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Institut
- Psychologie (64) (entfernen)
Fostering positive and realistic self-concepts of individuals is a major goal in education worldwide (Trautwein & Möller, 2016). Individuals spend most of their childhood and adolescence in school. Thus, schools are important contexts for individuals to develop positive self-perceptions such as self-concepts. In order to enhance positive self-concepts in educational settings and in general, it is indispensable to have a comprehensive knowledge about the development and structure of self-concepts and their determinants. To date, extensive empirical and theoretical work on antecedents and change processes of self-concept has been conducted. However, several research gaps still exist, and several of these are the focus of the present dissertation. Specifically, these research gaps encompass (a) the development of multiple self-concepts from multiple perspectives regarding stability and change, (b) the direction of longitudinal interplay between self-concept facets over the entire time period from childhood to late adolescence, and (c) the evidence that a recently developed structural model of academic self-concept (nested Marsh/Shavelson model [Brunner et al., 2010]) fits the data in elementary school students, (d) the investigation of structural changes in academic self-concept profile formation within this model, (e) the investigation of dimensional comparison processes as determinants of academic self-concept profile formation in elementary school students within the internal/external frame of reference model (I/E model; Marsh, 1986), (f) the test of moderating variables for dimensional comparison processes in elementary school, (g) the test of the key assumptions of the I/E model that effects of dimensional comparisons depend to a large degree on the existence of achievement differences between subjects, and (h) the generalizability of the findings regarding the I/E model over different statistical analytic methods. Thus, the aim of the present dissertation is to contribute to close these gaps with three studies. Thereby, data from German students enrolled in elementary school to secondary school education were gathered in three projects comprising the developmental time span from childhood to adolescence (ages 6 to 20). Three vital self-concept areas in childhood and adolescence were in-vestigated: general self-concept (i.e., self-esteem), academic self-concepts (general, math, reading, writing, native language), and social self-concepts (of acceptance and assertion). In all studies, data were analyzed within a latent variable framework. Findings are discussed with respect to the research aims of acquiring more comprehensive knowledge on the structure and development of significant self-concept in childhood and adolescence and their determinants. In addition, theoretical and practical implications derived from the findings of the present studies are outlined. Strengths and limitations of the present dissertation are discussed. Finally, an outlook for future research on self-concepts is given.
Background and rationale: Changing working conditions demand adaptation, resulting in higher stress levels in employees. In consequence, decreased productivity, increasing rates of sick leave, and cases of early retirement result in higher direct, indirect, and intangible costs. Aims of the Research Project: The aim of the study was to test the usefulness of a novel translational diagnostic tool, Neuropattern, for early detection, prevention, and personalized treatment of stress-related disorders. The trial was designed as a pilot study with a wait list control group. Materials and Methods: In this study, 70 employees of the Forestry Department Rhineland-Palatinate, Germany, were enrolled. Subjects were block-randomized according to the functional group of their career field, and either underwent Neuropattern diagnostics immediately, or after a waiting period of three months. After the diagnostic assessment, their physicians received the Neuropattern Medical Report, including the diagnostic results and treatment recommendations. Participants were informed by the Neuropattern Patient Report, and were eligible to an individualized Neuropattern Online Counseling account. Results: The application of Neuropattern diagnostics significantly improved mental health and health-related behavior, reduced perceived stress, emotional exhaustion, overcommitment and possibly, presenteeism. Additionally, Neuropattern sensitively detected functional changes in stress physiology at an early stage, thus allowing timely personalized interventions to prevent and treat stress pathology. Conclusion: The present study encouraged the application of Neuropattern diagnostics to early intervention in non-clinical populations. However, further research is required to determine the best operating conditions.
At any given moment, our senses are assaulted with a flood of information from the environment around us. We need to pick our way through all this information in order to be able to effectively respond to that what is relevant to us. In most cases we are usually able to select information relevant to our intentions from what is not relevant. However, what happens to the information that is not relevant to us? Is this irrelevant information completely ignored so that it does not affect our actions? The literature suggests that even though we mayrnignore an irrelevant stimulus, it may still interfere with our actions. One of the ways in which irrelevant stimuli can affect actions is by retrieving a response with which it was associated. An irrelevant stimulus that is presented in close temporal contiguity with a relevant stimulus can be associated with the response made to the relevant stimulus " an observation termed distractor-response binding (Rothermund, Wentura, & De Houwer, 2005). The studies presented in this work take a closer look at such distractor-response bindings, and therncircumstances in which they occur. Specifically, the study reported in chapter 6 examined whether only an exact repetition of the distractor can retrieve the response with which it was associated, or whether even similar distractors may cause retrieval. The results suggested that even repeating a similar distractor caused retrieval, albeit less than an exact repetition. In chapter 7, the existence of bindings between a distractor and a response were tested beyond arnperceptual level, to see whether they exist at an (abstract) conceptual level. Similar to perceptual repetition, distractor-based retrieval of the response was observed for the repetition of concepts. The study reported in chapter 8 of this work examined the influence of attention on the feature-response binding of irrelevant features. The results pointed towards a stronger binding effects when attention was directed towards the irrelevant feature compared to whenrnit was not. The study in chapter 9 presented here looked at the processes underlying distractor-based retrieval and distractor inhibition. The data suggest that motor processes underlie distractor-based retrieval and cognitive process underlie distractor inhibition. Finally, the findings of all four studies are also discussed in the context of learning.
Educational researchers have intensively investigated students" academic self-concept (ASC) and self-efficacy (SE). Both constructs are part of the competence-related self-perceptions of students and are considered to support students" academic success and their career development in a positive manner (e.g., Abele-Brehm & Stief, 2004; Richardson, Abraham, & Bond, 2012; Schneider & Preckel, 2017). However, there is a lack of basic research on ASC and SE in higher education in general, and in undergraduate psychology courses in particular. Therefore, according to the within-network and between-network approaches of construct validation (Byrne, 1984), the present dissertation comprises three empirical studies examining the structure (research question 1), measurement (research question 2), correlates (research question 3), and differentiation (research question 4) of ASC and SE in a total sample of N = 1243 psychology students. Concerning research question 1, results of confirmatory factor analysis (CFAs) implied that students" ASC and SE are domain-specific in the sense of multidimensionality, but they are also hierarchically structured, with a general factor at the apex according to the nested Marsh/Shavelson model (NMS model, Brunner et al., 2010). Additionally, psychology students" SE to master specific psychological tasks in different areas of psychological application could be described by a 2-dimensional model with six factors according to the Multitrait-Multimethod (MTMM)-approach (Campbell & Fiske, 1959). With regard to research question 2, results revealed that the internal structure of ASC and SE could be validly assessed. However, the assessment of psychology students" SE should follow a task-specific measurement strategy. Results of research question 3 further showed that both constructs of psychology students" competence-related self-perceptions were positively correlated to achievement in undergraduate psychology courses if predictor (ASC, SE) corresponded to measurement specificity of the criterion (achievement). Overall, ASC provided substantially stronger relations to achievement compared to SE. Moreover, there was evidence for negative paths (contrast effects) from achievement in one psychological domain on ASC of another psychological domain as postulated by the internal/external frame of reference (I/E) model (Marsh, 1986). Finally, building on research questions 1 to 3 (structure, measurement, and correlates of ASC and SE), psychology students" ASC and SE were be differentiated on an empirical level (research question 4). Implications for future research practices are discussed. Furthermore, practical implications for enhancing ASC and SE in higher education are proposed to support academic achievement and the career development of psychology students.
The search for relevant determinants of knowledge acquisition has a long tradition in educational research, with systematic analyses having started over a century ago. To date, a variety of relevant environmental and learner-related characteristics have been identified, providing a wide body of empirical evidence. However, there are still some gaps in the literature, which are highlighted in the current dissertation. The dissertation includes two meta-analyses summarizing the evidence on the effectiveness of electrical brain stimulation and the effects of prior knowledge on later learning outcomes and one empirical study employing latent profile transition analysis to investigate the changes in conceptual knowledge over time. The results from the three studies demonstrate how learning outcomes can be advanced by input from the environment and that they are highly related to the students" level of prior knowledge. It is concluded that the effects of environmental and learner-related variables impact both the biological and cognitive processes underlying knowledge acquisition. Based on the findings from the three studies, methodological and practical implications are provided, followed by an outline of four recommendations for future research on knowledge acquisition.
Interaction between the Hypothalamic-Pituitary-Adrenal Axis and the Circadian Clock System in Humans
(2017)
Rotation of the Earth creates day and night cycles of 24 h. The endogenous circadian clocks sense these light/dark rhythms and the master pacemaker situated in the suprachiasmatic nucleus of the hypothalamus entrains the physical activities according to this information. The circadian machinery is built from the transcriptional/translational feedback loops generating the oscillations in all nucleated cells of the body. In addition, unexpected environmental changes, called stressors, also challenge living systems. A response to these stimuli is provided immediately via the autonomic-nervous system and slowly via the hypothalamus"pituitary"adrenal (HPA) axis. When the HPA axis is activated, circulating glucocorticoids are elevated and regulate organ activities in order to maintain survival of the organism. Both the clock and the stress systems are essential for continuity and interact with each other to keep internal homeostasis. The physiological interactions between the HPA axis and the circadian clock system are mainly addressed in animal studies, which focus on the effects of stress and circadian disturbances on cardiovascular, psychiatric and metabolic disorders. Although these studies give opportunity to test in whole body, apply unwelcome techniques, control and manipulate the parameters at the high level, generalization of the results to humans is still a debate. On the other hand, studies established with cell lines cannot really reflect the conditions occurring in a living organism. Thus, human studies are absolutely necessary to investigate mechanisms involved in stress and circadian responses. The studies presented in this thesis were intended to determine the effects of cortisol as an end-product of the HPA axis on PERIOD (PER1, PER2 and PER3) transcripts as circadian clock genes in healthy humans. The expression levels of PERIOD genes were measured under baseline conditions and after stress in whole blood. The results demonstrated here have given better understanding of transcriptional programming regulated by pulsatile cortisol at standard conditions and short-term effects of cortisol increase on circadian clocks after acute stress. These findings also draw attention to inter-individual variations in stress response as well as non-circadian functions of PERIOD genes in the periphery, which need to be examined in details in the future.
Numerous RCTs demonstrate that cognitive behavioral therapy (CBT) for depression is effective. However, these findings are not necessarily representative of CBT under routine care conditions. Routine care studies are not usually subjected to comparable standardizations, e.g. often therapists may not follow treatment manuals and patients are less homogeneous with regard to their diagnoses and sociodemographic variables. Results on the transferability of findings from clinical trials to routine care are sparse and point in different directions. As RCT samples are selective due to a stringent application of inclusion/exclusion criteria, comparisons between routine care and clinical trials must be based on a consistent analytic strategy. The present work demonstrates the merits of propensity score matching (PSM), which offers solutions to reduce bias by balancing two samples based on a range of pretreatment differences. The objective of this dissertation is the investigation of the transferability of findings from RCTs to routine care settings.
Educational assessment tends to rely on more or less standardized tests, teacher judgments, and observations. Although teachers spend approximately half of their professional conduct in assessment-related activities, most of them enter their professional life unprepared, as classroom assessment is often not part of their educational training. Since teacher judgments matter for the educational development of students, the judgments should be up to a high standard. The present dissertation comprises three studies focusing on accuracy of teacher judgments (Study 1), consequences of (mis-)judgment regarding teacher nomination for gifted programming (Study 2) and teacher recommendations for secondary school tracks (Study 3), and individual student characteristics that impact and potentially bias teacher judgment (Studies 1 through 3). All studies were designed to contribute to a further understanding of classroom assessment skills of teachers. Overall, the results implied that, teacher judgment of cognitive ability was an important constant for teacher nominations and recommendations but lacked accuracy. Furthermore, teacher judgments of various traits and school achievement were substantially related to social background variables, especially the parents" educational background. However, multivariate analysis showed social background variables to impact nomination and recommendation only marginally if at all. All results indicated differentiated but potentially biased teacher judgments to impact their far-reaching referral decisions directly, while the influence of social background on the referral decisions itself seems mediated. Implications regarding further research practices and educational assessment strategies are discussed. The implications on the needs of teachers to be educated on judgment and educational assessment are of particular interest and importance.
Phase-amplitude cross-frequency coupling is a mechanism thought to facilitate communication between neuronal ensembles. The mechanism could underlie the implementation of complex cognitive processes, like executive functions, in the brain. This thesis contributes to answering the question, whether phase-amplitude cross-frequency coupling - assessed via electroencephalography (EEG) - is a mechanism by which executive functioning is implemented in the brain and whether an assumed performance effect of stress on executive functioning is reflected in phase-amplitude coupling strength. A huge body of studies shows that stress can influence executive functioning, in essence having detrimental effects. In two independent studies, each being comprised of two core executive function tasks (flexibility and behavioural inhibition as well as cognitive inhibition and working memory), beta-gamma phase-amplitude coupling was robustly detected in the left and right prefrontal hemispheres. No systematic pattern of coupling strength modulation by either task demands or acute stress was detected. Beta-gamma coupling might also be present in more basic attention processes. This is the first investigation of the relationship between stress, executive functions and phase-amplitude coupling. Therefore, many aspects have not been explored yet. For example, studying phase precision instead of coupling strength as an indicator for phase-amplitude coupling modulations. Furthermore, data was analysed in source space (independent component analysis); comparability to sensor space has still to be determined. These as well as other aspects should be investigated, due to the promising finding of very robust and strong beta-gamma coupling for all executive functions. Additionally, this thesis tested the performance of two widely used phase-amplitude coupling measures (mean vector length and modulation index). Both measures are specific and sensitive to coupling strength and coupling width. The simulation study also drew attention to several confounding factors, which influence phase-amplitude coupling measures (e. g. data length, multimodality).
Cognitive performance is contingent upon multiple factors. Beyond the impact of en-vironmental circumstances, the bodily state may hinder or promote cognitive processing. Af-ferent transmission from the viscera, for instance, is crucial not only for the genesis of affect and emotion, but further exerts significant influences on memory and attention. In particular, afferent cardiovascular feedback from baroreceptors demonstrated subcortical and cortical inhibition. Consequences for human cognition and behavior are the impairment of simple perception and sensorimotor functioning. Four studies are presented that investigate the mod-ulatory impact of baro-afferent feedback on selective attention. The first study demonstrates that the modulation of sensory processing by baroreceptor activity applies to the processing of complex stimulus configurations. By the use of a visual masking task in which a target had to be selected against a visual mask, perceptual interference was reduced when target and mask were presented during the ventricular systole compared to the diastole. In study two, selection efficiency was systematically manipulated in a visual selection task in which a target letter was flanked by distracting stimuli. By comparing participants" performance under homogene-ous and heterogeneous stimulus conditions, selection efficiency was assessed as a function of the cardiac cycle phase in which the targets and distractors were presented. The susceptibility of selection performance to the stimulus condition at hand was less pronounced during the ventricular systole compared to the diastole. Study one and two therefore indicate that inter-ference from irrelevant sensory input, resulting from temporally overlapping processing traces or from the simultaneous presentation of distractor stimuli, is reduced during phases of in-creased baro-afferent feedback. Study three experimentally manipulated baroreceptor activity by systematically varying the participant- body position while a sequential distractor priming task was completed. In this study, negative priming and distractor-response binding effects were obtained as indices of controlled and automatic distractor processing, respectively. It was found that only controlled distractor processing was affected by tonic increases in baro-receptor activity. In line with study one and two these results indicate that controlled selection processes are more efficient during enhanced baro-afferent feedback, observable in dimin-ished aftereffects of controlled distractor processing. Due to previous findings that indicated baro-afferent transmission to affect central, rather than response-related processing stages, study four measured lateralized-readiness potentials (LRPs) and reaction times (RTs), while participants, again, had to selectively respond to target stimuli that were surrounded by dis-tractors. The impact of distractor inhibition on stimulus-related, but not on response-related LRPs suggests that in a sequential distractor priming task, the sensory representations of dis-tractors, rather than motor responses are targeted by inhibition. Together with the results from studies one through three and the finding of baroreceptor-mediated behavioral inhibition tar-geting central processing stages, study four corroborates the presumption of baro-afferent signal transmission to modulate controlled processes involved in selective attention. In sum, the work presented shows that visual selective attention benefits from in-creased baro-afferent feedback as its effects are not confined to simple perception, but may facilitate the active suppression of neural activity related to sensory input from distractors. Hence, due to noise reduction, baroreceptor-mediated inhibition may promote effective selec-tion in vision.
The efficacy and effectiveness of psychotherapeutic interventions have been proven time and again. We therefore know that, in general, evidence-based treatments work for the average patient. However, it has also repeatedly been shown that some patients do not profit from or even deteriorate during treatment. Patient-focused psychotherapy research takes these differences between patients into account by focusing on the individual patient. The aim of this research approach is to analyze individual treatment courses in order to evaluate when and under which circumstances a generally effective treatment works for an individual patient. The goal is to identify evidence based clinical decision rules for the adaptation of treatment to prevent treatment failure. Patient-focused research has illustrated how different intake indicators and early change patterns predict the individual course of treatment, but they leave a lot of variance unexplained. The thesis at hand analyzed whether Ecological Momentary Assessment (EMA) strategies could be integrated into patient-focused psychotherapy research in order to improve treatment response prediction models. EMA is an electronically supported diary approach, in which multiple real-time assessments are conducted in participants" everyday lives. We applied EMA over a two-week period before treatment onset in a mixed sample of patients seeking outpatient treatment. The four daily measurements in the patients" everyday environment focused on assessing momentary affect and levels of rumination, perceived self-efficacy, social support and positive or negative life events since the previous assessment. The aim of this thesis project was threefold: First, to test the feasibility of EMA in a routine care outpatient setting. Second, to analyze the interrelation of different psychological processes within patients" everyday lives. Third and last, to test whether individual indicators of psychological processes during everyday life, which were assessed before treatment onset, could be used to improve prediction models of early treatment response. Results from Study I indicate good feasibility of EMA application during the waiting period for outpatient treatment. High average compliance rates over the entire assessment period and low average burdens perceived by the patients support good applicability. Technical challenges and the results of in-depth missing analyses are reported to guide future EMA applications in outpatient settings. Results from Study II shed further light on the rumination-affect link. We replicated results from earlier studies, which identified a negative association between state rumination and affect on a within-person level and additionally showed a) that this finding holds for the majority but not every individual in a diverse patient sample with mixed Axis-I disorders, b) that rumination is linked to negative but also to positive affect and c) that dispositional rumination significantly affects the state rumination-affect association. The results provide exploratory evidence that rumination might be considered a transdiagnostic mechanism of psychological functioning and well-being. Results from Study III finally suggest that the integration of indicators derived from EMA applications before treatment onset can improve prediction models of early treatment response. Positive-negative affect ratios as well as fluctuations in negative affect measured during patients" daily lives allow the prediction of early treatment response. Our results indicate that the combination of commonly applied intake predictors and EMA indicators of individual patients" daily experiences can improve treatment response predictions models. We therefore conclude that EMA can successfully be integrated into patient-focused research approaches in routine care settings to ameliorate or optimize individual care.
The last decades of stress research have yielded substantial advancements highlighting the importance of the phenomenon for basic psychological functions as well as physical health and well-being. Progress in stress research heavily relies on the availability of suitable and well validated laboratory stressors. Appropriate laboratory stressors need to be able to reliably provoke a response in the relevant parameters and be applicable in different research settings or experimental designs. This thesis focuses on the Cold Pressor Test (CPT) as a stress induction technique. Three published experiments are presented that show how the advantages of the CPT can be used to test stress effects on memory processes and how some of its disadvantages can be met by a simple modification that retains its feasibility and validity. The first experiment applies the CPT in a substantial sample to investigate the consolidation effects of post-learning sympathetic arousal. Stressed participants with high increases in heart rate during the CPT showed enhanced memory performance one day after learning compared to both the warm water control group and low heart rate responders. This finding suggests that beta-adrenergic activation elicited shortly after learning enhances memory consolidation and that the CPT induced heart rate response is a predictor for this effect. Moreover, the CPT proved to be an appropriate stressor to test hypothesis about endogenous adrenergic effects on memory processes. The second experiment addresses known practical limitations of the standard dominant hand CPT protocol. A bilateral feet CPT modification is presented, the elicited neuroendocrine stress response assessed and validated against the standard CPT in a within-subjects design. The bilateral feet CPT elicited a substantial neuroendocrine stress response. Moreover, with the exception of blood pressure responses, all stress parameters were enhanced compared to the standard CPT. This shows that the bilateral feet CPT is a valid alternative to the standard CPT. The third experiment further validates the bilateral feet CPT and its corresponding control procedure by employing it in a typical application scenario. Specifically, the bilateral feet CPT was used to modulate retrieval of event files in a distractor-response binding paradigm that required lateralized bimanual responses. Again, the bilateral feet CPT induced significant increases in heart rate, blood pressure and cortisol, no such increases could be observed in the warm water control condition. Moreover, stressed participants showed diminished retrieval compared to controls. These results provide further evidence for the feasibility and validity of the bilateral feet CPT and its warm water control procedure. Together the experiments presented here highlight the usefulness of the CPT as a tool in psychophysiological stress research. It is especially well suited to test hypothesis concerning stress effects on memory processes and its applicability can be further increased by the bilateral feet modification.
Death is perceived as a severe threat to the self. Although it is certain that everyone has to die, people usually don't think about the finiteness of their life. Everything reminding of death is ignored, rationalized and death-related thoughts and fears are pushed out of mind (TMT; Pyszczynski et al., 1999). However, people differ in their ability to regulate negative affect and to access their self-system (Kuhl, 2001). As death is assumed to arouse existential fears, the ability to regulate such fears is particularly important, higher self-access could be relevant in defending central personal values. This thesis aimed at showing existential fears under mortality salience and effects of self-regulation of affect under mortality salience. In two studies (Chapter 2) implicit negative affect under mortality salience was demonstrated. An additional study (Chapter 3) shows the effects of self-regulation on implicit negative affect, whereas four studies in Chapter 4 displayed differences in self-access under mortality salience depending on people- ability of self-regulating negative affect.
The Role of Dopamine and Acetylcholine as Modulators of Selective Attention and Response Speed
(2015)
The principles of top-down and bottom-up processing are essential to cognitive psychology. At their broadest, most general definition, they denote that processing can be driven either by the salience of the stimulus input or by individual goals and strategies. Selective top-down attention, specifically, consists in the deliberate prioritizing of stimuli that are deemed goal-relevant, while selective bottom-up attention relies on the automatic allocation of attention to salient stimuli (Connor, Egeth, & Yantis, 2004; Schneider, Schote, Meyer, & Frings, 2014). Variations within neurotransmitter systems can modulate cognitive performance in a domain-specific fashion (Greenwood, Fossella, & Parasuraman, 2005). Noudoost and Moore (2011a) proposed that the influence of the dopaminergic neurotransmitter system on selective top-down attention might be greater than the influence of this system on selective bottom-up attention; likewise, they assumed that the cholinergic neurotransmitter system might be more important for selective bottom-up than top-down attention. To test this hypothesis, naturally occurring variations within the two neurotransmitter systems were assessed. Five polymorphisms were selected; two of the dopaminergic system (the COMT Val158Met polymorphism and the DAT1 polymorphism) and three of the cholinergic system (the CHRNA4 rs1044396 polymorphism, the CHRNA5 rs3841324 polymorphism, and the CHRNA5 rs16969968 polymorphism). It was tested whether these polymorphisms modulated the performance in tasks of selective top-down attention (a Stroop task and a Negative priming task) and in a task of selective bottom-up attention (a Posner-Cuing task). Indeed, the dopaminergic polymorphisms influenced selective top-down attention, but exerted no effects on bottom-up attention. This aligned with the hypothesis proposed by Noudoost and Moore (2011a). In contrast, the cholinergic polymorphisms were not found to modulate selective bottom-up attention. The three cholinergic polymorphisms, however, affected the general response speed in the Stroop task, Negative priming task, and Posner-Cuing task (irrespective of attentional processing). In sum, the findings of this study provide strong indications that the dopaminergic system modulates selective top-down attention, while the cholinergic system is highly relevant for the general speed of information processing.
The distractor-response binding effect (Frings & Rothermund, 2011; Frings, Rothermund, & Wentura, 2007; Rothermund, Wentura, & De Houwer, 2005) is based on the idea that irrelevant information will be integrated with the response to the relevant stimuli in an episodic memory trace. The immediate re-encounter of any aspect of this saved episode " be it relevant or irrelevant " can lead to retrieval of the whole episode. As a consequence, the previously executed and now retrieved response may influencing the response to the current relevant stimulus. That is, the current response may either be facilitated or be impaired by the retrieved response, depending on whether it is compatible or incompatible to the currently demanded response. Previous research on this kind of episodic retrieval focused on the influence on action control. I examined if distractor response binding also plays a role in decision making in addition to action control. To this end I adapted the distractor-to-distractor priming paradigm (Frings et al., 2007) and conducted nine experiments in which participants had to decide as fast as possible which disease a fictional patient suffered from. To infer the correct diagnosis, two cues were presented; one did not give any hint for a disease (the irrelevant cue), whereas the other did (the relevant cue). Experiments 1a to 1c showed that the distractor-response binding effect is present in deterministic decision situations. Further, experiments 2a and 2b indicate that distractor-response binding also influences decisions under uncertainty. Finally, experiments 3a to 3d were conducted to test some constraints and underlying mechanisms of the distractor-response binding effect in decision making under uncertainty. In sum, these nine experiments provide strong evidence that distractor-response binding influences decision making.
Stress related disorders increase continuously. It is not yet clear if stress also promotes breast cancer. This dissertation provides an analyses of the current state of research and focuses on the significance of pre-/postnatal stress factors and chronic stress. The derived hypotheses are empirically examined on breast cancer patients. The clinical study investigates the links between those factors and prognosis and outcome.
Every day we are exposed to a large set of appetitive food cues, mostly of high caloric, high carbohydrate content. Environmental factors like food cue exposition can impact eating behavior, by triggering anticipatory endocrinal responses and reinforcing the reward value of food. Additionally, it has been shown that eating behavior is largely influence by neuroendocrine factors. Energy homeostasis is of great importance for survival in all animal species. It is challenged under the state of food deprivation which is considered to be a metabolic stressor. Interestingly, the systems regulating stress and food intake share neural circuits. Adrenal glucocorticoids, as cortisol, and the pancreatic hormone insulin have been shown to be crucial to maintain catabolic and anabolic balance. Cortisol and insulin can cross the blood-brain barrier and interact with receptors distributed throughout the brain, influencing appetite and eating behavior. At the same time, these hormones have an important impact on the stress response. The aim of the current work is to broaden the knowledge on reward related food cue processing. With that purpose, we studied how food cue processing is influenced by food deprivation in women (in different phases of the menstrual cycle) and men. Furthermore, we investigated the impact of the stress/metabolic hormones, insulin and cortisol, at neural sites important for energy metabolism and in the processing of visual food cues. The Chapter I of this thesis details the underlying mechanisms of the startle response and its application in the investigation of food cue processing. Moreover, it describes the effects of food deprivation and of the stress-metabolic hormones insulin and cortisol in reward related processing of food cues. It explains the rationale for the studies presented in Chapter II-IV and describes their main findings. A general discussion of the results and recommendations for future research is given. In the study described in Chapter II, startle methodology was used to study the impact of food deprivation in the processing of reward related food cues. Women in different phases of the menstrual cycle and men were studied, in order to address potential effects of sex and menstrual cycle. All participants were studied either satiated or food deprived. Food deprivation provoked enhanced acoustic startle (ASR) response during foreground presentation of visual food cues. Sex and menstrual cycle did not influence this effect. The startle pattern towards food cues during fasting can be explained by a frustrative nonreward effect (FNR), driven by the impossibility to consume the exposed food. In Chapter III, a study is described, which was carried out to explore the central effects of insulin and cortisol, using continuous arterial spin labeling to map cerebral blood flow patterns. Following standardized periods of fasting, male participants received either intranasal insulin, oral cortisol, both, or placebo. Intranasal insulin increased resting regional cerebral blood flow in the putamen and insular cortex, structures that are involved in the regulation of eating behavior. Neither cortisol nor interaction effects were found. These results demonstrate that insulin exerts an action in metabolic centers during resting state, which is not affected by glucocorticoids. The study described in Chapter IV uses a similar pharmacological manipulation as the one presented in Chapter III, while assessing processing of reward related food cues through the startle paradigm validated in Chapter II. A sample of men was studied during short-term food deprivation. Considering the importance of both cortisol and insulin in glucose metabolism, food pictures were divided by glycemic index. Cortisol administration enhanced ASR during foreground presentation of "high glycemic" food pictures. This result suggests that cortisol provokes an increase in reward value of high glycemic food cues, which is congruent with previous research on stress and food consumption. This thesis gives support to the FNR hypothesis towards food cues during states of deprivation. Furthermore, it highlights the potential effects of stress related hormones in metabolism-connected neuronal structures, and in the reward related mechanisms of food cue processing. In a society marked by increased food exposure and availability, alongside with increased stress, it is important to better understand the impact of food exposition and its interaction with relevant hormones. This thesis contributes to the knowledge in this field. More research in this direction is needed.
The influence of affect on vocal parameters has been well investigated in speech portrayed by actors, but little is known about affect expression in more natural or authentic speech behavior. This is partly due to the difficulty of generating speech samples that represent authentic expression of speaker affect. The present work investigates the influence of speaker affect on the vocal fundamental frequency (F0) in comparatively authentic speech samples. Three well-documented psychophysiological research methods were applied for the induction of affective states in German native speakers in order to obtain speech samples with authentic affect expression: the Cold Pressor Test (CPT), the Stroop Color-Word Test (SCWT) and the presentation of slides from the International Affective Pictures System (IAPS). The here reported results show that the influence of affect on F0 is differentially modulated by psychophysiological processes as well as socio-cultural influences. They also indicate that this approach may be useful for future research and further to gain a deeper understanding of authentic vocal affect expression. Moreover, F0 may constitute an additional non-invasive, easy to obtain measure for the established psychophysiological research methodology.
Stress has been considered one of the most relevant factors promoting aggressive behavior. Animal and human pharmacological studies revealed the stress hormones corticosterone in rodents and cortisol in humans to constitute a particularly important neuroendocrine determinate in facilitating aggression and beyond that, assumedly in its continuation and escalation. Moreover, cortisol-induced alterations of social information processing, as well as of cognitive control processes, have been hypothesized as possible influencing factors in the stress-aggression link. So far, the immediate impact of a preceding stressor and thereby stress-induced rise of cortisol on aggressive behavior as well as higher-order cognitive control processes and social information processing in this context have gone mostly unheeded. The present thesis aimed to extend the hitherto findings of stress and aggression in this regard. For this purpose two psychophysiological studies with healthy adults were carried out, both using the socially evaluated-cold pressor test as an acute stress induction. Additionally to behavioral data and subjective reports, event related potentials were measured and acute levels of salivary cortisol were collected on the basis of which stressed participants were divided into cortisol-responders and "nonresponders. Study 1 examined the impact of acute stress-induced cortisol increase on inhibitory control and its neural correlates. 41 male participants were randomly assigned to the stress procedure or to a non-stressful control condition. Beforehand and afterwards, participants performed a Go Nogo task with visual letters to measure response inhibition. The effect of acute stress-induced cortisol increase on covert and overt aggressive behavior and on the processing of provoking stimuli within the aggressive encounter was investigated in study 2. Moreover, this experiment examined the combined impact of stress and aggression on ensuing affective information processing. 71 male and female participants were either exposed to the stress or to the control condition. Following this, half of each group received high or low levels of provocation during the Taylor Aggression Paradigm. At the end of the experiment, a passive viewing paradigm with affective pictures depicting positive, negative, or aggressive scenes with either humans or objects was realized. The results revealed that men were not affected by a stress-induced rise in cortisol on a behavioral level, showing neither impaired response inhibition nor enhanced aggressive behavior. In contrast, women showed enhanced overt and covert aggressive behavior under a surge of endogenous cortisol, confirming previous results, albeit only in case of high provocation and only up to the level of the control group. Unlike this rather moderate impact on behavior, cortisol showed a distinct impact on neural correlates of information processing throughout inhibitory control, aggression-eliciting stimuli, and emotional pictures for both men and women. At this, stress-induced increase of cortisol resulted in enhanced N2 amplitudes to Go stimuli, whereas P2 amplitudes to both and N2 to Nogo amplitudes retained unchanged, indicating an overcorrection and caution of the response activation in favor of successful inhibitory control. The processing of aggression-eliciting stimuli during the aggressive encounter was complexly altered by stress differently for women and men. Under increased cortisol levels, the frontal or parietal P3 amplitude patterns were either diminished or reversed in the case of high provocation compared to the control group and to cortisol-nonresponders, indicating a desensitization towards aggression-eliciting stimuli in males, but a more elaborate processing of those in women. Moreover, stress-induced cortisol and provocation jointly altered subsequent affective information processing at early as well as later stages of the information processing stream. Again, increased levels of cortisol led opposite directed amplitudes in the case of high provocation relative to the control group and cortisol-nonresponders, with enhanced N2 amplitudes in men and reduced P3 and LPP amplitudes in men and women for all affective pictures, suggesting initially enhanced emotional reactivity in men, but ensuing reduced motivational attention and enhanced emotion regulation in both, men and women. As a result, these present findings confirm the relevance of HPA activity in the elicitation and persistence of human aggressive behavior. Moreover, they reveal the significance of compensatory and emotion regulatory strategies and mechanisms in response to stress and provocation, indorsing the relevance of social information and cognitive control processes. Still, more research is needed to clarify the conditions which lead to the facilitation of aggression and by which compensatory mechanisms this is prevented.
The present thesis addresses the validity of Binge Eating Disorder (BED) as well as underlying mechanisms of BED from three different angles. Three studies provide data discriminating obesity with BED from obesity without BED. Study 1 demonstrates differences between obese individuals with and without BED regarding eating in the natural environment, psychiatric comorbidity, negative affect as well as self reported tendencies in eating behavior. Evidence for possible psychological mechanisms explaining increased intake of BED individuals in the natural environment was given by analyzing associations of negative affect, emotional eating, restrained eating and caloric intake in obese BED compared to NBED controls. Study 2 demonstrated stress-induced changes in the eating behavior of obese individuals with BED. The impact of a psychosocial stressor, the Trier Social Stress Test (TSST, Kirschbaum, Pirke, &amp;amp; Hellhammer, 1993), on behavioral patterns of eating behavior in laboratory was investigated. Special attention was given to stress-induced changes in variables that reflect mechanisms of appetite regulation in obese BED individuals compared to controls. To further explore by which mechanisms stress might trigger binge eating, study 3 investigated differences in stress-induced cortisol secretion after a socially evaluated cold pressure test (SECPT, Schwabe, Haddad, &amp;amp; Schachinger, 2008) in obese BED as compared to obese NBED individuals.