Retracted: Racist biases in legal decisions are reduced by a justice focus

Six studies investigate whether the effect of racist biases on judges' legal decisions on minority defendants is reduced by a “justice focus.” Given that people associate legal decision‐making with the need to do so in a colorblind manner, a justice focus blocks the effect of racist biases on legal decisions. Experiment 1 shows that explicit instructions to adopt a justice goal decrease biases. Experiment 2 shows that a primed justice focus also decreases biases. Experiments 3a and 3b show the role of pre‐existing legal expertise, which makes people more susceptible a justice goal. Experiments 4a and 4b apply these findings by studying the role of a justice focus among professional courtroom judges. Together, these results demonstrate the importance of a justice focus in preventing racist biases in legal decision‐making. Importantly, a justice focus is a necessary but no sufficient condition for the colorblind administration of justice. Copyright © 2010 John Wiley & Sons, Ltd.     

Basic psychological needs and school engagement: a focus on justice and agency

In this paper, we examine the relationship between basic psychological needs and student engagement in a population of Italian secondary school students. To measure the psychological needs, we have selected a set of indicators that, beyond the needs for autonomy, competence and relatedness, also include the need for justice, which is crucial in adolescence when the degree of sensitivity to the ways people behave in interpersonal interactions is well developed. To measure student engagement, we have considered the four-dimensional structure of the construct, which has added the factor of agentic engagement to the three conventional dimensions of emotional, behavioural and cognitive engagement. Participants were 640 secondary school Italian students aged 15–17. The results confirm that justice should be considered as an additional basic need in school settings, as it fosters intrinsic student motivation and engagement. Moreover, our findings provide evidence that agency is a dimension that enriches the construct of student engagement. In the conclusion, justice and agency are treated as constructs that deserve to be more deeply considered in future research into learning environments.     

Self-regulation and protective health behaviour: How regulatory focus and anticipated regret are related to vaccination decisions

Objective: We examined how individual motivational orientations and anticipated regret are related to the protective health decision of vaccination behaviour.

Design: The proposed relations were examined in a large-scale sample (N = 3168) and three medium-sized samples (N = 151, N = 194, N = 208). Questionnaires were applied to assess regulatory focus, anticipated regret and vaccination behaviour.

Results: Increased prevention-focused self-regulation – which is represented by concerns about security-related goals, responsibilities and obligations – was related to a greater likelihood of vaccination. Prevention-focused individuals’ higher likelihood of getting vaccinated seems at least in part to be a consequence of anticipated regret for not vaccinating. Study 3 suggests that regulatory focus is less related to vaccination decisions when regret is increased by the decision-making context; that is, when information highlighting vaccination effectiveness and a low likelihood of adverse responses is provided.

Conclusion: Prevention-focused self-regulation is related to a greater likelihood of engaging in health-protective behaviour. This can be explained by prevention-focused individuals’ greater tendency to anticipate regret about getting ill as a consequence of not adopting protective measures. If people perceive a protective measure such as a vaccination as highly effective, anticipated regret for not adopting it is generally increased, and individual differences in regulatory focus no longer predict the decision.     

Set-specific capture can be reduced by preemptively occupying a limited-capacity focus of attention

Recent work has shown that contingent attentional capture effects can be especially large when multiple attentional sets for color guide visual search (Moore & Weissman, 2010). In particular, this research suggests that detecting a target-colored (e.g., orange) distractor leads the corresponding attentional set (e.g., identify orange letters) to enter a limited-capacity focus of attention in working memory, where it remains briefly while the distractor is being attended. Consequently, the ability to identify a differently-colored (e.g., green) target 100-300 ms later is impaired because the appropriate set (e.g., identify green letters) cannot also enter the focus of attention. In two experiments, we investigated whether such set-specific capture can be reduced by preemptively occupying the focus of attention. As predicted, a target-colored central distractor presented 233 ms before a target-colored peripheral distractor eliminated set-specific capture arising from the peripheral distractor. Moreover, this effect was observed only when the central distractor's color (e.g., orange) (a) matched a different set than the upcoming peripheral distractor's color (e.g., green) and (b) matched the same set as the upcoming central target's color (e.g., orange). We conclude that the same working memory limitations that give rise to set-specific capture can be preemptively exploited to reduce it.     

Not all stereotypic biases are created equal: evidence for a stereotype-disconfirming bias

Stereotype-confirming biases are well documented in the social psychological literature. However, motivations to disconfirm social stereotypes may be more influential for unprejudiced individuals. Three experiments are presented that test the hypothesis that extremely unprejudiced people exhibit a bias toward stereotype disconfirmation. Experiment 1 investigates stereotype disconfirmation in information-seeking preferences. Experiments 2 and 3 explore attributional strategies for stereotype disconfirmation. In all experiments, unprejudiced participants respond in ways reflecting a motivation to disconfirm social stereotypes. Implications for stereotype change and stereotypic influences on judgment and behavior are discussed.     

Aversive racism in Britain: the use of inadmissible evidence in legal decisions

The aversive racism framework (S. L. Gaertner & J. F. Dovidio, 1986 ) suggests that bias against Blacks is most likely to be expressed by Whites when it can be explained or justified along non‐racial grounds. The present experiment adopted a 2 (Evidence: admissible vs. inadmissible) × 2 (Defendant Race: White vs. Black) between subjects design, asking White participants, whose self‐reported prejudice was assessed, to judge a legal case. As predicted, increased guilt ratings and longer sentencing recommendations were forwarded for the Black (vs. White) defendant only when DNA evidence linking the defendant to the crime had previously been ruled inadmissible. This result was not qualified by self‐report racial attitudes. The implications for evidence inadmissibility in interracial contexts are considered, along with the repercussions of finding experimental evidence of aversive racism outside of North America. Copyright © 2005 John Wiley & Sons, Ltd.     

Retraction statement: It's all in the timing: Measuring emotional reactions to stereotype threat before and after taking a test

The following article from the European Journal of Social Psychology, “It's all in the timing: Measuring emotional reactions to stereotype threat before and after taking a test” by Marx, D. M., and Stapel, D. A., published online on 18 May 2006 in Wiley Online Library ( wileyonlinelibrary.com ), has been retracted by agreement between the first author, the journal Editor in Chief, Tom Postmes, and John Wiley and Sons Ltd. The retraction has been agreed upon following the results of an investigation into the work of Diederik A. Stapel ( https://www.commissielevelt.nl/ ). The Levelt Committee has determined that there were strong indications that this article contained data that were fabricated by Diederik A. Stapel. The first author was unaware of his actions and not in any way involved. REFERENCE Marx, D. M., & Stapel, D. A. (2006). It's all in the timing: Measuring emotional reactions to stereotype threat before and after taking a test. European Journal of Social Psychology, 36(5), 687–698.     

Turning quickly on myself: Automatic interpretation biases in dysphoria are self-referent

Cognitive theories emphasise automatic interpretation biases (AIB) in the development and maintenance of depression. The current study examined AIB using the word sentence association paradigm for depression (WSAP-D) via endorsement rates and reaction time indices. We directly tested the importance of self-relevance for AIB by modifying the WASP-D task to include self-referent ambiguous stimuli and contrasting them with other-referent ambiguous stimuli. We hypothesised that the dysphoric group, but not the non-dysphoric group, would demonstrate AIB only for self-referent ambiguous stimuli. Consistent with our main hypotheses, dysphoric individuals endorsed negative interpretations more often and faster than non-dysphoric individuals, only for self-referent ambiguous stimuli. Self-relevance may be a critical aspect of AIB in dysphoric populations.     

Observational drawing biases are predicted by biases in perception: Empirical support of the misperception hypothesis of drawing accuracy with respect to two angle illusions

We tested the misperception hypothesis of drawing errors, which states that drawing accuracy is strongly influenced by the perceptual encoding of a to-be-drawn stimulus. We used a highly controlled experimental paradigm in which nonartist participants made perceptual judgements and drawings of angles under identical stimulus exposure conditions. Experiment 1 examined the isosceles/scalene triangle angle illusion; congruent patterns of bias in the perception and drawing tasks were found for 40 and 60° angles, but not for 20 or 80° angles, providing mixed support for the misperception hypothesis. Experiment 2 examined shape constancy effects with respect to reproductions of single acute or obtuse angles; congruent patterns of bias in the perception and drawing tasks were found across a range of angles from 29 to 151°, providing strong support for the misperception hypothesis. In both experiments, perceptual and drawing biases were positively correlated. These results are largely consistent with the misperception hypothesis, suggesting that inaccurate perceptual encoding of angles is an important reason that nonartists err in drawing angles from observation.     

Perceptual biases in the horizontal and vertical dimensions are driven by separate cognitive mechanisms

Perceptual attention in healthy participants is characterized by two biases, one operating in the horizontal plane, which draws attention leftward, and the other operating in the vertical plane, which draws attention upward. Given that these biases are reliably found in the same individual, and appear similar at a surface level, a number of researchers have investigated the relationship between horizontal and vertical attentional biases. To date, these investigations have failed to find an association, and this may be due to the fact that one-dimensional vertical and horizontal stimuli were presented separately rather than being measured from a single, two-dimensional stimulus. Across three experiments, two dimensional stimuli were presented, and participants marked the centre of the stimuli. In addition, the shapes of the stimuli were manipulated to determine whether this produced the same modulation of the two biases. Across 13 stimuli and three experiments there were no correlations between the vertical and horizontal biases. In addition, manipulations of stimulus shape, which affected biases in one dimension, did not affect biases in the other dimension. There were, however, consistent correlations between the degree of bias within each dimension across the different stimuli. This study has produced converging evidence that horizontal and vertical biases in spatial judgments rely on separate cognitive mechanisms. To account for these results we discuss a model whereby horizontal asymmetries rely more on space-based mechanisms whereas vertical asymmetries rely more on object-based mechanisms.     

Combining disparate views of objects: Viewpoint costs are reduced by stereopsis

An issue of central concern in the object recognition literature is whether changes in the viewpoint from which an object is depicted produces systematic costs in performance, or whether performance is (largely) unaffected by such changes. This issue has generated a vigorous and lengthy debate because viewpoint-dependent or viewpoint-independent performance has been seen as a reflection of the underlying object representations. The current experiment shows that the effect of viewpoint differences between objects is strongly affected by whether or not they are depicted with stereoscopic depth, a result that is predicted by neither of the main approaches to object recognition. Instead, it is proposed that viewpoint costs in object recognition experiments are a function of the extent to which the information a subject is provided with generalizes across views, without this holding any necessary implications for the nature of the underlying object representations.     

Curvature biases in stereoscopic vision: a nasotemporal asymmetry

The reliability of curvature judgments for linear elements was studied, with stereograms that contained a binocular arc with curvature in depth, and either a binocular frontoparallel arc or a monocular one, on a background representing a hemiellipsoid. The subjects made about 15% errors on binocular arcs with curvature in depth, and 60%-80% of these occurred when both the hemiellipsoid and the arc were convex, the arc being perceived as concave, by transparency through the hemiellipsoid. There were also about 15%-30% errors on frontoparallel arcs, but spread among all situations, with a small prevalence of concave judgments. Curvature in depth was assigned to the monocular stimuli in more than 60% of the cases. There was a curvature bias when the monocular arcs were on the nasal side, and were viewed against a concave background. Assuming parallel viewing, nasal ingoing arcs were usually perceived as concave, and nasal outgoing arcs usually perceived as convex, in agreement with geometrical likelihood. Nasal-side elements captured by one eye are, in general, those with the highest likelihood of having matching elements in the other eye. Then the observed nasal bias effect suggests that the matching process in stereopsis could be driven from the nasal sides of the projections in the two cerebral hemispheres.     

Looking up versus looking down: attractiveness‐based organizational biases are moderated by social comparison direction

Organizational decision‐making research demonstrates an abundance of positive biases directed toward attractive individuals. However, recent research suggests that these favorable consequences of attractiveness do not hold when the person being evaluated is of the same sex as the evaluator. In the current study, participants evaluated prospective job candidates and indicated their desire to interact socially with the candidate. Results indicated positive responses toward attractive other‐sex targets but not toward attractive same‐sex targets. This pattern was moderated by participants' social comparison orientation: People who tended to engage in downward (rather than upward) social comparison displayed stronger reactions to attractive comparison targets. They indicated less desire to interact socially with attractive same‐sex job candidates than those who tend to engage in upward social comparison.     

Near-hand effects are robust: Three OSF pre-registered replications of visual biases in perihand space

ABSTRACT

Although previous work provides evidence that observers experience biases in visual processing when they view stimuli in perihand space, a few recent investigations have questioned the reliability of these near-hand effects. We addressed this controversy by running three pre-registered replication experiments. Experiment 1 was a replication of one of the initial studies on facilitated target detection near the hands in which participants performed an attentional cueing task while placing a single hand either near or far from the display. Experiment 2 tested the same paradigm while adopting the design of a recent experiment that called into question near-hand facilitation. Experiment 3 was a replication of a study in which hand proximity influenced working memory performance in a change detection paradigm. Across all three experiments, we found significant interactions between hand position and stimulus characteristics that indicated the hands’ presence altered visual processing, bolstering evidence favouring the robustness of near-hand effects.     

Analysis of recent incidents of on-field violence in sport: legal decisions and additional considerations from psychology

This article focuses on two recent incidents of serious on-field violence in sports and the legal consequences for those involved. The two incidents occurred in Dutch football (soccer) and became infamous owing to the nature of the violent incidents and widespread media coverage. The legal outcomes of these two incidents are described, and some of the difficulties that legal authorities face in considering assaults on the sports field are discussed. A new way of categorizing such violent incidents and the motivation behind them, based on an established psychological theory [reversal theory, Apter, 1982, 2001] is proposed. Taken along with the other points made in this article, being aware of when and how individuals cross the boundaries between play and anger, power or thrill violence may provide an additional perspective to making informed decisions about illegal violent acts on the sports field.     

Apology in the criminal justice setting: evidence for including apology as an additional component in the legal system

The criminal justice system has reached unprecedented scope in the United States, with over 6.4 million people under some type of supervision. Remedies that have the potential to reduce this number are continually being sought. This article analyzes an innovative strategy currently being reconsidered in criminal justice: the apology. Despite a legal system that only sporadically acknowledges it, evidence for the use of apology is supported by social science research, current criminal justice theories, case law, and empirical studies. Social psychological, sociological and socio-legal studies pinpoint the elements and function of apology, what makes apologies effective, and concerns about apology if it were implemented in the criminal justice system. Theoretical evidence is examined (including restorative justice, therapeutic jurisprudence, crime, shame, and reintegration) to explore the process of apology in the criminal justice context. Attribution theory and social conduct theory are used to explain the apology process specifically for victims and offenders. A brief examination of case law reveals that though apology has no formal place in criminal law, it has surfaced recently under the federal sentencing guidelines. Finally, empirical evidence in criminal justice settings reveals that offenders want to apologize and victims desire an apology. Moreover, by directly addressing the harmful act, apology may be the link to reduced recidivism for offenders, as well as empowerment for victims. This evidence combined suggests that apology is worthy of further study as a potentially valuable addition to the criminal justice process.     

Vowel bias in Danish word‐learning: processing biases are language‐specific

The present study explored whether the phonological bias favoring consonants found in French‐learning infants and children when learning new words (Havy & Nazzi, 2009; Nazzi, 2005) is language‐general, as proposed by Nespor, Peña and Mehler (2003), or varies across languages, perhaps as a function of the phonological or lexical properties of the language in acquisition. To do so, we used the interactive word‐learning task set up by Havy and Nazzi (2009), teaching Danish‐learning 20‐month‐olds pairs of phonetically similar words that contrasted either on one of their consonants or one of their vowels, by either one or two phonological features. Danish was chosen because it has more vowels than consonants, and is characterized by extensive consonant lenition. Both phenomena could disfavor a consonant bias. Evidence of word‐learning was found only for vocalic information, irrespective of whether one or two phonological features were changed. The implication of these findings is that the phonological biases found in early lexical processing are not language‐general but develop during language acquisition, depending on the phonological or lexical properties of the native language.     

Enhancements and justice: problems in determining the requirements of justice in a genetically transformed society

There is a concern that genetic engineering will exacerbate existing social divisions and inequalities, especially if only the wealthy can afford genetic enhancements. Accordingly, many argue that justice requires the imposition of constraints on genetic engineering. However, it would be unwise to decide at this time what limits should be imposed in the future. Decision makers currently lack both the theoretical tools and the factual foundation for making sound judgments about the requirements of justice in a genetically transformed society. Moreover, focusing on the uncertain inequities of the future may result in failure to give priority to more pressing inequities of the present. Especially in a country that recently has enacted tax legislation that will widen existing wealth disparities, concern about the distant threat of a genetic aristocracy appears misplaced.     

Animus and creativity in psychotherapy: a position statement

Calling attention to what the author calls the 'maternalization of our profession', a warning is sounded to psychotherapists, and women practitioners in particular, not to neglect their own creativity in the course of professional development undertaken to take better care of patients. Development of the animus, here reformulated as 'an archetype of the capacity for non-relationship', is seen as a balancing alternative to the usual training in the capacity to contain object relations. A literary parallel can be found in Ibsen's play, The Woman from the Sea. It is hoped, too, that through her own initiation into a creative life, the analyst will be better able to help the analysand find a connection with a 'creative centre'.