Talking about walking: biomechanics and the language of locomotion

What drives humans around the world to converge in certain ways in their naming while diverging dramatically in others? We studied how naming patterns are constrained by investigating whether labeling of human locomotion reflects the biomechanical discontinuity between walking and running gaits. Similarity judgments of a student locomoting on a treadmill at different slopes and speeds revealed perception of this discontinuity. Naming judgments of the same clips by speakers of English, Japanese, Spanish, and Dutch showed lexical distinctions between walking and running consistent with the perceived discontinuity. Typicality judgments showed that major gait terms of the four languages share goodness-of-example gradients. These data demonstrate that naming reflects the biomechanical discontinuity between walking and running and that shared elements of naming can arise from correlations among stimulus properties that are dynamic and fleeting. The results support the proposal that converging naming patterns reflect structure in the world, not only acts of construction by observers.     

Contextual effects on prejudiced attitudes: When the presence of others leads to more egalitarian responses

In the present paper, we tested the hypothesis that the physical presence of other ingroup members may ameliorate Whites’ spontaneous affective responses toward Blacks. Results of Study 1 demonstrated that IAT-assessed attitudes toward Blacks were indeed less negative when participants were tested in small groups rather than individually. Study 2 shed light on the underlying processes by demonstrating that respondents at the presence of others displayed increased accessibility to egalitarian-related concepts after Black primes, as compared to respondents tested individually. Overall, results point to the wide malleability of spontaneous affective responses and to the possibility that contextual factors, like the presence of other individuals, might automatically activate egalitarians goals. Results are discussed in relation to current models of automatic intergroup bias and preconscious control over it.     

Implicit ingroup metafavoritism: subtle preference for ingroup members displaying ingroup bias

The current article investigated how individuals evaluate ingroup members displaying either ingroup bias or egalitarian intergroup behaviors. The hypotheses predicted that on explicit responses a preference for the egalitarian ingroup member would emerge; in contrast, on more spontaneous and uncontrolled responses, a preference for the ingroup favoritist would result. Across four studies these hypotheses were confirmed for both minimal groups (Studies 1 and 2) and ethnic groups (Studies 3 and 4). Despite a verbal preference for those who behaved in an egalitarian way, an implicit ingroup metafavoritism was found. Overall, results indicated the presence of dual attitudes in the perception of ingroup members and the strict interconnection between intergroup behaviors and intragroup perception.     

Auditory attention causes visual inattentional blindness

When engaged in a visual task, we can fail to detect unexpected events that would otherwise be very noticeable. Here we ask whether a common auditory task, such as that of attending to a verbal stream, can also make us blind to the presence of visual objects that we do not anticipate. In two experiments, one hundred and twenty observers watched a dynamic display while performing either a visual or an auditory attention task, or both simultaneously. When observers were listening to verbal material, in order to either understand it or to remember it (auditory task), their probability of detecting an unexpected visual object was no higher than when they were counting bounces of moving items (visual task), although in the former case the observers' eyes and attention could move around the display freely rather than remaining focused on tracked items. Previous research has shown that attending to verbal material does not affect responses to lights flashing at irregular intervals, suggesting that driving performance is not hampered by listening. The lights, however, were expected. Our data imply that listening to the radio while driving, or to a portable audio player while walking or biking, can impair our reactions to objects or events that we do not expect.     

On the bounded rationality of gender stereotyping in fame judgments

The false‐fame effect is the phenomenon that familiar names are falsely judged famous more often than unfamiliar names. M.R. Banaji and A.G. Greenwald ( 1995 ) demonstrated a gender bias in the false‐fame effect: In line with existing gender stereotypes, the false‐fame effect was larger for male than for female names. A more general explanation for gender biasing in fame judgments is based on cognitive availability. Name gender could be used as an ecologically valid cue when making fame judgments. If the relevant universe of famous names contained more male than female names, a gender bias in fame judgments should be observed, if it contained more female names, the gender bias should be reversed. Indeed, this pattern could be demonstrated experimentally, and we argue that it is not compatible with an account that draws on gender stereotyping but with one based on cognitive availability. Copyright © 2004 John Wiley & Sons, Ltd.     

The Within‐Setting Variability of Validity in Cognitive Ability Tests

This study was directed to check the second prediction of the situational specificity hypothesis (SSH). According to this prediction, if the setting is held constant, then validity coefficients will not vary from study to study. This prediction was tested using data from a series of studies in which cognitive ability tests were used. These tests are subjected to a cultural bias that could affect the validity variability. The results are contrary to the second prediction of the SSH because a great variability was found in the validity coefficients within‐setting. However, the findings are consistent with the hypothesis of validity generalization (VGH) that predicts similar variability in both across settings and within‐setting. Also, the cultural context does not seem to affect the variability of validity and this variability is similar to that observed in previous studies of validity generalization.     

Access Problems and explanatory overkill

I argue that recent attempts to deflect Access Problems for realism about a priori domains such as mathematics, logic, morality, and modality using arguments from evolution result in two kinds of explanatory overkill: (1) the Access Problem is eliminated for contentious domains, and (2) realist belief becomes viciously immune to arguments from dispensability, and to non-rebutting counter-arguments more generally.