Relationship science and the credibility revolution: An introduction to the first part of the special issue

In the past 10 years, the field of relationship science—like many other fields—has been exposed to dramatic changes in how scientists approach the research process. Relationship science has been at the forefront of many recent changes in the field, whether it be high profile replication attempts or broader discussions about how to increase rigor and reproducibility. A major goal of this special issue was to provide an opportunity for relationship scientists to engage with these issues and reforms. The first four articles in this special issue represent a sampling of different approaches relationship researchers have used to enhance the credibility of their work.     

A focus group study on the potential of autonomous vehicles as a viable transportation option: Perspectives from people with disabilities and public transit agencies

Autonomous vehicle (AV) technology is becoming one of the most promising alternatives to improve mobility for people with disabilities. Nevertheless, how people with disabilities perceive AV as transportation services has not been explored. Also, limited information exists about how public transit agencies comprehend and perceive autonomous vehicle transportation (AVT) services. This study discusses mobility issues for people with disabilities and explores the potential of AVT to serve that population, particularly those with visual impairments or physical disabilities. Researchers conducted six focus groups comprising people with disabilities (N = 23) and public transit service experts (N = 10) in Austin, Texas and Houston, Texas. Each session was audio-recorded and analyzed using conventional content analysis. This study identified people with disabilities’ mobility issues related to: (1) current transit services (including fixed-route and paratransit services) and (2) the quality of neighborhood built environments. Both people with disabilities and transit experts expected that AVT could mitigate current mobility issues, especially in improved built environments. However, participants with disabilities also expressed concerns and anxieties regarding AVT. Transit experts agreed that more targeted strategies would be needed to overcome possible barriers to AVT for people with disabilities. This study provides insights on shaping AVT strategies and policies relevant to improving mobility for people with disabilities.     

Does Anxiety Improve Voters' Decision Making?

Affective Intelligence (AI) theory proposes to answer a fundamental question about democracy: how it succeeds even though most citizens pay little attention to politics. AI contends that, when circumstances generate sufficient anxiety, citizens make informed and thoughtful political decisions. In Ladd and Lenz (2008 ), we showed that two simpler depictions of anxiety's role can explain the vote interactions that apparently support AI. Here, we again replicate Marcus, Neuman and MacKuen's (2000 )'s voting model, which they contend supports AI, and again show that it is vulnerable to these alternative explanations, regardless of how candidate choice is measured. We also briefly review the broader literature and discuss Brader's (2005, 2006 ) important experimental results. Although the literature undoubtedly supports other aspects of AI, few studies directly test AI's voting claims, which were the focus of our reassessment. In our view, the only study that does so while ruling out the two alternatives is our analysis of the 1980 ANES Major Panel ( Ladd & Lenz, 2008 ), which finds no support for AI, but ample support for the alternatives. None of the responses to Ladd and Lenz (2008 ) addresses these findings. Overall, evidence that anxiety helps solve the problem of voter competence remains sparse and vulnerable to alternative explanations.     

Toward an Alliance Between the Issue-Processing Approach and Pragma-Dialectical Analysis

On the approach to discussions of policy choices that treats such discussions as instances of issue-processing, the joint use of the logic of questions and the logic of rules gives precise formulation to two sorts of issues. To one sort of issue belong issue-circumscribing questions; to another sort, issues-simplicter, which consist of disjunctions of policy proposals – so many proposed social rules – that are answers, in the case of each disjunction, to a given issue-circumscribing question. Work in pragma-dialectics can take over the issue-processing approach; and by doing so add to the pragma-dialectical repertory further dimensions in the analysis of issues and in protocol-narratives of discussion. The analysis and narratives would now include accounts of how issue-circumscribing questions generate initial standpoints and how discussions sometimes end with compromises between standpoints. Further research questions follow about transformations of issues and the comparison of successive rounds of discussion. A narrative of one period of discussion during `the War on Drugs' in the United States illustrates these points.     

Utility Functions: A Compromise Programming Approach to Specification and Optimization

Nowadays, utility theory and compromise programming (CP) are considered very different paradigms and methodologies to measure preferences as well as to determine decision maker's optima on an efficient frontier. In this paper, however, we show that a utility function with separate variables (presented in the form of a Taylor series around the ideal point) is reducible to a weighted sum of CP distances. This linkage between utility and compromise (based on a main assumption in which the usual utility functions hold) leads to (i) a method for specification and optimization of usual utility functions by operational technique and (ii) a reformulation of standard CP with the advantage of determining the best CP solution from a utility perspective. © 1997 John Wiley & Sons, Ltd.     

环境条件和兴趣对大学生妥协决策的影响

研究旨在考察个体在选择职业时是否会为了更好的环境条件(组织、城市)而降低对兴趣的要求。对63名大学生被试开展了两个实验,采用在环境条件和兴趣水平上有不同程度差异的职位配对来模拟两难决策。结果发现:(1)对不同组织声望和兴趣水平的职位的选择无性别差异;(2)组织声望差距、组织声望差距与兴趣差距的交互作用能显著预测职位的选择;(3)对不同城市级别和兴趣水平的职位的选择有性别差异,男生比女生更少放弃兴趣;(4)兴趣差距、城市级别差距与兴趣差距的交互作用能预测男生的选择,只有兴趣差距能预测女生的选择。结论:个体会为了更好的环境而或多或少在兴趣方面妥协。     

Moderating effect of Zhong Yong on the relationship between creativity and innovation behaviour

The present study examined the moderating effect of Zhong Yong on the relationship between perceived creativity and innovation behaviour in Chinese companies. A total of 273 paired questionnaires were collected with employee self-rated creativity and Zhong Yong and supervisor-rated innovation behaviour. The results show that for people higher on Zhong Yong, their creativity was not correlated with innovation behaviour; for people less immersed in Zhong Yong, this correlation is significant. This finding provides a new insight into the effects of Zhong Yong on the creativity-innovation behaviour transformation processes. The implications for future research are also discussed.     

Was William James a Patient at McLean Hospital for the Mentally Ill?

Rumors that William James was a patient at McLean Asylum near Boston have persisted for several decades. I focus on the reasons why the question has been so difficult to answer in any definitive way; assess the evidence presented in support of the rumors; note that two different periods in James’s life (late twenties and early sixties) have been judged the most likely; and explore the diagnostic question as well: If he was in fact a patient, for what was he being treated? I also discuss evidence that his younger brother Robertson was a patient at McLean and consider the bearing of this evidence on the question of whether William James was a patient at McLean and on the diagnostic issue.     

道德敏感性：概念理解与辨析

道德敏感性是新科尔伯格取向的重要概念,是道德行为发生之前逻辑上的心理初始成分,是对情境的道德领悟与解释,典型地反映了道德认知和道德情感的相互作用。对这个概念的性质和内涵理解存在能力观和经验观等不同观点;该概念也常操作化地为道德觉察、道德意识、后果意识、确认道德问题等;它与伦理敏感性、道德直觉等相近概念有着不同程度的区别和联系。     

大学生职业决策中的妥协策略

职业决策是大学生面临的重要的现实问题之一。通过预实验之后,随机选取89名大学生参加正式实验。采用2×3的混合实验设计探明大学生妥协策略的特点,结果表明:(1)大学生在三种妥协情境中的妥协次序基本支持Gottfredson的假设,但有其自身特点,社会声望始终是优先考虑的因素。(2)兴趣是职业决策的重要影响因素,不受东西方文化因素的影响。