Children Use Temporal Cues to Learn Causal Directionality

The ability to learn the direction of causal relations is critical for understanding and acting in the world. We investigated how children learn causal directionality in situations in which the states of variables are temporally dependent (i.e., autocorrelated). In Experiment 1, children learned about causal direction by comparing the states of one variable before versus after an intervention on another variable. In Experiment 2, children reliably inferred causal directionality merely from observing how two variables change over time; they interpreted Y changing without a change in X as evidence that Y does not influence X. Both of these strategies make sense if one believes the variables to be temporally dependent. We discuss the implications of these results for interpreting previous findings. More broadly, given that many real‐world environments are characterized by temporal dependency, these results suggest strategies that children may use to learn the causal structure of their environments.     

Do Student Evaluations of University Reflect Inaccurate Beliefs or Actual Experience? A Relative Rank Model

It was shown that student satisfaction ratings are influenced by context in ways that have important theoretical and practical implications. Using questions from the UK's National Student Survey, the study examined whether and how students' expressed satisfaction with issues such as feedback promptness and instructor enthusiasm depends on the context of comparison (such as possibly inaccurate beliefs about the feedback promptness or enthusiasm experienced at other universities) that is evoked. Experiment 1 found strong effects of experimentally provided comparison context—for example, satisfaction with a given feedback time depended on the time's relative position within a context. Experiment 2 used a novel distribution‐elicitation methodology to determine the prior beliefs of individual students about what happens in universities other than their own. It found that these beliefs vary widely and that students' satisfaction was predicted by how they believed their experience ranked within the distribution of others' experiences. A third study found that relative judgement principles also predicted students' intention to complain. An extended model was developed to show that purely rank‐based principles of judgement can account for findings previously attributed to range effects. It was concluded that satisfaction ratings and quality of provision are different quantities, particularly when the implicit context of comparison includes beliefs about provision at other universities. Quality and satisfaction should be assessed separately, with objective measures (such as actual times to feedback), rather than subjective ratings (such as satisfaction with feedback promptness), being used to measure quality wherever practicable. © 2014 The Authors. Journal of Behavioral Decision Making published by John Wiley & Sons Ltd.     

Polytomous multilevel testlet models for testlet‐based assessments with complex sampling designs

A pplications of standard item response theory models assume local independence of items and persons. This paper presents polytomous multilevel testlet models for dual dependence due to item and person clustering in testlet‐based assessments with clustered samples. Simulation and survey data were analysed with a multilevel partial credit testlet model. This model was compared with three alternative models – a testlet partial credit model (PCM), multilevel PCM, and PCM – in terms of model parameter estimation. The results indicated that the deviance information criterion was the fit index that always correctly identified the true multilevel testlet model based on the quantified evidence in model selection, while the Akaike and Bayesian information criteria could not identify the true model. In general, the estimation model and the magnitude of item and person clustering impacted the estimation accuracy of ability parameters, while only the estimation model and the magnitude of item clustering affected the item parameter estimation accuracy. Furthermore, ignoring item clustering effects produced higher total errors in item parameter estimates but did not have much impact on the accuracy of ability parameter estimates, while ignoring person clustering effects yielded higher total errors in ability parameter estimates but did not have much effect on the accuracy of item parameter estimates. When both clustering effects were ignored in the PCM, item and ability parameter estimation accuracy was reduced.     

A test of the relations between avoidance of panic-related situations and substance use, substance dependence, and depression among subclinical panickers

The hypotheses that among subclinical panickers, avoidance of panic-related situations would be associated with elevated substance use levels and increased likelihood of lifetime diagnoses of substance dependence and major depressive disorder (MDD) were tested. Findings confirmed that panic-related avoidance was associated with an elevated likelihood of lifetime diagnoses of nicotine and alcohol dependence as well as MDD, but not drug dependence. Panic avoidance was also related to relatively greater daily levels of cigarette and alcohol use.     

There must be a First: Why Thomas Aquinas Rejects Infinite,Essentially Ordered,Causal Series

Several of Thomas Aquinas's proofs for the existence of God rely on the claim that causal series cannot proceed in infinitum. I argue that Aquinas has good reason to hold this claim given his conception of causation. Because he holds that effects are ontologically dependent on their causes, he holds that the relevant causal series are wholly derivative: the later members of such series serve as causes only insofar as they have been caused by and are effects of the earlier members. Because the intermediate causes in such series possess causal powers only by deriving them from all the preceding causes, they need a first and non-derivative cause to serve as the source of their causal powers.     

Directional Variability of the Isometric Force Vector Produced by the Human Hand in Multijoint Planar Tasks

Numerous studies have examined control of force magnitude, but relatively little research has considered force direction control. The subjects applied isometric forces to a handle and the authors compared within-trial variability when force is produced in different directions. The standard deviation of the force parallel to the prescribed direction of force production increased linearly with the targeted force level, as did the standard deviation of the force perpendicular to the instructed direction. In contrast, the standard deviation of the angle of force production decreased with increased force level. In the 4 (of 8) instructed force directions where the endpoint force was generated due to a joint torque in only 1 joint (either the shoulder or elbow) the principal component axes in force space were well aligned with the prescribed direction of force production. In the other directions, the variance was approximately equal along the 2 force axes. The variance explained by the first principal component was significantly larger in torque space compared to the force space, and mostly corresponded to positive correlation between the joint torques. Such coordinated changes suggest that the torque variability was mainly due to the variability of the common drive to the muscles serving 2 joints, although this statement needs to be supported by direct studies of muscle activation in the future.     

Gaze direction and facial expressions exert combined but different effects on attentional resources

Gaze direction and facial expressions are critical components of face processing and have been shown to influence attention deployment. We investigated whether gaze direction (direct vs. averted) combined with a neutral or angry expression modulates the deployment of attentional resources over time. In a Rapid Serial Visual Presentation (RSVP) paradigm participants had to decide the gender of a neutral or an angry target face with direct or averted gaze (T1) and then to judge the orientation of a target picture of a landscape (T2), following the face at different time intervals. Results showed no attentional blink effect (i.e., no deterioration in T2 accuracy) when T1 was an angry face with direct gaze, whereas it was present for angry faces with averted gaze or neutral faces with either averted or direct gaze. These findings are consistent with appraisal theories and are discussed against the background of automatic processing of threat stimuli.