Alan F. Collins

The role of pictorial convention in haptic picture perception.

An investigation of tactile picture perception is reported. Blindfolded sighted subjects explored either ‘line drawings’ or ‘textured’ tactile pictures produced on Zytex swell paper. All pictures were ‘two-dimensional’, that is they depicted only one object face and so did not represent a third dimension. Both picture sets represented the same objects. Results revealed that the textured pictures, in which solid surfaces of depicted objects were uniformly textured, were recognised more often than tactile line drawings, in which surfaces of objects were simply bounded by lines. There were no significant correlations between imagery ability (visual, cutaneous, or kinaesthetic) and picture recognition success. Texture may be a form of ‘uniform connectedness’ (Palmer and Rock 1994 Psychonomic Bulletin & Review 1 29–55) or ‘common region’ (Palmer 1992 Cognitive Psychology 24 436–447), highlighting the global characteristics of stimuli. We argue that textured pictures may encourage the haptic system to take a more globally oriented approach to tactile picture perception, benefiting recognition.

The pathological gambler and the government of gambling

news items, the racing press, the policy of casino chains and, perhaps most ironically of all, in the character of a forensic psychologist in a popular TV series. As I write, The Times of 15 June 1995 has an article on its front page proclaiming the identification of ’lottomania’, a ’delusional illness triggered by publicity’ surrounding the UK’s national lottery.’ The article goes on to quote Dr Harry Doyle, a consultant psychiatrist, as believing that ’plenty of people are addicted’ (presumably to the lottery or to the delusion of winning). Today the pathological gambler lurks not only in the pages of the psy literature but in every casino, fruit-machine hall, racetrack and betting office. One does not have to look back far for the picture to be very different: in the psychiatric and psychological writings of the 1970s, the 1960s, the 1950s and before, the pathological gambler was a rare figure and one almost always denied the recognition afforded by an entry in the nosologies of mental illness. In 1980 this

The embodiment of reconciliation : Order and change in the work of frederic bartlett

Frederic Bartlett (1886-1969) was one of the most prominent figures in British academic psychology during the 20th century. His psychological work has had a mixed reception, but there is no doubt that it continues to be much cited. Bartlett and his work have also attracted considerable historical attention both within history of ideas accounts and in attempts to understand the establishment of British academic psychology. The present article argues that new light can be shed on Bartletts writings by seeing them as repeatedly grappling with 2 interrelated themes: the preservation of order and the adjustment to changing conditions. The article illustrates the ways in which these themes ran through his major works and informed some of his key theoretical concepts before going on to examine some of the potential sources for these themes.

Enhancing 2-D Tactile Picture Design from Knowledge of 3-D Haptic Object Recognition

Research into haptic object recognition suggests that matching stimulus input to a system of geon-like structural descriptions may play an important role in this perceptual modality, as it does in vision. The recognition of objects from tactile pictures or diagrams is an important skill for blind people, yet relatively little research has been conducted in attempts to optimize tactile picture design. This paper explains a novel, theoretically-motivated design for constructing tactile pictures (the TexyForm system). In a single experiment contrasting blindfolded sighted, early blind, and late blind participants, we demonstrate that TexyForm pictures were identified significantly more frequently than standard, visually realistic, tactile pictures. In particular, early blind participants improved their identification from 12.5% with visually realistic pictures to 50% with TexyForm pictures. All participants rated the TexyForm pictures as preferable to visually realistic pictures. We argue that using current theoretical knowledge and experimental data to drive tactile picture design is likely to lead to improvements in the usability of materials for blind people.

Analogue versus propositional representation in congenitally blind individuals.

Congenitally blind individuals are generally less accurate at mentally manipulating objects than sighted people. However, they often score higher on tests of short- and long-term verbal memory, and it has been suggested that an enhanced propositional representation compensates for inefficiencies in analogue visuospatial representation. Here, congenitally blind, blindfolded, and sighted participants recalled descriptions of relative object locations. In contrast to previous findings, the congenitally blind participants were as accurate as the blindfolded and sighted individuals at remembering the relative locations of objects, but their memory for the verbatim structure of presented descriptions was worse. We propose that, like sighted people, the congenitally blind spontaneously construct and remember analogue representations of object locations and that the performance discrepancies of the blind arise from the process of managing and manipulating these analogue representations.

Response styles, bipolar risk, and mood in students: The Behaviours Checklist.

OBJECTIVES An Integrative Cognitive Model of mood swings and bipolar disorder proposes that extreme positive and negative appraisals about internal states trigger ascent and descent behaviours, contributing to the onset and maintenance of mood swings. This study investigated the reliability and validity of a new inventory, the Behaviours Checklist (BC), by measuring associations with appraisals, response styles to positive and negative affect, bipolar risk, mania, and depression. DESIGN Correlational analogue study. METHODS Students (N = 134) completed the BC alongside measures of appraisals, response styles to positive and negative mood, mania, depression, and hypomanic personality (bipolar risk). RESULTS The BC was of adequate reliability and showed good validity. Ascent behaviours and appraisals predicted bipolar risk, whereas descent behaviours and appraisals were associated with depression. CONCLUSIONS Appraisals, ascent, and descent behaviours may play an important role in the development and maintenance of mood swings. Limitations and research recommendations are outlined. PRACTITIONER POINTS Extreme positive and negative appraisals of internal states, and subsequent behavioural responses (ascent and descent behaviours), are associated with bipolar risk and bipolar mood symptoms in a student sample. These processes are involved with mood dysregulation in clinical populations as well as bipolar risk in students, with implications for mood management.

An intimate connection : Oliver zangwill and the emergence of neuropsychology in Britain

In this article, the author argues that a number of conditions conspired to place the Cambridge psychologist Oliver Zangwill in a pivotal position for pursuing and promoting neuropsychology in Britain after World War II. In broad terms, these were the background and experience of Zangwill himself, the practical engagement of psychologists with patients with brain damage, neurologists, and psychiatrists, the introduction of medical reform including the establishment of a National Health Service, rekindled interest in cortical localization, and the elite social networks that existed in medicine and university life in postwar Britain. The author claims that the career of Zangwill reveals rather than obscures the importance of these wider conditions and demonstrates an unusually close connection between an individual and the emergence of a subdiscipline.

The Shackles of Practice: History of Psychology, Research Assessment, and the Curriculum

The history of psychology is being increasingly marginalised in British universities. In this article we argue that this marginalisation has been brought about by a combination of material circumstances resulting from the marketisation of the UK Higher Education sector. One consequence of this, the statutory audit known as the Research Excellence Framework, has made it increasingly difficult to undertake historical work as it has traditionally been done in UK psychology departments. At best such a situation challenges the ambition for historical work to have an impact on psychology. At worst it potentially renders the history of psychology irrelevant. Yet the theoretical justification for history of psychology has never been stronger. Psychology’s subject matter is neither exclusively natural nor entirely socially constructed, but lies on that “somewhat suspect borderland between physiology and philosophy” as Wilhelm Wundt put it. The discipline’s ontological claims are therefore always made from within epistemological frameworks which are themselves products of particular historical contexts. Such arguments have persuaded us that history of psychology has a fundamental role to play within the wider discipline. Yet as historians we cannot ignore the constraining social and material circumstances in which our field operates. We conclude that although the constraints of practice suggest that its prospects for influencing its parent discipline are seriously challenged, there are nevertheless opportunities for the history of psychology in areas such as the undergraduate curriculum.

An Asymmetric Relationship: The Spirit of Kenneth Craik and the Work of Warren McCulloch

Abstract Warren McCulloch held Kenneth Craik’s work in high regard. What was the source of this high regard and did this good opinion mean that Craik’s work had any effect on McCulloch’s own work? Aspects of Craik and McCulloch’s backgrounds are examined to help explain McCulloch’s views: the important place of philosophy in their education and some shared philosophical positions, their attraction to work in diverse disciplines, a respect for the science of physiology, an acceptance that mind was a legitimate object of enquiry, the demands and opportunities of military and wartime research, and a shared sense of creating a new approach to inquiries into human abilities. Two aspects of Craik’s theory about the nature of thought were also key: his claim that modelling was central to thought and the fact that those views complemented McCulloch’s own. Finally, McCulloch helped to contribute to Craik’s reputation and in doing so helped to create a founding father for cybernetics to be set alongside the likes of Ashby, Wiener and McCulloch himself.AbstractWarren McCulloch held Kenneth Craik’s work in high regard. What was the source of this high regard and did this good opinion mean that Craik’s work had any effect on McCulloch’s own work? Aspects of Craik and McCulloch’s backgrounds are examined to help explain McCulloch’s views: the important place of philosophy in their education and some shared philosophical positions, their attraction to work in diverse disciplines, a respect for the science of physiology, an acceptance that mind was a legitimate object of enquiry, the demands and opportunities of military and wartime research, and a shared sense of creating a new approach to inquiries into human abilities. Two aspects of Craik’s theory about the nature of thought were also key: his claim that modelling was central to thought and the fact that those views complemented McCulloch’s own. Finally, McCulloch helped to contribute to Craik’s reputation and in doing so helped to create a founding father for cybernetics to be set alongside the likes of...

Sir Frederic Bartlett, the Bartlett lecture, and an unwanted k

Sir Frederic Charles Bartlett was born on 20October 1886 in Stow-on-the-Wold, Gloucestershire, England.Hebecame one of the best-knownpsychologists of the twentieth century. And it is absolutely clear from his birth certificate, which I have in front of me as I write, that his first name was spelt without a final k. His major publications also repeatedly attest to the lack of a terminal “k”. Yet, as a quick search through Google Scholar will readily confirm, he is often mistakenly cited as Frederick Bartlett. Perhaps the occasional error in research articles can be allowed, but it is more embarrassing when an honorary lecture named after Bartlett has been repeatedly referred to as the Sir Frederick Bartlett lecture. On 24 February 2015 the Editor of QJEP received an email from the production manager, informing him that the author of that year’s Experimental Psychology Society Bartlett Lecture, Gordon Logan, had submitted corrections to his proofs in which he asked to amend “The 42nd Sir Frederick Bartlett Lecture” to “The 42nd Sir Frederic Bartlett Lecture” (Logan, 2015). The production team then noted a discrepancy between Logan’s (correct) spelling and spellings of Bartlett’s first name in many earlier publications of the lecture in QJEP. Rather than ignore this discovery, or brush it under the publication carpet, it was felt appropriate that the Journal record a reflection on this event, as well as resolve not to repeat the error in future. The Bartlett lecture was established by the EPS in 1966 with the inaugural lecture being given by Bartlett’s close and longstanding friend Carolus Oldfield. As one might expect, Oldfield got Bartlett’s name correct. His student and successor to the Cambridge chair, Oliver Zangwill, also got it right in the third lecture. There are other, later, correct renditions, and, happily, the EPS’s website now gives the correct spelling (though I am assured that for quite some time it did not). However, in many other Bartlett lectures, including ones by speakers who had known Bartlett personally such as T.C.D. Whiteside and Horace Barlow, the unwanted k creeps in, starting, it seems, with the 5th lecture by Gordon Bower (Bower, 1976). The EPS are not the only error-prone institution. At the time of writing (20 July 2015), the University of Cambridge’s webpage for St John’s College— Bartlett’s college—under “Politics, Psychology, Sociology and International Politics at St John’s”, comments that “Sir Frederick Bartlett, the influential Psychologist, was also a Fellow of the College” (perhaps by the time this article is published, that mistake will have been corrected). Bartlett was important for his institutional role in shaping British psychology, but in terms of ideas and findings, he is most often celebrated in relation to his