The Mccolllough Effect

In the first article, Knight, Mazzi and Savazzi (2015) made 3 hypotheses. The first hypothesis was that the Transcranial Magnetic Stimulation (TMS) threshold would change when the background changed from uniform to pattern (Knight et al., 2015). The second hypothesis was that the likelihood of the participant sensing light versus dark percepts would change when global luminance of the background changed (Knight et al., 2015). The third hypothesis was that the likelihood of light versus dark percepts would stay the same at different TMS intensities (Knight et al., 2015). The study had 16 participants who all wore corrective lens (Knight et al., 2015). To test the threshold of phosophenes, a Method of Constant Stimuli (MOCS) was used (Knight et al., 2015). The participants received 120 randomly administered trials with pulses from TMS under two different background conditions (Knight et al., 2015). A paired t-test was used to analyze the difference in stimulator intensity threshold for inducing percepts between background conditions (Knight et al., 2015). A repeated-measures analysis of variance

There is perfect correspondence between the retinal image and the cellular encoding in V1 (striate cortex), which is completed in terms of contrast and orientation. From there, information from the retinal image is sent forward to distinct regions of the occipital lobe for more complex encoding, called extra striate cortex, including V2 (discrimination, orientation, and color), V4 (shape), and V5 (motion) “(Stevens PH.D., livestong.com)

Research has shown that there is “greater activation in the left inferior frontal and medial temporal lobes” (Stanford, 2006, p. 208) during the encoding of words which were later remembered as compared to those which were forgotten. The sensations perceived by sensory nerves are decoded in the hippocampus of the brain into a single experience (Mastin, 2010). The hippocampus analyses new information and compares and asssociates it with previously stored memory (Mastin, 2010). Human memory is associative in that new information can be remembered better if it can be associated to previously acquired, firmly consolidated information (Mastin, 2010). The various pieces of information are then stored in different parts of the brain (Mastin, 2010). Though the exact method by which this information is later identified and recalled has yet to be discovered, it is understood that ultra-short term sensory memory is converted into short term memory which can then later be consolidated into long term memory (Mastin, 2010).

In acknowledging the stated above we replicated a study developed by mead & Hampson (1996) involving the divided visual field paradigm and a phonological rhyme/non-rhyme task to test the speed and accurateness of either side of the brain.

In experiment 1, participants were instructed to press a key to determine if the stimulus was red, blue, yellow, or green. On the second half of the experiment, the stimulus appeared in grey with only one colored letter which was positioned randomly. Error rates for the experiment were below 2.5% for each condition, which is quite low. Experiment 2 was the same as experiment 1 except that there were 114 data collections instead of 288 and there were 36 practice trials instead of 72. According to experiment 1 and 2 it is suggested that the effect of

The trials for each of the six conditions were presented in a random order. The experimenter controlled for differences among participants by having them set their own equiluminant point for the cue stimuli and eliminated luminance differences by embedding the stimuli in a random luminance noise. The experimenter also controlled for outliers by eliminating response

Further supportive evidence comes from priming studies; priming refers to the improved capacity for detecting or processing a novel or familiar stimuli based on recent experience (Tulving & Schater, 1990). In a famous study by Heist et al. (1991) amnesic patients and control subjects studied words and non-words. They were then given a perceptual identification test with briefly presented previously studied and unstudied items. Perceptual priming was measured as the increase in the probability of identifying the former versus the letter items. Amnesic patients exhibited entirely normal priming for both old words and non-words. On the other hand, they showed significant impairment in recognizing items that had appeared on the administered test. Priming of non-words did not appear to be based on the activation of words that were phonologically or orthographically similar to the non-words. The non-word results suggest that priming can involve the acquisition of new information, rather than simply the activation of pre-existing representations. Researchers concluded that intact perceptual priming in amnesic patients reflects specific changes

While Klein (2000)'s research did aim to recreate this phenomenon clearly, the current study differentiated its self by introducing the letters L and T as cues to which provided no information about the location of the target as the presentation. As presentation of a single cue meant it was four times more likely for a cue and a target to appear on the same side. The purpose of this variation was that a majority of previous studies had presented the facilitation effect and the IOR effect in a scenario where the cues were equally as

Participants in the study were asked to match an altered stimuli by size to a reference stimuli in the illustration. The aim was to examine whether the number of depth cues would influence the magnitude of the Ponzo illusion. It was hypothesized that as the number and type of depth cues in the illusion pattern increased, the participants’ estimates of the stimulus would also

How is memory encoded and what methods can lead to greater recall? There have been many different models suggested for human memory and many different attempts at defining a specific method of encoding that will lead to greater recall. In this experiment subjects are asked to do a semantic task on a word related to them and an orthographic task in which they analyze the letter in the word. The results of the experiment indicate that the words which where encoded semantically and are related to the self have greater recall.

The second, or immediately dim, phase of the experiment showed a decrease in vision with an average of 8/16 responses correct. The rod’s delayed response to send an action potential could explain this phenomenon; the eyes underwent a sharp change in illumination and the rods were adapting/converting the remaining light into an action potential as the participants matched the lines on the paper. Therefore, the rods didn’t have enough time to send an action potential before the participants recorded their results. In the third phase, the rods had enough time to adapt to the dim lighting and send an action potential; rhodopsin may have also helped perceive whatever light was left in the room. This resulted in increased recognition, with an average of 13/16 correct responses. The final phase had similar results to the second condition; the rods began adjusting to the twenty seconds of light, but then had to quickly readjust after diming the room again. Therefore, like the second phase, participants’ may have experienced a delayed action potential and their averaged responses greatly decreased to

Materials used for this study included stopwatches, and Stroop stimulus sheets. The sheets depicted 5 different animals, a cat, dog, cow, bear and pig in a random order. There were five rows of four animals, with a total of 40 silhouettes. One sheet had silhouettes marked without any labels (control condition), while the other had incongruent labels (incongruent condition), which served to create the two conditions. The stopwatch was used to record the time of the participant responses.

Participants were required to take part in an online custom designed applet from the Online Psychology Laboratory, authored by Mark Tew and Ken McGraw, University of Mississippi. The customised applet contained a variation of the original Muller-Lyer illusion, which studies the effect in fin angle, which varies from 15 degrees to 160 degrees (in every 15° interval) on the apparent length of lines. Participants were presented with in the standard Muller Lyer two lines, with one have fins and the other does not. Participants were required to adjust the plain line to make both lines

Shape is also processed in the Inferior Temporal Cortex, which leads me to believe that changing the shape of my words will increase the reaction times of my subjects. After all, if two things being processed is confusing, won’t three things create more confusion? But on the other hand, if the subjects can’t read the words that are shaped into a circle, it may be easier for them to say the incongruent ink color!

The term cognition refers to all the mental structures and processes involved in reception, storage, and use of knowledge, which involves the analysis of memory and mind. (Psychology book) Copious research has been conducted by psychologists on memory and different methods to how to better recall words. Studies by Atkinson and Shiffrin, Paivio, and Bower accordingly came to the conclusion that words tied to visual imagery have a stronger chance of being remembered than just their verbal associations.