Context effects: The proportional difference model and the reflection of preference.

The reflection effect (D. Kahneman & A. Tversky, 1979) was investigated using the stochastic model of choice developed by C. Gonzalez-Vallejo (2002). The model assumes that individuals make trade-offs among attribute values by relying on a difference variable. The model also specifies a threshold representing individual proclivities to reach to attribute differences. Two experiments demonstrated that changes in risk attitudes, from a gain to a loss situation, depended on the stimuli as well as on individuals' thresholds. Thresholds were generally lower in losses than in gains, indicating a risk-taking tendency. Thresholds were also lower when participants were endowed with greater savings. Model testing revealed better fits for the stochastic model than cumulative prospect theory (A. Tversky &. D. Kahneman, 1992). (PsycINFO Database Record (c) 2010 APA, all rights reserved)     

Testing interval independence versus configural weighting using judgments of strength of preference.

Judges made choices and rated strengths of preference between gambles composed of 50–50 chances to receive either of 2 monetary outcomes (x, y). Others judged how much they would pay to play their chosen gamble rather than the other gamble. Judged strengths of preference violated interval independence, because they depended on the value of a common outcome. For example, judges offered to pay an average of $44 to play ($74, $100) instead of ($8, $100) but offered to pay only $24 to play ($6, $74) instead of ($6, $8). Results violated the theory that utility of gambles is a nonconfigural average of the values of the outcomes and that strengths of preference are monotonically related to utility differences. Results can be explained by a configural weight model in which the lowest outcome receives greater weight. (PsycINFO Database Record (c) 2010 APA, all rights reserved)     

The consistency model: A process model for absolute judgments.

Stimuli receive higher ratings when smaller ones are presented more frequently than larger ones. A. Parducci ascribed this effect to the Ss' tendency to assign the same number of stimuli to each available category. An alternative interpretation is proposed. It is assumed that the judgment scale develops quickly and retains its initial form throughout the presentations. Because the more frequently presented stimuli are most likely to be presented first, the S's scale is centered on the range of these stimuli, thus producing (pseudo) frequency effects. Despite its simplicity, the consistency model accounts for the effects of stimulus frequency, number of stimuli, and number of categories. The model also accounts for long-term effects of previous scales. (PsycINFO Database Record (c) 2010 APA, all rights reserved)     

Footedness: Asymmetries in foot preference and skill and neuropsychological assessment of foot movement.

If footedness is defined in terms of a reliable role differentiation of the two feet and legs, right-handers show a right-foot bias for activities requiring fine manipulation and focused attention. In adult right-handers, the left leg tends to be the longer and heavier one, in keeping with the support role of that leg. In left-handers, anatomical asymmetries tend to be in the opposite direction, and functional preferences are somewhat less clearly expressed. Foot biases and their interaction with hand biases are of practical importance in the design of man-machine systems. The considerable sensitivity of foot and leg performance to neurological insult renders the assessment of foot and leg use very attractive for purposes of clinical neuropsychology. (PsycINFO Database Record (c) 2010 APA, all rights reserved)     

The influence of valence on distance judgments of human faces.

"An experiment was conducted to test the hypothesis that photographs of positively valent faces would be set nearer the subject than negative faces, in ostensibly objective distance judgments… . Several examples of valent faces were compared, e.g., popular vs. unpopular figures from public life, an authority figure vs. peers, and self vs. peers. The responses of women… bore out the predictions, those of the men did not do so uniformly." From Psyc Abstracts 36:04:4GD20B. (PsycINFO Database Record (c) 2010 APA, all rights reserved)     

Structure of causes for success and failure: A multidimensional scaling analysis of preference judgments.

Investigated whether B. Weiner's (1979) model of causal attributions applies to perceptions of the causes for success and failure. Instead of the usual similarity judgments, preference judgments were used to reveal the dimensions underlying these perceptions. Female subjects, randomly assigned to a success or failure condition, made preference judgments with regard to 12 causes for success or failure. Multidimensional scaling analysis uncovered internality, stability, and excusability dimensions, thus supporting Weiner's model at least partly. In addition, differences in the relative emphasis given to the dimensions were found between the success and failure conditions: Following success, the internality dimension was the most salient, whereas after failure the stability and excusability dimensions were the most important. Furthermore, after success subjects preferred more internal causes and more causes that seem inappropriate as an excuse. After failure, subjects chose more external and more excusable causes. (PsycINFO Database Record (c) 2010 APA, all rights reserved)     

MINERVA-DM: A memory processes model for judgments of likelihood.

This article describes an integration of most of the disparate likelihood judgment phenomena in behavioral decision making using a mathematical memory model. A new theory of likelihood judgments based on D. L. Hintzman's (1984, 1988) MINERVA2 memory model is described. The model, MINERVA-DM (DM?=?decision making), accounts for a wide range of likelihood judgment phenomena including frequency judgments, conditional likelihood judgments, conservatism, the availability and representativeness heuristics, base-rate neglect, the conjunction error, the validity effect, the simulation heuristic, and the hindsight bias. In addition, the authors extend the model to expert probability judgment and show how MINERVA-DM can account for both good and poor calibration (overconfidence) as a function of varying degrees of expertise. The authors' work is presented as a case study of the advantages of applying memory theory to study decision making. (PsycINFO Database Record (c) 2011 APA, all rights reserved)     

The effects of a narrative model on children's moral judgments.

Tested the hypothesis that children's moral orientation can be influenced by exposure to narrated models that express consistent moral judgments based on either the consequences of an action or the motives of the individual. 66 1st and 2nd graders were randomly assigned to 3 conditions: objective model (judgments based on consequences), subjective model (judgments based on motives), or no model, with an equal number of males and females in each group. Following the procedure of Piaget and others, a pretest presented all Ss with pairs of stories contrasting a well-intentioned act involving serious consequences with an ill-intentioned act involving minor consequences. In the experimental phase which followed the pretest by 2 wks, Ss were exposed to narrative characters who made consistent moral judgments. A posttest conducted by another E followed immediately. Results indicate that the objective model condition significantly increased responding based on consequences, and the subjective model condition significantly increased responding on motives. (PsycINFO Database Record (c) 2010 APA, all rights reserved)     

Subjective confidence in perceptual judgments: A test of the self-consistency model.

Two questions about subjective confidence in perceptual judgments are examined: the bases for these judgments and the reasons for their accuracy. Confidence in perceptual judgments has been claimed to rest on qualitatively different processes than confidence in memory tasks. However, predictions from a self-consistency model (SCM), which had been confirmed for general-information questions (Koriat, 2010) and social attitudes (Koriat & Adiv, 2010), are shown to hold true also for perceptual judgments. In SCM, confidence is modeled by the procedure for assessment of statistical level of confidence: For a 2-alternative, forced-choice item, confidence is based on the consistency with which the choice is favored across a sample of representations of the item, and acts as a monitor of the likelihood that a new sample will yield the same choice. Assuming that these representations are drawn from commonly shared populations of representations associated with each item, predictions regarding the basis of confidence were confirmed by results concerning the functions relating confidence and choice latency to interparticipant consensus and to intraparticipant consistency for majority and minority choices. With regard to the confidence-accuracy (C/A) relationship, the consensuality principle, documented for general-knowledge tasks (Koriat, 2008a), was replicated for perceptual judgments: Confidence correlated with the consensuality of the choice rather than with its correctness, suggesting that the C/A correlation is due to the relationship between confidence and self-consistency and is positive only as long as the correct choices are the consistently made choices. SCM provides a general model for the basis and accuracy of confidence judgments across different domains. (PsycINFO Database Record (c) 2010 APA, all rights reserved)     

Context effects in judgments of causation.

It is hypothesized that causal explanations for an occurrence vary as a function of the causal background against which the occurrence is considered. Three experiments are presented that test propositions regarding the operation of the causal background in the selection of causal explanations. Findings indicate that factors previously shown to affect subjects' attributions—specifically, role (actor vs. observer), covariation information (consensus and distinctiveness), and quality of performance (positive vs. negative)—may do so by guiding subjects' selection of a causal background. Evidence indicates that these factors may not have the predicted effect on subjects' attributions when competing cues, such as context or wording of the causal question, suggest the relevance of conflicting causal backgrounds. (PsycINFO Database Record (c) 2010 APA, all rights reserved)     

Young children's preference for complementary pairs: Evidence against a shift to a taxonomic preference.

Examined the development of conceptual preference for complementary and taxonomic relationships among 8 groups of 12 children (aged 3 yrs to 15 yrs 6 mo). The triads procedure was used with picture pairings familiar to the youngest age group. Data reveal a preference for complementary pairing for all age groups. These preferences were independent of Ss' ability to explain taxonomic relationships and of the relative attractiveness of the pictures, as determined by ratings of a 2nd sample of 96 children. Studies that have shown a shift from a complementary to a taxonomic conceptual preference in the early school years are reviewed, and the utility of conceptualizing the increased use of taxonomic organization with age as a shift in preference is questioned. (10 ref) (PsycINFO Database Record (c) 2010 APA, all rights reserved)     

Age-related priming effects in social judgments.

Two experiments investigated adult age differences in the impact of previously activated (and thus easily accessible) trait-related information on judgments about people. The authors hypothesized that age-related declines in the efficiency of controlled processing mechanisms during adulthood would be associated with increased susceptibility to judgment biases associated with such information. In each study, different-aged adults made impression judgments about a target, and assimilation of these judgments to trait constructs activated in a previous, unrelated task were examined. Consistent with the authors' hypotheses, older adults were likely to form impressions that were biased toward the primed trait constructs. In contrast, younger adults exhibited greater awareness of the primed information and were more likely to correct for its perceived influence, especially when distinctive contextual cues regarding the source of the primes were available. (PsycINFO Database Record (c) 2010 APA, all rights reserved)     

Anchoring effects in sequential clinical judgments.

To clarify further the nature of assimilation and contrast effects, serial judgments of clinical stimuli were studied using a 4-phase alternation of anchor design. Judgments of pathology of equivalent moderate clinical stimuli across the sequence of anchor contexts were made by 176 Ss. 2 types of behavior were judged, aggression and dependency. The results indicated significant anchoring effects on 3 of the 4 phases. Contrast on the initial phase was followed by a trend toward assimilation on the succeeding phases. It is concluded that assimilation effects using alternated anchors may be facilitated by the limited capacity of judges to discriminate clinical stimuli and by perceptual grouping effects. (PsycINFO Database Record (c) 2010 APA, all rights reserved)     

Serial position effects in comparative judgments.

Three studies examined the ubiquity of the bowed serial position effect in comparative judgments: the tendency for pairs of extreme magnitude to be discriminated more readily than pairs of intermediate magnitude. Although prior research has demonstrated that this effect occurs quite regularly in finite set experiments that repeatedly present a small number of items, there has been some ambiguity about the robustness of the bowed serial position effect in infinite set experiments, in which items are never repeated. Based on the extensive norms collected in Experiment 1, Experiment 2 demonstrated that a bowed serial position effect does in fact occur in a large infinite set experiment. The results of Experiment 3 indicate that this bowed serial position effect is not an artifact of our norms. The results are consistent with models that emphasize categorization of magnitudes and inconsistent with models that emphasize positional discriminability. (PsycINFO Database Record (c) 2010 APA, all rights reserved)     

Bias in proportion judgments: The cyclical power model.

When participants make part–whole proportion judgments, systematic bias is commonly observed. In some studies, small proportions are overestimated and large proportions underestimated; in other studies, the reverse pattern occurs. Sometimes the bias pattern repeats cyclically with a higher frequency (e.g., overestimation of proportions less than .25 and between .5 and .75; underestimation otherwise). To account for the various bias patterns, a cyclical power model was derived from Stevens' power law. The model proposes that the amplitude of the bias pattern is determined by the Stevens exponent, β (i.e., the stimulus continuum being judged), and that the frequency of the pattern is determined by a choice of intermediate reference points in the stimulus. When β??1, the under-then-over pattern is predicted. Two experiments confirming the model's assumptions are described. A mixed-cycle version of the model is also proposed that predicts observed asymmetries in bias patterns when the set of reference points varies across trials. (PsycINFO Database Record (c) 2010 APA, all rights reserved)     

Multiple congruity effects in judgments of magnitude.

Four experiments investigated a novel finding in the area of symbolic magnitude comparisons: Congruity effects may occur with subsets of objects. Such multiple congruity effects appear to signal the creation of size-ordered categories. Exp 1 observed separate congruity effects for large and small pairs despite the intermingling of pairs within a session. Exp 2 determined whether this result was an artifact of the items used. Exps 3 and 4 examined whether linear separability on a dimension of size or on some other correlated dimension was a prerequisite for multiple size-ordered categorization. The results of these experiments suggest that congruity effects are properly regarded as indicating the presence of an organized structure or category. Thus, to the extent that congruity effects typify magnitude comparisons, the processing of relational information appears to implicate categorization. (PsycINFO Database Record (c) 2011 APA, all rights reserved)     

The effects of assessment type on verbal ratings of conditional stimulus valence and contingency judgments: Implications for the extinction of evaluative learning.

Recent research on causal learning found (a) that causal judgments reflect either the current predictive value of a conditional stimulus (CS) or an integration across the experimental contingencies used in the entire experiment and (b) that postexperimental judgments, rather than the CS's current predictive value, are likely to reflect this integration. In the current study, the authors examined whether verbal valence ratings were subject to similar integration. Assessments of stimulus valence and contingencies responded similarly to variations of reporting requirements, contingency reversal, and extinction, reflecting either current or integrated values. However, affective learning required more trials to reflect a contingency change than did contingency judgments. The integration of valence assessments across training and the fact that affective learning is slow to reflect contingency changes can provide an alternative interpretation for researchers' previous failures to find an effect of extinction training on verbal reports of CS valence. (PsycINFO Database Record (c) 2010 APA, all rights reserved)     

Putting judgments of control into context: Contrast effects.

We tested predictions derived from the contrast literature concerning the influence of context on judgments of control. In Experiments 1–3, some Ss 1st completed a judgment of control task in which there was a relatively high degree of response-outcome contingency and then completed a task in which there was a moderate contingency. Other Ss 1st completed a task in which there was response-outcome noncontingency, then one in which there was a moderate contingency. The mean judgment of control rating for the moderate contingency task of the 1st group of Ss was reliably lower than that for the same task of the 2nd group. In Experiment 4, we increased the amount of initial exposure to the high or low contingency tasks. The judgments on the moderate contingency task still showed the same pattern as observed in Experiments 1–3. In Experiment 5, we found that the contrast effects observed in the prior experiments were eliminated when Ss did not complete a judgment scale following the 1st contingency problem (A. Pepitone and M. DiNuble; see record 1976-27744-001). Implications of the findings for existing theories and for future theoretical development are discussed. (PsycINFO Database Record (c) 2010 APA, all rights reserved)     

Effect of dimensional preference on adult shift learning: Some developmental implications.

Conducted 2 experiments to (a) examine the relationship between dimensional preference and proportion of optional reversal shifts among adults (undergraduates) and (b) provide convergent validity for the relationship between dimensional preference and shift behavior using an intradimensional-extradimensional shift paradigm. Comparison of the present results and a previous study with children indicate that children's and adults' shift behavior exhibits the same relationship with dimensional preference: a shift difference occurs with a nonpreferred but not with a preferred dimension. (PsycINFO Database Record (c) 2010 APA, all rights reserved)     

Personal involvement and strategies for making contingency judgments: A stake in the dating game makes a difference.

Examined the relation between the degree of involvement in a task and the complexity of strategy that Ss apply to the task. 48 female university volunteers were randomly assigned to either a dating (high-involvement) condition or 1 of 2 (low-involvement) control conditions. In addition, Ss in each condition were assigned to a person information or an abstract information condition. Ss in the person information condition received information about a particular male's dating preferences; those in the high-involvement condition were told that they would date this person. All Ss then performed a covariation judgment task (involving the male's dating preferences) for which the likelihood of their using simple or complex strategies was calculated. High-involvement Ss used more complex strategies and tended to be more accurate. These data are discussed in terms of the functionality of human information processing, heuristic analyses of inference strategies, and the importance of considering level of personal involvement in analyses of task performance. (26 ref) (PsycINFO Database Record (c) 2010 APA, all rights reserved)