Need for Cognition and Choice Framing Effects

Two experiments tested the hypothesis that framing biases in decision making would affect more strongly individuals with relatively low levels of need for cognition (NC). Participants were classified as high or low NC based on responses to a standard scale and subsequently were exposed to one of two framings of a choice problem. Different choice problems were used in each experiment, modeled after those developed by Kahneman and Tversky. Experiment 1 employed a monetary task and Experiment 2 a medical decision-making task. Consistent with expectations, framing effects on choice were observed in both experiments, but only for low NC participants. High NC participants were unaffected by problem framing, showing that they were less susceptible to attempts to alter their frame of reference.     

Is This a World Where Knowledge Has to Include Justification?

If any thesis is all-but-universally accepted by contemporary epistemologists, it is justificationism—the thesis that being an instance of knowledge has to include being epistemically justified in some appropriate way. If there is to be any epistemological knowledge about knowledge, a paradigm candidate would seem to be our knowledge that justificationism is true. This is a conception of a way in which knowledge has to be robust . Nevertheless, this paper provides reason to doubt the truth of that conception. Even epistemology's supposed conceptual core is not as epistemically unchallengeable as we might have assumed to be the case.     

2007 Presidential Address: Singing and Solidarity

As the audience entered the hall, a large screen displayed the title of the talk from an overhead projector. On the dais, about three feet above the floor, was a lectern, and next to it an arrangement of eight chairs facing each other in a square formation, two on each side of the square, the sides at a 45 degree angle from the side of the platform. At the appointed time, SSSR past-president Donald Miller climbed the steps to the lectern to introduce the speaker, Stephen Warner. When he had completed that task, Warner came forward to the lectern and a woman later identified as his wife, Anne Heider, began working the projector. A few minutes into the address, at Warner's cue, she and six others joined him on the dais, taking seats in the arrangement of chairs, from which position, facing each other with Warner standing facing toward them, they sang a song, as described below. When they were finished, they left the dais, and the rest of the address proceeded in a conventional manner. Prior to this singing demonstration, the address itself began as follows.     

Need for Uniqueness,Need for Cognition,and Creativity

This study examined two neglected dispositional contributions to creativity, namely needs for uniqueness and cognition. Multiple measures of creativity were used including an inventory of creative accomplishments, preference for complex visual figures (a measure similar to the Barron‐Welsh Art Scale), unconventional rather than popular word associations, and consensually‐assessed creative products. The latter included creative drawing, creative writing (a TAT story), richness of a photo essay about the self and the vividness of a recent dream. The predictors independently made significant contributions to creativity.     

FACE SUPPORT IN CONTROLLING POOR PERFORMANCE

The purpose of this study was to describe the use of face support in managerial communication on controlling poor performance. Face support was defined according to the degree of approval (positive face) and the degree of freedom given to poor performers to define a course of action (autonomy). Seventy bank branch managers were interviewed about a recent performance problem they had at tempted to control. Managers' use of positive face and autonomy strategies suggested punitive and problem solving styles of control. Further, an overall performance rating of the employee was positively correlated with use of positive face support and use of autonomy was positively correlated with the length of time between problem recurrence.     

Why 'Health' is not a Central Category for Public Health Policy

We normally think that public health policy is an important political activity. In turn, we normally understand the value of public health policy in terms of the promotion of health or some health-related good (such as opportunity for health), on the basis of the assumption that health is an important constituent or determinant of wellbeing. In this paper, I argue that the assumption that the value of public health policy should be understood in terms of health leads us to overlook important benefits generated by such policy. To capture these benefits we need to understand the ends of public health policy in terms of the promotion of 'physical safety'. I then go on to argue that the idea that 'health' is an important category for evaluating or estimating individuals' wellbeing in the normative context of social policy is confused. I then clarify the relationship between my arguments and QALY-based accounts of health assessment. In the final section of the paper, I defend this surprising conclusion against various attacks.     

CACREP: The Need for a Mid-Course Correction

Since its inception in 1981, CACREP (Council for Accreditation of Counseling and Related Educational Programs) has been AACD's (American Association for Counseling and Development) program accrediting agency. As of April 1991, 72 counselor preparation programs have earned CACREP accreditation. Recommendations to modify CACREP's standards and system of governance are made with the intention of increasing CACREP's influenceand making it accountable to the constituents it serves.     

JOB SURVIVAL OF NEW EMPLOYEES1

The job survival of 1,736 newly hired workers across a variety of organizations is examined. Voluntary and involuntary turnover are analyzed separately over the first 29 weeks on the job. Moderate support is found for a theory of job survival which distinguishes between the effects of job attitudes on voluntary withdrawal and job performance on involuntary withdrawal. Organization related factors such as pay and training are better predictors of job survival than are individual variables such as race, sex, age, and education.