Gender differences in adult word learning

In prior work, women were found to outperform men on short-term verbal memory tasks. The goal of the present work was to examine whether gender differences on short-term memory tasks are tied to the involvement of long-term memory in the learning process. In Experiment 1, men and women were compared on their ability to remember phonologically-familiar novel words and phonologically-unfamiliar novel words. Learning of phonologically-familiar novel words (but not of phonologically-unfamiliar novel words) can be supported by long-term phonological knowledge. Results revealed that women outperformed men on phonologically-familiar novel words, but not on phonologically-unfamiliar novel words. In Experiment 2, we replicated Experiment 1 using a within-subjects design, and confirmed gender differences on phonologically-familiar, but not on phonologically-unfamiliar stimuli. These findings are interpreted to suggest that women are more likely than men to recruit native-language phonological knowledge during novel word-learning.     

Do violent video games impair the effectiveness of in-game advertisements? The impact of gaming environment on brand recall, brand attitude, and purchase intention

The present study examined whether a violent video game impairs the effectiveness of in-game advertisements compared to a nonviolent video game. Participants recalled and evaluated in-game ads after navigating identical violent or nonviolent game scenarios. Participants' brand recall, recognition, and attitudes were comparatively lower after navigating the violent video game. Also, females in the violent game condition reported lower brand attitudes in comparison to males in the violent game condition, thus suggesting that the effects of gaming environment interacts with participants' gender. The findings supported the predictions of the limited capacity model of attention and cognitive priming effects. The results also extend previous studies on how violent media impair advertising effectiveness and provide practical implications for researchers and practitioners.     

A preliminary report on a new measure: Internalization of the Model Minority Myth Measure (IM-4) and its psychological correlates among Asian American college students

This investigation is a preliminary report on a new measure of internalization of the model minority myth. In 3 studies, there was evidence for the validation of the 15-item Internalization of the Model Minority Myth Measure (IM-4), with 2 subscales. The Model Minority Myth of Achievement Orientation referred to the myth of Asian Americans' greater success than other racial minority groups associated with their stronger work ethics, perseverance, and drives to succeed. The Model Minority Myth of Unrestricted Mobility referred to the myth of Asian Americans' greater success than other racial minority groups associated with their stronger belief in fairness of treatment and lack of perceived racism or barriers at school or work. The 2-subscale structure of the IM-4 was supported by a combination of exploratory and confirmatory factor analyses, with support of discriminant, convergent, and incremental validity, as well as internal reliability and stability over 2 weeks. The IM-4 is a new measure that taps into a uniquely racialized experience of Asian Americans with research and clinical implications.     

Analogical and category-based inference: a theoretical integration with Bayesian causal models

A fundamental issue for theories of human induction is to specify constraints on potential inferences. For inferences based on shared category membership, an analogy, and/or a relational schema, it appears that the basic goal of induction is to make accurate and goal-relevant inferences that are sensitive to uncertainty. People can use source information at various levels of abstraction (including both specific instances and more general categories), coupled with prior causal knowledge, to build a causal model for a target situation, which in turn constrains inferences about the target. We propose a computational theory in the framework of Bayesian inference and test its predictions (parameter-free for the cases we consider) in a series of experiments in which people were asked to assess the probabilities of various causal predictions and attributions about a target on the basis of source knowledge about generative and preventive causes. The theory proved successful in accounting for systematic patterns of judgments about interrelated types of causal inferences, including evidence that analogical inferences are partially dissociable from overall mapping quality.     

Perspective Taking and Communication Satisfaction in Coworker Dyads

Purpose  

This study addressed whether or not self-rated and other-rated perspective taking would converge and questioned the relationship between perspective taking and communication satisfaction among coworkers.     

Toward a New Generation of Cross-Cultural Research

ABSTRACT— In this article, we describe how cross-cultural research methodologies have evolved, with each phase of research addressing limitations of a previous one. We describe briefly the three previous phases and argue for embarking on a fourth phase that empirically establishes linkages between the active cultural ingredients hypothesized to cause between-country differences and the observed differences themselves. We discuss theoretical considerations and possible empirical methods to establish such linkages, and urge researchers to seriously consider incorporating these kinds of linkage studies in their programs of research.     

“I know you can do this” versus “How can you be so stupid?” Feedback among Chinese and American young adult friends

According to past research, young adults prefer positive feedback from their friends, but emotional reactions to negative feedback are less severe in Korea than in the United States. We extended this past work in several ways: We studied both giving and receiving feedback, recruited Chinese young adults, used realistic scenarios, and employed the situation‐sampling method. Using text‐message‐based vignettes, Study 1 found that both American and Chinese friends used happy emojis when exchanging positive feedback whereas Americans used less positive emojis than did the Chinese when exchanging negative feedback. We then collected actual examples of feedback that people had given to their friends (Study 2a) and showed them to new samples of Chinese and American young adults (Study 2b). This situation‐sampling methodology found that (a) Americans rated negative feedback from both cultures especially negatively, and (b) negative feedback examples from China were rated especially negatively by people in both cultures. That is, although Chinese negative feedback is seemingly more harsh, Chinese young adults do not react as negatively.     

A cross‐cultural review and perspective on status striving

A significant body of research on the motives and pathways to attaining status has accumulated in the last few decades. At the same time, many of the commonly held assumptions and established findings in the status literature are drawn from research conducted in industrialized Western cultures. In this article, we review several fundamental differences between two widely studied cultures—Eastern and Western cultures—and propose that the core premises in the status literature map far more neatly onto what is known about Western cultures and less well onto what is known of Eastern cultures. More specifically, we examine cross‐cultural differences with respect to the meaning of status, motives underlying status pursuits, and the pathways that lead to status. We note how the reasons behind status pursuits may diverge among people from these two cultures, and how the behaviors that people employ when striving for status in Western cultures may not be effective in Eastern cultures. We conclude by proposing several avenues for future research.     

Experimental results of affective valence and arousal to avatar's facial expressions.

The objectives of this study were to propose a method of presenting dynamic facial expressions to experimental subjects, in order to investigate human perception of avatar's facial expressions of different levels of emotional intensity. The investigation concerned how perception varies according to the strength of facial expression, as well as according to an avatar's gender. To accomplish these goals, we generated a male and a female virtual avatar with five levels of intensity of happiness and anger using a morphing technique. We then recruited 16 normal healthy subjects and measured each subject's emotional reaction by scoring affective arousal and valence after showing them the avatar's face. Through this study, we were able to investigate human perceptual characteristics evoked by male and female avatars' graduated facial expressions of happiness and anger. In addition, we were able to identify that a virtual avatar's facial expression could affect human emotion in different ways according to the avatar's gender and the intensity of its facial expressions. However, we could also see that virtual faces have some limitations because they are not real, so subjects recognized the expressions well, but were not influenced to the same extent. Although a virtual avatar has some limitations in conveying its emotion using facial expressions, this study is significant in that it shows that a new potential exists to use or manipulate emotional intensity by controlling a virtual avatar's facial expression linearly using a morphing technique. Therefore, it is predicted that this technique may be used for assessing emotional characteristics of humans, and may be of particular benefit for work with people with emotional disorders through a presentation of dynamic expression of various emotional intensities.