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At least 487 records · Page 27Linked to original sources
PubMed2001

Cholinergic modulation of speed of early information processing: the effect of donepezil on inspection time.

RATIONALE: Selective cholinergic receptor agonists and antagonists have been shown to modulate inspection time, a measure of speed of early information processing. OBJECTIVE: The present study aimed to examine the effects of globally increasing cholinergic function with the acetylcholinesterase inhibitor donepezil on inspection time. METHODS: Fourteen healthy subjects participated in a randomised double-blind, placebo controlled trial in which all subjects were tested under either acute placebo or donepezil (5 mg) treatment conditions. Testing was conducted pre- and 90 min post-drug administration. RESULTS: There was a significant decrease in inspection time in the donepezil condition compared to the placebo condition (F = 12.86; P < 0.01). DISCUSSION: The decrease or improvement of inspection time following donepezil administration is consistent with the role of the cholinergic system in modulating speed of information processing, and adds evidence that inspection time may serve as a physiological index of the integrity of the cholinergic system.

Adult↗
PubMed1996

Preattentive information processing as measured by backward masking and texton detection tasks in adolescents at high genetic risk for schizophrenia.

Schizophrenic patients have consistently been reported to show deficits in preattentive information processing as demonstrated by impairments in visual backward masking and texton detection tasks. Texton detection refers to Julesz's texton theory, which defines a certain limited number of texton elements (e.g., one 'L' among many '+') that can be detected readily and simultaneously without attentional effort irrespective of the size of the rest of the visual field. The present study investigated whether deficits of preattentive information processing are more prevalent in a group of adolescents of high genetic risk for schizophrenia compared to matched control subjects. Although differences in the performance in visual backward masking tasks could not be detected with our experimental approach, preattentive texton detection was to a certain extent disturbed in subjects at risk. Moreover, subjects at risk did not show the advantage of the right hemisphere in processing texton elements which was found in the control group. This may point to a subtle dysfunction of the right hemisphere in the risk group. It is concluded from the present study that deficits in preattentive texton detection may represent an indicator for a schizophrenic disposition. However, further studies including other high risk groups, schizophrenics in remission and individuals with a schizotypal personality disorder are needed to confirm this hypothesis.

Adolescent↗
PubMed2002

Impaired information processing triggers altered states of consciousness.

Schizophrenia, intoxication with tetrahydrocannabinol (Delta-THC), and cannabis psychosis induce characteristic time and space distortions suggesting a common psychotic dysfunction. Since genetic research into schizophrenia has led into disappointing dead ends, the present study is focusing on this phenotype. It is shown that information theory can account for the dynamical basis of higher sensorimotor information processing and consciousness under physiologic as well as pathologic conditions. If Kolmogorov entropy (inherent in the processing of action and time) breaks down in acute psychosis, it is predicted that Shannon entropy (inherent in the processing of higher dimensional perception) will increase, provoking positive symptoms and altered states of consciousness. In the search for candidate genes and the protection of vulnerable individuals from cannabis abuse, non-linear EEG analysis of Kolmogorov information could thus present us with a novel diagnostic tool to directly assess the breakdown of information processing in schizophrenia.

Cannabis↗
PubMed1989

An elementary information processing component in the circuitry of the retina generating the on-responses.

A pattern of neural connections that is a compulsory feature of photoreceptor terminals and is referred to as the synaptic ribbon complex was analyzed, and by combination of the structural information and information gained by intracellular recordings from photoreceptors, horizontal cells, and bipolar cells, it is possible to explain how the hyperpolarizing effect of light stimulating the photoreceptors is changed to a depolarization of depolarizing bipolar cells. The sign reversal is accomplished by the hyperpolarizing action of the horizontal cells on the photoreceptors, which blocks the transmission between the photoreceptors and the bipolar cells. This blocking action is controlled by the photoreceptor and it functions like a gate that is opened only when the photoreceptor is stimulated by light. The synaptic ribbon complex offers an example of an elementary information processing component with three input channels to the bipolar cells with each channel contributing a different piece of information and with the processing occurring presynaptically. Additional processing of information occurs within the dendritic tree through interactions of the responses of the individual dendritic endings to different types of input. This interaction can involve partial blocking of the conduction within the dendritic tree, making the interaction considerably more complex than simple summation. The responses recorded intracellularly from neurons reveal only the end result of the processing of information at the level of that neuron.

Animals↗
PubMed2003

Information processing biases among chronic pain patients and ankylosing spondylitis patients: the impact of diagnosis.

The aim of this research was to explore the impact that diagnostic status has on information processing biases among chronic pain (CP) and ankylosing spondylitis (AS) patients. AS patients, CP patients, and healthy hospital staff controls, completed a questionnaire and short computer task. During the computer task participants endorsed sensory, depression, illness, and neutral adjectives, following a cue question (which facilitated encoding of the adjectives in relation to the self). They were then asked to recall the adjectives in a surprise memory task. Diagnosed CP patients demonstrated a recall bias away from depression related stimuli, whilst the non-diagnosed CP patients did not. The results also suggest an association between receipt of a diagnosis and better psychological outcome in terms of information processing biasing. It was questioned whether the presence of a diagnosis among CP patients who are not currently depressed may protect or 'buffer' them against cognitive biasing towards classic depression related stimuli. The diagnosed AS group showed a bias towards sensory stimuli, perhaps reflecting the presence of an enduring and over-riding pain schema. The non-pain control group also displayed a sensory bias, which was attributed to a frequency effect as a result of working in an environment where they were regularly exposed to sensory language. The results are discussed in relation to existing literature in this area and implications for clinical practice are provided.

Chronic Disease↗
PubMed1997

Impaired spatial information processing in aged monkeys with preserved recognition memory.

Spatial information processing was examined in a non-human primate model of cognitive aging, using procedures formally similar to tasks designed for rats. The test apparatus was a large open field containing eight reward locations. Monkeys rapidly learned to visit each location once per trial, and probe manipulations confirmed that young animals navigated according to the distribution of cues surrounding the maze. In contrast, aged monkeys solved the task using a response sequencing strategy, independent of extramaze spatial information. Object recognition memory was normal in the aged group. The results reveal substantial correspondence in the cognitive effects of aging across rat and primate models, and they establish appropriate procedures for testing the long-standing proposal that the role of the hippocampus in normal spatial learning is similarly conserved.

Aging↗
PubMed2006

HIS-Monitor: an approach to assess the quality of information processing in hospitals.

OBJECTIVES: Hospital information systems (HIS) are a substantial quality and cost factor for hospitals. Systematic monitoring of HIS quality is an important task; however, this task is often seen to be insufficiently supported. To support systematic HIS monitoring, we developed HIS-Monitor, comprising about 107 questions, focusing on how a hospital information system does efficiently support clinical and administrative tasks. METHODS: The structure of HIS-Monitor consists of a matrix, crossing HIS quality criteria on one axis with a list of process steps within patient care on the other axis. HIS-Monitor was developed based on several pretests and was now tested in a larger feasibility study with 102 participants. RESULTS: HIS-Monitor intends to describe strengths and weaknesses of information processing in a hospital. Results of the feasibility study show that HIS-Monitor was able to highlight certain HIS problems such as insufficiently supported cross-departmental communication, legibility of drug orders and other paper-based documents, and overall time needed for documentation. We discuss feasibility of HIS-Monitor and the reliability and validity of the results. CONCLUSIONS: Further refinement and more formal validation of HIS-Monitor are planned.

Austria↗
PubMed1987

Adult age, information processing, and partial report performance.

Previous investigations using the partial report technique for examining adult age differences in iconic memory have suggested that older adults are less able to extract information stored in the icon than are young adults. The present study examined the hypothesis that poorer partial report performance on the part of older adults involves age-related differences in the speed of visual and auditory information processing. Elderly (M = 67 years) and young (M = 23.5 years) adults were contrasted on partial report, whole report, backward masking, and choice reaction time tasks. Results indicated that the older age group exhibited a smaller partial report advantage than did their younger counterparts. This age difference was found to be related in part to increases with age in the time required to encode and identify visual stimuli but was not related to the time required to translate auditory cues into recall instructions. In other words, the slowdown in visual information processing speed that accompanies increased age contributes to age differences in performance on tasks involving iconic memory.

Adult↗
PubMed1997

Are there dissociable roles of the mesostriatal and mesolimbocortical dopamine systems on temporal information processing in humans?

There is some experimental evidence suggesting that temporal processing of brief duration in the range of milliseconds is based on dopamine (DA)-dependent neural counting mechanisms, whereas processing of longer duration is cognitively mediated. To further elucidate the critical role of DA receptors of the D2 receptor family for temporal information processing in humans, the effects of the 3 mg of haloperidol, 300 mg of sulpiride, and 150 mg of remoxipride were studied in a placebo-controlled double-blind experiment. In addition, concomitant changes in cortical arousal as well as speed of information processing and motor execution were measured. Temporal processing of brief duration was significantly impaired by haloperidol (p < 0.01) but not by sulpiride and remoxipride, whereas processing of longer duration was adversely affected by haloperidol (p < 0.001) as well as remoxipride (p < 0.01) as compared to placebo. The pattern of results in combination with the different pharmacological profiles of the dopaminergic drugs applied in the present study suggests that temporal processing of brief duration is mediated by D2 receptor activity in the mesostriatal system and, thus, point to the basal ganglia as a neuroanatomical structure possibly involved in timing of brief duration. On the other hand, deteriorating effects of D2 receptor blockers on processing of longer duration appear to be due to DA-induced impairment of memory functions which may be mediated by the mesolimbocortical DA system.

Adult↗
PubMed2006

Mentalizing and Marr: an information processing approach to the study of social cognition.

To interact successfully, individuals must not only recognize one another as intentional agents driven primarily by internal mental states, but also possess a system for making reliable and useful inferences about the nature of those beliefs, feelings, goals, and dispositions. The ability to make such mental state inferences (i.e., to mentalize or mindread) is the central accomplishment of human social cognition. The present article suggests that our understanding of how humans go about making mental state inferences will benefit from treating social cognition primarily as an information processing system that comprises a set of mechanisms for elaborating more basic social information into an understanding of another's mind. Following Marr's [Marr, D., 1982. Vision. W. H. Freeman, San Francisco, CA] framework for the study of such information processing systems, I suggest that questions about social cognition might profitably be asked at three levels--computation, algorithm, and implementation--and outline a number of ways in which a description of social cognition at the middle level (i.e., the step-by-step processes that give rise to mental state inferences) can be informed by analysis at the other two.

Cognition↗
PubMed1998

The genetic basis of the relation between speed-of-information-processing and IQ.

The relationship of speed-of-information-processing (SIP), as derived from reaction times (RTs) on experimental tasks, and intelligence has been extensively studied. SIP is suggested to measure the efficiency with which subjects can perform basic cognitive operations underlying a wide range of intellectual abilities. Observed phenotypic correlations between RT and IQ typically are in the -0.2 to -0.4 range, and the question is addressed to what extent this relationship is determined by genetic or environmental influences. In a group of Dutch twins the heritabilities for RT tasks at age 16 and 18 years were estimated longitudinally and the nature of the RT-IQ relationship was investigated. At age 16 years heritabilities for a simple reaction time (SRT) and choice reaction time (CRT) were 64 and 62% and the average phenotypic correlations between the RTs and IQ, assessed by the Raven standard progressive matrices, was -0.21. At the second test occasion lower heritabilities were observed for the RTs, probably due to modifications in administration procedures. The mean correlations between the RTs and WAIS verbal and per formal subtests were -0.18 and -0.16. Multivariate genetic analyses at both ages showed that the RT-IQ correlations were explained by genetic influences. These results are in agreement with earlier findings (Baker et al., Behav Genet 1991;21:351-67; Ho et al., Behav Genet 1988;18:247-61) and support the existence of a common, heritable biological basis underlying the SIP-IQ relationship.

Adolescent↗
PubMed1987

Social stereotypes and information-processing strategies: the impact of task complexity.

Subjects read information about a defendant in a criminal trial with initial instructions to judge either his guilt (guilt judgment objective) or his aggressiveness (trait judgment objective). The defendant was either Hispanic or ethnically nondescript. After considering the evidence, subjects made both guilt and aggressiveness judgments (regardless of which type of judgment they were instructed to make at the time they read the information) and then recalled as much of the information they read as they could. Results favored the hypothesis that when subjects face a complex judgmental situation, they use stereotypes (when available and relevant) as a way of simplifying the judgment. Specifically, they use the stereotype as a central theme around which they organize presented evidence that is consistent with it, and they neglect inconsistent information. Subjects with a (complex) guilt judgment objective judged the defendant to be relatively more guilty and aggressive and recalled more negative information about him if he was Hispanic than if he was ethnically nondescript. In contrast, subjects with a (simple) trait judgment objective did not perceive either the guilt or aggressiveness of the two defendants to be appreciably different, and did not display any significant bias in their recall of the evidence. These and other results are discussed in terms of the information-processing strategies subjects are likely to use when they expect to make different types of judgments.

Aggression↗
PubMed2004

Posterior fossa lesion volume and slowed information processing in multiple sclerosis.

The relationship between performance on information processing efficiency measures and MRI-derived lesion volume including global and regional T2 and T1 lesion volumes was investigated in 20 patients with relapsing-remitting multiple sclerosis (RRMS) and secondary progressive multiple sclerosis (SPMS). Processing speed, as measured by the Sternberg Memory Scanning Test, was significantly correlated with posterior fossa lesion volume and slowed reaction time in seven out of eight patients (six out of seven with SPMS) with any lesion volume in the posterior fossa suggesting a 'threshold effect'. Processing capacity as measured by the Salthouse Keeping Track Test was not significantly correlated with the MRI measures. Cognitive performance did not correlate with Expanded Disability Status Scale score, depression or fatigue, and patients performed within normal limits on tests of attention/concentration ability. The significant relationship between posterior fossa lesion volume and memory scanning speed in this study suggests that pathological damage in the posterior fossa may contribute to slowed cognitive processing and may be an important direction for future studies of cognitive function in multiple sclerosis. Lack of correlation of cognitive measures with the other MRI measures may be due to low lesion volume relative to other studies, sample composition, and limited pathological specificity of the MRI measures.

Adult↗
PubMed2003

Event-related potential assessment of information processing after closed head injury.

We evaluated alterations in information processing after closed head injury as a function of task demands and stimulus modality. Visual and auditory discrimination tasks were administered to 11 survivors of a head injury and 16 matched healthy controls. In auditory tasks, compared with controls, the survivors had smaller N100s, smaller and later N200s, a more posterior scalp distribution of N200, and longer P300 and response latencies. Auditory N200 and P300 correlated highly with duration of unconsciousness. In contrast, in visual tasks, only a reduced N200 in the survivors differentiated the groups. Our results indicate that processing of auditory stimuli, including the perception and discrimination of stimulus features and the evaluation and categorization of stimuli, may be impaired after head trauma. Visual sensory processing may be spared, but higher-order visual processing involved in stimulus classification may be compromised.

Acoustic Stimulation↗
PubMedDate not supplied

[Information processing system for the DA240-4 discrete autoanalyser].

An information processing system (IPS) is described for checking the parity of the sample address code, setting the scale factor of the measured value from 0.1 to 1.0 analog-digital conversion of this value with automatic selection of measuring subranges. The IPS performs printing of the sample address and the measurement results in red or black colour depending on the autoanalyzer operation mode and on the input signals. In addition, it sends control signals into the autoanalyzer to check its functioning. This IPS is intended for operation with DA240-4 discrete autoanalyzer.

Analog-Digital Conversion↗
PubMed2002

An additive factor analysis of the effect of sub-anaesthetic doses of nitrous oxide on information processing: evidence for an impairment of the motor adjustment stage.

RATIONALE: Nitrous oxide (N(2)O) inhalation, at subanaesthetic concentrations, impairs choice reaction time (RT). However, the functional locus of this effect remains to be ascertained. In the present study, this issue was investigated by applying the additive factor logic to the RTs of rats performing a visuo-motor task. METHOD: The task consisted of either a left-side or a right-side body displacement to a visual stimulus displayed in either the left or right hemispace. The experimental design involved the manipulation of two task factors (stimulus luminance and foreperiod duration) the effects of which are additive on RT. Inhaled N(2)O (from 0% to 60%) was varied as the third factor of the design. RESULTS: N(2)O prolonged RT in a dose-dependent manner and this effect was additive with that of stimulus luminance, whilst it interacted with that of foreperiod duration. Moreover, at low concentrations (10-20%), N(2)O abolished the effect of foreperiod, possibly through a disturbance of time estimation processes, whereas at higher concentrations (30-40%) N(2)O enhanced the effect of foreperiod, probably by slowing down motor processes. Movement time (MT) was decreased by N(2)O at 20-40%. CONCLUSIONS: The present data provide evidence that N(2)O impairs information processing by altering at least the stage of motor adjustment. In addition, N(2)O spares the sensory processes implemented during the stimulus preprocessing stage. A subsidiary result is that at some concentrations, N(2)O displays opposite effects on reaction time and movement time. These results demonstrate that the additive factor method constitutes a powerful new tool for studying the pharmacology of information processing in animal models.

Anesthetics, Inhalation↗
PubMed1999

Mechanisms explaining the association between low back trouble and deficits in information processing. A controlled study with follow-up.

STUDY DESIGN: A controlled study with a 6-month follow-up period. OBJECTIVES: To find an explanation for the association between impairment in information processing, i.e., slow reaction times, and chronic low back trouble. SUMMARY OF BACKGROUND DATA: Low back trouble, chronic pain in general, and depression have been associated with impaired cognitive functions and slow reaction times. It is a common phenomenon that the preferred hand performs better than the nonpreferred hand in motor tasks. The authors hypothesized that chronic low back trouble hampers the functioning of short-term memory in a way that leads the preferred hand to loose its advantage over the nonpreferred hand, but that the advantage would be restored during the rehabilitation. METHODS: Sixty-one healthy control subjects and 68 patients with low back trouble participated in the study. Reaction times for the preferred and nonpreferred upper limbs were tested. A multiway analysis of covariance was used to examine the group, handedness, and rehabilitation effects on reaction times. The hypothesis was specifically tested with a third-degree interaction: group-handedness-rehabilitation. RESULTS: A significant interaction among group, handedness, and rehabilitation was found (P = 0.05). At the beginning, the reaction times for the preferred hand were faster among the control subjects (P = 0.001), but not among the patients with low back trouble (P = 0.62). After the rehabilitation, the preferred hand was faster both among the control subjects (P = 0.001) and the patients with low back trouble (P = 0.0002). During the rehabilitation, back pain, psychological distress, and general disability decreased significantly among the patients with chronic low back trouble. CONCLUSIONS: The results support the hypothesis that chronic low back trouble (i.e., pain, psychological distress, and general disability) hampers the functioning of short-term memory, which results in decreased speed of information processing among patients with chronic low back trouble.

Adult↗
PubMed2003

Cognitive aging and auditory information processing.

Over the last decade, much research has been conducted to investigate why older listeners report more difficulty in understanding spoken language than would be expected given their degree of audiometric hearing loss. Of particular relevance to audiological rehabilitation is recent research on older listeners when they are engaged in complex tasks involving the auditory processing of naturalistic signals in realistic social and physical environments Discourse epitomizes such activity. By understanding age-related and individual differences in perceptual and cognitive performance, we gain important insights into how hearing impairments influence activity and participation in context. In this paper, the problems of older adults as communicators in everyday life are illuminated by studies showing that auditory processing problems affect cognitive processing. Age-related problems in understanding spoken language are exacerbated by perceptual stressors such as noise and by cognitive stressors such as memory load. It is argued that the significance of these processing problems during discourse depends on social-emotional factors Therefore, goals for new signal-processing technologies designed for older adults who are hard of hearing can be framed not only in terms of improving signal audibility but also in terms of reducing stress on the listener during information processing. Furthermore, goals for therapeutic interventions can be framed in terms of reducing stress during information processing by modifying behaviors and physical and social environments to achieve the listener's goals.

Age Factors↗