Choosing, confidence, and accuracy: A meta-analysis of the confidence-accuracy relation in eyewitness identification studies.

There is widespread agreement among researchers that the correlation between identification accuracy and confidence in identification judgments is weak. For this reason, many experts caution against heavy reliance on confidence when evaluating identification accuracy. The authors present a meta-analytic review of 30 studies using staged-event methods that include target-present and target-absent lineups. Although the overall confidence–accuracy correlation in these studies corresponds to that reported in previous reviews, including choice as a moderator variable leads to a somewhat different conclusion. For choosers (those making positive identification), the confidence–accuracy correlation was reliably and consistently higher than for nonchoosers. In addition, the mean confidence level for correct choosers is higher than that for incorrect choosers in every study. (PsycINFO Database Record (c) 2010 APA, all rights reserved)     

Metamemory judgments of the origin and content of course information: Comparing text and lecture materials.

The accuracy and relations between students' specific and general knowledge of content and origin were examined. Students answered multiple-choice questions derived from the text, lecture, or both sources, decided whether each question originated from one of these sources or from their own conclusions, decided whether they had lecture information in their notes, and rated their confidence in these judgments. The three types of questions were equally difficult to answer but were significantly different in the accuracy and confidence of origin judgments, and confidence in the answers' correctness. Students' origin judgments were equivalent when they correctly and incorrectly answered questions. Students who knew fewer correct answers tended to be more confused about the origin of their knowledge. The dissociation between origin and content knowledge is discussed within M. K. Johnson and C. L. Raye's (see record 1981-06694-001) reality-monitoring model, with emphasis on the inference and retrieval processes involved in judging the origin of one's knowledge. (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)     

Meta-analytic interval estimation for standardized and unstandardized mean differences.

The fixed-effects (FE) meta-analytic confidence intervals for unstandardized and standardized mean differences are based on an unrealistic assumption of effect-size homogeneity and perform poorly when this assumption is violated. The random-effects (RE) meta-analytic confidence intervals are based on an unrealistic assumption that the selected studies represent a random sample from a large superpopulation of studies. The RE approach cannot be justified in typical meta-analysis applications in which studies are nonrandomly selected. New FE meta-analytic confidence intervals for unstandardized and standardized mean differences are proposed that are easy to compute and perform properly under effect-size heterogeneity and nonrandomly selected studies. The proposed meta-analytic confidence intervals may be used to combine unstandardized or standardized mean differences from studies having either independent samples or dependent samples and may also be used to integrate results from previous studies into a new study. An alternative approach to assessing effect-size heterogeneity is presented. (PsycINFO Database Record (c) 2010 APA, all rights reserved)     

The influence of virtual sample size on confidence and causal-strength judgments.

The authors investigated whether confidence in causal judgments varies with virtual sample size--the frequency of cases in which the outcome is (a) absent before the introduction of a generative cause or (b) present before the introduction of a preventive cause. Participants were asked to evaluate the influence of various candidate causes on an outcome as well as to rate their confidence in those judgments. They were presented with information on the relative frequencies of the outcome given the presence and absence of various candidate causes. These relative frequencies, sample size, and the direction of the causal influence (generative vs. preventive) were manipulated. It was found that both virtual and actual sample size affected confidence. Further, confidence affected estimates of strength, but confidence and strength are dissociable. The results enable a consistent explanation of the puzzling previous finding that observed causal-strength ratings often deviated from the predictions of both of the 2 dominant models of causal strength. (PsycINFO Database Record (c) 2010 APA, all rights reserved)     

Influence and inference: What the active perceiver overlooks.

We propose that perceivers who engage in social influence tasks (inducers) concentrate primarily on the relation between their influencing behaviors and the responsive behaviors of their target and ignore other important sources of information relevant to social inference (e.g., other concurrent sources of influence on the target person). As a result, inducers' inferences about the target person are biased by their own personal power. In Experiment 1, weak inducers drew more dispositional inferences about the targets of their influence attempts than did strong inducers when the magnitude of the inducers' power was revealed in the course of the social interaction, but not when inducers were informed about the magnitude of their power prior to the social interaction. These results suggest that inducers concentrated on information that they considered relevant to the assessment of their personal power and ignored information about concurrent sources of influence on the target person's behavior. In Experiment 2, inducers' judgments were unaffected by the presence or absence of information about concurrent sources of influence, whereas observers' judgments were significantly affected. The results of both experiments suggest that active perceivers, who are immersed in the social interactions they seek to interpret, differ from passive perceivers in a variety of theoretically predictable ways. (PsycINFO Database Record (c) 2010 APA, all rights reserved)     

An empirical assessment of meta-analytic practice.

In the three decades after the publication of the first meta-analyses in the behavioral sciences, hundreds of articles and a number of technical guides have emerged concerning meta-analytic practice and reporting standards. The purpose of the present study is to review the practice and reporting standards of a random sample of published meta-analyses (n = 100) in psychology and related disciplines in the decade from 1994 through 2004. We focus on practice and reporting at each stage of the meta-analytic process and explore differences between psychological subdisciplines. These findings suggest that the practice of meta-analysis in the last decade has not yet converged on a set of common standards, though some expert recommendations are beginning to be heeded. Authors should be attentive to proper procedure and reporting in light of the numerous threats to the validity of a meta-analysis. Ironically, even though meta-analysts often struggle with incomplete or inconsistent reporting in primary research they are themselves not entirely consistent in reporting their methods and results. (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)     

The conscious, the unconscious, and familiarity.

This article examines the role of subjective familiarity in the implicit and explicit learning of artificial grammars. Experiment 1 found that objective measures of similarity (including fragment frequency and repetition structure) predicted ratings of familiarity, that familiarity ratings predicted grammaticality judgments, and that the extremity of familiarity ratings predicted confidence. Familiarity was further shown to predict judgments in the absence of confidence, hence contributing to above-chance guessing. Experiment 2 found that confidence developed as participants refined their knowledge of the distribution of familiarity and that differences in familiarity could be exploited prior to confidence developing. Experiment 3 found that familiarity was consciously exploited to make grammaticality judgments including those made without confidence and that familiarity could in some instances influence participants' grammaticality judgments apparently without their awareness. All 3 experiments found that knowledge distinct from familiarity was derived only under deliberate learning conditions. The results provide decisive evidence that familiarity is the essential source of knowledge in artificial grammar learning while also supporting a dual-process model of implicit and explicit learning. (PsycINFO Database Record (c) 2010 APA, all rights reserved)     

Biases in Social Comparative Judgments: The Role of Nonmotivated Factors in Above-Average and Comparative-Optimism Effects.

Biases in social comparative judgments, such as those illustrated by above-average and comparative-optimism effects, are often regarded as products of motivated reasoning (e.g., self-enhancement). These effects, however, can also be produced by information-processing limitations or aspects of judgment processes that are not necessarily biased by motivational factors. In this article, the authors briefly review motivational accounts of biased comparative judgments, introduce a 3-stage model for understanding how people make comparative judgments, and then describe how various nonmotivational factors can influence the 3 stages of the comparative judgment process. Finally, the authors discuss several unresolved issues highlighted by their analysis, such as the interrelation between motivated and nonmotivated sources of bias and the influence of nonmotivated sources of bias on behavior. (PsycINFO Database Record (c) 2010 APA, all rights reserved)     

The realism in older people's confidence judgments of answers to general knowledge questions.

The study investigated 2 aspects of the accuracy (i.e., realism) of confidence judgments of persons age 60–93 years (N = 1,384) regarding their answers to general knowledge questions. These aspects are the level of confidence (calibration) in relation to the proportion of correct answers and the ability to discriminate between correct and incorrect answers by means of confidence judgments. No age differences were found for either of the 2 aspects. Gender differences were found for proportion of correct answers and confidence but not for the realism in the confidence judgments. (PsycINFO Database Record (c) 2010 APA, all rights reserved)     

Perceived versus meta-analytic effect sizes: An assessment of the accuracy of gender stereotypes.

Assessed the accuracy of people's stereotypes about gender differences in 2 studies by comparing perceptions of sizes of gender differences with meta-analytic findings. In Study 1, with 184 psychology students, perceptions of variability among men and women and perceptions of mean differences were incorporated into measures of perceived effect sizes. In Study 2, with 145 psychology students, Ss made direct judgments about the size of gender differences. Contrary to previous assertions about people's gender stereotypes, findings indicate that people do not uniformly overestimate gender differences. The results show that Ss are more likely to be accurate or to underestimate gender differences than overestimate them, and perceptions of the size of gender differences are correlated with meta-analytic effect sizes. Furthermore, degree of accuracy is influenced by biases favoring women, in-group favoritism, and the method used to measure perceptions. (PsycINFO Database Record (c) 2010 APA, all rights reserved)     

Mathematics self-efficacy and mathematics performances: The need for specificity of assessment.

In this study, 391 students were asked to provide 3 types of mathematics self-efficacy judgments: confidence to solve mathematics problems, confidence to succeed in math-related courses, and confidence to perform math-related tasks. Criterial tasks were solution of math problems and choice of math-related majors. As hypothesized, students' reported confidence to solve the problems they were later asked to solve was a more powerful predictor of that performance than was either their confidence to perform math-related tasks or to succeed in math-related courses. Similarly, confidence to succeed in math-related courses was a stronger predictor of choice of math-related majors than was either confidence to solve problems or to perform math-related tasks. Results support A. Bandura's (1986) contention that, because judgments of self-efficacy are task specific, measures of self-efficacy should be tailored to the criterial task being assessed and the domain of functioning being analyzed to increase prediction. (PsycINFO Database Record (c) 2010 APA, all rights reserved)     

Physician judgments of chronic pain patients

Recent evidence has indicated that physician judgments of patients can be influenced by contextual factors. This study examined three contextual factors relevant to hypothetical patients with low back pain, using vignettes that were varied in a 2 x 2 x 2 factorial design: level of reported pain (high vs low), level of supporting medical evidence (high vs low), and the valence of the physician-patient interaction (positive vs negative). Perceived levels of pain, disability, emotional distress, and somatic preoccupation were rated by internists after reading a vignette. Ratings of pain and disability were lower for patients without supporting medical evidence; ratings of distress, somatic preoccupation, and disability were greater for patients who exhibited negative rather than positive affect; internist ratings of pain were lower than patient ratings among patients reporting high levels of pain, while ratings were inflated for patients with low levels of pain. The results suggest that characteristics of both the patient and the situation may influence medical judgments.     

Aging, source, and decision criteria: When false fame errors do and do not occur.

Two experiments investigated the influence of decision criteria on source memory performance of older adults and younger adults. Experiment 1 used the false fame paradigm, which encourages people to use relatively loose decision criteria when making what are, in essence, source judgments. Consistent with previous research, older adults made more false fame errors than younger adults. Experiment 2 was identical to Experiment 1 except that the fame judgments were made with the traditional source task format that encourages relatively stringent decision criteria when making source judgments: Possible sources were listed, and participants categorized names in terms of their source. In contrast to Experiment 1, older adults reduced their false fame errors to the level of younger adults. Encouraging older adults to use relatively stringent decision criteria when making source discriminations can reduce age differences in source misattributions. (PsycINFO Database Record (c) 2010 APA, all rights reserved)     

Mental representations for musical meter.

Investigations of the psychological representation for musical meter provided evidence for an internalized hierarchy from 3 sources: frequency distributions in musical compositions, goodness-of-fit judgments of temporal patterns in metrical contexts, and memory confusions in discrimination judgments. The frequency with which musical events occurred in different temporal locations differentiates one meter from another and coincides with music-theoretic predictions of accent placement. Goodness-of-fit judgments for events presented in metrical contexts indicated a multileveled hierarchy of relative accent strength, with finer differentiation among hierarchical levels by musically experienced than inexperienced listeners. Memory confusions of temporal patterns in a discrimination task were characterized by the same hierarchy of inferred accent strength. These findings suggest mental representations for structural regularities underlying musical meter that influence perceiving, remembering, and composing music. (PsycINFO Database Record (c) 2010 APA, all rights reserved)     

Adult age differences in the realism of confidence judgments: Overconfidence, format dependence, and cognitive predictors.

Realistic confidence judgments are essential to everyday functioning, but few studies have addressed the issue of age differences in overconfidence. Therefore, the authors examined this issue with probability judgment and intuitive confidence intervals in a sample of 122 healthy adults (ages: 35-40, 55-60, 70-75 years). In line with predictions based on the na?ve sampling model (P. Juslin, A. Winman, & P. Hansson, 2007), substantial format dependence was observed, with extreme overconfidence when confidence was expressed as an intuitive confidence interval but not when confidence was expressed as a probability judgment. Moreover, an age-related increase in overconfidence was selectively observed when confidence was expressed as intuitive confidence intervals. Structural equation modeling indicated that the age-related increases in overconfidence were mediated by a general cognitive ability factor that may reflect executive processes. Finally, the results indicated that part of the negative influence of increased age on general ability may be compensated for by an age-related increase in domain-relevant knowledge. (PsycINFO Database Record (c) 2010 APA, all rights reserved)     

Realism in eyewitness confidence as a function of type of event witnessed and repeated recall.

This study investigated how the type of event witnessed and a repeated test schedule for confidence influenced the realism in confidence judgments. The experimental design contrasted 2 film versions (a violent and a nonviolent scenario) and 3 tests of confidence (immediate, repeated, and delayed). On average, for all single items, participants were highly overconfident in their judgments. However, the same participants severely underestimated their own performance when they, at the end of the test session, were asked to provide an estimate of how many questions they thought they had answered correctly. Whereas the effects on realism in confidence for the 2 different film versions were small, the realism in witnesses' confidence judgments increased when participants repeated their confidence ratings. The theoretical and forensical implications of these findings are discussed. (PsycINFO Database Record (c) 2010 APA, all rights reserved)     

Context, feedback, and the calibration and resolution of confidence in perceptual judgments

The effects of variations in the global task difficulty context on judgmental confidence and confidence calibration were investigated in two experiments requiring perceptual comparisons. In Experiment 1, target judgments of moderate difficulty were embedded in a larger set of more difficult (hard context) or less difficult (easy context) judgments. Decisional response time on the target items was longer in the hard context condition, but there was no effect of difficulty context on target judgment confidence, accuracy, over/underconfidence, calibration, or resolution. In Experiment 2, each subject was exposed to three levels of local judgment difficulty. The global contextual difficulty manipulation involved varying the frequency with which the hard and easy judgments appeared, and the presence or absence of trial-by-trial response feedback was manipulated between subjects. As in Experiment 1, contextual difficulty affected decisional response times but not mean confidence ratings or accuracy. However, we found that providing feedback on a globally difficult task makes calibration worse. Also, resolution (the ability to differentiate correct from incorrect judgments) was found to be superior for easy judgments in a difficult context and for difficult judgments in an easy context. We discuss the implication of these findings for research on confidence and confidence calibration.     

Testing architectures of the decision–confidence relation.

Two experiments examined the effect of rendering confidence judgments on the properties of the comparative decision process. In Exp 1, participants worked for 12 sessions that required 2-alternative perceptual, line-length comparisons. For sessions 1–4 and sessions 9–12, confidence judgments were not required. For sessions 5–8, participants provided confidence reports following each comparative judgment. The requirement of confidence judgments significantly increased decisional response time, suggesting that some confidence processing occurs in parallel with the primary decision process. Concomitantly, an examination of the properties of the time to determine confidence during sessions 5–8 revealed clear evidence of postdecisional confidence processing. These results were replicated in a 2nd experiment requiring 2 alternative comparative judgments of Canadian city populations. The authors conclude that confidence processing occurs both during the decision process and postdecisionally, and discuss the implications of the present findings for current theories of confidence in human judgment. (PsycINFO Database Record (c) 2010 APA, all rights reserved)