The Consequences of Terrorism: Disentangling the Effects of Personal and National Threat

The events of 11 September 2001 have led to a higher perceived risk of terrorism in the United States. A better understanding of the political consequences of 9/11 requires a more complete accounting of the nature and consequences of perceived threat. Here, the distinction between perceived personal and national risks is examined in terms of two competing hypotheses: (1) The personal threat of terrorism has a pervasive influence even on national decisions and perceptions, in line with its highly arousing nature. (2) The effects of personal threat are highly circumscribed and overshadowed by the impact of perceived national threat, consistent with findings on the meager impact of self–interest and other personal concerns on public opinion. A survey of 1,221 residents of Long Island and Queens, New York, explored the degree to which personal and national threat affect perceptions of the consequences of, and possible solutions to, terrorism. As expected, there was a clear distinction between perceived personal and national threat, although the two are related. Perceived personal threat did not influence the perceived economic consequences of terrorism, although it had a narrow effect on personal behaviors designed to minimize risk. Overall, the findings imply that the effects of personal threat are circumscribed, consistent with past research on the limited personal basis of political judgments. However, the tests of these hypotheses were constrained by a limited set of dependent variables that included national consequences but not policy solutions designed to limit terrorism.     

Prepared for the worst: readiness to acquire threat bias and susceptibility to elevate trait anxiety

Although people differ in their susceptibility to elevate trait anxiety in response to extended stress, little is known about the cognitive substrate of this particular individual difference. We report three studies designed to evaluate the hypothesis that individual differences in readiness to acquire an attentional bias toward threat cues, in response to a contingency that makes the acquisition of such a bias adaptive, underlie individual differences in susceptibility to elevate trait anxiety in response to extended stress. Our findings confirm that the ease with which such a threat bias can be transiently evoked by experimental conditions that encourage its acquisition predicts the degree to which trait anxiety later becomes elevated by extended exposure to a mild stressor. Furthermore, this reflects the fact that such early measures of attentional bias plasticity predict the later naturalistic acquisition of attentional bias in response to subsequent stress, which in turn is associated with a consequent increase in trait anxiety level. These findings are consistent with our proposed account of individual differences in susceptibility to elevate trait anxiety in response to stress.     

Advantaged group's emotional reactions to intergroup inequality: the dynamics of pride, guilt, and sympathy

Three studies establish intergroup inequality to investigate how it is emotionally experienced by the advantaged. Studies 1 and 2 examine psychology students' emotional experience of their unequal job situation with worse-off pedagogy students. When inequality is ingroup focused and legitimate, participants experience more pride. However, when inequality is ingroup focused and illegitimate, participants experience more guilt. Sympathy is increased when inequality is outgroup focused and illegitimate. These emotions have particular effects on behavioral tendencies. In Study 2 group-based pride predicts greater ingroup favoritism in a resource distribution task, whereas group-based sympathy predicts less ingroup favoritism. Study 3 replicates these findings in the context of students' willingness to let young immigrants take part in a university sport. Pride predicts less willingness to let immigrants take part whereas sympathy predicts greater willingness. Guilt is a weak predictor of behavioral tendencies in all studies. This shows the specificity of emotions experienced about intergroup inequality.     

An ideal solution to disputes about multiply realized kinds

Multiply realizable kinds are scientifically problematic, for it appears that we should not expect discoveries about them to hold of other members of that kind. As such, it looks like MR kinds should have no place in the ontology of the special sciences. Many resist this conclusion, however, because we lack a positive account of the role that certain realization-unrestricted terms play in special science explanations. I argue that many such terms actually pick out idealizing models. Idealizing explanation has many of the features normally associated with explanation by MR kinds. As idealized models are usually mere possibilia, such explanations do not run afoul of the metaphysical problems that plague MR kinds.

The Effect of Pastoral Care Services on Anxiety,Depression, Hope,Religious Coping,and Religious Problem Solving Styles: A Randomized Controlled Study

This randomized controlled study measured the effect of chaplain interventions on coronary artery bypass graft (CABG) patients over time. One hundred sixty-six CABG patients, received pre- and post-surgery testing at 1 month and 6 months with four instruments. Five chaplain visits were made to the intervention group, the control group received none. Comparison scores for anxiety, depression, hope, positive and negative religious coping, and religious coping styles were analyzed. Significant difference was found between groups in positive religious coping (PRC) (p = .023) and negative religious coping (NRC) (p = .046) scores over time. PRC increased in intervention group, decreased in the control group while NRC decreased in intervention group and increased in the control group. Demographics were comparable between groups. Moderate chaplain visits (average total visits time, 44 min) may be effective in helping CABG patients increase positive religious coping and decrease negative religious coping.

Getting technical about awareness

It has recently been argued that post-decision wagering provides an objective measure of awareness. We critically evaluate this claim, emphasizing the distinction between performance without awareness and a reluctance to gamble in full awareness of weak sensory evidence. We address two key methodological issues. The first is the design of the pay-off matrix to reward a strategy of wagering that reflects the strength of sensory evidence. The second is the use of signal detection theory to analyze the resulting data. We argue that proper treatment of these issues is essential if post-decision wagering is to prove valuable in validating claims of perception without awareness in normal subjects and neuropsychological patients.     

The Quality of Response Time Data Inference: A Blinded,Collaborative Assessment of the Validity of Cognitive Models

Psychonomic Bulletin & Review - Most data analyses rely on models. To complement statistical models, psychologists have developed cognitive models, which translate observed variables into...     

The longitudinal effects of alexithymia on romantic relationships

Using the tenets of Affection Exchange Theory, the study predicted longitudinal effects of alexithymia on both romantic relational outcomes (satisfaction and commitment) and relational communication (affectionate communication and relational maintenance behaviors). The study also predicted that Time 2 levels of relational communication would mediate the longitudinal effects of alexithymia on the relational outcomes. The results largely supported the predictions, with Time 1 alexithymia significantly negatively related to both relational outcome measures, affectionate communication, and two types of relational maintenance behaviors (understanding and assurances) at Time 2. Alternate models predicting alexithymia at Time 2 using the relational variables were nonsignificant. Finally, mediation was shown for both affectionate communication and understanding. Implications and possible directions for future research are explored.     

Why logical pluralism?

This paper scrutinizes the debate over logical pluralism. I hope to make this debate more tractable by addressing the question of motivating data: what would count as strong evidence in favor of logical pluralism? Any research program should be able to answer this question, but when faced with this task, many logical pluralists fall back on brute intuitions. This sets logical pluralism on a weak foundation and makes it seem as if nothing pressing is at stake in the debate. The present paper aims to improve this situation by looking at a promising case study and drawing general lessons about the kind of evidence that would support logical pluralism. I argue that the best motivation for logical pluralism will ultimately be rooted in certain kinds of performative data.

     

Individual differences in negative affect repair style

Motivation and Emotion - Two studies (ns?=?422, 263) examined individual differences in repair styles, in which strategies habitually used to repair negative affect depend on shared...