Qiangqiang Wang

The present study addressed two unresolved questions about SNARC-like effects: magnitude, ordinal position, and learned spatial associations often share the same left–right mapping, obscuring source-specific contributions, and it remains unclear whether their expression varies across judgment tasks. In a controlled-learning design, age magnitude and birth-order position predicted opposing mappings, whereas learned spatial location was orthogonal to both. Eighty-four adults participated in three independent samples (n = 28 each). Participants learned four fictional children’s ages, birth-order positions, bedroom locations, and team memberships before making age, birth-order, and team-membership judgments, respectively, with left–right responses. The birth-order task yielded a birth-order position × response side interaction consistent with an earlier-born–left/later-born–right mapping and a learned spatial location × response side interaction consistent with a same-side effect. In the age and team-membership tasks, neither focal interaction was reliable. A cross-experiment analysis supported task-related variation in the learned spatial location × response side interaction. These findings indicate that birth-order position and learned spatial location can each contribute to left–right spatial-response correspondence, whereas the age judgment did not yield a reliable younger-left/older-right pattern. More broadly, the findings support a task-sensitive, multi-source account of SNARC-like effects.

Slovenská akadémia vied vykonáva špičkový základný výskum, dlhodobý strategický a aplikovaný výskum a vývoj a poskytuje prístup k vedeckej infraštruktúre.

Previous studies have confirmed that money scarcity can impede individuals’ cognitive control; however, it remains unclear how this effect occurs. This study created a virtual shopping game that can vividly simulate individuals’ shopping-related thought processes in daily life to systematically investigate how money scarcity influences cognitive control. Participants were randomly assigned to either a money scarcity group or a money rich group and were asked to perform a virtual shopping game, an emotion test, and a cognitive control task. In the first two experiments, the participants were asked to perform a space compatibility task (Experiment 1) or a face task (Experiment 2) after completing the virtual shopping task, in which they indicated whether they would purchase the probe commodity. The results showed that (1) the response times of the money scarcity group in both the space compatibility task and the face task were markedly lower than those of the money rich group, and (2) the cognitive flexibility and interference suppression of the money rich group were greater than those of the money scarcity group; however, there was no obvious difference in response inhibition. Experiment 3 embedded the space compatibility task within the virtual shopping task. The response times of the money scarcity group were still markedly slower than those of the money rich group. Thus, money scarcity impedes individuals’ cognitive control, primarily by weakening their cognitive flexibility and interference suppression.

This study investigated whether the interference between two tasks in dual-task processing stems from bottleneck limitations or insufficient cognitive reso

Introduction: To explore the predictive effect of effort–reward imbalance on students' learning engagement and to elucidate the underlying mechanism, 796 students were selected for a survey.Methods: The participants were required to complete four scales: the Effort-reward Imbalance Scale, the Learning Engagement Scale, the Learned Helplessness Questionnaire, and the Perceived Social Support Scale.Results: (1) Students' effort–reward imbalance significantly and negatively predicts their learning engagement; (2) Learned helplessness serves as a mediator in the relationship between students' effort–reward imbalance and learning engagement; (3) Social support plays a moderating role in the association between effort–reward imbalance and learned helplessness. High levels of social support can buffer the impact of an effort–reward imbalance on learned helplessness, and the protective effect of social support is more obvious when the effort–reward imbalance is low.Discussion: The present study revealed how an effort–reward imbalance affects learning engagement among students through the dimensions of learned helplessness and perceived social support. The constructed model not only further clarifies the mechanism underlying the relationship between effort–reward imbalance and learning engagement but also holds significant implications for guiding students' education.

We designed two experiments to investigate the interference mechanism of the spatial–numerical association of response codes (SNARC) effect in randomly presented mixed contexts of numbers and letters, after manipulating the binding pattern of numbers and letters with left or right response position in situations where the ratio of numbers to letters was 1:3. The results from Experiment 1 showed that the SNARC effect occurred both for numbers and letters when binding small numbers with letters A–C, or large numbers and letters E–G. In Experiment 2 the SNARC effect was absent in classification of both numbers and letters when binding the digits 1–3 with letters E-G and binding 4–7 with A–C. This suggests that interference between the spatial representation of letters and numbers in working memory can lead to the disappearance of the SNARC effect in mixed contexts.

Previous studies of illusory conjunction (IC) mainly focused on alphabetic languages, while researchers have poorly understood the IC mechanism of Chinese words as an ideographic writing system. In the present study, we aimed to investigate the dynamic changes of IC effects for Chinese words under different stimulus exposure times and spatial arrangements. We conducted two experiments with a 3 (Condition: IC, non-IC-same, non-IC-different) × 3 (Exposure time: 38 ms, 88 ms, 138 ms) within-subject design. The results showed that in the IC condition, the two characters recombined regardless of exposure time as long as they could form an orthographically correct new word, demonstrating the universality of IC. In non-IC conditions, increasing exposure time decreased response time and significantly reduced error rate, indicating that attention played a decisive role in perceptual processing. The spatial arrangement had no impact on IC production. These findings support the feature confirmation account model, suggesting that attention modulates IC through top-down feature confirmation processes. These data expand an understanding of IC mechanisms, validate the role of attention in feature confirmation, and elucidate the inimitable mechanism of the Chinese word IC influenced by both low-level visual processing and high-level cognitive control.

We investigated the effect of aesthetics in sport on exercise intention and revealed factors influencing the judgment of aesthetics via an open-ended survey. Participants were 75 university students who watched sports video clips and rated the influence of each clip on their exercise intention. Results showed there was a stronger exercise intention after watching clips with high compared to low aesthetic value. Movement, music, and clothing were the three factors that were mentioned most often by participants in regard to aesthetic judgments. Our study highlights the importance of the aesthetic value of sports and provides a method for selection of video materials to utilize these aesthetics to promote public health.

The detection of lies told about one's identity challenges traditional methods considering characteristics of the lie. This study explored the neural activities underlying identity deception by using electroencephalogram recordings to promote the development of a detection tool. The participants (N = 18) were required to tell a lie or the truth about true and false identity information with the differentiation of deception paradigm. The results showed deceptive (vs. honest) responses to true identity information were associated with a prolonged reaction time and enhanced upper alpha oscillations as well as the attenuated P300 and theta activities, which indicates identity concealment engaged portent honest response control and reduced processing of self-relevant information. By contrast, deceptive (vs. honest) responses to false identity information were associated with absent reaction time cost and decreased alpha activities, which suggests identity faking involved low cognitive conflict but required some degree of behavioral regulation.

Although effort-reward imbalance has been proven to affect academic burnout, how effort-reward imbalance affects academic burnout remains unclear. This study, from the perspective of learning satisfaction and resilience, investigates how effort-reward imbalance affects academic burnout and reveals the influence of effort-reward imbalance on academic burnout. A sample of 755 junior high school students was assessed using the Revised Effort-Reward Imbalance for Learning Scale, Revised Learning Satisfaction Scale, Academic Burnout Scale, and Resilience Scale. Junior high school students’ effort-reward imbalance rates for learning, learning satisfaction, and academic burnout were all significantly correlated with each other; learning satisfaction mediated the relationship between them. Learning satisfaction mediated the relationship between junior high school students’ effort-reward imbalance rate for learning and academic burnout, and resilience negatively moderated the path from junior high school students’ effort-reward imbalance rate from learning to learning satisfaction. The results suggest that improving students’ resilience can effectively decrease the negative effects of effort-reward imbalance.