Working memory load improves early stages of independent visual processing.

Increasing evidence suggests that working memory and perceptual processes are dynamically interrelated due to modulating activity in overlapping brain networks. However, the direct influence of working memory on the spatio-temporal brain dynamics of behaviorally relevant intervening information remains unclear. To investigate this issue, subjects performed a visual proximity grid perception task under three different visual-spatial working memory (VSWM) load conditions. VSWM load was manipulated by asking subjects to memorize the spatial locations of 6 or 3 disks. The grid was always presented between the encoding and recognition of the disk pattern. As a baseline condition, grid stimuli were presented without a VSWM context. VSWM load altered both perceptual performance and neural networks active during intervening grid encoding. Participants performed faster and more accurately on a challenging perceptual task under high VSWM load as compared to the low load and the baseline condition. Visual evoked potential (VEP) analyses identified changes in the configuration of the underlying sources in one particular period occurring 160-190 ms post-stimulus onset. Source analyses further showed an occipito-parietal down-regulation concurrent to the increased involvement of temporal and frontal resources in the high VSWM context. Together, these data suggest that cognitive control mechanisms supporting working memory may selectively enhance concurrent visual processing related to an independent goal. More broadly, our findings are in line with theoretical models implicating the engagement of frontal regions in synchronizing and optimizing mnemonic and perceptual resources towards multiple goals.

Visual processing of concentric sine-wave gratings in adolescents and adults

The aim of this study was to compare the contrast visual processing of concentric sinusoidal gratings stimuli between adolescents and adults. The study included 20 volunteers divided into two groups: 10 adolescents aged 13-19 years (M=16.5, SD=1.65) and 10 adults aged 20-26 years (M=21.8, SD=2.04). In order to measure the contrast sensitivity at spatial frequencies of 0.6, 2.5, 5 and 20 degrees of visual angle (cpd), it was used the psychophysical method of two alternative forced choice (2AFC). A One Way ANOVA performance showed a significant difference in the comparison between groups: F [(4, 237)=3.74, p<.05]. The post-hoc Tukey HSD showed a significant difference between the frequencies of 0.6 (p <.05) and 20 cpd (p<.05). Thus, the results showed that the visual perception behaves differently with regard to the sensory mechanisms that render the contrast towards adolescents and adults. These results are useful to better characterize and comprehend human vision development.

Higher level physics : developed specifically for the IB diploma.

Texto que cubre el curso completo y todas las opciones que el estudiante puede elegir para el programa del diploma de Física del Bachillerato Internacional. También ayuda a preparar a fondo y de forma metódica los exámenes. Dentro de cada capítulo, hay ejercicios numerados para poder practicar y aplicar los conocimientos adquiridos y ayudan al alumno a evaluar su progreso. A veces, hay ejemplos que muestran cómo abordar las preguntas particularmente difíciles. Los capítulos uno a nueve brindan una cobertura de la materia principal. Los capítulos del diez al quince las opciones de nivel de E a J. Tiene las soluciones a las preguntas y a las prácticas de los capítulos.

Higher level chemistry : developed specifically for the IB diploma.

Texto que cubre el curso completo y todas las opciones que el estudiante puede elegir para el programa del diploma en Química del Bachillerato Internacional. También ayuda a preparar a fondo y de forma metódica los exámenes. Dentro de cada capítulo, hay ejercicios numerados para poder practicar y aplicar los conocimientos adquiridos y ayudan al alumno a evaluar su progreso. A veces, hay ejemplos que muestran cómo abordar las preguntas particularmente difíciles. Los capítulos uno a once brindan una cobertura de la materia principal. Los capítulos del doce al dieciocho las opciones de nivel de A a G. Tiene las soluciones a las preguntas y a las prácticas de los capítulos.

Higher level Biology : developed specifically for the IB diploma.

Texto que cubre el curso completo y todas las opciones que el estudiante puede elegir para el programa del diploma en Biología del Bachillerato Internacional. También ayuda a preparar a fondo y de forma metódica los exámenes. Dentro de cada capítulo, hay ejercicios numerados para poder practicar y aplicar los conocimientos adquiridos y ayudan al alumno a evaluar su progreso. A veces, hay ejemplos que muestran cómo abordar las preguntas particularmente difíciles. Los capítulos uno a once brindan una cobertura de la materia principal. Los capítulos del doce al diecinueve las opciones de nivel de A a H. Tiene las soluciones a las preguntas y a las prácticas de los capítulos.

Higher level mathematics : developed specifically for the IB diploma.

Texto que cubre el curso completo para el programa del diploma en Matemáticas del Bachillerato Internacional. También ayuda a preparar a fondo y de forma metódica los exámenes. Dentro de cada capítulo, hay ejercicios numerados para poder practicar y aplicar los conocimientos adquiridos y ayudan al alumno a evaluar su progreso. A veces, hay ejemplos que muestran cómo abordar las preguntas particularmente difíciles. El material para las cuatro opciones figura en la pagina web de la editorial del libro de texto y esta protegida con contraseña. El profesor debe indicar cuál de los cuatro temas de opción va a estudiar el alumno. Tiene las soluciones a las preguntas y a las prácticas de los capítulos.

Supporting teaching and learning in schools : a handbook for higher level teaching assistants.

Libro dirigido a la figura del HLTA (Higher Level Teaching Assistant) con el objetivo de proporcionar una guía práctica, ideas y material de apoyo para el desarrollo de un trabajo eficaz con los alumnos, los profesores, los padres y el resto de profesionales implicados en el bienestar de los niños. Incluye ejemplos reales de buenas prácticas, una base sobre pedagogía y sobre el rol de los profesores y HLTAs como creadores de ambientes productivos para el aprendizaje, y trata aspectos como la gestión de las clases y las interrelaciones con los alumnos, el papel del HLTA en la comunidad educativa y su desarrollo profesional.

Business and Management for the IB Diploma: Standard and Higher Level.

Esta guía contiene una revisión de todos los temas de ciencias empresariales para el Programa del Diploma de Bachillerato Internacional (IB Diploma). Los temas del libro son: la organización y el entorno empresarial (naturaleza de la actividad empresarial, tipos de organización, objetivos, herramientas de planificación de la organización, crecimiento y evolución, globalización), recursos humanos (relaciones empleador y empleado, liderazgo y gestión, motivación), las cuentas y finanzas (fuentes de financiación), marketing (el papel del marketing, producto, precio, promoción, lugar de distribución, marketing internacional), las operaciones de gestión.

An exploration of the role of narrative skills in higher-level reading comprehension of teenagers with hearing loss

This Study examines the relationship between scores on adolescents’ self-generated narratives and standardized reading-comprehension scores. This relationship is also compared with the more simple language metrics: vocabulary and syntax.

Collaterally cued labelling framework underpinning semantic-level visual content descriptor

In this paper, we introduce a novel high-level visual content descriptor devised for performing semantic-based image classification and retrieval. The work can be treated as an attempt for bridging the so called "semantic gap". The proposed image feature vector model is fundamentally underpinned by an automatic image labelling framework, called Collaterally Cued Labelling (CCL), which incorporates the collateral knowledge extracted from the collateral texts accompanying the images with the state-of-the-art low-level visual feature extraction techniques for automatically assigning textual keywords to image regions. A subset of the Corel image collection was used for evaluating the proposed method. The experimental results indicate that our semantic-level visual content descriptors outperform both conventional visual and textual image feature models.

The impact of novel labels on visual processing during infancy

The impact of novel labels on visual processing was investigated across two experiments with infants aged between 9 and 21 months. Infants viewed pairs of images across a series of preferential looking trials. On each trial, one image was novel, and the other image had previously been viewed by the infant. Some infants viewed images in silence; other infants viewed images accompanied by novel labels. The pattern of fixations both across and within trials revealed that infants in the labelling condition took longer to develop a novelty preference than infants in the silent condition. Our findings contrast with prior research by Robinson and Sloutsky (e.g., Robinson & Sloutsky, 2007a; Sloutsky & Robinson, 2008) who found that novel labels did not disrupt visual processing for infants aged over a year. Provided that overall task demands are sufficiently high, it appears that labels can disrupt visual processing for infants during the developmental period of establishing a lexicon. The results suggest that when infants are processing labels and objects, attentional resources are shared across modalities.

Manual response preparation and saccade programming are linked to attention shifts: ERP evidence for covert attentional orienting and spatially specific modulations of visual processing

The premotor theory of attention claims that attentional shifts are triggered during response programming, regardless of which response modality is involved. To investigate this claim, event-related brain potentials (ERPs) were recorded while participants covertly prepared a left or right response, as indicated by a precue presented at the beginning of each trial. Cues signalled a left or right eye movement in the saccade task, and a left or right manual response in the manual task. The cued response had to be executed or withheld following the presentation of a Go/Nogo stimulus. Although there were systematic differences between ERPs triggered during covert manual and saccade preparation, lateralised ERP components sensitive to the direction of a cued response were very similar for both tasks, and also similar to the components previously found during cued shifts of endogenous spatial attention. This is consistent with the claim that the control of attention and of covert response preparation are closely linked. N1 components triggered by task-irrelevant visual probes presented during the covert response preparation interval were enhanced when these probes were presented close to cued response hand in the manual task, and at the saccade target location in the saccade task. This demonstrates that both manual and saccade preparation result in spatially specific modulations of visual processing, in line with the predictions of the premotor theory.