Strategic Communication and the Integrative Complexity‐Ideology Relationship: Meta‐Analytic Findings Reveal Differences Between Public Politicians and Private Citizens in Their Use of Simple Rhetoric

Research on the relationship between political conservatism and integrative complexity has yielded contradictory results, and little effort has been made to place these mixed results in a theoretical context. The present article considers this issue through a strategic model of language that suggests different psychological processes apply to public politicians versus private citizens. We use a methodologically precise meta‐analytic test of the relationship between political ideology and integrative complexity to examine the degree that conservative simplicity can be understood as a function of public versus private samples. Across 35 studies, findings revealed that conservatives are significantly less complex than liberals overall; however, while this effect was significant for public politicians, no relationship emerged for private citizens. Consistent with a strategic model, conservative simplicity was particularly in evidence for elected officials. This theoretical analysis has many consequences for our understanding of psychological theories that help explain the consequences of political ideology.     

Parents’ perceptions of children’s executive functions across different cities

Culture is thought to strongly influence the development of executive functions (EF), such that ethnic groups with similar cultural origins are generally assumed to exhibit comparable levels of EF performance. However, other characteristics, such as urbanization and Westernization, may also affect EF performance in societies comprising different ethnic groups, even if the ethnic groups share a similar cultural origin. The present study aimed to compare the perceptions of parents in three cities [China–Shenzhen (ZH group), China–Hong Kong (HK group), and Singapore (SG group)] regarding the EF performances of their children, all of whom share the same genetic and cultural (i.e., Chinese) origin. The study recruited 95 children aged 5–6 years (ZH group = 32; HK group = 32; SG group = 31). Their parents were invited to complete the Behavior Rating Inventory of Executive Function (BRIEF). The ZH group had significantly lower BRIEF scores compared to both the HK and SG groups. However, the BRIEF scores of the HK and SG groups only differed significantly in terms of the Organization of Materials domain. The results suggest city-related differences in parents’ perceptions of their children’s EF performances, despite their similar genetic and cultural backgrounds. We additionally discuss further interpretations of our results and the limitations of this study.     

Social intelligence and interview accuracy: Individual differences in the ability to construct interviews and rate accurately

This research examined differences in interviewers’ ability to identify effective interview questions and to accurately rate interviewees’ responses. Given the theoretical association between these interview activities and the construct of social intelligence (SI), a performance‐based measure of SI was developed utilizing situational judgment test methodology. The initial step was to examine evidence of the psychometric properties and construct validity of the new SI measure. The SI measure, a test of general mental ability (GMA), and a personality inventory were then used to examine aspects of rater performance. Participants chose a set of interview questions and viewed interviewee responses during a videotaped interview. Results showed that people higher in SI and GMA chose interview questions judged by experts to be superior and were more accurate in rating interviewee responses. The SI measure explained variance beyond GMA and outperformed a trait‐based SI measure. Implications for the selection and training of interviewers are discussed.     

What’s Wrong with the Scrum Laws in Rugby Union? — Judgment,Truth and Refereeing

Officiating and the role of officials in sport is are crucial and often decisive factors in sports contests. Justice and desert of sport contests, in part, rely on officiating truths (performances) that arise from an appropriate admixture of epistemic (judgements) and metaphysical (actions) ingredients. This paper provides a rigorous and original philosophical analysis of the problems of obeying and applying the rules of sport. The paper focuses on a the scrum in rugby union. The scrum has become a focus of criticism and bewilderment. Elite rugby is damaged as a spectacle because too much time is wasted setting and re-setting scrums. Furthermore, trust in the fairness of games is eroded because the scrum is a ‘lottery’. In this paper, we identify two fundamental structural problems which contribute to the scrum controversy. First, we argue that officials cannot make reliable judgements about scrums because they cannot see what they need to see. Secondly, we argue that players cannot follow the laws of the scrum even if they have a strong desire to do so. Consequently, the scrum is not only potentially dangerous, but also flawed in terms of its capacity to actualise an intended part of the game.     

Self-prioritization and perceptual matching: The effects of temporal construal

Recent research has revealed that self-referential processing enhances perceptual judgments — the so-called self-prioritization effect. The extent and origin of this effect remains unknown, however. Noting the multifaceted nature of the self, here we hypothesized that temporal influences on self-construal (i.e., past/future-self continuity) may serve as an important determinant of stimulus prioritization. Specifically, as representations of the self increase in abstraction as a function of temporal distance (i.e., distance from now), self-prioritization may only emerge when stimuli are associated with the current self. The results of three experiments supported this prediction. Self-relevance only enhanced performance in a standard perceptual-matching task when stimuli (i.e., geometric shapes) were connected with the current self; representations of the self in the future (Expts. 1 & 2) and past (Expt. 3) failed to facilitate decision making. To identify the processes underlying task performance, data were interrogated using a hierarchical drift diffusion model (HDDM) approach. Results of these analyses revealed that self-prioritization was underpinned by a stimulus bias (i.e., rate of information uptake). Collectively, these findings elucidate when and how self-relevance influences decisional processing.     

Using item-level covariance to detect response distortion on personality measures

The covariance index is a response validity scale created with the purpose of detecting intentional distortion in self-report measures. Based on evidence that strong response sets increase the covariance between responses, a method was developed to identify increased covariance at the individual level. Two studies were conducted to evaluate the validity of this new measure across laboratory and field settings. Results showed that individuals who scored higher on the covariance index in situations where strong response sets were present were those who had distorted responses the most and whose scores on personality measures had worse validity. In addition, the new validity scales improved identification of distorted responses beyond traditional social desirability scales.     

The Proof is in the Pudding: Commentary on Papers Updating Anna Freud’s Diagnostic Profile

ABSTRACT

This fine collection of articles documents efforts to bring Anna Freud’s diagnostic profile (1965) up to date by integrating more recent theory and research in attachment theory, inter-subjective theory, and theories deriving from the work of Bion on the process of “containing” (Bion, 1988). While some of the articles present the theoretical context for this integrative effort, Melandri’s (this issue) thoughtful and comprehensive clinical case shows us how an updated diagnostic profile can be put to work in the consulting room.     

Sex-contingent face aftereffects depend on perceptual category rather than structural encoding

Many studies have used visual adaptation to investigate how recent experience with faces influences perception. While faces similar to those seen during adaptation phases are typically perceived as more 'normal' after adaptation, it is possible to induce aftereffects in one direction for one category (e.g. female) and simultaneously induce aftereffects in the opposite direction for another category (e.g. male). Such aftereffects could reflect 'category-contingent' adaptation of neurons selective for perceptual category (e.g. male or female) or 'structure-contingent' adaptation of lower-level neurons coding the physical characteristics of different face patterns. We compared these explanations by testing for simultaneous opposite after effects following adaptation to (a) two groups of faces from distinct sex categories (male and female) or (b) two groups of faces from the same sex category (female and hyper-female) where the structural differences between the female and hyper-female groups were mathematically identical to those between male and female groups. We were able to induce opposite aftereffects following adaptation between sex categories but not after adaptation within a sex category. These findings indicate the involvement of neurons coding perceptual category in sex-contingent face aftereffects and cannot be explained by neurons coding only the physical aspects of face patterns.