Fundamental Hope and Practical Identity

This article considers the question ‘What makes hope rational?’ We take Adrienne Martin's recent incorporation analysis of hope as representative of a tradition that views the rationality of hope as a matter of instrumental reasons. Against this tradition, we argue that an important subset of hope, ‘fundamental hope’, is not governed by instrumental rationality. Rather, people have reason to endorse or reject such hope in virtue of the contribution of the relevant attitudes to the integrity of their practical identity, which makes the relevant hope not instrumentally but intrinsically valuable. This argument also allows for a new analysis of the reasons people have to abandon hope and for a better understanding of non-fundamental, ‘prosaic’ hopes.     

Effects of Feedback on Self‐Evaluations and Self‐Regulation in Elementary School

Elementary school learners are typically highly confident when judging accuracy of their test responses, relatively independent of whether these are correct. While feedback has been shown to improve accuracy of adults' and adolescents' self‐evaluations and subsequent self‐regulation, little is known about beneficial effects for elementary school children. We investigated effects of fine‐grained feedback on fourth and sixth graders' self‐evaluations and restudy selections by presenting them the ideas they were meant to bring up in their test responses. One group received full‐definition feedback standards, whereas the other group received idea‐unit feedback standards. The two types of feedback strongly improved fourth and sixth graders' self‐evaluations for commission errors and for partially correct responses. While restudy selections before feedback were more adaptive for sixth than fourth graders, age differences disappeared after receiving feedback. Findings imply that feedback standards are a suitable tool to calibrate elementary school learners and to support effective self‐regulation.Copyright © 2017 John Wiley & Sons, Ltd.     

Action Dynamics in Intertemporal Choice Reveal Different Facets of Decision Process

Two experiments were conducted to examine decision process in intertemporal choice with spatial and temporal action dynamic measures generated from cursor movement. The effects of the context valence (gain and loss) and magnitude of the payoffs (small and large) were investigated. Other factors examined were differences between decisions made at versus away from the indifference point and response variability dependent on what was selected (delayed versus non‐delayed/less‐delayed payoff). Using principal components analysis, decision process is described with three orthogonal components. General decision difficulty is encompassed by two components: (1) Conflict, depicted by Idle time and deviations from a direct choice path, and (2) decision uncertainty or Wavering, described by left‐right directional flips. A general Locomotion factor was also present. In Experiment 1, Conflict was best at capturing the gain/loss and magnitude context effects. Greater Conflict was observed in the loss context and the small magnitude condition. When choices were closer to the indifference point, Wavering was most salient. In Experiment 2, when selecting larger, delayed payoffs, both Conflict and Wavering increased suggesting that controlling the temptation of selecting the sooner, smaller reward entails effort. By analyzing trajectories, the study advances knowledge of the construct validity of different action dynamic measures and supports the distinction of decision uncertainty and decision conflict. Copyright © 2015 John Wiley & Sons, Ltd.     

What Provides Justification for Cheating—Producing or Observing Counterfactuals?

When people can profit financially by lying, they do so to the extent to which they can justify their lies. One type of justification is the observation and production of desirable counterfactual information. Here, we disentangle observing and producing of desired counterfactuals and test whether the mere observation is sufficient or whether one actually needs to produce the information in order to justify lying. By employing a modified version of the Die‐Under‐Cup task, we ask participants to privately roll a die three times and to report the outcome of the first die roll (with higher values corresponding to higher payoffs). In all three conditions, participants produce (roll the die) and observe the first die roll, which is relevant for pay. We manipulate whether participants produce and observe versus only observe the second and third die roll outcomes, which are both irrelevant for pay. Results reveal that people lie to the same extent—when producing and observing the counterfactuals, and when merely observing them. It seems that merely observing counterfactual information is sufficient to allow people to use this information to justify their lies. We further test whether creativity and moral disengagement are associated with dishonesty and replicate the finding showing that unethical behavior increases with creativity. Copyright © 2017 John Wiley & Sons, Ltd.     

Disequilibrium and Loss of Narrative Coherence in Identity Construction: A Piagetian Perspective on Trauma in Adolescent Victims of Sexual Abuse

Previous authors have presented contradictory views of trauma as either the over- or under-elaboration of experience. This article provides a new theoretical perspective on trauma by incorporating Piagetian constructivism. On a theoretical level, it argues that both forms of narrative disruption following a traumatic episode are not contradictory. Rather, both over- and under-elaboration indicate disequilibrium and loss of narrative coherence in the construction of personal identity. Results are presented from an empirical study of the autobiographies of 15 adolescent victims (between the ages of 12 and 17) of sexual assault. Participants were enrolled in the initial stage of a psychotherapeutic treatment program for abuse in Santiago, Chile, at the time of study. Analysis of participant autobiographies reveals multiple forms of disorganization. The majority of adolescent narratives referred to predominance of traumatic experiences, whereas a small number of cases excluded traumatic experiences altogether. Discussion of study results shows that both forms of narrative disorganization indicate disequilibrium and loss of narrative coherence. Piagetian constructivist theory provides insight into this phenomenon by supporting and advancing understandings of trauma from a constructivist perspective. Implications for therapeutic treatment of sexual abuse, which may help generate clinical guidelines, are presented.     

Sex differences in dogs’ social learning of spatial information

We used a modified version of the Do as I Do paradigm to investigate dogs’ preference and flexibility in the acquisition of different types of spatial information in social learning situations. When required to match the location of the demonstration, dogs (N = 16) preferentially relied on allocentric information, i.e., the relationship between the location of the demonstration and the various objects surrounding it. However, when allocentric cues were inadequate to solve the task, dogs learned to rely on egocentric information, i.e., the direction—left/right—taken by the human demonstrator. The ease of resorting to the non-preferred egocentric strategy was sex-dependent with males acquiring the egocentric strategy in fewer trials than females. This study shows that dogs rely preferentially on allocentric cues when recalling socially acquired spatial information. However, they are impressively flexible in switching to egocentric strategies according to the task requirements. Whether preference for the allocentric strategy in processing spatial information is embedded in the nature of social learning or restricted to our paradigm is an open question. This study also supports the idea that sex differences in cognitive domains are widespread among mammals and calls for further investigations aimed at shedding light on the evolution, function and mechanisms of such differences.     

Does adaptive training work?

People intuitively alter the allocation of study time between items of varying difficulty, and such adaptive learning methods are widely used in education and in commercially available memory training programs. We investigated the effectiveness of a computer‐based adaptive learning system that utilises spacing and repetition effects by presenting difficult items with short gaps to establish fast learning, and easy items with long intervals to optimise long‐term retention. The immediate and delayed effects of adaptive training on cued recall were investigated relative to a control condition of non‐adaptive, random spacing. Adaptive training produced significantly higher immediate and delayed recall rates than random spacing. These results encourage the use of adaptive training in education and rehabilitation. Copyright © 2008 John Wiley & Sons, Ltd.     

The Deliberation-Without-Attention Effect: Evidence for an Artifactual Interpretation

ABSTRACT— Proponents of unconscious-thought theory assert that letting the unconscious "mull it over" can enhance decisions. In a series of recent studies, researchers demonstrated that participants whose attention was focused on solving a complex problem (i.e., those using conscious thought) made poorer choices, decisions, and judgments than participants whose attention was distracted from the problem (i.e., those purportedly using unconscious thought). We argue that this finding, rather than establishing the existence of a deliberation-without-attention effect, is explained more compellingly in terms of the well-established distinction between on-line and memory-based judgments. In Experiment 1 , we reversed the recent finding by simply changing participants' on-line processing goal from impression formation to memorization. Experiment 2 provided a replication and further established that some cognitive effort appears necessary to produce both the original pattern of results and its reversal, suggesting that such judgments are ultimately a product of conscious, rather than unconscious, thinking.     

Age effects on the employability-career success relationship

This study investigated the similarity of the factor structure for self-reported versus supervisor-rated employability for two age groups of workers, and then validated a career success enhancing model of employability across the two age groups. The results confirmed a two-factor model including self-reported and supervisor-rated employability as underlying factors. Moreover, Multi-Group Structural Equation Modeling (SEM) indicated that for the youngsters both self- and supervisor ratings of employability related significantly to objective career success outcomes. However, for the over-forties self-rated employability related positively to promotions throughout the career, while the supervisor ratings related negatively to overall promotions. The findings have important implications for performance appraisal practices aimed at increasing life-long employability and career success.     

Interpersonal evaluation bias in borderline personality disorder

Background

The cognitive theory of personality disorders hypothesizes that the emotional dysregulation and interpersonal problems in individuals with borderline personality disorder (BPD) are, at least partially, caused by dysfunctional cognitive schemas. These schemas lead to biased evaluation of environmental and interpersonal stimuli.

Method

This study examined the interpersonal evaluations of individuals with BPD, depressive and healthy control participants with the thin-slice judgments paradigm. Participants were asked to evaluate six persons in six film clips, which showed these persons for 10 s, during which these persons entered a room and took a seat. Interpersonal style of the BPD group was investigated with the Inventory of Interpersonal Problems (IIP-C) questionnaire.

Results

Individuals with BPD judged the persons as being more negative and aggressive and less positive than the healthy participants, and more aggressive than the depressive individuals. In addition, individuals with BPD reported more extreme interpersonal behavior relative to the controls.

Conclusions

The findings indicate an aggressivistic evaluation bias and elevated levels of interpersonal problems in individuals with BPD as suggested in the cognitive theory.