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Advantages of bias and prejudice: An exploration of their neurocognitive templates
Abstract
Bias is common in mental-processing tasks as diverse as target recognition, heuristic estimation and social judgment. This paper holds that cognitive biases stem from the covert operation of neural modules, which evolved to subserve adaptive behavior. Such modules can be innate or forged early in development. Research shows links between (i) biases in cognitive tasks and (ii) neural devices, which may mediate them. Evidence is included from biases that arise spontaneously in artificial neural networks during recognition/decision tasks. Two linked propositions follow. First, there are continuities in biasing strategies across different levels of cognitive processing. Second, a proclivity for stereotyping and prejudice depends on the biased functions of lower-level neural modules that promote adaptations to social environments. The propositions rest on evidence of biological preparedness for stereotyping and of deficits in social judgment in patients with neurological lesions. To test such claims, research studies are suggested at the boundary of cognitive neuroscience and social psychology. Advantages of bias and prejudice as evolved tools may include their: (1) speeding of scrutiny and improving of target detection in changing or uncertain situations; (2) aiding of a rapid choice of practical short-term rather than optimal longer term plans; (3) allowing appraisal of a workable world by creating fairly stable categories; (4) motivating of exploration and completion of problem-solving which might otherwise be abandoned too early. The biological priming of social biases need not mean that they are immutable; understanding them could lead to better ways of controlling them.
... Indeed, Krebs and Denton (1997) argued that the mechanisms of the human mind evolved in a way that favors social-cognitive biases because the biases promote survival through reciprocity processes; positively evaluating others in our in-group reassures us that our fellow in-group members will see to our needs. Similarly, Tobena, Marks, and Dar (1999) suggested that intergroup bias is due to the biased functioning of brain mechanisms that ordinarily facilitate social interactions. They argued that "stereotyping and prejudice may depend on 'prepared' properties of human neural machinery" (p. ...
... Consequently, we felt that the IAT would provide a good way to explore the possibility that people have a propensity for automatic intergroup bias, perhaps the result of hardwired mental configurations that have evolved for adaptive functioning (cf. Krebs & Denton, 1997;Tobena et al., 1999). ...
... Rather, perhaps intergroup bias stems in part from the way the human mind is organized and how it structures information (cf. Tobena et al., 1999). ...
Three experiments provided evidence that intergroup bias occurs automatically under minimal conditions, using the Implicit Association Test (IAT; A. G. Greenwald, D. E. McGhee, & J. L. K. Schwartz, 1998). In Experiment 1, participants more readily paired in-group names with pleasant words and out-group names with unpleasant words, even when they were experienced only with the in-group and had no preconceptions about the out-group. Participants in Experiment 2 likewise showed an automatic bias favoring the in-group, even when in-group/out-group exemplars were completely unfamiliar and identifiable only with the use of a heuristic. In Experiment 3, participants displayed a pro-in-group IAT bias following a minimal group manipulation. Taken together, the results demonstrate the ease with which intergroup bias emerges even in unlikely conditions.
... They are automatic and immediate, thus saving valuable cognitive processing resources and result in immediate action. Implicit biases are also mental shortcuts, used for quick categorization and identification of "ingroups" and "outgroups" (Tobena, Marks, & Dar, 1999). ...
... Research with young children suggests we are predisposed to categorize by gender, race, and age (Tobena et al., 1999). By age 5, children already take into account race as well as language and accent when choosing playmates (Anzures et al., 2013). ...
... Namely, individuals who hold favorable attitudes toward an outgroup member are likely to attend to that person's positive attributes, while those with unfavorable attitudes will focus on negative qualities. One such tendency is known as confirmation bias, or the unconscious propensity to pay closer attention to evidence that confirms our views and less attention to evidence that contradicts them (Tobena et al, 1999). For example, individuals who believe that outgroup members are threatening or inferior attend to evidence that supports their perception and ignore evidence to the contrary. ...
The report shows how the PTHV model and process of relational home visits builds understanding and trust, reduces anxiety and stress, and fosters positive cross-group interactions between educators and families. Moreover, these relational capacities are critical for identifying and reducing educators’ and families’ implicit biases that too often lead to disconnects, missed opportunities, and discriminatory behaviors in and
beyond the classroom. The findings indicate that when educators and families build mutually respectful and trusting relationships they become more aware of stereotypes and biases and work toward leaving them behind. As a result, they are both better equipped to support the students’ education. With the help of relational home visits, their common interest—the child’s success—wins out over unconscious assumptions. The report also offers valuable recommendations for strengthening and deepening the impact of relational home visits. How can we create more opportunities for educators and parents to identify and reflect on their implicit biases? How can we offer greater support to parents? How can we intentionally link home visits with a systems approach to decreasing implicit bias? We look forward to answering these questions together.
... Mai important, numeroase studii au arãtat cã module neuronale specifice ajutã la procesarea informaþiei sociale. De exemplu, s-a dovedit cã recunoaºterea expresiilor emoþionale pentru fricã ºi mânie se face în primul rând în amigdalã (Tobena, Marks ºi Dar, 1999). ...
... ).Tobena, Marks ºi Dar (1999) au propus o interpretare a erorilor cognitive în general ºi a stereotipurilor ºi prejudecãþilor în special din punctul de vedere al valorii lor adaptative. Dupã aceºti autori, erorile cognitive, fie ele la nivel perceptual, de memorie, social etc., sunt determinate de funcþionarea unor module neuronale specializate care opereazã automat. ...
... This is also true for stereotypes, as often we are forced to make quick judgments about people. Salient features are processed automatically and quickly, saving us resources and precious time (Tobena, Marks, & Dar, 1999). ...
... Another psychological construct related to the confirmation bias and the need for closure is overconfidence. As Tobena et al. (1999) noted, even people who are trained to rule out biases tend to be overconfident in estimating their performance and the accuracy of their assessments. For example, Koriat et al. (1980) gave participants a dual-choice general knowledge test, and asked them to rate their confidence in the chosen answer for each item. ...
This paper presents a theoretical model suggesting that doubt and certainty are two extremes of a continuum. Different people can be located in different locations on this continuum, according to how much they tend to seek refutation vs. confirmation. In both ends of the continuum lay mental disorders, which can be seen as extreme deviations from the usual relatively stable equilibrium between the two thinking processes. One end is defined by excessive skepticism and manifested as obsessive compulsive disorder (OCD), a disorder characterized by incessant doubt. The other end is defined by excessive certainty and lack of doubt, manifested as delusional disorders. Throughout this article, we demonstrate that the differences between normative thoughts and delusional thoughts are relatively vague, and that in general, the human default tendency is to prefer certainty over doubt. This preference is reflected in the confirmation bias as well as in other cognitive constructs such as overconfidence and stereotypes. Recent perspectives on these biases suggest that the human preference for confirmation can be explained in evolutionary terms as adaptive and rational. A parallel view of the scientific enterprise suggests that it also requires a certain equilibrium between skepticism and confirmation. We conclude by discussing the importance of the dialectic relationship between confirmation and refutation in both lay thinking and scientific thought.
Copyright © 2015 Elsevier Ltd. All rights reserved.
... The scale has previously been used as a measure of intuition in problem solving (Metcalfe, 1986). We argued that FOW allows us to probe conscious awareness more directly than either CR or PDW, as the scale ratings are not influenced by participants' decision strategies, such as risk aversion (see : Schurger & Sher, 2008), or personal theories on certainty (e.g. the illusion of validity -see: Tobena, Marks, & Dar, 1999). ...
... This may also suggest that the applied response criterion is distorted in all the scales to some extent, either as an effect of risk aversion (as in case of PDW -see: Clifford et al., 2008;Schurger & Sher, 2008), or the other assumptions people made on the scale requirements (e.g. illusion of validity -see: Tobena et al., 1999). ...
We compare four subjective awareness measures in the context of a visual identification task and investigate quantitative differences in terms of scale use and correlation with task performance. We also analyse the effect of identification task decisions on subsequent subjective reports. Results show that awareness ratings strongly predict accuracy for all scale types, although the type of awareness measure may influence the reported level of perceptual awareness. Surprisingly, the overall relationship between awareness ratings and performance was weaker when participants rated their awareness before providing identification responses. Furthermore, the Perceptual Awareness Scale was most exhaustive only when used after the identification task, whereas confidence ratings were most exhaustive when used before the identification task. We conclude that the type of subjective measure applied may influence the reports on visual awareness. We also propose that identification task decisions may affect subsequent awareness ratings.
... A recent fMRI experiment (Volz et al., 2009) using a minimal group paradigm showed additional MPFC activity when people made evaluative group decisions (dividing money between the in-group versus the out-group). This suggests that these between-group categorizations and in-group biases happen quite easily and it has been suggested that these cognitive biases could result from neural models that have evolved through evolution (Tobena et al., 1999). However, the question still remains whether a difference in neural representation associated with social categorization is also present when no evaluative processes are involved. ...
... The fact that we used competition between in-group and out-group to increase group identification probably only strengthened this effect (Sherif et al., 1961). Given the benefits associated with group membership, such difference in neural processing could be a result of evolution, in which our brains have developed to perceive the in-group and out-group differently (Hastorf and Cantril, 1954;Brewer and Caporael, 1990;Tobena et al., 1999;von Hippel and Trivers, 2011). Note that we do not argue that a single region (i.e. ...
Group membership is an important aspect of our everyday behavior. Recently, we showed that existing relevant in-group labels
increased activation in the medial prefrontal cortex (MPFC) compared with out-group labels, suggesting a role of the MPFC
in social categorization. However, the question still remains whether this increase in MPFC activation for in-group representation
is solely related with previous experience with the in-group. To test this, we randomly assigned participants to a red or
blue team and in a subsequent functional magnetic resonance imaging experiment they categorized red and blue team words as
belonging to either the in-group or the out-group. Results showed that even under these minimal conditions increased activation
was found in the MPFC when participants indicated that they belonged to a group, as compared with when they did not. This
effect was found to be associated with the level of group identification. These results confirm the role of MPFC in social
categorization.
... Çünkü eleştirel düşünme eğitim içerikleri bilişsel uyumsuzluk (Brookfield, 1995) yaratan, öğrencileri yapmak ve yaşamak istediklerine ilişkin karar almayı, etkin olmayı, olay ve olguları farklı bakış açısıyla incelemelerini (Şenşekerci ve Bilgin, 2008) sağlamaya yöneliktir. Bilginin yetersizliği gibi belirsizlik hallerindeki karar verme zorunluluğu ise zaman sınırlılığı, kestirme yol kullanımını ve yapılabilecek yanlışları uyumlu davranışlar haline sokmayı gerektirir (Tobena, Marks ve Dar, 1999). Macera eğitim programları da bu özellikleri işbirliğine dayalı grup çalışmasına adapte uyumsuzluk durumları geliştirerek sağlamaktadır (Priest ve Gass, 2018). ...
... When people judge whether something is a bird, they do not reason about all the elements of a bird but make a quick judgment. When people wonder how much someone belongs to one race or another, they seldom agonize over the features of that race, but instead they rely upon their cognitive template of that race (i.e., stereotypes; Tobena et al., 1999) to make a quick judgment. ...
Victimhood drives morality and politics. Morality evolved to protect from victimization, and today morality still revolves around concerns about victimhood and harm. Unfortunately, liberals and conservatives often identify different victims, creating political division. In this review of the psychology of perceived victimhood, we demonstrate its power and complexity. First, we look at evolution to explore why victimhood is so powerful, highlighting one neglected fact about human nature: humans are more prey than predator. Second, we examine three different definitions of what victimhood is based on understandings of individuals, groups, and morality, and how these definitions of victimhood can set the stage for conflict. Third, we explore how victimhood matters in judgments of others. It forms the core of moral judgments:people condemn acts based on how much these acts seem to victimize others. People also typecast others as victims or victimizers. Fourth, we review when people see themselves as a victim, and how this licenses selfishness. Finally, we show how victimhood inflames moral and political division, but also how it can bridge divides through sharing and acknowledging experiences of suffering.
... In particular, the lack of information in uncertainty institutions encountered and the time limitation, the shortcuts used, errors and biases that are often necessary to make decisions together with this uncertainty make them compatible. According to many researchers, such a mechanism is not only adaptive but also cognitively a feature that we bring ready (Tobena, A., Marks, I, and Dar, R. 1999). According to Beyer (1985), although there are many definitions of critical thinking, almost all of these definitions emphasize the ability / tendency to obtain, evaluate and use information effectively. ...
The aim of this research is to determine the relationship between preservice physical education teachers' self-efficacy beliefs and critical thinking tendencies. For this purpose, our universe constitutes preservice physical education teachers studying at different universities in the 2018-2019 academic year. The research sample consists of 640 preservice teachers in total, 350 males and 290 females. Cities in which the preservice teachers are involved in the research and the universities where they are studying; It consists of 8 provinces: Bartın, Bolu, Çorum, Düzce, Karabük, Kastamonu, Sinop, Zonguldak. Within the scope of the research, "California Critical Thinking Scale (CCTDI)" and "Teacher Self-Efficacy Scale" were used to obtain the data collected from preservice teachers. The data collected for the purpose of the research were analyzed with the SPSS-25 statistical program. Structural equation modeling analyzes were carried out using the data collected from 640 participant groups using the AMOS-25 package program. As a result, students can be directed to earn these trends through activities aimed at gaining critical thinking skills and tendencies by rethinking physical education and sports school programs being implemented in our country. In this regard, university students can be given the opportunity to become highly critical individuals.
... Humans often form opinions about a person or a group based on certain characteristics or traits they possess. This ability to infer information about a person or group is an evolutionary response that is thought to have helped members from different tribes recognize friends from foes during encounters (1). As society has become more heterogeneous, this once adaptive advantage is now a social problem that affects people who are deemed different. ...
An accent is a distinctive way a language is pronounced in a nation, community, or social class. Everyone has an accent, and we acquire our accents from listening to the people around us. Non-Caucasian children born in the United States most often speak English with a standard American accent, but they are often perceived to speak with a non-native accent. Three studies were done over three years to understand this behavior. In the first study, we hypothesized that the speaker’s race would play a role in the perception of the speaker’s accent. We found that the race of the speaker alone influenced the perception of the speaker’s accent as native or non-native, with native representing the standard American accent. In the second study, we hypothesized that listeners’ exposure to a linguistically diverse environment would help prevent the formation of stereotypes. The results from the second study showed that exposure to a multicultural environment reduced listeners’ stereotyping of a speaker’s accent based on the attributed race of the speaker, and this was independent of the race of the listener. Lastly, the third study explored the effectiveness of a brief intervention program that directly educated participants about speech stereotyping. We hypothesized that children would be more receptive to the educational program on stereotypes than adults. Our study showed that adults were receptive to education on stereotypes; however, the study on children’s receptiveness to education on stereotypes was inconclusive.
... Biases also create motivation to exploration and to complete projects (sunk cost and bandwagon effects, for instance). Moreover, they give adaptability to changing situations and speed up routine decisions (Tobena et al., 1999). ...
Opportunity recognition and evaluation, decision-making and long-term visions are vital in terms of coping and success of a company. In these situations, people often act against rationality, favour certain information or decisions and underestimate risks. These are caused by biases, and corporations need to be aware of them to dilute their effects. Especially in corporation sustainability, in which environmental, economic, and social dimensions must be considered, biases might cause discrimination due to prejudice of people, short-term vision due to irrational and insufficient data-analysis, and bad decisions due to unilateral opinions. To overcome them, it is necessary to start being aware of their existence, doing critical thinking and not rushing in decision-making. There are, however, also good sides about biases, but they can only be leveraged after they have first been learned to avoid and master them.
... Participants in these studies were clearly unaware that their confidence in their performance was excessive, as evidenced by their willingness to bet money on their answers. Overconfidence is assumed to be a universal bias, proposed to have an evolutionary basis and to be adaptive for optimal functioning (Johnson & Fowler, 2011;Tobena, Marks, & Dar, 1999). Against this backdrop, the current findings of under-confidence in individual with OCD appears to be unique, 3 suggesting not merely a lack of a protective normative bias in OCD, but rather the existence of a negative bias in the opposite direction. ...
People with obsessive-compulsive disorder (OCD) tend to distrust their memory, perception, and other cognitive functions, and many OCD symptoms can be traced to diminished confidence in one's cognitive processes. For example, poor confidence in recall accuracy can cause doubt about one's memory and motivate repeated checking. At the same time, people with OCD also display performance deficits in a variety of cognitive tasks, so their reduced confidence must be evaluated in relation to their actual performance. To that end, we conducted an exhaustive review and meta-analysis of studies in which OCD participants and non-clinical control participants performed cognitive tasks and reported their confidence in their performance. Our search resulted in 19 studies that met criteria for inclusion in the quantitative analysis, with all studies addressing either memory or perception. We found that both performance and reported confidence were lower in OCD than in control participants. Importantly, however, confidence was more impaired than performance in participants with OCD. These findings suggest that people with OCD are less confident in their memory and perception than they should be, indicating a genuine under-confidence in this population. We discuss potential mechanisms that might account for this finding and suggest avenues for further research into under-confidence and related meta-cognitive characteristics of OCD.
... Biases are shortcuts that people use to make quick decisions in a complex world and are, in general, not strictly negative [24,6]. The main risk with biases is that they operate outside of conscious awareness and yet, influence a person's decision making. ...
Implicit biases towards groups of people is acquiring an increasingly stronger focus in many areas of our society. Recognizing these biases is a difficult task, as biases are subconscious and socially unacceptable. We propose Stranded, a game in which players are led to reveal and recognize possible racial and gender biases. Players face challenges, inspired by real-world examples of bias-inducing situations, where they must assign the type of person they think fits a particular task, in a group survival context, and with limited time and knowledge. After each round, the ideal character for each task is given away through small hints; ultimately, players will not survive the challenge if they ignore them and rely on prior biases. This spurs players to think more deeply about characters in terms of inner strengths rather than prior biases. Stranded is an effective tool for raising interesting classroom discussions, by anonymously collecting the decisions made by all players, and showing their aggregate outcomes per task, which easily leads to a conversation on the motivation for certain decisions. An evaluation of Stranded shows that it is effective at provoking players to make biased judgements and that a considerable percentage of players felt more aware of their biases after playing the game.
... However, bias should not be alleviated arbitrarily. In human recognition pipeline, "Cognitive bias" [32], as a psychological activity, benefits our decisionmaking in uncertain and intricate circumstances with the help of language [31]. Figure2 illustrates how cognitive bias impacts on relation cognition. ...
Scene graph generation is a sophisticated task because there is no specific recognition pattern (e.g., "looking at" and "near" have no conspicuous difference concerning vision, whereas "near" could occur between entities with different morphology). Thus some scene graph generation methods are trapped into most frequent relation predictions caused by capricious visual features and trivial dataset annotations. Therefore, recent works emphasized the "unbiased" approaches to balance predictions for a more informative scene graph. However, human's quick and accurate judgments over relations between numerous objects should be attributed to "bias" (i.e., experience and linguistic knowledge) rather than pure vision. To enhance the model capability, inspired by the "cognitive bias" mechanism, we propose a novel 3-paradigms framework that simulates how humans incorporate the label linguistic features as guidance of vision-based representations to better mine hidden relation patterns and alleviate noisy visual propagation. Our framework is model-agnostic to any scene graph model. Comprehensive experiments prove our framework outperforms baseline modules in several metrics with minimum parameters increment and achieves new SOTA performance on Visual Genome dataset.
... Bias is inherent to mental processing and although it can be advantageous in speeding up decision making and motivating problem-solving [34], its influence on our thought processes creates vulnerability to false assumptions and reasoning flaws [35]. Cognitive bias is systematic error in thinking that influences decisions we make [36], for example, giving weight to information because we heard it first. ...
Background
Developing since colonisation, Australia’s healthcare system has dismissed an ongoing and successful First Nations health paradigm in place for 60,000 years. From Captain James Cook documenting ‘very old’ First Nations Peoples being ‘far more happier than we Europeans’ and Governor Arthur Phillip naming Manly in admiration of the physical health of Gadigal men of the Eora Nation, to anthropologist Daisy Bates’ observation of First Nations Peoples living ‘into their eighties’ and having a higher life expectancy than Europeans; our healthcare system’s shameful cultural safety deficit has allowed for an Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander child born in Australia today to expect to live 9 years less than a non-Indigenous child. Disproportionately negative healthcare outcomes including early onset diabetes-related foot disease and high rates of lower limb amputation in Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander Peoples contribute to this gross inequity.
Main body
In 2020, the Australian Health Practitioner Regulation Authority released the National Scheme’s Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander Health and Cultural Safety Strategy 2020–2025 - empowering all registered health practitioners within Australia to provide health care to Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander Peoples that is inclusive, respectful and safe, as judged by the recipient of care. This recently released strategy is critically important to the podiatry profession in Australia. As clinicians, researchers and educators we have a collective responsibility to engage with this strategy of cultural safety. This commentary defines cultural safety for podiatry and outlines the components of the strategy in the context of our profession. Discussion considers the impact of the strategy on podiatry. It identifies mechanisms for podiatrists in all settings to facilitate safer practice, thereby advancing healthcare to produce more equitable outcomes.
Conclusion
Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander Peoples access health services more frequently and have better health outcomes where provision of care is culturally safe. By engaging with the National Scheme’s Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander Health and Cultural Safety Strategy, all registered podiatrists in Australia can contribute to achieving equity in health outcomes for Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander Peoples.
... In particular, the lack of information in uncertainty institutions encountered and the time limitation, the shortcuts used, errors and biases that are often necessary to make decisions together with this uncertainty make them compatible. According to many researchers, such a mechanism is not only adaptive but also cognitively a feature that we bring ready (Tobena, A., Marks, I, and Dar, R. 1999). According to Beyer (1985), although there are many definitions of critical thinking, almost all of these definitions emphasize the ability / tendency to obtain, evaluate and use information effectively. ...
The aim of this research is to determine the relationship between preservice physical education teachers' self-efficacy beliefs and critical thinking tendencies. For this purpose, our universe constitutes preservice physical education teachers studying at different universities in the 2018-2019 academic year. The research sample consists of 640 preservice teachers in total, 350 males and 290 females. Cities in which the preservice teachers are involved in the research and the universities where they are studying; It consists of 8 provinces: Bartın, Bolu, Çorum, Düzce, Karabük, Kastamonu, Sinop, Zonguldak. Within the scope of the research, “California Critical Thinking Scale (CCTDI)” and “Teacher Self-Efficacy Scale” were used to obtain the data collected from preservice teachers. The data collected for the purpose of the research were analyzed with the SPSS-25 statistical program. Structural equation modeling analyzes were carried out using the data collected from 640 participant groups using the AMOS-25 package program. As a result, students can be directed to earn these trends through activities aimed at gaining critical thinking skills and tendencies by rethinking physical education and sports school programs being implemented in our country. In this regard, university students can be given the opportunity to become highly critical individuals.
... Çünkü eleştirel düşünme eğitim içerikleri bilişsel uyumsuzluk (Brookfield, 1995) yaratan, öğrencileri yapmak ve yaşamak istediklerine ilişkin karar almayı, etkin olmayı, olay ve olguları farklı bakış açısıyla incelemelerini (Şenşekerci ve Bilgin, 2008) sağlamaya yöneliktir. Bilginin yetersizliği gibi belirsizlik hallerindeki karar verme zorunluluğu ise zaman sınırlılığı, kestirme yol kullanımını ve yapılabilecek yanlışları uyumlu davranışlar haline sokmayı gerektirir (Tobena, Marks ve Dar, 1999). Macera eğitim programları da bu özellikleri işbirliğine dayalı grup çalışmasına adapte uyumsuzluk durumları geliştirerek sağlamaktadır (Priest ve Gass, 2018). ...
Araştırmanın amacı, risk alma ve eleştirel düşünme becerilerinde doğa macera eğitimine katılıma bağlı anlamlı değişimlerin olup olmadığını incelemektir. Araştırmaya 19 kadın (x̄yaş = 20.21 ± 1.96) ve 22 erkek (x̄yaş = 19.90 ± 1.41) olmak üzere toplam 41 üniversite öğrencisi gönüllü olarak katılmıştır. Macera eğitimi süreci 8 hafta boyunca birer saatlik kuramsal derslerin sonunda Aladağlar Milli Parkı’nda gerçekleştirilen doğa kampçılığı ve yürüyüşü, interaktif doğa eğitimi ve zirve tırmanışı (3480 m) etkinliklerini içeren 5 günlük kampı kapsamıştır. Veriler Alana Özgü Risk Alma Ölçeği- Kısa Formu (DOSPERT) (Yavaş Tez ve Dinç, 2017) ve Eleştirel Düşünme Eğilimleri Ölçeği (KEDEÖ) (Kökdemir, 2003) ile kuramsal eğitim öncesi ve kamp sonrası olmak üzere öntest-sontest şeklinde toplanmıştır. Verilerin analizinde, bağımsız gruplarda ve tekrarlı ölçümlerde t-testi kullanılmıştır. Analiz sonuçlarına göre, katılımcıların etkinlik öncesi ve sonrası rekreasyonel risk alma boyutunda anlamlı artış (t=-2.82; p<.01), etik risk alma boyutunda ise anlamlı düşüş (t=2.09; p<.05) belirlenmiştir. Eleştirel düşünme alt boyutlarında ise sırasıyla analitiklik (t=-2.29; p<.05), açık fikirlilik (t=7.03; p<.001), meraklılık (t=-3.23; p<.05) alt boyutlarında ve eleştirel düşünme toplam puanında (t=-5.38; p<.001) anlamlı artış, kendine güven alt boyutunda ise anlamlı düşüş (t=2.67; p<.05) olduğu saptanmıştır. DOSPERT’ten alınan toplam puanlar dikkate alındığında; erkeklerin kadınlara oranla her iki ölçümde anlamlı ölçüde yüksek risk aldıkları (t¹=-5.53, p<.001;t²=-2.61, p<.05), eleştirel düşünmenin ise analitiklik alt boyutu ve toplam puanları açısından cinsiyete göre farklılık göstermediği (p>.05) saptanmıştır. Sonuç olarak doğa macera eğitimlerinin özellikle rekreasyonel risk alma eğilimlerini arttırdığı, erkeklerin kadınlara göre risk alma eğilimlerinin daha yüksek olduğu, eğitimin eleştirel düşünme eğilimlerinde artışa neden olduğu ancak cinsiyetler arasında fark yaratmadığı söylenebilir.
... Finally, based on cognitive psychological research, we have a reason to believe that biased perception leads to biased judgement (see e.g. Tobena, Marks, and Dar 1999), and the risk for these biases is the greatest in contexts where cues are ambiguous. Especially in contexts characterized by moderate diversity, there are no clear indicators that would help in making accurate judgments about the actual degree of diversity or about its consequences for oneself and one's ingroup. ...
This nation-wide probability sample survey study among Finnish majority group members (N = 335) focused on the interactive effects of objective and subjective ethno-cultural diversity on three indicators of intergroup relations: outgroup attitudes, perceived group and personal discrimination, and outgroup trust. Complementing previous research that has mostly examined a linear relationship between cultural diversity and intergroup relations, special attention was given to moderate diversity contexts, which are claimed to pose different challenges to intergroup dynamics than high- and low-diversity contexts. It was hypothesised that majority group members who live in contexts characterised by moderate levels of objective diversity but subjectively perceive high levels of diversity will report more negative outgroup attitudes, lower levels of outgroup trust and higher levels of discrimination, as compared to those living in low- or high-diversity contexts. The hypothesis was confirmed for perceived group discrimination and outgroup trust. The results highlight the need to acknowledge possible non-linear relationships between diversity and intergroup relations.
... We may then go on to assume that she is relatively wealthy. Argu9bly, stereotyping is convenient because it prevents us having to work out another person's attitudes and likely behaviour · from fiist principles (Buchanan and Huczynski, 1997); enabling speedier situational scrutiny, short-term decision making and more manageable encounters with the world (Tobena et al., 1999). Indeed, Seligman (1997) suggests that stereotyping is a reasonable collection of social observations. ...
... 12 It thus enables speedier situational scrutiny, short-term decision making and more manageable encounters with the world. 13 How many of us (perhaps acting as caring parents or relatives) actively encourage our children or young relatives to see unknown males as "stranger-dangers"? On the other hand, stereotyping can lead to minor or gross inaccuracies, causing us to make [131] chapter four Perception, Stereotyping, and Attribution judgements about others that are overly generous or prejudicial. ...
... Instead we will use language (e.g., "better safe than sorry") that recognizes threat and negativity biases as normal to human processing systems (Baumeister, Bratslavsky, Finkenauer, & Vohs, 2001). Moreover, threat focused styles of attending and thinking can be very functional and understandable, and can track evolutionarily important concerns (Tobena, Marks, & Dar, 1999). We agree too that like OCD, not all behavior in BDD has to be conceptualised as a compulsion just because it is repetitive (Storch et al, 2008). ...
The descriptive phenomenology of Body Dysmorphic Disorder (BDD) is well known in terms of the content of the beliefs, the attentional biases and the nature of the repetitive behaviors. Less has been written about the function of BDD symptoms in relationship to a perceived threat of a distorted body image and past aversive experiences. This article therefore explores the functional and evolutionary contexts of the phenomenology of BDD as part of threat based safety strategies. The attentional bias and checking are discussed in terms of threat detection and monitoring. Behaviors such as comparing self with others and camouflaging appearances have the function of monitoring and avoiding social threats such as social contempt, shame, rejection and ridicule from others. These fears may be rooted in early aversive emotional memoires. People with BDD may find it difficult to engage in therapy if they do not have a good understanding of the context and function of their behaviors and if the memories of past aversive experiences (e.g., of rejections and shame) have not been emotionally processed. In addressing these social threats we discuss how the mammalian attachment and affiliation based emotions need to be recruited as part of the therapeutic process. These affiliative processing systems underpin a compassionate orientation to working with people with BDD and their capacity for engaging in the change process.
... La vivencia emocional valorativa antecede al juicio -se deduce una opinión y se actúa contra algo o alguien tan sólo a partir de un breve análisis-y es un proceso mental universal. Se basa en estrategias «mentales» más simples, «atajos cognitivos», automáticos, difícilmente detectados conscientemente, innatos y fraguados a lo largo de la experiencia, y son útiles para planear y decidir a corto plazo 7,8 . Los motivos que guían los comportamientos son fenómenos afectivos y se rigen por una lógica sentimental. ...
... By definition, bias refers to a systematic preference, which primes either the selection of targets or the recruitment of operational modes that results in weighted options in cognitive routines. Such weightings usually produce efficient performance, but can also lead to false observations or deductions (Tobena, Marks & Dar 1999: 1047. ...
This paper reports on decision-making cognitions just before and during the start-up decision within the entrepreneurial process. It uses empirical results based on responses collected through questionnaires from entrepreneurs, managers, employees and students as respon- dents. The importance of entrepreneurial cognitions is reported, and the possible implications during the decision-making process are explored. Using a case design required respondents to read a case and decide whether they would start the venture or not. First viability thoughts about the venture happened as early as reading 12% into the case, and 81% of the respondents had their first thought about the viability of the venture before reading 36% of the case. As all the financial information was attached at the end, viability was judged to a large extent without reading financial information. This confirms that respondents appear to have used heuristics (shortcuts) and biases to make the start-up decision. Correlation and inter-correlation strengths and directions between business risk perception, misconceptions, self-efficacy and illusion of control bias with the start-up decision and viability thoughts were established. Highly significant differences between those that sup- ported the start-up and those that did not were observed for business risk perception and misconceptions, and significant differences for illusion of control bias, but none for self-efficacy. The paper recognises the importance of cognitions in entrepreneurial thinking and the tendency to make judgements without complete information. This may lead to decisions that can contribute to failure, or may alternatively be the reason why some entrepreneurs are successful.
... Data is required, for example, on empathic perception with regard to the suffering of members of the exo-group, comparing normative with sectarian individuals (50,59). Likewise, it is imperative that we further our understanding of the links between biological markers of group identity and certain mechanisms of neurocognitive facilitation, as this interdependence is usually taken advantage of by doctrinal creeds in order to widen the gap between one group and another (60,63). This kind of evidence should serve to support, much more strongly, the approach suggested in the present paper. ...
... The influence of Descartes on current medical thinking is a good example of such a remote authority. But such broad categorization can come at a dangerous cost to society when negative stereotyping of a person or group of persons gives rise to prejudicial attitudes or behavior toward them [23]. ...
To address how health professionals may inadvertently contribute to the stigmatization of patients with chronic pain.
Formulation and implementation of the Australian National Pain Strategy.
Review of current concepts of stereotyping and stigma, consideration of their relationship to empathy, and how they might impinge upon the clinical encounter.
The extinction of empathy, which we refer to as "negative empathy," can overwhelm health professionals, allowing the entry of negative community stereotypes of chronic pain sufferers and add to their stigmatization. Prevailing dualistic frames of reference encourage this process.
Greater awareness by health professionals of their own potential, often inadvertent, contribution to the stigmatization of their patients with chronic pain may serve as a basis for an expanded model of clinical engagement.
... 78,95 Over the past 4 decades, intense research has been ongoing to explain not only the psychological mechanisms for reasoning, formulation of judgments, and decision making, but also in more recent years to study the neural functions of the brain during these processes. [96][97][98][99][100][101] The literature consistently shows that people use a subsystem of intuitive mental routines to cope with the complexity inherent in most decisions. These simplifying heuristic mechanisms, although prone to bias and errors, are nonetheless essential in directing our judgment and in most situations will serve us well. ...
Studies show that our brains use 2 modes of reasoning: heuristic (intuitive, automatic, implicit processing) and analytic (deliberate, rule-based, explicit processing). The use of intuition often dominates problem solving when innovative, creative thinking is required. Under conditions of uncertainty, we default to an even greater reliance on the heuristic processing. In health care settings and other such environments of increased importance, this mode becomes problematic. Since choice heuristics are quickly constructed from fragments of memory, they are often biased by prior evaluations of and preferences for the alternatives being considered. Therefore, a rigorous and systematic decision process notwithstanding, clinical judgments under uncertainty are often flawed by a number of unwitting biases. Clinical orthodontics is as vulnerable to this fundamental failing in the decision-making process as any other health care discipline. Several of the more common cognitive biases relevant to clinical orthodontics are discussed in this article. By raising awareness of these sources of cognitive errors in our clinical decision making, our intent was to equip the clinician to take corrective action to avoid them. Our secondary goal was to expose this important area of empirical research and encourage those with expertise in the cognitive sciences to explore, through further research, the possible relevance and impact of cognitive heuristics and biases on the accuracy of orthodontic judgments and decision making.
Prejudice research in social neuroscience has largely relied upon imaging technologies which show that particular 'target' brain areas are activated after presenting prejudice-provoking stimuli. The social neuroscience approach to stereotype formation and prejudice has typically focused on the amygdala and frontal lobe as key areas. fMRI studies have shown that the dorsolateral prefrontal cortex is implicated in the detection of implicit attitudes and the anterior cingulate cortex is associated with their regulation. However, there has been little investigation into the anterior temporal lobes (ATL) despite their involvement in semantic association and social processing. In a recent series of experiments we investigated the role of the ATLs in prejudice by utilising a non-invasive form of brain stimulation - repetitive transcranial magnetic stimulation (rTMS). rTMS has an advantage over imaging techniques because it allows tentative causal inferences to be drawn about a 'target' brain area as it is either stimulated or inhibited and its effect on the behavior in question is observed. The current series of studies show that the ATLs are involved in prejudice and investigate whether this effect is specific to stereotypes or if the effect is generalizable to all categories of concept formation.
Suicidal attacks are a warfare tactic rooted in lethal altruism, a highly damaging drift away from people's more generous tendencies. Martyrs who commit these acts are extreme altruists by definition: They offer their lives as a supreme investment for others' interests. Individual differences in altruism have been measured using scales and economic games that have led to a growing understanding of their genetic and neurohormonal basis. Analyzing that in relation to suicide martyrdom leads to a question: Are there pockets of individuals among all populations who are willing to make high-cost investments of trust/sacrifice in nonkin others, particularly at war? Disentangling the neurocognitive attributes of altruism and its relationship to other traits mediating martyrdom proneness is a vital task to understand the genesis of suicidal attacks. A temperamental workspace for warriors encompassing the trait dimensions of dominance- submission, Machiavellianism-gullibility, and selfishness-altruism is outlined to frame the main clusters mediating violent martyrdom.
This chapter explores possible evolutionary contexts and processes that seem to be involved in down regulating positive affect. The chapter explores the evolutionary basis for helplessness, entrapment and defeat, and attachment loss as natural solicitors of low mood and depression. In addition, the interconnectedness of physiological systems such as the immune system and affect regulating systems are discussed. Special attention is given to the role of social relationships as emotion regulators and self-evaluative processes such as shame and self-criticism. Depression is a complex and multifaceted process regulated and influenced by a range of psychological, social physiological processes. Seeking single process based theories and therapies are unlikely to be successful and may explain why treatment and prevention of depression remains problematic.
IntroductionClassification and Unipolar DepressionSymptoms and SyndromesCompeting ClassificationsThe Limits of ClassificationLeaky Classes and ComorbidityDepression and the Threshold ProblemCase Identification in ResearchQuestionnaires and InterviewsBottom-up and Top-Down Case IdentificationThe Frequency of Depressive DisorderDepression and SexDepression and AgeOther Sociodemographic Variables That Influence Rates of DepressionBIological Explanations for the Sex Ratio In DepressionLife Stress and DepressionThe Childhood Antecedents of Later DepressionThe Epidemiology of Treatment for DepressionThe Genetic Epidemiology of Major DepressionConclusions
References
This opening article outlines some key themes of an evolutionary approach to psychopathology, and explores possible implications for cognitive therapy. Evolutionary psychology suggests that many of our mental mechanisms are designed to promote survival and reproduction, not happiness, or even mental health, as such. This article focuses on the concept of evolved strategies and their phenotypic expressions, to fit specific niches. It suggests that evolved strategies and their phenotypic expressions partly operate through two psychobiological systems, called the defense and safeness systems, which detect and respond to threats and punishments, and safeness and potential rewards, respectively. Various cognitive schemas, rules and automatic thoughts, especially those linked to psychopathology, are often products of the linkages in strategies as coded in defense and safeness systems. The latter part of the article gives a brief exploration of the view that self-to-self relationships (self-evaluations and "self-talk") evolved from social cognitions and behavior. Negative self-evaluations, self-criticism, and self-attacking are viewed as internalized interactions between a hostile, dominant part of self, and an appeasing, subordinate part of self. One way of undermining this interaction is to introduce the notion of compassion for the self. A brief consideration is given to the development of "compassionate mind" in work with shame-prone people as expressed in high self-criticalness and/or self-hating. Throughout the text the main problems addressed are those of the more chronic, emotional difficulties often associated with some degree of what is called personality disorder.
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In this chapter, I start by describing the principles of classification, the resultant problems for the epidemiology of depression, and the revision of the ICD and DSM classificatory systems. I then provide an update on the epidemiology of depression in terms of age, sex, and life stress, integrating the findings of the recent World Mental Health Survey Initiative, which applied uniform methods to national surveys across the globe. As inexorable economic advancement is no longer guaranteed, I describe a number of aspects of the epidemiology of depression in the workplace. This covers the effects of unemployment, job characteristics, job insecurity, financial strain and debt. Potential mechanisms are reviewed. Finally, I summarise the major impact of childhood circumstances: various forms of disadvantage, bullying and sexual abuse
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IntroductionCognitive-Behavioural ModelsThe Practice of TherapyEvaluation of CBT for DepressionConclusions
References
Numerous biological factors have been found to be associated with depression. This chapter reviews the major findings in this area, including endocrine, neurochemical, neuroimaging, cellular and inflammatory markers. Attempts are made to describe coherent biological models of depression, and how biological changes relate to other known aetiological factors in depression such as genetic vulnerability, childhood adversity and life stresses. We also describe how biological factors affect treatment outcome, and relates specific biological changes to different sub-types of depression. Finally, we attempt to illustrate the complex inter-relationships that exist between the various biological factors described.
We present a summary of the biological treatment of mood disorders, focussing on pharmacotherapy. We discuss strategies for the treatment of unipolar disorder, including monotherapy, augmentation, use of novel agents, and controversial but widely available treatments such as St John's Wort. Pharmacotherapy may be used in conjunction with psychotherapy, and we present the trial evidence for this. For bipolar disorder, we present an overview of the pharmacological approaches for prophylaxis, management of acute mania and bipolar depression.
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The aim of this chapter is to outline commonly used measures of the level of depression in clinical and research endeavours. The measures are categorised according to the methods for assessing depression: idiographic vs nomothetic; self- vs observer-completed; rating scales vs structured interviews; multi-trait vs unitary trait; and psychometric vs behavioural approaches (including psychomotor abnormalities and speech characteristics). The Beck Depression Inventory and the Hamilton Rating Scale for Depression remain the most widely used psychometric measures, but the Patient Health Questionnaire-9 has shown a rapid increase in popularity. It is concluded that the various aspects of depression are best captured by using a battery of measures, including psychometric and behavioural approaches.
The classification of bipolar disorder has been the subject of much debate over the last few years, with some arguing for broader, dimensional classification of bipolar disorder, in comparison to the current categorical approach. This has raised the question of whether bipolar disorder is under-diagnosed, a question that has relevance for all those involved in planning and providing mental health services. To address these issues, there is a need to address how the current classification system evolved, and the epidemiological foundations upon which it has been built. In this chapter we summarise the historical underpinnings of current classification, review the epidemiological basis for this, and address recent controversies within the field of psychiatric classification and bipolar disorder.
Conflicts occur in all aspects of life, even genes compete for expression. Human conflicts tend to follow archetypal themes.
Like other animals we battle over resources and access to resources, power and status, and sexual opportunities. Many of our
human motivational systems have evolved over many millions of years and are key drivers for the emotional urgency by which
we pursue conflicts, seek to gain an advantage or subdue or even destroy competitors. Around 2 million years ago a species
leading to humans began to evolve capacities for high level cognitive processing which eventually gave us opportunities to
pursue our motivational systems in totally new ways. Whereas animals may fight and think about getting revenge humans can
use their intelligence to manipulate the minds of others, called them to war, and focus resources and scientific efforts to
the building of the most destructive weapons. Humans like other animals are also a highly tribal species and intergroup and
intertribal conflicts are extremely easy to stimulate. When this happens we have certain kinds of mindsets. These mindsets
are mostly about seeking an advantage in some way, so that the powerful always dominate the week. In contrast compassion focuses
on the plight of the weak, with a desire to improve their life situation and facilitate justice and fairness We can contextualise
International Negotiations as part of the process by which different archetypes are playing out their dramas for competitive
edge or compassionate engagement. This chapter will explore these dynamics in detail and argue that facilitating compassion
in international negotiations probably requires us to recognise, the complex archetypal dramas we are trapped in, and the
need for international law and third-party independent arbitration of conflicts.
Studies of risk perception examine the judgements people make when they are asked to characterize and evaluate hazardous activities
and technologies. This research aims to aid risk analysis and policy-making by providing a basis for understanding and anticipating
public responses to hazards and improving the communication of risk information among lay people, technical experts, and decision-makers.
This work assumes that those who promote and regulate health and safety need to understand how people think about and respond
to risk. Without such understanding, well-intended policies may be ineffective.
The notion of a neuron that responds selectively to the image of a particular complex object has been controversial ever since Gross and his colleagues reported neurons in the temporal cortex of monkeys that were selective for the sight of a monkey's hand (Gross, Rocha-Miranda, & Bender, 1972). Since that time, evidence has mounted for neurons in the temporal lobe that respond selectively to faces. The present paper presents a critical analysis of the evidence for face neurons and discusses the implications of these neurons for models of object recognition. The paper also presents some possible reasons for the evolution of face neurons and suggests some analogies with the development of language in humans.
Current thinking about Pavlovian conditioning differs substantially from that of 20 years ago. Yet the changes that have taken place remain poorly appreciated by psychologists generally. Traditional descriptions of conditioning as the acquired ability of one stimulus to evoke the original response to another because of their pairing are shown to be inadequate. They fail to characterize adequately the circumstances producing learning, the content of that learning, or the manner in which that learning influences performance. Instead, conditioning is now described as the learning of relations among events so as to allow the organism to represent its environment. Within this framework, the study of Pavlovian conditioning continues to be an intellectually active area, full of new discoveries and information relevant to other areas of psychology.
In both biology and the human sciences, social groups are sometimes treated as adaptive units whose organization cannot be reduced to individual interactions. This group-level view is opposed by a more individualistic one that treats social organization as a byproduct of self-interest. According to biologists, group-level adaptations can evolve only by a process of natural selection at the group level. Most biologists rejected group selection as an important evolutionary force during the 1960s and 1970s but a positive literature began to grow during the 1970s and is rapidly expanding today. We review this recent literature and its implications for human evolutionary biology. We show that the rejection of group selection was based on a misplaced emphasis on genes as “replicators” which is in fact irrelevant to the question of whether groups can be like individuals in their functional organization. The fundamental question is whether social groups and other higher-level entities can be “vehicles” of selection. When this elementary fact is recognized, group selection emerges as an important force in nature and what seem to be competing theories, such as kin selection and reciprocity, reappear as special cases of group selection. The result is a unified theory of natural selection that operates on a nested hierarchy of units.The vehicle-based theory makes it clear that group selection is an important force to consider in human evolution. Humans can facultatively span the full range from self-interested individuals to “organs” of group-level “organisms.” Human behavior not only reflects the balance between levels of selection but it can also alter the balance through the construction of social structures that have the effect of reducing fitness differences within groups, concentrating natural selection (and functional organization) at the group level. These social structures and the cognitive abilities that produce them allow group selection to be important even among large groups of unrelated individuals.
Three studies examined infant preferences for attractive faces in four types of faces: White adult male and female faces, Black adult female faces, and infant faces. Infants viewed pairs of faces, previously rated for attractiveness by adults, in a visual preference paradigm. Significant preferences were found for attractive faces across all facial types. The results confirm earlier reports of this phenomenon and extend those results by showing that infant preferences for attractive faces generalize across faces differing in race, gender, and age. Two potential explanations for these observed infant preferences are discussed.
After people learn to sort objects into categories they see them differently. Members of the same category look more alike and members of different categories look more different. This phenomenon of within-category compression and between-category separation in similarity space is called categorical perception (CP). It is exhibited by human subjects, animals and neural net models. In backpropagation nets trained first to auto-associate 12 stimuli varying along a one-dimensional continuum and then to sort them into 3 categories, CP arises as a natural side-effect because of four factors: (1) Maximal interstimulus separation in hidden-unit space during auto-association learning, (2) movement toward linear separability during categorization learning, (3) inverse-distance repulsive force exerted by the between-category boundary, and (4) the modulating effects of input iconicity, especially in interpolating CP to untrained regions of the continuum. Once similarity space has been "warped" in this way, the compressed and separated "chunks" have symbolic labels which could then be combined into symbol strings that constitute propositions about objects. The meanings of such symbolic representations would be "grounded" in the system's capacity to pick out from their sensory projections the object categories that the propositions were about.
Many decisions are based on beliefs concerning the likelihood of uncertain events such as the outcome of an election, the guilt of a defendant, or the future value of the dollar. Occasionally, beliefs concerning uncertain events are expressed in numerical form as odds or subjective probabilities. In general, the heuristics are quite useful, but sometimes they lead to severe and systematic errors. The subjective assessment of probability resembles the subjective assessment of physical quantities such as distance or size. These judgments are all based on data of limited validity, which are processed according to heuristic rules. However, the reliance on this rule leads to systematic errors in the estimation of distance. This chapter describes three heuristics that are employed in making judgments under uncertainty. The first is representativeness, which is usually employed when people are asked to judge the probability that an object or event belongs to a class or event. The second is the availability of instances or scenarios, which is often employed when people are asked to assess the frequency of a class or the plausibility of a particular development, and the third is adjustment from an anchor, which is usually employed in numerical prediction when a relevant value is available.
Tested the proposal by M. Snyder and S. W. Uranowitz that there exists a memory-priming mechanism by which information about a person that is normally unavailable in episodic memory is made available by the activation of a person stereotype that subsumes that information. In 2 experiments 128 college students read a biography of Betty K, who was later labeled as either a heterosexual or a lesbian before Ss took a recognition memory test. A signal-detection model was used to assess the effects of labeling on response bias as well as on the amount of information available in memory. The memory availability hypothesis predicted that Ss primed with a lesbian label for Betty K would have more availability in memory of lesbian information, and Ss primed with a heterosexual label would remember more heterosexual material. Neither experiment produced any improved recognition memory for biographic information due to activation of a sexual stereotype. Both experiments found a response bias (guessing) acting in the direction of the label S received. (22 ref) (PsycINFO Database Record (c) 2006 APA, all rights reserved).
Two studies, one with 2- to 3-month-olds and one with 6- to 8-month-olds, were conducted to examine infant preferences for attractive faces. A standard visual preference technique was used in which infants were shown pairs of color slides of the faces of adult women previously rated by other adults for attractiveness. The results showed that both the older and younger infants looked longer at attractive faces when the faces were presented in contrasting pairs of attractiveness (attractive/unattractive). When the faces were presented in pairs of similar levels of attractiveness (attractive/attractive vs. unattractive/unattractive) the older but not the younger infants looked longer at attractive faces. The results challenge the commonly held assumption that standards of attractiveness are learned through gradual exposure to the current cultural standard of beauty and are merely "in the eye of the beholder.".
The authors examined whether the negative behavior of 1 Black male would influence White participants' perceptions of Black Americans and behavior toward another Black person. In Study I, it was found that participants in the Black-negative condition tended to stereotype Blacks more than participants in the Black-control condition did. It was also found that participants who had observed a negative behavior, whether it was performed by a Black or a White confederate, avoided a subsequently encountered Black person more often than did participants in either the positive condition or the control condition. In a 2nd study, interpersonal interactions with a Black person were minimized only after participants observed the negative behavior of a Black confederate. Study 3 extended the findings of Study 1 by showing that group level stereotypes and the expression of ingroup favoritism resulted from simply overhearing a conversation in which a Black person was alleged to have committed a crime.
A fundamental task of language acquisition is to extract abstract algebraic rules. Three experiments show that 7-month-old
infants attend longer to sentences with unfamiliar structures than to sentences with familiar structures. The design of the
artificial language task used in these experiments ensured that this discrimination could not be performed by counting, by
a system that is sensitive only to transitional probabilities, or by a popular class of simple neural network models. Instead,
these results suggest that infants can represent, extract, and generalize abstract algebraic rules.
[opening paragraph] -- Clark: The ‘astonishing hypothesis’ which you put forward in your book, and which you obviously feel is very controversial, is that ‘You, your joys and sorrows, your memories and ambitions, your sense of personal identity and free will are, in fact, no more than the behaviour of a vast assembly of nerve cells. As Lewis Carroll's Alice might have phrased it: ‘You're nothing but a pack of neurons’.’ But it seems to me that this is not so astonishing a statement for a scientist to make. Isn't this what reductionist science has always believed?
The term working memory refers to a brain system that provides temporary storage and manipulation of the information necessary for such complex cognitive tasks as language comprehension, learning, and reasoning. This definition has evolved from the concept of a unitary short-term memory system. Working memory has been found to require the simultaneous storage and processing of information. It can be divided into the following three subcomponents: (i) the central executive, which is assumed to be an attentional-controlling system, is important in skills such as chess playing and is particularly susceptible to the effects of Alzheimer's disease; and two slave systems, namely (ii) the visuospatial sketch pad, which manipulates visual images and (iii) the phonological loop, which stores and rehearses speech-based information and is necessary for the acquisition of both native and second-language vocabulary.
Scitation is the online home of leading journals and conference proceedings from AIP Publishing and AIP Member Societies
The term working memory refers to a brain system that provides temporary storage and manipulation of the information necessary
for such complex cognitive tasks as language comprehension, learning, and reasoning. This definition has evolved from the
concept of a unitary short-term memory system. Working memory has been found to require the simultaneous storage and processing
of information. It can be divided into the following three subcomponents: (i) the central executive, which is assumed to be
an attentional-controlling system, is important in skills such as chess playing and is particularly susceptible to the effects
of Alzheimer's disease; and two slave systems, namely (ii) the visuospatial sketch pad, which manipulates visual images and
(iii) the phonological loop, which stores and rehearses speech-based information and is necessary for the acquisition of both
native and second-language vocabulary.
ABSTRACT This chapter considers the two main approaches to deductive thinking: theories based on formal rules of infer- ence postulate that deduction is a syntactic process akin to a logical proof; the mental model theory postulates that it is a semantic,process akin to the search for counterexamples. Experimental,evidence,bears out the predictions of the model theory: the more models needed for a deduction, the harder it is; erroneous,conclusions,are consistent with the premises; and ^general knowledge ,affects the process of search. Recent neurological evidence bears out, as the model theory predicts, a significant involvement of the right hemi- sphere in reasoning. If deduction is a purely verbal process then
Three approaches to the nature of human rationality are considered: Daniel Kahneman and Amos Tversky on decision making, David Hume on causation, and Peter Strawson on morality. All are seen as deploring the state of rational thought and despairing of the human capacity for logic. Their implicit model of the perfectly rational human is explored with the help of Mr. Spock and found to be of doubtful value considered in terms of evolutionary survival, where "prejudgment" is essential to decision making under stress. The glimmerings of this insight are found in Hume's "therapeutic" solution to his existential dilemma, and a general argument is made - with the help of side glances at prototype theory, linguistics, categorical thinking, and archetypes - that rationality cannot be equated with "logic" as generally understood but rather consists of a series of pragmatic prejudgments of reality that have stood the test of natural selection. This leads to a reconstruction of the idea of "prejudice" from a negative to a mildly positive attribute, with examples drawn from Charles Lamb and Paul Robeson, and hence to the conclusion that prejudice is not a warped form of thought but that thought is a particular form of prejudice.
The present study utilised a cognitive paradigm to examine attentional biases in mildly depressed persons. Twelve depressed and 12 nondepressed subjects completed an attentional task similar to that employed by MacLeod, Mathews, and Tata (1986). A tachistiscope was used to present subjects with a series of word pairs, each with one word printed above the other. Three types of word pairs were presented: manic-neutral, depressed-neutral, and manic-depressed. Selective attention to one member of a word pair was assessed using ac perception task. Based on cognitive models of depression, it was hypothesised that the depressed subjects would attend more to depressed-content words than to manic- or neutral-content words, whereas the nondepressed subjects would not exhibit any attentional biases. In contrast to these predictions, analyses indicated that whereas the depressed subjects attended equally to depressed-, manic-, and neutral-content words, the nondepressed subjects attended more to manic-content than they did to neutral- or depressed-content words. These results add support to the documentation of evenhandedness in the cognitive functioning of depressed subjects, and of self-sewing biases in nondepressed subjects. The present findings are discussed in terms of a zoom lens model of attention, in which depressed persons attempt to exhaustively process their sensory world, but with a loss of attentional resolution. In contrast, nondepressed individuals attempt to process a more limited portion of their sensory world, but with an increase in attentional power. Finally, directions for future research in this area are offered.
Memory illusions may be defined as cases in which a rememberer's report of a past event seriously deviates from the event's actual occurrence. This article introduces the special issue of theJournal of Memory and Languagethat is devoted to memory illusions by grounding their study in the context of perceptual illusions. Perceptual illusions have been investigated since the 1850s, whereas memory illusions have been systematically investigated only since the late 1960s or early 1970s (despite some pioneering research and writing before this time). I suggest possible reasons for this discrepancy in research activity, sketch a brief history of the study of memory illusions, and then consider the variety of memory illusions that are studied in contemporary psychology. The papers composing the special issue are introduced during this brief cataloging of memory illusions. Related areas of research are discussed in the concluding remarks.
Previous research on categorical perception (CP) has focussed primarily on low-level sensory continua. In a series of recent studies, we have found CP effects for ‘higher level’ representations: individual face categories. These findings suggest that CP effects can be acquired through experience, since such effects appear to vary as a direct function of the level of familiarity with individual faces. Thus, CP boundaries need not be innately specified. As such, the phenomenon of CP is much broader than has previously been believed. In this paper, we discuss the implications of these findings and explore various possible mechanisms to account for the phenomena. We then describe a number of further studies designed to distinguish between competing accounts.
It is usually assumed that people are visually aware of at least some of the neuronal activity in the primary visual area, V1, of the neocortex. But the neuroanatomy of the macaque monkey suggests that, although primates may be aware of neural activity in other visual cortical areas, they are not directly aware of that in area V1. There is some psychophysical evidence in humans that supports this hypothesis.
Most so-called “errors” in probabilistic reasoning are in fact not violations of probability theory. Examples of such “errors” include overconfidence bias, conjunction fallacy, and base-rate neglect. Researchers have relied on a very narrow normative view, and have ignored conceptual distinctions—e.g. single case versus relative frequency—fundamental to probability theory. By recognizing and using these distinctions, however, we can make apparently stable “errors” disappear, reappear, or even invert. I suggest what a reformed understanding of judgments under uncertainty might look like.
[ David Sloan Wilson ][1] The simple theory of natural selection predicts that an individual, whether human or animal, will act "selfishly" so as to maximize his or her genetic contribution to the next generation. But what of altruism, kindness, and generosity? Where do these traits fit into theories of survival of the fittest? In his Perspective, Wilson discusses an article in The American Naturalist that suggests that these behaviors arose in humans to maximize the survival of groups of hunter-gatherers, and that selection has acted not only on the individual, but on groups as well.
[][2]
[1]: http://www.sciencemag.org#affiliation
[2]: http://
Memory bias for negative versus positive adjectives was investigated in 11 recovered primary unipolar depressives, 12 non-psychiatric controls and 9 current depressives. Adjectives were presented in an intentional memory task, in either a self- or unfamiliar other person-referent condition, where a yes/no judgement was made of whether each word described the respective person. Depressives showed a negative self-referent bias in recall while the recovered group and the controls recalled more positive than negative self-referent material. However, in the other person-referent condition, the recovered depressives recalled fewer positive than negative adjectives, a pattern not shown by the other groups, suggesting that retrieval operations in recovery are not completely normal. It is suggested that the negative self-referent recall bias is a function of both mood and more enduring cognitive structures. Implication of these results for vulnerability are discussed.
Edward O. Wilson, Pellegrino University Research Professor and Honorary Curator in Entomology at Harvard University, is the author of 18 books, 2 of which have received the Pulitzer Prize; an ardent defender of the liberal arts; and a promoter of global conservation of species and natural ecosystems
Discusses situations in which people fail to use valid but abstract information about base-rate behavior. A review of empirical studies indicates that concrete information is used heavily in judgments about self and others; evidence is also presented showing little support for the view that people use consensus information in making attributions. Methodological issues are also examined. (PsycINFO Database Record (c) 2012 APA, all rights reserved)
[This book] is written for students of cognitive psychology, and also for clinicians and researchers in the areas of cognition, stress and emotional disorders. (PsycINFO Database Record (c) 2012 APA, all rights reserved)
describe the emotional phenomena of fear and anxiety from a clinical perspective / review . . . psychophysiological findings, and [provide] an analysis of the stimulus contexts that set the stage for the phenomena of fear and anxiety / the issue here is whether there are several forms of anxiety and fear or whether different manifestations originate from a common source
[discuss] theoretical structures that are needed to understand the phenomena of anxiety / the theoretical perspective derives from information-processing psychology emphasizing the nonconscious mechanisms . . . pivotal in understanding fear and anxiety / [discuss] some of the implications of this theoretical perspective / [this] perspective . . . views phobias and panic disorders as physiologically driven, and generalized anxiety disorder as a cognitively driven, with posttraumatic stress disorder (PTSD) at a somewhat intermediate position between the two groups (PsycINFO Database Record (c) 2012 APA, all rights reserved)