Illusory Correlations: A Simple Associative Algorithm Provides a Convergent Account of Seemingly Divergent Paradigms

Subjective correlations that exaggerate objectively presented contingencies are usually referred to as illusory correlations. An empirical review reveals 3 major paradigms of illusory correlations, drawing on 2 prominent but conflicting gestalt principles, congruency and distinctiveness. Congruency accounts for expectancy-based illusory correlations, whereas distinctiveness is relevant to illusions resulting from the asymmetry of positive and negative attributes and from infrequency. The congruency principle implies a processing advantage for expected stimuli, whereas distinctiveness assumes enhanced processing of unexpected events. This apparent conflict is resolved, and an integrative account is offered within a simple connectionist framework (BIAS) of correlation assessment. The basic algorithm is outlined, empirical findings are simulated, new theoretical distinctions are introduced, and analogies to related paradigms are explained.

Acquisition of the algorithms of social life: a domain-based approach

Proposing that the algorithms of social life are acquired as a domain-based process, the author offers distinctions between social domains preparing the individual for proximity-maintenance within a protective relationship (attachment domain), use and recognition of social dominance (hierarchical power domain), identification and maintenance of the lines dividing "us" and "them" (coalitional group domain), negotiation of matched benefits with functional equals (reciprocity domain), and selection and protection of access to sexual partners (mating domain). Flexibility in the implementation of domains occurs at 3 different levels: versatility at a bioecological level, variations in the cognitive representation of individual experience, and cultural and individual variations in the explicit management of social life. Empirical evidence for domain specificity was strongest for the attachment domain; supportive evidence was also found for the distinctiveness of the 4 other domains. Implications are considered at theoretical and applied levels.

Affordances in social judgment: Experimental proof of why it is a mistake to ignore how others behave towards a target and look solely at how the target behaves

In this article, we propose a comprehensive conception of what personality traits are and what they mean in lay personology. Our conception is a pragmatic one that relies on the ecological concept of affordance and the theory of dual knowledge. It is not based on the same knowledge-building process as other pragmatic conceptions in that it distinguishes evaluative knowledge, produced by the generalization of affordances, from descriptive knowledge, deemed to be of limited importance in trait usage. It posits that an essential component of the meaning of traits is how others act towards the persons who possess these traits. We present a compilation of ten experimental studies in various areas of interest (statistical studies of trait/behavior associations, semantic decision-making, person memory, judgments at zero acquaintance) to prove the importance of the evaluative component composed of others' behaviors (OBs). These experiments show that the evaluative component 1. includes a repertoire of behaviors that is just as reliable for encoding traits as the repertoire of behaviors ascribed to the target; 2. can be just as accessible as the descriptive component for highly evaluative traits; 3. is very powerful in structuring mental representations of persons; 4. is more highly activated in social contexts, especially in workevaluation situations, and 5. is more discriminative than the descriptive component in immediate appraisals of persons.

Inter- vs. independentes Selbstwissen als Determinante von Assimilation und Kontrast bei kontextuellem Priming

Zusammenfassung: Wenn eine Person bei der Beurteilung eines sozialen Stimulus einen verzerrenden Kontexteinfluß vermutet, kann sie ihr Urteil in der dem angenommenen Einfluß entgegengesetzten Richtung an die Kontextinformation assimilieren bzw. von dieser kontrastieren. Im vorliegenden Papier wird diese Annahme auf den speziellen Fall selbstbezogener Urteile angewendet. Hier sollte die Wahrscheinlichkeit, mit der eine Person zu korrigieren versucht, von ihrer Selbstdefinition abhängig sein. Personen mit independenter Selbstdefinition sollten Kontexteinflüsse auf selbstbezogene Urteile für verzerrend halten und ihnen entgegensteuern. Personen mit interdependenter Selbstdefinition sollten hingegen Kontextinformationen für eine angemessene Grundlage zur Bildung selbstbezogener Urteile halten und entsprechend Assimilationseffekte produzieren. In den beiden berichteten Studien zeigte sich erwartungsgemäß, daß Personen mit interdependenter Selbstdefinition sich in selbstbezogenen Urteilen von einem Priming selbstbezogenen Wissens leiten ließen, während Personen mit independenter Selbstdefinition keine Primingeffekte oder Kontrasteffekte produzierten.

Self-determination theory and the facilitation of intrinsic motivation, social development, and well-being

Human beings can be proactive and engaged or, alternatively, passive and alienated, largely as a function of the social conditions in which they develop and function. Accordingly, research guided by self-determination theory has focused on the social-contextual conditions that facilitate versus forestall the natural processes of self-motivation and healthy psychological development. Specifically, factors have been examined that enhance versus undermine intrinsic motivation, self-regulation, and well-being. The findings have led to the postulate of three innate psychological needs--competence, autonomy, and relatedness--which when satisfied yield enhanced self-motivation and mental health and when thwarted lead to diminished motivation and well-being. Also considered is the significance of these psychological needs and processes within domains such as health care, education, work, sport, religion, and psychotherapy.

Neural correlates of theory-of-mind reasoning: an event-related potential study

Everyday understanding of human behavior rests on having a theory of mind--the ability to relate people's actions to underlying mental states such as beliefs and desires. It has been suggested that an impaired theory of mind may lie at the heart of psychological disorders that are characterized by deficits in social understanding, such as autism. In this study, we employed the event-related potential methodology to index the activity of neural systems that are engaged during theory-of-mind reasoning in adults. Specifically, neural activity elicited by tasks that required thinking about mental as compared with nonmental representations (i.e., beliefs vs. photographs) was characterized by a focally enhanced positivity over left frontal areas, which was diminished over left parietal areas. These findings provide an important perspective on both children's theory-of-mind development and the neurobiology of disorders in which theory of mind seems to be impaired.

A Goal Systems–Self-Regulatory Perspective on Personality, Psychopathology, and Change

A motivational framework is presented linking personal goals and self-regulatory functions to normal personality, psychopathology, and the processes of change. First, the utility of goals as a “final common analytic pathway” or integrative unit is considered. Next, the premises of an emerging, goal-centered conception of adaptive functioning are discussed as a prelude to the author's outlining of a multidimensional working model of “goal systems.” Reactive depression is reconceptualized in terms of specific self-regulatory dysfunctions under the influence of goal systems to illustrate how dysfunctional goal systems can serve as the central organizing component of psychopathology. A set of 10 propositions pinpoints goal-based sources of vulnerability to self-regulatory dysfunction in depression. A set of 5 propositions details the potential goal-based sources of maintenance of self-regulatory deficits. Finally, 14 theory-based principles of psychotherapeutic change are proposed.

Goal orientations, beliefs about success, and performance improvement among young elite Dutch soccer players

Extending past work testing goal perspective theory in sport, one purpose of this study was to examine, via a longitudinal design, the relationship of goal orientations to the beliefs about the causes of success in the case of elite male Dutch soccer players. A second purpose was to determine the relationship of goals and beliefs to ratings of performance. Seventy-five male pupils representing five teams from an internationally renowned soccer school in The Netherlands completed the TEOSQ and a measure of their perceptions of the determinants of success in soccer at the onset and conclusion of one season. Assessments of the coaches' appraisal and athletes' self-reported performance in soccer were carried out at the same time. In line with other studies, a positive association between ego orientation and the belief that ability or innate talent are determinants of success was revealed. Task orientation was linked to the beliefs that effort, team play, and parental support contribute to achievement in soccer. An increase in skilled performance over the season (as appraised by the coach) corresponded to a stronger task orientation and the beliefs that soccer success stems from hard work and having supportive parents.

Understanding the Dynamics of Leadership: The Role of Follower Self-Concepts in the Leader/Follower Relationship

In this paper we integrate recent theory and research on the self-concept with leadership theory. We conceptualize the self as being defined at three levels: the individual, interpersonal, and group levels. The effects of the self on information processing and behavior are mediated by the working self-concept, which is composed of self-views, possible selves, and goals (standards). Leaders are seen as producing short-run changes by influencing the working self-concept and more enduring changes through the development of chronic schema. Subordinates are also seen as influencing leaders' self-schema, both individually and collectively. Both practical and theoretical implications of this perspective are discussed. Copyright 1999 Academic Press.

Implicit Theories versus the Social Construal of Ability in Self-Regulation and Performance on a Complex Task

The present experiment examined the relative impacts of implicit theories and the social construal of ability as either a fixed entity or an incremental skill on self-efficacy, affective reactions, self-set goals, and performance on a complex group-management task. It was also a novel task for participants. Participants who had an implicit theory that group-management ability is an incremental skill that can be acquired with experience developed stronger self-efficacy, maintained more positive affect, and set themselves more challenging goals across multiple trials. They also outperformed participants with a fixed-entity theory of group-management ability. Some of the motivational benefits of an incremental-skill conception were lost when the social construal of managerial ability emphasized a fixed-entity conception. However, the negative motivational effects of a fixed-entity theory of ability were not ameliorated by the social construal of managerial ability as an incremental skill. The effects of conceptions of ability were fully mediated by the self-regulatory responses of participants. The hypothesis that self-efficacy moderates the impact of ability conceptions on self-set goal challenges was not supported. Copyright 1999 Academic Press.

Emotion

We review recent trends and methodological issues in assessing and testing theories of emotion, and we review evidence that form follows function in the affect system. Physical limitations constrain behavioral expressions and incline behavioral predispositions toward a bipolar organization, but these limiting conditions appear to lose their power at the level of underlying mechanisms, where a bivalent approach may provide a more comprehensive account of the affect system.

On the Psychometric Principles of Affect

D. Watson and L. A. Clark (1997) announced “two fundamental psychometric principles” (p. 282) of affect: The positive correlation between affects with the same valence tends to be substantial, whereas the negative correlation between affects with opposite valence tends to be weak. These allegedly robust empirical generalizations underlie various conceptual models of affect (such as those that posit an independence between positive and negative affect) and various scales of affect. The authors offer an alternative analysis: The correlation between two affects is a function of the angle between them within a circular ordering. Two data sets were reanalyzed and showed predicted exceptions to Watson and Clark's principles: same-valenced pairs with weak correlations and oppositely valenced pairs with substantial correlations.

Eine Normierung unterschiedlicher Aspekte der evaluativen Bewertung von 92 Substantiven

Zusammenfassung: Die evaluative Komponente von Einstellungen ist in vielen sozialpsychologischen Forschungsfeldern von Bedeutung. Um für zukünftige Untersuchungen in diesem Bereich eine normierte Skalierung unterschiedlicher Aspekte der evaluativen Bewertung von Einstellungsobjekten bereitzustellen, wurde 72 Probanden die deutsche Übersetzung einer in der Einstellungsforschung bereits häufig verwendeten und standardisierten Menge von 92 Substantiven zur Beurteilung vorgelegt. Erhoben wurde neben der Wortlänge und der Worthäufigkeit die evaluative Bewertung auf einer bipolaren Skala, getrennte Ratings der Positivität und der Negativität auf unipolaren Skalen, zwei Indizes der Ambivalenz, der Prozentsatz von «positiv»-Antworten bei einer binären evaluativen Entscheidung sowie die mittlere Reaktionszeit bei der evaluativen Entscheidung. Die vollständigen Ergebnisse der Normierung werden in einem Anhang wiedergegeben.

TRUST AND DISTRUST IN ORGANIZATIONS: Emerging Perspectives, Enduring Questions

Scholarly interest in the study of trust and distrust in organizations has grown dramatically over the past five years. This interest has been fueled, at least in part, by accumulating evidence that trust has a number of important benefits for organizations and their members. A primary aim of this review is to assess the state of this rapidly growing literature. The review examines recent progress in conceptualizing trust and distrust in organizational theory, and also summarizes evidence regarding the myriad benefits of trust within organizational systems. The review also describes different forms of trust found in organizations, and the antecedent conditions that produce them. Although the benefits of trust are well-documented, creating and sustaining trust is often difficult. Accordingly, the chapter concludes by examining some of the psychological, social, and institutional barriers to the production of trust.

LOW SELF-ESTEEM AND INGROUP BIAS

This study examines the effect of collective self-esteem on ingroup bias exhibited through traditional measures (attributions) and alternative strategies (basking in reflected glory). Seventyseven U.S. college students were divided into minimally defined groups, worked together on a series of tasks, received performance feedback, completed the Collective Self-esteem scale (Luhtanen & Crocker, 1992) and then rated similarity to both groups and attributed performances to a variety of causes. It was predicted and found that low self-esteem individuals utilized basking in reflected glory more than individuals with higher self-esteem. Additionally, high self-esteem individuals exhibited greater bias through use of attributional ratings. Results are interpreted as evidence for the mediating role of self-consistency needs on ingroup bias strategies (e.g. Brown, Collins, & Schmidt, 1988).

The scientific status of unconscious processes: is Freud really dead?

At regular intervals for over half a century, critiques of Freud and psychoanalysis have emerged in the popular media and in intellectual circles, usually declaring that Freud has died some new and agonizing death, and that the enterprise he created should be buried along with him like the artifacts in the tomb of an Egyptian king. Although the critiques take many forms, a central claim has long been that unconscious processes, like other psychoanalytic constructs, lack any basis in scientific research. In recent years, however, a large body of experimental research has emerged in a number of independent literatures. This work documents the most fundamental tenet of psychoanalysis--that much of mental life is unconscious, including cognitive, affective, and motivational processes. This body of research suggests some important revisions in the psychoanalytic understanding of unconscious processes, but it also points to the conclusion that, based on controlled scientific investigations alone (that is, without even considering clinical data), the repeated broadside attacks on psychoanalysis are no longer tenable.