Filled-pause disfluencies such as um and er affect listeners' comprehension, possibly mediated by attentional mechanisms (J. E. Fox Tree, 2001). However, there is little direct evidence that hesitations affect attention. The current study used an acoustic manipulation of continuous speech to induce event-related potential components associated with attention (mismatch negativity [MMN] and P300) during the comprehension of fluent and disfluent utterances. In fluent cases, infrequently occurring acoustically manipulated target words gave rise to typical MMN and P300 components when compared to nonmanipulated controls. In disfluent cases, where targets were preceded by natural sounding hesitations culminating in the filled pause er, an MMN (reflecting a detection of deviance) was still apparent for manipulated words, but there was little evidence of a subsequent P300. This suggests that attention was not reoriented to deviant words in disfluent cases. A subsequent recognition test showed that nonmanipulated words were more likely to be remembered if they had been preceded by a hesitation. Taken together, these results strongly implicate attention in an account of disfluency processing: Hesitations orient listeners' attention, with consequences for the immediate processing and later representation of an utterance.

Citation: Turk, D. J., Brady-van den Bos, M., Collard, P., Gillespie-Smith, K., Conway, M.A. & Cunningham, S.J. (2013). Divided attention selectively impairs memory for self-relevant information. Memory and Cognition, 41(4), pp. 503-510. doi: 10.3758/s13421-012-0279-0 This is the accepted version of the paper.This version of the publication may differ from the final published version. Permanent AbstractInformation that is relevant to self tends to be remembered more than information relating to other people, but the role of attention in eliciting this 'selfreference effect' is unclear. The present study assessed the importance of attention using an ownership paradigm, which requires participants to encode items under conditions of imagined ownership by themselves or another participant. Previous work has established that this paradigm elicits a robust self-reference effect, with more 'self-owned' items being remembered than 'other-owned' items. Attentional resource availability was manipulated using divided attention tasks at encoding (Expt.1) and during a subsequent Remember-Know recognition test (Expt. 2). A significant self-reference effect in Remember responses emerged under full attention conditions, but dividing attention at either encoding or test eliminated the memory advantage for self-owned items. These findings are discussed in relation to the nature of self-referential cognition and the importance of attentional resource input at both encoding and retrieval in the creation and manifestation of the self-reference effect in memory.

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Background: Not all victims of bullying go on to develop problems with their mental health. To understand factors that may confer resilience, many have explored the moderating role of protective factors in relation to mental illness. No study to date, however, has considered moderators of adult wellbeing following victimisation. We explore 14 protective factors and test whether these promote good adult wellbeing in addition to prevent mental illness following victimisation. In doing so, we aimed to understand how positive mental health and resilience can be promoted. Methods: Data were derived from the Avon Longitudinal Study of Parents and Children. Participants were assessed for wellbeing and depressive symptoms at age 23, as well as victimisation in adolescence, and protective factors across development. Protective factors were categorised into individual-, family-and peer-level, and included factors like social skills, perceived school competence, and relationships with family and peers. The moderating role of the protective factors were examined using interactive regression models.Results: Perceived scholastic competence was the only factor that mitigated some of the negative effects of victimisation. Individuals with higher perceptions of scholastic competence had higher wellbeing in adulthood than victims with lower perceptions of competence. No protective factors positively moderated life satisfaction or the risk of depressive symptoms; although findings suggest that friendships in late adolescence may be protective for individuals exposed to less frequent victimisation. Conclusions:Our study is the first to explore a wide range of protective factors in predicting adult wellbeing following victimisation. We identify factors involved specifically in supporting wellbeing but not in reducing the risk of depression.Findings suggest that interventions aimed at increasing perceptions of scholastic competence in childhood may help to support more positive wellbeing in adulthood.