Constructing skilled images

When experts construct mental images, they do not rely only on perceptual features; they also access domain-specific knowledge and skills in long-term memory, which enables them to exceed the capacity limitations of the short-term working memory system. The central question of the present dissertation was whether the facilitating effect of long-term memory knowledge on working memory imagery tasks is primarily based on perceptual chunking or whether it relies on higher-level conceptual knowledge. Three domains of expertise were studied: chess, music, and taxi driving. The effects of skill level, stimulus surface features, and the stimulus structure on incremental construction of mental images were investigated. A method was developed to capture the chunking mechanisms that experts use in constructing images: chess pieces, street names, and visual notes were presented in a piecemeal fashion for later recall. Over 150 experts and non-experts participated in a total of 13 experiments, as reported in five publications. The results showed skill effects in all of the studied domains when experts performed memory and problem solving tasks that required mental imagery. Furthermore, only experts' construction of mental images benefited from meaningful stimuli. Manipulation of the stimulus surface features, such as replacing chess pieces with dots, did not significantly affect experts' performance in the imagery tasks. In contrast, the structure of the stimuli had a significant effect on experts' performance in every task domain. For example, taxi drivers recalled more street names from lists that formed a spatially continuous route than from alphabetically organised lists. The results suggest that the mechanisms of conceptual chunking rather than automatic perceptual pattern matching underlie expert performance, even though the tasks of the present studies required perception-like mental representations. The results show that experts are able to construct skilled images that surpass working memory capacity, and that their images are conceptually organised and interpreted rather than merely depictive.

Transition to parenthood after assisted reproductive treatment: Follow-up study of singleton pregnancies

Infertility treatments are relatively easily available in most Western countries today, but the psychological consequences of these high-tech treatments have scarcely been addressed. The purpose of this controlled longitudinal study was to explore the early environment of the infant born by assisted reproductive treatment (ART). We focused on the parents mental well-being, marital relations and experience of parenting. In addition to this, we assessed parent child interaction and parents mental representations of their child after long-standing infertility and several unsuccessful ART attempts. The subjects were infertile couples who achieved a singleton pregnancy by in vitro fertilization (IVF) or intracytoplasmic sperm injection (ICSI). The control group comprised of spontaneously conceiving couples with singleton pregnancies. ART women showed fewer depressive symptoms than controls during pregnancy and after delivery, but the difference vanished by the end of the child s first year. ART men consistently had lower levels of anxiety symptoms, sleeping difficulties, and social dysfunction than control men. Control women experienced a decrease in dyadic consensus during the child s first year, which did not happen among ART women. After the child was born, ART men reported a higher level of sexual affection compared with control men. Psychic symptoms and stressful life events were differently related to marital relations in ART and control groups. The parenting experiences of ART mothers were in general at a higher level, compared with controls, and they changed in a positive direction during the child s first year. Fathering experiences were at the same level in both groups, and they changed positively in both groups by the end of the child s first year. The parenting experiences of ART mothers and fathers were more resilient to certain child-related stressors than those of control group. Both mothers and fathers with long-term infertility showed more sensitive behaviour with their child in toddler-age than in infancy. Correspondingly, children s cooperation increased. Mothers often mentioned a fear of miscarriage and difficulty in creating representations of the child during pregnancy. Descriptions of the infants were mainly rich, vivid and loaded with positive features. In conclusion, ART parents in general seem to adapt well to the transition to parenthood. Former infertility and ART do not seem to constitute a risk for parents mental health, marital relations or experience of parenting. Even longstanding infertility with several unsuccessful treatment attempts did not create a risk as regards parenting behaviour or parents mental representations of their child. In this group, however, women were found to have fear for losing the child and difficulty in creating representations of the child during pregnancy, which in some cases may indicate need for psychosocial support. Even though our results are encouraging, infertility and infertility treatments are generally considered as a stressful experience. It is a challenge for health authorities to recognize those couples who need professional help to overcome the distressing experiences of infertility and ART.

Honey flows through fertile valleys : The cognitive and evolutionary foundations of paradise representations

The aim of the study is to explain how paradise beliefs are born from the viewpoint of mental functions of the human mind. The focus is on the observation that paradise beliefs across the world are mutually more similar than dissimilar. By using recent theories and results from the cognitive and evolutionary study of religion as well as from studies of environmental preferences, I suggest that this is because pan-human unconscious motivations, the architecture of mind, and the way the human mind processes information constrain the possible repertoire of paradise beliefs. The study is divided into two parts, theoretical and empirical. The arguments in the theoretical part are tested with data in the empirical part with two data sets. The first data set was collected using an Internet survey. The second data set was derived from literary sources. The first data test the assumption that intuitive conceptions of an environment of dreams generally follow the outlines set by evolved environmental preferences, but that they can be tweaked by modifying the presence of desirable elements. The second data test the assumption that familiarity is a dominant factor determining the content of paradise beliefs. The results of the study show that in addition to the widely studied belief in supernatural agents, belief in supernatural environments wells from the natural functioning of the human mind attesting the view that religious thinking and ideas are natural for human species and are produced by the same mental mechanisms as other cultural information. The results also help us to understand that the mental structures behind the belief in the supernatural have a wider scope than has been previously acknowledged.

Ancient Philosophers on Mental Illness

This dissertation is about ancient philosophers notions of mental illness, from Plato onwards. Mental illness here means disorders that, in ancient medical thought, were believed to originate in the body but to manifest themselves predominantly through mental symptoms. These illnesses were treated by physical means, which were believed to address the bodily cause of the illness, conceived of as an elemental imbalance or a state of cephalic stricture , for example. Sometimes the mental symptoms were addressed directly by psychotherapeutic means. The first and most important question explored concerns how the ancient philosophers responded to the medical notion of mental illness, and how they explained such illnesses in their theories of physiology and psychology. Although the illnesses are seldom discussed extensively, the philosophers were well aware of their existence and regarded their occurrence an indication of the soul s close dependence on the body. This called for a philosophical account. The second question addressed has to do with the ancient philosophers role as experts in mental problems of a non-medical kind, such as unwanted emotions. These problems were dubbed diseases of the soul , and the philosophers thus claimed to be doctors of the soul. Although the distinction between mental illnesses and diseases of the soul was often presented as rather obvious, there was some vagueness and overlap. There is still a third question that is explored, concerning the status of both mental illnesses and diseases of the soul as unnatural conditions, the role of the human body in the philosophical aetiologies of evil, and the medico-philosophical theories of psycho-physiological temperaments. This work consists of an introduction and five main chapters, focusing on Plato, Aristotle, the Stoics and Galen, and the Sceptics, the Epicureans and later Platonists. The sources drawn on are the original Greek and Latin philosophical and medical texts. It appears that the philosophers accepted the medical notion of mental illness, but interpreted it in various ways. The differences in interpretation were mostly attributable to differences in their theories of the soul. Although the distinction between mental illness and diseases of the soul was important, marking the boundary between the fields of expertise of medicine and philosophy, and of the individual s moral responsibilities, the problematic aspects of establishing it are discussed rather little in ancient philosophy. There may have been various reasons for this. The medical descriptions of mental illness are often extreme, symptoms of the psychotic type excluding the possibility of the condition being of the non-medical kind. In addition, the rigid normativeness of ancient philosophical anthropologies and their rigorous notion of human happiness decreased the need to assess the acceptability of individual variation in their emotional and intellectual lives and external behaviour.

The Unable Individual : The Actantial Analyses of Three Chinese Films and Discussion on Their Representations of the Individual’s Position in Contemporary Chinese Society

The thesis studies three contemporary Chinese films, Incense (Xianghuo 2003), Beijing Bicycle (Shiqi sui de danche, 2001), and South of the Clouds (Yun de nanfang, 2004). The aim of the thesis is to find out how these films represent the individual, his relationships with others, and his possibilities in society. The films all portray a male individual setting out to pursue a goal, facing one obstacle after the other in the process, and in the end failing to achieve his goal. The other characters in the films are also primarily either unable or unwilling to help the lead character. In the thesis these features of the films are analysed by applying A.J. Greimas’s structuralist semiotic theory about the actantial structure of discourses. The questions about the individual’s position are answered by defining which instances in the films actually represent the actantial positions of the sender, receiver, subject, object, helper and opponent. The results of the actantial analyses of the three films are further discussed in the light of theories regarding individualization. The focus is on the theories of Ulrich Beck, Elisabeth Beck-Gernsheim and Zygmunt Bauman, who see a development towards individualization in societies following the disintegration of traditional social structures. For the most part, these theories do seem to be applicable to the films’ representations of the individual’s position, especially regarding the increased responsibility of the individual. For example, the position of the family is represented as either insignificant or negative in all of the films, which fits with the description of the individualized society, contradicting the idea of traditional Chinese society. On the other hand, the identities and goals of the characters in the films are not represented as fragmented in the way the theories would suggest.

Space in Musical Semiosis : An Abductive Theory of the Musical Composition Process

Space in musical semiosis is a study of musical meaning, spatiality and composition. Earlier studies on musical composition have not adequately treated the problems of musical signification. Here, composition is considered an epitomic process of musical signification. Hence the core problems of composition theory are core problems of musical semiotics. The study employs a framework of naturalist pragmatism, based on C. S. Peirce’s philosophy. It operates on concepts such as subject, experience, mind and inquiry, and incorporates relevant ideas of Aristotle, Peirce and John Dewey into a synthetic view of esthetic, practic, and semiotic for the benefit of grasping musical signification process as a case of semiosis in general. Based on expert accounts, music is depicted as real, communicative, representational, useful, embodied and non-arbitrary. These describe how music and the musical composition process are mental processes. Peirce’s theories are combined with current morphological theories of cognition into a view of mind, in which space is central. This requires an analysis of space, and the acceptance of a relativist understanding of spatiality. This approach to signification suggests that mental processes are spatially embodied, by virtue of hard facts of the world, literal representations of objects, as well as primary and complex metaphors each sharing identities of spatial structures. Consequently, music and the musical composition process are spatially embodied. Composing music appears as a process of constructing metaphors—as a praxis of shaping and reshaping features of sound, representable from simple quality dimensions to complex domains. In principle, any conceptual space, metaphorical or literal, may set off and steer elaboration, depending on the practical bearings on the habits of feeling, thinking and action, induced in musical communication. In this sense, it is evident that music helps us to reorganize our habits of feeling, thinking, and action. These habits, in turn, constitute our existence. The combination of Peirce and morphological approaches to cognition serves well for understanding musical and general signification. It appears both possible and worthwhile to address a variety of issues central to musicological inquiry in the framework of naturalist pragmatism. The study may also contribute to the development of Peircean semiotics.

Non-reductive Physicalism, Irreducibility of the Mental and the Problem of Mental Causation : A study of Donald Davidson's and Georg Henrik von Wright's positions in the philosophy of mind

In this study I consider what kind of perspective on the mind body problem is taken and can be taken by a philosophical position called non-reductive physicalism. Many positions fall under this label. The form of non-reductive physicalism which I discuss is in essential respects the position taken by Donald Davidson (1917-2003) and Georg Henrik von Wright (1916-2003). I defend their positions and discuss the unrecognized similarities between their views. Non-reductive physicalism combines two theses: (a) Everything that exists is physical; (b) Mental phenomena cannot be reduced to the states of the brain. This means that according to non-reductive physicalism the mental aspect of humans (be it a soul, mind, or spirit) is an irreducible part of the human condition. Also Davidson and von Wright claim that, in some important sense, the mental aspect of a human being does not reduce to the physical aspect, that there is a gap between these aspects that cannot be closed. I claim that their arguments for this conclusion are convincing. I also argue that whereas von Wright and Davidson give interesting arguments for the irreducibility of the mental, their physicalism is unwarranted. These philosophers do not give good reasons for believing that reality is thoroughly physical. Notwithstanding the materialistic consensus in the contemporary philosophy of mind the ontology of mind is still an uncharted territory where real breakthroughs are not to be expected until a radically new ontological position is developed. The third main claim of this work is that the problem of mental causation cannot be solved from the Davidsonian - von Wrightian perspective. The problem of mental causation is the problem of how mental phenomena like beliefs can cause physical movements of the body. As I see it, the essential point of non-reductive physicalism - the irreducibility of the mental - and the problem of mental causation are closely related. If mental phenomena do not reduce to causally effective states of the brain, then what justifies the belief that mental phenomena have causal powers? If mental causes do not reduce to physical causes, then how to tell when - or whether - the mental causes in terms of which human actions are explained are actually effective? I argue that this - how to decide when mental causes really are effective - is the real problem of mental causation. The motivation to explore and defend a non-reductive position stems from the belief that reductive physicalism leads to serious ethical problems. My claim is that Davidson's and von Wright's ultimate reason to defend a non-reductive view comes back to their belief that a reductive understanding of human nature would be a narrow and possibly harmful perspective. The final conclusion of my thesis is that von Wright's and Davidson's positions provide a starting point from which the current scientistic philosophy of mind can be critically further explored in the future.

Community, Power, and Colonialism: The U.S. Army in Southern Arizona and New Mexico, 1866-1886

Empire is central to U.S. history. When we see the U.S. projecting its influence on a global scale in today s world it is important to understand that U.S. empire has a long history. This dissertation offers a case study of colonialism and U.S. empire by discussing the social worlds, labor regimes, and culture of the U.S. Army during the conquest of southern Arizona and New Mexico (1866-1886). It highlights some of the defining principles, mentalities, and characteristics of U.S. imperialism and shows how U.S. forces have in years past constructed their power and represented themselves, their missions, and the places and peoples that faced U.S. imperialism/colonialism. Using insights from postcolonial studies and whiteness studies, this work balances its attention between discursive representations (army stories) and social experience (army actions), pays attention to silences in the process of historical production, and focuses on collective group mentalities and identities. In the end the army experience reveals an empire in denial constructed on the rule of difference and marked by frustration. White officers, their wives, and the white enlisted men not only wanted the monopoly of violence for the U.S. regime but also colonial (mental/cultural) authority and power, and constructed their identity, authority, and power in discourse and in the social contexts of the everyday through difference. Engaged in warfare against the Apaches, they did not recognize their actions as harmful or acknowledge the U.S. invasion as the bloody colonial conquest it was. White army personnel painted themselves and the army as liberators, represented colonial peoples as racial inferiors, approached colonial terrain in terms of struggle, and claimed that the region was a terrible periphery with little value before the arrival of white civilization. Officers and wives also wanted to place themselves at the top of colonial hierarchies as the refined and respectable class who led the regeneration of the colony by example: they tried to turn army villages into islands of civilization and made journeys, leisure, and domestic life to showcase their class sensibilities and level of sophistication. Often, however, their efforts failed, resulting in frustration and bitterness. Many blamed the colony and its peoples for their failures. The army itself was divided by race and class. All soldiers were treated as laborers unfit for self-government. White enlisted men, frustrated by their failures in colonial warfare and by constant manual labor, constructed worlds of resistance, whereas indigenous soldiers sought to negotiate the effects of colonialism by working in the army. As colonized labor their position was defined by tension between integration and exclusion and between freedom and colonial control.

Studies of working memory in interrupted human-computer interaction

Distraction in the workplace is increasingly more common in the information age. Several tasks and sources of information compete for a worker's limited cognitive capacities in human-computer interaction (HCI). In some situations even very brief interruptions can have detrimental effects on memory. Nevertheless, in other situations where persons are continuously interrupted, virtually no interruption costs emerge. This dissertation attempts to reveal the mental conditions and causalities differentiating the two outcomes. The explanation, building on the theory of long-term working memory (LTWM; Ericsson and Kintsch, 1995), focuses on the active, skillful aspects of human cognition that enable the storage of task information beyond the temporary and unstable storage provided by short-term working memory (STWM). Its key postulate is called a retrieval structure an abstract, hierarchical knowledge representation built into long-term memory that can be utilized to encode, update, and retrieve products of cognitive processes carried out during skilled task performance. If certain criteria of practice and task processing are met, LTWM allows for the storage of large representations for long time periods, yet these representations can be accessed with the accuracy, reliability, and speed typical of STWM. The main thesis of the dissertation is that the ability to endure interruptions depends on the efficiency in which LTWM can be recruited for maintaing information. An observational study and a field experiment provide ecological evidence for this thesis. Mobile users were found to be able to carry out heavy interleaving and sequencing of tasks while interacting, and they exhibited several intricate time-sharing strategies to orchestrate interruptions in a way sensitive to both external and internal demands. Interruptions are inevitable, because they arise as natural consequences of the top-down and bottom-up control of multitasking. In this process the function of LTWM is to keep some representations ready for reactivation and others in a more passive state to prevent interference. The psychological reality of the main thesis received confirmatory evidence in a series of laboratory experiments. They indicate that after encoding into LTWM, task representations are safeguarded from interruptions, regardless of their intensity, complexity, or pacing. However, when LTWM cannot be deployed, the problems posed by interference in long-term memory and the limited capacity of the STWM surface. A major contribution of the dissertation is the analysis of when users must resort to poorer maintenance strategies, like temporal cues and STWM-based rehearsal. First, one experiment showed that task orientations can be associated with radically different patterns of retrieval cue encodings. Thus the nature of the processing of the interface determines which features will be available as retrieval cues and which must be maintained by other means. In another study it was demonstrated that if the speed of encoding into LTWM, a skill-dependent parameter, is slower than the processing speed allowed for by the task, interruption costs emerge. Contrary to the predictions of competing theories, these costs turned out to involve intrusions in addition to omissions. Finally, it was learned that in rapid visually oriented interaction, perceptual-procedural expectations guide task resumption, and neither STWM nor LTWM are utilized due to the fact that access is too slow. These findings imply a change in thinking about the design of interfaces. Several novel principles of design are presented, basing on the idea of supporting the deployment of LTWM in the main task.

Neuronal oscillations in gamma- and alpha-frequency bands: from object representations to sensory awareness

The synchronization of neuronal activity, especially in the beta- (14-30 Hz) /gamma- (30 80 Hz) frequency bands, is thought to provide a means for the integration of anatomically distributed processing and for the formation of transient neuronal assemblies. Thus non-stimulus locked (i.e. induced) gamma-band oscillations are believed to underlie feature binding and the formation of neuronal object representations. On the other hand, the functional roles of neuronal oscillations in slower theta- (4 8 Hz) and alpha- (8 14 Hz) frequency bands remain controversial. In addition, early stimulus-locked activity has been largely ignored, as it is believed to reflect merely the physical properties of sensory stimuli. With human neuromagnetic recordings, both the functional roles of gamma- and alpha-band oscillations and the significance of early stimulus-locked activity in neuronal processing were examined in this thesis. Study I of this thesis shows that even the stimulus-locked (evoked) gamma oscillations were sensitive to high-level stimulus features for speech and non-speech sounds, suggesting that they may underlie the formation of early neuronal object representations for stimuli with a behavioural relevance. Study II shows that neuronal processing for consciously perceived and unperceived stimuli differed as early as 30 ms after stimulus onset. This study also showed that the alpha band oscillations selectively correlated with conscious perception. Study III, in turn, shows that prestimulus alpha-band oscillations influence the subsequent detection and processing of sensory stimuli. Further, in Study IV, we asked whether phase synchronization between distinct frequency bands is present in cortical circuits. This study revealed prominent task-sensitive phase synchrony between alpha and beta/gamma oscillations. Finally, the implications of Studies II, III, and IV to the broader scientific context are analysed in the last study of this thesis (V). I suggest, in this thesis that neuronal processing may be extremely fast and that the evoked response is important for cognitive processes. I also propose that alpha oscillations define the global neuronal workspace of perception, action, and consciousness and, further, that cross-frequency synchronization is required for the integration of neuronal object representations into global neuronal workspace.

Cortical representations for phonological quantity

Different languages use temporal speech cues in different linguistic functions. In Finnish, speech-sound duration is used as the primary cue for the phonological quantity distinction ― i.e., a distinction between short and long phonemes. For the second-language (L2) learners of Finnish, quantity is often difficult to master if speech-sound duration plays a less important role in the phonology of their native language (L1). The present studies aimed to investigate the cortical representations for phonological quantity in native speakers and L2 users of Finnish by using behavioral and electrophysiological methods. Since long-term memory representations for different speech units have been previously shown to participate in the elicitation of the mismatch negativity (MMN) brain response, MMN was used to compare the neural representation for quantity between native speakers and L2 users of Finnish. The results of the studies suggested that native Finnish speakers' MMN response to quantity was determined by the activation of native-language phonetic prototypes rather than by phoneme boundaries. In addition, native speakers seemed to process phoneme quantity and quality independently from each other by separate brain representations. The cross-linguistic MMN studies revealed that, in native speakers of Finnish, the MMN response to duration or quantity-degree changes was enhanced in amplitude selectively in speech sounds, whereas this pattern was not observed in L2 users. Native speakers' MMN enhancement is suggested to be due to the pre-attentive activation of L1 prototypes for quantity. In L2 users, the activation of L2 prototypes or other L2 learning effects were not reflected in the MMN, with one exception. Even though L2 users failed to show native-like brain responses to duration changes in a vowel that was similar in L1 and L2, their duration MMN response was native-like for an L2 vowel with no counterpart in L1. Thus, the pre-attentive activation of L2 users' representations was determined by the degree of similarity of L2 sounds to L1 sounds. In addition, behavioral experiments suggested that the establishment of representations for L2 quantity may require several years of language exposure.

Finnish Homicides and Mental Disorders: An investigation of offense and offender characteristics

Although the majority of people with mental illness are not violent, scientific studies over the last decades show that certain psychiatric disorders increase the risk of violent behavior, including homicide. This thesis examined crime scene behaviors and offender background characteristics among mentally ill Finnish homicide offenders. Previously, homicide crime scene behaviors have been investigated in relation to offender demographic characteristics, whereas this study compares the behaviors of offenders with various mental illnesses. The study design was a retrospective chart review of the forensic psychiatric statements of Finnish homicide offenders. The work consists of four substudies. The aims of the study were as follows: To describe differences in the childhood and family backgrounds as well as in the adolescent and adult adjustment of Finnish homicide offenders belonging to different diagnostic categories (schizophrenia, personality disorder, alcoholism, drug addiction or no diagnosis). Further, the study examined associations between the crime scene behaviors and mental status of these offenders. Also, the distinguishing characteristics between two groups of offenders with schizophrenia were examined: early starters, who present antisocial behavior before the onset of schizophrenia, and late starters, who first offend after the onset of mental disorder. Finally, it was investigated how the use of excessive violence is associated with clinical and circumstantial variables as well as offender background characteristics among homicide offenders with schizophrenia. The main findings of the study can be summarized as follows. First, offenders with personality disorder or drug addiction had experienced multiple difficulties in their early environments: both family and individual problems were typical. Offenders with schizophrenia were relatively well-adjusted in childhood compared to the other groups. However, in adolescence and adulthood, social isolation, withdrawal and other difficulties attributable to these offenders illness became evident. In several aspects, offenders with alcohol dependency resembled offenders with no diagnosis in that these offenders had less problematic backgrounds compared to other groups. Second, the results showed that crime scene behaviors, victim gender and the victim-offender relationship differ between the groups. In particular, offenders with a diagnosis of schizophrenia or drug addiction have some unique features in their crime scene behaviors and choice of victims. Offenders with schizophrenia were more likely to kill a blood relative, to use a sharp weapon and to injure the victim s face. Drug addiction was associated with stealing from the victim and trying to cover up the body. Third, the results suggest that the offense characteristics of early- and late-start offenders with schizophrenia differ only modestly. However, several significant differences between the groups were found in characteristics of offenders: early starters had experienced a multitude of problems in their childhood surroundings and also later in life. Fourth, violent acts where the offender did not commit the offense alone or had previous homicidal history were predictive of excessive violence among offenders with schizophrenia. Positive psychotic symptoms did not predict the use of excessive violence. Nearly one third of the cases in the sample involved multiple and severe violence, including features such as sadism, mutilation, sexual components or extreme stabbing. In sum, mentally disordered homicide offenders are heterogeneous in their offense characteristics as well as their background characteristics. Empirically based information on how the offender s mental state is associated with specific crime scene behaviors can be utilized within the police force in developing methods of prioritizing suspects in unsolved homicide cases. Also, these results emphasise the importance of early interventions for problem families and children at risk of antisocial behavior. They may also contribute to the development of effective treatment for violent offenders.

Developmental origins of psychological vulnerability factors for mental disorders

Premature birth and associated small body size are known to affect health over the life course. Moreover, compelling evidence suggests that birth size throughout its whole range of variation is inversely associated with risk for cardiovascular disease and type 2 diabetes in subsequent life. To explain these findings, the Developmental Origins of Health and Disease (DOHaD) model has been introduced. Within this framework, restricted physical growth is, to a large extent, considered either a product of harmful environmental influences, such as suboptimal nutrition and alterations in the foetal hormonal milieu, or an adaptive reaction to the environment. Whether inverse associations exist between body size at birth and psychological vulnerability factors for mental disorders is poorly known. Thus, the aim of this thesis was to study in three large prospective cohorts whether prenatal and postnatal physical growth, across the whole range of variation, is associated with subsequent temperament/personality traits and psychological symptoms that are considered vulnerability factors for mental disorders. Weight and length at birth in full term infants showed quadratic associations with the temperamental trait of harm avoidance (Study I). The highest scores were characteristic of the smallest individuals, followed by the heaviest/longest. Linear associations between birth size and psychological outcomes were found such that lower weight and thinness at birth predicted more pronounced trait anxiety in late adulthood (Study II); lower birth weight, placental size, and head circumference at 12 months predicted a more pronounced positive schitzotypal trait in women (Study III); and thinness and smaller head circumference at birth associated with symptoms of attention-deficit hyperactivity disorder (ADHD) in children who were born at term (Study IV). These associations occured across the whole variation in birth size and after adjusting for several confounders. With respect to growth after birth, individuals with high trait anxiety scores in late adulthood were lighter in weight and thinner in infancy, and gained weight more rapidly between 7 and 11 years of age, but weighed less and were shorter in late adulthood in relation to weight and height measured at 11 years of age (Study II). These results suggest that a suboptimal prenatal environment reflected in smaller birth size may affect a variety of psychological vulnerability factors for mental disorders, such as the temperamental trait of harm avoidance, trait anxiety, schizotypal traits, and symptoms of ADHD. The smaller the birth size across the whole range of variation, the more pronounced were these psychological vulnerability factors. Moreover, some of these outcomes, such as trait anxiety, were also predicted by patterns of growth after birth. The findings are concordant with the DOHaD model, and emphasise the importance of prenatal factors in the aetiology of not only mental disorders but also their psychological vulnerability factors.

Tarinakontekstin vaikutus sanojen muistamiseen kompleksisessa työmuistitehtävässä

Objectives. The sentence span task is a complex working memory span task used for estimating total working memory capacity for both processing (sentence comprehension) and storage (remembering a set of words). Several traditional models of working memory suggest that performance on these tasks relies on phonological short-term storage. However, long-term memory effects as well as the effects of expertise and strategies have challenged this view. This study uses a working memory task that aids the creation of retrieval structures in the form of stories, which have been shown to form integrated structures in longterm memory. The research question is whether sentence and story contexts boost memory performance in a complex working memory task. The hypothesis is that storage of the words in the task takes place in long-term memory. Evidence of this would be better recall for words as parts of sentences than for separate words, and, particularly, a beneficial effect for words as part of an organized story. Methods. Twenty stories consisting of five sentences each were constructed, and the stimuli in all experimental conditions were based on these sentences and sentence-final words, reordered and recombined for the other conditions. Participants read aloud sets of five sentences that either formed a story or not. In one condition they had to report all the last words at the end of the set, in another, they memorised an additional separate word with each sentence. The sentences were presented on the screen one word at a time (500 ms). After the presentation of each sentence, the participant verified a statement about the sentence. After five sentences, the participant repeated back the words in correct positions. Experiment 1 (n=16) used immediate recall, experiment 2 (n=21) both immediate recall and recall after a distraction interval (the operation span task). In experiment 2 a distracting mental arithmetic task was presented instead of recall in half of the trials, and an individual word was added before each sentence in the two experimental conditions when the participants were to memorize the sentence final words. Subjects also performed a listening span task (in exp.1) or an operation span task (exp.2) to allow comparison of the estimated span and performance in the story task. Results were analysed using correlations, repeated measures ANOVA and a chi-square goodness of fit test on the distribution of errors. Results and discussion. Both the relatedness of the sentences (the story condition) and the inclusion of the words into sentences helped memory. An interaction showed that the story condition had a greater effect on last words than separate words. The beneficial effect of the story was shown in all serial positions. The effects remained in delayed recall. When the sentences formed stories, performance in verification of the statements about sentence context was better. This, as well as the differing distributions of errors in different experimental conditions, suggest different levels of representation are in use in the different conditions. In the story condition, the nature of these representations could be in the form of an organized memory structure, a situation model. The other working memory tasks had only few week correlations to the story task. This could indicate that different processes are in use in the tasks. The results do not support short-term phonological storage, but instead are compatible with the words being encoded to LTM during the task.