we probe the fundamental structure of particles that make up everything around us We do so using the world's largest and most complex scientific instruments Know more The Higgs Boson The W boson The Z boson The Large Hadron Collider The Birth of the web Antimatter Latest news Media News The research programme at CERN covers topics from kaons to cosmic rays and from the Standard Model to supersymmetry See all resources who passed away on 20 January at the age of 81 left his mark by developing the biomedical field of research both at ISOLDE (CERN) forty years ago and at many other laboratories He will be remembered as a tireless worker in the field of nuclear and applied nuclear physics combined with new radiochemical methods Gerd was born in Berlin in 1940 and went to secondary school in Aschersleben in the foothills of the Harz in Saxony-Anhalt After studying radiochemistry at the Technical University of Dresden he went straight on to the Joint Institute for Nuclear Research (JINR) in Dubna where he developed advanced production methods of rare short-lived radioisotopes for use in nuclear spectroscopy At the Central Institute for Nuclear Research in Rossendorf he became proficient in the use of the U-120 cyclotron and the RFR research reactor to produce medical radioisotopes and in the development of the associated radiopharmaceuticals on the production of radionuclides by means of rapid radiochemical methods in combination with mass separation In 1971 he was invited to ISOLDE (CERN) to team up with Helge Ravn to prepare extremely pure samples of rare long-lived nuclei for studies of their electron capture decay in view of their potential for neutrino mass determination he continued to develop radiopharmaceuticals and introduce them into the practice of nuclear medicine in the former East Germany and the Eastern Bloc countries he developed a number of new methods for labelling and synthesising radiopharmaceuticals which attracted a great deal of attention on the international stage the rather difficult problem of efficiently separating fission-produced Mo-99 from large samples of low enriched uranium brought him into many collaborations all over the world with a view to transferring his know-how to other laboratories His appointment as head of Cyclotron Radiopharmaceuticals also allowed him to take the initiative to introduce a PET scanner programme in the GDR using gas detectors derived from pioneering work at CERN Gerd spotted the potential of the ISOLDE mass-separation technique as a tool in modern nuclear medical research that would allow the introduction and use of better-suited but hitherto unavailable nuclides he began to prepare for the future use of large nuclear physics experiment facilities to produce such radionuclides He reactivated ISOLDE’s contacts with the Department of Nuclear Medicine at the University Hospital of Geneva (HUG) starting up a collaboration on the use of exotic positron-emitting nuclides for PET imaging This resulted in the development of new radiopharmaceuticals exploiting radionuclides of the rare earths and actinides Gerd lost his job at his home base of Rossendorf and had to start a new career elsewhere Gerd became a guest professor in the Department of Medical Biochemistry and Nuclear Medicine at the HUG he became head of their Radiochemistry group with responsibility for setting up and operating their new cyclotron This allowed him to continue his work on developing new approaches to labelling monoclonal antibodies and peptides with exotic lanthanide positron emitters produced at ISOLDE determining their in vivo stability and demonstrating their promising imaging properties Gerd was also the first to demonstrate the promising therapeutic properties of the alpha emitter terbium-149 keenly interested in the availability of these rare radioisotopes that CERN build a new radiochemical laboratory in connection with ISOLDE the large knowledge base on target and mass separator techniques for the production and handling of radionuclides could be used to make samples of these high-purity nuclides available for use in a broader biomedical research programme Gerd’s initial idea was eventually realised with the creation of the new CERN-MEDICIS facility Gerd was a first-rate experimental scientist and he stayed professionally active to the very end a member of numerous professional societies and a holder of many consultancy positions he spared no effort in sharing and transferring his know-how recently to the young generation of scientists at CERN-MEDICIS his work on the production of radiopharmaceuticals saved innumerable lives His R&D towards new radiopharmaceuticals and his pioneering work on terbium-149 for targeted alpha therapy is opening up new perspectives for efficient cancer treatment It is therefore particularly tragic that the development of efficient antiviral drugs came too late to support Gerd in his brave fight against COVID-19 More Social Media Accounts This 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Volume 3 - 2012 | https://doi.org/10.3389/fpsyg.2012.00445 This article is part of the Research TopicAction effects in perception and action: The Ideomotor ApproachView all 18 articles The aim of the study was to compare 3- to 8-year-old children’s propensity to anticipate a comfortable hand posture at the end of a grasping movement (end-state comfort effect) between two different object manipulation tasks participants were asked to insert a vertically positioned bar into a small opening of a box participants were asked to put an overturned-glass right-side-up on a coaster Half of the participants experienced action effects (lights) as a consequence of their movements (AE groups) while the other half of the participants did not (No-AE groups) While there was no difference between the AE and No-AE groups end-state comfort performance differed across age as well as between tasks Results revealed a significant increase in end-state comfort performance in the bar-transport task from 13% in the 3-year-olds to 94% in the 8-year-olds the number of children grasping the bar according to end-state comfort doubled from 3 to 4 years and from 4 to 5 years of age In the overturned-glass task an increase in end-state comfort performance from already 63% in the 3-year-olds to 100% in the 8-year-olds was significant as well When comparing end-state comfort performance across tasks results showed that 3- and 4-year-old children were better at manipulating the glass as compared to manipulating the bar because children are more familiar with manipulating glasses these results suggest that preschool years are an important period for the development of motor planning in which the familiarity with the object involved in the task plays a significant role in children’s ability to plan their movements according to end-state comfort In contrast to adults’ success in manipulating different objects according to end-state comfort findings were inconsistent with regard to children’s performance as a function of age and type of task the general aim of the present study was to investigate end-state comfort performance in children across different ages in two different object manipulation tasks They employed the overturned-glass task by asking two groups of preschool children (2–3 years and 5–6 years) to pick up an upside-down glass and to pour water into it only 20% of the 2- to 3-year-olds and 35% of the 5- to 6-year-olds grasped the glass according to end-state comfort the end-state comfort effect was not present even in the oldest children it is still an open question whether the presence of the end-state comfort effect differs between two tasks for children of the same age If one would find different developmental patterns of the end-state comfort effect between tasks then this would be evidence for the strong role of task constraints on the emergence of anticipatory planning skills in young children Another factor that might lead to different results in end-state comfort performance in young children might be the particular set-up used. Young children might find it easier to plan their actions according to end-state comfort, if their movements lead to interesting effects in the environment, such as a light that turns on as a consequence of their movement. This was the case in a recent study by Jovanovic and Schwarzer (2011) who used a modified version of the bar-transport task with 18- Instead of presenting the bar horizontally the bar used by Jovanovic and Schwarzer had a small platform on one end the bar stood with its platform on its top (requiring a comfortable thumb-up grip) and children were shown that when the bar was inserted into the cylinder lights lit up that were built into the cylinder The experimenter modeled the thumb-up grip twice for the child (baseline condition) and subsequently the bar was returned to its starting position and the child was encouraged to perform the same action as the experimenter the bar was returned to its starting position but this time standing on its platform (reverse condition) and children were asked to switch on the lights (now requiring an uncomfortable thumb-down grip) Only 8% of the 18-month-olds and none of the 24-month-olds grasped the bar with an uncomfortable thumb-down grip a comparatively high percentage of 60% of the 42-month-olds showed the end-state comfort effect the question arises whether the high percentage of children showing the end-state comfort effect at this age is a result of the action effects presented at the end of the object manipulation affecting attentional or motivational processes the light effects might have rendered the goal more salient and therefore the light effects might have motivated children to accomplish the task more accurately during which end-state comfort is still developing should benefit from the presence of an action effect but their data were excluded from further analyses because they did not understand German (one 3-year-old) or did not understand the task (one 3-year-old) due to an experimenter error (three 3-year-olds or because the child was unwilling to finish the task (two 3-year-olds) there were eight children in the AE group and eight children in the No-AE group except for the 7-year-old group with nine children in the AE group and seven children in the No-AE group The point-light-smiley consisted of 16 LED lights (Homefit lightning 3.3V/0.066W) arranged in an outer circle (diameter: 8.6 cm) of 8 LEDs with a distance of 3.2 cm between each LED light and additionally 1 for the nose and 5 for the mouth (distance: 1 cm) Left column: starting position of the bar and the glass in the critical trial in the bar-transport task and right-hand-trial in the overturned-glass task Right column: final position of the bar and the glass for the AE groups in the bar-transport task and the overturned-glass task the batteries were removed in both set-ups and light effects never occurred and all sessions were videotaped for future reference right column) was shown to the participant by Experimenter 2 how Experimenter 2 grasped the bar/glass was never demonstrated to the participant neither during the demonstration nor before the first trial or in between trials Experimenter 2 always covered the set-up with her body she covered her movements with a clipboard when grasping and moving the bar/glass The starting position of the bar/glass was always opposite to the participants’ to-be-used hand (e.g. for a right-hand-trial the bar/glass was placed to the left of the box/coaster) This was done in order to keep the movement required to grasp the bar/glass (moving the arm diagonally across the body’s midline) constant across both tasks In the bar-transport task, participants were asked to insert the bar into the opening of the box with their preferred hand and to put the non-preferred-hand behind their back. The bar-transport task was always performed with the preferred hand. Half of the trials were critical trials, which started with the bar being placed on its platform next to the bar holder (see Figure 1 followed by a 180° rotation to end in a comfortable thumb-up position The other half of the trials were uncritical trials which started with the bar being placed in the bar holder requiring a thumb-up grip with no rotation of the bar In the overturned-glass task participants were asked to put the glass right-side-up on the coaster In order to see if handedness has an impact on end-state comfort performance half of the trials were preferred-hand-trials in which participants had to use their preferred hand and to put their non-preferred-hand behind their back The other half of the trials were non-preferred-hand-trials in which participants had to use their non-preferred-hand and to put their preferred hand behind their back a thumb-down grip of the glass was required followed by a 180° rotation of the glass to reach end-state comfort if the child had difficulties using only one hand the experimenter took the child by their not-to-be-used hand and kept hold of their hand until they had completed the trial the order of the tasks was counterbalanced half of the participants received the bar-transport task first and the other half of the participants received the overturned-glass task first The trial order of the two sorts of trials in each task (critical/uncritical in the bar-transport task; preferred/non-preferred-hand in the overturned-glass task) was randomized such that (a) half of the participants started the task with a critical (preferred hand) trial and the other half of the participants started the task with an uncritical (non-preferred-hand) trial (b) the same sort of trial was administered maximally two times in a row A trial was repeated if (a) both hands were used (e) if the glass/bar was turned on the participant’s chest or (f) an experimenter error occurred (such as indicating the wrong hand) Handedness of all child participants was determined before the start of the experiment by registering the participant’s preferred hand when throwing a ball The participant’s preferred hand was determined by the hand that was used in at least two out of the three activities the end-state comfort effect was considered to be present if the score 1 was given in at least two out of three trials All six trials of a randomly chosen set of 25% of the participants of each age group were coded by a second coder the results regarding children’s performance in the presence or absence of an action effect are reported first the results on the influence of age on end-state comfort performance are reported for (1) the bar-transport task and (3) the comparison between the two tasks non-parametric tests were used with a significance level of α = 0.05 and with p-values between 0.05 and 0.10 considered as marginally significant For the following analyses we therefore pooled the data of the AE groups and the No-AE groups in both tasks Percentages of end-state comfort in action effect (AE) groups and no-action effect (No-AE) groups in the bar-transport task and the overturned-glass task The percentage of participants using a thumb-down grip in critical trials and the percentage of participants using a thumb-up grip in uncritical trials (in at least two out of three trials) in the bar-transport task for each age group are depicted in Figure 2 Almost all participants in all age groups grasped the bar thumb-up in uncritical trials with no significant difference between the age groups (Chi-square exact in the critical trials end-state comfort performance differed significantly between the age groups (Chi-square exact p < 0.001) and increased with age: 3-year-olds 13% end-state comfort performance was significantly different between the 3- and the 5- and 8-year-olds (Fisher’s exact test There was no effect of task order (bar-transport task first or second; Fisher’s exact test over all groups trial order (critical trials first or second; Fisher’s exact test p = 0.202) on end-state comfort performance in critical trials Percentages of participants showing the end-state comfort effect (ESC) in critical and uncritical trials across age in the bar-transport task Trial repetitions were unlikely to influence end-state comfort performance participants performed a total of 96 trials and the total number of trial repetitions per age group was 25 for 3-year-olds and 7 for each of the remaining older age groups the percentages of end-state comfort performance in preferred-hand-trials and in non-preferred-hand-trials did not differ significantly in neither of the age groups (McNemar In the following only analyses on preferred-hand-trials are reported in order to directly compare children’s performance in the two tasks Percentages of participants showing the end-state comfort effect (ESC) in preferred hand and non-preferred-hand-trials across age in the overturned-glass task There was a significant increase in end-state comfort performance with age (Chi-square exact end-state comfort performance was significantly different between the 3- and the 8-year-olds (Fisher’s exact test p = 0.018) and the 4- and the 8-year-olds (Fisher’s exact test There was no effect of task order (overturned-glass task first or second; Fisher’s exact test over all groups Fisher’s exact tests per age group trial order (preferred-hand-trials first or second; Fisher’s exact test p = 0.34) on end-state comfort performance Per age group participants performed a total of 96 trials and the total number of trial repetitions per age group was 26 for 3-year-olds In order to investigate whether children may have learned to grasp the glass according to end-state comfort across trials trial scores were summed across the first half (trials 1–3) and across the second half (trials 4–6) of the task regardless of trials being performed with the preferred- or non-preferred-hand When comparing children’s end-state comfort performance in the first half with the second half of the task there was no indication of learning (Wilcoxon When comparing end-state comfort performance between critical trials in the bar-transport task and preferred-hand-trials in the overturned-glass task differences were statistically significant only for the 3-year-olds (McNemar marginally significant for the 4-year-olds (McNemar and not significant for the other age groups (all ps > 0.625) a higher number of 3-and 4-year-olds showed the end-state comfort effect in the overturned-glass task The first aim of the present study was to compare the presence of the end-state comfort effect in children of different ages between two different object manipulation tasks, the bar-transport task, and the overturned-glass task respectively. In line with Weigelt and Schack (2010) and Stöckel et al. (2011) we found an increase in end-state comfort performance in the bar-transport task children’s propensity to use an uncomfortable thumb-down grip in critical trials rose from 13% in the 3-year-olds to 94% in the 8-year-olds the number of children showing the end-state comfort effect in this task doubled from 3 to 4 years and from 4 to 5 years of age whereas the older age groups differed only slightly in end-state comfort performance This might suggest that the age between 3- and 5 years is an important period in which children progressively become better in planning their movements children had to turn on a light inside a box by using either a familiar tool (spoon) or an unfamiliar tool (spoon-like object) both tools fit in the box with their handle end only Results revealed that children tended to grasp the familiar spoon by its handle even though children were shown to grasp the spoon by its bowl end for insertion the unfamiliar spoon was grasped much more flexibly and led to significantly more successes children’s familiarity with the object manipulations involved in this novel task likely biased their tool-directed actions the habitual system likely had hindered children in solving a novel task with a familiar object the habitual system might have helped children in solving a familiar task (overturned-glass task) with a familiar object the greater familiarity with handling glasses in the present study might have helped children to plan their movements in the overturned-glass task more accurately as compared to the bar-transport task the habitual system likely did not help children in solving the task since children may not have gathered sufficient experience with the object manipulations required when comparing end-state comfort performance between critical trials in the bar-transport task and preferred-hand-trials in the overturned-glass task 3- and 4-year-old children were better in manipulating the glass according to end-state comfort in the overturned-glass task than they were able to manipulate the bar in the bar-transport task when considering children’s performance in both tasks results show that the age between 3- and 5 years is an important period for motor planning in which the familiarity with the object involved in the task may play an important role in children’s ability to plan their movements according to end-state comfort these children still display stronger stimulus-driven behavioral tendencies as compared to 7-year-old children and they are less able to maintain the task goal it seems reasonable to assume that anticipatory planning skills develop at different rates regarding object manipulation and the acquisition of response-effect associations This assumption should be tested in future studies Children were never shown the uncomfortable thumb-down grip in order to make the light effects occur and no action effect associations could have been formed by observation children were only shown the starting state and the end-state of the action without the corresponding action and children had to emulate the formation of action effect associations is crucial Only through repeated co-occurrences of the uncomfortable thumb-down grip and the following light effect could children have associated the light effect with a thumb-down grip and hence anticipating the light effect might have helped them plan their movements more readily according to end-state comfort the light effects were presented independent of the initial grasp used by the child (thumb-down or thumb-up) also thumb-up grips in critical trials (and in preferred- or non-preferred-hand-trials) were followed by a light effect one might expect that children in the AE groups who used a comfortable thumb-up grip in the first critical trial will use a comfortable thumb-up grip in the following trials due to instrumental learning established by the rewarding light effect (smiley) inspection of the data revealed that all children changed grip posture in either task with an increase in thumb-down grips across age Even in the 3-year-olds each child showed an uncomfortable thumb-down grip in the overturned-glass task at least once suggest that the action effects used by Jovanovic and Schwarzer did not play a role in end-state comfort planning neither directly according to the principles of the common coding theory nor indirectly via enhancing children’s interest in performing the task Even though 18- and 24-month-old children did not benefit from observing the experimenter performing the transport in the reverse condition as shown in Experiment 3 of the same study the 42-month-olds tested in Experiment 1 might have benefited from observing the experimenter grasping the bar according to end-state comfort when returning the bar children in the current study never saw the experimenter grasping the bar This suggests that other differences between the studies are more likely to account for the difference in end-state comfort performance shown by children of comparable age Finally, the development of different cognitive abilities, such as executive functions, might explain some of the inconsistencies in the findings. It is interesting to note that around the same time during the preschool years when end-state comfort planning seems to develop, children also show a marked improvement in higher level cognitive processes, termed executive function, that are involved in planning and controlling goal-directed behavior (Zelazo et al., 1997) differences in task demands that are due to differences in methodology This is especially true for the preschool age which seems to be a period of marked development in end-state comfort planning or the more familiar the child is with the to be manipulated object the more cognitive resources may be available for motor planning and control that differences in task demands which tap into executive control processes may have a greater effect on younger compared to older children’s performance in end-state comfort tasks Further research is needed to investigate whether executive function skills play a role in the development of end-state comfort planning the comparison of two different object manipulation tasks within the same participants allowed us to investigate the influence of the particular task used as a possible contributing factor to the inconsistent results found across studies Results suggest that the familiarity with the object involved in the task does play a significant role in at least the younger children’s ability to plan their movements according to end-state comfort We like to thank Alexander Kirmße for his help with conducting this study all students of the bachelor course “Empirisches Praktikum 2011/2012” for their engagement and their contribution to the implementation of the study design data collection and coding and Rebecca Schneider also for coding the data We further thank Roland Pfister and two anonymous reviewers for their constructive and helpful comments on earlier versions of the manuscript The authors declare that the research was conducted in the absence of any commercial or financial relationships that could be construed as a potential conflict of interest The end-state comfort effect in young children Pubmed Abstract | Pubmed Full Text | CrossRef Full Text Pubmed Abstract | Pubmed Full Text | CrossRef Full Text Planning ahead: goal-directed problem solving by 2-year-olds Pubmed Abstract | Pubmed Full Text | CrossRef Full Text Evidence of motor planning in infant reaching behavior Pubmed Abstract | Pubmed Full Text | CrossRef Full Text Action planning in typically and atypically developing children (unilateral cerebral palsy) Pubmed Abstract | Pubmed Full Text | CrossRef Full Text Of human bonding: newborns prefer their mothers voices Pubmed Abstract | Pubmed Full Text | CrossRef Full Text Development of the acquisition and control of action-effect associations Pubmed Abstract | Pubmed Full Text | CrossRef Full Text Infants’ imitation of goal-directed actions: the role of movements and action effects CrossRef Full Text Learning about the effects of self-performed and observed actions in infancy Pubmed Abstract | Pubmed Full Text | CrossRef Full Text Contiguity and contingency in action-effect learning Pubmed Abstract | Pubmed Full Text | CrossRef Full Text End-state comfort in object manipulation [Abstract] Constraints on grip-selection: minimizing awkwardness Pubmed Abstract | Pubmed Full Text Action-effect anticipation in infant action control Pubmed Abstract | Pubmed Full Text | CrossRef Full Text The role of action effects in infants’ action control Pubmed Abstract | Pubmed Full Text | CrossRef Full Text Habitual and goal-directed factors in (everyday) object handling Pubmed Abstract | Pubmed Full Text | CrossRef Full Text The theory of event coding: a framework for perception and action planning Pubmed Abstract | Pubmed Full Text | CrossRef Full Text Infants’ behavioral reenactment of “failed attempts”: exploring the roles of emulation learning Pubmed Abstract | Pubmed Full Text | CrossRef Full Text Stimulus–response compatibility and motor programming of manual response sequences CrossRef Full Text Learning to grasp efficiently: the develoment of motor planning and the role of observational learning Pubmed Abstract | Pubmed Full Text | CrossRef Full Text goals and intention: children’s teleological reasoning about objects Pubmed Abstract | Pubmed Full Text | CrossRef Full Text Response-effect compatibility in manual choice reaction tasks Pubmed Abstract | Pubmed Full Text | CrossRef Full Text Planning manipulative hand movements: do young children show the end-state comfort effect Problem solving in infancy: the emergence of an action plan Pubmed Abstract | Pubmed Full Text | CrossRef Full Text The beginnings of tool use by infants and toddlers CrossRef Full Text How learning to shake a rattle affects 8-month-old infants’ perception of the rattle’s sound: electrophysiological evidence for action-effect binding in infancy Pubmed Abstract | Pubmed Full Text | CrossRef Full Text Bridging the gap between the other and me: the functional role of motor resonance and action effects in infants’ imitation Pubmed Abstract | Pubmed Full Text | CrossRef Full Text Adaptive control of ideomotor effect anticipations Pubmed Abstract | Pubmed Full Text | CrossRef Full Text CrossRef Full Text Planning macroscopic aspects of manual control CrossRef Full Text “Constraints for action selection: overhand versus underhand grips,” in Attention and Performance XIII: Motor Representation and Control Pubmed Abstract | Pubmed Full Text | CrossRef Full Text Planning and execution of action in children with and without developmental coordination disorder Pubmed Abstract | Pubmed Full Text | CrossRef Full Text Stöckel Representation of grasp postures and anticipatory motor planning in children Pubmed Abstract | Pubmed Full Text | CrossRef Full Text Pubmed Abstract | Pubmed Full Text | CrossRef Full Text A test of motor (not executive) planning in developmental coordination disorder and autism Pubmed Abstract | Pubmed Full Text | CrossRef Full Text Evidence for spontaneous action-effect binding in infants CrossRef Full Text Familiarity and complexity modulate the way children imitate tool-use actions: a cross-cultural study and “the game.” Merrill Palmer Q The development of end-state comfort planning in preschool children Pubmed Abstract | Pubmed Full Text | CrossRef Full Text Early development of executive function: a problem-solving framework CrossRef Full Text Disclaimer: All claims expressed in this article are solely those of the authors and do not necessarily represent those of their affiliated organizations Any product that may be evaluated in this article or claim that may be made by its manufacturer is not guaranteed or endorsed by the publisher 94% of researchers rate our articles as excellent or goodLearn more about the work of our research integrity team to safeguard the quality of each article we publish AXIS Capital Holdings announced it has received full approval from Lloyd’s to begin underwriting from April 1 AXIS first announced in December that it had secured in-principle approval from Lloyd’s to establish a new syndicate that will focus on providing capacity for new energy projects with a critical role in supporting the transition to net zero AXIS Head of Upstream Energy Elliot Lyes will serve as active underwriter for Syndicate 2050 and work alongside a cross-class team of underwriters to provide specialty insurance solutions tailored to the risks associated with replacing or displacing fossil fuels through lower-carbon alternatives AXIS will provide a single access point to specialist insurance solutions for cross-class risks over the lifecycle of projects and activities associated with replacing or displacing fossil fuels through lower-carbon alternatives and supporting energy resilience during the transition phase “Supporting the shift to net zero represents an enormous opportunity for the insurance industry to rise to the challenge by developing the specialty coverages that organizations need throughout their energy transition journeys Receiving permission to underwrite through Energy Transition Syndicate 2050 is a milestone for AXIS,” commented Mark Gregory we’ll be providing a single access point to holistic cross-class insurance solutions for energy projects that have a critical role in supporting the transition to net zero,” Gregory added Photograph: Wind turbines work at sunset on a wind farm near Aschersleben Please tell us what we can do to improve this article three traditional communist housing blocks are being transformed into modern apartment buildings with solar power the energy consumption can be integrated into a flat-rate rent the Ascherslebener Gebäude- und Wohnungsgesellschaft (AGW) is taking its own unique approach The housing company in the small town of Aschersleben in Saxony-Anhalt in eastern Germany shows what this looks like with the project now planned AGW has just begun to convert three old housing blocks left over from communist times into an energy-autonomous apartment building The highlight: the tenants will no longer pay a separate bill for the energy supply This is already included in the rent as a flat rate In order to achieve energy self-sufficiency the three buildings will first be completely renovated in terms of energy the top two floors of the original five-storey buildings have already been removed to take account of the population decline in Aschersleben solar modules will be installed on the facades The roof will also be activated for the production of solar power the craftsmen are adding an attic with a southwest-facing monopitch roof on top of the third floor They integrate solar modules into the entire roof surface See also: Onyx Solar realises one megawatt photovoltaic facade the three buildings are fitted with a modern energy concept This is because the solar systems not only supply electricity for the electrical consumers in the 22 flats They also supply the residential units with heat The planners have opted for an all-electric heat supply The buildings will not have central heating with heat pumps but a hot water boiler with a capacity of 200 litres will be installed in each flat These operate on surplus solar power and also store it over a longer period of time about 80 per cent of the hot water demand can be covered by solar energy," explains Timo Leukefeld The solar expert developed the concept of energy-autonomous apartment buildings with an energy flat rate The remaining demand is covered with green electricity from the grid Infrared panels provide the indoor heating "The heating market is undergoing a serious change as in the future primarily electricity-powered heating systems will be installed but we are convinced that highly efficient infrared heaters will also be used more and more," says Leukefeld Also interesting: Roof of historical building covered with solar modules such a heating concept has huge advantages There is no need for piping as with conventional water-guided heating systems This reduces the time and material costs for installation infrared heaters are maintenance-free for decades which will be a huge advantage in the long run given the increasing skilled labour shortages and rising hourly rates "This is a great value in terms of return on investment," Leukefeld emphasises But to achieve the highest possible degree of self-sufficiency solar power only flows from the roof when the sun is shining the technicians will install solar batteries in the buildings the storage mass of the building itself will also be used That is the thick concrete walls and new brickwork hot water boiler and activated building envelope - ensure a high degree of energy self-sufficiency," Leukefeld summarises the concept the residents will usually be completely self-sufficient," he predicts based on empirical results of previous projects Don't miss any important information about the solar energy transition! 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Volume 7 - 2016 | https://doi.org/10.3389/fpsyg.2016.00972 Recent research has shown that infants and young children up to the age of 5 years are more likely to imitate in-group members than out-group members and language are robust indicators for social categories and research mainly focuses on language and accent whereas race indicated by physical appearance is rarely investigated Research has shown that the aforementioned factors served as indicators of group membership and influenced children’s imitative behavior in such ways that the in-group member was more likely to be imitated the question arises how physical appearance of a person itself influences the imitative behavior we investigated the effect of group membership (in-group vs out-group) in 4-year-old children (N = 48) on children’s imitative behavior Children observed either an in-group or an out-group model (German vs which presented novel manual actions in four different tasks children got the opportunity to imitate the target actions children were either assigned to a live or a video condition to control for the influence of the presentation mode Results indicated that 4-year-old children did not imitate the in-group model more often than the out-group model there was no difference between the two presentation modes Results were discussed on the basis of research on the in-group-out-group effect We suggested that a pure difference in the model’s physical appearance might not be sufficient to elicit an in-group-out-group effect This indicates the important role of language in relation to race in preschoolers there is ample evidence that language is an important factor influencing the in-group-out-group effect already in infancy In accordance with the aforementioned findings where physical appearance was defined through colors or drawings more research concerning the physical appearance of a living person and its influence on the imitative behavior of children is needed Based on these somehow inconsistent results we decided to control for possible distracting influence of the video presentation and thus a live model condition was introduced in the present study as well The aim of the present study was to investigate whether group membership indicated by physical appearance of the model influences 4-year-olds’ imitative behavior we constructed four novel tasks with different three-step actions Both a Chinese and a German model presented these actions and children were given the opportunity to imitate these actions immediately afterward While these actions were presented on video we also introduced a live condition (German model only) to control for the possible distracting influence of the video presentation German preschoolers observed a German and a Chinese model that presented novel children were presented either with the German or with the Chinese model that demonstrated the actions children were presented with the other model that presented the same actions again children were allowed to play with the objects children observed only the German model in both the first and the second run we tested 4-year-old children in the current study to guarantee that race is detected by the children we expected no difference in imitation performance between video and live presentation at this age The final sample consisted of 48 German children (M = 4;5 (years; months); range = 3;9-5;0) Additional four children were tested but not included in the final sample due to procedural errors Children were randomly assigned to two experimental groups (live presentation Parents were recruited by telephone from a list of families who had earlier expressed interest in volunteering for research on child development They received a recompense for travel expenses and children were given a small gift and a certificate for participating This study has been conducted in accordance with ethical guidelines and received ethical clearance by the local ethics committee at the Saarland University There were four manual tasks. Each task consisted of three wooden building bricks, which were purpose-built (see Figure 1) consisted of one blue block [9 cm (length) × 4.5 cm (width) × 4.5 cm (height)] one red rectangular prism (6 × 10 × 4.5 cm) and one blue ball (diameter = 3.3 cm) The red prism and the blue block had yellow millings on each side consisted of a red L-shaped object (6 × 7 × 10.5 cm) a yellow flat building brick (1.5 × 11.5 × 5.9 cm) and a blue rectangular prism (4.5 × 9 × 4.5 cm) was made up of a rod colored half blue and half yellow (length = 11.6 cm; diameter = 3.2 cm) and two balls of different color (blue/yellow; diameter = 3.3 cm) there was a red squared block (6 × 7.6 × 6 cm) consisting of two brick-formed identical parts In the middle of the squared side of the block there was hole (diameter = 1.4) contained of a blue box (7.3 × 6 × 6 cm) and a red bar (10 × 2.2 × 2.2 cm) with a nub (diameter = 1.5 cm) and two holes under the nub (diameter = 1.3 cm) The blue box had six holes in the side walls (diameter = 1.6 cm) and a flap Three-step-action sequence of the four tasks Starting position and the subsequent three action steps of the bridge (A) For the bridge, the model tipped over the blue block on its left side. Then, one edge of the red rectangular prism was placed on one edge of the blue block. Finally, the blue ball was placed on one of the upper yellow millings (see Figure 1) the model put the L-shaped red object in an upright position the yellow flat building brick was leaned on the longer side of the L-shaped object the blue rectangular prism was leaned on the yellow flat building brick with the longer side of the right angle the model put together the two parts of the red squared block with the round opening she rotated the rod with a 180° turn and positioned it within the round opening of the red squared block the blue ball was positioned on top of the rod the first step was to put the yellow stick into the opening of the box which flapped because of the repelling magnets she pushed the red bar on the yellow stick and used it to close the lid of the box Two female adult models with different race (Chinese vs. German) demonstrated the manual tasks (see Figure 2) Both models were comparable in terms of age (31 years vs but differed in race-specific features (facial proportions and eye relief) Both the Chinese model and the German model were shown in the video condition and the same German model modeled the actions in the live condition we checked whether the models differed in other features than their physical appearance When students (N = 59) rated several characteristics of the models (e.g. no difference was obtained except that the German model was rated more sociable than the Chinese model 4-year-old children (N = 17) answered questions about sympathy and were asked which characteristics the models have in common (e.g. No significant differences between the two models were obtained Photographs of the German (left) and the Chinese (right) model each consisting of the presentation of the four different tasks being presented in counterbalanced order across participants The German model presented the tasks in the live condition whereas in the video condition the tasks were presented by the same German and the Chinese model one run with the German and one run with the Chinese model The order of the models was counterbalanced across participants children were given the possibility to play with the objects the influence of the model’s race (Chinese vs German model) was tested in a within-subject design in the video condition The influence of the presentation mode was tested in a between-subject design (live vs To check the pure factor repetition without an influence of the models race we analyzed this factor in the live condition (German model only; 1st vs Children sat on a high chair at a table (74 × 103 × 82 cm) in front of a blue covered wall with an opening (60 cm length) in the middle of it comparable to a “puppet theater.” The opening could be closed by a curtain children saw the German model performing the manual actions through this opening 50/60 Hz) was positioned exactly into the opening All aspects of the live demonstration were closely matched to the video demonstration (i.e. the experimenter who was standing on the side during the presentations reminded the child to look back to the model and focused the child’s attention back to the demonstration Both the video and the live condition followed the same general procedure An experimenter welcomed the parent and the child While the parent waited in an extra room and filled in questionnaires concerning some background information of the child (e.g. noticeable problems) the child was led to a separate room and the experimenter instructed the child (“Soon you will see a friend of mine who is playing with different toys”) a bell rang in order to draw the children’s attention to the closed curtain the curtain opened and the model looked directly at the child for 4–5 s the model looked at the first object and performed the manual action with it After performing the three steps each task consisted of The experimenter gave the identical objects to the child with a neutral instruction (“Now it is your turn to play with the toys!”) Children were allowed to play with the objects for 30 s starting when the child touched the first object whenever she/he finished playing with the objects The experimenter removed the objects after 30 s or after the child rang the bell and the presentation of the next task started the second run started immediately without a delay in between they could choose a toy as a reward and were then brought back to their parents Each session was videotaped by a camera (Canon Legria FS200E) directed frontally at the child and a second camera (Canon Legria FS406) recorded the child and the model from behind Children’s behavior was coded from the videotapes latency was coded as the time between the time when the experimenter had placed the objects in front of the child and the child’s first touch of an object A step was coded as imitated when children performed the same movement with the same object as the model had demonstrated at any point during the response period Children could receive a score from 0 to 3 in every single task leading to a sum score ranging from 0 to 12 for each run These two dependent variables (number of imitated steps and latency of first touch) were taken in account for the main hypothesis we coded the time children spent looking at the video and the live presentation to check for any differences of children’s attention No significant difference could be found concerning looking time (Wilcoxon text: z = -1.48; p = 0.138) 60% of the videos were coded by a second independent rater In order to investigate whether there were differences between the two models concerning latency and number of imitated steps a dependent-sample t-test was calculated Results revealed that children did not imitate more action steps when observing the in-group model (M = 9.25; SD = 3.03) compared to the out-group model (M = 9.54; SD = 2.65) Children did not start to play faster with the objects after having watched the German model performing the action as compared to the Chinese model two independent-sample t-tests were calculated t(11) = -1.30; p = 0.220 and not for latency Children’s imitation performance did not differ as a function of the presentation mode (German model only) No significant difference was found for the number of imitated steps (live: M = 8.38; SD = 3.32; video: M = 9.54; SD = 2.65; t(46) = -1.17 p = 0.185) as well as for the latency (live: M = 7.67; SD = 5.28; video: M = 7.20; SD = 4.49 Number of correctly imitated steps (A) and latency (B) in the live and in the video presentation depending on the run (1st and 2nd) and on the race of the model (German vs There was no main effect for model [F(1,11) = 3.11; p = 0.106] and no significant interaction between repetition and model to compare the live and the video condition two mixed ANOVAs with the within-factor repetition (1st and 2nd run) and the between-factor presentation mode (live vs results revealed a significant main effect for repetition with F(1,46) = 11.40; p = 0.002 no significant effect of the presentation mode and no significant interaction between repetition and presentation mode results revealed a significant main effect for repetition with F(1,46) = 9.46; p = 0.004 these studies used other indicators than physical appearance as a cue for group membership We will discuss possible explanations below we believe that it is unlikely the video presentation mode obscured an in-group-out-group effect in children concerning the model’s race Future research might test this assumption in a full-factorial design with video and live presentations for the in-group and out-group model their recollection was better and they were more likely to imitate we have to take into account that the improvement in imitative behavior was greater after having seen the live model as compared to the video presentation the starting level of imitated steps was lower in the live condition compared to the video presentation and only reached the same level in the second run it might be that in the live condition children had to acclimatize to the environment first as it was somehow artificial because the model did not communicate with the child at all there are different possible explanations for why the finding is in contrast to prior findings we have to consider the possibility that the results are due to an artefact of the tasks The imitation tasks could have been too easy for children and thus were performed independently of the model we looked at the total amount of children imitating all of the possible 12 steps correctly Only 5 children (10%) were able to imitate all steps correctly in the first as well as in the second run This indicates that the tasks were not too easy the latter ones were looking time studies and thus can only be compared to results obtained in imitation studies to a very limited amount there might be a developmental process concerning the awareness of differences between groups and the active use of this information for decisions Whereas 5-year-old children seem to take into account the race of the model findings reported in the literature are less clear the age of the children might be one reason for the fact that we did not find evidence for an in-group-out-group effect in the present study which were presented by models differing in age we kept the models’ age and gender constant in order to analyze the genuine effect of physical appearance the familiarity of Chinese people could be one possible reason why physical appearance was not salient enough to influence children’s imitative behavior Perhaps children are familiar with the physical appearance of Chinese people because they are around them in everyday life it might well be that the influence of the model’s race on children at different ages is moderated by language language might offer more salient information about the model’s race than physical appearance their interplay should be analyzed in more detail in further studies the age of children should be analyzed in more detailed studies which could include also children of the age of 3 and 5 years Various studies found evidence that children’s imitational behavior is influenced by group membership Belonging to a group is communicated through features like a model’s age The current study manipulating physical appearance only did not show evidence that the model’s race elicited the in-group-out-group effect in 4-year-olds We propose that additional information especially language (e.g. labels) is necessary to highlight group membership at this age and to result in group-specific imitative behavior in children All authors originated the idea for the study and contributed to the development of the conceptual framing AK was the primary conductor of analyses and wrote the most of the manuscript and CM revised and reworked the manuscript GA wrote some section and made suggestions for additional analyses This research was conducted within the International Research Training Group “Adaptive Minds” and supported by grants from the German Research Foundation (GRK 1457) We thank Tatjana Kaufmann and Lisa Jacob for their help with data collection and all parents and children who participated in this study we thank Ingo Besserdich for his help conducting the novel tasks we want to thank the reviewer Stefanie Hoehl Rana Esseily and the editor Ildikó Király for their helpful comments during the revision process Google Scholar CrossRef Full Text | Google Scholar Social Foundations of Thought and Action: A Social Cognitive Theory Google Scholar Nature and nurture in own-race face processing Transfer of learning between 2D and 3D sources during infancy: informing theory and practice Developmental changes in imitation from television during infancy Selective imitation of in-group over out-group members in 14-month-old infants and culture in children’s social category-based induction The four elementary forms of sociality: framework for a unified theory of social relations What young children think about the relationship between language variation and social difference CrossRef Full Text | Google Scholar Infants’ and young children’s imitation of linguistic in-group and out-group informants Children’s selective trust in native-accented speakers Children’s essentialist reasoning about language and race Northern= smart and Southern= nice: the development of accent attitudes in the United States CrossRef Full Text | Google Scholar CrossRef Full Text | Google Scholar Accent trumps race in guiding children’s social preferences CrossRef Full Text | Google Scholar Thirty years of investigating the own-race bias in memory for faces: a meta-analytic review CrossRef Full Text | Google Scholar Language and the development of children’s ethnic prejudice CrossRef Full Text | Google Scholar Young children contrast their behavior to that of out-group members Gibt es einen Videodefiziteffekt bei Aufgaben zur Theory of Mind [Is there a video deficit effect in Theory of Mind tasks?] CrossRef Full Text Automatic contrast: evidence that automatic comparison with the social self affects evaluative responses Recognition of own-race and other-race faces by three-month-old infants Preschool children’s comprehension of a Sesame Street video tape: the effects of repeated viewing and previewing instructions Social categories guide young children’s preferences for novel objects CrossRef Full Text | Google Scholar An ambiguous-race illusion in children’s face memory The medium can obscure the message: young children’s understanding of video Young children’s use of video as a source of socially relevant information Trötschel When yielding pieces of the pie is not a piece of cake: identity-based intergroup effects in negotiations Zmyj N and Aschersleben G (2016) Tom Is Not More Likely to Imitate Lisa Than Ying: The Influence of a Model’s Race Indicated by Physical Appearance on Children’s Imitation Copyright © 2016 Krieger, Möller, Zmyj and Aschersleben. This is an open-access article distributed under the terms of the Creative Commons Attribution License (CC BY) distribution or reproduction in other forums is permitted provided the original author(s) or licensor are credited and that the original publication in this journal is cited in accordance with accepted academic practice distribution or reproduction is permitted which does not comply with these terms *Correspondence: Andrea A. R. Krieger, YW5kcmVhLmtyaWVnZXJAdW5pLXNhYXJsYW5kLmRl and Irish senior basketball international player Adrian O’Sullivan has just signed his third professional basketball contract with Spanish side Aquimisa Carbajosa of the Liga Espanolo de Baloncesto (LEB Silver) Aquimisa Carbajosa is located in the beautiful Carbajosa de la Sagraga in the province of Salamanca on the North western coast of Spain who spent his last two years playing professionally with Reading Rocket’s ( England) and Bramsche Red Devils ( Germany) Before moving into the professional ranks Adrian started out play all his underage basketball with Ballincollig in the Cork local Leagues before moving to Blue Demons where he had a very successful spell with the Northside club and went on to win multiple National League trophies Bramsche's Adrian O'Sullivan in action for the Red Devils in the German Regionalliga Nord against Aschersleben Tigers “The team name of my new club is Aquimisa Carbajosa they are from Salamanca in Spain,” said Adrian “The move came about through an contact with a Spanish agent during lockdown "I reached out to the agent and we spoke about possible moves LEB Silver is the name of the league I’ll will be playing in this year and very skilled game with a lot of quick guards and outside shooters "With all going well I’ll be on a flight to Madrid and onward to Salamanca at the end of August for a week of pre-season before the season starts early October.”  his boyhood club Ballincollig were recently promoted to the men’s SuperLeague for the coming season “The last couple of years the lads in Ballincollig have had great success and of course you want to be a part of that "There’s nothing like success with the boys you’ve grown up with and I toyed with the idea of staying at home this season more so than others as they are now headed into the SuperLeague there’s plenty of time for that in the future I’ve been lucky enough to have some great experiences playing abroad and playing in a league like LEB Silver will be both a great challenge as the level of basketball will be a lot higher than he would have been accustomed to in his previous clubs “The goals for the new season as a team will of course to be playing at a high level like most but also playing our best basketball come the post season "I’m excited for the new opportunity and looking forward to the season ahead,” O’Sullivan added Keep up-to-date with the top stories in Cork with our daily newsletter straight to your inbox Please click here for our privacy statement. 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