Information spreading on mobile communication networks: A new model that incorporates human behaviors

NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

Ren, Fei; Li, Sai-Ping; Liu, Chuang

2017-03-01

Recently, there is a growing interest in the modeling and simulation based on real social networks among researchers in multi-disciplines. Using an empirical social network constructed from the calling records of a Chinese mobile service provider, we here propose a new model to simulate the information spreading process. This model takes into account two important ingredients that exist in real human behaviors: information prevalence and preferential spreading. The fraction of informed nodes when the system reaches an asymptotically stable state is primarily determined by information prevalence, and the heterogeneity of link weights would slow down the information diffusion. Moreover, the sizes of blind clusters which consist of connected uninformed nodes show a power-law distribution, and these uninformed nodes correspond to a particular portion of nodes which are located at special positions in the network, namely at the edges of large clusters or inside the clusters connected through weak links. Since the simulations are performed on a real world network, the results should be useful in the understanding of the influences of social network structures and human behaviors on information propagation.

How Attitude toward the Behavior, Subjective Norm, and Perceived Behavioral Control Affects Information Security Behavior Intention

ERIC Educational Resources Information Center

Johnson, David P.

2017-01-01

The education sector is at high risk for information security (InfoSec) breaches and in need of improved security practices. Achieving data protections cannot be through technical means alone. Addressing the human behavior factor is required. Security education, training, and awareness (SETA) programs are an effective method of addressing human…

Knowledge, Attitudes, and Informational Behaviors of College Students in Regard to the Human Papillomavirus

ERIC Educational Resources Information Center

Sandfort, Jessica R.; Pleasant, Andrew

2009-01-01

Objective: To assess students' human papillomavirus (HPV) knowledge, attitudes, and behaviors. Participants/ Methods: Students (N = 1,282) at a large, public university in the Northeast United States completed a questionnaire during February 2008 assessing HPV knowledge, prevalence, transmission, cervical cancer risk and stigma; sexual behavior,…

Uniform Local Binary Pattern Based Texture-Edge Feature for 3D Human Behavior Recognition.

PubMed

Ming, Yue; Wang, Guangchao; Fan, Chunxiao

2015-01-01

With the rapid development of 3D somatosensory technology, human behavior recognition has become an important research field. Human behavior feature analysis has evolved from traditional 2D features to 3D features. In order to improve the performance of human activity recognition, a human behavior recognition method is proposed, which is based on a hybrid texture-edge local pattern coding feature extraction and integration of RGB and depth videos information. The paper mainly focuses on background subtraction on RGB and depth video sequences of behaviors, extracting and integrating historical images of the behavior outlines, feature extraction and classification. The new method of 3D human behavior recognition has achieved the rapid and efficient recognition of behavior videos. A large number of experiments show that the proposed method has faster speed and higher recognition rate. The recognition method has good robustness for different environmental colors, lightings and other factors. Meanwhile, the feature of mixed texture-edge uniform local binary pattern can be used in most 3D behavior recognition.

Ontology-Based High-Level Context Inference for Human Behavior Identification

PubMed Central

Villalonga, Claudia; Razzaq, Muhammad Asif; Khan, Wajahat Ali; Pomares, Hector; Rojas, Ignacio; Lee, Sungyoung; Banos, Oresti

2016-01-01

Recent years have witnessed a huge progress in the automatic identification of individual primitives of human behavior, such as activities or locations. However, the complex nature of human behavior demands more abstract contextual information for its analysis. This work presents an ontology-based method that combines low-level primitives of behavior, namely activity, locations and emotions, unprecedented to date, to intelligently derive more meaningful high-level context information. The paper contributes with a new open ontology describing both low-level and high-level context information, as well as their relationships. Furthermore, a framework building on the developed ontology and reasoning models is presented and evaluated. The proposed method proves to be robust while identifying high-level contexts even in the event of erroneously-detected low-level contexts. Despite reasonable inference times being obtained for a relevant set of users and instances, additional work is required to scale to long-term scenarios with a large number of users. PMID:27690050

77 FR 10758 - National Institute of Child Health and Human Development Proposed Collection; Comment Request...

Federal Register 2010, 2011, 2012, 2013, 2014

2012-02-23

... behaviors. This information will enable the improvement of health services and programs for youth. The study.... The study has collected information on adolescent health behaviors and social and environmental contexts for these behaviors annually for three years beginning in the 2009-2010 school year. This study...

Modeling and simulating human teamwork behaviors using intelligent agents

NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

Fan, Xiaocong; Yen, John

2004-12-01

Among researchers in multi-agent systems there has been growing interest in using intelligent agents to model and simulate human teamwork behaviors. Teamwork modeling is important for training humans in gaining collaborative skills, for supporting humans in making critical decisions by proactively gathering, fusing, and sharing information, and for building coherent teams with both humans and agents working effectively on intelligence-intensive problems. Teamwork modeling is also challenging because the research has spanned diverse disciplines from business management to cognitive science, human discourse, and distributed artificial intelligence. This article presents an extensive, but not exhaustive, list of work in the field, where the taxonomy is organized along two main dimensions: team social structure and social behaviors. Along the dimension of social structure, we consider agent-only teams and mixed human-agent teams. Along the dimension of social behaviors, we consider collaborative behaviors, communicative behaviors, helping behaviors, and the underpinning of effective teamwork-shared mental models. The contribution of this article is that it presents an organizational framework for analyzing a variety of teamwork simulation systems and for further studying simulated teamwork behaviors.

A Human-Robot Co-Manipulation Approach Based on Human Sensorimotor Information.

PubMed

Peternel, Luka; Tsagarakis, Nikos; Ajoudani, Arash

2017-07-01

This paper aims to improve the interaction and coordination between the human and the robot in cooperative execution of complex, powerful, and dynamic tasks. We propose a novel approach that integrates online information about the human motor function and manipulability properties into the hybrid controller of the assistive robot. Through this human-in-the-loop framework, the robot can adapt to the human motor behavior and provide the appropriate assistive response in different phases of the cooperative task. We experimentally evaluate the proposed approach in two human-robot co-manipulation tasks that require specific complementary behavior from the two agents. Results suggest that the proposed technique, which relies on a minimum degree of task-level pre-programming, can achieve an enhanced physical human-robot interaction performance and deliver appropriate level of assistance to the human operator.

Model of rhythmic ball bouncing using a visually controlled neural oscillator.

PubMed

Avrin, Guillaume; Siegler, Isabelle A; Makarov, Maria; Rodriguez-Ayerbe, Pedro

2017-10-01

The present paper investigates the sensory-driven modulations of central pattern generator dynamics that can be expected to reproduce human behavior during rhythmic hybrid tasks. We propose a theoretical model of human sensorimotor behavior able to account for the observed data from the ball-bouncing task. The novel control architecture is composed of a Matsuoka neural oscillator coupled with the environment through visual sensory feedback. The architecture's ability to reproduce human-like performance during the ball-bouncing task in the presence of perturbations is quantified by comparison of simulated and recorded trials. The results suggest that human visual control of the task is achieved online. The adaptive behavior is made possible by a parametric and state control of the limit cycle emerging from the interaction of the rhythmic pattern generator, the musculoskeletal system, and the environment. NEW & NOTEWORTHY The study demonstrates that a behavioral model based on a neural oscillator controlled by visual information is able to accurately reproduce human modulations in a motor action with respect to sensory information during the rhythmic ball-bouncing task. The model attractor dynamics emerging from the interaction between the neuromusculoskeletal system and the environment met task requirements, environmental constraints, and human behavioral choices without relying on movement planning and explicit internal models of the environment. Copyright © 2017 the American Physiological Society.

Combining Human and Machine Intelligence to Derive Agents' Behavioral Rules for Groundwater Irrigation

NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

Hu, Y.; Quinn, C.; Cai, X.

2015-12-01

One major challenge of agent-based modeling is to derive agents' behavioral rules due to behavioral uncertainty and data scarcity. This study proposes a new approach to combine a data-driven modeling based on the directed information (i.e., machine intelligence) with expert domain knowledge (i.e., human intelligence) to derive the behavioral rules of agents considering behavioral uncertainty. A directed information graph algorithm is applied to identifying the causal relationships between agents' decisions (i.e., groundwater irrigation depth) and time-series of environmental, socio-economical and institutional factors. A case study is conducted for the High Plains aquifer hydrological observatory (HO) area, U.S. Preliminary results show that four factors, corn price (CP), underlying groundwater level (GWL), monthly mean temperature (T) and precipitation (P) have causal influences on agents' decisions on groundwater irrigation depth (GWID) to various extents. Based on the similarity of the directed information graph for each agent, five clusters of graphs are further identified to represent all the agents' behaviors in the study area as shown in Figure 1. Using these five representative graphs, agents' monthly optimal groundwater pumping rates are derived through the probabilistic inference. Such data-driven relationships and probabilistic quantifications are then coupled with a physically-based groundwater model to investigate the interactions between agents' pumping behaviors and the underlying groundwater system in the context of coupled human and natural systems.

Ambiguity and Uncertainty in Probabilistic Inference.

DTIC Science & Technology

1984-06-01

Bulletin, 1967, 68, 29-46. *Rappoport, A., a Wllston, T. S . *individual decision behavior . Annual Review of Psychology, 1972, 23, 131-176. * Savage, L... Behavior and Human Performance, 1973, 10 40-423. Shafer , G. A. A mathematical theory of evidence. Princeton, NJ: Princeton University Press, 1976.- *~-7... S . Comparison of Bayesian and regression approaches to the study of information processing in judgment. Organizational Behavior and Human

28 CFR 46.102 - Definitions.

Code of Federal Regulations, 2013 CFR

2013-07-01

... Judicial Administration DEPARTMENT OF JUSTICE (CONTINUED) PROTECTION OF HUMAN SUBJECTS § 46.102 Definitions...) Human subject means a living individual about whom an investigator (whether professional or student... investigator and subject. Private information includes information about behavior that occurs in a context in...

28 CFR 46.102 - Definitions.

Code of Federal Regulations, 2014 CFR

2014-07-01

... Judicial Administration DEPARTMENT OF JUSTICE (CONTINUED) PROTECTION OF HUMAN SUBJECTS § 46.102 Definitions...) Human subject means a living individual about whom an investigator (whether professional or student... investigator and subject. Private information includes information about behavior that occurs in a context in...

48 CFR 1335.001 - Definitions.

Code of Federal Regulations, 2012 CFR

2012-10-01

... CONTRACTING RESEARCH AND DEVELOPMENT CONTRACTING 1335.001 Definitions. Human subject means a living individual...” includes information about behavior that occurs in a context in which an individual can reasonably expect...) in order for obtaining the information to constitute research involving human subjects. Research...

48 CFR 1335.001 - Definitions.

Code of Federal Regulations, 2013 CFR

2013-10-01

... CONTRACTING RESEARCH AND DEVELOPMENT CONTRACTING 1335.001 Definitions. Human subject means a living individual...” includes information about behavior that occurs in a context in which an individual can reasonably expect...) in order for obtaining the information to constitute research involving human subjects. Research...

48 CFR 1335.001 - Definitions.

Code of Federal Regulations, 2014 CFR

2014-10-01

... CONTRACTING RESEARCH AND DEVELOPMENT CONTRACTING 1335.001 Definitions. Human subject means a living individual...” includes information about behavior that occurs in a context in which an individual can reasonably expect...) in order for obtaining the information to constitute research involving human subjects. Research...

48 CFR 1335.001 - Definitions.

Code of Federal Regulations, 2011 CFR

2011-10-01

... CONTRACTING RESEARCH AND DEVELOPMENT CONTRACTING 1335.001 Definitions. Human subject means a living individual...” includes information about behavior that occurs in a context in which an individual can reasonably expect...) in order for obtaining the information to constitute research involving human subjects. Research...

28 CFR 46.102 - Definitions.

Code of Federal Regulations, 2012 CFR

2012-07-01

... Judicial Administration DEPARTMENT OF JUSTICE (CONTINUED) PROTECTION OF HUMAN SUBJECTS § 46.102 Definitions...) Human subject means a living individual about whom an investigator (whether professional or student... investigator and subject. Private information includes information about behavior that occurs in a context in...

A Qualitative Model of Human Interaction with Complex Dynamic Systems

NASA Technical Reports Server (NTRS)

Hess, Ronald A.

1987-01-01

A qualitative model describing human interaction with complex dynamic systems is developed. The model is hierarchical in nature and consists of three parts: a behavior generator, an internal model, and a sensory information processor. The behavior generator is responsible for action decomposition, turning higher level goals or missions into physical action at the human-machine interface. The internal model is an internal representation of the environment which the human is assumed to possess and is divided into four submodel categories. The sensory information processor is responsible for sensory composition. All three parts of the model act in consort to allow anticipatory behavior on the part of the human in goal-directed interaction with dynamic systems. Human workload and error are interpreted in this framework, and the familiar example of an automobile commute is used to illustrate the nature of the activity in the three model elements. Finally, with the qualitative model as a guide, verbal protocols from a manned simulation study of a helicopter instrument landing task are analyzed with particular emphasis on the effect of automation on human-machine performance.

A qualitative model of human interaction with complex dynamic systems

NASA Technical Reports Server (NTRS)

Hess, Ronald A.

1987-01-01

A qualitative model describing human interaction with complex dynamic systems is developed. The model is hierarchical in nature and consists of three parts: a behavior generator, an internal model, and a sensory information processor. The behavior generator is responsible for action decomposition, turning higher level goals or missions into physical action at the human-machine interface. The internal model is an internal representation of the environment which the human is assumed to possess and is divided into four submodel categories. The sensory information processor is responsible for sensory composition. All three parts of the model act in consort to allow anticipatory behavior on the part of the human in goal-directed interaction with dynamic systems. Human workload and error are interpreted in this framework, and the familiar example of an automobile commute is used to illustrate the nature of the activity in the three model elements. Finally, with the qualitative model as a guide, verbal protocols from a manned simulation study of a helicopter instrument landing task are analyzed with particular emphasis on the effect of automation on human-machine performance.

Technological advances for studying human behavior

NASA Technical Reports Server (NTRS)

Roske-Hofstrand, Renate J.

1990-01-01

Technological advances for studying human behavior are noted in viewgraph form. It is asserted that performance-aiding systems are proliferating without a fundamental understanding of how they would interact with the humans who must control them. Two views of automation research, the hardware view and the human-centered view, are listed. Other viewgraphs give information on vital elements for human-centered research, a continuum of the research process, available technologies, new technologies for persistent problems, a sample research infrastructure, the need for metrics, and examples of data-link technology.

Predicting Exposure to Consumer-Products Using Agent-Based Models Embedded with Needs-Based Artificial Intelligence and Empirically -Based Scheduling Models

EPA Science Inventory

Information on human behavior and consumer product use is important for characterizing exposures to chemicals in consumer products and in indoor environments. Traditionally, exposure-assessors have relied on time-use surveys to obtain information on exposure-related behavior. In ...

75 FR 76736 - Agency Information Collection Activities: Proposed Collection; Comment Request

Federal Register 2010, 2011, 2012, 2013, 2014

2010-12-09

... Survey 3 30 22.02 661 Pre-training Behavior Survey 3 6 22.04 132 Post-training Behavior Survey 3 11 22.02... DEPARTMENT OF HEALTH AND HUMAN SERVICES Agency for Healthcare Research and Quality Agency Information Collection Activities: Proposed Collection; Comment Request AGENCY: Agency for Healthcare Research...

Information Processing of Trauma.

ERIC Educational Resources Information Center

Hartman, Carol R.; Burgess, Ann W.

1993-01-01

This paper presents a neuropsychosocial model of information processing to explain a victimization experience, specifically child sexual abuse. It surveys the relation of sensation, perception, and cognition as a systematic way to provide a framework for studying human behavior and describing human response to traumatic events. (Author/JDD)

Human Sexuality Education Program.

ERIC Educational Resources Information Center

Claremont Univ. Center, CA.

This program provides information to students about human sexual biology, behavior and attitudes. The primary intent of the workshops described is to provide fuller information and opportunity for self awareness to encourage participants to be more responsible as sexual beings, and to restructure their attitudes. The program presents the…

Behaviorally Relevant Abstract Object Identity Representation in the Human Parietal Cortex

PubMed Central

Jeong, Su Keun

2016-01-01

The representation of object identity is fundamental to human vision. Using fMRI and multivoxel pattern analysis, here we report the representation of highly abstract object identity information in human parietal cortex. Specifically, in superior intraparietal sulcus (IPS), a region previously shown to track visual short-term memory capacity, we found object identity representations for famous faces varying freely in viewpoint, hairstyle, facial expression, and age; and for well known cars embedded in different scenes, and shown from different viewpoints and sizes. Critically, these parietal identity representations were behaviorally relevant as they closely tracked the perceived face-identity similarity obtained in a behavioral task. Meanwhile, the task-activated regions in prefrontal and parietal cortices (excluding superior IPS) did not exhibit such abstract object identity representations. Unlike previous studies, we also failed to observe identity representations in posterior ventral and lateral visual object-processing regions, likely due to the greater amount of identity abstraction demanded by our stimulus manipulation here. Our MRI slice coverage precluded us from examining identity representation in anterior temporal lobe, a likely region for the computing of identity information in the ventral region. Overall, we show that human parietal cortex, part of the dorsal visual processing pathway, is capable of holding abstract and complex visual representations that are behaviorally relevant. These results argue against a “content-poor” view of the role of parietal cortex in attention. Instead, the human parietal cortex seems to be “content rich” and capable of directly participating in goal-driven visual information representation in the brain. SIGNIFICANCE STATEMENT The representation of object identity (including faces) is fundamental to human vision and shapes how we interact with the world. Although object representation has traditionally been associated with human occipital and temporal cortices, here we show, by measuring fMRI response patterns, that a region in the human parietal cortex can robustly represent task-relevant object identities. These representations are invariant to changes in a host of visual features, such as viewpoint, and reflect an abstract level of representation that has not previously been reported in the human parietal cortex. Critically, these neural representations are behaviorally relevant as they closely track the perceived object identities. Human parietal cortex thus participates in the moment-to-moment goal-directed visual information representation in the brain. PMID:26843642

A Biosocial View of Population: Fertility Behavior in Animal Groups and Early Human Societies. A Review.

ERIC Educational Resources Information Center

Murphy, Elaine M.

The paper discusses the relationship between social structure and fertility behavior in man. Focusing upon human fertility within the context of varying social groups, the document reviews recent interdisciplinary population studies. Information and interpretations from biology, ethnology, anthropology, history, and sociology are presented in four…

Monkeys preferentially process body information while viewing affective displays.

PubMed

Bliss-Moreau, Eliza; Moadab, Gilda; Machado, Christopher J

2017-08-01

Despite evolutionary claims about the function of facial behaviors across phylogeny, rarely are those hypotheses tested in a comparative context-that is, by evaluating how nonhuman animals process such behaviors. Further, while increasing evidence indicates that humans make meaning of faces by integrating contextual information, including that from the body, the extent to which nonhuman animals process contextual information during affective displays is unknown. In the present study, we evaluated the extent to which rhesus macaques (Macaca mulatta) process dynamic affective displays of conspecifics that included both facial and body behaviors. Contrary to hypotheses that they would preferentially attend to faces during affective displays, monkeys looked for longest, most frequently, and first at conspecifics' bodies rather than their heads. These findings indicate that macaques, like humans, attend to available contextual information during the processing of affective displays, and that the body may also be providing unique information about affective states. (PsycINFO Database Record (c) 2017 APA, all rights reserved).

Vision-based navigation in a dynamic environment for virtual human

NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

Liu, Yan; Sun, Ji-Zhou; Zhang, Jia-Wan; Li, Ming-Chu

2004-06-01

Intelligent virtual human is widely required in computer games, ergonomics software, virtual environment and so on. We present a vision-based behavior modeling method to realize smart navigation in a dynamic environment. This behavior model can be divided into three modules: vision, global planning and local planning. Vision is the only channel for smart virtual actor to get information from the outside world. Then, the global and local planning module use A* and D* algorithm to find a way for virtual human in a dynamic environment. Finally, the experiments on our test platform (Smart Human System) verify the feasibility of this behavior model.

Functional Neuronal Processing of Human Body Odors

PubMed Central

Lundström, Johan N.; Olsson, Mats J.

2013-01-01

Body odors carry informational cues of great importance for individuals across a wide range of species, and signals hidden within the body odor cocktail are known to regulate several key behaviors in animals. For a long time, the notion that humans may be among these species has been dismissed. We now know, however, that each human has a unique odor signature that carries information related to his or her genetic makeup, as well as information about personal environmental variables, such as diet and hygiene. Although a substantial number of studies have investigated the behavioral effects of body odors, only a handful have studied central processing. Recent studies have, however, demonstrated that the human brain responds to fear signals hidden within the body odor cocktail, is able to extract kin specific signals, and processes body odors differently than other perceptually similar odors. In this chapter, we provide an overview of the current knowledge of how the human brain processes body odors and the potential importance these signals have for us in everyday life. PMID:20831940

An integrated approach to rotorcraft human factors research

NASA Technical Reports Server (NTRS)

Hart, Sandra G.; Hartzell, E. James; Voorhees, James W.; Bucher, Nancy M.; Shively, R. Jay

1988-01-01

As the potential of civil and military helicopters has increased, more complex and demanding missions in increasingly hostile environments have been required. Users, designers, and manufacturers have an urgent need for information about human behavior and function to create systems that take advantage of human capabilities, without overloading them. Because there is a large gap between what is known about human behavior and the information needed to predict pilot workload and performance in the complex missions projected for pilots of advanced helicopters, Army and NASA scientists are actively engaged in Human Factors Research at Ames. The research ranges from laboratory experiments to computational modeling, simulation evaluation, and inflight testing. Information obtained in highly controlled but simpler environments generates predictions which can be tested in more realistic situations. These results are used, in turn, to refine theoretical models, provide the focus for subsequent research, and ensure operational relevance, while maintaining predictive advantages. The advantages and disadvantages of each type of research are described along with examples of experimental results.

Order Information in Working Memory: An Integrative Review of Evidence From Brain and Behavior

ERIC Educational Resources Information Center

Marshuetz, Christy

2005-01-01

Evidence about memory for order information comes from a number of different methodologies: human cognition, patient studies, neuroimaging studies, and animal lesion and behavioral studies. The present article discusses (a) evidence that order and item memory are separable; (b) proposed mechanisms for order memory (interitem associations, direct…

Health, Supportive Environments, and the Reasonable Person Model

Treesearch

Stephen Kaplan; Rachel Kaplan

2003-01-01

The Reasonable Person Model is a conceptual framework that links environmental factors with human behavior. People are more reasonable, cooperative, helpful, and satisfied when the environment supports their basic informational needs. The same environmental supports are important factors in enhancing human health. We use this framework to identify the informational...

Behavioral Sciences in Secondary Schools: An Inquiry-Oriented Interdisciplinary Approach to the Human Behavioral Sciences in Social Studies. Professional Education Series.

ERIC Educational Resources Information Center

Anderson, Randall C.

Trends in secondary-level behavioral science curriculum development, informational background, and strategies for teaching behavioral science concepts are provided in this book. Chapters one through three define the behavioral sciences and examine their changing role and status in social studies education. Chapters four through six develop…

Behavioral Signal Processing: Deriving Human Behavioral Informatics From Speech and Language

PubMed Central

Narayanan, Shrikanth; Georgiou, Panayiotis G.

2013-01-01

The expression and experience of human behavior are complex and multimodal and characterized by individual and contextual heterogeneity and variability. Speech and spoken language communication cues offer an important means for measuring and modeling human behavior. Observational research and practice across a variety of domains from commerce to healthcare rely on speech- and language-based informatics for crucial assessment and diagnostic information and for planning and tracking response to an intervention. In this paper, we describe some of the opportunities as well as emerging methodologies and applications of human behavioral signal processing (BSP) technology and algorithms for quantitatively understanding and modeling typical, atypical, and distressed human behavior with a specific focus on speech- and language-based communicative, affective, and social behavior. We describe the three important BSP components of acquiring behavioral data in an ecologically valid manner across laboratory to real-world settings, extracting and analyzing behavioral cues from measured data, and developing models offering predictive and decision-making support. We highlight both the foundational speech and language processing building blocks as well as the novel processing and modeling opportunities. Using examples drawn from specific real-world applications ranging from literacy assessment and autism diagnostics to psychotherapy for addiction and marital well being, we illustrate behavioral informatics applications of these signal processing techniques that contribute to quantifying higher level, often subjectively described, human behavior in a domain-sensitive fashion. PMID:24039277

Information Interaction: Providing a Framework for Information Architecture.

ERIC Educational Resources Information Center

Toms, Elaine G.

2002-01-01

Discussion of information architecture focuses on a model of information interaction that bridges the gap between human and computer and between information behavior and information retrieval. Illustrates how the process of information interaction is affected by the user, the system, and the content. (Contains 93 references.) (LRW)

Spontaneous revisitation during visual exploration as a link among strategic behavior, learning, and the hippocampus.

PubMed

Voss, Joel L; Warren, David E; Gonsalves, Brian D; Federmeier, Kara D; Tranel, Dan; Cohen, Neal J

2011-08-02

Effective exploratory behaviors involve continuous updating of sensory sampling to optimize the efficacy of information gathering. Despite some work on this issue in animals, little information exists regarding the cognitive or neural mechanisms for this sort of behavioral optimization in humans. Here we examined a visual exploration phenomenon that occurred when human subjects studying an array of objects spontaneously looked "backward" in their scanning paths to view recently seen objects again. This "spontaneous revisitation" of recently viewed objects was associated with enhanced hippocampal activity and superior subsequent memory performance in healthy participants, but occurred only rarely in amnesic patients with severe damage to the hippocampus. These findings demonstrate the necessity of the hippocampus not just in the aspects of long-term memory with which it has been associated previously, but also in the short-term adaptive control of behavior. Functional neuroimaging showed hippocampal engagement occurring in conjunction with frontocerebellar circuits, thereby revealing some of the larger brain circuitry essential for the strategic deployment of information-seeking behaviors that optimize learning.

Evolution of cooperative behavior in simulation agents

NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

Stroud, Phillip D.

1998-03-01

A simulated automobile factory paint shop is used as a testbed for exploring the emulation of human decision-making behavior. A discrete-events simulation of the paint shop as a collection of interacting Java actors is described. An evolutionary cognitive architecture is under development for building software actors to emulate humans in simulations of human- dominated complex systems. In this paper, the cognitive architecture is extended by implementing a persistent population of trial behaviors with an incremental fitness valuation update strategy, and by allowing a group of cognitive actors to share information. A proof-of-principle demonstration is presented.

The Aging Navigational System.

PubMed

Lester, Adam W; Moffat, Scott D; Wiener, Jan M; Barnes, Carol A; Wolbers, Thomas

2017-08-30

The discovery of neuronal systems dedicated to computing spatial information, composed of functionally distinct cell types such as place and grid cells, combined with an extensive body of human-based behavioral and neuroimaging research has provided us with a detailed understanding of the brain's navigation circuit. In this review, we discuss emerging evidence from rodents, non-human primates, and humans that demonstrates how cognitive aging affects the navigational computations supported by these systems. Critically, we show 1) that navigational deficits cannot solely be explained by general deficits in learning and memory, 2) that there is no uniform decline across different navigational computations, and 3) that navigational deficits might be sensitive markers for impending pathological decline. Following an introduction to the mechanisms underlying spatial navigation and how they relate to general processes of learning and memory, the review discusses how aging affects the perception and integration of spatial information, the creation and storage of memory traces for spatial information, and the use of spatial information during navigational behavior. The closing section highlights the clinical potential of behavioral and neural markers of spatial navigation, with a particular emphasis on neurodegenerative disorders. Copyright © 2017 Elsevier Inc. All rights reserved.

Emergent collective decision-making: Control, model and behavior

NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

Shen, Tian

In this dissertation we study emergent collective decision-making in social groups with time-varying interactions and heterogeneously informed individuals. First we analyze a nonlinear dynamical systems model motivated by animal collective motion with heterogeneously informed subpopulations, to examine the role of uninformed individuals. We find through formal analysis that adding uninformed individuals in a group increases the likelihood of a collective decision. Secondly, we propose a model for human shared decision-making with continuous-time feedback and where individuals have little information about the true preferences of other group members. We study model equilibria using bifurcation analysis to understand how the model predicts decisions based on the critical threshold parameters that represent an individual's tradeoff between social and environmental influences. Thirdly, we analyze continuous-time data of pairs of human subjects performing an experimental shared tracking task using our second proposed model in order to understand transient behavior and the decision-making process. We fit the model to data and show that it reproduces a wide range of human behaviors surprisingly well, suggesting that the model may have captured the mechanisms of observed behaviors. Finally, we study human behavior from a game-theoretic perspective by modeling the aforementioned tracking task as a repeated game with incomplete information. We show that the majority of the players are able to converge to playing Nash equilibrium strategies. We then suggest with simulations that the mean field evolution of strategies in the population resemble replicator dynamics, indicating that the individual strategies may be myopic. Decisions form the basis of control and problems involving deciding collectively between alternatives are ubiquitous in nature and in engineering. Understanding how multi-agent systems make decisions among alternatives also provides insight for designing decentralized control laws for engineering applications from mobile sensor networks for environmental monitoring to collective construction robots. With this dissertation we hope to provide additional methodology and mathematical models for understanding the behavior and control of collective decision-making in multi-agent systems.

Human-human reliance in the context of automation.

PubMed

Lyons, Joseph B; Stokes, Charlene K

2012-02-01

The current study examined human-human reliance during a computer-based scenario where participants interacted with a human aid and an automated tool simultaneously. Reliance on others is complex, and few studies have examined human-human reliance in the context of automation. Past research found that humans are biased in their perceived utility of automated tools such that they view them as more accurate than humans. Prior reviews have postulated differences in human-human versus human-machine reliance, yet few studies have examined such reliance when individuals are presented with divergent information from different sources. Participants (N = 40) engaged in the Convoy Leader experiment.They selected a convoy route based on explicit guidance from a human aid and information from an automated map. Subjective and behavioral human-human reliance indices were assessed. Perceptions of risk were manipulated by creating three scenarios (low, moderate, and high) that varied in the amount of vulnerability (i.e., potential for attack) associated with the convoy routes. Results indicated that participants reduced their behavioral reliance on the human aid when faced with higher risk decisions (suggesting increased reliance on the automation); however, there were no reported differences in intentions to rely on the human aid relative to the automation. The current study demonstrated that when individuals are provided information from both a human aid and automation,their reliance on the human aid decreased during high-risk decisions. This study adds to a growing understanding of the biases and preferences that exist during complex human-human and human-machine interactions.

Audio-visual affective expression recognition

NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

Huang, Thomas S.; Zeng, Zhihong

2007-11-01

Automatic affective expression recognition has attracted more and more attention of researchers from different disciplines, which will significantly contribute to a new paradigm for human computer interaction (affect-sensitive interfaces, socially intelligent environments) and advance the research in the affect-related fields including psychology, psychiatry, and education. Multimodal information integration is a process that enables human to assess affective states robustly and flexibly. In order to understand the richness and subtleness of human emotion behavior, the computer should be able to integrate information from multiple sensors. We introduce in this paper our efforts toward machine understanding of audio-visual affective behavior, based on both deliberate and spontaneous displays. Some promising methods are presented to integrate information from both audio and visual modalities. Our experiments show the advantage of audio-visual fusion in affective expression recognition over audio-only or visual-only approaches.

Client-controlled case information: a general system theory perspective.

PubMed

Fitch, Dale

2004-07-01

The author proposes a model for client control of case information via the World Wide Web built on principles of general system theory. It incorporates the client into the design, resulting in an information structure that differs from traditional human services information-sharing practices. Referencing general system theory, the concepts of controller and controlled system, as well as entropy and negentropy, are applied to the information flow and autopoietic behavior as they relate to the boundary-maintaining functions of today's organizations. The author's conclusions synthesize general system theory and human services values to lay the foundation for an information-sharing framework for human services in the 21st century.

Behavioral Signal Processing: Deriving Human Behavioral Informatics From Speech and Language: Computational techniques are presented to analyze and model expressed and perceived human behavior-variedly characterized as typical, atypical, distressed, and disordered-from speech and language cues and their applications in health, commerce, education, and beyond.

PubMed

Narayanan, Shrikanth; Georgiou, Panayiotis G

2013-02-07

The expression and experience of human behavior are complex and multimodal and characterized by individual and contextual heterogeneity and variability. Speech and spoken language communication cues offer an important means for measuring and modeling human behavior. Observational research and practice across a variety of domains from commerce to healthcare rely on speech- and language-based informatics for crucial assessment and diagnostic information and for planning and tracking response to an intervention. In this paper, we describe some of the opportunities as well as emerging methodologies and applications of human behavioral signal processing (BSP) technology and algorithms for quantitatively understanding and modeling typical, atypical, and distressed human behavior with a specific focus on speech- and language-based communicative, affective, and social behavior. We describe the three important BSP components of acquiring behavioral data in an ecologically valid manner across laboratory to real-world settings, extracting and analyzing behavioral cues from measured data, and developing models offering predictive and decision-making support. We highlight both the foundational speech and language processing building blocks as well as the novel processing and modeling opportunities. Using examples drawn from specific real-world applications ranging from literacy assessment and autism diagnostics to psychotherapy for addiction and marital well being, we illustrate behavioral informatics applications of these signal processing techniques that contribute to quantifying higher level, often subjectively described, human behavior in a domain-sensitive fashion.

Recognition of human activities using depth images of Kinect for biofied building

NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

Ogawa, Ami; Mita, Akira

2015-03-01

These days, various functions in the living spaces are needed because of an aging society, promotion of energy conservation, and diversification of lifestyles. To meet this requirement, we propose "Biofied Building". The "Biofied Building" is the system learnt from living beings. The various information is accumulated in a database using small sensor agent robots as a key function of this system to control the living spaces. Among the various kinds of information about the living spaces, especially human activities can be triggers for lighting or air conditioning control. By doing so, customized space is possible. Human activities are divided into two groups, the activities consisting of single behavior and the activities consisting of multiple behaviors. For example, "standing up" or "sitting down" consists of a single behavior. These activities are accompanied by large motions. On the other hand "eating" consists of several behaviors, holding the chopsticks, catching the food, putting them in the mouth, and so on. These are continuous motions. Considering the characteristics of two types of human activities, we individually, use two methods, R transformation and variance. In this paper, we focus on the two different types of human activities, and propose the two methods of human activity recognition methods for construction of the database of living space for "Biofied Building". Finally, we compare the results of both methods.

A REVIEW OF EFFORTS TO ORGANIZE INFORMATION ABOUT HUMAN LEARNING, TRANSFER, AND RETENTION.

ERIC Educational Resources Information Center

GINSBERG, ROSE; AND OTHERS

FOURTEEN EFFORTS TO ORGANIZE AVAILABLE INFORMATION ON HUMAN LEARNING, TRANSFER, AND RETENTION ARE SUMMARIZED AND EVALUATED ON SIX CRITERIA--BEHAVIORAL SIGNIFICANCE OF CATEGORIES, SCOPE, OBJECTIVITY AND RELIABILITY OF CATEGORIES, PROGNOSIS FOR THE SYSTEM, LOGICAL STRUCTURE, AND HEURISTIC VALUE OF THE SYSTEM. ATTENTION IS GIVEN TO OTHER SOURCES OF…

"My husband usually makes those decisions": gender, behavior, and attitudes toward the marine environment.

PubMed

Wester, Misse; Eklund, Britta

2011-07-01

Human behavior impacts the environment we live in. In order to better understand how one group, boat owners, in three Nordic countries adjacent to the Baltic Sea; Sweden, Finland and Denmark, viewed the relationship between the marine environment, leisure boats and issues of responsibility, a survey study was conducted (n = 1701). The results show that there are differences between gender in many areas and those women in general are more environmentally friendly than men in their views and behavior. Men and women seek information about boating by different channels and this knowledge may be used in future information campaigns. Both men and women ranked boat owners as having the lowest impact on the marine environment and perceived these to be responsible for addressing environmental issues caused by leisure boat activities. The results also show that it is important to prove the effectiveness of an environmentally safe product since this factor is ranked higher than price when considering buying a product. The results suggest that once environmentally friendly behavior is established, such as recycling, this behavior continues. One implication of this study is that small changes in human behavior are seen as acceptable but larger commitments are more difficult to achieve. If individuals do not feel responsible for causing environmental damage, this aspect needs to be addressed in information aimed at this group. Novel approaches on framing the information and new ways of disseminating information are needed.

Multitasking Information Seeking and Searching Processes.

ERIC Educational Resources Information Center

Spink, Amanda; Ozmutlu, H. Cenk; Ozmutlu, Seda

2002-01-01

Presents findings from four studies of the prevalence of multitasking information seeking and searching by Web (via the Excite search engine), information retrieval system (mediated online database searching), and academic library users. Highlights include human information coordinating behavior (HICB); and implications for models of information…

Global Environmental Change: Modifying Human Contributions Through Education

NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

Carter, Lynne M.

1998-12-01

The 1995 Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC, 1996) Science report concludes that evidence now available "points toward a discernible human influence on global climate" (p. 439). Reductions in emissions will require changes in human behavior. This study assessed whether gains in global environmental change knowledge would lead to changes in human behaviors that could be deemed environmentally responsible. The study assessed the impact on participant behavior of a two-and-one-half day National Informal Educators Workshop and Videoconference held November 14-16, 1994. The workshops were located in seven down-link sites around the continental U.S. and Hawaii. The program utilized a variety of pedagogical techniques during five hours of satellite programming with national expertise on global change topics (natural variability, greenhouse effect, ozone depletion, ecosystem response, and population and resource distribution) and applications of that information with local experts in regional workshops. Participants implemented many personal and professional behavior changes after participation in this program. Six behavior change scales were created from assessment of survey responses (four coefficient alphas were above .7, one was .68, and one was .58). Personal behavior changes grouped into three categories: Use of Fewer Resources (acts of everyday life generally under volitional control), Purchasing Choices/Options (less frequent acts, not under total volitional control, with significant environmental effect over the lifetime of the decision, e.g., an automobile) and Increased Awareness and Discussion (indicating changes in "habits of mind"). The professional behavior changes also grouped into three categories: Curriculum Development (developing/revising curricula including new knowledge); Networking (with colleagues from the program); and Office Procedures (reflecting environmentally responsible behavior). The statistically significant behavior changes implemented correspond with increases in content knowledge, confidence, a developing national network, regional applications, and satisfaction with the program.

Differential Use of Vocal and Gestural Communication by Chimpanzees (Pan troglodytes) in Response to the Attentional Status of a Human (Homo sapiens)

PubMed Central

Hostetter, Autumn B.; Cantero, Monica; Hopkins, William D.

2007-01-01

This study examined the communicative behavior of 49 captive chimpanzees (Pan troglodytes), particularly their use of vocalizations, manual gestures, and other auditory- or tactile-based behaviors as a means of gaining an inattentive audience’s attention. A human (Homo sapiens) experimenter held a banana while oriented either toward or away from the chimpanzee. The chimpanzees’ behavior was recorded for 60 s. Chimpanzees emitted vocalizations faster and were more likely to produce vocalizations as their 1st communicative behavior when a human was oriented away from them. Chimpanzees used manual gestures more frequently and faster when the human was oriented toward them. These results replicate the findings of earlier studies on chimpanzee gestural communication and provide new information about the intentional and functional use of their vocalizations. PMID:11824896

Functional neuronal processing of human body odors.

PubMed

Lundström, Johan N; Olsson, Mats J

2010-01-01

Body odors carry informational cues of great importance for individuals across a wide range of species, and signals hidden within the body odor cocktail are known to regulate several key behaviors in animals. For a long time, the notion that humans may be among these species has been dismissed. We now know, however, that each human has a unique odor signature that carries information related to his or her genetic makeup, as well as information about personal environmental variables, such as diet and hygiene. Although a substantial number of studies have investigated the behavioral effects of body odors, only a handful have studied central processing. Recent studies have, however, demonstrated that the human brain responds to fear signals hidden within the body odor cocktail, is able to extract kin specific signals, and processes body odors differently than other perceptually similar odors. In this chapter, we provide an overview of the current knowledge of how the human brain processes body odors and the potential importance these signals have for us in everyday life. Copyright © 2010 Elsevier Inc. All rights reserved.

Dynamic frontotemporal systems process space and time in working memory

PubMed Central

Adams, Jenna N.; Solbakk, Anne-Kristin; Endestad, Tor; Larsson, Pål G.; Ivanovic, Jugoslav; Meling, Torstein R.; Lin, Jack J.; Knight, Robert T.

2018-01-01

How do we rapidly process incoming streams of information in working memory, a cognitive mechanism central to human behavior? Dominant views of working memory focus on the prefrontal cortex (PFC), but human hippocampal recordings provide a neurophysiological signature distinct from the PFC. Are these regions independent, or do they interact in the service of working memory? We addressed this core issue in behavior by recording directly from frontotemporal sites in humans performing a visuospatial working memory task that operationalizes the types of identity and spatiotemporal information we encounter every day. Theta band oscillations drove bidirectional interactions between the PFC and medial temporal lobe (MTL; including the hippocampus). MTL theta oscillations directed the PFC preferentially during the processing of spatiotemporal information, while PFC theta oscillations directed the MTL for all types of information being processed in working memory. These findings reveal an MTL theta mechanism for processing space and time and a domain-general PFC theta mechanism, providing evidence that rapid, dynamic MTL–PFC interactions underlie working memory for everyday experiences. PMID:29601574

Models of Pilot Behavior and Their Use to Evaluate the State of Pilot Training

NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

Jirgl, Miroslav; Jalovecky, Rudolf; Bradac, Zdenek

2016-07-01

This article discusses the possibilities of obtaining new information related to human behavior, namely the changes or progressive development of pilots' abilities during training. The main assumption is that a pilot's ability can be evaluated based on a corresponding behavioral model whose parameters are estimated using mathematical identification procedures. The mean values of the identified parameters are obtained via statistical methods. These parameters are then monitored and their changes evaluated. In this context, the paper introduces and examines relevant mathematical models of human (pilot) behavior, the pilot-aircraft interaction, and an example of the mathematical analysis.

Canine aggression toward people: a guide for practitioners.

PubMed

Sueda, Karen Lynn C; Malamed, Rachel

2014-05-01

This article reviews the various causes of human-directed aggression in dogs and provides a step-by-step plan guiding the general practitioner through history taking, behavior observations, diagnosis, consultation, treatment, and follow-up care. Charts summarizing how to obtain behavioral information, the client's management options, treatment recommendations, diagnosis and treatment of human-directed aggression, and the clinician's role in preventing human-directed aggression are included. A graphic illustration of canine body language is also provided. Copyright © 2014 Elsevier Inc. All rights reserved.

Accommodating complexity and human behaviors in decision analysis.

DOE Office of Scientific and Technical Information (OSTI.GOV)

Backus, George A.; Siirola, John Daniel; Schoenwald, David Alan

2007-11-01

This is the final report for a LDRD effort to address human behavior in decision support systems. One sister LDRD effort reports the extension of this work to include actual human choices and additional simulation analyses. Another provides the background for this effort and the programmatic directions for future work. This specific effort considered the feasibility of five aspects of model development required for analysis viability. To avoid the use of classified information, healthcare decisions and the system embedding them became the illustrative example for assessment.

An Empirical Human Controller Model for Preview Tracking Tasks.

PubMed

van der El, Kasper; Pool, Daan M; Damveld, Herman J; van Paassen, Marinus Rene M; Mulder, Max

2016-11-01

Real-life tracking tasks often show preview information to the human controller about the future track to follow. The effect of preview on manual control behavior is still relatively unknown. This paper proposes a generic operator model for preview tracking, empirically derived from experimental measurements. Conditions included pursuit tracking, i.e., without preview information, and tracking with 1 s of preview. Controlled element dynamics varied between gain, single integrator, and double integrator. The model is derived in the frequency domain, after application of a black-box system identification method based on Fourier coefficients. Parameter estimates are obtained to assess the validity of the model in both the time domain and frequency domain. Measured behavior in all evaluated conditions can be captured with the commonly used quasi-linear operator model for compensatory tracking, extended with two viewpoints of the previewed target. The derived model provides new insights into how human operators use preview information in tracking tasks.

Predicting Team Performance through Human Behavioral Sensing and Quantitative Workflow Instrumentation

DTIC Science & Technology

2016-07-27

make risk-informed decisions during serious games . Statistical models of intra- game performance were developed to determine whether behaviors in...specific facets of the gameplay workflow were predictive of analytical performance and games outcomes. A study of over seventy instrumented teams revealed...more accurate game decisions. 2 Keywords: Humatics · Serious Games · Human-System Interaction · Instrumentation · Teamwork · Communication Analysis

A Method for the Study of Human Factors in Aircraft Operations

NASA Technical Reports Server (NTRS)

Barnhart, W.; Billings, C.; Cooper, G.; Gilstrap, R.; Lauber, J.; Orlady, H.; Puskas, B.; Stephens, W.

1975-01-01

A method for the study of human factors in the aviation environment is described. A conceptual framework is provided within which pilot and other human errors in aircraft operations may be studied with the intent of finding out how, and why, they occurred. An information processing model of human behavior serves as the basis for the acquisition and interpretation of information relating to occurrences which involve human error. A systematic method of collecting such data is presented and discussed. The classification of the data is outlined.

Energetic Passivity of the Human Ankle Joint.

PubMed

Lee, Hyunglae; Hogan, Neville

2016-12-01

Understanding the passive or nonpassive behavior of the neuromuscular system is important to design and control robots that physically interact with humans, since it provides quantitative information to secure coupled stability while maximizing performance. This has become more important than ever apace with the increasing demand for robotic technologies in neurorehabilitation. This paper presents a quantitative characterization of passive and nonpassive behavior of the ankle of young healthy subjects, which provides a baseline for future studies in persons with neurological impairments and information for future developments of rehabilitation robots, such as exoskeletal devices and powered prostheses. Measurements using a wearable ankle robot actuating 2 degrees-of-freedom of the ankle combined with curl analysis and passivity analysis enabled characterization of both quasi-static and steady-state dynamic behavior of the ankle, unavailable from single DOF studies. Despite active neuromuscular control over a wide range of muscle activation, in young healthy subjects passive or dissipative ankle behavior predominated.

Behavioral Economics Applied to Energy Demand Analysis: A Foundation

EIA Publications

2014-01-01

Neoclassical economics has shaped our understanding of human behavior for several decades. While still an important starting point for economic studies, neoclassical frameworks have generally imposed strong assumptions, for example regarding utility maximization, information, and foresight, while treating consumer preferences as given or external to the framework. In real life, however, such strong assumptions tend to be less than fully valid. Behavioral economics refers to the study and formalizing of theories regarding deviations from traditionally-modeled economic decision-making in the behavior of individuals. The U.S. Energy Information Administration (EIA) has an interest in behavioral economics as one influence on energy demand.

Inference in the Wild: A Framework for Human Situation Assessment and a Case Study of Air Combat.

PubMed

McAnally, Ken; Davey, Catherine; White, Daniel; Stimson, Murray; Mascaro, Steven; Korb, Kevin

2018-06-24

Situation awareness is a key construct in human factors and arises from a process of situation assessment (SA). SA comprises the perception of information, its integration with existing knowledge, the search for new information, and the prediction of the future state of the world, including the consequences of planned actions. Causal models implemented as Bayesian networks (BNs) are attractive for modeling all of these processes within a single, unified framework. We elicited declarative knowledge from two Royal Australian Air Force (RAAF) fighter pilots about the information sources used in the identification (ID) of airborne entities and the causal relationships between these sources. This knowledge was represented in a BN (the declarative model) that was evaluated against the performance of 19 RAAF fighter pilots in a low-fidelity simulation. Pilot behavior was well predicted by a simple associative model (the behavioral model) with only three attributes of ID. Search for information by pilots was largely compensatory and was near-optimal with respect to the behavioral model. The average revision of beliefs in response to evidence was close to Bayesian, but there was substantial variability. Together, these results demonstrate the value of BNs for modeling human SA. Copyright © 2018 Cognitive Science Society, Inc.

Health behavior change: can genomics improve behavioral adherence?

PubMed

McBride, Colleen M; Bryan, Angela D; Bray, Molly S; Swan, Gary E; Green, Eric D

2012-03-01

The National Human Genome Research Institute recommends pursuing "genomic information to improve behavior change interventions" as part of its strategic vision for genomics. The limited effectiveness of current behavior change strategies may be explained, in part, by their insensitivity to individual variation in adherence responses. The first step in evaluating whether genomics can inform customization of behavioral recommendations is evidence reviews to identify adherence macrophenotypes common across behaviors and individuals that have genetic underpinnings. Conceptual models of how biological, psychological, and environmental factors influence adherence also are needed. Researchers could routinely collect biospecimens and standardized adherence measurements of intervention participants to enable understanding of genetic and environmental influences on adherence, to guide intervention customization and prospective comparative effectiveness studies.

Predicting couple therapy outcomes based on speech acoustic features

PubMed Central

Nasir, Md; Baucom, Brian Robert; Narayanan, Shrikanth

2017-01-01

Automated assessment and prediction of marital outcome in couples therapy is a challenging task but promises to be a potentially useful tool for clinical psychologists. Computational approaches for inferring therapy outcomes using observable behavioral information obtained from conversations between spouses offer objective means for understanding relationship dynamics. In this work, we explore whether the acoustics of the spoken interactions of clinically distressed spouses provide information towards assessment of therapy outcomes. The therapy outcome prediction task in this work includes detecting whether there was a relationship improvement or not (posed as a binary classification) as well as discerning varying levels of improvement or decline in the relationship status (posed as a multiclass recognition task). We use each interlocutor’s acoustic speech signal characteristics such as vocal intonation and intensity, both independently and in relation to one another, as cues for predicting the therapy outcome. We also compare prediction performance with one obtained via standardized behavioral codes characterizing the relationship dynamics provided by human experts as features for automated classification. Our experiments, using data from a longitudinal clinical study of couples in distressed relations, showed that predictions of relationship outcomes obtained directly from vocal acoustics are comparable or superior to those obtained using human-rated behavioral codes as prediction features. In addition, combining direct signal-derived features with manually coded behavioral features improved the prediction performance in most cases, indicating the complementarity of relevant information captured by humans and machine algorithms. Additionally, considering the vocal properties of the interlocutors in relation to one another, rather than in isolation, showed to be important for improving the automatic prediction. This finding supports the notion that behavioral outcome, like many other behavioral aspects, is closely related to the dynamics and mutual influence of the interlocutors during their interaction and their resulting behavioral patterns. PMID:28934302

A fuzzy Bayesian network approach to quantify the human behaviour during an evacuation

NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

Ramli, Nurulhuda; Ghani, Noraida Abdul; Ahmad, Nazihah

2016-06-01

Bayesian Network (BN) has been regarded as a successful representation of inter-relationship of factors affecting human behavior during an emergency. This paper is an extension of earlier work of quantifying the variables involved in the BN model of human behavior during an evacuation using a well-known direct probability elicitation technique. To overcome judgment bias and reduce the expert's burden in providing precise probability values, a new approach for the elicitation technique is required. This study proposes a new fuzzy BN approach for quantifying human behavior during an evacuation. Three major phases of methodology are involved, namely 1) development of qualitative model representing human factors during an evacuation, 2) quantification of BN model using fuzzy probability and 3) inferencing and interpreting the BN result. A case study of three inter-dependencies of human evacuation factors such as danger assessment ability, information about the threat and stressful conditions are used to illustrate the application of the proposed method. This approach will serve as an alternative to the conventional probability elicitation technique in understanding the human behavior during an evacuation.

Behavioral Task Analysis

DTIC Science & Technology

2010-01-01

and related tech- nologies . Washington, DC: National Academies Press. Neisser , U . (1967) . Cognitive psychology. New York: Appleton-Century-Crofts...behavior (see Neisser [1967] for a review of the early stages of information processing). The result is a characterization of human tasks as involving

Differential use of sensory information in sexual behavior as a function of gender.

PubMed

Herz, R S; Cahill, E D

1997-09-01

Olfactory information is critical to mammalian sexual behavior. Based on parental investment theory the relative importance of olfaction compared with vision, touch, and hearing should be different for human males and females. In particular, because of its link to immunological profile and offspring viability, odor should be a more important determinant of sexual choice and arousal for females than for males. To test this hypothesis a questionnaire was developed and administered to 332 adults (166 males, 166 females). Subjects used a 1-7 scale to indicate how much they agreed with a series of statements concerning the importance of olfactory, visual, auditory, and tactile information for their sexual responsivity. The data reveal that males rated visual and olfactory information as being equally important for selecting a lover, while females considered olfactory information to be the single most important variable in mate choice. Additionally, when considering sexual activity, females singled out body odor from all other sensory experiences as most able to negatively affect desire, while males regarded odors as much more neutral stimuli for sexual arousal. The present results support recent findings in mice and humans concerning the relation of female preferences in body odor and major histocompatibility complex (MHC) compatibility and can be explained by an evolutionary analysis of sex differences in reproductive strategies. This work represents the first direct examination of the role of different forms of sensory information in human sexual behavior.

Using Biology to Teach Adolescents about STD Transmission and Self-Protective Behaviors

ERIC Educational Resources Information Center

Zamora, Angela; Romo, Laura F.; Kit-fong Au, Terry

2006-01-01

The effects of a prevention program designed to teach 7th grade students about the different risk behaviors associated with human immunodeficiency virus (HIV), chlamydia, and gonorrhea transmission were examined. Over 3 days, the students were taught how to reason about self-protective behaviors using information about the biological causal…

Displacement activities as a behavioral measure of stress in nonhuman primates and human subjects.

PubMed

Troisi, Alfonso

2002-02-01

Traditionally, research on human stress has relied mostly on physiological and psychological measures with a relatively minor emphasis on the behavioral aspects of the phenomenon. Such an approach makes it difficult to develop valid animal models of the human stress syndrome. A promising approach to the study of the behavioral correlates of stress is to analyze those behavior patterns that ethologists have named displacement activities and that, in primates, consist mostly of self-directed behaviors. In both nonhuman primates and human subjects, displacement behavior appears in situations characterized by social tension and is likely to reflect increased autonomic arousal. Pharmacological studies of nonhuman primates have shown that the frequency of occurrence of displacement behavior is increased by anxiogenic compounds and decreased by anxiolytic drugs. Ethological studies of healthy persons and psychiatric patients during interviews have found that increased displacement behavior not only correlates with a subjective feeling state of anxiety and negative affect but also gives more veridical information about the subject's emotional state than verbal statements and facial expression. The measurement of displacement activities may be a useful complement to the physiological and psychological studies aimed at analyzing the correlates and consequences of stress.

Human Information Behavior, Coping, and Decision-Making in the Context of a Personal Crisis: An Interpretative Phenomenological Analysis of the Voices of Birthmothers on Relinquishing a Child for Adoption

ERIC Educational Resources Information Center

Clemens, Rachael Annette

2017-01-01

This qualitative and interpretive inquiry explores the information behavior of birthmothers surrounding the processes of decision-making, coping, and living with the act of child relinquishment to adoption. An interpretative phenomenological analysis methodology is used to reveal the phenomenon as experienced by eight birthmothers, women who…

Study on data acquisition system for living environmental information for biofication of living spaces

NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

Shimoyama, Norihisa; Mita, Akira

2008-03-01

In Japan's rapidly aging society, the number of elderly people living alone increases every year. Theses elderly people require more and more to maintain as independent a life as possible in their own homes. It is necessary to make living spaces that assist in providing safe and comfortable lives. "Biofication of Living Spaces" is proposed with the concept of creating save and pleasant living environments. It implies learning from biological systems, and applying to living spaces features such as high adaptability and excellent tolerance to environmental changes. As a first step towards realizing "Biofied Spaces", a system for acquisition and storing information must be developed. This system is similar to the five human senses. The information acquired includes environmental information such as temperature, human behavior, psychological state and location of furniture. This study addresses human behavior as it is the most important factor in design of a living space. In the present study, pyroelectric infrared sensors were chosen for human behavior recognition. The pyroelectric infrared sensor is advantageous in that it has no limitation on the number of sensors put in a single space because sensors do not interfere with each other. Wavelet analysis was applied to the output time histories of the pyroelectric infrared sensors. The system successfully classified walking patterns with 99.5% accuracy of walking direction (from right or left) and 85.7% accuracy of distance for 440 patterns pre-learned and an accuracy of over 80% accuracy of walking direction for 720 non-learned patterns.

A Reading Preference and Risk Taxonomy for Printed Proprietary Information Compromise in the Aerospace and Defense Industry

ERIC Educational Resources Information Center

Stalker, Joshua Dylan

2012-01-01

The protection of proprietary information that users print from their information systems is a significant and relevant concern in the field of information security to both researchers and practitioners. Information security researchers have repeatedly indicated that human behaviors and perception are important factors influencing the information…

Information Seeking Behaviour of AIOU Administrators

ERIC Educational Resources Information Center

Mahmood, Malik Tariq

2005-01-01

The main purpose of this research study is to investigate the information-seeking behavior of Allama Iqbal Open University (AIOU) administrators in Pakistan. Information is obtained by using a wide variety of informal and formal sources, human sources, Internet as well as print media. The present study found that AIOU administrators are more…

The eHealth Behavior Management Model: a stage-based approach to behavior change and management.

PubMed

Bensley, Robert J; Mercer, Nelda; Brusk, John J; Underhile, Ric; Rivas, Jason; Anderson, Judith; Kelleher, Deanne; Lupella, Melissa; de Jager, André C

2004-10-01

Although the Internet has become an important avenue for disseminating health information, theory-driven strategies for aiding individuals in changing or managing health behaviors are lacking. The eHealth Behavior Management Model combines the Transtheoretical Model, the behavioral intent aspect of the Theory of Planned Behavior, and persuasive communication to assist individuals in negotiating the Web toward stage-specific information. It is here - at the point of stage-specific information - that behavioral intent in moving toward more active stages of change occurs. The eHealth Behavior Management Model is applied in three demonstration projects that focus on behavior management issues: parent-child nutrition education among participants in the U.S. Department of Agriculture Special Supplemental Nutrition Program for Women, Infants and Children; asthma management among university staff and students; and human immunodeficiency virus prevention among South African women. Preliminary results have found the eHealth Behavior Management Model to be promising as a model for Internet-based behavior change programming. Further application and evaluation among other behavior and disease management issues are needed.

Shall we dance? — The effect of information presentations on negotiation processes and outcomes

PubMed Central

Gettinger, Johannes; Koeszegi, Sabine T.; Schoop, Mareike

2012-01-01

The way information is presented influences human decision making and is consequently highly relevant to electronically supported negotiations. The present study analyzes in a controlled laboratory experiment how information presentation in three alternative formats (table, history graph and dance graph) influences the negotiators' behavior and negotiation outcomes. The results show that graphical information presentation supports integrative behavior and the use of non-compensatory strategies. Furthermore, information about the opponents' preferences increases the quality of outcomes but decreases post-negotiation satisfaction of negotiators. The implications for system designers are discussed. PMID:23552280

To qualify as a social partner, humans hide severe punishment, although their observed cooperativeness is decisive.

PubMed

Rockenbach, Bettina; Milinski, Manfred

2011-11-08

Conflicts of interest between the community and its members are at the core of human social dilemmas. If observed selfishness has future costs, individuals may hide selfish acts but display altruistic ones, and peers aim at identifying the most selfish persons to avoid them as future social partners. An interaction involving hiding and seeking information may be inevitable. We staged an experimental social-dilemma game in which actors could pay to conceal information about their contribution, giving, and punishing decisions from an observer who selects her future social partners from the actors. The observer could pay to conceal her observation of the actors. We found sophisticated dynamic strategies on either side. Actors hide their severe punishment and low contributions but display high contributions. Observers select high contributors as social partners; remarkably, punishment behavior seems irrelevant for qualifying as a social partner. That actors nonetheless pay to conceal their severe punishment adds a further puzzle to the role of punishment in human social behavior. Competition between hiding and seeking information about social behavior may be even more relevant and elaborate in the real world but usually is hidden from our eyes.

Speech Communication Behavior; Perspectives and Principles.

ERIC Educational Resources Information Center

Barker, Larry L., Ed.; Kibler, Robert J., Ed.

Readings are included on seven topics: 1) theories and models of communication processes, 2) acquisition and performance of communication behaviors, 3) human information processing and diffusion, 4) persuasion and attitude change, 5) psychophysiological approaches to studying communication, 6) interpersonal communication within transracial…

Evolutionary relevance facilitates visual information processing.

PubMed

Jackson, Russell E; Calvillo, Dusti P

2013-11-03

Visual search of the environment is a fundamental human behavior that perceptual load affects powerfully. Previously investigated means for overcoming the inhibitions of high perceptual load, however, generalize poorly to real-world human behavior. We hypothesized that humans would process evolutionarily relevant stimuli more efficiently than evolutionarily novel stimuli, and evolutionary relevance would mitigate the repercussions of high perceptual load during visual search. Animacy is a significant component to evolutionary relevance of visual stimuli because perceiving animate entities is time-sensitive in ways that pose significant evolutionary consequences. Participants completing a visual search task located evolutionarily relevant and animate objects fastest and with the least impact of high perceptual load. Evolutionarily novel and inanimate objects were located slowest and with the highest impact of perceptual load. Evolutionary relevance may importantly affect everyday visual information processing.

Towards a Biosocial Perspective: Suggestions from a Biologist.

ERIC Educational Resources Information Center

Flacks, Miriam

Written by a biologist, this paper is intended to present information on the sociological study of man from a biological perspective. Perspectives include that (1) sociology neglects biological variables that are part of understanding human behavior and human societies; (2) the sociobiological or evolutionary view of human development is…

The Relationship Between Coat Color and Aggressive Behaviors in the Domestic Cat.

PubMed

Stelow, Elizabeth A; Bain, Melissa J; Kass, Philip H

2016-01-01

The authors explored a possible relationship between coat color and aggressive behaviors in the domestic cat. This study used an Internet-based survey to collect information on coat color, affiliative behaviors toward cats/humans, agonistic behaviors toward cats/humans, other "problem" behaviors, and cat and guardian demographic data. A total of 1,432 cat guardians completed the online survey; after exclusions based on study protocol, data analysis included 1,274 completed surveys. Guardians reported sex-linked orange female (tortoiseshells, calicos, and "torbies"), black-and-white, and gray-and-white cats to be more frequently aggressive toward humans in 3 settings: during everyday interactions, during handling, and during veterinary visits. Kruskal-Wallis 1-way analysis of variance was used to compare possible differences between the 2 sexes and among different coat colors. Analyses of aggression due to handling, as well as aggression displayed during veterinarian visits, showed little difference among coat colors in these settings.

Visitor effect on the behavior of a group of spider monkeys (Ateles geoffroyi) maintained at an island in Lake Catemaco, Veracruz/Mexico.

PubMed

Pérez-Galicia, Sergio; Miranda-Anaya, Manuel; Canales-Espinosa, Domingo; Muñoz-Delgado, Jairo

2017-12-01

We analyzed the effect of human visitors on the behavior of a group of spider monkeys (Ateles geoffroyi) kept on a small tourist island. Although the spider monkey is a common species in zoos, there are very few specific studies on visitor effects on these monkeys. We conducted behavioral observations on the group of spider monkeys to evaluate the effect of visitors. We also used actimetry devices to measure the variations in the spider monkeys' locomotor activity associated with human presence. With regard to the effect on behavior, we found an increase in self-directed behaviors and a decrease in vocalization, both associated with human presence. Moreover, our results suggest that when people feed monkeys, there is an increase in agonistic behaviors. On the other hand, we found that changes in activity levels in response to human presence vary among individuals. We conclude that changes in spider monkeys' behavior could provide evidence of the negative effect of visitors in our study conditions. Although we discuss the differences in activity levels due to differences in social position, further research is required this topic. Our results can be used to inform management plans for this species in captivity. Improving this relationship between humans and non-human primates through tourism education programs would benefit ecotourism and therefore species conservation programs. © 2017 Wiley Periodicals, Inc.

Dynamic systems and inferential information processing in human communication.

PubMed

Grammer, Karl; Fink, Bernhard; Renninger, LeeAnn

2002-12-01

Research in human communication on an ethological basis is almost obsolete. The reasons for this are manifold and lie partially in methodological problems connected to the observation and description of behavior, as well as the nature of human behavior itself. In this chapter, we present a new, non-intrusive, technical approach to the analysis of human non-verbal behavior, which could help to solve the problem of categorization that plagues the traditional approaches. We utilize evolutionary theory to propose a new theory-driven methodological approach to the 'multi-unit multi-channel modulation' problem of human nonverbal communication. Within this concept, communication is seen as context-dependent (the meaning of a signal is adapted to the situation), as a multi-channel and a multi-unit process (a string of many events interrelated in 'communicative' space and time), and as related to the function it serves. Such an approach can be utilized to successfully bridge the gap between evolutionary psychological research, which focuses on social cognition adaptations, and human ethology, which describes every day behavior in an objective, systematic way.

"Watch out!": Effects of instructed threat and avoidance on human free-operant approach-avoidance behavior.

PubMed

Schlund, Michael W; Treacher, Kay; Preston, Oli; Magee, Sandy K; Richman, David M; Brewer, Adam T; Cameron, Gemma; Dymond, Simon

2017-01-01

Approach-avoidance paradigms create a competition between appetitive and aversive contingencies and are widely used in nonhuman research on anxiety. Here, we examined how instructions about threat and avoidance impact control by competing contingencies over human approach-avoidance behavior. Additionally, Experiment 1 examined the effects of threat magnitude (money loss amount) and avoidance cost (fixed ratio requirements), whereas Experiment 2 examined the effects of threat information (available, unavailable and inaccurate) on approach-avoidance. During the task, approach responding was modeled by reinforcing responding with money on a FR schedule. By performing an observing response, participants produced an escalating "threat meter". Instructions stated that the threat meter levels displayed the current probability of losing money, when in fact loss only occurred when the level reached the maximum. Instructions also stated pressing an avoidance button lowered the threat level. Overall, instructions produced cycles of approach and avoidance responding with transitions from approach to avoidance when threat was high and transitions back to approach after avoidance reduced threat. Experiment 1 revealed increasing avoidance cost, but not threat magnitude, shifted approach-avoidance transitions to higher threat levels and increased anxiety ratings, but did not influence the frequency of approach-avoidance cycles. Experiment 2 revealed when threat level information was available or absent earnings were high, but earnings decreased when inaccurate threat information was incompatible with contingencies. Our findings build on prior nonhuman and human approach-avoidance research by highlighting how instructed threat and avoidance can impact human AA behavior and self-reported anxiety. © 2017 Society for the Experimental Analysis of Behavior.

Summary of human social, cultural, behavioral (HSCB) modeling for information fusion panel discussion

NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

Blasch, Erik; Salerno, John; Kadar, Ivan; Yang, Shanchieh J.; Fenstermacher, Laurie; Endsley, Mica; Grewe, Lynne

2013-05-01

During the SPIE 2012 conference, panelists convened to discuss "Real world issues and challenges in Human Social/Cultural/Behavioral modeling with Applications to Information Fusion." Each panelist presented their current trends and issues. The panel had agreement on advanced situation modeling, working with users for situation awareness and sense-making, and HSCB context modeling in focusing research activities. Each panelist added different perspectives based on the domain of interest such as physical, cyber, and social attacks from which estimates and projections can be forecasted. Also, additional techniques were addressed such as interest graphs, network modeling, and variable length Markov Models. This paper summarizes the panelists discussions to highlight the common themes and the related contrasting approaches to the domains in which HSCB applies to information fusion applications.

Health Behavior Change: Can Genomics Improve Behavioral Adherence?

PubMed Central

Bryan, Angela D.; Bray, Molly S.; Swan, Gary E.; Green, Eric D.

2012-01-01

The National Human Genome Research Institute recommends pursuing “genomic information to improve behavior change interventions” as part of its strategic vision for genomics. The limited effectiveness of current behavior change strategies may be explained, in part, by their insensitivity to individual variation in adherence responses. The first step in evaluating whether genomics can inform customization of behavioral recommendations is evidence reviews to identify adherence macrophenotypes common across behaviors and individuals that have genetic underpinnings. Conceptual models of how biological, psychological, and environmental factors influence adherence also are needed. Researchers could routinely collect biospecimens and standardized adherence measurements of intervention participants to enable understanding of genetic and environmental influences on adherence, to guide intervention customization and prospective comparative effectiveness studies. PMID:22390502

Perceptual-Motor Behavior and Educational Processes.

ERIC Educational Resources Information Center

Cratty, Bryant J.

Addressed to elementary school and special class teachers, the text presents research-based information on perceptual-motor behavior and education, including movement and the human personality, research guidelines, and movement activities in general education. Special education is considered and perceptual motor abilities are discussed with…

Integrating Informational, Social, and Behavioral Exchanges Between Humans, Urban Centers, and the Internet

DTIC Science & Technology

2014-06-01

against measures of effectiveness to help discern how to better utilize physical structures and human activities to create a more effective and...behaviors were solely enacted within the physical bounds of an urban center- mall, outdoor shopping plaza, or downtown, to name a few. The Internet has...is the effective integration of these components to enact city functions, plans, and is realized in physical design. City functions are: production

Social Performance Cues Induce Behavioral Flexibility in Humans

PubMed Central

Toelch, Ulf; Bruce, Matthew J.; Meeus, Marius T. H.; Reader, Simon M.

2011-01-01

Behavioral flexibility allows individuals to react to environmental changes, but changing established behavior carries costs, with unknown benefits. Individuals may thus modify their behavioral flexibility according to the prevailing circumstances. Social information provided by the performance level of others provides one possible cue to assess the potential benefits of changing behavior, since out-performance in similar circumstances indicates that novel behaviors (innovations) are potentially useful. We demonstrate that social performance cues, in the form of previous players’ scores in a problem-solving computer game, influence behavioral flexibility. Participants viewed only performance indicators, not the innovative behavior of others. While performance cues (high, low, or no scores) had little effect on innovation discovery rates, participants that viewed high scores increased their utilization of innovations, allowing them to exploit the virtual environment more effectively than players viewing low or no scores. Perceived conspecific performance can thus shape human decisions to adopt novel traits, even when the traits employed cannot be copied. This simple mechanism, social performance feedback, could be a driver of both the facultative adoption of innovations and cumulative cultural evolution, processes critical to human success. PMID:21811477

Moves on the Street: Classifying Crime Hotspots Using Aggregated Anonymized Data on People Dynamics.

PubMed

Bogomolov, Andrey; Lepri, Bruno; Staiano, Jacopo; Letouzé, Emmanuel; Oliver, Nuria; Pianesi, Fabio; Pentland, Alex

2015-09-01

The wealth of information provided by real-time streams of data has paved the way for life-changing technological advancements, improving the quality of life of people in many ways, from facilitating knowledge exchange to self-understanding and self-monitoring. Moreover, the analysis of anonymized and aggregated large-scale human behavioral data offers new possibilities to understand global patterns of human behavior and helps decision makers tackle problems of societal importance. In this article, we highlight the potential societal benefits derived from big data applications with a focus on citizen safety and crime prevention. First, we introduce the emergent new research area of big data for social good. Next, we detail a case study tackling the problem of crime hotspot classification, that is, the classification of which areas in a city are more likely to witness crimes based on past data. In the proposed approach we use demographic information along with human mobility characteristics as derived from anonymized and aggregated mobile network data. The hypothesis that aggregated human behavioral data captured from the mobile network infrastructure, in combination with basic demographic information, can be used to predict crime is supported by our findings. Our models, built on and evaluated against real crime data from London, obtain accuracy of almost 70% when classifying whether a specific area in the city will be a crime hotspot or not in the following month.

An Ethnographic Analysis of Adolescent Sexual Minority Website Usage: Exploring Notions of Information Seeking and Sexual Identity Development

ERIC Educational Resources Information Center

Sulfridge, Rocky M.

2012-01-01

This dissertation explores the website usage of adolescent sexual minorities, examining notions of information seeking and sexual identity development. Sexual information seeking is an important element within human information behavior and is uniquely problematic for young sexual minorities. Utilizing a contemporary gay teen website, this…

Toward statistical modeling of saccadic eye-movement and visual saliency.

PubMed

Sun, Xiaoshuai; Yao, Hongxun; Ji, Rongrong; Liu, Xian-Ming

2014-11-01

In this paper, we present a unified statistical framework for modeling both saccadic eye movements and visual saliency. By analyzing the statistical properties of human eye fixations on natural images, we found that human attention is sparsely distributed and usually deployed to locations with abundant structural information. This observations inspired us to model saccadic behavior and visual saliency based on super-Gaussian component (SGC) analysis. Our model sequentially obtains SGC using projection pursuit, and generates eye movements by selecting the location with maximum SGC response. Besides human saccadic behavior simulation, we also demonstrated our superior effectiveness and robustness over state-of-the-arts by carrying out dense experiments on synthetic patterns and human eye fixation benchmarks. Multiple key issues in saliency modeling research, such as individual differences, the effects of scale and blur, are explored in this paper. Based on extensive qualitative and quantitative experimental results, we show promising potentials of statistical approaches for human behavior research.

Scaling behavior of online human activity

NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

Zhao, Zhi-Dan; Cai, Shi-Min; Huang, Junming; Fu, Yan; Zhou, Tao

2012-11-01

The rapid development of the Internet technology enables humans to explore the web and record the traces of online activities. From the analysis of these large-scale data sets (i.e., traces), we can get insights about the dynamic behavior of human activity. In this letter, the scaling behavior and complexity of human activity in the e-commerce, such as music, books, and movies rating, are comprehensively investigated by using the detrended fluctuation analysis technique and the multiscale entropy method. Firstly, the interevent time series of rating behaviors of these three types of media show similar scaling properties with exponents ranging from 0.53 to 0.58, which implies that the collective behaviors of rating media follow a process embodying self-similarity and long-range correlation. Meanwhile, by dividing the users into three groups based on their activities (i.e., rating per unit time), we find that the scaling exponents of the interevent time series in the three groups are different. Hence, these results suggest that a stronger long-range correlations exist in these collective behaviors. Furthermore, their information complexities vary in the three groups. To explain the differences of the collective behaviors restricted to the three groups, we study the dynamic behavior of human activity at the individual level, and find that the dynamic behaviors of a few users have extremely small scaling exponents associated with long-range anticorrelations. By comparing the interevent time distributions of four representative users, we can find that the bimodal distributions may bring forth the extraordinary scaling behaviors. These results of the analysis of the online human activity in the e-commerce may not only provide insight into its dynamic behaviors but may also be applied to acquire potential economic interest.

The first year of behavioral development and maternal care of beluga (Delphinapterus leucas) calves in human care.

PubMed

Hill, Heather M; Campbell, Carolyn; Dalton, Les; Osborn, Steven

2013-01-01

The current study provides additional information for the behavioral development and maternal care of belugas or white whales (Delphinapterus leucas) in the care of humans. The behaviors and mother-calf interactions of two female beluga calves were recorded from birth to 12 months as part of a longitudinal study of beluga behavioral development. As expected, the primary calf activity for both calves involved swimming with their mothers. The calves initiated the majority of the separations from and reunions with their mothers and exhibited early bouts of independence. Both mothers bonded with their calves and displayed similar maternal care behaviors but exhibited different behavioral patterns. Despite differences in social groupings, housing, and physical health, the two female belugas followed the behavioral development of beluga calves observed previously. © 2013 Wiley Periodicals, Inc.

Neurobiology of aggressive behavior.

PubMed

Delgado, J M

1976-10-30

Causality, neurological mechanisms, and behavioral manifestations may be heterogeneous in different forms of aggressive behavior, but some elements are shared by all forms of violence, including the necessity of sensory inputs, the coding and decoding of information according to acquired frames of reference, and the activation of pre-established patterns of response. Understanding and prevention of violence requires a simultaneous study of its social, cultural, and economic aspects, at parity with an investigation of its neurological mechanisms. Part of the latter information may be obtained through animal experimentation, preferably in non-human primates. Feline predatory behavior has no equivalent in man, and therefore its hypothalamic representation probably does not exist in the human brain. Codes of information, frames of reference for sensory perception, axis to evaluate threats, and formulas for aggressive performance are not established genetically but must be learned individually. We are born with the capacity to learn aggressive behavior, but not with established patterns of violence. Mechanisms for fighting which are acquired by individual experience may be triggered in a similar way by sensory cues, volition, and by electrical stimulation of specific cerebral areas. In monkeys, aggressive responses may be modified by changing the hierarchical position of the stimulated animal, indicating the physiological quality of the neurological mechanisms electrically activated.

Hippocampus, Retrosplenial and Parahippocampal Cortices Encode Multicompartment 3D Space in a Hierarchical Manner.

PubMed

Kim, Misun; Maguire, Eleanor A

2018-05-01

Humans commonly operate within 3D environments such as multifloor buildings and yet there is a surprising dearth of studies that have examined how these spaces are represented in the brain. Here, we had participants learn the locations of paintings within a virtual multilevel gallery building and then used behavioral tests and fMRI repetition suppression analyses to investigate how this 3D multicompartment space was represented, and whether there was a bias in encoding vertical and horizontal information. We found faster response times for within-room egocentric spatial judgments and behavioral priming effects of visiting the same room, providing evidence for a compartmentalized representation of space. At the neural level, we observed a hierarchical encoding of 3D spatial information, with left anterior hippocampus representing local information within a room, while retrosplenial cortex, parahippocampal cortex, and posterior hippocampus represented room information within the wider building. Of note, both our behavioral and neural findings showed that vertical and horizontal location information was similarly encoded, suggesting an isotropic representation of 3D space even in the context of a multicompartment environment. These findings provide much-needed information about how the human brain supports spatial memory and navigation in buildings with numerous levels and rooms.

Simulating motivated cognition

NASA Technical Reports Server (NTRS)

Gevarter, William B.

1991-01-01

A research effort to develop a sophisticated computer model of human behavior is described. A computer framework of motivated cognition was developed. Motivated cognition focuses on the motivations or affects that provide the context and drive in human cognition and decision making. A conceptual architecture of the human decision-making approach from the perspective of information processing in the human brain is developed in diagrammatic form. A preliminary version of such a diagram is presented. This architecture is then used as a vehicle for successfully constructing a computer program simulation Dweck and Leggett's findings that relate how an individual's implicit theories orient them toward particular goals, with resultant cognitions, affects, and behavior.

On the evolution of misunderstandings about evolutionary psychology.

PubMed

Young, J; Persell, R

2000-04-01

Some of the controversy surrounding evolutionary explanations of human behavior may be due to cognitive information-processing patterns that are themselves the result of evolutionary processes. Two such patterns are (1) the tendency to oversimplify information so as to reduce demand on cognitive resources and (2) our strong desire to generate predictability and stability from perceptions of the external world. For example, research on social stereotyping has found that people tend to focus automatically on simplified social-categorical information, to use such information when deciding how to behave, and to rely on such information even in the face of contradictory evidence. Similarly, an undying debate over nature vs. nurture is shaped by various data-reduction strategies that frequently oversimplify, and thus distort, the intent of the supporting arguments. This debate is also often marked by an assumption that either the nature or the nurture domain may be justifiably excluded at an explanatory level because one domain appears to operate in a sufficiently stable and predictable way for a particular argument. As a result, critiques in-veighed against evolutionary explanations of behavior often incorporate simplified--and erroneous--assumptions about either the mechanics of how evolution operates or the inevitable implications of evolution for understanding human behavior. The influences of these tendencies are applied to a discussion of the heritability of behavioral characteristics. It is suggested that the common view that Mendelian genetics can explain the heritability of complex behaviors, with a one-gene-one-trait process, is misguided. Complex behaviors are undoubtedly a product of a more complex interaction between genes and environment, ensuring that both nature and nurture must be accommodated in a yet-to-be-developed post-Mendelian model of genetic influence. As a result, current public perceptions of evolutionary explanations of behavior are handicapped by the lack of clear articulation of the relationship between inherited genes and manifest behavior.

Privacy and human behavior in the age of information.

PubMed

Acquisti, Alessandro; Brandimarte, Laura; Loewenstein, George

2015-01-30

This Review summarizes and draws connections between diverse streams of empirical research on privacy behavior. We use three themes to connect insights from social and behavioral sciences: people's uncertainty about the consequences of privacy-related behaviors and their own preferences over those consequences; the context-dependence of people's concern, or lack thereof, about privacy; and the degree to which privacy concerns are malleable—manipulable by commercial and governmental interests. Organizing our discussion by these themes, we offer observations concerning the role of public policy in the protection of privacy in the information age. Copyright © 2015, American Association for the Advancement of Science.

38 CFR 16.102 - Definitions.

Code of Federal Regulations, 2014 CFR

2014-07-01

... Section 16.102 Pensions, Bonuses, and Veterans' Relief DEPARTMENT OF VETERANS AFFAIRS PROTECTION OF HUMAN... Labor). (f) Human subject means a living individual about whom an investigator (whether professional or... between investigator and subject. “Private information” includes information about behavior that occurs in...

38 CFR 16.102 - Definitions.

Code of Federal Regulations, 2013 CFR

2013-07-01

... Section 16.102 Pensions, Bonuses, and Veterans' Relief DEPARTMENT OF VETERANS AFFAIRS PROTECTION OF HUMAN... Labor). (f) Human subject means a living individual about whom an investigator (whether professional or... between investigator and subject. “Private information” includes information about behavior that occurs in...

38 CFR 16.102 - Definitions.

Code of Federal Regulations, 2012 CFR

2012-07-01

... Section 16.102 Pensions, Bonuses, and Veterans' Relief DEPARTMENT OF VETERANS AFFAIRS PROTECTION OF HUMAN... Labor). (f) Human subject means a living individual about whom an investigator (whether professional or... between investigator and subject. “Private information” includes information about behavior that occurs in...

16 CFR 1028.102 - Definitions.

Code of Federal Regulations, 2012 CFR

2012-01-01

... Commercial Practices CONSUMER PRODUCT SAFETY COMMISSION GENERAL PROTECTION OF HUMAN SUBJECTS § 1028.102...) Human subject means a living individual about whom an investigator (whether professional or student... investigator and subject. “Private information” includes information about behavior that occurs in a context in...

Behavioral and Psychological Responses to HIV Antibody Testing.

ERIC Educational Resources Information Center

Jacobsen, Paul B.; And Others

1990-01-01

Considers effects of informing individuals of their antibody status as determined by human immunodeficiency virus (HIV) antibody testing. Reviews research examining changes in psychological distress and in behaviors associated with HIV infections among individuals who have undergone antibody testing. Identifies methodological issues in studying…

Effects of pesticides and antibiotics on penaeid shrimp with special emphases on behavioral and biomarker responses.

PubMed

Tu, Huynh Thi; Silvestre, Frederic; Phuong, Nguyen Thanh; Kestemont, Patrick

2010-04-01

The purpose of the present study is to provide information on the current state of knowledge regarding the effects of pesticides and antibiotics used in aquaculture on penaeid shrimp, one of the most common aquatic products for human consumption, with a special emphasis on the use of behavioral, physiological, and biochemical response. These include behavior; feeding rate changes; respiration rate, oxygen consumption, and osmoregulation alterations; nucleic acids, protein, and glycogen synthesis; cholinesterase activity inhibition; ATPase activity; and oxidative stress responses. This paper also deals with residues of antibiotics and pesticides in penaeid shrimp. Antibiotics and pesticides used in aquaculture may have adverse effects on treated animals and human consumers health if they are not correctly used. As a complement to the measurement of antibiotic and pesticide residues in tissues, the use of behavioral and biomarker responses can provide more relevant biological information on the potential adverse effects of antibiotics and pesticides on penaeid shrimp health. (c) 2009 SETAC.

Francis Bacon's behavioral psychology.

PubMed

MacDonald, Paul S

2007-01-01

Francis Bacon offers two accounts of the nature and function of the human mind: one is a medical-physical account of the composition and operation of spirits specific to human beings, the other is a behavioral account of the character and activities of individual persons. The medical-physical account is a run-of-the-mill version of the late Renaissance model of elemental constituents and humoral temperaments. The other, less well-known, behavioral account represents an unusual position in early modern philosophy. This theory espouses a form of behavioral psychology according to which (a) supposed mental properties are "hidden forms" best described in dispositional terms, (b) the true character of an individual can be discovered in his observable behavior, and (c) an "informed" understanding of these properties permits the prediction and control of human behavior. Both of Bacon's theories of human nature fall under his general notion of systematic science: his medical-physical theory of vital spirits is theoretical natural philosophy and his behavioral theory of disposition and expression is operative natural philosophy. Because natural philosophy as a whole is "the inquiry of causes and the production of effects," knowledge of human nature falls under the same two-part definition. It is an inquisition of forms that pertains to the patterns of minute motions in the vital spirits and the production of effects that pertains both to the way these hidden motions produce behavioral effects and to the way in which a skillful agent is able to produce desired effects in other persons' behavior. (c) 2007 Wiley Periodicals, Inc.

Integrated deployment architecture for predictive real-time traffic routing incorporating human factors considerations.

DOT National Transportation Integrated Search

2014-05-01

As Advanced Traveler Information Systems (ATIS) are being more widely accessed by drivers, understanding drivers behavioral responses to real-time travel information through ATIS and its consequential benefits are important to the widespread deplo...

Informed Consent in the Changing Landscape of Research.

PubMed

Hammer, Marilyn J

2016-09-01

The history of informed consent dates back as early as the 16th century (Selek, 2010). The current tenets of informed consent pertaining to the ethical conduct of research on human participants predominately stems from the 1947 Nuremberg Code (National Institutes of Health, 2016), which was created following the Nuremberg trials at the end of World War II. The unethical conduct of research on human participants during the Holocaust, coupled with experiments (e.g., the Tuskegee syphilis study), prompted a more formalized structure for ensuring the well-being and autonomy of human participants in research studies. The World Medical Association (2013) created the Declaration of Geneva in 1948 (Fischer, 2006), followed by the Declaration of Helsinki in 1964, to apply ethical principles to medical research involving human participants (Fischer, 2006; Rickham, 1964). A decade later, on July 12, 1974, the National Research Act was signed into law (U.S. Department of Health and Human Services [HHS], 1979). Through this act, the National Commission for the Protection of Human Subjects of Biomedical and Behavioral Research was formed and charged with developing guidelines for the conduct of biomedical and behavioral research. The guidelines were established in the Belmont Report (HHS, 1979; U.S. Department of Health, Education, and Welfare, 1979), which continues to be periodically updated. The Belmont Report describes the general principles of respect for persons, beneficence, and justice, and it outlines the process of obtaining informed consent to ensure that these principles are followed (HHS, 1979). In 1998, an informed consent checklist was instituted (HHS, 1998). Although clearly outlined, defined, and described in consent forms, it is beneficial to revisit how informed participants are when they enter research studies, particularly for patients undergoing treatment for cancer. This article will provide an overview of several areas for consideration. 
.

Primate Cognition: Attention, Episodic Memory, Prospective Memory, Self-Control, and Metacognition as Examples of Cognitive Control in Nonhuman Primates1

PubMed Central

Menzel, Charles R.; Parrish, Audrey E.; Perdue, Bonnie M.; Sayers, Ken; Smith, J. David; Washburn, David A.

2016-01-01

Primate Cognition is the study of cognitive processes, which represent internal mental processes involved in discriminations, decisions, and behaviors of humans and other primate species. Cognitive control involves executive and regulatory processes that allocate attention, manipulate and evaluate available information (and, when necessary, seek additional information), remember past experiences to plan future behaviors, and deal with distraction and impulsivity when they are threats to goal achievement. Areas of research that relate to cognitive control as it is assessed across species include executive attention, episodic memory, prospective memory, metacognition and self-control. Executive attention refers to the ability to control what sensory stimuli one attends to and how one regulates responses to those stimuli, especially in cases of conflict. Episodic memory refers to memory for personally experienced, autobiographical events. Prospective memory refers to the formation and implementation of future-intended actions, such as remembering what needs to be done later. Metacognition consists of control and monitoring processes that allow individuals to assess what information they have and what information they still need, and then if necessary to seek information. Self-control is a regulatory process whereby individuals forego more immediate or easier to obtain rewards for more delayed or harder to obtain rewards that are objectively more valuable. The behavioral complexity shown by nonhuman primates when given tests to assess these capacities indicates psychological continuities with human cognitive control capacities. However, more research is needed to clarify the proper interpretation of these behaviors with regard to possible cognitive constructs that may underlie such behaviors. PMID:27284790

Research opportunities in human behavior and performance

NASA Technical Reports Server (NTRS)

Christensen, J. M. (Editor); Talbot, J. M. (Editor)

1985-01-01

Extant information on the subject of psychological aspects of manned space flight are reviewed; NASA's psychology research program is examined; significant gaps in knowledge are identified; and suggestions are offered for future research program planning. Issues of human behavior and performance related to the United States space station, to the space shuttle program, and to both near and long term problems of a generic nature in applicable disciplines of psychology are considered. Topics covered include: (1) human performance requirements for a 90 day mission; (2) human perceptual, cognitive, and motor capabilities and limitations in space; (3) crew composition, individual competencies, crew competencies, selection criteria, and special training; (4) environmental factors influencing behavior; (5) psychosocial aspects of multiperson space crews in long term missions; (6) career determinants in NASA; (7) investigational methodology and equipment; and (8) psychological support.

Monitoring and decision making by people in man machine systems

NASA Technical Reports Server (NTRS)

Johannsen, G.

1979-01-01

The analysis of human monitoring and decision making behavior as well as its modeling are described. Classic and optimal control theoretical, monitoring models are surveyed. The relationship between attention allocation and eye movements is discussed. As an example of applications, the evaluation of predictor displays by means of the optimal control model is explained. Fault detection involving continuous signals and decision making behavior of a human operator engaged in fault diagnosis during different operation and maintenance situations are illustrated. Computer aided decision making is considered as a queueing problem. It is shown to what extent computer aids can be based on the state of human activity as measured by psychophysiological quantities. Finally, management information systems for different application areas are mentioned. The possibilities of mathematical modeling of human behavior in complex man machine systems are also critically assessed.

Cultural context in medical ethics: lessons from Japan.

PubMed

Powell, Tia

2006-04-03

This paper examines two topics in Japanese medical ethics: non-disclosure of medical information by Japanese physicians, and the history of human rights abuses by Japanese physicians during World War II. These contrasting issues show how culture shapes our view of ethically appropriate behavior in medicine. An understanding of cultural context reveals that certain practices, such as withholding diagnostic information from patients, may represent ethical behavior in that context. In contrast, nonconsensual human experimentation designed to harm the patient is inherently unethical irrespective of cultural context. Attempts to define moral consensus in bioethics, and to distinguish between acceptable and unacceptable variation across different cultural contexts, remain central challenges in articulating international, culturally sensitive norms in medical ethics.

Cultural context in medical ethics: lessons from Japan

PubMed Central

Powell, Tia

2006-01-01

This paper examines two topics in Japanese medical ethics: non-disclosure of medical information by Japanese physicians, and the history of human rights abuses by Japanese physicians during World War II. These contrasting issues show how culture shapes our view of ethically appropriate behavior in medicine. An understanding of cultural context reveals that certain practices, such as withholding diagnostic information from patients, may represent ethical behavior in that context. In contrast, nonconsensual human experimentation designed to harm the patient is inherently unethical irrespective of cultural context. Attempts to define moral consensus in bioethics, and to distinguish between acceptable and unacceptable variation across different cultural contexts, remain central challenges in articulating international, culturally sensitive norms in medical ethics. PMID:16759415

Following rules in the intermontane west: 19th-century mormon settlement

PubMed Central

Norton, William

2001-01-01

The academic discipline of human geography is concerned with human activities, especially as these relate to physical landscapes and contribute to the modification of those landscapes. Although little attention has been paid to objectivist philosophies to inform human geography, behavior analysis might offer a useful explanatory model. As an example, a behavior analysis of selected aspects of 19th-century Mormon movement and settlement in the intermontane West is conducted. Mormons are a society of believers who practice cooperative effort and support for other members, and the Mormon church is governed by priesthood authority with members being called to perform tasks. This analysis employs the concepts of metacontingency, rule-governed behavior, and delayed reinforcement to analyze how Mormons settled the intermontane West. PMID:22478355

Branching dynamics of viral information spreading.

PubMed

Iribarren, José Luis; Moro, Esteban

2011-10-01

Despite its importance for rumors or innovations propagation, peer-to-peer collaboration, social networking, or marketing, the dynamics of information spreading is not well understood. Since the diffusion depends on the heterogeneous patterns of human behavior and is driven by the participants' decisions, its propagation dynamics shows surprising properties not explained by traditional epidemic or contagion models. Here we present a detailed analysis of our study of real viral marketing campaigns where tracking the propagation of a controlled message allowed us to analyze the structure and dynamics of a diffusion graph involving over 31,000 individuals. We found that information spreading displays a non-Markovian branching dynamics that can be modeled by a two-step Bellman-Harris branching process that generalizes the static models known in the literature and incorporates the high variability of human behavior. It explains accurately all the features of information propagation under the "tipping point" and can be used for prediction and management of viral information spreading processes.

Branching dynamics of viral information spreading

NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

Iribarren, José Luis; Moro, Esteban

2011-10-01

Despite its importance for rumors or innovations propagation, peer-to-peer collaboration, social networking, or marketing, the dynamics of information spreading is not well understood. Since the diffusion depends on the heterogeneous patterns of human behavior and is driven by the participants’ decisions, its propagation dynamics shows surprising properties not explained by traditional epidemic or contagion models. Here we present a detailed analysis of our study of real viral marketing campaigns where tracking the propagation of a controlled message allowed us to analyze the structure and dynamics of a diffusion graph involving over 31 000 individuals. We found that information spreading displays a non-Markovian branching dynamics that can be modeled by a two-step Bellman-Harris branching process that generalizes the static models known in the literature and incorporates the high variability of human behavior. It explains accurately all the features of information propagation under the “tipping point” and can be used for prediction and management of viral information spreading processes.

14 CFR 1230.102 - Definitions.

Code of Federal Regulations, 2012 CFR

2012-01-01

... Aeronautics and Space NATIONAL AERONAUTICS AND SPACE ADMINISTRATION PROTECTION OF HUMAN SUBJECTS § 1230.102...) Human subject means a living individual about whom an investigator (whether professional or student... investigator and subject. “Private information” includes information about behavior that occurs in a context in...

14 CFR 1230.102 - Definitions.

Code of Federal Regulations, 2013 CFR

2013-01-01

... Aeronautics and Space NATIONAL AERONAUTICS AND SPACE ADMINISTRATION PROTECTION OF HUMAN SUBJECTS § 1230.102...) Human subject means a living individual about whom an investigator (whether professional or student... investigator and subject. “Private information” includes information about behavior that occurs in a context in...

Two different mechanisms support selective attention at different phases of training.

PubMed

Itthipuripat, Sirawaj; Cha, Kexin; Byers, Anna; Serences, John T

2017-06-01

Selective attention supports the prioritized processing of relevant sensory information to facilitate goal-directed behavior. Studies in human subjects demonstrate that attentional gain of cortical responses can sufficiently account for attention-related improvements in behavior. On the other hand, studies using highly trained nonhuman primates suggest that reductions in neural noise can better explain attentional facilitation of behavior. Given the importance of selective information processing in nearly all domains of cognition, we sought to reconcile these competing accounts by testing the hypothesis that extensive behavioral training alters the neural mechanisms that support selective attention. We tested this hypothesis using electroencephalography (EEG) to measure stimulus-evoked visual responses from human subjects while they performed a selective spatial attention task over the course of ~1 month. Early in training, spatial attention led to an increase in the gain of stimulus-evoked visual responses. Gain was apparent within ~100 ms of stimulus onset, and a quantitative model based on signal detection theory (SDT) successfully linked the magnitude of this gain modulation to attention-related improvements in behavior. However, after extensive training, this early attentional gain was eliminated even though there were still substantial attention-related improvements in behavior. Accordingly, the SDT-based model required noise reduction to account for the link between the stimulus-evoked visual responses and attentional modulations of behavior. These findings suggest that training can lead to fundamental changes in the way attention alters the early cortical responses that support selective information processing. Moreover, these data facilitate the translation of results across different species and across experimental procedures that employ different behavioral training regimes.

Two different mechanisms support selective attention at different phases of training

PubMed Central

Cha, Kexin; Byers, Anna; Serences, John T.

2017-01-01

Selective attention supports the prioritized processing of relevant sensory information to facilitate goal-directed behavior. Studies in human subjects demonstrate that attentional gain of cortical responses can sufficiently account for attention-related improvements in behavior. On the other hand, studies using highly trained nonhuman primates suggest that reductions in neural noise can better explain attentional facilitation of behavior. Given the importance of selective information processing in nearly all domains of cognition, we sought to reconcile these competing accounts by testing the hypothesis that extensive behavioral training alters the neural mechanisms that support selective attention. We tested this hypothesis using electroencephalography (EEG) to measure stimulus-evoked visual responses from human subjects while they performed a selective spatial attention task over the course of ~1 month. Early in training, spatial attention led to an increase in the gain of stimulus-evoked visual responses. Gain was apparent within ~100 ms of stimulus onset, and a quantitative model based on signal detection theory (SDT) successfully linked the magnitude of this gain modulation to attention-related improvements in behavior. However, after extensive training, this early attentional gain was eliminated even though there were still substantial attention-related improvements in behavior. Accordingly, the SDT-based model required noise reduction to account for the link between the stimulus-evoked visual responses and attentional modulations of behavior. These findings suggest that training can lead to fundamental changes in the way attention alters the early cortical responses that support selective information processing. Moreover, these data facilitate the translation of results across different species and across experimental procedures that employ different behavioral training regimes. PMID:28654635

Emotional First Aid: Crisis Development and Systems of Intervention.

ERIC Educational Resources Information Center

Rosenbluh, Edward S.; And Others

This instructional manual takes a developmental approach toward understanding the psychological, social and behavioral dynamics of human crisis. The manual describes the behavior patterns characterizing various psychological and physical crises, and provides background information and methods of crisis intervention with which to manage each. In…

INFORMATION OR NOISE. AN INVESTIGATION OF RESPONSE ERRORS.

DTIC Science & Technology

BEHAVIOR, SOCIAL PSYCHOLOGY), (* SOCIAL SCIENCES, SCIENTIFIC RESEARCH), PERFORMANCE(HUMAN), REACTION(PSYCHOLOGY), TEST CONSTRUCTION(PSYCHOLOGY), ATTITUDES(PSYCHOLOGY), MOTIVATION, PSYCHOLOGICAL TESTS, PUBLIC OPINION

Sexual information seeking on web search engines.

PubMed

Spink, Amanda; Koricich, Andrew; Jansen, B J; Cole, Charles

2004-02-01

Sexual information seeking is an important element within human information behavior. Seeking sexually related information on the Internet takes many forms and channels, including chat rooms discussions, accessing Websites or searching Web search engines for sexual materials. The study of sexual Web queries provides insight into sexually-related information-seeking behavior, of value to Web users and providers alike. We qualitatively analyzed queries from logs of 1,025,910 Alta Vista and AlltheWeb.com Web user queries from 2001. We compared the differences in sexually-related Web searching between Alta Vista and AlltheWeb.com users. Differences were found in session duration, query outcomes, and search term choices. Implications of the findings for sexual information seeking are discussed.

Deep-reasoning fault diagnosis - An aid and a model

NASA Technical Reports Server (NTRS)

Yoon, Wan Chul; Hammer, John M.

1988-01-01

The design and evaluation are presented for the knowledge-based assistance of a human operator who must diagnose a novel fault in a dynamic, physical system. A computer aid based on a qualitative model of the system was built to help the operators overcome some of their cognitive limitations. This aid differs from most expert systems in that it operates at several levels of interaction that are believed to be more suitable for deep reasoning. Four aiding approaches, each of which provided unique information to the operator, were evaluated. The aiding features were designed to help the human's casual reasoning about the system in predicting normal system behavior (N aiding), integrating observations into actual system behavior (O aiding), finding discrepancies between the two (O-N aiding), or finding discrepancies between observed behavior and hypothetical behavior (O-HN aiding). Human diagnostic performance was found to improve by almost a factor of two with O aiding and O-N aiding.

The Potential of Peer Robots to Assist Human Creativity in Finding Problems and Problem Solving

ERIC Educational Resources Information Center

Okita, Sandra

2015-01-01

Many technological artifacts (e.g., humanoid robots, computer agents) consist of biologically inspired features of human-like appearance and behaviors that elicit a social response. The strong social components of technology permit people to share information and ideas with these artifacts. As robots cross the boundaries between humans and…

Unified underpinning of human mobility in the real world and cyberspace

NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

Zhao, Yi-Ming; Zeng, An; Yan, Xiao-Yong; Wang, Wen-Xu; Lai, Ying-Cheng

2016-05-01

Human movements in the real world and in cyberspace affect not only dynamical processes such as epidemic spreading and information diffusion but also social and economical activities such as urban planning and personalized recommendation in online shopping. Despite recent efforts in characterizing and modeling human behaviors in both the real and cyber worlds, the fundamental dynamics underlying human mobility have not been well understood. We develop a minimal, memory-based random walk model in limited space for reproducing, with a single parameter, the key statistical behaviors characterizing human movements in both cases. The model is validated using relatively big data from mobile phone and online commerce, suggesting memory-based random walk dynamics as the unified underpinning for human mobility, regardless of whether it occurs in the real world or in cyberspace.

22 CFR 225.102 - Definitions.

Code of Federal Regulations, 2014 CFR

2014-04-01

... Relations AGENCY FOR INTERNATIONAL DEVELOPMENT PROTECTION OF HUMAN SUBJECTS § 225.102 Definitions. (a..., Wage and Hour requirements administered by the Department of Labor). (f) Human subject means a living...” includes information about behavior that occurs in a context in which an individual can reasonably expect...

22 CFR 225.102 - Definitions.

Code of Federal Regulations, 2013 CFR

2013-04-01

... Relations AGENCY FOR INTERNATIONAL DEVELOPMENT PROTECTION OF HUMAN SUBJECTS § 225.102 Definitions. (a..., Wage and Hour requirements administered by the Department of Labor). (f) Human subject means a living...” includes information about behavior that occurs in a context in which an individual can reasonably expect...

15 CFR 27.102 - Definitions.

Code of Federal Regulations, 2014 CFR

2014-01-01

... Commerce and Foreign Trade Office of the Secretary of Commerce PROTECTION OF HUMAN SUBJECTS § 27.102...) Human subject means a living individual about whom an investigator (whether professional or student... investigator and subject. “Private information” includes information about behavior that occurs in a context in...

49 CFR 11.102 - Definitions.

Code of Federal Regulations, 2013 CFR

2013-10-01

... Office of the Secretary of Transportation PROTECTION OF HUMAN SUBJECTS § 11.102 Definitions. (a..., Wage and Hour requirements administered by the Department of Labor). (f) Human subject means a living...” includes information about behavior that occurs in a context in which an individual can reasonably expect...

49 CFR 11.102 - Definitions.

Code of Federal Regulations, 2012 CFR

2012-10-01

... Office of the Secretary of Transportation PROTECTION OF HUMAN SUBJECTS § 11.102 Definitions. (a..., Wage and Hour requirements administered by the Department of Labor). (f) Human subject means a living...” includes information about behavior that occurs in a context in which an individual can reasonably expect...

Differential Neural Contributions to Native- and Foreign-Language Talker Identification

ERIC Educational Resources Information Center

Perrachione, Tyler K.; Pierrehumbert, Janet B.; Wong, Patrick C. M.

2009-01-01

Humans are remarkably adept at identifying individuals by the sound of their voice, a behavior supported by the nervous system's ability to integrate information from voice and speech perception. Talker-identification abilities are significantly impaired when listeners are unfamiliar with the language being spoken. Recent behavioral studies…

77 FR 57070 - Submission for OMB Review; Comment Request

Federal Register 2010, 2011, 2012, 2013, 2014

2012-09-17

... their behavior to mitigate that threat. Type of information collected will include (1) risk perceptions... and Climate Change: Risk Mitigation Behaviors of Homeowners. OMB Control Number: 0596-New. Summary of... risk to human and ecosystem health. In efforts to mitigate this risk the U.S. Forest Service (FS) uses...

Social Learning Theory and Developmental Psychology: The Legacies of Robert Sears and Albert Bandura.

ERIC Educational Resources Information Center

Grusec, Joan E.

1992-01-01

Social learning theory is evaluated from a historical perspective that goes up to the present. Sears and others melded psychoanalytic and stimulus-response learning theory into a comprehensive explanation of human behavior. Bandura emphasized cognitive and information-processing capacities that mediate social behavior. (LB)

A Network Neuroscience of Human Learning: Potential To Inform Quantitative Theories of Brain and Behavior

PubMed Central

Bassett, Danielle S.; Mattar, Marcelo G.

2017-01-01

Humans adapt their behavior to their external environment in a process often facilitated by learning. Efforts to describe learning empirically can be complemented by quantitative theories that map changes in neurophysiology to changes in behavior. In this review we highlight recent advances in network science that offer a sets of tools and a general perspective that may be particularly useful in understanding types of learning that are supported by distributed neural circuits. We describe recent applications of these tools to neuroimaging data that provide unique insights into adaptive neural processes, the attainment of knowledge, and the acquisition of new skills, forming a network neuroscience of human learning. While promising, the tools have yet to be linked to the well-formulated models of behavior that are commonly utilized in cognitive psychology. We argue that continued progress will require the explicit marriage of network approaches to neuroimaging data and quantitative models of behavior. PMID:28259554

A Network Neuroscience of Human Learning: Potential to Inform Quantitative Theories of Brain and Behavior.

PubMed

Bassett, Danielle S; Mattar, Marcelo G

2017-04-01

Humans adapt their behavior to their external environment in a process often facilitated by learning. Efforts to describe learning empirically can be complemented by quantitative theories that map changes in neurophysiology to changes in behavior. In this review we highlight recent advances in network science that offer a sets of tools and a general perspective that may be particularly useful in understanding types of learning that are supported by distributed neural circuits. We describe recent applications of these tools to neuroimaging data that provide unique insights into adaptive neural processes, the attainment of knowledge, and the acquisition of new skills, forming a network neuroscience of human learning. While promising, the tools have yet to be linked to the well-formulated models of behavior that are commonly utilized in cognitive psychology. We argue that continued progress will require the explicit marriage of network approaches to neuroimaging data and quantitative models of behavior. Copyright © 2017 Elsevier Ltd. All rights reserved.

Behavioral Health and Performance (BHP) Work-Rest Cycles

NASA Technical Reports Server (NTRS)

Leveton, Lauren B.; Whitmire, Alexandra

2011-01-01

BHP Program Element Goal: Identify, characterize, and prevent or reduce behavioral health and performance risks associated with space travel, exploration and return to terrestrial life. BHP Requirements: a) Characterize and assess risks (e.g., likelihood and consequences). b) Develop tools and technologies to prevent, monitor, and treat adverse outcomes. c) Inform standards. d) Develop technologies to: 1) reduce risks and human systems resource requirements (e.g., crew time, mass, volume, power) and 2) ensure effective human-system integration across exploration mission.

Integrative Analysis of Genetic, Genomic, and Phenotypic Data for Ethanol Behaviors: A Network-Based Pipeline for Identifying Mechanisms and Potential Drug Targets.

PubMed

Bogenpohl, James W; Mignogna, Kristin M; Smith, Maren L; Miles, Michael F

2017-01-01

Complex behavioral traits, such as alcohol abuse, are caused by an interplay of genetic and environmental factors, producing deleterious functional adaptations in the central nervous system. The long-term behavioral consequences of such changes are of substantial cost to both the individual and society. Substantial progress has been made in the last two decades in understanding elements of brain mechanisms underlying responses to ethanol in animal models and risk factors for alcohol use disorder (AUD) in humans. However, treatments for AUD remain largely ineffective and few medications for this disease state have been licensed. Genome-wide genetic polymorphism analysis (GWAS) in humans, behavioral genetic studies in animal models and brain gene expression studies produced by microarrays or RNA-seq have the potential to produce nonbiased and novel insight into the underlying neurobiology of AUD. However, the complexity of such information, both statistical and informational, has slowed progress toward identifying new targets for intervention in AUD. This chapter describes one approach for integrating behavioral, genetic, and genomic information across animal model and human studies. The goal of this approach is to identify networks of genes functioning in the brain that are most relevant to the underlying mechanisms of a complex disease such as AUD. We illustrate an example of how genomic studies in animal models can be used to produce robust gene networks that have functional implications, and to integrate such animal model genomic data with human genetic studies such as GWAS for AUD. We describe several useful analysis tools for such studies: ComBAT, WGCNA, and EW_dmGWAS. The end result of this analysis is a ranking of gene networks and identification of their cognate hub genes, which might provide eventual targets for future therapeutic development. Furthermore, this combined approach may also improve our understanding of basic mechanisms underlying gene x environmental interactions affecting brain functioning in health and disease.

INTEGRATIVE ANALYSIS OF GENETIC, GENOMIC AND PHENOTYPIC DATA FOR ETHANOL BEHAVIORS: A NETWORK-BASED PIPELINE FOR IDENTIFYING MECHANISMS AND POTENTIAL DRUG TARGETS

PubMed Central

Bogenpohl, James W.; Mignogna, Kristin M.; Smith, Maren L.; Miles, Michael F.

2016-01-01

Complex behavioral traits, such as alcohol abuse, are caused by an interplay of genetic and environmental factors, producing deleterious functional adaptations in the central nervous system. The long-term behavioral consequences of such changes are of substantial cost to both the individual and society. Substantial progress has been made in the last two decades in understanding elements of brain mechanisms underlying responses to ethanol in animal models and risk factors for alcohol use disorder (AUD) in humans. However, treatments for AUD remain largely ineffective and few medications for this disease state have been licensed. Genome-wide genetic polymorphism analysis (GWAS) in humans, behavioral genetic studies in animal models and brain gene expression studies produced by microarrays or RNA-seq have the potential to produce non-biased and novel insight into the underlying neurobiology of AUD. However, the complexity of such information, both statistical and informational, has slowed progress toward identifying new targets for intervention in AUD. This chapter describes one approach for integrating behavioral, genetic, and genomic information across animal model and human studies. The goal of this approach is to identify networks of genes functioning in the brain that are most relevant to the underlying mechanisms of a complex disease such as AUD. We illustrate an example of how genomic studies in animal models can be used to produce robust gene networks that have functional implications, and to integrate such animal model genomic data with human genetic studies such as GWAS for AUD. We describe several useful analysis tools for such studies: ComBAT, WGCNA and EW_dmGWAS. The end result of this analysis is a ranking of gene networks and identification of their cognate hub genes, which might provide eventual targets for future therapeutic development. Furthermore, this combined approach may also improve our understanding of basic mechanisms underlying gene x environmental interactions affecting brain functioning in health and disease. PMID:27933543

Gossip as an alternative for direct observation in games of indirect reciprocity.

PubMed

Sommerfeld, Ralf D; Krambeck, Hans-Jürgen; Semmann, Dirk; Milinski, Manfred

2007-10-30

Communication about social topics is abundant in human societies, and many functions have been attributed to such gossiping. One of these proposed functions is the management of reputations. Reputation by itself has been shown to have a strong influence on cooperation dynamics in games of indirect reciprocity, and this notion helps to explain the observed high level of cooperation in humans. Here we designed a game to test a widespread assumption that gossip functions as a vector for the transmission of social information. This empirical study (with 14 groups of nine students each) focuses on the composition of gossip, information transfer by gossip, and the behavior based on gossip information. We show that gossip has a strong influence on the resulting behavior even when participants have access to the original information (i.e., direct observation) as well as gossip about the same information. Thus, it is evident that gossip has a strong manipulative potential. Furthermore, gossip about cooperative individuals is more positive than gossip about uncooperative individuals, gossip comments transmit social information successfully, and cooperation levels are higher when people encounter positive compared with negative gossip.

Report of the Advisory Panel to the Mathematical and Information Science Directorate

DTIC Science & Technology

1988-04-01

how to program S computers so that...Engineering, to expand the domain of behaviors we know how to program computers to perform to include more behaviors that previously only humans could do...technology? It is not easy to make clear the difference between making an advance in discovering how to program a behavior that no one knew how to program

Interactional Patterns Among Dental School Students and the Influence of Building Design. Final Progress Report on the Planning Study: Behavioral Factors in Dental School Design.

ERIC Educational Resources Information Center

Myrick, Richard; Marx, Barbara S.

The relationship of architecture to human behavior is a topic of increasing concern both to designers and behavioral scientists. To further evaluate the extent of the relationship a series of preliminary investigations has been undertaken. The primary means of measurement was informal conversations of dental students as related to the…

78 FR 77692 - Agency Information Collection Activities: Proposed Collection; Comment Request

Federal Register 2010, 2011, 2012, 2013, 2014

2013-12-24

... DEPARTMENT OF HEALTH AND HUMAN SERVICES Substance Abuse and Mental Health Services Administration... proposed collections of information, the Substance Abuse and Mental Health Services Administration (SAMHSA... Systems--NEW The Substance Abuse and Mental Health Services Administration (SAMHSA), Center for Behavioral...

Humanizing Aggregated Data: Developing Personas to Prioritize User Needs for Earthquake Early Warning

NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

Burkett, E. R.; Jayanty, N. K.; Sellnow, D. D.; Given, D. D.; DeGroot, R. M.

2016-12-01

Methods that use storytelling to gather and synthesize data from people can be advantageous in understanding user needs and designing successful communication products. Using a multidisciplinary approach, we research and prioritize user needs for the ShakeAlert Earthquake Early Warning system (http://pubs.usgs.gov/fs/2014/3083/), drawing on best practices from social and behavioral science, risk communication, and human-centered design. We apply quantitative and qualitative human data collection methods including user surveys, interviews, journey maps, personas, and scenarios. Human-centered design methods leverage storytelling (a) in the acquisition of qualitative behavioral data (e.g. with journey mapping), (b) through goal-driven behaviors and needs that are synthesized into a persona as a composite model of the data, and (c) within context scenarios (the story plot or projected circumstances) in which the persona is placed in context to inform the design of relevant and usable products or services. ShakeAlert, operated by the USGS and partners, has transitioned into a production prototype phase in which users are permitted to begin testing pilot implementations to take protective actions in response to an earthquake alert. While a subset of responses will be automated (e.g., opening fire house doors), other applications of the technology will alert individuals by broadcast, public address, or mobile device notifications and require self-protective behavioral decisions (e.g., "Drop, Cover, and Hold On"). To better understand ShakeAlert user decisions and needs, we use human-centered design methods to synthesize aggregated behavioral data into "personas," which model the common behavioral patterns that can be used to guide plans for the ShakeAlert interface, messaging, and training. We present user data, methods, and resulting personas that will inform decisions moving forward to shape ShakeAlert messaging and training that will be most usable by alert recipients.

Focus on the success of others leads to selfish behavior

PubMed Central

van den Berg, Pieter; Molleman, Lucas; Weissing, Franz J.

2015-01-01

It has often been argued that the spectacular cognitive capacities of humans are the result of selection for the ability to gather, process, and use information about other people. Recent studies show that humans strongly and consistently differ in what type of social information they are interested in. Although some individuals mainly attend to what the majority is doing (frequency-based learning), others focus on the success that their peers achieve with their behavior (success-based learning). Here, we show that such differences in social learning have important consequences for the outcome of social interactions. We report on a decision-making experiment in which individuals were first classified as frequency- and success-based learners and subsequently grouped according to their learning strategy. When confronted with a social dilemma situation, groups of frequency-based learners cooperated considerably more than groups of success-based learners. A detailed analysis of the decision-making process reveals that these differences in cooperation are a direct result of the differences in information use. Our results show that individual differences in social learning strategies are crucial for understanding social behavior. PMID:25730855

Owners' direct gazes increase dogs' attention-getting behaviors.

PubMed

Ohkita, Midori; Nagasawa, Miho; Kazutaka, Mogi; Kikusui, Takefumi

2016-04-01

This study examined whether dogs gain information about human's attention via their gazes and whether they change their attention-getting behaviors (i.e., whining and whimpering, looking at their owners' faces, pawing, and approaching their owners) in response to their owners' direct gazes. The results showed that when the owners gazed at their dogs, the durations of whining and whimpering and looking at the owners' faces were longer than when the owners averted their gazes. In contrast, there were no differences in duration of pawing and likelihood of approaching the owners between the direct and averted gaze conditions. Therefore, owners' direct gazes increased the behaviors that acted as distant signals and did not necessarily involve touching the owners. We suggest that dogs are sensitive to human gazes, and this sensitivity may act as attachment signals to humans, and may contribute to close relationships between humans and dogs. Copyright © 2016 Elsevier B.V. All rights reserved.

Brain and Social Networks: Fundamental Building Blocks of Human Experience.

PubMed

Falk, Emily B; Bassett, Danielle S

2017-09-01

How do brains shape social networks, and how do social ties shape the brain? Social networks are complex webs by which ideas spread among people. Brains comprise webs by which information is processed and transmitted among neural units. While brain activity and structure offer biological mechanisms for human behaviors, social networks offer external inducers or modulators of those behaviors. Together, these two axes represent fundamental contributors to human experience. Integrating foundational knowledge from social and developmental psychology and sociology on how individuals function within dyads, groups, and societies with recent advances in network neuroscience can offer new insights into both domains. Here, we use the example of how ideas and behaviors spread to illustrate the potential of multilayer network models. Copyright © 2017 Elsevier Ltd. All rights reserved.

Modeling Human Behavior with Fuzzy and Soft Computing Methods

DTIC Science & Technology

2017-12-13

REPORT DOCUMENTATION PAGE Form Approved OMB No. 0704-0188 The public reporting burden for this collection of information is estimated to average 1...completing and reviewing the collection of information . Send comments regarding this burden estimate or any other aspect of this collection of... information , including suggestions for reducing the burden, to Department of Defense, Washington Headquarters Services, Directorate for Information

Combining human and machine intelligence to derive agents' behavioral rules for groundwater irrigation

NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

Hu, Yao; Quinn, Christopher J.; Cai, Ximing; Garfinkle, Noah W.

2017-11-01

For agent-based modeling, the major challenges in deriving agents' behavioral rules arise from agents' bounded rationality and data scarcity. This study proposes a "gray box" approach to address the challenge by incorporating expert domain knowledge (i.e., human intelligence) with machine learning techniques (i.e., machine intelligence). Specifically, we propose using directed information graph (DIG), boosted regression trees (BRT), and domain knowledge to infer causal factors and identify behavioral rules from data. A case study is conducted to investigate farmers' pumping behavior in the Midwest, U.S.A. Results show that four factors identified by the DIG algorithm- corn price, underlying groundwater level, monthly mean temperature and precipitation- have main causal influences on agents' decisions on monthly groundwater irrigation depth. The agent-based model is then developed based on the behavioral rules represented by three DIGs and modeled by BRTs, and coupled with a physically-based groundwater model to investigate the impacts of agents' pumping behavior on the underlying groundwater system in the context of coupled human and environmental systems.

Primate cognition: attention, episodic memory, prospective memory, self-control, and metacognition as examples of cognitive control in nonhuman primates.

PubMed

Beran, Michael J; Menzel, Charles R; Parrish, Audrey E; Perdue, Bonnie M; Sayers, Ken; Smith, J David; Washburn, David A

2016-09-01

Primate Cognition is the study of cognitive processes, which represent internal mental processes involved in discriminations, decisions, and behaviors of humans and other primate species. Cognitive control involves executive and regulatory processes that allocate attention, manipulate and evaluate available information (and, when necessary, seek additional information), remember past experiences to plan future behaviors, and deal with distraction and impulsivity when they are threats to goal achievement. Areas of research that relate to cognitive control as it is assessed across species include executive attention, episodic memory, prospective memory, metacognition, and self-control. Executive attention refers to the ability to control what sensory stimuli one attends to and how one regulates responses to those stimuli, especially in cases of conflict. Episodic memory refers to memory for personally experienced, autobiographical events. Prospective memory refers to the formation and implementation of future-intended actions, such as remembering what needs to be done later. Metacognition consists of control and monitoring processes that allow individuals to assess what information they have and what information they still need, and then if necessary to seek information. Self-control is a regulatory process whereby individuals forego more immediate or easier to obtain rewards for more delayed or harder to obtain rewards that are objectively more valuable. The behavioral complexity shown by nonhuman primates when given tests to assess these capacities indicates psychological continuities with human cognitive control capacities. However, more research is needed to clarify the proper interpretation of these behaviors with regard to possible cognitive constructs that may underlie such behaviors. WIREs Cogn Sci 2016, 7:294-316. doi: 10.1002/wcs.1397 For further resources related to this article, please visit the WIREs website. © 2016 Wiley Periodicals, Inc.

77 FR 21984 - Agency Information Collection Activities: Proposed Collection; Comment Request

Federal Register 2010, 2011, 2012, 2013, 2014

2012-04-12

... DEPARTMENT OF HEALTH AND HUMAN SERVICES Substance Abuse and Mental Health Services Administration... proposed collections of information, the Substance Abuse and Mental Health Services Administration (SAMHSA... results, substance use and sexual risk behaviors, current rapid HIV test results, types of services...

Learning and choosing in an uncertain world: An investigation of the explore-exploit dilemma in static and dynamic environments.

PubMed

Navarro, Daniel J; Newell, Ben R; Schulze, Christin

2016-03-01

How do people solve the explore-exploit trade-off in a changing environment? In this paper we present experimental evidence from an "observe or bet" task, in which people have to determine when to engage in information-seeking behavior and when to switch to reward-taking actions. In particular we focus on the comparison between people's behavior in a changing environment and their behavior in an unchanging one. Our experimental work is motivated by rational analysis of the problem that makes strong predictions about information search and reward seeking in static and changeable environments. Our results show a striking agreement between human behavior and the optimal policy, but also highlight a number of systematic differences. In particular, we find that while people often employ suboptimal strategies the first time they encounter the learning problem, most people are able to approximate the correct strategy after minimal experience. In order to describe both the manner in which people's choices are similar to but slightly different from an optimal standard, we introduce four process models for the observe or bet task and evaluate them as potential theories of human behavior. Copyright © 2016 Elsevier Inc. All rights reserved.

A Qualitative Study to Inform the Development of a Videogame for Adolescent Human Immunodeficiency Virus Prevention

PubMed Central

Rosenthal, Marjorie S.; Camenga, Deepa R.; Edelman, E. Jennifer; Fiellin, Lynn E.

2012-01-01

Abstract We used qualitative methods to inform the development of an interactive videogame focused on behavior change to reduce risk and promote human immunodeficiency virus (HIV) prevention in young minority adolescents. Guided by community-partnered research principles, we conducted and analyzed 16 individual interviews and six focus groups with 10–15 year-old boys and girls (36 unique participants) at a neighborhood-based nonprofit organization serving youth from low-resource neighborhoods. Three recurrent themes lent themselves to translation into a videogame-based intervention. Adolescents reported protective factors and facilitators to engaging in risk behaviors, including (1) their personal ability to balance the tension between individuation and group membership, (2) the presence of stable mentor figures in their life, and (3) the neighborhood in which they live. We used these themes to inform the design of our videogame intervention with the goal that these methods may increase the intervention's efficacy at promoting HIV prevention by making them more tailored and relevant to a specific population. Our qualitative study provides a practical understanding of how important elements identified by minority youth regarding negotiating around risk behaviors can be integrated into a videogame intervention. These findings offer valuable insights to researchers whose goal is to design effective and tailored interventions to affect behavior change. PMID:24078897

A computer simulation approach to measurement of human control strategy

NASA Technical Reports Server (NTRS)

Green, J.; Davenport, E. L.; Engler, H. F.; Sears, W. E., III

1982-01-01

Human control strategy is measured through use of a psychologically-based computer simulation which reflects a broader theory of control behavior. The simulation is called the human operator performance emulator, or HOPE. HOPE was designed to emulate control learning in a one-dimensional preview tracking task and to measure control strategy in that setting. When given a numerical representation of a track and information about current position in relation to that track, HOPE generates positions for a stick controlling the cursor to be moved along the track. In other words, HOPE generates control stick behavior corresponding to that which might be used by a person learning preview tracking.

Sexual Behaviors and AIDS Concerns among Young Adult Heterosexual Males.

ERIC Educational Resources Information Center

Pomerantz, Sherry C.; Vergare, Michael J.

As the human immunodeficiency virus spreads beyond homosexuals and intravenous drug users into the heterosexual community, there is heightened interest in the sexual behavior of sexually active young adults. There is little information on young adult black males, who may be at increased risk, since blacks in this country are contracting Acquired…

Robo-Psychophysics: Extracting Behaviorally Relevant Features from the Output of Sensors on a Prosthetic Finger.

PubMed

Delhaye, Benoit P; Schluter, Erik W; Bensmaia, Sliman J

2016-01-01

Efforts are underway to restore sensorimotor function in amputees and tetraplegic patients using anthropomorphic robotic hands. For this approach to be clinically viable, sensory signals from the hand must be relayed back to the patient. To convey tactile feedback necessary for object manipulation, behaviorally relevant information must be extracted in real time from the output of sensors on the prosthesis. In the present study, we recorded the sensor output from a state-of-the-art bionic finger during the presentation of different tactile stimuli, including punctate indentations and scanned textures. Furthermore, the parameters of stimulus delivery (location, speed, direction, indentation depth, and surface texture) were systematically varied. We developed simple decoders to extract behaviorally relevant variables from the sensor output and assessed the degree to which these algorithms could reliably extract these different types of sensory information across different conditions of stimulus delivery. We then compared the performance of the decoders to that of humans in analogous psychophysical experiments. We show that straightforward decoders can extract behaviorally relevant features accurately from the sensor output and most of them outperform humans.

Exploring Ownership in a Developmental Context

ERIC Educational Resources Information Center

Noles, Nicholaus S.; Keil, Frank C.

2011-01-01

Ownership and economic behaviors are highly salient elements of the human social landscape. Indeed, the human world is literally constructed of property. Individuals perceive and manipulate a complex web of people and property that is largely invisible and abstract. In this chapter, the authors focus on drawing together information from a variety…

An Examination of the Utility of Non-Linear Dynamics Techniques for Analyzing Human Information Behaviors.

ERIC Educational Resources Information Center

Snyder, Herbert; Kurtze, Douglas

1992-01-01

Discusses the use of chaos, or nonlinear dynamics, for investigating computer-mediated communication. A comparison between real, human-generated data from a computer network and similarly constructed random-generated data is made, and mathematical procedures for determining chaos are described. (seven references) (LRW)

7 CFR 1c.102 - Definitions.

Code of Federal Regulations, 2013 CFR

2013-01-01

... of the Secretary of Agriculture PROTECTION OF HUMAN SUBJECTS § 1c.102 Definitions. (a) Department or..., Wage and Hour requirements administered by the Department of Labor). (f) Human subject means a living...” includes information about behavior that occurs in a context in which an individual can reasonably expect...

7 CFR 1c.102 - Definitions.

Code of Federal Regulations, 2014 CFR

2014-01-01

... of the Secretary of Agriculture PROTECTION OF HUMAN SUBJECTS § 1c.102 Definitions. (a) Department or..., Wage and Hour requirements administered by the Department of Labor). (f) Human subject means a living...” includes information about behavior that occurs in a context in which an individual can reasonably expect...

The Carrot or the Stick? Evaluation of Education and Enforcement as Management Tools for Human-Wildlife Conflicts

PubMed Central

Baruch-Mordo, Sharon; Breck, Stewart W.; Wilson, Kenneth R.; Broderick, John

2011-01-01

Evidence-based decision-making is critical for implementing conservation actions, especially for human-wildlife conflicts, which have been increasing worldwide. Conservation practitioners recognize that long-term solutions should include altering human behaviors, and public education and enforcement of wildlife-related laws are two management actions frequently implemented, but with little empirical evidence evaluating their success. We used a system where human-black bear conflicts were common, to experimentally test the efficacy of education and enforcement in altering human behavior to better secure attractants (garbage) from bears. We conducted 3 experiments in Aspen CO, USA to evaluate: 1) on-site education in communal dwellings and construction sites, 2) Bear Aware educational campaign in residential neighborhoods, and 3) elevated law enforcement at two levels in the core business area of Aspen. We measured human behaviors as the response including: violation of local wildlife ordinances, garbage availability to bears, and change in use of bear-resistance refuse containers. As implemented, we found little support for education, or enforcement in the form of daily patrolling in changing human behavior, but found more support for proactive enforcement, i.e., dispensing warning notices. More broadly we demonstrated the value of gathering evidence before and after implementing conservation actions, and the dangers of measuring responses in the absence of ecological knowledge. We recommend development of more effective educational methods, application of proactive enforcement, and continued evaluation of tools by directly measuring change in human behavior. We provide empirical evidence adding to the conservation managers' toolbox, informing policy makers, and promoting solutions to human-wildlife conflicts. PMID:21264267

Towards Better Human Robot Interaction: Understand Human Computer Interaction in Social Gaming Using a Video-Enhanced Diary Method

NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

See, Swee Lan; Tan, Mitchell; Looi, Qin En

This paper presents findings from a descriptive research on social gaming. A video-enhanced diary method was used to understand the user experience in social gaming. From this experiment, we found that natural human behavior and gamer’s decision making process can be elicited and speculated during human computer interaction. These are new information that we should consider as they can help us build better human computer interfaces and human robotic interfaces in future.

Combining Modeling and Gaming for Predictive Analytics

DOE Office of Scientific and Technical Information (OSTI.GOV)

Riensche, Roderick M.; Whitney, Paul D.

2012-08-22

Many of our most significant challenges involve people. While human behavior has long been studied, there are recent advances in computational modeling of human behavior. With advances in computational capabilities come increases in the volume and complexity of data that humans must understand in order to make sense of and capitalize on these modeling advances. Ultimately, models represent an encapsulation of human knowledge. One inherent challenge in modeling is efficient and accurate transfer of knowledge from humans to models, and subsequent retrieval. The simulated real-world environment of games presents one avenue for these knowledge transfers. In this paper we describemore » our approach of combining modeling and gaming disciplines to develop predictive capabilities, using formal models to inform game development, and using games to provide data for modeling.« less

Robonaut Mobile Autonomy: Initial Experiments

NASA Technical Reports Server (NTRS)

Diftler, M. A.; Ambrose, R. O.; Goza, S. M.; Tyree, K. S.; Huber, E. L.

2006-01-01

A mobile version of the NASA/DARPA Robonaut humanoid recently completed initial autonomy trials working directly with humans in cluttered environments. This compact robot combines the upper body of the Robonaut system with a Segway Robotic Mobility Platform yielding a dexterous, maneuverable humanoid ideal for interacting with human co-workers in a range of environments. This system uses stereovision to locate human teammates and tools and a navigation system that uses laser range and vision data to follow humans while avoiding obstacles. Tactile sensors provide information to grasping algorithms for efficient tool exchanges. The autonomous architecture utilizes these pre-programmed skills to form complex behaviors. The initial behavior demonstrates a robust capability to assist a human by acquiring a tool from a remotely located individual and then following the human in a cluttered environment with the tool for future use.

Making sense of behavioral irregularities of great apes.

PubMed

Fabrega, Horacio

2006-01-01

Psychopathology, mental illness, and psychiatric treatment are concepts relevant to modern medicine and medical psychology and replete with cumbersome intellectual and literary baggage. They bear the imprint of suppositions, world views, and general beliefs and values exemplified in the science, history, and general culture of Anglo European societies. The study in higher apes of phenomena addressed by such concepts raises conceptual dilemmas, usually termed speciesism and anthropomorphism, not unlike those encountered in comparative human studies of similar phenomena across cultures and historical periods, namely, ethnocentrism and anachronism. The authors' synthesis of literature and their analysis of the implications of higher ape psychopathology represent an epistemically compelling account that broadens the scope of the comparative study of behavioral irregularities, a topic that provides a different slant for examining challenging questions in evolutionary biology and primatology, such as cognition, self awareness, intentional behavior, culture and behavioral traditions, social intelligence, sickness and healing, and altruism. Theoretical and empirical study of this topic expands formulation and can help provide informative answers about human evolution as well as essential features of human psychiatric syndromes, with potential practical implications. The study of psychopathology of higher apes and other non human primates represents an appropriate focus for neuroscience and bio-behavioral sciences.

Impacts of complex behavioral responses on asymmetric interacting spreading dynamics in multiplex networks

PubMed Central

Liu, Quan-Hui; Wang, Wei; Tang, Ming; Zhang, Hai-Feng

2016-01-01

Information diffusion and disease spreading in communication-contact layered network are typically asymmetrically coupled with each other, in which disease spreading can be significantly affected by the way an individual being aware of disease responds to the disease. Many recent studies have demonstrated that human behavioral adoption is a complex and non-Markovian process, where the probability of behavior adoption is dependent on the cumulative times of information received and the social reinforcement effect of the cumulative information. In this paper, the impacts of such a non-Markovian vaccination adoption behavior on the epidemic dynamics and the control effects are explored. It is found that this complex adoption behavior in the communication layer can significantly enhance the epidemic threshold and reduce the final infection rate. By defining the social cost as the total cost of vaccination and treatment, it can be seen that there exists an optimal social reinforcement effect and optimal information transmission rate allowing the minimal social cost. Moreover, a mean-field theory is developed to verify the correctness of simulation results. PMID:27156574

Impacts of complex behavioral responses on asymmetric interacting spreading dynamics in multiplex networks.

PubMed

Liu, Quan-Hui; Wang, Wei; Tang, Ming; Zhang, Hai-Feng

2016-05-09

Information diffusion and disease spreading in communication-contact layered network are typically asymmetrically coupled with each other, in which disease spreading can be significantly affected by the way an individual being aware of disease responds to the disease. Many recent studies have demonstrated that human behavioral adoption is a complex and non-Markovian process, where the probability of behavior adoption is dependent on the cumulative times of information received and the social reinforcement effect of the cumulative information. In this paper, the impacts of such a non-Markovian vaccination adoption behavior on the epidemic dynamics and the control effects are explored. It is found that this complex adoption behavior in the communication layer can significantly enhance the epidemic threshold and reduce the final infection rate. By defining the social cost as the total cost of vaccination and treatment, it can be seen that there exists an optimal social reinforcement effect and optimal information transmission rate allowing the minimal social cost. Moreover, a mean-field theory is developed to verify the correctness of simulation results.

Econophysics: from Game Theory and Information Theory to Quantum Mechanics

NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

Jimenez, Edward; Moya, Douglas

2005-03-01

Rationality is the universal invariant among human behavior, universe physical laws and ordered and complex biological systems. Econophysics isboth the use of physical concepts in Finance and Economics, and the use of Information Economics in Physics. In special, we will show that it is possible to obtain the Quantum Mechanics principles using Information and Game Theory.

A Dynamical Systems Model for Understanding Behavioral Interventions for Weight Loss

NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

Navarro-Barrientos, J.-Emeterio; Rivera, Daniel E.; Collins, Linda M.

We propose a dynamical systems model that captures the daily fluctuations of human weight change, incorporating both physiological and psychological factors. The model consists of an energy balance integrated with a mechanistic behavioral model inspired by the Theory of Planned Behavior (TPB); the latter describes how important variables in a behavioral intervention can influence healthy eating habits and increased physical activity over time. The model can be used to inform behavioral scientists in the design of optimized interventions for weight loss and body composition change.

Why Adolescents Use a Computer-Based Health Information System.

ERIC Educational Resources Information Center

Hawkins, Robert P.; And Others

The Body Awareness Resource Network (BARN) is a system of interactive computer programs designed to provide adolescents with confidential, nonjudgmental health information, behavior change strategies, and sources of referral. These programs cover five adolescent health areas: alcohol and other drugs, human sexuality, smoking prevention and…

77 FR 34960 - Agency Information Collection Activities: Submission for OMB Review; Comment Request

Federal Register 2010, 2011, 2012, 2013, 2014

2012-06-12

... DEPARTMENT OF HEALTH AND HUMAN SERVICES Substance Abuse and Mental Health Services Administration... Substance Abuse and Mental Health Services Administration (SAMHSA) will publish a summary of information... results, substance use and sexual risk behaviors, current rapid HIV test results, types of services...

Mobile Autonomous Humanoid Assistant

NASA Technical Reports Server (NTRS)

Diftler, M. A.; Ambrose, R. O.; Tyree, K. S.; Goza, S. M.; Huber, E. L.

2004-01-01

A mobile autonomous humanoid robot is assisting human co-workers at the Johnson Space Center with tool handling tasks. This robot combines the upper body of the National Aeronautics and Space Administration (NASA)/Defense Advanced Research Projects Agency (DARPA) Robonaut system with a Segway(TradeMark) Robotic Mobility Platform yielding a dexterous, maneuverable humanoid perfect for aiding human co-workers in a range of environments. This system uses stereo vision to locate human team mates and tools and a navigation system that uses laser range and vision data to follow humans while avoiding obstacles. Tactile sensors provide information to grasping algorithms for efficient tool exchanges. The autonomous architecture utilizes these pre-programmed skills to form human assistant behaviors. The initial behavior demonstrates a robust capability to assist a human by acquiring a tool from a remotely located individual and then following the human in a cluttered environment with the tool for future use.

Impact of individual interest shift on information dissemination in modular networks

NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

Zhao, Narisa; Cui, Xuelian

2017-01-01

Social networks exhibit strong community structure. Many researches have been done to explore the impacts of community structure on information diffusion but few combined with human behaviors together. In this paper, we focus on how the individual interests' changing behavior impacts the dynamics of information propagation. Firstly, we propose an information dissemination model considering both the community structure and individual interest shift where social reinforcement and time decaying are taken into account. The accuracy of the model is evaluated by comparing the simulation and theoretical results. Further, the numerical results illustrate that both the community structure and the interests changing behavior have effects on the outbreak size of the information dissemination. Specially, lower modularity and higher community connection density will accelerate the speed of information propagation especially when the information maximal lifetime is shorter. In addition, the changes of individual interests in the message have a great impact on the final density of the received through increasing or decreasing the number of satisfied individuals directly. What is more, our findings suggest that when the modularity of the network is higher and the community clustering coefficient is lower individual interest shift behavior will have a heavier effect on the spread scope.

What neurophysiological recordings tell us about cognitive and behavioral functions of the human subthalamic nucleus.

PubMed

Marceglia, Sara; Fumagalli, Manuela; Priori, Alberto

2011-01-01

The behavioral implications of deep brain stimulation (DBS) observed in Parkinson's disease patients provided evidence for a possible nonexclusively motor role of the subthalamic nucleus (STN) in basal ganglia circuitry. Basal ganglia pathophysiology can be studied directly by the analysis of neural rhythms measured in local field potentials recorded through DBS electrodes. Recent studies demonstrated that specific oscillations in the STN are involved in cognitive and behavioral information processing: action representation is mediated through β oscillations (13-35 Hz); cognitive information related to decision-making processes is mediated through the low-frequency oscillation (5-12 Hz); and limbic and emotional information is mediated through the α oscillation (8-12 Hz). These results revealed an important involvement of STN in decisional processes, cognitive functions, emotion control and conflict that could explain the post-DBS occurrence of behavioral disturbances.

Neuropeptide Regulation of Social Attachment: The Prairie Vole Model

PubMed Central

Tabbaa, Manal; Paedae, Brennan; Liu, Yan; Wang, Zuoxin

2016-01-01

Social attachments are ubiquitous among humans and integral to human health. Although great efforts have been made to elucidate the neural underpinnings regulating social attachments, we still know relatively little about the neuronal and neurochemical regulation of social attachments. As a laboratory animal research model, the socially monogamous prairie vole (Microtus ochrogaster) displays behaviors paralleling human social attachments and thus has provided unique insights into the neural regulation of social behaviors. Research in prairie voles has particularly highlighted the significance of neuropeptidergic regulation of social behaviors, especially of the roles of oxytocin (OT) and vasopressin (AVP). This article aims to review these findings. We begin by discussing the role of the OT and AVP systems in regulating social behaviors relevant to social attachments, and thereafter restrict our discussion to studies in prairie voles. Specifically, we discuss the role of OT and AVP in adult mate attachments, biparental care, social isolation, and social buffering as informed by studies utilizing the prairie vole model. Not only do these studies offer insight into social attachments in humans, but they also point to dysregulated mechanisms in several mental disorders. We conclude by discussing these implications for human health. PMID:28135000

The influence of information processing goal pursuit on postdecision affect and behavioral intentions.

PubMed

Laran, Juliano

2010-01-01

Two important forces in human behavior are action and inaction. Although action and inaction are commonly associated with the presence and the absence of behavioral activity, they can also be represented as information processing goals. Action (inaction) goals influence decision effort and increase satisfaction with environments that are structured to allow for more (less) processing (Studies 1 and 2). This increased satisfaction can transfer to the decision (Study 3) and can increase the intent to perform a decision-congruent behavior (Studies 4 and 6). Finally, the author shows escalation of action and inaction goals when they are not achieved (Study 5) and rebound of the alternative goal when the focal goal is achieved (Study 6).

Foundations to the unified psycho-cognitive engine.

DOE Office of Scientific and Technical Information (OSTI.GOV)

Bernard, Michael Lewis; Bier, Asmeret Brooke; Backus, George A.

This document outlines the key features of the SNL psychological engine. The engine is designed to be a generic presentation of cognitive entities interacting among themselves and with the external world. The engine combines the most accepted theories of behavioral psychology with those of behavioral economics to produce a unified simulation of human response from stimuli through executed behavior. The engine explicitly recognizes emotive and reasoned contributions to behavior and simulates the dynamics associated with cue processing, learning, and choice selection. Most importantly, the model parameterization can come from available media or survey information, as well subject-matter-expert information. The frameworkmore » design allows the use of uncertainty quantification and sensitivity analysis to manage confidence in using the analysis results for intervention decisions.« less

Agent based simulation on the process of human flesh search-From perspective of knowledge and emotion

NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

Zhu, Hou; Hu, Bin

2017-03-01

Human flesh search as a new net crowed behavior, on the one hand can help us to find some special information, on the other hand may lead to privacy leaking and offending human right. In order to study the mechanism of human flesh search, this paper proposes a simulation model based on agent-based model and complex networks. The computational experiments show some useful results. Discovered information quantity and involved personal ratio are highly correlated, and most of net citizens will take part in the human flesh search or will not take part in the human flesh search. Knowledge quantity does not influence involved personal ratio, but influences whether HFS can find out the target human. When the knowledge concentrates on hub nodes, the discovered information quantity is either perfect or almost zero. Emotion of net citizens influences both discovered information quantity and involved personal ratio. Concretely, when net citizens are calm to face the search topic, it will be hardly to find out the target; But when net citizens are agitated, the target will be found out easily.

Neuroligins Nlg2 and Nlg4 Affect Social Behavior in Drosophila melanogaster.

PubMed

Corthals, Kristina; Heukamp, Alina Sophia; Kossen, Robert; Großhennig, Isabel; Hahn, Nina; Gras, Heribert; Göpfert, Martin C; Heinrich, Ralf; Geurten, Bart R H

2017-01-01

The genome of Drosophila melanogaster includes homologs to approximately one-third of the currently known human disease genes. Flies and humans share many biological processes, including the principles of information processing by excitable neurons, synaptic transmission, and the chemical signals involved in intercellular communication. Studies on the molecular and behavioral impact of genetic risk factors of human neuro-developmental disorders [autism spectrum disorders (ASDs), schizophrenia, attention deficit hyperactivity disorders, and Tourette syndrome] increasingly use the well-studied social behavior of D. melanogaster , an organism that is amenable to a large variety of genetic manipulations. Neuroligins (Nlgs) are a family of phylogenetically conserved postsynaptic adhesion molecules present (among others) in nematodes, insects, and mammals. Impaired function of Nlgs (particularly of Nlg 3 and 4) has been associated with ASDs in humans and impaired social and communication behavior in mice. Making use of a set of behavioral and social assays, we, here, analyzed the impact of two Drosophila Nlgs, Dnlg2 and Dnlg4, which are differentially expressed at excitatory and inhibitory central nervous synapses, respectively. Both Nlgs seem to be associated with diurnal activity and social behavior. Even though deficiencies in Dnlg2 and Dnlg4 appeared to have no effects on sensory or motor systems, they differentially impacted on social interactions, suggesting that social behavior is distinctly regulated by these Nlgs.

Does affective information influence domestic dogs' (Canis lupus familiaris) point-following behavior?

PubMed

Flom, Ross; Gartman, Peggy

2016-03-01

Several studies have examined dogs' (Canis lupus familiaris) comprehension and use of human communicative cues. Relatively few studies have, however, examined the effects of human affective behavior (i.e., facial and vocal expressions) on dogs' exploratory and point-following behavior. In two experiments, we examined dogs' frequency of following an adult's pointing gesture in locating a hidden reward or treat when it occurred silently, or when it was paired with a positive or negative facial and vocal affective expression. Like prior studies, the current results demonstrate that dogs reliably follow human pointing cues. Unlike prior studies, the current results also demonstrate that the addition of a positive affective facial and vocal expression, when paired with a pointing gesture, did not reliably increase dogs' frequency of locating a hidden piece of food compared to pointing alone. In addition, and within the negative facial and vocal affect conditions of Experiment 1 and 2, dogs were delayed in their exploration, or approach, toward a baited or sham-baited bowl. However, in Experiment 2, dogs continued to follow an adult's pointing gesture, even when paired with a negative expression, as long as the attention-directing gesture referenced a baited bowl. Together these results suggest that the addition of affective information does not significantly increase or decrease dogs' point-following behavior. Rather these results demonstrate that the presence or absence of affective expressions influences a dogs' exploratory behavior and the presence or absence of reward affects whether they will follow an unfamiliar adult's attention-directing gesture.

Field assessment and enhancement of cognitive performance: development of an ambulatory vigilance monitor.

PubMed

Lieberman, Harris R; Kramer, F Matthew; Montain, Scott J; Niro, Philip

2007-05-01

Limited opportunities to study human cognitive performance in non-laboratory, ambulatory situations exist. However, advances in technology make it possible to extend behavioral assessments to the field. One of the first devices to measure human behavior in the field was the wrist-worn actigraph. This device acquires minute-by-minute information on an individual's physical activity and can distinguish sleep from waking, the most basic aspect of behavior. Our laboratory developed a series of wrist-worn devices, not much larger than a watch, which assess reaction time, vigilance and memory. The devices concurrently assess motor activity with greater temporal resolution than standard actigraphs. They also continuously monitor multiple environmental variables including temperature, humidity, sound, and light. These monitors have been employed during training and simulated military operations to collect behavioral and environmental information that would typically be unavailable under such circumstances. Development of the vigilance monitor, and how each successive version extended capabilities of the device are described. Data from several studies are presented, including studies conducted in harsh field environments during a simulated infantry assault, an officer training course. The monitors simultaneously documented environmental conditions, patterns of sleep and activity and effects of nutritional manipulations on cognitive performance. They provide a new method to relate cognitive performance to real world environmental conditions and assess effects of various interventions on human behavior in the field. They can also monitor cognitive performance in real time, and if it is degraded, attempt to intervene to maintain

The dynamics of perception and action.

PubMed

Warren, William H

2006-04-01

How might one account for the organization in behavior without attributing it to an internal control structure? The present article develops a theoretical framework called behavioral dynamics that integrates an information-based approach to perception with a dynamical systems approach to action. For a given task, the agent and its environment are treated as a pair of dynamical systems that are coupled mechanically and informationally. Their interactions give rise to the behavioral dynamics, a vector field with attractors that correspond to stable task solutions, repellers that correspond to avoided states, and bifurcations that correspond to behavioral transitions. The framework is used to develop theories of several tasks in which a human agent interacts with the physical environment, including bouncing a ball on a racquet, balancing an object, braking a vehicle, and guiding locomotion. Stable, adaptive behavior emerges from the dynamics of the interaction between a structured environment and an agent with simple control laws, under physical and informational constraints. ((c) 2006 APA, all rights reserved).

Human disturbances of waterfowl: An annotated bibliography

USGS Publications Warehouse

Dahlgren, R.B.; Korschgen, C.E.

1992-01-01

The expansion of outdoor recreation greatly increased the interaction between the public, waterfowl, and waterfowl habitat. The effects of these interactions on waterfowl habitats are visible and obvious, whereas the effects of interactions that disrupt the normal behavior of waterfowl are subtle and often overlooked, but perhaps no less harmful than destruction of habitat. Resource managers and administrators require information on the types, magnitude, and effect of disturbances from human contact with wildlife. This bibliography contains annotations for 211 articles with information about effects of human disturbances on waterfowl. Indexes are provided by subject or key words, geographic locations, species of waterfowl, and authors.

Cognitive Invariants of Geographic Event Conceptualization: What Matters and What Refines?

NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

Klippel, Alexander; Li, Rui; Hardisty, Frank; Weaver, Chris

Behavioral experiments addressing the conceptualization of geographic events are few and far between. Our research seeks to address this deficiency by developing an experimental framework on the conceptualization of movement patterns. In this paper, we report on a critical experiment that is designed to shed light on the question of cognitively salient invariants in such conceptualization. Invariants have been identified as being critical to human information processing, particularly for the processing of dynamic information. In our experiment, we systematically address cognitive invariants of one class of geographic events: single entity movement patterns. To this end, we designed 72 animated icons that depict the movement patterns of hurricanes around two invariants: size difference and topological equivalence class movement patterns endpoints. While the endpoint hypothesis, put forth by Regier (2007), claims a particular focus of human cognition to ending relations of events, other research suggests that simplicity principles guide categorization and, additionally, that static information is easier to process than dynamic information. Our experiments show a clear picture: Size matters. Nonetheless, we also find categorization behaviors consistent with experiments in both the spatial and temporal domain, namely that topology refines these behaviors and that topological equivalence classes are categorized consistently. These results are critical steppingstones in validating spatial formalism from a cognitive perspective and cognitively grounding work on ontologies.

The Nucleus Accumbens and Pavlovian Reward Learning

PubMed Central

Day, Jeremy J.

2011-01-01

The ability to form associations between predictive environmental events and rewarding outcomes is a fundamental aspect of learned behavior. This apparently simple ability likely requires complex neural processing evolved to identify, seek, and utilize natural rewards and redirect these activities based on updated sensory information. Emerging evidence from both animal and human research suggests that this type of processing is mediated in part by the nucleus accumbens and a closely associated network of brain structures. The nucleus accumbens is required for a number of reward-related behaviors, and processes specific information about reward availability, value, and context. Additionally, this structure is critical for the acquisition and expression of most Pavlovian stimulus-reward relationships, and cues that predict rewards produce robust changes in neural activity in the nucleus accumbens. While processing within the nucleus accumbens may enable or promote Pavlovian reward learning in natural situations, it has also been implicated in aspects of human drug addiction, including the ability of drug-paired cues to control behavior. This article will provide a critical review of the existing animal and human literature concerning the role of the NAc in Pavlovian learning with non-drug rewards and consider some clinical implications of these findings. PMID:17404375

Moving from Cognition to Behavior: What the Research Says

ERIC Educational Resources Information Center

Johnson, Russell E.; Chang, Chu-Hsiang; Lord, Robert G.

2006-01-01

In 1994, R. G. Lord and P. E. Levy proposed a variant of control theory that incorporated human information processing principles. The current article evaluates the empirical evidence for their propositions and updates the theory by considering contemporary research on information processing. Considerable support drawing from diverse literatures…

K-6 Social Studies Skills for the Human Behavior and Urban Studies Program.

ERIC Educational Resources Information Center

Banks, Samuel L., Ed.

This guide was developed to aid elementary students deal with life experiences through skill development. Major skills stressed are: locating, organizing, and evaluating information; acquiring information through listening, observing, and reading; communicating orally and in writing; interpreting pictures, charts, graphs, and tables; and working…

Practice and Personhood in Professional Interaction: Social Identities and Information Needs.

ERIC Educational Resources Information Center

Mokros, Hartmut B.; And Others

1995-01-01

Explores the human aspect of information retrieval by examining the behavior and pronoun use of librarians in the course of communicating with patrons during online computer search interactions. Compares two studies on the conduct of librarians as intermediaries in naturally occurring online computer search interactions. (JMV)

The Differences in Information Seeking Behavior between Distance and Residential Doctoral Students

ERIC Educational Resources Information Center

Brahme, Maria E.

2010-01-01

Librarians have historically been responsible for the organization and management of the stores of human knowledge, and for ensuring information literacy among researchers. In recent years, however, librarians have become disintermediated (Boyd-Byrnes & Rosenthal,2005) or, removed from, researchers and the research process for a variety of…

A Mechanistic Model of Human Recall of Social Network Structure and Relationship Affect.

PubMed

Omodei, Elisa; Brashears, Matthew E; Arenas, Alex

2017-12-07

The social brain hypothesis argues that the need to deal with social challenges was key to our evolution of high intelligence. Research with non-human primates as well as experimental and fMRI studies in humans produce results consistent with this claim, leading to an estimate that human primary groups should consist of roughly 150 individuals. Gaps between this prediction and empirical observations can be partially accounted for using "compression heuristics", or schemata that simplify the encoding and recall of social information. However, little is known about the specific algorithmic processes used by humans to store and recall social information. We describe a mechanistic model of human network recall and demonstrate its sufficiency for capturing human recall behavior observed in experimental contexts. We find that human recall is predicated on accurate recall of a small number of high degree network nodes and the application of heuristics for both structural and affective information. This provides new insight into human memory, social network evolution, and demonstrates a novel approach to uncovering human cognitive operations.

Two-Sided Matching in Hierarchical Organizations-An Application for the Assignment of Military Personnel

DTIC Science & Technology

2011-06-01

information overload has been examined in fields such as consumer behavior , it has not previously been examined in relation to assignment decision making...such as accounting, organization science and consumer behavior , and show that there is considerable evidence that humans make poor quality decisions...accuracy in the consumer behavior domain, however his approach was different for two primary reasons. Firstly, he examined the effect of an individual’s

Connecting Psychological Science with Climate Change: A Persuasion and Social Influence Assignment

ERIC Educational Resources Information Center

Munro, Geoffrey D.; Behlen, Margaret M.

2017-01-01

Students often have little understanding of the role psychological science plays in informing us about the impact of human behavior when addressing climate change. We designed an assignment for a social psychology course based on Frantz and Mayer's use of the decision tree model of helping behavior to identify the psychological barriers that…

A Human Capital Concern: The Literacy Proficiency of U.S. Immigrants. Policy Information Report

ERIC Educational Resources Information Center

Sum, Andrew; Kirsch, Irwin; Yamamoto, Kentaro

2004-01-01

This monograph provides a comprehensive description and analysis of the literacy proficiencies of the adult immigrant population (16-65 years old) in the U.S. in recent years and assesses their implications for the labor force behavior, employment, earnings, incomes, and civic behavior of the immigrant population. The first section will present…

How doth the little busy bee: unexpected metabolism.

PubMed

Barros, L Felipe; Sierralta, Jimena; Weber, Bruno

2015-01-01

Brain energy metabolism powers information processing and behavior, much as electricity powers a computer. However, a recent study in insects suggests that this relationship is more interesting, causally linking aggressive behavior to energetics. These findings may also shed new light on aerobic glycolysis, a long-standing riddle of human brain physiology. Copyright © 2014 Elsevier Ltd. All rights reserved.

Colloquium on Selected Topics in Behavioral Science Basic Research. (Alexandria, Virginia, April 23-25, 1980).

ERIC Educational Resources Information Center

Nogami, Glenda Y., Ed.; And Others

The 21 summaries of research programs, funded by the United States Army Research Institute (ARI) for the Behavioral and Social Sciences which are presented are grouped in five broad topic areas: computer-based systems; information processing; learning, memory and transfer; human relations; and related issues and trends. Papers presented include:…

A Secure Behavior Modification Sensor System for Physical Activity Improvement

ERIC Educational Resources Information Center

Price, Alan

2011-01-01

Today, advances in wireless sensor networks are making it possible to capture large amounts of information about a person and their interaction within their home environment. However, what is missing is how to ensure the security of the collected data and its use to alter human behavior for positive benefit. In this research, exploration was…

Sexual behavior of female adolescents on the spread of HIV/AIDS and other STDs in Carriacou.

PubMed

Patrice-Coy, Celestine; Johnson, Emmanuel Janagan; Boodram, Cheryl Ann Sarita

2016-09-01

This article explores information relating to female adolescents knowledge, attitudes, and behaviors toward human immunodeficiency virus (HIV) and other sexually transmitted diseases (STDs) in Carriacou. The authors aimed at finding out whether adolescent females in Carriacou receive adequate information about HIV and other STDs. Where did students receive most of their information about HIV/STDs and whether the knowledge has influenced their sexual behaviors? Furthermore, this study focused on how female adolescents feel toward people living with HIV/STDs.Focus group method was employed with 2 age groups of female adolescent students. Content analysis was carried out by the researcher to analyze the data. Themes were developed using coding and thematic analysis.The findings revealed that female adolescents were highly aware of HIV/STDs-related facts. They were knowledgeable and have received adequate information about HIV/STDs.

Effects of human recreation on the incubation behavior of American Oystercatchers

USGS Publications Warehouse

McGowan, C.P.; Simons, T.R.

2006-01-01

Human recreational disturbance and its effects on wildlife demographics and behavior is an increasingly important area of research. We monitored the nesting success of American Oystercatchers (Haematopus palliatus) in coastal North Carolina in 2002 and 2003. We also used video monitoring at nests to measure the response of incubating birds to human recreation. We counted the number of trips per hour made by adult birds to and from the nest, and we calculated the percent time that adults spent incubating. We asked whether human recreational activities (truck, all-terrain vehicle [ATV], and pedestrian traffic) were correlated with parental behavioral patterns. Eleven a priori models of nest survival and behavioral covariates were evaluated using Akaike's Information Criterion (AIC) to see whether incubation behavior influenced nest survival. Factors associated with birds leaving their nests (n = 548) included ATV traffic (25%), truck traffic (17%), pedestrian traffic (4%), aggression with neighboring oystercatchers or paired birds exchanging incubation duties (26%), airplane traffic (1%) and unknown factors (29%). ATV traffic was positively associated with the rate of trips to and away from the nest (??1 = 0.749, P < 0.001) and negatively correlated with percent time spent incubating (??1 = -0.037, P = 0.025). Other forms of human recreation apparently had little effect on incubation behaviors. Nest survival models incorporating the frequency of trips by adults to and from the nest, and the percentage of time adults spent incubating, were somewhat supported in the AIC analyses. A low frequency of trips to and from the nest and, counter to expectations, low percent time spent incubating were associated with higher daily nest survival rates. These data suggest that changes in incubation behavior might be one mechanism by which human recreation affects the reproductive success of American Oystercatchers.

Exploring the Human Element of Computer-Assisted Language Learning: An Iranian Context

ERIC Educational Resources Information Center

Fatemi Jahromi, Seyed Abolghasseminits; Salimi, Farimah

2013-01-01

Based on various theories of human agency (Ajzen, I. (2005). "Attitudes, personality and behavior" (2nd ed.). London: Open University Press; Davis, F.D. (1989). Perceived usefulness, perceived ease of use, and user acceptance of information technology. "MIS Quarterly", 13, 319-340; Rogers, E.M. (1983). "Diffusion of…

Beyond the Pleistocene: Using Phylogeny and Constraint to Inform the Evolutionary Psychology of Human Mating

ERIC Educational Resources Information Center

Eastwick, Paul W.

2009-01-01

Evolutionary psychologists explore the adaptive function of traits and behaviors that characterize modern Homo sapiens. However, evolutionary psychologists have yet to incorporate the phylogenetic relationship between modern Homo sapiens and humans' hominid and pongid relatives (both living and extinct) into their theorizing. By considering the…

Passive vs. Active Control of Rhythmic Ball Bouncing: The Role of Visual Information

ERIC Educational Resources Information Center

Siegler, Isabelle A.; Bardy, Benoit G.; Warren, William H.

2010-01-01

The simple task of bouncing a ball on a racket offers a model system for studying how human actors exploit the physics and information of the environment to control their behavior. Previous work shows that people take advantage of a passively stable solution for ball bouncing but can also use perceptual information to actively stabilize bouncing.…

Gossip as an alternative for direct observation in games of indirect reciprocity

PubMed Central

Sommerfeld, Ralf D.; Krambeck, Hans-Jürgen; Semmann, Dirk; Milinski, Manfred

2007-01-01

Communication about social topics is abundant in human societies, and many functions have been attributed to such gossiping. One of these proposed functions is the management of reputations. Reputation by itself has been shown to have a strong influence on cooperation dynamics in games of indirect reciprocity, and this notion helps to explain the observed high level of cooperation in humans. Here we designed a game to test a widespread assumption that gossip functions as a vector for the transmission of social information. This empirical study (with 14 groups of nine students each) focuses on the composition of gossip, information transfer by gossip, and the behavior based on gossip information. We show that gossip has a strong influence on the resulting behavior even when participants have access to the original information (i.e., direct observation) as well as gossip about the same information. Thus, it is evident that gossip has a strong manipulative potential. Furthermore, gossip about cooperative individuals is more positive than gossip about uncooperative individuals, gossip comments transmit social information successfully, and cooperation levels are higher when people encounter positive compared with negative gossip. PMID:17947384

Multimodal human communication--targeting facial expressions, speech content and prosody.

PubMed

Regenbogen, Christina; Schneider, Daniel A; Gur, Raquel E; Schneider, Frank; Habel, Ute; Kellermann, Thilo

2012-05-01

Human communication is based on a dynamic information exchange of the communication channels facial expressions, prosody, and speech content. This fMRI study elucidated the impact of multimodal emotion processing and the specific contribution of each channel on behavioral empathy and its prerequisites. Ninety-six video clips displaying actors who told self-related stories were presented to 27 healthy participants. In two conditions, all channels uniformly transported only emotional or neutral information. Three conditions selectively presented two emotional channels and one neutral channel. Subjects indicated the actors' emotional valence and their own while fMRI was recorded. Activation patterns of tri-channel emotional communication reflected multimodal processing and facilitative effects for empathy. Accordingly, subjects' behavioral empathy rates significantly deteriorated once one source was neutral. However, emotionality expressed via two of three channels yielded activation in a network associated with theory-of-mind-processes. This suggested participants' effort to infer mental states of their counterparts and was accompanied by a decline of behavioral empathy, driven by the participants' emotional responses. Channel-specific emotional contributions were present in modality-specific areas. The identification of different network-nodes associated with human interactions constitutes a prerequisite for understanding dynamics that underlie multimodal integration and explain the observed decline in empathy rates. This task might also shed light on behavioral deficits and neural changes that accompany psychiatric diseases. Copyright © 2012 Elsevier Inc. All rights reserved.

The virtues of gossip: reputational information sharing as prosocial behavior.

PubMed

Feinberg, Matthew; Willer, Robb; Stellar, Jennifer; Keltner, Dacher

2012-05-01

Reputation systems promote cooperation and deter antisocial behavior in groups. Little is known, however, about how and why people share reputational information. Here, we seek to establish the existence and dynamics of prosocial gossip, the sharing of negative evaluative information about a target in a way that protects others from antisocial or exploitative behavior. We present a model of prosocial gossip and the results of 4 studies testing the model's claims. Results of Studies 1 through 3 demonstrate that (a) individuals who observe an antisocial act experience negative affect and are compelled to share information about the antisocial actor with a potentially vulnerable person, (b) sharing such information reduces negative affect created by observing the antisocial behavior, and (c) individuals possessing more prosocial orientations are the most motivated to engage in such gossip, even at a personal cost, and exhibit the greatest reduction in negative affect as a result. Study 4 demonstrates that prosocial gossip can effectively deter selfishness and promote cooperation. Taken together these results highlight the roles of prosocial motivations and negative affective reactions to injustice in maintaining reputational information sharing in groups. We conclude by discussing implications for reputational theories of the maintenance of cooperation in human groups.

Associations between health literacy, HIV-related knowledge, and information behavior among persons living with HIV in the Dominican Republic.

PubMed

Stonbraker, Samantha; Smaldone, Arlene; Luft, Heidi; Cushman, Linda F; Lerebours Nadal, Leonel; Halpern, Mina; Larson, Elaine

2018-05-01

To determine the health literacy levels of persons living with human immunodeficiency virus (HIV) (PLWH) at a health clinic in the Dominican Republic (DR) and assess associations between health literacy, HIV-related knowledge, and health information behavior (how patients need, seek, receive, and use information). Cross-sectional, descriptive. Participants were 107 PLWH attending the Clinic. A theoretically based, 64-item survey assessing information behavior and HIV-related knowledge was administered in Spanish through individual interviews. Health literacy was assessed using the Short Assessment of Health Literacy-Spanish and English. On average, participants were 40.8 years old and had lived with HIV for 7.7 years. The majority (69.2%) had low health literacy. HIV-related knowledge and information behavior varied by health literacy level and uncertainty regarding a main indicator of disease progression, viral load, was demonstrated regardless of health literacy level. Participants with low health literacy were less likely to answer questions or answer questions correctly and many participants (39.2%) indicated viral transmission can occur through supernatural means. Findings demonstrate unmet information need and that information received may not always be understood. Methods to improve health education are needed to ensure patients receive health information in an understandable way. © 2017 Wiley Periodicals, Inc.

Effects of task and image properties on visual-attention deployment in image-quality assessment

NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

Alers, Hani; Redi, Judith; Liu, Hantao; Heynderickx, Ingrid

2015-03-01

It is important to understand how humans view images and how their behavior is affected by changes in the properties of the viewed images and the task they are given, particularly the task of scoring the image quality (IQ). This is a complex behavior that holds great importance for the field of image-quality research. This work builds upon 4 years of research work spanning three databases studying image-viewing behavior. Using eye-tracking equipment, it was possible to collect information on human viewing behavior of different kinds of stimuli and under different experimental settings. This work performs a cross-analysis on the results from all these databases using state-of-the-art similarity measures. The results strongly show that asking the viewers to score the IQ significantly changes their viewing behavior. Also muting the color saturation seems to affect the saliency of the images. However, a change in IQ was not consistently found to modify visual attention deployment, neither under free looking nor during scoring. These results are helpful in gaining a better understanding of image viewing behavior under different conditions. They also have important implications on work that collects subjective image-quality scores from human observers.

What every conservation biologist should know about economic theory.

PubMed

Gowdy, John; Hall, Charles; Klitgaard, Kent; Krall, Lisi

2010-12-01

The last century has seen the ascendance of a core economic model, which we will refer to as Walrasian economics. This model is driven by the psychological assumptions that humans act only in a self-referential and narrowly rational way and that production can be described as a self-contained circular flow between firms and households. These assumptions have critical implications for the way economics is used to inform conservation biology. Yet the Walrasian model is inconsistent with a large body of empirical evidence about actual human behavior, and it violates a number of basic physical laws. Research in behavioral science and neuroscience shows that humans are uniquely social animals and not self-centered rational economic beings. Economic production is subject to physical laws including the laws of thermodynamics and mass balance. In addition, some contemporary economic theory, spurred by exciting new research in human behavior and a wealth of data about the negative global impact of the human economy on natural systems, is moving toward a world view that places consumption and production squarely in its behavioral and biophysical context. We argue that abandoning the straightjacket of the Walrasian core is essential to further progress in understanding the complex, coupled interactions between the human economy and the natural world. We call for a new framework for economic theory and policy that is consistent with observed human behavior, recognizes the complex and frequently irreversible interaction between human and natural systems, and directly confronts the cumulative negative effects of the human economy on the Earth's life support systems. Biophysical economics and ecological economics are two emerging economic frameworks in this movement. © 2010 Society for Conservation Biology.

The neural bases of key competencies of emotional intelligence.

PubMed

Krueger, Frank; Barbey, Aron K; McCabe, Kevin; Strenziok, Maren; Zamboni, Giovanna; Solomon, Jeffrey; Raymont, Vanessa; Grafman, Jordan

2009-12-29

Emotional intelligence (EI) refers to a set of competencies that are essential features of human social life. Although the neural substrates of EI are virtually unknown, it is well established that the prefrontal cortex (PFC) plays a crucial role in human social-emotional behavior. We studied a unique sample of combat veterans from the Vietnam Head Injury Study, which is a prospective, long-term follow-up study of veterans with focal penetrating head injuries. We administered the Mayer-Salovey-Caruso Emotional Intelligence Test as a valid standardized psychometric measure of EI behavior to examine two key competencies of EI: (i) Strategic EI as the competency to understand emotional information and to apply it for the management of the self and of others and (ii) Experiential EI as the competency to perceive emotional information and to apply it for the integration into thinking. The results revealed that key competencies underlying EI depend on distinct neural PFC substrates. First, ventromedial PFC damage diminishes Strategic EI, and therefore, hinders the understanding and managing of emotional information. Second, dorsolateral PFC damage diminishes Experiential EI, and therefore, hinders the perception and integration of emotional information. In conclusion, EI should be viewed as complementary to cognitive intelligence and, when considered together, provide a more complete understanding of human intelligence.

The neural bases of key competencies of emotional intelligence

PubMed Central

Krueger, Frank; Barbey, Aron K.; McCabe, Kevin; Strenziok, Maren; Zamboni, Giovanna; Solomon, Jeffrey; Raymont, Vanessa; Grafman, Jordan

2009-01-01

Emotional intelligence (EI) refers to a set of competencies that are essential features of human social life. Although the neural substrates of EI are virtually unknown, it is well established that the prefrontal cortex (PFC) plays a crucial role in human social-emotional behavior. We studied a unique sample of combat veterans from the Vietnam Head Injury Study, which is a prospective, long-term follow-up study of veterans with focal penetrating head injuries. We administered the Mayer-Salovey-Caruso Emotional Intelligence Test as a valid standardized psychometric measure of EI behavior to examine two key competencies of EI: (i) Strategic EI as the competency to understand emotional information and to apply it for the management of the self and of others and (ii) Experiential EI as the competency to perceive emotional information and to apply it for the integration into thinking. The results revealed that key competencies underlying EI depend on distinct neural PFC substrates. First, ventromedial PFC damage diminishes Strategic EI, and therefore, hinders the understanding and managing of emotional information. Second, dorsolateral PFC damage diminishes Experiential EI, and therefore, hinders the perception and integration of emotional information. In conclusion, EI should be viewed as complementary to cognitive intelligence and, when considered together, provide a more complete understanding of human intelligence. PMID:20080795

Issues in Developing a Normative Descriptive Model for Dyadic Decision Making

NASA Technical Reports Server (NTRS)

Serfaty, D.; Kleinman, D. L.

1984-01-01

Most research in modelling human information processing and decision making has been devoted to the case of the single human operator. In the present effort, concepts from the fields of organizational behavior, engineering psychology, team theory and mathematical modelling are merged in an attempt to consider first the case of two cooperating decisionmakers (the Dyad) in a multi-task environment. Rooted in the well-known Dynamic Decision Model (DDM), the normative descriptive approach brings basic cognitive and psychophysical characteristics inherent to human behavior into a team theoretic analytic framework. An experimental paradigm, involving teams in dynamic decision making tasks, is designed to produce the data with which to build the theoretical model.

Lateral habenula neurons signal errors in the prediction of reward information

PubMed Central

Bromberg-Martin, Ethan S.; Hikosaka, Okihide

2011-01-01

Humans and animals have a remarkable ability to predict future events, which they achieve by persistently searching their environment for sources of predictive information. Yet little is known about the neural systems that motivate this behavior. We hypothesized that information-seeking is assigned value by the same circuits that support reward-seeking, so that neural signals encoding conventional “reward prediction errors” include analogous “information prediction errors”. To test this we recorded from neurons in the lateral habenula, a nucleus which encodes reward prediction errors, while monkeys chose between cues that provided different amounts of information about upcoming rewards. We found that a subpopulation of lateral habenula neurons transmitted signals resembling information prediction errors, responding when reward information was unexpectedly cued, delivered, or denied. Their signals evaluated information sources reliably even when the animal’s decisions did not. These neurons could provide a common instructive signal for reward-seeking and information-seeking behavior. PMID:21857659

The Prosocial Effects of 3,4-methylenedioxymethamphetamine (MDMA): Controlled Studies in Humans and Laboratory Animals

PubMed Central

Kamilar-Britt, Philip; Bedi, Gillinder

2015-01-01

Users of ±3,4-Methylenedioxymethamphetamine (MDMA; ‘ecstasy’) report prosocial effects such as sociability and empathy. Supporting these apparently unique social effects, data from controlled laboratory studies indicate that MDMA alters social feelings, information processing, and behavior in humans, and social behavior in rodents. Here, we review this growing body of evidence. In rodents, MDMA increases passive prosocial behavior (adjacent lying) and social reward while decreasing aggression, effects that may involve serotonin 1A receptor mediated oxytocin release interacting with vasopressin receptor 1A. In humans, MDMA increases plasma oxytocin and produces feelings of social affiliation. It decreases identification of negative facial expressions (cognitive empathy) and blunts responses to social rejection, while enhancing responses to others’ positive emotions (emotional empathy) and increasing social approach. Thus, consistent with drug folklore, laboratory administration of MDMA robustly alters social processing in humans and increases social approach in humans and animals. Effects are consistent with increased sociability, with mixed evidence about enhanced empathy. These neurobiologically-complex prosocial effects likely motivate recreational ecstasy use. PMID:26408071

The prosocial effects of 3,4-methylenedioxymethamphetamine (MDMA): Controlled studies in humans and laboratory animals.

PubMed

Kamilar-Britt, Philip; Bedi, Gillinder

2015-10-01

Users of ±3,4-methylenedioxymethamphetamine (MDMA; 'ecstasy') report prosocial effects such as sociability and empathy. Supporting these apparently unique social effects, data from controlled laboratory studies indicate that MDMA alters social feelings, information processing, and behavior in humans, and social behavior in rodents. Here, we review this growing body of evidence. In rodents, MDMA increases passive prosocial behavior (adjacent lying) and social reward while decreasing aggression, effects that may involve serotonin 1A receptor mediated oxytocin release interacting with vasopressin receptor 1A. In humans, MDMA increases plasma oxytocin and produces feelings of social affiliation. It decreases identification of negative facial expressions (cognitive empathy) and blunts responses to social rejection, while enhancing responses to others' positive emotions (emotional empathy) and increasing social approach. Thus, consistent with drug folklore, laboratory administration of MDMA robustly alters social processing in humans and increases social approach in humans and animals. Effects are consistent with increased sociability, with mixed evidence about enhanced empathy. These neurobiologically-complex prosocial effects likely motivate recreational ecstasy use. Copyright © 2015. Published by Elsevier Ltd.

How Has the Internet Reshaped Human Cognition?

PubMed

Loh, Kep Kee; Kanai, Ryota

2016-10-01

Throughout our evolutionary history, our cognitive systems have been altered by the advent of technological inventions such as primitive tools, spoken language, writing, and arithmetic systems. Thirty years ago, the Internet surfaced as the latest technological invention poised to deeply reshape human cognition. With its multifaceted affordances, the Internet environment has profoundly transformed our thoughts and behaviors. Growing up with Internet technologies, "Digital Natives" gravitate toward "shallow" information processing behaviors characterized by rapid attention shifting and reduced deliberations. They engage in increased multitasking behaviors that are linked to increased distractibility and poor executive control abilities. Digital natives also exhibit higher prevalence of Internet-related addictive behaviors that reflect altered reward-processing and self-control mechanisms. Recent neuroimaging investigations have suggested associations between these Internet-related cognitive impacts and structural changes in the brain. Against mounting apprehension over the Internet's consequences on our cognitive systems, several researchers have lamented that these concerns were often exaggerated beyond existing scientific evidence. In the present review, we aim to provide an objective overview of the Internet's impacts on our cognitive systems. We critically discuss current empirical evidence about how the Internet environment has altered the cognitive behaviors and structures involved in information processing, executive control, and reward-processing. © The Author(s) 2015.

Behavioral response of manatees to variations in environmental sound levels

USGS Publications Warehouse

Miksis-Olds, Jennifer L.; Wagner, Tyler

2011-01-01

Florida manatees (Trichechus manatus latirostris) inhabit coastal regions because they feed on the aquatic vegetation that grows in shallow waters, which are the same areas where human activities are greatest. Noise produced from anthropogenic and natural sources has the potential to affect these animals by eliciting responses ranging from mild behavioral changes to extreme aversion. Sound levels were calculated from recordings made throughout behavioral observation periods. An information theoretic approach was used to investigate the relationship between behavior patterns and sound level. Results indicated that elevated sound levels affect manatee activity and are a function of behavioral state. The proportion of time manatees spent feeding and milling changed in response to sound level. When ambient sound levels were highest, more time was spent in the directed, goal-oriented behavior of feeding, whereas less time was spent engaged in undirected behavior such as milling. This work illustrates how shifts in activity of individual manatees may be useful parameters for identifying impacts of noise on manatees and might inform population level effects.

Diagnostic value underlies asymmetric updating of impressions in the morality and ability domains.

PubMed

Mende-Siedlecki, Peter; Baron, Sean G; Todorov, Alexander

2013-12-11

While positive behavioral information is diagnostic when evaluating a person's abilities, negative information is diagnostic when evaluating morality. Although social psychology has considered these two domains as orthogonal and distinct from one another, we demonstrate that this asymmetry in diagnosticity can be explained by a single parsimonious principle--the perceived frequency of behaviors in these domains. Less frequent behaviors (e.g., high ability and low morality) are weighed more heavily in evaluations. We show that this statistical principle of frequency-derived diagnosticity is evident in human participants at both behavioral and neural levels of analysis. Specifically, activity in right ventrolateral prefrontal cortex increased preferentially when participants updated impressions based on diagnostic behaviors, and further, activity in this region covaried parametrically with the perceived frequency of behaviors. Activity in left ventrolateral PFC, left inferior frontal gyrus, and left superior temporal sulcus showed similar patterns of diagnosticity and sensitivity, though additional analyses confirmed that these regions responded primarily to updates based on immoral behaviors.

Persistent neuronal activity in human prefrontal cortex links perception and action

PubMed Central

Haller, Matar; Case, John; Crone, Nathan E.; Chang, Edward F.; King-Stephens, David; Laxer, Kenneth D.; Weber, Peter B.; Parvizi, Josef; Knight, Robert T.; Shestyuk, Avgusta Y.

2017-01-01

How do humans flexibly respond to changing environmental demands on a sub-second temporal scale? Extensive research has highlighted the key role of the prefrontal cortex in flexible decision-making and adaptive behavior, yet the core mechanisms that translate sensory information into behavior remain undefined. Utilizing direct human cortical recordings, we investigated the temporal and spatial evolution of neuronal activity, indexed by the broadband gamma signal, while sixteen participants performed a broad range of self-paced cognitive tasks. Here we describe a robust domain- and modality-independent pattern of persistent stimulus-to-response neural activation that encodes stimulus features and predicts motor output on a trial-by-trial basis with near-perfect accuracy. Observed across a distributed network of brain areas, this persistent neural activation is centered in the prefrontal cortex and is required for successful response implementation, providing a functional substrate for domain-general transformation of perception into action, critical for flexible behavior.

New approaches to investigating social gestures in autism spectrum disorder

PubMed Central

2012-01-01

The combination of economic games and human neuroimaging presents the possibility of using economic probes to identify biomarkers for quantitative features of healthy and diseased cognition. These probes span a range of important cognitive functions, but one new use is in the domain of reciprocating social exchange with other humans - a capacity perturbed in a number of psychopathologies. We summarize the use of a reciprocating exchange game to elicit neural and behavioral signatures for subjects diagnosed with autism spectrum disorder (ASD). Furthermore, we outline early efforts to capture features of social exchange in computational models and use these to identify quantitative behavioral differences between subjects with ASD and matched controls. Lastly, we summarize a number of subsequent studies inspired by the modeling results, which suggest new neural and behavioral signatures that could be used to characterize subtle deficits in information processing during interactions with other humans. PMID:22958572

Exposure to female fertility pheromones influences men's drinking.

PubMed

Tan, Robin; Goldman, Mark S

2015-06-01

Research has shown that humans consciously use alcohol to encourage sexual activity. In the current study, we investigated whether decision making about alcohol use and sex can be cued outside of awareness by recently revealed sexual signaling mechanisms. Specifically, we examined if males exposed without their knowledge to pheromones emitted by fertile females would increase their alcohol consumption, presumably via neurobehavioral information pathways that link alcohol to sex and mating. We found that men who smelled a T-shirt worn by a fertile female drank significantly more (nonalcoholic) beer, and exhibited significantly greater approach behavior toward female cues, than those who smelled a T-shirt worn by a nonfertile female. These findings reveal previously unknown influences on human alcohol consumption, augment the research base for pheromone cuing of sexual behavior in humans, and raise the possibility that other, as yet unknown, pathways of behavioral influence may be operating hidden from view. (c) 2015 APA, all rights reserved).

Exposure to Female Fertility Pheromones Influences Men’s Drinking

PubMed Central

Tan, Robin; Goldman, Mark S.

2015-01-01

Research shows that humans consciously use alcohol to encourage sexual activity. The current study investigated whether decision-making about alcohol use and sex can be cued outside of awareness by recently revealed sexual signaling mechanisms. Specifically, we examined if males exposed without their knowledge to pheromones emitted by fertile females would increase their alcohol consumption, presumably via neurobehavioral information pathways that link alcohol to sex and mating. We found that men who smelled a T-shirt worn by a fertile female drank significantly more (non-alcoholic) beer, and exhibited significantly greater approach behavior toward female cues, than those who smelled a T-shirt worn by a non-fertile female. These findings reveal previously unknown influences on human alcohol consumption, augment the research base for pheromone cuing of sexual behavior in humans, and raise the possibility that other, as yet unknown, pathways of behavioral influence may be operating hidden from view. PMID:26053321

A Bibliography of Research on the Influence of Irrelevant Information on Psychological Judgments

DTIC Science & Technology

1981-09-01

Kansas State University " I 00 -.HUMAN FACTORS TECHNICAL AREA C.3)(iiA € U.S. Army LUResearch Institute for the Behavioral and Social Sciences... Behavioral September 1981 and Social Sciences, 5001 Eisenhower Avenue, 13. NUMBER OF PAGES Alexandria, VA 22333 10 14. MONITORING AGENCY NAME & ADDRESS(if...81. Anderson, N. H., & Grant, D. A. A test of a statisticil learning theory model for two-choice behavior models with double stimulus events. Journal

Saccade selection when reward probability is dynamically manipulated using Markov chains

PubMed Central

Lovejoy, Lee P.; Krauzlis, Richard J.

2012-01-01

Markov chains (stochastic processes where probabilities are assigned based on the previous outcome) are commonly used to examine the transitions between behavioral states, such as those that occur during foraging or social interactions. However, relatively little is known about how well primates can incorporate knowledge about Markov chains into their behavior. Saccadic eye movements are an example of a simple behavior influenced by information about probability, and thus are good candidates for testing whether subjects can learn Markov chains. In addition, when investigating the influence of probability on saccade target selection, the use of Markov chains could provide an alternative method that avoids confounds present in other task designs. To investigate these possibilities, we evaluated human behavior on a task in which stimulus reward probabilities were assigned using a Markov chain. On each trial, the subject selected one of four identical stimuli by saccade; after selection, feedback indicated the rewarded stimulus. Each session consisted of 200–600 trials, and on some sessions, the reward magnitude varied. On sessions with a uniform reward, subjects (n = 6) learned to select stimuli at a frequency close to reward probability, which is similar to human behavior on matching or probability classification tasks. When informed that a Markov chain assigned reward probabilities, subjects (n = 3) learned to select the greatest reward probability more often, bringing them close to behavior that maximizes reward. On sessions where reward magnitude varied across stimuli, subjects (n = 6) demonstrated preferences for both greater reward probability and greater reward magnitude, resulting in a preference for greater expected value (the product of reward probability and magnitude). These results demonstrate that Markov chains can be used to dynamically assign probabilities that are rapidly exploited by human subjects during saccade target selection. PMID:18330552

Saccade selection when reward probability is dynamically manipulated using Markov chains.

PubMed

Nummela, Samuel U; Lovejoy, Lee P; Krauzlis, Richard J

2008-05-01

Markov chains (stochastic processes where probabilities are assigned based on the previous outcome) are commonly used to examine the transitions between behavioral states, such as those that occur during foraging or social interactions. However, relatively little is known about how well primates can incorporate knowledge about Markov chains into their behavior. Saccadic eye movements are an example of a simple behavior influenced by information about probability, and thus are good candidates for testing whether subjects can learn Markov chains. In addition, when investigating the influence of probability on saccade target selection, the use of Markov chains could provide an alternative method that avoids confounds present in other task designs. To investigate these possibilities, we evaluated human behavior on a task in which stimulus reward probabilities were assigned using a Markov chain. On each trial, the subject selected one of four identical stimuli by saccade; after selection, feedback indicated the rewarded stimulus. Each session consisted of 200-600 trials, and on some sessions, the reward magnitude varied. On sessions with a uniform reward, subjects (n = 6) learned to select stimuli at a frequency close to reward probability, which is similar to human behavior on matching or probability classification tasks. When informed that a Markov chain assigned reward probabilities, subjects (n = 3) learned to select the greatest reward probability more often, bringing them close to behavior that maximizes reward. On sessions where reward magnitude varied across stimuli, subjects (n = 6) demonstrated preferences for both greater reward probability and greater reward magnitude, resulting in a preference for greater expected value (the product of reward probability and magnitude). These results demonstrate that Markov chains can be used to dynamically assign probabilities that are rapidly exploited by human subjects during saccade target selection.

The Internet, Political Communications Research and the Search for a New Information Paradigm

ERIC Educational Resources Information Center

Chiu, William Franklin

2013-01-01

The Internet, as a digital record of human discourse, provides an opportunity to directly analyze political communicative behavior. The rapid emergence of social online networks augurs a transformation in the quality and quantity of information people have to evaluate their political system. Digital formats instantiate new categories of actors and…

Auditory, Tactile, and Audiotactile Information Processing Following Visual Deprivation

ERIC Educational Resources Information Center

Occelli, Valeria; Spence, Charles; Zampini, Massimiliano

2013-01-01

We highlight the results of those studies that have investigated the plastic reorganization processes that occur within the human brain as a consequence of visual deprivation, as well as how these processes give rise to behaviorally observable changes in the perceptual processing of auditory and tactile information. We review the evidence showing…

Considerations for Reaching the Latino Population with Sexuality and HIV/AIDS Information and Education.

ERIC Educational Resources Information Center

de la Vega, Ernesto

1990-01-01

Latino and Latina sexual attitudes and behaviors must be understood if educators and counselors hope to reach this population with effective sexuality and Human Immunodeficiency Virus/Acquired Immune Deficiency Syndrome (HIV/AIDS) information and education. The general U.S. Latino population is mostly sexually conservative; direct talk in public…

Digital and biological computing in organizations.

PubMed

Kampfner, Roberto R

2002-01-01

Michael Conrad unveiled many of the fundamental characteristics of biological computing. Underlying the behavioral variability and the adaptability of biological systems are these characteristics, including the ability of biological information processing to exploit quantum features at the atomic level, the powerful 3-D pattern recognition capabilities of macromolecules, the computational efficiency, and the ability to support biological function. Among many other things, Conrad formalized and explicated the underlying principles of biological adaptability, characterized the differences between biological and digital computing in terms of a fundamental tradeoff between adaptability and programmability of information processing, and discussed the challenges of interfacing digital computers and human society. This paper is about the encounter of biological and digital computing. The focus is on the nature of the biological information processing infrastructure of organizations and how it can be extended effectively with digital computing. In order to achieve this goal effectively, however, we need to embed properly digital computing into the information processing aspects of human and social behavior and intelligence, which are fundamentally biological. Conrad's legacy provides a firm, strong, and inspiring foundation for this endeavor.

Designing visual displays and system models for safe reactor operations based on the user`s perspective of the system

DOE Office of Scientific and Technical Information (OSTI.GOV)

Brown-VanHoozer, S.A.

Most designers are not schooled in the area of human-interaction psychology and therefore tend to rely on the traditional ergonomic aspects of human factors when designing complex human-interactive workstations related to reactor operations. They do not take into account the differences in user information processing behavior and how these behaviors may affect individual and team performance when accessing visual displays or utilizing system models in process and control room areas. Unfortunately, by ignoring the importance of the integration of the user interface at the information process level, the result can be sub-optimization and inherently error- and failure-prone systems. Therefore, tomore » minimize or eliminate failures in human-interactive systems, it is essential that the designers understand how each user`s processing characteristics affects how the user gathers information, and how the user communicates the information to the designer and other users. A different type of approach in achieving this understanding is Neuro Linguistic Programming (NLP). The material presented in this paper is based on two studies involving the design of visual displays, NLP, and the user`s perspective model of a reactor system. The studies involve the methodology known as NLP, and its use in expanding design choices from the user`s ``model of the world,`` in the areas of virtual reality, workstation design, team structure, decision and learning style patterns, safety operations, pattern recognition, and much, much more.« less

When Do Simpler Sexual Behavior Data Collection Techniques Suffice?: An Analysis of Consequent Uncertainty in HIV Acquisition Risk Estimates

ERIC Educational Resources Information Center

Pinkerton, Steven D.; Benotsch, Eric G.; Mikytuck, John

2007-01-01

The "gold standard" for evaluating human immunodeficiency virus (HIV) prevention programs is a partner-by-partner sexual behavior assessment that elicits information about each sex partner and the activities engaged in with that partner. When collection of detailed partner-by-partner data is not feasible, aggregate data (e.g., total…

Deodorant Characteristics of Breath Odor Occurred from Favorite Foods Using Metal Oxide Gas Sensors

NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

Seto, Shuichi; Oyabu, Takashi; Cai, Kuiqian; Katsube, Teruaki

Three types of metal oxide gas sensors were adopted to detect the degree of breath odor. Various sorts of information are included in the odor. Each sensor has different sensitivities to gaseous chemical substances and the sensitivities also differ according to human behaviors, for example taking a meal, teeth-brushing and drinking something. There is also a possibility that the sensor can detect degrees of daily fatigue. Sensor sensitivities were low for the expiration of the elderly when the subject drank green tea. In this study, it is thought that the odor system can be incorporated into a healing robot. The robot can communicate with the elderly using several words and also connect to Internet. As for the results, the robot can identify basic human behaviors and recognize the living conditions of the resident. Moreover, it can also execute a kind of information retrieval through the Internet. Therefore, it has healing capability for the aged, and can also receive and transmit information.

A biotic video game smart phone kit for formal and informal biophysics education

NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

Kim, Honesty; Lee, Seung Ah; Riedel-Kruse, Ingmar

2015-03-01

Novel ways for formal and informal biophysics education are important. We present a low-cost biotic game design kit that incorporates microbial organisms into an interactive gaming experience: A 3D-printable microscope containing four LEDs controlled by a joystick enable human players to provide directional light stimuli to the motile single-celled organism Euglena gracilis. These cellular behaviors are displayed on the integrated smart phone. Real time cell-tracking couples these cells into interactive biotic video game play, i.e., the human player steers Euglena to play soccer with virtual balls and goals. The player's learning curve in mastering this fun game is intrinsically coupled to develop a deeper knowledge about Euglena's cell morphology and the biophysics of its phototactic behavior. This kit is dual educational - via construction and via play - and it provides an engaging theme for a formal biophysics devices class as well as to be presented in informal outreach activities; its low cost and open soft- and hardware should enable wide adoption.

The Difference It Makes: A Resource Book on Gender for Educators.

ERIC Educational Resources Information Center

Chapman, Anne

The recent flood of new information on structuring human experience along gender lines and on the female component of human experience has profound implications for education. The new scholarship shows that much of what people once assumed to be innate gender difference is in fact produced by adults' different behavior toward boys and girls, of…

Lost in the Labyrinthine Library: A Multi-Method Case Study Investigating Public Library User Wayfinding Behavior

ERIC Educational Resources Information Center

Mandel, Lauren Heather

2012-01-01

Wayfinding is the method by which humans orient and navigate in space, and particularly in built environments such as cities and complex buildings, including public libraries. In order to wayfind successfully in the built environment, humans need information provided by wayfinding systems and tools, for instance architectural cues, signs, and…

Variables in Human Consequation/Feedback.

DTIC Science & Technology

1979-07-31

that make consequators effective , in each case listed according to the aspects that characterize them and their relationships with consequators ; another...category consists of the purposes and effects of consequated actions. The compilation draws variables from both cognitive research in information...This report presents salient variables in consequation or feedback processes that affect human behavior. As comprehensive a compilation has not been

The Experientiality of Sustainability: Living with Our Choices

NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

Pritchard, M.

2015-12-01

In an age when the escalating impact of human activity on the global environment has begun to threaten the long-term survival of humanity, increasing focus is being brought to bear on the scientific, social, economic, political, and cultural ramifications of the various courses of action open to individuals and societies across the globe. The intentional and intelligent modification of human behavior to balance environmental impact with human wellbeing is seen as the key to entering what Jeffrey Sachs has called the 'Age of Sustainable Development'. There are mechanisms, legal, socio-cultural, religious, economic, and technological that may ameliorate to varying degrees the environmental impact of human activity. These mechanisms are explored at length in the literature and assessed by their capacity to encourage or compel compliant behavior. They rely heavily on individual and collective choices based on rational self-interest, which is in turn informed by knowledge. The role of education in facilitating sustainable human activity is a key feature of many contributions to the literature. The alarming shortcoming in these discussions is the absence of an effective approach to learned sustainability that may achieve the necessary changes in human behavior and particularly adult choices with respect to daily acts of consumption. Sustainable practices and choices are most effectively produced through immersion in experientially based learning programs aimed at elementary and secondary school students. The experience of sustainable living during the critical phase of personal identity formation is the key to shaping behavior, and not just imparting knowledge. This AGU education session, ED041: Teaching Sustainability and Human Impact through Collaborative Teaching Methods, explores the principles on which such experiential immersion learning contributes to genuine sustainable behaviors and choices through targeted, intelligently designed residential programs.

Safety Psychology Applicating on Coal Mine Safety Management Based on Information System

NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

Hou, Baoyue; Chen, Fei

In recent years, with the increase of intensity of coal mining, a great number of major accidents happen frequently, the reason mostly due to human factors, but human's unsafely behavior are affected by insecurity mental control. In order to reduce accidents, and to improve safety management, with the help of application security psychology, we analyse the cause of insecurity psychological factors from human perception, from personality development, from motivation incentive, from reward and punishment mechanism, and from security aspects of mental training , and put forward countermeasures to promote coal mine safety production,and to provide information for coal mining to improve the level of safety management.

From genomes to societies: a holistic view of determinants of human health.

PubMed

Shi, Yuyan; Zhong, Sheng

2014-08-01

Both biological and social sciences have identified contributing factors to human health. However, health outcomes are unlikely to equal a simple sum of these identified factors. This article makes an attempt to put together the information, methods, and technologies that relate to health outcomes from biological, behavioral, and social disciplines. Much of this information was obtained by controlling for the variations of the factors in 'other' disciplines. For example, genetic factors were controlled for in identifying the behavioral determinants of health. Looking forward, better understandings of health outcomes may require exploiting the interactions of health determinants that were identified from different disciplines. We propose the concept of 'systems health' studies, which take health outcomes as the outputs of a system, where the inputs and their interactions from multiple disciplines are considered. Copyright © 2014 Elsevier Ltd. All rights reserved.

Human-Assisted Machine Information Exploitation: a crowdsourced investigation of information-based problem solving

NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

Kase, Sue E.; Vanni, Michelle; Caylor, Justine; Hoye, Jeff

2017-05-01

The Human-Assisted Machine Information Exploitation (HAMIE) investigation utilizes large-scale online data collection for developing models of information-based problem solving (IBPS) behavior in a simulated time-critical operational environment. These types of environments are characteristic of intelligence workflow processes conducted during human-geo-political unrest situations when the ability to make the best decision at the right time ensures strategic overmatch. The project takes a systems approach to Human Information Interaction (HII) by harnessing the expertise of crowds to model the interaction of the information consumer and the information required to solve a problem at different levels of system restrictiveness and decisional guidance. The design variables derived from Decision Support Systems (DSS) research represent the experimental conditions in this online single-player against-the-clock game where the player, acting in the role of an intelligence analyst, is tasked with a Commander's Critical Information Requirement (CCIR) in an information overload scenario. The player performs a sequence of three information processing tasks (annotation, relation identification, and link diagram formation) with the assistance of `HAMIE the robot' who offers varying levels of information understanding dependent on question complexity. We provide preliminary results from a pilot study conducted with Amazon Mechanical Turk (AMT) participants on the Volunteer Science scientific research platform.

Parkinson Patients' Initial Trust in Avatars: Theory and Evidence.

PubMed

Javor, Andrija; Ransmayr, Gerhard; Struhal, Walter; Riedl, René

2016-01-01

Parkinson's disease (PD) is a neurodegenerative disease that affects the motor system and cognitive and behavioral functions. Due to these impairments, PD patients also have problems in using the computer. However, using computers and the Internet could help these patients to overcome social isolation and enhance information search. Specifically, avatars (defined as virtual representations of humans) are increasingly used in online environments to enhance human-computer interaction by simulating face-to-face interaction. Our laboratory experiment investigated how PD patients behave in a trust game played with human and avatar counterparts, and we compared this behavior to the behavior of age, income, education and gender matched healthy controls. The results of our study show that PD patients trust avatar faces significantly more than human faces. Moreover, there was no significant difference between initial trust of PD patients and healthy controls in avatar faces, while PD patients trusted human faces significantly less than healthy controls. Our data suggests that PD patients' interaction with avatars may constitute an effective way of communication in situations in which trust is required (e.g., a physician recommends intake of medication). We discuss the implications of these results for several areas of human-computer interaction and neurological research.

Parkinson Patients’ Initial Trust in Avatars: Theory and Evidence

PubMed Central

Javor, Andrija; Ransmayr, Gerhard; Struhal, Walter; Riedl, René

2016-01-01

Parkinson’s disease (PD) is a neurodegenerative disease that affects the motor system and cognitive and behavioral functions. Due to these impairments, PD patients also have problems in using the computer. However, using computers and the Internet could help these patients to overcome social isolation and enhance information search. Specifically, avatars (defined as virtual representations of humans) are increasingly used in online environments to enhance human-computer interaction by simulating face-to-face interaction. Our laboratory experiment investigated how PD patients behave in a trust game played with human and avatar counterparts, and we compared this behavior to the behavior of age, income, education and gender matched healthy controls. The results of our study show that PD patients trust avatar faces significantly more than human faces. Moreover, there was no significant difference between initial trust of PD patients and healthy controls in avatar faces, while PD patients trusted human faces significantly less than healthy controls. Our data suggests that PD patients’ interaction with avatars may constitute an effective way of communication in situations in which trust is required (e.g., a physician recommends intake of medication). We discuss the implications of these results for several areas of human-computer interaction and neurological research. PMID:27820864

A Simple Exploration of Complexity at the Climate-Weather-Social-Conflict Nexus

NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

Shaw, M.

2017-12-01

The conceptualization, exploration, and prediction of interplay between climate, weather, important resources, and social and economic - so political - human behavior is cast, and analyzed, in terms familiar from statistical physics and nonlinear dynamics. A simple threshold toy model is presented which emulates human tendencies to either actively engage in responses deriving, in part, from environmental circumstances or to maintain some semblance of status quo, formulated based on efforts drawn from the sociophysics literature - more specifically vis a vis a model akin to spin glass depictions of human behavior - with threshold/switching of individual and collective dynamics influenced by relatively more detailed weather and land surface model (hydrological) analyses via a land data assimilation system (a custom rendition of the NASA GSFC Land Information System). Parameters relevant to human systems' - e.g., individual and collective switching - sensitivity to hydroclimatology are explored towards investigation of overall system behavior; i.e., fixed points/equilibria, oscillations, and bifurcations of systems composed of human interactions and responses to climate and weather through, e.g., agriculture. We discuss implications in terms of conceivable impacts of climate change and associated natural disasters on socioeconomics, politics, and power transfer, drawing from relatively recent literature concerning human conflict.

The motivation to control and the origin of mind: exploring the life-mind joint point in the Tree of Knowledge System.

PubMed

Geary, David C

2005-01-01

The evolved function of brain, cognitive, affective, conscious-psychological, and behavioral systems is to enable animals to attempt to gain control of the social (e.g., mates), biological (e.g., prey), and physical (e.g., nesting spots) resources that have tended to covary with survival and reproductive outcomes during the species' evolutionary history. These resources generate information patterns that range from invariant to variant. Invariant information is consistent across generations and within lifetimes (e.g., the prototypical shape of a human face) and is associated with modular brain and cognitive systems that coalesce around the domains of folk psychology, folk biology, and folk physics. The processing of information in these domains is implicit and results in automatic bottom-up behavioral responses. Variant information varies across generations and within lifetimes (e.g., as in social dynamics) and is associated with plastic brain and cognitive systems and explicit, consciously driven top-down behavioral responses. The fundamentals of this motivation-to-control model are outlined and links are made to Henriques' (2004) Tree of Knowledge System and Behavioral Investment Theory.

Human behavior recognition using a context-free grammar

NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

Rosani, Andrea; Conci, Nicola; De Natale, Francesco G. B.

2014-05-01

Automatic recognition of human activities and behaviors is still a challenging problem for many reasons, including limited accuracy of the data acquired by sensing devices, high variability of human behaviors, and gap between visual appearance and scene semantics. Symbolic approaches can significantly simplify the analysis and turn raw data into chains of meaningful patterns. This allows getting rid of most of the clutter produced by low-level processing operations, embedding significant contextual information into the data, as well as using simple syntactic approaches to perform the matching between incoming sequences and models. We propose a symbolic approach to learn and detect complex activities through the sequences of atomic actions. Compared to previous methods based on context-free grammars, we introduce several important novelties, such as the capability to learn actions based on both positive and negative samples, the possibility of efficiently retraining the system in the presence of misclassified or unrecognized events, and the use of a parsing procedure that allows correct detection of the activities also when they are concatenated and/or nested one with each other. An experimental validation on three datasets with different characteristics demonstrates the robustness of the approach in classifying complex human behaviors.

Computer modeling of human decision making

NASA Technical Reports Server (NTRS)

Gevarter, William B.

1991-01-01

Models of human decision making are reviewed. Models which treat just the cognitive aspects of human behavior are included as well as models which include motivation. Both models which have associated computer programs, and those that do not, are considered. Since flow diagrams, that assist in constructing computer simulation of such models, were not generally available, such diagrams were constructed and are presented. The result provides a rich source of information, which can aid in construction of more realistic future simulations of human decision making.

Automated ambulatory assessment of cognitive performance, environmental conditions, and motor activity during military operations

NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

Lieberman, Harris R.; Kramer, F. Matthew; Montain, Scott J.; Niro, Philip; Young, Andrew J.

2005-05-01

Until recently scientists had limited opportunities to study human cognitive performance in non-laboratory, fully ambulatory situations. Recently, advances in technology have made it possible to extend behavioral assessment to the field environment. One of the first devices to measure human behavior in the field was the wrist-worn actigraph. This device, now widely employed, can acquire minute-by-minute information on an individual"s level of motor activity. Actigraphs can, with reasonable accuracy, distinguish sleep from waking, the most critical and basic aspect of human behavior. However, rapid technologic advances have provided the opportunity to collect much more information from fully ambulatory humans. Our laboratory has developed a series of wrist-worn devices, which are not much larger then a watch, which can assess simple and choice reaction time, vigilance and memory. In addition, the devices can concurrently assess motor activity with much greater temporal resolution then the standard actigraph. Furthermore, they continuously monitor multiple environmental variables including temperature, humidity, sound and light. We have employed these monitors during training and simulated military operations to collect information that would typically be unavailable under such circumstances. In this paper we will describe various versions of the vigilance monitor and how each successive version extended the capabilities of the device. Samples of data from several studies are presented, included studies conducted in harsh field environments during simulated infantry assaults, a Marine Corps Officer training course and mechanized infantry (Stryker) operations. The monitors have been useful for documenting environmental conditions experienced by wearers, studying patterns of sleep and activity and examining the effects of nutritional manipulations on warfighter performance.

The human genome: a multifractal analysis

PubMed Central

2011-01-01

Background Several studies have shown that genomes can be studied via a multifractal formalism. Recently, we used a multifractal approach to study the genetic information content of the Caenorhabditis elegans genome. Here we investigate the possibility that the human genome shows a similar behavior to that observed in the nematode. Results We report here multifractality in the human genome sequence. This behavior correlates strongly on the presence of Alu elements and to a lesser extent on CpG islands and (G+C) content. In contrast, no or low relationship was found for LINE, MIR, MER, LTRs elements and DNA regions poor in genetic information. Gene function, cluster of orthologous genes, metabolic pathways, and exons tended to increase their frequencies with ranges of multifractality and large gene families were located in genomic regions with varied multifractality. Additionally, a multifractal map and classification for human chromosomes are proposed. Conclusions Based on these findings, we propose a descriptive non-linear model for the structure of the human genome, with some biological implications. This model reveals 1) a multifractal regionalization where many regions coexist that are far from equilibrium and 2) this non-linear organization has significant molecular and medical genetic implications for understanding the role of Alu elements in genome stability and structure of the human genome. Given the role of Alu sequences in gene regulation, genetic diseases, human genetic diversity, adaptation and phylogenetic analyses, these quantifications are especially useful. PMID:21999602

Octopuses (Enteroctopus dofleini) recognize individual humans.

PubMed

Anderson, Roland C; Mather, Jennifer A; Monette, Mathieu Q; Zimsen, Stephanie R M

2010-01-01

This study exposed 8 Enteroctopus dofleini separately to 2 unfamiliar individual humans over a 2-week period under differing circumstances. One person consistently fed the octopuses and the other touched them with a bristly stick. Each human recorded octopus body patterns, behaviors, and respiration rates directly after each treatment. At the end of 2 weeks, a body pattern (a dark Eyebar) and 2 behaviors (reaching arms toward or away from the tester and funnel direction) were significantly different in response to the 2 humans. The respiration rate of the 4 larger octopuses changed significantly in response to the 2 treatments; however, there was no significant difference in the 4 smaller octopuses' respiration. Octopuses' ability to recognize humans enlarges our knowledge of the perceptual ability of this nonhuman animal, which depends heavily on learning in response to visual information. Any training paradigm should take such individual recognition into consideration as it could significantly alter the octopuses' responses.

Social Media Use and Sexual Risk Reduction Behavior Among Minority Youth: Seeking Safe Sex Information.

PubMed

Stevens, Robin; Gilliard-Matthews, Stacia; Dunaev, Jamie; Todhunter-Reid, Abigail; Brawner, Bridgette; Stewart, Jennifer

Sexual health is an important area of study-particularly for minority youth and youth living in disadvantaged neighborhoods. The purpose of the research was to examine the sources of sexual health information associated with youth adopting sexual risk reduction behaviors. Data collection took place in a small city in the Northeastern United States using cross-sectional behavioral surveys and modified venue-based sampling. Participants included 249 African American and Latino youth aged 13-24. Participants reported their sources of information about contraception and human immunodeficiency virus/sexually transmitted disease, such as TV/movies, parents, social media; their intentions to have sex; and condom and contraception use during their last sexual activity. Social media use, past pregnancy experience, past sexual history, age, and gender were also measured. Standard tests of bivariate association (chi-square and F tests) were used to examine initial associations between sexual risk reduction behavior and exposure to sexual risk reduction information on social media. Logistic regression models were used to test multivariate relationships between information sources and sexual risk reduction behavior. Youth who were exposed to sexual health messages on social media were 2.69 times (p < .05) and 2.49 times (p < .08) more likely to have used contraception or a condom at last intercourse, respectively. Parents, schools, or traditional media as information sources were not significantly associated with contractive use or condom use at last intercourse. Youth sexual behavior is increasingly informed by social media messages. Health practitioners should utilize social media as an important health promotion tool.

Pet Face: Mechanisms Underlying Human-Animal Relationships

PubMed Central

Borgi, Marta; Cirulli, Francesca

2016-01-01

Accumulating behavioral and neurophysiological studies support the idea of infantile (cute) faces as highly biologically relevant stimuli rapidly and unconsciously capturing attention and eliciting positive/affectionate behaviors, including willingness to care. It has been hypothesized that the presence of infantile physical and behavioral features in companion (or pet) animals (i.e., dogs and cats) might form the basis of our attraction to these species. Preliminary evidence has indeed shown that the human attentional bias toward the baby schema may extend to animal facial configurations. In this review, the role of facial cues, specifically of infantile traits and facial signals (i.e., eyes gaze) as emotional and communicative signals is highlighted and discussed as regulating the human-animal bond, similarly to what can be observed in the adult-infant interaction context. Particular emphasis is given to the neuroendocrine regulation of the social bond between humans and animals through oxytocin secretion. Instead of considering companion animals as mere baby substitutes for their owners, in this review we highlight the central role of cats and dogs in human lives. Specifically, we consider the ability of companion animals to bond with humans as fulfilling the need for attention and emotional intimacy, thus serving similar psychological and adaptive functions as human-human friendships. In this context, facial cuteness is viewed not just as a releaser of care/parental behavior, but, more in general, as a trait motivating social engagement. To conclude, the impact of this information for applied disciplines is briefly described, particularly in consideration of the increasing evidence of the beneficial effects of contacts with animals for human health and wellbeing. PMID:27014120

Pet Face: Mechanisms Underlying Human-Animal Relationships.

PubMed

Borgi, Marta; Cirulli, Francesca

2016-01-01

Accumulating behavioral and neurophysiological studies support the idea of infantile (cute) faces as highly biologically relevant stimuli rapidly and unconsciously capturing attention and eliciting positive/affectionate behaviors, including willingness to care. It has been hypothesized that the presence of infantile physical and behavioral features in companion (or pet) animals (i.e., dogs and cats) might form the basis of our attraction to these species. Preliminary evidence has indeed shown that the human attentional bias toward the baby schema may extend to animal facial configurations. In this review, the role of facial cues, specifically of infantile traits and facial signals (i.e., eyes gaze) as emotional and communicative signals is highlighted and discussed as regulating the human-animal bond, similarly to what can be observed in the adult-infant interaction context. Particular emphasis is given to the neuroendocrine regulation of the social bond between humans and animals through oxytocin secretion. Instead of considering companion animals as mere baby substitutes for their owners, in this review we highlight the central role of cats and dogs in human lives. Specifically, we consider the ability of companion animals to bond with humans as fulfilling the need for attention and emotional intimacy, thus serving similar psychological and adaptive functions as human-human friendships. In this context, facial cuteness is viewed not just as a releaser of care/parental behavior, but, more in general, as a trait motivating social engagement. To conclude, the impact of this information for applied disciplines is briefly described, particularly in consideration of the increasing evidence of the beneficial effects of contacts with animals for human health and wellbeing.

Chorusing, synchrony, and the evolutionary functions of rhythm.

PubMed

Ravignani, Andrea; Bowling, Daniel L; Fitch, W Tecumseh

2014-01-01

A central goal of biomusicology is to understand the biological basis of human musicality. One approach to this problem has been to compare core components of human musicality (relative pitch perception, entrainment, etc.) with similar capacities in other animal species. Here we extend and clarify this comparative approach with respect to rhythm. First, whereas most comparisons between human music and animal acoustic behavior have focused on spectral properties (melody and harmony), we argue for the central importance of temporal properties, and propose that this domain is ripe for further comparative research. Second, whereas most rhythm research in non-human animals has examined animal timing in isolation, we consider how chorusing dynamics can shape individual timing, as in human music and dance, arguing that group behavior is key to understanding the adaptive functions of rhythm. To illustrate the interdependence between individual and chorusing dynamics, we present a computational model of chorusing agents relating individual call timing with synchronous group behavior. Third, we distinguish and clarify mechanistic and functional explanations of rhythmic phenomena, often conflated in the literature, arguing that this distinction is key for understanding the evolution of musicality. Fourth, we expand biomusicological discussions beyond the species typically considered, providing an overview of chorusing and rhythmic behavior across a broad range of taxa (orthopterans, fireflies, frogs, birds, and primates). Finally, we propose an "Evolving Signal Timing" hypothesis, suggesting that similarities between timing abilities in biological species will be based on comparable chorusing behaviors. We conclude that the comparative study of chorusing species can provide important insights into the adaptive function(s) of rhythmic behavior in our "proto-musical" primate ancestors, and thus inform our understanding of the biology and evolution of rhythm in human music and language.

Chorusing, synchrony, and the evolutionary functions of rhythm

PubMed Central

Ravignani, Andrea; Bowling, Daniel L.; Fitch, W. Tecumseh

2014-01-01

A central goal of biomusicology is to understand the biological basis of human musicality. One approach to this problem has been to compare core components of human musicality (relative pitch perception, entrainment, etc.) with similar capacities in other animal species. Here we extend and clarify this comparative approach with respect to rhythm. First, whereas most comparisons between human music and animal acoustic behavior have focused on spectral properties (melody and harmony), we argue for the central importance of temporal properties, and propose that this domain is ripe for further comparative research. Second, whereas most rhythm research in non-human animals has examined animal timing in isolation, we consider how chorusing dynamics can shape individual timing, as in human music and dance, arguing that group behavior is key to understanding the adaptive functions of rhythm. To illustrate the interdependence between individual and chorusing dynamics, we present a computational model of chorusing agents relating individual call timing with synchronous group behavior. Third, we distinguish and clarify mechanistic and functional explanations of rhythmic phenomena, often conflated in the literature, arguing that this distinction is key for understanding the evolution of musicality. Fourth, we expand biomusicological discussions beyond the species typically considered, providing an overview of chorusing and rhythmic behavior across a broad range of taxa (orthopterans, fireflies, frogs, birds, and primates). Finally, we propose an “Evolving Signal Timing” hypothesis, suggesting that similarities between timing abilities in biological species will be based on comparable chorusing behaviors. We conclude that the comparative study of chorusing species can provide important insights into the adaptive function(s) of rhythmic behavior in our “proto-musical” primate ancestors, and thus inform our understanding of the biology and evolution of rhythm in human music and language. PMID:25346705

Quantifying Information Flow During Emergencies

NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

Gao, Liang; Song, Chaoming; Gao, Ziyou; Barabási, Albert-László; Bagrow, James P.; Wang, Dashun

2014-02-01

Recent advances on human dynamics have focused on the normal patterns of human activities, with the quantitative understanding of human behavior under extreme events remaining a crucial missing chapter. This has a wide array of potential applications, ranging from emergency response and detection to traffic control and management. Previous studies have shown that human communications are both temporally and spatially localized following the onset of emergencies, indicating that social propagation is a primary means to propagate situational awareness. We study real anomalous events using country-wide mobile phone data, finding that information flow during emergencies is dominated by repeated communications. We further demonstrate that the observed communication patterns cannot be explained by inherent reciprocity in social networks, and are universal across different demographics.

A Cognitive Game Theoretic Analysis of Conflict Alerts in Air Traffic Control

NASA Technical Reports Server (NTRS)

Erev, Ido; Gopher, Daniel; Remington, Roger

1999-01-01

The current research was motivated by the recommendation made by a joint Government/Industry committee to introduce a new traffic control system, referred to as the Free Flight. This system is designed to use recent new technology to facilitate efficient and safe air transportation. We addressed one of the major difficulties that arise in the design of this and similar multi-agent systems: the adaptive (and slippery) nature of human agents. To facilitate a safe and efficient design of this multi-agent system, designers have to rely on assessments of the expected behavior of the different agents under various scenarios. Whereas the behavior of the computerized agents is predictable, the behavior of the human agents (including air traffic controllers and pilots) is not. Experimental and empirical observations suggest that human agents are likely to adjust their behavior to the design of the system. To see the difficulty that the adaptive nature of human agents creates assume that a good approximation of the way operators currently behave is available. Given this information an optimal design can be performed. The problem arises as the human operator will learn to adjust their behavior to the new system. Following this adjustment process the assumptions made by the designer concerning the operators behavior will no longer be accurate and the system might reach a suboptimal state. In extreme situations these potential suboptimal states might involve unnecessary risk. That is, the fact that operators learn in an adaptive fashion does not imply that the system will become safer as they gain experience. At least in the context of Safety dilemmas, experience can lead to a pareto deficient risk taking behavior.

Laban movement analysis to classify emotions from motion

NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

Dewan, Swati; Agarwal, Shubham; Singh, Navjyoti

2018-04-01

In this paper, we present the study of Laban Movement Analysis (LMA) to understand basic human emotions from nonverbal human behaviors. While there are a lot of studies on understanding behavioral patterns based on natural language processing and speech processing applications, understanding emotions or behavior from non-verbal human motion is still a very challenging and unexplored field. LMA provides a rich overview of the scope of movement possibilities. These basic elements can be used for generating movement or for describing movement. They provide an inroad to understanding movement and for developing movement efficiency and expressiveness. Each human being combines these movement factors in his/her own unique way and organizes them to create phrases and relationships which reveal personal, artistic, or cultural style. In this work, we build a motion descriptor based on a deep understanding of Laban theory. The proposed descriptor builds up on previous works and encodes experiential features by using temporal windows. We present a more conceptually elaborate formulation of Laban theory and test it in a relatively new domain of behavioral research with applications in human-machine interaction. The recognition of affective human communication may be used to provide developers with a rich source of information for creating systems that are capable of interacting well with humans. We test our algorithm on UCLIC dataset which consists of body motions of 13 non-professional actors portraying angry, fear, happy and sad emotions. We achieve an accuracy of 87.30% on this dataset.

Developmental Perspectives on Oxytocin and Vasopressin

PubMed Central

Hammock, Elizabeth A D

2015-01-01

The related neuropeptides oxytocin and vasopressin are involved in species-typical behavior, including social recognition behavior, maternal behavior, social bonding, communication, and aggression. A wealth of evidence from animal models demonstrates significant modulation of adult social behavior by both of these neuropeptides and their receptors. Over the last decade, there has been a flood of studies in humans also implicating a role for these neuropeptides in human social behavior. Despite popular assumptions that oxytocin is a molecule of social bonding in the infant brain, less mechanistic research emphasis has been placed on the potential role of these neuropeptides in the developmental emergence of the neural substrates of behavior. This review summarizes what is known and assumed about the developmental influence of these neuropeptides and outlines the important unanswered questions and testable hypotheses. There is tremendous translational need to understand the functions of these neuropeptides in mammalian experience-dependent development of the social brain. The activity of oxytocin and vasopressin during development should inform our understanding of individual, sex, and species differences in social behavior later in life. PMID:24863032

Modelling human decision-making in coupled human and natural systems

NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

Feola, G.

2012-12-01

A solid understanding of human decision-making is essential to analyze the complexity of coupled human and natural systems (CHANS) and inform policies to promote resilience in the face of environmental change. Human decisions drive and/or mediate the interactions and feedbacks, and contribute to the heterogeneity and non-linearity that characterize CHANS. However, human decision-making is usually over-simplistically modeled, whereby human agents are represented deterministically either as dumb or clairvoyant decision-makers. Decision-making models fall short in the integration of both environmental and human behavioral drivers, and concerning the latter, tend to focus on only one category, e.g. economic, cultural, or psychological. Furthermore, these models render a linear decision-making process and therefore fail to account for the recursive co-evolutionary dynamics in CHANS. As a result, these models constitute only a weak basis for policy-making. There is therefore scope and an urgent need for better approaches to human decision-making, to produce the knowledge that can inform vulnerability reduction policies in the face of environmental change. This presentation synthesizes the current state-of-the-art of modelling human decision-making in CHANS, with particular reference to agricultural systems, and delineates how the above mentioned shortcomings can be overcome. Through examples from research on pesticide use and adaptation to climate change, both based on the integrative agent-centered framework (Feola and Binder, 2010), the approach for an improved understanding of human agents in CHANS are illustrated. This entails: integrative approach, focus on behavioral dynamics more than states, feedbacks between individual and system levels, and openness to heterogeneity.

Mapping collective behavior in the big-data era.

PubMed

Bentley, R Alexander; O'Brien, Michael J; Brock, William A

2014-02-01

The behavioral sciences have flourished by studying how traditional and/or rational behavior has been governed throughout most of human history by relatively well-informed individual and social learning. In the online age, however, social phenomena can occur with unprecedented scale and unpredictability, and individuals have access to social connections never before possible. Similarly, behavioral scientists now have access to "big data" sets - those from Twitter and Facebook, for example - that did not exist a few years ago. Studies of human dynamics based on these data sets are novel and exciting but, if not placed in context, can foster the misconception that mass-scale online behavior is all we need to understand, for example, how humans make decisions. To overcome that misconception, we draw on the field of discrete-choice theory to create a multiscale comparative "map" that, like a principal-components representation, captures the essence of decision making along two axes: (1) an east-west dimension that represents the degree to which an agent makes a decision independently versus one that is socially influenced, and (2) a north-south dimension that represents the degree to which there is transparency in the payoffs and risks associated with the decisions agents make. We divide the map into quadrants, each of which features a signature behavioral pattern. When taken together, the map and its signatures provide an easily understood empirical framework for evaluating how modern collective behavior may be changing in the digital age, including whether behavior is becoming more individualistic, as people seek out exactly what they want, or more social, as people become more inextricably linked, even "herdlike," in their decision making. We believe the map will lead to many new testable hypotheses concerning human behavior as well as to similar applications throughout the social sciences.

Modelling large scale human activity in San Francisco

NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

Gonzalez, Marta

2010-03-01

Diverse group of people with a wide variety of schedules, activities and travel needs compose our cities nowadays. This represents a big challenge for modeling travel behaviors in urban environments; those models are of crucial interest for a wide variety of applications such as traffic forecasting, spreading of viruses, or measuring human exposure to air pollutants. The traditional means to obtain knowledge about travel behavior is limited to surveys on travel journeys. The obtained information is based in questionnaires that are usually costly to implement and with intrinsic limitations to cover large number of individuals and some problems of reliability. Using mobile phone data, we explore the basic characteristics of a model of human travel: The distribution of agents is proportional to the population density of a given region, and each agent has a characteristic trajectory size contain information on frequency of visits to different locations. Additionally we use a complementary data set given by smart subway fare cards offering us information about the exact time of each passenger getting in or getting out of the subway station and the coordinates of it. This allows us to uncover the temporal aspects of the mobility. Since we have the actual time and place of individual's origin and destination we can understand the temporal patterns in each visited location with further details. Integrating two described data set we provide a dynamical model of human travels that incorporates different aspects observed empirically.

A Qualitative Comparison of Susceptibility and Behavior in Recreational and Occupational Risk Environments: Implications for Promoting Health and Safety.

PubMed

Haas, Emily Joy; Mattson, Marifran

2016-06-01

Although internal factors that influence risk are frequently studied to understand human behavior, external factors, including social, cultural, and institutional factors, should be better utilized to inform ways to efficiently target, tailor, and promote safety messaging to at-risk populations. Semi-structured interviews obtained data from 37 motorcyclists and 18 mineworkers about their risk perceptions and behaviors within their respective dynamic environments. A comparative thematic analysis revealed information about external factors that influence risk perceptions and behaviors. Results support the importance of qualitative approaches for assessing and targeting individuals' risk perceptions and behaviors. In addition, segmenting at-risk subgroups within target populations and tailoring messages for these at-risk groups is critical for safety behavior modification. Practitioners should utilize strategic, culture-centric risk communication that takes into account external factors when determining when, who, and what to communicate via health promotion activities to more accurately disseminate valid, empathetic, and engaging communication with a higher level of fidelity.

The neural oscillations of conflict adaptation in the human frontal region.

PubMed

Tang, Dandan; Hu, Li; Chen, Antao

2013-07-01

Incongruency between print color and the semantic meaning of a word in a classical Stroop task activates the human conflict monitoring system and triggers a behavioral conflict. Conflict adaptation has been suggested to mediate the cortical processing of neural oscillations in such a conflict situation. However, the basic mechanisms that underlie the influence of conflict adaptation on the changes of neural oscillations are not clear. In the present study, electroencephalography (EEG) data were recorded from sixteen healthy human participants while they were performing a color-word Stroop task within a novel look-to-do transition design that included two response modalities. In the 'look' condition, participants were informed to look at the color of presented words but no responses were required; in the 'do' condition, they were informed to make arranged responses to the color of presented words. Behaviorally, a reliable conflict adaptation was observed. Time-frequency analysis revealed that (1) in the 'look' condition, theta-band activity in the left- and right-frontal regions reflected a conflict-related process at a response inhibition level; and (2) in the 'do' condition, both theta-band activity in the left-frontal region and alpha-band activity in the left-, right-, and centro-frontal regions reflected a process of conflict control, which triggered neural and behavioral adaptation. Taken together, these results suggest that there are frontal mechanisms involving neural oscillations that can mediate response inhibition processes and control behavioral conflict. Copyright © 2013 Elsevier B.V. All rights reserved.

Basolateral Amygdala, Nicotinic Cholinergic Receptors, and Nicotine: pharmacological effects and addiction in animal models and humans.

PubMed

Sharp, B M

2018-05-26

The amygdala is involved in processing incoming information about rewarding stimuli and emotions that denote danger such as anxiety and fear. Bi-directional neural connections between basolateral amygdala (BLA) and brain regions such as nucleus accumbens, prefrontal cortex, hippocampus and hindbrain regions regulate motivation, cognition, and responses to stress. Altered local regulation of BLA excitability is pivotal to the behavioral disturbances characteristic of posttraumatic stress disorder (PTSD), and relapse to drug use induced by stress. Herein, we review the physiological regulation of BLA by cholinergic inputs, emphasizing the role of BLA nicotinic receptors. We review BLA-dependent effects of nicotine on cognition, motivated behaviors and emotional states, including memory, taking and seeking drugs, and anxiety and fear in humans and animal models. The alterations in BLA activity observed in animal studies inform human behavioral and brain imaging research by enabling a more exact understanding of altered BLA function. Converging evidence indicates that cholinergic signaling from basal forebrain projections to local nicotinic receptors is an important physiological regulator of BLA and that nicotine alters BLA function. In essence, BLA is necessary for: behavioral responses to stimuli that evoke anxiety and fear; reinstatement of cue-induced drug seeking; responding to second-order cues conditioned to abused drugs; reacquisition of amplified nicotine self-administration due to chronic stress during abstinence; and to promote responding for natural reward. This article is protected by copyright. All rights reserved. This article is protected by copyright. All rights reserved.

Humans identify negative (but not positive) arousal in silver fox vocalizations: implications for the adaptive value of interspecific eavesdropping.

PubMed

Filippi, Piera; Gogoleva, Svetlana S; Volodina, Elena V; Volodin, Ilya A; de Boer, Bart

2017-08-01

The ability to identify emotional arousal in heterospecific vocalizations may facilitate behaviors that increase survival opportunities. Crucially, this ability may orient inter-species interactions, particularly between humans and other species. Research shows that humans identify emotional arousal in vocalizations across multiple species, such as cats, dogs, and piglets. However, no previous study has addressed humans' ability to identify emotional arousal in silver foxes. Here, we adopted low- and high-arousal calls emitted by three strains of silver fox-Tame, Aggressive, and Unselected-in response to human approach. Tame and Aggressive foxes are genetically selected for friendly and attacking behaviors toward humans, respectively. Unselected foxes show aggressive and fearful behaviors toward humans. These three strains show similar levels of emotional arousal, but different levels of emotional valence in relation to humans. This emotional information is reflected in the acoustic features of the calls. Our data suggest that humans can identify high-arousal calls of Aggressive and Unselected foxes, but not of Tame foxes. Further analyses revealed that, although within each strain different acoustic parameters affect human accuracy in identifying high-arousal calls, spectral center of gravity, harmonic-to-noise ratio, and F0 best predict humans' ability to discriminate high-arousal calls across all strains. Furthermore, we identified in spectral center of gravity and F0 the best predictors for humans' absolute ratings of arousal in each call. Implications for research on the adaptive value of inter-specific eavesdropping are discussed.

Anthropological film: a scientific and humanistic resource.

PubMed

Soren, E R

1974-12-20

More than a scientific endeavor but not strictly one of the humanities either, anthropology stands between these basic kinds of intellectual pursuit, bridging and contributing to both. Not limited to natural history, anthropology touches art, historical process, and human values, drawing from the materials and approaches of both science and humanities. This professional interest in a broad understanding of the human condition has led anthropologists to adapt and use modern cameras and films to inquire further into the variety of ways of life of mankind and to develop method and theory to prepare anthropological film as a permanent scientific and humanistic resource. Until quite recently the evolution of human culture and organization has diverged in the hitherto isolated regions of the world. Now this divergence has virtually ceased; we are witnessing an unprecedented period in human history-one where cultural divergence has turned to cultural convergence and where the varieties of independently evolved expressions of basic human potential are giving way to a single system of modern communications, transport, commerce, and manufacturing technology. Before the varieties of ways of life of the world disappear, they can be preserved in facsimile in anthropological films. As primary, undifferentiated visual information, these films facilitate that early step in the creation of new knowledge which is sometimes called humanistic and without which scientific application lies dormant, lacking an idea to test. In keeping with the two scholarly faces of anthropology, humanistic and scientific, anthropological films may provide material permitting both humanistic insight and the more controlled formulations of science. The lightweight filming equipment recently developed has been adapted by anthropologists as a tool of scholarly visual inquiry; methods of retrieving visual data from changing and vanishing ways of life have been developed; and new ways to reveal human beings to one another by using such visual resources have been explored. As a result, not only can anthropological film records permit continued reexamination of the past human conditions from which the present was shaped, but they also facilitate an ongoing public and scientific review of the dynamics of the human behavioral and social repertoire in relation to the contemporary conditions which pattern human responses and adaptation. How man fits into and copes with the changing world is of vital interest and concern. Visual data provide otherwise unobtainable information on human potential, behavior, and social organization. Such information, fed into the public media, facilitates informed consideration of alternative possibilities. By contributing to a better informed society, such films will help make our future more human and more humane.

Unraveling dynamics of human physical activity patterns in chronic pain conditions

NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

Paraschiv-Ionescu, Anisoara; Buchser, Eric; Aminian, Kamiar

2013-06-01

Chronic pain is a complex disabling experience that negatively affects the cognitive, affective and physical functions as well as behavior. Although the interaction between chronic pain and physical functioning is a well-accepted paradigm in clinical research, the understanding of how pain affects individuals' daily life behavior remains a challenging task. Here we develop a methodological framework allowing to objectively document disruptive pain related interferences on real-life physical activity. The results reveal that meaningful information is contained in the temporal dynamics of activity patterns and an analytical model based on the theory of bivariate point processes can be used to describe physical activity behavior. The model parameters capture the dynamic interdependence between periods and events and determine a `signature' of activity pattern. The study is likely to contribute to the clinical understanding of complex pain/disease-related behaviors and establish a unified mathematical framework to quantify the complex dynamics of various human activities.

Effects of Brief Training in Sex Counseling on the Attitudes and Behaviors of Health Professionals.

ERIC Educational Resources Information Center

Mann, Jay; Wallace, Douglas

Many medical and professional schools are now including courses in human sexuality in their curricula. This paper describes a course in sex counseling principles which focuses on the content and process of sex counseling. The course is designed to impart information about human sexual function and dysfunction, and to provide some exposure to the…

Memory Effects of Speech and Gesture Binding: Cortical and Hippocampal Activation in Relation to Subsequent Memory Performance

ERIC Educational Resources Information Center

Straube, Benjamin; Green, Antonia; Weis, Susanne; Chatterjee, Anjan; Tilo, Kircher

2009-01-01

In human face-to-face communication, the content of speech is often illustrated by coverbal gestures. Behavioral evidence suggests that gestures provide advantages in the comprehension and memory of speech. Yet, how the human brain integrates abstract auditory and visual information into a common representation is not known. Our study investigates…

Effects of an Informational Brochure, Lottery-Based Financial Incentive, and Public Posting on Absenteeism of Direct-Care Human Services Employees

ERIC Educational Resources Information Center

Luiselli, James K.; DiGennaro Reed, Florence D.; Christian, Walter P.; Markowski, Andrea; Rue, Hanna C.; St. Amand, CarrieAnne; Ryan, Chad J.

2009-01-01

Chronic absenteeism is a problem encountered by many human services organizations. Large-scale intervention projects to reduce staff absences have incorporated applied behavior analysis methods but there are few studies in the extant literature. In the present study, the authors record staff absenteeism at a specialized school for students with…

A Four-Dimensional Probabilistic Atlas of the Human Brain

PubMed Central

Mazziotta, John; Toga, Arthur; Evans, Alan; Fox, Peter; Lancaster, Jack; Zilles, Karl; Woods, Roger; Paus, Tomas; Simpson, Gregory; Pike, Bruce; Holmes, Colin; Collins, Louis; Thompson, Paul; MacDonald, David; Iacoboni, Marco; Schormann, Thorsten; Amunts, Katrin; Palomero-Gallagher, Nicola; Geyer, Stefan; Parsons, Larry; Narr, Katherine; Kabani, Noor; Le Goualher, Georges; Feidler, Jordan; Smith, Kenneth; Boomsma, Dorret; Pol, Hilleke Hulshoff; Cannon, Tyrone; Kawashima, Ryuta; Mazoyer, Bernard

2001-01-01

The authors describe the development of a four-dimensional atlas and reference system that includes both macroscopic and microscopic information on structure and function of the human brain in persons between the ages of 18 and 90 years. Given the presumed large but previously unquantified degree of structural and functional variance among normal persons in the human population, the basis for this atlas and reference system is probabilistic. Through the efforts of the International Consortium for Brain Mapping (ICBM), 7,000 subjects will be included in the initial phase of database and atlas development. For each subject, detailed demographic, clinical, behavioral, and imaging information is being collected. In addition, 5,800 subjects will contribute DNA for the purpose of determining genotype– phenotype–behavioral correlations. The process of developing the strategies, algorithms, data collection methods, validation approaches, database structures, and distribution of results is described in this report. Examples of applications of the approach are described for the normal brain in both adults and children as well as in patients with schizophrenia. This project should provide new insights into the relationship between microscopic and macroscopic structure and function in the human brain and should have important implications in basic neuroscience, clinical diagnostics, and cerebral disorders. PMID:11522763

Abstinence and abstinence-only education: a review of U.S. policies and programs.

PubMed

Santelli, John; Ott, Mary A; Lyon, Maureen; Rogers, Jennifer; Summers, Daniel; Schleifer, Rebecca

2006-01-01

Abstinence from sexual intercourse is an important behavioral strategy for preventing human immunodeficiency virus (HIV), other sexually transmitted infections (STIs), and pregnancy among adolescents. Many adolescents, including most younger adolescents, have not initiated sexual intercourse and many sexually experienced adolescents and young adults are abstinent for varying periods of time. There is broad support for abstinence as a necessary and appropriate part of sexuality education. Controversy arises when abstinence is provided to adolescents as a sole choice and where health information on other choices is restricted or misrepresented. Although abstinence is theoretically fully effective, in actual practice abstinence often fails to protect against pregnancy and STIs. Few Americans remain abstinent until marriage; many do not or cannot marry, and most initiate sexual intercourse and other sexual behaviors as adolescents. Although abstinence is a healthy behavioral option for teens, abstinence as a sole option for adolescents is scientifically and ethically problematic. A recent emphasis on abstinence-only programs and policies appears to be undermining more comprehensive sexuality education and other government-sponsored programs. We believe that abstinence-only education programs, as defined by federal funding requirements, are morally problematic, by withholding information and promoting questionable and inaccurate opinions. Abstinence-only programs threaten fundamental human rights to health, information, and life.

Unraveling the sub-processes of selective attention: insights from dynamic modeling and continuous behavior.

PubMed

Frisch, Simon; Dshemuchadse, Maja; Görner, Max; Goschke, Thomas; Scherbaum, Stefan

2015-11-01

Selective attention biases information processing toward stimuli that are relevant for achieving our goals. However, the nature of this bias is under debate: Does it solely rely on the amplification of goal-relevant information or is there a need for additional inhibitory processes that selectively suppress currently distracting information? Here, we explored the processes underlying selective attention with a dynamic, modeling-based approach that focuses on the continuous evolution of behavior over time. We present two dynamic neural field models incorporating the diverging theoretical assumptions. Simulations with both models showed that they make similar predictions with regard to response times but differ markedly with regard to their continuous behavior. Human data observed via mouse tracking as a continuous measure of performance revealed evidence for the model solely based on amplification but no indication of persisting selective distracter inhibition.

Multimodal integration of micro-Doppler sonar and auditory signals for behavior classification with convolutional networks.

PubMed

Dura-Bernal, Salvador; Garreau, Guillaume; Georgiou, Julius; Andreou, Andreas G; Denham, Susan L; Wennekers, Thomas

2013-10-01

The ability to recognize the behavior of individuals is of great interest in the general field of safety (e.g. building security, crowd control, transport analysis, independent living for the elderly). Here we report a new real-time acoustic system for human action and behavior recognition that integrates passive audio and active micro-Doppler sonar signatures over multiple time scales. The system architecture is based on a six-layer convolutional neural network, trained and evaluated using a dataset of 10 subjects performing seven different behaviors. Probabilistic combination of system output through time for each modality separately yields 94% (passive audio) and 91% (micro-Doppler sonar) correct behavior classification; probabilistic multimodal integration increases classification performance to 98%. This study supports the efficacy of micro-Doppler sonar systems in characterizing human actions, which can then be efficiently classified using ConvNets. It also demonstrates that the integration of multiple sources of acoustic information can significantly improve the system's performance.

Distinct contributions of functional and deep neural network features to representational similarity of scenes in human brain and behavior

PubMed Central

Greene, Michelle R; Baldassano, Christopher; Fei-Fei, Li; Beck, Diane M; Baker, Chris I

2018-01-01

Inherent correlations between visual and semantic features in real-world scenes make it difficult to determine how different scene properties contribute to neural representations. Here, we assessed the contributions of multiple properties to scene representation by partitioning the variance explained in human behavioral and brain measurements by three feature models whose inter-correlations were minimized a priori through stimulus preselection. Behavioral assessments of scene similarity reflected unique contributions from a functional feature model indicating potential actions in scenes as well as high-level visual features from a deep neural network (DNN). In contrast, similarity of cortical responses in scene-selective areas was uniquely explained by mid- and high-level DNN features only, while an object label model did not contribute uniquely to either domain. The striking dissociation between functional and DNN features in their contribution to behavioral and brain representations of scenes indicates that scene-selective cortex represents only a subset of behaviorally relevant scene information. PMID:29513219

Distinct contributions of functional and deep neural network features to representational similarity of scenes in human brain and behavior.

PubMed

Groen, Iris Ia; Greene, Michelle R; Baldassano, Christopher; Fei-Fei, Li; Beck, Diane M; Baker, Chris I

2018-03-07

Inherent correlations between visual and semantic features in real-world scenes make it difficult to determine how different scene properties contribute to neural representations. Here, we assessed the contributions of multiple properties to scene representation by partitioning the variance explained in human behavioral and brain measurements by three feature models whose inter-correlations were minimized a priori through stimulus preselection. Behavioral assessments of scene similarity reflected unique contributions from a functional feature model indicating potential actions in scenes as well as high-level visual features from a deep neural network (DNN). In contrast, similarity of cortical responses in scene-selective areas was uniquely explained by mid- and high-level DNN features only, while an object label model did not contribute uniquely to either domain. The striking dissociation between functional and DNN features in their contribution to behavioral and brain representations of scenes indicates that scene-selective cortex represents only a subset of behaviorally relevant scene information.

Perceptions of political leaders.

PubMed

David Schmitz, J; Murray, Gregg R

2017-01-01

Partisan identification is a fundamental force in individual and mass political behavior around the world. Informed by scholarship on human sociality, coalitional psychology, and group behavior, this research argues that partisan identification, like many other group-based behaviors, is influenced by forces of evolution. If correct, then party identifiers should exhibit adaptive behaviors when making group-related political decisions. The authors test this assertion with citizen assessments of the relative physical formidability of competing leaders, an important adaptive factor in leader evaluations. Using original and novel data collected during the contextually different 2008 and 2012 U.S. presidential elections, as well as two distinct measures obtained during both elections, this article presents evidence that partisans overestimate the physical stature of the presidential candidate of their own party compared with the stature of the candidate of the opposition party. These findings suggest that the power of party identification on political behavior may be attributable to the fact that modern political parties address problems similar to the problems groups faced in human ancestral times.

Exploring the potential of open big data from ticketing websites to characterize travel patterns within the Chinese high-speed rail system

PubMed Central

Luan, Xiali; Han, Shanrui; Zhou, Wen

2017-01-01

Big data have contributed to deepen our understanding in regards to many human systems, particularly human mobility patterns and the structure and functioning of transportation systems. Resonating the recent call for ‘open big data,’ big data from various sources on a range of scales have become increasingly accessible to the public. However, open big data relevant to travelers within public transit tools remain scarce, hindering any further in-depth study on human mobility patterns. Here, we explore ticketing-website derived data that are publically available but have been largely neglected. We demonstrate the power, potential and limitations of this open big data, using the Chinese high-speed rail (HSR) system as an example. Using an application programming interface, we automatically collected the data on the remaining tickets (RTD) for scheduled trains at the last second before departure in order to retrieve information on unused transit capacity, occupancy rate of trains, and passenger flux at stations. We show that this information is highly useful in characterizing the spatiotemporal patterns of traveling behaviors on the Chinese HSR, such as weekend traveling behavior, imbalanced commuting behavior, and station functionality. Our work facilitates the understanding of human traveling patterns along the Chinese HSR, and the functionality of the largest HSR system in the world. We expect our work to attract attention regarding this unique open big data source for the study of analogous transportation systems. PMID:28574991

Exploring the potential of open big data from ticketing websites to characterize travel patterns within the Chinese high-speed rail system.

PubMed

Wei, Sheng; Yuan, Jinfu; Qiu, Yanning; Luan, Xiali; Han, Shanrui; Zhou, Wen; Xu, Chi

2017-01-01

Big data have contributed to deepen our understanding in regards to many human systems, particularly human mobility patterns and the structure and functioning of transportation systems. Resonating the recent call for 'open big data,' big data from various sources on a range of scales have become increasingly accessible to the public. However, open big data relevant to travelers within public transit tools remain scarce, hindering any further in-depth study on human mobility patterns. Here, we explore ticketing-website derived data that are publically available but have been largely neglected. We demonstrate the power, potential and limitations of this open big data, using the Chinese high-speed rail (HSR) system as an example. Using an application programming interface, we automatically collected the data on the remaining tickets (RTD) for scheduled trains at the last second before departure in order to retrieve information on unused transit capacity, occupancy rate of trains, and passenger flux at stations. We show that this information is highly useful in characterizing the spatiotemporal patterns of traveling behaviors on the Chinese HSR, such as weekend traveling behavior, imbalanced commuting behavior, and station functionality. Our work facilitates the understanding of human traveling patterns along the Chinese HSR, and the functionality of the largest HSR system in the world. We expect our work to attract attention regarding this unique open big data source for the study of analogous transportation systems.

Where's the emotion? How sport psychology can inform research on emotion in human factors.

PubMed

Eccles, David W; Ward, Paul; Woodman, Tim; Janelle, Christopher M; Le Scanff, Christine; Ehrlinger, Joyce; Castanier, Carole; Coombes, Stephen A

2011-04-01

The aim of this study was to demonstrate how research on emotion in sport psychology might inform the field of human factors. Human factors historically has paid little attention to the role of emotion within the research on human-system relations. The theories, methods, and practices related to research on emotion within sport psychology might be informative for human factors because fundamentally, sport psychology and human factors are applied fields concerned with enhancing performance in complex, real-world domains. Reviews of three areas of theory and research on emotion in sport psychology are presented, and the relevancy of each area for human factors is proposed: (a) emotional preparation and regulation for performance, (b) an emotional trait explanation for risk taking in sport, and (c) the link between emotion and motor behavior. Finally, there are suggestions for how to continue cross-talk between human factors and sport psychology about research on emotion and related topics in the future. The relevance of theory and research on emotion in sport psychology for human factors is demonstrated. The human factors field and, in particular, research on human-system relations may benefit from a consideration of theory and research on emotion in sport psychology. Theories, methods, and practices from sport psychology might be applied usefully to human factors.

Measuring and Modeling Behavioral Decision Dynamics in Collective Evacuation

PubMed Central

Carlson, Jean M.; Alderson, David L.; Stromberg, Sean P.; Bassett, Danielle S.; Craparo, Emily M.; Guiterrez-Villarreal, Francisco; Otani, Thomas

2014-01-01

Identifying and quantifying factors influencing human decision making remains an outstanding challenge, impacting the performance and predictability of social and technological systems. In many cases, system failures are traced to human factors including congestion, overload, miscommunication, and delays. Here we report results of a behavioral network science experiment, targeting decision making in a natural disaster. In a controlled laboratory setting, our results quantify several key factors influencing individual evacuation decision making in a controlled laboratory setting. The experiment includes tensions between broadcast and peer-to-peer information, and contrasts the effects of temporal urgency associated with the imminence of the disaster and the effects of limited shelter capacity for evacuees. Based on empirical measurements of the cumulative rate of evacuations as a function of the instantaneous disaster likelihood, we develop a quantitative model for decision making that captures remarkably well the main features of observed collective behavior across many different scenarios. Moreover, this model captures the sensitivity of individual- and population-level decision behaviors to external pressures, and systematic deviations from the model provide meaningful estimates of variability in the collective response. Identification of robust methods for quantifying human decisions in the face of risk has implications for policy in disasters and other threat scenarios, specifically the development and testing of robust strategies for training and control of evacuations that account for human behavior and network topologies. PMID:24520331

Statistical physics of vaccination

NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

Wang, Zhen; Bauch, Chris T.; Bhattacharyya, Samit; d'Onofrio, Alberto; Manfredi, Piero; Perc, Matjaž; Perra, Nicola; Salathé, Marcel; Zhao, Dawei

2016-12-01

Historically, infectious diseases caused considerable damage to human societies, and they continue to do so today. To help reduce their impact, mathematical models of disease transmission have been studied to help understand disease dynamics and inform prevention strategies. Vaccination-one of the most important preventive measures of modern times-is of great interest both theoretically and empirically. And in contrast to traditional approaches, recent research increasingly explores the pivotal implications of individual behavior and heterogeneous contact patterns in populations. Our report reviews the developmental arc of theoretical epidemiology with emphasis on vaccination, as it led from classical models assuming homogeneously mixing (mean-field) populations and ignoring human behavior, to recent models that account for behavioral feedback and/or population spatial/social structure. Many of the methods used originated in statistical physics, such as lattice and network models, and their associated analytical frameworks. Similarly, the feedback loop between vaccinating behavior and disease propagation forms a coupled nonlinear system with analogs in physics. We also review the new paradigm of digital epidemiology, wherein sources of digital data such as online social media are mined for high-resolution information on epidemiologically relevant individual behavior. Armed with the tools and concepts of statistical physics, and further assisted by new sources of digital data, models that capture nonlinear interactions between behavior and disease dynamics offer a novel way of modeling real-world phenomena, and can help improve health outcomes. We conclude the review by discussing open problems in the field and promising directions for future research.

Physiology, behavior, and conservation.

PubMed

Cooke, Steven J; Blumstein, Daniel T; Buchholz, Richard; Caro, Tim; Fernández-Juricic, Esteban; Franklin, Craig E; Metcalfe, Julian; O'Connor, Constance M; St Clair, Colleen Cassady; Sutherland, William J; Wikelski, Martin

2014-01-01

Many animal populations are in decline as a result of human activity. Conservation practitioners are attempting to prevent further declines and loss of biodiversity as well as to facilitate recovery of endangered species, and they often rely on interdisciplinary approaches to generate conservation solutions. Two recent interfaces in conservation science involve animal behavior (i.e., conservation behavior) and physiology (i.e., conservation physiology). To date, these interfaces have been considered separate entities, but from both pragmatic and biological perspectives, there is merit in better integrating behavior and physiology to address applied conservation problems and to inform resource management. Although there are some institutional, conceptual, methodological, and communication-oriented challenges to integrating behavior and physiology to inform conservation actions, most of these barriers can be overcome. Through outlining several successful examples that integrate these disciplines, we conclude that physiology and behavior can together generate meaningful data to support animal conservation and management actions. Tangentially, applied conservation and management problems can, in turn, also help advance and reinvigorate the fundamental disciplines of animal physiology and behavior by providing advanced natural experiments that challenge traditional frameworks.

Neural mechanisms of human perceptual choice under focused and divided attention.

PubMed

Wyart, Valentin; Myers, Nicholas E; Summerfield, Christopher

2015-02-25

Perceptual decisions occur after the evaluation and integration of momentary sensory inputs, and dividing attention between spatially disparate sources of information impairs decision performance. However, it remains unknown whether dividing attention degrades the precision of sensory signals, precludes their conversion into decision signals, or dampens the integration of decision information toward an appropriate response. Here we recorded human electroencephalographic (EEG) activity while participants categorized one of two simultaneous and independent streams of visual gratings according to their average tilt. By analyzing trial-by-trial correlations between EEG activity and the information offered by each sample, we obtained converging behavioral and neural evidence that dividing attention between left and right visual fields does not dampen the encoding of sensory or decision information. Under divided attention, momentary decision information from both visual streams was encoded in slow parietal signals without interference but was lost downstream during their integration as reflected in motor mu- and beta-band (10-30 Hz) signals, resulting in a "leaky" accumulation process that conferred greater behavioral influence to more recent samples. By contrast, sensory inputs that were explicitly cued as irrelevant were not converted into decision signals. These findings reveal that a late cognitive bottleneck on information integration limits decision performance under divided attention, and places new capacity constraints on decision-theoretic models of information integration under cognitive load. Copyright © 2015 the authors 0270-6474/15/353485-14$15.00/0.

Toward applied behavior analysis of life aloft

NASA Technical Reports Server (NTRS)

Brady, J. V.

1990-01-01

This article deals with systems at multiple levels, at least from cell to organization. It also deals with learning, decision making, and other behavior at multiple levels. Technological development of a human behavioral ecosystem appropriate to space environments requires an analytic and synthetic orientation, explicitly experimental in nature, dictated by scientific and pragmatic considerations, and closely approximating procedures of established effectiveness in other areas of natural science. The conceptual basis of such an approach has its roots in environmentalism which has two main features: (1) knowledge comes from experience rather than from innate ideas, divine revelation, or other obscure sources; and (2) action is governed by consequences rather than by instinct, reason, will, beliefs, attitudes or even the currently fashionable cognitions. Without an experimentally derived data base founded upon such a functional analysis of human behavior, the overgenerality of "ecological systems" approaches render them incapable of ensuring the successful establishment of enduring space habitats. Without an experimentally derived function account of individual behavioral variability, a natural science of behavior cannot exist. And without a natural science of behavior, the social sciences will necessarily remain in their current status as disciplines of less than optimal precision or utility. Such a functional analysis of human performance should provide an operational account of behavior change in a manner similar to the way in which Darwin's approach to natural selection accounted for the evolution of phylogenetic lines (i.e., in descriptive, nonteleological terms). Similarly, as Darwin's account has subsequently been shown to be consonant with information obtained at the cellular level, so too should behavior principles ultimately prove to be in accord with an account of ontogenetic adaptation at a biochemical level. It would thus seem obvious that the most productive conceptual and methodological approaches to long-term research investments focused upon human behavior in space environments will require multidisciplinary inputs from such wide-ranging fields as molecular biology, environmental physiology, behavioral biology, architecture, sociology, and political science, among others.

Joint Force Quarterly. Issue 76, 1st Quarter 2015

DTIC Science & Technology

2015-01-01

behavior as culture is, and tapping the human capital of professionals in this area can be a powerful tool for informing strategic communication ...collection of information is estimated to average 1 hour per response, including the time for reviewing instructions , searching existing data sources...any other provision of law, no person shall be subject to a penalty for failing to comply with a collection of information if it does not display a

Social is special: A normative framework for teaching with and learning from evaluative feedback.

PubMed

Ho, Mark K; MacGlashan, James; Littman, Michael L; Cushman, Fiery

2017-10-01

Humans often attempt to influence one another's behavior using rewards and punishments. How does this work? Psychologists have often assumed that "evaluative feedback" influences behavior via standard learning mechanisms that learn from environmental contingencies. On this view, teaching with evaluative feedback involves leveraging learning systems designed to maximize an organism's positive outcomes. Yet, despite its parsimony, programs of research predicated on this assumption, such as ones in developmental psychology, animal behavior, and human-robot interaction, have had limited success. We offer an explanation by analyzing the logic of evaluative feedback and show that specialized learning mechanisms are uniquely favored in the case of evaluative feedback from a social partner. Specifically, evaluative feedback works best when it is treated as communicating information about the value of an action rather than as a form of reward to be maximized. This account suggests that human learning from evaluative feedback depends on inferences about communicative intent, goals and other mental states-much like learning from other sources, such as demonstration, observation and instruction. Because these abilities are especially developed in humans, the present account also explains why evaluative feedback is far more widespread in humans than non-human animals. Copyright © 2017 Elsevier B.V. All rights reserved.

Characterization of human-dog social interaction using owner report.

PubMed

Lit, Lisa; Schweitzer, Julie B; Oberbauer, Anita M

2010-07-01

Dog owners were surveyed for observations of social behaviors in their dogs, using questions adapted from the human Autism Diagnostic Observation Schedule (ADOS) pre-verbal module. Using 939 responses for purebred and mixed-breed dogs, three factors were identified: initiation of reciprocal social behaviors (INIT), response to social interactions (RSPNS), and communication (COMM). There were small or no effects of sex, age, breed group or training. For six breeds with more than 35 responses (Border Collie, Rough Collie, German Shepherd, Golden Retriever, Labrador Retriever, Standard Poodle), the behaviors eye contact with humans, enjoyment in interactions with human interaction, and name recognition demonstrated little variability across breeds, while asking for objects, giving/showing objects to humans, and attempts to direct humans' attention showed higher variability across these breeds. Breeds with genetically similar backgrounds had similar response distributions for owner reports of dog response to pointing. When considering these breeds according to the broad categories of "herders" and "retrievers," owners reported that the "herders" used more eye contact and vocalization, while the "retrievers" used more body contact. Information regarding social cognitive abilities in dogs provided by owner report suggest that there is variability across many social cognitive abilities in dogs and offers direction for further experimental investigations. Copyright (c) 2010 Elsevier B.V. All rights reserved.

Surface tension in human pathophysiology and its application as a medical diagnostic tool

PubMed Central

Fathi-Azarbayjani, Anahita; Jouyban, Abolghasem

2015-01-01

Introduction: Pathological features of disease appear to be quite different. Despite this diversity, the common feature of various disorders underlies physicochemical and biochemical factors such as surface tension. Human biological fluids comprise various proteins and phospholipids which are capable of adsorption at fluid interfaces and play a vital role in the physiological function of human organs. Surface tension of body fluids correlates directly to the development of pathological states. Methods: In this review, the variety of human diseases mediated by the surface tension changes of biological phenomena and the failure of biological fluids to remain in their native state are discussed. Results: Dynamic surface tension measurements of human biological fluids depend on various parameters such as sex, age and changes during pregnancy or certain disease. It is expected that studies of surface tension behavior of human biological fluids will provide additional information and might become useful in medical practice. Theoretical background on surface tension measurement and surface tension values of reference fluids obtained from healthy and sick patients are depicted. Conclusion: It is well accepted that no single biomarker will be effective in clinical diagnosis. The surface tension measurement combined with routine lab tests may be a novel non-invasive method which can not only facilitate the discovery of diagnostic models for various diseases and its severity, but also be a useful tool for monitoring treatment efficacy. We therefore expect that studies of surface tension behavior of human biological fluids will provide additional useful information in medical practice. PMID:25901295

Using full-mission simulation for human factors research in air transport operations

NASA Technical Reports Server (NTRS)

Orlady, Harry W.; Hennessy, Robert W.; Obermayer, Richard; Vreuls, Donald; Murphy, Miles R.

1988-01-01

This study examined state-of-the-art mission oriented simulation and its use in human factors research. Guidelines were developed for doing full-mission human factors research on crew member behavior during simulated air transport operations. The existing literature was reviewed. However, interviews with experienced investigators provided the most useful information. The fundamental scientific and practical issues of behavioral research in a simulation environment are discussed. Guidelines are presented for planning, scenario development, and the execution of behavioral research using full-mission simulation in the context of air transport flight operations . Research is recommended to enhance the validity and productivity of full-mission research by: (1) validating the need for high-fidelity simulation of all major elements in the operational environment, (2) improving methods for conducting full-mission research, and (3) examining part-task research on specific problems through the use of vehicles which contain higher levels of abstraction (and lower fidelity) of the operational environment.

Prosocial preferences do not explain human cooperation in public-goods games

PubMed Central

Burton-Chellew, Maxwell N.; West, Stuart A.

2013-01-01

It has become an accepted paradigm that humans have “prosocial preferences” that lead to higher levels of cooperation than those that would maximize their personal financial gain. However, the existence of prosocial preferences has been inferred post hoc from the results of economic games, rather than with direct experimental tests. Here, we test how behavior in a public-goods game is influenced by knowledge of the consequences of actions for other players. We found that (i) individuals cooperate at similar levels, even when they are not informed that their behavior benefits others; (ii) an increased awareness of how cooperation benefits others leads to a reduction, rather than an increase, in the level of cooperation; and (iii) cooperation can be either lower or higher than expected, depending on experimental design. Overall, these results contradict the suggested role of the prosocial preferences hypothesis and show how the complexity of human behavior can lead to misleading conclusions from controlled laboratory experiments. PMID:23248298

Prosocial preferences do not explain human cooperation in public-goods games.

PubMed

Burton-Chellew, Maxwell N; West, Stuart A

2013-01-02

It has become an accepted paradigm that humans have "prosocial preferences" that lead to higher levels of cooperation than those that would maximize their personal financial gain. However, the existence of prosocial preferences has been inferred post hoc from the results of economic games, rather than with direct experimental tests. Here, we test how behavior in a public-goods game is influenced by knowledge of the consequences of actions for other players. We found that (i) individuals cooperate at similar levels, even when they are not informed that their behavior benefits others; (ii) an increased awareness of how cooperation benefits others leads to a reduction, rather than an increase, in the level of cooperation; and (iii) cooperation can be either lower or higher than expected, depending on experimental design. Overall, these results contradict the suggested role of the prosocial preferences hypothesis and show how the complexity of human behavior can lead to misleading conclusions from controlled laboratory experiments.

Dunbar's number: group size and brain physiology in humans reexamined.

PubMed

de Ruiter, Jan; Weston, Gavin; Lyon, Stephen M

2011-01-01

Popular academic ideas linking physiological adaptations to social behaviors are spreading disconcertingly into wider societal contexts. In this article, we note our skepticism with one particularly popular—in our view, problematic—supposed causal correlation between neocortex size and social group size. The resulting Dunbar's Number, as it has come to be called, has been statistically tested against observed group size in different primate species. Although there may be reason to doubt the Dunbar's Number hypothesis among nonhuman primate species, we restrict ourselves here to the application of such an explanatory hypothesis to human, culture-manipulating populations. Human information process management, we argue, cannot be understood as a simple product of brain physiology. Cross-cultural comparison of not only group size but also relationship-reckoning systems like kinship terminologies suggests that although neocortices are undoubtedly crucial to human behavior, they cannot be given such primacy in explaining complex group composition, formation, or management.

Analysis of context dependence in social interaction networks of a massively multiplayer online role-playing game.

PubMed

Son, Seokshin; Kang, Ah Reum; Kim, Hyun-chul; Kwon, Taekyoung; Park, Juyong; Kim, Huy Kang

2012-01-01

Rapid advances in modern computing and information technology have enabled millions of people to interact online via various social network and gaming services. The widespread adoption of such online services have made possible analysis of large-scale archival data containing detailed human interactions, presenting a very promising opportunity to understand the rich and complex human behavior. In collaboration with a leading global provider of Massively Multiplayer Online Role-Playing Games (MMORPGs), here we present a network science-based analysis of the interplay between distinct types of user interaction networks in the virtual world. We find that their properties depend critically on the nature of the context-interdependence of the interactions, highlighting the complex and multilayered nature of human interactions, a robust understanding of which we believe may prove instrumental in the designing of more realistic future virtual arenas as well as provide novel insights to the science of collective human behavior.

White matter tractography using diffusion tensor deflection.

PubMed

Lazar, Mariana; Weinstein, David M; Tsuruda, Jay S; Hasan, Khader M; Arfanakis, Konstantinos; Meyerand, M Elizabeth; Badie, Benham; Rowley, Howard A; Haughton, Victor; Field, Aaron; Alexander, Andrew L

2003-04-01

Diffusion tensor MRI provides unique directional diffusion information that can be used to estimate the patterns of white matter connectivity in the human brain. In this study, the behavior of an algorithm for white matter tractography is examined. The algorithm, called TEND, uses the entire diffusion tensor to deflect the estimated fiber trajectory. Simulations and imaging experiments on in vivo human brains were performed to investigate the behavior of the tractography algorithm. The simulations show that the deflection term is less sensitive than the major eigenvector to image noise. In the human brain imaging experiments, estimated tracts were generated in corpus callosum, corticospinal tract, internal capsule, corona radiata, superior longitudinal fasciculus, inferior longitudinal fasciculus, fronto-occipital fasciculus, and uncinate fasciculus. This approach is promising for mapping the organizational patterns of white matter in the human brain as well as mapping the relationship between major fiber trajectories and the location and extent of brain lesions. Copyright 2003 Wiley-Liss, Inc.

Experimental econophysics: Complexity, self-organization, and emergent properties

NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

Huang, J. P.

2015-03-01

Experimental econophysics is concerned with statistical physics of humans in the laboratory, and it is based on controlled human experiments developed by physicists to study some problems related to economics or finance. It relies on controlled human experiments in the laboratory together with agent-based modeling (for computer simulations and/or analytical theory), with an attempt to reveal the general cause-effect relationship between specific conditions and emergent properties of real economic/financial markets (a kind of complex adaptive systems). Here I review the latest progress in the field, namely, stylized facts, herd behavior, contrarian behavior, spontaneous cooperation, partial information, and risk management. Also, I highlight the connections between such progress and other topics of traditional statistical physics. The main theme of the review is to show diverse emergent properties of the laboratory markets, originating from self-organization due to the nonlinear interactions among heterogeneous humans or agents (complexity).

The Role of Experience in the Behavioral Development of Human Infants: Current Status and Recommendations.

ERIC Educational Resources Information Center

White, Burton L.

This paper is designed as an information guide for those persons responsible for rearing human infants from birth to 18 months. The author provides an extensive review of the literature and trends of research in this area noting that the current volumes of knowledge in this area are not yet dependable enough to provide reliable bases for practice.…

Understanding active sampling strategies: Empirical approaches and implications for attention and decision research.

PubMed

Gottlieb, Jacqueline

2018-05-01

In natural behavior we actively gather information using attention and active sensing behaviors (such as shifts of gaze) to sample relevant cues. However, while attention and decision making are naturally coordinated, in the laboratory they have been dissociated. Attention is studied independently of the actions it serves. Conversely, decision theories make the simplifying assumption that the relevant information is given, and do not attempt to describe how the decision maker may learn and implement active sampling policies. In this paper I review recent studies that address questions of attentional learning, cue validity and information seeking in humans and non-human primates. These studies suggest that learning a sampling policy involves large scale interactions between networks of attention and valuation, which implement these policies based on reward maximization, uncertainty reduction and the intrinsic utility of cognitive states. I discuss the importance of using such paradigms for formalizing the role of attention, as well as devising more realistic theories of decision making that capture a broader range of empirical observations. Copyright © 2017 Elsevier Ltd. All rights reserved.

Tapir health and conservation medicine.

PubMed

Mangini, Paulo Rogerio; Medici, Emilia Patrícia; Fernandes-Santos, Renata Carolina

2012-12-01

Tapirs have unique nutritional needs, as well as anatomical, physiological, behavioral and ecological adaptations that must be considered when managing their health, both in the wild and in captivity. Information about how tapirs live in their natural habitats can provide crucial knowledge to prevent many of the health problems found in captivity such as infectious and parasitic diseases, reproductive issues and nutritional and behavioral disorders. Likewise, proper management in captivity can significantly contribute to in situ conservation programs. Conservation medicine is a science created to address the global health crisis that jeopardizes biodiversity causing imbalances among ecosystem, human, animal and vegetal health. In this context, common threats to tapir health and conservation, such as isolated and small populations surrounded by human activity, chemical pollution, domestic animals and their pathogenic agents, need to be better understood. This manuscript provides information about the health of tapirs both in captivity and in the wild and aims to encourage tapir conservationists worldwide to gather information about pathogen and disease dynamics and manifestation, as well as implications for tapir conservation. © 2012 Wiley Publishing Asia Pty Ltd, ISZS and IOZ/CAS.

Genetic information and ecosystem health: arguments for the application of chaos theory to identify boundary conditions for ecosystem management.

PubMed Central

Stomp, A M

1994-01-01

To meet the demands for goods and services of an exponentially growing human population, global ecosystems will come under increasing human management. The hallmark of successful ecosystem management will be long-term ecosystem stability. Ecosystems and the genetic information and processes which underlie interactions of organisms with the environment in populations and communities exhibit behaviors which have nonlinear characteristics. Nonlinear mathematical formulations describing deterministic chaos have been used successfully to model such systems in physics, chemistry, economics, physiology, and epidemiology. This approach can be extended to ecotoxicology and can be used to investigate how changes in genetic information determine the behavior of populations and communities. This article seeks to provide the arguments for such an approach and to give initial direction to the search for the boundary conditions within which lies ecosystem stability. The identification of a theoretical framework for ecotoxicology and the parameters which drive the underlying model is a critical component in the formulation of a prioritized research agenda and appropriate ecosystem management policy and regulation. PMID:7713038

Utilization of Historic Information in an Optimisation Task

NASA Technical Reports Server (NTRS)

Boesser, T.

1984-01-01

One of the basic components of a discrete model of motor behavior and decision making, which describes tracking and supervisory control in unitary terms, is assumed to be a filtering mechanism which is tied to the representational principles of human memory for time-series information. In a series of experiments subjects used the time-series information with certain significant limitations: there is a range-effect; asymmetric distributions seem to be recognized, but it does not seem to be possible to optimize performance based on skewed distributions. Thus there is a transformation of the displayed data between the perceptual system and representation in memory involving a loss of information. This rules out a number of representational principles for time-series information in memory and fits very well into the framework of a comprehensive discrete model for control of complex systems, modelling continuous control (tracking), discrete responses, supervisory behavior and learning.

Laryngeal Motor Cortex and Control of Speech in Humans

PubMed Central

Simonyan, Kristina; Horwitz, Barry

2011-01-01

Speech production is one of the most complex and rapid motor behaviors and involves a precise coordination of over 100 laryngeal, orofacial and respiratory muscles. Yet, we lack a complete understanding of laryngeal motor cortical control during production of speech and other voluntary laryngeal behaviors. In recent years, a number of studies have confirmed the laryngeal motor cortical representation in humans and provided some information about its interactions with other cortical and subcortical regions that are principally involved in vocal motor control of speech production. In this review, we discuss the organization of the peripheral and central laryngeal control based on neuroimaging and electrical stimulation studies in humans and neuroanatomical tracing studies in non-human primates. We hypothesize that the location of the laryngeal motor cortex in the primary motor cortex and its direct connections with the brainstem laryngeal motoneurons in humans, as oppose to its location in the premotor cortex with only indirect connections to the laryngeal motoneurons in non-human primates, may represent one of the major evolutionary developments in humans towards the ability to speak and vocalize voluntarily. PMID:21362688

Moral dimensions of human-wildlife conflict.

PubMed

Lute, Michelle L; Navarrete, Carlos David; Nelson, Michael Paul; Gore, Meredith L

2016-12-01

Despite increasing support for conservation globally, controversy over specific conservation policies persists among diverse stakeholders. Investigating the links between morals in relation to conservation can help increase understanding about why humans support or oppose policy, especially related to human-wildlife conflict or human conflict over wildlife. Yet the moral dimension of human-wildlife conflict has mostly gone unconsidered and unmeasured; thus, policy and programmatic efforts to reduce controversy may be missing a key part of the equation. We conducted a web-based survey (n = 1239 respondents) in Michigan (U.S.A.) to investigate cognitive and emotional influences on the value-behavior relationship. Respondents were identified by their interest and involvement in Michigan wolf management. The survey consisted of questions about values, emotions, cognitions, and behaviors relative to wolves in Michigan. We used path analysis to explore whether emotions and cognitions mediated the relationship between value and behavior. Most respondents attributed intrinsic value to wolves (n = 734) and all life (n = 773) and engaged in behaviors that benefited wolf populations and ecosystems regardless of stakeholder group (e.g., environmentalist, farmer). Attributing intrinsic value to wolves was positively related to favorable emotions toward wolves and cognitive assessments that hunting and trapping of wolves is unacceptable. Despite similarities in attribution of intrinsic value, groups differed in emotions and cognitions about wolf hunting. These differences provide a useful way to predict stakeholder behavior. Our findings may inform interventions aimed at increasing support for wolf management policies and positive interactions among stakeholders and wildlife. Leveraging agreement over intrinsic value may foster cooperation among stakeholders and garner support for controversial conservation policy. © 2016 Society for Conservation Biology.

Modeling Human Steering Behavior During Path Following in Teleoperation of Unmanned Ground Vehicles.

PubMed

Mirinejad, Hossein; Jayakumar, Paramsothy; Ersal, Tulga

2018-04-01

This paper presents a behavioral model representing the human steering performance in teleoperated unmanned ground vehicles (UGVs). Human steering performance in teleoperation is considerably different from the performance in regular onboard driving situations due to significant communication delays in teleoperation systems and limited information human teleoperators receive from the vehicle sensory system. Mathematical models capturing the teleoperation performance are a key to making the development and evaluation of teleoperated UGV technologies fully simulation based and thus more rapid and cost-effective. However, driver models developed for the typical onboard driving case do not readily address this need. To fill the gap, this paper adopts a cognitive model that was originally developed for a typical highway driving scenario and develops a tuning strategy that adjusts the model parameters in the absence of human data to reflect the effect of various latencies and UGV speeds on driver performance in a teleoperated path-following task. Based on data collected from a human subject test study, it is shown that the tuned model can predict both the trend of changes in driver performance for different driving conditions and the best steering performance of human subjects in all driving conditions considered. The proposed model with the tuning strategy has a satisfactory performance in predicting human steering behavior in the task of teleoperated path following of UGVs. The established model is a suited candidate to be used in place of human drivers for simulation-based studies of UGV mobility in teleoperation systems.

A system utilizing radio frequency identification (RFID) technology to monitor individual rodent behavior in complex social settings.

PubMed

Howerton, Christopher L; Garner, Joseph P; Mench, Joy A

2012-07-30

Pre-clinical investigation of human CNS disorders relies heavily on mouse models. However these show low predictive validity for translational success to humans, partly due to the extensive use of rapid, high-throughput behavioral assays. Improved assays to monitor rodent behavior over longer time scales in a variety of contexts while still maintaining the efficiency of data collection associated with high-throughput assays are needed. We developed an apparatus that uses radio frequency identification device (RFID) technology to facilitate long-term automated monitoring of the behavior of mice in socially or structurally complex cage environments. Mice that were individually marked and implanted with transponders were placed in pairs in the apparatus, and their locations continuously tracked for 24 h. Video observation was used to validate the RFID readings. The apparatus and its associated software accurately tracked the locations of all mice, yielding information about each mouse's location over time, its diel activity patterns, and the amount of time it was in the same location as the other mouse in the pair. The information that can be efficiently collected in this apparatus has a variety of applications for pre-clinical research on human CNS disorders, for example major depressive disorder and autism spectrum disorder, in that it can be used to quantify validated endophenotypes or biomarkers of these disorders using rodent models. While the specific configuration of the apparatus described here was designed to answer particular experimental questions, it can be modified in various ways to accommodate different experimental designs. Copyright © 2012 Elsevier B.V. All rights reserved.

Resting-State Functional Connectivity in the Human Connectome Project: Current Status and Relevance to Understanding Psychopathology.

PubMed

Barch, Deanna M

A key tenet of modern psychiatry is that psychiatric disorders arise from abnormalities in brain circuits that support human behavior. Our ability to examine hypotheses around circuit-level abnormalities in psychiatric disorders has been made possible by advances in human neuroimaging technologies. These advances have provided the basis for recent efforts to develop a more complex understanding of the function of brain circuits in health and of their relationship to behavior-providing, in turn, a foundation for our understanding of how disruptions in such circuits contribute to the development of psychiatric disorders. This review focuses on the use of resting-state functional connectivity MRI to assess brain circuits, on the advances generated by the Human Connectome Project, and on how these advances potentially contribute to understanding neural circuit dysfunction in psychopathology. The review gives particular attention to the methods developed by the Human Connectome Project that may be especially relevant to studies of psychopathology; it outlines some of the key findings about what constitutes a brain region; and it highlights new information about the nature and stability of brain circuits. Some of the Human Connectome Project's new findings particularly relevant to psychopathology-about neural circuits and their relationships to behavior-are also presented. The review ends by discussing the extension of Human Connectome Project methods across the lifespan and into manifest illness. Potential treatment implications are also considered.

Gustatory reception of chemicals affecting feeding in aedine mosquitoes

USDA-ARS?s Scientific Manuscript database

Mosquitoes vector dangerous human diseases during blood feeding. Gustatory (taste) receptor neurons in the mosquito provide important chemical information including the nature and suitability of a potential host. Here we discuss the behavior, neurophysiology and molecular mechanisms associated wit...

Aerospace medicine and biology: A continuing bibliography with indexes, supplement 273

NASA Technical Reports Server (NTRS)

1985-01-01

This bibliography lists 265 reports, articles, and other documents introduced into the NASA scientific and technical information system in June 1985. Topics in aerospace medicine and biology, metabolism, human behavior, man machine systems, and injuries are included.

Power-law regularities in human language

NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

Mehri, Ali; Lashkari, Sahar Mohammadpour

2016-11-01

Complex structure of human language enables us to exchange very complicated information. This communication system obeys some common nonlinear statistical regularities. We investigate four important long-range features of human language. We perform our calculations for adopted works of seven famous litterateurs. Zipf's law and Heaps' law, which imply well-known power-law behaviors, are established in human language, showing a qualitative inverse relation with each other. Furthermore, the informational content associated with the words ordering, is measured by using an entropic metric. We also calculate fractal dimension of words in the text by using box counting method. The fractal dimension of each word, that is a positive value less than or equal to one, exhibits its spatial distribution in the text. Generally, we can claim that the Human language follows the mentioned power-law regularities. Power-law relations imply the existence of long-range correlations between the word types, to convey an especial idea.

Human-machine analytics for closed-loop sense-making in time-dominant cyber defense problems

NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

Henry, Matthew H.

2017-05-01

Many defense problems are time-dominant: attacks progress at speeds that outpace human-centric systems designed for monitoring and response. Despite this shortcoming, these well-honed and ostensibly reliable systems pervade most domains, including cyberspace. The argument that often prevails when considering the automation of defense is that while technological systems are suitable for simple, well-defined tasks, only humans possess sufficiently nuanced understanding of problems to act appropriately under complicated circumstances. While this perspective is founded in verifiable truths, it does not account for a middle ground in which human-managed technological capabilities extend well into the territory of complex reasoning, thereby automating more nuanced sense-making and dramatically increasing the speed at which it can be applied. Snort1 and platforms like it enable humans to build, refine, and deploy sense-making tools for network defense. Shortcomings of these platforms include a reliance on rule-based logic, which confounds analyst knowledge of how bad actors behave with the means by which bad behaviors can be detected, and a lack of feedback-informed automation of sensor deployment. We propose an approach in which human-specified computational models hypothesize bad behaviors independent of indicators and then allocate sensors to estimate and forecast the state of an intrusion. State estimates and forecasts inform the proactive deployment of additional sensors and detection logic, thereby closing the sense-making loop. All the while, humans are on the loop, rather than in it, permitting nuanced management of fast-acting automated measurement, detection, and inference engines. This paper motivates and conceptualizes analytics to facilitate this human-machine partnership.

Multimodality Inferring of Human Cognitive States Based on Integration of Neuro-Fuzzy Network and Information Fusion Techniques

NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

Yang, G.; Lin, Y.; Bhattacharya, P.

2007-12-01

To achieve an effective and safe operation on the machine system where the human interacts with the machine mutually, there is a need for the machine to understand the human state, especially cognitive state, when the human's operation task demands an intensive cognitive activity. Due to a well-known fact with the human being, a highly uncertain cognitive state and behavior as well as expressions or cues, the recent trend to infer the human state is to consider multimodality features of the human operator. In this paper, we present a method for multimodality inferring of human cognitive states by integrating neuro-fuzzy network and information fusion techniques. To demonstrate the effectiveness of this method, we take the driver fatigue detection as an example. The proposed method has, in particular, the following new features. First, human expressions are classified into four categories: (i) casual or contextual feature, (ii) contact feature, (iii) contactless feature, and (iv) performance feature. Second, the fuzzy neural network technique, in particular Takagi-Sugeno-Kang (TSK) model, is employed to cope with uncertain behaviors. Third, the sensor fusion technique, in particular ordered weighted aggregation (OWA), is integrated with the TSK model in such a way that cues are taken as inputs to the TSK model, and then the outputs of the TSK are fused by the OWA which gives outputs corresponding to particular cognitive states under interest (e.g., fatigue). We call this method TSK-OWA. Validation of the TSK-OWA, performed in the Northeastern University vehicle drive simulator, has shown that the proposed method is promising to be a general tool for human cognitive state inferring and a special tool for the driver fatigue detection.

Derivation of Human Chromatic Discrimination Ability from an Information-Theoretical Notion of Distance in Color Space.

PubMed

da Fonseca, María; Samengo, Inés

2016-12-01

The accuracy with which humans detect chromatic differences varies throughout color space. For example, we are far more precise when discriminating two similar orange stimuli than two similar green stimuli. In order for two colors to be perceived as different, the neurons representing chromatic information must respond differently, and the difference must be larger than the trial-to-trial variability of the response to each separate color. Photoreceptors constitute the first stage in the processing of color information; many more stages are required before humans can consciously report whether two stimuli are perceived as chromatically distinguishable. Therefore, although photoreceptor absorption curves are expected to influence the accuracy of conscious discriminability, there is no reason to believe that they should suffice to explain it. Here we develop information-theoretical tools based on the Fisher metric that demonstrate that photoreceptor absorption properties explain about 87% of the variance of human color discrimination ability, as tested by previous behavioral experiments. In the context of this theory, the bottleneck in chromatic information processing is determined by photoreceptor absorption characteristics. Subsequent encoding stages modify only marginally the chromatic discriminability at the photoreceptor level.

Dynamic Dependence Analysis : Modeling and Inference of Changing Dependence Among Multiple Time-Series

DTIC Science & Technology

2009-06-01

isolation. In addition to being inherently multi-modal, human perception takes advantages of multiple sources of information within a single modality...restric- tion was reasonable for the applications we looked at. However, consider using a TIM to model a teacher student relationship among moving objects...That is, imagine one teacher object demonstrating a behavior for a student object. The student can observe the teacher and then recreate the behavior

Smart behavior of true slime mold in a labyrinth.

PubMed

Nakagaki, T

2001-11-01

Even for humans it is not easy to solve a maze. But the plasmodium of true slime mold, an amoeba-like unicellular organism, has shown an amazing ability to do so. This implies that an algorithm and a high computing capacity are included in the unicellular organism. In this report, we discuss information processing in the microorganism to focus on the issue as to whether the maze-solving behavior is akin to primitive intelligence.

Visual exploration and analysis of human-robot interaction rules

NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

Zhang, Hui; Boyles, Michael J.

2013-01-01

We present a novel interaction paradigm for the visual exploration, manipulation and analysis of human-robot interaction (HRI) rules; our development is implemented using a visual programming interface and exploits key techniques drawn from both information visualization and visual data mining to facilitate the interaction design and knowledge discovery process. HRI is often concerned with manipulations of multi-modal signals, events, and commands that form various kinds of interaction rules. Depicting, manipulating and sharing such design-level information is a compelling challenge. Furthermore, the closed loop between HRI programming and knowledge discovery from empirical data is a relatively long cycle. This, in turn, makes design-level verification nearly impossible to perform in an earlier phase. In our work, we exploit a drag-and-drop user interface and visual languages to support depicting responsive behaviors from social participants when they interact with their partners. For our principal test case of gaze-contingent HRI interfaces, this permits us to program and debug the robots' responsive behaviors through a graphical data-flow chart editor. We exploit additional program manipulation interfaces to provide still further improvement to our programming experience: by simulating the interaction dynamics between a human and a robot behavior model, we allow the researchers to generate, trace and study the perception-action dynamics with a social interaction simulation to verify and refine their designs. Finally, we extend our visual manipulation environment with a visual data-mining tool that allows the user to investigate interesting phenomena such as joint attention and sequential behavioral patterns from multiple multi-modal data streams. We have created instances of HRI interfaces to evaluate and refine our development paradigm. As far as we are aware, this paper reports the first program manipulation paradigm that integrates visual programming interfaces, information visualization, and visual data mining methods to facilitate designing, comprehending, and evaluating HRI interfaces.

Recognizing an individual face: 3D shape contributes earlier than 2D surface reflectance information.

PubMed

Caharel, Stéphanie; Jiang, Fang; Blanz, Volker; Rossion, Bruno

2009-10-01

The human brain recognizes faces by means of two main diagnostic sources of information: three-dimensional (3D) shape and two-dimensional (2D) surface reflectance. Here we used event-related potentials (ERPs) in a face adaptation paradigm to examine the time-course of processing for these two types of information. With a 3D morphable model, we generated pairs of faces that were either identical, varied in 3D shape only, in 2D surface reflectance only, or in both. Sixteen human observers discriminated individual faces in these 4 types of pairs, in which a first (adapting) face was followed shortly by a second (test) face. Behaviorally, observers were as accurate and as fast for discriminating individual faces based on either 3D shape or 2D surface reflectance alone, but were faster when both sources of information were present. As early as the face-sensitive N170 component (approximately 160 ms following the test face), there was larger amplitude for changes in 3D shape relative to the repetition of the same face, especially over the right occipito-temporal electrodes. However, changes in 2D reflectance between the adapter and target face did not increase the N170 amplitude. At about 250 ms, both 3D shape and 2D reflectance contributed equally, and the largest difference in amplitude compared to the repetition of the same face was found when both 3D shape and 2D reflectance were combined, in line with observers' behavior. These observations indicate that evidence to recognize individual faces accumulate faster in the right hemisphere human visual cortex from diagnostic 3D shape information than from 2D surface reflectance information.

GABAergic modulation of human social interaction in a prisoner's dilemma model by acute administration of alprazolam.

PubMed

Lane, Scott D; Gowin, Joshua L

2009-10-01

Recent work in neuroeconomics has used game theory paradigms to examine neural systems that subserve human social interaction and decision making. Attempts to modify social interaction through pharmacological manipulation have been less common. Here we show dose-dependent modification of human social behavior in a prisoner's dilemma model after acute administration of the γ-aminobutyric acid (GABA)-A modulating benzodiazepine alprazolam. Nine healthy adults received doses of placebo, 0.5, 1.0, and 2.0 mg alprazolam in a counterbalanced within-subject design, while completing multiple test blocks per day on an iterated prisoner's dilemma game. During test blocks in which peak subjective effects of alprazolam were reported, cooperative choices were significantly decreased as a function of dose. Consistent with previous reports showing that high acute doses of GABA-modulating drugs are associated with violence and other antisocial behavior, our data suggest that at sufficiently high doses, alprazolam can decrease cooperation. These behavioral changes may be facilitated by changes in inhibitory control facilitated by GABA. Game theory paradigms may prove useful in behavioral pharmacology studies seeking to measure social interaction, and may help inform the emerging field of neuroeconomics.

GABAergic modulation of human social interaction in a prisoner’s dilemma model via acute administration of alprazolam

PubMed Central

Lane, Scott D.; Gowin, Joshua L.

2010-01-01

Recent work in neuroeconomics has utilized game theory paradigms to examine neural systems that subserve human social interaction and decision making. Attempts to modify social interaction through pharmacological manipulation have been less common. Here we show dose-dependent modification of human social behavior in a prisoner’s dilemma (PD) model following acute administration of the GABA-A modulating benzodiazepine alprazolam. Nine healthy adults received doses of placebo, 0.5, 1.0, and 2.0 mg alprazolam in a counterbalanced within-subject design, while completing multiple test blocks per day on an iterated PD game. During test blocks in which peak subjective effects of alprazolam were reported, cooperative choices were significantly decreased as a function of dose. Consistent with previous reports showing that high acute doses of GABA-modulating drugs are associated with violence and other antisocial behavior, our data suggest that at sufficiently high doses, alprazolam can decrease cooperation. These behavioral changes may be facilitated by changes in inhibitory control facilitated by GABA. Game theory paradigms may prove useful in behavioral pharmacology studies seeking to measure social interaction, and may help inform the emerging field of neuroeconomics. PMID:19667972

Work and Rest Patterns and Psychomotor Vigilance Performance of Crewmemebers of the USS Jason Dunham: A Comparison of the 3/9 and 6/6 Watchstanding Schedules

DTIC Science & Technology

2014-12-31

collection of information if it does not display a currently valid OMB control number. PLEASE DO NOT RETURN YOUR FORM TO THE ABOVE ADDRESS. 1...24 3. Posttest Questionnaires .................................................................................. 26 4. Work...abnormal behavior for humans. Many human physiological functions are controlled by the circadian clock; for example, sleep and its associated functions

An Updated Version of the U.S. Air Force Multi-Attribute Task Battery (AF-MATB)

DTIC Science & Technology

2014-08-01

assessing human performance in a controlled multitask environment. The most recent release of AF-MATB contains numerous improvements and additions...Strategic Behavior, MATB, Multitasking , Task Battery, Simulator, Multi-Attribute Task Battery, Automation 16. SECURITY CLASSIFICATION OF: 17. LIMITATION OF...performance and multitasking strategy. As a result, a specific Information Throughput (IT) Mode was designed to customize the task to fit the Human

Persistent neural activity in auditory cortex is related to auditory working memory in humans and nonhuman primates

PubMed Central

Huang, Ying; Matysiak, Artur; Heil, Peter; König, Reinhard; Brosch, Michael

2016-01-01

Working memory is the cognitive capacity of short-term storage of information for goal-directed behaviors. Where and how this capacity is implemented in the brain are unresolved questions. We show that auditory cortex stores information by persistent changes of neural activity. We separated activity related to working memory from activity related to other mental processes by having humans and monkeys perform different tasks with varying working memory demands on the same sound sequences. Working memory was reflected in the spiking activity of individual neurons in auditory cortex and in the activity of neuronal populations, that is, in local field potentials and magnetic fields. Our results provide direct support for the idea that temporary storage of information recruits the same brain areas that also process the information. Because similar activity was observed in the two species, the cellular bases of some auditory working memory processes in humans can be studied in monkeys. DOI: http://dx.doi.org/10.7554/eLife.15441.001 PMID:27438411

No difference in sexual behavior of adolescent girls following Human Papilloma Virus vaccination: a case study two districts in Uganda; Nakasongola and Luwero.

PubMed

Aujo, Judith Caroline; Bakeera-Kitaka, Sabrina; Kiguli, Sarah; Mirembe, Florence

2014-02-12

Vaccination against Human Papilloma Virus (HPV) before sexual debut has been recommended by WHO as a primary prevention strategy against cervical cancer. In Uganda, vaccination against HPV started as a demonstration project among young girls in Nakasongola; and Ibanda districts. Studies have suggested that vaccination against HPV could result in risky sexual behavior and increase the risk of early sexual debut.This study was done to compare the sexual behavior of HPV vaccinated and non vaccinated adolescent girls in two neighboring districts in Uganda; and to assess whether HPV vaccination had any influence on sexual behavior of vaccinated adolescent girls. This was an unmatched comparative study, which used both qualitative and quantitative study methods. It was carried out among 400 primary school girls aged 12 to 15 years in the districts of Nakasongola (vaccinated) and Luwero (non vaccinated). Quantitative data was collected using a questionnaire while qualitative data was obtained using focus group discussions and key informant interviews. The main outcome measure was the number of sexually active girls in each group. Of the 400 girls, 8 volunteered information that they were sexually active, 5(2.5%) from Luwero (non vaccinated) and 3 (1.5%) from Nakasongola (vaccinated), but there was no statistically significant difference between the 2 groups. HPV vaccination was not significantly associated with being sexually active. There was no significant difference in sexual behavior between vaccinated and non vaccinated girls.

Cortical activity patterns predict robust speech discrimination ability in noise

PubMed Central

Shetake, Jai A.; Wolf, Jordan T.; Cheung, Ryan J.; Engineer, Crystal T.; Ram, Satyananda K.; Kilgard, Michael P.

2012-01-01

The neural mechanisms that support speech discrimination in noisy conditions are poorly understood. In quiet conditions, spike timing information appears to be used in the discrimination of speech sounds. In this study, we evaluated the hypothesis that spike timing is also used to distinguish between speech sounds in noisy conditions that significantly degrade neural responses to speech sounds. We tested speech sound discrimination in rats and recorded primary auditory cortex (A1) responses to speech sounds in background noise of different intensities and spectral compositions. Our behavioral results indicate that rats, like humans, are able to accurately discriminate consonant sounds even in the presence of background noise that is as loud as the speech signal. Our neural recordings confirm that speech sounds evoke degraded but detectable responses in noise. Finally, we developed a novel neural classifier that mimics behavioral discrimination. The classifier discriminates between speech sounds by comparing the A1 spatiotemporal activity patterns evoked on single trials with the average spatiotemporal patterns evoked by known sounds. Unlike classifiers in most previous studies, this classifier is not provided with the stimulus onset time. Neural activity analyzed with the use of relative spike timing was well correlated with behavioral speech discrimination in quiet and in noise. Spike timing information integrated over longer intervals was required to accurately predict rat behavioral speech discrimination in noisy conditions. The similarity of neural and behavioral discrimination of speech in noise suggests that humans and rats may employ similar brain mechanisms to solve this problem. PMID:22098331

No difference in sexual behavior of adolescent girls following Human Papilloma Virus vaccination: a case study two districts in Uganda; Nakasongola and Luwero

PubMed Central

2014-01-01

Background Vaccination against Human Papilloma Virus (HPV) before sexual debut has been recommended by WHO as a primary prevention strategy against cervical cancer. In Uganda, vaccination against HPV started as a demonstration project among young girls in Nakasongola; and Ibanda districts. Studies have suggested that vaccination against HPV could result in risky sexual behavior and increase the risk of early sexual debut. This study was done to compare the sexual behavior of HPV vaccinated and non vaccinated adolescent girls in two neighboring districts in Uganda; and to assess whether HPV vaccination had any influence on sexual behavior of vaccinated adolescent girls. Methods This was an unmatched comparative study, which used both qualitative and quantitative study methods. It was carried out among 400 primary school girls aged 12 to 15 years in the districts of Nakasongola (vaccinated) and Luwero (non vaccinated). Quantitative data was collected using a questionnaire while qualitative data was obtained using focus group discussions and key informant interviews. The main outcome measure was the number of sexually active girls in each group. Results Of the 400 girls, 8 volunteered information that they were sexually active, 5(2.5%) from Luwero (non vaccinated) and 3 (1.5%) from Nakasongola (vaccinated), but there was no statistically significant difference between the 2 groups. HPV vaccination was not significantly associated with being sexually active. Conclusion There was no significant difference in sexual behavior between vaccinated and non vaccinated girls. PMID:24520841

Informal Institutions and the Weaknesses of Human Behavior

DTIC Science & Technology

2005-01-01

der Wirtschafispolitik 2, 2001, S.185-210. * Haucap, Justus, Uwe Pauly & Christian Wey, Collective Wage Setting When Wages Are Generally Binding: An...in an Overlapping Generations Model, Nr. 8/1999. " Henning, Andreas & Wolfgang Greiner, Organknappheit im Transplantationswesen - L6sungs- ansditze aus

Preparing Physicians for Practice in Managed Care Environments.

ERIC Educational Resources Information Center

Lurie, Nicole

1996-01-01

Discussion of managed health care looks at its evolution and characteristics, implications for medical education, and the competencies needed by physicians in this new environment, including epidemiological thinking, understanding of human and organizational behavior, familiarity with information technology, quality control skills, knowledge of…

75 FR 5317 - Exposure Factors Handbook: 2009 Update

Federal Register 2010, 2011, 2012, 2013, 2014

2010-02-02

... chemicals. These factors include: Drinking water consumption; mouthing behavior; soil ingestion rates... document solely for the purpose of pre- dissemination peer review under applicable information quality... various factors used in assessing human exposure. This Handbook is aimed at exposure assessors inside the...

10 CFR 63.21 - Content of application.

Code of Federal Regulations, 2013 CFR

2013-01-01

... of general information and a Safety Analysis Report. An environmental impact statement must be... Analysis Report must include: (1) A description of the Yucca Mountain site, with appropriate attention to... the location of the reasonably maximally exposed individual, and regarding local human behaviors and...

10 CFR 63.21 - Content of application.

Code of Federal Regulations, 2012 CFR

2012-01-01

... of general information and a Safety Analysis Report. An environmental impact statement must be... Analysis Report must include: (1) A description of the Yucca Mountain site, with appropriate attention to... the location of the reasonably maximally exposed individual, and regarding local human behaviors and...

10 CFR 63.21 - Content of application.

Code of Federal Regulations, 2014 CFR

2014-01-01

... of general information and a Safety Analysis Report. An environmental impact statement must be... Analysis Report must include: (1) A description of the Yucca Mountain site, with appropriate attention to... the location of the reasonably maximally exposed individual, and regarding local human behaviors and...

Mobile Network Data for Public Health: Opportunities and Challenges

PubMed Central

Oliver, Nuria; Matic, Aleksandar; Frias-Martinez, Enrique

2015-01-01

The ubiquity of mobile phones worldwide is generating an unprecedented amount of human behavioral data both at an individual and aggregated levels. The study of this data as a rich source of information about human behavior emerged almost a decade ago. Since then, it has grown into a fertile area of research named computational social sciences with a wide variety of applications in different fields such as social networks, urban and transport planning, economic development, emergency relief, and, recently, public health. In this paper, we briefly describe the state of the art on using mobile phone data for public health, and present the opportunities and challenges that this kind of data presents for public health. PMID:26301211

The Role of Hedonic Behavior in Reducing Perceived Risk

PubMed Central

Jia, Jayson S.; Jia, Jianmin; Hsee, Christopher K.; Shiv, Baba

2016-01-01

Understanding how human populations naturally respond to and cope with risk is important for fields ranging from psychology to public health. We used geophysical and individual-level mobile-phone data (mobile-apps, telecommunications, and Web usage) of 157,358 victims of the 2013 Ya’an earthquake to diagnose the effects of the disaster and investigate how experiencing real risk (at different levels of intensity) changes behavior. Rather than limiting human activity, higher earthquake intensity resulted in graded increases in usage of communications apps (e.g., social networking, messaging), functional apps (e.g., informational tools), and hedonic apps (e.g., music, videos, games). Combining mobile data with a field survey (N = 2,000) completed 1 week after the earthquake, we use an instrumental-variable approach to show that only increases in hedonic behavior reduced perceived risk. Thus, hedonic behavior could potentially serve as a population-scale coping and recovery strategy that is often missing in risk management and policy considerations. PMID:27881710

Development of social skills in children: neural and behavioral evidence for the elaboration of cognitive models

PubMed Central

Soto-Icaza, Patricia; Aboitiz, Francisco; Billeke, Pablo

2015-01-01

Social skills refer to a wide group of abilities that allow us to interact and communicate with others. Children learn how to solve social situations by predicting and understanding other's behaviors. The way in which humans learn to interact successfully with others encompasses a complex interaction between neural, behavioral, and environmental elements. These have a role in the accomplishment of positive developmental outcomes, including peer acceptance, academic achievement, and mental health. All these social abilities depend on widespread brain networks that are recently being studied by neuroscience. In this paper, we will first review the studies on this topic, aiming to clarify the behavioral and neural mechanisms related to the acquisition of social skills during infancy and their appearance in time. Second, we will briefly describe how developmental diseases like Autism Spectrum Disorders (ASD) can inform about the neurobiological mechanisms of social skills. We finally sketch a general framework for the elaboration of cognitive models in order to facilitate the comprehension of human social development. PMID:26483621

Development of social skills in children: neural and behavioral evidence for the elaboration of cognitive models.

PubMed

Soto-Icaza, Patricia; Aboitiz, Francisco; Billeke, Pablo

2015-01-01

Social skills refer to a wide group of abilities that allow us to interact and communicate with others. Children learn how to solve social situations by predicting and understanding other's behaviors. The way in which humans learn to interact successfully with others encompasses a complex interaction between neural, behavioral, and environmental elements. These have a role in the accomplishment of positive developmental outcomes, including peer acceptance, academic achievement, and mental health. All these social abilities depend on widespread brain networks that are recently being studied by neuroscience. In this paper, we will first review the studies on this topic, aiming to clarify the behavioral and neural mechanisms related to the acquisition of social skills during infancy and their appearance in time. Second, we will briefly describe how developmental diseases like Autism Spectrum Disorders (ASD) can inform about the neurobiological mechanisms of social skills. We finally sketch a general framework for the elaboration of cognitive models in order to facilitate the comprehension of human social development.

The Role of Hedonic Behavior in Reducing Perceived Risk.

PubMed

Jia, Jayson S; Jia, Jianmin; Hsee, Christopher K; Shiv, Baba

2017-01-01

Understanding how human populations naturally respond to and cope with risk is important for fields ranging from psychology to public health. We used geophysical and individual-level mobile-phone data (mobile-apps, telecommunications, and Web usage) of 157,358 victims of the 2013 Ya'an earthquake to diagnose the effects of the disaster and investigate how experiencing real risk (at different levels of intensity) changes behavior. Rather than limiting human activity, higher earthquake intensity resulted in graded increases in usage of communications apps (e.g., social networking, messaging), functional apps (e.g., informational tools), and hedonic apps (e.g., music, videos, games). Combining mobile data with a field survey ( N = 2,000) completed 1 week after the earthquake, we use an instrumental-variable approach to show that only increases in hedonic behavior reduced perceived risk. Thus, hedonic behavior could potentially serve as a population-scale coping and recovery strategy that is often missing in risk management and policy considerations.

Supporting implementation of evidence-based behavioral interventions: the role of data liquidity in facilitating translational behavioral medicine.

PubMed

Abernethy, Amy P; Wheeler, Jane L; Courtney, Paul K; Keefe, Francis J

2011-03-01

The advancement of translational behavioral medicine will require that we discover new methods of managing large volumes of data from disparate sources such as disease surveillance systems, public health systems, and health information systems containing patient-centered data informed by behavioral and social sciences. The term "liquidity," when applied to data, refers to its availability and free flow throughout human/computer interactions. In seeking to achieve liquidity, the focus is not on creating a single, comprehensive database or set of coordinated datasets, nor is it solely on developing the electronic health record as the "one-stop shopping" source of health-related data. Rather, attention is on ensuring the availability of secure data through the various methods of collecting and storing data currently existent or under development-so that these components of the health information infrastructure together support a liquid data system. The value of accessible, interoperable, high-volume, reliable, secure, and contextually appropriate data is becoming apparent in many areas of the healthcare system, and health information liquidity is currently viewed as an important component of a patient-centered healthcare system. The translation from research interventions to behavioral and psychosocial indicators challenges the designers of healthcare systems to include this new set of data in the correct context. With the intention of advancing translational behavioral medicine at the local level, "on the ground" in the clinical office and research institution, this commentary discusses data liquidity from the patient's and clinician's perspective, requirements for a liquid healthcare data system, and the ways in which data liquidity can support translational behavioral medicine.

City rats: insight from rat spatial behavior into human cognition in urban environments.

PubMed

Yaski, Osnat; Portugali, Juval; Eilam, David

2011-09-01

The structure and shape of the urban environment influence our ability to find our way about in the city. Understanding how the physical properties of the environment affect spatial behavior and cognition is therefore a necessity. However, there are inherent difficulties in empirically studying complex and large-scale urban environments. These include the need to isolate the impact of specific urban features and to acquire data on the physical activity of individuals. In the present study, we attempted to overcome the above obstacles and examine the relation between urban environments and spatial cognition by testing the spatial behavior of rats. This idea originated from the resemblance in the operative brain functions and in the mechanisms and strategies employed by humans and other animals when acquiring spatial information and establishing an internal representation, as revealed in past studies. Accordingly, we tested rats in arenas that simulated a grid urban layout (e.g. Manhattan streets) and an irregular urban layout (e.g. Jerusalem streets). We found that in the grid layout, rat movement was more structured and extended over a greater area compared with their restricted movement in the irregular layout. These movement patterns recall those of humans in respective urban environments, illustrating that the structure and shape of the environment affect spatial behavior similarly in humans and rats. Overall, testing rats in environments that simulate facets of urban environments can provide new insights into human spatial cognition in urban environments.

Sexual differentiation of human behavior: effects of prenatal and pubertal organizational hormones.

PubMed

Berenbaum, Sheri A; Beltz, Adriene M

2011-04-01

A key question concerns the extent to which sexual differentiation of human behavior is influenced by sex hormones present during sensitive periods of development (organizational effects), as occurs in other mammalian species. The most important sensitive period has been considered to be prenatal, but there is increasing attention to puberty as another organizational period, with the possibility of decreasing sensitivity to sex hormones across the pubertal transition. In this paper, we review evidence that sex hormones present during the prenatal and pubertal periods produce permanent changes to behavior. There is good evidence that exposure to high levels of androgens during prenatal development results in masculinization of activity and occupational interests, sexual orientation, and some spatial abilities; prenatal androgens have a smaller effect on gender identity, and there is insufficient information about androgen effects on sex-linked behavior problems. There is little good evidence regarding long-lasting behavioral effects of pubertal hormones, but there is some suggestion that they influence gender identity and perhaps some sex-linked forms of psychopathology, and there are many opportunities to study this issue. Copyright © 2011 Elsevier Inc. All rights reserved.

Coherent activity between brain regions that code for value is linked to the malleability of human behavior

PubMed Central

Cooper, Nicole; Bassett, Danielle S.; Falk, Emily B.

2017-01-01

Brain activity in medial prefrontal cortex (MPFC) during exposure to persuasive messages can predict health behavior change. This brain-behavior relationship has been linked to areas of MPFC previously associated with self-related processing; however, the mechanism underlying this relationship is unclear. We explore two components of self-related processing – self-reflection and subjective valuation – and examine coherent activity between relevant networks of brain regions during exposure to health messages encouraging exercise and discouraging sedentary behaviors. We find that objectively logged reductions in sedentary behavior in the following month are linked to functional connectivity within brain regions associated with positive valuation, but not within regions associated with self-reflection on personality traits. Furthermore, functional connectivity between valuation regions contributes additional information compared to average brain activation within single brain regions. These data support an account in which MPFC integrates the value of messages to the self during persuasive health messaging and speak to broader questions of how humans make decisions about how to behave. PMID:28240271

"Artificial humans": Psychology and neuroscience perspectives on embodiment and nonverbal communication.

PubMed

Vogeley, Kai; Bente, Gary

2010-01-01

"Artificial humans", so-called "Embodied Conversational Agents" and humanoid robots, are assumed to facilitate human-technology interaction referring to the unique human capacities of interpersonal communication and social information processing. While early research and development in artificial intelligence (AI) focused on processing and production of natural language, the "new AI" has also taken into account the emotional and relational aspects of communication with an emphasis both on understanding and production of nonverbal behavior. This shift in attention in computer science and engineering is reflected in recent developments in psychology and social cognitive neuroscience. This article addresses key challenges which emerge from the goal to equip machines with socio-emotional intelligence and to enable them to interpret subtle nonverbal cues and to respond to social affordances with naturally appearing behavior from both perspectives. In particular, we propose that the creation of credible artificial humans not only defines the ultimate test for our understanding of human communication and social cognition but also provides a unique research tool to improve our knowledge about the underlying psychological processes and neural mechanisms. Copyright © 2010. Published by Elsevier Ltd.

Scalable, Secure Analysis of Social Sciences Data on the Azure Platform

DOE Office of Scientific and Technical Information (OSTI.GOV)

Simmhan, Yogesh; Deng, Litao; Kumbhare, Alok

2012-05-07

Human activity and interaction data is beginning to be collected at population scales through the pervasiveness of social media and willingness of people to volunteer information. This can allow social science researchers to understand and model human behavior with better accuracy and prediction power. Political and social scientists are starting to correlate such large scale social media datasets with events that impact society as evidence abound of the virtual and physical public spaces intersecting and influencing each other [1,2]. Managers of Cyber Physical Systems such as Smart Power Grid utilities are investigating the impact of consumer behavior on power consumption,more » and the possibility of influencing the usage profile [3]. Data collection is also made easier through technology such as mobile apps, social media sites and search engines that directly collect data, and sensors such smart meters and room occupancy sensors that indirectly measure human activity. These technology platforms also provide a convenient framework for “human sensors” to record and broadcast data for behavioral studies, as a form of crowd sourced citizen science. This has the added advantage of engaging the broader public in STEM activities and help influence public policy.« less

Deficits in voice and multisensory processing in patients with Prader-Willi syndrome.

PubMed

Salles, Juliette; Strelnikov, Kuzma; Carine, Mantoulan; Denise, Thuilleaux; Laurier, Virginie; Molinas, Catherine; Tauber, Maïthé; Barone, Pascal

2016-05-01

Prader-Willi syndrome (PWS) is a rare neurodevelopmental and genetic disorder that is characterized by various expression of endocrine, cognitive and behavioral problems, among which a true obsession for food and a deficit of satiety that leads to hyperphagia and severe obesity. Neuropsychological studies have reported that PWS display altered social interactions with a specific weakness in interpreting social information and in responding to them, a symptom closed to that observed in autism spectrum disorders (ASD). Based on the hypothesis that atypical multisensory integration such as face and voice interactions would contribute in PWS to social impairment we investigate the abilities of PWS to process communication signals including the human voice. Patients with PWS recruited from the national reference center for PWS performed a simple detection task of stimuli presented in an uni-o or bimodal condition, as well as a voice discrimination task. Compared to control typically developing (TD) individuals, PWS present a specific deficit in discriminating human voices from environmental sounds. Further, PWS present a much lower multisensory benefits with an absence of violation of the race model indicating that multisensory information do not converge and interact prior to the initiation of the behavioral response. All the deficits observed in PWS were stronger for the subgroup of patients suffering from Uniparental Disomy, a population known to be more sensitive to ASD. Altogether, our study suggests that the deficits in social behavior observed in PWS derive at least partly from an impairment in deciphering the social information carried by voice signals, face signals, and the combination of both. In addition, our work is in agreement with the brain imaging studies revealing an alteration in PWS of the "social brain network" including the STS region involved in processing human voices. Copyright © 2016 Elsevier Ltd. All rights reserved.

The Perception of Cooperativeness Without Any Visual or Auditory Communication.

PubMed

Chang, Dong-Seon; Burger, Franziska; Bülthoff, Heinrich H; de la Rosa, Stephan

2015-12-01

Perceiving social information such as the cooperativeness of another person is an important part of human interaction. But can people perceive the cooperativeness of others even without any visual or auditory information? In a novel experimental setup, we connected two people with a rope and made them accomplish a point-collecting task together while they could not see or hear each other. We observed a consistently emerging turn-taking behavior in the interactions and installed a confederate in a subsequent experiment who either minimized or maximized this behavior. Participants experienced this only through the haptic force-feedback of the rope and made evaluations about the confederate after each interaction. We found that perception of cooperativeness was significantly affected only by the manipulation of this turn-taking behavior. Gender- and size-related judgments also significantly differed. Our results suggest that people can perceive social information such as the cooperativeness of other people even in situations where possibilities for communication are minimal.

Social networks and environmental outcomes.

PubMed

Barnes, Michele L; Lynham, John; Kalberg, Kolter; Leung, PingSun

2016-06-07

Social networks can profoundly affect human behavior, which is the primary force driving environmental change. However, empirical evidence linking microlevel social interactions to large-scale environmental outcomes has remained scarce. Here, we leverage comprehensive data on information-sharing networks among large-scale commercial tuna fishers to examine how social networks relate to shark bycatch, a global environmental issue. We demonstrate that the tendency for fishers to primarily share information within their ethnic group creates segregated networks that are strongly correlated with shark bycatch. However, some fishers share information across ethnic lines, and examinations of their bycatch rates show that network contacts are more strongly related to fishing behaviors than ethnicity. Our findings indicate that social networks are tied to actions that can directly impact marine ecosystems, and that biases toward within-group ties may impede the diffusion of sustainable behaviors. Importantly, our analysis suggests that enhanced communication channels across segregated fisher groups could have prevented the incidental catch of over 46,000 sharks between 2008 and 2012 in a single commercial fishery.

The Perception of Cooperativeness Without Any Visual or Auditory Communication

PubMed Central

Chang, Dong-Seon; Burger, Franziska; de la Rosa, Stephan

2015-01-01

Perceiving social information such as the cooperativeness of another person is an important part of human interaction. But can people perceive the cooperativeness of others even without any visual or auditory information? In a novel experimental setup, we connected two people with a rope and made them accomplish a point-collecting task together while they could not see or hear each other. We observed a consistently emerging turn-taking behavior in the interactions and installed a confederate in a subsequent experiment who either minimized or maximized this behavior. Participants experienced this only through the haptic force-feedback of the rope and made evaluations about the confederate after each interaction. We found that perception of cooperativeness was significantly affected only by the manipulation of this turn-taking behavior. Gender- and size-related judgments also significantly differed. Our results suggest that people can perceive social information such as the cooperativeness of other people even in situations where possibilities for communication are minimal. PMID:27551362

The Selfish Goal: autonomously operating motivational structures as the proximate cause of human judgment and behavior.

PubMed

Huang, Julie Y; Bargh, John A

2014-04-01

We propose the Selfish Goal model, which holds that a person's behavior is driven by psychological processes called goals that guide his or her behavior, at times in contradictory directions. Goals can operate both consciously and unconsciously, and when activated they can trigger downstream effects on a person's information processing and behavioral possibilities that promote only the attainment of goal end-states (and not necessarily the overall interests of the individual). Hence, goals influence a person as if the goals themselves were selfish and interested only in their own completion. We argue that there is an evolutionary basis to believe that conscious goals evolved from unconscious and selfish forms of pursuit. This theoretical framework predicts the existence of unconscious goal processes capable of guiding behavior in the absence of conscious awareness and control (the automaticity principle), the ability of the most motivating or active goal to constrain a person's information processing and behavior toward successful completion of that goal (the reconfiguration principle), structural similarities between conscious and unconscious goal pursuit (the similarity principle), and goal influences that produce apparent inconsistencies or counterintuitive behaviors in a person's behavior extended over time (the inconsistency principle). Thus, we argue that a person's behaviors are indirectly selected at the goal level but expressed (and comprehended) at the individual level.

Opponent Classification in Poker

NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

Ahmad, Muhammad Aurangzeb; Elidrisi, Mohamed

Modeling games has a long history in the Artificial Intelligence community. Most of the games that have been considered solved in AI are perfect information games. Imperfect information games like Poker and Bridge represent a domain where there is a great deal of uncertainty involved and additional challenges with respect to modeling the behavior of the opponent etc. Techniques developed for playing imperfect games also have many real world applications like repeated online auctions, human computer interaction, opponent modeling for military applications etc. In this paper we explore different techniques for playing poker, the core of these techniques is opponent modeling via classifying the behavior of opponent according to classes provided by domain experts. We utilize windows of full observation in the game to classify the opponent. In Poker, the behavior of an opponent is classified into four standard poker-playing styles based on a subjective function.

Information for Successful Interaction with Autonomous Systems

NASA Technical Reports Server (NTRS)

Malin, Jane T.; Johnson, Kathy A.

2003-01-01

Interaction in heterogeneous mission operations teams is not well matched to classical models of coordination with autonomous systems. We describe methods of loose coordination and information management in mission operations. We describe an information agent and information management tool suite for managing information from many sources, including autonomous agents. We present an integrated model of levels of complexity of agent and human behavior, which shows types of information processing and points of potential error in agent activities. We discuss the types of information needed for diagnosing problems and planning interactions with an autonomous system. We discuss types of coordination for which designs are needed for autonomous system functions.

Assessing Anthropogenic Impacts on Tunas, Sharks and Billfishes with Direct Observations of Human Fishers on the High Seas

NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

Block, B.; Ferretti, F.; White, T.; De Leo, G.; Hazen, E. L.; Bograd, S. J.

2016-12-01

Anthropogenic impacts on marine predators have been examined within exclusive economic zones, but few data sets have enabled assessing human fishing impacts on the high seas. By combining large electronic tagging databases archiving mobile predator movements (e.g. Tagging of Pacific Pelagics, TAG A Giant, Animal Telemetry Network) with the global fishing catch and fishing effort data, from satellite tracks of vessels on the high seas (AIS), a better understanding of human use and exploitation at a global scale can be obtained. This capacity to combine the movements of mobile ocean predators (tunas, sharks, billfishes) with analyses of their human predator's behaviors, via examination of the global fishing fleet activities is unprecedented due to the new access researchers are garnering to these big satellite derived AIS databases. Global Fishing Watch is one example of such a data provider, that now makes accessible, the AIS data from the global community of maritime vessels, and has developed along with researchers new algorithms that delineate distinct types of fishing vessel behaviors (longline, purse seiner) and effort. When combined with satellite tagging data of mobile apex predators, oceanographic preferences, records of fishing fleets catches, targeted species and economic drivers of fisheries, new quantitative insights can be gained about the catch reporting of fleets, and the pelagic species targeted at a global scale. Research communities can now also examine how humans behave on the high seas, and potentially improve how fish stocks, such as tunas, billfishes, and sharks are exploited. The capacity to gather information on diverse human fishing fleets and behaviors remotely, should provide a wealth of new tools that can potentially be applied toward the resource management efforts surrounding these global fishing fleets. This type of information is essential for prioritizing regions of conservation concern for megaufauna swimming in our oceans.

Can fear extinction be enhanced? A review of pharmacological and behavioral findings

PubMed Central

Fitzgerald, Paul J.; Seemann, Jocelyn R.; Maren, Stephen

2014-01-01

There is considerable interest, from both a basic and clinical standpoint, in gaining a greater understanding of how pharmaceutical or behavioral manipulations alter fear extinction in animals. Not only does fear extinction in rodents model exposure therapy in humans, where the latter is a cornerstone of behavioral intervention for anxiety disorders such as post-traumatic stress disorder and specific phobias, but also understanding more about extinction provides basic information into learning and memory processes and their underlying circuitry. In this paper, we briefly review three principal approaches that have been used to modulate extinction processes in animals and humans: a purely pharmacological approach, the more widespread approach of combining pharmacology with behavior, and a purely behavioral approach. The pharmacological studies comprise modulation by: brain derived neurotrophic factor (BDNF), d-cycloserine, serotonergic and noradrenergic drugs, neuropeptides, endocannabinoids, glucocorticoids, histone deacetylase (HDAC) inhibitors, and others. These studies strongly suggest that extinction can be modulated by drugs, behavioral interventions, or their combination, although not always in a lasting manner. We suggest that pharmacotherapeutic manipulations provide considerable promise for promoting effective and lasting fear reduction in individuals with anxiety disorders. PMID:24374101

Men's Intentions to Engage in Behaviors to Protect Against Human Papillomavirus (HPV): Testing the Risk Perception Attitude Framework.

PubMed

Pask, Elizabeth B; Rawlins, Sarah T

2016-01-01

Guided by the risk perception attitude framework (RPA), this study examined men's perceptions of risk and efficacy beliefs as predictors of their intentions to engage in self-protective behaviors. The results of multiple regression analyses did not provide support for the RPA prediction that efficacy beliefs moderate the relationship between risk perceptions and self-protective behavior. However, the results provide support for the main effects of risk and efficacy on all four behavioral intentions examined (i.e., Internet information seeking, communication with a health provider, HPV vaccination, and condom use). Risk and efficacy were positively related to (and significant individual predictors of) all four behavioral intentions. Scholarly and practical implications of these findings are discussed.

Predictive Coding Strategies for Invariant Object Recognition and Volitional Motion Control in Neuromorphic Agents

DTIC Science & Technology

2015-09-02

human behavior. In this project, we hypothesized that visual memory of past motion trajectories may be used for selecting future behavior. In other...34Decoding sequence of actions using fMRI ", Society for Neuroscience Annual Meeting, San Diego, CA, USA, Nov 9-13 2013 (only abstract) 3. Hansol Choi, Dae...Shik Kim, "Planning as inference in a Hierarchical Predictive Memory ", Proceedings of International Conference on Neural Information Processing

Use of GDNF-Releasing Nanofiber Nerve Guide Conduits for the Repair of Conus Medullaris/Cauda Equina Injury in the Non-Human Primate

DTIC Science & Technology

2012-10-01

peripheral nerve graft to bridge the tissue gap. A comprehensive set of electrodiagnostic, imaging , behavioral and anatomical studies will provide...spinal cord and avulsed ventral roots. All 20 surgeries have been completed and collections of comprehensive functional and imaging data are in...gap. A comprehensive set of electrodiagnostic, imaging , behavioral and anatomical studies will provide detailed information about the outcome of the

THE COGNITIVE NEUROSCIENCE OF WORKING MEMORY

PubMed Central

D’Esposito, Mark; Postle, Bradley R.

2015-01-01

For over 50 years, psychologists and neuroscientists have recognized the importance of a “working memory” to coordinate processing when multiple goals are active, and to guide behavior with information that is not present in the immediate environment. In recent years, psychological theory and cognitive neuroscience data have converged on the idea that information is encoded into working memory via the allocation of attention to internal representations – be they semantic long-term memory (e.g., letters, digits, words), sensory, or motoric. Thus, information-based multivariate analyses of human functional MRI data typically find evidence for the temporary representation of stimuli in regions that also process this information in nonworking-memory contexts. The prefrontal cortex, on the other hand, exerts control over behavior by biasing the salience of mnemonic representations, and adjudicating among competing, context-dependent rules. The “control of the controller” emerges from a complex interplay between PFC and striatal circuits, and ascending dopaminergic neuromodulatory signals. PMID:25251486

A Brave New World?

ERIC Educational Resources Information Center

Botstein, Leon

2001-01-01

Do the "new economy" and "information age" really exist? Effects of the railroad and telephone fell far short of those predicted. The psychology of human behavior may not have changed much. One must maintain a healthy skepticism about predictions concerning any new technology's influence and long-range significance. (MLH)

Weather, Climate, and You.

ERIC Educational Resources Information Center

Blai, Boris, Jr.

Information from the American Institute of Medical Climatologists on human responses to weather and climatic conditions, including clouds, winds, humidity, barometric pressure, heat, cold, and other variables that may exert a pervasive impact on health, behavior, disposition, and the level of efficiency with which individuals function is reviewed.…

16 CFR 1028.102 - Definitions.

Code of Federal Regulations, 2010 CFR

2010-01-01

... 16 Commercial Practices 2 2010-01-01 2010-01-01 false Definitions. 1028.102 Section 1028.102 Commercial Practices CONSUMER PRODUCT SAFETY COMMISSION GENERAL PROTECTION OF HUMAN SUBJECTS § 1028.102... investigator and subject. “Private information” includes information about behavior that occurs in a context in...

Structure and function of the healthy pre-adolescent pediatric gut microbiome

USDA-ARS?s Scientific Manuscript database

The gut microbiome influences myriad host functions, including nutrient acquisition, immune modulation, brain development, and behavior. Although human gut microbiota are recognized to change as we age, information regarding the structure and function of the gut microbiome during childhood is limite...

Spontaneous alternation: A potential gateway to spatial working memory in Drosophila.

PubMed

Lewis, Sara A; Negelspach, David C; Kaladchibachi, Sevag; Cowen, Stephen L; Fernandez, Fabian

2017-07-01

Despite their ubiquity in biomedical research, Drosophila have yet to be widely employed as model organisms in psychology. Many complex human-like behaviors are observed in Drosophila, which exhibit elaborate displays of inter-male aggression and female courtship, self-medication with alcohol in response to stress, and even cultural transmission of social information. Here, we asked whether Drosophila can demonstrate behavioral indices of spatial working memory in a Y-maze, a classic test of memory function and novelty-seeking in rodents. Our data show that Drosophila, like rodents, alternate their visits among the three arms of a Y-maze and spontaneously favor entry into arms they have explored less recently versus ones they have just seen. These findings suggest that Drosophila possess some of the information-seeking and working memory facilities mammals depend on to navigate through space and might be relevant models for understanding human psychological phenomena such as curiosity. Copyright © 2017 Elsevier Inc. All rights reserved.

Public health impact of disease-behavior dynamics. Comment on "Coupled disease-behavior dynamics on complex networks: A review" by Z. Wang et al.

NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

Wells, Chad R.; Galvani, Alison P.

2015-12-01

In a loop of dynamic feedback, behavior such as the decision to vaccinate, hand washing, or avoidance influences the progression of the epidemic, yet behavior is driven by the individual's and population's perceived risk of infection during an outbreak. In what we believe will become a seminal paper that stimulates future research as well as an informative teaching aid, Wang et. al. comprehensively review methodological advances that have been used to incorporate human behavior into epidemiological models on the effects of coupling disease transmission and behavior on complex social networks [1]. As illustrated by the recent outbreaks of measles and Middle Eastern Respiratory Syndrome (MERS), here we highlight the importance of coupling behavior and disease transmission that Wang et al. address.

When synthetic chemicals degrade in the environment: What are the absolute fate, effects, and potential risks to humans and the ecosystem?

USGS Publications Warehouse

Boxall, Alistair; Sinclair, C.; Fenner, Kathrin; Kolpin, Dana W.; Maund, S.

2004-01-01

Although some regulatory schemes require information about the impacts of degradates on human and environmental health, that information does not exist for many compounds (25, 26). Pesticides are the exception. In this article, we bring together the available data to address the environmental behavior of degradates and their effects on organisms and discuss how to identify substances of potential concern. In addition, we cite gaps in the current knowledge and make recommendations for future research requirements. While the article focuses on pesticides, we believe these observations can be extended to biologically active compounds and some industrial substances.

Evolutionary awareness.

PubMed

Gorelik, Gregory; Shackelford, Todd K

2014-08-27

In this article, we advance the concept of "evolutionary awareness," a metacognitive framework that examines human thought and emotion from a naturalistic, evolutionary perspective. We begin by discussing the evolution and current functioning of the moral foundations on which our framework rests. Next, we discuss the possible applications of such an evolutionarily-informed ethical framework to several domains of human behavior, namely: sexual maturation, mate attraction, intrasexual competition, culture, and the separation between various academic disciplines. Finally, we discuss ways in which an evolutionary awareness can inform our cross-generational activities-which we refer to as "intergenerational extended phenotypes"-by helping us to construct a better future for ourselves, for other sentient beings, and for our environment.

New Directions for Military Decision Making Research in Combat and Operational Settings

DTIC Science & Technology

1991-12-01

information; their search rules emphasize feasibility more than optimality; decisions depend on the order in which alternatives are presented...12:76-90. Easterbrook, J.A. "The effect of Emotion on Cue Utilization and the Organization of Behaviour." Psychological Review, 1959, 66:183-201...Acquisition and Affective State on Halo, Accuracy, Information Retrival , and Evaluations." Organizational Behavior and Human Decision Processes, 1988, 42:22

A Study of Organizational Information Search, Acquisition, Storage and Retrieval

DTIC Science & Technology

1986-08-01

on organizational structures and processes are akin to the effects on the coping behaviors of individuals (Driver and Streufert, 1969; Farace , Monge...Crriizaiiorial Environment. Human Relations, 18: 21-32. Farace , R.B., Monge, P. R., & Russell, H. M. 1977. Crnmunicatino and Organizing. Reading, MA: Addison...inputs required for an organization to perform its tasks ( Farace , Monge, and Russell, 1977). Information load is reflected in the amount of

A lack of appetite for information and computation. Simple heuristics in food choice.

PubMed

Schulte-Mecklenbeck, Michael; Sohn, Matthias; de Bellis, Emanuel; Martin, Nathalie; Hertwig, Ralph

2013-12-01

The predominant, but largely untested, assumption in research on food choice is that people obey the classic commandments of rational behavior: they carefully look up every piece of relevant information, weight each piece according to subjective importance, and then combine them into a judgment or choice. In real world situations, however, the available time, motivation, and computational resources may simply not suffice to keep these commandments. Indeed, there is a large body of research suggesting that human choice is often better accommodated by heuristics-simple rules that enable decision making on the basis of a few, but important, pieces of information. We investigated the prevalence of such heuristics in a computerized experiment that engaged participants in a series of choices between two lunch dishes. Employing MouselabWeb, a process-tracing technique, we found that simple heuristics described an overwhelmingly large proportion of choices, whereas strategies traditionally deemed rational were barely apparent in our data. Replicating previous findings, we also observed that visual stimulus segments received a much larger proportion of attention than any nutritional values did. Our results suggest that, consistent with human behavior in other domains, people make their food choices on the basis of simple and informationally frugal heuristics. Copyright © 2013 Elsevier Ltd. All rights reserved.

Two-dimensional thermal video analysis of offshore bird and bat flight

DOE PAGES

Matzner, Shari; Cullinan, Valerie I.; Duberstein, Corey A.

2015-09-11

Thermal infrared video can provide essential information about bird and bat presence and activity for risk assessment studies, but the analysis of recorded video can be time-consuming and may not extract all of the available information. Automated processing makes continuous monitoring over extended periods of time feasible, and maximizes the information provided by video. This is especially important for collecting data in remote locations that are difficult for human observers to access, such as proposed offshore wind turbine sites. We present guidelines for selecting an appropriate thermal camera based on environmental conditions and the physical characteristics of the target animals.more » We developed new video image processing algorithms that automate the extraction of bird and bat flight tracks from thermal video, and that characterize the extracted tracks to support animal identification and behavior inference. The algorithms use a video peak store process followed by background masking and perceptual grouping to extract flight tracks. The extracted tracks are automatically quantified in terms that could then be used to infer animal type and possibly behavior. The developed automated processing generates results that are reproducible and verifiable, and reduces the total amount of video data that must be retained and reviewed by human experts. Finally, we suggest models for interpreting thermal imaging information.« less

Two-dimensional thermal video analysis of offshore bird and bat flight

DOE Office of Scientific and Technical Information (OSTI.GOV)

Matzner, Shari; Cullinan, Valerie I.; Duberstein, Corey A.

Thermal infrared video can provide essential information about bird and bat presence and activity for risk assessment studies, but the analysis of recorded video can be time-consuming and may not extract all of the available information. Automated processing makes continuous monitoring over extended periods of time feasible, and maximizes the information provided by video. This is especially important for collecting data in remote locations that are difficult for human observers to access, such as proposed offshore wind turbine sites. We present guidelines for selecting an appropriate thermal camera based on environmental conditions and the physical characteristics of the target animals.more » We developed new video image processing algorithms that automate the extraction of bird and bat flight tracks from thermal video, and that characterize the extracted tracks to support animal identification and behavior inference. The algorithms use a video peak store process followed by background masking and perceptual grouping to extract flight tracks. The extracted tracks are automatically quantified in terms that could then be used to infer animal type and possibly behavior. The developed automated processing generates results that are reproducible and verifiable, and reduces the total amount of video data that must be retained and reviewed by human experts. Finally, we suggest models for interpreting thermal imaging information.« less

Early convergence research and education supported by the National Science Foundation.

PubMed

Bainbridge, William Sims

2004-05-01

The following pages describe research grants awarded by the National Science Foundation that illustrate how different fields of science and technology can converge in order to increase human potential. Technological convergence involves the unification of the sciences of Nanotechnology, Biotechnology, Information Technology, and new technologies based on Cognitive Science (NBIC). Because it supports research across all major branches of science and technology, including the social and behavioral sciences, the NSF has been a focus of discussions about converging technologies to enhance human capabilities and serve human needs.

Validating Human Behavioral Models for Combat Simulations Using Techniques for the Evaluation of Human Performance

DTIC Science & Technology

2004-01-01

Cognitive Task Analysis Abstract As Department of Defense (DoD) leaders rely more on modeling and simulation to provide information on which to base...capabilities and intent. Cognitive Task Analysis (CTA) Cognitive Task Analysis (CTA) is an extensive/detailed look at tasks and subtasks performed by a...Domain Analysis and Task Analysis: A Difference That Matters. In Cognitive Task Analysis , edited by J. M. Schraagen, S.

Groups' Actions Trump Injunctive Reaction in an Incidental Observation by Young Children

PubMed Central

Turner, Cameron R.; Nielsen, Mark; Collier-Baker, Emma

2014-01-01

Children's ability to use social information to direct their behavior is key to their survival and development. However, in observing adult behavior, children are confronted with multiple forms of social information that may vary in reliability and adaptiveness. Two of the most well established biases influencing human behavior are: (1) following the majority (majority influence or conformity); and (2) the use of emotional signals. The current experiment aimed to evaluate how children respond when both information about the majority behavior of a group (descriptive norm) and attitudes of the group towards a behavior (injunctive norm, expressed through an emotional reaction) are present and what happens when they are in conflict. We used a method designed to mimic the manner in which children might observe group members' behavior during development. Novel apparatuses were constructed for which there were two discrete actions that could be performed to retrieve a reward. Three-year-olds observed four adults demonstrating one set of actions, followed by a fifth adult who presented an alternative set of actions. The first four adults' injunctive responses to this fifth adult's actions were manipulated between-groups: positive, negative, or neutral. It was found that children preferred to copy the majority action, regardless of the injunctive reaction of the group. We argue that this affirms the adaptive utility of copying the majority. PMID:25198163

Head Motion Modeling for Human Behavior Analysis in Dyadic Interaction

PubMed Central

Xiao, Bo; Georgiou, Panayiotis; Baucom, Brian; Narayanan, Shrikanth S.

2015-01-01

This paper presents a computational study of head motion in human interaction, notably of its role in conveying interlocutors’ behavioral characteristics. Head motion is physically complex and carries rich information; current modeling approaches based on visual signals, however, are still limited in their ability to adequately capture these important properties. Guided by the methodology of kinesics, we propose a data driven approach to identify typical head motion patterns. The approach follows the steps of first segmenting motion events, then parametrically representing the motion by linear predictive features, and finally generalizing the motion types using Gaussian mixture models. The proposed approach is experimentally validated using video recordings of communication sessions from real couples involved in a couples therapy study. In particular we use the head motion model to classify binarized expert judgments of the interactants’ specific behavioral characteristics where entrainment in head motion is hypothesized to play a role: Acceptance, Blame, Positive, and Negative behavior. We achieve accuracies in the range of 60% to 70% for the various experimental settings and conditions. In addition, we describe a measure of motion similarity between the interaction partners based on the proposed model. We show that the relative change of head motion similarity during the interaction significantly correlates with the expert judgments of the interactants’ behavioral characteristics. These findings demonstrate the effectiveness of the proposed head motion model, and underscore the promise of analyzing human behavioral characteristics through signal processing methods. PMID:26557047

Looking for ideas: Eye behavior during goal-directed internally focused cognition☆

PubMed Central

Walcher, Sonja; Körner, Christof; Benedek, Mathias

2017-01-01

Humans have a highly developed visual system, yet we spend a high proportion of our time awake ignoring the visual world and attending to our own thoughts. The present study examined eye movement characteristics of goal-directed internally focused cognition. Deliberate internally focused cognition was induced by an idea generation task. A letter-by-letter reading task served as external task. Idea generation (vs. reading) was associated with more and longer blinks and fewer microsaccades indicating an attenuation of visual input. Idea generation was further associated with more and shorter fixations, more saccades and saccades with higher amplitudes as well as heightened stimulus-independent variation of eye vergence. The latter results suggest a coupling of eye behavior to internally generated information and associated cognitive processes, i.e. searching for ideas. Our results support eye behavior patterns as indicators of goal-directed internally focused cognition through mechanisms of attenuation of visual input and coupling of eye behavior to internally generated information. PMID:28689088

Delayed system response times affect immediate physiology and the dynamics of subsequent button press behavior.

PubMed

Kohrs, Christin; Hrabal, David; Angenstein, Nicole; Brechmann, André

2014-11-01

System response time research is an important issue in human-computer interactions. Experience with technical devices and general rules of human-human interactions determine the user's expectation, and any delay in system response time may lead to immediate physiological, emotional, and behavioral consequences. We investigated such effects on a trial-by-trial basis during a human-computer interaction by measuring changes in skin conductance (SC), heart rate (HR), and the dynamics of button press responses. We found an increase in SC and a deceleration of HR for all three delayed system response times (0.5, 1, 2 s). Moreover, the data on button press dynamics was highly informative since subjects repeated a button press with more force in response to delayed system response times. Furthermore, the button press dynamics could distinguish between correct and incorrect decisions and may thus even be used to infer the uncertainty of a user's decision. Copyright © 2014 Society for Psychophysiological Research.

Analysis of Context Dependence in Social Interaction Networks of a Massively Multiplayer Online Role-Playing Game

PubMed Central

Son, Seokshin; Kang, Ah Reum; Kim, Hyun-chul; Kwon, Taekyoung; Park, Juyong; Kim, Huy Kang

2012-01-01

Rapid advances in modern computing and information technology have enabled millions of people to interact online via various social network and gaming services. The widespread adoption of such online services have made possible analysis of large-scale archival data containing detailed human interactions, presenting a very promising opportunity to understand the rich and complex human behavior. In collaboration with a leading global provider of Massively Multiplayer Online Role-Playing Games (MMORPGs), here we present a network science-based analysis of the interplay between distinct types of user interaction networks in the virtual world. We find that their properties depend critically on the nature of the context-interdependence of the interactions, highlighting the complex and multilayered nature of human interactions, a robust understanding of which we believe may prove instrumental in the designing of more realistic future virtual arenas as well as provide novel insights to the science of collective human behavior. PMID:22496771

Revisiting the Role of Bad News in Maintaining Human Observing Behavior

ERIC Educational Resources Information Center

Fantino, Edmund; Silberberg, Alan

2010-01-01

Results from studies of observing responses have suggested that stimuli maintain observing owing to their special relationship to primary reinforcement (the conditioned- reinforcement hypothesis), and not because they predict the availability and nonavailability of reinforcement (the information hypothesis). The present article first reviews a…

Computer-Assisted Organizing

ERIC Educational Resources Information Center

Brunner, David James

2009-01-01

Organizing refers to methods of distributing physical and symbolic tasks among multiple agents in order to achieve goals. My dissertation investigates the dynamics of organizing in hybrid information processing systems that incorporate both humans and computers. To explain the behavior of these hybrid systems, I develop and partially test a theory…

Cross-Cultural Approaches: Readings in Comparative Research.

ERIC Educational Resources Information Center

Ford, Clellan S., Ed.

Selected articles illustrate different ways of analyzing social customs for cross-cultural comparisons. Approaches represent a veriety of theoretical points of view, thus exposing some fundamental problems in comparative research. Emphasis is placed upon contrasting ways of analyzing information on human behavior, social life, and culture. Five…

RISK COMMUNICATION AS A RISK MANAGEMENT TOOL: A RISK COMMUNICATION WORKBOOK

EPA Science Inventory

Communicating information about environmental risk to the people most affected by it is one of the major challenges faced by risk managers and community decision makers. Changing human behavior is a far more complex task than designing water retention systems or managing storm wa...

Do domestic dogs interpret pointing as a command?

PubMed

Scheider, Linda; Kaminski, Juliane; Call, Josep; Tomasello, Michael

2013-05-01

Domestic dogs comprehend human gestural communication flexibly, particularly the pointing gesture. Here, we examine whether dogs interpret pointing informatively, that is, as simply providing information, or rather as a command, for example, ordering them to move to a particular location. In the first study a human pointed toward an empty cup. In one manipulation, the dog either knew or did not know that the designated cup was empty (and that the other cup actually contained the food). In another manipulation, the human (as authority) either did or did not remain in the room after pointing. Dogs ignored the human's gesture if they had better information, irrespective of the authority's presence. In the second study, we varied the level of authority of the person pointing. Sometimes this person was an adult, and sometimes a young child. Dogs followed children's pointing just as frequently as they followed adults' pointing (and ignored the dishonest pointing of both), suggesting that the level of authority did not affect their behavior. Taken together these studies suggest that dogs do not see pointing as an imperative command ordering them to a particular location. It is still not totally clear, however, if they interpret it as informative or in some other way.

Amodal processing in human prefrontal cortex.

PubMed

Tamber-Rosenau, Benjamin J; Dux, Paul E; Tombu, Michael N; Asplund, Christopher L; Marois, René

2013-07-10

Information enters the cortex via modality-specific sensory regions, whereas actions are produced by modality-specific motor regions. Intervening central stages of information processing map sensation to behavior. Humans perform this central processing in a flexible, abstract manner such that sensory information in any modality can lead to response via any motor system. Cognitive theories account for such flexible behavior by positing amodal central information processing (e.g., "central executive," Baddeley and Hitch, 1974; "supervisory attentional system," Norman and Shallice, 1986; "response selection bottleneck," Pashler, 1994). However, the extent to which brain regions embodying central mechanisms of information processing are amodal remains unclear. Here we apply multivariate pattern analysis to functional magnetic resonance imaging (fMRI) data to compare response selection, a cognitive process widely believed to recruit an amodal central resource across sensory and motor modalities. We show that most frontal and parietal cortical areas known to activate across a wide variety of tasks code modality, casting doubt on the notion that these regions embody a central processor devoid of modality representation. Importantly, regions of anterior insula and dorsolateral prefrontal cortex consistently failed to code modality across four experiments. However, these areas code at least one other task dimension, process (instantiated as response selection vs response execution), ensuring that failure to find coding of modality is not driven by insensitivity of multivariate pattern analysis in these regions. We conclude that abstract encoding of information modality is primarily a property of subregions of the prefrontal cortex.

Reducing Risk of Noise-Induced Hearing Loss in Collegiate Music Ensembles Using Ambient Technology.

PubMed

Powell, Jason; Chesky, Kris

2017-09-01

Student musicians are at risk for noise-induced hearing loss (NIHL) as they develop skills and perform during instructional activities. Studies using longitudinal dosimeter data show that pedagogical procedures and instructor behaviors are highly predictive of NIHL risk, thus implying the need for innovative approaches to increase instructor competency in managing instructional activities without interfering with artistic and academic freedom. Ambient information systems, an emerging trend in human-computer interaction that infuses psychological behavioral theories into technologies, can help construct informative risk-regulating systems. The purpose of this study was to determine the effects of introducing an ambient information system into the ensemble setting. The system used two ambient displays and a counterbalanced within-subjects treatment study design with six jazz ensemble instructors to determine if the system could induce a behavior change that alters trends in measures resulting from dosimeter data. This study assessed efficacy using time series analysis to determine changes in eight statistical measures of behavior over a 9-wk period. Analysis showed that the system was effective, as all instructors showed changes in a combination of measures. This study is in an important step in developing non-interfering technology to reduce NIHL among academic musicians.

Understanding human behavior in times of war.

PubMed

Vetter, Stefan

2007-12-01

The Third Geneva Convention reflects on the values of humanism, declaring the rights of humaneness, honor, and protection before torture and final discharge of war prisoners after the end of a war. These days, the occurrences in Baghdad Central Detention Center (formerly known as Abu Ghraib Prison), the actions of British soldiers in Basra, and the inflamed public discussion of whether torture might be an appropriate method to obtain crucial information from terrorists put the Third Geneva Convention back in the spotlight. The aforementioned occurrences raise questions regarding the psychological mass phenomena that make us vulnerable to think and to act against our education, habits, and beliefs. Only an understanding of these phenomena will help us to act against behavior we condemn. This article is an attempt to show how cognition of societies and individuals slowly changes during longer conflicts. Furthermore, it tries to summarize the possibilities we have to confront these tendencies.

There or not there? A multidisciplinary review and research agenda on the impact of transparent barriers on human perception, action, and social behavior

PubMed Central

Marquardt, Gesine; Cross, Emily S.; de Sousa, Alexandra A.; Edelstein, Eve; Farnè, Alessandro; Leszczynski, Marcin; Patterson, Miles; Quadflieg, Susanne

2015-01-01

Through advances in production and treatment technologies, transparent glass has become an increasingly versatile material and a global hallmark of modern architecture. In the shape of invisible barriers, it defines spaces while simultaneously shaping their lighting, noise, and climate conditions. Despite these unique architectural qualities, little is known regarding the human experience with glass barriers. Is a material that has been described as being simultaneously there and not there from an architectural perspective, actually there and/or not there from perceptual, behavioral, and social points of view? In this article, we review systematic observations and experimental studies that explore the impact of transparent barriers on human cognition and action. In doing so, the importance of empirical and multidisciplinary approaches to inform the use of glass in contemporary architecture is highlighted and key questions for future inquiry are identified. PMID:26441756

Using fMRI to study reward processing in humans: past, present, and future

PubMed Central

Wang, Kainan S.; Smith, David V.

2016-01-01

Functional magnetic resonance imaging (fMRI) is a noninvasive tool used to probe cognitive and affective processes. Although fMRI provides indirect measures of neural activity, the advent of fMRI has allowed for 1) the corroboration of significant animal findings in the human brain, and 2) the expansion of models to include more common human attributes that inform behavior. In this review, we briefly consider the neural basis of the blood oxygenation level dependent signal to set up a discussion of how fMRI studies have applied it in examining cognitive models in humans and the promise of using fMRI to advance such models. Specifically, we illustrate the contribution that fMRI has made to the study of reward processing, focusing on the role of the striatum in encoding reward-related learning signals that drive anticipatory and consummatory behaviors. For instance, we discuss how fMRI can be used to link neural signals (e.g., striatal responses to rewards) to individual differences in behavior and traits. While this functional segregation approach has been constructive to our understanding of reward-related functions, many fMRI studies have also benefitted from a functional integration approach that takes into account how interconnected regions (e.g., corticostriatal circuits) contribute to reward processing. We contend that future work using fMRI will profit from using a multimodal approach, such as combining fMRI with noninvasive brain stimulation tools (e.g., transcranial electrical stimulation), that can identify causal mechanisms underlying reward processing. Consequently, advancements in implementing fMRI will promise new translational opportunities to inform our understanding of psychopathologies. PMID:26740530

Rate-distortion theory and human perception.

PubMed

Sims, Chris R

2016-07-01

The fundamental goal of perception is to aid in the achievement of behavioral objectives. This requires extracting and communicating useful information from noisy and uncertain sensory signals. At the same time, given the complexity of sensory information and the limitations of biological information processing, it is necessary that some information must be lost or discarded in the act of perception. Under these circumstances, what constitutes an 'optimal' perceptual system? This paper describes the mathematical framework of rate-distortion theory as the optimal solution to the problem of minimizing the costs of perceptual error subject to strong constraints on the ability to communicate or transmit information. Rate-distortion theory offers a general and principled theoretical framework for developing computational-level models of human perception (Marr, 1982). Models developed in this framework are capable of producing quantitatively precise explanations for human perceptual performance, while yielding new insights regarding the nature and goals of perception. This paper demonstrates the application of rate-distortion theory to two benchmark domains where capacity limits are especially salient in human perception: discrete categorization of stimuli (also known as absolute identification) and visual working memory. A software package written for the R statistical programming language is described that aids in the development of models based on rate-distortion theory. Copyright © 2016 The Author. Published by Elsevier B.V. All rights reserved.

[Problems and ethical challenges in public health communication].

PubMed

Loss, J; Nagel, E

2009-05-01

Health communication, e.g., mass media campaigns, patient information leaflets or websites, plays an important role in public health. It contributes to citizen empowerment and helps them make informed decisions in health matters. However, public health communication can lead to adverse effects on both individual and societal level, e.g., by inaccurate or partial information, discriminatory messages, scandalizing coverage or inadequate tailoring to relevant target groups. It seems important to suggest ethical criteria for health information, e.g., (1) accuracy, completeness and balance, (2) transparency, (3) participation of the target group, (4) respect for human dignity, (5) social justice and equity, (6) appropriateness. Thoughtfulness is important in order not to stigmatize population subgroups. In addition, it is laborious to comprehensively and correctly present benefits and risks of a certain health behavior. Marketing principles guide how to 'sell' a certain health behavior, but health campaigns should not manipulate target persons for the sake of a population health aim. It remains unclear, however, how the different providers of health information can be held ethically responsible.

Integrating Data and Networks: Human Factors

NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

Chen, R. S.

2012-12-01

The development of technical linkages and interoperability between scientific networks is a necessary but not sufficient step towards integrated use and application of networked data and information for scientific and societal benefit. A range of "human factors" must also be addressed to ensure the long-term integration, sustainability, and utility of both the interoperable networks themselves and the scientific data and information to which they provide access. These human factors encompass the behavior of both individual humans and human institutions, and include system governance, a common framework for intellectual property rights and data sharing, consensus on terminology, metadata, and quality control processes, agreement on key system metrics and milestones, the compatibility of "business models" in the short and long term, harmonization of incentives for cooperation, and minimization of disincentives. Experience with several national and international initiatives and research programs such as the International Polar Year, the Group on Earth Observations, the NASA Earth Observing Data and Information System, the U.S. National Spatial Data Infrastructure, the Global Earthquake Model, and the United Nations Spatial Data Infrastructure provide a range of lessons regarding these human factors. Ongoing changes in science, technology, institutions, relationships, and even culture are creating both opportunities and challenges for expanded interoperability of scientific networks and significant improvement in data integration to advance science and the use of scientific data and information to achieve benefits for society as a whole.

Learning and exploration in action-perception loops.

PubMed

Little, Daniel Y; Sommer, Friedrich T

2013-01-01

Discovering the structure underlying observed data is a recurring problem in machine learning with important applications in neuroscience. It is also a primary function of the brain. When data can be actively collected in the context of a closed action-perception loop, behavior becomes a critical determinant of learning efficiency. Psychologists studying exploration and curiosity in humans and animals have long argued that learning itself is a primary motivator of behavior. However, the theoretical basis of learning-driven behavior is not well understood. Previous computational studies of behavior have largely focused on the control problem of maximizing acquisition of rewards and have treated learning the structure of data as a secondary objective. Here, we study exploration in the absence of external reward feedback. Instead, we take the quality of an agent's learned internal model to be the primary objective. In a simple probabilistic framework, we derive a Bayesian estimate for the amount of information about the environment an agent can expect to receive by taking an action, a measure we term the predicted information gain (PIG). We develop exploration strategies that approximately maximize PIG. One strategy based on value-iteration consistently learns faster than previously developed reward-free exploration strategies across a diverse range of environments. Psychologists believe the evolutionary advantage of learning-driven exploration lies in the generalized utility of an accurate internal model. Consistent with this hypothesis, we demonstrate that agents which learn more efficiently during exploration are later better able to accomplish a range of goal-directed tasks. We will conclude by discussing how our work elucidates the explorative behaviors of animals and humans, its relationship to other computational models of behavior, and its potential application to experimental design, such as in closed-loop neurophysiology studies.

Utility of the Hebb-Williams Maze Paradigm for Translational Research in Fragile X Syndrome: A Direct Comparison of Mice and Humans.

PubMed

Boutet, Isabelle; Collin, Charles A; MacLeod, Lindsey S; Messier, Claude; Holahan, Matthew R; Berry-Kravis, Elizabeth; Gandhi, Reno M; Kogan, Cary S

2018-01-01

To generate meaningful information, translational research must employ paradigms that allow extrapolation from animal models to humans. However, few studies have evaluated translational paradigms on the basis of defined validation criteria. We outline three criteria for validating translational paradigms. We then evaluate the Hebb-Williams maze paradigm (Hebb and Williams, 1946; Rabinovitch and Rosvold, 1951) on the basis of these criteria using Fragile X syndrome (FXS) as model disease. We focused on this paradigm because it allows direct comparison of humans and animals on tasks that are behaviorally equivalent (criterion #1) and because it measures spatial information processing, a cognitive domain for which FXS individuals and mice show impairments as compared to controls (criterion #2). We directly compared the performance of affected humans and mice across different experimental conditions and measures of behavior to identify which conditions produce comparable patterns of results in both species. Species differences were negligible for Mazes 2, 4, and 5 irrespective of the presence of visual cues, suggesting that these mazes could be used to measure spatial learning in both species. With regards to performance on the first trial, which reflects visuo-spatial problem solving, Mazes 5 and 9 without visual cues produced the most consistent results. We conclude that the Hebb-Williams mazes paradigm has the potential to be utilized in translational research to measure comparable cognitive functions in FXS humans and animals (criterion #3).

Integrated Human Behavior Modeling and Stochastic Control (IHBMSC)

DTIC Science & Technology

2014-08-01

T after the outcome of two inspections has become available is calculated as in the Kalman filtering paradigm. First and foremost, n = 2 is adequate...output, the probability P2(T |·, ·) that the inspected object is a T is calculated—see equations (5.7, 5.8) where a discrete Kalman filtering ...information or value. The behavior of the Stochastic Controller can be usefully compared to a 2-stage screen or a 2-stage filter . The 1st stage of the

Saving Human Lives: What Complexity Science and Information Systems can Contribute

NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

Helbing, Dirk; Brockmann, Dirk; Chadefaux, Thomas; Donnay, Karsten; Blanke, Ulf; Woolley-Meza, Olivia; Moussaid, Mehdi; Johansson, Anders; Krause, Jens; Schutte, Sebastian; Perc, Matjaž

2015-02-01

We discuss models and data of crowd disasters, crime, terrorism, war and disease spreading to show that conventional recipes, such as deterrence strategies, are often not effective and sufficient to contain them. Many common approaches do not provide a good picture of the actual system behavior, because they neglect feedback loops, instabilities and cascade effects. The complex and often counter-intuitive behavior of social systems and their macro-level collective dynamics can be better understood by means of complexity science. We highlight that a suitable system design and management can help to stop undesirable cascade effects and to enable favorable kinds of self-organization in the system. In such a way, complexity science can help to save human lives.

Saving Human Lives: What Complexity Science and Information Systems can Contribute.

PubMed

Helbing, Dirk; Brockmann, Dirk; Chadefaux, Thomas; Donnay, Karsten; Blanke, Ulf; Woolley-Meza, Olivia; Moussaid, Mehdi; Johansson, Anders; Krause, Jens; Schutte, Sebastian; Perc, Matjaž

We discuss models and data of crowd disasters, crime, terrorism, war and disease spreading to show that conventional recipes, such as deterrence strategies, are often not effective and sufficient to contain them. Many common approaches do not provide a good picture of the actual system behavior, because they neglect feedback loops, instabilities and cascade effects. The complex and often counter-intuitive behavior of social systems and their macro-level collective dynamics can be better understood by means of complexity science. We highlight that a suitable system design and management can help to stop undesirable cascade effects and to enable favorable kinds of self-organization in the system. In such a way, complexity science can help to save human lives.

Homeostasis lighting control based on relationship between lighting environment and human behavior

NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

Ueda, Risa; Mita, Akira

2015-03-01

Although each person has own preferences, living spaces which can respond to various preferences and needs have not become reality. Focusing on the lighting environments which influence on the impression of living spaces, this research aims to offer comfortable lighting environments for each resident by a flexible control. This research examines the relationship between lighting environments and human behaviors considering colored lights. In accord with the relationship, this research proposes an illuminance-color control system which flexibly changes spatial environments responding to human conditions. Firstly, the psychological evaluation was conducted in order to build human models for various environments. As a result, preferred lighting environments for each examinee were determined for particular behaviors. Moreover, satisfaction levels of lighting environments were calculated by using seven types of impression of the environments as parameters. The results were summarized as human models. Secondly, this research proposed "Homeostasis Lighting Control System", which employs the human models. Homeostasis lighting control system embodies the algorithm of homeostasis, which is one of the functions of the physiological adaptation. Human discomfort feelings are obtained automatically by the sensor agent robot. The system can offer comfortable lighting environments without controlling environments by residents autonomously based on the information from the robot. This research takes into accounts both illuminance and color. The robot communicates with the server which contains human models, then the system corresponds to individuals. Combining these three systems, the proposed system can effectively control the lighting environment. At last, the feasibility of the proposed system was verified by simulation experiments.

Arrestant Effect of Human Scalp Components on Head Louse (Phthiraptera: Pediculidae) Behavior.

PubMed

Ortega-Insaurralde, Isabel; Ceferino Toloza, Ariel; Gonzalez-Audino, Paola; Inés Picollo, María

2017-03-01

Relevant evidence has shown that parasites process host-related information using chemical, visual, tactile, or auditory cues. However, the cues that are involved in the host-parasite interaction between Pediculus humanus capitis (De Geer 1767) and humans have not been identified yet. In this work, we studied the effect of human scalp components on the behavior of adult head lice. Filter paper segments were rubbed on volunteers' scalps and then placed in the experimental arena, where adult head lice were individually tested. The movement of the insects was recorded for each arena using the software EthoVision. Average movement parameters were calculated for the treatments in the bioassays such as total distance, velocity, number of times a head louse crossed between zones of the arena, and time in each zone of the arena. We found that scalp components induced head lice to decrease average locomotor activity and to remain arrested on the treated paper. The effect of the ageing of human scalp samples in the response of head lice was not statistically significant (i.e., human scalp samples of 4, 18, 40, and 60 h of ageing did not elicit a significant change in head louse behavior). When we analyzed the effect of the sex in the response of head lice to human scalp samples, males demonstrated significant differences. Our results showed for the first time the effect of host components conditioning head lice behavior. We discuss the role of these components in the dynamic of head lice infestation. © The Authors 2016. Published by Oxford University Press on behalf of Entomological Society of America. All rights reserved. For Permissions, please email: journals.permissions@oup.com.

The processing of positional information in a two-item sequence limits the emergence of symmetry in baboons (Papio papio), but not in humans (Homo sapiens).

PubMed

Fagot, Joël; Malassis, Raphaelle; Medam, Tiphaine

2018-03-01

When trained to associate Stimulus A to Stimulus B, humans can derive the untrained symmetrical B to A relation while nonhuman animals have much more difficulties. Urcuioli (2008, Journal of the Experimental Analysis of Behavior, 90, 257--282; 2015, Conductal, 3, 4--25) proposed that the apparent difficulty of animals in symmetry testing reflects their double encoding of the information on the stimuli (identity and relation) and their positional (i.e., spatial and temporal/ordinal) characteristics. This comparative study tested the emergence of symmetry in humans and baboons in a task in which the position of the stimuli was manipulated independently of their relation. Humans and baboons initially learned to associate pairs of visual shapes on a touch screen in a specific order. Three pairs of (A-B, C-D, and E-F) stimuli were used in training. After training, the two species were tested with the B-A, F-C, and E-D pairs. The B-A pairs preserved the association initially learned with A-B but reversed the positional information relative to training. The F-C pair neither preserved the association nor the positional information of the training pairs, and positional information were the only cues preserved in the E-D pair. Humans showed a response time advantage for B-A, suggesting symmetry, but also for E-D, suggesting that they also process positional information. In baboons, the advantage was found only for E-D, suggesting that they only process positional information. These results confirm that the processing of stimulus pairs differ between nonhuman animals to humans.

Traveling Theta Waves in the Human Hippocampus

PubMed Central

Zhang, Honghui

2015-01-01

The hippocampal theta oscillation is strongly correlated with behaviors such as memory and spatial navigation, but we do not understand its specific functional role. One hint of theta's function came from the discovery in rodents that theta oscillations are traveling waves that allow parts of the hippocampus to simultaneously exhibit separate oscillatory phases. Because hippocampal theta oscillations in humans have different properties compared with rodents, we examined these signals directly using multielectrode recordings from neurosurgical patients. Our findings confirm that human hippocampal theta oscillations are traveling waves, but also show that these oscillations appear at a broader range of frequencies compared with rodents. Human traveling waves showed a distinctive pattern of spatial propagation such that there is a consistent phase spread across the hippocampus regardless of the oscillations' frequency. This suggests that traveling theta oscillations are important functionally in humans because they coordinate phase coding throughout the hippocampus in a consistent manner. SIGNIFICANCE STATEMENT We show for the first time in humans that hippocampal theta oscillations are traveling waves, moving along the length of the hippocampus in a posterior–anterior direction. The existence of these traveling theta waves is important for understanding hippocampal neural coding because they cause neurons at separate positions in the hippocampus to experience different theta phases simultaneously. The theta phase that a neuron measures is a key factor in how that cell represents behavioral information. Therefore, the existence of traveling theta waves indicates that, to fully understand how a hippocampal neuron represents information, it is vital to also account for that cell's location in addition to conventional measures of neural activity. PMID:26354915

Lognormal Infection Times of Online Information Spread

PubMed Central

Doerr, Christian; Blenn, Norbert; Van Mieghem, Piet

2013-01-01

The infection times of individuals in online information spread such as the inter-arrival time of Twitter messages or the propagation time of news stories on a social media site can be explained through a convolution of lognormally distributed observation and reaction times of the individual participants. Experimental measurements support the lognormal shape of the individual contributing processes, and have resemblance to previously reported lognormal distributions of human behavior and contagious processes. PMID:23700473

Research Themes and Technological Base Program in Behavioral and Social Sciences for the U.S. Army

DTIC Science & Technology

1976-01-01

appears to produce different al human information processing strategies. Concrete stimuli exert unifying or organizing effects that function as memory ...Technology for Tactical Information Processing and Presentation Scope: a. Objectives: To provide technological advances for enchancing user performance in...auditory, and black and white- color , situation portrayal. 44 :v.:;..^ „..■ ..„i--.v ..^.:n:,r.^,...::..:■ .;......’,. .^.M. ■ m»m viriniap

Literature, Literary Values, and the Teaching of Literature: Abstracts of Doctoral Dissertations Published in "Dissertation Abstracts International," May through July 1978 (Vol. 38 No. 11 through Vol. 39 No. 1).

ERIC Educational Resources Information Center

ERIC Clearinghouse on Reading and Communication Skills, Urbana, IL.

This collection of abstracts is part of a continuing series providing information on recent doctoral dissertations. The 15 titles deal with a variety of topics, including the following: human sexual information, behaviors, and attitudes in fiction for young people; affective responses of adolescents to a poem; objectives for the junior high…

Dopamine modulates risk-taking as a function of baseline sensation-seeking trait.

PubMed

Norbury, Agnes; Manohar, Sanjay; Rogers, Robert D; Husain, Masud

2013-08-07

Trait sensation-seeking, defined as a need for varied, complex, and intense sensations, represents a relatively underexplored hedonic drive in human behavioral neuroscience research. It is related to increased risk for a range of behaviors including substance use, gambling, and risky sexual practice. Individual differences in self-reported sensation-seeking have been linked to brain dopamine function, particularly at D2-like receptors, but so far no causal evidence exists for a role of dopamine in sensation-seeking behavior in humans. Here, we investigated the effects of the selective D2/D3 agonist cabergoline on performance of a probabilistic risky choice task in healthy humans using a sensitive within-subject, placebo-controlled design. Cabergoline significantly influenced the way participants combined different explicit signals regarding probability and loss when choosing between response options associated with uncertain outcomes. Importantly, these effects were strongly dependent on baseline sensation-seeking score. Overall, cabergoline increased sensitivity of choice to information about probability of winning; while decreasing discrimination according to magnitude of potential losses associated with different options. The largest effects of the drug were observed in participants with lower sensation-seeking scores. These findings provide evidence that risk-taking behavior in humans can be directly manipulated by a dopaminergic drug, but that the effectiveness of such a manipulation depends on baseline differences in sensation-seeking trait. This emphasizes the importance of considering individual differences when investigating manipulation of risky decision-making, and may have relevance for the development of pharmacotherapies for disorders involving excessive risk-taking in humans, such as pathological gambling.

Brief communication: Reaction to fire by savanna chimpanzees (Pan troglodytes verus) at Fongoli, Senegal: Conceptualization of "fire behavior" and the case for a chimpanzee model.

PubMed

Pruetz, Jill D; LaDuke, Thomas C

2010-04-01

The use and control of fire are uniquely human traits thought to have come about fairly late in the evolution of our lineage, and they are hypothesized to correlate with an increase in intellectual complexity. Given the relatively sophisticated cognitive abilities yet small brain size of living apes compared to humans and even early hominins, observations of wild chimpanzees' reactions to naturally occurring fire can help inform hypotheses about the likely responses of early hominins to fire. We use data on the behavior of savanna chimpanzees (Pan troglodytes verus) at Fongoli, Senegal during two encounters with wildfires to illuminate the similarities between great apes and humans regarding their reaction to fire. Chimpanzees' close relatedness to our lineage makes them phylogenetically relevant to the study of hominid evolution, and the open, hot and dry environment at Fongoli, similar to the savanna mosaic thought to characterize much of hominid evolution, makes these apes ecologically important as a living primate model as well. Chimpanzees at Fongoli calmly monitor wildfires and change their behavior in anticipation of the fire's movement. The ability to conceptualize the "behavior" of fire may be a synapomorphic trait characterizing the human-chimpanzee clade. If the cognitive underpinnings of fire conceptualization are a primitive hominid trait, hypotheses concerning the origins of the control and use of fire may need revision. We argue that our findings exemplify the importance of using living chimpanzees as models for better understanding human evolution despite recently published suggestions to the contrary. (c) 2009 Wiley-Liss, Inc.

Human factors in incident reporting

NASA Technical Reports Server (NTRS)

Jones, S. G.

1993-01-01

The paper proposes a cooperative research effort be undertaken by academic institutions and industry organizations toward the compilation of a human factors data base in conjunction with technical information. Team members in any discipline can benefit and learn from observing positive examples of decision making and performance by crews under stressful or less than optimal circumstances. The opportunity to note trends in interpersonal and interactive behaviors and to categorize them is terms of more or less desirable outcomes should not be missed.

Annual Progress Report for July 1, 1980 through June 30, 1981,

DTIC Science & Technology

1981-08-01

71 14.4 Directory of Computer-Readable Bibliographic Databases .......... 73 14.5 University of Illinois Online Search Service...34Aeasures of Human Performance in Fault Diagnosis Tasks," M.S.I.E. Thesis (July 1931). 13.35 ). R. Morehead, "Models of Human Behavior in Online Searching...1981 , to appear). 1 Journal Articles 14.7 A. E. Williams, Databases and Online Statistics for 1979," Bul. Amer. Soc. for Information Science 7(2

Giftedness and Cultural Accumulation: An Information Processing Perspective

ERIC Educational Resources Information Center

Woolcott, Geoff

2013-01-01

There appears to be differing approaches, in modern education, to the identification and development of gifted students, but researchers are beginning to find some cohesiveness through approaches that examine giftedness from within broad views of human cognition and behavior. This paper takes such an approach by considering learning and memory as…

The Development of Educational Technology.

ERIC Educational Resources Information Center

Sakamoto, Takashi

The degree to which the concepts of educational technolgoy are penetrating into educational practice in Japan is surveyed. Educational technology is defined as a branch of study in which the results of engineering techniques, information science, the natural sciences, the behavioral sciences and human technology are used to promote efficiency in…

Population and Human Development: A Course Curriculum Including Lesson Plans, Activities, and Bibliography. Revised.

ERIC Educational Resources Information Center

Murphy, Elaine M.; Long, Alison T.

This course outline suggests materials and learning activities on the interrelated causes and consequences of population growth and other population matters. The document describes 15 class sessions which integrate information for sociology, anthropology, psychology, biology, animal behavior, and education. Topics include the history of human…

Initial Description of a Quantitative, Cross-Species (Chimpanzee-Human) Social Responsiveness Measure

ERIC Educational Resources Information Center

Marrus, Natasha; Faughn, Carley; Shuman, Jeremy; Petersen, Steve E.; Constantino, John N.; Povinelli, Daniel J.; Pruett, John R., Jr.

2011-01-01

Objective: Comparative studies of social responsiveness, an ability that is impaired in autism spectrum disorders, can inform our understanding of both autism and the cognitive architecture of social behavior. Because there is no existing quantitative measure of social responsiveness in chimpanzees, we generated a quantitative, cross-species…

Modeling User Behavior in Computer Learning Tasks.

ERIC Educational Resources Information Center

Mantei, Marilyn M.

Model building techniques from Artifical Intelligence and Information-Processing Psychology are applied to human-computer interface tasks to evaluate existing interfaces and suggest new and better ones. The model is in the form of an augmented transition network (ATN) grammar which is built by applying grammar induction heuristics on a sequential…

Collective (Team) Learning Process Models: A Conceptual Review

ERIC Educational Resources Information Center

Knapp, Randall

2010-01-01

Teams have become a key resource for learning and accomplishing work in organizations. The development of collective learning in specific contexts is not well understood, yet has become critical to organizational success. The purpose of this conceptual review is to inform human resource development (HRD) practice about specific team behaviors and…

Identifying Health Beliefs Influencing Hispanic College Men's Willingness to Vaccinate against HPV

ERIC Educational Resources Information Center

Stephens, Dionne P.; Thomas, Tami L.; Eaton, Asia

2016-01-01

This study identifies health beliefs influencing Hispanic college men's human papillomavirus (HPV) vaccine uptake decision making processes. Hispanic college men were interviewed about their HPV vaccine knowledge, and information seeking behaviors. Overall, participants did not view HPV infection or vaccination as an immediate concern or priority;…

Imagery and Information Processing: Some Implications for Therapeutic Communication.

ERIC Educational Resources Information Center

King, Corwin P.

This study of the human power to make mental images in the mind, here called "imagery," is studied as a phenomena of empirical psychology. The findings have importance for the process of communication, especially in behavioral modification through psychotherapy. Current research in imagery is reviewed, along with possible applications to…

Development of Environmental Attitude Scale towards Pre-Service Biology Teachers

ERIC Educational Resources Information Center

Tafli, Tugba; Ates, Ali

2016-01-01

Healthy life for all living creatures in nature is possible with a clean and habitable environment. Raising awareness of protecting environment in human landscape is important for conservation. Upbringing of informed individuals about environment and constituting behavioral changes by gaining their positive attitudes for nature have an important…

A Theory of Marking Rules.

ERIC Educational Resources Information Center

Geoghegan, William H.

In attempting to understand and describe the means by which human beings actually produce and interpret the message forms appropriate to a given domain of verbal behavior, it becomes apparent that the cognitive processes involved can reasonably be characterized as information processing phenomena. Throughout the production of a message form, an…

Learning and Cognition: The Cognitive Revolution in American Psychology.

ERIC Educational Resources Information Center

Inoue, Yukiko

Cognitive psychology has replaced behaviorism as the dominant school of thought in American psychology regarding learning and development. This paper investigates changes in the field that have led to this major shift. The different methods used by behaviorists and human information processing (HIP) psychology are described. The metaphor of the…

A Review of Human Spatial Representations Computational, Neuroscience, Mathematical, Developmental, and Cognitive Psychology Considerations

DTIC Science & Technology

2000-12-18

Gallistel , 1988). Hermer and Spelke (1996) found that the young children were able to detect, remember, and use the same nongeometric information...America, 50, 637-642. Margules, J., & Gallistel , C. R. (1988). Heading in the rat: Determination by environmental shape. Animal Learning & Behavior, 16(4

Persuasive Communications to Change Actions: An Analysis of Behavioral and Cognitive Impact in HIV Prevention

PubMed Central

Albarracín, Dolores; McNatt, Penny S.; Klein, Cynthia T. F.; Ho, Ringo M.; Mitchell, Amy L.; Kumkale, G. Tarcan

2016-01-01

This meta-analysis examined the validity of various theoretical assumptions about cognitive and behavioral change following a communication recommending condom use. The synthesis comprised 82 treatment and 29 control groups included in 46 longitudinal reports with measures of perceived severity and susceptibility, attitudes and expectancies, norms, perceptions of control, intentions, knowledge, behavioral skills, or condom use. Results indicated that across the sample of studies, communications taught recipients about facts related to HIV and also induced favorable attitudes and expectancies, greater control perceptions, and stronger intentions to use condoms in the future. Moreover, messages that presented attitudinal information and modeled behavioral skills led to increased condom use. Results are discussed in the context of theories of human behavior and change and in reference to HIV-prevention interventions. PMID:12683737

Effects of tryptophan depletion on the performance of an iterated Prisoner's Dilemma game in healthy adults.

PubMed

Wood, Richard M; Rilling, James K; Sanfey, Alan G; Bhagwagar, Zubin; Rogers, Robert D

2006-05-01

Adaptive social behavior often necessitates choosing to cooperate with others for long-term gains at the expense of noncooperative behaviors giving larger immediate gains. Although little is know about the neural substrates that support cooperative over noncooperative behaviors, recent research has shown that mutually cooperative behavior in the context of a mixed-motive game, the Prisoner's Dilemma (PD), is associated with increased neural activity within reinforcement circuitry. Other research attests to a role for serotonin in the modulation of social behavior and in reward processing. In this study, we used a within-subject, crossover, double-blind design to investigate performance of an iterated, sequential PD game for monetary reward by healthy human adult participants following ingestion of an amino-acid drink that either did (T+) or did not (T-) contain l-tryptophan. Tryptophan depletion produced significant reductions in the level of cooperation shown by participants when playing the game on the first, but not the second, study days. This effect was accompanied by a significantly diminished probability of cooperative responding given previous mutually cooperative behavior. These data suggest that serotonin plays a significant role in the acquisition of socially cooperative behavior in human adult participants, and suggest novel hypotheses concerning the serotonergic modulation of reward information in socially cooperative behavior in both health and psychiatric illness.

Neural correlates of behavioral amplitude modulation sensitivity in the budgerigar midbrain

PubMed Central

Neilans, Erikson G.; Abrams, Kristina S.; Idrobo, Fabio; Carney, Laurel H.

2016-01-01

Amplitude modulation (AM) is a crucial feature of many communication signals, including speech. Whereas average discharge rates in the auditory midbrain correlate with behavioral AM sensitivity in rabbits, the neural bases of AM sensitivity in species with human-like behavioral acuity are unexplored. Here, we used parallel behavioral and neurophysiological experiments to explore the neural (midbrain) bases of AM perception in an avian speech mimic, the budgerigar (Melopsittacus undulatus). Behavioral AM sensitivity was quantified using operant conditioning procedures. Neural AM sensitivity was studied using chronically implanted microelectrodes in awake, unrestrained birds. Average discharge rates of multiunit recording sites in the budgerigar midbrain were insufficient to explain behavioral sensitivity to modulation frequencies <100 Hz for both tone- and noise-carrier stimuli, even with optimal pooling of information across recording sites. Neural envelope synchrony, in contrast, could explain behavioral performance for both carrier types across the full range of modulation frequencies studied (16–512 Hz). The results suggest that envelope synchrony in the budgerigar midbrain may underlie behavioral sensitivity to AM. Behavioral AM sensitivity based on synchrony in the budgerigar, which contrasts with rate-correlated behavioral performance in rabbits, raises the possibility that envelope synchrony, rather than average discharge rate, might also underlie AM perception in other species with sensitive AM detection abilities, including humans. These results highlight the importance of synchrony coding of envelope structure in the inferior colliculus. Furthermore, they underscore potential benefits of devices (e.g., midbrain implants) that evoke robust neural synchrony. PMID:26843608

Deterrence and transmission as mechanisms ensuring reliability of gossip.

PubMed

Giardini, Francesca

2012-10-01

Spreading information about the members of one's group is one of the most universal human behaviors. Thanks to gossip, individuals can acquire the information about their peers without sustaining the burden of costly interactions with cheaters, but they can also create and revise social bonds. Gossip has also several positive functions at the group level, promoting cohesion and norm compliance. However, gossip can be unreliable, and can be used to damage others' reputation or to circulate false information, thus becoming detrimental to people involved and useless for the group. In this work, we propose a theoretical model in which reliability of gossip depends on the joint functioning of two distinct mechanisms. Thanks to the first, i.e., deterrence, individuals tend to avoid informational cheating because they fear punishment and the disruption of social bonds. On the other hand, transmission provides humans with the opportunity of reducing the consequences of cheating through a manipulation of the source of gossip.

Health communication and consumer behavior on meat in Belgium: from BSE until dioxin.

PubMed

Verbeke, W; Viaene, J; Guiot, O

1999-01-01

This article focuses on the impact of mass media meat-health information on consumer perception, attitude, and behavior toward fresh meat in Belgium. In a situation similar to that which occurred in most other European countries, Belgian fresh meat consumption fell considerably during 1995-1999. A multitude of messages linking meat consumption to human health risks were reported by mass media. Bovine Spongiform Encephalopathy (BSE) since 1996 and dioxin in 1999 constituted the major issues. Empirical research, conducted in April 1998, revealed the tremendous negative impact of mass media coverage of meat-health issues on consumer risk perception, health concern, and attitude and behavior toward fresh meat. Oppositely, personal communication through butchers had only a small effect on consumer decision-making in this era dominated by alarming meat-health press. Implications are threefold. First, mass media should be aware of its social responsibilities, which include spreading reliable and correct information to the society. This is especially the case as human health risks are involved. Second, the meat industry urgently needs to reorient itself toward quality, safety, and transparency. Finally, future communication dealing with similar crises situations requires cooperation across the meat chain, government, and those who are responsible for public health promotion and communication.

The role of redundant information in cultural transmission and cultural stabilization.

PubMed

Acerbi, Alberto; Tennie, Claudio

2016-02-01

Redundant copying has been proposed as a manner to achieve the high-fidelity necessary to pass on and preserve complex traits in human cultural transmission. There are at least 2 ways to define redundant copying. One refers to the possibility of copying repeatedly the same trait over time, and another to the ability to exploit multiple layers of information pointing to the same trait during a single copying event. Using an individual-based model, we explore how redundant copying (defined as in the latter way) helps to achieve successful transmission. The authors show that increasing redundant copying increases the likelihood of accurately transmitting a behavior more than either augmenting the number of copying occasions across time or boosting the general accuracy of social learning. They also investigate how different cost functions, deriving, for example, from the need to invest more energy in cognitive processing, impact the evolution of redundant copying. The authors show that populations converge either to high-fitness/high-costs states (with high redundant copying and complex culturally transmitted behaviors; resembling human culture) or to low-fitness/low-costs states (with low redundant copying and simple transmitted behaviors; resembling social learning forms typical of nonhuman animals). This outcome may help to explain why cumulative culture is rare in the animal kingdom. (c) 2016 APA, all rights reserved).

Sympatric Apes in Sacred Forests: Shared Space and Habitat Use by Humans and Endangered Javan Gibbons (Hylobates moloch)

PubMed Central

Reisland, Melissa Ann; Lambert, Joanna E.

2016-01-01

In this research, we use a combination of ethnographic observation and GIS analysis to explore the use of space by humans and gibbons (Hylobates moloch) to determine areas of potential space competition in the sacred forest and nature reserve Cagar Alam Leuweung Sancang in West Java, Indonesia. More specifically, we test whether gibbons respond to the presence of humans in a manner consistent with predator-avoidance and predicted that the gibbon study subjects would avoid areas visited by humans (Risk-Disturbance Hypothesis). Data were collected August 2010-June 2011. We collected GPS locations and behavioral data on both the humans (6,652 hours) and the gibbons (1,253 hours) in the forest using 10 minute instantaneous sampling. Results indicate that humans preferentially assemble at the most sacred spot in the forest (Cikajayaan waterfall). Two gibbon groups’ home ranges encompassed most of the sacred areas. Group B avoided areas of high human use, as high human use areas and high gibbon use areas did not overlap. Group C, though, continued to use areas that were heavily visited by humans. We thus found partial support for the Risk-Disturbance Hypothesis, although the variation in gibbon response to human disturbance indicates behavioral flexibility. We suggest that understanding the effects of shared space on wildlife is necessary for informing conservation policy in human-visited forests. PMID:26790025

Emotion identification method using RGB information of human face

NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

Kita, Shinya; Mita, Akira

2015-03-01

Recently, the number of single households is drastically increased due to the growth of the aging society and the diversity of lifestyle. Therefore, the evolution of building spaces is demanded. Biofied Building we propose can help to avoid this situation. It helps interaction between the building and residents' conscious and unconscious information using robots. The unconscious information includes emotion, condition, and behavior. One of the important information is thermal comfort. We assume we can estimate it from human face. There are many researchs about face color analysis, but a few of them are conducted in real situations. In other words, the existing methods were not used with disturbance such as room lumps. In this study, Kinect was used with face-tracking. Room lumps and task lumps were used to verify that our method could be applicable to real situation. In this research, two rooms at 22 and 28 degrees C were prepared. We showed that the transition of thermal comfort by changing temperature can be observed from human face. Thus, distinction between the data of 22 and 28 degrees C condition from face color was proved to be possible.

Temporal dynamics of choice behavior in rats and humans: an examination of pre- and post-choice latencies

PubMed Central

Fam, Justine; Westbrook, Fred; Arabzadeh, Ehsan

2016-01-01

Identifying similarities and differences in choice behavior across species is informative about how basic mechanisms give rise to more complex processes. In the present study, we compared pre- and post-choice latencies between rats and humans under two paradigms. In Experiment 1, we used a cued choice paradigm where subjects were presented with a cue that directed them as to which of two options to respond for rewards. In Experiment 2, subjects were free to choose between two options in order to procure rewards. In both Experiments rewards were delivered with distinct probabilities. The trial structure used in these experiments allowed the choice process to be decomposed into pre- and post-choice processes. Overall, post-choice latencies reflected the difference in reward probability between the two options, where latencies for the option with higher probability of reward were longer than those for the option with lower probability of reward. An interesting difference between rats and humans was observed: the choice behavior for humans, but not rats, was sensitive to the free-choice aspect of the tasks, such that in free-choice trials post-choice latencies no longer reflected the difference in reward probabilities between the two options. PMID:26862000

Convergent functional genomics in addiction research - a translational approach to study candidate genes and gene networks.

PubMed

Spanagel, Rainer

2013-01-01

Convergent functional genomics (CFG) is a translational methodology that integrates in a Bayesian fashion multiple lines of evidence from studies in human and animal models to get a better understanding of the genetics of a disease or pathological behavior. Here the integration of data sets that derive from forward genetics in animals and genetic association studies including genome wide association studies (GWAS) in humans is described for addictive behavior. The aim of forward genetics in animals and association studies in humans is to identify mutations (e.g. SNPs) that produce a certain phenotype; i.e. "from phenotype to genotype". Most powerful in terms of forward genetics is combined quantitative trait loci (QTL) analysis and gene expression profiling in recombinant inbreed rodent lines or genetically selected animals for a specific phenotype, e.g. high vs. low drug consumption. By Bayesian scoring genomic information from forward genetics in animals is then combined with human GWAS data on a similar addiction-relevant phenotype. This integrative approach generates a robust candidate gene list that has to be functionally validated by means of reverse genetics in animals; i.e. "from genotype to phenotype". It is proposed that studying addiction relevant phenotypes and endophenotypes by this CFG approach will allow a better determination of the genetics of addictive behavior.

Collective Behavior of Market Participants during Abrupt Stock Price Changes

PubMed Central

Maskawa, Jun-ichi

2016-01-01

Under uncertainty, human and animal collectives often respond stochastically to events they encounter. Human or animal individuals behave depending on others’ actions, and sometimes follow choices that are sub-optimal for individuals. Such mimetic behaviors are enhanced during emergencies, creating collective behavior of a group. A stock market that is about to crash, as markets did immediately after the Lehman Brothers bankruptcy, provides illustrative examples of such behaviors. We provide empirical evidence proving the existence of collective behavior among stock market participants in emergent situations. We investigated the resolution of extreme supply-and-demand order imbalances by increased balancing counter orders: buy and sell orders for excess supply and demand respectively, during times of price adjustment, so-called special quotes on the Tokyo Stock Exchange. Counter orders increase positively depending on the quantity of revealed counter orders: the accumulated orders in the book until then. Statistics of the coming counter order are well described using a logistic regression model with the ratio of revealed orders until then to the finally revealed orders as the explanatory variable. Results given here show that the market participants make Bayesian estimations of optimal choices to ascertain whether to order using information about orders of other participants. PMID:27513335

Collective Behavior of Market Participants during Abrupt Stock Price Changes.

PubMed

Maskawa, Jun-Ichi

2016-01-01

Under uncertainty, human and animal collectives often respond stochastically to events they encounter. Human or animal individuals behave depending on others' actions, and sometimes follow choices that are sub-optimal for individuals. Such mimetic behaviors are enhanced during emergencies, creating collective behavior of a group. A stock market that is about to crash, as markets did immediately after the Lehman Brothers bankruptcy, provides illustrative examples of such behaviors. We provide empirical evidence proving the existence of collective behavior among stock market participants in emergent situations. We investigated the resolution of extreme supply-and-demand order imbalances by increased balancing counter orders: buy and sell orders for excess supply and demand respectively, during times of price adjustment, so-called special quotes on the Tokyo Stock Exchange. Counter orders increase positively depending on the quantity of revealed counter orders: the accumulated orders in the book until then. Statistics of the coming counter order are well described using a logistic regression model with the ratio of revealed orders until then to the finally revealed orders as the explanatory variable. Results given here show that the market participants make Bayesian estimations of optimal choices to ascertain whether to order using information about orders of other participants.

Effects of optimism on gambling in the rat slot machine task.

PubMed

Rafa, Dominik; Kregiel, Jakub; Popik, Piotr; Rygula, Rafal

2016-03-01

Although gambling disorder is a serious social problem in modern societies, information about the behavioral traits that could determine vulnerability to this psychopathology is still scarce. In this study, we used a recently developed ambiguous-cue interpretation ​(ACI)​ paradigm to investigate whether 'optimism' and 'pessimism' as behavioral traits may determine the gambling-like behavior of rodents. In a series of ACI tests (cognitive bias screening), we identified rats that displayed 'pessimistic' and 'optimistic' traits. Subsequently, using the rat slot machine task (rSMT), we investigated if the 'optimistic'/'pessimistic' traits could determine the crucial feature of gambling-like behavior that has been investigated in rats and humans: the ​interpretation of 'near-miss' outcomes as a positive (i.e., win) situation. We found that 'optimists' did not interpret 'near-miss', 'near loss', or 'clear win' as win trials more often than ​their 'pessimistic' ​conspecifics; however, the 'optimists' were statistically more likely to reach for a reward in the hopeless 'clear loss' situation. This agrees with human studies and provides a platform for modeling interactions between behavioral traits and gambling in animals. Copyright © 2015 Elsevier B.V. All rights reserved.

My owner, right or wrong: the effect of familiarity on the domestic dog's behavior in a food-choice task.

PubMed

Cook, Amy; Arter, Jennifer; Jacobs, Lucia F

2014-03-01

Dogs are strongly influenced by human behavior, and they readily form bonds with specific humans. Yet these lines of inquiry are not often combined. The goal of this study was to investigate whether such bonds would play a role in how dogs behave in response to human signals. Using various types of signals, we compared dogs' use of information from a familiar human (their owner) versus an unfamiliar human when choosing between two food containers. In some conditions, the owner indicated a container that gave food and a stranger indicated a container that did not; in other conditions, this was reversed. Dogs more often chose the container indicated by or nearest to their owner, even when this container never yielded a food reward. In two conditions, dogs chose at chance: a control condition in which both pointers were strangers and a condition in which the owner and stranger sat reading books and provided no social signal. This is the first study to directly compare owners to strangers in a single food-choice situation. Our results suggest that dogs make decisions by attending preferentially to social signals from humans with whom they have become familiar.

Comparison of visual sensitivity to human and object motion in autism spectrum disorder.

PubMed

Kaiser, Martha D; Delmolino, Lara; Tanaka, James W; Shiffrar, Maggie

2010-08-01

Successful social behavior requires the accurate detection of other people's movements. Consistent with this, typical observers demonstrate enhanced visual sensitivity to human movement relative to equally complex, nonhuman movement [e.g., Pinto & Shiffrar, 2009]. A psychophysical study investigated visual sensitivity to human motion relative to object motion in observers with autism spectrum disorder (ASD). Participants viewed point-light depictions of a moving person and, for comparison, a moving tractor and discriminated between coherent and scrambled versions of these stimuli in unmasked and masked displays. There were three groups of participants: young adults with ASD, typically developing young adults, and typically developing children. Across masking conditions, typical observers showed enhanced visual sensitivity to human movement while observers in the ASD group did not. Because the human body is an inherently social stimulus, this result is consistent with social brain theories [e.g., Pelphrey & Carter, 2008; Schultz, 2005] and suggests that the visual systems of individuals with ASD may not be tuned for the detection of socially relevant information such as the presence of another person. Reduced visual sensitivity to human movements could compromise important social behaviors including, for example, gesture comprehension.

The social brain in psychiatric and neurological disorders

PubMed Central

Kennedy, Daniel P.; Adolphs, Ralph

2013-01-01

Psychiatric and neurological disorders have historically provided key insights into the structure-function relationships that subserve human social cognition and behavior, informing the concept of the ‘social brain’. In this review, we take stock of the current status of this concept, retaining a focus on disorders that impact social behavior. We discuss how the social brain, social cognition, and social behavior are interdependent, and emphasize the important role of development and compensation. We suggest that the social brain, and its dysfunction and recovery, must be understood not in terms of specific structures, but rather in terms of their interaction in large-scale networks. PMID:23047070

Perceived Risks and Benefits in a Text Message Study of Substance Abuse and Sexual Behavior.

PubMed

Bonar, Erin E; Koocher, Gerald P; Benoit, Matthew F; Collins, R Lorraine; Cranford, James A; Walton, Maureen A

2018-01-01

To inform ethical procedures for human subjects research using mobile health (mHealth), we examined perceived risks and benefits of study participation among emerging adults ( N =54) with drug use who completed text message assessments of substance use and sexual behaviors. Most participants reported comfort with participation and some reported perceived benefits, such as improved relationships. Perceived risks were infrequently reported, including negative emotions, and legal or financial concerns. In conclusion, participants from a vulnerable population reported few perceived harms of participation in longitudinal mHealth assessments of sensitive behaviors. Researchers should continue characterizing participants' perspectives on ethical aspects of mHealth research.

Prospect Theory and Interval-Valued Hesitant Set for Safety Evacuation Model

NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

Kou, Meng; Lu, Na

2018-01-01

The study applies the research results of prospect theory and multi attribute decision making theory, combined with the complexity, uncertainty and multifactor influence of the underground mine fire system and takes the decision makers’ psychological behavior of emotion and intuition into full account to establish the intuitionistic fuzzy multiple attribute decision making method that is based on the prospect theory. The model established by this method can explain the decision maker’s safety evacuation decision behavior in the complex system of underground mine fire due to the uncertainty of the environment, imperfection of the information and human psychological behavior and other factors.

Developing Cognitive Models for Social Simulation from Survey Data

NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

Alt, Jonathan K.; Lieberman, Stephen

The representation of human behavior and cognition continues to challenge the modeling and simulation community. The use of survey and polling instruments to inform belief states, issue stances and action choice models provides a compelling means of developing models and simulations with empirical data. Using these types of data to population social simulations can greatly enhance the feasibility of validation efforts, the reusability of social and behavioral modeling frameworks, and the testable reliability of simulations. We provide a case study demonstrating these effects, document the use of survey data to develop cognitive models, and suggest future paths forward for social and behavioral modeling.

A communication channel model of the software process

NASA Technical Reports Server (NTRS)

Tausworthe, R. C.

1988-01-01

Reported here is beginning research into a noisy communication channel analogy of software development process productivity, in order to establish quantifiable behavior and theoretical bounds. The analogy leads to a fundamental mathematical relationship between human productivity and the amount of information supplied by the developers, the capacity of the human channel for processing and transmitting information, the software product yield (object size), the work effort, requirements efficiency, tool and process efficiency, and programming environment advantage. Also derived is an upper bound to productivity that shows that software reuse is the only means than can lead to unbounded productivity growth; practical considerations of size and cost of reusable components may reduce this to a finite bound.

A communication channel model of the software process

NASA Technical Reports Server (NTRS)

Tausworthe, Robert C.

1988-01-01

Beginning research into a noisy communication channel analogy of software development process productivity, in order to establish quantifiable behavior and theoretical bounds is discussed. The analogy leads to a fundamental mathematical relationship between human productivity and the amount of information supplied by the developers, the capacity of the human channel for processing and transmitting information, the software product yield (object size) the work effort, requirements efficiency, tool and process efficiency, and programming environment advantage. An upper bound to productivity is derived that shows that software reuse is the only means that can lead to unbounded productivity growth; practical considerations of size and cost of reusable components may reduce this to a finite bound.

Visual Working Memory Enhances the Neural Response to Matching Visual Input.

PubMed

Gayet, Surya; Guggenmos, Matthias; Christophel, Thomas B; Haynes, John-Dylan; Paffen, Chris L E; Van der Stigchel, Stefan; Sterzer, Philipp

2017-07-12

Visual working memory (VWM) is used to maintain visual information available for subsequent goal-directed behavior. The content of VWM has been shown to affect the behavioral response to concurrent visual input, suggesting that visual representations originating from VWM and from sensory input draw upon a shared neural substrate (i.e., a sensory recruitment stance on VWM storage). Here, we hypothesized that visual information maintained in VWM would enhance the neural response to concurrent visual input that matches the content of VWM. To test this hypothesis, we measured fMRI BOLD responses to task-irrelevant stimuli acquired from 15 human participants (three males) performing a concurrent delayed match-to-sample task. In this task, observers were sequentially presented with two shape stimuli and a retro-cue indicating which of the two shapes should be memorized for subsequent recognition. During the retention interval, a task-irrelevant shape (the probe) was briefly presented in the peripheral visual field, which could either match or mismatch the shape category of the memorized stimulus. We show that this probe stimulus elicited a stronger BOLD response, and allowed for increased shape-classification performance, when it matched rather than mismatched the concurrently memorized content, despite identical visual stimulation. Our results demonstrate that VWM enhances the neural response to concurrent visual input in a content-specific way. This finding is consistent with the view that neural populations involved in sensory processing are recruited for VWM storage, and it provides a common explanation for a plethora of behavioral studies in which VWM-matching visual input elicits a stronger behavioral and perceptual response. SIGNIFICANCE STATEMENT Humans heavily rely on visual information to interact with their environment and frequently must memorize such information for later use. Visual working memory allows for maintaining such visual information in the mind's eye after termination of its retinal input. It is hypothesized that information maintained in visual working memory relies on the same neural populations that process visual input. Accordingly, the content of visual working memory is known to affect our conscious perception of concurrent visual input. Here, we demonstrate for the first time that visual input elicits an enhanced neural response when it matches the content of visual working memory, both in terms of signal strength and information content. Copyright © 2017 the authors 0270-6474/17/376638-10$15.00/0.

Tripping with Synthetic Cannabinoids ("Spice"): Anecdotal and Experimental Observations in Animals and Man.

PubMed

Järbe, Torbjörn U C; Raghav, Jimit Girish

2017-01-01

The phenomenon of consuming synthetic cannabinoids ("Spice") for recreational purposes is a fairly recent trend. However, consumption of cannabis dates back millennia, with numerous accounts written on the experience of its consumption, and thousands of scientific reports published on the effects of its constituents in laboratory animals and humans. Here, we focus on consolidating the scientific literature on the effects of "Spice" compounds in various behavioral assays, including assessing abuse liability, tolerance, dependence, withdrawal, and potential toxicity. In most cases, the behavioral effects of "Spice" compounds are compared with those of Δ 9 -tetrahydrocannabinol. Methodological aspects, such as modes of administration and other logistical issues, are also discussed. As the original "Spice" molecules never were intended for human consumption, scientifically based information about potential toxicity and short- and long-term behavioral effects are very limited. Consequently, preclinical behavioral studies with "Spice" compounds are still in a nascent stage. Research is needed to address the addiction potential and other effects, including propensity for producing tissue/organ toxicity, of these synthetic cannabimimetic "Spice" compounds.

A plausible neural circuit for decision making and its formation based on reinforcement learning.

PubMed

Wei, Hui; Dai, Dawei; Bu, Yijie

2017-06-01

A human's, or lower insects', behavior is dominated by its nervous system. Each stable behavior has its own inner steps and control rules, and is regulated by a neural circuit. Understanding how the brain influences perception, thought, and behavior is a central mandate of neuroscience. The phototactic flight of insects is a widely observed deterministic behavior. Since its movement is not stochastic, the behavior should be dominated by a neural circuit. Based on the basic firing characteristics of biological neurons and the neural circuit's constitution, we designed a plausible neural circuit for this phototactic behavior from logic perspective. The circuit's output layer, which generates a stable spike firing rate to encode flight commands, controls the insect's angular velocity when flying. The firing pattern and connection type of excitatory and inhibitory neurons are considered in this computational model. We simulated the circuit's information processing using a distributed PC array, and used the real-time average firing rate of output neuron clusters to drive a flying behavior simulation. In this paper, we also explored how a correct neural decision circuit is generated from network flow view through a bee's behavior experiment based on the reward and punishment feedback mechanism. The significance of this study: firstly, we designed a neural circuit to achieve the behavioral logic rules by strictly following the electrophysiological characteristics of biological neurons and anatomical facts. Secondly, our circuit's generality permits the design and implementation of behavioral logic rules based on the most general information processing and activity mode of biological neurons. Thirdly, through computer simulation, we achieved new understanding about the cooperative condition upon which multi-neurons achieve some behavioral control. Fourthly, this study aims in understanding the information encoding mechanism and how neural circuits achieve behavior control. Finally, this study also helps establish a transitional bridge between the microscopic activity of the nervous system and macroscopic animal behavior.

Automatically identifying, counting, and describing wild animals in camera-trap images with deep learning.

PubMed

Norouzzadeh, Mohammad Sadegh; Nguyen, Anh; Kosmala, Margaret; Swanson, Alexandra; Palmer, Meredith S; Packer, Craig; Clune, Jeff

2018-06-19

Having accurate, detailed, and up-to-date information about the location and behavior of animals in the wild would improve our ability to study and conserve ecosystems. We investigate the ability to automatically, accurately, and inexpensively collect such data, which could help catalyze the transformation of many fields of ecology, wildlife biology, zoology, conservation biology, and animal behavior into "big data" sciences. Motion-sensor "camera traps" enable collecting wildlife pictures inexpensively, unobtrusively, and frequently. However, extracting information from these pictures remains an expensive, time-consuming, manual task. We demonstrate that such information can be automatically extracted by deep learning, a cutting-edge type of artificial intelligence. We train deep convolutional neural networks to identify, count, and describe the behaviors of 48 species in the 3.2 million-image Snapshot Serengeti dataset. Our deep neural networks automatically identify animals with >93.8% accuracy, and we expect that number to improve rapidly in years to come. More importantly, if our system classifies only images it is confident about, our system can automate animal identification for 99.3% of the data while still performing at the same 96.6% accuracy as that of crowdsourced teams of human volunteers, saving >8.4 y (i.e., >17,000 h at 40 h/wk) of human labeling effort on this 3.2 million-image dataset. Those efficiency gains highlight the importance of using deep neural networks to automate data extraction from camera-trap images, reducing a roadblock for this widely used technology. Our results suggest that deep learning could enable the inexpensive, unobtrusive, high-volume, and even real-time collection of a wealth of information about vast numbers of animals in the wild. Copyright © 2018 the Author(s). Published by PNAS.

Modeling the Uptake of Scientific Information by the Public and Opinion Flow in Society (Invited)

NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

Lewandowsky, S.; Brown, G. D.; Cook, J.

2013-12-01

Improved communication of scientific findings requires knowledge not only of how people process information, but also how such information spreads through society and how people's opinions are shaped by those of others. Recent advances in cognitive science have yielded mathematical modeling techniques that permit the detailed analysis of individuals' cognition as well as the behavior of communities in the aggregate. We present two case studies that highlight the insights that can be derived from mathematical models of cognition: We show how rational processing of information (i.e., Bayesian hypothesis revision) can nonetheless give rise to seemingly 'irrational' belief updating, as for example when acceptance of human-caused global warming decreases among conservatives in response to evidence for human-caused global warming. We also show in an agent-based simulation how social norms can lead to polarization of societies. The model assumes that agents located within a social network observe the behavior of neighbours and infer from their behavior the social distribution of particular attitudes (e.g. towards climate change). Agents are assumed to dislike behaviours that are extreme within their neighbourhood (social extremeness aversion), and hence have a tendency to conform. However, agents are also assumed to prefer choices that are consistent with their own true beliefs (authenticity preference). Expression of attitudes reflects a compromise between these opposing principles. The model sheds light on the role of perceived rather than actual social consensus on attitudes to climate change. This is particularly relevant given the widespread perception among those who reject climate science that the percentage of the public that is sharing their beliefs is much higher than it actually is.

Probabilistic modeling of discourse-aware sentence processing.

PubMed

Dubey, Amit; Keller, Frank; Sturt, Patrick

2013-07-01

Probabilistic models of sentence comprehension are increasingly relevant to questions concerning human language processing. However, such models are often limited to syntactic factors. This restriction is unrealistic in light of experimental results suggesting interactions between syntax and other forms of linguistic information in human sentence processing. To address this limitation, this article introduces two sentence processing models that augment a syntactic component with information about discourse co-reference. The novel combination of probabilistic syntactic components with co-reference classifiers permits them to more closely mimic human behavior than existing models. The first model uses a deep model of linguistics, based in part on probabilistic logic, allowing it to make qualitative predictions on experimental data; the second model uses shallow processing to make quantitative predictions on a broad-coverage reading-time corpus. Copyright © 2013 Cognitive Science Society, Inc.

The role of sleep in human declarative memory consolidation.

PubMed

Alger, Sara E; Chambers, Alexis M; Cunningham, Tony; Payne, Jessica D

2015-01-01

Through a variety of methods, researchers have begun unraveling the mystery of why humans spend one-third of their lives asleep. Though sleep likely serves multiple functions, it has become clear that the sleeping brain offers an ideal environment for solidifying newly learned information in the brain. Sleep , which comprises a complex collection of brain states, supports the consolidation of many different types of information. It not only promotes learning and memory stabilization, but also memory reorganization that can lead to various forms of insightful behavior. As this chapter will describe, research provides ample support for these crucial cognitive functions of sleep . Focusing on the declarative memory system in humans, we review the literature regarding the benefits of sleep for both neutral and emotionally salient declarative memory. Finally, we discuss the literature regarding the impact of sleep on emotion regulation.

Brain entropy and human intelligence: A resting-state fMRI study

PubMed Central

Calderone, Daniel; Morales, Leah J.

2018-01-01

Human intelligence comprises comprehension of and reasoning about an infinitely variable external environment. A brain capable of large variability in neural configurations, or states, will more easily understand and predict variable external events. Entropy measures the variety of configurations possible within a system, and recently the concept of brain entropy has been defined as the number of neural states a given brain can access. This study investigates the relationship between human intelligence and brain entropy, to determine whether neural variability as reflected in neuroimaging signals carries information about intellectual ability. We hypothesize that intelligence will be positively associated with entropy in a sample of 892 healthy adults, using resting-state fMRI. Intelligence is measured with the Shipley Vocabulary and WASI Matrix Reasoning tests. Brain entropy was positively associated with intelligence. This relation was most strongly observed in the prefrontal cortex, inferior temporal lobes, and cerebellum. This relationship between high brain entropy and high intelligence indicates an essential role for entropy in brain functioning. It demonstrates that access to variable neural states predicts complex behavioral performance, and specifically shows that entropy derived from neuroimaging signals at rest carries information about intellectual capacity. Future work in this area may elucidate the links between brain entropy in both resting and active states and various forms of intelligence. This insight has the potential to provide predictive information about adaptive behavior and to delineate the subdivisions and nature of intelligence based on entropic patterns. PMID:29432427

Brain entropy and human intelligence: A resting-state fMRI study.

PubMed

Saxe, Glenn N; Calderone, Daniel; Morales, Leah J

2018-01-01

Human intelligence comprises comprehension of and reasoning about an infinitely variable external environment. A brain capable of large variability in neural configurations, or states, will more easily understand and predict variable external events. Entropy measures the variety of configurations possible within a system, and recently the concept of brain entropy has been defined as the number of neural states a given brain can access. This study investigates the relationship between human intelligence and brain entropy, to determine whether neural variability as reflected in neuroimaging signals carries information about intellectual ability. We hypothesize that intelligence will be positively associated with entropy in a sample of 892 healthy adults, using resting-state fMRI. Intelligence is measured with the Shipley Vocabulary and WASI Matrix Reasoning tests. Brain entropy was positively associated with intelligence. This relation was most strongly observed in the prefrontal cortex, inferior temporal lobes, and cerebellum. This relationship between high brain entropy and high intelligence indicates an essential role for entropy in brain functioning. It demonstrates that access to variable neural states predicts complex behavioral performance, and specifically shows that entropy derived from neuroimaging signals at rest carries information about intellectual capacity. Future work in this area may elucidate the links between brain entropy in both resting and active states and various forms of intelligence. This insight has the potential to provide predictive information about adaptive behavior and to delineate the subdivisions and nature of intelligence based on entropic patterns.

Payoff Information Biases a Fast Guess Process in Perceptual Decision Making under Deadline Pressure: Evidence from Behavior, Evoked Potentials, and Quantitative Model Comparison.

PubMed

Noorbaloochi, Sharareh; Sharon, Dahlia; McClelland, James L

2015-08-05

We used electroencephalography (EEG) and behavior to examine the role of payoff bias in a difficult two-alternative perceptual decision under deadline pressure in humans. The findings suggest that a fast guess process, biased by payoff and triggered by stimulus onset, occurred on a subset of trials and raced with an evidence accumulation process informed by stimulus information. On each trial, the participant judged whether a rectangle was shifted to the right or left and responded by squeezing a right- or left-hand dynamometer. The payoff for each alternative (which could be biased or unbiased) was signaled 1.5 s before stimulus onset. The choice response was assigned to the first hand reaching a squeeze force criterion and reaction time was defined as time to criterion. Consistent with a fast guess account, fast responses were strongly biased toward the higher-paying alternative and the EEG exhibited an abrupt rise in the lateralized readiness potential (LRP) on a subset of biased payoff trials contralateral to the higher-paying alternative ∼ 150 ms after stimulus onset and 50 ms before stimulus information influenced the LRP. This rise was associated with poststimulus dynamometer activity favoring the higher-paying alternative and predicted choice and response time. Quantitative modeling supported the fast guess account over accounts of payoff effects supported in other studies. Our findings, taken with previous studies, support the idea that payoff and prior probability manipulations produce flexible adaptations to task structure and do not reflect a fixed policy for the integration of payoff and stimulus information. Humans and other animals often face situations in which they must make choices based on uncertain sensory information together with information about expected outcomes (gains or losses) about each choice. We investigated how differences in payoffs between available alternatives affect neural activity, overt choice, and the timing of choice responses. In our experiment, in which participants were under strong time pressure, neural and behavioral findings together with model fitting suggested that our human participants often made a fast guess toward the higher reward rather than integrating stimulus and payoff information. Our findings, taken with findings from other studies, support the idea that payoff and prior probability manipulations produce flexible adaptations to task structure and do not reflect a fixed policy. Copyright © 2015 the authors 0270-6474/15/3510989-23$15.00/0.

Augmenting team cognition in human-automation teams performing in complex operational environments.

PubMed

Cuevas, Haydee M; Fiore, Stephen M; Caldwell, Barrett S; Strater, Laura

2007-05-01

There is a growing reliance on automation (e.g., intelligent agents, semi-autonomous robotic systems) to effectively execute increasingly cognitively complex tasks. Successful team performance for such tasks has become even more dependent on team cognition, addressing both human-human and human-automation teams. Team cognition can be viewed as the binding mechanism that produces coordinated behavior within experienced teams, emerging from the interplay between each team member's individual cognition and team process behaviors (e.g., coordination, communication). In order to better understand team cognition in human-automation teams, team performance models need to address issues surrounding the effect of human-agent and human-robot interaction on critical team processes such as coordination and communication. Toward this end, we present a preliminary theoretical framework illustrating how the design and implementation of automation technology may influence team cognition and team coordination in complex operational environments. Integrating constructs from organizational and cognitive science, our proposed framework outlines how information exchange and updating between humans and automation technology may affect lower-level (e.g., working memory) and higher-level (e.g., sense making) cognitive processes as well as teams' higher-order "metacognitive" processes (e.g., performance monitoring). Issues surrounding human-automation interaction are discussed and implications are presented within the context of designing automation technology to improve task performance in human-automation teams.

Videos of conspecifics elicit interactive looking patterns and facial expressions in monkeys

PubMed Central

Mosher, Clayton P.; Zimmerman, Prisca E.; Gothard, Katalin M.

2014-01-01

A broader understanding of the neural basis of social behavior in primates requires the use of species-specific stimuli that elicit spontaneous, but reproducible and tractable behaviors. In this context of natural behaviors, individual variation can further inform about the factors that influence social interactions. To approximate natural social interactions similar to those documented by field studies, we used unedited video footage to induce in viewer monkeys spontaneous facial expressions and looking patterns in the laboratory setting. Three adult male monkeys, previously behaviorally and genetically (5-HTTLPR) characterized (Gibboni et al., 2009), were monitored while they watched 10 s video segments depicting unfamiliar monkeys (movie monkeys) displaying affiliative, neutral, and aggressive behaviors. The gaze and head orientation of the movie monkeys alternated between ‘averted’ and ‘directed’ at the viewer. The viewers were not reinforced for watching the movies, thus their looking patterns indicated their interest and social engagement with the stimuli. The behavior of the movie monkey accounted for differences in the looking patterns and facial expressions displayed by the viewers. We also found multiple significant differences in the behavior of the viewers that correlated with their interest in these stimuli. These socially relevant dynamic stimuli elicited spontaneous social behaviors, such as eye-contact induced reciprocation of facial expression, gaze aversion, and gaze following, that were previously not observed in response to static images. This approach opens a unique opportunity to understanding the mechanisms that trigger spontaneous social behaviors in humans and non-human primates. PMID:21688888

Human behavior and malaria.

PubMed

Hongvivatana, T

1986-09-01

Human behavior in malaria is often narrowly referred to behavior of the target populations in transmission and control of malaria. In this presentation it was discussed that such view is too narrow. A broader framework incorporating illness behavior and human behavior in malaria control bureaucracies is needed for the success of national malaria control programme. Literature under the three broad categories of human behavior in malaria is reviewed to justify future directions in human behavior research and their significance for successful malaria control.

Information Processing Capabilities in Performers Differing in Levels of Motor Skill

DTIC Science & Technology

1979-01-01

F. I. 1. , ’ Lockhart , R. S. Levels of* processing : A framework for memory research. Journal of Verbal Learning and Verbal Behavior, 1972, 11, 671-684...ARI TECHNICAL REPORT LEVEr.79iA4 Information Processing Capabilities in Performers Differing In Levels of 00 Motor Skill ,4 by Robert N. Singer... PROCESSING CAPABILITIES IN PERFORMERS DIFFERING IN LEVELS OF MOTOR SKILL INTRODUCTION In the human behaving systems model developed by Singer, Gerson, and

The role of behavioral decision theory for cockpit information management

NASA Technical Reports Server (NTRS)

Jonsson, Jon E.

1991-01-01

The focus of this report is the consideration of one form of cognition, judgment and decision making, while examining some information management issues associated with the implementation of new forms of automation. As technology matures and more tasks become suitable to automation, human factors researchers will have to consider the effect that increasing automation will have on operator performance. Current technology allows flight deck designers the opportunity to automate activities involving substantially more cognitive processing.

The pervasive nature of unconscious social information processing in executive control

PubMed Central

Prabhakaran, Ranjani; Gray, Jeremy R.

2012-01-01

Humans not only have impressive executive abilities, but we are also fundamentally social creatures. In the cognitive neuroscience literature, it has long been assumed that executive control mechanisms, which play a critical role in guiding goal-directed behavior, operate on consciously processed information. Although more recent evidence suggests that unconsciously processed information can also influence executive control, most of this literature has focused on visual masked priming paradigms. However, the social psychological literature has demonstrated that unconscious influences are pervasive, and social information can unintentionally influence a wide variety of behaviors, including some that are likely to require executive abilities. For example, social information can unconsciously influence attention processes, such that simply instructing participants to describe a previous situation in which they had power over someone or someone else had power over them has been shown to unconsciously influence their attentional focus abilities, a key aspect of executive control. In the current review, we consider behavioral and neural findings from a variety of paradigms, including priming of goals and social hierarchical roles, as well as interpersonal interactions, in order to highlight the pervasive nature of social influences on executive control. These findings suggest that social information can play a critical role in executive control, and that this influence often occurs in an unconscious fashion. We conclude by suggesting further avenues of research for investigation of the interplay between social factors and executive control. PMID:22557956

Disentangling prenatal and inherited influences in humans with an experimental design.

PubMed

Rice, Frances; Harold, Gordon T; Boivin, Jacky; Hay, Dale F; van den Bree, Marianne; Thapar, Anita

2009-02-17

Exposure to adversity in utero at a sensitive period of development can bring about physiological, structural, and metabolic changes in the fetus that affect later development and behavior. However, the link between prenatal environment and offspring outcomes could also arise and confound because of the relation between maternal and offspring genomes. As human studies cannot randomly assign offspring to prenatal conditions, it is difficult to test whether in utero events have true causal effects on offspring outcomes. We used an unusual approach to overcome this difficulty whereby pregnant mothers are either biologically unrelated or related to their child as a result of in vitro fertilization (IVF). In this sample, prenatal smoking reduces offspring birth weight in both unrelated and related offspring, consistent with effects arising through prenatal mechanisms independent of the relation between the maternal and offspring genomes. In contrast, the association between prenatal smoking and offspring antisocial behavior depended on inherited factors because association was only present in related mothers and offspring. The results demonstrate that this unusual prenatal cross-fostering design is feasible and informative for disentangling inherited and prenatal effects on human health and behavior. Disentangling these different effects is invaluable for pinpointing markers of prenatal adversity that have a causal effect on offspring outcomes. The origins of behavior and many common complex disorders may begin in early life, therefore this experimental design could pave the way for identifying prenatal factors that affect behavior in future generations.

Mad men, women and steroid cocktails: a review of the impact of sex and other factors on anabolic androgenic steroids effects on affective behaviors.

PubMed

Onakomaiya, Marie M; Henderson, Leslie P

2016-02-01

For several decades, elite athletes and a growing number of recreational consumers have used anabolic androgenic steroids (AAS) as performance enhancing drugs. Despite mounting evidence that illicit use of these synthetic steroids has detrimental effects on affective states, information available on sex-specific actions of these drugs is lacking. The focus of this review is to assess information to date on the importance of sex and its interaction with other environmental factors on affective behaviors, with an emphasis on data derived from non-human studies. The PubMed database was searched for relevant studies in both sexes. Studies examining AAS use in females are limited, reflecting the lower prevalence of use in this sex. Data, however, indicate significant sex-specific differences in AAS effects on anxiety-like and aggressive behaviors, interactions with other drugs of abuse, and the interplay of AAS with other environmental factors such as diet and exercise. Current methods for assessing AAS use have limitations that suggest biases of both under- and over-reporting, which may be amplified for females who are poorly represented in self-report studies of human subjects and are rarely used in animal studies. Data from animal literature suggest that there are significant sex-specific differences in the impact of AAS on aggression, anxiety, and concomitant use of other abused substances. These results have relevance for human females who take these drugs as performance-enhancing substances and for transgender XX individuals who may illicitly self-administer AAS as they transition to a male gender identity.

Fear learning and memory across adolescent development Hormones and Behavior Special Issue: Puberty and Adolescence

PubMed Central

Pattwell, Siobhan S.; Lee, Francis S.; Casey, B.J.

2013-01-01

Throughout the past several decades, studies have uncovered a wealth of information about the neural circuitry underlying fear learning and extinction that has helped to inform treatments for fear-related disorders such as post-traumatic stress and anxiety. Yet, up to 40 percent of people do not respond to such treatments. Adolescence, in particular, is a developmental stage during which anxiety disorders peak, yet little is known about the development of fear-related neural circuitry during this period. Moreover, pharmacological and behavioral therapies that have been developed are based on mature circuitry and function. Here, we review neural circuitry implicated in fear learning and data from adolescent mouse and human fear learning studies. In addition, we propose a developmental model of fear neural circuitry that may optimize current treatments and inform when, during development, specific treatments for anxiety may be most effective. PMID:23998679

Fear learning and memory across adolescent development: Hormones and Behavior Special Issue: Puberty and Adolescence.

PubMed

Pattwell, Siobhan S; Lee, Francis S; Casey, B J

2013-07-01

Throughout the past several decades, studies have uncovered a wealth of information about the neural circuitry underlying fear learning and extinction that has helped to inform treatments for fear-related disorders such as post-traumatic stress and anxiety. Yet, up to 40% of people do not respond to such treatments. Adolescence, in particular, is a developmental stage during which anxiety disorders peak, yet little is known about the development of fear-related neural circuitry during this period. Moreover, pharmacological and behavioral therapies that have been developed are based on mature circuitry and function. Here, we review neural circuitry implicated in fear learning and data from adolescent mouse and human fear learning studies. In addition, we propose a developmental model of fear neural circuitry that may optimize current treatments and inform when, during development, specific treatments for anxiety may be most effective. Copyright © 2013 Elsevier Inc. All rights reserved.

Study of the human postural control system during quiet standing using detrended fluctuation analysis

NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

Teresa Blázquez, M.; Anguiano, Marta; de Saavedra, Fernando Arias; Lallena, Antonio M.; Carpena, Pedro

2009-05-01

The detrended fluctuation analysis is used to study the behavior of different time series obtained from the trajectory of the center of pressure, the output of the activity of the human postural control system. The results suggest that these trajectories present two different regimes in their scaling properties: persistent (for high frequencies, short-range time scale) to antipersistent (for low frequencies, long-range time scale) behaviors. The similitude between the results obtained for the measurements, done with both eyes open and eyes closed, indicate either that the visual system may be disregarded by the postural control system while maintaining the quiet standing, or that the control mechanisms associated with each type of information (visual, vestibular and somatosensory) cannot be disentangled with the type of analysis performed here.

Effectiveness of Social Behaviors for Autonomous Wheelchair Robot to Support Elderly People in Japan

PubMed Central

Shiomi, Masahiro; Iio, Takamasa; Kamei, Koji; Sharma, Chandraprakash; Hagita, Norihiro

2015-01-01

We developed a wheelchair robot to support the movement of elderly people and specifically implemented two functions to enhance their intention to use it: speaking behavior to convey place/location related information and speed adjustment based on individual preferences. Our study examines how the evaluations of our wheelchair robot differ when compared with human caregivers and a conventional autonomous wheelchair without the two proposed functions in a moving support context. 28 senior citizens participated in the experiment to evaluate three different conditions. Our measurements consisted of questionnaire items and the coding of free-style interview results. Our experimental results revealed that elderly people evaluated our wheelchair robot higher than the wheelchair without the two functions and the human caregivers for some items. PMID:25993038

Aerospace medicine and biology: A continuing bibliography with indexes (supplement 353)

NASA Technical Reports Server (NTRS)

1989-01-01

This bibliography lists 238 reports, articles, and other documents introduced into the NASA Scientific and Technical Information System in August 1991. Subject coverage includes: aerospace medicine and psychology, life support systems and controlled environments, safety equipment, exobiology and extraterrestrial life, biotechnology, human factors engineering, and flight crew behavior and performance.

Some Ideas on the Microcomputer and the Information/Knowledge Workstation.

ERIC Educational Resources Information Center

Boon, J. A.; Pienaar, H.

1989-01-01

Identifies the optimal goal of knowledge workstations as the harmony of technology and human decision-making behaviors. Two types of decision-making processes are described and the application of each type to experimental and/or operational situations is discussed. Suggestions for technical solutions to machine-user interfaces are then offered.…

Using Call Detail Records for Modeling Coastal Recreation Behavior

EPA Science Inventory

Call data records (CDR) are data from cellular phone networks that can be used to understand human mobility or where people go spatially. They can be used to estimate visitation to an area such as a coastal access point for a given time window, as well as provide information on t...

10 Years of Illusions

ERIC Educational Resources Information Center

Smeets, Jeroen B. J.; Brenner, Eli

2006-01-01

A decade ago, S. Aglioti, J. F. X. DeSouza, and M. A. Goodale (1995) published an experiment that has had a big influence on the way that visual information is thought to control human behavior. Their findings have often been simplified as suggesting that action is immune to perceptual illusions. The current authors critically analyze the 4 steps…

Changing a Generation's Way of Thinking: Teaching Computational Thinking through Programming

ERIC Educational Resources Information Center

Buitrago Flórez, Francisco; Casallas, Rubby; Hernández, Marcela; Reyes, Alejandro; Restrepo, Silvia; Danies, Giovanna

2017-01-01

Computational thinking (CT) uses concepts that are essential to computing and information science to solve problems, design and evaluate complex systems, and understand human reasoning and behavior. This way of thinking has important implications in computer sciences as well as in almost every other field. Therefore, we contend that CT should be…

The Costs and Economies of Open and Distance Learning.

ERIC Educational Resources Information Center

Rumble, Greville

This book is designed to give planners of open and distance learning programs the technical information needed to determine the cost of programs and analyze the behavior of costs. The following are among the topics discussed: budgets; classification of resources (human resources, premises and accommodation, and equipment and furniture); a basic…

Animal-Assisted Activities for Students with Disabilities: Obtaining Stakeholders' Approval and Planning Strategies for Teachers

ERIC Educational Resources Information Center

Baumgartner, Erin; Cho, Jeong-il

2014-01-01

Animal-human interactions have been found to have positive influences on children across the world. In particular, research supports the benefits of animal-assisted activities in addressing students' social and behavioral problems within the classroom environment. The general information about animal-assisted activities provided in this…

IRON SULFIDE-ARSENITE INTERACTIONS: ADSORPTION BEHAVIOR ONTO IRON MONOSULFIDES AND CONTROLS ON ARSENIC ACCUMULATION IN PYRITE

EPA Science Inventory

Because arsenic in ground water and surface water poses a risk to ecosystem and human health, more detailed information is needed on the factors that govern arsenic fate and transport in the environment. Arsenic mobility in natural systems is often linked to iron and sulfur cycl...

Know Yourself: Comprehensive Health Education Material for High School Students.

ERIC Educational Resources Information Center

Chicago Public Schools, IL.

This book was developed to help high school students understand the changes taking place in their bodies and to learn about themselves at the same time. Topics include good grooming, clean health habits, human reproduction, sexually transmitted diseases, responsible sexual behavior, and substance abuse. This information can increase students'…

Category Induction via Distributional Analysis: Evidence from a Serial Reaction Time Task

ERIC Educational Resources Information Center

Hunt, Ruskin H.; Aslin, Richard N.

2010-01-01

Category formation lies at the heart of a number of higher-order behaviors, including language. We assessed the ability of human adults to learn, from distributional information alone, categories embedded in a sequence of input stimuli using a serial reaction time task. Artificial grammars generated corpora of input strings containing a…

Choosing Learning Methods Suitable for Teaching and Learning in Computer Science

ERIC Educational Resources Information Center

Taylor, Estelle; Breed, Marnus; Hauman, Ilette; Homann, Armando

2013-01-01

Our aim is to determine which teaching methods students in Computer Science and Information Systems prefer. There are in total 5 different paradigms (behaviorism, cognitivism, constructivism, design-based and humanism) with 32 models between them. Each model is unique and states different learning methods. Recommendations are made on methods that…

Machine Learning Methods for Articulatory Data

ERIC Educational Resources Information Center

Berry, Jeffrey James

2012-01-01

Humans make use of more than just the audio signal to perceive speech. Behavioral and neurological research has shown that a person's knowledge of how speech is produced influences what is perceived. With methods for collecting articulatory data becoming more ubiquitous, methods for extracting useful information are needed to make this data…

Working memory management and predicted utility

PubMed Central

Chatham, Christopher H.; Badre, David

2013-01-01

Given the limited capacity of working memory (WM), its resources should be allocated strategically. One strategy is filtering, whereby access to WM is granted preferentially to items with the greatest utility. However, reallocation of WM resources might be required if the utility of maintained information subsequently declines. Here, we present behavioral, computational, and neuroimaging evidence that human participants track changes in the predicted utility of information in WM. First, participants demonstrated behavioral costs when the utility of items already maintained in WM declined and resources should be reallocated. An adapted Q-learning model indicated that these costs scaled with the historical utility of individual items. Finally, model-based neuroimaging demonstrated that frontal cortex tracked the utility of items to be maintained in WM, whereas ventral striatum tracked changes in the utility of items maintained in WM to the degree that these items are no longer useful. Our findings suggest that frontostriatal mechanisms track the utility of information in WM, and that these dynamics may predict delays in the removal of information from WM. PMID:23882196

Weighted integration of short-term memory and sensory signals in the oculomotor system.

PubMed

Deravet, Nicolas; Blohm, Gunnar; de Xivry, Jean-Jacques Orban; Lefèvre, Philippe

2018-05-01

Oculomotor behaviors integrate sensory and prior information to overcome sensory-motor delays and noise. After much debate about this process, reliability-based integration has recently been proposed and several models of smooth pursuit now include recurrent Bayesian integration or Kalman filtering. However, there is a lack of behavioral evidence in humans supporting these theoretical predictions. Here, we independently manipulated the reliability of visual and prior information in a smooth pursuit task. Our results show that both smooth pursuit eye velocity and catch-up saccade amplitude were modulated by visual and prior information reliability. We interpret these findings as the continuous reliability-based integration of a short-term memory of target motion with visual information, which support modeling work. Furthermore, we suggest that saccadic and pursuit systems share this short-term memory. We propose that this short-term memory of target motion is quickly built and continuously updated, and constitutes a general building block present in all sensorimotor systems.

Why copy others? Insights from the social learning strategies tournament.

PubMed

Rendell, L; Boyd, R; Cownden, D; Enquist, M; Eriksson, K; Feldman, M W; Fogarty, L; Ghirlanda, S; Lillicrap, T; Laland, K N

2010-04-09

Social learning (learning through observation or interaction with other individuals) is widespread in nature and is central to the remarkable success of humanity, yet it remains unclear why copying is profitable and how to copy most effectively. To address these questions, we organized a computer tournament in which entrants submitted strategies specifying how to use social learning and its asocial alternative (for example, trial-and-error learning) to acquire adaptive behavior in a complex environment. Most current theory predicts the emergence of mixed strategies that rely on some combination of the two types of learning. In the tournament, however, strategies that relied heavily on social learning were found to be remarkably successful, even when asocial information was no more costly than social information. Social learning proved advantageous because individuals frequently demonstrated the highest-payoff behavior in their repertoire, inadvertently filtering information for copiers. The winning strategy (discountmachine) relied nearly exclusively on social learning and weighted information according to the time since acquisition.

Why Copy Others? Insights from the Social Learning Strategies Tournament

PubMed Central

Rendell, L.; Boyd, R.; Cownden, D.; Enquist, M.; Eriksson, K.; Feldman, M. W.; Fogarty, L.; Ghirlanda, S.; Lillicrap, T.; Laland, K. N.

2010-01-01

Social learning (learning through observation or interaction with other individuals) is widespread in nature and is central to the remarkable success of humanity, yet it remains unclear why it pays to copy, and how best to do so. To address these questions we organised a computer tournament in which entrants submitted strategies specifying how to use social learning and its asocial alternative (e.g. trial-and-error) to acquire adaptive behavior in a complex environment. Most current theory predicts the emergence of mixed strategies that rely on some combination of the two types of learning. In the tournament, however, strategies that relied heavily on social learning were found to be remarkably successful, even when asocial information was no more costly than social information. Social learning proved advantageous because individuals frequently demonstrated the highest-payoff behavior in their repertoire, inadvertently filtering information for copiers. The winning strategy (discountmachine) relied exclusively on social learning, and weighted information according to the time since acquisition. PMID:20378813

The influence of essential oils on human attention. I: alertness.

PubMed

Ilmberger, J; Heuberger, E; Mahrhofer, C; Dessovic, H; Kowarik, D; Buchbauer, G

2001-03-01

Scientific research on the effects of essential oils on human behavior lags behind the promises made by popular aromatherapy. Nearly all aspects of human behavior are closely linked to processes of attention, the basic level being that of alertness, which ranges from sleep to wakefulness. In our study we measured the influence of essential oils and components of essential oils [peppermint, jasmine, ylang-ylang, 1,8-cineole (in two different dosages) and menthol] on this core attentional function, which can be experimentally defined as speed of information processing. Substances were administered by inhalation; levels of alertness were assessed by measuring motor and reaction times in a reaction time paradigm. The performances of the six experimental groups receiving substances (n = 20 in four groups, n = 30 in two groups) were compared with those of corresponding control groups receiving water. Between-group analysis, i.e. comparisons between experimental groups and their respective control groups, mainly did not reach statistical significance. However, within-group analysis showed complex correlations between subjective evaluations of substances and objective performance, indicating that effects of essentials oils or their components on basic forms of attentional behavior are mainly psychological.

Managing the Fukushima Challenge

PubMed Central

Suzuki, Atsuyuki

2014-01-01

The Fukushima Daiichi accident raises a fundamental question: Can science and technology prevent the inevitability of serious accidents, especially those with low probabilities and high consequences? This question reminds us of a longstanding challenge with the trans-sciences, originally addressed by Alvin Weinberg well before the Three Mile Island and Chernobyl accidents. This article, revisiting Weinberg's issue, aims at gaining insights from the accident with a special emphasis on the sociotechnical or human behavioral aspects lying behind the accident's causes. In particular, an innovative method for managing the challenge is explored referring to behavioral science approaches to a decision-making process on risk management; such as managing human behavioral risks with information asymmetry, seeking a rational consensus with communicative action, and pursuing procedural rationality through interactions with the outer environment. In short, this article describes the emerging need for Japan to transform its national safety management institutions so that these might be based on interactive communication with parties inside and outside Japan. PMID:24954604

SAME-GENDER SEX IN THE UNITED STATES IMPACT OF T-ACASI ON PREVALENCE ESTIMATES

PubMed Central

VILLARROEL, MARIA A.; TURNER, CHARLES F.; EGGLESTON, ELIZABETH; AL-TAYYIB, ALIA; ROGERS, SUSAN M.; ROMAN, ANTHONY M.; COOLEY, PHILIP C.; GORDEK, HARPER

2011-01-01

Well-conducted telephone surveys provide an economical means of estimating the prevalence of sexual and reproductive behaviors in a population. There is, however, a nontrivial potential for bias since respondents must report sensitive information to a human interviewer. The National STD and Behavior Measurement Experiment (NSBME) evaluates a new survey technology—telephone audio computer-assisted self-interviewing (T-ACASI)—that eliminates this requirement. The NSBME embedded a randomized experiment in a survey of probability samples of 1,543 U.S. and 744 Baltimore adults ages 18 to 45. Compared with NSBME respondents interviewed by human interviewers, respondents interviewed by T-ACASI were 1.5 to 1.6 times more likely to report same-gender sexual attraction, experience, and genital contact. The impact of T-ACASI was more pronounced (odds ratio = 2.5) for residents of locales that have historically been less tolerant of same-gender sexual behaviors and for respondents in households with children (odds ratio = 3.0). PMID:21998488

Prediction of the Possibility a Right-Turn Driving Behavior at Intersection Leads to an Accident by Detecting Deviation of the Situation from Usual when the Behavior is Observed

NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

Hayashi, Toshinori; Yamada, Keiichi

Deviation of driving behavior from usual could be a sign of human error that increases the risk of traffic accidents. This paper proposes a novel method for predicting the possibility a driving behavior leads to an accident from the information on the driving behavior and the situation. In a previous work, a method of predicting the possibility by detecting the deviation of driving behavior from usual one in that situation has been proposed. In contrast, the method proposed in this paper predicts the possibility by detecting the deviation of the situation from usual one when the behavior is observed. An advantage of the proposed method is the number of the required models is independent of the variety of the situations. The method was applied to a problem of predicting accidents by right-turn driving behavior at an intersection, and the performance of the method was evaluated by experiments on a driving simulator.

Prospective Optimization with Limited Resources

PubMed Central

Snider, Joseph; Lee, Dongpyo; Poizner, Howard; Gepshtein, Sergei

2015-01-01

The future is uncertain because some forthcoming events are unpredictable and also because our ability to foresee the myriad consequences of our own actions is limited. Here we studied how humans select actions under such extrinsic and intrinsic uncertainty, in view of an exponentially expanding number of prospects on a branching multivalued visual stimulus. A triangular grid of disks of different sizes scrolled down a touchscreen at a variable speed. The larger disks represented larger rewards. The task was to maximize the cumulative reward by touching one disk at a time in a rapid sequence, forming an upward path across the grid, while every step along the path constrained the part of the grid accessible in the future. This task captured some of the complexity of natural behavior in the risky and dynamic world, where ongoing decisions alter the landscape of future rewards. By comparing human behavior with behavior of ideal actors, we identified the strategies used by humans in terms of how far into the future they looked (their “depth of computation”) and how often they attempted to incorporate new information about the future rewards (their “recalculation period”). We found that, for a given task difficulty, humans traded off their depth of computation for the recalculation period. The form of this tradeoff was consistent with a complete, brute-force exploration of all possible paths up to a resource-limited finite depth. A step-by-step analysis of the human behavior revealed that participants took into account very fine distinctions between the future rewards and that they abstained from some simple heuristics in assessment of the alternative paths, such as seeking only the largest disks or avoiding the smaller disks. The participants preferred to reduce their depth of computation or increase the recalculation period rather than sacrifice the precision of computation. PMID:26367309

Prospective Optimization with Limited Resources.

PubMed

Snider, Joseph; Lee, Dongpyo; Poizner, Howard; Gepshtein, Sergei

2015-09-01

The future is uncertain because some forthcoming events are unpredictable and also because our ability to foresee the myriad consequences of our own actions is limited. Here we studied how humans select actions under such extrinsic and intrinsic uncertainty, in view of an exponentially expanding number of prospects on a branching multivalued visual stimulus. A triangular grid of disks of different sizes scrolled down a touchscreen at a variable speed. The larger disks represented larger rewards. The task was to maximize the cumulative reward by touching one disk at a time in a rapid sequence, forming an upward path across the grid, while every step along the path constrained the part of the grid accessible in the future. This task captured some of the complexity of natural behavior in the risky and dynamic world, where ongoing decisions alter the landscape of future rewards. By comparing human behavior with behavior of ideal actors, we identified the strategies used by humans in terms of how far into the future they looked (their "depth of computation") and how often they attempted to incorporate new information about the future rewards (their "recalculation period"). We found that, for a given task difficulty, humans traded off their depth of computation for the recalculation period. The form of this tradeoff was consistent with a complete, brute-force exploration of all possible paths up to a resource-limited finite depth. A step-by-step analysis of the human behavior revealed that participants took into account very fine distinctions between the future rewards and that they abstained from some simple heuristics in assessment of the alternative paths, such as seeking only the largest disks or avoiding the smaller disks. The participants preferred to reduce their depth of computation or increase the recalculation period rather than sacrifice the precision of computation.

Cross-modal versus within-modal recall: differences in behavioral and brain responses.

PubMed

Butler, Andrew J; James, Karin H

2011-10-31

Although human experience is multisensory in nature, previous research has focused predominantly on memory for unisensory as opposed to multisensory information. In this work, we sought to investigate behavioral and neural differences between the cued recall of cross-modal audiovisual associations versus within-modal visual or auditory associations. Participants were presented with cue-target associations comprised of pairs of nonsense objects, pairs of nonsense sounds, objects paired with sounds, and sounds paired with objects. Subsequently, they were required to recall the modality of the target given the cue while behavioral accuracy, reaction time, and blood oxygenation level dependent (BOLD) activation were measured. Successful within-modal recall was associated with modality-specific reactivation in primary perceptual regions, and was more accurate than cross-modal retrieval. When auditory targets were correctly or incorrectly recalled using a cross-modal visual cue, there was re-activation in auditory association cortex, and recall of information from cross-modal associations activated the hippocampus to a greater degree than within-modal associations. Findings support theories that propose an overlap between regions active during perception and memory, and show that behavioral and neural differences exist between within- and cross-modal associations. Overall the current study highlights the importance of the role of multisensory information in memory. Copyright © 2011 Elsevier B.V. All rights reserved.

Aerospace medicine and biology: A continuing bibliography with indexes (supplement 395)

NASA Technical Reports Server (NTRS)

1994-01-01

This bibliography lists 82 reports, articles and other documents introduced into the NASA Scientific and Technical Information System during Nov. 1992. Subject coverage includes: general life sciences; aerospace medicine (including physiological factors, biological effects of radiation, and effects of weightlessness on man and animals); behavioral sciences (including psychological factors, individual and group behavior, crew training and evaluation, and psychic research); man/system technology and life support (including human engineering, biotechnology, and space suits and protective clothing) and space biology (including exobiology, planetary biology, and extraterrestrial life).

Tactual discrimination of softness.

PubMed

Srinivasan, M A; LaMotte, R H

1995-01-01

1. We investigated the ability of humans to tactually discriminate the softness of objects, using novel elastic objects with deformable and rigid surfaces. For objects with deformable surfaces, we cast transparent rubber specimens with variable compliances. For objects with rigid surfaces ("spring cells") we fabricated telescoping hollow cylinders with the inner cylinder supported by several springs. To measure the human discriminability and to isolate the associated information-processing mechanisms, we performed psychophysical experiments under three conditions: 1) active touch with the normal finger, where both tactile and kinesthetic information was available to the subject: 2) active touch with local cutaneous anesthesia, so that only kinesthetic information was available; and 3) passive touch, where a computer-controlled mechanical stimulator brought down the compliant specimens onto the passive fingerpad of the subject, who therefore had only tactile information. 2. We first characterized the mechanical behavior of the human fingerpad and the test objects by determining the relationship between the depth and force of indentation during constant-velocity indentations by a rigid probe. The fingerpad exhibited a pronounced nonlinear behavior in the indentation depth versus force trace such that compliance, as indicated by the local slope of the trace, decreased with increases in indentation depth. The traces for all the rubber specimens were approximately linear, indicating a constant but distinct value of compliance for each specimen. The fingerpad was more compliant than each of the rubber specimens. 3. All the human subjects showed excellent softness discriminability in ranking the rubber specimens by active touch, and the subjective perception of softness correlated one-to-one with the objectively measured compliance. The ability of subjects to discriminate the compliance of spring cells was consistently poorer compared with that of the rubber specimens. 4. For pairwise discrimination of a selected set of rubber specimens, kinesthetic information alone was insufficient. However, tactile information alone was sufficient, even when the velocities and forces of specimen application were randomized. In contrast, for discriminating pairs of spring cells, tactile information alone was insufficient, and both tactile and kinesthetic information were found to be necessary. 5. The differences in the sufficiency of tactile information for the discrimination of the two types of objects can be explained by the mechanics of contact of the fingerpad and its effect on tactile information. For objects with deformable surfaces, the spatial pressure distribution within the contact region depends on both the force applied and the specimen compliance.(ABSTRACT TRUNCATED AT 250 WORDS)

Artificial intelligence and immediacy: designing health communication to personally engage consumers and providers.

PubMed

Kreps, Gary L; Neuhauser, Linda

2013-08-01

We describe how ehealth communication programs can be improved by using artificial intelligence (AI) to increase immediacy. We analyzed major deficiencies in ehealth communication programs, illustrating how programs often fail to fully engage audiences and can even have negative consequences by undermining the effective delivery of information intended to guide health decision-making and influence adoption of health-promoting behaviors. We examined the use of AI in ehealth practices to promote immediacy and provided examples from the ChronologyMD project. Strategic use of AI is shown to help enhance immediacy in ehealth programs by making health communication more engaging, relevant, exciting, and actionable. AI can enhance the "immediacy" of ehealth by humanizing health promotion efforts, promoting physical and emotional closeness, increasing authenticity and enthusiasm in health promotion efforts, supporting personal involvement in communication interactions, increasing exposure to relevant messages, reducing demands on healthcare staff, improving program efficiency, and minimizing costs. User-centered AI approaches, such as the use of personally involving verbal and nonverbal cues, natural language translation, virtual coaches, and comfortable human-computer interfaces can promote active information processing and adoption of new ideas. Immediacy can improve information access, trust, sharing, motivation, and behavior changes. Copyright © 2013 Elsevier Ireland Ltd. All rights reserved.