The “false consensus effect”: An egocentric bias in social perception and attribution processes

Evidence from four studies demonstrates that social observers tend to perceive a “false consensus” with respect to the relative commonness of their own responses. A related bias was shown to exist in the observers' social inferences. Thus, raters estimated particular responses to be relatively common and relatively unrevealing concerning the actors' distinguishing personal dispositions when the responses in question were similar to the raters' own responses; responses differing from those of the rater, by contrast, were perceived to be relatively uncommon and revealing of the actor. These results were obtained both in questionnaire studies presenting subjects with hypothetical situations and choices and in authentic conflict situations. The implications of these findings for our understanding of social perception phenomena and for our analysis of the divergent perceptions of actors and observers are discussed. Finally, cognitive and perceptual mechanisms are proposed which might account for distortions in perceived consensus and for corresponding biases in social inference and attributional processes.     

The effects of labeling dimensional values on setting differences in shift performance of kindergarten children

A reversal-shift paradigm was used to study the effects of dimensional labeling on the performance of 270 kindergarten children. Task 1 was a simultaneous discrimination problem in which form, size, and color were redundant relevant dimensions, In the shift task, one of the dimensions remained relevant with reward contingencies reversed, and the other two dimensions were made irrelevant. In both tasks, the children named the stimulus object to be chosen, prior to choosing, in terms of one of the three sets of dimensionnal values. Shift performance was predicted to be superior in groups required to name relevant dimensional values in comparison with groups required to name irrelevant dimensional values. Moreover shift performance was predicted to differ, within groups, for four different types of stimulus settings. Fmally, differences in performance on the settings were predicted to be larger for the irrelevant-labeling groups than for the relevant-labelmg groups. The results were found to be in good agreement with these predictions. The findings were discussed in relation to the subproblem analysis proposed by Tighe and Tighe (1972).     

Improving Delivery Behaviors During Exposure for Pediatric OCD: A Multiple Baseline Training Trial With Community Therapists

This study tested whether a new training tool, the Exposure Guide (EG), improved in-session therapist behaviors (i.e., indicators of quality) that have been associated with youth outcomes in prior clinical trials of exposure therapy. Six therapists at a community mental health agency (CMHA) provided exposure therapy for 8 youth with obsessive–compulsive disorder (OCD). Using a nonconcurrent multiple baseline design with random assignment to baseline lengths of 6 to 16 weeks, therapists received gold-standard exposure therapy training with weekly consultation (baseline phase) followed by addition of EG training and feedback (intervention phase). The primary outcome was therapist behavior during in-session exposures, observed weekly using a validated coding system. Therapist behavior was evaluated in relation to a priori benchmarks derived from clinical trials. Additional outcomes included training feasibility/acceptability, therapist response to case vignettes and beliefs about exposure, and independent evaluator-rated clinical outcomes. Three therapists reached behavior benchmarks only during the EG (intervention) phase. Two therapists met benchmarks during the baseline phase; one of these subsequently moved away from benchmarks but met them again after starting the EG phase. Across all therapists, the percentage of weeks meeting benchmarks was significantly higher during the EG phase (86.4%) vs. the baseline phase (53.2%). Youth participants experienced significant improvement in OCD symptoms and global illness severity from pre- to posttreatment. Results provide initial evidence that adding the EG to gold-standard training can change in-session therapist behaviors in a CMHA setting.     

Gendered Racial Stereotypes and Coaching Intercollegiate Athletic Teams: The Representation of Black and Asian Women Coaches on U.S. Women’s and Men’s Teams

Sex Roles - The purpose of this study was to examine the representation of Black and Asian women coaches on women’s and men’s intercollegiate athletic teams. Through the theoretical...     

Active or Inert? An Experimental Comparison of Creative Ideation across Incubation Periods

The primary objective of this study was to contribute to the growing research discipline investigating the effects of physical exercise on divergent thinking creativity performance. Thirty‐two students participated in this two‐visit, within‐subject intervention. Individuals consented to participate in two randomized, and counterbalanced, experimental conditions, consisting of 15 min of active treadmill walking and an inert, seated control incubation period. Creativity was assessed at baseline and post‐exercise (and control) via the Instances Creativity Task (ICT). Creativity scores for changes in fluency (F(1, 31) = 2.90, p = .10) were not statistically significant across the experimental conditions. Originality scores were higher at baseline and follow‐up when compared to the exercise condition (F(1, 31) = 6.82, p = .01). However, there was no statistically significant condition × time interaction effect (F(1, 31) = 1.78, p = .19). Further analyses demonstrated that there was no statistically significant difference between the experimental conditions on recall score (F(1, 31) = 1.04, p = .32). All models indicated statistically significant main effects for time: fluency (F(1, 31) = 131.17, p < .001); originality (F(1, 31) = 36.54, p < .001); and recall (F(1, 31) = 51.75, p < .001). These findings suggest that both active and inert creative incubation periods may similarly enhance subsequent divergent thinking performance.     

Teachers’ perceived time pressure,emotional exhaustion and the role of social support from the school principal

Social Psychology of Education - Many teachers experience high levels of work-related strain due to time pressure, which over time can lead to various health problems, such as emotional exhaustion....     

Psychophysical isolation of the modality responsible for detecting multimodal stimuli: a chemosensory example

Multiple sense modalities can be stimulated conjointly by a physically complex item, such as a predator, and also by a physically solitary stimulus that acts on multiple receptor classes. As a prime example of this latter group, l-menthol from mint stimulates taste, smell, and several somatosensory submodalities. In 6 experiments that used a variety of psychometric techniques, the authors experimentally isolated the modality by which l-menthol is detected in the upper airways (the nose and mouth). Interestingly, absolute detection in both the nasal and oral cavities was based on olfaction and not stinging, cooling, or taste. These experiments illustrate how the sensory modality responsible for detecting a multimodal or multisensory stimulus can be psychophysically isolated.     

Beyond heritability: neurotransmitter genes differentially modulate visuospatial attention and working memory

A cued, visuospatial attention task and a working memory task were administered to 89 healthy adults genotyped for a T-to-C polymorphism in CHRNA4, a nicotinic receptor subunit gene. Increasing gene dose of the C allele of the CHRNA4 gene (i.e., no C alleles, one C allele, two C alleles) was associated with increased reaction time (RT) benefits of valid attentional cuing and reduced RT costs of invalid cues, but was not associated with working memory performance. In a second experiment, 103 healthy persons were genotyped for a G-to-A polymorphism of the dopamine beta-hydroxylase (DBH) gene. Increasing gene dose of the G allele of the DBH gene was associated with increased working memory accuracy at a high memory load. However, there was no consistent association between the DBH gene and visuospatial attention. Thus, a double dissociation was observed, with visuospatial attention associated with CHRNA4 but not the DBH gene and, conversely, working memory associated with the DBH gene but not CHRNA4. The results show that normal allelic variations in single neurotransmitter genes modulate individual differences in processing components of cognitive functions in healthy individuals.