bluuebunny/crossref_metadata_2025 huggingface dataset:
Language, procedures, and the non-perceptual origin of natural number concepts
Authors: Barner David
Published: July 2018

Perceptual representations – e.g., of objects or approximate magnitudes –are often invoked as building blocks that children combine with linguisticsymbols when they acquire the positive integers. Systems of numericalperception are either assumed to contain the logical foundations ofarithmetic innately, or to supply the basis for their induction. Here Ipropose an alternative to this general framework, and argue that theintegers are not learned from perceptual systems, but instead arise toexplain perception as part of language acquisition. Drawing oncross-linguistic data and developmental data, I show that small numbers(1-4) and large numbers (~5+) arise both historically and in individualchildren via entirely distinct mechanisms, constituting independentlearning problems, neither of which begins with perceptual building blocks.Specifically, I propose that children begin by learning small numbers(i.e., *one, two, three*) using the same logical resources that supportother linguistic markers of number (e.g., singular, plural). Several yearslater, children discover the logic of counting by inferring the logicalrelations between larger number words from their roles in blind countingprocedures, and only incidentally associate number words with perception ofapproximate magnitudes, in an *ad hoc* and highly malleable fashion.Counting provides a form of explanation for perception but is not causallyderived from perceptual systems.
Time and money explain social class differences in students’ social integration at university.
Authors: Rubin Mark
Published: July 2018

Working-class students tend to be less socially integrated at university than middle-class students (Rubin, 2012a). The present research investigated two potential reasons for this working-class social exclusion effect. First, working-class students may have fewer finances available to participate in social activities. Second, working-class students tend to be older than middle-class students and, consequently, they are likely to have more work and/or childcare commitments. These additional commitments may prevent them from attending campus which, in turn, reduces their opportunity for social integration. These predictions were confirmed among undergraduate students at an Australian university (N = 433) and a USA university (N = 416). Strategies for increasing working-class students’ social integration at university are discussed.
Not all Online Sexual Activities are the Same
Authors: Barrada Juan Ramón
Published: July 2018

Young people’s use and participation in online sexual activities (OSA) has increased in the past two decades and has changed their behavior in the area of sexuality. The existing literature has some important limitations, concerning the assessment of the construct and its orientation toward problematic use, while ignoring its healthy use or social participation and its relationship with well-being. The main objective of this study was to analyze the relationships between the three types of OSA (compulsive, isolated, and social) proposed by Delmonico and Miller, as well as offline sexual behavior, and psychosexual well-being. It was also necessary to evaluate the factor structure of the Internet Sexual Screening Test (ISST). Participants were 1,147 university students of both sexes, aged between 18 and 26 years, who completed a battery of online questionnaires. The main finding of the study is that, when controlling for other online sexual behavior, different types of OSA evaluated relate differently to offline sexual behavior and to psychosexual well-being, and that most young people made healthy use and participation of OSA. It also presents a new structure of the ISST. The discussion emphasizes the need to recognize the positive consequences of OSA to implement programs for the promotion of sexual health.
Alexithymic traits impact the perception of implied motion in facial displays of affect.
Authors: Senior Carl , Hassel Stefanie , Waheed Arisha , Ridout Nathan
Published: July 2018

Something akin to motion perception occurs even when actual motion is not present but merely implied. However, it is not known if the experience of implied motion occurs during the perception of faces or even different affects. Moreover, it is not known if implied motion is moderated by individual differences in anxiety, depression or alexithymia. To examine this, participants were presented with picture pairs showing facial affect that implied either a forward or backward motion, i.e., depicting an increasing intensity in affect, or its diminution. Participants indicated whether or not the second face in the pair was the same as, or different from, the first face shown. To measure general affect recognition ability the Ekman 60 faces test was administered, as were the Toronto Alexithymia scale (TAS-20) and the Hospital Anxiety and Depression scale (HADS). Analysis of error rates revealed significant main effects for direction and emotion. There was no significant correlation with overall HADS score for any of the six emotions; there was also no effect of depression, anxiety or general face recognition abilities. Interestingly, the number of errors in the forward condition was negatively related to scores on the difficulty identifying feelings subscale of the TAS-20, which suggests that individuals who have problems identifying their own and others’ feelings had experienced a reduction in the experience of implied motion. Results suggest that implied motion may influence the experience of affect recognition and can be applied to clinical groups, specifically those demonstrating deficits in correctly recognising salient social cues.
Domain-specific perfectionism: An examination of perfectionism beyond the trait-level and its link to well-being
Authors: Levine Shelby L. , Milyavskaya Marina
Published: July 2018

This study examined 1) whether perfectionism relates to stress, affect, and vitality similarly at the between-person and domain-specific levels; 2) how much personal standards and evaluative concerns perfectionism vary between domains and how this variability is related to well-being. Students (N=580) selected four important domains and completed surveys on domain and general perfectionism and well-being. In multilevel analyses (with n=2320 domains), perfectionism was related to well-being outcomes similarly at the trait and domain-level. There was more variability across domains in personal standards than in evaluative concerns perfectionism. Variability in personal standards perfectionism was positively related to depression. Overall, results suggest that examining perfectionism within multiple personally-relevant domains can better explain how perfectionism influences well-being. Further research needs to examine perfectionism with this multi-level approach.
Dispositional disinhibition and alcohol use disorders: Personality, risk appraisal and problematic alcohol consumption
Authors: Satchell Liam , Johnson Henry , Hudson Charlotte A. , Harper Craig
Published: July 2018

Background: The relationship between psychopathic personality and problematic alcohol consumption could be important for understanding risk and potential interventions. This existing work on psychopathy and alcohol abuse is typically conducted in criminal and hospitalised populations and little attention has been paid to investigating the general populations’ psychopathic personality and problematic consumption of alcohol. The psychopathy-focused Triarchic Psychopathy Measure (TriPM) and the more general Reinforcement Sensitivity Theory of personality (RST) focus on individual differences related to low self-control and sensation seeking, and could relate to problematic alcohol consumption in non-forensic samples. The current study brings together RST and psychopathic personality traits to predict alcohol use disorders. We hypothesise that impulsivity and anxiety predict problematic alcohol consumption and related risk appraisal.Methods: We analysed data from a sample of 349 general population participants who had completed measures of the TriPM, RST, alcohol use disorders (AUDIT) and their perceived negative outcomes of high risk behaviour with the Cognitive Appraisal of Risky Events (CARE) measure.Results: We find some evidence that TriPM’s disinhibition and RST’s anxious personality traits relate to AUDIT scores. We find limited evidence that personality traits predict the negative appraisal of risky events, but alcohol use was related to increased perceptions of the negative outcomes of alcohol consumption.Conclusions: Overall this study shows that individual differences do relate to problematic alcohol consumption but not the appraisal of risks related to alcohol consumption. This has implications for the structuring of intervention for those at risk of problematic consumption of alcohol.
Bicycle helmet law does not deter cyclists in Finland
Authors: Radun Igor , Olivier Jake
Published: July 2018

Objective: Bicycle helmet legislation (BHL) in Finland went into effect in January 2003 and applies to cyclists of all ages. There are no mechanisms to fine cyclists riding without a helmet; however, helmet wearing rates are 64% in Helsinki and 42% across Finland. Our aim was to assess the impact of BHL on cycling in Finland. Methods: We used data from the 1998/1999, 2004/2005 and 2010/2011 Finnish National Travel Surveys. Results: Data across three surveys suggests cycling has declined from before to after BHL. In a 2004/2005 survey, however, only 0.063% (95% CI: 0.02-0.10%) of responders identified helmet use as their most important obstacle to cycling. Conclusion: It is unlikely BHL is a causal factor in the downward trend in Finnish cycling. Lack of cycling infrastructure and concerns for safety are much more common reasons given.
Input variability and learner age in L2 vocabulary learning (submitted 2018)
Authors: Sinkeviciute Ruta , Brown Helen , Brekelmans Gwen , Wonnacott Elizabeth
Published: July 2018

Input variability is key in many aspects of linguistic learning, yet variability increases input complexity, which may cause difficulty in some learning contexts. The current work investigates this trade-off by comparing speaker variability effects on L2 vocabulary learning in different age-groups. Existing literature suggests that speaker variability benefits L2 vocabulary learning in adults, but this may not be the case for younger learners. In this study, native English-speaking adults, 7-8 year-olds, and 10-11 year-olds learned six novel Lithuanian words from a single speaker, and six from eight speakers. In line with previous research, adults showed better production of the multi-speaker items at test. No such benefit was found for either group of children either in production or comprehension. Children also had greater difficulties in processing multiple-speaker cues during training. We conclude that age-related capacity limitations may constrain the ability to utilize speaker variability when learning words in a new language.
Deep Down My Enemy is Good: Thinking About the True Self Reduces Intergroup Bias
Authors: De Freitas Julian , Cikara Mina
Published: July 2018

Intergroup bias — preference for one’s in-group relative to out-groups — is one of the most robust phenomena in all of psychology. Here we investigate whether a positive bias that operates at the individual-level, belief in a good true self, may be leveraged to reduce intergroup bias. We find that even stereotypically threatening out-group agents are believed to have a good true self (Experiment 1). More importantly, consideration of in-group and out- group members’ true self reduces intergroup bias, both in the form of explicit evaluative judgments (Experiment 2) and actual donation behavior (Experiment 3). Across studies, the palliative effects of thinking of an individual’s true self generalize to that individual’s entire group. In sum, a simple intervention — thinking about another’s true self — reduces the gap in how people evaluate and treat out-group relative to in-group members. We discuss implications of these findings for conflict reduction strategies.
PPS submission "Am I Famous Yet" - Shiota
Authors: Shiota Michelle N.
Published: July 2018

To be famous is to be widely known, and honored for one’s achievements. The process by which researchers achieve fame or eminence is skewed by heuristics that influence visibility; implications of these heuristics are magnified by a snowball effect, in which current fame leads to bias in ostensibly objective metrics of merit, including the distribution of resources that support future excellence. This effect may disproportionately hurt women and minorities, who struggle with both external and internalized implicit biases regarding competence and worth. While some solutions to this problem are available, they will not address the deeper problems of defining what it means for research to “make a difference” in our field and in society, and consistently holding our work to that criterion.
Integrating Visual and Bayesian Statistical Analyses in Single Case Experimental Research to Evaluate the Effectiveness and Magnitude of a Comprehensive Behavioral Intervention
Authors: Natesan Prathiba , Mehta Smita
Published: July 2018

Single case experimental designs (SCEDs) have become an indispensable methodology where randomized control trials may be impossible or even inappropriate. However, the nature of SCED data presents challenges for both visual and statistical analyses. Small sample sizes, autocorrelations, data types, and design types render many parametric statistical analyses and maximum likelihood approaches ineffective. The presence of autocorrelation decreases interrater reliability in visual analysis. The purpose of the present study is to demonstrate a newly developed model called the Bayesian unknown change-point (BUCP) model which overcomes all the above-mentioned data analytic challenges. This is the first study to formulate and demonstrate rate ratio effect size for autocorrelated data, which has remained an open question in SCED research until now. This expository study also compares and contrasts the results from BUCP model with visual analysis, and rate ratio effect size with nonoverlap of all pairs (NAP) effect size. Data from a comprehensive behavioral intervention are used for the demonstration.
Pragmatic Nihilism: How a Theory of Nothing Can Help Health Psychology Progress
Authors: Peters Gjalt - Jorn Ygram , Crutzen Rik
Published: July 2018

Health psychology aims to explain and change a wide variety of behaviours, and to this end has developed a plethora of theories. Several attempts have been undertaken to build integrative theories, and some even strive for a Theory of Everything. We argue against these efforts, arguing that instead, adopting a stance that may be called ‘pragmatic nihilism’ is more fruitful in the endeavour to understand and change specific health behaviours.The first tenet of pragmatic nihilism is that psychological variables, those defined in our health psychology theories, are usefully considered as metaphors rather than referring to entities that exist in the mind. As a consequence, the second tenet emphasizes theories’ definitions and guidelines for the operationalisation of those variables. The third tenet of pragmatic nihilism is that each operationalisation represents a cross section of a variety of dimensions, such as behavioural specificity and duration of the behaviour, and most importantly, psychological aggregation level. Any operationalisation thus represents a number of implicit or explicit choices regarding these dimensions.These three tenets of pragmatic nihilism have two implications. First, they provide a foundation that enables integrating theories in a more flexible and accurate manner than made possible by integrative theories. Second, this perspective emphasizes the importance of operationalisations, underlining the importance of investing in the careful development of measurement instruments, and thorough and extensive reporting of the specifics and performance on those measurement instruments as well as disclosure of the instruments themselves.
Classifiers as Count Syntax: Individuation and Measurement in the Acquisition of Mandarin
Authors: Li Peggy , Barner David , Huang Becky H.
Published: July 2018

The distinction between mass nouns (e.g., butter) and count nouns (e.g.,table) offers a test case for asking how the syntax and semantics ofnatural language are related, and how children exploit syntax-semanticsmappings when acquiring language. Virtually no studies have examined thisdistinction in classifier languages (e.g., Mandarin Chinese) due to thewidespread assumption that such languages lack mass-count syntax. However,Cheng and Sybesma (1998) argue that Mandarin encodes the mass-count at theclassifier level: classifiers can be categorized as “mass-classifiers” or“count-classifiers.” Mass and count classifiers differ in semanticinterpretation and occur in different syntactic constructions. The currentstudy is first an empirical test of Cheng and Sybesma’s hypothesis, andsecond, a test of the acquisition of putative mass and count classifiers bychildren learning Mandarin. Experiments 1 and 2 asked whethercount-classifiers select individuals and whether mass classifiers selectportions of stuff or groups of individual things. Adult Mandarin-speakersindeed showed this pattern of interpretation, while 4- to 6-year-olds hadnot fully mastered the distinction. Experiment 3 tested participants’syntactic sensitivity by asking them to match two syntactic constructions(one that supported the mass or portion reading and one that did not) totwo contrasting choices (a portion of an object and a whole object). Adevelopmental trend in syntactic knowledge was observed: adults were nearperfect and the older children were more likely than the younger childrento correctly match the contrasting phrases to their correspondingreferents. Thus, in three experiments we find support for Cheng andSybesma’s analysis, but also that children master the syntax and semanticsof Mandarin classifiers much later than English-speaking children acquireknowledge of the English mass-count distinction.
Moral Values Coding Guide
Authors: Hoover Joseph , Johnson-Grey Kate M , Dehghani Morteza , Graham Jesse
Published: July 2018

This guide is intended to be a manual for coding the moral content of natural languagedocuments and a record of the USC Computational Social Science and Virtue Ideologyand Morality labs’ protocol for coding the moral content of social media and othertexts. The general goal is for this guide to be a self-contained manual that can be usedfor training research assistants and establishing common practices for the identificationand labeling of morally relevant sentiment in natural language. It currently includes anintroduction to coding sentiment according to the Moral Foundations Theoryframework.
Affective Recognition for Multimedia Environments A Review
Authors: Moghimi Mohammadhossein , Stone Robert , Rotshtein Pia
Published: July 2018

Detecting emotional responses in multimedia environments is an academically and technologically challenging research issue. In the domain of Affective Computing, from non-interactive and static stimuli (e.g. affective image) to highly interactive and dynamic environments (affective virtual realities), researchers have employed a wide range of affective stimuli to measure and interpret human psychological and physiological emotional behaviours. Various psychophysiological parameters (e.g. Electroencephalography, Galvanic Skin Response, Heart Rate, etc.) have been employed and investigated, in order to detect and quantify human affective states. In this paper, we present a detailed literature review of over 33 affective computing studies, undertaken since 1993. All aspects of these studies (stimuli type, pre-processing, windowing, features, classification technique, etc.) have been reported in detail. We believe that this paper not only summarises the breadth of research over the past 20 years, but also serves to clarify various significant aspects and details of this increasingly valuable and relevant research area.
The Cognitive Reflection Test is robust to multiple exposures
Authors: Bialek Michal , Pennycook Gordon
Published: July 2018

The Cognitive Reflection Test (CRT) is a widely used measure of the propensity to engage in analytic or deliberative reasoning in lieu of gut feelings or intuitions. CRT problems are unique because they reliably cue intuitive but incorrect responses and, therefore, appear simple among those who do poorly. By virtue of being comprised of so-called “trick-problems” that, in theory, could be discovered as such, it is commonly held that the predictive validity of the CRT is undermined by prior experience with the task. Indeed, recent studies show that people who have previous experience with the CRT score higher on the test. Naturally, however, it is not obvious that this actually undermines the predictive validity of the test. Across six studies with ~2500 participants and seventeen variables of interest (e.g., religious belief, bullshit receptivity, smartphone usage, susceptibility to heuristics and biases, numeracy), we did not find a single case where the predictive power of the CRT was significantly undermined by repeated exposure. This was despite the fact that we replicated the previously reported increase in accuracy among individuals who report previous experience with the CRT. We speculate that the CRT remains robust after multiple exposures because less reflective (more intuitive) individuals fail to realize that being presented with apparently easy problems more than once confers information about the tasks’ actual difficulty.
Serial dependence in timing perception
Authors: Roseboom Warrick
Published: July 2018

Recent sensory history affects subsequent experience. Behavioural results have demonstrated this effect in two forms: repeated exposure to the same sensory input produces negative after-effects wherein sensory stimuli like that previously experienced are judged as less like the exposed stimulation, while singular exposures can produce positive after-effects wherein judgements are more like previously experienced stimulation. For timing perception, there is controversy regarding the influence of recent exposure - both singular and repeated exposure produce apparently negative after-effects - often referred to as temporal recalibration and rapid temporal recalibration, respectively. While negative after-effects have been found following repeated exposure for all timing tasks, following a single exposure, they have only been demonstrated using synchrony judgements (SJ). Here, we examine the influence of a single presentation – serial dependence for timing – for standard timing tasks: SJ, temporal order judgements (TOJ), and magnitude estimation judgements (MJ). We found that serial dependence produced apparently negative after-effects in SJ, but positive after-effects in TOJ and MJ. We propose that these findings, and those following repeated exposure, can be reconciled within a framework wherein negative after-effects occur at sensory layers, consistent with classical depictions of sensory adaptation, and Bayesian-like positive after-effects operating across different, higher, decision levels. These findings are consistent with the after-effects known from other perceptual dimensions and provide a general framework for interpreting positive (serial dependence) and negative (sensory adaptation) after-effects across different tasks.
Lexical predictability during natural reading: Effects of surprisal and entropy reduction
Authors: Lowder Matthew , Choi Wonil , Ferreira Fernanda , Henderson John
Published: July 2018

What are the effects of word-by-word predictability on sentence processing times during the natural reading of a text? Although information-complexity metrics such as surprisal and entropy reduction have been useful in addressing this question, these metrics tend to be estimated using computational language models, which require some degree of commitment to a particular theory of language processing. Taking a different approach, the current study implemented a large-scale cumulative cloze task to collect word-by-word predictability data for 40 passages and compute surprisal and entropy reduction values in a theory-neutral manner. A separate group of participants read the same texts while their eye movements were recorded. Results showed that increases in surprisal and entropy reduction were both associated with increases in reading times. Further, these effects did not depend on the global difficulty of the text. The findings suggest that surprisal and entropy reduction independently contribute to variation in reading times, as these metrics seem to capture different aspects of lexical predictability.
Who is Prejudiced, and Towards Whom? The Big Five Traits and Generalized Prejudice
Authors: Crawford Jarret , Brandt Mark John
Published: July 2018

Meta-analyses show that low levels of Openness and Agreeableness correlate with generalized prejudice. However, previous studies narrowly assessed prejudice toward low status, disadvantaged groups. Using a broad operationalization of generalized prejudice towards a heterogeneous array of targets, we sought to answer two questions: a) Are some types of people prejudiced against most types of groups, and b) Are some types of people prejudiced against certain types of groups? Across four samples (N = 7,543), Openness was very weakly related to broad generalized prejudice, r = -.03, 95%CI [-.07, -.001], whereas low Agreeableness was reliably associated with broad generalized prejudice (r = -.23, 95%CI [-.31, -.16]). When target characteristics moderated relationships between Big Five traits and prejudice, they implied that perceiver-target dissimilarity on personality traits explain prejudice. Importantly, the relationship between Agreeableness and prejudice remained robust across target groups, suggesting it is the personality trait orienting people toward (dis)liking of others.
Word Senses
Authors: Rabagliati Hugh , Srinivasan Mahesh
Published: July 2018

Across languages, most frequent words are also highly ambiguous, and carry multiple distinct but related senses of meaning. This chapter aims to explain why words have the particular senses that they do, discussing to what degree word senses are arbitrary cultural conventions or reflections of how speakers conceptualize the world around them. The chapter reviews theoretical proposals about the nature of word senses drawn from linguistics and psychology, and evaluates these proposals against a large recent body of experimental work on the topic. Finally, the chapter suggests that word senses reflect a balance between two communicative pressures: A pressure toward facilitating fast and efficient conversational exchanges, and one toward making languages easier for children to learn.
Nature’s Broken Path to Restoration. A Critical Look at Attention Restoration Theory
Authors: Joye Yannick , Dewitte Siegfried
Published: July 2018

Over the past three decades, a growing body of environmental psychology research has demonstrated that interacting with natural environments – and especially greenspace – can have beneficial psychological effects on human individuals. One influential and widely-cited theoretical account to explain such effects is Attention Restoration Theory (ART). ART zooms in on the cognitive benefits nature can yield, and assumes that when an individual’s ability to concentrate or direct attention has become depleted, then nature is well-equipped to replenish this capacity. Nature’s restorative potential is thought to especially derive from its soft fascinating characteristics; these can put an individual in an effortless mode of attention, thereby giving directed attention a relative opportunity to rest and replenish itself. Although ART has been highly influential in the field of restoration studies and continues to inspire health promotion interventions, with the current paper we aim to show that the framework has important empirical and conceptual shortcomings. We specifically aim to show (a) that some of ART’s principal theoretical notions are vague (e.g., soft fascination), have remained underdeveloped, and lack a clear operationalization, (b) that the framework has failed to (adequately) test its main theoretical predictions (i.e., that nature effects are recovery effects), and (c) that there is currently little support for the ART-based assumption that restoration is – or derives from – an ancient evolved adaptive response. We conclude our paper with discussing four outstanding questions for ART, and make methodological suggestions that could potentially address some of ART’s current shortcomings.
A Self-Regulatory Framework for Message Framing
Authors: Cesario Joseph , Corker Katherine S. , Jelinek Sara
Published: July 2018

After several decades of research on message framing, there is still no clear and consistentanswer to the question of when emphasizing positive or negative outcomes in a persuasive message will be most effective. Whereas early framing research considered the type of recommended behavior (health-affirming vs. illness-detection) to be the determining factor, more recent research has looked to individual differences to answer this question. In this paper, we incorporate both approaches under a single framework. The framework describes the multiple self-regulatory levels at which a message can be framed and predicts when framing at each level will be most effective. Two central predictions were confirmed across four studies: (1) messages describing the pleasures of adhering to the recommended behavior are most effective for recipients in a promotion focus (who are concerned with meeting growth needs), whereas messages describing the pains of not adhering are most effective for recipients in a prevention focus (who are concerned with meeting safety needs), and (2) the content of an advocacy message is essential, as different topics induce different regulatory orientations. By showing that different message content can induce a promotion or prevention focus, past findings and theories can be accommodated within the proposed framework, and a single set of self-regulatory principles can be used to understand message framing.
An empirical validation of the Quadruple Process Model of implicit attitudes against alternate, theoretically defensible specifications.
Authors: Calanchini Jimmy , Sherman Jeff , Klauer Karl Christoph , Ferrer Emilio
Published: July 2018

The Quadruple process (Quad) model is a multinomial processing tree that specifies the joint contribution of four qualitatively distinct cognitive processes to responses on implicit measures. The way in which these processes interact to drive responses was initially specified according to theory, and the construct validity of this specification of the model has been demonstrated across a wide variety of studies. However, there are other theoretically-defensible ways in which these processes might interact. The purpose of the present research was to compare the standard version of the Quad model against alternate specifications in order to determine which model best fits data from the Implicit Association Test. Three different versions of the Quad model were applied to very large samples of real participants’ data across three content domains: racial attitudes, sexual orientation attitudes, and gender stereotypes. The standard model provided best fit for racial attitudes and gender stereotype data. However, other versions of the model provided equivalent fit to sexual orientation attitudes data. Taken together, these analyses indicate that the standard version of the Quad model provides best fit to data from the Implicit Association Test in general, but that alternate specifications may be appropriate for some content domains and participant populations.
Illusion of political tolerance
Authors: Brown-Iannuzzi Jazmin Lati , Najle Maxine Belén , Gervais Will M
Published: July 2018

Tolerance for diversity in America is often indexed by direct measures, such as self-reported “willingness to vote” polls. Yet, pressures to be or appear unprejudiced may bias such estimates, yielding misleading and overly optimistic inferences about tolerance in America. The current research investigated the degree to which direct and indirect measures of political candidate preferences converge and diverge across six target groups varying in acceptability of stigmatization (atheists, African Americans, Catholics, gay men and lesbians, Muslims, and women) and across relevant participant demographics. Overall, participants (N = 3000, nationally representative) reported less willingness to vote for target groups when measured indirectly, relative to directly. Additionally, the divergence between direct and indirect measures was especially evident for social groups for which overt stigmatization is normatively inappropriate. This research provides a vital benchmark that quantifies the gulf between direct and indirect measures of tolerance for various oft-stigmatized groups in America.
Identity Development
Authors: McLean Kate C. , Syed Moin
Published: July 2018

Identity development is a critical psychosocial task with relevance across the lifespan, but which plays a central role in adolescence and emerging adulthood. Broadly, identity development involves constructing an understanding of who one is, and how one came to be that person; that is, identity is an understanding of self that is integrated and coherent across time and context. Successful management of this developmental task facilitates psychological health, the ability to connect with others, and the ability to contribute to one’s society.
Desirable difficulties during the development of active inquiry skills
Authors: Kachergis George , Rhodes Marjorie , Gureckis Todd Matthew
Published: July 2018

This study explores developmental changes in the ability to ask informative questions, hypothesizing a link between the ability to update beliefs in light of evidence and the ability to ask informative questions. Five- to ten-year-old children played an iPad game asking them to identify a hidden insect. Learners could either ask about individual insects, or make a series of feature queries (e.g., “Does the hidden insect have antennae?”) that could more efficiently narrow the hypothesis space. Critically, the task display either helped children integrate evidence with the hypothesis space or required them to perform this operation themselves. Our prediction was that assisting children with belief updating would help them formulate more informative queries. Although this assistance improved some aspects of their active inquiry behavior, children required to update their own beliefs asked questions that were more context-sensitive and thus informative. The results show how making a task more difficult may actually improve children’s active inquiry skills, thus illustrating a type of “desirable difficulty” for reasoning.
Advancing the Cultural Study of Personality and Identity: Models, Methods, and Outcomes
Authors: Syed Moin
Published: July 2018

Personality and identity are overlapping but distinct constructs. This article describes the three-level model of personality and, specifically, how identity fits within it. Importantly, identity operates at multiple levels of personality, depending on whether the focus is on domain-specific identity development processes or the integrated life story on a broad scale. The strength of the three level model of personality is then described with respect to a) how it provides an ideal framework for cultural psychological inquiries into universality and specificity, b) how it is well-suited for mixed methods research that combines quantitative and qualitative methods, and c) how different levels of personality may be related to psychological outcomes.
On the Diagnosticity of Motyl et al. (in press).
Authors: Motyl Matt , Skitka Linda , Demos Alexander Pantelis
Published: July 2018

This is our response to Uri Simonsohn, Joe Simmons, and Leif Nelson's critique of Motyl et al. (in press, JPSP).
What causes failure to apply the Pigeonhole Principle in simple reasoning problems?
Authors: Mercier Hugo , Politzer Guy , Sperber
Published: July 2018

The Pigeonhole Principle states that if n items are sorted into m categories and if n > m, then at least one category must contain more than one item. For instance if 22 pigeons are put into 17 pigeonholes, at least one pigeonhole must contain more than one pigeon. This principle seems very intuitive, yet when asked a question about, for instance, a city with 220,000 inhabitants who all have hair, and told that no inhabitant has more than 170,000 hairs, many people think that it is merely likely that two inhabitants have the exact same number of hair on their head. We investigate two potential causes for this failure to apply the Pigeonhole Principle: that it is due to the large numbers used, or to the cardinal representations of these numbers replacing a nominal representation. By varying both factors, we show that performance improved both when the numbers were presented nominally, and when they are small, albeit less so. We discuss potential interpretations of these results in terms of intuition and reasoning.
Origins of the Belief in Good True Selves
Authors: De Freitas Julian , Cikara Mina , Grossmann Igor , Schlegel Rebecca Jean
Published: July 2018

Despite differences in beliefs about the self across cultures and relevant individual differences, recent evidence suggests that people universally believe in a ‘true self’ that is morally good. We propose that this belief arises from a general tendency: psychological essentialism.
The Joint Contributions of Maternal Depression and Infant Negative Emotionality to Maternal Sensitivity to Infant Distress
Authors: Cecil Charlotte A. M. , Pickles Andrew , Hill Jonathan , Sharp Helen
Published: July 2018

Little is known about the role of infant emotionality and its interplay with maternal depression in the prediction of maternal sensitivity and whether these emotion-laden processes in mother and infant may be particularly relevant to sensitivity to distress. We studied 260 first time mothers and their infants, recruited into a general population prospective study during pregnancy. Infant negative emotionality was assessed at 5 weeks using the Neonatal Behavioral Assessment. At 29 weeks maternal sensitivity was observed and mothers were interviewed for DSM Major Depressive episodes since birth. Controlling for potential confounders, neither maternal depression nor infant negative emotionality independently predicted maternal sensitivity, but the interaction between them was statistically significant (p = .01). Increasing infant negative emotionality predicted decreasing maternal sensitivity to distress, only in mothers who experienced an episode of Major Depressive Disorder during the postnatal period. This effect was not seen for sensitivity to non-distress, although the test of the difference between the effects was not statistically significant (p = .07). Maternal postnatal depression may create an affective and cognitive vulnerability to the effects of frequent intense infant negative emotions. These findings have implications for our understanding of psychological processes underlying parental sensitivity, and hence for early interventions.
A geometric framework for modeling dynamic decisions among arbitrarily many alternatives
Authors: Kvam Peter D.
Published: July 2018

Multiple-choice and continuous-response tasks pose a number of challenges for models of the decision process, from empirical challenges like context effects to computational demands imposed by choice sets with a large number of outcomes. This paper develops a general framework for constructing models of the cognitive processes underlying both inferential and preferential choice among any arbitrarily large number of alternatives. This geometric approach represents the alternatives in a choice set along with a decision maker's beliefs or preferences in a ``decision space,'' simultaneously capturing the support for different alternatives along with the similarity relations between the alternatives in the choice set. Support for the alternatives (represented as vectors) shifts over time according to the dynamics of the belief / preference state (represented as a point) until a stopping rule is met (state crosses a hyperplane) and the corresponding selection is made. I review stopping rules that guarantee optimality in multi-alternative inferential choice, minimizing response time for a desired level of accuracy, as well as methods for constructing the decision space, which can result in context effects when applied to preferential choice.
Severity and susceptibility: measuring the perceived effectiveness and believability of tobacco health warnings
Authors: Maynard Olivia M
Published: July 2018

Background: Pictorial tobacco health warning labels (HWLs) have been shown to be more effective than text-only HWLs in changing smoking attitudes and intentions. However, there is contradictory evidence regarding how the severity of the content of HWLs influences responses to them. Methods: We examined the perceived believability and effectiveness of HWLs in an online study using a convenience sample of non-smokers (N = 437) and smokers (N = 436). HWLs were in one of three formats: (text-only, a moderately severe image or highly severe image) and focussed on three disease outcomes (lung cancer, blindness or tooth and gum disease). Participants rated the effectiveness and believability of each HWL and also rated their perceived susceptibility to each disease. Results: The most severe pictorial HWLs received the highest believability and effectiveness ratings and as expected, the text-only HWLs received the lowest. Lung cancer HWLs were rated most believable and effective, with the blindness HWLs receiving the lowest scores. Smokers considered themselves to be more susceptible to all three diseases, and among smokers, perceived susceptibility to the diseases was positively correlated with effectiveness and believability ratings of the HWLs.Conclusion: Our findings support previous evidence that pictorial HWLs are rated as more effective and believable than text-only warnings, and provide some support for the use of severe or ‘grotesque’ HWLs on tobacco products. Our data also suggest that HWLs should aim to increase perceived susceptibility to disease, as this was positively related to perceived message effectiveness and believability.
Goal Motivation and the Subjective Perception of Past and Future Obstacles
Authors: Leduc-Cummings Isabelle , Milyavskaya Marina , Peetz Johanna
Published: July 2018

Want-to (vs. have-to) motivation has been found to lead to more successful goal attainment and reports of fewer obstacles. However, to date, only correlational research has been conducted. The present research experimentally examines the effects of motivation on the subjective perception of the frequency and disruptiveness of obstacles, and explores whether the results differ based on time (past vs. future obstacles). In four studies, participants were randomly assigned to want-to or have-to motivation for the goal of eating healthy and reported on the frequency and disruptiveness of obstacles encountered in the past week or anticipated in the coming week. Time moderated the effect of motivation such that want-to motivation led to the perception of fewer and less disruptive obstacles, but only for future (not past) obstacles. The possible reasons for this discrepancy, and the implications for the relationship between want-to motivation and goal pursuit are discussed.
Zooming into Real-Life Extraversion – How Personality and Situation Shape Sociability in Social Interactions
Authors: Breil Simon Mats , Geukes Katharina , Wilson Robert Edmund , Nestler Steffen , Vazire Simine , Back Mitja
Published: July 2018

Here, we provide you with supplemental material (additional tables, data, R-Codes) and a Preprint to the manuscript "Zooming into Real-Life Extraversion - How Personality and Context Shape Sociability in Social Interactions" by Breil et al. (under review). Abstract:What predicts sociable behavior? While main effects of personality and situation characteristics on sociability are well established, the determinants of sociable behavior within real-life social interactions are understudied. Moreover, although such effects are often hypothesized, there is to date little evidence of person-situation interaction effects. Finally, previous research focused on self-reported behavior ratings, and less is known on the partner’s social perspective, i.e. how partners perceive and influence an actor’s behavior. In the current research we investigated predictors of sociable behavior in real-life social interactions across social perspectives, including person and situation main effects as well as person-situation interaction effects. In two experience-sampling studies (Study 1: N = 394, US, time-based; Study 2: N = 124, Germany, event-based), we assessed personality traits with self- and informant reports, self-reported sociable behavior during real-life social interaction, and corresponding information on the situation (dimensional ratings of situation characteristics and categorical situation classifications). In Study 2, we additionally assessed interaction partner-reported behavior. Multilevel analyses provided consistent evidence for main effects of personality and situation features, and for person-situation interaction effects. First, extraverts acted more sociable in general. Second, individuals behaved more sociable in hedonic/positive/low-duty situations (vs. eudaimonic/negative/high-duty situations). Third, the latter was particularly true for extraverts. Further specific interaction effects were found for the other social perspectives. These results are discussed regarding the complex interplay of persons and situations in shaping human behavior.
A framework for psychological interventions in Autism Spectrum Disorder
Authors: Diederich Joachim
Published: July 2018

Psychological interventions for autism spectrum disorder (ASD) aim at shaping behaviour by use of classical or instrumental conditioning or try to address co-morbid mental health conditions by use of cognitive behaviour therapy or other approaches. Few psychological interventions directly address deficits in ASD such as social communication issues or repetitive behaviours. The objective here is to provide a framework for psychological interventions that directly address core deficits within the spectrum and also help with mental health and behavioural issues closely associated with it. From a research perspective, the framework allows the identification of gaps where additional psychological techniques are required and facilitates strategies for empirical research. For the clinical practitioner, a structure for psychological interventions is provided in order to facilitate the search for treatment options.