Values and assumptions about values and assumptions.

Responds to comments by I. A. M. Nicholson, E. H. McWhirter, D. R. Ramm, and R. N. Sollod (see records 1998-00122-009, 1998-00122-010, 1998-00122-011, and 1998-00122-012) regarding I. Prilleltensky's (see record 1997-04451-002) article on the moral implications of psychological discourse and action. It is stated that these 4 authors, by commenting in a respectful fashion, show that they share the value of mutual understanding and the assumption that the best way to make progress in a discussion is through dialogue rather than moral exclusion. (PsycINFO Database Record (c) 2010 APA, all rights reserved)     

Automatic ethics: The effects of implicit assumptions and contextual cues on moral behavior.

We empirically examine the reflexive or automatic aspects of moral decision making. To begin, we develop and validate a measure of an individual's implicit assumption regarding the inherent morality of business. Then, using an in-basket exercise, we demonstrate that an implicit assumption that business is inherently moral impacts day-to-day business decisions and interacts with contextual cues to shape moral behavior. Ultimately, we offer evidence supporting a characterization of employees as reflexive interactionists: moral agents whose automatic decision-making processes interact with the environment to shape their moral behavior. (PsycINFO Database Record (c) 2010 APA, all rights reserved)     

The unbearable automaticity of being.

What was noted by E. J. Langer (1978) remains true today: that much of contemporary psychological research is based on the assumption that people are consciously and systematically processing incoming information in order to construe and interpret their world and to plan and engage in courses of action. As did Langer, the authors question this assumption. First, they review evidence that the ability to exercise such conscious, intentional control is actually quite limited, so that most of moment-to-moment psychological life must occur through nonconscious means if it is to occur at all. The authors then describe the different possible mechanisms that produce automatic, environmental control over these various phenomena and review evidence establishing both the existence of these mechanisms as well as their consequences for judgments, emotions, and behavior. Three major forms of automatic self-regulation are identified: an automatic effect of perception on action, automatic goal pursuit, and a continual automatic evaluation of one's experience. From the accumulating evidence, the authors conclude that these various nonconscious mental systems perform the lion's share of the self-regulatory burden, beneficently keeping the individual grounded in his or her current environment. (PsycINFO Database Record (c) 2010 APA, all rights reserved)     

The automaticity of emotion recognition.

Evolutionary accounts of emotion typically assume that humans evolved to quickly and efficiently recognize emotion expressions because these expressions convey fitness-enhancing messages. The present research tested this assumption in 2 studies. Specifically, the authors examined (a) how quickly perceivers could recognize expressions of anger, contempt, disgust, embarrassment, fear, happiness, pride, sadness, shame, and surprise; (b) whether accuracy is improved when perceivers deliberate about each expression's meaning (vs. respond as quickly as possible); and (c) whether accurate recognition can occur under cognitive load. Across both studies, perceivers quickly and efficiently (i.e., under cognitive load) recognized most emotion expressions, including the self-conscious emotions of pride, embarrassment, and shame. Deliberation improved accuracy in some cases, but these improvements were relatively small. Discussion focuses on the implications of these findings for the cognitive processes underlying emotion recognition. (PsycINFO Database Record (c) 2010 APA, all rights reserved)     

Hypnotic susceptibility and verbal automaticity: Automatic and strategic processing differences in the Stroop color-naming task.

The original hypothesis of M. Dixon et al (1990) that highly hypnotizable (HH) Ss process words more automatically than do low hypnotizable (LH) Ss was retested in a paradigm that separated strategic from automatic processes in the Stroop color-naming task. The words red and blue preceded a color patch that was red or blue. Ss were told that the word predicted the opposite color 75% of the time. Automatic and strategic processes were assessed by varying interstimulus interval (ISI) between the word and the color patch. Both HH and LH Ss showed significant strategic effects (faster incongruent-trial, color-naming reaction times [RTs] than congruent-trial RTs at ISIs over 400 msec), but only HH Ss showed significant automaticity (significantly faster congruent-trial RTs than incongruent-trial RTs at 16.7 msec, the lowest ISI). (PsycINFO Database Record (c) 2010 APA, all rights reserved)     

Unexamined nonreligious assumptions.

Comments on I. Prilleltensky's (see record 1997-04451-002) discussion of issues in the relation of values to psychotherapy and his proposal of emancipatory communitarian approaches. It is argued that the assumption of agnosticism or atheism within psychology, including the assumption that there should not be a religious or spiritual dimension in emancipatory communitarianism, is unexamined, and no longer needs to be made. (PsycINFO Database Record (c) 2010 APA, all rights reserved)     

Two many assumptions.

Responds to M. Kotkin and C. Daviet"s comments (see record 1999-15532-010) on the present author"s criticisms of the 1994 Consumer Reports study of consumers" views on mental health services (see record 1996-13324-001). Kotkin and Daviet suggested that the present author misrepresented the sampling procedure by using an incorrect percentage rate. The present author argues that both rates are literally correct given the different denominators used. He further comments that a convincing case could be made that neither figure gives a very helpful picture of the use of mental health professionals. (PsycINFO Database Record (c) 2010 APA, all rights reserved)     

An analysis of memory-based theories of automaticity.

Memory-based theories of automaticity predict that performance in a memory search task which is automatic will not require a representation of the memory set in working memory. The information contained in working memory was manipulated by inserting an interference task between the presentation of a memory set and a probe stimulus in a memory search task. The interference task prevented rehearsal, necessitating the retrieval of the memory set from long-term memory in variably mapped (VM) conditions. Performance in consistently mapped (CM) conditions provided strong support for memory-based theories of automaticity. With CM practice, both the effects of memory load and the effect of the interference task were eliminated. Furthermore, there was a temporal coupling in the reduction of these two effects with consistent practice. Monte Carlo simulations of memory-based automaticity predict such a temporal coupling. Automaticity is viewed as a continuum reflecting the relative contribution of the direct memory access of past solutions from long-term memory on performance. (PsycINFO Database Record (c) 2010 APA, all rights reserved)     

The automaticity of interpreting Automaticity.

Comments on J. A. Bargh and T. L. Chartrand's (see record 1999-05760-002) treatise on the pervasiveness of automaticity and its relation to self-regulation. While agreeing with Bargh and Chartrand that people do seem to evidence an automaticity of sorts in many behaviors, the present authors disagree with Bargh and Chartrand's interpretation of that automaticity as an empiricist "mechanism." Bargh and Chartrand failed to note that other interpretations are possible for automaticity. Other interpretations of automaticity, founded on philosophical traditions other than empiricism, do exist, and they lead to radically different conclusions. The present authors look at several of the competing interpretations of automaticity, including rationalist and ontological hermeneutics. The conclusions that scientists reach about data are driven as much by the philosophies they implicitly affirm as the data themselves. Before a particular interpretation of automaticity is adopted, psychologists ought to be aware of the different theoretical possibilities that exist and inform such a concept, as well as the conclusions and implications they suggest. (PsycINFO Database Record (c) 2010 APA, all rights reserved)     

Memory-based automaticity in the discrimination of visual numerosity.

In the development of memory-based models of automaticity, it is crucial to specify the nature of the memory representation. Seven experiments with 94 students use a counting task to determine whether a feature (i.e., identity, color, or orientation) is explicitly represented in memory. It is assumed that the degree of transfer to a pattern differing on one feature is determined by that feature's importance in supporting skilled performance. Exp 1 determined the practice necessary to obtain automaticity. In Exps 2a, 3a, and 4a, which investigated the nature of the representation after extended practice, changing neither the identity nor color of elements had strong effects on transfer, but changing pattern orientation did impair memory retrieval, thus suggesting that for the counting task, pattern orientation is more important than element identity or color. Exps 2b, 3b, and 4b replicated these results after limited practice. (PsycINFO Database Record (c) 2010 APA, all rights reserved)     

Attention, automaticity, and developmental dyscalculia.

People suffering from developmental dyscalculia (DD) show an abnormal pattern of the size congruity effect. They do not display a facilitation component in a numerical Stroop task. In this task, participants are presented with 2 digits that differ both in physical size and numerical value, and they have to compare the digits while ignoring one of the dimensions. The present study examined performance of those with DD and control participants in the numerical Stroop task under cognitive load. The no-load condition replicated previous findings (i.e., lack of facilitation in the physical task for the DD group). Load had opposite effects on interference and facilitation. Load eliminated facilitation and increased interference in the control group. Load increased interference only in the physical task in the DD group. The opposite effect of load on facilitation and interference suggests that these components are related to different cognitive mechanisms. The fact that load produced a DD-like pattern in the control group could suggest that individuals with DD suffer from difficulty in recruiting attention in addition to the deficits in numerical processing. (PsycINFO Database Record (c) 2010 APA, all rights reserved)     

The implicit assumptions of modern psychology.

Presents the Presidential Address to the Division of Theoretical and Philosophical Psychology (Division 24) of the American Psychological Association, delivered August 25. 1985. The author discusses the key philosophical and theoretical issues facing modern psychology as well as the "perennially problematic" intellectual foundations of psychology. (PsycINFO Database Record (c) 2010 APA, all rights reserved)     

Attention in the acquisition and expression of automaticity.

The instance theory of automaticity claims that people learn what they attend to and express what they learned in transfer if they attend to the same things in the same was. These hypotheses were tested in 8 category search experiments in which target position was cued by color (red or green). The main question was whether target color would be encoded in training and retrieved in transfer. After training, recognition memory for target color was above chance, which suggests that color was encoded. However, category search performance was not affected by changing target color unless color was reported explicitly during training and transfer, which suggests that color was not always retrieved. The results are consistent with the instance theory. The distinction between encoding and retrieval is important in understanding the acquisition and expression of automaticity. Automatic performance emphasized speed and so may not be sensitive to things that are retrieved slowly. (PsycINFO Database Record (c) 2010 APA, all rights reserved)     

Theories of automaticity and the power law of practice.

In a recent reanalysis of numerosity judgment data from T. J. Palmeri (see record 1997-03378-004), T. C. Rickard (see record 1999-00904-017) found that mean response times did not decrease as a pure power law of practice and standard deviations systematically increased and then decreased with practice in some conditions. Rickard argued that these results were consistent with the component power laws (CMPL) theory of strategy shifting (Rickard, 1997), but were inconsistent with instance theory (G. D. Logan, 1988) and the exemplar-based random walk (EBRW) model (R. M. Nosofsky & Palmeri, 1997). In this article, the author demonstrates how a slightly more complex power function fitted the numerosity data nearly as well as the CMPL function, and how race models, such as instance theory and the EBRW, can predict deviations from a pure power law of practice and can predict nonmonotonic changes in standard deviations with practice. Potential limitations of CMPL are also discussed. (PsycINFO Database Record (c) 2010 APA, all rights reserved)     

Inevitability and automaticity: A response to Fisk.

Responds to the comments of A. D. Fisk (see record 1986-16289-001) on the present authors' (see record 1985-27168-001) work on automatic processing of fundamental information. The present authors use the term automaticity as a process by which some attributes of an attended to stimulus are encoded into memory. It is suggested that Fisk's view of automaticity is derived from the study of automatic search mechanisms, particularly as they slowly develop in multiple frame visual search tasks; therefore, several methodological problems that Fisk addresses do not fit the concerns of the present authors or are irrelevant to them. (12 ref) (PsycINFO Database Record (c) 2010 APA, all rights reserved)     

Spontaneous versus directed recognition: The relativity of automaticity.

Examined the contrast between spontaneous and directed recognition by using the flanker paradigm. It was reasoned that spontaneous recognition of a flanking word would be reflected by the influence that word had on recognition of a target word. In a first experiment, when attention was divided at test, recognition decisions were made more rapidly when flanker and target words were congruent, rather than incongruent, with regard to the response they dictated. In later experiments, the authors attempted to specify factors that influence spontaneous recognition of a flanking word and examined the effects of number of prior presentations and physical similarity between study and test. To anticipate, the nature of the results leads to questioning whether recognition is ever truly spontaneous. The findings are discussed in relation to the relativity of automaticity (O. Neumann, 1984). (PsycINFO Database Record (c) 2010 APA, all rights reserved)     

Restructuring versus automaticity: Alternative accounts of skill acquisition.

Disagrees with the view of W. Schneider and R. M. Shiffrin (see PA, Vol 58:305; see also Shiffrin and Schneider, PA, Vol 57:4785) that improvement in performance is due to the development of automatic (capacity-free) processes. The present author notes that Schneider and Shiffrin's evidence was confounded by a category difference between memory-ensemble and distractor-set characters and argues that attempts by Shiffrin and Schneider to resolve the confounding failed. An alternative explanation of their results is presented in terms of the restructuring of task components. Other evidence regarding capacity-free processing is reviewed, and the implications of the critique for limited-capacity models of attention are discussed. (34 ref) (PsycINFO Database Record (c) 2010 APA, all rights reserved)     

Aging and the development of automaticity in visual search.

The rate of short-term memory search has previously been reported to be slower for older individuals than for college-age Ss (F. I. Craik, 1977). Current research has suggested that after extensive practice with the same population of stimuli, performance in memory-search and visual-search tasks can become "automatic," or independent of memory load. The present experiment examined age differences in the development of automatic processing in a hybrid memory-search/visual-search paradigm; 8 young (18–25 yrs old) and 8 older (61–74 yrs old) Ss participated. Although older Ss demonstrated a significantly slower rate of search, the 2 age groups shifted toward automatic processing, over practice, at equivalent rates. The slower rate of search thus represents an age-related increase in the time required to compare the memory-set items against those in a visual array, rather than a change in the mode of processing available. (20 ref) (PsycINFO Database Record (c) 2010 APA, all rights reserved)     

Attention and automaticity in the processing of self-relevant information.

Studied the neglected aspect of social cognition: the way people select information for further processing from the vast amount available in social environments. A dichotic listening task was used in which 141 undergraduate Ss attended to or ignored self-relevant stimuli. It was found that self-relevant information required fewer attentional resources when presented to the attended channel, but more when presented to the rejected channel, relative to neutral words. This differential capacity allocation occurred despite Ss' lack of awareness of the contents of the rejected channel. Results support the existence and interaction of the 2 processes of attention in social information processing: a control process that regulates the contents of conscious awareness and an automatic process that attracts attention to stimuli without conscious intent. (70 ref) (PsycINFO Database Record (c) 2010 APA, all rights reserved)