Every penny counts: The effect of holistic-analytic thinking style on donation decisions in the times of COVID-19

This research explores how individual differences in holistic-analytic thinking style affect people's donation intentions and decisions. Specifically, we find that individuals with a more holistic thinking style are more likely to make donations compared to individuals with a less holistic thinking style, and the effect is mediated by the belief that every penny counts. In the first two studies, we examine the impact of cognitive style on donation for a Covid-19-related cause. This context is important because ensuring that individual donors believe their contributions matter is crucial when raising donations for a cause that impacts a large number of beneficiaries, such as fighting Covid-19. We establish the underlying mechanism of the impact of cognitive style on donation intention and donation amount. A third study shows that our findings can be extended beyond the context of Covid-19 and generalized to other nonprofit projects. In conclusion, taking into account an individual-difference variable, such as holistic-analytic thinking style, is important to explain donation decisions and might be worth considering when designing and implementing social interventions, especially during pandemic situations like the one produced by Covid-19. (PsycInfo Database Record (c) 2023 APA, all rights reserved)

Thinking disposition, thinking style, and susceptibility to causal illusion predict fake news discriminability

Acceptance of fake news is probably modulated by an intricate interplay of social, cultural, and political factors. In this study, we investigated whether individual-level cognitive factors related to thinking and decision making could influence the tendency to accept fake news. A group of volunteers responded to a COVID19-related fake news discrimination scale as well as to questionnaires assessing their thinking style (reflective vs. intuitive) and thinking disposition (actively open-mindedness). Furthermore, they completed a computerized contingency learning task aimed at measuring their tendency to develop a causal illusion, a cognitive bias leading to perceive causal connections between non-contingent events. More actively open-minded and more reflective individuals presented higher fake news discrimination scores. In addition, those who developed weaker causal illusions in the contingency learning task were also more accurate at differentiating between fake and legitimate news. Actively open-minded thinking was the main contributor in a regression model predicting fake news discrimination.Copyright © 2022 The Authors. Applied Cognitive Psychology published by John Wiley & Sons Ltd.

Thinking disposition, thinking style, and susceptibility to causal illusion predict fake news discriminability

Acceptance of fake news is probably modulated by an intricate interplay of social, cultural, and political factors. In this study, we investigated whether individual-level cognitive factors related to thinking and decision making could influence the tendency to accept fake news. A group of volunteers responded to a COVID19-related fake news discrimination scale as well as to questionnaires assessing their thinking style (reflective vs. intuitive) and thinking disposition (actively open-mindedness). Furthermore, they completed a computerized contingency learning task aimed at measuring their tendency to develop a causal illusion, a cognitive bias leading to perceive causal connections between non-contingent events. More actively open-minded and more reflective individuals presented higher fake news discrimination scores. In addition, those who developed weaker causal illusions in the contingency learning task were also more accurate at differentiating between fake and legitimate news. Actively open-minded thinking was the main contributor in a regression model predicting fake news discrimination. (PsycInfo Database Record (c) 2022 APA, all rights reserved)

On the Disposition to Think Analytically: Four Distinct Intuitive-Analytic Thinking Styles.

Many measures have been developed to index intuitive versus analytic thinking. Yet it remains an open question whether people primarily vary along a single dimension or if there are genuinely different types of thinking styles. We distinguish between four distinct types of thinking styles: Actively Open-minded Thinking, Close-Minded Thinking, Preference for Intuitive Thinking, and Preference for Effortful Thinking. We discovered strong predictive validity across several outcome measures (e.g., epistemically suspect beliefs, bullshit receptivity, empathy, moral judgments), with some subscales having stronger predictive validity for some outcomes but not others. Furthermore, Actively Open-minded Thinking, in particular, strongly outperformed the Cognitive Reflection Test in predicting misperceptions about COVID-19 and the ability to discern between vaccination-related true and false news. Our results indicate that people do, in fact, differ along multiple dimensions of intuitive-analytic thinking styles and that these dimensions have consequences for understanding a wide range of beliefs and behaviors.

Thinking disposition, thinking style, and susceptibility to causal illusion predict fake news discriminability

Acceptance of fake news is probably modulated by an intricate interplay of social, cultural, and political factors. In this study, we investigated whether individual‐level cognitive factors related to thinking and decision making could influence the tendency to accept fake news. A group of volunteers responded to a COVID19‐related fake news discrimination scale as well as to questionnaires assessing their thinking style (reflective vs. intuitive) and thinking disposition (actively open‐mindedness). Furthermore, they completed a computerized contingency learning task aimed at measuring their tendency to develop a causal illusion, a cognitive bias leading to perceive causal connections between non‐contingent events. More actively open‐minded and more reflective individuals presented higher fake news discrimination scores. In addition, those who developed weaker causal illusions in the contingency learning task were also more accurate at differentiating between fake and legitimate news. Actively open‐minded thinking was the main contributor in a regression model predicting fake news discrimination. [ FROM AUTHOR] Copyright of Applied Cognitive Psychology is the property of John Wiley & Sons, Inc. and its content may not be copied or emailed to multiple sites or posted to a listserv without the copyright holder's express written permission. However, users may print, download, or email articles for individual use. This may be abridged. No warranty is given about the accuracy of the copy. Users should refer to the original published version of the material for the full . (Copyright applies to all s.)

Emotion, analytic thinking and susceptibility to misinformation during the COVID-19 outbreak.

Misinformation has become prevalent since the beginning of the COVID-19 pandemic. To understand why people believe and share misinformation, we conducted a nationwide survey during the COVID-19 outbreak in China. We found the indirect effects of COVID-19 risk on people's information accuracy judgment and associated information sharing intention through people's emotional states. People faced with a higher level of COVID-19 risk (measured by a 7-day moving average of daily new deaths or new cases) experienced weaker positive and stronger negative emotions, and heightened emotionality (both the positive and negative emotions) was associated with increased belief in and greater likelihood to share the COVID-19 information regardless of veracity. We also found that only the negative emotion mediated the relation between the COVID-19 risk and the truth discernment regarding accuracy judgment. However, the mediating effect of negative emotion disappeared among people with high analytic thinking ability. These findings suggest that the analytic thinking ability could moderate the destructive relationship between negative emotion and accuracy discernment. Based on a large sample, our findings provide actionable insights for the policymakers to respond to the spread of misinformation appropriately and promptly during the pandemic.

Risk-Perception Change Associated with COVID-19 Vaccine's Side Effects: The Role of Individual Differences.

The COVID-19 vaccine appears to be a crucial requirement to fight the pandemic. However, a part of the population possesses negative attitudes towards the vaccine. The spread of conspiracy theories and contradictory information about the pandemic have altered the population's perception of risk. The risk-perception of the vaccine's side effects may be affected by individual differences. The complex relationship between risk-perception and individual differences is relevant when people have to make decisions based on ambiguous and constantly changing information, as in the early phases of the Italian vaccination campaign. The present study aimed at measuring the effect of individual differences in risk-perception associated with the COVID-19 vaccine's side effects in a context characterized by information ambiguity. An online survey was conducted to classify a sample of Italian pro-vaccine people into cognitive/behavioral style groups. Furthermore, changes in vaccine risk-perception after inconsistent communications regarding the vaccine's side effects were compared between groups. The results showed that "analytical" individuals did not change their perception regarding the probability of vaccine side effects but changed their perception regarding the severity of side effects; "open" and "polarized" individuals neither changed their perception regarding the probability nor of the severity of side effects, showing a different kind of information processing, which could interfere with an informed decision-making process.

Conspiratorial Beliefs and Cognitive Styles: An Integrated Look on Analytic Thinking, Critical Thinking, and Scientific Reasoning in Relation to (Dis)trust in Conspiracy Theories.

The tendency to believe in conspiracy theories (implying secret and malevolent plots by scheming groups or individuals), incites growing decennial interest among psychological researchers (exploring the associated personality traits, worldviews and cognitive styles of people). The link between the conspiratorial beliefs and the cognitive styles remains of particular interest to scholars, requiring integrated theoretical considerations. This perspective article will focus on the relationship between the propensity to (dis)trust conspiracy theories and three cognitive styles: analytic thinking, critical thinking, and scientific reasoning. Analytic thinking (inclination toward slow and deliberate processing of information in a conscious effort to mitigate biases and reach objective understanding of facts), is a well-studied concept in the context of conspiratorial beliefs, while the negative mutual relationship seems well-evidenced. On the other hand, the evidence on the link with the critical thinking (readiness to consider, reason, appraise, review, and interpret facts to update existing beliefs) has only started to emerge in the last years. Finally, scientific reasoning (ability to apply principles of scientific inquiry to formulate, test, revise and update knowledge in accordance with new evidence), is the least studied of the three cognitive styles in relation to conspiracy theories. The present article will: (a) revise the (lack of) scientific consensus on the definitional and conceptual aspects (by providing theoretical framework); (b) summarize the state of the art on the subject (by providing overview of empirical evidence); (c) discuss directions for future research (especially in relation to the COVID-19 pandemic). An integrated perspective on the relationship between conspiratorial beliefs and cognitive styles of people, may serve to inspire future behavioral interventions.

Bias in Medicine: Lessons Learned and Mitigation Strategies.

Cognitive bias consists of systematic errors in thinking due to human processing limitations or inappropriate mental models. Cognitive bias occurs when intuitive thinking is used to reach conclusions about information rather than analytic (mindful) thinking. Scientific progress is delayed when bias influences the dissemination of new scientific knowledge, as it has with the role of human leucocyte antigen antibodies and antibody-mediated rejection in cardiac transplantation. Mitigating strategies can be successful but involve concerted action by investigators, peer reviewers, and editors to consider how we think as well as what we think.

How scientific reasoning correlates with health-related beliefs and behaviors during the COVID-19 pandemic?

We examined whether scientific reasoning is associated with health-related beliefs and behaviors over and above general analytic thinking ability in the general public (N = 783, aged 18-84). Health-related beliefs included: anti-vaccination attitudes, COVID-19 conspiracy beliefs, and generic health-related epistemically suspect beliefs. Scientific reasoning correlated with generic pseudoscientific and health-related conspiracy beliefs and COVID-19 conspiracy beliefs. Crucially, scientific reasoning was a stronger independent predictor of unfounded beliefs (including anti-vaccination attitudes) than general analytic thinking was; however, it had a more modest role in health-related behaviors.