Selena

Title:
Integrated event files store abstract relationships that influence sequential action control

Abstract:
Current views of action control posit that responding to a stimulus leads to the creation of an episodic memory - or event file - that stores the stimulus-response integration episode. Recent data further suggest that integrating two event files allows one to encode abstract relationships (e.g., same vs. different) between recent (a) stimuli and/or (b) responses from separate stimulus-response integration episodes. This could be useful for learning non-routine action sequences (e.g., how to play a new song on the piano), but little is known about whether encoding and retrieving abstract relationships influences sequential action control. To investigate this possibility, we used a task wherein only the retrieval of one or more abstract relationships between two stimuli and/or two responses can produce sequential trial effects. We found that varying the abstract perceptual and/or categorical similarity between two stimuli (Experiments 1 and 2) or the spatial similarity between two finger responses on the left and right hands (Experiment 3) exerted a strong influence on performance. These findings suggest that “integrated” event files may support the learning of novel, non-routine action sequences.

Tanner

Title:
Bad guesses: Assumptions and behavior in situations of inequity

Abstract:
Human beings report a desire to correct inequity, but fail to support policies that aim to reduce wealth gaps. Data from game theory and large-scale surveys suggest that this behavior is due to our increased tolerance of inequity when it is the result of a difference in skill or effort. Research on common cognitive biases such as a false belief in a just world and the headwinds/tailwinds asymmetry finds that people often assume that an uneven distribution of wealth is a direct result of uneven ability or effort unless information about the cause of inequity is given. In a pair of experiments, we test whether voluntary investments towards balancing wealth distribution diminish as individuals are denied information about the comparative effort that they and their partners put into earning their finances. We use a public goods investment paradigm to assess when individuals will contribute to a fund that benefits the less wealthy, and how these contributions correlate with belief that the world is inherently just.