The vengeance puzzle—retributive justice or hostile aggression?

Vengeance is understood as a blend of instrumental and hostile aggression. Taking the Berkowitz neoassociationistic aggression model as a basis, 84 students received a priming manipulation (anger, fear, or control condition). Afterwards, they judged one of four vengeance scenarios that differed in victim‐perpetrator relationship (coworker vs. stranger) and in the attributed motive of the perpetrator. Priming had an influence on judgments of injustice and on anticipated fury, but no effect whatsoever on aggression (measured as the decrease in well‐being wished for the perpetrator). The type of relationship had an effect only on anticipated disappointment. The main effects of motive were found on aggression and on the anticipated feeling of the perpetrator after the act. Aggression could be predicted from the motive of the perpetrator and well‐being of the victim after the transgression. Neither anticipated fury, importance of deterrence, nor judgment of injustice predicted aggression. Aggr. Behav. 00:1–12, 2005. © 2005 Wiley‐Liss, Inc.     

Are women always more interpersonally sensitive than men? Impact of goals and content domain

Two studies examined motivation and content domain as possible influences on sex differences in interpersonal sensitivity. Although much research has found women to excel on tasks measuring interpersonal sensitivity, most of the tasks have measured accuracy in female-relevant domains such as emotion. The present studies measured interpersonal sensitivity, defined as accurate recall of another person, for both female-relevant and male-relevant content domains and also included motivational manipulations intended to influence men and women differently. Study 1 measured accuracy of recalling information in a written vignette about a person, and Study 2 measured accuracy of recalling details about an interaction partner. Both studies supported hypotheses about domain specificity and gender-relevant motivation. However, even for male-stereotypic content and for tasks framed to favor men's motivation to perform well, men's accuracy never exceeded women's.     

Gender differences in memory for the appearance of others

Five studies investigated gender differences in the accurate recall of the appearance of others. The greater interpersonal orientation and interpersonal sensitivity of women were predicted to give women an advantage over men in appearance accuracy. Under both directed- and incidental-learning conditions, women more accurately recalled information concerning the appearance of their social targets than did men, participants' memory for the appearance of female targets was more accurate than it was for male targets, and neither gender was found to be a relative advantage in recalling the appearance of same-gender targets. The motivational and knowledge-based factors that might underlie a gender difference in appearance accuracy are discussed.     

Manual training of mental rotation

The aim of this study was to investigate the timing relations between phonological encoding that is, the generation of an abstract phonological representation of a to-be-produced utterance and the initiation of articulation. Previous research (Meyer &; Schriefers, 1991) using a picture-word paradigm suggested that, in the production of simple one-word naming responses, a speaker completes phonological encoding of the complete word before articulation is initiated. In the present study, this question was investigated for the production of German no-determiner noun phrases (e.g. roter Tisch, “red table”;). The results showed reliable facilitation effects for distractors that are identical to the first syllable of the first word of the noun phrase. For the second syllable of the first word, only weak facilitation effects were obtained. For the second word, no significant facilitation effects were obtained. However, additional analyses showed that two groups of speakers can be distinguished, one showing only facilitation effects for the first syllable of the first word, and the other showing an additional facilitation effect for the second syllable of the first word. Together with related results, our findings lead to two conclusions. First, the (phonological) word is not the lower limit of phonological encoding before articulation can be initiated. Second, speakers can adjust the size of the advance planning unit at the phonological level based on the specific speaking context.     

“The interviewer is a machine!” Investigating the effects of conventional and technology-mediated interview methods on interviewee reactions and behavior

Despite the growing number of organizations interested in the use of asynchronous video interviews (AVIs), little is known about its impact on interviewee reactions and behavior. We randomly assigned participants (N = 299) from two different countries (Switzerland and India) to a face-to-face interview, an avatar-based video interview (with an avatar as a virtual recruiter), or a text-based video interview (with written questions) and collected data on a set of self-rated and observer-rated criteria. Overall, we found that whereas participants reported more negative reactions towards the two asynchronous interviews, observer ratings revealed similar performance across the three interviews and lower stress levels in the two AVIs. These findings suggest that despite technology-mediated interview methods still not being well-accepted, interviewees are not at a disadvantage when these methods are used in terms of how well interviewees perform and how stressed they appear to external observers. Implications are discussed.     

The development of hierarchical factor solutions

Although simple structure has proved to be a valuable principle for rotation of axes in factor analysis, an oblique factor solution often tends to confound the resulting interpretation. A model is presented here which transforms the oblique factor solution so as to preserve simple structure and, in addition, to provide orthogonal reference axes. Furthermore, this model makes explicit the hierarchical ordering of factors above the first-order domain.Grateful acknowledgment is given to Dr. Lloyd G. Humphreys for his encouragement and valuable suggestions in the development of this task. This investigation was carried out under the Air Force Personnel and Training Research Center program in support of Project Nos. 7702 and 7950. Permission is granted for reproduction, translation, publication, and use or disposal in whole or in part by or for the United States Government.     

Social support from fellow group members triggers additional effort in groups

This research demonstrates social support from fellow group members as unique trigger of additional effort and performance in groups. Support‐induced effort gains are shown both compared with groups without social support and individual work. Study 1 examined existing beliefs about motivating group work among employees with professional group work experience (n = 130). The results revealed social support as one of the most frequently reported sources of group‐induced effort gains. Study 2 explored self‐reported effort intentions in group training scenarios among athletes (n = 94). Finally, Study 3 examined performance as a manifest indicator of effort in an experimental persistence task among students (n = 88). The results of Study 2 and Study 3 showed significant gains due to social support in both self‐reported effort and manifest performance, respectively. Together, the results demonstrate that receiving social support from fellow group members leads to higher effort in groups at the level of existing beliefs about motivating group work, at the level of effort intentions, and at the level of manifest performance behavior. The observed findings cannot be explained by established sources of motivation gains in groups such as social comparison or social indispensability. Copyright © 2014 John Wiley & Sons, Ltd.     

Facing an incompetent leader: The effects of a nonexpert leader on subordinates' perception and behaviour

We investigated the effects of a leader's task-incompetence on how subordinates perceive and interact with their leader. In Study 1, 80 participants in a subordinate role interacted via e-mail and in Study 2, 80 participants interacted face-to-face with either a competent or an incompetent leader on a problem-solving task. Participants' dominance behaviour, how much they resisted the leader's influence, their perception of the leader, and their task involvement were assessed. As predicted, subordinates perceived the leader's incompetence as a lack of power and compensated for it by taking on a more powerful position themselves (i.e., more dominance behaviour, more resistance to the leader's influencing attempts). In sum, having a task-incompetent leader affects not only the subordinates' perception of the leader but also how the subordinate interacts with the leader.