@article{DiemerAlpersPeperkornetal.2015, author = {Diemer, Julia and Alpers, Georg W. and Peperkorn, Henrik M. and Shiban, Youssef and M{\"u}hlberger, Andreas}, title = {The impact of perception and presence on emotional reactions: a review of research in virtual reality}, series = {Frontiers in Psychology}, volume = {6}, journal = {Frontiers in Psychology}, number = {26}, doi = {10.3389/fpsyg.2015.00026}, url = {http://nbn-resolving.de/urn:nbn:de:bvb:20-opus-144200}, year = {2015}, abstract = {Virtual reality (VR) has made its way into mainstream psychological research in the last two decades. This technology, with its unique ability to simulate complex, real situations and contexts, offers researchers unprecedented opportunities to investigate human behavior in well controlled designs in the laboratory. One important application of VR is the investigation of pathological processes in mental disorders, especially anxiety disorders. Research on the processes underlying threat perception, fear, and exposure therapy has shed light on more general aspects of the relation between perception and emotion. Being by its nature virtual, i.e., simulation of reality, VR strongly relies on the adequate selection of specific perceptual cues to activate emotions. Emotional experiences in turn are related to presence, another important concept in VR, which describes the user's sense of being in a VR environment. This paper summarizes current research into perception of fear cues, emotion, and presence, aiming at the identification of the most relevant aspects of emotional experience in VR and their mutual relations. A special focus lies on a series of recent experiments designed to test the relative contribution of perception and conceptual information on fear in VR. This strand of research capitalizes on the dissociation between perception (bottom up input) and conceptual information (top-down input) that is possible in VR. Further, we review the factors that have so far been recognized to influence presence, with emotions (e.g., fear) being the most relevant in the context of clinical psychology. Recent research has highlighted the mutual influence of presence and fear in VR, but has also traced the limits of our current understanding of this relationship. In this paper, the crucial role of perception on eliciting emotional reactions is highlighted, and the role of arousal as a basic dimension of emotional experience is discussed. An interoceptive attribution model of presence is suggested as a first step toward an integrative framework for emotion research in VR. Gaps in the current literature and future directions are outlined.}, language = {en} } @article{KaethnerKueblerHalder2015, author = {K{\"a}thner, Ivo and K{\"u}bler, Andrea and Halder, Sebastian}, title = {Rapid P300 brain-computer interface communication with a head-mounted display}, series = {Frontiers in Neuroscience}, volume = {9}, journal = {Frontiers in Neuroscience}, number = {207}, doi = {10.3389/fnins.2015.00207}, url = {http://nbn-resolving.de/urn:nbn:de:bvb:20-opus-148520}, year = {2015}, abstract = {Visual ERP (P300) based brain-computer interfaces (BCIs) allow for fast and reliable spelling and are intended as a muscle-independent communication channel for people with severe paralysis. However, they require the presentation of visual stimuli in the field of view of the user. A head-mounted display could allow convenient presentation of visual stimuli in situations, where mounting a conventional monitor might be difficult or not feasible (e.g., at a patient's bedside). To explore if similar accuracies can be achieved with a virtual reality (VR) headset compared to a conventional flat screen monitor, we conducted an experiment with 18 healthy participants. We also evaluated it with a person in the locked-in state (LIS) to verify that usage of the headset is possible for a severely paralyzed person. Healthy participants performed online spelling with three different display methods. In one condition a 5 x 5 letter matrix was presented on a conventional 22 inch TFT monitor. Two configurations of the VR headset were tested. In the first (glasses A), the same 5 x 5 matrix filled the field of view of the user. In the second (glasses B), single letters of the matrix filled the field of view of the user. The participant in the LIS tested the VR headset on three different occasions (glasses A condition only). For healthy participants, average online spelling accuracies were 94\% (15.5 bits/min) using three flash sequences for spelling with the monitor and glasses A and 96\% (16.2 bits/min) with glasses B. In one session, the participant in the LIS reached an online spelling accuracy of 100\% (10 bits/min) using the glasses A condition. We also demonstrated that spelling with one flash sequence is possible with the VR headset for healthy users (mean: 32.1 bits/min, maximum reached by one user: 71.89 bits/min at 100\% accuracy). We conclude that the VR headset allows for rapid P300 BCI communication in healthy users and may be a suitable display option for severely paralyzed persons.}, language = {en} } @article{WuWinklerWieseretal.2015, author = {Wu, Lingdan and Winkler, Markus H. and Wieser, Matthias J. and Andreatta, Marta and Li, Yonghui and Pauli, Paul}, title = {Emotion regulation in heavy smokers: experiential, expressive and physiological consequences of cognitive reappraisal}, series = {Frontiers in Psychology}, volume = {6}, journal = {Frontiers in Psychology}, number = {1555}, doi = {10.3389/fpsyg.2015.01555}, url = {http://nbn-resolving.de/urn:nbn:de:bvb:20-opus-145225}, year = {2015}, abstract = {Emotion regulation dysfunctions are assumed to contribute to the development of tobacco addiction and relapses among smokers attempting to quit. To further examine this hypothesis, the present study compared heavy smokers with non-smokers (NS) in a reappraisal task. Specifically, we investigated whether non-deprived smokers (NDS) and deprived smokers (DS) differ from non-smokers in cognitive emotion regulation and whether there is an association between the outcome of emotion regulation and the cigarette craving. Sixty-five participants (23 non-smokers, 22 NDS, and 20 DS) were instructed to down-regulate emotions by reappraising negative or positive pictorial scenarios. Self-ratings of valence, arousal, and cigarette craving as well as facial electromyography and electroencephalograph activities were measured. Ratings, facial electromyography, and electroencephalograph data indicated that both NDS and DS performed comparably to nonsmokers in regulating emotional responses via reappraisal, irrespective of the valence of pictorial stimuli. Interestingly, changes in cigarette craving were positively associated with regulation of emotional arousal irrespective of emotional valence. These results suggest that heavy smokers are capable to regulate emotion via deliberate reappraisal and smokers' cigarette craving is associated with emotional arousal rather than emotional valence. This study provides preliminary support for the therapeutic use of reappraisal to replace maladaptive emotion-regulation strategies in nicotine addicts.}, language = {en} } @article{SchroederPfister2015, author = {Schroeder, Philipp A. and Pfister, Roland}, title = {Arbitrary numbers counter fair decisions: trails of markedness in card distribution}, series = {Frontiers in Psychology}, volume = {6}, journal = {Frontiers in Psychology}, doi = {10.3389/fpsyg.2015.00240}, url = {http://nbn-resolving.de/urn:nbn:de:bvb:20-opus-143481}, pages = {240}, year = {2015}, abstract = {Converging evidence from controlled experiments suggests that the mere processing of a number and its attributes such as value or parity might affect free choice decisions between different actions. For example the spatial numerical associations of response codes (SNARC) effect indicates the magnitude of a digit to be associated with a spatial representation and might therefore affect spatial response choices (i.e., decisions between a "left" and a "right" option). At the same time, other (linguistic) features of a number such as parity are embedded into space and might likewise prime left or right responses through feature words [odd or even, respectively; markedness association of response codes (MARC) effect]. In this experiment we aimed at documenting such influences in a natural setting. We therefore assessed number space and parity space association effects by exposing participants to a fair distribution task in a card playing scenario. Participants drew cards, read out loud their number values, and announced their response choice, i.e., dealing it to a left vs. right player, indicated by Playmobil characters. Not only did participants prefer to deal more cards to the right player, the card's digits also affected response choices and led to a slightly but systematically unfair distribution, supported by a regular SNARC effect and counteracted by a reversed MARC effect. The experiment demonstrates the impact of SNARC- and MARC-like biases in free choice behavior through verbal and visual numerical information processing even in a setting with high external validity.}, language = {en} } @article{TopolinskiStrack2015, author = {Topolinski, Sascha and Strack, Fritz}, title = {Corrugator activity confirms immediate negative affect in surprise}, series = {Frontiers in Psychology}, volume = {6}, journal = {Frontiers in Psychology}, number = {134}, doi = {10.3389/fpsyg.2015.00134}, url = {http://nbn-resolving.de/urn:nbn:de:bvb:20-opus-144068}, year = {2015}, abstract = {The emotion of surprise entails a complex of immediate responses, such as cognitive interruption, attention allocation to, and more systematic processing of the surprising stimulus. All these processes serve the ultimate function to increase processing depth and thus cognitively master the surprising stimulus. The present account introduces phasic negative affect as the underlying mechanism responsible for this switch in operating mode. Surprising stimuli are schema discrepant and thus entail cognitive disfluency, which elicits immediate negative affect. This affect in turn works like a phasic cognitive tuning switching the current processing mode from more automatic and heuristic to more systematic and reflective processing. Directly testing the initial elicitation of negative affect by surprising events, the present experiment presented high and low surprising neutral trivia statements to N = 28 participants while assessing their spontaneous facial expressions via facial electromyography. High compared to low surprising trivia elicited higher corrugator activity, indicative of negative affect and mental effort, while leaving zygomaticus (positive affect) and frontalis (cultural surprise expression) activity unaffected. Future research shall investigate the mediating role of negative affect in eliciting surprise-related outcomes.}, language = {en} } @article{CheethamWuPaulietal.2015, author = {Cheetham, Marcus and Wu, Lingdan and Pauli, Paul and Jancke, Lutz}, title = {Arousal, valence, and the uncanny valley: psychophysiological and self-report findings}, series = {Frontiers in Psychology}, volume = {6}, journal = {Frontiers in Psychology}, number = {981}, doi = {10.3389/fpsyg.2015.00981}, url = {http://nbn-resolving.de/urn:nbn:de:bvb:20-opus-151519}, year = {2015}, abstract = {The main prediction of the Uncanny Valley Hypothesis (UVH) is that observation of humanlike characters that are difficult to distinguish from the human counterpart will evoke a state of negative affect. Well-established electrophysiological [late positive potential (LPP) and facial electromyography (EMG)] and self-report [Self-Assessment Manikin (SAM)] indices of valence and arousal, i.e., the primary orthogonal dimensions of affective experience, were used to test this prediction by examining affective experience in response to categorically ambiguous compared with unambiguous avatar and human faces (N = 30). LPP and EMG provided direct psychophysiological indices of affective state during passive observation and the SAM provided self-reported indices of affective state during explicit cognitive evaluation of static facial stimuli. The faces were drawn from well-controlled morph continua representing the UVH' dimension of human likeness (DHL). The results provide no support for the notion that category ambiguity along the DHL is specifically associated with enhanced experience of negative affect. On the contrary, the LPP and SAM-based measures of arousal and valence indicated a general increase in negative affective state (i.e., enhanced arousal and negative valence) with greater morph distance from the human end of the DHL. A second sample (N = 30) produced the same finding, using an ad hoc self-rating scale of feelings of familiarity, i.e., an oft-used measure of affective experience along the UVH' familiarity dimension. In conclusion, this multi-method approach using well-validated psychophysiological and self-rating indices of arousal and valence rejects for passive observation and for explicit affective evaluation of static faces the main prediction of the UVH.}, language = {en} } @article{AndreattaPauli2015, author = {Andreatta, Marta and Pauli, Paul}, title = {Appetitive vs. aversive conditioning in humans}, series = {Frontiers in Behavioral Neuroscience}, volume = {9}, journal = {Frontiers in Behavioral Neuroscience}, number = {128}, doi = {10.3389/fnbeh.2015.00128}, url = {http://nbn-resolving.de/urn:nbn:de:bvb:20-opus-148614}, year = {2015}, abstract = {In classical conditioning, an initially neutral stimulus (conditioned stimulus, CS) becomes associated with a biologically salient event (unconditioned stimulus, US), which might be pain (aversive conditioning) or food (appetitive conditioning). After a few associations, the CS is able to initiate either defensive or consummatory responses, respectively. Contrary to aversive conditioning, appetitive conditioning is rarely investigated in humans, although its importance for normal and pathological behaviors (e.g., obesity, addiction) is undeniable. The present study intents to translate animal findings on appetitive conditioning to humans using food as an US. Thirty-three participants were investigated between 8 and 10 am without breakfast in order to assure that they felt hungry. During two acquisition phases, one geometrical shape (avCS+) predicted an aversive US (painful electric shock), another shape (appCS+) predicted an appetitive US (chocolate or salty pretzel according to the participants' preference), and a third shape (CS) predicted neither US. In a extinction phase, these three shapes plus a novel shape (NEW) were presented again without US delivery. Valence and arousal ratings as well as startle and skin conductance (SCR) responses were collected as learning indices. We found successful aversive and appetitive conditioning. On the one hand, the avCS+ was rated as more negative and more arousing than the CS and induced startle potentiation and enhanced SCR. On the other hand, the appCS+ was rated more positive than the CS and induced startle attenuation and larger SCR. In summary, we successfully confirmed animal findings in (hungry) humans by demonstrating appetitive learning and normal aversive learning.}, language = {en} } @article{KozlikNeumannLozo2015, author = {Kozlik, Julia and Neumann, Roland and Lozo, Ljubica}, title = {Contrasting motivational orientation and evaluative coding accounts: on the need to differentiate the effectors of approach/avoidance responses}, series = {Frontiers in Psychology}, volume = {6}, journal = {Frontiers in Psychology}, number = {563}, doi = {10.3389/fpsyg.2015.00563}, url = {http://nbn-resolving.de/urn:nbn:de:bvb:20-opus-143192}, year = {2015}, abstract = {Several emotion theorists suggest that valenced stimuli automatically trigger motivational orientations and thereby facilitate corresponding behavior. Positive stimuli were thought to activate approach motivational circuits which in turn primed approach-related behavioral tendencies whereas negative stimuli were supposed to activate avoidance motivational circuits so that avoidance-related behavioral tendencies were primed (motivational orientation account). However, recent research suggests that typically observed affective stimulus response compatibility phenomena might be entirely explained in terms of theories accounting for mechanisms of general action control instead of assuming motivational orientations to mediate the effects (evaluative coding account). In what follows, we explore to what extent this notion is applicable. We present literature suggesting that evaluative coding mechanisms indeed influence a wide variety of affective stimulus response compatibility phenomena. However, the evaluative coding account does not seem to be sufficient to explain affective S-R compatibility effects. Instead, several studies provide clear evidence in favor of the motivational orientation account that seems to operate independently of evaluative coding mechanisms. Implications for theoretical developments and future research designs are discussed.}, language = {en} } @article{SchererFallerFriedrichetal.2015, author = {Scherer, Reinhold and Faller, Josef and Friedrich, Elisabeth V. C. and Opisso, Eloy and Costa, Ursula and K{\"u}bler, Andrea and M{\"u}ller-Putz, Gernot R.}, title = {Individually Adapted Imagery Improves Brain-Computer Interface Performance in End-Users with Disability}, series = {PLoS ONE}, volume = {10}, journal = {PLoS ONE}, number = {5}, doi = {10.1371/journal.pone.0123727}, url = {http://nbn-resolving.de/urn:nbn:de:bvb:20-opus-143021}, pages = {e0123727}, year = {2015}, abstract = {Brain-computer interfaces (BCIs) translate oscillatory electroencephalogram (EEG) patterns into action. Different mental activities modulate spontaneous EEG rhythms in various ways. Non-stationarity and inherent variability of EEG signals, however, make reliable recognition of modulated EEG patterns challenging. Able-bodied individuals who use a BCI for the first time achieve - on average - binary classification performance of about 75\%. Performance in users with central nervous system (CNS) tissue damage is typically lower. User training generally enhances reliability of EEG pattern generation and thus also robustness of pattern recognition. In this study, we investigated the impact of mental tasks on binary classification performance in BCI users with central nervous system (CNS) tissue damage such as persons with stroke or spinal cord injury (SCI). Motor imagery (MI), that is the kinesthetic imagination of movement (e.g. squeezing a rubber ball with the right hand), is the "gold standard" and mainly used to modulate EEG patterns. Based on our recent results in able-bodied users, we hypothesized that pair- wise combination of "brain-teaser" (e.g. mental subtraction and mental word association) and "dynamic imagery" (e. g. hand and feet MI) tasks significantly increases classification performance of induced EEG patterns in the selected end-user group. Within- day (How stable is the classification within a day?) and between-day (How well does a model trained on day one perform on unseen data of day two?) analysis of variability of mental task pair classification in nine individuals confirmed the hypothesis. We found that the use of the classical MI task pair hand vs. feed leads to significantly lower classification accuracy - in average up to 15\% less - in most users with stroke or SCI. User-specific selection of task pairs was again essential to enhance performance. We expect that the gained evidence will significantly contribute to make imagery-based BCI technology become accessible to a larger population of users including individuals with special needs due to CNS damage.}, language = {en} } @article{TopolinskiZuernSchneider2015, author = {Topolinski, Sascha and Z{\"u}rn, Michael and Schneider, Iris K.}, title = {What's in and what's out in branding? A novel articulation effect for brand names}, series = {Frontiers in Psychology}, volume = {6}, journal = {Frontiers in Psychology}, number = {585}, doi = {10.3389/fpsyg.2015.00585}, url = {http://nbn-resolving.de/urn:nbn:de:bvb:20-opus-143036}, year = {2015}, abstract = {The present approach exploits the biomechanical connection between articulation and ingestion-related mouth movements to introduce a novel psychological principle of brand name design. We constructed brand names for diverse products with consonantal stricture spots either from the front to the rear of the mouth, thus inwards (e.g., BODIKA), or from the rear to the front, thus outwards (e.g., KODIBA). These muscle dynamics resemble the oral kinematics during either ingestion (inwards), which feels positive, or expectoration (outwards), which feels negative. In 7 experiments (total N = 1261), participants liked products with inward names more than products with outward names (Experiment 1), reported higher purchase intentions (Experiment 2), and higher willingness-to-pay (Experiments 3a-3c, 4, 5), with the price gain amounting to 4-13\% of the average estimated product value. These effects occurred across English and German language, under silent reading, for both edible and non-edible products, and even in the presence of a much stronger price determinant, namely fair-trade production (Experiment 5).}, language = {en} } @misc{RodriguezMartinMeule2015, author = {Rodr{\´i}guez-Mart{\´i}n, Boris C. and Meule, Adrian}, title = {Food craving: new contributions on its assessment, moderators, and consequences}, series = {Frontiers in Psychology}, volume = {6}, journal = {Frontiers in Psychology}, number = {21}, issn = {1664-1078}, doi = {10.3389/fpsyg.2015.00021}, url = {http://nbn-resolving.de/urn:nbn:de:bvb:20-opus-190299}, year = {2015}, abstract = {No abstract available.}, language = {en} } @phdthesis{Schmidt2014, author = {Schmidt, Barbara}, title = {Taking your chances: risk behavior and its relation to arousal, framing and motivation}, url = {http://nbn-resolving.de/urn:nbn:de:bvb:20-opus-107149}, school = {Universit{\"a}t W{\"u}rzburg}, year = {2014}, abstract = {Human risk behavior is the subject of growing research in the field of psychology as well as economics. One central topic is the influence of psychological variables on risk behavior. Studies contained in this work investigated the impact of arousal, framing and motivation on risk behavior. Arousal can on the one hand be a temporarily stable trait and on the other hand a situation-dependent variable. We showed that low trait arousal, measured via resting heart rate, predicted risky behavior. After physical exercise, state arousal was heightened in the experiment. Participants tended to act less risky after physical exercise. Taken together, the results suggest an inverse relation of arousal and risk behavior. Most studies investigating risk behavior employ a payment method that we call pay-one method: although the gambles that are used consist of many trials, only one trial is paid out. We investigated the effect of the payment method on risk behavior by employing both the pay-one and a pay-all method, which pays out all trials, in a within-subjects design. We found that participants acted about 10\% less risky in the pay-one condition compared to the pay-all condition. This result suggests that risk-aversion is over-estimated in common risk paradigms that use the pay-one method. When we worked on a hard task before, we like to engage in a more likable task afterwards. That observation led to the general classification of tasks in want-to and have-to tasks. Our body system strives towards a balance between those two task types in the sense of a homeostasis. We assessed event-related potentials (ERPs) in a risk game that we treated as a want-to task. When participants worked on a difficult have-to task before, amplitudes of the ERP-components in the risk game were raised compared to a condition where participants worked on an easy task before. We conclude that the motivation shift towards a want-to task after a have-to task can be assessed via ERP amplitudes. In conclusion, it was shown that arousal, framing and motivation are important psychological variables that influence risk behavior. The specific mechanisms of these influences have been investigated and discussed.}, subject = {Risikoverhalten}, language = {en} } @article{Meule2014, author = {Meule, Adrian}, title = {Are certain foods addictive?}, series = {Frontiers in Psychiatry}, volume = {5}, journal = {Frontiers in Psychiatry}, number = {38}, issn = {1664-0640}, url = {http://nbn-resolving.de/urn:nbn:de:bvb:20-opus-120257}, year = {2014}, abstract = {A commentary on Lifestyle medicine: the importance of firmgrounding on evidence by Rippe JM. Am J Lifestyle Med (2014) doi:10.1177/ 1559827613520527}, language = {en} } @article{WieserGerdesReichertsetal.2014, author = {Wieser, Matthias J. and Gerdes, Antje B. M. and Reicherts, Philipp and Pauli, Paul}, title = {Mutual influences of pain and emotional face processing}, series = {Frontiers in Psychology}, volume = {5}, journal = {Frontiers in Psychology}, issn = {1664-1078}, doi = {10.3389/fpsyg.2014.01160}, url = {http://nbn-resolving.de/urn:nbn:de:bvb:20-opus-118446}, pages = {1160}, year = {2014}, abstract = {The perception of unpleasant stimuli enhances whereas the perception of pleasant stimuli decreases pain perception. In contrast, the effects of pain on the processing of emotional stimuli are much less known. Especially given the recent interest in facial expressions of pain as a special category of emotional stimuli, a main topic in this research line is the mutual influence of pain and facial expression processing. Therefore, in this mini-review we selectively summarize research on the effects of emotional stimuli on pain, but more extensively turn to the opposite direction namely how pain influences concurrent processing of affective stimuli such as facial expressions. Based on the motivational priming theory one may hypothesize that the perception of pain enhances the processing of unpleasant stimuli and decreases the processing of pleasant stimuli. This review reveals that the literature is only partly consistent with this assumption: pain reduces the processing of pleasant pictures and happy facial expressions, but does not - or only partly - affect processing of unpleasant pictures. However, it was demonstrated that pain selectively enhances the processing of facial expressions if these are pain-related (i.e., facial expressions of pain). Extending a mere affective modulation theory, the latter results suggest pain-specific effects which may be explained by the perception-action model of empathy. Together, these results underscore the important mutual influence of pain and emotional face processing.}, language = {en} } @phdthesis{Winkler2014, author = {Winkler, Markus Heinrich}, title = {Motivational properties of reward associated stimuli - Conditioning studies with smoke and monetary reinforcement}, url = {http://nbn-resolving.de/urn:nbn:de:bvb:20-opus-121794}, school = {Universit{\"a}t W{\"u}rzburg}, year = {2014}, abstract = {Abstract Tobacco addiction is considered as a chronic relapsing disorder, characterized by compul-sive drug seeking and intake. Learning processes are stressed to account for the situational-specific expression of core features of the disorder, e.g., craving for drug, tolerance and ex-cessive consumption. According to incentive theories, smoke conditioned stimuli are hy-pothesized to be appetitive in nature, promoting craving, approach and consummatory be-havior. Commonly, smoking cues are treated as simple excitatory conditioned stimuli formed by a close and reliable overlap with the drug effect. However, the smoking ritual comprises a multitude of stimuli which may give rise to different forms of learning and con-ditioned responses partially opposing each other. Previous research suggests the predictive content and the temporal proximity of smoking stimuli to the drug effect as important de-terminants of cue reactivity. In contrast to stimuli related to the preparatory stage of smok-ing and the start of consumption (BEGIN stimuli), stimuli from the terminal stage of smok-ing (END stimuli) apparently lack high cue reactivity. Several lines of evidence suggest the poor cue properties of terminal stimuli to be related to their signaling of poor smoke availa-bility. Indeed, cue reactivity is commonly decreased when smoking appears to be unavaila-ble. Moreover, the learning literature suggests that stimuli predictive for the non-availability of reward may acquire the capacity to modulate or oppose the responses of ex-citatory conditioned stimuli. Therefore, the aim of the present thesis was to enhance our knowledge of stimulus control in human drug addiction and incentive motivation by running a series of conditioning studies with smoke intake and monetary reward as reinforcer. Sub-jective report and physiological measures of motivational valence and consummatory re-sponse tendencies were used as dependent variables. The first experiment of this thesis used a differential conditioning paradigm to reveal evi-dence for the conditioning of preparatory and consummatory responses to a CS+ for smok-ing. Neutral pictograms served as CSs and single puffs on a cigarette as US. In line with the predictions of incentive theories, the excitatory CS+ for smoking acquired the ability to evoke an appetitive conditioned response, as indicated by enhanced activity of the M. zy-gomaticus major. Moreover, anticipation of puffing on the cigarette increased the activity of the M. orbicularis oris (lip muscle), indicating the activation of consummatory response tendencies. Finally, the CS+ evoked stronger skin conductance responses, indicative of in-creased autonomic arousal and orienting in preparation for action. In contrast, the rating data were apparently unaffected by the experimental contingency. In sum, the physiological data provide support for the notion that excitatory smoke conditioning gives rise to appeti-tive and consummatory conditioned responses, which may at least partially contribute to the maintenance of tobacco addiction. The second experiment of this thesis adapted the conditioning protocol of the first study to probe the functional significance of terminal stimuli in the control of addictive behavior. This study manipulated the predictive relationship of BEGIN and END stimuli to smoke rein-forcement to provide further support for the differential reactivity to both stimuli and the retarded (i.e., delayed) conditioning of END stimuli. Overall, the results of the first study of this thesis were conceptually replicated as the association of a BEGIN stimulus with smoke intake resulted in the acquisition of appetitive and consummatory physiological responses. Importantly, the results revealed evidence for a retarded excitatory conditioning of END stimuli. Thus, pairing of an END stimulus with smoke intake failed to produce a conditioned discrimination in terms of motivational valence and autonomic arousal, as indicated by the activity of the M. corrugator supercilii and the skin conductance data. These results provide further support for the notion that END stimuli may be weak cues for smoking. Moreover, in light of the results of the first study of this thesis, the retarded excitatory conditioning of terminal stimuli may be suggestive of an inhibitory response component, which may be re-lated to their signaling of poor smoke availability. In sum, these results add to a growing body of data, which suggest that the expression of cue reactivity may be modulated by the temporal proximity and the availability of the drug effect. The aim of the third study of this thesis was to provide "proof of concept" for an inhibi-tory conditioning notion of terminal stimuli. In this analog study BEGIN and END stimuli were emulated as discriminative SD and S for monetary reward. During an acquisition phase conditioned inhibition was established to the S predictive of the non-availability of re-ward. Subsequently a retardation test was used to substantiate conditioned inhibition. In this test, excitatory conditioning of the previous S was compared to the excitatory condi-tioning of a novel control stimulus. Importantly, the results revealed evidence for reward conditioned inhibition as indicated by the retarded acquisition of subjective (pleasure and reward expectancy) and physiological (skin conductance and activity of the M. orbicularis oculi) responses. In sum, these results provide support for the notion that stimuli predictive for the non-availability of reward may acquire the capacity to oppose the responses of ex-citatory conditioned stimuli. Thus, future research may benefit from the consideration of inhibitory conditioning processes in drug addiction, which may be of theoretical, methodo-logical and clinical importance. In sum, the present thesis revealed evidence for 1) an appetitive nature of excitatory condi-tioned smoking cues, 2) the dependency of this learning process on the temporal position of the conditioned stimuli in the intake ritual and 3) the acquisition of conditioned inhibition by a stimulus predictive for the non-availability of reward, as evident in retarded excitatory conditioning. Overall, these studies made a novel contribution to the field of human drug addiction and incentive motivation and provided valuable suggestions for further research.}, subject = {Rauchen}, language = {en} } @phdthesis{Ewald2014, author = {Ewald, Heike}, title = {Influence of context and contingency awareness on fear conditioning - an investigation in virtual reality}, url = {http://nbn-resolving.de/urn:nbn:de:bvb:20-opus-111226}, school = {Universit{\"a}t W{\"u}rzburg}, year = {2014}, abstract = {Fear conditioning is an efficient model of associative learning, which has greatly improved our knowledge of processes underlying the development and maintenance of pathological fear and anxiety. In a differential fear conditioning paradigm, one initially neutral stimulus (NS) is paired with an aversive event (unconditioned stimulus, US), whereas another stimulus does not have any consequences. After a few pairings the NS is associated with the US and consequently becomes a conditioned stimulus (CS+), which elicits a conditioned response (CR). The formation of explicit knowledge of the CS/US association during conditioning is referred to as contingency awareness. Findings about its role in fear conditioning are ambiguous. The development of a CR without contingency awareness has been shown in delay fear conditioning studies. One speaks of delay conditioning, when the US coterminates with or follows directly on the CS+. In trace conditioning, a temporal gap or "trace interval" lies between CS+ and US. According to existing evidence, trace conditioning is not possible on an implicit level and requires more cognitive resources than delay conditioning. The associations formed during fear conditioning are not exclusively associations between specific cues and aversive events. Contextual cues form the background milieu of the learning process and play an important role in both acquisition and the extinction of conditioned fear and anxiety. A common limitation in human fear conditioning studies is the lack of ecological validity, especially regarding contextual information. The use of Virtual Reality (VR) is a promising approach for creating a more complex environment which is close to a real life situation. I conducted three studies to examine cue and contextual fear conditioning with regard to the role of contingency awareness. For this purpose a VR paradigm was created, which allowed for exact manipulation of cues and contexts as well as timing of events. In all three experiments, participants were guided through one or more virtual rooms serving as contexts, in which two different lights served as CS and an electric stimulus as US. Fear potentiated startle (FPS) responses were measured as an indicator of implicit fear conditioning. To test whether participants had developed explicit awareness of the CS-US contingencies, subjective ratings were collected. The first study was designed as a pilot study to test the VR paradigm as well as the conditioning protocol. Additionally, I was interested in the effect of contingency awareness. Results provided evidence, that eye blink conditioning is possible in the virtual environment and that it does not depend on contingency awareness. Evaluative conditioning, as measured by subjective ratings, was only present in the group of participants who explicitly learned the association between CS and US. To examine acquisition and extinction of both fear associated cues and contexts, a novel cue-context generalization paradigm was applied in the second study. Besides the interplay of cues and contexts I was again interested in the effect of contingency awareness. Two different virtual offices served as fear and safety context, respectively. During acquisition, the CS+ was always followed by the US in the fear context. In the safety context, none of the lights had any consequences. During extinction, a additional (novel) context was introduced, no US was delivered in any of the contexts. Participants showed enhanced startle responses to the CS+ compared to the CS- in the fear context. Thus, discriminative learning took place regarding both cues and contexts during acquisition. This was confirmed by subjective ratings, although only for participants with explicit contingency awareness. Generalization of fear to the novel context after conditioning did not depend on awareness and was observable only on trend level. In a third experiment I looked at neuronal correlates involved in extinction of fear memory by means of functional magnetic resonance imaging (fMRI). Of particular interest were differences between extinction of delay and trace fear conditioning. I applied the paradigm tested in the pilot study and additionally manipulated timing of the stimuli: In the delay conditioning group (DCG) the US was administered with offset of one light (CS+), in the trace conditioning group (TCG) the US was presented 4s after CS+ offset. Most importantly, prefrontal activation differed between the two groups. In line with existing evidence, the ventromedial prefrontal cortex (vmPFC) was activated in the DCG. In the TCG I found activation of the dorsolateral prefrontal cortex (dlPFC), which might be associated with modulation of working memory processes necessary for bridging the trace interval and holding information in short term memory. Taken together, virtual reality proved to be an elegant tool for examining human fear conditioning in complex environments, and especially for manipulating contextual information. Results indicate that explicit knowledge of contingencies is necessary for attitude formation in fear conditioning, but not for a CR on an implicit level as measured by FPS responses. They provide evidence for a two level account of fear conditioning. Discriminative learning was successful regarding both cues and contexts. Imaging results speak for different extinction processes in delay and trace conditioning, hinting that higher working memory contribution is required for trace than for delay conditioning.}, subject = {Klassische Konditionierung}, language = {en} } @article{MeuleGearhard2014, author = {Meule, Adrian and Gearhard, Ashley N.}, title = {Food Addiction in the Light of DSM-5}, series = {Nutrients}, volume = {6}, journal = {Nutrients}, number = {9}, issn = {2072-6643}, doi = {10.3390/nu6093653}, url = {http://nbn-resolving.de/urn:nbn:de:bvb:20-opus-119279}, pages = {3653-71}, year = {2014}, abstract = {The idea that specific kind of foods may have an addiction potential and that some forms of overeating may represent an addicted behavior has been discussed for decades. In recent years, the interest in food addiction is growing and research on this topic lead to more precise definitions and assessment methods. For example, the Yale Food Addiction Scale has been developed for the measurement of addiction-like eating behavior based on the diagnostic criteria for substance dependence of the fourth revision of the Diagnostic and Statistical Manual of Mental Disorders (DSM-IV). In 2013, diagnostic criteria for substance abuse and-dependence were merged, thereby increasing the number of symptoms for substance use disorders (SUDs) in the DSM-5. Moreover, gambling disorder is now included along SUDs as a behavioral addiction. Although a plethora of review articles exist that discuss the applicability of the DSM-IV substance dependence criteria to eating behavior, the transferability of the newly added criteria to eating is unknown. Thus, the current article discusses if and how these new criteria may be translated to overeating. Furthermore, it is examined if the new SUD criteria will impact future research on food addiction, for example, if "diagnosing" food addiction should also be adapted by considering all of the new symptoms. Given the critical response to the revisions in DSM-5, we also discuss if the recent approach of Research Domain Criteria can be helpful in evaluating the concept of food addiction.}, language = {en} } @article{HoehneHolzStaigerSaelzeretal.2014, author = {H{\"o}hne, Johannes and Holz, Elisa and Staiger-S{\"a}lzer, Pit and M{\"u}ller, Klaus-Robert and K{\"u}bler, Andrea and Tangermann, Michael}, title = {Motor Imagery for Severely Motor-Impaired Patients: Evidence for Brain-Computer Interfacing as Superior Control Solution}, series = {PLoS ONE}, volume = {9}, journal = {PLoS ONE}, number = {8}, doi = {10.1371/journal.pone.0104854}, url = {http://nbn-resolving.de/urn:nbn:de:bvb:20-opus-119331}, pages = {e104854}, year = {2014}, abstract = {Brain-Computer Interfaces (BCIs) strive to decode brain signals into control commands for severely handicapped people with no means of muscular control. These potential users of noninvasive BCIs display a large range of physical and mental conditions. Prior studies have shown the general applicability of BCI with patients, with the conflict of either using many training sessions or studying only moderately restricted patients. We present a BCI system designed to establish external control for severely motor-impaired patients within a very short time. Within only six experimental sessions, three out of four patients were able to gain significant control over the BCI, which was based on motor imagery or attempted execution. For the most affected patient, we found evidence that the BCI could outperform the best assistive technology (AT) of the patient in terms of control accuracy, reaction time and information transfer rate. We credit this success to the applied user-centered design approach and to a highly flexible technical setup. State-of-the art machine learning methods allowed the exploitation and combination of multiple relevant features contained in the EEG, which rapidly enabled the patients to gain substantial BCI control. Thus, we could show the feasibility of a flexible and tailorable BCI application in severely disabled users. This can be considered a significant success for two reasons: Firstly, the results were obtained within a short period of time, matching the tight clinical requirements. Secondly, the participating patients showed, compared to most other studies, very severe communication deficits. They were dependent on everyday use of AT and two patients were in a locked-in state. For the most affected patient a reliable communication was rarely possible with existing AT.}, language = {en} } @article{MeuleLutzKrawietzetal.2014, author = {Meule, Adrian and Lutz, Annika P. C. and Krawietz, Vera and St{\"u}tzer, Judith and V{\"o}gele, Claus and K{\"u}bler, Andrea}, title = {Food-cue affected motor response inhibition and self-reported dieting success: a pictorial affective shifting task}, series = {Frontiers in Psychology}, volume = {5}, journal = {Frontiers in Psychology}, issn = {1664-1078}, doi = {10.3389/fpsyg.2014.00216}, url = {http://nbn-resolving.de/urn:nbn:de:bvb:20-opus-119840}, pages = {216}, year = {2014}, abstract = {Behavioral inhibition is one of the basic facets of executive functioning and is closely related to self-regulation. Impulsive reactions, that is, low inhibitory control, have been associated with higher body mass index (BMI), binge eating, and other problem behaviors (e.g., substance abuse, pathological gambling, etc.). Nevertheless, studies which investigated the direct influence of food-cues on behavioral inhibition have been fairly inconsistent. In the current studies, we investigated food-cue affected behavioral inhibition in young women. For this purpose, we used a go/no-go task with pictorial food and neutral stimuli in which stimulus-response mapping is reversed after every other block (affective shifting task). In study 1, hungry participants showed faster reaction times to and omitted fewer food than neutral targets. Low dieting success and higher BMI were associated with behavioral disinhibition in food relative to neutral blocks. In study 2, both hungry and satiated individuals were investigated. Satiation did not influence overall task performance, but modulated associations of task performance with dieting success and self-reported impulsivity. When satiated, increased food craving during the task was associated with low dieting success, possibly indicating a preload-disinhibition effect following food intake. Food-cues elicited automatic action and approach tendencies regardless of dieting success, self-reported impulsivity, or current hunger levels. Yet, associations between dieting success, impulsivity, and behavioral food-cue responses were modulated by hunger and satiation. Future research investigating clinical samples and including other salient non-food stimuli as control category is warranted.}, language = {en} } @article{WoelkSuetterlinKochetal.2014, author = {W{\"o}lk, Julian and S{\"u}tterlin, Stefan and Koch, Stefan and V{\"o}gele, Claus and Schulz, Stefan M.}, title = {Enhanced cardiac perception predicts impaired performance in the Iowa Gambling Task in patients with panic disorder}, series = {Brain and Behavior}, volume = {4}, journal = {Brain and Behavior}, number = {2}, issn = {2162-3279}, doi = {10.1002/brb3.206}, url = {http://nbn-resolving.de/urn:nbn:de:bvb:20-opus-119865}, pages = {238-46}, year = {2014}, abstract = {OBJECTIVE: Somatic marker theory predicts that somatic cues serve intuitive decision making; however, cardiovascular symptoms are threat cues for patients with panic disorder (PD). Therefore, enhanced cardiac perception may aid intuitive decision making only in healthy individuals, but impair intuitive decision making in PD patients. METHODS: PD patients and age-and sex-matched volunteers without a psychiatric diagnosis (n=17, respectively) completed the Iowa Gambling Task (IGT) as a measure of intuitive decision making. Interindividual differences in cardiac perception were assessed with a common mental-tracking task. RESULTS: In line with our hypothesis, we found a pattern of opposing associations (Fisher's Z=1.78, P=0.04) of high cardiac perception with improved IGT-performance in matched control-participants (r=0.36, n=14) but impaired IGT-performance in PD patients (r=-0.38, n=13). CONCLUSION: Interoceptive skills, typically assumed to aid intuitive decision making, can have the opposite effect in PD patients who experience interoceptive cues as threatening, and tend to avoid them. This may explain why PD patients frequently have problems with decision making in everyday life. Screening of cardiac perception may help identifying patients who benefit from specifically tailored interventions.}, language = {en} } @article{EwaldGlotzbachSchoonGerdesetal.2014, author = {Ewald, Heike and Glotzbach-Schoon, Evelyn and Gerdes, Antje B. M. and Andreatta, Marta and M{\"u}ller, Mathias and M{\"u}hlberger, Andreas and Pauli, Paul}, title = {Delay and trace fear conditioning in a complex virtual learning environment - neural substrates of extinction}, series = {Frontiers in Human Neuroscience}, volume = {8}, journal = {Frontiers in Human Neuroscience}, number = {323}, issn = {1662-5161}, doi = {10.3389/fnhum.2014.00323}, url = {http://nbn-resolving.de/urn:nbn:de:bvb:20-opus-116230}, year = {2014}, abstract = {Extinction is an important mechanism to inhibit initially acquired fear responses. There is growing evidence that the ventromedial prefrontal cortex (vmPFC) inhibits the amygdala and therefore plays an important role in the extinction of delay fear conditioning. To our knowledge, there is no evidence on the role of the prefrontal cortex in the extinction of trace conditioning up to now. Thus, we compared brain structures involved in the extinction of human delay and trace fear conditioning in a between-subjects-design in an fMRI study. Participants were passively guided through a virtual environment during learning and extinction of conditioned fear. Two different lights served as conditioned stimuli (CS); as unconditioned stimulus (US) a mildly painful electric stimulus was delivered. In the delay conditioning group (DCG) the US was administered with offset of one light (CS+), whereas in the trace conditioning group (TCG) the US was presented 4s after CS+ offset. Both groups showed insular and striatal activation during early extinction, but differed in their prefrontal activation. The vmPFC was mainly activated in the DCG, whereas the TCG showed activation of the dorsolateral prefrontal cortex (dlPFC) during extinction. These results point to different extinction processes in delay and trace conditioning. VmPFC activation during extinction of delay conditioning might reflect the inhibition of the fear response. In contrast, dlPFC activation during extinction of trace conditioning may reflect modulation of working memory processes which are involved in bridging the trace interval and hold information in short term memory.}, language = {en} } @article{HuesteggeRohrssenvanErmingenMarbachetal.2014, author = {Huestegge, Lynn and Rohrßen, Julia and van Ermingen-Marbach, Muna and Pape-Neumann, Julia and Heim, Stefan}, title = {Devil in the details ? Developmental dyslexia and visual long-term memory for details}, series = {Frontiers in Psychology}, volume = {5}, journal = {Frontiers in Psychology}, number = {686}, issn = {1664-1078}, doi = {10.3389/fpsyg.2014.00686}, url = {http://nbn-resolving.de/urn:nbn:de:bvb:20-opus-115887}, year = {2014}, abstract = {Cognitive theories on causes of developmental dyslexia can be divided into language-specific and general accounts. While the former assume that words are special in that associated processing problems are rooted in language-related cognition (e.g., phonology) deficits, the latter propose that dyslexia is rather rooted in a general impairment of cognitive (e.g., visual and/or auditory) processing streams. In the present study, we examined to what extent dyslexia (typically characterized by poor orthographic representations) may be associated with a general deficit in visual long-term memory (LTM) for details. We compared object- and detail-related visual LTM performance (and phonological skills) between dyslexic primary school children and IQ-, age-, and gender-matched controls. The results revealed that while the overall amount of LTM errors was comparable between groups, dyslexic children exhibited a greater portion of detail-related errors. The results suggest that not only phonological, but also general visual resolution deficits in LTM may play an important role in developmental dyslexia.}, language = {en} } @article{ErlbeckKueblerKotchoubeyetal.2014, author = {Erlbeck, Helena and K{\"u}bler, Andrea and Kotchoubey, Boris and Veser, Sandra}, title = {Task instructions modulate the attentional mode affecting the auditory MMN and the semantic N400}, series = {Frontiers in Human Neuroscience}, volume = {8}, journal = {Frontiers in Human Neuroscience}, number = {654}, doi = {10.3389/fnhum.2014.00654}, url = {http://nbn-resolving.de/urn:nbn:de:bvb:20-opus-115553}, year = {2014}, abstract = {Event-related potentials (ERPs) have been proven to be a useful tool to complement clinical assessment and to detect residual cognitive functions in patients with disorders of consciousness. These ERPs are of ten recorded using passive or unspecific instructions. Patient data obtained this way are then compared to data from healthy participants, which are usually recorded using active instructions. The present study investigates the effect of attentive modulations and particularly the effect of activevs. passive instruction on the ERP components mismatch negativity (MMN) and N400. A sample of 18 healthy participants listened to three auditory paradigms: anoddball, aword priming, and a sentence paradigm. Each paradigm was presented three times with different instructions: ignoring auditory stimuli, passive listening, and focused attention on the auditory stimuli. After each task, the participants indicated their subjective effort. The N400 decreased from the focused task to the passive task, and was extinct in the ignore task. The MMN exhibited higher amplitudes in the focused and passive task compared to the ignore task. The data indicate an effect of attention on the supratemporal component of the MMN. Subjective effort was equally high in the passive and focused tasks but reduced in the ignore task. We conclude that passive listening during EEG recording is stressful and attenuates ERPs, which renders the interpretation of the results obtained in such conditions difficult.}, language = {en} } @article{BlechertMeuleBuschetal.2014, author = {Blechert, Jens and Meule, Adrian and Busch, Niko A. and Ohla, Kathrin}, title = {Food-pics: an image database for experimental research on eating and appetite}, series = {Frontiers in Psychology}, volume = {5}, journal = {Frontiers in Psychology}, issn = {1664-1078}, doi = {10.3389/fpsyg.2014.00617}, url = {http://nbn-resolving.de/urn:nbn:de:bvb:20-opus-115987}, pages = {617}, year = {2014}, abstract = {Our current environment is characterized by the omnipresence of food cues. The sight and smell of real foods, but also graphically depictions of appetizing foods, can guide our eating behavior, for example, by eliciting food craving and influencing food choice. The relevance of visual food cues on human information processing has been demonstrated by a growing body of studies employing food images across the disciplines of psychology, medicine, and neuroscience. However, currently used food image sets vary considerably across laboratories and image characteristics (contrast, brightness, etc.) and food composition (calories, macronutrients, etc.) are often unspecified. These factors might have contributed to some of the inconsistencies of this research. To remedy this, we developed food-pics, a picture database comprising 568 food images and 315 non-food images along with detailed meta-data. A total of N = 1988 individuals with large variance in age and weight from German speaking countries and North America provided normative ratings of valence, arousal, palatability, desire to eat, recognizability and visual complexity. Furthermore, data on macronutrients (g), energy density (kcal), and physical image characteristics (color composition, contrast, brightness, size, complexity) are provided. The food-pics image database is freely available under the creative commons license with the hope that the set will facilitate standardization and comparability across studies and advance experimental research on the determinants of eating behavior. Read F}, language = {en} } @article{PetrasekProkopovaSladeketal.2014, author = {Petrasek, Tomas and Prokopova, Iva and Sladek, Martin and Weissova, Kamila and Vojtechova, Iveta and Bahnik, Stepan and Zemanova, Anna and Sch{\"o}nig, Kai and Berger, Stefan and Tews, Bjoern and Bartsch, Dusan and Schwab, Martin E. and Sumova, Alena and Stuchlik, Ales}, title = {Nogo-A-deficient transgenic rats show deficits in higher cognitive functions, decreased anxiety, and altered circadian activity patterns}, series = {Frontiers in Behavioral Neuroscience}, volume = {8}, journal = {Frontiers in Behavioral Neuroscience}, number = {90}, doi = {10.3389/fnbeh.2014.00090}, url = {http://nbn-resolving.de/urn:nbn:de:bvb:20-opus-117073}, year = {2014}, abstract = {Decreased levels of Nogo-A-dependent signaling have been shown to affect behavior and cognitive functions. In Nogo-A knockout and knockdown laboratory rodents, behavioral alterations were observed, possibly corresponding with human neuropsychiatric diseases of neurodevelopmental origin, particularly schizophrenia. This study offers further insight into behavioral manifestations of Nogo-A knockdown in laboratory rats, focusing on spatial and non-spatial cognition, anxiety levels, circadian rhythmicity, and activity patterns. Demonstrated is an impairment of cognitive functions and behavioral flexibility in a spatial active avoidance task, while non-spatial memory in a step-through avoidance task was spared. No signs of anhedonia, typical for schizophrenic patients, were observed in the animals. Some measures indicated lower anxiety levels in the Nogo-A-deficient group. Circadian rhythmicity in locomotor activity was preserved in the Nogo-A knockout rats and their circadian period (tau) did not differ from controls. However, daily activity patterns were slightly altered in the knockdown animals. We conclude that a reduction of Nogo-A levels induces changes in CNS development, manifested as subtle alterations in cognitive functions, emotionality, and activity patterns.}, language = {en} } @article{GerdesWieserAlpers2014, author = {Gerdes, Antje B. M. and Wieser, Matthias J. and Alpers, Georg W.}, title = {Emotional pictures and sounds: a review of multimodal interactions of emotion cues in multiple domains}, series = {Frontiers in Psychology}, volume = {5}, journal = {Frontiers in Psychology}, issn = {1664-1078}, doi = {10.3389/fpsyg.2014.01351}, url = {http://nbn-resolving.de/urn:nbn:de:bvb:20-opus-114548}, pages = {1351}, year = {2014}, abstract = {In everyday life, multiple sensory channels jointly trigger emotional experiences and one channel may alter processing in another channel. For example, seeing an emotional facial expression and hearing the voice's emotional tone will jointly create the emotional experience. This example, where auditory and visual input is related to social communication, has gained considerable attention by researchers. However, interactions of visual and auditory emotional information are not limited to social communication but can extend to much broader contexts including human, animal, and environmental cues. In this article, we review current research on audiovisual emotion processing beyond face-voice stimuli to develop a broader perspective on multimodal interactions in emotion processing. We argue that current concepts of multimodality should be extended in considering an ecologically valid variety of stimuli in audiovisual emotion processing. Therefore, we provide an overview of studies in which emotional sounds and interactions with complex pictures of scenes were investigated. In addition to behavioral studies, we focus on neuroimaging, electro- and peripher-physiological findings. Furthermore, we integrate these findings and identify similarities or differences. We conclude with suggestions for future research.}, language = {en} } @article{MartensBenschHalderetal.2014, author = {Martens, Suzanne and Bensch, Michael and Halder, Sebastian and Hill, Jeremy and Nijboer, Femke and Ramos-Murguialday, Ander and Schoelkopf, Bernhard and Birbaumer, Niels and Gharabaghi, Alireza}, title = {Epidural electrocorticography for monitoring of arousal in locked-in state}, series = {Frontiers in Human Neuroscience}, volume = {8}, journal = {Frontiers in Human Neuroscience}, doi = {10.3389/fnhum.2014.00861}, url = {http://nbn-resolving.de/urn:nbn:de:bvb:20-opus-114863}, pages = {861}, year = {2014}, abstract = {Electroencephalography (EEG) often fails to assess both the level (i.e., arousal) and the content (i.e., awareness) of pathologically altered consciousness in patients without motor responsiveness. This might be related to a decline of awareness, to episodes of low arousal and disturbed sleep patterns, and/or to distorting and attenuating effects of the skull and intermediate tissue on the recorded brain signals. Novel approaches are required to overcome these limitations. We introduced epidural electrocorticography (ECoG) for monitoring of cortical physiology in a late-stage amytrophic lateral sclerosis patient in completely locked-in state (CLIS) Despite long-term application for a period of six months, no implant related complications occurred. Recordings from the left frontal cortex were sufficient to identify three arousal states. Spectral analysis of the intrinsic oscillatory activity enabled us to extract state-dependent dominant frequencies at <4, similar to 7 and similar to 20 Hz, representing sleep-like periods, and phases of low and elevated arousal, respectively. In the absence of other biomarkers, ECoG proved to be a reliable tool for monitoring circadian rhythmicity, i.e., avoiding interference with the patient when he was sleeping and exploiting time windows of responsiveness. Moreover, the effects of interventions addressing the patient's arousal, e.g., amantadine medication, could be evaluated objectively on the basis of physiological markers, even in the absence of behavioral parameters. Epidural ECoG constitutes a feasible trade-off between surgical risk and quality of recorded brain signals to gain information on the patient's present level of arousal. This approach enables us to optimize the timing of interactions and medical interventions, all of which should take place when the patient is in a phase of high arousal. Furthermore, avoiding low responsiveness periods will facilitate measures to implement alternative communication pathways involving brain-computer interfaces (BCI).}, language = {en} } @article{RealKotchoubeyKuebler2014, author = {Real, Ruben G. L. and Kotchoubey, Boris and K{\"u}bler, Andrea}, title = {Studentized continuous wavelet transform (t-CWT) in the analysis of individual ERPs: real and simulated EEG data}, doi = {10.3389/fnins.2014.00279}, url = {http://nbn-resolving.de/urn:nbn:de:bvb:20-opus-113581}, year = {2014}, abstract = {This study aimed at evaluating the performance of the Studentized Continuous Wavelet Transform (t-CWT) as a method for the extraction and assessment of event-related brain potentials (ERP) in data from a single subject. Sensitivity, specificity, positive (PPV) and negative predictive values (NPV) of the t-CWT were assessed and compared to a variety of competing procedures using simulated EEG data at six low signal-to-noise ratios. Results show that the t-CWT combines high sensitivity and specificity with favorable PPV and NPV. Applying the t-CWT to authentic EEG data obtained from 14 healthy participants confirmed its high sensitivity. The t-CWT may thus be well suited for the assessment of weak ERPs in single-subject settings.}, language = {en} } @article{KirschKoenigsteinKunde2014, author = {Kirsch, Wladimir and K{\"o}nigstein, Elisabeth and Kunde, Wilfried}, title = {Action feedback affects the perception of action-related objects beyond actual action success}, doi = {10.3389/fpsyg.2014.00017}, url = {http://nbn-resolving.de/urn:nbn:de:bvb:20-opus-112670}, year = {2014}, abstract = {Successful object-oriented action typically increases the perceived size of aimed target objects. This phenomenon has been assumed to reflect an impact of an actor's current action ability on visual perception. The actual action ability and the explicit knowledge of action outcome, however, were confounded in previous studies. The present experiments aimed at disentangling these two factors. Participants repeatedly tried to hit a circular target varying in size with a stylus movement under restricted feedback conditions. After each movement they were explicitly informed about the success in hitting the target and were then asked to judge target size. The explicit feedback regarding movement success was manipulated orthogonally to actual movement success. The results of three experiments indicated the participants' bias to judge relatively small targets as larger and relatively large targets as smaller after explicit feedback of failure than after explicit feedback of success. This pattern was independent of the actual motor performance, suggesting that the actors' evaluations of motor actions may bias perception of target objects in itself.}, language = {en} } @article{PohlKundeGanzetal.2014, author = {Pohl, Carsten and Kunde, Wilfried and Ganz, Thomas and Conzelmann, Annette and Pauli, Paul and Kiesel, Andrea}, title = {Gaming to see: action video gaming is associated with enhanced processing of masked stimuli}, doi = {10.3389/fpsyg.2014.00070}, url = {http://nbn-resolving.de/urn:nbn:de:bvb:20-opus-112681}, year = {2014}, abstract = {Recent research revealed that action video game players outperform non-players in a wide range of attentional, perceptual and cognitive tasks. Here we tested if expertise in action video games is related to differences regarding the potential of shortly presented stimuli to bias behavior. In a response priming paradigm, participants classified four animal pictures functioning as targets as being smaller or larger than a reference frame. Before each target, one of the same four animal pictures was presented as a masked prime to influence participants' responses in a congruent or incongruent way. Masked primes induced congruence effects, that is, faster responses for congruent compared to incongruent conditions, indicating processing of hardly visible primes. Results also suggested that action video game players showed a larger congruence effect than non-players for 20 ms primes, whereas there was no group difference for 60 ms primes. In addition, there was a tendency for action video game players to detect masked primes for some prime durations better than non-players. Thus, action video game expertise may be accompanied by faster and more efficient processing of shortly presented visual stimuli.}, language = {en} } @article{MeuleHermannKuebler2014, author = {Meule, Adrian and Hermann, Tina and K{\"u}bler, Andrea}, title = {A short version of the Food Cravings Questionnaire—Trait: the FCQ-T-reduced}, doi = {10.3389/fpsyg.2014.00190}, url = {http://nbn-resolving.de/urn:nbn:de:bvb:20-opus-112748}, year = {2014}, abstract = {One of the most often used instruments for the assessment of food cravings is the Food Cravings Questionnaire (FCQ), which consists of a trait (FCQ-T; 39 items) and state (FCQ-S; 15 items) version. Scores on the FCQ-T have been found to be positively associated with eating pathology, body mass index (BMI), low dieting success and increases in state food craving during cognitive tasks involving appealing food stimuli. The current studies evaluated reliability and validity of a reduced version of the FCQ-T consisting of 15 items only (FCQ-T-r). Study 1 was a questionnaire study conducted online among students (N = 323). In study 2, female students (N = 70) performed a working memory task involving food and neutral pictures. Study 1 indicated a one-factorial structure and high internal consistency (α = 0.94) of the FCQ-T-r. Scores of the FCQ-T-r were positively correlated with BMI and negatively correlated with dieting success. In study 2, participants reported higher state food craving after the task compared to before. This increase was positively correlated with the FCQ-T-r. Hours since the last meal positively predicted food craving before the task when controlling for FCQ-T-r scores and the interaction of both variables. Contrarily, FCQ-T-r scores positively predicted food craving after the task when controlling for food deprivation and the interaction term. Thus, trait food craving was specifically associated with state food craving triggered by palatable food-cues, but not with state food craving related to plain hunger. Results indicate high reliability of the FCQ-T-r. Replicating studies that used the long version, small-to-medium correlations with BMI and dieting success could be found. Finally, scores on the FCQ-T-r predicted cue-elicited food craving, providing further support of its validity. The FCQ-T-r constitutes a succinct, valid and reliable self-report measure to efficiently assess experiences of food craving as a trait.}, language = {en} } @article{PieczykolanHuestegge2014, author = {Pieczykolan, Aleksandra and Huestegge, Lynn}, title = {Oculomotor dominance in multitasking: Mechanisms of conflict resolution in cross-modal action}, doi = {10.1167/14.13.18}, url = {http://nbn-resolving.de/urn:nbn:de:bvb:20-opus-111024}, year = {2014}, abstract = {In daily life, eye movement control usually occurs in the context of concurrent action demands in other effector domains. However, little research has focused on understanding how such cross-modal action demands are coordinated, especially when conflicting information needs to be processed conjunctly in different action modalities. In two experiments, we address this issue by studying vocal responses in the context of spatially conflicting eye movements (Experiment 1) and in the context of spatially conflicting manual actions (Experiment 2, under controlled eye fixation conditions). Crucially, a comparison across experiments allows us to assess resource scheduling priorities among the three effector systems by comparing the same (vocal) response demands in the context of eye movements in contrast to manual responses. The results indicate that in situations involving response conflict, eye movements are prioritized over concurrent action demands in another effector system. This oculomotor dominance effect corroborates previous observations in the context of multiple action demands without spatial response conflict. Furthermore, and in line with recent theoretical accounts of parallel multiple action control, resource scheduling patterns appear to be flexibly adjustable based on the temporal proximity of the two actions that need to be performed.}, language = {en} } @article{KueblerHolzRiccioetal.2014, author = {K{\"u}bler, Andrea and Holz, Elisa M. and Riccio, Angela and Zickler, Claudia and Kaufmann, Tobias and Kleih, Sonja C. and Staiger-S{\"a}lzer, Pit and Desideri, Lorenzo and Hoogerwerf, Evert-Jan and Mattia, Donatella}, title = {The User-Centered Design as Novel Perspective for Evaluating the Usability of BCI-Controlled Applications}, doi = {10.1371/journal.pone.0112392}, url = {http://nbn-resolving.de/urn:nbn:de:bvb:20-opus-111051}, year = {2014}, abstract = {Albeit research on brain-computer interfaces (BCI) for controlling applications has expanded tremendously, we still face a translational gap when bringing BCI to end-users. To bridge this gap, we adapted the user-centered design (UCD) to BCI research and development which implies a shift from focusing on single aspects, such as accuracy and information transfer rate (ITR), to a more holistic user experience. The UCD implements an iterative process between end-users and developers based on a valid evaluation procedure. Within the UCD framework usability of a device can be defined with regard to its effectiveness, efficiency, and satisfaction. We operationalized these aspects to evaluate BCI-controlled applications. Effectiveness was regarded equivalent to accuracy of selections and efficiency to the amount of information transferred per time unit and the effort invested (workload). Satisfaction was assessed with questionnaires and visual-analogue scales. These metrics have been successfully applied to several BCI-controlled applications for communication and entertainment, which were evaluated by end-users with severe motor impairment. Results of four studies, involving a total of N = 19 end-users revealed: effectiveness was moderate to high; efficiency in terms of ITR was low to high and workload low to medium; depending on the match between user and technology, and type of application satisfaction was moderate to high. The here suggested evaluation metrics within the framework of the UCD proved to be an applicable and informative approach to evaluate BCI controlled applications, and end-users with severe impairment and in the locked-in state were able to participate in this process.}, language = {en} } @article{PfisterObhiRiegeretal.2014, author = {Pfister, Roland and Obhi, Sukhvinder S. and Rieger, Martina and Wenke, Dorit}, title = {Action and perception in social contexts: intentional binding for social action effects}, doi = {10.3389/fnhum.2014.00667}, url = {http://nbn-resolving.de/urn:nbn:de:bvb:20-opus-112828}, year = {2014}, abstract = {The subjective experience of controlling events in the environment alters the perception of these events. For instance, the interval between one's own actions and their consequences is subjectively compressed—a phenomenon known as intentional binding. In two experiments, we studied intentional binding in a social setting in which actions of one agent prompted a second agent to perform another action. Participants worked in pairs and were assigned to a "leader" and a "follower" role, respectively. The leader's key presses triggered (after a variable interval) a tone and this tone served as go signal for the follower to perform a keypress as well. Leaders and followers estimated the interval between the leader's keypress and the following tone, or the interval between the tone and the follower's keypress. The leader showed reliable intentional binding for both intervals relative to the follower's estimates. These results indicate that human agents experience a pre-reflective sense of agency for genuinely social consequences of their actions.}, language = {en} } @article{GuhnDreslerAndreattaetal.2014, author = {Guhn, Anne and Dresler, Thomas and Andreatta, Marta and M{\"u}ller, Laura D. and Hahn, Tim and Tupak, Sara V. and Polak, Thomas and Deckert, J{\"u}rgen and Herrmann, Martin J.}, title = {Medial prefrontal cortex stimulation modulates the processing of conditioned fear}, doi = {10.3389/fnbeh.2014.00044}, url = {http://nbn-resolving.de/urn:nbn:de:bvb:20-opus-111309}, year = {2014}, abstract = {The extinction of conditioned fear depends on an efficient interplay between the amygdala and the medial prefrontal cortex (mPFC). In rats, high-frequency electrical mPFC stimulation has been shown to improve extinction by means of a reduction of amygdala activity. However, so far it is unclear whether stimulation of homologues regions in humans might have similar beneficial effects. Healthy volunteers received one session of either active or sham repetitive transcranial magnetic stimulation (rTMS) covering the mPFC while undergoing a 2-day fear conditioning and extinction paradigm. Repetitive TMS was applied offline after fear acquisition in which one of two faces (CS+ but not CS-) was associated with an aversive scream (UCS). Immediate extinction learning (day 1) and extinction recall (day 2) were conducted without UCS delivery. Conditioned responses (CR) were assessed in a multimodal approach using fear-potentiated startle (FPS), skin conductance responses (SCR), functional near-infrared spectroscopy (fNIRS), and self-report scales. Consistent with the hypothesis of a modulated processing of conditioned fear after high-frequency rTMS, the active group showed a reduced CS+/CS- discrimination during extinction learning as evident in FPS as well as in SCR and arousal ratings. FPS responses to CS+ further showed a linear decrement throughout both extinction sessions. This study describes the first experimental approach of influencing conditioned fear by using rTMS and can thus be a basis for future studies investigating a complementation of mPFC stimulation to cognitive behavioral therapy (CBT).}, language = {en} } @article{KueblerHautzingerLudolphetal.2014, author = {K{\"u}bler, Andrea and Hautzinger, Martin and Ludolph, Albert and Dickhaus, Thorsten and Real, Ruben G. L.}, title = {Well-being in amyotrophic lateral sclerosis: a pilot experience sampling study}, doi = {10.3389/fpsyg.2014.00704}, url = {http://nbn-resolving.de/urn:nbn:de:bvb:20-opus-113057}, year = {2014}, abstract = {Objective: The aim of this longitudinal study was to identify predictors of instantaneous well-being in patients with amyotrophic lateral sclerosis (ALS). Based on flow theory well-being was expected to be highest when perceived demands and perceived control were in balance, and that thinking about the past would be a risk factor for rumination which would in turn reduce well-being. Methods: Using the experience sampling method, data on current activities, associated aspects of perceived demands, control, and well-being were collected from 10 patients with ALS three times a day for two weeks. Results: Results show that perceived control was uniformly and positively associated with well-being, but that demands were only positively associated with well-being when they were perceived as controllable. Mediation analysis confirmed thinking about the past, but not thinking about the future, to be a risk factor for rumination and reduced well-being. Discussion: Findings extend our knowledge of factors contributing to well-being in ALS as not only perceived control but also perceived demands can contribute to well-being. They further show that a focus on present experiences might contribute to increased well-being.}, language = {en} } @article{WieserFlaischPauli2014, author = {Wieser, Matthias J. and Flaisch, Tobias and Pauli, Paul}, title = {Raised Middle-Finger: Electrocortical Correlates of Social Conditioning with Nonverbal Affective Gestures}, doi = {10.1371/journal.pone.0102937}, url = {http://nbn-resolving.de/urn:nbn:de:bvb:20-opus-113061}, year = {2014}, abstract = {Humans form impressions of others by associating persons (faces) with negative or positive social outcomes. This learning process has been referred to as social conditioning. In everyday life, affective nonverbal gestures may constitute important social signals cueing threat or safety, which therefore may support aforementioned learning processes. In conventional aversive conditioning, studies using electroencephalography to investigate visuocortical processing of visual stimuli paired with danger cues such as aversive noise have demonstrated facilitated processing and enhanced sensory gain in visual cortex. The present study aimed at extending this line of research to the field of social conditioning by pairing neutral face stimuli with affective nonverbal gestures. To this end, electro-cortical processing of faces serving as different conditioned stimuli was investigated in a differential social conditioning paradigm. Behavioral ratings and visually evoked steady-state potentials (ssVEP) were recorded in twenty healthy human participants, who underwent a differential conditioning procedure in which three neutral faces were paired with pictures of negative (raised middle finger), neutral (pointing), or positive (thumbs-up) gestures. As expected, faces associated with the aversive hand gesture (raised middle finger) elicited larger ssVEP amplitudes during conditioning. Moreover, theses faces were rated as to be more arousing and unpleasant. These results suggest that cortical engagement in response to faces aversively conditioned with nonverbal gestures is facilitated in order to establish persistent vigilance for social threat-related cues. This form of social conditioning allows to establish a predictive relationship between social stimuli and motivationally relevant outcomes.}, language = {en} } @article{KueblerBlankertzKleihetal.2014, author = {K{\"u}bler, Andrea and Blankertz, Benjamin and Kleih, Sonja C. and Kaufmann, Tobias and Hammer, Eva M.}, title = {Visuo-motor coordination ability predicts performance with brain-computer interfaces controlled by modulation of sensorimotor rhythms (SMR)}, doi = {10.3389/fnhum.2014.00574}, url = {http://nbn-resolving.de/urn:nbn:de:bvb:20-opus-113084}, year = {2014}, abstract = {Modulation of sensorimotor rhythms (SMR) was suggested as a control signal for brain-computer interfaces (BCI). Yet, there is a population of users estimated between 10 to 50\% not able to achieve reliable control and only about 20\% of users achieve high (80-100\%) performance. Predicting performance prior to BCI use would facilitate selection of the most feasible system for an individual, thus constitute a practical benefit for the user, and increase our knowledge about the correlates of BCI control. In a recent study, we predicted SMR-BCI performance from psychological variables that were assessed prior to the BCI sessions and BCI control was supported with machine-learning techniques. We described two significant psychological predictors, namely the visuo-motor coordination ability and the ability to concentrate on the task. The purpose of the current study was to replicate these results thereby validating these predictors within a neurofeedback based SMR-BCI that involved no machine learning.Thirty-three healthy BCI novices participated in a calibration session and three further neurofeedback training sessions. Two variables were related with mean SMR-BCI performance: (1) a measure for the accuracy of fine motor skills, i.e., a trade for a person's visuo-motor control ability; and (2) subject's "attentional impulsivity". In a linear regression they accounted for almost 20\% in variance of SMR-BCI performance, but predictor (1) failed significance. Nevertheless, on the basis of our prior regression model for sensorimotor control ability we could predict current SMR-BCI performance with an average prediction error of M = 12.07\%. In more than 50\% of the participants, the prediction error was smaller than 10\%. Hence, psychological variables played a moderate role in predicting SMR-BCI performance in a neurofeedback approach that involved no machine learning. Future studies are needed to further consolidate (or reject) the present predictors.}, language = {en} } @article{KaufmannHerwegKuebler2014, author = {Kaufmann, Tobias and Herweg, Andreas and K{\"u}bler, Andrea}, title = {Toward brain-computer interface based wheelchair control utilizing tactually-evoked event-related potentials}, doi = {10.1186/1743-0003-11-7}, url = {http://nbn-resolving.de/urn:nbn:de:bvb:20-opus-110042}, year = {2014}, abstract = {Background People with severe disabilities, e.g. due to neurodegenerative disease, depend on technology that allows for accurate wheelchair control. For those who cannot operate a wheelchair with a joystick, brain-computer interfaces (BCI) may offer a valuable option. Technology depending on visual or auditory input may not be feasible as these modalities are dedicated to processing of environmental stimuli (e.g. recognition of obstacles, ambient noise). Herein we thus validated the feasibility of a BCI based on tactually-evoked event-related potentials (ERP) for wheelchair control. Furthermore, we investigated use of a dynamic stopping method to improve speed of the tactile BCI system. Methods Positions of four tactile stimulators represented navigation directions (left thigh: move left; right thigh: move right; abdomen: move forward; lower neck: move backward) and N = 15 participants delivered navigation commands by focusing their attention on the desired tactile stimulus in an oddball-paradigm. Results Participants navigated a virtual wheelchair through a building and eleven participants successfully completed the task of reaching 4 checkpoints in the building. The virtual wheelchair was equipped with simulated shared-control sensors (collision avoidance), yet these sensors were rarely needed. Conclusion We conclude that most participants achieved tactile ERP-BCI control sufficient to reliably operate a wheelchair and dynamic stopping was of high value for tactile ERP classification. Finally, this paper discusses feasibility of tactile ERPs for BCI based wheelchair control.}, language = {en} } @article{MeuleBeckTeranBerkeretal.2014, author = {Meule, Adrian and Beck Teran, Carina and Berker, Jasmin and Gr{\"u}ndel, Tilman and Mayerhofer, Martina and Platte, Petra}, title = {"On the differentiation between trait and state food craving: Half-year retest-reliability of the Food Cravings Questionnaire-Trait-reduced (FCQ-T-r) and the Food Cravings Questionnaire-State (FCQ-S)"}, doi = {10.1186/s40337-014-0025-z}, url = {http://nbn-resolving.de/urn:nbn:de:bvb:20-opus-110585}, year = {2014}, abstract = {Background: Food craving refers to an intense desire to consume a specific food. The Food Cravings Questionnaires (FCQs) assess food cravings on a trait and a state level. Method: The current study examined half-year retest-reliability of the Food Cravings Questionnaire-Trait-reduced (FCQ-T-r) and the Food Cravings Questionnaire-State (FCQ-S) and reports associations with current food deprivation in female students. Results: The FCQ-T-r had higher retest-reliability (rtt = .74) than the FCQ-S (rtt = .39). Although trait food craving was correlated with state food craving, it was unaffected by current food deprivation. Conclusions: Although state and trait food craving are interdependent, the FCQs are able to differentiate between the two. As scores of the FCQ-T-r represent a stable trait, but are also sensitive to changes in eating behavior, they may be useful for the investigation of the course of eating disorders and obesity.}, language = {en} } @phdthesis{Meule2014, author = {Meule, Adrian}, title = {Food craving as a central construct in the self-regulation of eating behavior}, url = {http://nbn-resolving.de/urn:nbn:de:bvb:20-opus-104597}, school = {Universit{\"a}t W{\"u}rzburg}, year = {2014}, abstract = {Background: Food craving refers to an intense desire to consume a specific kind of food of which chocolate is the most often craved one. It is this intensity and specificity that differentiates food craving from feelings of hunger. Although food craving and hunger often co-occur, an energy deficit is not a prerequisite for experiencing food craving, that is, it can also occur without being hungry. Food craving often precedes and predicts over- or binge eating which makes it a reasonable target in the treatment of eating disorders or obesity. One of the arguably most extensively validated measures for the assessment of food craving are the Food Cravings Questionnaires (FCQs), which measure food craving on a state (FCQ-S) and trait (FCQ-T) level. Specifically, the FCQ-S measures the intensity of current food craving whereas the FCQ-T measures the frequency of food craving experiences in general. The aims of the present thesis were to provide a German measure for the assessment of food craving and to investigate cognitive, behavioral, and physiological correlates of food craving. For this purpose, a German version of the FCQs was presented and its reliability and validity was evaluated. Using self-reports, relationships between trait food craving and dieting were examined. Cognitive-behavioral correlates of food craving were investigated using food-related tasks assessing executive functions. Psychophysiological correlates of food craving were investigated using event-related potentials (ERPs) in the electroencephalogram and heart rate variability (HRV). Possible intervention approaches to reduce food craving were derived from results of those studies. Methods: The FCQs were translated into German and their psychometric properties and correlates were investigated in a questionnaire-based study (articles \#1 \& \#2). The relationship between state and trait food craving with executive functioning was examined with behavioral tasks measuring working memory performance and behavioral inhibition which involved highly palatable food-cues (articles \#3 \& \#4). Electrophysiological correlates of food craving were tested with ERPs during a craving regulation task (article \#5). Finally, a pilot study on the effects of HRV-biofeedback for reducing food craving was conducted (article \#6). Results: The FCQs demonstrated high internal consistency while their factorial structure could only partially be replicated. The FCQ-T also had high retest-reliability which, expectedly, was lower for the FCQ-S. Validity of the FCQ-S was shown by positive relationships with current food deprivation and negative affect. Validity of the FCQ-T was shown by positive correlations with related constructs. Importantly, scores on the subscales of the FCQ-T were able to discriminate between non-dieters and successful and unsuccessful dieters (article \#1). Furthermore, scores on the FCQ-T mediated the relationship between rigid dietary control strategies and low dieting success (article \#2). With regard to executive functioning, high-calorie food-cues impaired working memory performance, yet this was independent of trait food craving and rarely related to state food craving (article \#3). Behavioral disinhibition in response to high-calorie food-cues was predicted by trait food craving, particularly when participants were also impulsive (article \#4). Downregulation of food craving by cognitive strategies in response to high-calorie food-cues increased early, but not later, segments of the Late Positive Potential (LPP) (article \#5). Few sessions of HRV-biofeedback reduced self-reported food cravings and eating and weight concerns in high trait food cravers (article \#6). Conclusions: The German FCQs represent sound measures with good psychometric properties for the assessment of state and trait food craving. Although state food craving increases during cognitive tasks involving highly palatable food-cues, impairment of task performance does not appear to be mediated by current food craving experiences. Instead, trait food craving is associated with low behavioral inhibition in response to high-calorie food-cues, but not with impaired working memory performance. Future studies need to examine if trait food craving and, subsequently, food-cue affected behavioral inhibition can be reduced by using food-related inhibition tasks as a training. Current food craving and ERPs in response to food-cues can easily be modulated by cognitive strategies, yet the LPP probably does not represent a direct index of food craving. Finally, HRV-biofeedback may be a useful add-on element in the treatment of disorders in which food cravings are elevated. To conclude, the current thesis provided measures for the assessment of food craving in German and showed differential relationships between state and trait food craving with self-reported dieting behavior, food-cue affected executive functioning, ERPs and HRV-biofeedback. These results provide promising starting points for interventions to reduce food craving based on (1) food-cue-related behavioral trainings of executive functions, (2) cognitive craving regulation strategies, and (3) physiological parameters such as HRV-biofeedback.}, subject = {Craving}, language = {en} } @phdthesis{Dignath2014, author = {Dignath, David}, title = {Conflict Management}, url = {http://nbn-resolving.de/urn:nbn:de:bvb:20-opus-103586}, school = {Universit{\"a}t W{\"u}rzburg}, year = {2014}, abstract = {Menschen haben die beeindruckende F{\"a}higkeit zu planen, sich Ziele zu setzen und entsprechend zu handeln. Dies ist aber nicht immer der Fall. Jeder kennt Situationen, in denen Impulse, wie zum Beispiel der Drang noch ein weiteres Bier zu trinken oder stark {\"u}berlernte Verhaltensgewohnheiten, wie zum Beispiel automatisch auf der rechten Straßenseite zu fahren unseren eigentlichen Zielen im Weg stehen. Dieser ´Wettstreit´ zwischen impulsiven oder habituellen Verhaltenstendenzen und zielgerichteten Handlungen wird auch als Konflikt bezeichnet. Solch ein Konflikt tritt st{\"a}ndig in Erscheinung und kann viele Formen annehmen. Daher {\"u}berrascht es nicht weiter, dass die Art und Weise wie Konflikt kontrolliert wird, auch sehr unterschiedlich sein kann. Es scheint offensichtlich, dass Menschen Konflikte ganz verschieden handhaben k{\"o}nnen: Wenn wir eine Konfliktsituation erwarten, k{\"o}nnen wir bereits vorausschauend zus{\"a}tzliche Anstrengungen unternehmen um den Konflikt dann in der Situation ad{\"a}quat zu l{\"o}sen. Alternativ k{\"o}nnen wir solche Situationen auch bereits im Vorfeld vermeiden und umgehen damit die Gefahr, unseren Impulsen nachzugeben. Auch wenn wir mit einer Konfliktsituation bereits konfrontiert sind, k{\"o}nnen wir versuchen durch besondere Anstrengungen diesen Konflikt aufzul{\"o}sen. Schließlich haben wir auch die M{\"o}glichkeit, uns aus der Situation zur{\"u}ckziehen wodurch wir das Risiko minimieren, entgegen unserer eigentlichen Ziele zu handeln. Um diese Variabilit{\"a}t von Konfliktbew{\"a}ltigung besser zu verstehen, versucht die vorliegende Arbeit eine genauere Beschreibung dieser Kontrollprozesse zu geben. Zwei Dimensionen von Kontrollfunktionen werden identifiziert. Diese ergeben sich aus teilweise antagonistischen Erfordernissen an erfolgreiche Handlungskontrolle und beschreiben zum einen die Abw{\"a}gung zwischen Flexibilit{\"a}t und Stabilit{\"a}t, zum Anderen die Abw{\"a}gung zwischen antizipativer Selektion und reaktiver Korrektur. Um zu erkl{\"a}ren, wie diese beiden Dimensionen von Kontrollfunktionen interagieren und wie daraus ein ad{\"a}quater Umgang mit Konflikten entstehen kann, wird das „Conflict Management Framework" eingef{\"u}hrt. Eine Hypothese, die aus diesem Rahmenmodel hervorgeht, beschreibt eine spezifische Strategie mit Konflikt umzugehen, die in dieser Art noch nicht untersucht wurde: Wenn Konflikt erlebt wird, ziehen sich Personen aus dieser Situation zur{\"u}ck und versuchen dadurch dem Konflikt zu entgehen. Der empirische Teil der Arbeit untersucht diese Verhaltensstrategie in Bezug auf Konflikterleben und testet, ob Personen unter bestimmten Bedingungen sich aus Konfliktsituationen zur{\"u}ckziehen. Im Rahmen dieser Untersuchung werden drei Reihen an Experimenten vorgestellt die sowohl Freie-Wahl Paradigmen, Klassifikationsaufgaben unter Zeitdruck, als auch die Aufzeichnung kontinuierlicher Bewegungen umfassen. Es zeigte sich, dass Konflikt motivationale Vermeidungstendenzen hervorruft (Experimente 1 und 2), Entscheidungsverhalten verzerrt, so dass kurzfristig mit Konflikt assoziierte Aufgaben vermieden werden (Experimente 3 und 5), und die Ausf{\"u}hrung von komplexen Handlungen beeinflusst (Experimente 6 und 7). Diese Ergebnisse unterst{\"u}tzen das vorgeschlagene Rahmenmodell und erm{\"o}glichen eine vertiefte Auseinandersetzung mit der Frage, wie unterschiedliche Konfliktbew{\"a}ltigungsstrategien integriert werden k{\"o}nnen. Dazu wird ein konnektionistisches Modell vorgestellt, dass die parallele Anwendung von zwei unterschiedlichen Strategien zur Konfliktbew{\"a}ltigung erm{\"o}glicht und damit die empirischen Befunde der Experimente 3, 4 und 5 erkl{\"a}ren kann. Im verbleibenden Teil der vorliegenden Arbeit werden Fehler einer solchen Integration von Konfliktbew{\"a}ltigungsstrategien analysiert. Es wird diskutiert, in wie fern das vorgeschlagene Rahmenmodell mit spezifischen klinischen St{\"o}rungen vereinbar ist. Außerdem wird darauf eingegangen, wie interindividuelle Unterschiede hinsichtlich der Art und Weise Konflikte zu meistern, mit Hilfe eines solches Modells besser erkl{\"a}rt werden k{\"o}nnten. Schließlich wird ein Versuch unternommen, so genannte Selbstkontroll-Fehler durch eine mangelhafte Dynamik unterschiedlicher Konfliktbew{\"a}ltigungsstrategien zu erkl{\"a}ren.}, subject = {Konflikt}, language = {en} } @article{PfisterSchwarzJanczyketal.2013, author = {Pfister, Roland and Schwarz, Katharina A. and Janczyk, Markus and Dale, Rick and Freeman, Jonathan B.}, title = {Good things peak in pairs: a note on the bimodality coefficient}, series = {Frontiers in Psychology}, volume = {4}, journal = {Frontiers in Psychology}, issn = {1664-1078}, doi = {10.3389/fpsyg.2013.00700}, url = {http://nbn-resolving.de/urn:nbn:de:bvb:20-opus-190413}, year = {2013}, abstract = {A commentary on Assessing bimodality to detect the presence of a dual cognitive process by Freeman, J. B., and Dale, R. (2013). Behav. Res. Methods 45, 83-97. doi: 10.3758/s13428-012-0225-x}, language = {en} } @article{FoersterPfisterSchmidtsetal.2013, author = {Foerster, Anna and Pfister, Roland and Schmidts, Constantin and Dignath, David and Kunde, Wilfried}, title = {Honesty saves time (and justifications)}, series = {Frontiers in Psychology}, volume = {4}, journal = {Frontiers in Psychology}, issn = {1664-1078}, doi = {10.3389/fpsyg.2013.00473}, url = {http://nbn-resolving.de/urn:nbn:de:bvb:20-opus-190451}, year = {2013}, abstract = {A commentary on Honesty requires time (and lack of justifications) by Shalvi, S., Eldar, O., and Bereby-Meyer, Y. (2012). Psychol. Sci. 23, 1264-1270. doi: 10.1177/0956797612443835}, language = {en} } @article{MeuleVoegele2013, author = {Meule, Adrian and V{\"o}gele, Claus}, title = {The psychology of eating}, series = {Frontiers in Psychology}, volume = {4}, journal = {Frontiers in Psychology}, issn = {1664-1078}, doi = {10.3389/fpsyg.2013.00215}, url = {http://nbn-resolving.de/urn:nbn:de:bvb:20-opus-190460}, year = {2013}, abstract = {No abstract available.}, language = {en} } @article{Meule2013, author = {Meule, Adrian}, title = {Impulsivity and overeating: a closer look at the subscales of the Barratt Impulsiveness Scale}, series = {Frontiers in Psychology}, volume = {4}, journal = {Frontiers in Psychology}, issn = {1664-1078}, doi = {10.3389/fpsyg.2013.00177}, url = {http://nbn-resolving.de/urn:nbn:de:bvb:20-opus-190497}, year = {2013}, abstract = {No abstract available.}, language = {en} } @phdthesis{Shiban2013, author = {Shiban, Youssef}, title = {Attenuating Renewal following Exposure Therapy : Mechanisms of Exposure in Multiple Contexts and its Influence on the Renewal of Fear: Studies in Virtual Reality}, url = {http://nbn-resolving.de/urn:nbn:de:bvb:20-opus-76673}, school = {Universit{\"a}t W{\"u}rzburg}, year = {2013}, abstract = {„Renewal" bezeichnet das Wiederauftreten von Angst nach erfolgreicher Expositionstherapie in Folge einer erneuten Konfrontation mit dem phobischen Stimulus in einem neuen, sich vom Expositionskontext unterscheidenden Kontext. Bouton (1994) zufolge deutet diese Angstr{\"u}ckkehr durch einen Kontextwechsel darauf hin, dass die Angst nicht gel{\"o}scht wurde. Stattdessen wurde w{\"a}hrend der Expositionssitzung eine neue Assoziation gelernt, die das gef{\"u}rchtete Objekt mit „keiner Angst", also den konditionierten Reiz (conditioned stimulus, CS) mit „keinem unkonditionierten Reiz" (no unconditioned stimulus, no US), verbindet. Bouton argumentiert weiter, dass diese Assoziation kontextabh{\"a}ngig ist, wodurch Effekte wie Angst-Renewal erkl{\"a}rt werden k{\"o}nnen. Da in einem neuen Kontext die CS-no US-Assoziation nicht aktiviert wird, wird die Angst auch nicht gehemmt. Die Kontextabh{\"a}ngigkeit der CS-no US-Assoziation wurde in mehreren Studien belegt (Balooch \& Neumann, 2011; Siavash Bandarian Balooch, Neumann, \& Boschen, 2012; Culver, Stoyanova, \& Craske, 2011; Kim \& Richardson, 2009; Neumann \& Kitlertsirivatana, 2010). Aktuell konzentriert sich die Forschung zur Therapie von Angstst{\"o}rungen auf die Frage, wie Angst reduziert und gleichzeitig ein R{\"u}ckfall verhindert werden kann. Hierzu werden verschiedene Expositionsprotokolle untersucht, wie zum Beispiel (1) Exposition in mehreren Kontexten (multiple contexts exposure, MCE), um Renewal zu reduzieren (z.B. Balooch \& Neumann, 2011); (2) verl{\"a}ngerte Exposition (prolonged exposure, PE), um die hemmende Assoziation w{\"a}hrend des Extinktionslernes zu st{\"a}rken (z.B. Thomas, Vurbic, \& Novak, 2009) und (3) Rekonsolidierungs-Updates (reconsolidation update, RU), die den Rekonsolidierungsprozess durch eine kurze Exposition des CS+ vor der eigentlichen Exposition aktualisieren sollen (Schiller et al., 2010). Bisher liegen jedoch nur sehr wenige Studien vor, die diese neuen Expositionsprotokolle an klinischen Stichproben untersucht haben, und - soweit bekannt - keine Studie, welche die Wirkmechanismen dieser Protokolle an einer klinischen Stichprobe erforscht. Die vorliegende Dissertation hat drei Ziele. Das erste Ziel besteht darin zu pr{\"u}fen, ob Expositionstherapie in multiplen Kontexten die Wahrscheinlichkeit von Renewal reduziert. Das zweite Ziel ist die Untersuchung der Mechanismen, die dem Effekt der Exposition in multiplen Kontexten zugrunde liegen und das dritte ist den Kontext im Zusammenhang mit Konditionierung und Extinktion zu konzeptualisieren. Insgesamt wurden drei Studien durchgef{\"u}hrt. Die erste Studie untersuchte den Effekt von Exposition in multiplen Kontexten auf Renewal, die zweite und dritte Studie die Wirkmechanismen von MCE. In der ersten Studie wurden spinnenphobische Probanden (N = 30) viermal mit einer virtuellen Spinne konfrontiert. Die Expositionstrials wurden entweder in einem gleichbleibenden Kontext oder in vier verschiedenen Kontexten durchgef{\"u}hrt. Am Ende der Sitzung absolvierten alle Teilnehmer einen virtuellen Renewaltest, bei dem die virtuelle Spinne in einem neuen Kontext gezeigt wurde, und einen in vivo Verhaltensvermeidungstest (behavioral avoidance test, BAT) mit einer echten Spinne. Die Ergebnisse zeigten, dass Probanden, welche die vier Expositionstrials in unterschiedlichen Kontexten erfuhren, weniger Angst, sowohl im virtuellen Renewaltest als auch im BAT, erlebten. In dieser Studie konnte die Wirksamkeit von MCE f{\"u}r die Reduktion von Renewal erfolgreich nachgewiesen werden. Studie 2 (N = 35) untersuchte die Wirkmechanismen von MCE in einem differentiellen Konditionierungsparadigma. Die Extinktion wurde in multiplen Kontexten durchgef{\"u}hrt. Hierbei war das Ziel, eine {\"a}hnliche Verminderung von Renewal wie in Studie 1 nachzuweisen. Der Extinktion folgten zwei Tests, mit dem Ziel m{\"o}gliche hemmende Effekte des Kontexts, die w{\"a}hrend der Extinktionsphase erworben wurden, aufzudecken. Bez{\"u}glich des Effektes von MCE wurden drei Hypothesen aufgestellt: (1) Der Extinktionskontext wird mit der Exposition assoziiert, fungiert folglich w{\"a}hrend der Extinktion als Sicherheitssignal und konkurriert daher mit dem Sicherheitslernen des CS. Dies f{\"u}hrt zu einem verminderten Extinktionseffekt auf den CS, wenn die Extinktion nur in einem Kontext durchgef{\"u}hrt wird. (2) Die Elemente im Extinktionskontext (z.B. Raumfarbe, M{\"o}bel) stehen im Zusammenhang mit der CS-no US-Assoziation und erinnern daher an die Extinktion, was zu einer gr{\"o}ßeren Angsthemmung f{\"u}hrt, wenn sie w{\"a}hrend eines Tests gezeigt werden. (3) Nach der emotionalen Prozesstheorie (emotional process theory; Bouton, 1994; Foa et al., 1996) bestimmen die Therapieprozessfaktoren die St{\"a}rke des Renewals. Beispielsweise korrelieren initiale Angstaktivierung, Aktivierung in und zwischen den Sitzungen mit der St{\"a}rke des Renewals. Jedoch waren in dieser Studie keine Unterschiede zwischen den Gruppen im Renewaltest zu beobachten, weswegen die Ergebnisse der zwei Nachtests nicht zu interpretieren sind. Das Ziel von Studie 3 (N = 61) war es, das Konzept des Kontexts im Rahmen von Konditionierung und Exposition zu definieren. In Studie 3 wurde das Auftreten der Generalisierungsabnahme (generalization decrement) genutzt, bei der eine konditionierte Reaktion infolge eines Kontextwechsels nur reduziert auftritt. Auf diesem Weg kann Kontext{\"a}hnlichkeit quantifiziert werden. Nach einer Akquisitonsphase in einem Kontext wurden die Teilnehmer in einem von drei verschiedenen Kontexten getestet. Zwei dieser Kontexte unterschieden sich nur in einer Dimension (Anordnung der Objekte vs. Objekteigenschaften). Die dritte Gruppe wurde im Akquisitonskontext getestet und diente als Kontrollgruppe. Es fanden sich jedoch keine Unteschiede zwischen den Gruppen in den Testphasen. Eine m{\"o}gliche Erkl{\"a}rung ist die Neuartigkeit des Testkontextes. Teilnehmer, die nach der Extinktion einem neuen Kontext ausgesetzt waren, erwarteten in einem anderen Kontext eine zweite Extinktionsphase und zeigten daher mehr statt weniger Angst als erwartet.}, subject = {Angst}, language = {en} } @phdthesis{Reuss2013, author = {Reuß, Heiko}, title = {The interplay of unconscious processing and cognitive control}, url = {http://nbn-resolving.de/urn:nbn:de:bvb:20-opus-76950}, school = {Universit{\"a}t W{\"u}rzburg}, year = {2013}, abstract = {The aim of this study was both to investigate the influence of cognitive control on unconscious processing, and to investigate the influence of unconscious processing on cognitive control. At first, different mechanisms and accounts to explain unconscious priming are presented. Here, perceptual and motor processes, as well as stimulus-response learning, semantic categorization, and the action trigger account as theories to explain motor priming are discussed. Then, the issue of the potential limits of unconscious processing is presented. Findings that indicate that active current intentions and expertise modulate unconscious processing are illustrated. Subsequently, results that imply an influence of unconsciously presented stimuli that goes beyond motor processes are discussed, with a special focus on inhibition processes, orienting of attention, task set activation, and conflict adaptation. Then I present the results of my own empirical work. Experiment 1 shows that the effective processing of unconsciously presented stimuli depends on expertise, even when potentially confounding difference between the expert and novice groups are controlled. The results of Experiments 2 and 3 indicate that the intention to use particular stimuli is a crucial factor for the effectiveness of these stimuli when they are presented unconsciously. Additionally, these findings show that shifts of attention can be triggered by centrally presented masked arrow cues. Experiments 4 and 5 broaden these results to cue stimuli that are not inherently associated with a spatial meaning. The finding corroborate that typically endogenously controlled shifts of attention can also be induced by unconscious stimuli. Experiments 6 and 7 demonstrate that even a central cognitive control process like task set activation is not contingent on conscious awareness, but can in contrast be triggered through unconscious stimulation. Finally, these results are integrated and I discuss how the concept of cognitive control and the limits of unconscious processing may have to be reconsidered. Furthermore, potential future research possibilities in this field are presented.}, subject = {Bewusstsein}, language = {en} } @article{MeuleKueblerBlechert2013, author = {Meule, Adrian and K{\"u}bler, Andrea and Blechert, Jens}, title = {Time course of electrocortical food-cue responses during cognitive regulation of craving}, series = {Frontiers in Psychology}, volume = {4}, journal = {Frontiers in Psychology}, number = {669}, issn = {1664-1078}, doi = {10.3389/fpsyg.2013.00669}, url = {http://nbn-resolving.de/urn:nbn:de:bvb:20-opus-122566}, year = {2013}, abstract = {In our current obesogenic environment, exposure to visual food-cues can easily lead to craving and overeating because short-term, pleasurable effects of food intake dominate over the anticipated long-term adverse effects such as weight gain and associated health problems. Here we contrasted these two conditions during food-cue presentation while acquiring event-related potentials (ERPs) and subjective craving ratings. Female participants (n = 25) were presented with either high-calorie (HC) or low-calorie (LC) food images under instructions to imagine either immediate (NOW) or long-term effects (LATER) of consumption. On subjective ratings for HC foods, the LATER perspective reduced cravings as compared to the NOW perspective. For LC foods, by contrast, craving increased under the LATER perspective. Early ERPs (occipital N1, 150-200 ms) were sensitive to food type but not to perspective. Late ERPs (late positive potential, LPP, 350-550 ms) were larger in the HC-LATER condition than in all other conditions, possibly indicating that a cognitive focus on negative long-term consequences induced negative arousal. This enhancement for HC-LATER attenuated to the level of the LC conditions during the later slow wave (550-3000 ms), but amplitude in the HC-NOW condition was larger than in all other conditions, possibly due to a delayed appetitive response. Across all conditions, LPP amplitudes were positively correlated with self-reported emotional eating. In sum, results reveal that regulation effects are secondary to an early attentional analysis of food type and dynamically evolve over time. Adopting a long-term perspective on eating might promote a healthier food choice across a range of food types.}, language = {en} } @article{FischerPlessowKiesel2013, author = {Fischer, Rico and Plessow, Franziska and Kiesel, Andrea}, title = {The effects of alerting signals in masked priming}, series = {Frontiers in Psychology}, volume = {4}, journal = {Frontiers in Psychology}, number = {448}, issn = {1664-1078}, doi = {10.3389/fpsyg.2013.00448}, url = {http://nbn-resolving.de/urn:nbn:de:bvb:20-opus-122581}, year = {2013}, abstract = {Alerting signals often serve to reduce temporal uncertainty by predicting the time of stimulus onset. The resulting response time benefits have often been explained by facilitated translation of stimulus codes into response codes on the basis of established stimulus-response (S-R) links. In paradigms of masked S-R priming alerting signals also modulate response activation processes triggered by subliminally presented prime stimuli. In the present study we tested whether facilitation of visuo-motor translation processes due to alerting signals critically depends on established S-R links. Alerting signals resulted in significantly enhanced masked priming effects for masked prime stimuli that included and that did not include established S-R links fi.e., target vs. novel primes). Yet, the alerting-priming interaction was more pronounced for target than for novel primes. These results suggest that effects of alerting signals on masked priming are especially evident when S-R links between prime and target exist. At the same time, an alerting-priming interaction also for novel primes suggests that alerting signals also facilitate stimulus-response translation processes when masked prime stimuli provide action-trigger conditions in terms of programmed S-R links.}, language = {en} } @article{EhrenfeldHerbortButz2013, author = {Ehrenfeld, Stephan and Herbort, Oliver and Butz, Martin V.}, title = {Modular neuron-based body estimation: maintaining consistency over different limbs, modalities, and frames of reference}, series = {Frontiers in Computational Neuroscience}, volume = {7}, journal = {Frontiers in Computational Neuroscience}, number = {148}, doi = {10.3389/fncom.2013.00148}, url = {http://nbn-resolving.de/urn:nbn:de:bvb:20-opus-122253}, year = {2013}, abstract = {This paper addresses the question of how the brain maintains a probabilistic body state estimate over time from a modeling perspective. The neural Modular Modality Frame (nMMF) model simulates such a body state estimation process by continuously integrating redundant, multimodal body state information sources. The body state estimate itself is distributed over separate, but bidirectionally interacting modules. nMMF compares the incoming sensory and present body state information across the interacting modules and fuses the information sources accordingly. At the same time, nMMF enforces body state estimation consistency across the modules. nMMF is able to detect conflicting sensory information and to consequently decrease the influence of implausible sensor sources on the fly. In contrast to the previously published Modular Modality Frame (MMF) model, nMMF offers a biologically plausible neural implementation based on distributed, probabilistic population codes. Besides its neural plausibility, the neural encoding has the advantage of enabling (a) additional probabilistic information flow across the separate body state estimation modules and (b) the representation of arbitrary probability distributions of a body state. The results show that the neural estimates can detect and decrease the impact of false sensory information, can propagate conflicting information across modules, and can improve overall estimation accuracy due to additional module interactions. Even bodily illusions, such as the rubber hand illusion, can be simulated with nMMF. We conclude with an outlook on the potential of modeling human data and of invoking goal-directed behavioral control.}, language = {en} } @article{SchwarzWieserGerdesetal.2013, author = {Schwarz, Katharina A. and Wieser, Matthias J. and Gerdes, Antje B. M. and M{\"u}hlberger, Andreas and Pauli, Paul}, title = {Why are you looking like that? How the context influences evaluation and processing of human faces}, series = {Social Cognitive and Affective Neuroscience}, volume = {8}, journal = {Social Cognitive and Affective Neuroscience}, number = {4}, doi = {10.1093/scan/nss013}, url = {http://nbn-resolving.de/urn:nbn:de:bvb:20-opus-132126}, pages = {438-445}, year = {2013}, abstract = {Perception and evaluation of facial expressions are known to be heavily modulated by emotional features of contextual information. Such contextual effects, however, might also be driven by non-emotional aspects of contextual information, an interaction of emotional and non-emotional factors, and by the observers' inherent traits. Therefore, we sought to assess whether contextual information about self-reference in addition to information about valence influences the evaluation and neural processing of neutral faces. Furthermore, we investigated whether social anxiety moderates these effects. In the present functional magnetic resonance imaging (fMRI) study, participants viewed neutral facial expressions preceded by a contextual sentence conveying either positive or negative evaluations about the participant or about somebody else. Contextual influences were reflected in rating and fMRI measures, with strong effects of self-reference on brain activity in the medial prefrontal cortex and right fusiform gyrus. Additionally, social anxiety strongly affected the response to faces conveying negative, self-related evaluations as revealed by the participants' rating patterns and brain activity in cortical midline structures and regions of interest in the left and right middle frontal gyrus. These results suggest that face perception and processing are highly individual processes influenced by emotional and non-emotional aspects of contextual information and further modulated by individual personality traits.}, language = {en} } @article{HalderHammerKleihetal.2013, author = {Halder, Sebastian and Hammer, Eva Maria and Kleih, Sonja Claudia and Bogdan, Martin and Rosenstiel, Wolfgang and Birbaumer, Niels and K{\"u}bler, Andrea}, title = {Prediction of Auditory and Visual P300 Brain-Computer Interface Aptitude}, series = {PLoS ONE}, volume = {8}, journal = {PLoS ONE}, number = {2}, url = {http://nbn-resolving.de/urn:nbn:de:bvb:20-opus-130327}, pages = {e53513}, year = {2013}, abstract = {Objective Brain-computer interfaces (BCIs) provide a non-muscular communication channel for patients with late-stage motoneuron disease (e.g., amyotrophic lateral sclerosis (ALS)) or otherwise motor impaired people and are also used for motor rehabilitation in chronic stroke. Differences in the ability to use a BCI vary from person to person and from session to session. A reliable predictor of aptitude would allow for the selection of suitable BCI paradigms. For this reason, we investigated whether P300 BCI aptitude could be predicted from a short experiment with a standard auditory oddball. Methods Forty healthy participants performed an electroencephalography (EEG) based visual and auditory P300-BCI spelling task in a single session. In addition, prior to each session an auditory oddball was presented. Features extracted from the auditory oddball were analyzed with respect to predictive power for BCI aptitude. Results Correlation between auditory oddball response and P300 BCI accuracy revealed a strong relationship between accuracy and N2 amplitude and the amplitude of a late ERP component between 400 and 600 ms. Interestingly, the P3 amplitude of the auditory oddball response was not correlated with accuracy. Conclusions Event-related potentials recorded during a standard auditory oddball session moderately predict aptitude in an audiory and highly in a visual P300 BCI. The predictor will allow for faster paradigm selection. Significance Our method will reduce strain on patients because unsuccessful training may be avoided, provided the results can be generalized to the patient population.}, language = {en} } @article{KleihKuebler2013, author = {Kleih, Sonja C. and K{\"u}bler, Andrea}, title = {Empathy, motivation, and P300-BCI performance}, series = {Frontiers in Human Neuroscience}, volume = {7}, journal = {Frontiers in Human Neuroscience}, number = {642}, doi = {10.3389/fnhum.2013.00642}, url = {http://nbn-resolving.de/urn:nbn:de:bvb:20-opus-130559}, year = {2013}, abstract = {Motivation moderately influences brain-computer interface (BCI) performance in healthy subjects when monetary reward is used to manipulate extrinsic motivation. However, the motivation of severely paralyzed patients, who are potentially in need for BCI, could mainly be internal and thus, an intrinsic motivator may be more powerful. Also healthy subjects who participate in BCI studies could be internally motivated as they may wish to contribute to research and thus extrinsic motivation by monetary reward would be less important than the content of the study. In this respect, motivation could be defined as "motivation-to-help." The aim of this study was to investigate, whether subjects with high motivation for helping and who are highly empathic would perform better with a BCI controlled by event-related potentials (P300-BCI). We included N = 20 healthy young participants na{\"i}ve to BCI and grouped them according to their motivation for participating in a BCI study in a low and highly motivated group. Motivation was further manipulated with interesting or boring presentations about BCI and the possibility to help patients. Motivation for helping did neither influence BCI performance nor the P300 amplitude. Post hoc, subjects were re-grouped according to their ability for perspective taking. We found significantly higher P300 amplitudes on parietal electrodes in participants with a low ability for perspective taking and therefore, lower empathy, as compared to participants with higher empathy. The lack of an effect of motivation on BCI performance contradicts previous findings and thus, requires further investigation. We speculate that subjects with higher empathy who are good perspective takers with regards to patients in potential need of BCI, may be more emotionally involved and therefore, less able to allocate attention on the BCI task at hand.}, language = {en} } @article{MusselGoeritzHewig2013, author = {Mussel, Patrick and G{\"o}ritz, Anja S. and Hewig, Johannes}, title = {The value of a smile: Facial expression affects ultimatum-game responses}, series = {Judgment and Decision Making}, volume = {8}, journal = {Judgment and Decision Making}, number = {3}, url = {http://nbn-resolving.de/urn:nbn:de:bvb:20-opus-129639}, pages = {381-385}, year = {2013}, abstract = {In social interaction, the facial expression of an opponent contains information that may influence the interaction. We asked whether facial expression affects decision-making in the ultimatum game. In this two-person game, the proposer divides a sum of money into two parts, one for each player, and then the responder decides whether to accept the offer or reject it. Rejection means that neither player gets any money. Results of a large-sample study support our hypothesis that offers from proposers with a smiling facial expression are more often accepted, compared to a neutral facial expression. Moreover, we found lower acceptance rates for offers from proposers with an angry facial expression.}, language = {en} } @article{EderRothermundDeHouwer2013, author = {Eder, Andreas B. and Rothermund, Klaus and De Houwer, Jan}, title = {Affective Compatibility between Stimuli and Response Goals: A Primer for a New Implicit Measure of Attitudes}, series = {PLoS ONE}, volume = {8}, journal = {PLoS ONE}, number = {11}, doi = {10.1371/journal.pone.0079210}, url = {http://nbn-resolving.de/urn:nbn:de:bvb:20-opus-129872}, pages = {e79210}, year = {2013}, abstract = {We examined whether a voluntary response becomes associated with the (affective) meaning of intended response effects. Four experiments revealed that coupling a keypress with positive or negative consequences produces affective compatibility effects when the keypress has to be executed in response to positively or negatively evaluated stimulus categories. In Experiment 1, positive words were evaluated faster with a keypress that turned the words ON (versus OFF), whereas negative words were evaluated faster with a keypress that turned the words OFF (versus ON). Experiment 2 showed that this compatibility effect is reversed if an aversive tone is turned ON and OFF with keypresses. Experiment 3 revealed that keypresses acquire an affective meaning even when the association between the responses and their effects is variable and intentionally reconfigured before each trial. Experiment 4 used affective response effects to assess implicit ingroup favoritism, showing that the measure is sensitive to the valence of categories and not to the valence of exemplars. Results support the hypothesis that behavioral reactions become associated with the affective meaning of the intended response goal, which has important implications for the understanding and construction of implicit attitude measures.}, language = {en} } @article{AndreattaMuehlbergerGlotzbachSchoonetal.2013, author = {Andreatta, Marta and M{\"u}hlberger, Andreas and Glotzbach-Schoon, Evelyn and Pauli, Paul}, title = {Pain predictability reverses valence ratings of a relief-associated stimulus}, series = {Front in Systems Neuroscience}, volume = {7}, journal = {Front in Systems Neuroscience}, number = {53}, doi = {10.3389/fnsys.2013.00053}, url = {http://nbn-resolving.de/urn:nbn:de:bvb:20-opus-129275}, year = {2013}, abstract = {Relief from pain is positively valenced and entails reward-like properties. Notably, stimuli that became associated with pain relief elicit reward-like implicit responses too, but are explicitly evaluated by humans as aversive. Since the unpredictability of pain makes pain more aversive, this study examined the hypotheses that the predictability of pain also modulates the valence of relief-associated stimuli. In two studies, we presented one conditioned stimulus \((_{FORWARD}CS+)\) before a painful unconditioned stimulus (US), another stimulus \((_{BACKWARD}CS+)\) after the painful US, and a third stimulus (CS-) was never associated with the US. In Study 1, \(_{FORWARD}CS+\) predicted half of the USs while the other half was delivered unwarned and followed by \(_{BACKWARD}CS+\). In Study 2, all USs were predicted by \(_{FORWARD}CS+\) and followed by \(_{BACKWARD}CS+\). In Study 1 both \(_{FORWARD}CS+\) and \(_{BACKWARD}CS+\) were rated as negatively valenced and high arousing after conditioning, while \(_{BACKWARD}CS+\) in Study 2 acquired positive valence and low arousal. Startle amplitude was significantly attenuated to \(_{BACKWARD}CS+\) compared to \(_{FORWARD}CS+\) in Study 2, but did not differ among CSs in Study 1. In summary, predictability of aversive events reverses the explicit valence of a relief-associated stimulus.}, language = {en} } @article{KopfDreslerReichertsetal.2013, author = {Kopf, Juliane and Dresler, Thomas and Reicherts, Philipp and Herrmann, Martin J. and Reif, Andreas}, title = {The Effect of Emotional Content on Brain Activation and the Late Positive Potential in a Word n-back Task}, series = {PLoS ONE}, journal = {PLoS ONE}, doi = {10.1371/journal.pone.0075598}, url = {http://nbn-resolving.de/urn:nbn:de:bvb:20-opus-96687}, year = {2013}, abstract = {Introduction There is mounting evidence for the influence of emotional content on working memory performance. This is particularly important in light of the emotion processing that needs to take place when emotional content interferes with executive functions. In this study, we used emotional words of different valence but with similar arousal levels in an n-back task. Methods We examined the effects on activation in the prefrontal cortex by means of functional near-infrared spectroscopy (fNIRS) and on the late positive potential (LPP). FNIRS and LPP data were examined in 30 healthy subjects. Results Behavioral results show an influence of valence on the error rate depending on the difficulty of the task: more errors were made when the valence was negative and the task difficult. Brain activation was dependent both on the difficulty of the task and on the valence: negative valence of a word diminished the increase in activation, whereas positive valence did not influence the increase in activation, while difficulty levels increased. The LPP also differentiated between the different valences, and in addition was influenced by the task difficulty, the more difficult the task, the less differentiation could be observed. Conclusions Summarized, this study shows the influence of valence on a verbal working memory task. When a word contained a negative valence, the emotional content seemed to take precedence in contrast to words containing a positive valence. Working memory and emotion processing sites seemed to overlap and compete for resources even when words are carriers of the emotional content.}, language = {en} } @article{PlatteHerbertPaulietal.2013, author = {Platte, Petra and Herbert, Cornelia and Pauli, Paul and Breslin, Paul A. S.}, title = {Oral Perceptions of Fat and Taste Stimuli Are Modulated by Affect and Mood Induction}, series = {PLoS ONE}, journal = {PLoS ONE}, doi = {10.1371/journal.pone.0065006}, url = {http://nbn-resolving.de/urn:nbn:de:bvb:20-opus-96421}, year = {2013}, abstract = {This study examined the impact of three clinical psychological variables (non-pathological levels of depression and anxiety, as well as experimentally manipulated mood) on fat and taste perception in healthy subjects. After a baseline orosensory evaluation, 'sad', 'happy' and 'neutral' video clips were presented to induce corresponding moods in eighty participants. Following mood manipulation, subjects rated five different oral stimuli, appearing sweet, umami, sour, bitter, fatty, which were delivered at five different concentrations each. Depression levels were assessed with Beck's Depression Inventory (BDI) and anxiety levels were assessed via the Spielberger's STAI-trait and state questionnaire. Overall, subjects were able to track the concentrations of the stimuli correctly, yet depression level affected taste ratings. First, depression scores were positively correlated with sucrose ratings. Second, subjects with depression scores above the sample median rated sucrose and quinine as more intense after mood induction (positive, negative and neutral). Third and most important, the group with enhanced depression scores did not rate low and high fat stimuli differently after positive or negative mood induction, whereas, during baseline or during the non-emotional neutral condition they rated the fat intensity as increasing with concentration. Consistent with others' prior observations we also found that sweet and bitter stimuli at baseline were rated as more intense by participants with higher anxiety scores and that after positive and negative mood induction, citric acid was rated as stronger tasting compared to baseline. The observation that subjects with mild subclinical depression rated low and high fat stimuli similarly when in positive or negative mood is novel and likely has potential implications for unhealthy eating patterns. This deficit may foster unconscious eating of fatty foods in sub-clinical mildly depressed populations.}, language = {en} } @article{PauliGlotzbachSchoonAndreattaetal.2013, author = {Pauli, Paul and Glotzbach-Schoon, Evelyn and Andreatta, Marta and Reif, Andreas and Ewald, Heike and Tr{\"o}ger, Christian and Baumann, Christian and Deckert, J{\"u}rgen and M{\"u}hlberger, Andreas}, title = {Contextual fear conditioning in virtual reality is affected by 5HTTLPR and NPSR1 polymorphisms: effects on fear-potentiated startle}, series = {Frontiers in Behavioral Neuroscience}, journal = {Frontiers in Behavioral Neuroscience}, doi = {10.3389/fnbeh.2013.00031}, url = {http://nbn-resolving.de/urn:nbn:de:bvb:20-opus-96516}, year = {2013}, abstract = {The serotonin (5-HT) and neuropeptide S (NPS) systems are discussed as important genetic modulators of fear and sustained anxiety contributing to the etiology of anxiety disorders. Sustained anxiety is a crucial characteristic of most anxiety disorders which likely develops through contextual fear conditioning. This study investigated if and how genetic alterations of the 5-HT and the NPS systems as well as their interaction modulate contextual fear conditioning; specifically, function polymorphic variants in the genes coding for the 5-HT transporter (5HTT) and the NPS receptor (NPSR1) were studied. A large group of healthy volunteers was therefore stratified for 5HTTLPR (S+ vs. LL carriers) and NPSR1 rs324981 (T+ vs. AA carriers) polymorphisms resulting in four genotype groups (S+/T+, S+/AA, LL/T+, LL/AA) of 20 participants each. All participants underwent contextual fear conditioning and extinction using a virtual reality (VR) paradigm. During acquisition, one virtual office room (anxiety context, CXT+) was paired with an unpredictable electric stimulus (unconditioned stimulus, US), whereas another virtual office room was not paired with any US (safety context, CXT-). During extinction no US was administered. Anxiety responses were quantified by fear-potentiated startle and ratings. Most importantly, we found a gene × gene interaction on fear-potentiated startle. Only carriers of both risk alleles (S+/T+) exhibited higher startle responses in CXT+ compared to CXT-. In contrast, anxiety ratings were only influenced by the NPSR1 polymorphism with AA carriers showing higher anxiety ratings in CXT+ as compared to CXT-. Our results speak in favor of a two level account of fear conditioning with diverging effects on implicit vs. explicit fear responses. Enhanced contextual fear conditioning as reflected in potentiated startle responses may be an endophenotype for anxiety disorders.}, language = {en} } @article{HerbertSfaerleaBlumenthal2013, author = {Herbert, Cornelia and Sf{\"a}rlea, Anca and Blumenthal, Terry}, title = {Your emotion or mine: labeling feelings alters emotional face perception—an ERP study on automatic and intentional affect labeling}, series = {Frontiers in Human Neuroscience}, journal = {Frontiers in Human Neuroscience}, doi = {10.3389/fnhum.2013.00378}, url = {http://nbn-resolving.de/urn:nbn:de:bvb:20-opus-97065}, year = {2013}, abstract = {Empirical evidence suggests that words are powerful regulators of emotion processing. Although a number of studies have used words as contextual cues for emotion processing, the role of what is being labeled by the words (i.e., one's own emotion as compared to the emotion expressed by the sender) is poorly understood. The present study reports results from two experiments which used ERP methodology to evaluate the impact of emotional faces and self- vs. sender-related emotional pronoun-noun pairs (e.g., my fear vs. his fear) as cues for emotional face processing. The influence of self- and sender-related cues on the processing of fearful, angry and happy faces was investigated in two contexts: an automatic (experiment 1) and intentional affect labeling task (experiment 2), along with control conditions of passive face processing. ERP patterns varied as a function of the label's reference (self vs. sender) and the intentionality of the labeling task (experiment 1 vs. experiment 2). In experiment 1, self-related labels increased the motivational relevance of the emotional faces in the time-window of the EPN component. Processing of sender-related labels improved emotion recognition specifically for fearful faces in the N170 time-window. Spontaneous processing of affective labels modulated later stages of face processing as well. Amplitudes of the late positive potential (LPP) were reduced for fearful, happy, and angry faces relative to the control condition of passive viewing. During intentional regulation (experiment 2) amplitudes of the LPP were enhanced for emotional faces when subjects used the self-related emotion labels to label their own emotion during face processing, and they rated the faces as higher in arousal than the emotional faces that had been presented in the "label sender's emotion" condition or the passive viewing condition. The present results argue in favor of a differentiated view of language-as-context for emotion processing.}, language = {en} } @article{KaufmannHolzKuebler2013, author = {Kaufmann, Tobias and Holz, Elisa M. and K{\"u}bler, Andrea}, title = {Comparison of tactile, auditory, and visual modality for brain-computer interface use: a case study with a patient in the locked-in state}, series = {Frontiers in Human Neuroscience}, journal = {Frontiers in Human Neuroscience}, doi = {10.3389/fnins.2013.00129}, url = {http://nbn-resolving.de/urn:nbn:de:bvb:20-opus-97079}, year = {2013}, abstract = {This paper describes a case study with a patient in the classic locked-in state, who currently has no means of independent communication. Following a user-centered approach, we investigated event-related potentials (ERP) elicited in different modalities for use in brain-computer interface (BCI) systems. Such systems could provide her with an alternative communication channel. To investigate the most viable modality for achieving BCI based communication, classic oddball paradigms (1 rare and 1 frequent stimulus, ratio 1:5) in the visual, auditory and tactile modality were conducted (2 runs per modality). Classifiers were built on one run and tested offline on another run (and vice versa). In these paradigms, the tactile modality was clearly superior to other modalities, displaying high offline accuracy even when classification was performed on single trials only. Consequently, we tested the tactile paradigm online and the patient successfully selected targets without any error. Furthermore, we investigated use of the visual or tactile modality for different BCI systems with more than two selection options. In the visual modality, several BCI paradigms were tested offline. Neither matrix-based nor so-called gaze-independent paradigms constituted a means of control. These results may thus question the gaze-independence of current gaze-independent approaches to BCI. A tactile four-choice BCI resulted in high offline classification accuracies. Yet, online use raised various issues. Although performance was clearly above chance, practical daily life use appeared unlikely when compared to other communication approaches (e.g., partner scanning). Our results emphasize the need for user-centered design in BCI development including identification of the best stimulus modality for a particular user. Finally, the paper discusses feasibility of EEG-based BCI systems for patients in classic locked-in state and compares BCI to other AT solutions that we also tested during the study.}, language = {en} } @article{HalderRufFurdeaetal.2013, author = {Halder, Sebastian and Ruf, Carolin Anne and Furdea, Adrian and Pasqualotto, Emanuele and De Massari, Daniele and van der Heiden, Linda and Bogdan, Martin and Rosenstiel, Wolfgang and Birbaumer, Niels and K{\"u}bler, Andrea and Matuz, Tamara}, title = {Prediction of P300 BCI Aptitude in Severe Motor Impairment}, series = {PLoS ONE}, journal = {PLoS ONE}, doi = {10.1371/journal.pone.0076148}, url = {http://nbn-resolving.de/urn:nbn:de:bvb:20-opus-97268}, year = {2013}, abstract = {Brain-computer interfaces (BCIs) provide a non-muscular communication channel for persons with severe motor impairments. Previous studies have shown that the aptitude with which a BCI can be controlled varies from person to person. A reliable predictor of performance could facilitate selection of a suitable BCI paradigm. Eleven severely motor impaired participants performed three sessions of a P300 BCI web browsing task. Before each session auditory oddball data were collected to predict the BCI aptitude of the participants exhibited in the current session. We found a strong relationship of early positive and negative potentials around 200 ms (elicited with the auditory oddball task) with performance. The amplitude of the P2 (r = -0.77) and of the N2 (r = -0.86) had the strongest correlations. Aptitude prediction using an auditory oddball was successful. The finding that the N2 amplitude is a stronger predictor of performance than P3 amplitude was reproduced after initially showing this effect with a healthy sample of BCI users. This will reduce strain on the end-users by minimizing the time needed to find suitable paradigms and inspire new approaches to improve performance.}, language = {en} } @article{BiehlEhlisMuelleretal.2013, author = {Biehl, Stefanie C. and Ehlis, Ann-Christine and M{\"u}ller, Laura D. and Niklaus, Andrea and Pauli, Paul and Herrmann, Martin J.}, title = {The impact of task relevance and degree of distraction on stimulus processing}, series = {BMC Neuroscience}, journal = {BMC Neuroscience}, doi = {10.1186/1471-2202-14-107}, url = {http://nbn-resolving.de/urn:nbn:de:bvb:20-opus-97271}, year = {2013}, abstract = {Background The impact of task relevance on event-related potential amplitudes of early visual processing was previously demonstrated. Study designs, however, differ greatly, not allowing simultaneous investigation of how both degree of distraction and task relevance influence processing variations. In our study, we combined different features of previous tasks. We used a modified 1-back task in which task relevant and task irrelevant stimuli were alternately presented. The task irrelevant stimuli could be from the same or from a different category as the task relevant stimuli, thereby producing high and low distracting task irrelevant stimuli. In addition, the paradigm comprised a passive viewing condition. Thus, our paradigm enabled us to compare the processing of task relevant stimuli, task irrelevant stimuli with differing degrees of distraction, and passively viewed stimuli. EEG data from twenty participants was collected and mean P100 and N170 amplitudes were analyzed. Furthermore, a potential connection of stimulus processing and symptoms of attention deficit hyperactivity disorder (ADHD) was investigated. Results Our results show a modulation of peak N170 amplitudes by task relevance. N170 amplitudes to task relevant stimuli were significantly higher than to high distracting task irrelevant or passively viewed stimuli. In addition, amplitudes to low distracting task irrelevant stimuli were significantly higher than to high distracting stimuli. N170 amplitudes to passively viewed stimuli were not significantly different from either kind of task irrelevant stimuli. Participants with more symptoms of hyperactivity and impulsivity showed decreased N170 amplitudes across all task conditions. On a behavioral level, lower N170 enhancement efficiency was significantly correlated with false alarm responses. Conclusions Our results point to a processing enhancement of task relevant stimuli. Unlike P100 amplitudes, N170 amplitudes were strongly influenced by enhancement and enhancement efficiency seemed to have direct behavioral consequences. These findings have potential implications for models of clinical disorders affecting selective attention, especially ADHD.}, language = {en} } @article{HalderVarkutiBogdanetal.2013, author = {Halder, Sebastian and Varkuti, Balint and Bogdan, Martin and K{\"u}bler, Andrea and Rosenstiel, Wolfgang and Sitaram, Ranganatha and Birbaumer, Niels}, title = {Prediction of brain-computer interface aptitude from individual brain structure}, series = {Frontiers in Human Neuroscience}, journal = {Frontiers in Human Neuroscience}, doi = {10.3389/fnhum.2013.00105}, url = {http://nbn-resolving.de/urn:nbn:de:bvb:20-opus-96558}, year = {2013}, abstract = {Objective: Brain-computer interface (BCI) provide a non-muscular communication channel for patients with impairments of the motor system. A significant number of BCI users is unable to obtain voluntary control of a BCI-system in proper time. This makes methods that can be used to determine the aptitude of a user necessary. Methods: We hypothesized that integrity and connectivity of involved white matter connections may serve as a predictor of individual BCI-performance. Therefore, we analyzed structural data from anatomical scans and DTI of motor imagery BCI-users differentiated into high and low BCI-aptitude groups based on their overall performance. Results: Using a machine learning classification method we identified discriminating structural brain trait features and correlated the best features with a continuous measure of individual BCI-performance. Prediction of the aptitude group of each participant was possible with near perfect accuracy (one error). Conclusions: Tissue volumetric analysis yielded only poor classification results. In contrast, the structural integrity and myelination quality of deep white matter structures such as the Corpus Callosum, Cingulum, and Superior Fronto-Occipital Fascicle were positively correlated with individual BCI-performance. Significance: This confirms that structural brain traits contribute to individual performance in BCI use.}, language = {en} } @article{HalderHammerKleihetal.2013, author = {Halder, Sebastian and Hammer, Eva Maria and Kleih, Sonja Claudia and Bogdan, Martin and Rosenstiel, Wolfgang and Birbaumer, Nils and K{\"u}bler, Andrea}, title = {Prediction of Auditory and Visual P300 Brain-Computer Interface Aptitude}, url = {http://nbn-resolving.de/urn:nbn:de:bvb:20-opus-77992}, year = {2013}, abstract = {Objective: Brain-computer interfaces (BCIs) provide a non-muscular communication channel for patients with late-stage motoneuron disease (e.g., amyotrophic lateral sclerosis (ALS)) or otherwise motor impaired people and are also used for motor rehabilitation in chronic stroke. Differences in the ability to use a BCI vary from person to person and from session to session. A reliable predictor of aptitude would allow for the selection of suitable BCI paradigms. For this reason, we investigated whether P300 BCI aptitude could be predicted from a short experiment with a standard auditory oddball. Methods: Forty healthy participants performed an electroencephalography (EEG) based visual and auditory P300-BCI spelling task in a single session. In addition, prior to each session an auditory oddball was presented. Features extracted from the auditory oddball were analyzed with respect to predictive power for BCI aptitude. Results: Correlation between auditory oddball response and P300 BCI accuracy revealed a strong relationship between accuracy and N2 amplitude and the amplitude of a late ERP component between 400 and 600 ms. Interestingly, the P3 amplitude of the auditory oddball response was not correlated with accuracy. Conclusions: Event-related potentials recorded during a standard auditory oddball session moderately predict aptitude in an audiory and highly in a visual P300 BCI. The predictor will allow for faster paradigm selection. Significance: Our method will reduce strain on patients because unsuccessful training may be avoided, provided the results can be generalized to the patient population.}, subject = {Psychologie}, language = {en} } @article{HerbertKueblerVoegele2013, author = {Herbert, Cornelia and K{\"u}bler, Andrea and V{\"o}gele, Klaus}, title = {Risk for Eating Disorders Modulates Startle-Responses to Body Words}, url = {http://nbn-resolving.de/urn:nbn:de:bvb:20-opus-78140}, year = {2013}, abstract = {Body image disturbances are core symptoms of eating disorders (EDs). Recent evidence suggests that changes in body image may occur prior to ED onset and are not restricted to in-vivo exposure (e.g. mirror image), but also evident during presentation of abstract cues such as body shape and weight-related words. In the present study startle modulation, heart rate and subjective evaluations were examined during reading of body words and neutral words in 41 student female volunteers screened for risk of EDs. The aim was to determine if responses to body words are attributable to a general negativity bias regardless of ED risk or if activated, ED relevant negative body schemas facilitate priming of defensive responses. Heart rate and word ratings differed between body words and neutral words in the whole female sample, supporting a general processing bias for body weight and shape-related concepts in young women regardless of ED risk. Startle modulation was specifically related to eating disorder symptoms, as was indicated by significant positive correlations with self-reported body dissatisfaction. These results emphasize the relevance of examining body schema representations as a function of ED risk across different levels of responding. Peripheral-physiological measures such as the startle reflex could possibly be used as predictors of females' risk for developing EDs in the future.}, subject = {Psychologie}, language = {en} } @phdthesis{Wu2013, author = {Wu, Lingdan}, title = {Emotion Regulation in Addicted Smokers}, url = {http://nbn-resolving.de/urn:nbn:de:bvb:20-opus-85471}, school = {Universit{\"a}t W{\"u}rzburg}, year = {2013}, abstract = {Background: Nicotine addiction is the most prevalent type of drug addiction that has been described as a cycle of spiraling dysregulation of the brain reward systems. Imaging studies have shown that nicotine addiction is associated with abnormal function in prefrontal brain regions that are important for cognitive emotion regulation. It was assumed that addicts may perform less well than healthy nonsmokers in cognitive emotion regulation tasks. The primary aims of this thesis were to investigate emotional responses to natural rewards among smokers and nonsmokers and to determine whether smokers differ from nonsmokers in cognitive regulation of positive and negative emotions. To address these aims, two forms of appraisal paradigms (i.e., appraisal frame and reappraisal) were applied to compare changes in emotional responses of smokers with that of nonsmokers as a function of appraisal strategies. Experiment 1: The aim of the first experiment was to evaluate whether and how appraisal frames preceding positive and negative picture stimuli affect emotional experience and facial expression of individuals. Twenty participants were exposed to 125 pairs of auditory appraisal frames (either neutral or emotional) followed by picture stimuli reflecting five conditions: unpleasant-negative, unpleasant-neutral, pleasant-positive, pleasant-neutral and neutral-neutral. Ratings of valence and arousal as well as facial EMG activity over the corrugator supercilii and the zygomaticus major were measured simultaneously. The results indicated that appraisal frames could alter both subjective emotional experience and facial expressions, irrespective of the valence of the pictorial stimuli. These results suggest and support that appraisal frame is an efficient paradigm in regulation of multi-level emotional responses. 8 Experiment 2: The second experiment applied the appraisal frame paradigm to investigate how smokers differ from nonsmokers on cognitive emotion regulation. Sixty participants (22 nonsmokers, 19 nondeprived smokers and 19 12-h deprived smokers) completed emotion regulation tasks as described in Experiment 1 while emotional responses were concurrently recorded as reflected by self-ratings and psychophysiological measures (i.e., facial EMG and EEG). The results indicated that there was no group difference on emotional responses to natural rewards. Moreover, nondeprived smokers and deprived smokers performed as well as nonsmokers on the emotion regulation task. The lack of group differences in multiple emotional responses (i.e., self-reports, facial EMG activity and brain EEG activity) suggests that nicotine addicts have no deficit in cognitive emotion regulation of natural rewards via appraisal frames. Experiment 3: The third experiment aimed to further evaluate smokers' emotion regulation ability by comparing performances of smokers and nonsmokers in a more challenging cognitive task (i.e., reappraisal task). Sixty-five participants (23 nonsmokers, 22 nondeprived smokers and 20 12-h deprived smokers) were instructed to regulate emotions by imagining that the depicted negative or positive scenario would become less negative or less positive over time, respectively. The results showed that nondeprived smokers and deprived smokers responded similarly to emotional pictures and performed as well as nonsmokers in down-regulating positive and negative emotions via the reappraisal strategy. These results indicated that nicotine addicts do not have deficit in emotion regulation using cognitive appraisal strategies. In sum, the three studies consistently revealed that addicted smokers were capable to regulate emotions via appraisal strategies. This thesis establishes the groundwork for therapeutic use of appraisal instructions to cope with potential self-regulation failures in nicotine addicts.}, subject = {Gef{\"u}hl}, language = {en} } @phdthesis{Reicherts2013, author = {Reicherts, Philipp}, title = {Cognitive and Emotional Influences on Placebo Analgesia and Nocebo Hyperalgesia}, url = {http://nbn-resolving.de/urn:nbn:de:bvb:20-opus-106455}, school = {Universit{\"a}t W{\"u}rzburg}, year = {2013}, abstract = {The perception of pain can be modulated by a variety of factors such as biological/pharmacological treatments as well as potent cognitive and emotional manipulations. Placebo and nocebo effects are among the most prominent examples for such manipulations. Placebo and nocebo manipulations cause reliable psychological and physiological changes, although the administered agent or treatment is inert. The present dissertation aimed at investigating the role of cognitive and emotional influences in the generation of placebo and nocebo effects on pain perception. In addition, the feasibility of solely psychological placebo manipulations to alter the perception of pain was tested. Two commonly discussed preconditions for the generation of placebo and nocebo effects are prior experiences (i.e., past encounter of drug effects) and expectations (i.e., positive or negative attitudes towards an intervention). So far, research on placebo and nocebo effects relied on the administration of sham interventions, which resembled medical treatments like inert pills, creams or injections. However, such experimental procedures deal with confounds due to earlier experiences and expectations resulting from the individual's history with medical interventions. Accordingly, the implementation of a placebo manipulation that is completely new to an individual, seems necessary to disentangle the contribution of experience and expectation for the induction of placebo and nocebo effects. To this end, in Experiment 1 the level of experience and expectation regarding a placebo-nocebo treatment was stepwise manipulated across three different experimental groups. To avoid any resemblances to earlier experiences and individual expectations, a mere psychological placebo-nocebo treatment was chosen that was new to all participants. They were instructed that visual black and white stripe patterns had been found to reliably alter the perception of pain. One group of participants received only the placebo-nocebo instruction (expectation), a second group experienced a placebo-nocebo treatment within a conditioning phase (experience) but no instruction, and a third group received the combination of both that is a placebo-nocebo instruction and a placebo-nocebo conditioning (experience + expectation). It was shown that only the experience + expectation group revealed significantly higher pain ratings and physiological responses during nocebo, compared to placebo trials of the succeeding test phase. These findings demonstrate that the induction of a mere psychological placebo-nocebo effect on pain is in principle possible. Most important, results indicate that such effects most likely rely on both, a positive treatment experience, due to the encounter of an effective intervention (placebo conditioning), and a positive expectation about the intervention (placebo instruction).Besides experience and expectation, the current mood state has been shown to modulate pain and to impact the induction of placebo and nocebo effects. In this vein it has been demonstrated that placebo effects come along with positive affect, while nocebo effects often occur together with elevated feelings of anxiety. To clarify the interaction of emotions and placebo-nocebo manipulations on pain perception, in Experiment 2 the paradigm of Experiment 1 was modified. Instead of black and white stripe patterns, positive and negative emotional pictures were presented, which either cued pain increase (nocebo) or pain decrease (placebo). Two experimental groups were compared, which differed with regard to the instructed contingency of positive pictures serving as placebo and negative pictures serving as nocebo cues or vice versa (congruent vs. incongruent). Results indicate that the differentiation of placebo and nocebo trials (behaviorally and physiologically) was more pronounced for the congruent compared to the incongruent group. However, in the incongruent group, affective pain ratings were also significantly higher for nocebo (positive pictures) than placebo (negative pictures) trials, similar to the congruent group. These findings demonstrate that a placebo-nocebo manipulation is capable to dampen and even reverse the originally pain augmenting effect of negative emotions. The results of Experiment 2 were further corroborated in Experiment 3, when the design was adapted to the fMRI scanner, and again a congruent and an incongruent experimental group were compared. Behavioral, physiological and neurophysiological markers of pain processing revealed a differentiation between nocebo and placebo conditions that was present irrespective of the experimental group. In addition, the fMRI analysis revealed an increased engagement of prefrontal areas for the incongruent group only, supposedly reflecting the reinterpretation or appraisal process when positive pictures were cueing negative outcomes. Taken together, the results of the present studies showed (a) that it is possible to induce a placebo-nocebo effect on pain solely by a psychological manipulation, (b) that both, prior experiences and positive expectation, are necessary preconditions for this placebo-nocebo effect, (c) that the impact of negative emotion on pain can be dampened and even reversed by placebo-nocebo manipulations, and (d) that most likely a cognitive top-down process is crucial for the induction of (psychological) placebo-nocebo effects. These results significantly enhance our understanding of psychological mechanisms involved in the induction of placebo-nocebo effects. Further, a fruitful foundation for future studies is provided, which will need to determine the contributions of primarily nocebo or placebo responses mediating the effects as demonstrated in the present studies. In a long-term perspective, the present findings may also help to exploit placebo effects and prevent from nocebo effect in clinical contexts by further elucidating crucial psychological factors that contribute to the placebo and nocebo response.}, subject = {Placebo}, language = {en} } @phdthesis{Kaufmann2013, author = {Kaufmann, Tobias}, title = {Brain-computer interfaces based on event-related potentials: toward fast, reliable and easy-to-use communication systems for people with neurodegenerative disease}, url = {http://nbn-resolving.de/urn:nbn:de:bvb:20-opus-83441}, school = {Universit{\"a}t W{\"u}rzburg}, year = {2013}, abstract = {Objective: Brain Computer Interfaces (BCI) provide a muscle independent interaction channel making them particularly valuable for individuals with severe motor impairment. Thus, different BCI systems and applications have been proposed as assistive technology (AT) solutions for such patients. The most prominent system for communication utilizes event-related potentials (ERP) obtained from the electroencephalogram (EEG) to allow for communication on a character-by-character basis. Yet in their current state of technology, daily life use cases of such systems are rare. In addition to the high EEG preparation effort, one of the main reasons is the low information throughput compared to other existing AT solutions. Furthermore, when testing BCI systems in patients, a performance drop is usually observed compared to healthy users. Patients often display a low signal-to-noise ratio of the recorded EEG and detection of brain responses may be aggravated due to internally (e.g. spasm) or externally induced artifacts (e.g. from ventilation devices). Consequently, practical BCI systems need to cope with mani-fold inter-individual differences. Whilst these high demands lead to increasing complexity of the technology, daily life use of BCI systems requires straightforward setup including an easy-to-use graphical user interface that nonprofessionals can handle without expert support. Research questions of this thesis: This dissertation project aimed at bringing forward BCI technology toward a possible integration into end-users' daily life. Four basic research questions were addressed: (1) Can we identify performance predictors so that we can provide users with individual BCI solutions without the need of multiple, demanding testing sessions? (2) Can we provide complex BCI technology in an automated, user-friendly and easy-to-use manner, so that BCIs can be used without expert support at end-users' homes? (3) How can we account for and improve the low information transfer rates as compared to other existing assistive technology solutions? (4) How can we prevent the performance drop often seen when bringing BCI technology that was tested in healthy users to those with severe motor impairment? Results and discussion: (1) Heart rate variability (HRV) as an index of inhibitory control (i.e. the ability to allocate attention resources and inhibit distracting stimuli) was significantly related to ERP-BCI performance and accounted for almost 26\% of variance. HRV is easy to assess from short heartbeat recordings and may thus serve as a performance predictor for ERP-BCIs. Due to missing software solutions for appropriate processing of artifacts in heartbeat data (electrocardiogram and inter-beat interval data), our own tool was developed that is available free of charge. To date, more than 100 researchers worldwide have requested the tool. Recently, a new version was developed and released together with a website (www.artiifact.de). (2) Furthermore, a study of this thesis demonstrated that BCI technology can be incorporated into easy-to-use software, including auto-calibration and predictive text entry. Na{\"i}ve, healthy nonprofessionals were able to control the software without expert support and successfully spelled words using the auto-calibrated BCI. They reported that software handling was straightforward and that they would be able to explain the system to others. However, future research is required to study transfer of the results to patient samples. (3) The commonly used ERP-BCI paradigm was significantly improved. Instead of simply highlighting visually displayed characters as is usually done, pictures of famous faces were used as stimulus material. As a result, specific brain potentials involved in face recognition and face processing were elicited. The event-related EEG thus displayed an increased signal-to-noise ratio, which facilitated the detection of ERPs extremely well. Consequently, BCI performance was significantly increased. (4) The good results of this new face-flashing paradigm achieved with healthy participants transferred well to users with neurodegenerative disease. Using a face paradigm boosted information throughput. Importantly, two users who were highly inefficient with the commonly used paradigm displayed high accuracy when exposed to the face paradigm. The increased signal-to-noise ratio of the recorded EEG thus helped them to overcome their BCI inefficiency. Significance: The presented work at hand (1) successfully identified a physiological predictor of ERP-BCI performance, (2) proved the technology ready to be operated by na{\"i}ve nonprofessionals without expert support, (3) significantly improved the commonly used spelling paradigm and (4) thereby displayed a way to effectively prevent BCI inefficiency in patients with neurodegenerative disease. Additionally, missing software solutions for appropriate handling of artifacts in heartbeat data encouraged development of our own software tool that is available to the research community free of charge. In sum, this thesis significantly improved current BCI technology and enhanced our understanding of physiological correlates of BCI performance.}, subject = {Gehirn-Computer-Schnittstelle}, language = {en} } @article{MeuleFathRealetal.2013, author = {Meule, Adrian and Fath, Katharina and Real, Ruben G. L. and S{\"u}tterlin, Stefan and V{\"o}gele, Claus and K{\"u}bler, Andrea}, title = {Quality of life, emotion regulation, and heart rate variability in individuals with intellectual disabilities and concomitant impaired vision}, series = {Psychology of Well-Being: Theory, Research and Practice}, journal = {Psychology of Well-Being: Theory, Research and Practice}, doi = {10.1186/2211-1522-3-1}, url = {http://nbn-resolving.de/urn:nbn:de:bvb:20-opus-96247}, year = {2013}, abstract = {Background Positive associations have been found between quality of life, emotion regulation strategies, and heart rate variability (HRV) in people without intellectual disabilities. However, emotion regulation and HRV have rarely been investigated in people with intellectual disabilities. Assessment of subjectively reported quality of life and emotion regulation strategies in this population is even more difficult when participants are also visually impaired. Methods Subjective and objective quality of life, emotion regulation strategies, and HRV at rest were measured in a sample of people with intellectual disabilities and concomitant impaired vision (N = 35). Heart rate was recorded during a 10 min resting period. For the assessment of quality of life and emotion regulation, custom made tactile versions of questionnaire-based instruments were used that enabled participants to grasp response categories. Results The combined use of reappraisal and suppression as emotion regulation strategies was associated with higher HRV and quality of life. HRV was associated with objective quality of life only. Emotion regulation strategies partially mediated the relationship between HRV and quality of life. Conclusions Results replicate findings about associations between quality of life, emotion regulation, and HRV and extend them to individuals with intellectual disabilities. Furthermore, this study demonstrated that quality of life and emotion regulation could be assessed in such populations even with concomitant impaired vision with modified tactile versions of established questionnaires. HRV may be used as a physiological index to evaluate physical and affective conditions in this population.}, language = {en} } @article{KirschHerbortButzetal.2012, author = {Kirsch, Wladimir and Herbort, Oliver and Butz, Martin V. and Kunde, Wilfried}, title = {Influence of Motor Planning on Distance Perception within the Peripersonal Space}, url = {http://nbn-resolving.de/urn:nbn:de:bvb:20-opus-75332}, year = {2012}, abstract = {We examined whether movement costs as defined by movement magnitude have an impact on distance perception in near space. In Experiment 1, participants were given a numerical cue regarding the amplitude of a hand movement to be carried out. Before the movement execution, the length of a visual distance had to be judged. These visual distances were judged to be larger, the larger the amplitude of the concurrently prepared hand movement was. In Experiment 2, in which numerical cues were merely memorized without concurrent movement planning, this general increase of distance with cue size was not observed. The results of these experiments indicate that visual perception of near space is specifically affected by the costs of planned hand movements.}, subject = {Psychologie}, language = {en} } @phdthesis{Kinateder2012, author = {Kinateder, Max}, title = {Social Influence in Emergency Situations - Studies in Virtual Reality}, url = {http://nbn-resolving.de/urn:nbn:de:bvb:20-opus-76805}, school = {Universit{\"a}t W{\"u}rzburg}, year = {2012}, abstract = {In 1999, a tragic catastrophe occurred in the Mont Blanc Tunnel, one of the most important transalpine road tunnels. Twenty-seven of the victims never left their vehicles as a result of which they were trapped in smoke and suffocated (Beard \& Carvel, 2005). Immediate evacuation is crucial in tunnel fires, but still many tunnel users stay passive. During emergency situations people strongly influence each other's behavior (e.g. Nilsson \& Johansson, 2009a). So far, only few empirical experimental studies investigated the interaction of individuals during emergencies. Recent developments of advanced immersive virtual worlds, allow simulating emergency situations which makes analogue studies possible. In the present dissertation project, theoretical aspects of human behavior and SI in emergencies are addressed (Chapter 1). The question of Social Influence in emergency situations is investigated in five simulation studies during different relevant stages of the evacuation process from a simulated road tunnel fire (Chapter 2). In the last part, the results are discussed and criticized (Chapter 3). Using a virtual reality (VR) road tunnel scenario, study 1 (pilot study) and 2 investigated the effect of information about adequate behavior in tunnel emergencies as well as Social Influence (SI) on drivers' behavior. Based on a classic study of Darley and Latan{\´e} (1968) on bystander inhibition, the effect of passive bystanders on self-evacuation was analyzed. Sixty participants were confronted with an accident and smoke in a road tunnel. The presence of bystanders and information status was manipulated and consequently, participants were randomly assigned into four different groups. Informed participants read a brochure containing relevant information about safety behavior in emergency situations prior to the tunnel drives. In the bystander conditions, passive bystanders were situated in a car in front of the emergency situation. Participants who had received relevant information left the car more frequently than the other participants. Neither significant effect of bystanders nor interaction with information status on the participants' behavior was observed. Study 3 (pilot study) examined a possible alternative explanation for weak SI in VR. Based on the Threshold Theory of Social Influence (Blascovich, 2002b) and the work of Guadagno et al. (2007), the perception of virtual humans as an avatar (a virtual representation of a real human being) or as an agent (a computer-controlled animated character) was manipulated. Subsequently, 32 participants experienced an accident similar to the one in study 1. However, they were co-drivers and a virtual agent (VA) was the driver. Participants reacted differently in avatar and agent condition. Consequently, the manipulation of the avatar condition was implemented in study 4. In study 4, SI within the vehicle was investigated, as drivers are mostly not alone in their car. In a tunnel scenario similar to the first study, 34 participants were confronted with an emergency situation either as drivers or co-drivers. In the driver group, participants drove themselves and a VA was sitting on the passenger seat. Correspondently, participants in the co-driver group were seated on the passenger seat and the VA drove the vehicle on a pre-recorded path. Like in study 1, the tunnel was blocked by an accident and smoke was coming from the accident in one drive. The VA initially stayed inactive after stopping the vehicle but started to evacuate after ca. 30 seconds. About one third of the sample left the vehicle during the situation. There were no significant differences between drivers and co-drivers regarding the frequency of leaving the vehicle. Co-drivers waited significantly longer than drivers before leaving the vehicle. Study 5 looked at the pre-movement and movement phase of the evacuation process. Forty participants were repeatedly confronted with an emergency situation in a virtual road tunnel filled with smoke. Four different experimental conditions systematically varied the presence and behavior of a VA. In all but one conditions a VA was present. Across all conditions at least 60\% of the participants went to the emergency exit. If the VA went to the emergency exit, the ratio increased to 75\%. If the VA went in the opposite direction of the exit, however, only 61\% went there. If participants were confronted with a passive VA, they needed significantly longer until they started moving and reached the emergency exit. The main and most important finding across all studies is that SI is relevant for self-evacuation, but the degree of SI varies across the phases of evacuation and situation. In addition to the core findings, relevant theoretical and methodological questions regarding the general usefulness and limitations of VR as a research tool are discussed. Finally, a short summary and outlook on possible future studies is presented.}, subject = {Notfall}, language = {en} } @phdthesis{Walter2012, author = {Walter, Martina}, title = {A new methodological approach to assess drug driving - The German Smartphone Survey}, url = {http://nbn-resolving.de/urn:nbn:de:bvb:20-opus-75283}, school = {Universit{\"a}t W{\"u}rzburg}, year = {2012}, abstract = {The aim of the present piece of work was to give information about the frequency of psychoactive substances within the German driver population and to identify preventive and promotive circumstances of drug driving. Furthermore, a new methodological approach to gather and link data about the consumption of psychoactive substances and the mobility of drug users is shown. Traditionally, roadside surveys are conducted to estimate the prevalence of drug driving within a population. By the present study, an alternative method is introduced. In total, 195 drug users (mainly cannabis users) and 100 controls out of the normal driving population were queried for four weeks about their driving and drug consumption behaviour by a questionnaire that was deployed on smartphones. The prevalences of drug driving within the sample were extrapolated into representative values. Because the subjects reported all daily activities within the study-period, it was also possible to describe situations in which the subjects decided against driving under influence. Besides, relevant previous experiences, attitudes, the approval of legal regulations, other traffic-specific parameters, social influences and personality variables were queried. So, individual factors that are associated with drug driving can be specified. The results are integrated in a model that shows dependencies of different societal, behavioural and legal variables. They can serve as major input to the discussion on drug driving and can be of practical use for rehabilitation and prevention purposes. The results can be summarised as follows: - Compared to the results of a German roadside survey from 1994, the prevalences that are found within the present study seem pretty low. This finding is discussed and possible explanations for the described trend are lined out. Furthermore, the prevalences that were calculated in the present study are compared to current data from other European countries. - The results show differences between users and controls on several variables. The differences indicate that substance use impacts on the structuring of day-to-day life. Overall, the controls' days proceed more along a daily working routine than the users' (e.g. less mobility at night, more mobility at rush-hour, alcohol consumption mainly at nights out). - The individual extent to which drugs are consumed differs dependent on daytime, day of the week and kind of substance. Of course, these dependencies also influence the occurrence of drug driving. Other factors of influence on drug driving are the distance, the availability of alternative modes of transport as well as the presence of female companions. - Not everybody who uses drugs drives under the influence of drugs. A striking predictor for frequent drug driving and highly intoxicated driving is a high consumption, associated with risky consumption patterns and a low subjective feeling of impairment after drug consumption. - The subjects' attitudes towards drug driving and their beliefs about social norms largely go in line with the behaviour they engage in. Drug users have rather liberal attitudes towards drug use and driving under influence. - A possible deterrence effect of sanctioning and police enforcement and its dependence on the acceptance and awareness of the measures is delineated. - Only small effects are found when examining the objective impairment that is caused by drug use by a computer-based test battery. This result is critically discussed with regards to the operationalisation of the study groups. - Except from driving under influence, there is no evidence to suggest that DUI offenders also show problematic behaviour according to other traffic-related measures. - Parents and peers may have an influence as role models on the development of problematic behaviour. A good relationship between parents and children may have a positive impact on the development of conventional values and behaviour. - Drug use is associated with some crucial personality dimensions and drugs are often used to solve personal problems. A less precise but similar difference was found for users who commit many drives under influence compared to users who never or only sometimes drive under influence. Moreover, users marginally more often have psychological problems compared to controls. Finally, the strengths and weaknesses of the new methodological approach of data collection are discussed as well as the challenges that are faced when implementing it. All in all, it has proved to be a promising method and should serve as a standard to which future studies should aspire.}, subject = {Verkehrspsychologie}, language = {en} } @article{ConzelmannReifJacobetal.2012, author = {Conzelmann, Annette and Reif, Andreas and Jacob, Christian and Weyers, Peter and Lesch, Klaus-Peter and Lutz, Beat and Pauli, Paul}, title = {A polymorphism in the gene of the endocannabinoid-degrading enzyme FAAH (FAAH C385A) is associated with emotional-motivational reactivity}, series = {Psychopharmacology}, volume = {224}, journal = {Psychopharmacology}, number = {4}, doi = {10.1007/s00213-012-2785-y}, url = {http://nbn-resolving.de/urn:nbn:de:bvb:20-opus-126845}, pages = {573-579}, year = {2012}, abstract = {RATIONALE: The endocannabinoid (eCB) system is implicated in several psychiatric disorders. Investigating emotional-motivational dysfunctions as underlying mechanisms, a study in humans revealed that in the C385A polymorphism of the fatty acid amide hydrolase (FAAH), the degrading enzyme of the eCB anandamide (AEA), A carriers, who are characterized by increased signaling of AEA as compared to C/C carriers, exhibited reduced brain reactivity towards unpleasant faces and enhanced reactivity towards reward. However, the association of eCB system with emotional-motivational reactivity is complex and bidirectional due to upcoming compensatory processes. OBJECTIVES: Therefore, we further investigated the relationship of the FAAH polymorphism and emotional-motivational reactivity in humans. METHODS: We assessed the affect-modulated startle, and ratings of valence and arousal in response to higher arousing pleasant, neutral, and unpleasant pictures in 67 FAAH C385A C/C carriers and 45 A carriers. RESULTS: Contrarily to the previous functional MRI study, A carriers compared to C/C carriers exhibited an increased startle potentiation and therefore emotional responsiveness towards unpleasant picture stimuli and reduced startle inhibition indicating reduced emotional reactivity in response to pleasant pictures, while both groups did not differ in ratings of arousal and valence. CONCLUSIONS: Our findings emphasize the bidirectionality and thorough examination of the eCB system's impact on emotional reactivity as a central endophenotype underlying various psychiatric disorders.}, language = {en} } @article{ReussKieselKundeetal.2012, author = {Reuss, Heiko and Kiesel, Andrea and Kunde, Wilfried and W{\"u}hr, Peter}, title = {A cue from the unconscious - masked symbols prompt spatial anticipation}, series = {Frontiers in Psychology}, volume = {3}, journal = {Frontiers in Psychology}, url = {http://nbn-resolving.de/urn:nbn:de:bvb:20-opus-123971}, pages = {397}, year = {2012}, abstract = {Anticipating where an event will occur enables us to instantaneously respond to events that occur at the expected location. Here we investigated if such spatial anticipations can be triggered by symbolic information that participants cannot consciously see. In two experiments involving a Posner cueing task and a visual search task, a central cue informed participants about the likely location of the next target stimulus. In half of the trials, this cue was rendered invisible by pattern masking. In both experiments, visible cues led to cueing effects, that is, faster responses after valid compared to invalid cues. Importantly, even masked cues caused cueing effects, though to a lesser extent. Additionally, we analyzed effects on attention that persist from one trial to the subsequent trial. We found that spatial anticipations are able to interfere with newly formed spatial anticipations and influence orienting of attention in the subsequent trial. When the preceding cue was visible, the corresponding spatial anticipation persisted to an extent that prevented a noticeable effect of masked cues. The effects of visible cues were likewise modulated by previous spatial anticipations, but were strong enough to also exert an impact on attention themselves. Altogether, the results suggest that spatial anticipations can be formed on the basis of unconscious stimuli, but that interfering influences like still active spatial anticipations can suppress this effect.}, language = {en} } @article{MeuleKuebler2012, author = {Meule, Adrian and K{\"u}bler, Andrea}, title = {The translation of substance dependence criteria to food-related behaviors: different views and interpretations.}, series = {Frontiers in psychiatry}, journal = {Frontiers in psychiatry}, doi = {10.3389/fpsyt.2012.00064}, url = {http://nbn-resolving.de/urn:nbn:de:bvb:20-opus-123092}, year = {2012}, abstract = {No abstract available.}, language = {en} } @article{SuetterlinPaapBabicetal.2012, author = {S{\"u}tterlin, Stefan and Paap, Muirne C. S. and Babic, Stana and K{\"u}bler, Andrea and V{\"o}gele, Claus}, title = {Rumination and Age: Some Things Get Better}, series = {Journal of Aging Research}, volume = {2012}, journal = {Journal of Aging Research}, number = {267327}, doi = {10.1155/2012/267327}, url = {http://nbn-resolving.de/urn:nbn:de:bvb:20-opus-124356}, year = {2012}, abstract = {Rumination has been defined as a mode of responding to distress that involves passively focusing one's attention on symptoms of distress without taking action. This dysfunctional response style intensifies depressed mood, impairs interpersonal problem solving, and leads to more pessimistic future perspectives and less social support. As most of these results were obtained from younger people, it remains unclear how age affects ruminative thinking. Three hundred members of the general public ranging in age from 15 to 87 years were asked about their ruminative styles using the Response Styles Questionnaire (RSQ), depression and satisfaction with life. A Mokken Scale analysis confirmed the two-factor structure of the RSQ with brooding and reflective pondering as subcomponents of rumination. Older participants (63 years and older) reported less ruminative thinking than other age groups. Life satisfaction was associated with brooding and highest for the earlier and latest life stages investigated in this study.}, language = {en} } @article{StippekohlWinklerWalteretal.2012, author = {Stippekohl, Bastian and Winkler, Markus H. and Walter, Bertram and Kagerer, Sabine and Mucha, Ronald F. and Pauli, Paul and Vaitl, Dieter and Stark, Rudolf}, title = {Neural Responses to Smoking Stimuli Are Influenced by Smokers' Attitudes towards Their Own Smoking Behaviour}, series = {PLoS One}, volume = {7}, journal = {PLoS One}, number = {11}, doi = {10.1371/journal.pone.0046782}, url = {http://nbn-resolving.de/urn:nbn:de:bvb:20-opus-124393}, year = {2012}, abstract = {An important feature of addiction is the high drug craving that may promote the continuation of consumption. Environmental stimuli classically conditioned to drug-intake have a strong motivational power for addicts and can elicit craving. However, addicts differ in the attitudes towards their own consumption behavior: some are content with drug taking (consonant users) whereas others are discontent (dissonant users). Such differences may be important for clinical practice because the experience of dissonance might enhance the likelihood to consider treatment. This fMRI study investigated in smokers whether these different attitudes influence subjective and neural responses to smoking stimuli. Based on self-characterization, smokers were divided into consonant and dissonant smokers. These two groups were presented smoking stimuli and neutral stimuli. Former studies have suggested differences in the impact of smoking stimuli depending on the temporal stage of the smoking ritual they are associated with. Therefore, we used stimuli associated with the beginning (BEGIN-smoking-stimuli) and stimuli associated with the terminal stage (END-smoking-stimuli) of the smoking ritual as distinct stimulus categories. Stimulus ratings did not differ between both groups. Brain data showed that BEGIN-smoking-stimuli led to enhanced mesolimbic responses (amygdala, hippocampus, insula) in dissonant compared to consonant smokers. In response to END-smoking-stimuli, dissonant smokers showed reduced mesocortical responses (orbitofrontal cortex, subcallosal cortex) compared to consonant smokers. These results suggest that smoking stimuli with a high incentive value (BEGIN-smoking-stimuli) are more appetitive for dissonant than consonant smokers at least on the neural level. To the contrary, smoking stimuli with low incentive value (END-smoking-stimuli) seem to be less appetitive for dissonant smokers than consonant smokers. These differences might be one reason why dissonant smokers experience difficulties in translating their attitudes into an actual behavior change.}, language = {en} } @article{RitzEnlowSchulzetal.2012, author = {Ritz, Thomas and Enlow, Michelle Bosquet and Schulz, Stefan M. and Kitts, Robert and Staudenmayer, John and Wright, Rosalind J.}, title = {Respiratory Sinus Arrhythmia as an Index of Vagal Activity during Stress in Infants: Respiratory Influences and Their Control}, series = {PLoS One}, volume = {7}, journal = {PLoS One}, number = {12}, doi = {10.1371/journal.pone.0052729}, url = {http://nbn-resolving.de/urn:nbn:de:bvb:20-opus-135396}, pages = {e52729}, year = {2012}, abstract = {Respiratory sinus arrhythmia (RSA) is related to cardiac vagal outflow and the respiratory pattern. Prior infant studies have not systematically examined respiration rate and tidal volume influences on infant RSA or the extent to which infants' breathing is too fast to extract a valid RSA. We therefore monitored cardiac activity, respiration, and physical activity in 23 six-month old infants during a standardized laboratory stressor protocol. On average, 12.6\% (range 0-58.2\%) of analyzed breaths were too short for RSA extraction. Higher respiration rate was associated with lower RSA amplitude in most infants, and lower tidal volume was associated with lower RSA amplitude in some infants. RSA amplitude corrected for respiration rate and tidal volume influences showed theoretically expected strong reductions during stress, whereas performance of uncorrected RSA was less consistent. We conclude that stress-induced changes of peak-valley RSA and effects of variations in breathing patterns on RSA can be determined for a representative percentage of infant breaths. As expected, breathing substantially affects infant RSA and needs to be considered in studies of infant psychophysiology.}, language = {en} } @article{JinAllisonKaufmannetal.2012, author = {Jin, Jing and Allison, Brendan Z. and Kaufmann, Tobias and K{\"u}bler, Andrea and Zhang, Yu and Wang, Xingyu and Cichocki, Andrzej}, title = {The Changing Face of P300 BCIs: A Comparison of Stimulus Changes in a P300 BCI Involving Faces, Emotion, and Movement}, series = {PLoS One}, volume = {7}, journal = {PLoS One}, number = {11}, doi = {10.1371/journal.pone.0049688}, url = {http://nbn-resolving.de/urn:nbn:de:bvb:20-opus-134173}, pages = {e49688}, year = {2012}, abstract = {Background: One of the most common types of brain-computer interfaces (BCIs) is called a P300 BCI, since it relies on the P300 and other event-related potentials (ERPs). In the canonical P300 BCI approach, items on a monitor flash briefly to elicit the necessary ERPs. Very recent work has shown that this approach may yield lower performance than alternate paradigms in which the items do not flash but instead change in other ways, such as moving, changing colour or changing to characters overlaid with faces. Methodology/Principal Findings: The present study sought to extend this research direction by parametrically comparing different ways to change items in a P300 BCI. Healthy subjects used a P300 BCI across six different conditions. Three conditions were similar to our prior work, providing the first direct comparison of characters flashing, moving, and changing to faces. Three new conditions also explored facial motion and emotional expression. The six conditions were compared across objective measures such as classification accuracy and bit rate as well as subjective measures such as perceived difficulty. In line with recent studies, our results indicated that the character flash condition resulted in the lowest accuracy and bit rate. All four face conditions (mean accuracy >91\%) yielded significantly better performance than the flash condition (mean accuracy = 75\%). Conclusions/Significance: Objective results reaffirmed that the face paradigm is superior to the canonical flash approach that has dominated P300 BCIs for over 20 years. The subjective reports indicated that the conditions that yielded better performance were not considered especially burdensome. Therefore, although further work is needed to identify which face paradigm is best, it is clear that the canonical flash approach should be replaced with a face paradigm when aiming at increasing bit rate. However, the face paradigm has to be further explored with practical applications particularly with locked-in patients.}, language = {en} } @article{HerbertMuthPollatosetal.2012, author = {Herbert, Beate M. and Muth, Eric R. and Pollatos, Olga and Herbert, Cornelia}, title = {Interoception across Modalities: On the Relationship between Cardiac Awareness and the Sensitivity for Gastric Functions}, series = {PLoS One}, volume = {7}, journal = {PLoS One}, number = {5}, doi = {10.1371/journal.pone.0036646}, url = {http://nbn-resolving.de/urn:nbn:de:bvb:20-opus-130733}, pages = {e36646}, year = {2012}, abstract = {The individual sensitivity for ones internal bodily signals ("interoceptive awareness") has been shown to be of relevance for a broad range of cognitive and affective functions. Interoceptive awareness has been primarily assessed via measuring the sensitivity for ones cardiac signals ("cardiac awareness") which can be non-invasively measured by heartbeat perception tasks. It is an open question whether cardiac awareness is related to the sensitivity for other bodily, visceral functions. This study investigated the relationship between cardiac awareness and the sensitivity for gastric functions in healthy female persons by using non-invasive methods. Heartbeat perception as a measure for cardiac awareness was assessed by a heartbeat tracking task and gastric sensitivity was assessed by a water load test. Gastric myoelectrical activity was measured by electrogastrography (EGG) and subjective feelings of fullness, valence, arousal and nausea were assessed. The results show that cardiac awareness was inversely correlated with ingested water volume and with normogastric activity after water load. However, persons with good and poor cardiac awareness did not differ in their subjective ratings of fullness, nausea and affective feelings after drinking. This suggests that good heartbeat perceivers ingested less water because they subjectively felt more intense signals of fullness during this lower amount of water intake compared to poor heartbeat perceivers who ingested more water until feeling the same signs of fullness. These findings demonstrate that cardiac awareness is related to greater sensitivity for gastric functions, suggesting that there is a general sensitivity for interoceptive processes across the gastric and cardiac modality.}, language = {en} } @article{KlaukeWinterGajewskaetal.2012, author = {Klauke, Benedikt and Winter, Bernward and Gajewska, Agnes and Zwanzger, Peter and Reif, Andreas and Herrmann, Martin J. and Dlugos, Andrea and Warrings, Bodo and Jacob, Christian and M{\"u}hlberger, Andreas and Arolt, Volker and Pauli, Paul and Deckert, J{\"u}rgen and Domschke, Katharina}, title = {Affect-Modulated Startle: Interactive Influence of Catechol-O-Methyltransferase Val158Met Genotype and Childhood Trauma}, series = {PLoS One}, volume = {7}, journal = {PLoS One}, number = {6}, doi = {10.1371/journal.pone.0039709}, url = {http://nbn-resolving.de/urn:nbn:de:bvb:20-opus-132184}, pages = {e39709}, year = {2012}, abstract = {The etiology of emotion-related disorders such as anxiety or affective disorders is considered to be complex with an interaction of biological and environmental factors. Particular evidence has accumulated for alterations in the dopaminergic and noradrenergic system - partly conferred by catechol-O-methyltransferase (COMT) gene variation - for the adenosinergic system as well as for early life trauma to constitute risk factors for those conditions. Applying a multi-level approach, in a sample of 95 healthy adults, we investigated effects of the functional COMT Val158Met polymorphism, caffeine as an adenosine A2A receptor antagonist (300 mg in a placebo-controlled intervention design) and childhood maltreatment (CTQ) as well as their interaction on the affect-modulated startle response as a neurobiologically founded defensive reflex potentially related to fear- and distress-related disorders. COMT val/val genotype significantly increased startle magnitude in response to unpleasant stimuli, while met/met homozygotes showed a blunted startle response to aversive pictures. Furthermore, significant gene-environment interaction of COMT Val158Met genotype with CTQ was discerned with more maltreatment being associated with higher startle potentiation in val/val subjects but not in met carriers. No main effect of or interaction effects with caffeine were observed. Results indicate a main as well as a GxE effect of the COMT Val158Met variant and childhood maltreatment on the affect-modulated startle reflex, supporting a complex pathogenetic model of the affect-modulated startle reflex as a basic neurobiological defensive reflex potentially related to anxiety and affective disorders.}, language = {en} } @article{GrussWieserSchweinbergeretal.2012, author = {Gruss, L. Forest and Wieser, Matthias J. and Schweinberger, Stefan R. and Keil, Andreas}, title = {Face-evoked steady-state visual potentials: effects of presentation rate and face inversion}, series = {Frontiers in Human Neuroscience}, volume = {6}, journal = {Frontiers in Human Neuroscience}, number = {316}, doi = {10.3389/fnhum.2012.00316}, url = {http://nbn-resolving.de/urn:nbn:de:bvb:20-opus-134399}, year = {2012}, abstract = {Face processing can be explored using electrophysiological methods. Research with event-related potentials has demonstrated the so-called face inversion effect, in which the N170 component is enhanced in amplitude and latency to inverted, compared to upright, faces. The present study explored the extent to which repetitive lower-level visual cortical engagement, reflected in flicker steady-state visual evoked potentials (ssVEPs), shows similar amplitude enhancement to face inversion. We also asked if inversion-related ssVEP modulation would be dependent on the stimulation rate at which upright and inverted faces were flickered. To this end, multiple tagging frequencies were used (5, 10, 15, and 20 Hz) across two studies (n=21, n=18). Results showed that amplitude enhancement of the ssVEP for inverted faces was found solely at higher stimulation frequencies (15 and 20 Hz). By contrast, lower frequency ssVEPs did not show this inversion effect. These findings suggest that stimulation frequency affects the sensitivity of ssVEPs to face inversion.}, language = {en} } @article{HommersLewandEhrmann2012, author = {Hommers, Wilfried and Lewand, Martin and Ehrmann, Dominic}, title = {Testing the moral algebra of two Kohlbergian informers}, series = {Ps{\´i}cologica}, volume = {33}, journal = {Ps{\´i}cologica}, number = {3}, url = {http://nbn-resolving.de/urn:nbn:de:bvb:20-opus-133917}, pages = {515-532}, year = {2012}, abstract = {This paper seeks to unify two major theories of moral judgment: Kohlberg's stage theory and Anderson's moral information integration theory. Subjects were told about thoughts of actors in Kohlberg's classic altruistic Heinz dilemma and in a new egoistical dilemma. These actors's thoughts represented Kohlberg's stages I (Personal Risk) and IV (Societal Risk) and had three levels, High, Medium, and Low. They were presented singly and in a 3 x 3 integration design. Subjects judged how many months of prison the actor deserved. The data supported the averaging model of moral integration theory, whereas Kohlberg's theory has no way to handle the integration problem. Following this, subjects ranked statements related to Kohlberg's first four stages in a procedure similar to that of Rest (1975). Higher score went with larger effect of Societal Risk as predicted by Kohlberg's theory. But contrary to Kohlberg's theory, no age trends were found. Also strongly contrary to Kohlberg's theory, effects of Personal Risk (Stage I) and Societal Risk (Stage IV) correlated positively.}, language = {en} } @article{HerbertSuetterlin2012, author = {Herbert, Cornelia and S{\"u}tterlin, Stefan}, title = {Do not respond! Doing the think/no-think and go/no-go tasks concurrently leads to memory impairment of unpleasant items during later recall}, url = {http://nbn-resolving.de/urn:nbn:de:bvb:20-opus-76028}, year = {2012}, abstract = {Previous research using neuroimaging methods proposed a link between mechanisms controlling motor response inhibition and suppression of unwanted memories.The present study investigated this hypothesis behaviorally by combining the think/no-think paradigm (TNT) with a go/no-go motor inhibition task. Participants first learned unpleasant cue-target pairs. Cue words were then presented as go or no-go items in the TNT. Participants' task was to respond to the cues and think of the target word aloud or to inhibit their response to the cue and the target word from coming to mind. Cued recall assessed immediately after the TNT revealed reduced recall performance for no-go targets compared to go targets or baseline cues not presented in the TNT. The results demonstrate that doing the no-think and no-go task concurrently leads to memory suppression of unpleasant items during later recall. Results are discussed in line with recent empirical research and theoretical positions.}, subject = {Psychologie}, language = {en} } @article{JanczykHeinemannPfister2012, author = {Janczyk, Markus and Heinemann, Alexander and Pfister, Roland}, title = {Instant attraction: Immediate action-effect bindings occur for both, stimulus- and goal-driven actions}, url = {http://nbn-resolving.de/urn:nbn:de:bvb:20-opus-76203}, year = {2012}, abstract = {Flexible behavior is only possible if contingencies between own actions and following environmental effects are acquired as quickly as possible; and recent findings indeed point toward an immediate formation of action-effect bindings already after a single coupling of an action and its effect. The present study explored whether these short-term bindings occur for both, stimulus- and goal-driven actions ("forced-choice actions" vs. "free-choice actions"). Two experiments confirmed that immediate action-effect bindings are formed for both types of actions and affect upcoming behavior. These findings support the view that action-effect binding is a ubiquitous phenomenon which occurs for any type of action.}, subject = {Psychologie}, language = {en} } @article{HaeringKiesel2012, author = {Haering, Carola and Kiesel, Andrea}, title = {Mine is earlier than yours: Causal beliefs influence the perceived time of action effects}, url = {http://nbn-resolving.de/urn:nbn:de:bvb:20-opus-76229}, year = {2012}, abstract = {When a key press causes a stimulus, the key press is perceived later and the stimulus earlier than key presses and stimuli presented independently. This bias in time perception has been linked to the intention to produce the effect and thus been called intentional binding (IB). In recent studies it has been shown that the IB effect is stronger when participants believed that they caused the effect stimulus compared to when they believed that another person caused the effect (Desantis et al., 2011). In this experiment we ask whether causal beliefs influence the perceived time of an effect when the putative effect occurs temporally close to another stimulus that is also an effect. In our study two participants performed the same task on connected computers with separate screens. Each trial started synchro- nously on both computers. When a participant pressed a key, a red and a yellow stimulus appeared as action effects simultaneously or with a slight delay of up to 50 ms. The partic- ipants' task was to judge the temporal order of these two effect stimuli. Participants were either told that one participant caused one of the two stimuli while the other participant seated at the other computer caused the other stimulus, or each participant was told that he/she caused both stimuli. The different causal beliefs changed the perceived time of the effects' appearance relative to each other. When participants believed they each caused one effect, their "own" effect was perceived earlier than the other participant's effect. When the participants believed each caused both effects, no difference in the perceived temporal order of the red and yellow effect was found. These results confirm that higher order causal beliefs change the perceived time of an action effect even in a setting in which the occurrence of the putative effect can be directly compared to a reference stimulus.}, subject = {Psychologie}, language = {en} } @article{SchwerdtleKanisKahletal.2012, author = {Schwerdtle, Barbara and Kanis, Julia and Kahl, Lena and K{\"u}bler, Andrea and Schlarb, Angelika A.}, title = {Children's Sleep Comic: development of a new diagnostic tool for children with sleep disorders [original research]}, url = {http://nbn-resolving.de/urn:nbn:de:bvb:20-opus-75722}, year = {2012}, abstract = {Background: A solid diagnosis of sleep disorders in children should include both self-ratings and parent ratings. However, there are few standardized self-assessment instruments to meet this need. The Children's Sleep Comic is an adapted version of the unpublished German questionnaire "Freiburger Kinderschlafcomic" and provides pictures for items and responses. Because the drawings were outdated and allowed only for qualitative analysis, we revised the comic, tested its applicability in a target sample, and suggest a procedure for quantitative analysis. Methods: All items were updated and pictures were newly drawn. We used a sample of 201 children aged 5-10 years to test the applicability of the Children's Sleep Comic in young children and to run a preliminary analysis. Results: The Children's Sleep Comic comprises 37 items covering relevant aspects of sleep disorders in children. Application took on average 30 minutes. The procedure was well accepted by the children, as reflected by the absence of any dropouts. First comparisons with established questionnaires indicated moderate correlations. Conclusion: The Children's Sleep Comic is appropriate for screening sleep behavior and sleep problems in children. The interactive procedure can foster a good relationship between the investigator and the child, and thus establish the basis for successful intervention if necessary.}, subject = {Psychologie}, language = {en} } @article{TobiasVoelkerGuneschetal.2012, author = {Tobias, Kaufmann and V{\"o}lker, Stefan and Gunesch, Laura and K{\"u}bler, Andrea}, title = {Spelling is just a click away - a user-centered brain-computer interface including auto-calibration and predictive text entry}, doi = {10.3389/fnins.2012.00072}, url = {http://nbn-resolving.de/urn:nbn:de:bvb:20-opus-75739}, year = {2012}, abstract = {Brain-computer interfaces (BCI) based on event-related potentials (ERP) allow for selection of characters from a visually presented character-matrix and thus provide a communica- tion channel for users with neurodegenerative disease. Although they have been topic of research for more than 20 years and were multiply proven to be a reliable communication method, BCIs are almost exclusively used in experimental settings, handled by qualified experts. This study investigates if ERP-BCIs can be handled independently by laymen without expert support, which is inevitable for establishing BCIs in end-user's daily life situations. Furthermore we compared the classic character-by-character text entry against a predictive text entry (PTE) that directly incorporates predictive text into the character- matrix. N = 19 BCI novices handled a user-centered ERP-BCI application on their own without expert support. The software individually adjusted classifier weights and control parameters in the background, invisible to the user (auto-calibration). All participants were able to operate the software on their own and to twice correctly spell a sentence with the auto-calibrated classifier (once with PTE, once without). Our PTE increased spelling speed and, importantly, did not reduce accuracy. In sum, this study demonstrates feasi- bility of auto-calibrating ERP-BCI use, independently by laymen and the strong benefit of integrating predictive text directly into the character-matrix.}, subject = {Psychologie}, language = {en} } @misc{WieserBrosch2012, author = {Wieser, Mattias J. and Brosch, Tobias}, title = {Faces in context: A review and systematization of contextual influences on affective face processing}, url = {http://nbn-resolving.de/urn:nbn:de:bvb:20-opus-76351}, year = {2012}, abstract = {Facial expressions are of eminent importance for social interaction as they convey information about other individuals' emotions and social intentions. According to the predominant "basic emotion" approach, the perception of emotion in faces is based on the rapid, auto- matic categorization of prototypical, universal expressions. Consequently, the perception of facial expressions has typically been investigated using isolated, de-contextualized, static pictures of facial expressions that maximize the distinction between categories. However, in everyday life, an individual's face is not perceived in isolation, but almost always appears within a situational context, which may arise from other people, the physical environment surrounding the face, as well as multichannel information from the sender. Furthermore, situational context may be provided by the perceiver, including already present social infor- mation gained from affective learning and implicit processing biases such as race bias.Thus, the perception of facial expressions is presumably always influenced by contextual vari- ables. In this comprehensive review, we aim at (1) systematizing the contextual variables that may influence the perception of facial expressions and (2) summarizing experimental paradigms and findings that have been used to investigate these influences. The studies reviewed here demonstrate that perception and neural processing of facial expressions are substantially modified by contextual information, including verbal, visual, and auditory information presented together with the face as well as knowledge or processing biases already present in the observer. These findings further challenge the assumption of auto- matic, hardwired categorical emotion extraction mechanisms predicted by basic emotion theories. Taking into account a recent model on face processing, we discuss where and when these different contextual influences may take place, thus outlining potential avenues in future research.}, subject = {Psychologie}, language = {en} } @article{LikowskiMuehlbergerGerdesetal.2012, author = {Likowski, Katja U. and M{\"u}hlberger, Andreas and Gerdes, Antje B. M. and Wieser, Mattias J. and Pauli, Paul and Weyers, Peter}, title = {Facial mimicry and the mirror neuron system: simultaneous acquisition of facial electromyography and functional magnetic resonance imaging}, url = {http://nbn-resolving.de/urn:nbn:de:bvb:20-opus-75813}, year = {2012}, abstract = {Numerous studies have shown that humans automatically react with congruent facial reactions, i.e., facial mimicry, when seeing a vis-{\´a}-vis' facial expressions. The current experiment is the first investigating the neuronal structures responsible for differences in the occurrence of such facial mimicry reactions by simultaneously measuring BOLD and facial EMG in an MRI scanner. Therefore, 20 female students viewed emotional facial expressions (happy, sad, and angry) of male and female avatar characters. During picture presentation, the BOLD signal as well as M. zygomaticus major and M. corrugator supercilii activity were recorded simultaneously. Results show prototypical patterns of facial mimicry after correction for MR-related artifacts: enhanced M. zygomaticus major activity in response to happy and enhanced M. corrugator supercilii activity in response to sad and angry expressions. Regression analyses show that these congruent facial reactions correlate significantly with activations in the IFG, SMA, and cerebellum. Stronger zygomaticus reactions to happy faces were further associated to increased activities in the caudate, MTG, and PCC. Corrugator reactions to angry expressions were further correlated with the hippocampus, insula, and STS. Results are discussed in relation to core and extended models of the mirror neuron system (MNS).}, subject = {Psychologie}, language = {en} } @article{HerbortButz2012, author = {Herbort, Oliver and Butz, Martin V.}, title = {Too good to be true? Ideomotor theory from a computational perspective}, url = {http://nbn-resolving.de/urn:nbn:de:bvb:20-opus-76383}, year = {2012}, abstract = {In recent years, Ideomotor Theory has regained widespread attention and sparked the development of a number of theories on goal-directed behavior and learning. However, there are two issues with previous studies' use of Ideomotor Theory. Although Ideomotor Theory is seen as very general, it is often studied in settings that are considerably more simplistic than most natural situations. Moreover, Ideomotor Theory's claim that effect anticipations directly trigger actions and that action-effect learning is based on the formation of direct action-effect associations is hard to address empirically. We address these points from a computational perspective. A simple computational model of Ideomotor Theory was tested in tasks with different degrees of complexity.The model evaluation showed that Ideomotor Theory is a computationally feasible approach for understanding efficient action-effect learning for goal-directed behavior if the following preconditions are met: (1) The range of potential actions and effects has to be restricted. (2) Effects have to follow actions within a short time window. (3) Actions have to be simple and may not require sequencing. The first two preconditions also limit human performance and thus support Ideomotor Theory. The last precondition can be circumvented by extending the model with more complex, indirect action generation processes. In conclusion, we suggest that IdeomotorTheory offers a comprehensive framework to understand action-effect learning. However, we also suggest that additional processes may mediate the conversion of effect anticipations into actions in many situations.}, subject = {Psychologie}, language = {en} } @phdthesis{Schubert2012, author = {Schubert, Lisa}, title = {The Respective Impact of Stimulus Valence and Processing Fluency on Evaluative Judgments in Stereotype Disconfirmation}, url = {http://nbn-resolving.de/urn:nbn:de:bvb:20-opus-77426}, school = {Universit{\"a}t W{\"u}rzburg}, year = {2012}, abstract = {Both specific stimulus valence and unspecific processing dynamics can influence evaluative responses. Eight experiments investigated their respective influence on evaluative judgments in the domain of stereotyping. Valence of stereotypic information and consistency-driven fluency were manipulated in an impression formation paradigm. When information about the to-be-evaluated target person was strongly valenced, no effects of consistency-driven fluency were observed. Higher cognitive processes, valence of inconsistent attributes, processing priority of category information, and impression formation instructions were ruled out as possible factors responsible for the non-occurrence of fluency effects. However, consistency-driven fluency did influence the evaluative judgment, if the information about a target person was not strongly valenced. It is therefore concluded that both stimulus valence and consistency-driven processing fluency play a role in evaluative judgments in the domain of stereotyping. The respective impact of stimulus valence is much stronger than the impact of unspecific processing dynamics, however. Implications for fluency research and the applied field of stereotype change are discussed.}, subject = {Vorurteil}, language = {en} } @misc{FazelRezaiAllisonGugeretal.2012, author = {Fazel-Rezai, Reza and Allison, Brendan Z. and Guger, Christoph and Sellers, Eric W. and Kleih, Sonja C. and K{\"u}bler, Andrea}, title = {P300 brain computer interface: current challenges and emerging trends}, url = {http://nbn-resolving.de/urn:nbn:de:bvb:20-opus-75941}, year = {2012}, abstract = {A brain-computer interface (BCI) enables communication without movement based on brain signals measured with electroencephalography (EEG). BCIs usually rely on one of three types of signals: the P300 and other components of the event-related potential (ERP), steady state visual evoked potential (SSVEP), or event related desynchronization (ERD). Although P300 BCIs were introduced over twenty years ago, the past few years have seen a strong increase in P300 BCI research. This closed-loop BCI approach relies on the P300 and other components of the ERP, based on an oddball paradigm presented to the subject. In this paper, we overview the current status of P300 BCI technology, and then discuss new directions: paradigms for eliciting P300s; signal processing methods; applications; and hybrid BCIs. We conclude that P300 BCIs are quite promising, as several emerging directions have not yet been fully explored and could lead to improvements in bit rate, reliability, usability, and flexibility.}, subject = {Psychologie}, language = {en} } @article{RoeserEichholzSchwerdtleetal.2012, author = {Roeser, Karolin and Eichholz, Ruth and Schwerdtle, Barbara and Schlarb, Angelika A. and K{\"u}bler, Andrea}, title = {Relationship of sleep quality and health-related quality of life in adolescents according to self- and proxy ratings: a questionnaire survey}, url = {http://nbn-resolving.de/urn:nbn:de:bvb:20-opus-75953}, year = {2012}, abstract = {Introduction: Sleep disturbances are common in adolescents and adversely affect performance, social contact, and susceptibility to stress. We investigated the hypothesis of a relationship between sleep and health-related quality of life (HRQoL), and applied self- and proxy ratings. Materials and Methods: The sample comprised 92 adolescents aged 11-17 years. All participants and their parents completed a HRQoL measure and the Sleep Disturbance Scale for Children (SDSC ). Children with SDSC T -scores above the normal range (above 60) were classified as poor sleepers. Results: According to self- and proxy ratings, good sleepers reported significantly higher HRQoL than poor sleep- ers. Sleep disturbances were significantly higher and HRQoL significantly lower in self- as compared to parental ratings. Parent-child agreement was higher for subscales measuring observable aspects. Girls experienced significantly stronger sleep disturbances and lower self-rated HRQoL than boys. Discussion: Our findings support the positive relationship of sleep and HRQoL. Furthermore, parents significantly underestimate sleep disturbances and overestimate HRQoL in their children.}, subject = {Psychiatrie}, language = {en} } @article{GlotzbachMuehlbergerGschwendtneretal.2011, author = {Glotzbach, Evelyn and M{\"u}hlberger, Andreas and Gschwendtner, Kathrin and Fallgatter, Andreas J and Pauli, Paul and Herrmann, Martin J}, title = {Prefrontal Brain Activation During Emotional Processing: A Functional Near Infrared Spectroscopy Study (fNIRS)}, series = {The Open Neuroimaging Journal}, volume = {5}, journal = {The Open Neuroimaging Journal}, doi = {10.2174/1874440001105010033}, url = {http://nbn-resolving.de/urn:nbn:de:bvb:20-opus-141714}, pages = {33-39}, year = {2011}, abstract = {The limbic system and especially the amygdala have been identified as key structures in emotion induction and regulation. Recently research has additionally focused on the influence of prefrontal areas on emotion processing in the limbic system and the amygdala. Results from fMRI studies indicate that the prefrontal cortex (PFC) is involved not only in emotion induction but also in emotion regulation. However, studies using fNIRS only report prefrontal brain activation during emotion induction. So far it lacks the attempt to compare emotion induction and emotion regulation with regard to prefrontal activation measured with fNIRS, to exclude the possibility that the reported prefrontal brain activation in fNIRS studies are mainly caused by automatic emotion regulation processes. Therefore this work tried to distinguish emotion induction from regulation via fNIRS of the prefrontal cortex. 20 healthy women viewed neutral pictures as a baseline condition, fearful pictures as induction condition and reappraised fearful pictures as regulation condition in randomized order. As predicted, the view-fearful condition led to higher arousal ratings than the view-neutral condition with the reappraise-fearful condition in between. For the fNIRS results the induction condition showed an activation of the bilateral PFC compared to the baseline condition (viewing neutral). The regulation condition showed an activation only of the left PFC compared to the baseline condition, although the direct comparison between induction and regulation condition revealed no significant difference in brain activation. Therefore our study underscores the results of previous fNIRS studies showing prefrontal brain activation during emotion induction and rejects the hypothesis that this prefrontal brain activation might only be a result of automatic emotion regulation processes.}, language = {en} } @article{ReussPohlKieseletal.2011, author = {Reuss, Heiko and Pohl, Carsten and Kiesel, Andrea and Kunde, Wilfried}, title = {Follow the sign! Top-down contingent attentional capture of masked arrow cues}, series = {Advances in Cognitive Psychology}, volume = {7}, journal = {Advances in Cognitive Psychology}, doi = {10.2478/v10053-008-0091-3}, url = {http://nbn-resolving.de/urn:nbn:de:bvb:20-opus-140030}, pages = {82-91}, year = {2011}, abstract = {Arrow cues and other overlearned spatial symbols automatically orient attention according to their spatial meaning. This renders them similar to exogenous cues that occur at stimulus location. Exogenous cues trigger shifts of attention even when they are presented subliminally. Here, we investigate to what extent the mechanisms underlying the orienting of attention by exogenous cues and by arrow cues are comparable by analyzing the effects of visible and masked arrow cues on attention. In Experiment 1, we presented arrow cues with overall 50\% validity. Visible cues, but not masked cues, lead to shifts of attention. In Experiment 2, the arrow cues had an overall validity of 80\%. Now both visible and masked arrows lead to shifts of attention. This is in line with findings that subliminal exogenous cues capture attention only in a top-down contingent manner, that is, when the cues fit the observer's intentions.}, language = {en} } @article{BilalicKieselPohletal.2011, author = {Bilalic, Merim and Kiesel, Andrea and Pohl, Carsten and Erb, Michael and Grodd, Wolfgang}, title = {It Takes Two-Skilled Recognition of Objects Engages Lateral Areas in Both Hemispheres}, series = {PLoS ONE}, volume = {6}, journal = {PLoS ONE}, number = {1}, doi = {10.1371/journal.pone.0016202}, url = {http://nbn-resolving.de/urn:nbn:de:bvb:20-opus-176935}, pages = {e16202}, year = {2011}, abstract = {Our object recognition abilities, a direct product of our experience with objects, are fine-tuned to perfection. Left temporal and lateral areas along the dorsal, action related stream, as well as left infero-temporal areas along the ventral, object related stream are engaged in object recognition. Here we show that expertise modulates the activity of dorsal areas in the recognition of man-made objects with clearly specified functions. Expert chess players were faster than chess novices in identifying chess objects and their functional relations. Experts' advantage was domain-specific as there were no differences between groups in a control task featuring geometrical shapes. The pattern of eye movements supported the notion that experts' extensive knowledge about domain objects and their functions enabled superior recognition even when experts were not directly fixating the objects of interest. Functional magnetic resonance imaging (fMRI) related exclusively the areas along the dorsal stream to chess specific object recognition. Besides the commonly involved left temporal and parietal lateral brain areas, we found that only in experts homologous areas on the right hemisphere were also engaged in chess specific object recognition. Based on these results, we discuss whether skilled object recognition does not only involve a more efficient version of the processes found in non-skilled recognition, but also qualitatively different cognitive processes which engage additional brain areas}, language = {en} } @article{Pfister2011, author = {Pfister, Roland}, title = {Wardrobe Malfunctions and the Measurement of Internet Behaviour}, url = {http://nbn-resolving.de/urn:nbn:de:bvb:20-opus-69067}, year = {2011}, abstract = {The wardrobe malfunction—an unanticipated exposure of bodily parts in the public—has become a prevailing issue in concerts, shows and other celebrity events that is reliably reported by the media. The internet as the fastest source for celebrity gossip allows measuring the impact of such wardrobe malfunctions on the public in-terest in a celebrity. This measurement in turn allows conclusions about intention, motivation, and internet be-haviour of a wide variety of internet users. The present study exemplifies the use of an innovative non-reactive measure of active interest—the Search Volume Index—to assess the impact of a variety of internet-related phe-nomena, including wardrobe malfunctions. Results indicate that interest in a celebrity increases immediately af-ter such an event and stays at a high level for about three weeks (the wardrobe plateau). This special form of ce-lebrity gossip thus meets a constant interest of a substantial proportion of internet users.}, subject = {Psychologie}, language = {en} }