Machiavellianism and Spontaneous Mentalization: One Step Ahead of Others

In spite of the Machiavellians' successful strategies in exploitation of others, they show cognitive deficiencies, especially reduced mind‐reading skill. Theory of mind is usually regarded as an ability to make inferences about the mental states of others and thus to predict their behaviour. In our study, we have instead emphasized a motivation‐based approach, using the concept of spontaneous mentalization. This concept is construed solely in a motivational context and not in relation to the automaticity of mind‐reading ability. It entails that people in their social relations make efforts to explore the thoughts and intentions of others and are motivated to make hypotheses about the mental state of the other person. We assumed that what is peculiar to Machiavellianism is spontaneous mentalization as a kind of motivation rather than mind‐reading as an ability. To measure spontaneous mentalization, we created a set of image stimuli and asked our participants to describe their impressions of the pictures. The results show that individual differences in spontaneous mentalization correlate positively with the scores of Machiavellianism. These results suggest that those who have a stronger motivation for putting themselves into the mind of others can be more successful in misleading and exploiting them. Further research should be carried out to clarify how spontaneous mentalization and mind‐reading ability relate to each other. Copyright © 2011 John Wiley & Sons, Ltd.     

Internal reasons and practical limits on rational deliberation

I argue that agent-causal libertarianism has a strong initial rejoinder to Mele's luck argument against it, but that his claim that it has yet to be explained how agent-causation yields responsibility-conferring control has significant force. I suggest an avenue of response. Subsequently, I raise objections to Mele's criticisms of my four-case manipulation argument against compatibilism.     

Development of the Two‐Dimensional Mood Scale for self‐monitoring and self‐regulation of momentary mood states

The purpose of this study was to develop a measure for self‐monitoring and self‐regulation of momentary mood states. The Two‐Dimensional Mood Scale (TDMS), consisting of eight words selected on the basis of pleasure and arousal, was created as an efficient measure of self‐monitoring. In Study 1, the validity and reliability of the TDMS were examined by administering the measure to 904 university students. Structural equation modeling revealed that mood states were constructed of two components, arousal and pleasure, and factor analysis found two factors, vitality and stability. In Study 2, differences between two mood manipulations, activation (exercise) and relaxation techniques were examined in 224 university students. The results showed that exercise induced higher vitality (, ) but no change in stability (, ), while relaxation resulted in an increase in stability (, ) but no change in vitality (, ). The TDMS can be combined with various mood manipulations to enable individuals to self‐regulate and alter negative psychological states.     

Psychologically Distinct Classes of Motor Behavior Inferred from Individual Differences: Evidence from a Sequential Stacking Task

A number of studies have demonstrated regularities in how individuals select and perform single object manipulations, but little work has been concerned with the manipulation of multiple objects. To this end, the authors asked participants to stack a set of linearly spaced containers onto various goal locations. Our aim was to determine whether participants adopted specific strategies to complete this task. We focused on whether the distance between the objects, the goal location of the objects, or both, determined the classes of movement sequences that individuals used to perform the task. The results showed that some individuals tended to use one hand for lifting and releasing the containers whereas other individuals tended to use both hands for lifting and releasing the containers. Those participants who tended to use one hand varied which hand was used according to the goal location of the containers but not the distance between containers. The emergence of these individual differences provides a new basis for inferring psychologically distinct classes of motor behavior.     

程序公正的测量及研究操纵

程序公正是指处理管理事务所依据的原则是否公正。普遍认可的程序公正原则包括一致性、避免偏见、准确性、可修正、代表性、道德与伦理原则。程序公正研究主要有测量和实验操纵两种研究范式。对程序公正的测量主要以单维为主,亦有少数多维测量量表;对程序公正的实验操纵主要以发言权为主,有少数研究对准确性、无偏性或综合几项原则进行操纵。未来研究应考虑程序公正的结构问题,对程序公正的操纵范围进行扩展、操纵方法考虑情景性,还需关注程序公正与程序不公正的差异。     

Experimentally manipulated change in children's proactive and reactive aggressive behavior

The current study assessed the effectiveness of two behavior manipulations created to differentially lower aggressive responses in a laboratory task. It was hypothesized that the reactive anger manipulation would have the greatest effect for reactive aggressive behavior and the instrumental manipulation would significantly affect proactive aggressive behavior and slightly affect the reactive behavior. Fifty participants played pinball in competition for points against an unknown peer, whose responses were actually controlled by the experimenter. Participants could push a noise button, sending the peer an annoying noise; a tilt button, interfering with the opponent's game; or a no answer button, offering a pro‐social alternative to aggression. After playing four rounds, participants were randomly assigned to either a reactive anger or a positive instrumental manipulation group; they then played pinball again for four rounds. Results indicate that the instrumental manipulation significantly lowered aggressive responses for both reactive and proactive behavior. The reactive manipulation effected aggressive responses only for use of the noise button and produced significantly lower levels of anger. Aggr. Behav. 29:215–227, 2003. © 2003 Wiley‐Liss, Inc.     

Towards a structural ownership condition on moral responsibility

In this paper, I propose and defend a structural ownership condition on moral responsibility. According to the condition I propose, an agent owns a mental item if and only if it is part of or is partly grounded by a coherent set of psychological states. As I discuss, other theorists have proposed or alluded to conditions like psychological coherence, but each proposal is unsatisfactory in some way. My account appeals to narrative explanation to elucidate the relevant sense of psychological coherence.     

Evaluation of empirical pretreatment assessments for developing treatments for expulsion in pediatric feeding disorders

A common problem among children with feeding disorders is expulsion (removing or spitting food or drink from the mouth), which interferes with treatment success when the goal is consumption. Previous research has identified effective treatments to reduce expulsion, most commonly—re-presentation (presenting the expelled bite or a new bite of the same food immediately following the expulsion). However, there is not currently an assessment model in place to inform treatment decisions with a goal to reduce expulsion. In the present study, we used a multielement design to identify conditions under which little or no expulsion occurred with three children with feeding disorders. The results of the assessment were then used to inform treatment selection aimed to eliminate expulsion. The comparisons of the assessment included physical prompt, bite number, texture, preference, bite presentation style, and size of the bite. Results suggest that this assessment was useful for the design of individualized treatments for children who frequently expel food.     

Dispositional and induced optimism lead to attentional preference for faces displaying positive emotions: An eye-tracker study

The aim of this study was to examine whether dispositional optimism and induced optimism are associated with an attentional bias for positive stimuli. Fifty-six healthy participants performed an eye-tracking task twice, while their gazing time at faces displaying joy, anger, pain, or a neutral expression was measured. Participants scoring high on dispositional optimism tended to gaze longer at joy faces during the first face-presentation trial compared to participants scoring lower on optimism, and this correlation became significant during the second face-presentation trial. In between the two presentations, participants received either an optimism manipulation or a control manipulation. There was no effect of type of manipulation on gazing behavior but post hoc analyses demonstrated that participants showing an increase in state optimism displayed a significant decrease in gaze duration for anger faces and a nearly significant increase in gaze duration for joy faces.