Face exploration, emotion recognition, and emotional enhancement of memory in relapsing-remitting multiple sclerosis.

Background: Recognizing familiar faces and identifying emotions through facial expressions are essential for social functioning. This study aimed to examine whether people with relapsing-remitting multiple sclerosis (PwMS) differ from healthy control individuals (HC) in their performance on different tasks related to facial emotion processing.

Methods: In a cross-sectional controlled study, 30 PwMS and 35 HC completed a baseline neuropsychological evaluation and experimental tasks assessing visual exploration of facial stimuli through eye tracking, facial emotion recognition, and facial memory recognition.

A color-digit Stroop task shows numerical influence on numerosity processing.

The numerical Stroop task involves presenting participants with two digits that differ in physical size and numerical value and asking them to report which digit had the larger size or value while ignoring the other dimension. Previous studies show that participants have difficulty ignoring the irrelevant dimension and thus have implications on the automaticity of numerical processing. The present study investigates the automatic influence of numerical value on numerosity processing in a novel Stroop-like task.

Evidence for Two Types of Task Conflict in a Color-Digit Stroop Task.

In the present study, we conducted a Stroop-like task in which the participants were required to decide whether the presented stimulus, which could be either a colored digit or a colored rectangle, consisted of more or less than five colors. Like other Stroop-like tasks, the stimuli could be congruent (the stimulus was a digit that was equal to the presented number of colors), incongruent (the stimulus was a digit that was different than the presented number of colors), or neutral (a colored rectangle). We utilized a two-to-one response setting so that in some incongruent trials the digit and the number of colors would elicit the same response (e.

Insights from Eye Blinks into the Cognitive Processes Involved in Visual Word Recognition.

Behavioral differences in speed and accuracy between reading familiar and unfamiliar words are well-established in the empirical literature. However, these standard measures of skill proficiency are limited in their ability to capture the moment-to-moment processing involved in visual word recognition. In the present study, the effect of word familiarity was initially investigated using an eye blink rate among adults and children.

The contribution of difficulty of an irrelevant task to task conflict.

In the standard colour-word Stroop task, participants are presented with colour words and required to respond to their colour while ignoring their meaning. Two types of conflict might occur in such experiments: information conflict and task conflict. Information conflict reflects the processing of two contradicting pieces of information and is indicated by shorter reaction times (RTs) in congruent than in incongruent trials.

Resting Stroop task: Evidence of task conflict in trials with no required response.

In the typical Stroop task, participants are presented with color words written in different ink colors and are asked to respond to their color. It has been suggested that the Stroop task consists of two main conflicts: information conflict (color vs. word naming) and task conflict (respond to color vs.

Using facial expressions instead of response keys in the implicit association test.

Previous research found that when people are instructed to smile toward liked objects and show negative facial expressions toward disliked objects, their facial response is faster and more intense than when they are required to smile toward disliked objects and express negative facial response toward liked objects. The present research tested a technologically innovative indirect evaluation measure that was based on that finding. Participants completed an implicit association test (IAT)-a common indirect measure of evaluation, responding with their emotional facial expressions, rather than by pressing response keys.

A pupillometric study of developmental and individual differences in cognitive effort in visual word recognition.

Throughout the history of modern psychology, the neural basis of cognitive performance, and particularly its efficiency, has been assumed to be an essential determinant of developmental and individual differences in a wide range of human behaviors. Here, we examine one aspect of cognitive efficiency-cognitive effort, using pupillometry to examine differences in word reading among adults (N = 34) and children (N = 34). The developmental analyses confirmed that children invested more effort in reading than adults, as indicated by larger and sustained pupillary responses.

Task and information conflicts in the numerical Stroop task.

Studies of the Stroop color-word task have provided evidence for the existence of two conflicts: (1) an early task conflict between noting the relevant color and reading afforded by the irrelevant word (or word-like stimuli), and (2) a late information conflict between the information provided by the word and the information provided by the color. Measurements of pupil changes, in addition to reaction time (RT), have extended understanding regarding these two conflicts. The current work examines the generalizability of such understanding.

The contribution of temporal analysis of pupillometry measurements to cognitive research.

Reaction time (RT) is one of the most frequently used measures to detect cognitive processes. When tasks require more cognitive processes/resources, reaction is slower. However, RTs may provide only restricted information regarding the temporal characteristics of cognitive processes.

Top-down effect on pupillary response: Evidence from shape from shading.

Shaded 2D images often create an illusion of depth, due to the shading information and assumptions regarding the location of the light source. Specifically, 2D images that are lighter on top usually appear convex while images that are darker on top, usually appear concave, reflecting the assumption that light is coming from above. The process of recovering the 3D shape of a shaded image is called Shape from Shading.

The contribution of meaning to the detection of task conflict.

The colour-word Stroop task produces both information conflict (detection of the ink colour vs word meaning) and task conflict (respond to the ink colour vs read the word). In this study, we measured both reaction time and pupil dilation, and the neutral stimuli in our study were non-readable letter strings as well as meaningless non-readable stimuli (i.e.

Neutral stimuli and pupillometric task conflict.

It has been suggested that the interference in the Stroop task arises due to both information conflict (color vs. word meaning) and task conflict (respond to the color vs. read the word).

Pupillometric contributions to deciphering Stroop conflicts.

The Stroop task gives rise to two major conflicts: the task conflict (respond to the color vs. read the word) and the information conflict that can result from the stimulus-response compatibility (SRC; difference between two responses) or from the stimulus-stimulus compatibility (SSC; difference between the two contradictive pieces of information). We conducted a two-to-one Stroop experiment (i.

Dissociation between reaction time and pupil dilation in the Stroop task.

It has been suggested that the Stroop task gives rise to 2 conflicts: the information conflict (color vs. word meaning) and the task conflict (name the color vs. read the word).

CHAP: Open-source software for processing and analyzing pupillometry data.

Pupil dilation is an effective indicator of cognitive and affective processes. Although several eyetracker systems on the market can provide effective solutions for pupil dilation measurement, there is a lack of tools for processing and analyzing the data provided by these systems. For this reason, we developed CHAP: open-source software written in MATLAB.

A novel blink detection method based on pupillometry noise.

Pupillometry (or the measurement of pupil size) is commonly used as an index of cognitive load and arousal. Pupil size data are recorded using eyetracking devices that provide an output containing pupil size at various points in time. During blinks the eyetracking device loses track of the pupil, resulting in missing values in the output file.