Further Validation of Measures of Target Detection and Stereotype Activation in the Stereotype Misperception Task.

Previous research presented a multinomial model to estimate four latent processes (target detection, stereotype activation, stereotype application, guessing) that contribute to responses in the Stereotype Misperception Task, an indirect measure of stereotyping (Krieglmeyer and Sherman, 2012). The present research further investigates the validity of the target detection (D) and stereotype activation (SAC) parameters. To this end, the data from Experiment 2 and Experiment 4 in Krieglmeyer and Sherman (2012) were re-analyzed using a bootstrap method to investigate the robustness of the results. Furthermore, two conceptual replication studies were conducted and analyzed with the same bootstrap method. A manipulation of target distinctness influenced the D parameter as predicted. A manipulation of prime prototypicality influenced the SAC parameter as predicted. Taken together, the results support the validity of the D and SAC model parameters.

Retrieval cues fail to influence contextualized evaluations.

Initial evaluations generalise to new contexts, whereas counter-attitudinal evaluations are context-specific. Counter-attitudinal information may not change evaluations in new contexts because perceivers fail to retrieve counter-attitudinal cue-evaluation associations from memory outside the counter-attitudinal learning context. The current work examines whether an additional, counter-attitudinal retrieval cue can enhance the generalizability of counter-attitudinal evaluations. In four experiments, participants learned positive information about a target person, Bob, in one context, and then learned negative information about Bob in a different context. While learning the negative information, participants wore a wristband as a retrieval cue for counter-attitudinal Bob-negative associations. Participants then made speeded as well as deliberate evaluations of Bob while wearing or not wearing the wristband. Internal meta-analysis failed to find a reliable effect of the counter-attitudinal retrieval cue on speeded or deliberate evaluations, whereas the context cues influenced speeded and deliberate evaluations. Counter to predictions, counter-attitudinal retrieval cues did not disrupt the generalisation of first-learned evaluations or the context-specificity of second-learned evaluations (Experiments 2-4), but the counter-attitudinal retrieval cue did influence evaluations in the absence of context cues (Experiment 1). The current work provides initial evidence that additional counter-attitudinal retrieval cues fail to disrupt the renewal and generalizability of first-learned evaluations.

On the Roles of Stereotype Activation and Application in Diminishing Implicit Bias.

Stereotypes can influence social perception in undesirable ways. However, activated stereotypes are not always applied in judgments. The present research investigated how stereotype activation and application processes impact social judgments as a function of available resources for control over stereotypes. Specifically, we varied the time available to intervene in the stereotyping process and used multinomial modeling to independently estimate stereotype activation and application. As expected, social judgments were less stereotypic when participants had more time to intervene. In terms of mechanisms, stereotype application, and not stereotype activation, corresponded with reductions in stereotypic biases. With increasing time, stereotype application was reduced, reflecting the fact that controlling application is time-dependent. In contrast, stereotype activation increased with increasing time, apparently due to increased engagement with stereotypic material. Stereotype activation was highest when judgments were least stereotypical, and thus, reduced stereotyping may coincide with increased stereotype activation if stereotype application is simultaneously decreased.

Mild acute stress improves response speed without impairing accuracy or interference control in two selective attention tasks: Implications for theories of stress and cognition.

Acute stress is generally thought to impair performance on tasks thought to rely on selective attention. This effect has been well established for moderate to severe stressors, but no study has examined how a mild stressor-the most common type of stressor-influences selective attention. In addition, no study to date has examined how stress influences the component processes involved in overall selective attention task performance, such as controlled attention, automatic attentional activation, decision-making, and motor abilities. To address these issues, we randomly assigned 107 participants to a mild acute stress or control condition. As expected, the mild acute stress condition showed a small but significant increase in cortisol relative to the control condition. Following the stressor, we assessed attention with two separate flanker tasks. One of these tasks was optimized to investigate component attentional processes using computational cognitive modeling, whereas the other task employed mouse-tracking to illustrate how response conflict unfolded over time. The results for both tasks showed that mild acute stress decreased response time (i.e., increased response speed) without influencing accuracy or interference control. Further, computational modeling and mouse-tracking analyses indicated that these effects were due to faster motor action execution time for chosen actions. Intriguingly, however, cortisol responses were unrelated to any of the observed effects of mild stress. These results have implications for theories of stress and cognition, and highlight the importance of considering motor processes in understanding the effects of stress on cognitive task performance.

What Cognitive Mechanisms Do People Reflect on When They Predict IAT Scores?

Research indicates that individuals can prospectively predict biases they will show on the implicit-association test (IAT). The present study uses the Quadruple process model to analyze data from Hahn, Judd, Hirsh, and Blair to investigate which cognitive mechanisms people reflect on when predicting their racial bias scores on the IAT. The Quadruple process model reveals that a combination of activated associations and self-regulatory control best explains what participants report when they predict their biases on the IAT. Furthermore, it appears to be specifically the total activation of positive attitudes toward Whites and negative attitudes toward minorities rather than negative attitudes toward minorities alone, that participants use to make their predictions.

The Weapons Identification Task: Recommendations for adequately powered research.

This article synthesizes the extant literature on the Weapons Identification Task (WIT), a sequential priming paradigm developed to investigate the impact of racial priming on identification of stereotype-congruent and stereotype-irrelevant objects. Given recent controversy over the replicability of and statistical power required to detect priming effects, the aim of this synthesis is to systematically assess the literature in order to develop recommendations for statistical power in future research with the WIT paradigm. To develop these recommendations, the present article first quantitatively ascertains the magnitude of publication bias in the extant literature. Next, expected effect sizes and power recommendations are generated from the extant literature. Finally, a close conceptual replication of the WIT paradigm is conducted to prospectively test these recommendations. Racial priming effects are detected in this prospective test providing increased confidence in the WIT priming effect and credibility to the proposed recommendations for power.

Measures of Implicit Gender Attitudes May Exaggerate Differences in Underlying Associations among Chinese Urban and Rural Women.

The oppression of women in rural China is more severe than in urban China, not only because the two areas differ in terms of social hierarchy, but also because urban women are more likely to fight against their subordination, which is endorsed by conventional social views on gender. To independently assess these relationships, we applied the Quadruple Process model to measure the processes underlying implicit gender attitudes in a sample of urban and rural females. The results indicated that the urban women had higher in-group favoritism than did the rural women. Application of the Quad model, however, showed that pro-women associations were similarly activated among urban and rural women, but that women in rural settings more effectively inhibited activated associations. Differences in inhibition, rather than in activated associations, appear to account for the less favorable attitudes among rural women. Thus, the differences in attitudinal responses among urban and rural women exaggerate the differences in underlying evaluative associations with respect to gender and conceal differences in self-regulating the expression of those associations.