Automatic optimism: The affective basis of judgments about the likelihood of future events.

People generally judge that the future will be consistent with their desires, but the reason for this desirability bias is unclear. This investigation examined whether affective reactions associated with future events are the mechanism through which desires influence likelihood judgments. In 4 studies, affective reactions were manipulated for initially neutral events. Compared with a neutral condition, events associated with positive reactions were judged as likely to occur, and events associated with negative reactions were judged as unlikely to occur. Desirability biases were reduced when participants could misattribute affective reactions to a source other than future events, and the relationship between affective reactions and judgments was influenced when approach and avoidance motivations were independently manipulated. Together, these findings demonstrate that positive and negative affective reactions to potential events cause the desirability bias in likelihood judgments and suggest that this effect occurs because of a tendency to approach positive possibilities and avoid negative possibilities. (PsycINFO Database Record (c) 2010 APA, all rights reserved)     

Fear of death and the judgment of social transgressions: a multidimensional test of terror management theory

The purpose of the research was to integrate a multidimensional approach to fear of personal death with terror management theory. In Study 1, 190 students were divided according to the manipulation of death salience and the intrapersonal and interpersonal aspects of fear of death and were asked to judge transgressions that have either intrapersonal or interpersonal consequences. Study 2 was a conceptual replication of Study 1, with the exception that the manipulation of mortality salience included conditions that made salient either intrapersonal or interpersonal aspects of death. Findings indicate that the effects of mortality salience depend on the aspect of death that is made salient, the aspect of death that individuals most fear, and the type of the judged transgression. More severe judgments of transgressions after death salience manipulation were found mainly when there was a fit between these 3 factors. Findings are discussed in light of terror management theory.     

Identification and leadership in small groups: Salience, frame of reference, and leader stereotypicality effects on leader evaluations.

Two studies tested the prediction that people who identify strongly with a group base leadership perceptions on the group prototypicality of the leader whereas leadership schemas diminish in importance. Leadership and prototypicality were operationalized as relational constructs grounded in people's salient social comparative frame of reference. Study 1 (N?=?82) had participants nominate a group leader and measured perceptions of the leader relative to nonleaders on leadership effectiveness, group prototypicality, and leadership stereotypicality. In Study 2 (N?=?164) prototypicality, stereotypicality, and group salience were experimentally manipulated. As predicted, leadership stereotypicality became a weaker basis for leadership among high identifiers. The role of prototypicality in leadership was complexly affected by identification, which (a) accentuated leader-follower similarity on perceived prototypicality and leadership effectiveness, (b) changed the salient frame of reference, and (c) thus changed relative prototypicality of group members and leadership perceptions. (PsycINFO Database Record (c) 2010 APA, all rights reserved)     

Personal responsibility and salience of the request for help: Determinants of the relation between negative affect and helping behavior.

148 female undergraduates participated in 3 experiments. The hypothesis that attribution of responsibility to self for one's experimentally induced depressed mood would induce greater inclination to offer help when subsequently asked was tested in Exp I through a design that manipulated mood (negative vs neutral) and attribution of responsibility for it (internal vs external). The obtained opposite result seemed attributable to the low salience of the request for help. Exp II replicated Exp I using a highly salient request for help and confirmed the initial hypothesis. In Exp III, a negative mood was induced in all Ss, and attribution of responsibility (internal vs external) was crossed with salience of the helping request in a 2 by 2 factorial design. The obtained interaction confirmed the prediction that internal attribution of responsibility increases willingness to help (as measured either behaviorally or attitudinally) when the request is salient, but inhibits it when the request lacks salience. Self-focus, as measured by the Stroop Color-Word Test, was shown to mediate these effects. (40 ref) (PsycINFO Database Record (c) 2010 APA, all rights reserved)     

Is perceptual salience needed in explanations of the isolation effect?

The isolation effect is a well-known phenomenon that has a well-accepted explanation: An item that is isolated on a list becomes perceptually salient, which leads to extra rehearsal that enhances memory for the isolate. To evaluate this hypothesis, the authors isolated an item near the beginning of a list. Immediately after each item was presented for study, participants judged the likelihood of recalling the item. Although the isolation effect occurred, participants did not judge the isolate as being more memorable than the preceding item, suggesting that the isolate was not salient. In a second experiment, participants rehearsed items aloud. Isolation at the beginning of the list did not produce extra rehearsal. By contrast, isolation in the middle of the list produced extra rehearsal; however, even when the isolate did not receive extra rehearsal, an isolation effect was evident. Thus, salience and extra rehearsal are not necessary for producing an isolation effect. (PsycINFO Database Record (c) 2010 APA, all rights reserved)     

Personal involvement and the robustness of perceptual salience effects.

Conducted 2 experiments, using a total of 146 undergraduates, to examine the generalizability of perceptual salience effects. Previous research in social cognition established that "top of the head" processing is a robust inferential bias even in involving task situations. It was expected, however, that perceivers who were personally involved in an issue would be more motivated than less-involved perceivers to shift attention from salient cues to attitudinally congruent but nonsalient message cues. In both experiments, salience was manipulated by varying the visual prominence of discussants in a 2-person conversation. In Exp I, involvement was experimentally manipulated by varying whether perceivers would be personally affected by an issue. In Exp II, involvement was operationalized as a subject variable. The results suggest that personal involvement indeed constitutes a boundary condition for salience effects. As expected, ratings of highly involved perceivers reflected more systematic processing of message arguments, regardless of which discussant was visually salient, whereas ratings of less-involved perceivers reflected "top of the head" processing. The analogous influence of personal involvement in persuasion research and the role of individual difference variables in research on inferential biases are discussed. (25 ref) (PsycINFO Database Record (c) 2010 APA, all rights reserved)     

Arousal and causal attribution.

Two experiments involving a total of 114 male undergraduates investigated whether arousal increased the impact of salient information on causal attributions and decreased the impact of nonsalient information. In Exp 1, salience was manipulated by instructions that directed Ss' attention to different types of information. Arousal was manipulated by the presence or absence of white noise. As expected, the impact of salient information on causal attributions increased with arousal. In Exp 2, emotional arousal (anger) decreased the perceived impact of a nonsalient person in a social interaction. Both effects were most pronounced for Ss with lower chronic levels of arousal. (French abstract) (PsycINFO Database Record (c) 2010 APA, all rights reserved)     

Antecedents and consequences of demand/withdraw.

The authors examined the immediate antecedents and consequences of the demand/withdraw interaction pattern within naturally occurring conflicts. Both partners in 75 couples, including gay, lesbian, and straight couples, were interviewed individually regarding 2 recent conflicts, 1 chosen by each partner, and completed postinterview questionnaires. Interviews were coded for antecedents (e.g., upset prior to conflict), consequences (e.g., resolution of conflict), and demand/withdraw behaviors. In the postinterview questionnaires, participants rated demand/withdraw behaviors and their satisfaction with the outcome of the discussion. Results demonstrated that demand/withdraw behavior shifts depending on whose issue is under discussion, but other proximal antecedents did not significantly predict demand/withdraw. Regarding consequences, results indicated that most conflicts do not result in resolution, and most resolutions do not involve agreed-on change. Demand/withdraw did not predict a decreased likelihood of resolution. However, for those issues that were resolved, demand/withdraw resulted in a decreased likelihood of changes being agreed on. Furthermore, demand/withdraw predicted less satisfaction with the outcome of the discussion, even when controlling for the substantive outcome. Results were generally replicated across both self-report and coder ratings of demand/withdraw. (PsycINFO Database Record (c) 2010 APA, all rights reserved)     

Why does a red snake in the grass capture your attention?

It has been suggested that affective stimuli automatically capture attention; this preferential processing is thought to be related to the evolutionary significance of affective stimuli. However, recent evidence suggests that perceptual salience alone might explain why some affective stimuli are more likely to influence attentional processes in certain contexts. In this study, we manipulated affective and perceptual salience to better understand how affective information is processed and how it impacts attentional processes in different contexts. We used stimuli that are both affectively and perceptually salient, while varying the task requirement to encourage the processing of perceptually salient (Experiment 1) or affectively salient (Experiment 2) information. This design made it possible to observe independent and interdependent relationships between perceptual and affective salience. The results showed that when the task encouraged the processing of perceptually salient information, affective salience did not influence task performance. In contrast, when the task encouraged the processing of affectively salient information, affectively salient information impaired task performance. The findings suggest that the affective nature of the stimuli does not always influence attentional processes. (PsycINFO Database Record (c) 2011 APA, all rights reserved)     

The salience of vertical symmetry

It has long been accepted that amongst patterns which are bilaterally symmetrical, those which have their axis of symmetry vertical are more saliently symmetrical than patterns whose axis of symmetry is at some other orientation. The evidence regarding the relative salience of other orientations of axis of symmetry is somewhat more equivocal. In experiment 1, subjects were required to discriminate between symmetric or random-dot patterns when the axis of symmetry was at one of eighteen different orientations, spaced 10 degrees apart, both clockwise and counterclockwise of vertical to horizontal. The data indicated that vertical was most salient, then horizontal but that, unlike in the classical oblique effect for contrast sensitivity, performance for precisely diagonal axes was better than that for surrounding axis orientations. Additional data (from experiments 2 and 3) also showed that the salience of vertical and horizontal axes of symmetry can be manipulated extensively by varying the range of stimuli presented, presumably by manipulating the scanning or attentional strategy adopted by the observer. Many previous studies of symmetry perception may have confounded hard-wired salience for vertical symmetry with scanning or attentional strategies.     

Impact of salient vocal qualities on causal attribution for a speaker's behavior.

Two determinants of auditory salience were manipulated—the intensity and sex of a speaker's voice. 98 college students served as listeners. As predicted, Ss attended more to a 75-db than to a 70-db voice on a binaural listening test, and Ss attributed more causality to an actor in a 2-person conversation when his voice was 75 db in intensity than when it was 70 db. Contrary to expectation, Ss listened more to the actor with the male voice. Consistent with this tendency for the male voice to be more salient, Ss attributed more causality to an actor when the voice was male than when it had been electronically converted to a female voice of the same intensity and intonation. Vocal salience also influenced Ss' impressions of the actors, but it had no impact on recall of the actors' verbalizations. (19 ref) (PsycINFO Database Record (c) 2010 APA, all rights reserved)     

Contrast effects in attitude judgment: An examination of the accentuation hypothesis.

A common finding in attitude judgment is that attitude positions discrepant from an extreme judge's own position are judged as more discrepant than in fact they are. The 2 studies in this article suggest that these contrast effects may be due to accentuation phenomena, as outlined by H. Tajfel (see record 1958-04920-001). Judges may make more polarized pro/anti judgments if they perceive the attitude positions as also differing on an agree/disagree (peripheral) dimension and if the judgment dimension and the peripheral dimension are correlated. In Study 1, a survey was conducted of 290 members of the National Organization for Women and the Massachusetts Federation of Republican Women to test the hypothesis. Strong support was found for the accentuation explanation of contrast effects. To rule out an individual difference alternative explanation for these results, Study 2 with 44 undergraduates experimentally manipulated the salience of the agree/disagree peripheral dimension. Greater contrast was found when the dimension was salient. (18 ref) (PsycINFO Database Record (c) 2010 APA, all rights reserved)     

The role of control motivation in mortality salience effects on ingroup support and defense.

Terror management research has shown that mortality salience (MS) leads to increased support and defense of cultural ingroups and their norms (i.e., worldview defense, WD). The authors investigated whether these effects can be understood as efforts to restore a generalized sense of control by strengthening one's social ingroup. In Studies 1-3, the authors found that WD was only increased following pure death salience, compared with both dental pain salience and salience of self-determined death. As both the pure death and the self-determined death conditions increased accessibility of death-related thoughts (Study 4), these results do not emerge because only the pure death induction makes death salient. At the same time, Study 5 showed that implicitly measured control motivation was increased in the pure death salience condition but not under salience of both self-determined death and dental pain. Finally, in Study 6, the authors manipulated MS and control salience (CS) independently and found a main effect for CS but not for MS on WD. The results are discussed with regard to a group-based control restoration account of terror management findings. (PsycINFO Database Record (c) 2010 APA, all rights reserved)     

Underlying Processes in the Implicit Association Test: Dissociating Salience From Associations.

The authors investigated whether effects of the Implicit Association Test (IAT) are influenced by salience asymmetries, independent of associations. Two series of experiments analyzed unique effects of salience by using nonassociated, neutral categories that differed in salience. In a 3rd series, salience asymmetries were manipulated experimentally while holding associations between categories constant. In a 4th series, valent associations of the target categories were manipulated experimentally while holding salience asymmetries constant. Throughout, IAT effects were found to depend on salience asymmetries. Additionally, salience asymmetries between categories were assessed directly with a visual search task to tionally, provide an independent criterion of salience asymmetries. Salience asymmetries corresponded to IAT effects and also accounted for common variance in IAT effects and explicit measures of attitudes or the self-concept. (PsycINFO Database Record (c) 2010 APA, all rights reserved)     

Assessments of Changes in the Effective Salience of Stimulus Elements as a Result of Stimulus Preexposure.

Rats received exposure to 3 flavor compounds, AX and BX, presented in alternation, and CX, presented on a separate block of trials. The hypothesis that this treatment would leave B effectively more salient than C was tested in 3 ways. Experiment 1 showed that the unconditioned response evoked by B was stronger than that evoked by C. Experiment 2 showed that B was more effective than C when used as a reinforcer in a sensory preconditioning procedure. Experiment 3 showed that B was learned about more readily than C as a conditioned stimulus in flavor aversion conditioning. Alternating preexposure to 2 similar stimuli may protect their distinctive features from the loss of salience normally produced by nonreinforced exposure to a stimulus. (PsycINFO Database Record (c) 2010 APA, all rights reserved)     

Effects of person salience versus role salience on reward allocation in a dyad.

Research has shown that resource allocation in a dyad sometimes follows the principle of equity (proportional reward) and sometimes that of parity (equal reward). However, existing evidence does not clarify the conditions under which each of these rules is invoked. A number of theorists have suggested that salience of the other as a person should lead to parity-based allocation, whereas salience of the other as a functionary filling a role should lead to equity-based allocation. The present study with 60 male and 60 female undergraduates tested these possibilities. Ss were led to perceive their own inputs to group performance as being either substantially lower or substantially higher than a partner's inputs. The partner had been portrayed to the S in terms that made salient the partner's personal characteristics, the partner's role assignment, or neither of these. Among females, subsequent reward allocation followed the predicted pattern in both high- and low-input conditions. Among males, contrary to expectation, person salience led to heightened feelings of competitiveness and to increased allocations to the self. (22 ref) (PsycINFO Database Record (c) 2010 APA, all rights reserved)     

Perceptions of an aggressive encounter as a function of the victim's salience and the perceiver's arousal.

Investigated the effects of a victim's physical salience and perceivers' arousal on perceptions of a verbally aggressive interaction. Based on evidence that there is a tendency to attribute causality to salient stimulus persons and to form more evaluatively extreme impressions of such persons, it was predicted that an aggressor's behavior would be attributed more to causes in a physically salient than a nonsalient victim and that the behavior of a salient victim would be evaluated more extremely than that of a nonsalient victim. Based on J. A. Easterbrook's (1959) hypothesis that arousal narrows the focus of attention to the most salient cues in the situation, it was further predicted that aroused perceivers would manifest both a stronger tendency to attribute causality to a physically salient victim of aggression and more extreme ratings of the stimulus persons than would nonaroused perceivers. Data from 2 studies with 206 undergraduates support all of the experimental hypotheses except one: The tendency to attribute the aggressor's behavior more to a physically salient than a nonsalient victim was not greater for aroused than for nonaroused perceivers. (23 ref) (PsycINFO Database Record (c) 2010 APA, all rights reserved)     

Positive Tertiary Appraisals and Posttraumatic Stress Disorder in U.S. Male Veterans of the War in Vietnam: The Roles of Positive Affirmation, Positive Reformulation, and Defensive Denial.

A 70.9% majority of the U.S. male veterans in a nationwide sample appraised the impact of their service in Vietnam on their present lives as mainly positive. A substantial minority, 41.7%, judged the effects to be highly salient. With controls on level of exposure to war-zone stressors measured with data from military records, the valence and salience of these appraisals are investigated in relation to posttraumatic stress disorder (PTSD) and other indicators of wartime and postwar functioning. The results are consistent with the hypothesis that mainly positive tertiary appraisals are affirmations of successful wartime and postwar adaptation rather than defensive denials related to maladaptive outcomes. The possibility that mainly positive tertiary appraisals also contribute to successful postwar adaptation is discussed. (PsycINFO Database Record (c) 2010 APA, all rights reserved)     

Prosocial self-schemas, self-awareness, and children's prosocial behavior

Three studies examined the hypothesis that a child's prosocial self-schema predicts prosocial behavior. In Study 1, only self-aware boys showed a self-schema-behavior relation. Study 2 altered both salience of donating opportunity and relationship of recipient to donor. The hypothesized Self-Awareness x Self-Schema interaction was significant, and there were no gender differences. Study 3 systematically manipulated the salience of the donating opportunity. All participants were self-aware. For boys in high and low salience conditions, prosocial self-schema predicted donating behavior. For girls, prosocial self-schema predicted behavior only in the high salience condition. The findings demonstrate that self-schemas can regulate behavior when participants are self-aware. Girls, however, may require higher salience of the donating opportunity for the self-schema to affect their behavior.     

The cost of event-based prospective memory: Salient target events.

Evidence has begun to accumulate showing that successful performance of event-based prospective memory (PM) comes at a cost to other ongoing activities. The current study builds on previous work by examining the cost associated with PM when the target event is salient. Target salience is among the criteria for automatic retrieval of intentions according to the multiprocess view of PM. An alternative theory, the preparatory attentional and memory processes theory, argues that PM performance, including retrieval of the intent, is never automatic and successful performance always will come at a cost to other ongoing activity. The 4 experiments reported here used a salient PM target event. In addition, Experiments 3 and 4 were designed to meet the stringent criteria proposed for automatic retrieval of intentions by multiprocess theory, and, yet, in all 4 experiments, delayed intentions interfered with ongoing task performance. (PsycINFO Database Record (c) 2010 APA, all rights reserved)