Expectancy Violation Research Articles

Linguistic Landscape and Markedness Conceptualization in Commercial Ads

This research focuses on the linguistic landscape (abbreviated as LL) and explores how both linguistic and non-linguistic markedness are manipulated in commercial advertisements to create a compelling impact on potential customers, thereby attracting their attention to the product. The study utilizes data collected from commercial signs found on social media platforms and snapshots taken within the Mataram Municipal area. These gathered data are then subjected to analytical processing, taking into account the verbal and non-verbal context surrounding the advertisements. Additionally, the conceptual aspects of the speakers are also considered to support the analysis of the marked and unmarked status of the analyzed terms. The findings reveal that the exposure of markedness in the signage heavily relies on foregrounding techniques. Foregrounding is primarily achieved through the violation of the speakers' expectations regarding the terms used, encompassing both linguistic and socio-cultural perspectives that readers possess. Furthermore, these foregrounding techniques are reinforced by the proximity between the text and the surrounding context of the signage and its environment. By combining these textual and environmental elements, advertisers aim to optimize the intended message conveyed by the signage.

Extensive representation of sensory deviance in the responses to auditory gaps in unanesthetized rats.

Unexpected changes in incoming sensory streams are associated with large errors in predicting the deviant stimulus relative to a memory trace of past stimuli. Mismatch negativity (MMN) in human studies and the release from stimulus-specific adaptation (SSA) in animal models correlate with prediction errors and deviance detection.1 In human studies, violation of expectations elicited by an unexpected stimulus omission resulted in an omission MMN.2,3,4,5 These responses are evoked after the expected occurrence time of the omitted stimulus, implying that they reflect the violation of a temporal expectancy.6 Because they are often time locked to the end of the omitted stimulus,4,6,7 they resemble off responses. Indeed, suppression of cortical activity after the termination of the gap disrupts gap detection, suggesting an essential role for offset responses.8 Here, we demonstrate that brief gaps in short noise bursts in the auditory cortex of unanesthetized rats frequently evoke offset responses. Importantly, we show that omission responses are elicited when these gaps are expected but are omitted. These omission responses, together with the release from SSA of both onset and offset responses to rare gaps, form a rich and varied representation of prediction-related signals in the auditory cortex of unanesthetized rats, extending substantially and refining the representations described previously in anesthetized rats.

The Role of Expectancy Violation in Extinction Learning: A Two-Day Online Fear Conditioning Study.

Exposure therapy is at the core of the treatment of pathological anxiety. While the inhibitory learning model proposes a framework for the mechanisms underlying exposure therapy, in particular expectancy violation, causal evidence for its assumptions remains elusive. Therefore, the aim of the current study was to provide evidence for the influence of expectancy violation on extinction retention by manipulating the magnitude of expectancy violation during extinction learning. In total, 101 individuals completed a web-based fear conditioning protocol, consisting of a fear acquisition and extinction phase, as well as a spontaneous recovery and fear reinstatement test 24h later. To experimentally manipulate expectancy violation, participants were presented only with states of the conditioned stimulus that either weakly or strongly predicted the aversive outcome. Consequently, the absence of any aversive outcomes in the extinction phase resulted in low or high expectancy violation, respectively. We found successful fear acquisition and manipulation of expectancy violation, which was associated with reduced threat ratings for the high compared to the low expectancy violation group directly after extinction learning. On Day 2, inhibitory CS-noUS associations could be retrieved for expectancy ratings, whereas there were no substantial group differences for threat ratings. These findings indicate that the magnitude of expectancy violation is related to the retrieval of conscious threat expectancies, but it is unclear how these changes translate to affective components (i.e., threat ratings) of the fear response and to symptoms of pathological anxiety.

The impact of online tax community advice on individual taxpayer decision making

In this study, we examine the impact of advice shared on an online tax community and taxpayer decision making. Online tax communities are linked to major tax preparation software and provide a way for taxpayers to ask unique questions and receive responses. While online communities are intended to facilitate the transmission of unbiased advice between individual taxpayers, the quality, content, and source of responses can greatly vary. Drawing on the predictions of expectancy violations theory (EVT), we investigate two facets of provided advice: response provider expertise and response language concreteness. Our results indicate that taxpayers report more conservatively (more aggressively) when presented with advice from a deemed tax expert if concrete language (abstract language) is used. Further, we find that taxpayers' perceived usefulness of the response mediates this relationship. Collectively, we contribute to EVT and provide evidence on the recognition and use of online tax community responses.

Predicting coping with expectation violations: combining the ViolEx Model and the Covariation Principle.

An experimental vignette study examined whether three specific situational cues predict ways of coping with violated expectations. The situational cues (consistency, distinctiveness, consensus) were derived from the Covariation Principle. The assessed coping strategies were based on the ViolEx Model-assimilation (activities to fulfill one's expectation), accommodation (expectation change) and immunization (ignoring the discrepant information). A sample of 124 adults (mean age = 23.60 years; 49.19 percent psychology students) were randomly assigned to an experimental and control condition. Participants of the experimental condition read several vignettes about expectation violations with systematically manipulated situational cues, while participants of the control condition received the same vignettes without such cues. Participants had to rate the usefulness of each coping strategy per vignette. The situational cues mostly led to response shifts in coping tendencies: Situations with low consistency cues mostly led to immunization, whereas high consistency led to assimilation in the case of high distinctiveness and to accommodation in the case of low distinctiveness. Consensus cues only played a minor part in the coping process. The results show that situational characteristics influence people's coping behavior, regardless of their dispositional preferences for certain coping strategies.

Threat and reactions to violated expectations in groups: Adding control to the equation

ABSTRACT Group members frequently face violations of group-based expectations by in- and outgroup members’ behaviour. Responses to such violations include confronting the violators and escaping from the group. The current article presents a novel, integrative model explaining how and why violations of group-based expectations elicit these reactions. We argue that group members experience violations of expectations as threats to their social selves, which motivates them to react at all. Crucially adding to extant theorising, we argue that how group members react depends on their perceived control, a largely overlooked factor thus far. Herein, we synthesise our model’s empirical basis, which spans studies on different violations (violations of ingroup norms, norms for cooperation, and expectations based on political ideology) and different group contexts (e.g., attitude-based lab groups, learning groups, Facebook groups). Moreover, we discuss boundary conditions for the model’s applicability and its potential for integration with classic research on social identity management.

Expectation violations produce error signals in mouse V1.

Repeated exposure to visual sequences changes the form of evoked activity in the primary visual cortex (V1). Predictive coding theory provides a potential explanation for this, namely that plasticity shapes cortical circuits to encode spatiotemporal predictions and that subsequent responses are modulated by the degree to which actual inputs match these expectations. Here we use a recently developed statistical modeling technique called Model-Based Targeted Dimensionality Reduction (MbTDR) to study visually evoked dynamics in mouse V1 in the context of an experimental paradigm called "sequence learning." We report that evoked spiking activity changed significantly with training, in a manner generally consistent with the predictive coding framework. Neural responses to expected stimuli were suppressed in a late window (100-150ms) after stimulus onset following training, whereas responses to novel stimuli were not. Substituting a novel stimulus for a familiar one led to increases in firing that persisted for at least 300ms. Omitting predictable stimuli in trained animals also led to increased firing at the expected time of stimulus onset. Finally, we show that spiking data can be used to accurately decode time within the sequence. Our findings are consistent with the idea that plasticity in early visual circuits is involved in coding spatiotemporal information.

The modulation of expectation violation on attention: Evidence from the spatial cueing effects

The study sought to investigate whether and how expectation violation can modulate attention using the exogenous spatial cueing paradigm, under the theoretical framework of the Memory Encoding Cost (MEC) model. The MEC proposes that exogenous spatial cueing effects are mainly driven by a combination of two distinct mechanisms: attentional facilitation triggered by the presence of an abrupt cue, and attentional suppression induced by memory encoding of the cue. In current experiments, participants needed to identify a target letter that was sometimes preceded by a peripheral onset cue. Various types of expectation violation were introduced by regulating the probability of cue presentation (Experiments 1 & 5), the probability of cue location (Experiments 2 & 4), and the probability of irrelevant sound presentation (Experiment 3). The results showed that expectation violation could enhance the cueing effect (valid vs. invalid cue) in some cases. More crucially, all experiments consistently observed asymmetrical modulation of expectation violation on the cost (invalid vs. neutral cue) and benefit (valid vs. neutral cue) effects: Expectation violation increased the cost effects while did not modulate or decreased (or even reversed) the benefit effects. Furthermore, Experiment 5 provided direct evidence that violation of expectations could enhance the memory encoding of a cue (e.g., color) and this memory advantage could manifest quickly in the early stages of the experiment. The MEC better explains these findings than some traditional models like the spotlight: Expectation violation can both enhance the attentional facilitation of the cue and memory encoding of irrelevant cue information. These findings suggest that expectation violation has a general adaptive function in modulating the attention selectivity.

Co-worker undermining, emotional exhaustion and organisational commitment: the moderating role of servant leadership

PurposeNot much is known about the conditions under which the negative relationship between co-worker undermining and employee outcomes may wax or wane. This study seeks to address this issue by analysing the role of leadership in mitigating the negative impact of co-worker undermining on employee outcomes. Drawing on expectancy violation theory (EVT), the study proposes that servant leadership will alleviate the association between co-worker undermining, emotional exhaustion and consequently organisational commitment.Design/methodology/approachTwo-wave time-lagged data were collected from a sample of 345 nurses working under 33 supervisors in a large public hospital in Malaysia. To account for the nested nature of the data, generalised multilevel structural equation modeling (GSEM) in STATA was used to test the hypotheses.FindingsAfter controlling for transformational leadership, co-worker undermining was indirectly related to organisational commitment via emotional exhaustion, and this indirect relationship was weaker when servant leadership was high.Practical implicationsOrganisations need to invest in interventions that help reduce co-worker undermining and put emphasis on promoting servant leadership.Originality/valueThe study extends the literature by introducing EVT as a new theoretical lens to analyse the consequences of co-worker undermining on employee outcomes. The study also addresses calls for research on the role of leadership in ameliorating the negative consequences of co-worker undermining.

Is Cyberloafing an Outcome of Supervisor Phubbing: Examining the Roles of Workplace Ostracism and Psychological Detachment

Supervisor phubbing (or phone snubbing) is the phenomenon where a supervisor snubs a subordinate by favoring his/her mobile phone above him/her when they are in a meeting. Subordinates who are phone snubbed by supervisors often feel neglected and turn to their own phones and virtual social circles for acceptance. The study aims to explore the impact of Supervisor Phubbing (SP) on Cyberloafing (CL), taking Workplace Ostracism (WO) as a mediator and Psychological Detachment (PD) as a moderator. Social Exchange Theory (SET) and Expectancy Violations Theory (EVT) are put forward as the underpinning theories to explain the underlying mechanism in the proposed relationships. Utilizing the time lagged method, data was collected from 267 employees working in varied industries in India. Statistical tools such as SPSS 21, AMOS 21, and PROCESS, were utilized to test the hypothesised model. The findings show that SP causes subordinates to feel ostracized which in turn, leads to CL. The study also examined how PD can act as a moderator and create an impeding effect on CL, WO, and PD emerged as significant mediator and moderator respectively. It is pertinent for organizations to understand that unfriendly practices such as SP can lead to organizational repercussions like WO and CL. Discussion on implications followed by limitations and future scope of research is included in the paper.

RESPONSIBLE AGENCY: A HUMAN DISTINCTIVE?

AbstractWhile agent responsibility appears to be one of the clearest examples of a human distinctive, practices of holding responsible are bound up with social expectations and emotional reactions, many of which are shared with other social animals. This essay attends to the ways in which what Peter Strawson first identified as the reactive emotions, including notably anger, resentment, and indignation, are key to making sense of both the shared and distinctive features of responsible human agency. Like human beings, other social animals express a range of reactive emotions in response to others’ conformity with or violation of implicit social expectations and norms; human beings sometimes reflect on these reactive attitudes and their justifiability, asking whether and when it is appropriate to hold others accountable, blame, and/or punish them. We should recognize that we often praise and blame others for attitudes and desires which they have not chosen and over which they have no direct control, and that this is appropriate.

Smiling versus resting B**ch face: patients’ evaluations of male and female healthcare providers’ facial expressions

ABSTRACT Resting b**ch face (RBF) is described as an unintentional angry facial expression that is evaluated negatively and usually attributed to women. A 2 (smiling/RBF) x 2 (female/male provider) online experiment, guided by expectancy violations theory, investigated whether U.S. adults’ perceptions of a healthcare provider, medical care quality, and likelihood to make another appointment would be impacted by the provider’s facial expression and sex. Results indicated that RBF was an expectancy violation resulting in decreased liking and perceptions of care quality. The female provider with RBF was evaluated more negatively than the smiling female provider and the male provider with RBF on liking, caring, medical care quality, and likelihood to make a future appointment. Additional findings are further discussed in the paper. Patients may hold biases toward providers based on their facial expressions and biological sex.

Online daters' reactions to sexually explicit initiation messages

AbstractThis study used expectancy violations theory and uses and gratifications theory to conduct an experiment investigating how the content of relationship initiation messages, recipients' gender, and recipients' motives for using online dating applications shape whether and how the initiation message violates recipients' expectations. Participants (N = 275) were recruited through an emergent adult population at a large Midwestern university and identified primarily as women (66.7%), heterosexual (79%), and white (64.5%). Participants were randomly assigned to imagine matching with someone through online dating who sent either a traditional greeting or sexually explicit content in their initial message. As predicted, receiving a sexually explicit message was more unexpected and perceived more negatively than receiving an ordinary greeting, but the intensity of that negative reaction was moderated by users' motives for using online dating apps and gender. Negative reactions to receiving sexually explicit content were amplified for women and individuals interested in long‐term relationships. Negative reactions were dampened for men and online daters interested in casual sexual relationships. The implications of the findings are discussed in relation to expectancy violations theory and research on relationship initiation in online contexts.

A study on the effect of the violation of communication expectations between military professors and cadets on class interest and engagement

This study aimed to find a way to enhance the education quality of military academies by analyzing how expectancy violations of communication between professors and cadets influence cadets' interest and engagement in class. This study was conducted as follows. First, a literature review of instructor communication and expectancy violation theories was conducted. Next, the instructor communication factor was measured using several authorized measurement scales targeting the cadets at KAAY. Finally, a number of three-step hierarchical regression analyses were conducted to derive implications regarding the effect of cadets' communication experiences and expectancy violations on cadets' interest and engagement in class. The results of these analyses are as follows. First, the analysis on how professors' communication expectancy violations affect cadets' interest in class revealed that expectancy violations of nonverbal friendliness had negative effects on emotional interest. Second, the analysis on how professors' communication expectancy violations affected cadets' engagement in class revealed that expectancy violations of professionalism had negative effects on interactive engagement, expectancy violations of nonverbal friendliness had negative effects on emotional engagement, and expectancy violations of validation had negative effects on interactive engagement. Finally, an analysis on the difference in how professors' communication expectancy violations affect cadets' interest and engagement in class revealed that the real experience of instructor communication affects cadets’ interest and engagement in class more than expectancy violations.

Responding to a societal crisis: How does corporate social responsibility engagement influence corporate reputation?

While both an “insurance” and “penance” effect of corporate social responsibility (CSR) has been discussed within prior literature, it is unclear how a firm’s CSR engagement in response to a societal crisis such as the COVID-19 pandemic impacts its short-term and long-term corporate reputation. Drawing from case examples of firms’ responses to the recent COVID-19 pandemic and from relevant aspects of crisis management theory, expectancy violations theory, and signaling theory, this paper presents a conceptual framework of corporate reputation change during and after a societal crisis that describes how the direction and speed of a firm’s visible CSR engagement during a societal crisis can change its corporate reputation. Specifically, this paper suggests that firms who exceed stakeholder expectations with lower pre-crisis levels of visible CSR engagement have greater opportunities for increasing their short-term corporate reputations while firms with higher pre-crisis levels of visible CSR engagement are at greater risk for experiencing a decline in their short-term corporate reputations. These changes in short-term corporate reputations are expected to diminish over time, though this depends upon whether firms return to their pre-crisis levels of visible CSR engagement. Finally, building on the case examples and conceptual framework presented, this manuscript concludes with practical guidelines for managers of firms preparing to navigate future societal crises and provides an alternative pathway for both qualitative and quantitative inquiry that has the potential to illuminate important insights for both organizational studies and firms.

Manipulating expectancy violations to strengthen the efficacy of human fear extinction

Recent theoretical and clinical articles have emphasized a role for expectancy violations in improving the effectiveness of exposure therapy. Expectancy violations are critical to extinction learning and strengthening these violations has been suggested to improve the formation and retention of extinction memories, which should result in lasting symptom reductions after treatment. However, more detailed mechanistic insights in this process are needed to better inform clinical interventions. In two separate fear-conditioning experiments, we investigated whether stronger expectancy violations (Exp1) or fostering awareness of expectancy violations (Exp2) during extinction could reduce the subsequent return of fear. We measured fear potentiated startle (FPS) and skin conductance responses (SCR) as physiological indices of fear, and US expectancy ratings to assess our manipulations. While we successfully created stronger expectancy violations in Exp1, we found no evidence that these stronger violations reduced the return of fear at test. Interestingly, fostering awareness of violations (Exp2) reduced differential SCRs, but not FPS responses. These findings provide novel insights into the effect of US expectancies on fear extinction in the lab, but they also illustrate the complexity of capturing clinically relevant processes of change with fear-conditioning studies.

Expectation Violations, Expectation Change, and Expectation Persistence: The Scientific Landscape as Revealed by Bibliometric Network Analyses

Expectation violations occur when there is a discrepancy between expected and perceived events or experiences. Often, however, expectations persist despite disconfirming evidence. Therefore, research on expectation violations, expectation change, and expectation persistence has been conducted in several fields of psychology with wide-ranging theoretical assumptions and empirical considerations. In the present review, we analysed how these research fields relate to each other using bibliometric network analyses. For this purpose, we conducted a systematic literature search to identify scientific publications on expectation violations, expectation change, and expectation persistence. The literature corpus was then quantitatively analysed using similarity measures that allow a data-driven classification of publications into groups, revealing their conceptual, theoretical, and empirical commonalities. Our results indicate that many influential publications have focused on finding reactivity measures (e.g., brain activation) to the discrepancy experienced between expectations and outcomes. Furthermore, these measures have been used to assess when and to which degree learning and behavioural adaptation (i.e., expectation change) take place. We discuss the potential application of these measures for understanding expectation violations, expectation change, and expectation persistence in more complex settings (e.g., social interaction). The goal of this review was to foster interdisciplinarity in psychology, enabling scientists and practitioners to identify new topics, promising empirical approaches, and previously neglected variables.

180. Manipulating Expectancy Violations to Strengthen the Efficacy of Human Fear Extinction

180. Manipulating Expectancy Violations to Strengthen the Efficacy of Human Fear Extinction

Treating specific phobia in youth: A randomized controlled microtrial comparing gradual exposure in large steps to exposure in small steps

IntroductionExposure may be especially effective when within exercises, there is a strong violation of threat expectancies and much opportunity for fear reduction. Outcomes of exposure may therefore improve when exposure is conducted in large steps (LargeSE) relative to small steps (SmallSE). MethodsChildren and young people with a specific phobia (SP) (N = 50, age 8–17, 64 % girls) participated in a preregistered single-blind, randomized controlled microtrial comparing LargeSE and SmallSE in a four-week baseline-treatment design. Clinical interviews, behavioral avoidance tests, and self-report measures were assessed at pre-treatment, post-treatment, and at one-month follow-up. ResultsWithin exercises, LargeSE resulted in higher initial fear levels and more within-session expectancy violation. Nevertheless, SmallSE resulted in a larger decline of SP severity from baseline to post-treatment and follow-up, and a larger decline of anxiety and avoidance towards one’s individual goal from baseline to follow-up. There were no differences between LargeSE and SmallSE regarding changes in general self-efficacy or behavioral avoidance. Although session duration was standardized and similar for both conditions, participants in SmallSE received more (shorter) exercises. DiscussionSmallSE might be more effective in reducing SP severity because children in SmallSE were exposed to a larger number and variety of exercises than children in LargeSE.

Darwinian Bases of Religious Meaning: Interactionism, General Interpretive Theories, and 6E Cognitive Science

Abstract Interactionism holds that explanatory and interpretive projects are mutually enriching. If so, then the evolutionary and cognitive science of religions’ explanatory theories should aid interpretive projects concerning religious meaning. Although interpretive accounts typically focus on the local and the particular, interpreters over the past century have construed Freud and Marx as offering general interpretive theories. So, precedent for general interpretive theorizing exists. 4E cognitive science, which champions how cognition is embedded in natural and cultural settings, extended into external structures, enacted via motor routines, and embodied via representations rooted in human bodily form, has encouraged interpretive researchers. Theories of embodied cognition especially have embraced a sweeping view of meaning that attends to the emotions’ role and to their evolutionary origins. That inspires a 6E cognitive science that attends to the emotional and evolved dimensions of cognition too and opens up the possibility of general interpretive theories of broadly Darwinian character. Evolved cognitive systems qualify as maturationally natural cognition, which exhibits a distinctive constellation of features. The by-product theory holds that religious representations’ engagement of maturationally natural cognition fosters religions’ success. Representations with some minimal violation of intuitive expectations concerning some ontological category grab attention, stick in memory, and preserve the many automatic inferences accompanying the category. The empirical evidence for this and other elaborations of the by-product view suggests that it discloses dynamics of evolved cognition and associated emotions that tend to guide the pursuit of religious meanings systematically toward well-worn grooves in the semantic landscape.