• 自闭症谱系障碍的早期筛查工具

    Subjects: Psychology >> Social Psychology submitted time 2023-03-28 Cooperative journals: 《心理科学进展》

    Abstract: The purpose of screening research is to provide a comprehensive understanding about the risks of early identification of autism spectrum disorder. This study comprehensively and systematically reviewed the commonly-used screening tools for early detection of autism in infants and preschool children. Under the guidelines of the Preferred Reporting Items for Systematic review and Meta-Analysis (PRISMA), we queried the topic “screening tools for autism spectrum disorder” against the three major literature retrieval databases (WOS, Scopus, PubMed) and obtained 175 articles, of which 35 articles and 18 corresponding screening tools were further evaluated to comply with the Quality Assessment of Diagnostic Accuracy Studies-2 (QUADAS-2) checklist. These tools were analyzed from the aspects of application level, psychometric and measurement properties, cultural adaptability, diagnostic criteria and classification accuracy. From the aspect of application level, the screening tools were categorized into three levels based on the types of screening samples, wherein Level- I screening tools, totaling up to 4, focus on general-purpose screening of population and the examination of other developmental disorders, and the evaluation is mainly based on the reports from parents; Level-II screening tools, totaling up to 8, were mainly based on the clinical reports from well-trained clinicians or the observations from the interactions between trained professionals and children; the hybrid-level screening tools, totaling up to 6, were based on the Level-I general population and the Level-II clinical samples. From the aspect of psychometric and measurement properties, existing studies only adopted several metrics of reliability and validity, e.g., internal consistency reliability, rater reliability, test-retest reliability and criterion validity, to evaluate the psychometric properties of screening tools,, whereas the other metrics such as split half reliability, measurement error, content validity, structural validity, cross-cultural validity and hypothesis test were seldom adopted except in only a few studies, and one-third studies did not carry out any psychometric evaluation, potentially resulting in the high-risk bias of QUADAS-2. From the aspect of cultural adaptability, the series of M-CHAT tools(M-CHAT, M-CHAT/F,M-CHAT-R/F), subjected to extensive evaluation in multiple languages, have demonstrated obvious cultural adaptability, and were recognized as the most widely-used and the most famous screening tool based on parent reports. However, there is an increasing trend that screening tools developed to be localized to the culture and languages in communities or countries with scarce resources. From the aspect of diagnostic standards, the DSM-IV or DSM-IV-TR (accounting for 43%) were still used as the main reference standard instead of the DSM-5 manual (accounting for 34%). It was concluded from sensitivity and specificity that the tools for preschool children outperform those for infants in terms of classification accuracy. The tools rated as good level for infants include M-CHAT-R/F and PDQ-1, and the tools rated as excellent level for children include OERA and TIDOS, wherein M-CHAT-R / F is one of the most promising screening tools for estimating the risks of autism spectrum disorder. Lastly, we discussed the limitations of QUADAS-2 and the necessity of choosing stringent quality assessment measures and the importance of further validating these measurements.

  • 解读不显著结果:基于500个实证研究的量化分析

    Subjects: Psychology >> Social Psychology submitted time 2023-03-28 Cooperative journals: 《心理科学进展》

    Abstract: Background: P-value is the most widely used statistical index for inference in science. A p-value greater than 0.05, i.e., nonsignificant results, however, cannot distinguish the two following cases: the absence of evidence or the evidence of absence. Unfortunately, researchers in psychological science may not be able to interpret p-values correctly, resulting in wrong inference. For example, Aczel et al (2018), after surveying 412 empirical studies published in Psychonomic Bulletin & Review, Journal of Experimental Psychology: General, and Psychological Science, found that about 72% of nonsignificant results were misinterpreted as evidence in favor of the null hypothesis. Misinterpretations of nonsignificant results may lead to severe consequences. One such consequence is missing potentially meaningful effects. Also, in matched-group clinical trials, misinterpretations of nonsignificant results may lead to false “matched” groups, thus threatening the validity of interventions. So far, how nonsignificant results are interpreted in Chinese psychological literature is unknown. Here we surveyed 500 empirical papers published in five mainstream Chinese psychological journals, to address the following questions: (1) how often are nonsignificant results reported; (2) how do researchers interpret nonsignificant results in these published studies; (3) if researchers interpreted nonsignificant as “evidence for absence,” do empirical data provide enough evidence for null effects? Method: Based on our pre-registration (https://osf.io/czx6f), we first randomly selected 500 empirical papers from all papers published in 2017 and 2018 in five mainstream Chinese psychological journals (Acta Psychologica Sinica, Psychological Science, Chinese Journal of Clinical Psychology, Psychological Development and Education, Psychological and Behavioral Studies). Second, we screened abstracts of these selected articles to check whether they contain negative statements. For those studies which contain negative statements in their abstracts, we searched nonsignificant statistics in their results and checked whether the corresponding interpretations were correct. More specifically, all those statements were classified into four categories (Correct-frequentist, Incorrect-frequentist: whole population, Incorrect-frequentist: current sample, Difficult to judge). Finally, we calculated Bayes factors based on available t values and sample sizes associated with those nonsignificant results. The Bayes factors can help us to estimate to what extent those results provided evidence for the absence of effects (i.e., the way researchers incorrectly interpreted nonsignificant results). Results: Our survey revealed that: (1) out of 500 empirical papers, 36% of their abstracts (n = 180) contained negative statements; (2) there are 236 negative statements associated with nonsignificant statistics in those selected studies, and 41% of these 236 negative statements misinterpreted nonsignificant results, i.e., the authors inferred that the results provided evidence for the absence of effects; (3) Bayes factor analyses based on available t-values and sample sizes found that only 5.1% (n = 2) nonsignificant results could provide strong evidence for the absence of effects (BF01 > 10). Compared with the results from Aczel et al (2019), we found that empirical papers published in Chinese journals contain more negative statements (36% vs. 32%), and researchers made fewer misinterpretations of nonsignificant results (41% vs. 72%). It worth noting, however, that there exists a categorization of ambiguous interpretations of nonsignificant results in the Chinese context. More specifically, many statements corresponding to nonsignificant results were “there is no significant difference between condition A and condition B”. These statements can be understood either as “the difference is not statistically significant”, which is correct, or “there is no difference”, which is incorrect. The percentage of misinterpretations of nonsignificant results raised to 64% if we adopt the second way to understand these statements, in contrast to 41% if we used the first understanding. Conclusion: Our results suggest that Chinese researchers need to improve their understanding of nonsignificant results and use more appropriate statistical methods to extract information from nonsignificant results. Also, more precise wordings should be used in the Chinese context.

  • 基于心灵知觉理论的AI服务用户接受机制及使用促进策略

    Subjects: Psychology >> Social Psychology submitted time 2023-03-28 Cooperative journals: 《心理科学进展》

    Abstract: Many enterprises have adopted AI services to respond to customer needs, yet several studies indicate that users are not always satisfied with AI in service. This study explores the key factors that drive users' attitudes toward AI services and usage promotion strategies based on the generation and influence of users' mind perceptions of AI, which including (1) Mechanism analysis: How do the cues and experiential factors of users' early contact with AI lead to the perception that AI is “good at computing but not feeling”? This study argues that past frustrations with AI in emotional-social service scenarios and mass media portrayals of AI as “highly intelligent and low in emotional intelligence” have led users to develop the perception that AI is good at computation but lacks feelings. This makes users willing to use AI for functional purposes only in cognitive-analytical tasks, but not like to establish empathic connections with AI in emotional-social tasks. (2) Moderating effects: How do different internal user states and external AI features moderate the formation and activation of this mind perception toward AI? This study believes that higher frequency of AI use and technology use self-efficacy make individuals more likely to establish para-friendship relationships with AI, those two factors that inhibit the formation of mind perceptions that users believe AI is good at computing but lacks feeling. On the other hand, the degree of anthropomorphism and the degree of flexibility in the task influenced individuals' cognitive cues to AI, those two factors that inhibit the activation of the user's mind perception toward AI. (3) Facilitation strategies: With the reverse utilization of mind perception, how can the mimicry of AI as warmth animals and the provision of technical assistance enable users to accept services from AI in a wider range of scenarios? This study proposes that by designing an information framework that demonstrates the computational power of AI and at the same time, mimics AI as an animal with “high warmth” quality, it can reconcile the paradox of “AI is good at computation but lacks feeling” and promote the user's perception of AI's empathic ability. This will increase users' willingness to use AI in emotional-social tasks. On the other hand, providing users with tips and technical assistance when interacting with AI can help build a joint interaction model between AI and humans, reduce users' concerns about AI's lack of empathic capacity, and increase people's willingness to use AI in emotional-social tasks. This study attempts to construct a new model of AI service acceptance based on the theory of mind perception at the theoretical level and provide a psychological reference for theoretically explaining users' ambivalent attitudes toward AI services. At the practical level, this study attempts to propose two pathways to facilitate users' acceptance of AI services with the help of mind perception theory and provide a technical reference for enterprises to enhance the effectiveness of AI applications in their service processes.

  • 长期高策略性技能训练对运动员大脑白质结构的影响:一项DTI研究

    Subjects: Psychology >> Social Psychology submitted time 2023-03-27 Cooperative journals: 《心理学报》

    Abstract: Previous brain imaging studies have shown that the specialized experience achieved by expert sports players after years of training contributes to plasticity in both brain function and structure. However, changes in brain plasticity related to participating in various types of sports, specifically sports that involve higher-level strategies and cognitive function, remain unclear. Table tennis is a sport requiring high levels of strategy. Thus, the present study investigated the white matter structure of the brain in expert table tennis players who had undergone long-term training. Given the accumulating evidence that action processing in the brain occurs along two distinct pathways—dorsal and ventral—we hypothesized that, in addition to changes in the white matter of the dorsal sensorimotor system, the white matter in the ventral pathway linking brain regions related to higher-level cognitive function would differ between expert table tennis players and nonplayers. An investigational group of 31 expert table tennis players (20.06 ± 1.69 years of age) and a control group of 28 college students (20.68 ± 1.66 years of age) who had no professional training in table tennis were recruited for the study. The table tennis players were members of university teams, and each player had more than 7 years of table tennis training. Diffusion tensor imaging techniques were used to compare white matter microstructure properties of the brain between expert players and nonplayers. Statistical analyses were performed using independent t-tests. Further analysis was conducted for the expert player group to assess whether any correlation existed between fractional anisotropy (FA) values and training time. Consistent with our hypothesis, the white matter microstructure properties of both the dorsal and ventral pathways in expert table tennis players significantly differed from those in nonplayers. Specifically, FA values in the bilateral corticospinal tracts, which mainly connect brain regions in the dorsal sensorimotor system, were higher in experts than in nonplayers. Compared with nonplayers, expert players also had higher FA values in the left inferior longitudinal fasciculus and bilateral inferior occipitofrontal fasciculus of the ventral pathway, which are involved in higher-level cognitive processing, such as semantic processing or thinking. By contrast, no white matter region showed a higher FA value in nonplayers than in expert players, and no region was found with axial diffusivity difference between the groups. Additionally, radial diffusivity was lower in the left superior longitudinal fasciculus and bilateral inferior occipitofrontal fasciculus in experts than in nonplayers. Correlation analysis of the expert group showed significant positive correlations between training time and FA values in both the left superior longitudinal fasciculus in the ventral pathway and bilateral corticospinal tracts in the dorsal pathway. Taken together, these findings suggest that enhanced structural integrity of the white matter in both the dorsal and ventral pathways is associated with long-term, expert table tennis training. The observed structural plasticity is conducive to promoting cognitive processing of concrete sensorimotor and abstract information, which would enable expert players to excel at sports requiring a high level of strategy.