religious beliefs he was taught.The Woman:1. Wants to marry and have children with the man she is dating.2. Wants to raise her children without any religious beliefs.Cognitive dissonance must be resolved in some way and in this situation the man and woman must either end the relationship or greatly decrease their personal importance of how their children will be raised. CD is more commonly observed among smaller situations that conflict with the idea that people believe they are intelligent (Kneer, Glock, & Rieger, 2012). For example, consider the addiction of smoking. It is common knowledge that smoking results in negative and undesirable health consequences, yet the behavior still conti nues. Each time a per son chooses to smoke they encounter the cognitive dissonance of inflicting self-harm, or not receiving the satisfaction or relieve the craving (Kneer, Glock, & Rieger, 2012).A student who studies for an exam but receives a poor grade may encounter a cognitive dissonance between believing he or she underestim a ted t h e exa m an d actually needed to study more (their own fault), or believing the exam was purposely made to be extremely difficult so students would not h ave good r esult s (som eon e else's/th e professor 's fault). The first choice admits fault and leaves the student having made an unintelligent decision. The second choice places blame on the professor and leaves the student with no fault and therefore having not made an unintelligent decision.Current research has shown that CD affects a variety of experiences including personal responsibility (Cheng & Hsu, 2012), justification (Bendersky & Curhan, 2009), eating disorder prevention (McMillan, Stice, & Rohde, 2011), normative standards (Voisin & Fointiat, 2013), criminal evidence (Ask, Reinhard, Marksteiner, & Granhag, 2011), motive (Gawronski, 2012), perceptions of natural environments (Balcetis & Dunning, 2007), normative standards (Stone & Cooper, 2001), white lies (Argo & Shiv, 2012), and ethics (Barkan, Ayal, Gino, & Ariely, 2012). …

We analyzed data from 74 male collegiate hockey players. Each athlete’s season began with a baseline administration of the Immediate Post-Concussion Assessment and Cognitive Testing (ImPACT) neuropsychology test battery. Fourteen athletes sustained a sport-related head injury and were readministered the test to assess the impact of the injury. A significant decrease in performance (compared to baseline) on immediate and delayed word recall and designs followed the first concussion. Following a second sport-related concussion, the 4 affected athletes showed significant decrease in visual motor speed. Performance improved on 2 response speed measures ( Ps < .01). More errors occurred during a visual processing/discrimination task and immediate recall of designs declined ( Ps < .05). We discuss the results in light of recent work related to the impact of early-life concussions and head injury on late-life consequences, such as chronic traumatic encephalopathy, and more immediate issues such as return-to-play decisions for athletes.

Several large meta-analytic studies have failed to support a consistent relationship between visual or “nonverbal” memory deficits and right mesial temporal lobe changes. The Brown Location Test (BLT), a recently developed dot location learning and memory test, uses a nonsymmetrical array and provides control over many of the confounding variables (e.g., verbal influence and drawing requirements) inherent in other measures of visual memory. In the present investigation, we evaluated the clinical utility of the BLT in patients who had undergone left or right anterior mesial temporal lobectomy. We also provide normative data of 298 healthy adults for standardized scores. Results revealed significantly worse performance on the BLT in the right as compared to the left lobectomy group and the healthy adult normative sample. The present findings support a role for the right anterior mesial temporal lobe in dot location learning and memory.

Previous research has documented the impact of time of day on vigilance and memory and the moderating influence of circadian typology (morningness-eveningness) on the relationship between time of testing and cognitive processes. This study examined the impact of circadian typology and time of testing on executive functions. Morning-type and evening-type people were randomly assigned to a morning or afternoon testing time, and their performance on neuropsychological tests, including the Conners Continuous Performance Test (CPT), the Digit Span test, the Controlled Oral Word Association Test (COWAT), and the Wisconsin Card Sorting Test (WCST) was compared. No interactions between circadian typology and time of day were observed on the CPT or Digit Span test. A time of day effect was found on the letter generation portion of the COWAT. More words were generated in the afternoon than in the morning. In contrast, performance on the WCST was best when morning-type participants were tested at their optimal time of day. These findings suggest that circadian typology should be considered when scheduling neuropsychological assessments, rehabilitation training, and critical job tasks.

The use of American Indian (AI) words and images in athletic teams' nicknames, logos, and mascots remains a controversial issue. This study investigated the emotional impact of the University of North Dakota's "Fighting Sioux" nickname/logo on 33 AI and 36 majority culture (MC) students enrolled at the university. Participants completed the Multiple Affect Adjective Checklist-Revised (MAACL-R) before viewing two slide presentations of Fighting Sioux-related images: one neutral (i.e., non-controversial) and one controversial. Participants completed the MAACL-R after each presentation. They also completed the Nickname and Logo Distress Scale, and AI participants completed the Northern Plains Biculturalism Inventory to assess their degree of cultural orientation. Results showed that AIs experienced higher negative affect following both slide presentations than did MC participants. MC participants' affect was only changed following the controversial slide presentation. The findings suggest AI students may experience significantly higher levels of psychological distress when viewing even neutral images of AI nicknames/logos. Language: en

A corpus of 576 words and orthographically legal pseudowords was rated by 150 undergraduates to obtain a subjective estimate of the number of meanings possessed by the stimuli. The information contained in this corpus may be used to supplement current, sources of word-meaning information (e.g., total number of dictionary entries). Experimental evidence is presented that supports the reliability of the normative data.

It is with great pleasure that I introduce the First Special Issue for Current Psychology as Editor-in-Chief. This Special Issue, dealing with the psychological aftermath of a decade of disasters is in exceptional hands and I am happy to see Katie Cherry, Ph.D. at the helm of this Special Issue. Katie and I go back a long way. We both did dissertations on adult development and aging and routinely attend the biennial Cognitive Aging Conference in Atlanta. Katie is already an established expert in the field of Cognitive Aging with more recent work in Disasters and Aging, having published widely in each area. She now adds to this impressive list of research on the impact (shortas well as long-term) of the 2005 Hurricanes Katrina and Rita and the 2010 BP Oil Spill. I hope you enjoy these impressive papers as much as I do.

Poulton (1982) has criticized within-subject manipulations of the standard conditions for dual-task methodology. Two experiments compared between-versus within-subject designs employing lexical decisions. The results confirmed Poulton’s claim of asymmetry of transfer within repeated measure designs. Conclusions regarding attention allocation, therefore, are equivocal in comparison with independent groups designs.

The fan effect paradigm was used to investigate the influence of emotional mood state on longterm memory retrieval (Anderson, 1983). Subjects learned target facts embedded in unrelated sentences to a specified criterion and were then given a happy, sad, or neutral mood induction. Mean response times (RTs) and error rates were analyzed in a speeded recognition test in which subjects distinguished between the learned facts and foil facts (foil facts were constructed by recombining the same concepts). A follow-up lexical decision task indicated that mean RT was positively correlated with an increase in the weighted proportion of irrelevant thoughts produced by subjects in an induced sad mood. Results suggest that irrelevant thoughts associated with the sad mood state interfered with more relevant, task-oriented, thoughts and support the notion that sad mood is related to a failure to inhibit irrelevant information.