Factors that affect action possibility judgements: Recent experience with the action and the current body state

It has been suggested that action possibility judgements are formed through a covert simulation of the to-be-executed action. We sought to determine whether the motor system (via a common coding mechanism) influences this simulation, by investigating whether action possibility judgements are influenced by experience with the movement task (Experiments 1 and 2) and current body states (Experiment 3). The judgement task in each experiment involved judging whether it was possible for a person's hand to accurately move between two targets at presented speeds. In Experiment 1, participants completed the action judgements before and after executing the movement they were required to judge. Results were that judged movement times after execution were closer to the actual execution time than those prior to execution. The results of Experiment 2 suggest that the effects of execution on judgements were not due to motor activation or perceptual task experience—alternative explanations of the execution-mediated judgement effects. Experiment 3 examined how judged movement times were influenced by participants wearing weights. Results revealed that wearing weights increased judged movement times. These results suggest that the simulation underlying the judgement process is connected to the motor system, and that simulations are dynamically generated, taking into account recent experience and current body state.     

Factors that affect action possibility judgments: The assumed abilities of other people

Judging what actions are possible and impossible to complete is a skill that is critical for planning and executing movements in both individual and joint actions contexts. The present experiments explored the ability to adapt action possibility judgments to the assumed characteristics of another person. Participants watched alternating pictures of a person's hand moving at different speeds between targets of different indexes of difficulty (according to Fitts' Law) and judged whether or not it was possible for individuals with different characteristics to maintain movement accuracy at the presented speed. Across four studies, the person in the pictures and the background information about the person were manipulated to determine how and under what conditions participants adapted their judgments. Results revealed that participants adjusted their possibility judgments to the assumed motor capabilities of the individual they were judging. However, these adjustments only occurred when participants were instructed to take the other person into consideration suggesting that the adaption process is a voluntary process. Further, it was observed that the slopes of the regression equations relating movement time and index of difficulty did not differ across conditions. All differences between conditions were in the y-intercept of the regression lines. This pattern of findings suggests that participants formed the action possibility judgments by first simulating their own performance, and then adjusted the “possibility” threshold by adding or subtracting a correction factor to determine what is and is not possible for the other person to perform.     

Inside the happy personality: Personality states,situation experience,and state affect mediate the relation between personality and affect

Personality traits are strongly related to affect, but the mechanisms accounting for this association remain mostly unclear. We test a new theoretical model that proposes that personality states, situation characteristics, and affective states mediate the relation between personality traits and trait affect. Data from an experience sampling study (N = 206; 4381 observations) indicate that personality traits are associated with personality states and experienced situation characteristics, personality states and experienced situation characteristics are associated with state affect, state affect is associated with trait affect, and that these variables indeed mediate the relation between personality traits and trait affect. These results emphasize the importance of daily experiences for trait-level variables and call for further research on the interplay between personality, behavior, situations, and affect.     

Correlations of trait and state emotions with utilitarian moral judgements

In four experiments, we asked subjects for judgements about scenarios that pit utilitarian outcomes against deontological moral rules, for example, saving more lives vs. a rule against active killing. We measured trait emotions of anger, disgust, sympathy and empathy (the last two in both specific and general forms, the latter referring to large groups of people), asked about the same emotions after each scenario (state emotions). We found that utilitarian responding to the scenarios, and higher scores on a utilitarianism scale, were correlated negatively with disgust, positively (but weakly and inconsistently) with anger, positively with specific sympathy and state sympathy, and less so with general sympathy or empathy. In a fifth experiment, we asked about anger and sympathy for specific outcomes, and we found that these are consistently predictive of utilitarian responding.     

Contest experience and body size affect different types of contest decisions

This study examined the relative importance of contest experience and size differences to behavioral decisions over the course of contests. Using a mangrove rivulus fish, Kryptolebias marmoratus, we showed that although contest experience and size differences jointly determined contest outcomes, they affected contestants’ interactions at different stages of contests. Contest experience affected behavioral decisions at earlier stages of contests, including the tendency and latency to launch attacks, the tendency to escalate contests into mutual attacks and the outcome of non-escalated contests. Once contests were escalated into mutual attacks, the degree of size difference affected the fish’s persistence in escalation and chance of winning, but contest experience did not. These results support the hypothesis that contest experience modifies individuals’ estimation of their fighting ability rather than their actual strength. Furthermore, (1) in contests between two naïve contestants, more than 60 % of fish that were 2–3 mm smaller than their opponent escalated the contest to physical fights, even though their larger opponents eventually won 92 % of escalated fights and (2) fish with a losing experience were very likely to retreat in the face of an opponent 2–3 mm smaller than them without escalating. The result that a 2–3 mm size advantage could not offset the influence of a losing experience on the tendency to escalate suggests that, as well as depending on body size, the fish’s physical strength is influenced by other factors which require further investigation.     

Human judgements of control: The interaction of the current contingency and previous controllability

Two experiments were carried out to determine the effects of the learned helplessness treatment on judgement of control over a outcome. In the first experiment judgements were found to be sensitive to the actual level of response-outcome contingency. When the contingency level was high, this sensitivity was also influenced by pretreatment, in that a prior uncontrollable experience gave rise to lower judgements than both a controllable one and no experience at all. The latter pretreatments produced the most accurate judgements. In the second experiment the judgements after an uncontrollable task were found to be insensitive to a previous controllable or uncontrollable pretreatment. The results are discussed in terms of contingency-learning models.     

The analysis of intuition: Processing fluency and affect in judgements of semantic coherence

In semantic coherence judgements individuals are able to intuitively discriminate whether a word triad has a common remote associate (coherent) or not (incoherent) without consciously retrieving the common associate. A processing-fluency account for these intuitions is proposed, which assumes that (a) coherent triads are processed more fluently than incoherent triads, (b) this high fluency triggers a subtle positive affect, and (c) this affect may be experienced as a cognitive feeling and used in explicit judgement. In line with this account, it was shown that coherent triads (a) are processed faster than incoherent triads (Study 1), (b) serve as positive affective primes (Study 2), and (c) are liked more than incoherent triads (Study 3). When participants were provided with an irrelevant source of their affective reactions, they lost the ability to intuitively discriminate between coherent and incoherent triads (Study 4). Finally, an item-based analysis found that triads that are processed faster are liked more and are more likely to be judged coherent, irrespective of their actual coherence (Study 5).     

Self-recognition: body and action

How do I know it was me who moved? A recent experimental study illustrates the contribution of one's body schema and awareness of one's own actions to self-recognition. The results provide evidence that bodily cues and action cues are important in self-recognition, and they demonstrate that action cues overrule bodily cues.     

Collective action and the politics of affect

The anti-globalisation has shifted away from a politics that aims to uncover and resist neoliberal ideology to one that bypasses and potentially disrupts habits of thinking about neoliberalism. Focusing on mass gatherings such as the Seattle demonstrations in 1999, several scholars suggest that the anti-globalisation movement has embraced a politics of affect that, while potentially increasing the collective's capacity for action, also risks strengthening existing divisions and creating sad passions. In response to these concerns, this article develops an account of the affective politics the World Social Forum has moved to. Drawing on my experiences at the 2005 World Social Forum in Porto Alegre I describe the Forum as a space in which social movements from around the globe testify to their experiences of struggle. I employ Freireian pedagogical techniques and theories of brain-body connections to develop an account of the way in which testimony and dialogue generate new thinking from which a collective language can emerge. I suggest that the discourse that arises can lead to new ways of being.     

Human factors with nonhumans: factors that affect computer-task performance

There are two general strategies that may be employed for "doing human factors research with nonhuman animals." First, one may use the methods of traditional human factors investigations to examine the nonhuman animal-to-machine interface. Alternatively, one might use performance by nonhuman animals as a surrogate for or model of performance by a human operator. Each of these approaches is illustrated with data in the present review. Chronic ambient noise was found to have a significant but inconsequential effect on computer-task performance by rhesus monkeys (Macaca mulatta). Additional data supported the generality of findings such as these to humans, showing that rhesus monkeys are appropriate models human psychomotor performance. It is argued that ultimately the interface between comparative psychology and technology will depend on the coordinated use of both strategies of investigation.     

Ruminative self-focus and negative affect: an experience sampling study

The authors conducted an experience sampling study to investigate the relationship between momentary ruminative self-focus and negative affect. Ninety-three adults recorded these variables at quasi-random intervals 8 times daily for 1 week. Scores on questionnaire measures of dispositional rumination were associated with mean levels of momentary ruminative self-focus over the experience sampling week. Concurrently, momentary ruminative self-focus was positively associated with negative affect. Cross-lagged analyses revealed that whereas ruminative self-focus predicted negative affect at a subsequent occasion, negative affect also predicted ruminative self-focus at a subsequent occasion. Decomposition of the dispositional rumination measure suggested that brooding, but not reflective pondering, was associated with higher mean levels of negative affect. Though broadly consistent with Nolen-Hoeksema's (1991) response styles theory, these results suggest that a reciprocal relationship exists between ruminative self-focus and negative affect.     

Masculinity and femininity scales: current state of the art

A theoretical and empirical review of masculinity and femininity scales was carried out after 30 years of their existence. Hypotheses to be tested were: (a) muldimensionality versus bidimensionality; (b) inadequate percentage of variance accounted for (less than 50%); (c) inconsistency between factor structure and the dualistic model. 618, 200 and 287 students took part in each of the three studies that were carried out. Factorial analyses (PAF) were performed. Results support multidimensionality, unsatisfactory percentage of variance accounted for, and lack of congruence between obtained factors and the dualistic model. All these data were analysed within the context of the twofold sex and gender reality model.     

The role of cognition and affect in the formation of customer satisfaction judgements concerning service recovery encounters

• It is widely accepted that justice perceptions play an important role in shaping customers' evaluations of service recovery experiences. However, this stream of justice research has evolved with little cross‐reference to emotion research. The current paper seeks to address this issue by explicitly considering the role of perceived justice in the elicitation of recovery‐specific consumer emotions. Specifically, we develop and test a model suggesting that perceived justice represents a cognitive appraisal dimension, which helps to explain the elicitation of positive and negative emotions during and/or after service recovery encounters. Furthermore, we argue that customer satisfaction with service recovery (i.e. recovery satisfaction) is based partly on cognitive (i.e. perceived justice based) and partly on affective responses. Support for the proposed model is provided through findings from an empirical study showing that both cognitive and affective influences work to create the recovery satisfaction judgement. This finding has significant implications for the theory and practice of service recovery management.

Copyright © 2008 John Wiley & Sons, Ltd.     

Hitting is contagious: experience and action induction

In baseball, it is believed that "hitting is contagious," that is, probability of success increases if the previous few batters get a hit. Could this effect be partially explained by action induction--that is, the tendency to perform an action related to one that has just been observed? A simulation was used to investigate the effect of inducing stimuli on batting performance for more-experienced (ME) and less-experienced (LE) baseball players. Three types of inducing stimuli were compared with a no-induction condition: action (a simulated ball traveling from home plate into left, right, or center field), outcome (a ball resting in either left, right, or center field), and verbal (the word "left", "center", or "right"). For both ME and LE players, fewer pitchers were required for a successful hit in the action condition. For ME players, there was a significant relationship between the inducing stimulus direction and hit direction for both the action and outcome prompts. For LE players, the prompt only had a significant effect on batting performance in the action condition, and the magnitude of the effect was significantly smaller than for ME. The effect of the inducing stimulus decreased as the delay (i.e., no. of pitches between prompt and hit) increased, with the effect being eliminated after roughly 4 pitches for ME and 2 pitches for LE. It is proposed that the differences in the magnitude and time course of action induction as a function of experience occurred because ME have more well-developed perceptual-motor representations for directional hitting.     

Intentional action: conscious experience and neural prediction

Intentional action involves both a series of neural events in the motor areas of the brain, and also a distinctive conscious experience that "I" am the author of the action. This paper investigates some possible ways in which these neural and phenomenal events may be related. Recent models of motor prediction are relevant to the conscious experience of action as well as to its neural control. Such models depend critically on matching the actual consequences of a movement against its internally predicted effects. However, it remains unclear whether our conscious experience of action depends on a precise matching process, or a retrospective inference that "I" must have been responsible for a particular event. We report an experiment in which normal subjects judged the perceived time of either intentional actions, involuntary movements, or subsequent effects (auditory tones) of these. We found that the subject's intention to produce the auditory tone produced an intentional binding between the perceived times of the subject's action and the tone. However, if the intention was interrupted by an imposed involuntary movement, followed by the identical tone, no such binding occurred. The phenomenology of intentional action requires an appropriate predictive link between intentions and effects, rather than a retrospective inference that "I" caused the effect.     

Actuality and possibility: On the complementarity of two registers in the bodily constitution of experience

The purpose of this paper is to demonstrate the usefulness of the concept of possibility, and not merely that of actuality, for an inquiry into the bodily constitution of experience. The paper will study how the possibilities of action that may (or may not) be available to the subject help to shape the meaning attributed to perceived objects and to the situation occupied by the subject within her environment. This view will be supported by reference to empirical evidence provided by recent and current research on the perceptual estimation of distances and the effects brought about by the use of a tool on the organisation of our perceived immediate space.

Positive affect and the experience of meaning in life

Six studies examined the role of positive affect (PA) in the experience of meaning in life (MIL). Study 1 showed strong relations between measures of mood, goal appraisals, and MIL. In multivariate analyses, PA was a stronger predictor of MIL than goal appraisals. In Study 2, the most consistent predictor of the experience of meaning in a day was the PA experienced that day. Later, global MIL was predicted by average daily PA, rather than average daily MIL. Study 3 demonstrated no prospective relations between measures of MIL and PA over 2 years. In Study 4, priming positive mood concepts enhanced MIL. In Study 5, manipulated positive mood enhanced ratings of MIL for those who were not given an attributional cue for their moods. In Study 6, PA was associated with a high level of distinction between meaningful and meaningless activities. Results indicate that positive moods may predispose individuals to feel that life is meaningful. In addition, positive moods may increase sensitivity to the meaning-relevance of a situation.