Joachim Krueger

Brown University · Department of Cognitive, Linguistic and Psychological Sciences

We extend Ivancovsky et al.'s finding on the association between curiosity and creativity by proposing a sequential causal model assuming that (a) curiosity determines the motivation to seek information and that (b) creativity constitutes a capacity to act on that motivation. This framework assumes that both high levels of curiosity and creativity...

This dataset includes the decisions of N = 428 participants regarding the 67 symmetric 2×2 one-shot games presented by Villiger et al. (2022) as well as information about participants’ Social Value Orientation and Honesty-Humility. Additional documentation is available in the codebook presented below.

Using a variant of the hide‐and‐seek game, we show in three studies that self‐enhancement can help or hinder strategic thinking. In this guessing game, one player chooses a number while another player tries to guess it. Each player does this either in a random fashion (throwing a mental die) or by active thinking. The structure of the game implies...

We elaborate on Glowacki's claim that humans are more capable of establishing peace than other mammals. We present three aspects suggesting caution. First, the social capabilities of nonhuman primates should not be underestimated. Second, the effect of these capabilities on peace establishment is nonmonotonous. Third, defining peace by human-center...

We discuss and expand Boyer's idea of ownership coordination. Interpersonal similarity, we suggest, can moderate the attainment of coordination: Perceived similarity predicts coordination costs, whereas actual similarity dictates coordination success and the severity of illusory assumptions regarding a shared understanding of ownership. The example...

We empirically explore whether perceptions of (in)determinism are related to the willingness to tolerate uncertainty. We argue that the belief in indeterminism supports a sense of personal autonomy and independence from external influence, a stance that provides protection from perceived uncertainties. Our preliminary study ( N = 61) suggests that...

Reviews 'The Saad truth about happiness: 8 secrets for leading the good life' by Gad Saad. This review is in press with the American Journal of Psychology.

We consider an underdeveloped feature of De Neys's model. Decisions with multiple intuitions per option are neither trivial to explain nor rare. These decision scenarios are crucial for an assessment of the model's generalizability and adequacy. Besides monitoring absolute differences in intuition strength, the mind might add the strengths of intui...

We empirically explore whether perceptions of (in)determinism are related to the willingness to tolerate uncertainty. We argue that the belief in indeterminism supports a sense of personal autonomy and independence from external influence, a stance that provides protection from perceived uncertainties. Our preliminary study ( N = 61) provides first...

We elaborate on Glowacki’s (2022) claim that humans are most capable of establishing peace compared to other mammals. We present three aspects suggesting caution. First, the social capabilities of non-human primates should not be underestimated. Second, the effect of these capabilities on peace establishment is non-monotonous. Third, defining peace...

We discuss the concept of tribalism and the role of personal beliefs and cultural stereotypes in shaping social perceptions, arguing that social categorization is the result of psychological processes occurring within individual minds. We further argue that people perceive the social world through the lens of their own scheme of categorization, fai...

We empirically explore the idea that individuals' perception of the (in)determinism of their world plays a crucial role in how they tolerate uncertainties. We argue that the belief in indeterminism provides personal autonomy and partial independence from the influence of external events, which can protect against perceived uncertainties. Our small...

The Inductive Reasoning Model (IRM) provides an integrated platform for the study of several phenomena central to self- and social perception. The model goes beyond the traditional phenomenon-focused research strategy by showing how to generate point-specific hypotheses about the size of individual effects and how to predict the interrelations amon...

Using a variant of the hide-and-seek game, we show in two studies that self-enhancement can help or hinder strategic thinking. In the game, players either choose a number or attempt to guess that number. They can do so by randomizing or by active thinking. Guessers profit from thinking of a number, whereas choosers suffer from it. Yet, irrespective...

We consider an underdeveloped feature of De Neys’s model. Decisions with multiple intuitions per option are neither trivial to explain nor rare. These decision scenarios are crucial for an assessment of the model’s generalizability and adequacy. Besides monitoring absolute differences in intuition strength, the mind might add the strengths of intui...

Data are getting bigger and they encroach ever more on individual and social decision making (Gigerenzer, 2022). This is for the good inasmuch data carry useful information. Information that is predictive, valid, and free from unwanted biases helps improve human welfare. Big data can reveal truths that challenge compelling intuitions or cherished b...

The symmetric 2x2 one-shot game is one of the simplest and most commonly used representations of strategic conflict. Among others, it includes the prisoner’s dilemma, the game of chicken, the volunteer’s dilemma, and the assurance game. All of these games share three characteristics: (1) both players have to make a single choice between two options...

The symmetric 2x2 one-shot game is one of the simplest and most commonly used representations of strategic conflict. Among others, it includes the prisoner’s dilemma, the game of chicken, the volunteer’s dilemma, and the assurance game. All of these games share three characteristics: (1) both players have to make a single choice between two options...

This is a commentary on G. Gigerenzer's "How to stay smart in a smart world." It follows up on a review of his book and Gigerenzer's reply to it. The central issue is whether AI may not only succeed in replicating (and surpassing) human performance but also whether it may attain a similarity in kind; that is is in what it is and not only in what it...

In the standard volunteer’s dilemma (VoD), a single prosocial act (i.e., volunteering) yields the optimal overall outcome. Whereas the volunteer’s outcome is certain, the defector’s outcome depends on what others do. This research addressed the confounding of prosocial responses with uncertainty avoidance in the standard VoD. In Experiment 1, parti...

Reviews Kenrick & Lundberg-Kenrick's book ‘Solving modern problems with a stone-age brain: Human evolution and the seven fundamental motives.’ Acknowledges the contributions of evolutionary psychology to the study of motivation, while noting the prevalence of the naturalistic fallacy, which in the book presents itself as an endorsement of petit bou...

Alexei Ivanovich is a Russian casino gambler in Wiesbaden, Germany, a posh spa town Dostoevsky fictionalized as Roulettenburg. The character of Alexei is, in part, modeled on Dostoevsky himself, a literary blending that lies beyond the scope of this chapter to explore fully. Instead, our goal is to offer a review of the psychology of gambling and a...

Gigerenzer distinguishes between human and artificial intellegence and finds them incommensurable. He discusses many failures of AI but also capabilities that threaten society and human values. This is a review of his book, to be published in The American Journal of Psychology.

Research has offered limited insight into the psychological elements associated with free will beliefs. Self-enhancement, uncertainty intolerance, and self-other similarity are among the widely researched phenomena that appear relevant. We explore the connections between these phenomena and free will beliefs. In a first study, we find minimal to no...

Humans live our lives in a dialectic of knowledge and ignorance. Knowing – or hoping – that knowledge is power and that ignorance is no bliss, most humans want to know. They wish to reduce their epistemic uncertainty and the insecurity that comes with that. States of uncertainty are most poignant when they depend on other people, and especially tho...

Reviews Bernard Reginster's (2021) book "The will to nothingness: An essay on Nietzsche’s On the genealogy of morality" Notes implications of Nietzsche's and Reginster's thinking for moral psychology.

Reviews Keith Stanovich's (2021) ‘The bias that divides us: The science and politics of myside thinking’, Highlights implications for research on rationality and current cultural trends, especially on university campuses.

Social life unfolds with tension between power and sociability. As both, the need of power and the need of sociability, are crucial to interpersonal transactions, the person faces a dilemma. The satisfaction of one need limits the satisfaction of the other. We approach this dilemma by first reviewing two seemingly contrary biases in social percepti...

Reviews Steven Pinker's (2021) 'Rationality: What it is, why it seems scarce, why it matters.’ Notes that the term 'rationality' refers to a fuzzy (but useful) set of concepts and methods. Raises questions about the sociology of rationality research.

Reviewing the literature of the past two decades, Orth and Robins (2022) conclude that high self-esteem yields reliable benefits. In this commentary, we caution that for objective outcome measures, these effects are variable- and domain-dependent. The allure of high self-esteem remains largely a matter of mind and memory, not behavior. (PsycInfo Da...

Historiographic analysis is underused in academic psychology. In this expository essay, I intend to show that historical events or persons can be described with reference to theory and research provided by empirical psychology. Besides providing evidence-based grounds for a more penetrating historical account, the conclusions drawn from a historiog...

Most research on relationship quality addresses ongoing involvements. Research on past relationships is rare. As a first step, Athenstaedt and colleagues (2020) explored attitudes toward former romantic partners in an Austrian sample of heterosexual respondents. They found that men held less negative attitudes than women. In two studies conducted i...

Theory and research seek to isolate the properties of experts in judgment and decision-making tasks. Confidence in judgment and social projection have emerged as two important meta-judgmental markers. The joint utility of these two indicators of expertise has not been considered yet. We show that the joint study of individual and contextual differe...

At its best, strategic thinking yields an advantage needed to beat an opponent. At the least, it protects the person from exploitation. In four studies, conducted in two countries, we used a simple number-guessing game, in which one respondent wins by guessing the number chosen by another. We show that people generate numbers nonrandomly, and, on t...

When deciding on an online purchase, consumers often face a plethora of information. Yet, individuals consumers differ greatly in the amount of information they are willing and able to acquire and process before making purchasing decisions. Extensively processing all available information does not necessarily promote good decisions. Instead, the em...

Psychologists, economists, historians, computer scientists, sociologists, philosophers, and legal scholars explore the conscious choice not to seek information. The history of intellectual thought abounds with claims that knowledge is valued and sought, yet individuals and groups often choose not to know. We call the conscious choice not to seek or...

Trust is based on both rational considerations (outcomes and expectations) and moral considerations (respect for moral norms). We find that social proximity shifts the extent to which trust is perceived as a moral decision. People are more likely to trust similar strangers (partners they share personality traits with) because they feel it is the mo...

The experimental research paradigm lies at the core of empirical psychology. New data analytical and computational tools continually enrich its methodological arsenal, while the paradigm’s mission remains the testing of theoretical predictions and causal explanations. Predictions regarding experimental results necessarily point to the future. Once...

Social projection is the tendency to assume that others are similar to the self, whereas self-enhancement is the tendency to see them as inferior. Although these concepts appear to be in conflict, we suggest that both can stem from the same motive of self-protection. In three studies, we show that respondents overestimate the prevalence of self-enh...

A review of ‘Perfectly confident: How to calibrate your decisions wisely’ by Don A. Moore. Accepted for publication in the American Journal of Psychology.

Building on classic game theory, psychologists have explored the effects of social preferences and expectations on strategic behaviour. Ordinary social perceivers are sensitive to additional contextual factors not addressed by game theory and its recent psychological extensions. We review the results of a research programme exploring how observers...

Social projection is the tendency to assume that others are similar to the self, whereas self-enhancement is the tendency to see them as inferior. Although these concepts appear to be in conflict, we suggest that both can stem from the same motive of self-protection. In three studies, we show that respondents overestimate the prevalence of self-enh...

When two actors have exactly the same mental states but one happens to harm another person (unlucky actor) and the other one does not (lucky actor), the latter elicits milder moral judgment among bystanders. We hypothesized that the social role from which transgressions are perceived would moderate this outcome effect. In three preregistered expe...

When two actors have exactly the same mental states but one happens to harm another person (unlucky actor) and the other one does not (lucky actor), the latter elicits milder moral judgment among bystanders. We hypothesized that the social role from which transgressions are perceived would moderate this outcome effect. In three preregistered experi...

This is not the story of a catastrophic breakdown of scientific thinking but rather of a minor case of forecasting myopia, which, we think, is diagnostic of a larger point. Our forecasting failure occurred when we were studying the decision to make a prosocial sacrifice in the so-called Volunteer’s Dilemma (VoD). The VoD is a rather challenging sit...

When two actors have the same mental states but one happens to harm another person (unlucky actor) and the other one does not (lucky actor), the latter elicits milder moral judgment. To understand how this outcome effect would affect post-harm interactions between victims and perpetrators, we examined how the social role from which transgressions a...

As the debate over best statistical practices continues in academic journals, conferences, and the blogosphere, working researchers (e.g., psychologists) need to figure out how much time and effort to invest in attending to experts' arguments, how to design their next project, and how to craft a sustainable long-term strategy for data analysis and...

A volunteer’s dilemma exists when a prosocial act such as volunteering leaves the volunteer better off than if no one had volunteered but worse off than if someone else had volunteered. Ideally, a person would do what others are not doing. Research has identified psychological processes and judgmental heuristics affecting the likelihood of voluntee...

In a volunteer's dilemma (VoD), one person must make a material sacrifice so that others benefit. If no one makes a sacrifice, everyone is worse off than a volunteer. How do people make the decision to volunteer? We explore 4 a priori strategies in a 2-person 1-shot VoD. Two strategies focus a person's attention on either his or her own (egocentris...

Impression formation is a basic module of fundamental research in social cognition, with broad implications for applied research on interpersonal relations, social attitudes, employee selection, and person judgments in legal and political context. Drawing on a pool of 28 predominantly positive traits used in Solomon Asch’s (1946) seminal impression...

The practice of Significance Testing (ST) remains widespread in psychological science despite continual criticism of its flaws and abuses. Using simulation experiments, we address four concerns about ST and for two of these we compare ST’s performance with prominent alternatives. We find the following: First, the 'p' values delivered by ST predict...

As the debate over best statistical practices continues in academic journals, conferences, and the blogosphere, working researchers (e.g., psychologists) need to figure out how much time and effort to invest in attending to experts’ arguments, how to design their next project, and how to craft a sustainable long-term strategy for data analysis and...

In a volunteer’s dilemma (VoD), one person must make a material sacrifice so that others benefit. If no one makes a sacrifice, everyone is worse off than a volunteer. How do people make the decision to volunteer? We explore four a priori strategies in a two-person one-shot VoD. Two strategies focus a person’s attention to either his or her own (ego...

Alle Menschen befinden sich eigentlich in einer vollkommen unkontrollierbaren Situation. Wir wissen nicht woher wir kommen und wohin wir gehen werden. Zudem ist uns aufgrund der außerordentlichen Leistungsfähigkeit des menschlichen kognitiven Systems bewusst, dass wir irgendwann sterben werden. Um diesem Gefühl der Unkontrollierbarkeit ein Stück we...

Die Sozialpsychologie befasst sich mit dem Erleben und Verhalten von Menschen in Interaktion mit ihrer Umwelt. Mithilfe unterschiedlicher wissenschaftlicher Methoden – von qualitativer Befragung bis zum echten Experiment – wird in dieser Grundlagendisziplin das Verhalten des Menschen anhand einer Stichprobe von Individuen systematisch untersucht, w...

Die moderne Sozialpsychologie beschäftigt sich auch mit den neuronalen Grundlagen sozialpsychologischer Phänomene, was im Rahmen der sozialen Neurowissenschaften mittels neurowissenschaftlicher Methodik erfolgt. Vorwiegend werden hierzu EEG- und fMRT-Studien durchgeführt, in denen die Aktivität bestimmter Nervenzellen gemessen bzw. die Anatomie und...