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

A meta-study is a collection of many very small studies, called micro-studies, based on one core design. Meta-studies address many disadvanta7ges of meta-analyses and provide a possible solution for the replication crisis in research. In addition to addressing the problems related to meta-analyses, meta-studies provide several unique advantages to conducting research, specifically by testing the limits of generalizability and by having higher statistical power than a traditional design of the same total sample size. As a demonstration of the methodology, we conducted two meta-studies of the risky-choice gain-loss framing effect. In addition to replicating many past findings involving the framing effect, we also found two novel results, one of which was particularly surprising. One novel result was the nonlinear moderation of the framing effect by extreme probabilities (e.g., 1% and 99%). Participants were less likely to exhibit the framing effect when presented with extreme probabilities than when presented with moderate probabilities. The surprising novel result was that the framing effect doubled in size when participants were presented with a slightly risky option instead of a certain option. This result is contradictory to both Prospect Theory and Fuzzy Trace Theory predictions.

Committee: Michael DeKay (Advisor); Paul De Boeck (Committee Member); Ellen Peters (Committee Member) Subjects: Psychology

Master of Arts, Miami University, 2023, Psychology

Articles and videos on social media are major sources of misinformation. Yet there is another commonly viewed media form users encounter daily influencing their decisions and perceptions… memes. Applying the tenets of Fuzzy Trace Theory (FTT), I sought to identify how memes effectively portray the underlying meaning of information to social media users (i.e., “the gist”). Articles like those covering news topics displayed on Facebook News Feed were created to show no bias towards a topic. Memes were found on Facebook that corresponded to the topics of each article, either refuting or supporting the article's topic. Participants were randomly assigned to either a control group that viewed no memes, positive meme group which viewed memes in support of the articles, or negative memes that refuted the articles. Results indicate negative memes refuting information are more effective at influencing a viewer's decisions and perceptions of certain topics. Results also suggest that it is neither an individual image nor text within a meme influencing viewers. Rather, it is the juxtaposition of image and text forming a complete meme that influences an individual's decision and perceptions. Overall, memes appear to afford individuals inferences that they later use during decision-making and perception tasks.

Committee: Christopher Wolfe (Committee Chair) Subjects: Behavioral Psychology; Behavioral Sciences; Cognitive Psychology; Psychology; Web Studies

Master of Arts, University of Toledo, 2022, Psychology - Experimental

STEM (science, technology, engineering, and mathematics) communication that fosters understanding is as crucial today as it is lacking. More than ever, there is a need for STEM communication that goes beyond 'nudging' the average layperson toward a target behavior, or simply bombarding them with complex and ill-constructed information. The prevailing ‘nudge-or-bombard' strategies can result in subject knowledge that is at best incomplete and easily forgotten, and at its worst is impoverished, eliciting short-term compliance that can result in distrust of experts and policymakers. Additionally, empirically based communication techniques that go beyond disseminating rote facts to achieving insight are imperative in an oversaturated communication environment wherein laypeople are flooded with more information than they can achieve expertise in, or even comprehend (Scheufele, 2006). The present study aimed to extend existing findings of evidence-based communication grounded in a dual-process model of cognition called Fuzzy-Trace Theory (FTT) into the realm of STEM communication. It also sought to lend further evidence to the use of a new computational textual measurement tool based on FTT that informs the development of effective textual information via assisting individuals in the formation of an overall bottom-line understanding of a text. In the present study, 201 participants were presented with one of two versions of a text on a complex STEM subject matter. Texts were edited systematically using the FTT-based computational methodology to produce either a dense information presentation or one that was manipulated with the goal of increasing understanding by helping participants ‘get the gist' of the text. Participants then completed two measures that tested their knowledge and comprehension of the text. Additionally, risk perception questionnaires and multiple decision intention tasks were administered that were associated with preparedness for the risks presented i (open full item for complete abstract)

Committee: JD Jasper (Committee Chair) Subjects: Experimental Psychology; Psychology; Quantitative Psychology

Doctor of Philosophy, Miami University, 2021, Psychology

Background. Cancer is a widespread disease in the United States, with 1.7 million new cases and 600,000 deaths every year. Thus, effectively communicating the risk factors and treatments for cancers to patients and the public is important for improving these outcomes. Medical communicators have frequently used computational linguistic tools, such as Flesch-Kincaid Grade Level (FKGL), to evaluate and improve the comprehensibility of their written medical materials. However, Gist Inference Scores (GIS), guided by Fuzzy-Trace Theory (FTT), may be a more optimal computational measure to assess the likelihood that people will understand medical texts. However, little research has examined how medical information gets socially diffused through communication following reading. Aims. The primary goal of this research was to determine to what extent the psycholinguistic properties of cancer texts predict comprehension and social diffusion. Design. Study 1 used a within-subjects design to assess how 4 cancer texts that varied on GIS (high/low) and credibility (high/low) were communicated through writing. Study 2 used a between-subjects design that attempted to replicate and extend the findings in Study 1 to web-based verbal communication. Study 3 used a between-subjects web-based design to measure how participants communicate about two proposition-matched lung cancer texts that varied on GIS (high/low). Finally, Study 4 used a between-subjects web-based design where participants completed a fill-in-the-blank cloze task on either a high or low GIS text. Results. Study 1 and Study 2 showed that high GIS cancer texts are transmitted at higher GIS levels compared to low GIS cancer texts. Study 1 also showed that the transmission of high GIS texts, regardless of credibility, more strongly emphasized the gist of the information compared to low GIS texts. However, the verbal transmission of the low GIS text in Study 2 emphasized gist propositions more than the high GIS text. Study 3 (open full item for complete abstract)

Committee: Christopher Wolfe (Committee Chair); Joseph Johnson (Committee Member); Allen McConnell (Committee Member); Rose Marie Ward (Committee Member) Subjects: Cognitive Psychology; Communication; Linguistics; Psychology

Master of Arts, Miami University, 2017, Psychology

Verbal overshadowing is a memory effect in which verbally expressing details of one's memory for a given stimulus has shown to later interfere with the ability to recognize it. Due to mixed results that have been reported, this effect was recently the subject of a global replication study, which legitimized the phenomenon, but offered little explanation of the mechanisms driving it. One possible explanation lies in the task instructions typically utilized to explore verbal overshadowing, in which participants are asked to provide highly detailed descriptions of a bank robber featured in a video and subsequently select him from a lineup. Given that research grounded in Fuzzy-Trace Theory (FTT) has often linked verbatim descriptions of surface details with poor memory performance, I hypothesized that tailoring task instructions to elicit more meaningful gist-based descriptions of the robber would overcome verbal overshadowing, and potentially facilitate memory performance over and above controls. The results showed that verbal overshadowing occurred with the standard instructions, which produced the least accurate responses. The gist instructions, which evoked more meaningful descriptions, produced lineup choice accuracy similar to a no-description control condition. Following FTT, the findings suggest that the locus of verbal overshadowing lies within verbatim representations of memory.

Committee: Christopher Wolfe (Advisor); Joseph Johnson (Committee Member); Wessels Pete (Committee Member) Subjects: Cognitive Psychology; Psychology

Master of Arts, Miami University, 2014, Psychology

Working memory capacity and fuzzy processing preference are two constructs that predict reasoning ability. To date, no studies have examined the relationship between these two constructs. This study aimed to test fuzzy-trace theory's prediction of a gist processing preference in light of working memory capacity, and measure the extent to which these two constructs interact to affect reasoning ability. I assessed this relationship using an individual differences measure and a dual-task paradigm. Reasoning ability was examined in the context of base rate neglect and conjunction fallacies. Most participants preferred to reason with gist. Working memory capacity and fuzzy processing preference were independent of each other, but did not interact to produce sound reasoning. Surprisingly, fuzzy processing preference did not predict reasoning ability, and for base rate questions, predicted higher errors. However, there is evidence that data may have been confounded by various issues, leading to counterintuitive findings.

Committee: Christopher Wolfe PhD (Committee Chair); David Waller PhD (Committee Member); Robin Thomas PhD (Committee Member) Subjects: Academic Guidance Counseling

Master of Arts, The Ohio State University, 2013, Psychology

Whether for letters or numbers, memory span increases dramatically from age 2 to young adulthood. The cognitive mechanisms underlying this age-related change are still somewhat uncertain. With emphasis on the Fuzzy Trace Theory (FTT) and the representational change account of numerical cognition, the present study introduced a single number recall task in which 39 preschool-aged children were asked to remember a quantity between 0 and 20 following a brief distractor task. Emphasizing accuracy of single number recall, results revealed support for the hypothesis that the link between children's linear numeric magnitude representations and single number recall is confounded neither by age nor by memory span. Somewhat surprisingly, a number of “non-mapping” children failed to map non-symbolic and symbolic quantities on 3 numeric tasks (i.e., give-a-number task, number line estimation task, counting task). However, among children who successfully mapped symbolic numbers to non-symbolic quantities, linearity of children's numeric magnitude representations uniquely predicted memory for single numbers. I discuss implications of the findings in light of previous research and suggest directions for future research in areas of arithmetic development and number-based decision-making.

Committee: John Opfer (Committee Chair); Stephen Petrill (Committee Member); Robert Cudeck (Committee Member) Subjects: Cognitive Psychology; Developmental Psychology; Psychology