Inverse statistics and misperception of exponential growth

Exponential growth presented by numerical series or graphs is grossly underestimated by human subjects. This misperception was considerably lessened by presenting decreasing functions; this conclusion holds for both numeric and graphic stimuli. In the numerical conditions, about 25% of the subjects performed according to the statistical norm. In contrast with previous results, considerable individual differences with respect to sensitivity for rate of growth were observed. This finding was interpreted in terms of task difficulty: Extrapolation of ascending series is too difficult a task to be discriminative. Extrapolation of descending series is much easier, and may therefore better discriminate among subjects.     

Stable individual differences in situation-behaviour,construct-behaviour,and goal-behaviour relations

This study starts from a cognitive-social-learning conceptualization of the contribution of static person by situation interaction to overt behaviour variance. Individual differences in the relation between, on the one hand, situational variation in behaviour and, on the other hand, situational variation in objective situational characteristics, situational variation in construed situational characteristics, and situational variation in goals-in-situations were systematically investigated. Thirty-six first-year psychology students had to freely generate and briefly describe 20 interpersonal situations that they had encountered during the last year. Afterwards, they had to rate each situation for four basic behavioural continua, eight supplied objective situational characteristics, eight supplied constructs, and eight supplied goals. Correlational analysis revealed many stable individual differences, not only in degree, but also in direction (sign) of situation-behaviour, construct–behaviour, and goal–behaviour relations. These relational variables could be reduced to seven relational factorial dimensions. The theoretical and practical implications of these findings are discussed.     

A generalized majorization method for least souares multidimensional scaling of pseudodistances that may be negative

The usual convergence proof of the SMACOF algorithm model for least squares multidimensional scaling critically depends on the assumption of nonnegativity of the quantities to be fitted, called the pseudodistances. When this assumption is violated, erratic convergence behavior is known to occur. Three types of circumstances in which some of the pseudodistances may become negative are outlined: nonmetric multidimensional scaling with normalization on the variance, metric multidimensional scaling including an additive constant, and multidimensional scaling under the city-block distance model. A generalization of the SMACOF method is proposed to resolve the difficulty that is based on the same rationale frequently involved in robust fitting with least absolute residuals.I am grateful to Patrick Groenen and Rian van Blokland-Vogelesang for their help with some of the computations, and to the anonymous referees for their very useful comments.     

Police communication programmes aimed at burglary victims: A review of studies and an experimental evaluation

The effects and side-effects of a victim assistance project aimed at victims of burglary are experimentally evaluated. Key features of the programme included the provision of burglary prevention information by police officers during a personal interaction with the victim through a positive and limitative communication strategy. Results suggest that important programme goals (for example, stronger satisfaction with police performance, a more internal risk orientation concerning victimization, stronger preventive intentions) were met. One of the positive effects for which experimental support was found was an improvement in police-victim relations. As regards side-effects the programme led neither to response generalization, nor to increased fear of crime outside the home. However, the side-effects of increased fear in the home did occur in female victims and victims with an external risk-orientation. The implications for future victim assistance projects in this domain are finally discussed.     

The desirability of beliefs: preschoolers' appreciation of fact beliefs and subsequent emotions

In this study, we investigated the extent to which preschool children's own knowledge about reality biases their understanding that others' beliefs about reality govern others' emotions and not reality itself. Therefore, an increasing tension was created between the beliefs of the protagonist and the participant, by providing varying degrees of evidence about the validity of the protagonist's belief. Children of between 4 and 5 years of age were asked to predict the protagonist's emotion, given the protagonist's desire and the protagonist's belief. The results show that, to a certain extent, preschool children take others' beliefs into account when predicting others' emotions. When the outcome is clear, children probably feel tied to reality, and in the case of false beliefs, their knowledge about reality biases their emotion predictions, as was also evident in ‘false belief’ research (Wimmer H, Perner I. 1983. Beliefs about beliefs: representation and constraining function of wrong beliefs in young children's understanding of deception. Cognition 13: 103–128). However, when it is uncertain what the actual outcome will be, then it is not the likelihood of others' beliefs but the desirability of the outcome that biases children's predictions of others' emotions. In other words, when the actual outcome is yet unclear, 4‐ and 5‐year‐olds show a tendency for wishful thinking in their predictions of others' emotions. Copyright © 2000 John Wiley & Sons, Ltd.     

Organizing principles of involvement in human rights and their social anchoring in value priorities

Two questionnaire studies were conducted (N=80 and N=175) to examine the structure and the social anchoring of the organizing principles of personal and governmental involvement concerning human rights. The results indicated that these organizing principles had, as hypothesized one abstract and one applied dimension. The second study evaluated the correlations between these dimensions and values. Results were consistent with Schwartz's (1992) model predicting both the internal structure of values and their relations with other variables. Amongst other results, self-transcendence values were positively correlated with the abstract involvements and the applied personal involvement, and negatively with the applied governmental involvement. The results concerning the correlations between conservation values and the four organizing principles were the opposite. Results concerning the links between different levels of social anchorings, particularly between the value types and variables such as religious affiliation and practice political preferences, and social and political activism were also presented and discussed. © 1998 John Wiley & Sons, Ltd.     

The Credibility of Newspapers and Fear of Crime

It was hypothesized that the effect of a fear-arousing newspaper article about crime on fear of crime and concern about crime as a societal problem is dependent on source (newspaper) credibility. In an experimental study, participants were presented with an article on street robberies, ostensibly published in a more credible newspaper or in a less credible newspaper, whereas a control group did not read any article. As predicted, it was found that the article's effect on fear of robbery, fear of crime in general, and concern about robbery as a societal problem was fully dependent on source credibility. Further, women reported more fear of robbery and fear of crime in general than did men.     

Overgeneral autobiographical memory in depressed adolescents with, versus without, a reported history of trauma

Autobiographical memory retrieval is fundamental to the developing self-concept in adolescence, to emotion regulation, and to social problem solving and has been shown to be compromised in adolescents diagnosed with depression (R. J. Park, I. M. Goodyer, & J. D. Teasdale, 2002). The authors of the present study assessed autobiographical memory overgenerality in a sample of depressed adolescent participants with, versus without, a reported history of trauma and never-depressed control participants by using an emotion word-cueing paradigm. The authors' analyses showed for the first time that adolescents with major depression and with no reported history of trauma exhibited an overgeneral memory bias. They also revealed that depressed adolescents who reported a history of trauma retrieved fewer overgeneral memories than did depressed adolescents who reported no history of trauma. Among depressed adolescents who reported a history of trauma, more severe posttraumatic stress symptoms were associated with less overgenerality. Possible accounts of these findings are suggested.     

Naturalism Need Not Be "Made Safe": A Response to William Rottschaefer's Misunderstandings

In this article, I respond to William Rottschaefer's analysis of my writings on religion and science, especially my Religion, Science and Naturalism (1996). I show that I am not trying "to make naturalism safe," as Rottschaefer contends, but rather attempting to explore options available when one endorses naturalistic approaches. I also explain why I object to the label "supernaturalistic naturalism" used by Rottschaefer. Possible limitations to naturalistic projects are discussed, not as limitations imposed but rather as features uncovered.     

Telling time from analog and digital clocks: a multiple-route account

Does the naming of clocks always require conceptual preparation? To examine this question, speakers were presented with analog and digital clocks that had to be named in Dutch using either a relative (e.g., "quarter to four") or an absolute (e.g., "three forty-five") clock time expression format. Naming latencies showed evidence of conceptual preparation when speakers produced relative time expressions to analog and digital clocks, but not when they used absolute time expressions. These findings indicate that conceptual mediation is not always mandatory for telling time, but instead depends on clock time expression format, supporting a multiple-route account of Dutch clock time naming.