Development processes in social inference: Averaging of intentions and consequences in moral judgment.

Conducted 2 experiments wih 53 kindergartners, 33 1st graders, 12 5th and 6th graders, and 19 adults to test the applicability of N. H. Anderson's (see record 1971-24805-001) relative-weight averaging model to children's judgments based on intentions and consequences. Exp I provided support for the model over a wide age range (kindergarten through adult) using stimuli similar to J. Piaget's (1965) in which the intentions ranged from positive to negative and the consequences ranged from neutral to negative. Exp II extended Exp I by including consequences ranging from positive to negative. In Exp II, intentions and consequences interacted suggesting that some modification of the assumptions of the averaging model is necessary to fully account for the data. Data from the 2 experiments suggest that both intentions and consequences influence judgments at all ages examined and that developmental changes in moral judgments are continuous rather than stagelike. These developmental differences can best be described by changes in the weights of intentions and consequences. The major developmental change appears to be a decrease in the weight of consequences with increasing age. The possibility of using algebraic models to describe the results of studies that have attempted to influence the relative importance of intentions and consequences in children's moral judgments is discussed. (16 ref) (PsycINFO Database Record (c) 2010 APA, all rights reserved)     

Group decisions as social inference heuristics.

Three experiments investigated whether people use group decision outcomes as heuristic cues to judge group members' attitudes. In Experiment 1, Ss read a vignette in which a group's decision either was explicitly stated or in which Ss were compelled to infer the decision from other relevant information. It was hypothesized that Ss would be more likely to use the group decision outcome as an inference heuristic when the outcome was provided for them than when they were forced to generate that outcome. The results confirmed our hypothesis. In Experiment 2, a group decision was presented to Ss for whom the decision was either high or low in personal relevance. The results showed that Ss displayed a stronger correspondence bias for group decisions low in personal relevance than for ones high in personal relevance. Moreover, the decision outcome was better remembered over time than other decision-relevant information. Experiment 3 replicated this result for a nondichotomous decision outcome and also found that the more likely Ss were to remember the outcome over time, the more correspondent their inferences became. These and other data are shown to support a heuristic model of the social inference process. (PsycINFO Database Record (c) 2010 APA, all rights reserved)     

Causal inference in randomized experiments with mediational processes.

This article links the structural equation modeling (SEM) approach with the principal stratification (PS) approach, both of which have been widely used to study the role of intermediate posttreatment outcomes in randomized experiments. Despite the potential benefit of such integration, the 2 approaches have been developed in parallel with little interaction. This article proposes the cross-model translation (CMT) approach, in which parameter estimates are translated back and forth between the PS and SEM models. First, without involving any particular identifying assumptions, translation between PS and SEM parameters is carried out on the basis of their close conceptual connection. Monte Carlo simulations are used to further clarify the relation between the 2 approaches under particular identifying assumptions. The study concludes that, under the common goal of causal inference, what makes a practical difference is the choice of identifying assumptions, not the modeling framework itself. The CMT approach provides a common ground in which the PS and SEM approaches can be jointly considered, focusing on their common inferential problems. (PsycINFO Database Record (c) 2010 APA, all rights reserved)     

Social inference processes in juror judgments of multiple-offense trials.

According to law, a defendant may be tried for multiple offenses in a single trial, although the courts intuitively recognize that such "joinder" may be prejudicial. The present study investigated the effects of joinder on jurors' decisions, emphasizing the social psychological mechanisms underlying judgmental biases. 732 representative jurors (aged 18–82 yrs) judged a videotaped trial of a single offense or a joined trial of 3 offenses that varied as a function of (a) charge similarity, (b) evidence similarity, and (c) judges' instructions designed to reduce judgment biases. A defendant was more likely to be convicted on a particular charge in a joined trial than on the same charge tried alone, and judges' instructions were ineffective. Joinder produced confusion of evidence and negative inferences about the defendant, but did not significantly influence perceptions of evidence strength. Defendant and evidence ratings were strongly related to verdicts, whereas confusion was not. Results suggest that the effects of joinder are mediated through inferences about the defendent's criminality. (64 ref) (PsycINFO Database Record (c) 2010 APA, all rights reserved)     

Hypothesis-testing processes in social interaction.

In 4 separate investigations, female undergraduates were provided with hypotheses about the personal attributes of other individuals (targets). Ss then prepared to test these hypotheses (i.e., that their targets were extraverts or that their targets were introverts) by choosing a series of questions to ask their targets in a forthcoming interview. In each investigation, Ss planned to test these hypotheses by preferentially searching for behavioral evidence that would confirm the hypotheses. Moveover, these search procedures channeled social interaction between Ss and targets in ways that caused the targets to provide actual behavioral confirmation for Ss' hypotheses. A theoretical analysis of the psychological processes believed to underlie and generate both the preferential search for hypothesis-confirming behavioral evidence and the interpersonal consequences of hypothesis-testing activities is presented. (15 ref) (PsycINFO Database Record (c) 2010 APA, all rights reserved)     

Cognitive processes in perceived social support.

This article describes 2 studies testing hypotheses that perceived social support operates in part as a cognitive personality construct. Both studies found that perceived support manifested a pattern of correlations more similar to cognitive variables than did support received from the environment and that the relation between perceived support and psychological distress was reduced substantially when the cognitive personality variables were controlled statistically. Study 2 also tested hypotheses generated from schema theory that perceived support would be related to the interpretation and recall of novel supportive behaviors. As predicted, low-perceived-support students interpreted novel supportive behaviors more negatively than high-support students and remembered a lower proportion of behaviors perceived as helpful. (PsycINFO Database Record (c) 2010 APA, all rights reserved)     

The social context of reasoning: Conversational inference and rational judgment.

Social rules governing communication require the listener to go beyond the information given in a message, contrary to the assumption that rational people should operate only on the information explicitly given in judgment tasks. An attributional model of conversational inference is presented that shows how hearers' message interpretations are guided by their perceptions of the speaker. The model is then applied to the analysis of experiments on reasoning processes in cognitive psychology, developmental psychology, social psychology, and decision research. It is shown that the model can predict how experimental manipulations of relevant source and message attributes affect respondents' judgments. Failure to recognize the role of conversational assumptions in governing inference processes can lead rational responses to be misclassified as errors and their source misattributed to cognitive shortcomings in the decision maker. (PsycINFO Database Record (c) 2010 APA, all rights reserved)     

Attributional and social comparison processes in depression.

In this study we examined the consequences for depressed and nondepressed individuals of receiving comparison feedback regarding their causal understanding of an event. Specifically, the effects of similar, dissimilar, or no-comparison feedback on depressed and nondepressed subjects' evaluations of the comparison other and on their feelings about themselves were investigated. Because the reduction of uncertainty about one's conception of social reality is a major motive underlying social-comparison processes, we expected that depressed individuals, who are assumed to have experienced heightened uncertainty associated with frequent exposure to uncontrollable life events, would be more motivated to engage in social comparison and would be more sensitive to social-comparison feedback. Results generally were consistant with this reasoning. The implications of the results in terms of the development and maintenance of depression were discussed. (PsycINFO Database Record (c) 2010 APA, all rights reserved)     

Depressives'' future-event schemas and the social inference process

Atrial fibrillation (AF) is the most common, sustained, symptomatic tachyarrhythmia that clinicians are called upon to manage. Management strategies include ventricular rate control coupled with anticoagulation, versus restoration and maintenance of sinus rhythm. Rate control may be achieved pharmacologically, with agents that impair AV nodal conduction directly and/or by increasing parasympathetic/sympathetic balance, or by modifying or ablating the AV nodal region anatomically. Rhythm control may be achieved by electrical or pharmacologic conversion followed by maintenance of sinus rhythm by pharmacologic (or occasionally ablative) therapies. This article will present current approaches to rate and rhythm control issues in atrial fibrillation. Parts 1 and 2, published previously, dealt with rate control and with the restoration of sinus rhythm. Part 3, the current article, details the selection process of choosing a therapy to maintain sinus rhythm, including the likelihood of success, the risks of therapy, and individualization of therapy as dependent upon the nature of the structural heart disease present. It also discusses nonpharmacologic approaches that have been recently developed or are undergoing development. One suggested drug selection algorithm is provided.     

Text comprehension after brain injury: Left prefrontal lesions affect inference processes.

Comprehending language in context requires inferencing, particularly for the establishment of local coherence. In the neurolinguistic literature, an inference deficit after right hemisphere brain damage has been postulated, but clinical observation and imaging data suggest that left-frontal lesions might also result in inference deficits. In the present experiment, 25 nonaphasic patients performed a coherence judgment task requiring them to indicate a pragmatic connection between 2 successively presented sentences. Patients with left-temporal or right-frontal lesions performed the task well. In contrast, patients with left- and bifrontal lesions exhibited the most severe deficit. Both error rates and response times were elevated for coherent trials as compared with incoherent trials. These results confirm that the left-frontal lobe contributes to inference processes. (PsycINFO Database Record (c) 2010 APA, all rights reserved)     

Component social support processes: Comments and integration.

Discusses the current interest in psychological and health-protective effects of social support, which is derived from epidemiological and public health models of disease etiology in which environmental resources are seen as reducing risk and vulnerability. Although positive effects for social support have been reported, social support research has not been theory driven, so there is still a lack of basic understanding of how social ties are health protective. Building on prior work of symbolic interactionists, a model is presented that highlights 2 key components of social support: esteem-enhancing appraisals and stress-related interpersonal transactions. The model distinguishes between social activity, the functions served by that activity, and how those functions are perceived and appraised. The model illustrates the hypothesis that social support influences health outcomes through the appraisal process. This suggests that it is not social activity per se that is health protective, but how that activity is perceived and interpreted. (39 ref) (PsycINFO Database Record (c) 2010 APA, all rights reserved)     

Choosing social situations: Two investigations of self-monitoring processes.

In Study 1, 125 undergraduates chose to enter or not to enter a situation that called for behavioral expressions of extraversion, as measured by the Eysenck Personality Inventory. For high-self-monitoring (HSM) Ss, willingness to enter this situation was a direct reflection of the clarity with which the extraverted character of the situation was defined. For low-self-monitoring (LSM) Ss, willingness to enter this situation was related to their personal dispositions within the domain of extraversion and introversion. In Study 2 (234 Ss), Ss were assigned to a situation and were allowed to indicate how the situation might be changed to make them more willing to enter it. The transformed situations of HSM Ss were relatively clearly defined. The transformed situations of LSM Ss were relatively congruent with their own extraverted or introverted dispositions. The processes by which HSM and LSM Ss facilitated the enactment of their characteristic behavioral orientations are discussed. (15 ref) (PsycINFO Database Record (c) 2010 APA, all rights reserved)     

Comparison processes in social judgment: Mechanisms and consequences.

This article proposes an informational perspective on comparison consequences in social judgment. It is argued that to understand the variable consequences of comparison, one has to examine what target knowledge is activated during the comparison process. These informational underpinnings are conceptualized in a selective accessibility model that distinguishes 2 fundamental comparison processes. Similarity testing selectively makes accessible knowledge indicating target-standard similarity, whereas dissimilarity testing selectively makes accessible knowledge indicating target-standard dissimilarity. These respective subsets of target knowledge build the basis for subsequent target evaluations, so that similarity testing typically leads to assimilation whereas dissimilarity testing typically leads to contrast. The model is proposed as a unifying conceptual framework that integrates diverse findings on comparison consequences in social judgment. (PsycINFO Database Record (c) 2010 APA, all rights reserved)     

Social planning and social action do involve psychological processes.

Responds to the comments of J. W. Lounsbury et al (1979) on L. D. Goodstein and I. Sandler's (see record 1979-22507-001) conceptual analysis of community psychology (CP). The conceptual analysis originally offered is defended in its role as a catalyst in the development of new fields such as CP. (PsycINFO Database Record (c) 2010 APA, all rights reserved)     

Self-knowledge and social inference: II. The diagnosticity of cognitive/affective and behavioral data.

Explored the social perceptions of 60 undergraduate observers exposed to tape-recorded interviews in which 20 undergraduate speakers described themselves, either emphasizing past thoughts and feelings, past behaviors, or whatever mix of these speakers perceived as appropriate. Observers' subsequent impressions of speakers were measured using Q-sort ratings and various affective and behavioral predictions, which both speakers and speakers' close friends (n?=?20) had previously completed. It was found that the cognitive/affective interviews produced more accurate social impressions, or at least impressions that were more in accord with speakers' self-assessments prior to the interviews and with the assessments made by their close friends, than did the behavioral or the mixed interviews. This greater congruence was shown to result both from real and from stereotyped accuracy. The relevance of these findings to theory and research on self-perception is discussed. (52 ref) (PsycINFO Database Record (c) 2010 APA, all rights reserved)     

Minority influence: A meta-analytic review of social influence processes.

A meta-analytic review of 97 minority influence experiments evaluated the processes by which sources advocating deviant, minority opinions exert influence. Minority impact was most marked on measures of influence that were private from the source and indirectly related to the content of the appeal and less evident on direct private influence measures and on public measures. This attenuated impact of minorities on direct private and public measures suggests that in response to normative pressures, recipients avoided aligning themselves with a deviant source. Mediator analyses revealed that minorities perceived as especially consistent in the advocacy of their views were especially influential. The relation between normative and informational pressures in the minority influence paradigm was discussed. (PsycINFO Database Record (c) 2010 APA, all rights reserved)     

Self-knowledge and social inference: I. The impact of cognitive/affective and behavioral data.

Two studies investigated the sources of information that people would perceive as diagnostic of self. In Study 1, 40 undergraduates completed a questionnaire in which they rated private thoughts and feelings, other peoples' as well as their own, as far more informative and prototypic of self than overt actions. In Study 2, 48 undergraduate speakers participated in a structured interview during which they revealed either a sample of their past thoughts and feelings, a sample of their past behavior, or a mixture of these 2 types of information to 71 undergraduate observers who watched and listened from behind a 1-way mirror. The interviews offering cognitive/affective revelations were perceived, both by the speakers themselves and by observers, to be more informative than interviews offering behavioral revelations. Analyses from both studies, however, suggest that the tendency to weight cognitive/affective information more heavily than behavioral information may be stronger and more consistent for self-perception than social perception. Study 2, in particular, indicates that speakers made more extreme dispositional inferences based on cognitive/affective interviews, whereas observers did not. Ratings of interpersonal liking closely paralleled ratings of perceived informativeness for the questionnaire responses in Study 1 but not for the responses to explicit revelations of thoughts and feeling vs behavior in Study 2. Sex differences were also observed on several measures. (38 ref) (PsycINFO Database Record (c) 2010 APA, all rights reserved)     

Interpersonal consequences of person perception processes in two social contexts.

Examined whether perceiver-based perceptual processes affect social behavior. Approximately 1,100 undergraduates were exposed to a videotape that portrayed a male or female child interacting with an adult in a playroom. In Study 1, Ss who "saw" the child emit (a) primarily positive behaviors (i.e., Ss who were positively biased), (b) about equal numbers of positive and negative behaviors (i.e., Ss who were accurate), or (c) primarily negative behaviors (i.e., Ss who were negatively biased) then engaged in cooperative task activities with a 7-yr-old child. In Study 2, a subset of these Ss engaged in a discussion with another undergraduate about 3 issues on which they apparently disagreed. Systematic analyses of these interactions suggested that perceptual processes affected social behavior—negatively biased Ss tended to act in a more authoritarian manner in their encounters with the child, whereas positively biased Ss were the least effective in the discussion task. (23 ref) (PsycINFO Database Record (c) 2010 APA, all rights reserved)     

Modeling heterogeneity in social interaction processes using multilevel survival analysis.

More than 15 years ago, survival or hazard regression analyses were introduced to psychology (W. Gardner & W. A. Griffin, 1989; W. A. Griffin & W. Gardner, 1989) as powerful methodological tools for studying real time social interaction processes among dyads. Almost no additional published applications have appeared, although such data are commonly collected and the applicable questions are central to many important theoretical perspectives. To revisit the basic methods, the authors use an example from emotion regulation theory in which the level of child antisocial behavior is hypothesized to be positively associated with the hazard rate of angry emotions and negatively associated with sad, fearful emotions in the face of parental negative behavior (scolding). The authors discuss the limitations of traditional approaches to the analysis of social interaction and demonstrate improvements in the ability to model individual differences now available in existing software. (PsycINFO Database Record (c) 2010 APA, all rights reserved)