Austin Lee Nichols, Corey L Cook, Catherine A Cottrell
{"title":"What do people desire in their leaders? An affordance management approach to trait desirability across domains.","authors":"Austin Lee Nichols, Corey L Cook, Catherine A Cottrell","doi":"10.1037/xap0000545","DOIUrl":"10.1037/xap0000545","url":null,"abstract":"<p><p>Although research has extensively examined the traits people expect leaders to possess, it has only recently begun to highlight the importance of investigating the traits that followers truly desire in leaders. Applying an affordance management approach, we hypothesized that some traits (i.e., those necessary to accomplish most group goals) would be desired in all leaders. In contrast, other traits (i.e., those relevant to accomplishing competitive vs. cooperative goals) should differ in their desirability depending on the goals of the respective group. In Studies 1 (student sample) and 3 (working adult sample), participants were presented with leaders who were initially lacking 10 positive traits. Participants in Study 2 received leaders who all were at the 100th percentile on 10 corresponding negative traits. We then asked them to use their budgets to increase (Studies 1 and 3) or decrease (Study 2) amounts of these traits with the goal of \"building\" ideal leaders. Across the three studies, results suggested that participants desired some traits (i.e., intelligence, trustworthiness) across leadership domains while the desirability of other traits (e.g., assertiveness, cooperativeness) was dependent on the goals of the group. We discuss the implications of affordance management on leadership practice. (PsycInfo Database Record (c) 2026 APA, all rights reserved).</p>","PeriodicalId":48003,"journal":{"name":"Journal of Experimental Psychology-Applied","volume":" ","pages":"117-137"},"PeriodicalIF":2.1,"publicationDate":"2026-03-01","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"145330532","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":3,"RegionCategory":"心理学","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}
Raunak M Pillai, Malak Elmessiry, Sarah Brown-Schmidt, Lisa K Fazio
{"title":"Is that true? Examining the effects of question wording on the effectiveness of political fact checks.","authors":"Raunak M Pillai, Malak Elmessiry, Sarah Brown-Schmidt, Lisa K Fazio","doi":"10.1037/xap0000559","DOIUrl":"10.1037/xap0000559","url":null,"abstract":"<p><p>Sentences can be worded to place key information in focus, marking this information as a newer, more prominent contribution to the ongoing discourse. In turn, readers often devote more attention to, and hence better remember, such focused information. Here, we examine whether sentence-level changes that place key information in focus can improve the efficacy of short-form fact checks, brief (140-character) social media posts that verify the truth of publicly circulating claims. Across three experiments (<i>N</i> = 539 U.S.-based Amazon Mechanical Turk/Connect workers), participants read short fact checks on American politics that used open-ended questions to place the focus on the key details under contention (e.g., \"What did person A do? Y, not X.\") or yes-no questions that did not (e.g., \"Did person A do X? No, they did Y.\"). Exposure to fact checks increased the accuracy of peoples' beliefs, both immediately and after a 1-week delay. Contrary to our hypotheses, both formats resulted in comparable beliefs and memory for key details. We conclude that exposure to short-form fact checks can increase belief accuracy, regardless of their precise phrasing. (PsycInfo Database Record (c) 2026 APA, all rights reserved).</p>","PeriodicalId":48003,"journal":{"name":"Journal of Experimental Psychology-Applied","volume":" ","pages":"80-98"},"PeriodicalIF":2.1,"publicationDate":"2026-03-01","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"145758009","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":3,"RegionCategory":"心理学","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}
{"title":"Retrieval practice versus generating mnemonics: Implications for study strategy use in chemistry.","authors":"Jonathan G Tullis, Di Zhang","doi":"10.1037/xap0000544","DOIUrl":"10.1037/xap0000544","url":null,"abstract":"<p><p>Many researchers and educators have strongly advocated for utilizing retrieval practice to improve student learning and grades. Yet, the mnemonic consequences of retrieval practice have almost exclusively been compared to rereading, which is a passive, ineffective study strategy. Across two experiments that each included 69 college student participants conducted in the 2022-2023 academic year, we tested how practice retrieving chemistry concepts impacts memory and transfer compared to generating mnemonics (and rereading). Learning was assessed either after 5 min or 2 days. Practicing retrieval and generating mnemonics both bolstered memory and transfer compared to restudying but did not yield different test performance from each other. Practicing retrieval took about half as much time as generating mnemonics, revealing its efficiency for learning complex concepts. However, participants rated generating mnemonics as more effective than practicing retrieval. We discuss the implications of these results for learners' study and for theories of retrieval practice. (PsycInfo Database Record (c) 2026 APA, all rights reserved).</p>","PeriodicalId":48003,"journal":{"name":"Journal of Experimental Psychology-Applied","volume":" ","pages":"38-56"},"PeriodicalIF":2.1,"publicationDate":"2026-03-01","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"144974297","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":3,"RegionCategory":"心理学","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}
{"title":"From expert to learner metrics of transfer: How learners' perceived similarity predicts transfer and moderates instructional practices.","authors":"David Menendez","doi":"10.1037/xap0000566","DOIUrl":"10.1037/xap0000566","url":null,"abstract":"<p><p>Theories of transfer argue that people are more likely to transfer knowledge to a new scenario the more similar the scenario is to what they have previously learned. However, prior research predominantly relies on expert- or researcher-based judgments of how similar two scenarios are, rather than learner-based similarity metrics. Two studies (<i>N</i> total = 483) with undergraduate students in the United States examined how learner-based similarity judgments relate to transfer. These studies also show how using learner-based metrics can help researchers explore how features of lessons (i.e., the richness of diagrams) influence transfer. Participants sorted the stimuli in the posttest based on their similarity either at the beginning (Study 1) or the end of the study (Study 2). Participants learned about metamorphosis using either perceptually rich or bland life cycle diagrams. After the lesson, they completed a posttest after the lesson and after a month. Both studies showed that participants' similarity judgments predict transfer. Using this metric also showed that participants were more likely to extend their knowledge to animals similar to the ladybug when they learned with the rich diagram, but to dissimilar animals when they learned with the bland diagram. This was consistent after the 1-month delay. (PsycInfo Database Record (c) 2026 APA, all rights reserved).</p>","PeriodicalId":48003,"journal":{"name":"Journal of Experimental Psychology-Applied","volume":" ","pages":"1-18"},"PeriodicalIF":2.3,"publicationDate":"2026-03-01","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"146012849","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":3,"RegionCategory":"心理学","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}
Thomas Wilschut, Maarten van der Velde, Florian Sense, Bridgid Finn, Burcu Arslan, Hedderik van Rijn
{"title":"Benefits of pretesting prior to retrieval practice are limited, unless used for prior knowledge-based personalization.","authors":"Thomas Wilschut, Maarten van der Velde, Florian Sense, Bridgid Finn, Burcu Arslan, Hedderik van Rijn","doi":"10.1037/xap0000540","DOIUrl":"10.1037/xap0000540","url":null,"abstract":"<p><p>An abundance of research has demonstrated that both posttesting (also referred to as <i>retrieval practice</i>) and pretesting (asking a learner for an answer to a cue <i>before</i> a study trial has been provided) can enhance the long-term retention of material. While the benefits of retrieval practice have been widely applied in various real-world applications, such as computerized tools that promote the memorization of factual materials, pretesting has seen limited real-world application. In this study, we examine whether and under which realistic digital learning conditions combining pretesting and posttesting can promote learning. In four experiments (total <i>N</i> = 210), we contrast learning conditions in which repeated retrieval practice is preceded by passive study to learning conditions in which retrieval practice is preceded by a test. In the first two experiments, we confirm and extend previous findings by demonstrating that pretesting boosts retrieval accuracy and reduces response times on subsequent retrieval repetitions, regardless of the accuracy of the pretest. We find these effects both when a fixed item repetition schedule is used and with performance-based, adaptive item scheduling that resembles popular digital learning tools. However, after three repetitions of an item, the initial advantage of pretesting disappears, calling into question its usefulness in applied settings that involve spaced repetition. In the final two experiments, we explore a more targeted use of pretesting, leveraging it to assess prior knowledge. Dropping items that were answered correctly during the pretest enhanced overall learning efficiency, especially for learners with moderate to high prior knowledge, without disadvantaging those with low prior knowledge. (PsycInfo Database Record (c) 2026 APA, all rights reserved).</p>","PeriodicalId":48003,"journal":{"name":"Journal of Experimental Psychology-Applied","volume":" ","pages":"19-37"},"PeriodicalIF":2.1,"publicationDate":"2026-03-01","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"144609907","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":3,"RegionCategory":"心理学","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}
Flavien Thuaire, Clément Belletier, Matthieu Lutz, Marie Izaute
{"title":"Congruent visuohaptic bimodality improves detection of defects.","authors":"Flavien Thuaire, Clément Belletier, Matthieu Lutz, Marie Izaute","doi":"10.1037/xap0000539","DOIUrl":"10.1037/xap0000539","url":null,"abstract":"<p><p>Quality control is often carried out by humans. They are more accurate than machines at detecting the many possible defects in complex objects. This task is often multisensorial because defects may be found using touch or vision, or both. A recent multisensory processing theory suggests that different sensory modalities have their own independent resources but rely on a central attentional system if these resources are exceeded. Conversely, different sensory modalities may be combined to exploit redundancies and complementarities to improve sensitivity, but information from the different modalities should be identical to produce such an improvement. The present study was conducted in 2020 and was designed to investigate visuohaptic sensitivity with the aim of improving methods for detecting defects. The main result of these experiments is that when participants benefited from both visual and haptic information, they were more accurate at detecting defects than when using only visual or haptic information. This improvement only occurred if the same defect was examined with both modalities. These results should be replicated in expert operators. Our results highlight the strength of multisensoriality because congruency yielded better performances than unimodal conditions and incongruency decreased accuracy but may allow two products to be checked at once. (PsycInfo Database Record (c) 2025 APA, all rights reserved).</p>","PeriodicalId":48003,"journal":{"name":"Journal of Experimental Psychology-Applied","volume":" ","pages":"286-296"},"PeriodicalIF":2.1,"publicationDate":"2025-12-01","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"144477287","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":3,"RegionCategory":"心理学","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}
Annika Scholl, Helen Rapp, Gerben A van Kleef, Kai Sassenberg
{"title":"On the road to power: Showing benevolence and integrity fuels power granting.","authors":"Annika Scholl, Helen Rapp, Gerben A van Kleef, Kai Sassenberg","doi":"10.1037/xap0000535","DOIUrl":"10.1037/xap0000535","url":null,"abstract":"<p><p>Establishing power relations is often a democratic process in which people decide whom to grant social power (i.e., control over valued resources). But on which basis do people make this decision? When do they trust in a person's responsible use of power-and how does the target's behavior play into this decision? Here, we draw attention to the potential interplay between two behavioral ingredients-benevolence and integrity-borrowed from approaches on interpersonal trust. We argue that people more willingly grant power to others who (a) show <i>benevolence</i> (i.e., intentions to support shared, not selfish, interests) and can thus be trusted to use power responsibly, and particularly so (b) when others also show integrity (i.e., alignment between intentions and actions, or \"practicing what one preaches\"). Four studies (<i>N</i> = 1,151; Western samples; 2018-2021) supported this interplay of benevolence and integrity, highlighting when and why people willingly hand over power to someone. These findings extend prior approaches to leader emergence through a novel focus on the interplay between two central ingredients to power granting, which reveals that benevolence and integrity by themselves are not sufficient. Rather, the road to power is paved with benevolent intentions carried out with integrity. (PsycInfo Database Record (c) 2025 APA, all rights reserved).</p>","PeriodicalId":48003,"journal":{"name":"Journal of Experimental Psychology-Applied","volume":" ","pages":"243-259"},"PeriodicalIF":2.1,"publicationDate":"2025-12-01","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"144200550","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":3,"RegionCategory":"心理学","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}
Timothy J Pleskac, Joseph Cesario, David J Johnson, Glen Gagnon
{"title":"Modeling police officers' deadly force decisions in an immersive shooting simulator.","authors":"Timothy J Pleskac, Joseph Cesario, David J Johnson, Glen Gagnon","doi":"10.1037/xap0000542","DOIUrl":"10.1037/xap0000542","url":null,"abstract":"<p><p>We used an immersive shooting simulator to examine how race, suspect behavior, and policing scenario shape officers' deadly force decisions. Officers (<i>N</i> = 659) from the Milwaukee Police Department responded to dynamic video scenarios using realistic handgun responses. Mistaken shootings of unarmed Black suspects were more likely than of White suspects, but only when the suspects behaved nonantagonistically. Cognitive modeling showed this race effect arose not from an initial bias to shoot but from differences in evidence accumulation once the object was visible. Scenario and suspect behavior had the largest overall influence, shaping decisions by altering initial proclivity to shoot. Further analysis suggested that suspect behavior within specific scenarios may partially explain observed race effects. These findings provide a process-level account of deadly force decisions, integrating real-world complexity with psychological theory, and offer a framework for improving research and training around police use-of-force. (PsycInfo Database Record (c) 2025 APA, all rights reserved).</p>","PeriodicalId":48003,"journal":{"name":"Journal of Experimental Psychology-Applied","volume":" ","pages":"297-313"},"PeriodicalIF":2.1,"publicationDate":"2025-12-01","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"144776635","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":3,"RegionCategory":"心理学","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}
Samuel Pratt, Payton J Jones, Victoria M E Bridgland, Benjamin W Bellet, Richard J McNally
{"title":"Sending signals: Trigger warnings and safe space notifications.","authors":"Samuel Pratt, Payton J Jones, Victoria M E Bridgland, Benjamin W Bellet, Richard J McNally","doi":"10.1037/xap0000541","DOIUrl":"10.1037/xap0000541","url":null,"abstract":"<p><p>Trigger warnings and safe space notifications are common in higher education. Although researchers have evaluated these practices as mental health tools, little attention has been paid to the interpersonal signals they send. In this experiment conducted in fall 2024, we examined how trigger warnings and safe space notifications shape students' perceptions of instructors and the classroom environment. We randomly assigned 738 American undergraduate students to view videos of instructors delivering a brief lecture on trauma, preceded by the instructor providing a trigger warning, a safe space notification, both, or neither. Participants rated the instructor's epistemic trustworthiness, concern for student well-being, political orientation, and Left-Wing Authoritarianism scale, as well as their own feelings of psychological safety and willingness to discuss controversial topics in the classroom. Analyses using Bayes Factors provided substantial evidence that trigger warnings had no overall impact on students' perceptions. In contrast, safe space notifications increased students' feelings of psychological safety and willingness to discuss controversial topics. Safe spaces also increased perceptions of instructors as caring and trustworthy but signaled that instructors were liberal and left-wing authoritarian, including the subscale measuring support for top-down censorship. Implications for the use of trigger warnings and safe spaces in educational contexts are discussed. (PsycInfo Database Record (c) 2025 APA, all rights reserved).</p>","PeriodicalId":48003,"journal":{"name":"Journal of Experimental Psychology-Applied","volume":" ","pages":"229-242"},"PeriodicalIF":2.3,"publicationDate":"2025-12-01","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"144561547","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":3,"RegionCategory":"心理学","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}
{"title":"Investigating climate change through argumentation: Purposeful questioning supports argumentation and knowledge acquisition.","authors":"Kalypso Iordanou, Deanna Kuhn","doi":"10.1037/xap0000534","DOIUrl":"10.1037/xap0000534","url":null,"abstract":"<p><p>Over several weeks, 125 young adolescents engaged deeply with the topic of climate change in a discourse-based program designed to build argumentation skills. We put to a test the hypothesis that information on this complex and critical topic is best acquired and made use of in argument if acquiring it is experienced as having purpose and able to fulfill a role in argument. Activities in an experimental condition followed the program's practice of making available topic-related information in the form of brief questions and answers on an as-requested basis. Offered to them as a potential resource in peer dialogs on the topic, throughout the activity participants selected questions they wished answers to, and these were provided. Students in a comparison condition followed the traditional classroom practice of being assigned to read an introductory text as background information on the topic. It contained information identical to that in the questions and answer cards experimental group participants chose to access. Under both conditions, all information remained available once accessed. Both groups benefited in knowledge gain, as well as skill development in coordinating evidence with claims in final essays. However, the experimental group showed greater knowledge as well as skill gain, and a difference we suggest is attributable to the knowledge gained having an anticipated purpose making them more likely to make use of it. (PsycInfo Database Record (c) 2025 APA, all rights reserved).</p>","PeriodicalId":48003,"journal":{"name":"Journal of Experimental Psychology-Applied","volume":" ","pages":"276-285"},"PeriodicalIF":2.1,"publicationDate":"2025-12-01","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"143992385","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":3,"RegionCategory":"心理学","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}