Biomedical subjects

Rossana De Beni

Publications and source records attributed to Rossana De Beni.

14 recordsLinked to original sources

PubMed2006

The generation and maintenance of visual mental images: evidence from image type and aging.

Imagery is a multi-componential process involving different mental operations. This paper addresses whether separate processes underlie the generation, maintenance and transformation of mental images or whether these cognitive processes rely on the same mental functions. We also examine the influence of age on these mental operations for independence of components. In Experiment 1, younger (22 years) and older (69 years) adults generated and maintained general, specific, contextual and autobiographical visual mental images evoked in response to concrete nouns. The older adults had longer generation times, but there was no difference between the two groups on maintenance. Both groups had shortest generation and maintenance times for general images, whereas only the older adults took longest in generating autobiographical images. In Experiment 2, the total maintenance time and number of transformations for each type of image were compared in another group of younger and older adults. General images were less transformed and more subject to decay for both groups. The older people maintained the autobiographical mental images for longest compared to other image types. In conclusion, image generation, maintenance and transformation seem to be differently affected by type of image and aging, supporting a model of their cognitive segregation.

Adult↗

PubMed2006

Working memory components and imagery instructions in the elaboration of a spatial mental model.

The paper investigates the involvement of verbal and visuo-spatial working memory during the processing of spatial texts via a dual-task paradigm. Subjects were presented with three texts describing locations from a route perspective, and had either to imagine themselves moving along a route in surroundings or to rehearse verbal information. Concurrently they had to perform a spatial tapping task, an articulatory task, or no secondary task. Performance on a verification test used to assess the product of comprehension showed that the concurrent tapping task impaired performance in the imagery instructions group but not in the repetition instructions group, and caused the beneficial effect of imagery instructions to vanish. This result was not observed with the articulatory task, where interference effects were similar in both instructions groups. Performance on the concurrent tasks confirmed the pattern obtained with the verification test. In addition, results seem partly dependent on the capacity of spatial working memory as measured by the Corsi Blocks Test. We argue that these results clarify the processes of the construction of a spatial mental model, and confirm that the visuo-spatial working memory is involved in mental imagery.

Adult↗

PubMed2006

The effects of verbal and spatial interference in the encoding and retrieval of spatial and nonspatial texts.

The paper investigates the specific roles of visual-spatial working memory (VSWM) and verbal working memory (VWM) in encoding and retrieval of information conveyed by spatial and nonspatial texts. In two experiments, a total of 109 undergraduate students-54 in Experiment 1, 55 in Experiment 2-listened to spatial and nonspatial texts while performing a spatial (Experiment 1) or verbal (Experiment 2) concurrent task during either encoding or retrieval. Text memorisation and comprehension were tested by free-recall and sentence-verification tasks. The results show that a concurrent spatial task is detrimental to memory performance for spatial text more than for nonspatial text. In contrast, a concurrent verbal task is equally damaging to memory performance for both spatial and nonspatial texts. Moreover, a spatial task interferes with both encoding and retrieval, in contrast with a verbal task, where the interference effect is active only when the task is performed during encoding. Overall, these findings show the involvement of VSWM in the construction and reactivation of mental models derived from spatial descriptions, and the role played by VWM in construction, but not reactivation, of mental models derived from spatial and nonspatial texts.

Adult↗

PubMed2006

Influence of other-beliefs on self-beliefs and on everyday memory self-report in the elderly.

BACKGROUND AND AIMS: Elderly people tend to evaluate their memory functioning pessimistically and have a decrease in self-efficacy beliefs associated with an attributional style which relies mainly on uncontrollable causes. This pattern may be significantly influenced by the caregivers evaluations of self-efficacy beliefs and attributional style of the elderly. This study compares older and younger adults with respect to everyday memory self-assessment, self-efficacy beliefs and attributional style, and examines the relationships between everyday memory self-assessment, self-evaluations, and evaluations by significant others as regards elderly self-efficacy beliefs, attributional style, and everyday memory. METHODS: 100 older, 100 younger, and 100 middle-aged adults were required to complete questionnaires aimed at assessing everyday memory, attributional style, and self-efficacy beliefs. The group of middle-aged adults was asked to complete questionnaires aimed at assessing the perceived efficacy and attributional style of the older and younger participants. RESULTS: Data indicate that, unlike younger adults, the elderly negatively evaluate their everyday memory, have an attributional style mainly characterized by uncontrollable factors, and have less confidence in their memory. A structural equation model shows that the opinions of the significant others (relatives or medical staff) as regards the perceived efficacy and attributional style of elderly people affect their self-efficacy and attributional style which, in turn, influence everyday self-reported memory efficiency. CONCLUSIONS: Results indicate the central role of metamemory in everyday memory evaluation in the elderly, and stress the importance of what significant others think as regards the elderly person in question. From a practical point of view, it makes an important contribution to intervention and prevention programs involving people in close contact with the elderly, by suggesting ways in which significant others can help in optimizing the ability of older people to meet the challenges of aging successfully.

Adolescent↗

PubMed2006

Are people with high and low mental rotation abilities differently susceptible to the alignment effect?

We investigated whether the alignment effect (Levine et al, 1982 Journal of Experimental Psychology: General 111 157-175) is influenced by mental rotation abilities. In two experiments, groups of undergraduate students with high and low performance in mental rotation tasks were required to study either schematic (experiment 1) or more complex (experiment 2) maps, and to perform a number of pointing tasks adopting a perspective which could be aligned, misaligned (45 degrees, 135 degrees), or counteraligned (180 degrees) with the perspective assumed during learning. Cognitive styles in spatial representation have also been considered. Results of experiment 1 show that people with low performance in mental rotation tasks prefer to adopt a representation of space focused more on landmarks. Their performance in the pointing tasks depends on the alignment conditions, with more errors in the counteraligned condition followed by the two misaligned and aligned ones. In contrast to this, high-ability mental rotators prefer survey and route spatial representations and are affected only by the aligned and non-aligned conditions. In the second experiment, practice was studied as a function of mental rotation and alignment. The group high in mental rotation ability was found to be free from the alignment effect in the pointing tasks performed after the final of four learning phases.

Cognition↗

PubMed2006

What people believe about memory.

Two representative samples of adult Norwegians (n=2000) were asked a set of general and specific questions regarding their beliefs and opinions about human memory. The results indicate that on many questions, such as time of the earliest memories, inhibiting effects of collaboration, and memory for dramatic versus ordinary events, the views of the general public concurred with current research findings, and people in general had realistic views about their own memory performance. On other questions, such as the reliability of olfactory as compared with visual and auditory memory, the memory of small children in comparison with that of adults, the likelihood of repression of adult traumatic memories, and on more general questions such as the possibility of training memory and the capacity limitations of long-term memory, a large proportion of the participants expressed views that are less supported by scientific evidence. Implications of these findings are briefly discussed.

Adult↗

PubMed2005

Left mediotemporal structures mediate the retrieval of episodic autobiographical mental images.

The aim of this functional magnetic resonance imaging (fMRI) study was to investigate the neuroanatomical substrates associated with the process of mental generation of specific (i.e., exemplar) and episodic autobiographical (i.e., an image of a unique life episode connected with an object) images. The fMRI paradigm in this experiment included a non-image generation baseline and two activation conditions requiring the generation of either specific or episodic autobiographical images. Image generation times and brain activation were recorded. Behavioral results showed that generating specific mental images took significantly less than generating episodic autobiographical images. Individuals generated specific images that were well distinct from the episodic autobiographical ones, semantic in nature without an episodic reference. Episodic autobiographical images did not show a significant bias towards preferential retrieval from any particular life period but were retrieved from across the entire life span. Conjunction analysis of the fMRI data showed that the two image generation conditions significantly activated a common set of neural structures, including mediofrontal areas. This shared pattern of activation might be the result of an underlying similar format and characteristics (e.g., richness in details) between the two types of images and might reflect the involvement of similar cognitive processes. Distinct patterns of significant activation were also present. Activation in the right parietal regions, cuneus, precuneus and left temporal regions was associated solely with the generation of specific images. Regions more specifically devoted to episodic memory retrieval and imagery, such as the left parahippocampal gyrus and precuneus, and the posterior cingulate cortex bilaterally, were significantly activated exclusively by the generation of episodic autobiographical images.

Adult↗

PubMed2005

Updating in working memory: a comparison of good and poor comprehenders.

In this research, we examined the relation between reading comprehension and success in a working memory updating task. We tested the hypotheses that poor comprehenders' deficiencies are associated with a specific difficulty in the working memory updating process, particularly in controlling for information that is no longer relevant. In the first experiment, groups of poor and good comprehenders, ages 8-11 years, were administered a working memory updating task. In the second experiment a year later, a subgroup of participants involved in the first experiment was tested with a different updating task. In both experiments, poor comprehenders had less accurate recall performance and made more intrusion errors than did good comprehenders. Moreover, distinguishing intrusion errors on the basis of their permanence in memory, we found that poor comprehenders were more likely to intrude items that were maintained longer in memory than were good comprehenders. This type of error predicted reading comprehension abilities better than did working memory recall. This suggests that the relation between reading comprehension and working memory is mediated by the ability to control for irrelevant information.

Child↗

PubMed2005

Different neuronal pathways support the generation of general and specific mental images.

The aim of this functional magnetic resonance imaging (fMRI) study was to investigate the neural correlates associated with the generation of general (i.e., prototypical) and specific (i.e., exemplar) visual mental images from concrete nouns. The fMRI paradigm included a non-imagery baseline, and two activation conditions requiring the generation of either general or specific images. Image generation times and brain activation were recorded. Analysis of the behavioral results showed that generating general images took less than the specific ones. The comparison of each activation condition with the baseline showed significant increase in brain activation in left frontal areas in both kinds of images, with the additional involvement of the posterior cingulate cortex during the generation of specific images. When the two activation conditions were contrasted with each other and masked for their respective comparison with baseline, significant activation was found in right frontal areas for general mental images, whereas a significant increase in activation in the left superior frontal region and the right thalamus was detected during the generation of specific mental images. These findings suggest that general and specific mental images are generated with the support of two different neural pathways. The generation of general images seems to involve brain areas associated with the formation of global gestalt-like images (areas in the right hemisphere), while the generation of specific mental images appears to require additional support from areas involved in the retrieval of visual details (i.e., the right thalamus).

Adult↗

PubMed2004

What happens to information to be suppressed in working-memory tasks? Short and long term effects.

The study explored, from an individual differences point of view, what happens to information to be suppressed in a working-memory task at short and long term. In particular, it was examined whether control mechanisms of irrelevant information in working memory imply their complete elimination from working memory or just the modulation of their activation. To this end, we compared the fate of irrelevant information in groups of subjects with high and low reading comprehension (Experiments 1 and 2) and subjects with high and low working memory (Experiments 1, 2, 3, and 4). All the experiments presented a working-memory task devised by De Beni, Palladino, Pazzaglia, and Cornoldi (1998), which required participants to process lists of words, to tap when a word from a particular category was presented, and then to recall only the last items in each list. Results confirmed that participants with high reading comprehension also have higher working memory and make less intrusion errors due to irrelevant items that have to be processed but then discarded. Furthermore, it was found that participants with low working memory have slightly better implicit (Experiment 1) and explicit memory (Experiments 3 and 4) of highly activated irrelevant information. Nevertheless, in a long-term recognition test, participants with high and low reading comprehension/working memory presented a similar pattern of memory for different types of irrelevant information (Experiment 2), whereas in a short-term memory recognition test, low-span participants presented a facilitation effect in the time required for the recognition of highly activated irrelevant information (Experiment 4). It was concluded that efficient working-memory performance is related to the temporary reduction of activation of irrelevant information but does not imply its elimination from memory.

Adult↗

PubMed2004

Decline in working memory updating through ageing: intrusion error analyses.

The present research examines the decline in working memory updating through age. Two experiments compared groups of participants in different age ranges (young-old, 55-65 years, old, 66-75 years and old-old, more than 75 years and, in Experiment 2 only, young, 20-30 years). Memory updating tasks were administered, which required participants to remember the smallest items in each list. To perform the task correctly, participants had to update information efficiently, reducing interference from items no longer relevant. Intrusion errors were computed and in the first experiment these were described as "intrusions of irrelevant items" (immediate exclusion) and "intrusions of once relevant items" (delayed exclusion). The oldest adults performed worse in memory updating and made a greater number of intrusion errors of once relevant information. In the second experiment results showed that increases in memory load (number of items that had to be remembered) and updating demand (number of potentially relevant items) impaired performance. The oldest adults had greater difficulty when the task demand was increased. Furthermore, they produced a higher number of intrusion errors, particularly when the updating demand was increased. It therefore appears that elderly people have specific difficulty in updating information in working memory by excluding irrelevant information.

Adult↗

PubMed2003

Reading comprehension and aging: does an age-related difference necessarily mean impairment?

BACKGROUND AND AIMS: This research investigated reading comprehension in groups of younger-old (55-69 years) and older-old (70-90 years) Italian adults to determine age-related differences and explore their extent. The second aim of our research was to investigate the nature of individual age-related differences and their relation to working memory and metacognition. METHODS: In Experiment 1,250 participants read two passages, a narrative and an expository text, and answered a series of multiple-choice inferential questions. In Experiment 2, three groups: younger-old good and poor comprehenders and older-old poor comprehenders were compared for working memory and metacognitive tasks. RESULTS: Although older-old adults had some difficulty compared with younger-old, a comparison with normative control scores (comprehension level achieved at the end of 8th grade compulsory education) showed that their reading comprehension of a narrative text was adequate, demonstrating basic comprehension skills for everyday life. Younger-old good comprehenders had higher working memory and metacognitive scores than younger-old poor comprehenders, consistent with results obtained in the literature with younger participants. Older-old adults had poorer working memory than younger-old poor comprehenders, although they did not differ in metacognitive performance. CONCLUSIONS: Results show that age differences influence the relationship between reading comprehension and memory and metacognition.

Aged↗

PubMed2003

When mental images are very detailed: image generation and memory performance as a function of age.

Older adults appear to have problems in mental imagery which seem to influence memory, such as in the recall of concrete words. However, the effects of imagery instruction on old participants' memory are quite inconsistent (Richardson, 1980; Salthouse, 1992). Two experiments explored the effects of aging on the nature of mental images generated from non-related nouns, and their memory. A sample of 234 participants, young (20-22 years) young-old (55-65 years), old (66-75 years) and old-old (>75 years), were recruited from universities and recreation centres. In Experiment 1 participants were required to generate mental images and describe them accurately in 40 s. Mental images were classified as general, specific-contextual and self-referred. Details were distinguished between relevant, information useful for describing a mental image and irrelevant, information which is not pertinent, or useful for describing a mental image. A final memory task was proposed. In Experiment 2 evocation and description time was manipulated in order to reduce the production of irrelevant detail: a shorter condition (evocation+description time=20 s) and a longer condition (evocation+description time=40 s). Results show that older adults produce a higher number of general and self-referred images but a lower number of specific images;report a greater quantity of irrelevant detail;recall a lower number of items. Decrease in evocation and description time reduced the irrelevant details and increased older adults' memory performance.

Age Factors↗

PubMed2003

Imagery and rehearsal as study strategies for written or orally presented passages.

In the present research, we studied the influence of text presentation modality on recall under imagery, rehearsal, and no strategy instructions. It was hypothesized that imagery is a more effective recall strategy for an oral presentation and rehearsal for a written presentation, and that imagery and rehearsal are effective study strategies. One hundred twenty participants participated, 80 of whom were trained in the use of imagery or rehearsal in the study of passages and 40 of whom made up the control group. A text was presented orally or in writing; the trained participants were to memorize it using the strategy taught, and the participants in the control group were to memorize it using a freely chosen strategy. They were then asked for free written recall. The results confirmed that the participants using imagery recalled the oral presentation better than the written one, and those using rehearsal recalled the written presentation better than the oral one. The discussion focuses on a selective-interference explanation of the presentation modality effects. Practical suggestions are given, and implications for future research are discussed.

Adult↗