Moritz Köster

Cultural background shapes spatial reference frame proclivity

Spatial navigation is an essential human skill that is influenced by several factors. The present study investigates how gender, age, and cultural background account for differences in reference frame proclivity and performance in a virtual navigation task. Using an online navigation study, we recorded reaction times, error rates (confusion of turning axis), and reference frame proclivity (egocentric vs. allocentric reference frame) of 1823 participants. Reaction times significantly varied with gender and age, but were only marginally influenced by the cultural background of participants. Error rates were in line with these results and exhibited a significant influence of gender and culture, but not age. Participants’ cultural background significantly influenced reference frame selection; the majority of North-Americans preferred an allocentric strategy, while Latin-Americans preferred an egocentric navigation strategy. European and Asian groups were in between these two extremes. Neither the factor of age nor the factor of gender had a direct impact on participants’ navigation strategies. The strong effects of cultural background on navigation strategies without the influence of gender or age underlines the importance of socialized spatial cognitive processes and argues for socio-economic analysis in studies investigating human navigation.

Infants Understand Others’ Needs

Infants begin to help other individuals in the second year of life. However, it is still unclear whether early helping behavior is based on an understanding of other individuals’ needs and is thus motivated prosocially. In the present eye-tracking study, 9- to 18-month-old infants (N = 71) saw a character in need of help, unable to reach its goal because of an obstacle, and a second character that was able to achieve a goal on its own. When a third individual (a helper) initiated an action, the infants expected the helper to help the character in need (as indicated during the anticipatory-looking and violation-of-expectation phases). Their prosocial understanding did not differ between age groups and was not related to their helping behavior (measured in two behavioral tasks). Thus, infants understand other individuals’ needs even before they start to help others themselves. This indicates that early helping may indeed be motivated prosocially and raises the question of which other competences underlie the ontogeny of helping behavior.

Neuronal Oscillations Indicate Sleep-dependent Changes in the Cortical Memory Trace.

Sleep promotes the consolidation of newly acquired associative memories. Here we used neuronal oscillations in the human EEG to investigate sleep-dependent changes in the cortical memory trace. The retrieval activity for object–color associations was assessed immediately after encoding and after 3 hr of sleep or wakefulness. Sleep had beneficial effects on memory performance and led to reduced event-related theta and gamma power during the retrieval of associative memories. Furthermore, event-related alpha suppression was attenuated in the wake group for memorized and novel stimuli. There were no sleep-dependent changes in retrieval activity for missed items or items retrieved without color. Thus, the sleep-dependent reduction in theta and gamma oscillations was specific for the retrieval of associative memories. In line with theoretical accounts on sleep-dependent memory consolidation, decreased theta may indicate reduced mediotemporal activity because of a transfer of information into neocortical networks during sleep, whereas reduced parietal gamma may reflect effects of synaptic downscaling. Changes in alpha suppression in the wake group possibly index reduced attentional resources that may also contribute to a lower memory performance in this group. These findings indicate that the consolidation of associative memories during sleep is associated with profound changes in the cortical memory trace and relies on multiple neuronal processes working in concert.

What about microsaccades in the electroencephalogram of infants

Kampis et al . [[1][1]] use gamma oscillations (here 25–35 Hz) in the scalp-recorded electroencephalogram (EEG) of infants to investigate the neuronal signatures of objects representations. Oscillations in the gamma range have been used in several infant studies in the recent years [[2][2]–[4][3

Visual cortical networks align with behavioral measures of context-sensitivity in early childhood

&NA; This study investigates how visual cortical networks align with context‐sensitivity, namely the relative focus on the object versus the background of a visual scene, in early childhood. Context‐sensitivity was assessed by a picture description and a recognition memory task. To segregate object and background processing in the visual cortex in 5‐ and 7‐year‐old children, object and background were presented at different frequencies (12 Hz or 15 Hz), evoking disparate neuronal responses (steady state visually evoked potentials, SSVEPs) in the electroencephalogram. In younger compared to older children the background elicited higher SSVEPs. Visual cortical processing of object versus background was associated with behavioral measures for older but not for younger children. This relation was strongest for verbal descriptions and generalized to the cortical processing of abstract stimuli and object and background presented alone. Thus, visual cortical networks restructure and align with behavioral measures of context‐sensitivity in early childhood. HighlightsObject versus background processing in the visual cortex was analyzed using SSVEPs.Cortical processes matched with verbal context‐sensitivity measures in 7‐year‐olds.No correlation between cortical processing and behavioral measures in 5‐year‐olds.Background versus object SSVEPs were higher in 5‐year‐olds compared to 7‐yearolds.Visual cortical networks restructure and align with language in early childhood.

A life history framework advances the understanding of intentions for police cooperation

Recent policing incidents have increased attention to relationships between community members and police. Academic research on attitudes toward police predominantly follows Tyler’s process-based model of policing; examining the influence of sociodemographic factors on perceptions of procedural justice, whether or not police are fair and trustworthy in their interaction with community members. We developed additional domains of attitudes toward police using evolutionary life history theory (LHT) as a basis for understanding relations with authority figures. We focus on the social roles of police officers in their communities: maintenance of the stability of society, the benefits in social status derived from the role of police officer, and the use of institutional power to exploit community residents and gain resources illicitly. Our new domains demonstrated explanatory power beyond perceptions of procedural justice, demographic factors, and a general life history speed indicator, in both undergraduate (N = 581) and Internet- recruited German (N = 471) samples.

Visual attention in 5-year-olds from three different cultures

Cognitive processes differ markedly between children from different cultures, with best evidence for attention to visual scenes and the activities of others. Children from urban Western cultures tend to focus on focal objects, whereas children from urban East-Asian cultures rather attend to contextual elements of a visual scene. Regarding the attention to others’ activities, children from subsistence-based farming communities often observe several activities simultaneously, while children from urban Western contexts focus on activities sequentially. Here we assessed 144 5-year-old children from three prototypical cultural contexts (urban Germany, rural Cameroon, urban Japan) to investigate variations in attention across a variety of tasks. Attention to the elements of a visual scene was assessed in an optical illusion task, in picture descriptions and an eye-tracking paradigm. Attention to and learning from others’ activities was assessed in a parallel action task and a rule-based game. Some tasks indicated higher context-sensitive attention in urban Japan, while other findings indicated higher context-sensitive attention in urban Germany. Levels of parallel attention and learning from others’ activities were lower in rural Cameroonian children compared to the urban samples. Across tasks, the visual attention measures were unrelated. These findings substantiate that culture has a profound influence on early cognitive development, already in the preschool years. Furthermore, they raise critical questions about the early origins of cultural specificities in attention and the generalizability of attention phenomena beyond specific tasks and populations.

Coherence in general and personal semantic knowledge: functional differences of the posterior and centro-parietal N400 ERP component

A growing body of scientific literature investigated the difference between general and personal semantic knowledge. In contrast to general world knowledge, personal semantics comprises highly individual knowledge about oneself. The present study aimed to differentiate processes of integration into personal as opposed to general semantic knowledge. For that purpose, participants were presented with pictures of themselves (Self-condition) or unknown persons (Other-condition) superimposed on a congruent or incongruent background. We hypothesized that self-referential processing is based on automatic retrieval of personal information as opposed to the processing of unknown persons, which requires voluntary, i.e., strategic, attention demanding processing. The topography of the N400 effect varied as a function of the type of semantic knowledge. We found a centro-parietal N400 effect within the Self-condition and a posterior effect within the Other-condition. The voluntary integration of facial expressions of unknown persons within the Other-condition was, furthermore, indexed by an N170 effect. The unresolved tension in personal semantics was reflected by the N500. Our study thus provides new impulses for interpretation of the N400’s functional properties and extends our knowledge about the N500. Implications for the functional properties of the self as an organizational structure are discussed.

Memory entrainment by visually evoked theta-gamma coupling in the human brain

The formation of novel memories is orchestrated by the rhythmic interplay of neuronal activity within and across cell assemblies. Critically, given the correlative nature of neurophysiological recordings, the functional role of neuronal rhythms in the human brain is still unclear. Here, episodic memory encoding was entrained by a rhythmic visual stimulation at an individually adjusted theta frequency (3-8Hz), in contrast to the stimulation at an individual alpha frequency (8-12Hz). Memory enhancing effects of the theta stimulation were not explained by theta power per se, but were driven by theta coupled gamma oscillations (40-120Hz) in wide spread neocortical networks. These findings provide first evidence for a functional role of the theta-gamma neuronal code in human episodic memory. The entrainment of mnemonic network mechanisms by a simplistic visual stimulation technique demonstrates that internal rhythms can align with external pacemakers, which can entrain complex cognitive functions in the wake human brain.

Neuronal oscillations reveal the processes underlying intentional compared to incidental learning in children and young adults

This EEG study investigated the neuronal processes during intentional compared to incidental learning in young adults and two groups of children aged 10 and 7 years. Theta (3–8 Hz) and alpha (10–16 Hz) neuronal oscillations were analyzed to compare encoding processes during an intentional and an incidental encoding task. In all three age groups, both encoding conditions were associated with an increase in event-related theta activity. Encoding-related alpha suppression increased with age. Memory performance was higher in the intentional compared to the incidental task in all age groups. Furthermore, intentional learning was associated with an improved encoding of perceptual features, which were relevant for the retrieval phase. Theta activity increased from incidental to intentional encoding. Specifically, frontal theta increased in all age groups, while parietal theta increased only in adults and older children. In younger children, parietal theta was similarly high in both encoding phases. While alpha suppression may reflect semantic processes during encoding, increased theta activity during intentional encoding may indicate perceptual binding processes, in accordance with the demands of the encoding task. Higher encoding-related alpha suppression in the older age groups, together with age differences in parietal theta activity during incidental learning in young children, is in line with recent theoretical accounts, emphasizing the role of perceptual processes in mnemonic processing in young children, whereas semantic encoding processes continue to mature throughout middle childhood.