Caring About (COVID-19 Related) Social Issues Signals Trustworthiness: Direct and Conceptual Replication of Zlatev (2019)

With three convenient samples (n = 1,087) and one sample representative for the German population in terms of age and gender (n = 210), we replicate research by Zlatev (2019) showing that perceived benevolence-based and perceived integrity-based trustworthiness increase with a target’s level of caring about a social issue. We show that these results generalize to various issues ranging from environmental issues (i.e., installation of wind turbines in the North Sea) to issues related to the COVID-19 pandemic (i.e., online teaching to prevent the spread of the virus). Furthermore, we provide initial behavioral evidence for this effect by showing that transfers in a trust game increase with a target’s caring about a social issue. All results are robust for age, gender, and social issue. To provide best estimates for the effect of a target’s level of caring on perceived trustworthiness, we report results of three mini meta-analyses including our findings as well as the findings of the original research. Policy implications are discussed.

Is Passive Priming Really Impervious to Verb Semantics? A High-Powered Replication of Messenger Et al. (2012)

The aim of the present study was to conduct a particularly stringent pre-registered in-vestigation of the claim that there exists a level of linguistic representation that “includes syntactic category information but not semantic information” (Branigan & Pickering, 2017: 8). As a test case, we focussed on the English passive; a construction for which previous findings have been somewhat contradictory. On the one hand, several studies using different methodologies have found an advantage for theme-experiencer passives (e.g., The girl was shocked by the tiger; and also agent-patient passives; e.g., The girl was hit by the tiger) over experiencer-theme passives (e.g., The girl was ignored by the tiger). On the other hand, Messenger et al. (2012) found no evidence that theme-experiencer and experiencer-theme passives vary in their propensity to prime production of agent-patient passives. We therefore conducted an online replication of Messen-ger et al (2012) with a pre-registered appropriately powered sample (N=240). Although a large and significant priming effect (i.e., an effect of prime sentence type) was ob-served, a Bayesian analysis yielded only weak/anecdotal evidence (BF=2.11) for the crucial interaction of verb type by prime type; a finding that was robust to different coding and exclusion decisions, operationalizations of verb semantics (dichoto-mous/continuous), analysis frameworks (Bayesian/frequentist) and – as per a mixed-effects-multiverse analyses – random effects structures. Nevertheless, these findings do no not provide evidence for the absence of semantic effects (as has been argued for the findings of Messenger et al, 2012). We conclude that these and related findings are best explained by a model that includes both lexical, exemplar-level representations and rep-resentations at multiple higher levels of abstraction.

Leading Us Unto Temptation? No Evidence for an Asymmetry in Automatic Associations Between Goals and Temptations

The asymmetry hypothesis of counteractive control theory suggests that—at least for successful self-regulators—exposure to temptations facilitates the accessibility of goal-related cognitive constructs, whereas exposure to goals inhibits the accessibility of temptation-related cognitive constructs. Using a lexical decision task, Fishbach et al., 2003 (Study 3) found that this asymmetry existed even at an automatic level of processing. In this attempted replication, 221 students completed a lexical decision task that included goal-related and temptation-related stimuli words preceded by either a goal-related prime, a temptation-related prime, or an irrelevant prime. Unlike the original study, we found only significant priming effects, where temptation-primes facilitated the recognition of goal-related words and goal-primes likewise facilitated the recognition of temptation-related words. We did not replicate the previously reported asymmetry. Additionally, we found no significant moderation of the hypothesized priming asymmetry by any of the traits of self-regulatory success, construal level, temptation strength, or self-control, again failing to replicate prior findings. The same priming patterns were found among participants who completed the study in-lab and those who completed the study online. This replication study suggests that the cognitive associations between goals and temptations are relatively symmetric and faciliatory, at least during the initial, automatic level of cognitive processing.

Working for the Best or Bracing for the Worst? Approach and Avoidance Motivation in Planning

Even though planning is generally helpful in goal pursuit, people do not always choose to plan. The inclination to plan might depend on whether we focus on what we seek to approach or what we seek to avoid. In two pre-registered experiments, we tested the relative effect of approach versus avoidance motivation on willingness to plan (total N=1349). With outcome framing as the experimental manipulation, participants were randomly assigned to either an approach or an avoidance condition, and then indicated their willingness to plan their study activities before an upcoming exam. Contrary to predictions, the results showed no significant difference in willingness to plan depending on condition in either experiment. There was mixed support for the importance of anticipated affect and perceived distance as process mechanisms: While Experiment 1 showed that participants who experienced the day of the exam as closer in time were more willing to plan their study preparations (regardless of condition), we found no mediational effects through perceived distance or anticipated affect. In Experiment 2, anticipated affect intensity mediated the association between motivation and willingness to plan, where participants induced to approach motivation predicted greater intensity of anticipated affect upon achieving their goals, and thus were more willing to plan, than participants induced to avoidance motivation. However, such mediational effects without a main effect remain ambiguous and should be interpreted with caution. Seen as a whole, the results suggest that the effect of different motivation types on the willingness to plan may be different than previously thought: They may not influence this aspect of goal striving.

Words May Jump-Start Meaning More Than Vision: A Non-Replication of Early ERP Effects in Boutonnet and Lupyan (2015)

We report a replication of Boutonnet and Lupyan’s (2015) study of the effects of linguistic labelling on perceptual performance. In addition to a response time advantage of linguistic labels over non-linguistic auditory cues in judging visual objects, Boutonnet and Lupyan found that the two types of cues produced different patterns in the early perceptual ERP components P1 and P2 but not the later, semantics-relevant N4. This study thus adds an important piece of evidence supporting the claim of genuine top-down effects on perception. Given the controversy over this claim and the need for replication of key findings, we attempted to replicate Boutonnet and Lupyan (2015). We replicated their behavioral findings that response times to indicate whether an auditory cue matches a visual image of an object were faster for match than mismatch trials and faster for linguistic than non-linguistic cues. We did not replicate the main ERP effects supporting a positive effect of linguistic labels on the early perceptual ERP components P1 and P2, though we did find a congruence by cue type interaction effect on those components. Unlike Boutonnet and Lupyan, we found a main effect of cue type on the N4 in which non-linguistic cues produced more negative amplitudes. Exploratory analyses of the unpredicted N4 effect suggest that the response time advantage of linguistic labels occurred during semantic rather than early visual processing. This experiment was pre-registered at https://osf.io/cq8g4/ and conducted as part of an undergraduate cognitive science research methods class at Vassar College.

Perfectionistic Cognitions as Antecedents of Work Engagement: Personal Resources, Personal Demands, or Both?

Whereas personal resources have been established as a counterpart to external job resources in the Job Demands–Resources Theory, personal demands as a counterpart to job demands have been rather neglected. In this study, we propose that multidimensional perfectionism—in the form of daily perfectionistic cognitions—is a relevant personal characteristic for predicting daily work engagement in addition to and in its interplay with daily time pressure as a common job demand. 157 employees participated in a daily diary study for 15 workdays. As hypothesized, multilevel regression analyses yielded a positive unique effect of perfectionistic strivings cognitions and a negative unique effect of perfectionistic concerns cognitions on daily work engagement. Furthermore, we found that both unique perfectionistic strivings cognitions and perfectionistic concerns cognitions moderated a quadratic relationship between daily time pressure and daily work engagement. Building on the Job Demands–Resources Theory, we propose that the dimension of perfectionistic strivings constitutes a personal resource and the dimension of perfectionistic concerns constitutes a personal demand in the prediction of work engagement.

Assessing the Unidimensionality of Clayton’s Environmental Identity Scale Using Confirmatory Factor Analysis (CFA) and Bifactor Exploratory Structural Equation Modeling (bifactor-ESEM)

A relevant intrapersonal characteristic for understanding intentions and behavior toward environmental sustainability is the degree to which nature is important for a person’s self-definition. Clayton’s Environmental Identity (EID) scale purports to measure this construct. However, a limited number of prior exploratory studies of this measure have supported different factor structures. Hence, our initial aim was to develop an understanding of the dimensionality of Clayton’s 24-item EID scale by testing competing latent structures using confirmatory factor analysis. We analyzed self-reported data from 458 adults (Mage = 26.7 years; 81% female). Four a priori models (a first-order model, a second-order model, a unidimensional model, and a bifactor model) did not show satisfactory fit to the data. An ancillary analysis using bifactor exploratory structural equation modeling (bifactor-ESEM) indicated a bifactor model with three specific factors had a good fit to the data. The factor loadings of this model and values for bifactor indices (Omega Hierarchical and Explained Common Variance [ECV]) indicated a single mean score across all EID scale items taps into an essentially unidimensional construct and is therefore appropriate to interpret. In sum, our study provides a critical insight into the dimensionality of Clayton’s EID scale that will be valuable when applying this measure for research and intervention purposes.

Cognitive Control and the Implicit Association Test: A Replication of Siegel, Dougherty, and Huber (2012)

The implicit association test (IAT) is widely used to measure evaluative associations towards groups or the self but is influenced by other traits. Siegel, Dougherty, and Huber (2012, Journal of Experimental Social Psychology) found that manipulating cognitive control via false feedback (Study 3) changed the degree to which the IAT was related to cognitive control versus evaluative associations. We conducted two replications of this study and a mini meta-analysis. Null-hypothesis tests, meta-analysis, and a small telescope approach demonstrated weak to no support for the original hypotheses. We conclude that the original findings are unreliable and that both the original study and our replications do not provide evidence that manipulating cognitive control affects IAT scores.

Issues in Conservation—Three Value Moments in the Public Perception of Cultural Heritage Objects in Public Spaces

Cultural heritage professionals are becoming increasingly concerned about the lack of care being taken by municipalities for their cultural heritage objects which include works of art in public places. They have therefore begun to ask the public to help take care of “their” cultural heritage through so-called public participation projects. Cultural heritage professionals tacitly assume that if they “teach” the public to treasure such objects of “their” heritage, the public will become more proactive in helping to conserve them. However, research being conducted by the authors is showing that a majority of the general public often has a completely different awareness and/or feeling about cultural heritage objects in their neighborhoods than the cultural heritage professionals think they have, or think they should have. Three recent case studies carried out by the authors show that these differences are most noticeable during so-called “value moments” at the beginning and at the perceived end of an object’s life. These are the two moments when decisions are made, usually by cultural heritage professionals, to place an object in a neighborhood or have it significantly changed or removed, often to the surprise and disagreement of the residents. Between these two moments lay many moments when an object is taken for granted, grudgingly accepted, or not even noticed. Given the fact that cultural heritage professionals often make the ultimate decisions and do not always consider or outright ignore public opinion, it should not be surprising that there is an increasingly negative public perception of what they do. The results of the case studies illustrate the need for professionals to consider and accept as valid, public feelings about cultural heritage objects in their neighborhoods.

Estimating Time: Comparing the Accuracy of Estimation Methods for Interval Timing

In interval timing experiments, motor reproduction is the predominant method used when participants are asked to estimate an interval. However, it is unknown how its accuracy, precision and efficiency compare to alternative methods, such as indicating the duration by spatial estimation on a timeline. In two experiments, we compared different interval estimation methods. In the first experiment, participants were asked to reproduce an interval by means of motor reproduction, timeline estimation, or verbal estimation. We found that, on average, verbal estimates were more accurate and precise than line estimates and motor reproductions. However, we found a bias towards familiar whole second units when giving verbal estimates. Motor reproductions were more precise, but not more accurate than timeline estimates. In the second experiment, we used a more complex task: Participants were presented a stream of digits and one target letter and were subsequently asked to reproduce both the interval to target onset and the duration of the total stream by means of motor reproduction and timeline estimation. We found that motor reproductions were more accurate, but not more precise than timeline estimates. In both experiments, timeline estimates had the lowest reaction times. Overall, our results suggest that the transformation of time into space has only a relatively minor cost. In addition, they show that each estimation method comes with its own advantages, and that the choice of estimation method depends on choices in the experimental design: for example, when using durations with integer durations verbal estimates are superior, yet when testing long durations, motor reproductions are time intensive making timeline estimates a more sensible choice.