Motivating meta-awareness of mind wandering: A way to catch the mind in flight?

Given the negative effects of mind wandering on performance, it may be profitable to be aware of task-unrelated thoughts (TUTs) as they occur. The present study investigated whether motivating people to catch TUTs increases meta-awareness. We offered incentives for increased self-catching during reading. To enhance the veracity of these self-reports, we used a “bogus-pipeline” procedure; we convinced participants that their mental states were being covertly monitored using physiological measures. In reality, mind wandering was assessed covertly by a secondary task (“gibberish detection”), and overtly by experience sampling. The results showed that incentives increased the number of self-catches without increasing overall mind wandering. Moreover, both the bogus pipeline and the opportunity for incentives increased the validity of self-reports, evidenced by significantly increased correlations between self-caught and behaviorally assessed mind wandering. We discuss the relevance of this methodological approach for research on mind wandering and research building on introspective reports more generally.     

Fairness‐related behaviour modulation by friendship is moderated by American primes in Chinese participants

Empirical studies from the fields of psychology and behavioural economics indicate that people do not like being treated unfairly and may punish those who violate the norm, even at a cost to themselves. Recent research has emphasized the relationship effect on fairness‐related behaviour but has shown conflicting results and has not focused much on the characteristics of culture. This study used the cultural priming paradigm and the Ultimatum Game (UG) to explore whether cultural primes could moderate the relationship effect on fairness‐related decision making. We primed Chinese participants with either Chinese cultural symbols or American cultural symbols and asked them to play as responders with friends or strangers in the two‐party UG (experiment 1) or in the three‐party UG (experiment 2). Results from the two experiments confirm that Chinese participants accepted unfair offers more often when the offers were made by friends than when the offers were made by strangers. However, the relationship effect was diminished after American cultural priming. These results suggest that American primes can moderate the relationship effect on fairness‐related behaviour in Chinese people. This finding may shed new light on the likelihood of exiting from the heavy reliance on social relationships in Chinese society.     

Theory of Mind experience sampling in typical adults

We explored the frequency with which typical adults make Theory of Mind (ToM) attributions, and under what circumstances these attributions occur. We used an experience sampling method to query 30 typical adults about their everyday thoughts. Participants carried a Personal Data Assistant (PDA) that prompted them to categorize their thoughts as Action, Mental State, or Miscellaneous at approximately 30 pseudo-random times during a continuous 10-h period. Additionally, participants noted the direction of their thought (self versus other) and degree of socializing (with people versus alone) at the time of inquiry. We were interested in the relative frequency of ToM (mental state attributions) and how prominent they were in immediate social exchanges. Analyses of multiple choice answers suggest that typical adults: (1) spend more time thinking about actions than mental states and miscellaneous things, (2) exhibit a higher degree of own- versus other-directed thought when alone, and (3) make mental state attributions more frequently when not interacting (offline) than while interacting with others (online). A significant 3-way interaction between thought type, direction of thought, and socializing emerged because action but not mental state thoughts about others occurred more frequently when participants were interacting with people versus when alone; whereas there was an increase in the frequency of both action and mental state attributions about the self when participants were alone as opposed to socializing. A secondary analysis of coded free text responses supports findings 1–3. The results of this study help to create a more naturalistic picture of ToM use in everyday life and the method shows promise for future study of typical and atypical thought processes.     

Knock,Knock–Who’s Scared?: The Knockout Game as a Short-lived Crime Problem

ABSTRACT

The “knockout game”--youths assaulting strangers at random with the goal of knocking them unconscious with a single blow—attracted intense attention in the United States for a brief period near the end of 2013. This paper examines the history of a set of claims about similar behaviors preceded that knockout game’s eventual celebrity. It demonstrates the difficulty of successfully constructing a new crime problem; it took decades before a combination of elements—location, the characterization of offenders and victims, an emphasis on technology, and a prominent media venue willing to promote the story—brought these claims to prominence.     

头部朝向在社会性注意转移中的作用

注视指向是非常重要的社会性注意线索,但是在日常情境中,注视指向往往伴随着头部朝向信息,而且两者都包含空间指向信息.已有研究发现头部朝向会影响注视指向知觉的速度和准确性,为注视指向提供参照系,进而会影响注视指向诱发的社会性注意.头部朝向和注视指向加工的神经机制也存在着广泛的重合.因此,除眼睛注视以外,头部朝向也是建构和完善基于心理模型的社会性注意机制的一个关键因素.未来的研究应关注头部朝向与眼睛注视指向共同影响注意转移的作用机制,并且从功能整合的角度开展神经机制研究.     

Power influences the expression of Honesty-Humility: The power-exploitation affordances hypothesis

Across different experiments we show that individual differences in Honesty-Humility predict exploitation in economic games, and that this relation is moderated by situational power. Power was manipulated by comparing games in which allocators either had absolute power (dictator game), intermediate (delta game), or shared power (ultimatum game) over joint outcomes. We developed the power-exploitation affordances hypothesis that predicts that allocators with lower Honesty-Humility act more exploitative when they have absolute power than when their power is intermediate or shared. Additionally, we also tested these predictions for the actual earnings in these games. The results were generally supportive of our main hypotheses. Our findings contribute to understanding situational and personality effects on how individuals behave in positions of power (e.g., leaders).     

The Attention-Lapse and Motor Decoupling accounts of SART performance are not mutually exclusive

There is an ongoing debate about the mechanisms purported to underlie performance in the Sustained-Attention-to-Response Task (SART). Whereas the Attention-Lapse account posits that SART errors result from attentional disengagement, the Motor Decoupling account proposes that SART errors result from failures to inhibit a fast, prepotent motor response, despite adequate attention to the task. That SART performance might be fully accounted for by motor decoupling is problematic for a Attention-Lapse account, and for the use of the SART as an index of attention lapses. To test whether SART performance is in fact fully accounted for by motor decoupling, I examined the relation between SART performance and attention lapses while controlling for motor decoupling. The results were clear: The SART was associated with attention lapses independently of motor decoupling. Thus, the present study suggests that both accounts are correct and that the SART is a valid measure of attention lapses.     

The frozen cyborg: A reply to Selinger and Engström

Selinger and Engstrom, A moratorium on cyborgs: Computation, cognition and commerce, 2008 (this issue) urge upon us a moratorium on ‘cyborg discourse’. But the argument underestimates the richness and complexity of our ongoing communal explorations. It leans on a somewhat outdated version of the machine metaphor (exemplified perhaps by a frozen 1970’s Cyborg). The modern cyborg, informed by an evolving computational model of mind, can play a positive role in the critical discussions that Selinger and Engstrom seek.     

网络游戏成瘾:沉浸的影响及其作用机制

本研究以491名男大学生为被试,考察了沉浸对网络游戏成瘾的影响、沉浸的前因变量和相关作用机制。结果发现:(1)网络游戏中的沉浸与网络游戏成瘾呈显著正相关,与控制、挑战呈显著正相关;挑战和控制与网络游戏成瘾呈显著正相关。(2)挑战通过沉浸的完全中介作用对网络游戏成瘾产生影响,挑战对网络游戏成瘾没有直接效应;控制除了通过沉浸的部分中介作用对网络游戏成瘾产生影响,还对网络游戏成瘾有直接效应。     

高功能孤独症儿童的合作行为

合作行为是一种重要的亲社会行为, 对儿童的社会适应具有重要意义, 而孤独症儿童的典型特征是社会功能存在缺陷, 从而导致合作行为的缺乏。以往研究未能就孤独症儿童在不同合作任务类型中的表现做出区分, 本研究采用经典的囚徒困境博弈和合作性工具任务比较了6~12岁的高功能孤独症儿童和正常发展儿童在不同任务中的合作行为。结果显示高功能孤独症儿童和正常儿童在囚徒困境中的合作行为没有显著差异, 然而, 他们在工具性任务中表现出比正常儿童更低水平的合作行为。这说明高功能孤独症儿童在对认知能力有不同要求的合作任务中的表现不同。