A current theory of attention posits that several micro-indices of attentional vigilance are dependent on activation of the locus coeruleus, a brainstem nucleus that regulates cortical norepinephrine activity (Aston-Jones et al., 1999). This theory may account for many findings in the infant literature, while highlighting important new areas for…

How do humans interact with tools? Gibson (1979) suggested that humans perceive directly what tools afford in terms of meaningful actions. This "affordances" hypothesis implies that visual objects can potentiate motor responses even in the absence of an intention to act. Here we explore the temporal evolution of motor plans afforded by common…

Individuals with autism spectrum disorder (ASD) demonstrate intact or superior local processing of visual-spatial tasks. We investigated the hypothesis that in a disembedding task, autistic individuals exhibit a more local processing style than controls, which is reflected by altered electromagnetic brain activity in response to embedded stimuli…

Models of how the human brain reconstructs an intended meaning from a linguistic input often draw upon the N400 event-related potential (ERP) component as evidence. Current accounts of the N400 emphasise either the role of contextually induced lexical preactivation of a critical word (Lau, Phillips, & Poeppel, 2008) or the ease of integration into…

An increasingly large number of neuroimaging studies have investigated functionally connected networks during rest, providing insight into human brain architecture. Assessment of the functional qualities of resting state networks has been limited by the task-independent state, which results in an inability to relate these networks to specific…

The hippocampus is proposed to process overlapping episodes as discrete memory traces, although direct evidence for this in human episodic memory is scarce. Using green-screen technology we created four highly overlapping movies of everyday events. Participants were scanned using high-resolution fMRI while recalling the movies. Multivariate…

Human speech is composed of two types of information, related to content (lexical information, i.e., "what" is being said [e.g., words]) and to the speaker (indexical information, i.e., "who" is talking [e.g., voices]). The extent to which lexical versus indexical information is represented separately or integrally in the brain is unresolved. In…

We investigated the neural correlates of attentional modulation in the perceptual comparison process for detecting feature-binding changes in an event-related functional magnetic resonance imaging (fMRI) experiment. Participants performed a variant of a cued change detection task. They viewed a memory array, a spatial retro-cue, and later a probe…

Through "Evangelii Gaudium" (2013) and "Laudato si'" (2015) Pope Francis has approached contemporary culture head-on with a call for Catholics to engage, and not retreat from, the changes and challenges of the 21st century. Traditional expectations and norms of society such as education, occupations, communication, and…

Keeping up with novel methods and keeping abreast of new applications are crucial issues in engineering education. In brain research, one of the most significant research areas in recent decades, many developments have application in both modern engineering technology and education. New measurement methods in the observation of brain activity open…

Despite the popularity of mobile reading devices, many studies have indicated that small screens restrict information transmission, adversely affecting reading performance on mobile devices. Moreover, mobile reading typically occurs in different reading contexts. Therefore, suitable text display type for mobile reading in different reading…

Affective computing seeks to create computational systems that adapt content and resources according to the affective states of the users. However, the detection of the user's affection such as motivation and emotion is challenging especially when an attention problem is present. An approach to convey learning resources to children with learning…

The general purpose of the study was to promote the research on effects of physical activity on mathematical performance and brain functions, which is of particular interest regarding children's education as well as for all adults. Several studies have identified an influence of cycling on cognitive processes and brain activity. In the present…

The learning of modern languages in primary school (PL) was recently promoted to statutory status in the curriculum of England and Wales, but practice remains patchy. Low PL capacity amongst primary school teachers and constraints on curricular time persist. Viewed through the lenses of policy, learning theory and context, current PL practice can…

Late second language (L2) learners often struggle with L2 prosody, both in perception and production. This may result from first language (L1) interference or some property of how a second language functions in a late learner independent of what their L1 might be. Here we investigate prosody's role in determining information structure through…