Reality Show
Karen Douglas & Robbie Sutton
British Journal of Social Psychology, forthcoming
Abstract:
We advance a new account of why people endorse conspiracy theories, arguing that individuals use the social-cognitive tool of projection when making social judgements about others. In two studies, we found that individuals were more likely to endorse conspiracy theories if they thought they would be willing, personally, to participate in the alleged conspiracies. Study 1 established an association between conspiracy beliefs and personal willingness to conspire, which fully mediated a relationship between Machiavellianism and conspiracy beliefs. In Study 2, participants primed with their own morality were less inclined than controls to endorse conspiracy theories - a finding fully mediated by personal willingness to conspire. These results suggest that some people think 'they conspired' because they think 'I would conspire'.
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Wishful Thinking: Belief, Desire, and the Motivated Evaluation of Scientific Evidence
Anthony Bastardi, Eric Luis Uhlmann & Lee Ross
Psychological Science, forthcoming
"Evaluations of purported scientific evidence were shaped more by what participants desired to be true than by what they had initially believed to be true. Conflicted participants, who planned to use day care for their children but initially believed such care to be markedly inferior to home care, interpreted ambiguous scientific evidence in a manner congruent with their desire to believe that their plans would not be disadvantageous for their children. After they examined mixed scientific evidence, these conflicted participants shifted their beliefs and considered home care to be no better than day care. By contrast, after exposure to the same mixed evidence, unconflicted participants - those who shared the same initial belief in the superiority of home care and intended to use only home care when they became parents - maintained their strong initial belief.
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How the Grapevine Keeps You in Line: Gossip Increases Contributions to the Group
Bianca Beersma & Gerben Van Kleef
Social Psychological and Personality Science, forthcoming
Abstract:
Gossip is often characterized as bad and immoral. The authors challenge this view and propose that gossip constrains self-serving behavior that harms the group. When people expect their group members to gossip and their decisions are identifiable, they will be concerned about group members' opinions, and this should lead them to contribute more resources to the group. When people believe their group members are unlikely to gossip, identifiability of decisions should have less impact on group opinion concerns and contributions to the group. Participants were led to believe that their fellow group members had a low or high tendency to gossip, and that their contribution to the group was identifiable by the group or not. Results confirmed our hypotheses, demonstrating that gossip is a powerful tool to control self-serving behavior in groups. Indeed, the grapevine keeps group members in line. Although mostly viewed negatively, gossip may be essential for groups' survival.
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Dopaminergic Genes Predict Individual Differences in Susceptibility to Confirmation Bias
Bradley Doll, Kent Hutchison & Michael Frank
Journal of Neuroscience, 20 April 2011, Pages 6188-6198
Abstract:
The striatum is critical for the incremental learning of values associated with behavioral actions. The prefrontal cortex (PFC) represents abstract rules and explicit contingencies to support rapid behavioral adaptation in the absence of cumulative experience. Here we test two alternative models of the interaction between these systems, and individual differences thereof, when human subjects are instructed with prior information about reward contingencies that may or may not be accurate. Behaviorally, subjects are overly influenced by prior instructions, at the expense of learning true reinforcement statistics. Computational analysis found that this pattern of data is best accounted for by a confirmation bias mechanism in which prior beliefs-putatively represented in PFC-influence the learning that occurs in the striatum such that reinforcement statistics are distorted. We assessed genetic variants affecting prefrontal and striatal dopaminergic neurotransmission. A polymorphism in the COMT gene (rs4680), associated with prefrontal dopaminergic function, was predictive of the degree to which participants persisted in responding in accordance with prior instructions even as evidence against their veracity accumulated. Polymorphisms in genes associated with striatal dopamine function (DARPP-32, rs907094, and DRD2, rs6277) were predictive of learning from positive and negative outcomes. Notably, these same variants were predictive of the degree to which such learning was overly inflated or neglected when outcomes are consistent or inconsistent with prior instructions. These findings indicate dissociable neurocomputational and genetic mechanisms by which initial biases are strengthened by experience.
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The artful dodger: Answering the wrong question the right way
Todd Rogers & Michael Norton
Journal of Experimental Psychology: Applied, forthcoming
Abstract:
What happens when speakers try to "dodge" a question they would rather not answer by answering a different question? In 4 studies, we show that listeners can fail to detect dodges when speakers answer similar-but objectively incorrect-questions (the "artful dodge"), a detection failure that goes hand-in-hand with a failure to rate dodgers more negatively. We propose that dodges go undetected because listeners' attention is not usually directed toward a goal of dodge detection (i.e., Is this person answering the question?) but rather toward a goal of social evaluation (i.e., Do I like this person?). Listeners were not blind to all dodge attempts, however. Dodge detection increased when listeners' attention was diverted from social goals toward determining the relevance of the speaker's answers (Study 1), when speakers answered a question egregiously dissimilar to the one asked (Study 2), and when listeners' attention was directed to the question asked by keeping it visible during speakers' answers (Study 4). We also examined the interpersonal consequences of dodge attempts: When listeners were guided to detect dodges, they rated speakers more negatively (Study 2), and listeners rated speakers who answered a similar question in a fluent manner more positively than speakers who answered the actual question but disfluently (Study 3). These results add to the literatures on both Gricean conversational norms and goal-directed attention. We discuss the practical implications of our findings in the contexts of interpersonal communication and public debates.
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The persistent effects of a false news shocks
Carlos Carvalho, Nicholas Klagge & Emanuel Moench
Journal of Empirical Finance, forthcoming
Abstract:
In September 2008, a six-year-old article about the 2002 bankruptcy of United Airline's parent company resurfaced on the Internet and was mistakenly believed to be reporting a new bankruptcy .ling by the company. This episode caused the company's stock price to drop by as much as 76 percent in just a few minutes, before NASDAQ halted trading. After the "news" had been identified as false, the stock price rebounded, but still ended the day 11.2 percent below the previous close. We explore this natural experiment by using a simple asset-pricing model to study the aftermath of this false news shock. We find that, after three trading sessions, the company's stock was still trading below the two-standard-deviation band implied by the model and that it returned to within one standard deviation only during the sixth trading session. On the seventh day after the episode, the stock was trading at exactly the level predicted by the asset-pricing model. We investigate several potential explanations for this finding, but fail to find empirical evidence supporting either one. We also document that the false news shock had a persistent effect on the stock prices of other major airline companies. This is consistent with the view that contagion effects would have dominated competitive effects had the bankruptcy actually taken place.
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David Zhu & James Westphal
Organization Science, forthcoming
Abstract:
We consider how a social psychological bias referred to as pluralistic ignorance occurs among security analysts and how this bias may lead to behavioral conformity and isomorphism in analysts' reactions to the adoption of a particular organizational policy, namely, stock repurchase plans. Our theory suggests why (1) there may be a systematic tendency for analysts to underestimate the extent to which other analysts share their reservations about repurchase plans (i.e., reservations about whether plans reflect well on the performance prospects of adopting firms), such that (2) analysts conform to other analysts and issue more positive earnings forecasts and stock recommendations in response to the adoption of repurchase plans despite having private reservations about whether the plans reflect well on adopting firms. We also contend that analysts are less likely to underestimate the extent to which others share their reservations about repurchase plans to the extent that they have frequent communication ties to other analysts. Whereas prior neoinstitutional research on conformity and isomorphism has primarily adopted a cognitive perspective in which actors conform to the behavior of others based on their understandings of a particular policy or practice (i.e., they take the value of the policy for granted or infer the value of the policy from others' prior decisions), we develop a social psychological perspective on isomorphism wherein actors imitate others based on their biased perceptions of others' beliefs about the policy. We also extend perspectives on institutional persistence by explaining why constituents may continue to publicly endorse a policy despite having private reservations about the policy's efficiency benefits.
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Andrew Flanagin & Miriam Metzger
Information, Communication & Society, April 2011, Pages 355-374
Abstract:
This study examined the perceived credibility of user-generated (i.e. Wikipedia) versus more expertly provided online encyclopedic information (i.e. Citizendium, and the online version of the Encyclopaeligdia Britannica) across generations. Two large-scale surveys with embedded quasi-experiments were conducted: among 11-18-year-olds living at home and among adults 18 years and older. Results showed that although use of Wikipedia is common, many people (particularly adults) do not truly comprehend how Wikipedia operates in terms of information provision, and that while people trust Wikipedia as an information source, they express doubt about the appropriateness of doing so. A companion quasi-experiment found that both children and adults assess information to be more credible when it originates or appears to originate from Encyclopaeligdia Britannica. In addition, children rated information from Wikipedia to be less believable when they viewed it on Wikipedia's site than when that same information appeared on either Citizendium's site or on Encyclopaeligdia Britannica's site. Indeed, content originating from Wikipedia was perceived by children as least credible when it was shown on a Wikipedia page, yet the most credible when it was shown on the page of Encyclopaeligdia Britannica. The practical and theoretical implications of these results are discussed.
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Becoming a Vampire Without Being Bitten: The Narrative Collective Assimilation Hypothesis
Shira Gabriel & Ariana Young
Psychological Science, forthcoming
Abstract:
The Narrative Collective Assimilation Hypothesis - that experiencing narratives leads one to psychologically become a part of the collective described within the narrative - was proposed and examined. Participants read passages from either Harry Potter or Twilight. Both implicit and explicit measures revealed that participants who read Harry Potter psychologically became wizards, whereas those who read Twilight psychologically became vampires. The results also suggested that narrative collective assimilation is psychologically meaningful and relates to the basic human need for connection. Specifically, it was found that the tendency to fulfill belongingness needs through group affiliation moderated the extent to which narrative collective assimilation occurred and that narrative collective assimilation led to increases in life satisfaction and positive mood, two primary outcomes of belonging. The implications for the importance of narratives, the need to belong to groups, and social surrogacy are discussed.
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Age-related differences in deception
Ted Ruffman et al.
Psychology and Aging, forthcoming
Abstract:
Young and older participants judged the veracity of young and older speakers' opinions about topical issues. All participants found it easier to judge when an older adult was lying relative to a young adult, and older adults were worse than young adults at telling when speakers were telling the truth versus lying. Neither young nor older adults were advantaged when judging a speaker from the same age group. Overall, older adults were more transparent as liars and were worse at detecting lies, with older adults' worse emotion recognition fully mediating the relation between age group and lie detection failures.
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Steven Shepherd et al.
Journal of Experimental Social Psychology, forthcoming
Abstract:
Research inspired by the compensatory control model (CCM) shows that people compensate for personal control threats by bolstering aspects of the cultural worldview that afford external control. According to the CCM these effects stem from the motivation to maintain perceived order, but it is alternatively possible that they represent indirect efforts to bolster distally related psychological structures described by uncertainty management theory (self-relevant certainty) and terror management theory (death-transcendence). To assess whether compensatory control processes play a unique role in worldview defense, we hypothesized that personal control threats would increase affirmation of cultural constructs that specifically bolster order more so than constructs that bolster distally related structures. The results of 5 studies provide converging support for this hypothesis in the context of attitudes toward diverse cultural constructs (Study 1: national culture; Studies 2 and 3: consumer products; Studies 4 and 5: political candidates). Also supporting hypotheses, uncertainty salience and mortality salience elicited greater affirmation of identity- and immortality-conferring targets, respectively, compared to order-conferring constructs. Discussion focuses on the value of different perspectives on existential motivation for predicting specific forms of worldview defense.
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Taking the road less traveled by: Does conversation eradicate pernicious cascades?
Henry Cao, Bing Han & David Hirshleifer
Journal of Economic Theory, forthcoming
Abstract:
We offer a model in which sequences of individuals often converge upon poor decisions and are prone to fads, despite communication of the payoff outcomes from past choices. This reflects both direct and indirect action-based information externalities. In contrast with previous cascades literature, cascades here are spontaneously dislodged and in general have a probability less than one of lasting forever. Furthermore, the ability of individuals to communicate can reduce average decision accuracy and welfare.
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A structural hermeneutics of The O'Reilly Factor
Matthew Norton
Theory and Society, May 2011, Pages 315-346
Abstract:
There has been a significant rise in opinion and talk-based programming on American cable news channels since the mid-1990s. These news analysis programs are often politically partisan in their interpretive approach. This article examines one of the most prominent and popular of these shows, The O'Reilly Factor using the theoretical tools of structural hermeneutics. The program produces a radically simple and partisan schema for interpreting the news, but to do so it relies on the constructed persona of the host, a complex underlying meaning structure formulated around binary oppositions, and a number of rhetorical techniques. The show simplifies, but is not itself simple. To simplify the news in a way that suggests partisan conclusions that still seem relevant rather than cartoonish, individual episodes and segments of the show frame issues in terms of a meaning structure that leads strongly to partisan conclusions, but affords an appearance of the reasonable consideration of diverse views. It is suggested that this kind of deep analysis of meaning structures is important for making sense of how news analysis programs and mediated partisanship function as a cultural system.
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Motivational incentives modulate age differences in visual perception
Julia Spaniol et al.
Psychology and Aging, forthcoming
Abstract:
This study examined whether motivational incentives modulate age-related perceptual deficits. Younger and older adults performed a perceptual discrimination task in which bicolored stimuli had to be classified according to their dominating color. The valent color was associated with either a positive or negative payoff, whereas the neutral color was not associated with a payoff. Effects of incentives on perceptual efficiency and response bias were estimated using the diffusion model (Ratcliff, 1978). Perception of neutral stimuli showed age-related decline, whereas perception of valent stimuli, both positive and negative, showed no age difference. This finding is interpreted in terms of preserved top-down control over the allocation of perceptual processing resources in healthy aging.
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Marret Noordewier & Diederik Stapel
Basic and Applied Social Psychology, January 2011, Pages 1-6
Abstract:
People do not like inconsistencies, and therefore disconfirmation of stereotypes often feels unpleasant. However, people do like other people to be nice, thus negative stereotypes that are positively disconfirmed should be pleasant. The question then is, when does the (in)congruency and when does the likeability or positivity of the target determine people's affective responses? In two experiments we show that when people are under cognitive load, affective responses are determined by the (in)congruency, regardless of whether the target is positive or negative (positive affect after confirmation, negative affect after disconfirmation). However, when people have sufficient cognitive resources, their affective responses are determined by the positivity of the target, regardless of the (in)congruency (positive affect after a positive target, negative affect after a negative target).
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When Less is Heard than Meets the Ear: Change Deafness in a Telephone Conversation
Kimberly Fenn et al.
Quarterly Journal of Experimental Psychology, forthcoming
Abstract:
During a conversation, we hear the sound of the talker as well as the intended message. Traditional models of speech perception posit that acoustic details of a talker's voice are not encoded with the message whereas more recent models propose that talker identity is automatically encoded. When shadowing speech, listeners often fail to detect a change in talker identity. The present study was designed to investigate whether talker changes would be detected when listeners are actively engaged in a normal conversation, and visual information about the speaker is absent. Participants were called on the phone and during the conversation the experimenter was surreptitiously replaced by another talker. Participants rarely noticed the change. However, when explicitly monitoring for a change, detection increased. Voice memory tests suggested that participants remembered only coarse information about both voices, rather than fine details. This suggests that although listeners are capable of change detection, voice information is not continuously monitored at a fine-grain level of acoustic representation during natural conversation and not be automatically encoded. Conversational expectations may shape the way we direct attention to voice characteristics and perceive differences in voice.
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Spatial categorization and time perception: Why does it take less time to get home?
Priya Raghubir, Vicki Morwitz & Amitav Chakravarti
Journal of Consumer Psychology, forthcoming
Abstract:
This paper identifies a new bias in consumers' time perceptions - consumers perceive a journey from a destination to home to be faster than a trip from home to the same destination. In three experiments we demonstrate that this effect occurs both for short trips and for long trips to and from home. We also show that this effect occurs for other familiar locations in addition to home. We discuss several possible causes for this effect and offer preliminary support for one possible reason that involves differences in how consumers spatially encode "home" vs. a destination. Since home is extremely familiar it enjoys a rich mental representation, and therefore, consumers may encode it as a relatively larger geographical area than the less familiar destination. We offer preliminary evidence that this can lead to a directional asymmetry in their feelings of trip progress.
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Music Alters Visual Perception
Jacob Jolij & Maaike Meurs
PLoS ONE, April 2011, e18861
Background: Visual perception is not a passive process: in order to efficiently process visual input, the brain actively uses previous knowledge (e.g., memory) and expectations about what the world should look like. However, perception is not only influenced by previous knowledge. Especially the perception of emotional stimuli is influenced by the emotional state of the observer. In other words, how we perceive the world does not only depend on what we know of the world, but also by how we feel. In this study, we further investigated the relation between mood and perception.
Methods and Findings: We let observers do a difficult stimulus detection task, in which they had to detect schematic happy and sad faces embedded in noise. Mood was manipulated by means of music. We found that observers were more accurate in detecting faces congruent with their mood, corroborating earlier research. However, in trials in which no actual face was presented, observers made a significant number of false alarms. The content of these false alarms, or illusory percepts, was strongly influenced by the observers' mood.
Conclusions: As illusory percepts are believed to reflect the content of internal representations that are employed by the brain during top-down processing of visual input, we conclude that top-down modulation of visual processing is not purely predictive in nature: mood, in this case manipulated by music, may also directly alter the way we perceive the world.