Gerald Matthews Books

Human Performance provides the student and researcher with a comprehensive and accessible review of performance, in the real world and essential cognitive science theory. Four main sections cover both theoretical and practical issues: Section One outlines the perspectives on performance offered by contemporary cognitive science, including information processing and neuroscience perspectives. Section Two presents a multi-level view of the performer as biological organism, information-processor and intentional agent. It reviews the development of the cognitive theory of performance through experimental studies and also looks at practical issues such as human error. Section Three reviews the impact of stress factors such as noise, fatigue and illness on performance. Section Four assesses individual and group differences in performance with accounts of ability, personality and aging.

This text critically reviews the literature on attention and emotion, and offers an integrative cognitive attentional model of the development and maintenance of emotional disorders. It highlights the similarities and differences between disorders and offers specific new treatment implications. The book contains numerous summary sections so that readers less familiar with the cognitive literature can follow the main issues without being overwhelmed. The central aims of this work are: to review critically models of attention and their application to attentional processes in emotional disorders; To develop an integrative theoretical framework and model for conceptualizing attentional processes associated with the aetiology and maintenance of emotional stress reactions; and to discuss the implications for clinical practice of attentional theories of emotional dysfunction.