Implicit Measures Of Associations Research Articles

A Comparative Investigation of the Predictive Validity of Four Indirect Measures of Bias and Prejudice.

Although measures of implicit associations are influential in the prejudice literature, comparative tests of the predictive power of these measures are lacking. A large-scale (N > 100,000) analysis of four commonly used measures-the Implicit Association Test (IAT), Single-Category IAT (SC-IAT), evaluative priming task (EPT), and sorting paired features task (SPF)-across 10 intergroup domains and 250 outcomes found clear evidence for the superiority of the SC-IAT in predictive and incremental predictive validity. Follow-up analyses suggested that the SC-IAT benefited from an exclusive focus on associations toward stigmatized group members, as associations toward non-stigmatized group members diluted the predictive strength of relative measures like the IAT, SPF, and EPT. These results highlight how conclusions about predictive validity can vary drastically depending on the measure selected and reveal novel insights about the value of different measures when focusing on predictive than convergent validity.

Collective narcissism and explicit and implicit collective self-esteem revisited: A preregistered replication and extension

Research on the positivity of collective narcissists’ in-group evaluation is scarce. So far, only one published study has shown that collective narcissists favorably evaluate their in-group at the explicit level but have negative (or, less positive) implicit in-group evaluations (Golec de Zavala et al., 2009, Study 4). The present preregistered replication study used a larger sample (N = 481), carefully constructed implicit association measures, and examined agentic and communal facets of collective narcissism and implicit collective self-esteem. Yet, our study did not replicate the core finding of Golec de Zavala et al. (2009, Study 4). Although our study does not support the mask model of collective narcissism, it provides further evidence for the distinctiveness of agentic and communal collective narcissism.

Predictors of Automatic Preference for People Without Disabilities Over People With Disabilities: A Chi-Squared Automatic Interaction Detector Analysis

PurposeThe present study examined patterns of demographic characteristics that are predictive of people's automatic preference for people without disabilities over people with disabilities.MethodPredictions of automatic preference for people without disabilities were investigated among 41,789 individuals who volunteered to complete the Disability Implicit Association Test (D-IAT) at the Project Implicit website (https://implicit.harvard.edu/).ResultsResults indicate that men over 55 without a disability, who scored neutral or high on explicit preference for people without disabilities, who are religious and conservative, are likely to have higher automatic and explicit preference for people without disabilities.ConclusionsResults of the present study provide support for the use of implicit association measures to assess latent attitudes toward people with and without disabilities.

Capturing implicit texture–flavour associations to predict consumers’ new product preferences

New food product development involves explicit, sensory test phases, though these tests cannot identify consumers' automatic processes and do not consider influential links between perception and memory, so they often lead to biased responses. Rigorous implicit testing can reflect consumer decision making more accurately, by assessing automatic reactions, especially in the case of new food product development where affective reactions are one of the main drivers. Two studies demonstrate the feasibility (Study 1) and accuracy (Study 2) of an implicit sensory test involving the gustatory modality. A gustative priming protocol with a lexical decision task demonstrates that different textures are associated with different flavours in memory. An investigation of consumers’ preferences for products that match the strongest associations further reveals that implicit protocols can inform new product development. Implicit measures of associations are more predictive than explicit measures and can be used upstream during new product development.

Responsibility, Determinism, and the Objective Stance: Using IAT to Evaluate Strawson’s Account of our ‘Incompatibilist’ Intuitions

People who judge that a wrongdoer’s behaviour is determined are disposed, in certain cases, to judge that the wrongdoer cannot be responsible for his behaviour. Some try to explain this phenomenon by arguing that people are intuitive incompatibilists about determinism and moral responsibility. However, Peter Strawson argues that we excuse determined wrongdoers because judging that someone is determined puts us into a psychological state – ‘the objective stance’ – which prevents us from holding them responsible, not because we think that determined wrongdoers cannot be responsible. Two studies were completed to test the claim that the objective stance prevents us from judging wrongdoers responsible. Implicit association measures revealed that participants primed in the objective stance appraised a wrongdoer more positively, but as no less blameworthy, than those neutrally primed. These findings raise doubts about Strawson’s explanation of our tendency to excuse determined wrongdoers.

A Review of Implicit Measures of Associations in Self Injurious Behavior (Suicide Attempt, Non-Suicidal Self Injurious Behavior) Research

A Review of Implicit Measures of Associations in Self Injurious Behavior (Suicide Attempt, Non-Suicidal Self Injurious Behavior) Research

Moderators of Implicit-Explicit Exercise Cognition Concordance.

Investigating implicit-explicit concordance can aid in understanding underlying mechanisms and possible intervention effects. This research examined the concordance between implicit associations of exercise with health or appearance and related explicit motives. Variables considered as possible moderators were behavioral regulations, explicit attitudes, and social desirability. Participants (N = 454) completed measures of implicit associations of exercise with health and appearance and questionnaire measures of health and appearance motives, attitudes, social desirability, and behavioral regulations. Attitudes significantly moderated the relationship between implicit associations of exercise with health and health motives. Identified regulations significantly moderated implicit-explicit concordance with respect to associations with appearance. These results suggest that implicit and explicit exercise-related cognitions are not necessarily independent and their relationship to each other may be moderated by attitudes or some forms of behavioral regulation. Future research that takes a dual-processing approach to exercise behavior should consider potential theoretical moderators of concordance.

Characterizing implicit mental health associations across clinical domains

Background and objectivesImplicit associations are relatively uncontrollable associations between concepts in memory. The current investigation focuses on implicit associations in four mental health domains (alcohol use, anxiety, depression, and eating disorders) and how these implicit associations: a) relate to explicit associations and b) self-reported clinical symptoms within the same domains, and c) vary based on demographic characteristics (age, gender, race, ethnicity, and education). MethodsParticipants (volunteers over age 18 to a research website) completed implicit association (Implicit Association Tests), explicit association (self + psychopathology or attitudes toward food, using semantic differential items), and symptom measures at the Project Implicit Mental Health website tied to: alcohol use (N = 12,387), anxiety (N = 21,304), depression (N = 24,126), or eating disorders (N = 10,115). ResultsWithin each domain, implicit associations showed small to moderate associations with explicit associations and symptoms, and predicted self-reported symptoms beyond explicit associations. In general, implicit association strength varied little by race and ethnicity, but showed small ties to age, gender, and education. LimitationsThis research was conducted on a public research and education website, where participants could take more than one of the studies. ConclusionsAmong a large and diverse sample, implicit associations in the four domains are congruent with explicit associations and self-reported symptoms, and also add to our prediction of self-reported symptoms over and above explicit associations, pointing to the potential future clinical utility and validity of using implicit association measures with diverse populations.

Investigating the operation of the affect heuristic: is it an associative construct?

Affect is of central importance in risk perception and risky decision-making, and the affect heuristic is a very influential construct developed in relation to this. We examined whether this heuristic operates at an associative level of processing as, despite much theorising, empirical evidence on this issue is lacking. We compared affective heuristic task performance with performance on established implicit association tasks. Participants (n = 151) completed explicit attitude and risk measures, and five experimental tasks (three Go/No-Go Association Tasks (GNAT), a priming task and a time-pressured affect heuristic task). A modified ‘risk-benefit’ GNAT provided a speeded analogue of the affect heuristic task which was equivalent to the evaluative GNAT in terms of response mode and cognitive effort. Affect heuristic task performance was not associated with implicit task performance. The evaluative GNAT did not correlate with the risk-benefit GNAT (speeded affect heuristic task). However, affect heuristic task performance was strongly associated with, and significantly predicted by, explicit affective attitude and explicit risk measures suggesting that this heuristic may primarily reflect deliberative rather than associative processing. Findings contradict the (much cited) notion that this important psychological construct operates at an associative level. However, the conclusions that can be drawn from this study are limited by the implicit attitude measures used here. In future research, it would be desirable to use different measures of implicit associations, e.g. the Single-Category Implicit Association task, to further interrogate the processes operating within the affect heuristic.

On the validity of implicit association measures of personality traits

Participants (N=200) completed self-report and implicit association (IAT) measures of Extraversion, Conscientiousness, and Emotional Stability. Peer trait ratings and supervisor ratings of job performance were also collected. Results suggested low convergence between IAT and self-report trait measures. Cognitive ability and self-positive bias both explained significant portions of the method variance expressed by IAT measures. Correlations between IAT trait measures and job performance were statistically non-significant, of similar magnitudes to their self-report counterparts, and of magnitudes consistent with past research on criterion validities of self-report trait measures. The results offer only very limited support for the use of IAT trait measures in applied assessment settings.

Making implicit measures of associations with snack foods more negative through evaluative conditioning

The present study examined whether implicit measures of associations with snack foods and food consumer behaviour could be changed through a picture–picture evaluative conditioning procedure. In the experimental condition ( n = 41), female participants completed a conditioning procedure in which pictures of snack foods were paired with images of negatively valenced female body shapes, and pictures of fruits were paired with images of positively valenced body shapes. In a control condition ( n = 44), snack and fruit stimuli were randomly paired with positively and negatively valenced body shapes. Implicit measures of associations with high-fat snack foods were obtained by using a positive and a negative unipolar single category Implicit Association Test (sc-IAT). A virtual supermarket task was used to assess food consumer behaviour. Results indicated that participants in the experimental condition held a less positive association with high-fat foods on the positive sc-IAT and a more negative association with these foods on the negative sc-IAT as compared to control participants. Opposed to our hypothesis, no behavioural differences were found between the groups. These results imply that this form of associative learning can produce shifts in implicit measures of food evaluations, though behavioural effects were absent.

Assessing the impact of replication on implicit association test effect by means of the extended logistic model for the assessment of change

The present study consists of a longitudinal investigation in which implicit association measures were collected by means of the implicit association test (IAT), with the purpose of assessing the impact of replication on the test effect with the same participants. The extended logistic model for the assessment of change (ELMAC), a procedure that belongs to Rasch modeling, was applied. By means of the ELMAC application, the existence of latent traits characteristic of the impact on the IAT effect (due to replication through time) is shown; more precisely, the model time parameters show the decrement of the IAT effect through time, due to the decrease of the implicit preference in both conditions, compatible and incompatible, associated with sweet foods and salty foods. The results confirm that in the long run, the incompatible condition latency may approach the compatible condition latency, causing a significant attenuation of the IAT effect.

An Implicit Test of the Associations Between Children and Sex in Pedophiles.

Pedophiles are motivated to disguise their thoughts and feelings about their sexual beliefs and attraction toward children. New developments using implicit measures of associations have been successful in accessing socially stigmatic beliefs, even in cases in which the participant is resistant to this disclosure. Using an implicit measure, the authors show that pedophiles have an association between children and sex, whereas nonpedophilic offenders have an association between adults and sex. The task can therefore identify a core cognitive abnormality that may underpin some pedophilic deviant sexual behavior.