Psychological Groups and Political Psychology: A Response to Huddy's "Critical Examination of Social Identity Theory"

In a recent article in this journal, Leonie Huddy (2001) asks whether the social identity approach developed by Tajfel, Turner, and their collaborators can "advance the study of identity within political science" (p. 128). She concludes that "various shortcomings and omissions in its research program" (p. 128) hinder the application of the approach to political phenomena. This paper presents a response to Huddy's evaluation of the social identity approach. Several aspects of her account of social identity work are challenged, especially her suggestion that it ignores subjective aspects of group membership. The interpretation of the minimal group paradigm is discussed in detail, as are issues of identity choice, salience, and variations in identity strength. The treatment of groups as process in social identity theory and self–categorization theory is given particular emphasis.     

Prediction Errors and Attention in the Presence and Absence of Feedback

ABSTRACT— Contemporary theories of learning typically assume that learning is driven by prediction errors—in other words, that we learn more when our predictions turn out to be incorrect than we do when our predictions are correct. Results from the recording of electrical brain activity suggest one mechanism by which this might happen; we seem to direct visual attention toward the likely causes of previous prediction errors. This can happen very rapidly—within less than 200 milliseconds of the error-causing object being presented. It is tempting to infer that if learning is driven by prediction errors, then little can be learned in the absence of feedback. Such a conclusion is unwarranted. In fact, the substantial learning that is sometimes the result of simple exposure to objects can also be explained by processes of directing attention toward the likely causes of previous prediction errors.     

项目诊断性在特征推理中作用的研究

该研究在Murphy等人2005年研究的基础上,探讨了项目诊断性对特征推理的影响。实验1探讨归类情况下,项目诊断性对特征推理的影响。实验2探讨不归类情况下,项目诊断性对特征推理的影响。实验结果表明,归类与否决定项目诊断性是否影响特征推理。在归类情况下,高低两种诊断性条件下的特征概率判断没有差异,表明归类情况下,项目诊断性不影响特征推理;在不归类的情况下,高低两种诊断性条件下的特征概率判断存在显著差异,表明不归类情况下,项目诊断性影响特征推理。     

The role of social categorization and identity threat in the perception of migrants

This paper investigates how the categorization of migrant workers shapes their reception. In an experiment with Northern Irish Protestants we manipulated the representation of Poland to make the Catholicism of Polish migrants either more, or less, salient. Furthermore, judgements of Polish migrants were obtained under conditions designed to encourage participants to believe that sectarian conflict in Northern Ireland was either resolved, or still a strong feature of the present social landscape. Overall, results showed that when Poland's Catholicism was salient, participants were less welcoming of Polish migrants. Furthermore, this effect was mediated by increases in the level of symbolic threat participants believed the migrants posed to participants' (Protestant) community identity. Copyright © 2009 John Wiley & Sons, Ltd.     

Semantic and subword priming during binocular suppression

In general, stimuli that are familiar and recognizable have an advantage of predominance during binocular rivalry. Recent research has demonstrated that familiar and recognizable stimuli such as upright faces and words in a native language could break interocular suppression faster than their matched controls. In this study, a visible word prime was presented binocularly then replaced by a high-contrast dynamic noise pattern presented to one eye and either a semantically related or unrelated word was introduced to the other eye. We measured how long it took for target words to break from suppression. To investigate word-parts priming, a second experiment also included word pairs that had overlapping subword fragments. Results from both experiments consistently show that semantically related words and words that shared subword fragments were faster to gain dominance compared to unrelated words, suggesting that words, even when interocularly suppressed and invisible, can benefit from semantic and subword priming.     

Recognition of natural scenes from global properties: seeing the forest without representing the trees

Human observers are able to rapidly and accurately categorize natural scenes, but the representation mediating this feat is still unknown. Here we propose a framework of rapid scene categorization that does not segment a scene into objects and instead uses a vocabulary of global, ecological properties that describe spatial and functional aspects of scene space (such as navigability or mean depth). In Experiment 1, we obtained ground truth rankings on global properties for use in Experiments 2-4. To what extent do human observers use global property information when rapidly categorizing natural scenes? In Experiment 2, we found that global property resemblance was a strong predictor of both false alarm rates and reaction times in a rapid scene categorization experiment. To what extent is global property information alone a sufficient predictor of rapid natural scene categorization? In Experiment 3, we found that the performance of a classifier representing only these properties is indistinguishable from human performance in a rapid scene categorization task in terms of both accuracy and false alarms. To what extent is this high predictability unique to a global property representation? In Experiment 4, we compared two models that represent scene object information to human categorization performance and found that these models had lower fidelity at representing the patterns of performance than the global property model. These results provide support for the hypothesis that rapid categorization of natural scenes may not be mediated primarily though objects and parts, but also through global properties of structure and affordance.     

Resource-dependent effects during sex categorization

The limited capacity of face perception resources in the left cerebral hemisphere was examined using a sex categorization task. One study tested the hypothesis that sex categorization is impeded whenever feature extraction resources in the left hemisphere are simultaneously being utilized by another task. This hypothesis was tested by presenting prime faces for either 32 ms or 320 ms to either the left or right visual-field just before centrally presented target faces were categorized by sex. Results showed that sex categorization was slower after prime faces were presented for 32 ms in the right visual-field compared to the left visual-field. This difference was not found after the 320 ms prime length. The results are interpreted in the context of a neurocognitive model of social perception and suggest that efficient sex categorization depends, in part, on the availability of facial feature extraction resources in the left hemisphere.     

The semantic red effect: Processing the word red undermines intellectual performance

Recent research has shown that a two second glimpse of color can have an important influence on affect, cognition, and behavior. The present research examined whether perceiving color is necessary to produce an effect on psychological functioning or whether the mere act of processing a color word might be sufficient. Specifically, four experiments tested the hypothesis that processing the word red undermines intellectual performance, much like actually perceiving the color red. Supportive data were obtained with three different types of subtle manipulation, with three different types of control words, and on two different types of IQ test performance. Worry, but not mood or general arousal, was shown to mediate the semantic red effect, which appears to take place outside of individuals’ awareness. The theoretical and practical implications of the results are discussed.     

Semantics and truth relative to a world

This paper argues that relativity of truth to a world plays no significant role in empirical semantic theory, even as it is done in the model-theoretic tradition relying on intensional type theory. Some philosophical views of content provide an important notion of truth at a world, but they do not constrain the empirical domain of semantic theory in a way that makes this notion empirically significant. As an application of this conclusion, this paper shows that a potential motivation for relativism based on the relativity of truth to a world fails.