Characterization of Children's Decision Making: Sensitivity to Punishment Frequency,Not Task Complexity

On a gambling task that models real-life decision making, children between ages 7 and 12 perform like patients with bilateral lesions of the ventromedial prefrontal cortex (VMPFC), opting for choices that yield high immediate gains in spite of higher future losses (Crone &; Van der Molen, 2004 Crone, E. A. and Van der Molen, M. W. 2004. Developmental changes in decision-making: Performance on a gambling task previously shown to rely on ventromedial prefrontal cortex. Developmental Neuropsychology, 25(3): 251–279. [PUBMED][INFOTRIEVE][CROSSREF][Taylor &; Francis Online], [Web of Science ®] , [Google Scholar]). The current study set out to characterize developmental changes in decision making by varying task complexity and punishment frequency. Three age groups (7–9 years, 10–12 years, 13–15 years) performed two versions of a computerized variant of the original Iowa gambling task. Task complexity was manipulated by varying the number of choices participants could make. Punishment frequency was manipulated by varying the frequency of delayed punishment. Results showed a developmental increase in the sensitivity to future consequences, which was present only when the punishment was presented infrequently. These results could not be explained by differential sensitivity to task complexity, hypersensitivity to reward, or failure to switch response set after receiving punishment. There was a general pattern of boys outperforming girls by making more advantageous choices over the course of the task. In conclusion, 7–12-year-old children—like VMPFC patients—appear myopic about the future except when the potential for future punishment is high.     

The process of forming a mobile media habit: results of a longitudinal study in a real-world setting

ABSTRACT

Media habits are central constructs in audience research. Yet, little is known about the formation of (media) habits. Based on theoretical elaboration and the results of a longitudinal study on the formation of a mobile media application habit—specifically the smartphone application of the Union of European Football Associations for the European soccer championship 2016—in a real-world setting, this article develops a comprehensive framework of media habit formation. The framework focuses on the core process of habit formation: Habits form with (regular) repetition of a behavior in a specific context that is perceived as rewarding. Yet, the findings of the study show that regularity in behavior performance and stable external circumstances are less crucial for the formation of a mobile media habit. Instead, gateway behaviors are proposed as relevant context features for the formation of mobile media habits.     

Relationship Formation and Early Risk Exposure: Diverging Associations with Romantic Self-Concept and Attachment

Early risk exposure reportedly influences romantic relationship formation via an increase in sexualized reproductive strategies and attachment insecurity. Because these are risk adaptations that predict differing interactions in romantic relationships and are complexly related to gender, two studies focused on these features in relation to relationship formation in emerging adulthood. Beyond confirming that self-reported early risk exposure was associated with a more sexualized romantic self-concept, greater numbers of relationships, and greater attachment insecurity, “Study 1” confirmed a hypothesized four-way interaction between gender, early risk, romantic self-concept, and attachment style. “Study 2” clarified the interaction through a regression model predicting a sexualized romantic self-concept differently for men and women. A structural equation model including all the study variables confirmed the hypothesis that pathways for men primarily predicted unrestricted sexuality (i.e., numbers of casual relationships), whereas the pathways for women included direct effects from risk and indicators of committed relationships.     

Eye gaze patterns reveal how we reason about fractions

ABSTRACT

Fractions are defined by numerical relationships, and comparing two fractions’ magnitudes requires within-fraction (holistic) and/or between-fraction (componential) relational comparisons. To better understand how individuals spontaneously reason about fractions, we collected eye-tracking data while they performed a fraction comparison task with conditions that promoted or obstructed different types of comparisons. We found evidence for both componential and holistic processing in this mixed-pairs task, consistent with the hybrid theory of fraction representation. Additionally, making within-fraction eye movements on trials that promoted a between-fraction comparison strategy was associated with slower responses. Finally, participants who performed better on a non-numerical test of reasoning took longer to respond to the most difficult fraction trials, which suggests that those who had greater facility with non-numerical reasoning attended more to numerical relationships. These findings extend prior research and support the continued investigation into the mechanistic links between numerical and non-numerical reasoning.     

Effects of Data Noise on Statistical Judgement

People made forecasts from graphically presented time series. Series were sinusoids overlaid by a zero or positive linear trend and a zero, low, moderate, or high level of noise. Forecasting performance was affected by both these variables. However, it did not correlate with ability to identify the trend and correlated significantly with ability to detect the sinusoidal pattern only when series were noise-free. A second experiment showed that the effect of data noise was not influenced by the number of forecasts that people made from a series. These findings are consistent with the view that data noise does not affect the way that forecasts are made but that it impairs them for two reasons. First, it renders the anchor-and-adjust heuristics underlying them less effective. Second, it causes people to add more noise to their judgements in their attempts to make them representative of the data.     

Analysing the Simultaneous Relationship Between Life Satisfaction and Health-Related Quality of Life

This paper aims to examine whether life satisfaction and health-related quality of life (HRQoL) are simultaneously related, as well as to quantify the bias that occurs if simultaneity is not accounted for. The study sample consisted of 870 respondents, representative of the Spanish adult general population. Using a simultaneous equations system —with the satisfaction with life scale (SWLS) and the SF-6D index as outcome variables—, we found a simultaneous association between life satisfaction and HRQoL, although this relationship is heterogeneous in individual characteristics such as age and sex. More important, the fact of estimating the relationship between life satisfaction and HRQoL under a unidirectional approach severely underestimates the effect of life satisfaction on HRQoL and, to a lesser degree, the reverse direction effect. In consequence, policy decisions intended to improve satisfaction with life or HRQoL can be wrong if they rely on unidirectional estimates. Another relevant implication of this research is that, as a result of the simultaneous relationship between life satisfaction and HRQoL, not only health interventions may increase satisfaction with life, but also policies that improve life satisfaction can lead to positive side effects on HRQoL.     

Word recognition across orthographies: Another look at the interaction between context and degradation

Abstract

The performance of English and Spanish subjects was examined in two experiments using a lexical decision task in which the effects of semantic priming and stimulus degradation were systematically varied. The Orthographic Depth Hypothesis predicts that priming and degradation will interact in the orthographically “deep” language (English) but not in the “shallow” one (Spanish). In the first experiment, the two factors were found to interact in a similar way in both English and Spanish groups. In the second experiment, in which only Spanish subjects participated, the interaction was again present but only in those subjects who showed an overall facilitation effect on primed words. The results are consistent with the use of the so-called “direct” route in Spanish and are at variance with other previous findings which have suggested that reading in shallow orthographies occurs via the “indirect” phonological route. There was also evidence that nonword rejection times were slower in Spanish subjects and that the performance of the two groups was affected differently by the different types of neutral baseline primes (asterisks or unrelated words). Possible interpretations of these performance variations are briefly discussed.     

The link between anger and admiration toward governmental actions and self-reported preventive behaviour in the context of the COVID-19 pandemic

In the context of the COVID-19 pandemic, across six correlational studies in four different countries (total N = 4937), we examined the link between citizens' anger with and admiration for the government's actions and decisions (i.e., system-based anger and admiration) and engagement in preventive behaviour. The internal meta-analyses showed that individuals who admired the government's actions were more likely to adopt personal hygiene and social distancing behaviour. Yet, the link between emotions and preventive behaviour differed concerning the target of emotions, especially for anger. Specifically, anger about restrictions imposed by the government was negatively related to preventive behaviours, but this relationship was not significant when the target of anger was the government's overall handling of the pandemic. Our findings emphasise the importance of citizens' emotions and the targets of those emotions during the crisis.     

Object individuation and event mapping: developmental changes in infants’ use of featural information

The present research examined the development of 4.5‐ to 7.5‐month‐old infants’ ability to map different‐features occlusion events using a simplified event‐mapping task. In this task, infants saw a different‐features (i.e. egg‐column) event followed by a display containing either one object or two objects. Experiments 1 and 2 assessed infants’ ability to judge whether the egg‐column event was consistent with a subsequent one‐column display. Experiments 3 and 4 examined infants’ ability to judge whether the objects seen in the egg‐column event and those seen in a subsequent display were consistent in their featural composition. At 7.5 and 5.5 months, but not at 4.5 months, the infants successfully mapped the egg‐column event onto the one‐column display. However, the 7.5‐ and 5.5‐month‐olds differed in whether they mapped the featural properties of those objects. Whereas the 7.5‐month‐olds responded as if they expected to see two specific objects, an egg and a column, in the final display the 5.5‐month‐olds responded as if they simply expected to see ‘two objects’. Additional results revealed, however, that when spatiotemporal information specified the presence of two objects, 5.5‐month‐olds succeeded at tagging the objects as being featurally distinct, although they still failed to attach more specific information about what those differences were. Reasons for why the younger infants had difficulty integrating featural information into their object representations were discussed.