自主选择偏好：表现、机制与应用

自主选择偏好指当面临自主选择或委托他人选择时, 人们总是偏好自主选择, 即使为此付出代价也在所不惜。自主选择偏好可能有过度自信、控制幻觉和模糊厌恶的原因, 但更多可能源于自主选择本身承载了某种内在价值。奖赏系统(纹状体、内侧前额叶)的神经活动是其关键的神经基础, 同时自主选择也受认知调控系统的调节。未来研究应在社会情景下揭示自主选择偏好的作用机制和调控因素, 并探索它在群体间的平衡机制, 以增进个体幸福和群体利益。     

The Motivational Origins of Religious Practices

I hypothesize that people engage in religious practices, in part, because such practices activate the frontal lobes. Activation of the frontal lobes is both intrinsically rewarding and necessary for acquisition of many of the behaviors that religions seek to foster, including self-responsibility, impulse and emotion modulation, empathy, moral insight, hope, and optimism. Although direct tests of the hypothesis are as yet nonexistent, there is reasonably strong circumstantial evidence (reviewed herein) for it. Recent brain-imaging studies indicate greater anterior activation values and increased blood flow to frontal sites during prayer and meditation. Regular prayer is positively correlated with better overall mental health. Religiosity is correlated with higher levels of self-monitoring, empathy, and moral insight and other positive behaviors and negatively correlated with depression and impulsive and risky behaviors. Independent data show that self-monitoring, empathy, hope, and moral insight are all selectively associated with intact frontal function, whereas depression, impulsiveness, and drug and alcohol abuse are associated selectively with frontal dysfunction. If religious practices do indeed preferentially activate and stimulate development of the frontal lobes, (a) religious practices should be considered as possible adjuncts for some patients in treatment for mental health disorders, and (b) the frontal lobes (rather than the temporal lobes) should be considered the major brain site that supports the core components of religious experience.     

Job-content Perceptions, Performance–reward Expectancies, and Absenteeism among Low-wage Public-sector Clerical Employees

This study explored relations of job-content perceptions (i.e., skill variety and task significance), and performance–reward expectancies, with absenteeism among 134 low-wage public-sector clerical employees. Results indicated that those employees who perceived limited performance–reward expectancies (i.e., lower instrumentality), and who considered their jobs to be either higher on skill variety or task significance, were likely to be absent more often. Moreover, the link between skill variety and absenteeism was moderated by instrumentality in a manner suggesting that respondents may have utilized absenteeism as a means of compensating for perceived workplace contributions not extrinsically rewarded. These findings further suggest that employees in occupational settings for which performance-related extrinsic rewards are less available may not respond to favorable job-content perceptions in the positive manner generally predicted by job characteristics theory.     

Sensitivity of children's behavior to probabilistic reward: effects of a decreasing-ratio lottery system on math performance

Probabilistic reward has been shown to affect children's choice behavior in game-like activities. We examined the effects of a lottery system containing progressively lower exchange ratios on children's completion of math problems. Two of the 3 children completed problems above baseline levels until the chance of exchange dropped to 25%. This study describes a potentially useful method for examining reinforcement schedules in applied settings and extends previous research on probabilities of reinforcement.     

Effects of competitive reward distribution on auditing and competitive responding

This study allowed subjects to audit each other's responding during a series of competitive contests. Six pairs of female college students competed in 3-min contests in which the competitive response was a knob pull. A sum of money was divided using a proportional distribution or a 100%/0% reward distribution. In the proportional distribution, a subject's proportion of the sum was her proportion of the total number of responses. Also, in every contest either subject could make a response that would end the contest prematurely and give both subjects the same amount: a sum equal to 33% of the competitive total. Each subject could press either or both of two audit buttons that displayed her own and the other's response total for 10 s. Results replicated earlier findings in showing the superiority of the proportional distribution in total number of competitive responses made. No subject audited continuously, and only 1 audited most of the time. Most audits were interpersonal, including both own and other's scores. Auditing typically was more frequent in 100%/0% contests in which subjects were more likely to stop the contest when they were far behind. Winners were more likely to audit than were losers. Competitive response rates increased when the differences revealed by audits were small and decreased when they were large. Overall audit patterns were consistent with the view that feedback as "news" is more often sought when it can lead to improved outcomes.     

Performance Effects of Reward-Related Feedback on the Dimensional Change Card Sort Task

The Dimensional Change Card Sort (DCCS) is one of the most widely used measures of preschool executive function, yet relatively little is known about how altering emotional demands of the task affects DCCS performance. This study examined the effects of emotionally evocative reward-related feedback on preschool children's performance on the DCCS in a sample of 105 children aged 3.5–4.5 years. In a within-subjects design, children completed the standard DCCS and a modified version of the DCCS in which sticker rewards were gained or lost after each trial. With a reward at stake, children were more accurate but had slower reaction time on the post-switch DCCS. Another sample (N = 20) of 3.5- to 4.5-year-olds who completed the standard DCCS twice without reward showed no change in performance, indicating results are not due to practice effects. Findings demonstrate preschool children's ability to adjust their approach to the DCCS in the presence of emotionally evocative reward-related feedback by prioritizing accuracy over speed. Trial-by-trial reward-related feedback may facilitate cognitive control in early childhood.     

金钱惩罚促进Stroop任务中的行为表现

本研究通过Stroop任务和修改版MIDT相结合,目的是考察不同额度金钱惩罚对Stroop任务行为表现的影响。结果发现：（1）无论是中性试次,一致试次还是不一致试次,金钱惩罚不仅减少了被试的行为反应时,而且提高了正确率;（2）非惩罚条件与惩罚条件下的冲突效应以及其他不同额度惩罚条件下的冲突效应差异不显著;（3）金钱惩罚对不一致试次反应时的影响与个体的惩罚敏感性呈显著负相关,而与奖赏敏感性无关。结果表明,金钱惩罚能够促进个体的一般行为表现,但是不会提高冲突抑制能力。同时,金钱惩罚对认知行为的影响与其惩罚敏感性密切相关。     

Effects of Change in Social Content of Video Rewards on Response Patterns of Bonnet Macaques

Three individually housed bonnet macaques, with long-term experience in performing a joystick task with a reward choice of either viewing color video of a single bonnet group or obtaining a banana-flavored food treat, were presented with images of a new group when they chose to view social video. The change produced absolute increases in responding for social video and enhanced preference for viewing social video relative to obtaining the food treat, supporting the view that the monkeys were strongly attending to the social content of the videos.     

Criteria of Justice: Desert,Needs and Equality

The conception of social justice as equality is defended in this paper by examining what may appear to be two inegalitarian conceptions of justice, as distribution according to desert and as distribution according to need. It is argued that claims of just entitlement arise within a context of reciprocal co-operation for mutual benefit. Within such a context there are special cases where it can be said that those who contribute more deserve more, and that those who need more should get more, but those claims themselves presuppose a norm of equal contribution and equal benefit. This revised version was published online in August 2006 with corrections to the Cover Date.     

奖励驱动的双任务加工过程中的分离脑机制：来自ERP的证据

运用事件相关电位技术, 采用分支双任务范式, 探讨在奖励驱动的双任务加工过程中, 第一任务奖励编码和第二任务奖励编码的时间进程及其脑机制。结果发现：双任务的反应时显著大于单任务的反应时; 单任务的N2波幅显著大于双任务条件; 双任务的P3波幅显著大于单任务条件。双任务加工过程中奖励编码的半球效应主要体现在P3上, 且右半球参与第一任务奖励信息的编码, 驱动第一任务; 两半球协同参与第二任务奖励信息的编码, 驱动第二任务。结果表明：双任务所耗费的心理资源更多, 同时双任务加工过程中第一任务奖励信息编码的半球优势效应与任务的性质有关。