Here and now
Quick to Act, Quick to Forget: The Link Between Impulsiveness and Prospective Memory
Carrie Cuttler, Tonia Relkov & Steven Taylor
European Journal of Personality, forthcoming
Abstract:
Several traits of impulsiveness (e.g. lack of planning and perseverance, difficulty focusing attention) seem intimately connected to the skills required for successful prospective memory performance. This is the first study to examine whether the various inter-correlated dimensions of impulsiveness are related to problems with prospective memory. Undergraduate students (N = 184) completed the Barratt Impulsiveness Scale 11, the Prospective Memory Questionnaire, the Prospective and Retrospective Memory Questionnaire, and two objective prospective memory tests. Results revealed consistent correlations between the various dimensions of impulsiveness (attentional, motor, non-planning) and self-reported problems with prospective memory. Subsequent regression analyses indicated that attentional impulsiveness is a unique predictor of self-reported problems with internally cued prospective memory, and non-planning impulsiveness is a unique predictor of self-reported problems with episodic and overall prospective memory. Similarly, findings from the objective prospective tests showed that non-planning impulsiveness was related to worse performance on the two prospective memory tests. Whereas non-planning impulsiveness was also related to using fewer prospective memory-aiding strategies, mediation analyses showed that use of these strategies does not account for any of the detected relationships. Because the findings suggest that a failure to plan does not underlie the detected effects, other potential explanations for the relationships are discussed.
----------------------
Bias and brains: Risk aversion and cognitive ability across real and hypothetical settings
Matthew Taylor
Journal of Risk and Uncertainty, June 2013, Pages 299-320
Abstract:
I collect data on subjects' risk attitudes using real and hypothetical risky choices. I also measure their cognitive ability using the cognitive reflective test (CRT). On average, measured risk preferences are not significantly different across real and hypothetical settings. However, cognitive ability is inversely related to risk aversion when choices are hypothetical, but it is unrelated when the choices are real. This interaction between cognitive ability and hypothetical setting is consistent with the notion that some individuals, specifically higher-ability individuals, may treat hypothetical choices as "puzzles," and provides one potential explanation for why some studies find that subjects indicate that they are more tolerant of risk when they make hypothetical choices than when they make real choices.
----------------------
Perceptions of Toxic Exposure: Considering "White Male" and "Black Female" Effects
Nnenia Campbell, Christine Bevc & Steven Picou
Sociological Spectrum, July/August 2013, Pages 313-328
Abstract:
Research on risk perception suggests that social position produces identifiable patterns in the way that people evaluate potential risks, particularly in locally polluted environments. The present study builds upon this literature by examining perceived risk of exposure to environmental toxins among residents located on the Gulf Coasts of Louisiana and Mississippi following Hurricane Katrina. Demographic information from a sample of residents was used to explore the concepts of the "white male effect" and the "black female effect," discussed in recent research. In support of existing literature, we find that white males tend to be exceptionally risk accepting when asked about potential toxic exposure, whereas black females tend to be exceptionally risk averse compared to other groups. Our analysis suggests that awareness of differential vulnerability and long-standing conflicts over environmental contamination across the Gulf Coast region have left some residents with heightened sensitivity to the possibility of a locally polluted environment.
----------------------
Compulsive Cell Phone Use and History of Motor Vehicle Crash
Stephen O'Connor et al.
Journal of Adolescent Health, forthcoming
Purpose: Few studies have examined the psychological factors underlying the association between cell phone use and motor vehicle crash. We sought to examine the factor structure and convergent validity of a measure of problematic cell phone use, and to explore whether compulsive cell phone use is associated with a history of motor vehicle crash.
Methods: We recruited a sample of 383 undergraduate college students to complete an online assessment that included cell phone use and driving history. We explored the dimensionality of the Cell Phone Overuse Scale (CPOS) using factor analytic methods. Ordinary least-squares regression models were used to examine associations between identified subscales and measures of impulsivity, alcohol use, and anxious relationship style, to establish convergent validity. We used negative binomial regression models to investigate associations between the CPOS and motor vehicle crash incidence.
Results: We found the CPOS to be composed of four subscales: anticipation, activity interfering, emotional reaction, and problem recognition. Each displayed significant associations with aspects of impulsivity, problematic alcohol use, and anxious relationship style characteristics. Only the anticipation subscale demonstrated statistically significant associations with reported motor vehicle crash incidence, controlling for clinical and demographic characteristics (relative ratio, 1.13; confidence interval, 1.01-1.26). For each 1-point increase on the 6-point anticipation subscale, risk for previous motor vehicle crash increased by 13%.
Conclusions: Crash risk is strongly associated with heightened anticipation about incoming phone calls or messages. The mean score on the CPOS is associated with increased risk of motor vehicle crash but does not reach statistical significance.
----------------------
Evidence for a heritable brain basis to deviance-promoting deficits in self-control
James Yancey et al.
Journal of Criminal Justice, forthcoming
Purpose: Classic criminological theories emphasize the role of impaired self-control in behavioral deviancy. Reduced amplitude of the P300 brain response is reliably observed in individuals with antisocial and substance-related problems, suggesting it may serve as a neurophysiological indicator of deficiencies in self-control that confer liability to deviancy.
Methods: The current study evaluated the role of self-control capacity - operationalized by scores on a scale measure of trait disinhibition - in mediating the relationship between P300 brain response and behavioral deviancy in a sample of adult twins (N = 419) assessed for symptoms of antisocial/addictive disorders and P300 brain response.
Results: As predicted, greater disorder symptoms and higher trait disinhibition scores each predicted smaller P300 amplitude, and trait disinhibition mediated observed relations between antisocial/addictive disorders and P300 response. Further, twin modeling analyses revealed that trait disinhibition scores and disorder symptoms reflected a common genetic liability, and this genetic liability largely accounted for the observed phenotypic relationship between antisocial-addictive problems and P300 brain response.
Conclusions: These results provide further evidence that heritable weaknesses in self-control capacity confer liability to antisocial/addictive outcomes and that P300 brain response indexes this dispositional liability.
----------------------
Discounting for Personal and Social Payments: Patience for Others, Impatience for Ourselves
Gregory Howard
Journal of Environmental Economics and Management, forthcoming
Abstract:
The market rate of return on private investment is often used as the discount rate when conducting Cost-Benefit Analysis (CBA) of public projects. I argue that the decision to invest pits current consumption against future consumption, both of which accumulate to the private decision maker. Public projects, on the other hand, provide benefits that accrue to society in general. To examine the appropriateness of discount rates based on returns to private investment, this paper considers lab experiments designed to test whether individuals discount personal and social benefits at different rates. Personal benefits are captured through personal monetary payments, while social benefits are captured through anonymous donations to charitable organizations. I jointly elicit time and risk preferences and find that subjects discount charitable contributions at significantly lower rates than personal payments.
----------------------
Deborah Zaitchik, Yeshim Iqbal & Susan Carey
Child Development, forthcoming
Abstract:
There is substantial variance in the age at which children construct and deploy their first explicit theory of biology. This study tests the hypothesis that this variance is due, at least in part, to individual differences in their executive function (EF) abilities. A group of 79 boys and girls aged 5-7 years (with a mean age of 6½ years) were presented with two test batteries: (a) a biology battery that probed their understanding of life, death, and body functions and (b) an EF battery that tested working memory, inhibition, and set-shifting skills. Individuals' EF scores significantly predict their biology scores, even after controlling for age and verbal IQ.
----------------------
Learned Cardiac Control with Heart Rate Biofeedback Transfers to Emotional Reactions
Nathalie Peira, Gilles Pourtois & Mats Fredrikson
PLoS ONE, July 2013
Abstract:
Emotions involve subjective feelings, action tendencies and physiological reactions. Earlier findings suggest that biofeedback might provide a way to regulate the physiological components of emotions. The present study investigates if learned heart rate regulation with biofeedback transfers to emotional situations without biofeedback. First, participants learned to decrease heart rate using biofeedback. Then, inter-individual differences in the acquired skill predicted how well they could decrease heart rate reactivity when later exposed to negative arousing pictures without biofeedback. These findings suggest that (i) short lasting biofeedback training improves heart rate regulation and (ii) the learned ability transfers to emotion challenging situations without biofeedback. Thus, heart rate biofeedback training may enable regulation of bodily aspects of emotion also when feedback is not available.
----------------------
Genetic and environmental contributions to stability and change in levels of self-control
Kevin Beaver et al.
Journal of Criminal Justice, forthcoming
Purpose: There has been an emerging body of research estimating the stability in levels of self-control across different sections of the life course. At the same time, some of this research has attempted to examine the factors that account for both stability and change in levels of self-control. Missing from much of this research is a concerted focus on the genetic and environmental architecture of stability and change in self-control.
Methods: The current study was designed to address this issue by analyzing a sample of kinship pairs drawn from the Child and Young Adult Supplement of the National Longitudinal Survey of Youth 1979 (CNLSY).
Results: Analyses of these data revealed that genetic factors accounted for between 74 and 92 percent of the stability in self-control and between 78 and 89 percent of the change in self-control. Shared and nonshared environmental factors explained the rest of the stability and change in levels of self-control.
Conclusions: A combination of genetic and environmental influences is responsible for the stability and change in levels of self-control over time.
----------------------
Is it all about the self? The effect of self-control depletion on ultimatum game proposers
Eliran Halali, Yoella Bereby-Meyer & Axel Ockenfels
Frontiers in Human Neuroscience, June 2013
Abstract:
In the ultimatum-game, as in many real-life social exchange situations, the selfish motive to maximize own gains conflicts with fairness preferences. In the present study we manipulated the availability of cognitive-control resources for ultimatum-game proposers to test whether preference for fairness is a deliberative cognitive-controlled act or an automatic act. In two experiments we found that a shortage of cognitive control (ego depletion) led proposers in the ultimatum game (UG) to propose significantly more equal split offers than non-depleted proposers. These results can be interpreted as resulting from an automatic concern for fairness, or from a greater fear of rejection, which would be in line with a purely self-interested response. To separate these competing explanations, in Experiment 2 we conducted a dictator-game in which the responder cannot reject the offer. In contrast to the increased fairness behavior demonstrated by depleted ultimatum-game proposers, we found that depleted dictator-game allocators chose the equal split significantly less often than non-depleted allocators. These results indicate that fairness preferences are automatically driven among UG proposers. The automatic fair behavior, however, at least partially reflects concern about self-interest gain. We discuss different explanations for these results.
----------------------
The effect of prior outcomes on gender risk-taking differences
Desmond Lam & Bernadete Ozorio
Journal of Risk Research, Summer 2013, Pages 791-802
Abstract:
This study proposed that men are more likely to take greater risk after a win (‘house money' effect), while women are more likely to take greater risk after a loss (‘escalation of commitment' effect). These effects are, however, moderated by prior experiences in risk-taking and role characteristics. Three distinct groups of 30 subjects (total = 90) each were solicited to play an experimental betting game. The subjects were categorized into risk providers (RP), risk customers (RC), and non-risk customers (NRC). RP are represented by casino executives, RC by leisure life-time casino gamblers, and NRC by non-casino gamblers. On average, RC group was found to take most betting risk. Male RCs were more likely to bet more after a win, while female RCs were more likely to bet more after a loss. NRCs, irrespective of gender, were more likely to bet more after a loss. There were no gender risk-taking differences in prior outcomes in the RP group.