Michael J Beran
Biographic Data
| ID | 4496901 |
|---|---|
| NAME | Michael J Beran |
| GIVEN NAMES | Michael J |
| FAMILY NAME | Beran |
| SIGNATURE | BERAN M J |
| AFFILIATIONS | Georgia State University |
| ORCID | 0000-0002-2504-0338 |
| VERIFIED | Yes |
| TOTAL WORKS | 20 |
| TOTAL CITATIONS | 6 |
| WORKS AS AUTHOR | 19 |
| WORKS AS EDITOR | 1 |
| FIRST PUBLICATION YEAR | 2001 |
| LATEST PUBLICATION YEAR | 2026 |
| H-INDEX | 2 |
Reimagining the vividness of visual imagery questionnaire as a single item screener for aphantasia
Despite criticism, the Vividness of Visual Imagery Questionnaire (VVIQ) has emerged as the gold standard for identifying visual aphantasia (i.e., the absence or stark reduction of visual imagery). While more comprehensive measures are needed to investigate mental imagery on several other dimensions such as sharpness, saturation or clarity, we argue in the present paper that the VVIQ is sufficient for identifying aphantasia. In a large data set of…
Cognitive offloading by children in perceptual discrimination tasks
Assessing aphantasia prevalence and the relation of self-reported imagery abilities and memory task performance
Focality and prospective memory in preschool children
We examined the influence of prospective memory (PM) cue focality in a sample of preschool children. Prior investigations in older populations indicated that focal targets were associated with enhanced PM performance, perhaps through more automatic retrieval processes. Importantly, this influential variable has not been thoroughly explored in younger samples. Over three test sessions, preschool children completed a memory task where they were sho…
Capuchin monkeys (sometimes) go when they know
Words matter
Beginning in the 1960s the first systematic projects dedicated to testing whether great apes could acquire some aspects of human language were conducted. The ape subjects demonstrated remarkable capacities to learn and use elements of either sign language or an artificial language. The results from research across several laboratories drew a mixture of excitement and skepticism, and critiques and debates have ensued since the earliest reports wer…
Mirror Self-Recognition
Metacognition
Foundations Of Metacognition
Language‐Trained Chimpanzees ( P an troglodytes ) Delay Gratification by Choosing Token Exchange Over Immediate Reward Consumption
Token exchange inherently introduces an element of delay between behavior and reward and so token studies may help us better understand delay of gratification and self‐control. To examine this possibility, we presented three language‐trained chimpanzees with repeated choices involving different foods that could be eaten immediately or lexigram (graphic symbol) tokens that represented (and could be traded for) foods later. When both options were f…
Summation and quantity judgments of sequentially presented sets by capuchin monkeys ( Cebus apella )
Capuchin monkeys ( Cebus apella ) were presented with two sets of food items, identical in food type but differing in number. Animals selected one set and were permitted to consume their choice. Set sizes ranged from 1 to 6 items. In experiment 1, each set was uncovered and recovered before a response was made, and the monkeys selected the larger set at high levels. Experiment 2 presented sets that had both visible and nonvisible food items in th…
A Salience Theory of Learning and Behavior
Delay of Gratification and Delay Maintenance by Rhesus Macaques (Macaca Mulatta)
The authors tested the self-control of rhesus macaques by assessing if they could refrain from reaching into a food container to maximize the accumulation of sequentially delivered food items (a delay-maintenance task). Three different versions of the task varied the quantity and quality of available food items. In the first 2 versions, food items accumulated across the length of the trial until a monkey consumed the items. In the 3rd task, a sin…
A Stroop-Like Effect in Color-Naming of Color-Word Lexigrams by a Chimpanzee (Pan Troglodyte)
The Stroop effect (J. R. Stroop, 1935) reflects the difficulty in ignoring irrelevant, but automatically processed, semantic information that is inherent in certain stimuli. With humans, researchers have found this effect when they asked participants to name the color of the letters that make up a word that is incongruent with that color. The authors tested a chimpanzee that had learned to associate geometric symbols called lexigrams with specifi…
Chimpanzees (Pan troglodytes) use markers to monitor the movement of a hidden item
The Evolution of Thought
Primate Psychology
The Roots of Human Behavior are found in nonhuman primates
Maintenance of Self-Imposed Delay of Gratification by Four Chimpanzees ( Pan troglodytes ) and an Orangutan ( Pongo pygmaeus )
Delay maintenance, which is the continuance over time of the choice to forgo an immediate, less preferred reward for a future, more preferred reward, was examined in 4 chimpanzees (Pan troglodytes) and 1 orangutan (Pongo pygmaeus). In the 1st experiment, the apes were presented with 20 chocolate pieces that were placed, one at a time, into a bowl that was within their reach. The apes could consume the available chocolate pieces at any time during…
Comparative cognitive science and the Japanese influence in primatology
Review of Primate Origins of Human Cognition and Behavior by Tetsuro Matsuzawa. Tokyo, Springer‐Verlag, 2001, xxi + 587 pp, 248 fig., 4 in color, $119.00
Maintenance of Self-Imposed Delay of Gratification by Four Chimpanzees ( Pan troglodytes ) and an Orangutan ( Pongo pygmaeus )
Delay maintenance, which is the continuance over time of the choice to forgo an immediate, less preferred reward for a future, more preferred reward, was examined in 4 chimpanzees (Pan troglodytes) and 1 orangutan (Pongo pygmaeus). In the 1st experiment, the apes were presented with 20 chocolate pieces that were placed, one at a time, into a bowl that was within their reach. The apes could consume the available chocolate pieces at any time during…
Delay of Gratification and Delay Maintenance by Rhesus Macaques (Macaca Mulatta)
The authors tested the self-control of rhesus macaques by assessing if they could refrain from reaching into a food container to maximize the accumulation of sequentially delivered food items (a delay-maintenance task). Three different versions of the task varied the quantity and quality of available food items. In the first 2 versions, food items accumulated across the length of the trial until a monkey consumed the items. In the 3rd task, a sin…
A Stroop-Like Effect in Color-Naming of Color-Word Lexigrams by a Chimpanzee (Pan Troglodyte)
The Stroop effect (J. R. Stroop, 1935) reflects the difficulty in ignoring irrelevant, but automatically processed, semantic information that is inherent in certain stimuli. With humans, researchers have found this effect when they asked participants to name the color of the letters that make up a word that is incongruent with that color. The authors tested a chimpanzee that had learned to associate geometric symbols called lexigrams with specifi…
Comparative cognitive science and the Japanese influence in primatology
Review of Primate Origins of Human Cognition and Behavior by Tetsuro Matsuzawa. Tokyo, Springer‐Verlag, 2001, xxi + 587 pp, 248 fig., 4 in color, $119.00
Maintenance of Self-Imposed Delay of Gratification by Four Chimpanzees ( Pan troglodytes ) and an Orangutan ( Pongo pygmaeus )
Delay maintenance, which is the continuance over time of the choice to forgo an immediate, less preferred reward for a future, more preferred reward, was examined in 4 chimpanzees (Pan troglodytes) and 1 orangutan (Pongo pygmaeus). In the 1st experiment, the apes were presented with 20 chocolate pieces that were placed, one at a time, into a bowl that was within their reach. The apes could consume the available chocolate pieces at any time during…
The Roots of Human Behavior are found in nonhuman primates
Chimpanzees (Pan troglodytes) use markers to monitor the movement of a hidden item
The Evolution of Thought
Primate Psychology
A Salience Theory of Learning and Behavior
Delay of Gratification and Delay Maintenance by Rhesus Macaques (Macaca Mulatta)
The authors tested the self-control of rhesus macaques by assessing if they could refrain from reaching into a food container to maximize the accumulation of sequentially delivered food items (a delay-maintenance task). Three different versions of the task varied the quantity and quality of available food items. In the first 2 versions, food items accumulated across the length of the trial until a monkey consumed the items. In the 3rd task, a sin…
A Stroop-Like Effect in Color-Naming of Color-Word Lexigrams by a Chimpanzee (Pan Troglodyte)
The Stroop effect (J. R. Stroop, 1935) reflects the difficulty in ignoring irrelevant, but automatically processed, semantic information that is inherent in certain stimuli. With humans, researchers have found this effect when they asked participants to name the color of the letters that make up a word that is incongruent with that color. The authors tested a chimpanzee that had learned to associate geometric symbols called lexigrams with specifi…
Summation and quantity judgments of sequentially presented sets by capuchin monkeys ( Cebus apella )
Capuchin monkeys ( Cebus apella ) were presented with two sets of food items, identical in food type but differing in number. Animals selected one set and were permitted to consume their choice. Set sizes ranged from 1 to 6 items. In experiment 1, each set was uncovered and recovered before a response was made, and the monkeys selected the larger set at high levels. Experiment 2 presented sets that had both visible and nonvisible food items in th…
Language‐Trained Chimpanzees ( P an troglodytes ) Delay Gratification by Choosing Token Exchange Over Immediate Reward Consumption
Token exchange inherently introduces an element of delay between behavior and reward and so token studies may help us better understand delay of gratification and self‐control. To examine this possibility, we presented three language‐trained chimpanzees with repeated choices involving different foods that could be eaten immediately or lexigram (graphic symbol) tokens that represented (and could be traded for) foods later. When both options were f…
Foundations Of Metacognition
Mirror Self-Recognition
Metacognition
Capuchin monkeys (sometimes) go when they know
Words matter
Beginning in the 1960s the first systematic projects dedicated to testing whether great apes could acquire some aspects of human language were conducted. The ape subjects demonstrated remarkable capacities to learn and use elements of either sign language or an artificial language. The results from research across several laboratories drew a mixture of excitement and skepticism, and critiques and debates have ensued since the earliest reports wer…
Focality and prospective memory in preschool children
We examined the influence of prospective memory (PM) cue focality in a sample of preschool children. Prior investigations in older populations indicated that focal targets were associated with enhanced PM performance, perhaps through more automatic retrieval processes. Importantly, this influential variable has not been thoroughly explored in younger samples. Over three test sessions, preschool children completed a memory task where they were sho…
Assessing aphantasia prevalence and the relation of self-reported imagery abilities and memory task performance
Cognitive offloading by children in perceptual discrimination tasks
Reimagining the vividness of visual imagery questionnaire as a single item screener for aphantasia
Despite criticism, the Vividness of Visual Imagery Questionnaire (VVIQ) has emerged as the gold standard for identifying visual aphantasia (i.e., the absence or stark reduction of visual imagery). While more comprehensive measures are needed to investigate mental imagery on several other dimensions such as sharpness, saturation or clarity, we argue in the present paper that the VVIQ is sufficient for identifying aphantasia. In a large data set of…
Psychology (19 works) · Cognition (10 works) · Child and Animal Learning Development (8 works) · Computer Science (8 works) · Cognitive psychology (7 works) · Neuroscience (7 works) · Primate Behavior and Ecology (7 works) · Developmental psychology (6 works) · Biology (5 works) · Communication (5 works)