Money can’t buy love: Asymmetric beliefs about gift price and feelings of appreciation

Across three studies, we identify an asymmetry between gift-givers’ and gift-recipients’ beliefs about the link between gift price and feelings of appreciation. Gift-givers expected a positive correlation between how much they spent on a gift and the extent to which gift-recipients would appreciate the gift because gift-givers assume that more expensive gifts convey a higher level of thoughtfulness. Gift-recipients, in contrast, reported no such association between gift price and their actual feelings of appreciation. This effect occurred regardless of whether the individual’s role and the magnitude of the gift were manipulated or measured in the field. Taken together, these findings cast doubt on whether gift-givers can draw on their personal experience as gift-recipients in order to identify meaningful gifts for others.     

The illusion of courage in social predictions: Underestimating the impact of fear of embarrassment on other people

The results of two experiments support the thesis that emotional perspective taking entails two judgments: a prediction of one’s own preferences and decisions in a different emotional situation, and an adjustment of this prediction to accommodate perceived differences between self and others. Participants overestimated others’ willingness to engage in embarrassing public performances—miming (Experiment 1) and dancing (Experiment 2)—in exchange for money. Consistent with a dual judgment model, this overestimation was greater among participants facing a hypothetical rather than a real decision to perform. Further, participants’ predictions of others’ willingness to perform were more closely correlated with self-predictions than with participants’ estimates of others’ thoughts about the costs and benefits of performing.     

The tendency to overestimate what is visible in a planar mirror amongst adults and children

Adults hold several mistaken beliefs about simple mechanical and optical phenomena. In particular, many adults believe that they would be able to see their own image in a mirror before they are in front of it. Similarly, they expect objects to become visible in mirrors before they actually do. This overestimation of what is visible is known as the early error (Bertamini, Spooner, & Hecht, 2003). It has been suggested that incorrect models about mechanics, and therefore erroneous beliefs, develop over time, as evidenced by good performance in young children (Kaiser, McCloskey, & Proffitt, 1986). With respect to knowledge about what is visible in mirrors we report the first developmental data. We confirmed an effect for prospective University students but found no evidence of any early error in children between the age of 5 and 11. This erroneous belief about mirrors develops during the later school years when people develop a system of beliefs based on experience.     

What they want and what they get: The social goals of boys with ADHD and comparison boys

Twenty-seven boys diagnosed with attention-deficit hyperactivity disorder (ADHD) and 18 comparison boys participated in a competitive tetradic interaction task. Boys were individually interviewed before the game about their goals for the interaction, and adult observers inferred boys' social goals from videotapes of the interaction. Social acceptance was determined by combining positive and negative sociometric nominations collected through individual interviews at the end of the summer research program in which the interaction was held. In their self-reports, ADHD-high aggressive boys prioritized trouble-seeking and fun at the expense of rules to a greater extent than did both ADHD-low aggressive and comparison boys. Observers judged ADHD-high-aggressive boys to seek attention more strongly and seek fairness less strongly than the other two groups. Self-reported goals of defiance and cooperation predicted boys' end-of-program social standing, even with interactional behaviors and subgroup status controlled statistically. Observer-inferred goals were differentially associated with social acceptance for ADHD and comparison boys, suggesting discontinuities in peer interaction processes. Differentiation of goals from behavior and the integral role of children's goals in peer acceptance are discussed.This research received primary support from National Institute of Mental Health Grant RO1 MH45064, awarded to Stephen P. Hinshaw. Special acknowledgments are due to the child participants and the many dedicated interviewers and behavior observers who made this study possible.     

Honesty pays: On the benefits of having and disclosing information in coalition bargaining

People typically think of negotiations as competitive, which often leads them to engage in secrecy and even deception. In three experiments we show that this approach can backfire in coalition bargaining. Results show that, even though bargainers with an outcome advantage only obtain favorable outcomes when this information is public, they rarely choose to reveal this information. Fairness motivations fueled decisions to reveal this information and make attractive offers whereas self-interest fueled decisions not to reveal and make unattractive offers. Finally, perspective taking increased proselfs' inclinations to keep their advantage private whereas it increased prosocials' inclinations to reveal. These findings suggest that many people are not naturally inclined to reveal private information when they have an outcome advantage, but that fairness motives encourage revelation and, ironically, increase revealers' outcomes in coalition bargaining. Thus, in this context, honesty pays.     

Tainted recommendations: The social comparison bias

The present analysis reveals the social comparison bias – a bias that emerges from the social comparison process and taints recommendations. We hypothesize that people who have high standing on a relevant dimension (e.g., quantity of publications) begin to protect their social comparison context by making recommendations that prevent others, who might surpass them on the relevant dimension, from entering their comparison context. Studies 1 and 2 instantiate this effect in both hypothetical and real decision situations, showing that people tend not to recommend individuals who surpass them on the relevant dimension on which they have high standing. Finally, Study 3, in a sample of real employees, links the effect to one’s concern for protecting self-esteem. Theoretical and organizational implications are discussed.     

Saving the worst for last: The effect of time horizon on the efficiency of negotiating benefits and burdens

Three experiments explored the effect of outcome delays—longer time horizons for the realization of outcomes—on the efficiency of negotiated agreements. We hypothesized that there would be a positive relationship between a longer temporal distance to the consequences of negotiated agreements and the efficiency of those agreements. Outcome delays did increase the efficiency of the negotiated agreements. In addition, type of resource, burden or benefit, moderated this relationship. Because negotiating for burdens is more difficult than negotiating for benefits in the present, the salutary discounting effects of outcome delays were greater for burdens. The multifaceted effects of time on negotiations are discussed.     

Fairness considerations: Increasing understanding of intentionality during adolescence

The development of fairness considerations in decision making is not well understood. Here we tested the hypothesis that increased understanding of intentionality during adolescence underlies increased fairness considerations in social decision making. We conducted three experiments using an adapted version of the Ultimatum Game with participants during four stages of adolescence: 9, 12, 15, and 18 years of age. Participants made or evaluated monetary offers, and we manipulated the intentionality context of offers. Results show that strategic thinking is already present at 9 years of age. There was no age difference in fairness of offers when the responder could not reject an offer (Experiment 1), but when they could reject an offer there was an age-related increase in taking into account the perspective and intentionality of other players when making offers (Experiment 2) and evaluating offers (Experiment 3). Taken together, the results demonstrate a linear developmental transition in fairness considerations that may have important implications for our understanding of social interactions during adolescence.     

The benefits of retail therapy: Making purchase decisions reduces residual sadness

People often shop when feeling sad, but whether and why shopping reduces residual (lingering) sadness remains an open question. Sadness is strongly associated with a sense that situational forces control the outcomes in one's life, and thus we theorized that the choices inherent in shopping may restore personal control over one's environment and reduce residual sadness. Three experiments provided support for our hypothesis. Making shopping choices helped to alleviate sadness whether they were hypothetical (Experiment 1) or real (Experiment 2). In addition, all experiments found support for the underlying mechanism of personal control restoration. Notably, the benefits of restored personal control over one's environment do not generalize to anger (Experiments 2 and 3), because anger is associated with a sense that other people (rather than situational forces) are likely to cause negative outcomes, and these appraisals are not ameliorated by restoring personal control over one's environment.     

On the benefits of thinking unconsciously: Unconscious thought can increase post-choice satisfaction

This work compares conscious thought and unconscious thought in relation to quality of choice. Earlier work [Dijksterhuis, A. (2004). Think different: The merits of unconscious thought in preference development and decision making. Journal of Personality and Social Psychology, 87, 586-598] has shown that people make better choices after engaging in unconscious thought (i.e., unconscious activity during a period of distraction) rather than in conscious thought. However, the evidence was obtained for choices between hypothetical alternatives with quality of choice operationalized normatively. As quality of decision is essentially subjective, in the current experiment participants chose between real objects with quality operationalized as post-choice satisfaction. In a paradigm based on work by Wilson and colleagues [Wilson, T. D., Lisle, D., Schooler, J. W., Hodges, S. D., Klaaren, K. J., & LaFleur, S. J. (1993). Introspecting about reasons can reduce post-choice satisfaction. Personality and Social Psychology Bulletin, 19, 331-339], participants were briefly presented with five art posters, and chose one either (a) immediately, (b) after thorough conscious thinking about each poster, or (c) after a period of distraction. Participants took their favorite poster home and were phoned 3-5 weeks later. As hypothesized, unconscious thinkers were more satisfied with their choice than participants in the other two conditions.     

Strategy compatibility: The time versus money effect on product evaluation strategies

We show that time priming leads consumers to adopt an alternative-based evaluation strategy, whereas money priming elicits the use of an attribute-based evaluation strategy. In Experiment 1, we used process tracing in Mouselab to test this proposition, and the results suggested that the effect of time versus money priming on the choice of product-evaluation strategy was mediated by a holistic versus piecemeal information-processing. The results of Experiments 2A and 2B showed that the use of time versus money priming to trigger the choice of an alternative-based versus attribute-based evaluation strategy may result in systematic preference reversals. Specifically, when time (versus money) was primed, the participants were found to be more likely to choose a product dominating on a verbally described (versus numerically described) attribute (Experiment 2A), and one dominating on a non-alignable (versus alignable) attribute (Experiment 2B).     

Perspective taking and emotion: The case of disgust and sadness

In a recent study (Gilead et al., 2016), perspective taking (PT) was found to have a significant effect on affect ratings of negative pictures compared to neutrals. The current study explores the question whether PT would be affected equally by distinct negative emotions. We used neutral pictures and pictures classified as provoking sadness or disgust, matched for their intensity and arousal. Participants were asked to rate the pictures (on a scale from 1—no emotional reaction, to 5—very strong reaction) from 3 different perspectives - tough, sensitive, or their own – “me”. In Experiment 1, all pictures were mixed in the same blocks. In Experiment 2, the sad and disgust pictures were separated into two different blocks (each including neutrals). Both experiments showed significant interaction between PT and emotion. PT was found to be influenced by valence; however, distinct negative emotions were found to affect PT similarly.     

The structure of choice

An unsolved fundamental problem in decision science concerns the extent to which the nature of the perceived relationships among items in a set of alternatives influences how they are chosen. More specifically, given a choice set with n items, how does human choice behavior differ as a function of the perceived relationships between the items of the set? In what follows, we study this problem empirically and theoretically from the standpoint of the dimensional structure of the choice set. In particular, we use generalized invariance structure theory (GIST; Vigo, 2013, 2014) to propose an inverse relationship between the degree of concept learning difficulty of a choice set (as determined by its degree of invariance or internal coherence) and choice response times on its members. To our knowledge, this is the first model that precisely unifies these two fundamental constructs. On average, the model, without free parameters, accounts for nearly 90% of the variance in the data from our two response-time experiments.     

Cognitive and emotional empathy in typically developing children: The influence of age,gender, and intelligence

In the current study, the influence of age, gender and IQ on cognitive and emotional empathy in school-aged children and adolescents was examined adopting two behavioural paradigms: participants were shown film clips with different scenes of social interaction to which they were asked to respond. Thus, 134 children aged seven to 17 years (mean age = 138.4 months, sd = 31.66 months) were tested for emotion recognition, perspective taking and emotional empathy. Age strongly influenced components of cognitive empathy and explained 33.5% to 39.1% of the variance. Gender and IQ also were significant predictors, yet only explained 3% to 5%, respectively 8% to 9% of the variance. In contrast, neither age, gender nor IQ were related to emotional empathy. Results suggest developmental maturation of cognitive, but not emotional empathy throughout childhood and adolescence. To explain variability in emotional empathy, additional biological and psychosocial factors need to be studied.     

Risk taking under the influence: A fuzzy-trace theory of emotion in adolescence

Fuzzy-trace theory explains risky decision making in children, adolescents, and adults, incorporating social and cultural factors as well as differences in impulsivity. Here, we provide an overview of the theory, including support for counterintuitive predictions (e.g., when adolescents “rationally” weigh costs and benefits, risk taking increases, but it decreases when the core gist of a decision is processed). Then, we delineate how emotion shapes adolescent risk taking—from encoding of representations of options, to retrieval of values/principles, to application of those values/principles to representations of options. Our review indicates that: (i) gist representations often incorporate emotion including valence, arousal, feeling states, and discrete emotions; and (ii) emotion determines whether gist or verbatim representations are processed. We recommend interventions to reduce unhealthy risk taking that inculcate stable gist representations, enabling adolescents to identify quickly and automatically danger even when experiencing emotion, which differs sharply from traditional approaches emphasizing deliberation and precise analysis.     

The duality of virtue: Deconstructing the moral hypocrite

The present study examined the processes giving rise to moral hypocrisy, a phenomenon in which individuals judge their own transgressions to be less morally objectionable than the same transgressions enacted by others. Two alternative models of the source of hypocrisy were compared to determine whether hypocrisy results from automatic or volitional biases. Findings demonstrated not only that participants viewed their own transgressions as significantly more “fair” than the same transgressions enacted by others, but also that this bias was eliminated under conditions of cognitive constraint. These findings support the view that hypocrisy stems from volitionally-guided justifications, and thereby suggest that at a more basic level, humans possess a negative response to violations of fairness norms whether enacted by themselves or others.     

The bedside manner of homo economicus: How and why priming an economic schema reduces compassion

We investigate how, why and when activating economic schemas reduces the compassion that individuals extend to others in need when delivering bad news. Across three experiments, we show that unobtrusively priming economic schemas decreases the compassion that individuals express to others in need, that this effect is mediated by dampened feelings of empathy and heightened perceptions of unprofessionalism, and that it is circumscribed to bad news that has economic implications. We discuss implications for theory and research on schemas, procedural justice, emotion expression, and prosocial behavior.     

Doing as they would do: How the perceived ethical preferences of third-party beneficiaries impact ethical decision-making

Although unethical behavior often benefits third-parties not directly complicit in the misconduct, not all beneficiaries welcome these ill-gotten benefits. We investigate whether actors consider the ethical preferences of potential beneficiaries or rely solely on their own ethical predispositions when making decisions that affect others. Three studies demonstrate that the perceived ethical preferences of these beneficiaries can substantially influence the likelihood that actors behave unethically on their behalves. These studies show that actors consider the ethical preferences of beneficiaries only when their own ethical disposition is outcome-based.