@phdthesis{Liesner2022, author = {Liesner, Marvin Paul}, title = {I control it, but does it mean it is part of me? How the relationship between body movements and controlled object movements influences the sense of agency and the sense of ownership}, doi = {10.25972/OPUS-28703}, url = {http://nbn-resolving.de/urn:nbn:de:bvb:20-opus-287030}, school = {Universit{\"a}t W{\"u}rzburg}, year = {2022}, abstract = {The "active self" approach suggests that any object we manipulate voluntarily and foreseeably becomes part of our "self" in the sense that we feel control over this object (sense of agency) and experience it as belonging to our own body (sense of ownership). While there is considerable evidence that we can indeed experience both a sense of agency and a sense of ownership over a broad variety of objects when we control these through our actions, the approach has also been criticized for exaggerating the flexibility of the human self. In this thesis, I investigate the influence that the relationship between the body movements controlling an object and the movements of the object itself has on the process of integrating an object into the self. I demonstrate that fully controlling an object is not sufficient for it to be integrated into the self since both explicit and implicit measures of the sense of agency and the sense of ownership indicate less or no integration when body movements are transformed into inverted object movements. Furthermore, I show that such inversions lead to the downregulation of sensory signals either from the body or from the controlled object in order to deal with the conflicting multisensory information when performing such actions. I argue that this downregulation is the underlying factor behind the diminished or eliminated integration of inverted body and object movements and I discuss further pathways for possible future studies building up on these findings.}, subject = {Experimentelle Psychologie}, language = {en} } @phdthesis{Madeira2022, author = {Madeira, Octavia}, title = {The Human-Experimental Virtual Elevated Plus-Maze as an Anxiety Model}, doi = {10.25972/OPUS-28147}, url = {http://nbn-resolving.de/urn:nbn:de:bvb:20-opus-281478}, school = {Universit{\"a}t W{\"u}rzburg}, year = {2022}, abstract = {Anxiety research is one of the major psychological research domains and looks back on decades of research activity. Traditionally, novel theories and approaches are tested utilizing animal models. One way to study inherent anxiety in rodents is the elevated plus-maze (EPM). The EPM is a plus-shaped platform with two closed, i.e., walled, arms and two open unwalled arms. If given the opportunity to freely explore the apparatus, rodents instinctively avoid the open arms to protect themselves from predators. Hence, they spent less time on open and more time on closed arms, which is behaviorally associated with general anxiety. In the course of the pharmacological validation, it was found that this exploratory pattern can be reversed by anxiolytic substances, e.g., benzodiazepines, or potentiated by anxiogenics. One of the significant advantages of the EPM is that no prior training session is required in contrast to conditioning studies, thus allowing to observe natural behavior. Therefore, together with the economic and uncomplicated setup, the EPM has become a standard preclinical rodent anxiety test over the decades. In order to validate these rodent anxiety tests, there have recently been attempts to retranslate them to humans. A paramount of cross-species validation is not only the simple transferability of these animal tests but also the observation of anxiety behaviors that are evolutionarily conserved across species. Accordingly, it could be possible to conclude various factors associated with the etiology and maintenance of anxiety disorders in humans. So far, convincing translations of the EPM to humans are still lacking. For that reason, the primary aim of this dissertation is to retranslate the EPM throughout three studies and to evaluate cross-species validity critically. Secondly, the undertaken studies are set out to observe ambulatory activity equivalent to rodent EPM behavior, i.e., open arm avoidance. Thirdly, the undertaken studies aimed to assess the extent to which trait anxiety influences human exploratory activity on the platform to associate it with the assumption that rodent EPM-behavior is a reflection of general anxiety. Finally, virtual reality (VR) was the method of choice to maintain the economic advantage and adjust the EPM size to humans. Study 1 (N = 30) was set up to directly transfer the rodent EPM regarding test design and experimental procedure using a Computer Automatic Virtual Environment (CAVE). The results revealed that humans unlike rodents display a general open arms approach during free exploration. However, open arm avoidance was associated with high trait anxiety and acrophobia (fear of height), which was initially assessed as a control variable due to the virtual platform height. Regression analyses and subjective anxiety ratings hinted at a more significant influence of acrophobia on open arm avoidance. In addition, it was assumed that the open arms approach might have resulted from claustrophobic tendencies experienced in the closed arms due to the high walls. Study 2 (N = 61) sought to differentiate the influence of trait anxiety and acrophobia and adapt the virtual EPM to humans. Therefore, parts of the platform held a semi-transparent grid-floor texture, and the wall height on the closed arms was reduced to standard handrail level. Moreover, participants were priorly screened to exclude clinically significant levels of acrophobia, claustrophobia, and agoraphobia. The data on general exploratory activity showed no arm preference. Regression analyses confirmed that acrophobia is related to open arm avoidance, corroborating the finding of Study 1. Surprisingly, for trait anxiety, the result of Study 1 could not be replicated. Instead, for trait anxiety, no significant effect was found indicating that predominantly fear of heights shapes human EPM behavior even on a subclinical stage. In Study 3 (N = 57), the EPM was embedded into a city setting to 1) create a more natural human environment and 2) eliminate height. Furthermore, a head-mounted display was utilized for VR presentation, and arousal ratings were introduced. Participants were screened for high and low levels of trait anxiety and agoraphobia, and claustrophobia. Replicating the findings of Study 2, no difference in open and closed arm activity was observed, and no effect was found in relationship with trait anxiety. The data on anxiety ratings and claustrophobia suggest a positive correlation indicating that in this city EPM, claustrophobic tendencies might play a role in closed arm avoidance. In summary, this thesis added valuable insights into the retranslation of a well-established standard anxiety test used in rodents. However, it also majorly challenges current findings on the cross-species validity of the EPM. Various explanatory models for the results are critically discussed and associated with clinical implications concerning future research.}, subject = {Virtuelle Realit{\"a}t}, language = {en} } @phdthesis{Winter2022, author = {Winter, Carla}, title = {Evaluation der Verwendung von Virtueller Realit{\"a}t (VR) als Erg{\"a}nzung zum Laufbandtraining im Rahmen der Behandlung von Gangst{\"o}rungen bei Patienten mit Multipler Sklerose (MS) und Schlaganfall}, doi = {10.25972/OPUS-28054}, url = {http://nbn-resolving.de/urn:nbn:de:bvb:20-opus-280544}, school = {Universit{\"a}t W{\"u}rzburg}, year = {2022}, abstract = {Die Rehabilitation von Gangst{\"o}rungen bei Patienten mit MS und Schlaganfall erfolgt h{\"a}ufig mithilfe eines konventionellen Laufbandtrainings. Einige Studien haben bereits gezeigt, dass durch eine Erweiterung dieses Trainings um eine virtuelle Realit{\"a}t die Motivation der Patienten gesteigert und die Therapieergebnisse verbessert werden k{\"o}nnen. In der vorliegenden Studie wurde eine immersive VR-Anwendung (unter Verwendung eines HMD) f{\"u}r die Gangrehabilitation von Patienten evaluiert. Hierbei wurden ihre Anwendbarkeit und Akzeptanz gepr{\"u}ft sowie ihre Kurzzeiteffekte mit einer semi-immersiven Pr{\"a}sentation (unter Verwendung eines Monitors) und mit einem konventionellen Laufbandtraining ohne VR verglichen. Der Fokus lag insbesondere auf der Untersuchung der Anwendbarkeit beider Systeme und der Auswirkungen auf die Laufgeschwindigkeit und Motivation der Benutzer. Im Rahmen einer Studie mit Innersubjekt-Design nahmen zun{\"a}chst 36 gesunde Teilnehmer und anschließend 14 Patienten mit MS oder Schlaganfall an drei experimentellen Bedingungen (VR {\"u}ber HMD, VR {\"u}ber Monitor, Laufbandtraining ohne VR) teil. Sowohl in der Studie mit gesunden Teilnehmern als auch in der Patientenstudie zeigte sich in der HMD-Bedingung eine h{\"o}here Laufgeschwindigkeit als beim Laufbandtraining ohne VR und in der Monitor-Bedingung. Die gesunden Studienteilnehmer berichteten {\"u}ber eine h{\"o}here Motivation nach der HMD-Bedingung als nach den anderen Bedingungen. Es traten in beiden Gruppen keine Nebenwirkungen im Sinne einer Simulator Sickness auf und es wurden auch keine Erh{\"o}hungen der Herzfrequenzen nach den VR-Bedingungen detektiert. Die Bewertungen des Pr{\"a}senzerlebens waren in beiden Gruppen in der HMD-Bedingung h{\"o}her als in der Monitor-Bedingung. Beide VR-Bedingungen erhielten hohe Bewertungen f{\"u}r die Benutzerfreundlichkeit. Die meisten der gesunden Teilnehmer (89 \%) und Patienten (71 \%) pr{\"a}ferierten das HMD-basierte Laufbandtraining unter den drei Trainingsformen und die meisten Patienten k{\"o}nnten sich vorstellen, es h{\"a}ufiger zu nutzen. Mit der vorliegenden Studie wurde eine strukturierte Evaluation der Anwendbarkeit eines immersiven VR-Systems f{\"u}r die Gangrehabilitation gepr{\"u}ft und dieses erstmals in den direkten Vergleich zu einem semi-immersiven System und einem konventionellen Training ohne VR gesetzt. Die Studie best{\"a}tigte die Praktikabilit{\"a}t der Kombination eines Laufbandtrainings mit immersiver VR. Aufgrund ihrer hohen Benutzerfreundlichkeit und der geringen Nebenwirkungen scheint diese Trainingsform besonders f{\"u}r Patienten geeignet zu sein, um deren Trainingsmotivation und Trainingserfolge, wie z. B. die Laufgeschwindigkeit, zu steigern. Da immersive VR-Systeme allerdings nach wie vor spezifische technische Installationsprozeduren erfordern, sollte f{\"u}r die spezifische klinische Anwendung eine Kosten-Nutzen-Bewertung erfolgen.}, subject = {Multiple Sklerose}, language = {de} } @phdthesis{Brych2022, author = {Brych, Mareike Kimberly}, title = {How movements and cognition interact: An investigation of spontaneous blinks}, doi = {10.25972/OPUS-26737}, url = {http://nbn-resolving.de/urn:nbn:de:bvb:20-opus-267376}, school = {Universit{\"a}t W{\"u}rzburg}, year = {2022}, abstract = {During natural behavior, cognitive processes constantly coincide with body movements such as head or eye movements or blinks. However, during experimental investigations of cognitive processes, movements are often highly restricted which is rather unnatural. In order to improve our understanding of natural behavior, this thesis investigates the interaction between cognition and movements by focusing on spontaneous blinks, which naturally interact with other body movements. Spontaneous blinks are inevitably connected to vision as they shut out incoming visual information. Both sensory-based and cognitive factors, for example, stimulus occurrence and evaluation, were reported to influence blink behavior. Our first study investigated if such influences are comparable for visual and non-visual input. The chosen experimental design allowed dissociating sensory-driven and cognitive influences, which then could be compared between the visual and auditory domain. Our results show that blinks are more strongly modulated during passive observation of visual input compared to auditory input. This modulation is however enhanced for both input modalities by an increased attentional demand. In addition, the cognitively defined meaning of a stimulus changes blink latency independent of the sensory domain. Overall, our findings show that spontaneous blinks and cognitive processes are linked beyond vision. Moreover, the underlying cognitive processes that influence blinks are largely the same across different sensory input indicating that blinks are profoundly integrated into our system. When investigating natural behavior, it is important to consider that movements rarely occur in isolation, but are executed side by side. As these movements interact and have a link to cognitive processes, the complexity of our system increases. In order to take this complexity into account, the second part of the experimental research focused on movement interactions, more specifically on the interactions between blinks, pupil size and speaking. Our results reveal that speech-related motor activity increases blink rate and pupil size as well as modulates blink timing. This is in line with previous research that described a relation between different body and eye movements. Importantly, each bodily-induced change in eye movements affects visual information intake. Therefore, different movements can be tightly linked to perceptual processes through complex interactions. Altogether, the work of this thesis provides rich evidence that movements and cognitive processes are deeply intertwined. Therefore, movements should be seen as an integral part of our system. Taking the relevance of movements and their interactions into account during experimental investigations is necessary in order to reveal a more realistic and complete picture of human natural behavior.}, subject = {Kognition}, language = {en} } @phdthesis{Grossekathoefer2022, author = {Großekath{\"o}fer, Jonas David}, title = {Virtually Valid? On the Importance of Ecological Validity and Virtual Reality for Social Attention Research}, doi = {10.25972/OPUS-26041}, url = {http://nbn-resolving.de/urn:nbn:de:bvb:20-opus-260417}, school = {Universit{\"a}t W{\"u}rzburg}, year = {2022}, abstract = {Gazes are of central relevance for people. They are crucial for navigating the world and communicating with others. Nevertheless, research in recent years shows that many findings from experimental research on gaze behavior cannot be transferred from the laboratory to everyday behavior. For example, the frequency with which conspecifics are looked at is considerably higher in experimental contexts than what can be observed in daily behavior. In short: findings from laboratories cannot be generalized into general statements. This thesis is dedicated to this matter. The dissertation describes and documents the current state of research on social attention through a literature review, including a meta-analysis on the /gaze cueing/ paradigm and an empirical study on the robustness of gaze following behavior. In addition, virtual reality was used in one of the first studies in this research field. Virtual reality has the potential to significantly improve the transferability of experimental laboratory studies to everyday behavior. This is because the technology enables a high degree of experimental control in naturalistic research designs. As such, it has the potential to transform empirical research in the same way that the introduction of computers to psychological research did some 50 years ago. The general literature review on social attention is extended to the classic /gaze cueing/ paradigm through a systematic review of publications and a meta-analytic evaluation (Study 1). The cumulative evidence supported the findings of primary studies: Covert spatial attention is directed by faces. However, the experimental factors included do not explain the surprisingly large variance in the published results. Thus, there seem to be further, not well-understood variables influencing these social processes. Moreover, classic /gaze cueing/ studies have limited ecological validity. This is discussed as a central reason for the lack of generalisability. Ecological validity describes the correspondence between experimental factors and realistic situations. A stimulus or an experimental design can have high and low ecological validity on different dimensions and have different influences on behavior. Empirical research on gaze following behavior showed that the /gaze cueing/ effect also occurs with contextually embedded stimuli (Study 2). The contextual integration of the directional cue contrasted classical /gaze cueing/ studies, which usually show heads in isolation. The research results can thus be transferred /within/ laboratory studies to higher ecologically valid research paradigms. However, research shows that the lack of ecological validity in experimental designs significantly limits the transferability of experimental findings to complex situations /outside/ the laboratory. This seems to be particularly the case when social interactions and norms are investigated. However, ecological validity is also often limited in these studies for other factors, such as contextual embedding /of participants/, free exploration behavior (and, thus, attentional control), or multimodality. In a first study, such high ecological validity was achieved for these factors with virtual reality, which could not be achieved in the laboratory so far (Study 3). Notably, the observed fixation patterns showed differences even under /most similar/ conditions in the laboratory and natural environments. Interestingly, these were similar to findings also derived from comparisons of eye movement in the laboratory and field investigations. These findings, which previously came from hardly comparable groups, were thus confirmed by the present Study 3 (which did not have this limitation). Overall, /virtual reality/ is a new technical approach to contemporary social attention research that pushes the boundaries of previous experimental research. The traditional trade-off between ecological validity and experimental control thus becomes obsolete, and laboratory studies can closely inherit an excellent approximation of reality. Finally, the present work describes and discusses the possibilities of this technology and its practical implementation. Within this context, the extent to which this development can still guarantee a constructive classification of different laboratory tests in the future is examined.}, subject = {Aufmerksamkeit}, language = {en} } @phdthesis{Schmitt2022, author = {Schmitt, Nadine J. B.}, title = {What is integrity and how do we use it? - Enhancing the validity of integrity by reviewing integrity tests, expanding the nomological network, and reducing faking}, doi = {10.25972/OPUS-26046}, url = {http://nbn-resolving.de/urn:nbn:de:bvb:20-opus-260468}, school = {Universit{\"a}t W{\"u}rzburg}, year = {2022}, abstract = {This dissertation focuses on the construct and criterion validity of integrity tests and aims to enhance both. To accomplish this goal, three approaches were adopted: First, an overview and systematic comparison of integrity tests was conducted with reference to the construction and application of the tests. Second, the nomological network of integrity tests was expanded with reference to honesty-humility and organizational citizenship behavior at their factor and facet level. Third, two promising methods to reduce faking on integrity tests were tested: the double rating method (Hui, 2001) and the indirect questioning technique. In line with previous research, the results of the overview and comparison of integrity measures confirmed that integrity tests are multidimensional and heterogenous. A clear definition of integrity is urgently needed. The personality trait of honesty-humility and its facets of fairness, and modesty revealed the most significant relationships to integrity. Moreover, organizational citizenship behavior and its facets of altruism, conscientiousness, and sportsmanship were found to significantly relate to integrity. Furthermore, integrity tests were able not only to predict organizational citizenship behavior but also to incrementally predict job performance and organizational citizenship behavior beyond the factor and facet level of the personality traits of conscientiousness and honesty-humility. In contrast to the indirect questioning technique, the double rating method, which includes an other rating and a self rating, was shown to be able to significantly reduce faking on integrity tests in an anonymous survey setting. This dissertation makes an important contribution to better explain the construct and nomological network of integrity, provide a more detailed view on integrity tests and their protection against faking, and expand the predictive and incremental validity of these tests. The implications for future research and practice are further discussed.}, subject = {Integrit{\"a}t}, language = {en} } @phdthesis{Klinke2022, author = {Klinke, Christopher Matthias}, title = {Experimental investigation of the effect of distal stress induction on threat conditioning in humans}, doi = {10.25972/OPUS-22556}, url = {http://nbn-resolving.de/urn:nbn:de:bvb:20-opus-225562}, school = {Universit{\"a}t W{\"u}rzburg}, year = {2022}, abstract = {Stress constitutes a major risk factor for the development of psychiatric disorders, such as PTSD and anxiety disorders, by shifting the brain into a state of sensitization and makes it more vulnerable when being exposed to further aversive events. This was experimentally in-vestigated in rodents by examining the effect of a distal stress induction on threat conditioning, where stress impaired extinction learning and caused spontaneous recovery. However, this effect has never been experimentally investigated in humans, so far. Thus, the aim of this dissertation was to investigate the effect of distal stress on threat conditioning in humans. Therefore, two subsequent studies were conducted. For both studies, the threat conditioning paradigm comprised threat acquisition, extinction learning, and re-extinction. In the threat acquisition phase, two geometrical shapes were used as conditioned stimulus (CS), from which one (CS+) was paired with a painful electric stimulus (unconditioned stimulus, US), but not the other one (CS-). During extinction learning 24 h later and re-extinction seventeen days later, CSs were again presented but without any US delivery. In Study 1, 69 participants underwent either a stress (socially evaluated cold pressor test; SECPT) or sham protocol 10 days prior to threat conditioning. Furthermore, context effects were examined by placing the stress protocol in the same context (context-A stress, and sham group) or a different context (context-B stress group) than conditioning. Results revealed that the context-A, but not context-B, stress group displayed impaired safety learning (i.e. potenti-ation towards CS-) for startle response during threat acquisition. Moreover, the same stress group showed impaired threat extinction, evident in sustained CS discrimination in valence and arousal ratings during extinction learning, and memory recall. In sum, distal stress on the one hand impaired safety learning during threat conditioning on a level of startle response. On the other hand, stress impaired threat extinction on a level of ratings. Noteworthy, the effect of distal stress was only found when the stressor was placed in the same context as later threat learning. Hence, suggesting that the combination of stressor and stressor-associated context exerted the effect on threat extinction. In Study 2, it was examined if distal stress induction could also have an impact on threat and extinction processes without the necessity of context association. Therefore, the same stress (n = 45) or sham protocol (n = 44) as in Study 1 was conducted in a different context than and 24 h prior to a threat conditioning paradigm. Similar to Study 1, weakened extinction learning was found in fear ratings for the stress (vs. sham) group, which was indicated by persistent CS+/CS- differentiation after the first block of extinction trials. Alterations in safety learning towards the CS- during threat acquisition were only supported by significant correlations between stress measures on the stress day and conditioned startle response of the CS- during acquisition. Taken together, in two subsequent studies this dissertation provided first evidence of impaired threat extinction after distal stress induction in humans. Furthermore, impairments in safety learning, as can be observed in PTSD, were additionally demonstrated. Interestingly, the effects were boosted and more profound when associating the stressor to the later learning context. These results have clinical implications as they can be translated to the notion that prior stress exposure makes an individual more vulnerable for later aversive events.}, subject = {Stress}, language = {en} } @phdthesis{Zetzl2021, author = {Zetzl, Teresa Margarete}, title = {Cancer-related fatigue intervention}, doi = {10.25972/OPUS-25166}, url = {http://nbn-resolving.de/urn:nbn:de:bvb:20-opus-251662}, school = {Universit{\"a}t W{\"u}rzburg}, year = {2021}, abstract = {The incidence of cancer cases is rising steadily, while improved early detection and new cancer-specific therapies are reducing the mortality rate. In addition to curing cancer or prolonging life, increasing the quality of life is thus an important goal of oncology, which is why the burdens of cancer and treatment are becoming more important. A common side effect of cancer and its therapy is cancer-related fatigue, a tiredness that manifests itself on physical, emotional and cognitive levels and is not in proportion to previous physical efforts. Since the etiology of fatigue has not yet been fully clarified, symptom-oriented therapy is preferable to cause-specific therapy. In addition to activity management, sleep hygiene, and cognitive behavioral therapy, mind-body interventions such as yoga are recommended for reducing fatigue. Previous studies with small sample sizes were able to examine the efficacy of yoga regarding fatigue predominantly in patients with breast cancer. Long-term effects of yoga have rarely been studied and there have been no attempts to increase long-term effects through interventions such as reminder e-mails. This dissertation takes a closer look at these mentioned aspects of the study sample and long-term effects. An 8-week randomized controlled yoga intervention was conducted, including patients with different cancer types reporting mild to severe fatigue. Following the 8-week yoga therapy, a randomized group of participants received weekly reminder e-mails for 6 months for regular yoga practice, whereas the control group did not receive reminder e-mails. The first paper is a protocol article, which addresses the design and planned implementation of the research project this dissertation is based upon. This serves to ensure better replicability and comparability with other yoga studies. Due to a very low consent rate of patients in the pilot phase, it was necessary to deviate from the protocol article in the actual implementation and the planned inclusion criterion of fatigue >5 was reduced to fatigue >1. The second paper examines the efficacy of the eight-week yoga intervention. Patients in the intervention group who participated in the yoga classes seven times or more showed a significantly greater reduction in general and physical fatigue than those who participated less often. The efficacy of yoga was related to the number of attended yoga sessions. Women with breast cancer who participated in yoga reported greater reductions in fatigue than women with other cancer types. There was also an improvement for depression and quality of life after eight weeks of yoga therapy compared to no yoga therapy. These results imply that yoga is helpful in reducing depression and cancer-related fatigue, especially in terms of physical aspects and improving quality of life. The third paper focuses on the efficacy of reminder e-mails in terms of fatigue and practice frequency. Patients who received reminder e-mails reported greater reductions in general and emotional fatigue, as well as significant increases in practice frequency, compared to patients who did not receive reminder e-mails. Compared to fatigue scores before yoga, significantly lower fatigue and depression scores and higher quality of life were reported after yoga therapy and at follow-up six months later. Weekly e-mail reminders after yoga therapy may have positive effects on general and emotional fatigue and help cancer patients with fatigue establish a regular yoga practice at home. However, higher practice frequency did not lead to higher improvement in physical fatigue as found in Paper 2. This may indicate other factors that influence the efficacy of yoga practice on physical fatigue, such as mindfulness or side effects of therapy. This research project provides insight into the efficacy of yoga therapy for oncology patients with fatigue. It is important that such interventions be offered early, while fatigue symptoms are not too severe. Regular guided yoga practice can reduce physical fatigue, but subsequent yoga practice at home does not further reduce physical fatigue. Reminder emails after completed yoga therapy could only reduce patients' emotional fatigue. It may be that physical fatigue was reduced as much as possible by the previous yoga therapy and that there was a floor effect, or it may be that reminder emails are not suitable as an intervention to reduce physical fatigue at all. Further research is needed to examine the mechanisms of the different interventions in more detail and to find appropriate interventions that reduce all levels of fatigue equally.}, subject = {Erm{\"u}dungssyndrom}, language = {en} } @phdthesis{RiechelmannverhSteinbacher2021, author = {Riechelmann [verh. Steinbacher], Eva Katharina}, title = {Gaze interaction: Cognitive mechanisms of oculomotor action control}, doi = {10.25972/OPUS-21527}, url = {http://nbn-resolving.de/urn:nbn:de:bvb:20-opus-215279}, school = {Universit{\"a}t W{\"u}rzburg}, year = {2021}, abstract = {Humans use their eyes not only as visual input devices to perceive the environment, but also as an action tool in order to generate intended effects in their environment. For instance, glances are used to direct someone else's attention to a place of interest, indicating that gaze control is an important part of social communication. Previous research on gaze control in a social context mainly focused on the gaze recipient by asking how humans respond to perceived gaze (gaze cueing). So far, this perspective has hardly considered the actor's point of view by neglecting to investigate what mental processes are involved when actors decide to perform an eye movement to trigger a gaze response in another person. Furthermore, eye movements are also used to affect the non-social environment, for instance when unlocking the smartphone with the help of the eyes. This and other observations demonstrate the necessity to consider gaze control in contexts other than social communication whilst at the same time focusing on commonalities and differences inherent to the nature of a social (vs. non-social) action context. Thus, the present work explores the cognitive mechanisms that control such goal-oriented eye movements in both social and non-social contexts. The experiments presented throughout this work are built on pre-established paradigms from both the oculomotor research domain and from basic cognitive psychology. These paradigms are based on the principle of ideomotor action control, which provides an explanatory framework for understanding how goal-oriented, intentional actions come into being. The ideomotor idea suggests that humans acquire associations between their actions and the resulting effects, which can be accessed in a bi-directional manner: Actions can trigger anticipations of their effects, but the anticipated resulting effects can also trigger the associated actions. According to ideomotor theory, action generation involves the mental anticipation of the intended effect (i.e., the action goal) to activate the associated motor pattern. The present experiments involve situations where participants control the gaze of a virtual face via their eye movements. The triggered gaze responses of the virtual face are consistent to the participant's eye movements, representing visual action effects. Experimental situations are varied with respect to determinants of action-effect learning (e.g., contingency, contiguity, action mode during acquisition) in order to unravel the underlying dynamics of oculomotor control in these situations. In addition to faces, conditions involving changes in non-social objects were included to address the question of whether mechanisms underlying gaze control differ for social versus non-social context situations. The results of the present work can be summarized into three major findings. 1. My data suggest that humans indeed acquire bi-directional associations between their eye movements and the subsequently perceived gaze response of another person, which in turn affect oculomotor action control via the anticipation of the intended effects. The observed results show for the first time that eye movements in a gaze-interaction scenario are represented in terms of their gaze response in others. This observation is in line with the ideomotor theory of action control. 2. The present series of experiments confirms and extends pioneering results of Huestegge and Kreutzfeldt (2012) with respect to the significant influence of action effects in gaze control. I have shown that the results of Huestegge and Kreutzfeldt (2012) can be replicated across different contexts with different stimulus material given that the perceived action effects were sufficiently salient. 3. Furthermore, I could show that mechanisms of gaze control in a social gaze-interaction context do not appear to be qualitatively different from those in a non-social context. All in all, the results support recent theoretical claims emphasizing the role of anticipation-based action control in social interaction. Moreover, my results suggest that anticipation-based gaze control in a social context is based on the same general psychological mechanisms as ideomotor gaze control, and thus should be considered as an integral part rather than as a special form of ideomotor gaze control.}, subject = {Verhaltenskontrolle}, language = {en} } @phdthesis{Seger2021, author = {Seger, Benedikt Thomas}, title = {Children's Comprehension of Illustrated Narrative Text: The Role of Tripartite Representations and Perceptual Simulation}, doi = {10.25972/OPUS-24228}, url = {http://nbn-resolving.de/urn:nbn:de:bvb:20-opus-242280}, school = {Universit{\"a}t W{\"u}rzburg}, year = {2021}, abstract = {This doctoral thesis is part of a research project on the development of the cognitive compre-hension of film at W{\"u}rzburg University that was funded by the German Research Foundation (Deutsche Forschungsgemeinschaft) between 2013 and 2019 and awarded to Gerhild Nied-ing. That project examined children's comprehension of narrative text and its development in illustrated versus non-illustrated formats. For this purpose, van Dijk and Kintsch's (1983) tri-partite model was used, according to which text recipients form text surface and textbase rep-resentations and construct a situation model. In particular, predictions referring to the influ-ence of illustrations on these three levels of text representation were derived from the inte-grated model of text and picture comprehension (ITPC; Schnotz, 2014), which holds that text-picture units are processed on both text-based (descriptive) and picture-based (depictive) paths. Accordingly, illustrations support the construction of a situation model. Moreover, in line with the embodied cognition account (e.g., Barsalou, 1999), it was assumed that the situa-tion model is grounded in perception and action; text recipients mentally simulate the situation addressed in the text through their neural systems related to perception (perceptual simulation) and action (motor resonance). Therefore, the thesis also examines whether perceptual simula-tion takes place during story reception, whether it improves the comprehension of illustrated stories, and whether motor resonance is related to the comprehension of text accompanied by dynamic illustrations. Finally, predictions concerning the development of comprehending illus-trated text were made in line with Springer's (2001) hypotheses according to which younger children, compared with older children and adults, focus more on illustrations during text comprehension (perceptual boundedness) and use illustrations for the development of cogni-tive skills (perceptual support). The first research question sought to validate the tripartite model in the context of children's comprehension of narrative text, so Hypothesis 1 predicted that children yield representations of the text surface, the textbase, and the situation model during text reception. The second research question comprised the assumptions regarding the impact of illustrations on text comprehension. Accordingly, it was expected that illustrations improve the situation model (Hypothesis 2a), especially when they are processed before their corresponding text passages (Hypothesis 2b). Both hypotheses were derived from the ITPC and the assumption that per-ceptual simulation supports the situation model. It was further predicted that dynamic illustra-tions evoke more accurate situation models than static ones (Hypothesis 2c); this followed from the assumption that motor resonance supports the situation model. In line with the ITPC, it was assumed that illustrations impair the textbase (Hypothesis 2d), especially when they are presented after their corresponding text passages (Hypothesis 2e). In accordance with earlier results, it was posited that illustrations have a beneficial effect for the text surface (Hypothesis 2f). The third research question addressed the embodied approach to the situation model. Here, it was assumed that perceptual simulation takes place during text reception (Hypothesis 3a) and that it is more pronounced in illustrated than in non-illustrated text (Hypothesis 3b); the latter hypothesis was related to a necessary premise of the assumption that perceptual sim-ulation improves the comprehension of illustrated text. The fourth research question was relat-ed to perceptual boundedness and perceptual support and predicted age-related differences; younger children were expected to benefit more from illustrations regarding the situation model (Hypothesis 4a) and to simulate vertical object movements in a more pronounced fash-ion (Hypothesis 4b) than older children. In addition, Hypothesis 4c held that perceptual simu-lation is more pronounced in younger children particularly when illustrations are present. Three experiments were conducted to investigate these hypotheses. Experiment 1 (Seger, Wannagat, \& Nieding, submitted).compared the tripartite representations of written text without illustrations, with illustrations presented first, and with illustrations presented after their corresponding sentences. Students between 7 and 13 years old (N = 146) took part. Ex-periment 2 (Seger, Wannagat, \& Nieding, 2019) investigated the tripartite representations of auditory text, audiovisual text with static illustrations, and audiovisual text with dynamic il-lustrations among children in the same age range (N = 108). In both experiments, a sentence recognition method similar to that introduced by Schmalhofer and Glavanov (1986) was em-ployed. This method enables the simultaneous measurement of all three text representations. Experiment 3 (Seger, Hauf, \& Nieding, 2020) determined the perceptual simulation of vertical object movements during the reception of auditory and audiovisual narrative text among chil-dren between 5 and 11 years old and among adults (N = 190). For this experiment, a picture verification task based on Stanfield and Zwaan's (2001) paradigm and adapted from Hauf (2016) was used. The first two experiments confirmed Hypothesis 1, indicating that the tripartite model is appli-cable to the comprehension of auditory and written narrative text among children. A benefi-cial effect of illustrations to the situation model was observed when they were presented syn-chronously with auditory text (Hypotheses 2a), but not when presented asynchronously with written text (Hypothesis 2b), so the ITPC is partly supported on this point. Hypothesis 2c was rejected, indicating that motor resonance does not make an additional contribution to the comprehension of narrative text with dynamic illustrations. Regarding the textbase, a general negative effect of illustrations was not observed (Hypothesis 2d), but a specific negative effect of illustrations that follow their corresponding text passages was seen (Hypothesis 2e); the latter result is also in line with the ITPC. The text surface (Hypothesis 2f) appears to benefit from illustrations in auditory but not written text. The results obtained in Experiment 3 sug-gest that children and adults perceptually simulate vertical object movements (Hypothesis 3a), but there appears to be no difference between auditory and audiovisual text (Hypothesis 3b), so there is no support for a functional relationship between perceptual simulation and the situ-ation model in illustrated text. Hypotheses 4a-4c were investigated in all three experiments and did not receive support in any of them, which indicates that representations of illustrated and non-illustrated narrative text remain stable within the age range examined here.}, subject = {Textverstehen}, language = {en} } @phdthesis{HartliebgebFaust2021, author = {Hartlieb [geb. Faust], Verena}, title = {Die Bedeutung der phonologischen Bewusstheit f{\"u}r die Entwicklung mathematischer Kompetenzen bei Kindern mit und ohne Migrationshintergrund : Ergebnisse einer L{\"a}ngsschnittstudie vom Beginn des Vorschuljahres bis zum Ende der ersten Klasse}, doi = {10.25972/OPUS-24404}, url = {http://nbn-resolving.de/urn:nbn:de:bvb:20-opus-244047}, school = {Universit{\"a}t W{\"u}rzburg}, year = {2021}, abstract = {Die Entwicklung mathematischer Kompetenzen beginnt bereits vor Schuleintritt und wird durch viele Faktoren beeinflusst. In der vorliegenden Arbeit wird prim{\"a}r untersucht, ob die phonologische Bewusstheit als (meta-)sprachliche Kompetenz auch f{\"u}r die fr{\"u}he mathematische Kompetenzentwicklung bedeutsam ist und ob sich bei Kindern mit und ohne Migrationshintergrund vergleichbare Zusammenh{\"a}nge finden lassen. Ein weiterer Schwerpunkt bildet die {\"U}berpr{\"u}fung von differenziellen Effekten von ausgew{\"a}hlten, mathematischen Vorschultrainings sowie eines Trainings der phonologischen Bewusstheit auf die mathematischen Kompetenzen unter Ber{\"u}cksichtigung des Migrationshintergrundes. Die statistischen Analysen basieren auf einer Stichprobe von {\"u}ber 370 Kindern, die im Verlauf der L{\"a}ngsschnittstudie zu vier Messzeitpunkten, jeweils am Beginn und Ende des Vorschul- bzw. ersten Schuljahres, untersucht wurden. Durch Berechnung hierarchischer Regressionsanalysen ließ sich global kein zus{\"a}tzlicher Erkl{\"a}rungsbeitrag der phonologischen Bewusstheit neben den mathematischen Ausgangskompetenzen feststellen. Der Vergleich der beiden Migrationsgruppen ergab keine strukturellen Unterschiede. Die {\"U}berpr{\"u}fung von spezifischen Effekten durch mathematische Vorschulprogramme (Krajewski et al., 2007; Friedrich \& de Galg{\´o}czy, 2004; Preiß, 2004, 2005) und von unspezifischen Effekten durch ein Training der phonologischen Bewusstheit und der Buchstaben-Laut-Zuordnung (K{\"u}spert \& Schneider, 2008; Plume \& Schneider, 2004) auf die mathematischen Kompetenzen lieferte nur vereinzelt positive Effekte, die jedoch bei Ber{\"u}cksichtigung von individuellen und famili{\"a}ren Kontrollvariablen reduziert wurden. Die Generalisierbarkeit der Ergebnisse ist durch die komplexe Datenstruktur verbunden mit kleinen Stichprobengr{\"o}ßen in den jeweiligen Faktorenstufen limitiert. Insgesamt erm{\"o}glicht die vorliegende Arbeit eine differenzierte Betrachtung der mathematischen Kompetenzentwicklung bei Kindern mit und ohne Migrationshintergrund und liefert wichtige Implikationen f{\"u}r Forschung und Praxis.}, subject = {Mathematik}, language = {de} } @phdthesis{Gromer2021, author = {Gromer, Daniel}, title = {Mechanisms Underlying Virtual Reality Exposure Therapy for Specific Phobias}, doi = {10.25972/OPUS-20733}, url = {http://nbn-resolving.de/urn:nbn:de:bvb:20-opus-207334}, school = {Universit{\"a}t W{\"u}rzburg}, year = {2021}, abstract = {Virtual reality exposure therapy (VRET) is an effective cognitive-behavioral treatment for anxiety disorders that comprises systematic confrontations to virtual representations of feared stimuli and situations. However, not all patients respond to VRET, and some patients relapse after successful treatment. One explanation for this limitation of VRET is that its underlying mechanisms are not yet fully understood, leaving room for further improvement. On these grounds, the present thesis aimed to investigate two major research questions: first, it explored how virtual stimuli induce fear responses in height-fearful participants, and second, it tested if VRET outcome could be improved by incorporating techniques derived from two different theories of exposure therapy. To this end, five studies in virtual reality (VR) were conducted. Study 1 (N = 99) established a virtual environment for height exposure using a Computer Automatic Virtual Environment (CAVE) and investigated the effects of tactile wind simulation in VR. Height-fearful and non-fearful participants climbed a virtual outlook, and half of the participants received wind simulation. Results revealed that height-fearful participants showed stronger fear responses, on both a subjective and behavioral level, and that wind simulation increased subjective fear. However, adding tactile wind simulation in VR did not affect presence, the user's sense of 'being there' in the virtual environment. Replicating previous studies, fear and presence in VR were correlated, and the correlation was higher in height-fearful compared to non-fearful participants. Study 2 (N = 43) sought to corroborate the findings of the first study, using a different VR system for exposure (a head-mounted display) and measuring physiological fear responses. In addition, the effects of a visual cognitive distractor on fear in VR were investigated. Participants' fear responses were evident on both a subjective and physiological level---although much more pronounced on skin conductance than on heart rate---but the virtual distractor did not affect the strength of fear responses. In Study 3 (N = 50), the effects of trait height-fearfulness and height level on fear responses were investigated in more detail. Self-rated level of acrophobia and five different height levels in VR (1 m--20 m) were used as linear predictors of subjective and physiological indices of fear. Results showed that subjective fear and skin conductance responses were a function of both trait height-fearfulness and height level, whereas no clear effects were visible for heart rate. Study 4 (N = 64 + N = 49) aimed to advance the understanding of the relationship between presence and fear in VR. Previous research indicates a positive correlation between both measures, but possible causal mechanisms have not yet been identified. The study was the first to experimentally manipulate both presence (via the visual and auditive realism of the virtual environment) and fear (by presenting both height and control situations). Results indicated a causal effect of fear on presence, i.e., experiencing fear in a virtual environment led to a stronger sense of `being there' in the virtual environment. However, conversely, presence increased by higher scene realism did not affect fear responses. Nonetheless, presence seemed to have some effects on fear responding via another pathway, as participants whose presence levels were highest in the first safe context were also those who had the strongest fear responses in a later height situation. This finding indicated the importance of immersive user characteristics in the emergence of presence and fear in VR. The findings of the first four studies were integrated into a model of fear in VR, extending previous models and highlighting factors that lead to the emergence of both fear and presence in VR. Results of the studies showed that fear responses towards virtual heights were affected by trait height-fearfulness, phobic elements in the virtual environment, and, at least to some degree, on presence. Presence, on the other hand, was affected by experiencing fear in VR, immersion---the characteristics of the VR system---and immersive user characteristics. Of note, the manipulations of immersion used in the present thesis, visual and auditory realism of the virtual environment and tactile wind simulation, were not particularly effective in manipulating presence. Finally, Study 5 (N = 34) compared two different implementations of VRET for acrophobia to investigate mechanisms underlying its efficacy. The first implementation followed the Emotional Processing Theory, assuming that fear reduction during exposure is crucial for positive treatment outcome. In this condition, patients were asked to focus on their fear responses and on the decline of fear (habituation) during exposures. The second implementation was based on the inhibitory learning model, assuming that expectancy violation is the primary mechanism underlying exposure therapy efficacy. In this condition, patients were asked to focus on the non-occurrence of feared outcomes (e.g., 'I could fall off') during exposure. Based on predictions of the inhibitory learning model, the hypothesis for the study was that expectancy-violation-based exposure would outperform habituation-based exposure. After two treatment sessions in VR, both treatment conditions effectively reduced the patients' fear of heights, but the two conditions did not differ in their efficacy. The study replicated previous studies by showing that VRET is an effective treatment for acrophobia; however, contrary to the assumption, explicitly targeting the violation of threat expectancies did not improve outcome. This finding adds to other studies failing to provide clear evidence for expectancy violation as the primary mechanism underlying exposure therapy. Possible explanations for this finding and clinical implications are discussed, along with suggestions for further research.}, subject = {Virtuelle Realit{\"a}t}, language = {en} } @phdthesis{Stegmann2021, author = {Stegmann, Yannik}, title = {Electrocortical mechanisms of sustained attention during the acquisition and interaction of conditioned fear and anxiety}, doi = {10.25972/OPUS-23770}, url = {http://nbn-resolving.de/urn:nbn:de:bvb:20-opus-237700}, school = {Universit{\"a}t W{\"u}rzburg}, year = {2021}, abstract = {Adapting defensive behavior to the characteristics of a threatening situation is a fundamental function of the brain. Particularly, threat imminence plays a major role for the organization of defensive responses. Acute threat prompts phasic physiological responses, which are usually associated with an intense feeling of fear. In contrast, diffuse and potentially threatening situations elicit a sustained state of anxious apprehension. Detection of the threatening stimulus defines the key event in this framework, initiating the transition from potential to acute threat. Consequently, attention to threat is crucial for supporting defensive behavior. The functions of attention are finely tuned to the characteristics of a threatening situation. Potential threat is associated with hypervigilance, in order to facilitate threat detection. Once a threatening stimulus has been identified, attention is selectively focused on the source of danger. Even though the concepts of selective attention and hypervigilance to threat are well established, evidence for their neural correlates remain scarce. Therefore, a major goal of this thesis is to elucidate the neural correlates of selective attention to acute threat and hypervigilance during potential threat. A second aim of this thesis is to provide a mechanistic account for the interaction of fear and anxiety. While contemporary models view fear and anxiety as mutually exclusive, recent findings for the neural networks of fear and anxiety suggest potential interactions. In four studies, aversive cue conditioning was used to induce acute threat, while context conditioning served as a laboratory model of potential threat. To quantify neural correlates of selective attention and hypervigilance, steady-state visual evoked potentials (ssVEPs) were measured as an index of visuocortical responding. Study 1 compared visuocortical responses to acute and potential threat for high versus low trait-anxious individuals. All individuals demonstrated enhanced electrocortical responses to the central cue in the acute threat condition, suggesting evidence for the neural correlate of selective attention. However, only low anxious individuals revealed facilitated processing of the contexts in the potential threat condition, reflecting a neural correlate of hypervigilance. High anxious individuals did not discriminate among contexts. These findings contribute to the notion of aberrational processing of potential threat for high anxious individuals. Study 2 and 3 realized orthogonal combinations of cue and context conditioning to investigate potential interactions of fear and anxiety. In contrast to Study 1 and 2, Study 3 used verbal instructions to induce potentially threatening contexts. Besides ssVEPs, threat ratings and skin conductance responses (SCRs) were recorded as efferent indices of defensive responding. None of these studies found further evidence for the neural correlates of hypervigilance and selective attention. However, results for ratings and SCRs revealed additive effects of fear and anxiety, suggesting that fear and anxiety are not mutually exclusive, but interact linearly to organize and facilitate defensive behavior. Study 4 tested ssVEPs to more ecologically valid forms of context conditioning, using flickering video stimuli of virtual offices to establish context representations. Contrary to expectations, results revealed decreased visuocortical responses during sustained presentations of anxiety compared to neutral contexts. A disruption of ssVEP signals eventually suggests interferences by continuously changing video streams which are enhanced as a function of motivational relevance. In summary, this thesis provided evidence for the neural correlates of attention only for isolated forms of fear and anxiety, but not for their interaction. In contrast, an additive interaction model of fear and anxiety for measures of defensive responding offers a new perspective on the topography of defensive behavior.}, subject = {Furcht}, language = {en} } @phdthesis{Schmidts2021, author = {Schmidts, Constantin}, title = {Affective regulation of cognitive conflict}, doi = {10.25972/OPUS-21989}, url = {http://nbn-resolving.de/urn:nbn:de:bvb:20-opus-219897}, school = {Universit{\"a}t W{\"u}rzburg}, year = {2021}, abstract = {Kognitive Kontrolle beschreibt Prozesse die n{\"o}tig sind um zielgerichtetes Handeln im Angesicht von internen oder externen Widerst{\"a}nden zu erm{\"o}glichen. Wenn wir aus eigenen St{\"u}cken oder inspiriert durch unsere Umwelt Handlungen vorbereiten die unseren aktuellen Zielen entgegen stehen, kommt es zu Konflikten. Solche Konflikte k{\"o}nnen sich auf nachfolgendes Erleben und Verhalten auswirken. Aversive Konsequenzen von Konflikt k{\"o}nnten in einem Konflikt{\"u}berwachungsmodul registriert werden, welches anschließend Aufmerksamkeits{\"a}nderungen und Handlungstendenzen zur Reduzierung dieses negativen Affektes in Gang setzt. Wenn das der Fall w{\"a}re, k{\"o}nnten die vielfach beobachteten Verhaltensanpassungen an kognitiven Konflikt ein Ausdruck von Emotionsregulation sein. Ein theoretischer Eckpfeiler der gegenw{\"a}rtigen Forschung zur Emotionsregulation ist das Prozessmodell der Emotionsregulation, das aus den Regulationsstrategien Situationsauswahl, Situationsmodifikation, Aufmerksamkeitslenkung, kognitiven Ver{\"a}nderungen und Reaktionsmodulation besteht. Unter der Annahme, dass Konfliktanpassung und Affektregulation auf gemeinsamen Mechanismen fußen, habe ich aus dem Prozessmodell der Emotionsregulation Vorhersagen zur kognitiven Kontrolle abgeleitet und diese in elf Experimenten getestet (N = 509). Die Versuchsteilnehmer zeigten Situationsauswahl in Bezug auf Konflikte, allerdings nur dann, wenn sie ausdr{\"u}cklich auf Handlungs- und Ergebniskontingenzen hingewiesen wurden (Experimente 1 bis 3). Ich fand Anzeichen f{\"u}r einen Mechanismus, der der Situationsmodifikation {\"a}hnelt, aber keine Hinweise auf eine Beteiligung von Affekt (Experimente 4 bis 10). Eine {\"A}nderung der Konfliktbewertung hatte keinen Einfluss auf das Ausmaß der Konfliktadaptation (Experiment 11). Insgesamt gab es Hinweise auf eine explizite Aversivit{\"a}t kognitiver Konflikte, jedoch weniger auf implizite Aversivit{\"a}t, was darauf hindeutet, dass Konflikte vor allem dann Affektregulationsprozesse ausl{\"o}sen, wenn Menschen explizit Affektregulationsziele vor Augen haben.}, subject = {Affekt}, language = {en} } @phdthesis{Wiedemann2020, author = {Wiedemann, Katharina}, title = {Fr{\"u}hzeitige Informationen {\"u}ber Systemgrenzen beim hochautomatisierten Fahren}, doi = {10.25972/OPUS-21658}, url = {http://nbn-resolving.de/urn:nbn:de:bvb:20-opus-216581}, school = {Universit{\"a}t W{\"u}rzburg}, year = {2020}, abstract = {Fahrzeughersteller haben die Verf{\"u}gbarkeit sogenannter hochautomatisierter Fahrfunktionen (SAE Level 3; SAE, 2018) in ihren Modellen angek{\"u}ndigt. Hierdurch wird der Fahrer in der Lage sein, sich permanent von der Fahraufgabe abzuwenden und fahrfremden T{\"a}tigkeiten nachzugehen. Allerdings muss er immer noch als R{\"u}ckfallebene zur Verf{\"u}gung stehen, um im Fall von Systemgrenzen oder -fehlern (siehe Gold, Naujoks, Radlmayr, Bellem \& Jarosch, 2017), die Fahrzeugkontrolle zu {\"u}bernehmen. Das {\"U}bernahmeerfordernis wird dem Fahrer durch die Ausgabe einer {\"U}bernameaufforderung vermittelt. Die {\"U}bernahme der manuellen Fahrzeugf{\"u}hrung aus dem hochautomatisierten Fahren stellt aus psychologischer Sicht einen Aufgabenwechsel dar. Bei der Untersuchung von Aufgabenwechseln im Bereich der kognitiven und angewandten Psychologie zeigte sich vielfach, dass Aufgabenwechsel mit verl{\"a}ngerten Reaktionszeiten und erh{\"o}hten Fehlerraten assoziiert sind. F{\"u}r den Anwendungsfall des automatisierten Fahrens liegen ebenfalls eine Reihe empirischer Studien vor, die darauf hinweisen, dass der Wechsel zum manuellen Fahren mit einer Verschlechterung der Fahrleistung gegen{\"u}ber dem manuellen Fahren verbunden ist. Da Erkenntnisse vorliegen, dass eine Vorbereitung auf den Aufgabenwechsel die zu erwartenden Kosten verringern kann, ist das Ziel dieser Arbeit die Konzeption und empirische Evaluation einer Mensch-Maschine-Schnittstelle, die Nutzer hochautomatisierter Fahrzeuge durch fr{\"u}hzeitige Vorinformationen {\"u}ber Systemgrenzen auf die Kontroll{\"u}bernahme vorbereitet. Drei Experimente im Fahrsimulator mit Bewegungssystem betrachteten jeweils unterschiedliche Aspekte fr{\"u}hzeitiger Vorinformationen {\"u}ber bevorstehende {\"U}bernahmen. Das erste Experiment untersuchte, ob Fahrer {\"u}berhaupt von fr{\"u}hzeitigen Situationsank{\"u}ndigungen, beispielsweise im Sinne einer verbesserten {\"U}bernahmeleistung, profitieren. Das zweite Experiment befasste sich mit der Frage, wie solche Ank{\"u}ndigungen zeitlich und inhaltlich zu gestalten sind (d. h. wann sie pr{\"a}sentiert werden und welche Informationen sie enthalten sollten), und welchen Einfluss deren Gestaltung auf die Aufgabenbearbeitung (insbesondere deren Unterbrechung und sp{\"a}tere Wiederaufnahme) w{\"a}hrend der automatisierten Fahrt hat. Um herauszufinden, wie ein Anzeigekonzept zur l{\"a}ngerfristigen Planung von fahrfremden T{\"a}tigkeiten w{\"a}hrend des automatisierten Fahrens beitragen k{\"o}nnte, fand im dritten Experiment ein Vergleich von Situationsank{\"u}ndigungen, die vor dem Erreichen einer {\"U}bernahmesituation ausgegeben wurden, mit kontinuierlich pr{\"a}sentierten Informationen {\"u}ber die verbleibende Distanz zur n{\"a}chsten Systemgrenze statt. In allen Studien wurde neben den Auswirkungen fr{\"u}hzeitiger Vorinformationen auf die {\"U}bernahmeleistung und Bearbeitung von fahrfremden T{\"a}tigkeiten auch untersucht, welche Auswirkungen ein erweitertes {\"U}bernahmekonzept auf die Fahrerreaktion in Grenz- und Fehlerf{\"a}llen, in denen Vorinformationen entweder nicht oder fehlerhaft angezeigt wurden, hat. F{\"u}r die Gestaltung zuk{\"u}nftiger {\"U}bernahmekonzepte f{\"u}r hochautomatisierte Fahrzeuge kann basierend auf den Ergebnissen empfohlen werden, fr{\"u}hzeitige Anzeigen von Systemgrenzen zur Erm{\"o}glichung eines sicheren und komfortablen Wechsels zwischen dem manuellen und dem automatisierten Fahren in die Mensch-Maschine-Schnittstelle zu integrieren. Basierend auf den Ergebnissen dieser Arbeit liegt der empfohlene Zeitpunkt f{\"u}r diskrete Ank{\"u}ndigungen bei einer Reisegeschwindigkeit von 120 km/h bei etwa 1000 Meter (d. h. ca. 30 Sekunden) vor der Ausgabe der {\"U}bernahmeaufforderung. Zudem wird empfohlen zur Absch{\"a}tzung der verbleibenden Zeit im automatisierten Modus eine Anzeige der Entfernung zur n{\"a}chsten Systemgrenze in das Konzept zu integrieren, die dem Fahrer eine l{\"a}ngerfristige Aufgabenplanung erm{\"o}glicht. Neben der reinen Anzeige des {\"U}bernahmeerfordernisses sollten dem Fahrer auch Informationen {\"u}ber das erforderliche Fahrman{\"o}ver nach der Kontroll{\"u}bernahme {\"u}bermittelt werden.}, subject = {Autonomes Fahrzeug}, language = {de} } @phdthesis{LangeneSoehnchen2020, author = {Lange [n{\´e} S{\"o}hnchen], Bastian}, title = {Influence of social anxiety on social attention and corresponding changes in action patterns}, doi = {10.25972/OPUS-18900}, url = {http://nbn-resolving.de/urn:nbn:de:bvb:20-opus-189001}, school = {Universit{\"a}t W{\"u}rzburg}, year = {2020}, abstract = {People who suffer Social Anxiety Disorder (SAD) are under substantial personal distress and endure impaired normal functioning in at least some parts of everyday life. Next, to the personal suffering, there are also the immense public health costs to consider, as SAD is the most common anxiety disorder and thereby one of the major psychiatric disorders in general. Over the last years, fundamental research found cognitive factors as essential components in the development and maintenance of social fears. Following leading cognitive models, avoidance behaviors are thought to be an important factor in maintaining the developed social anxieties. Therefore, this thesis aims to deepen the knowledge of avoidance behaviors exhibited in social anxiety, which allows to get a better understanding of how SAD is maintained. To reach this goal three studies were conducted, each using a different research approach. In the first study cutting-edge Virtual Reality (VR) equipment was used to immerse participants in a virtual environment. In this virtual setting, High Socially Anxious (HSA) individuals and matched controls had to execute a social Approach-Avoidance Task (AAT). In the task, participants had to pass a virtual person displaying neutral or angry facial expressions. By using a highly immersive VR apparatus, the first described study took the initial step in establishing a new VR task for the implicit research on social approach-avoidance behaviors. By moving freely through a VR environment, participants experienced near real-life social situations. By tracking body and head movements, physical and attentional approach-avoidance processes were studied. The second study looked at differences in attention shifts initiated by gaze-cues of neutral or emotional faces. Comparing HSA and controls, enabled a closer look at attention re-allocation with special focus on social stimuli. Further, context conditioning was used to compare task performance in a safe and in a threatening environment. Next to behavioral performance, the study also investigated neural activity using Electroencephalography (EEG) primarily looking at the N2pc component. In the third study, eye movements of HSA and Low Socially Anxious (LSA) were analyzed using an eye-tracking apparatus while participants executed a computer task. The participants' tasks consisted of the detection of either social or non-social stimuli in complex visual settings. The study intended to compare attention shifts towards social components between these two tasks and how high levels of social anxiety influence them. In other words, the measurements of eye movements enabled the investigation to what extent social attention is task-dependent and how it is influenced by social anxiety. With the three described studies, three different approaches were used to get an in-depth understanding of what avoidance behaviors in SAD are and to which extent they are exhibited. Overall, the results showed that HSA individuals exhibited exaggerated physical and attentional avoidance behavior. Furthermore, the results highlighted that the task profoundly influences attention allocation. Finally, all evidence indicates that avoidance behaviors in SAD are exceedingly complex. They are not merely based on the fear of a particular stimulus, but rather involve highly compound cognitive processes, which surpass the simple avoidance of threatening stimuli. To conclude, it is essential that further research is conducted with special focus on SAD, its maintaining factors, and the influence of the chosen research task and method.}, subject = {Sozialangst}, language = {en} } @phdthesis{Ahrens2020, author = {Ahrens, Lea Marlen}, title = {The Role of Attentional Control and Fear Acquisition and Generalization in Social Anxiety Disorder}, doi = {10.25972/OPUS-17162}, url = {http://nbn-resolving.de/urn:nbn:de:bvb:20-opus-171622}, school = {Universit{\"a}t W{\"u}rzburg}, year = {2020}, abstract = {Although Social Anxiety Disorder (SAD) is one of the most prevalent mental disorders, still little is known about its development and maintenance. Cognitive models assume that deviations in attentional as well as associative learning processes play a role in the etiology of SAD. Amongst others, deficits in inhibitory attentional control as well as aberrations during fear generalization, which have already been observed in other anxiety disorders, are two candidate mechanisms that might contribute to the onset and retention of SAD. However, a review of the literature shows that there is a lack of research relating to these topics. Thus, the aim of the present thesis was to examine in which way individuals with SAD differ from healthy controls regarding attentional control and generalization of acquired fear during the processing of social stimuli. Study 1 tested whether impairment in the inhibitory control of attention is a feature of SAD, and how it might be influenced by emotional expression and gaze direction of an interactional partner. For this purpose, individuals with SAD and healthy controls (HC) participated in an antisaccade task with faces displaying different emotional expressions (angry, neutral and happy) and gaze directions (direct and averted) serving as target stimuli. While the participants performed either pro- or antisaccades in response to the peripherally presented faces, their gaze behavior was recorded via eye-tracking, and ratings of valence and arousal were obtained. Results revealed that both groups showed prolonged latencies and increased error rates in trials with correct anti- compared to prosaccades. However, there were no differences between groups with regard to response latency or error rates, indicating that SAD patients did not exhibit impairment on inhibitory attentional control in comparison to HC during eye-tracking. Possible explanations for this finding could be that reduced inhibitory attentional control in SAD only occurs under certain circumstances, for example, when these individuals currently run the risk of being negatively evaluated by others and not in the mere presence of phobic stimuli, or when the cognitive load of a task is so high that it cannot be unwound by compensatory strategies, such as putting more effort into a task. As not only deviations in attentional, but also associative learning processes might be pathogenic markers of SAD, these mechanisms were further addressed in the following experiments. Study 2 is the first that attempted to investigate the generalization of conditioned fear in patients with SAD. To this end, patients with SAD and HC were conditioned to two neutral female faces serving as conditioned stimuli (CS+: reinforced; CS-: non-reinforced) and a fearful face paired with a loud scream serving as unconditioned stimulus (US). Fear generalization was tested by presenting morphs of the two faces (GS: generalization stimuli), which varied in their similarity to the original faces. During the whole experiment, self-report ratings, heart rate (HR) and skin conductance responses (SCR) were recorded. Results demonstrated that SAD patients rated all stimuli as less pleasant and more arousing, and overestimated the occurrence of the US compared to HC, indicating a general hyperarousal in individuals with SAD. In addition, ratings and SCR indicated that both groups generalized their acquired fear from the CS+ to intermediate GSs as a function of their similarity to the CS+. However, except for the HR data, which indicated that only SAD patients but not HC displayed a generalization response in this measure, most of the results did not support the hypothesis that SAD is characterized by overgeneralization. A plausible reason for this finding could be that overgeneralization is just a key characteristic of some anxiety disorders and SAD is not one of them. Still, other factors, such as comorbidities in the individuals with SAD, could also have had an influence on the results, which is why overgeneralization was further examined in study 3. The aim of study 3 was to investigate fear generalization on a neuronal level. Hence, high (HSA) and low socially anxious participants (LSA) underwent a conditioning paradigm, which was an adaption of the experimental design used study 2 for EEG. During the experiment, steady-state visually evoked potentials (ssVEPs) and ratings of valence and arousal were recorded. Analyses revealed significant generalization gradients in all ratings with highest fear responses to the CS+ and a progressive decline of these reactions with increasing similarity to the CS-. In contrast, the generalization gradient on a neuronal level showed highest amplitudes for the CS+ and a reduction in amplitude to the most proximal, but not distal GSs in the ssVEP signal, which might be interpreted as lateral inhibition in the visual cortex. The observed dissociation among explicit and implicit measures points to different functions of behavioral and sensory cortical processes during fear generalization: While the ratings might reflect an individual's consciously increased readiness to react to threat, the lateral inhibition pattern in the occipital cortex might serve to maximize the contrast among stimuli with and without affective value and thereby improve adaptive behavior. As no group differences could be observed, the finding of study 2 that overgeneralization does not seem to be a marker of SAD is further consolidated. In sum, the conducted experiments suggest that individuals with SAD are characterized by a general hyperarousal during the exposition to disorder-relevant stimuli as indicated by enhanced arousal and reduced valence ratings of the stimuli compared to HC. However, the hypotheses that reduced inhibitory attentional control and overgeneralization of conditioned fear are markers of SAD were mostly not confirmed. Further research is required to elucidate whether they only occur under certain circumstances, such as high cognitive load (e.g. handling two tasks simultaneously) or social stress (e.g. before giving a speech), or whether they are not characteristics of SAD at all. With the help of these findings, new interventions for the treatment of SAD can be developed, such as attentional bias modification or discrimination learning.}, subject = {Sozialangst}, language = {en} } @phdthesis{Foerster2020, author = {F{\"o}rster, Anna}, title = {Searching for truth in dishonesty: The cognitive architecture of lying}, doi = {10.25972/OPUS-20973}, url = {http://nbn-resolving.de/urn:nbn:de:bvb:20-opus-209730}, school = {Universit{\"a}t W{\"u}rzburg}, year = {2020}, abstract = {Honest actions predominate human behavior. From time to time, this general preference must yield to dishonest actions, which require an effortful process of overcoming initial honest response activation. This thesis presents three experimental series to elucidate this tug-of-war between honest and dishonest response tendencies in overtly committed instances of lies, thereby joining recent efforts to move from a sheer phenomenological perspective on dishonest responding as being more difficult than honest responding to a precise description of the underlying cognitive processes. The consideration of cognitive theories, empirical evidence, and paradigms from different research fields - dishonesty, cognitive control and sensorimotor stage models of information processing - lay the groundwork for the research questions and methodological approach of this thesis. The experiments pinpoint the underlying conflict of dishonest responding in the central, capacity-limited stage of information processing (Experiments 1 to 4), but they also demonstrate that cognitive control processes (Experiments 5 to 7) and the internalization of false alibis (Experiments 8 to 11) can reduce or even completely eliminate this conflict. The data reveals great flexibility at the cognitive basis of dishonest responding: On the one hand, dishonest responding appears to rely heavily on capacity-limited processes of response selection to overcome honest response tendencies alongside up- and downstream consequences of response activation and monitoring. On the other hand, agents have powerful tools to mitigate these effortful processes through control adaptation and false alibis. These results support and expand current theorizing of the cognitive underpinnings of dishonest responding. Furthermore, they are alerting from an applied perspective on the detection of lies, especially when considering the flexibility of even basic cognitive processes in the face of false alibis. A promising way to move forward from here would be a fine-grained discrimination of response activation, passive decay and active inhibition of honest representations in dishonest responding and the assessment of the adaptiveness of these processes.}, subject = {L{\"u}ge}, language = {en} } @phdthesis{Weiss2020, author = {Weiß, Martin}, title = {The neural principles of behavior modification using socioemotional facial feedback cues in economic decision-making}, doi = {10.25972/OPUS-20865}, url = {http://nbn-resolving.de/urn:nbn:de:bvb:20-opus-208654}, school = {Universit{\"a}t W{\"u}rzburg}, year = {2020}, abstract = {The present dissertation aims to shed light on different mechanisms of socio-emotional feedback in social decision-making situations. The objective is to evaluate emotional facial expressions as feedback stimuli, i.e., responses of interaction partners to certain social decisions. In addition to human faces, artificial emojis are also examined due to their relevance for modern digital communication. Previous research on the influence of emotional feedback suggests that a person's behavior can be effectively reinforced by rewarding stimuli. In the context of this dissertation, the differences in the feedback processing of human photographs and emojis, but also the evaluation of socially expected versus socially unexpected feedback were examined in detail in four studies. In addition to behavioral data, we used the electroencephalogram (EEG) in all studies to investigate neural correlates of social decision-making and emotional feedback. As the central paradigm, all studies were based on a modified ultimatum game. The game is structured as follows: there is a so-called proposer who holds a specific amount of money (e.g., 10 cents) and offers the responder a certain amount (e.g., 3 cents). The responder then decides whether to accept or reject the offer. In the version of the ultimatum game presented here, different types of proposers are introduced. After the participants have accepted or rejected in the role of the responder, the different proposers react to the participant's decision with specific emotional facial expressions. Different feedback patterns are used for the individual experiments conducted in the course of this dissertation. In the first study, we investigated the influence of emotional feedback on decision-making in the modified version of the ultimatum game. We were able to show that a proposer who responds to the acceptance of an offer with a smiling face achieves more accepted offers overall than a control proposer who responds to both accepted and rejected offers with a neutral facial expression. Consequently, the smile served as a positive reinforcement. Similarly, a sad expression in response to a rejected offer also resulted in higher acceptance rates as compared to the control identity, which could be considered an expression of compassion for that proposer. On a neuronal level, we could show that there are differences between simply looking at negative emotional stimuli (i.e., sad and angry faces) and their appearance as feedback stimuli after rejected offers in the modified ultimatum game. The so-called feedback-related negativity was reduced (i.e., more positive) when negative emotions appeared as feedback from the proposers. We argued that these findings might show that the participants wanted to punish the proposers by rejecting an offer for its unfairness and therefore the negative feedback met their expectations. The altered processing of negative emotional facial expressions in the ultimatum game could therefore indicate that the punishment is interpreted as successful. This includes the expectation that the interaction partner will change his behavior in the future and eventually make fairer offers. In the second study we wanted to show that smiling and sad emojis as feedback stimuli in the modified ultimatum game can also lead to increased acceptance rates. Contrary to our assumptions, this effect could not be observed. At the neural level as well, the findings did not correspond to our assumptions and differed strongly from those of the first study. One finding, however, was that the neural P3 component showed how the use of emojis as feedback stimuli particularly characterizes certain types of proposers. This is supported by the fact that the P3 is increased for the proposer who rewards an acceptance with a smile as well as for the proposer who reacts to rejection with a sad emoji compared to the neutral control proposer. The third study examined the discrepancy between the findings of the first and second study. Accordingly, both humans and emojis representing the different proposers were presented in the ultimatum game. In addition, emojis were selected that showed a higher similarity to known emojis from common messenger services compared to the second study. We were able to replicate that the proposers in the ultimatum game, who reward an acceptance of the offer with a smile, led to an increased acceptance rate compared to the neutral control proposers. This difference is independent of whether the proposers are represented by emojis or human faces. With regard to the neural correlates, we were able to demonstrate that emojis and human faces differ strongly in their neural processing. Emojis showed stronger activation than human faces in the face-processing N170 component, the feedback-related negativity and the P3 component. We concluded that the results of the N170 and feedback-related negativity could indicate a signal for missing social information of emojis compared to faces. The increased P3 amplitude for emojis might imply that emojis appear unexpectedly as reward stimuli in a social decision task compared to human faces. The last study of this project dealt with socially unexpected feedback. In comparison to the first three studies, new proposer identities were implemented. In particular, the focus was on a proposer who reacted to the rejection of an offer unexpectedly with a smile and to the acceptance with a neutral facial expression. According to the results, participants approach this unexpected smile through increased rejection, although it is accompanied by financial loss. In addition, as reported in studies one and three, we were able to show that proposers who respond to the acceptance of an offer with a smiling face and thus meet the expectations of the participants have higher offer acceptance rates than the control proposer. At the neuronal level, especially the feedback from the socially unexpected proposer led to an increased P3 amplitude, which indicates that smiling after rejection is attributed a special subjective importance. The experiments provide new insights into the social influence through emotional feedback and the processing of relevant social cues. Due to the conceptual similarity of the studies, it was possible to differentiate between stable findings and potentially stimulus-dependent deviations, thus creating a well-founded contribution to the current research. Therefore, the novel paradigm presented here, and the knowledge gained from it could also play an important role in the future for clinical questions dealing with limited social competencies.}, subject = {Entscheidungsverhalten}, language = {en} } @phdthesis{Genheimer2020, author = {Genheimer, Hannah}, title = {The acquisition of anxiety and the impact of transcutaneous vagus nerve stimulation on extinction learning in virtual contexts}, doi = {10.25972/OPUS-20639}, url = {http://nbn-resolving.de/urn:nbn:de:bvb:20-opus-206390}, school = {Universit{\"a}t W{\"u}rzburg}, year = {2020}, abstract = {This thesis aims for a better understanding of the mechanisms underlying anxiety as well as trauma- and stressor-related disorders and the development of new therapeutic approaches. I was first interested in the associative learning mechanisms involved in the etiology of anxiety disorders. Second, I explored the therapeutic effects of transcutaneous vagus nerve stimulation (tVNS) as a promising new method to accelerate and stabilize extinction learning in humans. For these purposes, I applied differential anxiety conditioning protocols realized by the implementation of virtual reality (VR). Here, a formerly neutral virtual context (anxiety context, CTX+) is presented whereby the participants unpredictably receive mildly aversive electric stimuli (unconditioned stimulus, US). Another virtual context (safety context, CTX-) is never associated with the US. Moreover, extinction of conditioned anxiety can be modeled by presenting the same contexts without US delivery. When unannounced USs were administered after extinction, i.e. reinstatement, the strength of the "returned" conditioned anxiety can provide information on the stability of the extinction memory. In Study 1, I disentangled the role of elemental and conjunctive context representations in the acquisition of conditioned anxiety. Sequential screenshots of two virtual offices were presented like a flip-book so that I elicited the impression of walking through the contexts. Some pictures of CTX+ were paired with an US (threat elements), but not some other screenshots of the same context (non-threat elements), nor the screenshots depicting CTX- (safety elements). Higher contingency ratings for threat compared to non-threat elements revealed elemental representation. Electro-cortical responses showed larger P100 and early posterior negativity amplitudes elicited by screenshots depicting CTX+ compared to CTX- and suggested conjunctive representation. These results support the dual context representation in anxiety acquisition in healthy individuals. Study 2 addressed the effects of tVNS on the stabilization of extinction learning by using a context conditioning paradigm. Potentiated startle responses as well as higher aversive ratings in CTX+ compared to CTX- indicate successful anxiety conditioning. Complete extinction was found in startle responses and valence ratings as no differentiation between CTX+ and CTX- suggested. TVNS did not affect extinction or reinstatement of anxiety which may be related to the inappropriate transferability of successful stimulation parameters from epilepsy patients to healthy participants during anxiety extinction. Therefore, in Study 3 I wanted to replicate the modulatory effects of tVNS on heart rate and pain perception by the previously used parameters. However, no effects of tVNS were observed on subjective pain ratings, on pain tolerance, or on heart rate. This led to the conclusion that the modification of stimulation parameters is necessary for a successful acceleration of anxiety extinction in humans. In Study 4, I prolonged the tVNS and, considering previous tVNS studies, I applied a cue conditioning paradigm in VR. Therefore, during acquisition a cue (CS+) presented in CTX+ predicted the US, but not another cue (CS-). Both cues were presented in a second context (CTX-) and never paired with the US. Afterward, participants received either tVNS or sham stimulation and underwent extinction learning. I found context-dependent cue conditioning only in valence ratings, which was indicated by lower valence for CS+ compared to CS- in CTX+, but no differential ratings in CTX-. Successful extinction was indicated by equal responses to CS+ and CS-. Interestingly, I found reinstatement of conditioned fear in a context-dependent manner, meaning startle response was potentiated for CS+ compared to CS- only in the anxiety context. Importantly, even the prolonged tVNS had no effect, neither on extinction nor on reinstatement of context-dependent cue conditioning. However, I found first evidence for accelerated physiological contextual extinction due to less differentiation between startles in CTX+ compared to CTX- in the tVNS than in the sham stimulated group. In sum, this thesis first confirms the dual representation of a context in an elemental and a conjunctive manner. Second, though anxiety conditioning and context-dependent cue conditioning paradigms worked well, the translation of tVNS accelerated extinction from rats to humans needs to be further developed, especially the stimulation parameters. Nevertheless, tVNS remains a very promising approach of memory enhancement, which can be particularly auspicious in clinical settings.}, subject = {Angst}, language = {en} }