Showing papers in "Psychological Review in 1983"

Extensional versus intuitive reasoning: The conjunction fallacy in probability judgment.

Abstract: Perhaps the simplest and the most basic qualitative law of probability is the conjunction rule: The probability of a conjunction, P (A&B) cannot exceed the probabilities of its constituents, P (A) and P (B), because the extension (or the possibility set) of the conjunction is included in the extension of its constituents. Judgments under uncertainty, however, are often mediated by intuitive heuristics that are not bound by the conjunction rule. A conjunction can be more representative than one of its constituents, and instances of a specific category can be easier to imagine or to retrieve than instances of a more inclusive category. The representativeness and availability heuristics therefore can make a conjunction appear more probable than one of its constituents. This phenomenon is demonstrated in a variety of contexts including estimation of word frequency, personality judgment, medical prognosis, decision under risk, suspicion of criminal acts, and political forecasting. Systematic violations of the conjunction rule are observed in judgments of lay people and of experts in both between-subjects and within-subjects comparisons. Alternative interpretations of the conjunction fallacy are discussed and attempts to combat it are explored.

The 1982 Interpersonal Circle: A taxonomy for complementarity in human transactions

Abstract: The purpose of this article is to integrate previous theory and research addressing interpersonal complementarity, a construct that is central to refined and extended research and clinical applications of interpersonal theory. The article first describes the 1982 Interpersonal Circle, which the author constructed as a comprehensive taxonomy of the domain of two-dimensional interpersonal behavior. The 1982 Circle integrates and expands the content of four major adult interpersonal measures (LaForge & Suczek's Interpersonal Check List, Wiggins's Interpersonal Adjective Scales, Lorr & McNair's Interpersonal Behavior Inventory, and Kiesler et al.'s Impact Message Inventory) to provide a circle taxonomy consisting of 16 segments, 128 subclasses, 2 levels, and 350 bipolar items. Second, the article reviews previous conceptions of interpersonal complementarity and, using the 1982 Circle as a theoretical and operational guide, derives 11 propositions of complementarity as they apply in personality, psychopathology, and psychotherapy.

Toward an Ecological Theory of Social Perception

Abstract: The ecological approach to perception (J. Gibson, 1979; Shaw, Turvey, & Mace, 1982) is applied to the social domain. The general advantages of this approach are enumerated, its applicability to social perception is documented, and its specific implications for research on emotion perception, impression formation, and causal attribution are discussed. The implications of the ecological approach for our understanding of errors in social perception are also considered. Finally, the major tenets of the ecological approach are contrasted with current cognitive approaches, and a plea is made for greater attention to the role of perception in social knowing.

The use of statistical heuristics in everyday inductive reasoning

Abstract: In reasoning about everyday problems, people use statistical heuristics, that is, judgmental tools that are rough intuitive equivalents of statistical principles. Statistical heuristics have improved historically and they improve ontogenetically. Use of statistical heuristics is more likely when (a) the sample space and the sampling process are clear, (b) the role of chance in producing events is clear, or (c) the culture specifies statistical reasoning as normative for the events. Perhaps because statistical procedures are part of people's intuitive equipment to begin with, training in statistics has a marked impact on reasoning. Training increases both the likelihood that people will take a statistical approach to a given problem and the quality of the statistical solutions. These empirical findings have important normative implications.

The Act Frequency Approach to Personality

Abstract: The act frequency approach to personality is advanced in this article. Dispositions are viewed as summaries of act frequencies that, in themselves, possess no explanatory status. As sociocultural emergents, dispositions function as natural cognitive categories with acts as members. Category boundaries are fuzzy, and acts within each category differ in their prototypicality of membership. A series of studies focusing on indices of act trends and on a comparative analysis of the internal structure of dispositions illustrates this basic formulation. The act frequency approach is then placed within a taxonomic framework of the relations among act categories (horizontal dimension) and hierarchic classification (vertical dimension). Theoretical implications of the act frequency approach are examined. Dispositional consistency is distinguished from behavioral consistency and several act frequency indices (e.g., dispositional versatility, situational scope) are defined. Situational analysis and personality coherence are then viewed from the act frequency perspective. Discussion focuses on the possible origins and development of dispositional categories and implications of alternative middle-level constructs for act categorization and personality theory.

Hypothesis Evaluation from a Bayesian Perspective.

Abstract: Bayesian inference provides a general framework for evaluating hypotheses. It is a normative method in the sense of prescribing how hypotheses should be evaluated. However, it may also be used descriptively by characterizing people's actual hypothesis-evaluation behavior in terms of its consistency with or departures from the model. Such a characterization may facilitate the development of psychological accounts of how that behavior is produced. This article explores the potential of Bayesian inference as a theoretical framework for describing how people evaluate hypotheses. First, it identifies a set of logically possible forms of nonBayesian behavior. Second, it reviews existing research in a variety of areas to see whether these possibilities are ever realized. The analysis shows that in some situations several apparently distinct phenomena are usefully viewed as special cases of the same kind of behavior, whereas in other situations previous investigations have conferred a common label (e.g., confirmation bias) to several distinct phenomena. It also calls into question a number of attributions of judgmental bias, suggesting that in some cases the bias is different than what has previously been claimed, whereas in others there may be no bias at all.

A Cognitive-Social Learning Model of Social-Skill Training.

Abstract: Prior efforts to systematicall y organize and define the growing area of social-skill training with children are characterized by several major shortcomings that may impede the progress of future research. As an alternative, the present article explores the purposes, methods, major findings, and future directions of socialskill training research from the perspective of a cognitive-social learning explanation of behavior change. Social-learning principles are utilized to provide both an explanatory framework and a potential technology for social-skill training methodology. Attention is devoted to conceptualizi ng skill-trainin g methods in terms of theoretically derived variables and components as well as formal properties of training. Findings from empirical research are reviewed with respect to important or promising variables, their hypothesized function in behavior change, and their demonstrated effects on children's social behavior. Current and future research trends are discussed in light of the proposed model and available empirical evidence. During the last two decades, investigators working within developmental, clinical, and educational disciplines have contributed to a growing body of literature on social-skill training with children. Social skills, as denned in this article, refer to children's ability to organize cognitions and behaviors into an integrated course of action directed toward culturally acceptable social or interpersonal goals. Also included in this definition is the propensity to continuously assess and modify goal-directed behavior so as to maximize the likelihood of reaching one's goals. Current research efforts reflect a common interest in social behavioral change during childhood and a commitment to training paradigms based on principles of learning and instruction. Despite these similarities, it is apparent that investigations within each discipline differ in terms of analytic and technological objectives and thus scientific and practical contributions.

Regulation during challenge: A general model of learned performance under schedule constraint.

Abstract: This article develops a general behavior-regulation model of learned performance related to the equilibrium approach of Timberlake ( 1980) and Timberlake and Allison ( 1974). The model is based on four assumptions: (a) Both the instrumental and contingent responses are regulated with respect to their own set point~; (b) these set points can be measured in a free baseline when both responses are relatively unconstrained and simultaneously available; (c) a reinforcement schedule can be seen as a constraint function that cross-couples the environmental effects of regulatory systems underlying the instrumental and contingent responses, thereby challenging their set points; and (d) molar behavior change under a schedule represents a compromise between the deviations from set points forced by the constraint function. These assumptions are translated into a set of coupled differential equations describing two regulatory systems related by a schedule. After providing an exact solution for this model, we derive as special cases two current alternative models of learned performance (Allison, 1976; Staddon, 1979). Finally, we demonstrate that the model is consistent in form with data from a variety of simple schedules.

Further déjà vu in the search for cross-situational consistency: a response to Mischel and Peake

Abstract: Mischel et Peake (1982) ont critique des propositions recentes pour aborder la question de la variabilite trans-situationnelle du comportement. L'auteur repond a ces critiques en developpant ses conceptions sur le role des variables liees a la personne

The empirical claims of maximization theory: A reply to Rachlin and to Kagel, Battalio, and Green.

Abstract: Kagel, Battalio, and Green (1983) and Rachlin (1983) claim to find errors in Prelec's (1982) critique of maximization theory. They present new evidence, which, they suggest, demonstrates that maximization accounts better for equilibrium behavior on schedules of reinforcement than does matching. On closer examination the allegations of mathematical and conceptual errors are found to be without substance and the new data do not differentially favor maximization or matching. Hence, the conclusions drawn in Prelec (1982) do not at this time need revision.