BA, Kent State University, 2020, College of Arts and Sciences / Department of Psychological Sciences

Parents often make health decisions for their children. Visuals have been shown to facilitate decision-making. In this study, I investigated which visual (i.e., icon arrays, number lines, or Arabic numerals) led parents to make the most mathematically-accurate response about the risk of a drug's side effect. Theories from cognitive and social psychology predicted that number lines would be the most helpful. Participants (n = 86, Mage= 38.45, 63.5% female), who were the parent to at least one child, were randomly assigned to view one of the three visual types that were shown between-subjects. Results from the study indicated that icon arrays that visualized large-component fractions (e.g., 108/648) led parents to make the least accurate estimates of side effect risks. For all visuals, participants were more accurate when they estimated small-component (e.g., 1/6) as compared to large-component risks. A practical implication of this research is that small components are ideal when presenting health information.

Committee: Clarissa Thompson Ph.D. (Advisor); Jennifer Taber Ph.D. (Advisor); Maureen Blankemeyer Ph.D. (Committee Member); Angela Neal-Barnett Ph.D. (Committee Member) Subjects: Psychology

MA, Kent State University, 2020, College of Arts and Sciences / Department of Psychological Sciences

Health information is ambiguous when it is lacking in reliability, credibility, or is in some way inadequate. Ambiguous health information might lead to maladaptive responses, such as avoiding beneficial health procedures, defensive processing, and pessimistic appraisal. According to Construal Level Theory, a person's construal-level (i.e., mindset) can influence how people represent objects and events in their minds. A low-level construal refers to a detail-oriented mindset, whereas a high-level construal refers to a big-picture mindset. Different construal-levels might promote adaptive responses to ambiguous health information. The purpose of the present study was to examine the effects of ambiguous health information about alcohol consumption on cognitions that have been shown to predict health behavior and whether construal moderated these effects. Participants in this 2 (Construal Level: High, Low) x 2 (Health Communication: Ambiguous, Unambiguous) fully crossed factorial design were randomly assigned to engage in a task that elicited a low-level construal or a high-level construal. Next, participants were randomly assigned to read an ambiguous or unambiguous health communication about the health effects of alcohol consumption. Inconsistent with hypotheses that ambiguous health information would promote maladaptive outcomes across cognitions predictive of health behavior, there were no significant main effects on health cognitions, message responses, or intentions to reduce alcohol consumption. Two effects were found regarding the use of construal. Construal moderated only one response to ambiguous health information: inconsistent with hypotheses, among participants who received a high-level construal, those who read an ambiguous health communication had somewhat lower intentions to reduce alcohol consumption compared with those who read an unambiguous health communication. Further, the results of one exploratory analysis demonstrated that high-level construal (open full item for complete abstract)

Committee: Jennifer Taber (Advisor); John Updegraff (Committee Member); Manfred van Dulmen (Committee Member); William Lechner (Committee Member) Subjects: Psychology

Master of Arts, The Ohio State University, 2019, Communication

Online contexts, especially social networking sites, are becoming a widely available space to disseminate health information and target specific populations for health campaigns. Limited evidence for health message engagement in these contexts exists. This study draws on the elaboration likelihood model and construal level theory to predict processing time and recall when individuals are presented health messages from various sources and of differing viewpoints. Participants (n = 159) were shown messages about electronic cigarettes, designed to look like tweets, from socially close and socially distant others. Processing times were highest for pro-attitudinal messages while messages from socially close sources were more likely to be recalled, and increasing social distance increased the difference in processing times for pro- and counter-attitudinal messages. We demonstrate the applicability of behavioral measures in online studies, while finding that attitudes, social distance, and their interaction affect message processing.

Committee: Richard Huskey Dr. (Advisor); David DeAndrea Dr. (Committee Chair) Subjects: Communication

Bachelor of Business Administration (BBA), Ohio University, 2019, Business Administration

This paper examined how fraud type, auditor type, and fraud inquiry affect employee fraud reporting intentions. Kaplan and colleagues (2011) studied the presence of fraud-related questions from an auditor to potential whistleblowers. This study examines the method of inquiry; specifically, the effect that written inquiry, as opposed to verbal or no inquiry, has on reporting intentions. From a Construal Level Theory perspective, this study found that written inquiry received the highest mean reporting intentions due to it eliciting from the employee a more concrete, lower construal thought process. This study also found that reporting intentions are stronger in fraud cases involving misappropriation of assets compared to fraudulent financial reporting and that auditor type was insignificant in this whistleblowing scenario. Supplemental analysis provided information on how a lower construal thought process allows the potential reporter to understand the risks of whistleblowing, thus reducing perceived costs and increasing reporting intentions.

Committee: Aaron Wilson Dr. (Advisor); David Stott Dr. (Advisor) Subjects: Accounting

Master of Arts (MA), Bowling Green State University, 2017, Psychology

Decision-makers neglect prior probabilities, or base-rates, when faced with problems of Bayesian inference (e.g. Bar-Hillel, 1980; Kahneman & Tversky, 1972, 1973; Nisbett and Borgida 1975). Judgments are instead made via the representativeness heuristic, in which a probability judgment is made by how representative its most salient features are (Kahneman & Tversky, 1972). Research has shown that base-rate neglect can be lessened by making individual subsets amenable to overall superset extraction (e.g. Gigerenzer & Hoffrage, 1995; Evans et al. 2000; Evans et al. 2002; Tversky & Kahneman, 1983). In addition to nested sets, psychological distance should change the weight afforded to base-rate information. Construal Level Theory (Trope & Liberman, 2010) proposes that psychological distances—a removal from the subjective and egocentric self—result in differential information use. When we are proximal to an event we focus on its concrete aspects, and distance from an event increases our focus on its abstract aspects. Indeed, previous research has shown that being psychologically distant from an event increases the use of abstract and aggregate information (Burgoon, Henderson, & Wakslak, 2013; Ledgerwood, Wakslak, & Wang, 2010), although these results have been contradicted (Braga, Ferreira, & Sherman, 2015). Over two experiments I test the idea that psychological distance increases base-rate use. In Experiment 1 I attempt to partially replicate previous research that indicates temporal psychological distance increases the use of the representativeness heuristic (Braga et al., 2015); that is, actually increases base-rate neglect. In Experiment 2 I tested this effect in problems of Bayesian inference, using the standard mammography (Eddy, 1982) and lawyers and engineers (Kahneman & Tversky, 1973) problems. My results provide preliminary, converging evidence that both social and temporal psychological distances increase the use of base-rate information.

Committee: Richard Anderson (Advisor); Scott Highhouse (Committee Member); Yiwei Chen (Committee Member) Subjects: Psychology

Doctor of Philosophy, The Ohio State University, 2014, Environment and Natural Resources

Words, phrases, and data must be framed in some way, and a growing body of risk communication research indicates that any message frame chosen exerts some predictable effect on the audience. Likewise, construal level theory states that not only is there no neutral level of construal, but one's current construal level effects numerous other cognitive processes. Any portrayal of information will necessarily assume a relatively general or specific frame, which will influence how the audience construes the message. Therefore, it is not possible to neutrally present any risk data, and whatever message frame is chosen will exert some effect on the audience. In this dissertation I explain the construal level theory of psychological distance (CLT), discuss its role in risk communication, demonstrate how it can be used to increase the effectiveness of risk messages, and conclude with a theoretical investigation into how construal levels and psychological distance interact with other constructs typically measured and manipulated in the field of risk communication. In chapter one, I review the relevant literature on CLT and risk communication, give practical suggestions for risks communication practitioners and pose research questions in hopes of spurring inquiry in this new and promising direction. Integrating construal levels and psychological distance into risk communication efforts can be done at little to no cost. This chapter provides a baseline of knowledge suitable for risk communication practitioners and scientists outside the field of social psychology to draw from when formulating new risk messages. In chapter two, I test the effectiveness of using general versus specific message frames in communicating the risks associated with radon gas. Contrary to risk communication conventional wisdom, I demonstrate that a general message frame, with more global data, encouraged a greater amount of mitigation behavior than a specific frame with localized data for tho (open full item for complete abstract)

Committee: Robyn Wilson (Advisor); Eric Toman (Committee Member); Kentaro Fujita (Committee Member) Subjects: Communication; Environmental Health; Environmental Studies; Psychology

PhD, University of Cincinnati, 2012, Business: Business Administration

The social desirability bias is the tendency of respondents to adjust their responses or behavior in such a way as to present themselves in socially acceptable terms. The systematic bias introduced by the social desirability bias threatens the legitimacy of empirical research by confounding a phenomenon of interest with impression management behavior, thus obscuring research results and potentially triggering false conclusions. When the social desirability bias is a concern (e.g., when asking socially sensitive, embarrassing, or private questions), researchers commonly use techniques such as indirect questioning to avoid this bias. By asking respondents how most or the typical person would respond (i.e, referring to a third party target) the respondent transcends from an egocentric focus on his or her own unflattering attitudes or behavior onto that of an ambiguous target. Given the target's indistinctness respondents project their own feelings, attitudes, behaviors, or beliefs when responding while remaining psychologically distanced from the true, yet socially undesirable response. According to construal level theory this process of “transcendence” is possible because individuals are able to form abstract mental construals (Trope and Liberman 2010). This mental construal process is essential to recalling the past, empathizing with others, and visualizing future events. We propose that when presented with an indirect question, respondents increase their mental construal to project a response onto the third party target. As mental construals increase, individuals refocus from detailed, incidental features to central, fundamental characteristics (Trope and Liberman 2010). Consequently, we propose that indirect questioning prompts respondents to deemphasize the contextual demand to engage in impression management behavior by increasing construal levels. This research serves three primary purposes. First, we propose construal level theory as a theoretical explanation (open full item for complete abstract)

Committee: Frank Kardes PhD (Committee Chair); Rebecca Naylor PhD (Committee Member); David Curry PhD (Committee Member); James Kellaris PhD (Committee Member) Subjects: Marketing

Doctor of Philosophy, The Ohio State University, 2012, Psychology

Construal Level Theory (CLT; Trope & Liberman, 2003, 2010) proposes that how people cross psychological distances is functional for many things, such as making plans for the future and understanding other people. Although research (see Trope & Liberman, 2010) suggests that people generally use cognitive abstraction as a means of mental distance travel, no research to date has examined individual differences in this tendency to use abstraction. The present research investigated individual differences with two different approaches. First, I examine whether the individual differences could distinguish between a population of people who generally experience difficulty with psychological distance travel and those who do not. Second, I assess the stability and predictive ability of the individual differences. CLT argues that when people continually use abstraction to cross psychological distance, an association between psychological distance and abstraction forms (Trope & Liberman, 2010). In all of the studies, an Implicit Association Test (IAT) designed by Bar-Anan and colleagues (2006) was used to measure individual differences in the associative pattern between psychological distance and abstraction. Studies 1 and 2 addressed the first goal of this research: to establish the existence of individual differences in how people cross psychological distances. Depressed individuals often experience difficulty crossing psychological distances such as temporal and social distance; thus, individual differences in depressive symptomatology may be associated with individual differences in the use of abstraction to cross psychological distances. In both studies participants completed a measure of depressive symptomatology during a mass screening session and then completed a temporal distance –abstraction IAT (study 1) or a social distance-abstraction IAT (study 2) during a laboratory session. Results revealed that depressive symptomatology scores were negatively correlated with th (open full item for complete abstract)

Committee: Gifford Weary PhD (Advisor); Kentaro Fujita PhD (Advisor); Russell Fazio PhD (Committee Member) Subjects: Social Psychology

Doctor of Philosophy, The Ohio State University, 2012, Psychology

After people make choices, there are two main ways in which they might think about or, frame, the choice event: in terms of the option they chose, or in terms of the option they did not choose. How people frame past choice events is likely to impact their reactions to those choice events, but what determines the extent to which people frame choice events in terms of each option? This dissertation examines two factors – social distance and temporal distance – that have the capacity to influence framing. Chapter 1 discusses how, as dimensions of the broader concept of psychological distance, changes in social and temporal distance influence the extent to which people mentally represent an event in terms of its primary, or defining features (at greater distance), versus its secondary, or incidental features (at lower distance). I argue that, after a choice has been made between two, mutually exclusive options, the choice event's primary feature is the option that was chosen, while the choice event's secondary feature is the non-chosen option. It thus follows that decreases in psychological distance from a choice event should lead to a greater tendency to frame a past choice event in terms of the non-chosen option, relative to the chosen option. Four experiments test this hypothesis. Chapter 2 describes the results of two experiments that show support for the idea that decreases in social distance from a decision maker lead to a greater tendency to frame a past choice event in terms of the non-chosen option. Chapter 3 describes two additional experiments that conceptually replicate these effects using a manipulation of temporal distance. And one of these experiments demonstrates that changes in temporal distance change only the salience of the non-chosen option – in particular, decreasing distance increases its salience – and do not change the salience of the chosen option. Chapter 4 integrates the results of the present research with existing theories and findings in (open full item for complete abstract)

Committee: Lisa K. Libby PhD (Advisor); Russell H. Fazio PhD (Committee Member); Kentaro Fujita PhD (Committee Member) Subjects: Marketing; Psychology; Social Psychology

Doctor of Philosophy, The Ohio State University, 2011, Psychology

People often fail at self-control: they fail to make choices that advance their primary goals over competing but often transient secondary concerns. Several theories of self-control have attempted to identify the mechanisms underlying people's self-control failures, which seem most frequent when temptations are most proximal. In particular, construal level theory (Trope & Liberman, 2003) identifies such proximity as a factor influencing people's mental representations of self-control conflicts. Greater distance leads to higher-level, more abstract and goal-focused construals of choice, with resultant increases in the correspondence between people's choices and their primary goals. When people anticipate future self-control conflicts, success can be enhanced with prospective self-control strategies, such as contingently rewarding successes, punishing failures, or replacing fallible self-control with more certain external controls on choice. Construal level theory can also be applied to people's adoption of these strategies. I predicted that adopting a higher-level construal of an anticipated self-control conflict would lead to greater use of prospective self-control to protect one's primary goals against anticipated secondary temptations. In three studies, I examined this prediction. In study 1, participants anticipated being able to earn academic feedback by attending a testing session scheduled at an inconvenient time, and they were asked to offer a cancellation fee if they failed to attend. In study 2, participants considered how their fitness goals might be jeopardized by self-control failure, and they were offered a chance to enroll in fitness classes that encouraged self-control by deducting fees for failing to exercise regularly. In study 3, participants imagined taking part in a snack taste test, during which they could either consume as many snacks as they wished or set a predefined limit that would be enforced by a researcher. In all three studies, particip (open full item for complete abstract)

Committee: Kentaro Fujita PhD (Advisor); Lisa Libby PhD (Committee Member); Duane Wegener PhD (Committee Member) Subjects: Social Psychology

Master of Arts, The Ohio State University, 2011, Psychology

Self-control success is determined in part by one's construal, or subjective mental representation, of the situation. Such construal levels are cued by psychological distance, or the distance between the observer's direct experience and the situation being construed. Past research indicates that higher level construals, which are associated with psychological distance, promote self-control success while lower level construals, which are associated with psychological proximity, undermine self-control success. Higher levels of construal are thought to promote self-control success because they allow one to act in accordance with abstract, global goals that may be masked by the contextualized details of a lower level of construal. The present work examines the strength of association between psychological distance and construal level. It is hypothesized that psychological distance and construal level will be associated and that individual differences in the strength of these associations as well as ability to break out of them will predict self-control success. Specifically, it was expected that identification of target objects would be speeded when there was a congruency between distance and construal (distality with high level construal and proximity with low level contrual) as compared to an incongruency between distance and construal (distality with low level construal and proximity with high level construal). It was also expected that those whose association between distance and construal is weak should have greater self-control success due to an ability to construe a proximal temptation at a high level. Two experiments test these hypotheses. While the results of Study 2 provide further support for the association between distance and construal, the hypothesis that those with a weaker association will have better self-control than those with a rigid association was not supported. Implications for models of self-control as well as implications for research on indivi (open full item for complete abstract)

Committee: Kentaro Fujita (Advisor); Jennifer Crocker (Committee Member); Russ Fazio (Committee Member) Subjects: Psychology

Master of Arts, The Ohio State University, 2008, Psychology

Past research indicates that high-level mental construals promote greater self-control than low-level mental construals. High-level construals are thought to promote self-control because high-level construals preferentially weight global concerns over local concerns. The present work examines the precise social-cognitive mechanism by which the weighting of global over local concerns occurs. It was hypothesized that high-level construals weight global concerns ahead of local concerns by keeping global concerns cognitively accessible. Four experiments support this logic. Specifically, it was found that the automatic activation of goals (global concerns) by temptations (objects associated with local concerns) occurred at high levels of construal but not at low levels of construal (Study 1 and 2). Furthermore, the inhibition of temptations by goals occurred at high levels but not low levels of construal (Study 3 and 4). These findings extend past work by illuminating the underlying social-cognitive mechanisms by which high-level construals promote self-control.

Committee: Kentaro Fujita (Advisor); William Cunningham (Committee Member); Russell Fazio (Committee Member) Subjects: Psychology