Beitrag zu den Grundlagenproblemen in der Wahrscheinlichkeitsrechnung

Zusammenfassung Es wird gezeigt, daß man zwei Gruppen von Erscheinungen unterscheiden muß, solche, bei denen bestimmte Voraussagen unter Angabe gabe des größten Fehlerintervalles Sinn haben, und solche, bei denen bestimmte Voraussagen leer sind. Über die zweite Gruppe von Erscheinungen können jedoch Wahrscheinlichkeitsvoraussagen gemacht werden, das sind solche Aussagen, die nicht exakt, sondern nur praktisch bestätigt oder widerlegt werden können. Am Beispiel des Roulette wird gezeigt, wie man aus einigen Wahrscheinlichkeitsaussagen über die Erscheinungen beim Roulette unter Zugrundelegung von gewissen Rechenvorschriften weitere Wahrscheinlichkeitsaussagen über dieselben Erscheinungen gewinnen kann. Aus der praktischen Bestätigung der abgeleiteten Wahrscheinlichkeitsaussagen ergibt sich die Berechtigung für die Anwendung der gennanten Rechenvorschriften. In Verallgemeinerung der Erscheinungen bei dem Roulette wird die Definition eines Kollektivs in Wahrscheinlichkeitsaussagen gegeben.     

Der Mensch in der Masse

Ohne ZusammenfassungPrivaat docent aan de Gemeente Universiteit van Amsterdam     

"...As we forgive those who trespass against us...": theological reflections on sin and guilt in the hospital environment.

In general parlance the term sin has lost its existential meaning. Originally a Jewish-Christian term within a purely religious context, referring to a wrongdoing with regard to God, sin has slowly become reduced to guilt in the course of the secularization process. Guilt refers to a wrongdoing, especially with regard to fellow human beings. It also refers to errors of judgement with what can be tragic consequences. These errors can occur whenever human beings are called upon to act, including the hospital environment. A Christian hospital has to address the issue of how to deal not only with guilt-ridden misdemeanors, but also with wrongdoing unto God, which overshadows every instance of guilt-ridden human behavior. Here, as in every parish, the Church Service is the place to acknowledge sin, confess sin, and forgive sin, beyond the boundaries of the parish itself.     

The self-regulation of automatic associations and behavioral impulses

The distinction between automatic processes and controlled processes is a central organizational theme across areas of psychology. However, this dichotomy conceals important differences among qualitatively different processes that independently contribute to ongoing behavior. The Quadruple process model is a multinomial model that provides quantitative estimates of 4 distinct processes in a single task: the likelihood that an automatic response tendency is activated; the likelihood that a contextually appropriate response can be determined; the likelihood that automatic response tendencies are overcome when necessary; and the likelihood that in the absence of other information, behavior is driven by a general response bias. The model integrates dual-process models from many domains of inquiry and offers a generalized, more nuanced framework of impulse regulation across these domains. The model offers insights into many central questions surrounding the operation and the interaction of automatic and controlled processes. Applications of the model to empirical and theoretical concerns in a variety of areas of psychology are discussed.     

Class, race, and the face: social context modulates the cross-race effect in face recognition

The current research investigates the hypothesis that the well-established cross-race effect (CRE; better recognition for same-race than for cross-race faces) is due to social-cognitive mechanisms rather than to differential perceptual expertise with same-race and cross-race faces. Across three experiments, the social context in which faces are presented has a direct influence on the CRE. In the first two experiments, middle-class White perceivers show superior recognition for same-race White faces presented in wealthy but not in impoverished contexts. The second experiment indicates this effect is due to the tendency to categorize White faces in impoverished contexts as outgroup members (e.g., "poor Whites"). In the third experiment, this effect is replicated using different ingroup and outgroup categorizations (university affiliation), with ingroup White faces being recognized better than outgroup White faces. In line with a social-cognitive model of the CRE, context had no influence on recognition for cross-race Black faces across the three experiments.     

Insight without cortex: lessons from the avian brain

Insight is a cognitive feature that is usually regarded as being generated by the neocortex and being present only in humans and possibly some closely related primates. In this essay we show that especially corvids display behavioral skills within the domains of object permanence, episodic memory, theory of mind, and tool use/causal reasoning that are insightful. These similarities between humans and corvids at the behavioral level are probably the result of a convergent evolution. Similarly, the telencephalic structures involved in higher cognitive functions in both species show a high degree of similarity, although the forebrain of birds has no cortex-like lamination. The neural substrate for insight-related cognitive functions in mammals and birds is thus not necessarily based on a laminated cortical structure but can be generated by differently organized forebrains. Hence, neither is insight restricted to mammals, as predicted from a “scala naturae”, nor is the laminated cortex a prerequisite for the highest cognitive functions.     

Holistic processing is tuned for in-group faces

Past research has found that mere in-group/out-group categorizations are sufficient to elicit biases in face memory. The current research yields novel evidence that mere social categorization is also sufficient to modulate processes underlying face perception, even for faces for which we have strong perceptual expertise: same-race (SR) faces. Using the composite face paradigm, we find that SR faces categorized as in-group members (i.e., fellow university students) are processed more holistically than are SR faces categorized as out-group members (i.e., students at another university). Hence, holding perceptual expertise with faces constant, categorizing an SR target as an out-group member debilitates the strong holistic processing typically observed for SR faces.     

Information distortion in the evaluation of a single option

Extending previous work on biased predecisional processing, we investigate the distortion of information during the evaluation of a single option. A coherence-based account of the evaluation task suggests that individuals will form an initial assessment of favorability toward the option and then bias their evaluation of subsequent information to cohere with their initial disposition. Three experiments tested this hypothesis. Initial disposition was manipulated (Studies 1 and 3) or measured (Study 2), and attribute ratings were collected as indicators of information distortion. Results from all three experiments indicate that attribute evaluations were biased to favor initial dispositions. These findings provide evidence that information distortion is one cause of primacy effects in judgment and decision-making settings involving a single option.     

When Are Tutorial Dialogues More Effective Than Reading?

It is often assumed that engaging in a one-on-one dialogue with a tutor is more effective than listening to a lecture or reading a text. Although earlier experiments have not always supported this hypothesis, this may be due in part to allowing the tutors to cover different content than the noninteractive instruction. In 7 experiments, we tested the interaction hypothesis under the constraint that (a) all students covered the same content during instruction, (b) the task domain was qualitative physics, (c) the instruction was in natural language as opposed to mathematical or other formal languages, and (d) the instruction conformed with a widely observed pattern in human tutoring: Graesser, Person, and Magliano's 5-step frame. In the experiments, we compared 2 kinds of human tutoring (spoken and computer mediated) with 2 kinds of natural-language-based computer tutoring (Why2-Atlas and Why2-AutoTutor) and 3 control conditions that involved studying texts. The results depended on whether the students' preparation matched the content of the instruction. When novices (students who had not taken college physics) studied content that was written for intermediates (students who had taken college physics), then tutorial dialogue was reliably more beneficial than less interactive instruction, with large effect sizes. When novices studied material written for novices or intermediates studied material written for intermediates, then tutorial dialogue was not reliably more effective than the text-based control conditions.     

Categorization and individuation in the cross-race recognition deficit: Toward a solution to an insidious problem

Recent theory and evidence suggest that the Cross-Race Effect (better recognition for same-race (SR) faces than for cross-race (CR) faces) is due to social-cognitive processes of categorization of out-group members, causing perceivers to attend to category-specifying information of CR faces at the expense of individuating information. Three experiments seek to extend this social-cognitive explanation of the CRE by investigating the extent to which the Cross-Race Effect can be reduced by inducing perceivers to individuate rather than categorize CR faces. In all three experiments, participants who received warning of the Cross-Race Effect prior to encoding, and instructions to individuate out-group members, showed no CRE. Experiment 2 suggests that this elimination of the CRE was not due merely to increased motivation to process all stimuli. This is one of few empirical displays of an elimination of the CRE outside of visual training. Moreover, these results are congenial with Levin’s (2000) feature-selection model, which suggests that the CRE is due to differential social cognitions about in-group and out-group members, rather than to differences in perceptual expertise. By eliciting individuation of out-group members at encoding, the CRE can be eliminated.