The influence of visual information on auditory lateralization

Sætrevik, B. (2010). The influence of visual information on auditory lateralization. Scandinavian Journal of Psychology. The classic McGurk study showed that presentation of one syllable in the visual modality simultaneous with a different syllable in the auditory modality creates the perception of a third, not presented syllable. The current study presented dichotic syllable pairs (one in each ear) simultaneously with video clips of a mouth pronouncing the syllables from one of the ears, or pronouncing a syllable that was not part of the dichotic pair. When asked to report the auditory stimuli, responses were shifted towards selecting the auditory stimulus from the side that matched the visual stimulus.     

Social desirability in personality inventories: Symptoms,diagnosis and prescribed cure

An analysis of social desirability in personality assessment is presented. Starting with the symptoms, Study 1 showed that mean ratings of graded personality items are moderately to strongly linearly related to social desirability (Self Deception, Impression formation, and the first Principal Component), suggesting that item popularity may be a useful heuristic tool for identifying items which elicit socially desirable responding. We diagnose the cause of socially desirable responding as an interaction between the evaluative content of the item and enhancement motivation in the rater. Study 2 introduced a possible cure; evaluative neutralization of items. To test the feasibility of the method lay psychometricians (undergraduates) reformulated existing personality test items according to written instructions. The new items were indeed lower in social desirability while essentially retaining the five factor structure and reliability of the inventory. We conclude that although neutralization is no miracle cure, it is simple and has beneficial effects.     

流言、信任和公民社会:集体记忆和有关判断的各种文化

各种当代社会都充满着流言(rumor)。无论如何,我们都生活在一种信息环境中,而这种环境中既信息过多,同时也信息过少。许多人希望我们相信各种关于真相的说法,或者至少希望我们也同样坚持这些说法。这些说法的来源可能是不确定的,不过,在某些适当的情况下,我们就会把它们整合到我们的信念体系之中,按照这些主张而行动,并且通过集体记忆而回忆它们。如果假定确实有这些说法存在,那么,问题就变成了我们在什么时间、什么地点信任什么人和什么事情。就针对有关社会的各种断言做出的反应引导着我们的各种行动而言,判断是必不可少的,尽管它可能是潜…