Forgive them for I have sinned: The relationship between guilt and forgiveness of others' transgressions

We propose that guilt leads to forgiveness of others' transgressions. In Study 1, people prone to experience guilt (but not shame) were also prone to forgive others for past misdeeds. In Study 2, we manipulated harm‐ and inequity‐based guilt; both increased forgiveness of others' transgressions. Further, the effect of guilt on forgiveness was mediated by identification with the transgressor. In Study 3, we replicated the guilt–forgiveness relationship and examined three other plausible mediators: capability for similar wrongdoing, empathic understanding, and general identification; only identification with the transgressor satisfied the criteria for mediation. In Study 4, we induced guilt by asking participants to harm a friend or stranger. Guilt induced by harming a friend led to greater forgiveness of third‐party transgressors, and again, identification with the transgressor mediated the effect. We discuss the implications of these results for understanding how the prosocial effects of guilt extend beyond the boundaries of a single interpersonal relationship.     

Learning Psychoanalysis: A Classification Based on Students' Learning Trajectories

This study was undertaken in an effort to sharpen selection procedures and improve faculty response to the learning needs of students. Eschewing a traditional anticipatory approach in determining suitability for training, the authors undertook a retrospective study to investigate the learning trajectories of candidates. A learning trajectory is defined as the particular way individuals learn, or fail to learn, as they advance through an Institute's training program. The database of this study grew out of the authors' experience with students in classrooms, in supervision, and from discussions about them in Progression, Selection, and The Evaluation of Learning committees. Realizing the reductionism of categorizing a highly complex and diverse group of individuals, the authors, nonetheless, found that candidates tended to group into five rather distinct categories. This paper discusses in detail the characteristics of these five categories and suggests ways in which this grouping may help in both selection and in planning more effective training for candidates. The authors are fully aware that this study has impressionistic qualities and warrants more rigorous research methods, but hope that it will arouse interest in other psychoanalytic centers and stimulate studies to corroborate, refine, or reject the conclusions reached by this group.     

Visual attention and coactivation of response decisions for features from different dimensions

The role of visual attention in task performance has been extensively debated. On the basis of the dimensional-action model, we hypothesized that a major role of attention is to transfer response decisions from targets on which it is focused to high-level centers dealing with response execution. This hypothesis predicts that response decisions for two targets will interact only when attention is focused on both targets, and only when the response to the targets is defined by different dimensions. Three experiments, using the redundancy-gain paradigm, tested and confirmed this prediction. Experiment 1 showed that coactivation of two cross-dimensional targets occurred only when the targets were positioned in the same location, not when they were in separate locations. Experiment 2 manipulated the focus of attention and showed that coactivation can occur even for targets positioned in different locations if they are both within the attentional focus. Experiment 3 showed that this attention-induced coactivation does not occur for targets from the same dimensional module. These results suggest that a major role of attention is postperceptual and involves gating of selected responses to executive functions.     

Visualized prosocial behavior and emotion in late life

Correlational research suggests that among older adults prosociality relates to positive emotions; yet causality remains unclear. We conducted an experiment to investigate whether visualizing a prosocial action would experience enhanced positive and lower negative emotion, and whether this would be particularly true for those with certain altruistic personality traits. Participants aged sixty and above were primed with a prosocial (helping a needy stranger), social (going out with friends), or neutral (walking down the street) induction. Results indicated that positive affect was highest among those who visualized a prosocial interaction, and that this effect was strongest among those higher in social responsibility. In contrast, less altruistically oriented participants reported higher negative affect in the prosocial condition. Thus, while prosociality promoted positive affect particularly among the socially responsible, it led to increased negative affect among those lower in altruistic orientation. Results suggest that individual differences influence older adults’ responses to exposure to prosocial involvement.     

Short horizons and tempting situations: Lack of continuity to our future selves leads to unethical decision making and behavior

People who feel continuity with their future selves are more likely to behave in ethically responsible ways as compared to people who lack continuity with their future selves. We find that individual differences in perceived similarity to one’s future self predicts tolerance of unethical business decisions (Studies 1a and 1b), and that the consideration of future consequences mediates the extent to which people regard inappropriate negotiation strategies as unethical (Study 2). We reveal that low future self-continuity predicts unethical behavior in the form of lies, false promises, and cheating (Studies 3 and 4), and that these relationships hold when controlling for general personality dimensions and trait levels of self-control (Study 4). Finally, we establish a causal relationship between future self-continuity and ethical judgments by showing that when people are prompted to focus on their future self (as opposed to the future), they express more disapproval of unethical behavior (Study 5).     

Flexibility over automaticity: Separable representations for colours and words

This study demonstrates that associations between colour words and the colours they denote are not mandatory. Experiments 1–3 used a go/no-go task in which participants responded to one print colour and one word and withheld response from another print colour and another word. In Experiment 1, the content of the words denoted noncolour entities. In Experiment 2 the two words denoted two colours that were different from the target print colours. In Experiment 3, the words denoted the same colours as the target print colours but each response set included incompatible print colour and word (e.g., one response to the print colour blue and the word “green” and another response to the print colour green and the word “blue”). Participants performed equally well in all the experiments. Experiment 4a used Arabic digits and words denoting numbers, two formats that are known to have shared representations. Here, participants had difficulties separating their responses to the digits and words. These results suggest that representations of words are distinct from the content that they represent, supporting the existence of distinct verbal and colour modules.     

Object-based representations govern both the storage of information in visual short-term memory and the retrieval of information from it

Interest is growing in how information is retained in visual short-term memory (VSTM). We describe an experiment that assesses VSTM within the context of multidimensional signal detection theory. On every trial, participants were presented with a 250-ms display containing four colored shapes. They were then probed 900 ms later with a colored shape and made separate old/new judgments about the color and the shape. In any particular trial, one, both, or neither of the probed features had been presented. Performance differed according to whether both probed features belonged to a single object or to two different objects. When both probed features belonged to the same object, featural retrieval was better than would be predicted by independent feature storage. When both probed features belonged to two different objects, featural retrieval was worse than would be predicted by independent feature storage. We conclude that storage in and retrieval from VSTM operate on the basis of object-based representations.     

Statistical properties of the rWG(J) index of agreement

L. R. James, R. G. Demaree, and G. Wolf (1984) introduced rWG(J) to estimate interrater agreement for a group. This index is calculated by comparing an observed group variance with an expected random variance. As researchers have gained experience using this index, several questions have arisen. What are the consequences of replacing values beyond the unit interval by 0? What is the dependence of rWG(J) on the group size? The authors' simulations show that a positive bias is caused by the truncation, but for large population values of rWG(J) it is negligible. Also, in this case, the group size has no effect on the expected value of rWG(J). For inference on rWG(J), researchers can exploit the availability of computers to simulate data from the hypothesized distribution and then compare the simulation results for rWG(J) with the actual values. In addition, it is shown how the bootstrap method can be used for comparing the indices of 2 groups.     

Doing philosophy is doing its history

While Curley argues that we need to know the history of philosophy so as not to avoid important alternatives to contemporary proposals, I argue that philosophy is an essentially historical enterprise. Unlike science, philosophy cannot forget its history. Not to know the history of philosophy is not to understand why the questions we seek to answer are worth answering or asking.     

Inferred and expressed self-image of pupils rated by teachers as high and low in anxiety: a comparison of self-other ratings.

The association was examined between 98 third-grade pupils' expressed self-image scores and inferred self-image ratings from teachers. Significant self-other agreements were found with sexes combined. With sexes separated, significant self-other agreements were found for the 52 girls, but not for the 46 boys.