Automatic vigilance for negative words in lexical decision and naming: comment on Larsen, Mercer, and Balota (2006)

An automatic vigilance hypothesis states that humans preferentially attend to negative stimuli, and this attention to negative valence disrupts the processing of other stimulus properties. Thus, negative words typically elicit slower color naming, word naming, and lexical decisions than neutral or positive words. Larsen, Mercer, and Balota analyzed the stimuli from 32 published studies, and they found that word valence was confounded with several lexical factors known to affect word recognition. Indeed, with these lexical factors covaried out, Larsen et al. found no evidence of automatic vigilance. The authors report a more sensitive analysis of 1011 words. Results revealed a small but reliable valence effect, such that negative words (e.g., "shark") elicit slower lexical decisions and naming than positive words (e.g., "beach"). Moreover, the relation between valence and recognition was categorical rather than linear; the extremity of a word's valence did not affect its recognition. This valence effect was not attributable to word length, frequency, orthographic neighborhood size, contextual diversity, first phoneme, or arousal. Thus, the present analysis provides the most powerful demonstration of automatic vigilance to date.     

Outcome summaries of latency‐based functional analyses conducted in hospital inpatient units

Latency‐based functional analysis (FA) may be a viable alternative to the standard, rate‐based, FA when frequently evoking problem behavior is not advisable. We conducted 18 latency‐based FAs of the problem behavior of children diagnosed with autism in inpatient hospital settings and identified functional relations during 44.4% (8 of 18) of latency‐based FAs. Implications for conducting FAs of severe problem behavior are discussed.     

Exploring metaphor's epistemic function: Uncertainty moderates metaphor-consistent priming effects on social perceptions

Consistent with conceptual metaphor theory's claim that metaphors operate at a conceptual, and not just linguistic, level, prior research shows that priming perceptions related to concrete concepts influences perceptions related to dissimilar, more abstract concepts in metaphor-consistent ways. However, the theory's claim that metaphors function to reduce uncertainty about abstract concepts has yet to be experimentally assessed. Two studies tested whether situational variation in uncertainty moderates metaphor-consistent priming effects. Study 1 focused on the metaphor life is a path and showed that priming path perceptions (vs. literal representations) increased perceived autobiographical continuity only if uncertainty about personal identity was salient. Study 2 focused on verticality metaphors and showed that vertical orientation primes influenced satisfaction with the decision to attend one's current university in both directions (up is good, bad is down) only if uncertainty about the value of the college experience was salient.     

Fear and uncertainty in the face of death: The role of life after death in group identification

Terror management theory argues that mortality‐induced terror motivates group identification. Uncertainty–identity theory argues that uncertainty about what happens after death motivates group identification. Two experiments were conducted to test the latter reasoning. In Experiment 1 (n = 187), mortality salience was manipulated, and uncertainty about the afterlife was measured to predict national identification. As hypothesized, mortality salience strengthened identification only among those who were uncertain about the afterlife. In Experiment 2 (n = 177), mortality salience was manipulated as before, but belief in an afterlife was also manipulated—participants were primed to believe that there was an afterlife, there was not an afterlife, or the existence of an afterlife was uncertain. As in Experiment 1, mortality salience strengthened identification only among those who were existentially uncertain. These experiments show that uncertainty plays a significant role in reactions to mortality salience, and support uncertainty–identity theory's analysis of the role of self‐uncertainty in ideological conviction and group behavior. Copyright © 2011 John Wiley & Sons, Ltd.     

Epistemic Side Constraints and the Structure of Epistemic Normativity

In this paper, I develop the notion of an epistemic side constraint in order to overcome one of the main challenges to a goal‐based approach to the structure of epistemic normativity. I argue that the rationale for such side constraints can be found in the work of John Locke and that his argument is best understood as the epistemic analog to David Gauthier's argument as to the rationality of being moral.     

Creative Approaches to Address Online Dating in Counseling

Within the last decade, online dating has become an increasingly popular method for meeting potential partners. Online dating comes with a unique set of opportunities and challenges that may affect the overall mental health of our clients. Hence, it is essential for counselors to be prepared and able to discuss online dating in counseling. The authors of this article introduce three potential creative interventions to assist in addressing online dating within counseling.     

Attention norms in Siegel’s The Rationality of Perception

Can we be responsible for our attention? Can attention be epistemically good or bad? Siegel tackles these under‐explored questions in “Selection Effects”, a pathbreaking chapter of The Rationality of Perception. In this chapter, Siegel develops one of the first philosophical accounts of attention norms. Her account is inferential: patterns of attention are often controlled by inferences and therefore subject to rational epistemic norms that govern any other form of inference. Although Siegel’s account is explanatorily powerful, it cannot capture a core attention norm in cognitive science: one should balance between exploratory and exploitative attention. For central cases of exploratory attention such as mind‐wandering, child‐like, and creative thinking are non‐inferential. Siegel’s view classifies them as “normative freebies” that are not subject to epistemic evaluation. We’re therefore left with a disjunctive conclusion: either Siegel’s inferentialist theory of attention norms is incomplete or cognitive scientists are wrong about the norms that govern attention.     

Multiculturalism and Group Therapy in the United States: A Social Constructionist Perspective

Multiculturalism encourages the inclusion of the broad range of cultural differences that exist in society into our therapeutic dialogues. This paper examines multicultural group therapy through the perspective of social constructionism. Emphasis is given to the unacknowledged and unspoken imbalance of power that exists in psychotherapeutic contexts. The concepts of multiple individual identity and cultural representation are discussed and illustrated with case examples. Clinical considerations for the multicultural group therapist are provided.     

Differential prediction and the use of multiple predictors: the omitted variables problem

Moderated regression is widely used to examine differential prediction by race or gender. When using multiple predictors in a selection system, guidance as to whether differential prediction analysis should be conducted on each predictor individually, or on the set of predictors in combination, is lacking. Analyzing predictors individually creates the possibility of an omitted variable problem. Army Project A data were used to examine differential prediction by race with the use of personality measures for 79 predictor-criterion combinations. Traditional analysis indicated predictive bias by intercept in 45 instances and by slope in 7 instances; the inclusion of an Armed Services Vocational Aptitude Battery general factor as an additional predictor changed the conclusion in 32 cases for the intercept and in 3 cases for the slope.