Social media marketing has become one of the most significant growth paths for many businesses in today’s world. However, many companies are still unclear about using social media marketing to get their advantages, particularly in an e-commerce environment. In this background, this study is proposed to examine the effects of social media marketing activities on relationship quality, such as commitment, trust, and satisfaction in order to predict consumers’ online repurchase intentions in China’s e-commerce environment. This study proposed a theoretical model (...) by using the stimulus-organism-response theory. Using a structured questionnaire and purposive sampling, this study examined the responses of 403 consumers through partial least square-structural equation modeling. The findings discovered that SMMAs significantly strengthen the relationship quality factors, such as commitment, trust, and satisfaction, which in turn positively increase consumer online repurchase intentions in China’s e-commerce industry. This is novel research that contributes to the S-O-R theory and provides several managerial guidelines that assist managers in improving their business performance in the e-commerce industry. This research also highlighted some limitations. (shrink)

Humans have the ability to learn surprisingly complicated statistical information in a variety of modalities and situations, often based on relatively little input. These statistical learning (SL) skills appear to underlie many kinds of learning, but despite their ubiquity, we still do not fully understand precisely what SL is and what individual differences on SL tasks reflect. Here, we present experimental work suggesting that at least some individual differences arise from stimulus-specific variation in perceptual fluency: the ability to rapidly (...) or efficiently code and remember the stimuli that SL occurs over. Experiment 1 demonstrates that participants show improved SL when the stimuli are simple and familiar; Experiment 2 shows that this improvement is not evident for simple but unfamiliar stimuli; and Experiment 3 shows that for the same stimuli (Chinese characters), SL is higher for people who are familiar with them (Chinese speakers) than those who are not (English speakers matched on age and education level). Overall, our findings indicate that performance on a standard SL task varies substantially within the same (visual) modality as a function of whether the stimuli involved are familiar or not, independent of stimulus complexity. Moreover, test–retest correlations of performance in an SL task using stimuli of the same level of familiarity (but distinct items) are stronger than correlations across the same task with stimuli of different levels of familiarity. Finally, we demonstrate that SL performance is predicted by an independent measure of stimulus-specific perceptual fluency that contains no SL component at all. Our results suggest that a key component of SL performance may be related to stimulus-specific processing and familiarity. (shrink)

Cognitive Science, Volume 46, Issue 2, February 2022.

W. V. Quine is one of the most eminent philosophers alive today. Now in his mid-eighties he has produced a sharp, sprightly book that encapsulates the whole of his philosophical enterprise, including his thinking on all the key components of his epistemological stance--especially the value of logic and mathematics. New readers of Quine may have to go slowly, fathoming for themselves the richness that past readers already know lies between these elegant lines. For the faithful there is much to ponder. (...) In this short book, based on lectures delivered in Spain in 1990, Quine begins by locating his work historically. He provides a lightning tour of the history of philosophy (particularly the history of epistemology), beginning with Plato and culminating in an appreciative sketch of Carnap's philosophical ambitions and achievements. This leads, in the second chapter, to an introduction to Quine's attempt to naturalize epistemology, which emphasizes his continuities with Carnap rather than the differences between them. The next chapters develop the naturalistic story of the development of science to take account of how our conceptual apparatus is enhanced so that we can view the world as containing re-identifiable objects. Having explained the role of observation sentences in providing a checkpoint for assessing scientific theories, and having despaired of constructing an empirical criterion to determine which sentences are meaningful, Quine in the remaining chapters takes up a variety of important issues about knowledge. He concludes with an extended treatment of his views about reference and meaning and his attitudes toward psychological and modal notions. The presentation is distinctive, and the many small refinements of detail and formulation will fascinate all who know Quine's philosophy. (shrink)

Recent research suggests that processing of irrelevant information can be modulated in a rapid online fashion by contextual information in the task environment depending on the usefulness of that information in different contexts. Congruency effects evoked by irrelevant stimulus attributes are smaller in contexts with high proportions of incongruent trials and larger in contexts with high proportions of congruent trials . The present study investigates these context-adaptation effects in a masked-priming paradigm. Context-specific adaptation effects transfer to stimulus identities (...) that are equiprobale in all contexts – an observation that renders explanations in terms of event-learning processes unlikely. Yet, context-specific effects vanished when the irrelevant information remained unconscious. The results suggest that context-specific adaptation of congruency effects reflect cognitive control operations that alter the processing of irrelevant information depending on the experienced utility of that information for action control. (shrink)

Noam Chomsky's Poverty of the Stimulus Argument is one of the most famous and controversial arguments in the study of language and the mind. Though widely endorsed by linguists, the argument has met with much resistance in philosophy. Unfortunately, philosophical critics have often failed to fully appreciate the power of the argument. In this paper, we provide a systematic presentation of the Poverty of the Stimulus Argument, clarifying its structure, content, and evidential base. We defend the argument against (...) a variety of philosophical criticisms, new and old, and argue that the Poverty of the Stimulus Argument continues to deserve its guiding role in the study of language and the mind. (shrink)

Alexithymia is associated with emotion processing deficits, particularly for negative emotional information. However, also common are a high prevalence of somatic symptoms and the perception of somatic sensations as distressing. Although little research has yet been conducted on memory in alexithymia, we hypothesized a paradoxical effect of alexithymia on memory. Specifically, recall of negative emotional words was expected to be reduced in alexithymia, while memory for illness words was expected to be enhanced in alexithymia.Eighty-five high or low alexithymia participants viewed (...) and rated arousing illness-related , emotionally positive , negative , and neutral words . Recall was assessed 45 min later.High alexithymia participants recalled significantly fewer negative emotion words but also more illness-related words than low alexithymia participants. The results suggest that personal relevance can shape cognitive processing of stimuli, even to enhance retention of a subclass of stimuli whose retention is generally impaired in alexithymia. (shrink)

The role of cognitive control mechanisms in reducing interference from emotionally salient distractors was investigated. In two experiments, participants performed a flanker task in which target-distractor affective compatibility and cognitive load were manipulated. Differently from past studies, targets and distractors were presented at separate spatial locations and cognitive load was not domain-specific. In Experiment 1, words and faces, were used respectively as targets and distractors, whereas in Experiment 2, both targets and distractors were faces. Findings showed interference from distractor (...) processing only when cognitive load was high. The present findings indicate that, when targets and distractors are presented at different spatial locations, cognitive control mechanisms are involved in preventing interference from positive or negative distractors. The role of stimulus valence and type is also discussed with regard to different patterns of interference observed. (shrink)

Representationalists have routinely expressed skepticism about the idea that inflexible responses to stimuli are to be explained in representational terms. Representations are supposed to be more than just causal mediators in the chain of events stretching from stimulus to response, and it is difficult to see how the sensory states driving reflexes are doing more than playing the role of causal intermediaries. One popular strategy for distinguishing representations from mere causal mediators is to require that representations are decoupled (...) from specific stimulus conditions. I believe this requirement on representation is mistaken and at odds with explanatory practices in sensory ecology. Even when sensory states have the job of coordinating a specific output with a specific input, we can still find them doing the work of representations, carrying information needed for organisms to respond successfully to environmental conditions. We can uncover information at work by intervening specifically on the information conveyed by sensory states, leaving their causal role undisturbed. (shrink)

This article presents a new interpretation of the consciousness-related neuroscientific findings using the framework of stochastic electrodynamics (SED), a branch of physics that sheds light on the basic principles underlying quantum systems. It is propounded that SED supplemented by two well-founded hypotheses leads to a satisfying explanation of the neural correlates of consciousness. The theoretical framework thus defined is based on the notion that all conceivable shades of phenomenal awareness are woven into the frequency spectrum of a universal background field, (...) called zero-point field (ZPF), implying that the fundamental mechanism underlying conscious systems rests upon the access to information available in the ZPF. The body of evidence can be interpreted such that in the extroverted, stimulus-oriented operating mode the brain produces streams of consciousness by periodically writing persistent information states into the ZPF (theta cycle). In the introspective operating mode, which goes along with activations of the default mode network, the brain is receptive to the flow of ZPF information states that constitutes the record of conscious experiences, suggesting that the sense of self and the retrieval of memories is accomplished by periodically reading (filtering) persistent information states from the ZPF (alpha cycle). Moreover, the data support the conclusion that meditative practices and psychedelics detune the filter, thus preventing the instantiation of self-referential conscious states, which leads to the dissolution of the ego. Instead, the brain taps into a wider spectrum of ZPF modes and, hence, gains access to an extended phenomenal color palette, resulting in expanded consciousness. (shrink)

The Role of Dorsal Premotor Cortex in Resolving Abstract Motor Rules provides alternative hypotheses about the cognitive functions affected by the application of repetitive transcranial magnetic stimulation. Their model simulated the effect of stimulation of the left dorsal premotor cortex right as participants provide a Models were used to demonstrate that the increased variability in observed response times can result from interference in replanning during the process of responding to the uninstructed stimulus.

Eye-related movements such as blinks and microsaccades are modulated during bistable perceptual tasks. However, if they play an active role during internal perceptual switches is not known. We conducted two experiments involving an ambiguous plaid stimulus, wherein participants were asked to continuously report their percept, which could consist of either unidirectional coherent or bidirectional component movement. Our main results show that blinks and microsaccades did not facilitate perceptual switches. On the contrary, a reduction in eye movements preceded the (...) perceptual switch. Blanks, on the other hand, thought to mimic the retinal consequences of a blink, consistently led to a switch. Through the timing of the blank-introduced perceptual change, we were able to estimate the delay between the internal switch and the response. This delay further allowed us to evaluate that the reduction in blink probability co-occurred with the internal perceptual switch. Additionally, our results indicate that distinct internal processes underlie the switch to coherent vs. component percept. Blanks exclusively facilitated a switch to the coherent percept, and only the switch to coherent percept was followed by an increase in blink rate. In a second study, we largely replicated the findings and included a microsaccade analysis. Microsaccades only showed a weak relation with perceptual switches, but their direction was correlated with the perceived motion direction. Nevertheless, our data suggests an interaction between microsaccades and blinks by showing that microsaccades were differently modulated around blinks compared with blanks. This study shows that a reduction in eye movements precedes internal perceptual switches indicating that the rate of blinks can set the stage for a reinterpretation of sensory input. While a perceptual switch based on changed sensory input usually leads to an increase in blink rate, such an increase was only present after the perceptual switch to coherent motion but absent after the switch to component percept. This provides evidence of different underlying mechanism or internal consequence of the two perceptual switches and suggests that blinks can uncover differences in internal percept-related processes that are not evident from the percept itself. (shrink)

Rising negative emotions are like “time bombs” that impede productivity in the workplace. The present investigation provides an insight into the effects of defensive silence and defensive voice on counterproductive work behavior through knowledge hiding in the context of knowledge workers in Chinese academic institutions. Partial least square structural equation modeling was applied to the current samples. The study obtained conjecture the proposed mediating role of knowledge hiding between the negative working attitude and counterproductive work behavior, which is against (...) the organizational norms and performance. The result indicates that the positive relationships exist from defensive silence and defensive voice to counterproductive work behavior, mediated by knowledge hiding. This study links knowledge hiding literature and stimulus-organism-response to better explore the academic behavior in a knowledge setting. (shrink)

In the past two decades, reinforcement learning has become a popular framework for understanding brain function. A key component of RL models, prediction error, has been associated with neural signals throughout the brain, including subcortical nuclei, primary sensory cortices, and prefrontal cortex. Depending on the location in which activity is observed, the functional interpretation of prediction error may change: Prediction errors may reflect a discrepancy in the anticipated and actual value of reward, a signal indicating the salience or novelty of (...) a stimulus, and many other interpretations. Anterior cingulate cortex has long been recognized as a region involved in processing behavioral error, and recent computational models of the region have expanded this interpretation to include a more general role for the region in predicting likely events, broadly construed, and signaling deviations between expected and observed events. Ongoing modeling work investigating the interaction between ACC and additional regions involved in cognitive control suggests an even broader role for cingulate in computing a hierarchically structured surprise signal critical for learning models of the environment. The result is a predictive coding model of the frontal lobes, suggesting that predictive coding may be a unifying computational principle across the neocortex. (shrink)

Community of philosophical inquiry (CPI) is a way of practicing philosophy in a group that is characterized by conversation; that creates its discussion agenda from questions posed by the conversants as a response to some stimulus (whether text or some other media); and that includes discussion of specific philosophers or philosophical traditions, if at all, only in order to develop its own ideas about the concepts under discussion. The epistemological conviction of community of philosophical inquiry is that communal dialogue, (...) facilitated by a philosophically educated person, recapitulates and reconstructs the major elements—and even the positions or claims—of the tradition, in one form or another, through the distributed thinking characteristic of dialogical discourse. The pedagogical locus of control of CPI is the group as a whole, which is understood as potentially self‐regulating through a process of ongoing dialectical transformation. The role of the facilitator is to act, among other things, from the Socratic “position of ignorance” as a bridge between concepts and arguments and as a trigger for conceptual system transformation. (shrink)

My account of the causal role of consciousness in a physical world is modeled on Dretske’s celebrated explanation of the causal role of beliefs (something that Dretske himself never offered). First, behavior must be understood as a (broadly individuated) process that begins with some external stimulus causing some neurological event C, and ends with causing a bodily movement M (e.g., the Kennedy assassination is a process that begins with Oswald pulling the trigger at 12:30pm CST on November (...) 23 in 1963 in Dallas, Texas, but only ends half an hour later when Kennedy is pronounced dead at 1 pm CST). The internal neurological event C causes bodily movement M, but only by virtue of being recruited by natural selection to represent the instantiation of some external property F when properly stimulated under normal circumstances. But the reason why C causes M lies in the fact that C represents the instantiation of the external property F. I withdraw my hand from a hot surface because the activation of nociceptive specific neurons in my parietal lobe (together with the activation of neuronal patterns in my motor cortices) was recruited by natural selection to represent the tissue damage in my hand. The activation of nociceptive specific neurons causes my hand to withdraw but for the reason that it represents tissue data at the time that I felt pain in my hand. (shrink)

Twentieth century philosophy and psychology have been peculiarly averse to mental images. Throughout nearly two and a half millennia of philosophical wrangling, from Aristotle to Hume to Bergson, images (perceptual and quasi-perceptual experiences), sometimes under the alias of "ideas", were almost universally considered to be both the prime contents of consciousness, and the vehicles of cognition. The founding fathers of experimental psychology saw no reason to dissent from this view, it was commonsensical, and true to the lived experience of conscious (...) thinking. However, early in this century, just about when the behaviorist revolution in psychology was loudly declaring the scientific illegitimacy of any attempt to study consciousness, and the concomitant non-existence of imagery (Watson, 1913; see Thomas, 1989), philosophy was undergoing its "linguistic turn", a turn to seeing philosophy as essentially about language rather than the world, even the 'inner' world. For decades, the very concept of the mental image was suspect, and it was certainly banished from playing any major role in theories of mind and of thinking. Ralph Ellis' Questioning Consciousness, together with the recent speculations of certain influential neuroscientists (Edelman, 1992; Damasio, 1994), may be signaling the end this unusual era. (shrink)

Mechanisms of attention play a crucial role in filtering sensory inputs from the external world, allowing information to be prioritised for goal directed behaviour. To what extent might these same capacity-limited processes influence grapheme-colour synaesthesia, in which letters, numbers or words evoke concurrent experiences of colour? Asking synaesthetes themselves whether attention seems important in their experiences has provided a range of answers. On the one hand, for some synaesthetes, diverting attention can diminish the quality of their synaesthetic colours. On (...) the other, there are suggestions that synaesthetic experiences can themselves alter the manner in which attention is allocated to sensory stimuli in the environment. Here, we review a range of empirical investigations that have examined the role of attention in grapheme-colour synaesthesia. A particular focus of these studies has been the extent to which an inducing stimulus - such as an achromatic letter or digit - must be attended or consciously perceived to trigger a concurrent synaesthetic experience. In most cases, limiting attention or masking inducers tends to reduce or eliminate behavioural evidence of synaesthetic experiences. We also discuss how synaesthesia might improve performance in visual search tasks through post-attentive processes such as grouping, or by facilitating decision-making processes. (shrink)

The thesis examines the philosophical implications of the computational theory of early vision developed by Marr. According to Marr, early visual processes consist of sequences of "modular" computational mechanisms. These processes rely on functional relations between rates of change in stimulus magnitudes which result from certain contingent, global properties--natural constraints--of the physical world. ;Marr argues that explanations of early vision must have three distinct levels of description: computational, algorithmic and physical. In Chapter 1 I defend the explanatory significance of (...) this distinction in levels. In fulfilling its role in describing the dependence of visual processes on natural constraints, the computational level forms an autonomous level of description in the sense that it is unaffected by the computational steps at the other levels. ;In Chapter 2 I discuss the implications of natural constraints for the issues of individualism and methodological solipsism. I conclude that Mart's theory is nonindividualistic in the sense that visual content does not supervene on neural properties. However, this merely reflects the fact that different computational theories may be selected for the same system. Importantly, Marr's theory does not violate methodological solipsism since interpretations within theories must supervene on neural properties. ;In Chapter 3 I argue from the results of Chapters 1 and 2 that psychological explanation does not reduce to neurophysiology. This conclusion does not follow from the functionalist argument against physicalism, which is based on an incorrect account of computational theories. Rather the conclusion reflects the explanatory incompleteness of neurophysiological theories given the autonomous role of the computational level. ;In Chapter 4 I look in detail at the arguments for a "language of thought" as they apply to early vision. I distinguish two versions of the language of thought hypothesis, one weaker than the other. I conclude that the stronger version, which claims that a cognitive system is "program-using", is false of early vision because of the role of natural constraints. The weaker claim that cognitive processes employ symbolic transformations is true of the computational-level theory of early vision, but there is insufficient evidence to establish the claim at the algorithmic level. (shrink)

Among the studies on the perception of gaze vs. non-gaze stimuli, some have shown that the two types of stimuli trigger different patterns of attentional effects, while others have reported no such differences. In three experiments, we investigated the role of stimulus perceivability in spatial interference effects when the targets were gaze vs. non-gaze stimuli. We used a spatial Stroop task that required participants to make a speeded response to the direction indicated by the targets located on the (...) left or right side of fixation. In different experiments, the targets consisted of eyes, symbols, and/or arrows. The results showed that the magnitude of the spatial congruency effect differed between the types of targets when stimulus perceivability was not controlled. However, when the perceivability of the task relevant parts was comparable between the different types of targets, similar congruency effects were found regardless of target type. These results underscore the importance of controlling for stimulus perceivability, which is closely linked to the attentional zoom required to perform a task, when making inferences about the attentional mechanisms in the processing of gaze vs. non-gaze stimuli. (shrink)

Flax seedlings grown in the absence of environmental stimuli, stresses and injuries do not form epidermal meristems in their hypocotyls. Such meristems do form when the stimuli are combined with a transient depletion of calcium. These stimuli include the “manipulation stimulus” resulting from transferring the seedlings from germination to growth conditions. If, after a stimulus, calcium depletion is delayed, meristem production is also delayed; in other words, the meristem-production instruction can be memorised. Memorisation includes both storage and recall (...) of information. Here, we focus on information recall. We show that if the first transient calcium depletion is followed by a second transient depletion there is a new round of meristem production. We also show that if an excess of calcium follows calcium depletion, meristem production is blocked; but if the excess of calcium is in turn followed by another calcium depletion, again there is a new round of meristem production. The same stored information can thus be recalled repeatedly . We describe a conceptual model that takes into account these findings. (shrink)