Asymmetrical attention allocation to dissimilar and similar attitudes

Evaluations of others are sometimes influenced more by their dissimilar than similar attitudes. The authors investigated this similarity–dissimilarity asymmetry at the level of stimulus processing. In a variant of the Stroop task in Experiment 1 (N = 50), dissimilar attitudes of the participants interfered more with their color-naming performance than did similar attitudes. In a dual-task paradigm of Experiment 2 (N = 92), a greater attention allocation to dissimilar than similar attitudes disappeared when the cognitive load was low, but not when it was high. Findings illustrated the similarity–dissimilarity asymmetry at the level of stimulus processing, and presented the asymmetry as another case of the fundamental positive–negative asymmetry. Implications and alternative interpretations of these findings are discussed.     

Bias and regulation of bias in intergroup interactions: Implicit attitudes toward Muslims and interaction quality

Previous research suggests that automatically activated bias manifests itself in behavior that can jeopardize the quality of intergroup interactions. However, regulation of automatic associations has the potential to attenuate their influence on intergroup interaction. To test this possibility, 46 non-Muslim White participants interacted with a Muslim confederate and completed an implicit measure of attitudes toward Muslims. The Quadruple Process model [Sherman, J. W., Gawronski, B., Gonsalkorale, K., Hugenberg, K., Allen, T. J., & Groom, C. J. (2008). The self-regulation of automatic associations and behavioral impulses. Psychological Review, 115, 314-335] was applied to the implicit measure to estimate participants’ strength of negative associations with Muslims and their ability to overcome those negative associations. The confederate’s ratings of how much he liked the participants were predicted by an interaction between automatic negative associations and the ability to overcome them. Specifically, when the strength of participants’ negative associations with Muslims was low, participants’ level of overcoming bias was unrelated to the confederate’s ratings. In contrast, the ability to regulate automatic negative associations predicted greater liking when those associations were strong.     

Cognitive constraint on the ‘automatic pilot’ for the hand: Movement intention influences the hand’s susceptibility to involuntary online corrections

Research suggests that the reaching hand automatically deviates toward a target that changes location (jumps) during the reach. In the current study, we investigated whether movement intention can influence the target jump’s impact on the hand. We compared the degree of trajectory deviation to a jumped target under three instruction conditions: (1) GO, in which participants were told to go to the target if it jumped, (2) STOP, in which participants were told to immediately stop their movement if the target jumped, and (3) IGNORE, in which participants were told to ignore the target if it jumped and to continue to its initial location. We observed a reduced response to the jump in the IGNORE condition relative to the other conditions, suggesting that the response to the jump is contingent on the jump being a task-relevant event.     

运用眼动指标探测个体的内隐攻击性

以黑白线条人物画为实验材料,采用Eyelinkll型眼动仪,对14名大学生观看攻击者、被攻击者以及中性人物图片的眼动指标进行分析.研究结果发现:(1)被试观看攻击者和被攻击者的平均瞳孔大小显著大于观看中性人物时的平均瞳孔大小;(2)被试注视攻击者的时间显著高于注视中性人物和被攻击者的时间;(3)被试对攻击者的凝视次数,显著高于对中性人物和被攻击者的凝视次数.本研究的结果表明,个体对攻击性材料具有自动化的偏好.     

Auditory Stroop reveals implicit gender associations in adults and children

Gender provides a powerful social heuristic for structuring incoming information. Thus, it may be difficult to attend to aspects of a person’s sex without also activating irrelevant gender associations. In two experiments, an auditory Stroop revealed implicit gender associations. Participants categorized the sex of voices saying names and words stereotypically associated with male, female or neutral gender roles. Both adults and children were slower when the voice’s sex was stereotypically incongruent with the spoken word or name. Although both groups showed such interference, children—who are generally less flexible about gender roles—showed more interference in response to gender-stereotypical words (e.g., football) than names (e.g., Rachel), whereas adults showed the opposite pattern. Given the simplicity of this task, the auditory Stroop might be used both to tap into implicit gender associations and to investigate their development.     

The evaluation-behavior link: Direct and beyond valence

The present research tests the hypothesis that affective stimuli automatically trigger approach/avoidance tendencies. A first experiment showed that in a vigilance task participants responded faster with an approach behavior (i.e., arm flexion) to happy words than to sad words and faster with an avoidance behavior (i.e., arm extension) to sad than to happy words that were presented outside of conscious awareness. These findings were replicated and extended in a second experiment. In this experiment, emotion words presented outside of conscious awareness were responded faster by arm flexion when they were associated with approach than when they were associated with avoidance, irrespective of their valence. Conversely, emotion words associated with avoidance were responded faster by arm extension. Globally, these findings suggest that the implicit perception of affective stimuli automatically triggers the behavioral responses that are associated with them.     

Urban Aboriginal‐Australian and Anglo‐Australian children: in‐group preference,self‐concept,and teachers' academic evaluations

The in‐group preference and self‐concepts of urban Aboriginal‐Australian and Anglo‐Australian children have never been compared, nor their relationships to teachers' evaluations of academic performance. In this study, 60 Aboriginal (primarily local Nyoongah) and 60 Anglo children aged 6–12 years were tested on in‐group preference; children aged 8+ were tested on self‐concept. Also, their teachers evaluated them on their general academic performance. Results indicated that Anglo children showed greater in‐group preference and scored higher on teacher evaluations than Aboriginal children, although there was no difference on self‐concept. No correlation existed between in‐group preference and self‐concept. It was concluded that the problems faced by Aboriginal children are only likely to be alleviated by a great deal of structural change. Copyright © 2000 John Wiley & Sons, Ltd.     

Combining experiences over time: the effects of duration,intensity changes and on-line measurements on retrospective pain evaluations

Two experiments were conducted to examine the effects of various factors on retrospective pain evaluation. The factors examined in Experiment 1 were the rate and pattern of change, the intensity (particularly the final intensity), and the duration of the painful experience. Experiment 2 manipulated these factors and, in addition, examined the effect of continuous (on-line) ratings on the overall retrospective evaluation. The two experiments utilized different pain modalities, heat in the first and mechanical pressure in the second. In addition, all subjects in Experiment 1 experienced stimuli with the same physical magnitude, while in Experiment 2 stimuli were individually tailored to make them subjectively equivalent. In both experiments, subjects were presented with a series of painful stimuli and evaluated the intensity of each stimulus immediately upon its termination. The stimuli themselves were composed of multiple intensity levels that differentially changed over time (Intensity-Patterns). Subjects' on-line ratings in Experiment 2 closely mirrored the physical patterns of the intensities. The main conclusion from both experiments is that the retrospective evaluations of painful experiences are influenced primarily by a combination of the final pain intensity and the intensity trend during the latter half of the experience. In addition, results indicated that duration has little impact on retrospective evaluations for stimuli of relatively constant intensity. However, when the stimulus intensity changes over time, duration does play a role. Finally, the task of continuously reporting the stimulus intensity had a moderating impact on the retrospective evaluations. © 1998 John Wiley & Sons, Ltd.     

Group evaluations as self-group distancing: Ingroup typicality moderates evaluative intergroup bias in stigmatized groups

Outgroup favoritism among members of stigmatized groups can be seen as a form of self-group distancing. We examined how intergroup evaluations in stigmatized groups vary as a function of ingroup typicality. In Studies 1 and 2, Black participants (N = 125,915; N = 766) more strongly preferred light-skinned or White relative to dark-skinned or Black individuals the lighter their own skin tone. In Study 3, overweight participants (N = 147,540) more strongly preferred normal-weight relative to overweight individuals the lower their own body weight. In Study 4, participants with disabilities (N = 35,058) more strongly preferred non-disabled relative to disabled individuals the less visible they judged their own disability. Relationships between ingroup typicality and intergroup evaluations were at least partially mediated by ingroup identification (Studies 2 and 3). A meta-analysis across studies yielded an average effect size of r = .12. Furthermore, higher ingroup typicality was related to both ingroup and outgroup evaluations. We discuss ingroup typicality as an individual constraint to self-group distancing among stigmatized group members and its relation to intergroup evaluations.