Cognitive bias believing you are good at the things you are bad at, as successes are more vivid?

It could be described as quite a few cognitive biases.  See https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_cognitive_biases.

For example, confirmation bias, illusory superiority or choice-supportive bias could be at work here in your description.


Toolbox for modelling visual search performance

I'm assuming that you want some kind of "computer vision" model (in that you want to be able to provide the model with input stimuli in the form of an image), and that you want to predict some kind of behaviour? (e.g., RT from a search task). Fleshing out the different processes involved is not going to be trivial, so there probably isn't a "one-size-fits-all" "toolbox" for your problem.

Perhaps the "saliency map model" by Itti and Koch would be suitable. There are many more modern versions of this (including a MATLAB toolbox and a number of related models). While it is not necessarily the best, the advantages in this case are that Itti and Koch actually used an orientation pop-out task in their original paper (Vision Research, 2000). However, I'm not sure to what degree the feature detectors actually resemble neurons, and I don't think a memory component has been included.


Term for an inability to accept ideas that are outside the norm

At an individual level, a person that refuses to even consider an idea that goes against his or her existing beliefs would be called close-minded or narrow-minded.

Intolerant and prejudiced can also be used, but intolerant tends to be applied when discussing religious or political ideas, and prejudiced when talking about racial relations.

Conformist can also be used, and is a more neutral term. It's also a bit vague, so you'd have to specify which idea or range is being conformed to.

A public discourse limited to an acceptable range of subjects would limited to "safe topics".

A person who can accept or generate ideas outside of socially acceptable opinions can be labelled a free-thinker. Depending on how far outside the norms the ideas are, the person and may be branded a "radical" or even "pervert" in order to indicate society or government's disapproval of the individual.


I think you may have answered your own question.

You can build a GSR meter or purchase one online. You do not necessarily need to hook it up to your computer; if it has an LED you can simply record the results with pen and paper. If you want to measure heart rate, buy a stethoscope. Or if you want to be really cheap, check your pulse using two fingers; it's free.

Note that I have no experience with building my own GSR meter or using the GSR meter that I've linked to. I cannot vouch for the accuracy or reliability of these devices. The familiar adage is probably appropriate: you get what you pay for.


What are the methods to reject ocular artifacts in the EEG?

According to a review by Croft & Barry (2000), a number of possible methods exist to prevent, or reject ocular artifacts in the EEG;

Prevention/reduction of artifact instances

Recording with eyes closed -
A very effective method, but eye closure alters the EEG, e.g., it increases alpha band activity;
Let subjects fixate on a target -
Method reduces blinks, but does not eliminate them.

Rejection

Exclude trials with amplitudes larger than, e.g., 50 microV  -
Method works only with a trial-based approach; artifacts below criterion level will remain.

Reduction

Subtract a certain standard voltage when an artifact occurs  -
A crude method;
Online attenuation of the EEG signal when an artifact is detected  -
Works better as the former technique, but is still crude;
Regression techniques where different electrodes are used to estimate the artifact component in other electrodes  -
A more sophisticated method with apparently good results.

For details I refer to Croft & Barry (2000) and the primary literature cited therein.

Reference
- Croft & Barry Neurophysiol Clin (2000); 30: 5-19


Determining if participants learned the objects as a whole or feature by feature

Your experiment is most similar to those in categorization research. For example, Wills et al (2013)* argued that single-dimension classification (one-feature analysis) is less effortful, than multidimensional with more than one dimension, and omni-dimensional, where you process and categorize the stimuli as a whole. They used the match-to-standard procedure, where each stimuli is classified by participants as members of categories. This task was first used by Regehr and Brooks (1995) and basically means that you map each the stimuli features and each stimuli feature that you categorize.

For example, you have Stimulus A (dark, square), Stimulus B (light, triangle) and Stimulus C (dark, triangle). The dimensions are shape and colour.

Dimensions    colour shape
Stimulus A      1      0
Stimulus B      0      1
Stimulus C      1      1

Of course you have to have to set up rules for stimuli structures in category learning or learning in general and fit the stimuli into those structures.

If you instruct them to pay attention to the first dimension only, you would pay attention only to the first dimension in the data analysis. But that would be supervised learning, and that would defeat the purpose of your experiment. If you are curious to whether they learn by single-dimensions or through omni-dimension, you must not supervise the learningand should not provide feedback, because feedback will likely become superior to simple observational learning (see Wills, Milton & Edmunds, 2015).

A very good example is Nosofsky et al. (1994) replicating Shepard et al. (1961). That one is the closest to what you described you want to do. You can find the data and look at the categorisational structure in catlearn (Wills et al., 2016), so you can see how they handled their stimuli dimensions and data.

Hope this helps. I might have not been too coherent, but I think the gist is there.

Nosofsky, R. M., Gluck, M. A., Palmeri, T. J., McKinley, S. C., & Glauthier, P. (1994). Comparing modes of rule-based classification learning: A replication and extension of Shepard, Hovland, and Jenkins (1961). Memory & Cognition, 22(3), 352–369.

Regehr, G., & Brooks, L. R. (1995). Category organization in free classification: The organizing effect of an array of stimuli. Journal of Experimental Psychology: Learning, Memory, and Cognition, 21(2), 347–363.

Shepard, R. N., Hovland, C. I., & Jenkins, H. M. (1961). Learning and memorization of classifications. Psychological Monographs: General and Applied, 75(13), 1.

Wills, A. J., Connell, G. O., Edmunds, C. E. R., & Inkster, A. B. (2016). Progress in modeling through distributed collaboration: Concepts, tools, and category-learning examples. Psychology of Learning and Motivation, 1–23.

Wills, A. J., Milton, F., & Edmunds, C. E. R. (2015). Feedback can be superior to observational training for both rule-based and information-integration category structures. Retrieved from https://pearl.plymouth.ac.uk/handle/10026.1/3064

Wills, A.J., Milton, F., Longmore, C.A., Hester, S., & Robinson, J. (2013). Is overall similarity classification less effortful than single-dimension classification?. Quarterly Journal of Experimental Psychology, 66, 299-318.

* You can visit the authors' website to get the data and how the analysed that data.


Can we learn to adapt to image-reversal when being intermittently exposed to them?

Wearing prism glasses needs adaptation of behavior. That takes time. Wearing them during all waking hours speeds up the process as it forces the wearer to adapt in everyday life. If the subject does not adapt quickly, it's going to be a very hungry, un-showered, immobile and eventually a very unhappy subject, because tasks of daily living become pretty much impossible without adapting to the prisms.

Putting them on for an hour or so per day will not force the subject to cope with it. And even if a training regimen is commenced in that hour, when the subject puts them off the learning process stops. Eventually they may get there, but it is certainly not as effective.


Is there some hierarchy of the human senses?

Now I think I have understood your mental model of human perception, I can give you an answer. Correct me if this is not what you meant to ask.

If I understood you, you think that the human brain functions like a robotic brain. A sensor captures an image, sends it to the brain (which is comparable to a central processing unit), then the next one, etc. The brain then processes each incoming image. And analogically for senses other than vision. And you are asking if, if we stopped sending signals form one sense, the brain will have free capacity to process more informaiton from the other senses.

The theory behind it

The problem is that you can't define it as neatly as that. On a very high level, this model is almost right, except for the part where the brain takes in one "captured frame" after the other and processes a frame as a whole. Technically, the eye really captures one frame (a fixation), does not see while it moves to a different viewpoint (a saccade), then it captures again. But from then on, the analogy breaks.

The captured light is not sent to a central perception-processing place in the brain as a package. Rather, there are many neurons on the first step of the visual processing (V1 area). And each of them is connected to a few retina cells, a few fellow neurons from the same area, and neurons from the next step of visual processing. No V1 neuron "sees" the whole frame. Each V1 neuron will fire when it is excited enough; but exciting and inhibiting signals come from all directions - retina cells, neighbour V1 neurons, hierarchically "higher" V2 neurons - which means that the input for the object we perceived is not just the light falling on the retina, but also what we have just perceived.

If you pick a single V1 neuron and count how often it fires, you can certainly count some kind of average rate, but it will not be much dependent on the rate at which eye fixations happen (which is actually a constant). It will have something to do with the amount of light  falling on the retina, and the rate at which this light changes, but these are only a few of the contributing factors - what the brain has already recognized is another factor, through the signals coming from the "higher" neurons. So, if you try measuring at the first stage of the brain - which is the V1 neurons for vision - you can't operationalise your measures.

Besides, at that stage, no consolidation has happened yet. The information output of the V1 neuron is not a recognized object, they do very low-level recognition of textures, contours and similar. Information coming from other senses - the classical five ones, but also ones not widely known in popular culture, and ones which are known but not categorized as senses (such as pain, body spatial orientation) - gets incorporated into the recognized object along the way.

But one thing to recognize here is that, if you are asking about the effect where the recognition process starts, then no, your idea won't work. The V1 neurons can't process information coming from the other senses. They are connected to the retina, not to the cochlea. If we amputate a person's eyes (good thing this is a thought experiment only), the V1 neurons won't start processing sound signals instead.

But you are probably aware that blind people can recognize more of their environment based on other senses like sound, than sighted people wearing eyecovers. This indicates that the brain has learned to use the information coming through the other channels more efficiently.

A speculation

I think it is reasonable to assume that in the "sense switched off" situation the brain will also recognize more of the information coming in from other channels. The brain does not recognize everything that comes in from the senses, but only what it is interested in at the current moment. If there is nothing coming in through vision, it might "decide" to recognize more details coming in through sound than it would have otherwise.

This means that the assumption you mentioned in the comments is true, if we start looking at the effect after recognition has happened - a person whose vision was "switched off" will extract more information out of the same amount of audio signals reaching the ear. But it is not really measurable, because we can only speculate how this information is represented within the brain. We don't have any metrics for "information as represented in the brain". Shannon found out how to measure informaiton which is stored somewhere accessible, as in a written word, but the information within the brain is not accessible, and its amount is only weakly correlated with the information available to the sensory organs.

Be aware that not only is the amount of the information in the brain not the one available to the sensory organs, but it is also created from a mix of sensory perceptions and knowledge. At that point, you can't hold apart what came from the senses and what didn't.

  When we look at something, perhaps 95% of what we consciously perceive is not what is "out there" but what is already in our heads in long-term memory. [Colin Ware]

Even if we could make measurements there, we wouldn't be just measuring the impact of the senses. We would have big trouble distinguishing it from the impact of memory.

So, can we have a hierarchy?

I explained why we can't have a hierarchy at the input-end of the recognition pathways. I speculated that we can have a hierarchy at the output-end - but even if my speculation is true, we can't measure anything at that end. So, the answer to the question as a whole is: if there is a hierarchy, we can't measure it in the way you propose.

I think there are experiments which try to make some rude sort of hierarchy, using observation of the kind "a person with covered eyes feels more disoriented than a person with stuffed ears". But this doesn't have the precision you are implying, does not answer to what extent the lower sense can be developed if the first one is missing permanently, and it can only be applied to the more prominent external senses like vision and hearing. (There are authors who argue that being certain of the truth of a statement is a sense - how do you turn that off?) Besides, experimentation with turning senses off can be dangerous, see research on sensory deprivation chambers for details.

I don't have formatted citations for that post here. The information on the functioning of the visual pathway can be read in the book "Visual thinking for design" by Colin Ware. The info on how well one sense can replace another is certainly available in peer-previewed literature, but the one case I remember vividly is described by a journalist, http://www.mensjournal.com/article/print-view/the-blind-man-who-taught-himself-to-see-20120504. The author who claims certainty is a sense is Robert Burton.


http://www.scientificamerican.com/article/what-is-the-memory-capacity/

https://www.quora.com/Is-there-a-physical-limit-to-human-memory-If-yes-can-it-or-has-it-been-measured

It's said that you store everything or nearly everything you experience in your subconscious mind.


Any basic Neuroscience book would suffice, really. For example, a really good and widely used book is

Principles of Neural Science from Kandel et al. I read it nearly from cover to cover, and it details the workings of the nervous system from bottom to top. Parts IV to IX are probably most relevant to you:

Part IV: The Neural Basis of Cognition
Part V: Perception
Part VI: Movement
Part VII: The Unconscious and Conscious Processing of Neural Information
Part VIII: Development and the Emergence of Behavior
Part IX: Language, Thought, Affect, and Learning


What's this cognitive bias that relates to misremembering exact stimuli?

As opposed to the contrast effect which relates to stimuli that are presented simultaneously or in immediate succession, the similar distinction bias constitutes a possible/partial explanation for the phenomenon that you conjecture: stimuli are experienced as more distinct when presented simultaneously than when they are presented separately.

Another bias that may play a role here is anchoring, which describes the tendency to take that piece of information which is presented first in some context as a reference.

Note that this applies to (perceptual) judgement, not so much to memory/misremembering (but I think that this is what your question is actually about).

I am sceptical regarding the observation of underestimation being more likely. It is possible that some worry to miss leads to a hasty decision, but isn't it equally possible that a more optimistic participant has an opposite tendency, missing the correct stimulus? This will depend on the design, too – it should make a difference whether the displayed series just starts with the yellow sample, shows the blue sample before starting with the yellow, shows the whole continuum before starting at either end, etc.

In general, the accuracy of perceptual judgement is the subject of signal detection theory which considers tendencies to falsely miss a present target stimulus, or to falsely rate an absent target stimulus as present. Signal detection theory explicitly includes response bias and reasons why responses may be either liberally or conservatively biased.


Which personality theories do belong to humanistic?

TLDR: All humanistic psychologists helped to shape todays overall humanistic personality theory "(e.g. Allport, Frankl etc.)"

In order to enable a full grasp of the subject, I need to go over a few things, and to a degree, I am revisiting a few areas I covered in other answers to questions.  In fact, mentioning Gordon Allport in your question made me find something out which changes a few things in my past research.  You got an upvote from me with that.

First, a bit of history

As I pointed out in Why has behaviourism fallen out of favour?, there are what is known as 3 forces of psychology

  Behavioural Theory (First Force) – (Short & Thomas, 2014, p. 203)
  Psychodynamic Theory (Second Force) – (Short & Thomas, 2014, p. 139)
  Humanistic Theory (Third Force) – (Short & Thomas, 2014, p. 79)

Although there is now talk of a possible fourth force such as Multicultural Psychology or Transpersonal Psychology

The humanistic approach is said to have been fully developed in the 1950s through a meeting between Abraham Maslow, Carl Rogers and Clark Moustakas; and the underpinning philosophy of humanistic thinking is that, in the view of Maslow (1968, p. 10), psychoanalysis attends to the ‘sick’ half of therapy – disorder and treatment – whilst humanistic therapy tends to the ‘healthy’ half – growth, potential and self-actualisation. (Reeves, 2013).  However, the discussion regarding Humanistic Psychology was started a lot earlier than that by Gordon Allport in 1930 (see below).

Humanistic models of approach include (Counselling Directory, n.d.):

Existential Therapy,
Gestalt Therapy,
Human Givens Psychotherapy,
Person-Centred Therapy (PCT),
Psychosynthesis,
Reality Therapy,
Solution-focused Brief Therapy,
Transactional Analysis (TA), and
Transpersonal Psychology

All the founders of the above therapies (including Eric Berne) helped form Humanistic Psychology.

As my first link indicated, Behaviourism hasn't completely fallen out of favour. Due to the work of Carl Rogers, there has been some shift, although not a complete shift, away from the rigidity of the Psychodynamic approach towards the Humanistic approach to therapy and Behaviourism has also started to gain more of the spotlight again.

The key concepts of Person-Centred Counselling, Transactional Analysis and Gestalt Therapy are three of the most widely practiced. (Reeves, 2013)

According to Dr. David R. Hiles of De Montfort University, Leicester, England, the Pioneers of Humanistic-Existential Psychology include:

Carl Jung (1875-1961)

  Carl Jung is possibly one of the most important figures in psychology, and yet he remains controversial. For many psychologists he is little more than a historical curiosity. Someone who worked with Freud in the early days of the founding of psychoanalysis, and then went his own way, founded his own school of psychology, became rather eccentric, and is worthy of only the most cursory of mentions in introductory text books. To other psychologists, he is possibly the most complete psychologist that there has ever been.

Rollo May (1909-1994)

  Rollo May, the distinguished existential psychologist and existential psychotherapist, was a co-founder of the Humanistic Psychology movement. He was an outspoken critic of his contemporaries, and was largely responsible for integrating the humanistic and existential traditions.

Abraham Maslow (1908-1970)

  Maslow was a major American psychologist, a visionary, an inspired thinker, who radically altered the course of development of the discipline of psychology. Born in New York, he was educated at the University of Wisconsin, where he studied primate behaviour under Harry Harlow and Clark Hull. He returned to New York in 1935 by accepting a research position with Edward Thorndike at Columbia University. Through his contact with the New School for Social Research, near Greenwich Village, he came to know and study with:- Alfred Adler, Erich Fromm, Karen Horney of the psychoanalytic school; Kurt Goldstein, Max Wertheimer and Kurt Koffka of the Gestalt school of thought.

Frederick (Fritz) Perls, the founder of Gestalt psychology, is also on the list (see below).

Carl Rogers (1902-1987)

  Rogers pioneered the development of client-centred therapy. A major figure in the history of psychology, with a basically optimistic view of humankind, he was a co-founder of the Humanistic Psychology movement.

James Bugental (1915- )

  James Bugental is an important figure in the early development of humanistic psychology, and in the practice of a humanistic approach to psychotherapy.

Erich Fromm (1900-1980)

  Erich Fromm was a German psychoanalyst and social theorist, who always saw himself as neo-Frudian in orientation, but who many regard as having occupied a key position on the periphery of the humanistic movement.

Roberto Assagioli (1888-1974)

  Assagioli was an Italian psychiatrist and founder of Psychosynthesis. He trained as a psychoanalyst and was a member of the Freud Society in Zurich. He withdrew from membership as he became discontented with a lack of consideration with the growth of human potential by Freud and his followers, and during the 20's and 30's began to develop his own theory and methods. Only in the 50's and 60's was his work recognized outside of Italy.

Frederick (Fritz) Perls (1893-1970)

  Perls was a Freudian trained psychoanalyst, the founder of Gestalt therapy, and a charismatic figure. Born in Berlin, he received his M.D. from Frederich Wilhelm University, and then received a psychoanalytic training with Wilhelm Reich as his analyst. He met many of the key founders of Gestalt psychology (Kohler, Wertheimer, Lewin) and worked as Kurt Goldstein's assistant. He went to South Africa in 1934, where he set up the Institute of Psychoanalysis, and met Jan Smuts, the inventor of the term "holism". Moving to the USA in 1946, with his wife he set up the New York Institute of Gestalt Therapy in 1952.

Viktor Frankl (1905-1997)

  Frankl saw that each person's suffering is unique, and opportunity for growth lies in the way the person bears their suffering. Logotherapy is an attempt to implement that insight in a therapeutic context. Frankl had been strongly influenced by the existential philosophers, Heidegger and Jaspers, and began to develop a philosophy of his own. As the titles of his many popular books suggest, Logotherapy is concerned basically with meaning, the will to meaning, the unheard cry for meaning.

And a few others

Gordon Allport (1897–1967)

You mentioned Gordon Allport in your question and yet he is not mentioned by Dr. David R. Hiles, or Reeves above, which is interesting because it is argued that the term "humanistic psychology" was first coined by Gordon Allport in 1930 (DeCarvalho, 1991).

(Allport, 1930) under the subheading of 'A new Science Needed' said:

  My points, I fear, have been arbitrarily chosen and rather dogmatically presented.  In no other way, however, is it possible to illustrate in a short time the thesis of this paper, namely that a deliberate formulation of a science of personality is not only a necessary but an altogether possible task.  It is mere laziness to insist that knowing people is an art, and therewith to dismiss the subject.  If knowing people is an art, it seems to be an art which, like medicine, can be formulated and communicated, and which can and should be included within a new and broader type of humanistic psychology (p.127, italics added)

DeCarvalho states that you can find similar statements in all of Allport's major works and particularly in the 1960s.

  Ignorance of Allport's use of the term humanistic psychology is symbolic of a larger ignorance of Allport's contribution to the humanistic current in American psychology: This omission occurs not only in the texts of the history and systems of psychology, but unfortunately also among humanistic psychologists themselves.....Allport was a well-known personality theorist and perhaps the most prestigious thinker of the early and mid-20th century psychological world who championed the humanistic movement in psychology in the earliest stages. (DeCarvalho, 1991)

References

Allport, G. W. (1930). Some guiding principles in understanding personality. The family, 11(4), 124-128.DOI: 10.1177/104438943001100407Free PDF: http://journals.sagepub.com/doi/pdf/10.1177/104438943001100407

Counselling Directory (n.d.) Humanistic Therapies. [Online]
Available at: http://www.counselling-directory.org.uk/humanistic.html
[Accessed 16 February 2017].

DeCarvalho, R. J. (1991). Gordon Allport and humanistic psychology. Journal of Humanistic Psychology, 31(3), 8-13.DOI: 10.1177/0022167891313002

Maslow, A. (1968). Toward a Psychology of Being. New York: Van Nostrand.

Reeves, A. (2013). An Introduction to Counselling and Psychotherapy: From Theory to Practice. London: SAGE Publications Ltd.

Short, F. & Thomas, P. (2015) Core Approaches in Counselling and Psychotherapy. Hove: Routledge.


Are there any models of the human visual field of view taking into account head, neck and eye movements and calculating likelihood of fixation?

Disclaimer: This answer is a bit self-serving because it only describes research work from the lab where I am a student. However, I think it's relevant for the question!

Coordination of eye, head, and hand

http://www.cis.rit.edu/research/vpl/publications/ExpBrainRes2001.pdf

Pelz, J., Hayhoe, M., & Loeber, R. (2001). The coordination of eye, head, and hand movements in a natural task. Experimental Brain Research, 139(3), 266-277.

This paper analyzes eye, head, and hand movements in subjects while they copy a block pattern. It doesn't incorporate any of the neck movements as such, though.

Predictive saccades in virtual reality

http://www.journalofvision.org/content/13/1/20.full

Diaz, G., Cooper, J., Rothkopf, C., & Hayhoe, M. (2013). Saccades to future ball location reveal memory-based prediction in a virtual-reality interception task. Journal of vision, 13(1), 20.

In this work, a virtual racquetball task is used to elicit predictive eye movements in freely-moving subjects while wearing a head-mounted virtual reality display (including an eye tracker). The VR display and racquet are tracked using a motion-capture tool. The results are mostly focused on eye-in-head but incorporate some neat methods for extracting gaze points using the virtual world, and for showing the data on a graph.


Whats the difference between BDD and hypochondriasis?

DSM-5 is the go to book for psychiatric dignoses and I would strongly recommend you pick up a copy if you are studying Psychiatry.

I am going to split my answer in 3 as you are talking about two different disgnoses and the 3rd part will be making a comparison between the two.

Hypochondriasis

The more recently approved Diagnostic and Statistical Manual of Mental Disorders (DSM-5) contains many revisions, but few are as sweeping as those involving somatoform disorders. In the updated edition, hypochondriasis and several related conditions have been replaced by two new, empirically derived concepts: Somatic Symptom Disorder and Illness Anxiety Disorder. They differ markedly from the somatoform disorders in DSM-IV.

To meet the diagnostic criteria for Somatic Symptom Disorder under DSM-5 (Page 311), patients must have:

The Somatic Symptom Disorder is considered persistant if it is characterised by severe symptoms, marked impairment, and long duration (more than 6 months).

The DSM also goes on to say that there are 3 levels of severity, which are:

Mild if only one of the symptoms specified in Criterion B is fulfilled.
Moderate If two or more of the symptoms specified in Criterion B are fulfilled.
Severe If two or more of the symptoms specified in Criterion B are fulfilled, plus there are multiple somatic complaints (or one very severe somatic symptom).

Patients with illness anxiety disorder may or may not have a medical condition but have heightened bodily sensations, are intensely anxious about the possibility of an undiagnosed illness, or devote excessive time and energy to health concerns, often obsessively researching them. Like people with somatic symptom disorder, they are not easily reassured. Illness anxiety disorder can cause considerable distress and life disruption, even at moderate levels.

In DSM-5 Page 315 it states that the diagnostic critera for Illness Anxiety Disorder is

  Preoccupation with having or acquiring a serious illness.
  Somatic symptoms are not present or, if present, are only mild in intensity. If another medical condition is present or there is a high
  risk for developing a medical condition (e.g., strong family history
  is present), the preoccupation is clearly excessive or
  disproportionate.
  There is a high level of anxiety about health, and the individual is easily alarmed about personal health status.
  The individual performs excessive health-related behaviours (e.g., repeatedly checks his or her body for signs of illness) or exhibits
  maladaptive avoidance (e.g., avoids doctor appointments and
  hospitals).
  Illness preoccupation has been present for at least 6 months, but the specific illness that is feared may change over that period of
  time.
  The illness-related preoccupation is not better explained by another mental disorder, such as somatic symptom disorder, panic
  disorder, generalised anxiety disorder, body dysmorphic disorder,
  obsessive-compulsive disorder, or delusional disorder, somatic type.

The DSM goes on to say that there are two types of Illness Anxiety Disorder

  Care-seeking type: Medical care, including physician visits or undergoing tests and procedures, is frequently used.
  Care-avoidant type: Medical care is rarely used.

  Diagnostic Features

  Most individuals with hypochondriasis are now classified as having
  somatic symptom disorder; however, in a minority of cases, the
  diagnosis of illness anxiety disorder applies instead...

Body Dysmorphic Disorder (BDD)

In DSM-5, BDD is described under Obsessive Compulsive Disorders.

BDD as described in DSM-5

  Preoccupation with one or more perceived defects or flaws in physical appearance that are not observable or appear slight to others.
  At some point during the course of the disorder, the individual has performed repetitive behaviors (e.g., mirror checking, excessive
  grooming, skin picking, reassurance seeking) or mental acts (e.g.,
  comparing his or her appearance with that of others) in response to
  the appearance concerns.
  The preoccupation causes clinically significant distress or impairment in social, occupational, or other important areas of
  functioning.
  The appearance preoccupation is not better explained by concerns with body fat or weight in an individual whose symptoms meet
  diagnostic criteria for an eating disorder.

  Diagnostic Features

  Individuals with body dysmorphic disorder (formerly known as
  dysmorphophobia) are preoccupied with one or more perceived defects or
  flaws in their physical appearance, which they believe look ugly,
  unattractive, abnormal, or deformed...

Comparison between Hypochondriasis and BDD

When you compare the two within the DSM they do differ as you suggest where Hypochondriasis is more about somatic symptoms as it is about perception of illness whereas BDD is about physical appearances.  However when you look at the International Statistical Classification of Diseases (ICD) produced by the World Health Organisation, which is linked to in the DSM with the ICD codes at the top of each Diagnostic Criteria (for example 300.82 (F45.1) for Somatic Symptom Disorder - see image above), the 10th revision ICD code - ICD-10 - which is in brackets, refers to Section F45 of the ICD and this adds to the definitions.

  F45 - Somatoform disorders

  The main feature is repeated presentation of physical symptoms
  together with persistent requests for medical investigations, in spite
  of repeated negative findings and reassurances by doctors that the
  symptoms have no physical basis. If any physical disorders are
  present, they do not explain the nature and extent of the symptoms or
  the distress and preoccupation of the patient.

...

  F45.2 - Hypochondriacal disorder

  The essential feature is a persistent preoccupation with the possibility of having one or more serious and progressive physical
  disorders. Patients manifest persistent somatic complaints or a
  persistent preoccupation with their physical appearance. Normal or
  commonplace sensations and appearances are often interpreted by
  patients as abnormal and distressing, and attention is usually focused
  upon only one or two organs or systems of the body. Marked depression
  and anxiety are often present, and may justify additional diagnoses.

  Body dysmorphic disorder
  Dysmorphophobia (nondelusional)
  Hypochondriacal neurosis
  Hypochondriasis
  Nosophobia

  Excl.:
  delusional dysmorphophobia (F22.8)
  fixed delusions about bodily functions or shape (F22.-)

When reading this it confuses things as F45.2 considers BDD to be a somatic disorder as it is about perception rather than fact, however in my view, as psychiatry uses the DSM to distinguish between the two, in a psychiatric sense you get a definitive answer which you already have.

With psychosomatic disorders your mind can make your body act like it actually has the medical problem or make an actual problem like pain worse, where as in BDD your mind cannot alter the physical shape of the body.


Improved Typing as a result of slight movement

I personaly also play piano and see myself into that flow easly,

Check out what I just found

From: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Flow_(psychology)

  Flow is the mental state of operation in which a person performing an
  activity is fully immersed in a feeling of energized focus, full
  involvement, and enjoyment in the process of the activity. In essence,
  flow is characterized by complete absorption in what one does

  (...)

  Components of flow

  Nakamura and Csíkszentmihályi identify the following six factors as
  encompassing an experience of flow.

  intense and focused concentration on the present moment merging of action and awareness
  a loss of reflective self-consciousness
  a sense of personal control or agency over the situation or activity
  a distortion of temporal experience, one's subjective experience of time is altered
  experience of the activity as intrinsically rewarding, also referred to as autotelic experience

  (...)

Check this out:

  Roy Palmer suggests that "being in the zone" may also influence movement patterns as better integration of the conscious and subconscious reflex functions improves coordination.

  (...)

  Music

  Musicians, especially improvisational soloists may experience a
  similar state of mind while playing their instrument. Research has
  shown that performers in a flow state have a heightened quality of
  performance as opposed to when they are not in a flow state. In a
  study performed with professional classical pianists who played piano
  pieces several times to induce a flow state, a significant
  relationship was found between the flow state of the pianist and the
  pianist’s heart rate, blood pressure, and major facial muscles. As the
  pianist entered the flow state, heart rate and blood pressure
  decreased and the major facial muscles relaxed. This study further
  emphasized that flow is a state of effortless attention. In spite of
  the effortless attention and overall relaxation of the body, the
  performance of the pianist during the flow state improved.


Paradoxical senses of scale: Are they common or is it just me?

The symptoms belong to the Alice-in-Wonderland Syndrome, which is supposed to be very common in childhood. An interesting article appeared in the New York Times.


What is the notation about group differences in terms standard deviations?

The psychology notation for standardized differences between group means is d. I.e., the difference between group differences divided by the within-group standard deviation. Note that there are some variants about which group is used or whether a pooled standard deviation is obtained.

I.e., in your example: d = 0.3.

If you want to report means and sds, then you typically use M and SD.


Difference in frequencies of mistakes between use of left-right vs. up-down

There is data on this question generated by research on the embodiment of spatial cognition. The idea here is that we mentally represent and construct space in relation to our bodies. From this perspective, the differences that you describe (left vs. right more complicated than up vs down) stem from the properties of how we perceive the world in our bodies:

Tversky (2008) describing research of Franklin and Tversky (1990):

  We proposed that people keep track of the relative positions of the objects around them as they move by constructing a spatial-mental framework out of the three axes of the body and appending objects to it, updating it as the situation changes. We reasoned that accessibility of objects should reflect characteristics of the body axes and the world  relevant to perception and action. The head-feet axis has salient asymmetries both perceptually and behaviorally; moreover, for the canonically upright observer, it correlates with the only asymmetric axis in the world, the up-down axis of gravity. The  front-back axis separates the world that can be easily perceived and acted on from the world that cannot be easily perceived or acted on, but the left-right axis has few salient perceptual or behavioral asymmetries. This analysis predicts that, for the upright observer, things located along the head-feet axis should be fastest to retrieve, followed by things located on the front-back axis, followed by things located on the left-right axis.

Their data supports this reasoning. Furthermore in their experiments they also disentangled gravity from body orientation by having some participants recline:

  For the reclining observer, no body axis correlates with gravity, so accessibility depends entirely on the body axes. In this case, things located along the front-back axis should be fastest because of the forward bias of perception and action.

This was the case as well.

Note that accessibility was operationalized as the speed in which participants could name the position of an object. Participants made very few errors in this task. So strictly speaking it does not answer your question about left-right errors. On the whole, this has nevertheless much overlap with your question. They could have increased the number of errors by imposing a short reaction time window, for example. In this case they would have expected these effects on the error rate.

References

Franklin, N., & Tversky, B. (1990). Searching imagined environments. Journal of Experimental Psychology: General, 119, 63–76. doi:10.1037/0096-3445.119.1.63

Tversky, B. (2008). Spatial cognition: Situated and embodied. In P. Robbins and M. Aydede (Eds). Cambridge handbook of situated cognition. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press.


Acceleration of subjective time with age

I think that from an experimental perspective, the subjective passage of time being faster in later life is somewhat true, but not as simple as the above, and only on a decade-scale, not a minute/hour/day-scale. The results tend to depend on the methodology; in particular using metaphors may produce different results than using a Likert scale. Also even this weak effect of age appears to cap around the age of 50. Furthermore being under time pressure (presently or during the period in question) significantly skews the answers (towards faster passage). So it's a pretty complex topic.

Refs & further reading:

Why Does Time Fly as We Get Older?, Sci Am
Why time seems to speed up as we get older, Vox


How does chronic stress improve memory processes?

Interesting question. Intuitively, I would have thought that chronic stress would uncompromisingly be a detriment to our memory and recall.

An article by Ohira et al (2011) makes note that it is accepted that chronic stress is seen to adversely affect memory, it may not be replicated in other studies:

  "However, results related to the effects of chronic job stress
  and cognitive functions remain controversial. Although
  chronic job stress is generally linked to reduced memory
  and learning (Holman and Wall, 2002; Taris and Feij,
  2004), a recent epidemiological study with a larger sample
  size failed to replicate these effects (Elovainio et al., 2009)."

Other studies may indicate that predictable chronic mild stress can improve hippocampal neurogenesis and memory (Parihar et al., 2011). Your question doesn't describe the level of stress experienced as a variable so broadly, this article might be very relevant:

  "Furthermore, enrichments in mood and memory after PCMS were
  associated with substantially increased hippocampal neurogenesis ...
  The overall stress reaction in an organism can be advantageous for
  cognitive functions when it induces moderate increases in
  corticosterone levels and leads to adaptation and resistance ... The
  PCMS regimen used in this study likely elicited moderate increases in
  corticosterone levels, which facilitated adaptive and beneficial
  responses in the brain."

It's implied that unpredictable chronic stress would have a detrimental effect on memory. Some of the biological reasons for enhancing memory processes are presented in that above study.

EDIT: Additional Information

Also see - McFadden, L.M., Paris, J.J., Mitzelfelt, M.S., McDonough, S., Frye, C.A. & Matuszewich, L. (2011). Sex-dependent effects of chronic unpredictable stress in the water maze. Physiology & Behavior, 102(3), 266-275. The research conversely highlights that unpredictable stress improves performance on a spatial memory task in female rats.

References

Ohira, H., Matsunga, M., Kumra, K., Murakami, H., Osumi., T., Isowa, T., Fukuyama, S., Shinoda, J. & Yamada, J. (2011). Chronic stress modulates neural and cardiovascular responses during reversal learning. Neuroscience, 193, 193-204
Parihar, VK., Hattiangady, B., Kuruba, R., Shuai, B. & Shetty, AK. (2011). Predictable chronic mild stress improves mood, hippocampal neurogenesis and memory. Molecular Psychiatry, 16, 171-183


What are the visual cognitive abilities of a new born?

At birth, visual structures are fully present yet immature in their potentials.

Following are the innate visual abilities of an infant

1. detect changes in brightness,
2. distinguish between stationary and kinetic objects,
3. follow kinetic objects in their visual fields.

However, many of these areas are very poorly developed.

With physical improvements such as

1. increased distances between the cornea and retina,
2. increased pupil dimensions,
3. strengthened cones and rods

an infant's visual ability improves with time.

The neuro- pathway and physical changes that underlie these improvements in vision remains a strong focus in research.

Because of an infant's inability to verbally express their visual field, growing research in this field relays heavy on non-verbal cues including

an infants perceived ability to detect patterns and visual changes.

You may find more details here


Is there a way to have strangers tag my images?

Amazon Mechanical Turk is perfect for something like this.  In fact, tagging content is one of their default project types, so you should be able to just load in your images and use their template for tagging.

If you haven't seen it before, MTurk is basically a labor marketplace for very small tasks. It works best for paying people a few cents to complete very short tasks, but it is frequently used to recruit subjects for longer behavioral studies as well.


Where can I find experimental data supportive of the Hick-Hyman law?

In Hyman (1953) the following data is shown (Fig.1). The bits of information were the number of choices in an AFC task, where 1 to 8 alternatives corresponded to 0, 1, 1.58, 2.00, 2.32, 2.58, 2.81, and 3 bits of information (the 2log of the N alternatives).

Fig. 1. RT as a function of bits of info. source: Hyman (1953)

Reference
- Hyman, J Exp Psychol (1953); 45(3): 188-96


Why Is It That We Have Blindspots in Our Eyes?

The blind spots are scotomas (areas of degenerated acuity) found in all mammalian eyes, and are due to the way the optic nerve crosses the retina (back of the eye):

  Because there are no cells to detect light on the optic disc, the
  corresponding part of the field of vision is invisible. Some process
  in our brains interpolates the blind spot based on surrounding detail
  and information from the other eye, so we do not normally perceive the
  blind spot.

Scotomas can result from eye damage as well, and the result is the same:

  There is no direct conscious awareness of visual scotomas. They are
  simply regions of reduced information within the visual field. Rather
  than recognizing an incomplete image, patients with scotomas report
  that things "disappear" on them.

As photoreceptor density in our eyes is not evenly distributed, and changes over time due to ageing and cell damage, the way our brain processes the visual field is probably an adaptation, so it is not useful to think of it as "pixelated":

  In vision, filling-in phenomena are those responsible for the
  completion of missing information across the physiological blind spot,
  and across natural and artificial scotomata. There is also evidence
  for similar mechanisms of completion in normal visual analysis.

There are three main perspectives on how this happens in the brain.  The first is "bottom-up" - called isomorphic filling-in - which is done by early visual systems using information from neighbouring areas.  Think of this like the "magic healing brush" in Photoshop.  The second is "top-down" - called symbolic filling-in - which is done by downstream areas of the brain filling in the missing parts with higher-level knowledge.  The third is that filling-in is a fallacy called the homunculus argument, that is based on the false notion of a Cartesian theatre - that the visual system "projects" an image from the eye onto an observer inside our brain.  However this does not make any sense, and so there is no reason to suppose that any kind of "filling-in" process actually needs to happen.

PS: The eye holds an interesting place in the history of evolution, as it has been used to support the case for both intelligent design - due to its amazing complexity - and evolution by chance - due to its flawed design.  In mammalian eyes, the optic nerve delivers neurons to photoreceptors from in front, requiring it to pass through the retina.  In cephalopod (eg, octopus) eyes, the optic nerve delivers neurons to photoreceptors from behind - a design that results in no blind spots.


Functional fixedness for defining problems

What you are describing is called mental set. The following extract is from this excelent article.

  A mental set is a tendency to only see solutions that have worked in
  the past. This type of fixed thinking can make it difficult to come up
  with solutions and can impede the problem-solving process.

  For example, imagine that you are trying to solve a math problem in
  your algebra class. The problem seems similar to ones you have worked
  on previously, so you approach solving it in the same way. Because of
  your mental set, you are unable to see a simpler solution that might
  be possible.

Additional reference:

Galotti, Kathleen M. (5 February 2009). Cognitive Psychology: In and Out of the Laboratory. Cengage Learning. pp. 341–344. ISBN 978-0-17-644065-7. Retrieved 25 March 2011.


What effect do random visitors have on children in orphanages and people in old age homes?

There is indeed research done on the topic. Some links:
http://www.thinkchildsafe.org/thinkbeforevisiting/
http://www.hsrc.ac.za/HSRC_Review_Article-195.phtml
http://www.thinkchildsafe.org/thinkbeforevisiting/resources/Misguided_Kindness.pdf
http://www.thinkchildsafe.org/thinkbeforevisiting/resources/UN%20Guidelines%20Alternative%20Care.pdf
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Volunteer_travel

Extracts:

  A child's right to privacy Under international law, children in
  orphanages have the same rights as children across the globe to have a
  safe and private home setting. Short-term orphanage visits from
  tourists and travelers lowers a child's privacy inside their own home.
  Additionally, reports show that short-term visits can cause harm to a
  child's development and emotional wellbeing. We think everyone agrees
  that children need safety, privacy and stability.

and

  How do I harm children by visiting an orphanage?
  Many orphanages rely
  almost entirely on donations from visitors to survive. Thus directors
  may purposefully maintain poor living conditions for children to
  secure funds from tourists. Children who appear underserved may come
  across as a cry for help more than children who appear well fed and
  cared for. This of course places guilt on tourists if they do not help
  immediately. By visiting orphanages and making a donation you may be
  fuelling a system that exploits children.

and

  Institutionalised children will thus tend to manifest the same
  indiscriminate affection towards volunteers. After a few days or
  weeks, this attachment is broken when the volunteer leaves and a new
  attachment forms when the next volunteer arrives. Although there is
  little empirical evidence on children's reactions to very short-term,
  repeat attachments over time, evidence from the study of children in
  temporary or unstable foster care indicates that repeated disruptions
  in attachment are extremely disturbing for children, especially very
  young children.


Does personality imply an inclination to be an expert in one field or average in "all" fields?

I imagine there are many ways of looking at this question. Here are just a few ideas:

Society and specialisation:
One lens for viewing this question is to focus on the reward structure of our society. There are many forces in society which encourage specialisation and the development of specific expertise. Careers are typically built around developing expertise in a particular domain (e.g., doctors, lawyers, computer programmers, etc.). The nature of the reward structure that is facilitated by large economic markets means that the most popular actors, musicians, and politicians, and the most successful athletes get more of the financial and social rewards than those that just dabble in such activities. The flipside of a specialised society is that you don't need to know how to do many things, because you just pay someone else to do it. Thus, from this perspective, in historical terms society appears to be encouraging expertise more than in the past.

General individual differences: The concept of need for achievement refers to an "individual's desire for significant accomplishment, mastering of skills, control, or high standards."

Self-actualising: You could look at research on how people find meaning in their life and how mastery and expertise fits into that experience. In particular, the journey of acquiring mastery in a domain has often been linked to feelings of meaning and purpose. For example, have a look at something like Self Determination Theory and the role of competence in achieving a sense of personal growth.

Expertise and deliberate practice research: There's a substantial body of research that has studied people acquiring expertise in particular domains. Ericsson et al (1993) provides a good introduction to this research. A central claim in Ericsson's model is that deliberate practice is key to acquiring expertise. And given that deliberate practice is optimised for improving performance it may not necessarily be intrinsically enjoyable. Thus, this suggests that the motivation to engage in deliberate practice over an extended period of time may be a key differentiator between those who do and do not acquire expertise.

References

Ericsson, K. A., Krampe, R. T., & Tesch-Römer, C. (1993). The role of deliberate practice in the acquisition of expert performance. Psychological review, 100(3), 363. PDF


Is there a neural network model of Pavlovian Learning?

In general, what you're looking for is a biologically plausible model of reinforcement learning and/or conditioning. I know of two publications in particular that address this.

The first is A Biologically Plausible Spiking Neuron Model of Fear Conditioning and the second is A Spiking Neural Integrator Model of the Adaptive Control of Action by the Medial Prefrontal Cortex. They both using the Neural Engineering Framework and a learning rule to modify the connection weights between ensembles of biologically plausible spiking neurons. These connections are modified to create and destroy associations between stimuli and an action. However, in the second paper, it's shown that the mechanism can also learn timing information.


How can self-awareness be controlled and varied in a laboratory setting?

I'm not sure about a direct connection to research on deindividuation, but in general self awareness, sense of ownership and sense of agency can be altered by experimental methodologies that manipulate the perceived relationship between actions and the effects of those actions. These types of experiments are sometimes called behavioural illusions.
A common example of this is the rubber hand illusion, where participants are shown a fake hand that is stroked by a brush and end up experiencing sensations of being brushed in their own hand. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=sxwn1w7MJvk
The original paper on this is:

Botvinick, M., & Cohen, J. (1998). Rubber hands ‘feel’ touch that eyes see. Nature, 391(6669), 756. doi:10.1038/35784

But there are many other types of behavioural illusions...
Subliminal or perceivable primes can influence participants' experiences of self generated actions:

Aarts, H., Custers, R., & Wegner, D. M. (2005). On the inference of personal authorship: Enhancing experienced agency by priming effect information. Consciousness and Cognition, 14(3), 439–458. doi:10.1016/j.concog.2004.11.001
Dijksterhuis, A., Preston, J., Wegner, D. M., & Aarts, H. (2008). Effects of subliminal priming of self and God on self-attribution of authorship for events. Journal of Experimental Social Psychology, 44(1), 2–9. doi:10.1016/j.jesp.2007.01.003

Providing false or virtual representations of participants limbs can lead to changed feelings of ownership and agency for those limbs:

Wegner, D. M., Sparrow, B., & Winerman, L. (2004). Vicarious agency: Experiencing control over the movements of others. Journal of Personality and Social Psychology, 86(6), 838–48. doi:10.1037/0022-3514.86.6.838
Slater, M., Perez-Marcos, D., Ehrsson, H. H., & Sanchez-Vives, M. V. (2009). Inducing illusory ownership of a virtual body. Frontiers in Neuroscience, 3(2), 214–220. doi:10.3389/neuro.01.029.2009

and hypnosis can also be used to alter self awareness:

Connors, M. H., Barnier, A. J., Coltheart, M., Cox, R. E., & Langdon, R. (2012). Mirrored-self misidentification in the hypnosis laboratory: Recreating the delusion from its component factors. Cognitive Neuropsychiatry, 17(2), 151–176. doi:10.1080/13546805.2011.582287
McConkey, K. M., Szeps, A., & Barnier, A. J. (2001). Indexing the experience of sex change in hypnosis and imagination. The International Journal of Clinical and Experimental Hypnosis, 49(2), 123–138.
Rahmanovic, A., Barnier, A. J., Cox, R. E., Langdon, R. A., & Coltheart, M. (2012). That’s not my arm: A hypnotic analogue of somatoparaphrenia. Cognitive Neuropsychiatry, 17(1), 36–63.

Unfortunately, there aren't really any standardised measures for specifically measuring self awareness. In most of these studies participants are simply asked to describe experience or rate, for example, how in control they felt. A scale was recently developed to measure sense of agency in hypnosis and this should also be adaptable to other contexts:

Polito, V., Barnier, A. J., & Woody, E. Z. (2013). Developing the Sense of Agency Rating Scale (SOARS): An empirical measure of agency disruption in hypnosis. Consciousness and Cognition, 22(3), 684–696. doi:10.1016/j.concog.2013.04.003


Does a mental disorder exist where people think someone else is sick?

There is a condition called hypochondriases by proxy (e.g., Moreira & Moreira, 1999). It is also referred to as vulnerable child syndrome (Pacurar et al., 2015). The parent, particularly if (s)he is inexperienced or unsupported, might see symptoms and illness in a child where in fact there are none. For instance, the parent might be convinced that a common cold is a respiratory infection, or that a simple headache is a brain tumor. In such a scenario, the parent might exaggerate the child's symptoms in order to get the physician to take her fears seriously. This would then be akin to a "cry for help" rather than an intentional desire to malinger (Mart, 1999).

Hypochondriases by proxy is reported to be related to Munchausen syndrome and Munchausen by proxy syndrome, which belong belong to a group of diseases called factitious disorders. In these disorders, a healthy person feigns to suffer from disease, illness, or psychological issues to draw attention or sympathy, or they can project a disease or illness upon to another person, asking or requiring medical intervention for them, respectively
(Pacurar et al., 2015).

References
- Mart, Am J Forensic Psychol (1999); 17(1): 69
- Moreira & Moreira, J Pediatr (Rio J) (1999); 75(5): 373-6
- Pacurar, Romanian J Pediatrics (2015); LXIV(3): 252-8


Is there a standard definition of a "hallucination"?

Elliot et al. (2008) define a hallucination as:

  A sensory experience which occurs in the absence of corresponding external stimulation of the relevant sensory organ, has sufficient sense of reality resemble a veridical perception (i.e. the perception seems to be "real"), over which the subject does not feel direct and voluntary control, and which occurs in the awake state.

They define illusions as:

  These are false perceptions of a real external stimulus, for example a change in shape, size, color or texture. In some cases, where the external stimulus is minimal, the differentiation nosologically (nosology: the classification of diseases) from hallucination can be difﬁcult, although illusions carry different aetiological and diagnostic implications.

and delusions as:

  [A]bnormalities of thought rather than perception (although they may develop from the latter) and may be defined as ‘fixed false beliefs, strongly held and immutable in the face of refuting evidence, that are not consonant with the person’s education, social and cultural background.' [I]ts exact meaning and usage have evolved continuously, reflecting trends in psychology. Delusional themes commonly include: guilt, worthlessness, ill-health, persecution, reference, grandeur, love, jealousy, poverty, infestation, and religion. [...]

Regarding the difference between a hallucination and an illusion, which are the most closely related ones among the three, the Stanford Encyclopedia gives a clear-cut example, namely:

  For example, when one has a visual experience as of a red object, it may be that one is really seeing an object and its red color (veridical perception), that one is seeing a green object (illusion), or that one is not seeing an object at all (hallucination).

Reference
- Elliot et al. Epilepsy Research (2009); 85: 162-71


Can a sequence of "automatic" tasks be seen in an EEG?

The basic answer is that it depends on:

training protocol (duration, frequency)
modality (hearing, seeing, memorizing, attention, etc)
individual variance (observable changes varies between individuals - some may not respond to the training)

So it has to be determined individually for each task (not enough information provided in the original question). In other words, it is an empirical question, which means that the answer lies in the results of an experiment - ”we have to check”.


This is actually a pretty complicated question.

In general, there isn't a lot of consistent evidence that would suggest that discrete emotions like anger have stereotyped response patterns. Anger is a fairly heterogeneous emotion category, meaning that it may not look the same (and have the same outcomes) in any given situation. Consequently, there may not be a good (or at least simple) answer to your question. This is the "psychological constructionist" argument (for a comprehensive overview, see Barrett & Russell, 2014).

On the other hand "basic emotion" proponents (Ekman, Izard, Panksepp) would suggest that activation of an "anger circuit" in the brain reliably produces a particular response pattern (e.g., feelings of unpleasantness, high arousal, approach motivation, certain facial expressions, hormonal changes, etc.).  However, attempts to match these responses with specific emotions like anger have never quite worked out.  Also, recent meta-analyses looking at emotion in the brain don't seem to support this perspective (e.g., Lindquist et al., 2012).

Edit: I don't find Wikipedia's explanation (linked by Mike) to be particularly convincing since it cites an article published 15 years ago.  Emotion research has come a long way since then.

Edit2: Sources

For general psychological constructionist arguments about the nature of emotion, see: Barrett 2006 and Barrett 2014
For basic emotion arguments, see: Ekman & Cordaro 2011
For reviews on mapping physiological changes to emotions, see: Cacioppo et al. 2000, Stemmler 2004, and for a theory-driven review of reviews/meta-analyses see Quigley & Barrett 2014


What introductory material is available linking complexity theory to cognitive science?

In general, there are two types of 'complexity' that are studied. Usually, when people talk about 'complexity', especially on the internet, they mean Santa Fe Institute style complexity. This is a vague and poorly defined concept that has struggled for a number of years without making significant progress. It uses pretty words, but has yet to deliver on any real results. I will not discuss it more in this answer.

The other type of complexity is computational complexity theory as studied by theoretical computer science. In general, this field is too mathematical and too rigorous to engage with most of cognitive science and psychology, but there are a few connections. I recommend looking at the cstheory question: What is the complexity class most closely associated with what the human mind can accomplish quickly?

In that question, the author is curious to know which complexity class most closely resembles what humans can achieve. My favourite answer discusses the Tractable Cognition thesis. For reference, see these papers:

Iris van Rooij. The Tractable Cognition thesis. Cognitive Science, 32, pp. 939-984, 2008.
Iris van Rooij. Parameters that make Cognitive Work Light. FPT News: Parameterized Complexity Newsletter, June 2009.

A specialized part of computational complexity known as computational learning theory has been particularily notable in trying to make connections to cognitive science, in particular linguists. Gold's theorem on the non-learnability of certain families of formal languages was especially relevant in the early days of the poverty of the stimulus debate. You can learn more about it in these two questions:

Applications of computational learning theory in the cognitive sciences
General mathematical frameworks of language acquisition since Gold

Keep in mind, that computational complexity is advanced material and requires a decent mathematical sophistication. However, with difficulty comes insights.


What is the difference between conditioning and learning?

In Pavlov experiment, the unconditioned response and conditioned response is the same (both are salivating). In the analogy, the unconditioned belief is not the same with the conditioned belief.

In Pavlov experiment, the unconditioned response can only happen after the unconditioned stimulus. In the analogy, the unconditioned belief can be recalled ("activated") even though there is no unconditioned observation.


Short answer
Generally, Hodgkin & Huxley-derived models are used to describe the gating characteristics of ion channels and ligand operated receptors.

Background
Ligand-gated and voltage-operated ion channels do not really perform a memory task. Instead, they channel ions across the cell memnrane and by doing so they can convey information from out the cell (neurotransmitter release / voltage changes) into the cell. Their role is physiological and the way they are modeled is typically based on Hodgkin & Huxley kinetics (Sig, 2014) (Fig. 1).

Fig. 1. Hodgkin & Huxley model of membrane kinetics. source: Neuronal Dynamics

The Hodgkin-Huxley model models the semi-permeable cell membrane as a capacitor that separates the interior of the cell from the extracellular fluid. If an input current is injected into the cell, it may add further charge on the capacitor, or leak through the channels in the cell membrane. Each channel type is modeled by a resistor (conductor of current). The unspecific channel has a leak resistance R, the sodium channel a resistance RNa and the potassium channel a resistance RK. The diagonal arrow across the diagram of the resistor indicates that the value of the resistance is not fixed, but changes depending on whether the ion channel is open or closed. Because of active ion transport through the cell membrane, the ion concentration inside the cell is different from that in the extracellular liquid. The Nernst potential generated by the difference in ion concentration is represented by a battery. The Nernst potential depends on the ion and hence there are separate batteries for sodium, potassium, and the unspecific third channel, with battery voltages ENa, EK and EL (source: Neuronal Dynamics).

Now to your edited question: you say

  [Ion channels] are just switched on and off instantaneously. But this may be oversimplified: it takes some time...

It goes further than that; voltage-operated ion channels like the Na+ channel are actively activated and inactivated with well-defined time constants that, among other things, govern the process of absolute and relative refractoriness of nerve cells (Fig. 2). The temporal gating characteristics in terms of activation and inactivation are expressed as time constants, which can be described in for example a Markov model (Wang et al., 2004). For example,

dm/dt = 1/τm(V) * (m∞(V)−m), where

m∞(V) = α(V) / [α(V)+β(V)] (9)
τm(V) = 1 / [α(V)+β(V)]

Here, m∞ is the steady-state activation and τm is the activation time constant of the Na+ current (n∞ and τn represent the same quantities for the K+ current). In the case of h, h∞ and τh are called steady-state inactivation and inactivation time constant, respectively (source: Destexhe & Huguenard, 2007).

Similar formulas apply to the association and dissociation constants in ligand-operated channels, where timing of activation and inactivation are affected by the ligand's affinity for the receptor.

Fig. 2. Ion channel gating. source: Lehmann-Horne & Jurkatt-Rott (1999)

References
- Lehmann-Horne & Jurkatt-Rott, Physiol Rev (1999); 79(4): 1317-72
- Sig, J Gen Physiol (2014); 144(1) 7-26
- Wang et al., J Physiol (2004); 557(3): 705–17


How does one study the effect of a dietary supplement on cognition?

To the general question of how to test the claims , there's a couple things you want to show:

1) that the body absorbs the supplement (measure the absorption rate)
2) that the supplement crosses the blood brain barrier
3) that the
supplement actually plays the role of agonist, antagonist, or
allosteric modulator (or possibly even has a toxic effect).  These
are biochemical roles that depend on molecular properties like shape
and charge distribution, as well as kinetic interactions (chemistry).
4) that the interaction of the ligand or effector (or toxin) with the
receptor (or system) that's being affected by the supplement produces
a cognitive benefit.

The first three are feats of biochemistry, the fourth of behavioral/psychological biology.  So this is a complicated interdisciplinary task in the first place.  Now if we want to consider all the control situations (especially 4) it becomes even more complicated.

Known cognitive benefits are come from substances like caffeine, nicotine, chocolate (it has theobromine), amphetamines, and other stimulant-like drugs.

GABA, on the other hand, exists naturally in the brain.  It's part of an integrated molecular system and is tightly controlled by the citrus cycle (aka Krebs Cycle) and the GABA shunt.  If you have more of it, but you don't need it, your body will just break it down or convert it (it's part of a very dexterous set of metabolic molecules).

The best cognitive benefit you can get is simply from eating right, not having nutrient deficiencies, omega 3's are good for long-term brain health.  Circulatory health is good for long-term brain health (so exercise and less cholesterol).  Pretty much all your typical healthy habits.  Most of the evidence for the nutrititional/exercise claims I provided in this thread


Why does sensory deprivation cause hallucinations?

According to the article The Brain’s Voices: Comparing Nonclinical Auditory Hallucinations and Imagery (Linden et al. 2011):

  Spontaneous activation of sensory areas (Hunter et al. 2006) has been described in cases of sensory deprivation or during epileptic seizures. Local spontaneous activity may underlie certain types of hallucinations, for example, visual hallucinations of Charles Bonnet syndrome (Ffytche 2005) and possibly imagery of music without lyrics (Kraemer et al. 2005).

An example, from Neural activity in speech-sensitive auditory cortex during silence (Hunter et al. 2006) states that the auditory cortex has a propensity to spontaneously “activate” during silence.  Specifically, from their study

  suggest that, within auditory regions, endogenous activity is modulated by anterior cingulate cortex, resulting in spontaneous activation during silence. Hence, an aspect of the brain's “default mode” resembles a (preprepared) substrate for the development of auditory hallucinations. These observations may help explain why such hallucinations are ubiquitous.

In the article Visual hallucinations in psychologically normal people: Charles Bonnet syndrome (Teunisse et al. 1996), states that this syndrome, where healthy people can experience visual hallucinations undergoing sensor deprivation, is more common than first realised, their study suggests that under conditions of sensory-deprivation, the slightest amount of arousal triggered the hallucinations.

This is discussed further in Spontaneous and driven cortical activity: implications for computation (Ringach, 2009), where their study suggests

  the lack of a stimulus generates a weak feedforward drive and the cortical state is determined largely by its own intrinsic dynamics and top-down expectations. This explains why spontaneous activity is not noise. Further, if the attractor has been shaped (via evolution or developmental rules) to represent the manifold of natural signals, it is easy to see how sensory deprivation or weak input can lead to “hallucinations” during deprivation

Additional references:

Ffytche D, Visual hallucinations and the Charles Bonnet syndrome. Curr Psychiatry Rep 2005;7:168-179.

Kraemer D,
Macrae C,
Green A,
Kelley W
. Musical imagery: sound of silence activates auditory cortex. Nature 2005;434:158.


The answers to your questions in your post would depend on the scope of your study.  For example, with

  How long should the time between encoding and decoding be?

it would depend on what criteria is set within the scope of the study.  If the people who are asking you to perform the study are asking for specific timescales then you need to stick to them and outline that in your report.

If however you have freedom to do so, as you seem to be asking on a psychological standpoint, it may be beneficial to test different timescales and maybe tabulate the results of memorability against time. You could even test different timescales against different ranges of emotional levels attached to the event.

For example,

does a person remember a highly emotional episodic memory longer than a non-emotional one?

What about medium levels of emotions?

You could also add to this with your question on how long snippets should be.

Does a 5sec video snippet help someone to remember better than a single frame image?

If you have the time and freedom to explore, you can conduct a large amount of research on memory.  It would only be down to how wide you can make the scope of the study whilst keeping it within the remit of what you are trying to find out.


It's probably not a fear response. Young animals (and human children) sometimes lack it in some contexts. See the controversy with the fear of snakes in children.

Looking at a two similar videos lioness vs impala calf of young lion vs oryx calf however, besides some moments of confusion of the calfs, they do one of two things: face the predator head on (which would work if they had grown horns) or try to suddenly sprint away, which is again not easy for the them to pull off being so young.

So it is a mixture of fight, flight, and probably some confusion as well. There's this notion of learned helplessness but it's a bit of stretch to apply it to any of those videos, in my opinion.


Do men, on average, have a higher general intelligence score?

There's a Wikipedia page with a lot of related studies. Among other things we find out there that:

A 2004 meta-analysis by Richard Lynn and Paul Irwing published in 2005 found that the mean IQ of men exceeded that of women by up to 5 points on the Raven's Progressive Matrices test.[...] Lynn's findings were debated in a series of articles for Nature.[...]

This new (2017) study you ask about was conducted by a group whose fist author has recently co-authored papers with Lynn. And not surprisingly, the way they construct their g in the 2017 paper is quite similar to Lynn's, i.e. fairly substantially loaded the progressive matrices test.

So perhaps their ultimate result is not surprising in this respect, i.e. it seems a replication of older research in a newer sample. On the other hand, the 2017 reports statistically significant differences on practically on all factors (some in the opposite direction)

As far as I can tell, this is quite unprecedented... so we'll see what reactions it triggers from other researchers in the field.
In previous work Lynn has been accused of basing his conclusions on convenience (and thus non-representative) samples.
In this 2017 paper, the authors state:

Although the HCP data still have a
somewhat restricted age-range (22 to 37 years), the sample is demographically
diverse and can be considered a more population-representative
sample compared to that of Burgaleta et al. (2012).

"More representative" is not necessarily representative.

They also mention that another recent study published in the same journal, Illiescu et al. 2016 who claim nationally representative samples for Romania found for instance much fewer differences on the progressive matrices test... limited to a small age window which interestingly overlapped substantially with the HCP sample age group:

It's not too clear if this is due to not enough power for the other sub-samples or there's a small age effect that appears and then vanishes... or it could be just spurious (these tests are non-corrected for multiple comparisons). Iliescu et al. do say that:

The p-values reported in Tables 1–6 are not corrected for multiple comparisons. When using Bonferroni adjustments none of the comparisons are significant. The interpretations therefore focused on effect sizes. [...]
Given that diversity and volume of the data, and the fact that some of
the compared samples (age × sex) are small, we have conducted a
meta-analysis for each category of scores, for each of the 6 tests.
Table 7 presents these results. The only two scores with a significant
(though small) effect are the Raven (d=0.11, p < 0.01), and the Performance
subscore of the SON-R (d=0.12, p < 0.01), both in favor of males.
In the case of the SON-R, medium heterogeneity is signaled by the data:
Q(5)=10.01, p < 0.10, I2=50.04, i.e. 50% of the total variability in this
set of effect sizes are due to between-subsamples variability (true heterogeneity).
In the case of the Raven scores, heterogeneity is not present:
Q(22) = 21.34, ns., I2 = 0.00; i.e. all variability in effect size
estimates is due to sampling error within subsamples.

So Iliescu et al. also found an overall difference in progressive matrices which doesn't seem to vary with age, but not much else. I'm too sure about SON but it looks somewhat similar with progressive matrices in some respects (it's a non-verbal test).
And researchers have tried to pinpoint what type of questions on the progressive matrices test cause the sex differences typilcally reported, with some hypoteses failing replication. A 2008 review-ish paper said

In conclusion, the identification of APM performance
dimensions based on information processing continues to
be an open question and is likely to remain intractable
without experimental manipulations of important variables
related to the construction of the items and to the test as a
whole.

There's another 2017 study which found that

Visuospatial ability was found to significantly contribute to performance on the RPM, over and above fluid ability, supporting the contention that visuospatial ability is involved in RPM performance. No sex differences were found in this relationship, although sex differences in visuospatial ability may explain sex differences in RPM scores.

Time will tell if this can be replicated or not.
Likewise there's a 2014 study in a Chinese university students sample which found no sex difference in a progressive matrices test

The mean CRT scores were (66.13±3.13) for males and (66.40±3.05) for females. No significant gender difference (P>0.05) in CRT scores was found between females and males.

But nonetheless using neuroimaging proposed that men and women have different brain activation patterns on such tests:

Despite a large number of behavioral studies that demonstrated gender differences in Raven’s Matrices reasoning ability, no neural evidence supported this difference. In this study, voxel-based morphometry (VBM) was used in an attempt to uncover the gender-specific neural basis of Raven’s Matrices reasoning ability as measured by the combined Raven’s Matrices test (CRT) in 370 healthy young adults. The behavioral results showed no difference between males and females. However, the VBM results showed that the relationship between reasoning ability and regional gray matter volume (rGMV) differed between sexes. The association between CRT scores and rGMV in the dorsolateral prefrontal cortex (associated with visuospatial ability) was significantly greater in males than in females, whereas the reverse was true for the inferior frontal cortex (relating to verbal reasoning ability) and the medial frontal cortex (engaged in information binding) where the association was greater in females. These findings suggest that males and females use differently structured brains in different ways to achieve similar levels of overall Raven’s Matrices reasoning ability.

So I think this question is pretty much in the air still.
Another 2017 study I find interesting did not report sex differences (either way) but did propose that participants (of both sexes) use two different enough brain regions to solve the varying problems on the progressive matrices test, namely that there might be different visuospatial and verbal-analytic intelligences (possibly correlated, of course):

Recent studies revealed spontaneous neural activity to be associated with fluid intelligence (gF) which is commonly assessed by Raven’s Advanced Progressive Matrices, and embeds two types of reasoning: visuospatial and verbal-analytic reasoning. With resting-state fMRI data, using global brain connectivity (GBC) analysis which averages functional connectivity of a voxel in relation to all other voxels in the brain, distinct neural correlates of these two reasoning types were found. For visuospatial reasoning, negative correlations were observed in both the primary visual cortex (PVC) and the precuneus, and positive correlations were observed in the temporal lobe. For verbal-analytic reasoning, negative correlations were observed in the right inferior frontal gyrus (rIFG), dorsal anterior cingulate cortex and temporoparietal junction, and positive correlations were observed in the angular gyrus. Furthermore, an interaction between GBC value and type of reasoning was found in the PVC, rIFG and the temporal lobe. These findings suggest that visuospatial reasoning benefits more from elaborate perception to stimulus features, whereas verbal-analytic reasoning benefits more from feature integration and hypothesis testing. In sum, the present study offers, for different types of reasoning in gF, first empirical evidence of separate neural substrates in the resting brain.

For more on this latter issue see my answer to a related question here.


There isn't much of a difference in IQ tests between left and right-handed people. I don't know if this is (more) significant on a sub-test like Raven's.

On the other hand there's  some correlation between both handedness and first-language script direction and the phenomenon of mirror writing. So the native script direction may be relevant to a test like Raven's.  I don't know if they adjust for it (e.g. by rotating the matrix) when it's "translated" to Hebrew or Japanese.


How good are people at guessing the ages of their respective ethnic group?

Cross-race effect in facial processing

As @analystic has noted, there is substantial research documenting what is sometimes called the "cross-race effect":

  Cross-race effect (sometimes called cross-race bias, other-race bias
  or own-race bias) is the tendency for people of one race to have
  difficulty recognizing and processing faces and facial expressions of
  members of a race or ethnic group other than their own.

For an overview of research see the meta-analysis by Meissner and Brigham (2001). To quote parts of the abstract:

  Data were analyzed from 39 research articles, involving
  91 independent samples and nearly 5,000 participants. Measures of hit
  and false alarm rates, and aggregate measures of discrimination
  accuracy and response criterion were examined, including an analysis
  of 8 study moderators. ... Overall, results indicated a "mirror effect" pattern in which own-race faces yielded a higher proportion of hits and a lower
  proportion of false alarms compared with other-race faces.

Note that the effect is probably related to degree of interaction with the  racial group. Thus, it is not so much a fixed genetic difference, but rather that in many societies we tend to interact more with our own racial group.

It would not be surprising if part of the cross-race effect would be reflected in poorer performance in rating the age of people from a different race relative to one's own race.

General skill in estimating ages

You can find a nice review of the age estimation literature in Rhodes (2009).
The author suggests that a general in group bias may exist in skill in age estimation. I.e., that prediction is not just better for the same race but also for people of similar age.

  Taken together, data on group biases in age estimation must be
  regarded as suggestive that in-group age estimation is superior to
  that of out-group age estimation. This may include more accurate age
  estimates for individuals of one’s own ethnicity or age group (but see
  Burt & Perrett, 1995). However, given the dearth of data, the full
  range and impact of group biases on age estimation has yet to be
  explored.

Estimating ages of own versus other race

I also found a specific study by Dehon and Bredart (2001) which specifically looked at accuracy in cross-racial age estimation.

Citing the abstract:

  In the present study, we investigated whether this finding extends to
  age perception. Caucasian and African participants were asked to
  estimate the age of Caucasian and African faces. The main result of
  this experiment was a significant race of 'subject $\times$ race of face'
  interaction showing that Caucasian participants performed better at
  evaluating Caucasian faces than African faces. However, African
  participants performed equally with both type of faces. This result is
  explained by the Africans' time of residence in Belgium

They used  72 Caucasian and 72 African photographs as stimuli. Actual ages of faces ranged between 20 and 45 years. In terms of absolute deviation in years between actual age and estimated age, thy found that:

  Caucasian participants were better at estimating the age of
  Caucasian faces (mean = 6.35 years, SD=3.13 years) than African
  faces (mean= 7.79 years, SD= 2.96 years) whereas the performance of
  African participants did not differ with the kind of face (mean =6.98
  years, SD =3.25 years and mean =  6.79 years, SD= 2.86 years for
  Caucasian and African faces, respectively).

Note of course that these differences in age accuracy are not that large.

References

Dehon, H. & Bredart, S. (2001). An 'other-race' effect in age estimation from faces. Perception, 30, 1107-1114.
Meissner, C.A. & Brigham, J.C. (2001). Thirty years of investigating the own-race bias in memory for faces: A meta-analytic review.. Psychology, Public Policy, and Law, 7, 3. PDF
Rhodes, M.G. (2009). Age estimation of faces: A review. Applied Cognitive Psychology, 23, 1-12.


The "Backwards Bike" and implications for how we think

While both prism adaptation and negative transfer are pointers to the right direction, I'd see this as a question concerning brain plasticity (you may want to tag the question with that, I don't have the required points to create a new tag).

The guy could indeed learn to ride the reverse bike, but he would have to work hard on it, and would have a hard time reversing to normal bikes later on, as you report.

Take a look at wikipedia's Perceptual adaptation page:

  Experimental support[edit]
  In the 1890s, psychologist George M. Stratton conducted experiments in which he tested the theory of perceptual adaptation. In one experiment, he wore a reversing glasses for 21½ hours over three days, with no change in his vision. After removing the glasses, "normal vision was restored instantaneously and without any disturbance in the natural appearance or position of objects."

  Modern version of inverting mirrors with harness.
  On a later experiment, Stratton wore the glasses for eight whole days. By day four, the images seen through the instrument were still upside down. However, on day five, images appeared upright until he concentrated on them; then they became inverted again. By having to concentrate on his vision to turn it upside down again, especially when he knew images were hitting his retinas in the opposite orientation as normal, Stratton deduced his brain had reprocessed his vision and adapted to the changes in vision.

So people look at the world literally upside-down, but then adjust abruptly.

A good read about this is On Intelligence, and in my research with chess experts I have argued for a cognitive model of "experience recognition" in here and here.

An amazing video of the beginning of the learning process is here: Amy hears sound for the first time.  At about 1m45s you can clearly see that she is confused about about her sensations---she doesn't have the experience of hearing, and her brain is just now trying to make sense of what this new influx of surprising information means and how it should be processed.

Or look at this small girl, who has had her entire left hemisphere taken out of her brain, with few behavioral problems.

As a thought experiment, imagine you could suddenly "feel" the radio waves flowing all around us.  At first you'd be extremely confused.  Yet, after some time, you'd be able to discern people turning off their phones on a plane, turning on their gps, or the "silence" in rural areas.  If you had the experience for a long enough time, you would be able to ground it to meaningful events surrounding you.


So I'm the author of the IAT package in R. It's based on the original scoring algorithm outlined in this publication. Because the scoring algorithm is based on a standard 7-block IAT, the score IAT1 corresponds to the D score relative to the difference between blocks 6 and 3, while IAT2 corresponds to the D score relative to blocks 7 and 4. IAT is then simply the mean of IAT1 and IAT2, and represents the overall D-score of the test. In a simple applied example, you might use this variable as the outcome in a simple t-test to see if there is an effect of some treatment group versus a control group.

One thing to keep in mind when using the IATData loaded with the package is that there are order effects due to randomization of whether participants received stereotype congruent sorting first or stereotype incongruent sorting first. Thus, the D score needs to be calculated separately between these two groups, otherwise the D score would be flipped for half of the participants (see the example in ?cleanIAT to see what I mean).

As for discrepancies, I never tested against SPSS code, but it was designed to replicate the SAS macro used by the Nosek lab exactly.

Finally, a faster version using dplyr is available for download off of my github if you're interested:

library(devtools)
install_github("dpmartin42/IAT")


How do Hemispatial Neglect patients react when told of their disability?

It’s probably best to ask clinicians since papers usually don’t go into very specific details about patient interactions, but in general this is what I can conclude based on a bit of research. Neglect often co-occurs with other impairments as there can be a range of causes (such as stroke) arising from damage to various brain structures; so it should be considered “as a cluster of deficits characterised by lateralised spatial bias” (Manly, 2002). Besides severity of neglect, these co-occuring impairments would also affect the type of reactions neglect patients may show.

Patients with neglect due to right-hemisphere damage show hypoarousal, flattened affect, and emotional indifference (Heilman et al., 1978) which may explain why many are unconcerned about their disorder (anosodiaphoria) and act indifferent toward their disorder (Denes et al., 1982). Similar to emotional impairment, there is also a strong associated lack of awareness of their disorder (anosognosia)  among neglect patients (Eslinger et al., 2002; Buxbaum et al., 2004). Sometimes, even after improvement due to therapy and training, patients may still not acknowledge their impairment (Manly, 2002). Patients that are unaware of the disorder usually react with denial (Bisiach, 2007; Berti & Rizzolatti 1992). In one study, which uses mirrors to flip objects in the left visual to the right, patients “behave as if the object were behind, or in, the mirror — as if the left side of their world did not ‘exist’” (Turnbull, 1997). Neglect is more likely associated with right-hemisphere damage compared to left, and both anosodiaphoria and anosognosia occur at higher rates in neglect patients with right-hemisphere damage compared to left (Stone et al. 1993).


Are there any theories suggesting mindfulness is the opposite mental state to self-regulation?

I don't think there's any evidence suggesting that mindfulness or meditation are the opposite of self-regulation. In arguing why, it'll be useful to define terms.
Meditation and mindfulness
First off, meditation and mindfulness are not the same thing. Meditation generally refers to a family of practices for investigating or inducing different states of consciousness. For example, "loving-kindness" meditation requires focusing your attention on the feelings of love and closeness you have towards someone in your life (and has been studied by Fredrickson, et al., 2008). There are many forms of meditation, and so the link between meditation and self-regulation could vary based on the type of meditation one is thinking of. The type of meditation you seem to be thinking of is mindfulness. So let's talk about what mindfulness is.
Mindfulness is generally thought to have two components: 1) a regulation of attention to conscious experience of the present moment and 2) non-judgement or non-evaluation of that experience. (a definition I paraphrased from Greenberg et al. (2012); note that they discuss alternative conceptualizations as well). So, when you catch yourself in yoga class, daydreaming about what you're going to make for dinner tomorrow, and then stressing about whether or not your dinner guests will like it, you are failing both criteria for mindfulness. Conversely, if you find yourself in a yoga class, aware of how each of the positions makes your body feel, and you simply notice (rather than judge or react to) these feelings, then you're being mindful.
Emotional self-regulation
Your question relates to the link (if any) between mindfulness and emotional self-regulation in particular. So, let's clarify what emotional self-regulation is.
Emotional self-regulation is the ability to override one's undesirable emotional impulses into more desirable ones. For instance, you may find your mother-in-law insanely irritating. When she comes around, you have a strong impulse to yell and shout about how obnoxious she is. However, this action doesn't really jive with your goal of maintaining a peaceful, pleasant relationship with your spouse. So, if you manage to suppress the urge to shout at your mother-in-law, and replace it with a more acceptable tight-lipped grin, you've successfully self-regulated (much better than I probably could).
Link between the two
It seems that mindfulness ought to increase one's ability to self-regulate in this way. Specifically, mindfulness should help one A) identify the emotional impulse as it shows up by increasing attention to one's present moment and B) neutralize the intensity of the emotional impulse by reducing the extent to which one justifies or identifies with it.
If you're viewing emotional impulses mindfully (noticing them as they show up, and not judging or evaluating them), then you're simply treating them as perturbations of conscious experience. In other words, they're just another change in your experience, as if someone had changed the color of the lights in the room. Seeing emotional impulses as mere changes in conscious experience creates some mental space between you and them. All of a sudden you don't feel so identified with your emotional experience (any more than you feel identified with the color of the light in the room).
The literature offers some support for these arguments. Brown & Ryan (2003) find a positive correlation between trait mindfulness (one's general propensity for mindfulness) and several constructs related to emotional self-regulation. It's correlational work, so we're not sure which of these is causing the other. Nevertheless, the signs of the correlations suggest the concepts are, at the very least, not opposites. More mindfulness tends to be associated with more emotional self-regulation

References
Brown, K. W., & Ryan, R. M. (2003). The benefits of being present: mindfulness and its role in psychological well-being. Journal of Personality and Social Psychology, 84(4): 822. http://selfdeterminationtheory.org/SDT/documents/2003_BrownRyan.pdf
Fredrickson, B. L., Cohn, M. A., Coffey, K. A., Pek, J., & Finkel, S. M. (2008). Open hearts build lives: positive emotions, induced through loving-kindness meditation, build consequential personal resources. Journal of Personality and Social Psychology, 95(5): 1045. http://psycnet.apa.org/psycinfo/2008-14857-004
Greenberg, J., Reiner, K., & Meiran, N. (2012). “Mind the trap”: mindfulness practice reduces cognitive rigidity. PLoS One, 7(5): e36206.


Typical and minimum voxel sizes for various field strength MRI machines?

This is a slightly older post, but the Wikipedia article is basically correct.  It is a non-committal range of 1mm - 5mm.  Typically high resolution fMRI will probably be <= 1mm on a side, but is typically going to be higher field scanners (>>= 3T) or using slightly different sequences than the standard fMRI sequence.

Best thing to do would be to do a quick survey of the literature (e.g., https://scholar.google.com/scholar?hl=en&as_sdt=0%2C9&q=high+resolution+fMRI&btnG=) and get an intuition from there.  I think what you will find is it will depend a lot of sequence, sequence parameters and main magnet field strength.