Quality,quantity, and impact in academic publication

Publication records of 85 social‐personality psychologists were tracked from the time of their doctoral studies until 10 years post‐PhD. Associations between publication quantity (number of articles), quality (mean journal impact factor and article influence score), and impact (citations, h‐index, g‐index, webpage visits) were examined. Publication quantity and quality were only modestly related, and there was evidence of a quality‐quantity trade‐off. Impact was more strongly associated with quantity than quality. Authors whose records weighed quality over quantity tended to be associated with more prestigious institutions, but had lesser impact. Quantity‐ and quality‐favoring publication strategies may have important implications for the shape and success of scientific careers. Copyright © 2009 John Wiley & Sons, Ltd.     

Proactively performing teams: The role of work design,transformational leadership,and team composition

This study investigated the determinants of team proactive performance amongst 43 shift teams from a UK chemical processing plant. Using external ratings of team proactive performance, the study found that the most proactive teams were those with higher levels of self‐management, transformational team leaders, and a higher‐than‐average level of proactive personality. The relationship between transformational leadership and team proactive performance was mediated by favourable interpersonal norms. In addition, lower diversity of proactive personality amongst team members had an indirect association with team proactive performance via its negative effect on favourable interpersonal norms.     

THE SIMULATION ARGUMENT: REPLY TO WEATHERSON

I reply to some recent comments by Brian Weatherson on my 'simulation argument'. I clarify some interpretational matters, and address issues relating to epistemological externalism, the difference from traditional brain-in-a-vat arguments, and a challenge based on grue'-like predicates.     

Motivations for play in online games.

An empirical model of player motivations in online games provides the foundation to understand and assess how players differ from one another and how motivations of play relate to age, gender, usage patterns, and in-game behaviors. In the current study, a factor analytic approach was used to create an empirical model of player motivations. The analysis revealed 10 motivation subcomponents that grouped into three overarching components (achievement, social, and immersion). Relationships between motivations and demographic variables (age, gender, and usage patterns) are also presented.     

Daydreams and Anarchy: A Defense of Anomalous Mental Causation

Must mental properties figure in psychological causal laws if they are causally efficacious? And do those psychological causal laws give the essence of mental properties? Contrary to the prevailing consensus, I argue that, on the usual conception of laws that is in play in these debates, there are in fact lawless causally efficacious properties both in and out of the philosophy of mind. I argue that this makes a great difference to the philosophical relevance of empirical psychology. 1 begin by making the case that revolutions and hurricanes are lawless phenomena, before arguing for a similar thesis about creativity, love, courage, dreams, daydreams, and musings. Furthermore, the empirical research on these phenomena suggests that the philosophical issues may be independent of what empirical psychology can tell us.     

The effects of aging on remembering intentions: performance on a simulated shopping task

Three studies are described in which age differences on a task measuring memory for delayed intentions using naturalistic stimuli were examined. A simulated street scene was constructed from a network of photographs and sounds that participants could move through using a touch screen while completing a series of event‐based shopping errand instructions. The objective of the research was to identify the cognitive processes involved in the task that were vulnerable to the effects of ageing. Memory search but not cue detection was specifically affected in older persons when participants were given fewer trials to learn the instructions. There was no age specific effect on cue detection or memory search in either an unfamiliar street or one with increased levels of irrelevant visual and auditory noise. Cue detection but not memory search was disproportionately affected in older persons after filled interruptions, suggesting that the capacity for self‐initiated reinstatement of working memory is reduced in old age. In general, using a computer‐based simulation of a real‐life task was found to be a practical means of examining the effects on behaviour and cognition of task parameters that are significant in assessing everyday memory abilities. Copyright © 2006 John Wiley & Sons, Ltd.     

Social Identity and Spatial Behaviour: The Relationship between National Category Salience, the Sense of Home, and Labour Mobility across National Boundaries

This study explores the impact of manipulating the salience of national categories upon the willingness of highly identifying Scots to take up either short-term or long-term jobs in Scotland as compared to England. The results support the hypotheses (a) that high-identifying Scots increase preference for intra- over extranational locations when national categories are salient, (b) that this effect is fully mediated by "fitting in"—that is, the sense of being "at home" in Scottish as compared to English locations, and (c) that these relationships only hold for long-term as opposed to short-term jobs. We discuss these results in terms of the impact of identity definitions upon spatialised action and the economic/political importance of this relationship.     

The persistence of welfare stigma: Does the passing of time and subsequent employment moderate the negative perceptions associated with unemployment benefit receipt?

People receiving welfare payments are stigmatized. However, previous studies of welfare recipient stereotypes have not examined whether the stigma endures after payments are no longer received and have rarely considered the stigma associated with specific categories of welfare payments. We examined whether welfare stigma endures in three experiments (total N = 873) focused on one category of welfare recipient, people receiving government income support due to their unemployment. To test if this stigmatized identity marked or scarred how people are perceived, we compared evaluations of currently unemployed benefit recipients to currently employed people who either previously received this benefit or who had no stated history of benefit receipt. Across the three experiments, we found that current recipients of unemployment benefits were evaluated as much less conscientious, less human, and poorer workers, but as somewhat more extraverted than currently employed individuals irrespective of their welfare history. Moreover, we found that currently employed individuals were evaluated similarly, regardless of whether they had a prior history of benefit receipt, and the recency of this prior benefit experience. This pattern of results suggests that receiving unemployment benefits does not scar how a person is perceived by others, but only temporarily marks how they are perceived. These findings suggest that welfare stigma may create an evaluative barrier to returning to work, but that if this barrier can be overcome there are no negative evaluations of former recipients’ character. Overall, community members seem accepting of prior benefit receipt once a person returns to work.