Associations between a one-shot delay discounting measure and age, income, education and real-world impulsive behavior

There has been discussion over the extent to which delay discounting – as prototypically shown by a preference for a smaller-sooner sum of money over a larger-later sum – measures the same kind of impulsive preferences that drive non-financial behavior. To address this issue, a dataset was analyzed containing 42,863 participants’ responses to a single delay-discounting choice, along with self-report behaviors that can be considered as impulsive. Choice of a smaller-sooner sum was associated with several demographics: younger age, lower income, and lower education; and impulsive behaviors: earlier age of first sexual activity and recent relationship infidelity, smoking, and higher body mass index. These findings suggest that at least an aspect of delay discounting preference is associated with a general trait influencing other forms of impulsivity, and therefore that high delay discounting is another form of impulsive behavior.     

Who art thou? Personality predictors of artistic preferences in a large UK sample: The importance of openness

The present study examined individual differences in artistic preferences in a sample of 91,692 participants (60% women and 40% men), aged 13–90 years. Participants completed a Big Five personality inventory ( Goldberg, 1999 ) and provided preference ratings for 24 different paintings corresponding to cubism, renaissance, impressionism, and Japanese art, which loaded on to a latent factor of overall art preferences. As expected, the personality trait openness to experience was the strongest and only consistent personality correlate of artistic preferences, affecting both overall and specific preferences, as well as visits to galleries, and artistic (rather than scientific) self‐perception. Overall preferences were also positively influenced by age and visits to art galleries, and to a lesser degree, by artistic self‐perception and conscientiousness (negatively). As for specific styles, after overall preferences were accounted for, more agreeable, more conscientious and less open individuals reported higher preference levels for impressionist, younger and more extraverted participants showed higher levels of preference for cubism (as did males), and younger participants, as well as males, reported higher levels of preferences for renaissance. Limitations and recommendations for future research are discussed.     

Using SMS text messaging for teaching and data collection in the behavioral sciences

Recent interest in university teaching has focused on interactivity in lectures and practical classes, and teachers in several fields have set up systems in which students can interact with the lecturer using mobile-phonebased SMS text messaging. This approach has particular potential in psychology, where students could use SMS messaging as a way of responding in simple psychology experiments or demonstrations. We describe a simple architecture for an SMS-based responding, using an SMS-to-HTTP message relay service, and a PHP/MySQL input-output handler. We describe briefly two experiments we have run using the system. The first experiment examined anchoring effects in an SMS-based auction. The second experiment examined delay discounting, with participants indicating their intertemporal preferences using SMS. Finally, we evaluate the feedback we obtained from students about the practical and conceptual issues surrounding text-message-based responding.     

Are Auditory Distractions Disturbing and Detrimental to the Performance of Expert Golfers? A Field Experiment

Although auditory distractions are prevalent and often seen as a threat to performance, relatively few studies have explored distraction effects in an applied sport context. This field experiment examined expert golfers' (n = 36) competitive performance in a normal and a distracting condition. The results displayed similar performance in the two conditions. Participants' responses to a postcompetition questionnaire generally suggested that they found auditory distractions below moderately disturbing and detrimental to their performance. Overall, our results contradict the popular consensus that distractions are disturbing and detrimental in motor performance contexts.     

Development of a portable psychometric testing device for use in the field: an alcohol investigation

Cognitive and psychomotor performance have traditionally been assessed in the laboratory. There is a need for an objective portable assessment tool to assess cognitive and psychomotor performance. This study investigated the viability of a portable psychometric test battery, in a controlled laboratory environment, possibly leading to use in the field. A randomised, double-blind placebo controlled, three-way crossover design was employed. 16 subjects received 50 mg/100 ml and 80 mg/100 ml of alcohol and alcohol placebo. Performance was assessed with a tracking task, and an attention task presented on a small ruggedised handheld computer. The attention task showed no significant training effects; however, an element of the tracking task did. Statistical significance, effect size, and test-retest reliability analyses are presented indicating sensitivity of the portable psychometric test battery to the impairing effects of two separate doses of alcohol. Ability to undertake wide-scale impairment testing in the field with meaningful results in the absence of baseline data collection may have wide reaching implications, particularly in relation to the assessment of drivers impaired by drug use.