Identifying Causal Estimands for Time-Varying Treatments Measured with Time-Varying (Age or Grade-Based) Instruments

This commentary discusses causal estimands of same-age and same-grade comparisons for assessing grade-retention effects on student ability and performance. Using potential outcomes notation, we show that same-age and same-grade comparisons refer to different retention–promotion contrasts and therefore assess different causal questions. We also comment on deleting versus censoring records of students who dropped out of the study or do not belong to the treatment regimes under investigation. Whereas deleting entire student records potentially induces collider bias, censoring circumvents bias if censoring is ignorable given the observed pretreatment covariates.     

A Bayesian Theory of Sequential Causal Learning and Abstract Transfer

Two key research issues in the field of causal learning are how people acquire causal knowledge when observing data that are presented sequentially, and the level of abstraction at which learning takes place. Does sequential causal learning solely involve the acquisition of specific cause‐effect links, or do learners also acquire knowledge about abstract causal constraints? Recent empirical studies have revealed that experience with one set of causal cues can dramatically alter subsequent learning and performance with entirely different cues, suggesting that learning involves abstract transfer, and such transfer effects involve sequential presentation of distinct sets of causal cues. It has been demonstrated that pre‐training (or even post‐training) can modulate classic causal learning phenomena such as forward and backward blocking. To account for these effects, we propose a Bayesian theory of sequential causal learning. The theory assumes that humans are able to consider and use several alternative causal generative models, each instantiating a different causal integration rule. Model selection is used to decide which integration rule to use in a given learning environment in order to infer causal knowledge from sequential data. Detailed computer simulations demonstrate that humans rely on the abstract characteristics of outcome variables (e.g., binary vs. continuous) to select a causal integration rule, which in turn alters causal learning in a variety of blocking and overshadowing paradigms. When the nature of the outcome variable is ambiguous, humans select the model that yields the best fit with the recent environment, and then apply it to subsequent learning tasks. Based on sequential patterns of cue‐outcome co‐occurrence, the theory can account for a range of phenomena in sequential causal learning, including various blocking effects, primacy effects in some experimental conditions, and apparently abstract transfer of causal knowledge.     

Qualitative probabilistic inference under varied entropy levels

In previous work, we studied four well known systems of qualitative probabilistic inference, and presented data from computer simulations in an attempt to illustrate the performance of the systems. These simulations evaluated the four systems in terms of their tendency to license inference to accurate and informative conclusions, given incomplete information about a randomly selected probability distribution. In our earlier work, the procedure used in generating the unknown probability distribution (representing the true stochastic state of the world) tended to yield probability distributions with moderately high entropy levels. In the present article, we present data charting the performance of the four systems when reasoning in environments of various entropy levels. The results illustrate variations in the performance of the respective reasoning systems that derive from the entropy of the environment, and allow for a more inclusive assessment of the reliability and robustness of the four systems.     

Influence of warmth and competence on the promotion of safe in-group selection: Stereotype content model and social categorization of faces

Categorizing an individual as a friend or foe plays a pivotal role in navigating the social world. According to the stereotype content model (SCM), social perception relies on two fundamental dimensions, warmth and competence, which allow us to process the intentions of others and their ability to enact those intentions, respectively. Social cognition research indicates that, in categorization tasks, people tend to classify other individuals as more likely to belong to the out-group than the in-group (in-group overexclusion effect, IOE) when lacking diagnostic information, probably with the aim of protecting in-group integrity. Here, we explored the role of warmth and competence in group-membership decisions by testing 62 participants in a social-categorization task consisting of 150 neutral faces. We assessed whether (a) warmth and competence ratings could predict the in-group/out-group categorization, and (b) the reliance on these two dimensions differed in low-IOE versus high-IOE participants. Data showed that high ratings of warmth and competence were necessary to categorize a face as in-group. Moreover, while low-IOE participants relied on warmth, high-IOE participants relied on competence. This finding suggests that the proneness to include/exclude unknown identities in/from one's own in-group is related to individual differences in the reliance on SCM social dimensions. Furthermore, the primacy of the warmth effect seems not to represent a universal phenomenon adopted in the context of social evaluation.     

重估测谎决策的Bayes推断试验

谎与非谎的情绪反应没有独立的客观标准,以Polygrapy构成技术的测谎缺乏稳定的效度。本研究尝试运用Bayes方法分析一项实测案例,计算两名被试的低显性测谎反应结果,使准确判决有谎的概率由机会水平50％分别调整到可明确分辩的74％和49％,从决策分析角度为改良测谎程序和提高测谎效率提供了一种新的操作思路。     

Resisting Explanation

Although explanation is widely regarded as an important concept in the study of rational inquiry, it remains largely unexplored outside the philosophy of science. This, I believe, is not due to oversight as much as to institutional resistance. In analytic philosophy it is basic that epistemic rationality is a function of justification and that justification is a function of argument. Explanation, however, is not argument nor is belief justification its function. I argue here that the task of incorporating explanation into the theory of rational inquiry poses a serious challenge to our basic concept of epistemic rationality as well as the a priori method of inquiry that still lies at the heart of analytic philosophy. Specifically, it pushes us toward a much stronger form of naturalism than is generally thought necessary, one in which argument and explanation are recognized as distinct and equally fundamental cognitive processes whose dynamic relationship is one of the central issues in the theory of rationality.     

说明文阅读中局部连贯因果推理的产生

探讨熟悉主题的说明文阅读过程中维持局部连贯的因果推理的产生问题。3个实验分别采用了不同的实验材料, 实验1的文本提供明确的前提信息, 实验2的材料提供隐含的前提信息, 实验3的材料在前提信息与结论信息之间插入了其他信息。总的结果表明, 熟悉主题的说明文阅读过程中, 当文本提供的前提信息与结论信息一起呈现时, 无论提供明确的还是隐含的前提信息, 实现文本局部因果连贯的推理能够即时产生; 当前提信息相隔2个句子后, 虽然读者还是可以产生因果推理检测到与推理内容矛盾的信息, 但是这种检测敏感度大有降低。基于本研究结果, 结合相关研究, 本文尝试提出关于文本阅读中推理产生的“认知代价”观, 试图整合文本推理理论。     

自发特质推理中的社会刻板效应

近来, 考察自发特质推理中的社会刻板效应, 成为自发特质推理研究的一个新趋势。在介绍自发特质推理及其研究范式的基础上, 概述了刻板印象与特质的概念联系, 并阐明了考察自发特质推理中的社会刻板效应的理论依据和方法。接着, 对自发特质推理中的职业、种族和性别刻板效应研究进行了回顾, 发现刻板印象对自发特质推理的影响主要通过它对自发特质推理的阻碍作用体现出来, 在高认知负荷下, 这种阻碍作用更为明显。最后, 从研究对象、研究方法、研究内容三个方面对该领域的研究进行了评价和展望。     

Keeping up impressions: Inferential rules for impression change across the Big Five

Not all first impressions have equal longevity. Which kinds of impression have the greatest mobility—downward and upward—over the course of acquaintanceships? In this article, we propose an inferential account of impression maintenance across Big Five trait domains. With data from field and laboratory studies, we provide evidence that positive impressions of agreeableness (A), conscientiousness (C), and emotional stability (ES) are especially vulnerable to small amounts of contrary evidence, whereas positive first impressions of extraversion (E) and openness (O) are more resistant to contrary information. Impressions of E and O demonstrated minimal susceptibility to negativity effects in a longitudinal study of college roommate impressions (Study 1), in a study of perceivers’ implicit theories about different trait domains (Study 2), and in an experimental study of manipulated impression change (Study 3).