群体关系与问责对信息共享意愿及谈判行为的影响研究

本研究就国人的群体关系与问责对谈判者行为及信息共享意愿进行考察,试图探讨文化对谈判者的影响。通过对128名在校大学生的模拟谈判实验,发现谈判者在群内谈判比在群际谈判时有更高的信息共享意愿和更少的强硬行为,群体关系和问责对信息共享意愿及主观利益冲突有交互效应。具体而言,高度问责时,谈判者在群内谈判比群际谈判时有更多的信息共享意愿;低度问责时,谈判者在群内谈判比群际谈判时有更少的主观利益冲突。     

信息呈现顺序对公平判断形成的影响

在公平启发理论的基础上,以130名大学生为被试采用实验室实验探讨了信息呈现顺序对公平判断形成的影响。结果表明：（1）信息呈现顺序能够影响人们的公平判断——当结果适宜性信息更早获得时,结果公平对公平判断的影响要大于结果适宜性信息较晚呈现时的影响;（2）公平形式偏好对公平判断的信息效应具有调节作用,即当高偏好信息先于低偏好信息出现时,公平判断的顺序效应会得到加强;而在低偏好信息先于高偏好信息出现的情况下,公平判断的顺序效应会被减弱。     

高水平视觉表征中客体与位置的联系

从两个方面综述了高水平视觉表征中客体与位置的联系,即客体信息影响位置记忆和客体-位置捆绑。其中,客体信息影响一般的位置记忆及其偏向（如位置估计偏向于区域中央或偏向客体的功能部位）。而有关客体-位置捆绑,以往研究发现确实存在这种捆绑,它离不开背景客体的参与,并且背景客体间的空间关系影响它的形成。未来的研究应关注客体信息影响位置记忆的其他证据及背景捆绑改变条件下客体-位置捆绑的存在与否,并探讨位置信息对客体记忆的影响。     

Temperament moderates the effect of the verbal threat information pathway on children's heart rate responses to novel animals

Temperamental variables such as trait anxiety are risk factors in children for the development of anxiety disorders. This experiment aimed to test whether temperament moderates the effect of verbal threat information on the physiological component of the fear emotion. An experiment is reported in which 6-10 year old children's (N = 54) fear beliefs about novel animals were measured. They were then given threat, positive or no verbal information about these animals following which their heart rate was recorded while they placed their hands in boxes that they believed these animals inhabited. Children also completed a questionnaire measure of trait anxiety. Child-reported temperament moderated the effect that threat information has on the physiological component of the fear emotion. Fear information is, therefore, a possible mechanism through which temperament leads children to acquire animal fears.     

Selective Exposure in the Internet Age: The Interaction between Anxiety and Information Utility

The rise of the Internet forces scholars to reevaluate the frequency and nature of political information seeking in the contemporary period. The functionality of the Internet makes passive exposure more difficult, and selective information seeking easier, than in the past. However, people may also use the Internet in a new and directed way—to arm themselves with information to express and defend their views either online or in the real world. The central question we explore in this paper is what explains balanced versus biased information seeking in the era of the Internet? We combine insights from Sears and Freedman (1967 ) with newer work on emotion to predict motivated selectivity: focusing specifically on the interaction between anxiety and information utility. Our central theoretical claim is that anxiety does not simply boost any information seeking; it triggers information seeking that is useful for addressing the problem at hand. Anxiety alone, therefore, does not guarantee a balanced information search. When counterattitudinal information is useful for some reason—for example, to defend their own opinions to others who may disagree—anxious citizens should seek it out. As a consequence, these subjects should learn more specific information about where each candidate stands on the issues. In an experiment we find support for these hypotheses. We conclude that while today's flexible Internet environment may permit selectivity, balanced seeking should still occur under a fairly common set of circumstances.     

The enduring scandal of deduction

Deductive inference is usually regarded as being “tautological” or “analytical”: the information conveyed by the conclusion is contained in the information conveyed by the premises. This idea, however, clashes with the undecidability of first-order logic and with the (likely) intractability of Boolean logic. In this article, we address the problem both from the semantic and the proof-theoretical point of view. We propose a hierarchy of propositional logics that are all tractable (i.e. decidable in polynomial time), although by means of growing computational resources, and converge towards classical propositional logic. The underlying claim is that this hierarchy can be used to represent increasing levels of “depth” or “informativeness” of Boolean reasoning. Special attention is paid to the most basic logic in this hierarchy, the pure “intelim logic”, which satisfies all the requirements of a natural deduction system (allowing both introduction and elimination rules for each logical operator) while admitting of a feasible (quadratic) decision procedure. We argue that this logic is “analytic” in a particularly strict sense, in that it rules out any use of “virtual information”, which is chiefly responsible for the combinatorial explosion of standard classical systems. As a result, analyticity and tractability are reconciled and growing degrees of computational complexity are associated with the depth at which the use of virtual information is allowed.     

Multidimensional Adaptive Testing with Optimal Design Criteria for Item Selection

Several criteria from the optimal design literature are examined for use with item selection in multidimensional adaptive testing. In particular, it is examined what criteria are appropriate for adaptive testing in which all abilities are intentional, some should be considered as a nuisance, or the interest is in the testing of a composite of the abilities. Both the theoretical analyses and the studies of simulated data in this paper suggest that the criteria of A-optimality and D-optimality lead to the most accurate estimates when all abilities are intentional, with the former slightly outperforming the latter. The criterion of E-optimality showed occasional erratic behavior for this case of adaptive testing, and its use is not recommended. If some of the abilities are nuisances, application of the criterion of A _s -optimality (or D _s -optimality), which focuses on the subset of intentional abilities is recommended. For the measurement of a linear combination of abilities, the criterion of c-optimality yielded the best results. The preferences of each of these criteria for items with specific patterns of parameter values was also assessed. It was found that the criteria differed mainly in their preferences of items with different patterns of values for their discrimination parameters. The first author is now at the Department of Methodology and Statistics, Statistics, Faculty of Social Sciences, Utrecht University, Heidelberglaan 1, 3854 Utrecht, The Netherlands. The second author is now at Research Department, CTB/McGraw-Hill, Monterey, CA, USA.     

Social Information Processing Skills in Children with Histories of Heavy Prenatal Alcohol Exposure

Based on caregiver report, children with prenatal alcohol exposure have difficulty with social functioning, but little is known about their social cognition. The current study assessed the social information processing patterns of school-age children with heavy prenatal alcohol exposure using a paradigm based on Crick and Dodge’s reformulated six-stage model. Fifty-two children (aged 7–11) with and without heavy prenatal alcohol exposure were tested using a structured interview measure of social information processing involving 18 videotaped vignettes of children in group entry and provocation situations. Alcohol-exposed children displayed maladaptive processing patterns on the goal, response generation, and response evaluation steps in group entry situations, and encoding, attribution, response evaluation, and enactment steps during provocation situations. Children with heavy prenatal alcohol exposure also had difficulty on the Test of Problem Solving, and performance correlated with social information processing measures. Such difficulties may lead to problems in social functioning and warrant early intervention.