Judgment Process Research Articles

Perceptual anchoring and adjustment

AbstractAnchoring and adjustment, a ubiquitous heuristic process in judgment and decision making, has been vastly demonstrated in the numerical domain. We, with the help of four studies, demonstrate the anchoring and adjustment bias in perceptual domains. Our results show that anchoring and adjustment can bias our judgments at relatively low levels of cognition. Additionally, we outline a process by which anchoring and adjustment biases individuals' judgments in perceptual domains. Our results indicate a process wherein individuals search for an answer by testing plausible answers, the search being biased by the anchor question. We show that this movement is dominated by adjustments to adjacent possible responses indicating a search process constrained by selective accessibility. This process account explains the extant data in numerical domains as well—thus providing a way for a potential resolution to the disagreement among different existing process accounts for the anchoring phenomenon.

Action Modulates the Conscious Reasoning Process of Moral Judgment: Evidence From Behavior and Neurophysiology.

Moral judgment can be highly affected by the action and intention factors on a behavior level. Previous neuroimaging studies have demonstrated that the intention factor can modulate both the affective and cognitive processing of moral judgment. The present event-related potentials (ERP) study examined how the action factor modulated the neural dynamics of moral judgment under a newly developed moral dilemma paradigm including three different conditions: harm caused by action (i.e., doing harm), harm caused by omission (i.e., allowing harm), and no harm. Behavior data showed that participants preferred utilitarian judgments and spent less time on the allowing harm condition than for the doing harm condition. ERP results revealed that, compared with the doing harm and no harm dilemmas, the allowing harm dilemmas elicited an enhanced N450 response associated with cognitive control and/or cognitive effort processes, but attenuated a late positive potentials (LPP) response associated with top-down control of attention and cognitive “rational” control processes. Such LPP amplitude differences were positively correlated with the C-score of the moral competence test which indexed the cognitive aspect of moral judgment competency. These findings suggested that people have a strong omission bias, and such an action factor modulates the conscious reasoning process during moral judgment, including the cognitive control and/or cognitive effort, and attentional allocation processes.

Driving excellence in credit risk management practices in commercial lending - an empirical analysis of Indian public sector banks

Credit decisions are investment decisions with uncertainty over future cash inflows. The credit/risk managers in banks have to make informed choices based on their risk perceptions about commercial borrowers and manage credit risk at operational, strategic and regulatory levels. This study has investigated the effectiveness of a wide array of credit risk management (CRM) practices of Indian public sector banks through statistical analysis of perceptions of their credit analysts. Based on a systematic and comprehensive review of CRM systems in these banks, the study concluded that the most functional CRM practices are - awareness about other banks' risk management systems, a strong loan appraisal and review mechanism, implementation of know your customer (KYC) norms, multi-tier credit approval process, risk-based appraisals, and controlling wilful defaults by all means. The study also observed that there are many statistically significant different managerial perceptions about several CRM practices and this might be affecting the decision-making and judgment process on loan appraisals, risk scoring, loan reviews and other critical CRM processes and procedures.

Hammering Sound Frequency Analysis to Fix an Acetabular Cup during Total Hip Arthroplasty: Clinical Trials and Biomechanical Studies

Failure during total hip arthroplasty may lead to bedridden of the elderly. Since the acetabulum cup fix in an anatomically deep region, failures, such as loosening and fracture, occur three times more frequently compared with failures of the stem fix in the femur. We investigated the possibility of evaluating whether fixation was acquired by frequency analysis of the hammering sound of implanting a cup into the acetabulum. The subjects were 11 patients (11 joints) who underwent total hip arthroplasty, biomechanical test materials, and orthopedic models. Surgeries and experiments were performed by orthopedists specialized in the hip. A system was constructed with a tablet PC and directional microphone, the peak frequency at which the amplitude reached the maximum was determined, and judgment processing (stable, unstable) of cup fixability was performed in real time. The stable maximum peak frequency observed in the clinical trials was 4.42 ± 4.02 kHz. The mean stable maximum peak frequency in the biomechanical tests was 4.46 ± 1.19 kHz in biomechanical test materials and 4.56 ± 2.02 kHz in orthopaedicmodels. When hammering was continued, the frequency leading to fracture decreased in both biomechanical test materials and orthopaedicmodels. In conclusion, in clinical trials and biomechanical studies, variation of the maximum peak frequency decreased when fixation was acquired and the frequency stabilized. It was suggested that this method can serve as a fixability evaluation method of acetabular cups because analysis can be performed in real time during surgery, for which prevention of intraoperative fracture can be expected.

草原生态环境损害因果关系判定路径

近年来，随着生态环境损害鉴定评估技术指南等相关文件的陆续出台，我国的生态环境损害鉴定评估工作已逐渐向专业化、程序化、标准化的方向发展，相关作用机理、技术方法方面的研究也逐渐深入。草原是我国占地面积最大的生态系统，是生态文明建设的核心区域。然而近些年来，草原生态环境损害事件屡有发生，迫切需要依据草原生态环境损害机制与特点制定具有针对性的鉴定评估技术与方法，保障草原生态环境损害鉴定评估工作的顺利开展。以草原生态环境损害为研究对象，对其鉴定评估的重要环节——因果关系的判定进行了探讨，提出了判定的一般过程与基本思路，即损害发生的可能性分析、损害行为识别、损害路径推演、其他损害行为存在的可能性分析与不确定性阐述五个过程，同时提出了因果关系判定准则与理论依据，以期为草原生态环境损害鉴定评估工作及相关政策的制定者提供科学依据。;With the rapid growth in population and economic and social development, China's ecological and environmental damage incidents occur frequently, resulting in varying degrees of impact and damage to the structure and function of different ecosystems, which seriously threatens the safety of human life and property, natural resources and the health of ecosystem. Along with the successive releases of related technical guides and documents in recent years, identification and assessment of eco-environmental damage in China have been gradually developing towards professionalism, proceduralization and standardization, and the research on the related mechanisms and technical methods has been developing more and more sophisticated. Identification and assessment of eco-environmental damage refers to the process in which identification agencies conduct a scientific and reasonable analysis of the causal relationship between behavior of environmental damage and environmental damage, assess the scope and extent of environmental damage, and quantify the amount of ecological environmental damage. Systematic research on the theory and technical methods of identification and assessment of eco-environmental damage has important theoretical and practical significance for ensuring our country's ecological security and realizing regional sustainable development, and it is also an important aspect of promoting construction of China's ecological civilization. Grassland is the largest ecosystem in our country and the core area for construction of ecological civilization. However, grassland eco-environmental damage occurs frequently in recent years, it is necessary to formulate identification and assessment techniques and methods based on mechanisms and characteristics of the grassland eco-environmental damage. The judgement of causality is an important part of the identification and assessment of eco-environmental damage of grassland, and it is directly related to the accountability of eco-environmental damage of grassland. However, there are not many studies on the causality judgement of eco-environmental damage of grassland, and relevant systems need to be established as soon as possible to promote the further development of identification and assessment of eco-environmental damage of grassland. This article targets grassland eco-environmental damage and discusses one of its important processes of identification and assessment——causality judgement. The article puts forward the general process and basic logic of the causality judgement, which includes analysis of possibility of damage occurrence, identification of damage behavior, deduction of damage path, analysis of possibility of existence of other damage behavior and explanation of uncertainty, as well as judgement rules and theoretical basis. We hope to provide scientific basis for related work and policy makers of identification and assessment of the grassland eco-environmental damage.

“NEW TRENDS IN EVALUATION AND THEIR SIGNIFICANCEIN THE FIELD OF PRESENT EDUCATION SYSTEM.”

The word evaluation indicates finding out the value of something. It is directly related to education system. Evaluation is the act of placing value on something. Evaluation is the process of value judgement of something. Evaluation is one of the most important aspects of total education system. It is the process of determining the current status of an object. It is related to finding out the positive and negative value of an object. Evaluation is a systematic process. Education is a process of modification or changing behavior pattern of individuals. The soul aim of education is to develop all the qualities and potentialities of the child. It may be physical, mental, social, emotional, moral etc. here the teacher plays a very significant role to improve all the aspects in individuals. Evaluation is very important in education system because evaluation helps to judge the improvement of the students. It helps to judge the quality of teaching. Examination is a part of total evaluation process. In our ancient systems of education evaluation was done mainly through oral test, recitation of texts, reading of texts etc. But the term evaluation has come into prominent and systematic in recent years. There are many new trends in the evaluation process. Evaluation plays a very important role in education. The modern concept of evaluation provides a wider perspective and scope of use. Present education system is child centric and in this system of education the traditional examination system becomes outdated. So, various new trends are come into contact to the evaluation system. Educational evaluation is the process of analysis, identification and interpretation in any type of academic performance. Continuous and Comprehensive Evaluation, Formative Evaluation, Summative Evaluation etc. are some of the new trends in the evaluation and they have a great significance in the field of present education system.

ФОРМИРОВАНИЕ ИДЕИ МАТЕМАТИЧЕСКОЙ ФЕНОМЕНОЛОГИИ В ФИЛОСОФИИ ЭДМУНДА ГУССЕРЛЯ

The article presents the historical prerequisites for the creation of mathematical phenomenology. Within the framework of the infinite numbers problems, the ways of their phenomenological interpretation are dis-cussed. Using the example of cooperation between Cantor and Husserl, the idea of mathematical phenome-nology is formulated, which takes into account the correlation of mathematical objects with our conscious-ness. In formal logic, subjective factors often affect the judgment process. The phenomenological method is valuable in that it makes it possible to conduct both objectively and subjectively oriented research in math-ematics and formal logic. In such a correlative study, subjective acts and objective referents of any phenom-enon should be taken into account. The main goal of correlative research is to create conditions for over-coming relativistic tendencies in mathematics and formal logic. As a result of the analysis, the question of the relationship between descriptive phenomenology and formalized constructions is raised. In the historical and philosophical context, the answer to this question is based on the theoretical developments provided in Husserl’s Formal and Transcendental Logic. Subjective-oriented logic goes back to the latent structures of theoretical reason. Here the problems of consciousness are formulated and solved in its live, actual execu-tion with the help of egological research. In conclusion, historical examples of the subjective transformation of formal logic are provided. In the first example, an interpretation of Descartes’ conclusion cogito, ergo sum is given, showing that the existential inconsistency of «I do not exist» and the reliability of the initial position «I exist» were realized here. Another example of the transformation of logic is Husserl’s phenome-nology. In order to bring logical forms to their subjective obviousness, it is necessary to change the orienta-tion of consciousness and to consider objects as givens of consciousness.

Design judgement processes in mature Swedish manufacturing companies

Industrial designers make decisions in a different way than other professions. This creates a discrepancy in cross-functional development projects which impacts both the organisation and how strate...

A Study on the Anti-bias Education of Elementary Social Studies through Value Analysis

편견은 자신의 기반 지식이나 사고 체계를 바탕으로 어떠한 대상에 대한 가치판단을 통해 형성된다. 잘못된 가치판단에서 야기되는 부정적 편견은 심각한 경우 차별로 이어져 사회 문제를 발생시킨다는 점에서 이러한 편견을 갖게 되는 가치판단 과정에 대한 충분한 검토가 이루어질 필요가 있다. 본 연구에서는 사회과에서의 반편견교육의 중요성에 대해 주목하고 학생 스스로 가치문제에 대해 성찰하고 합리적인 가치 결정 과정에 직접 참여함으로써 가치문제를 해결하고 바람직한 가치를 내면화 할 수 있는 가치분석 모형을 재구성하여 제안하였다. 재구성된 가치분석 모형은 가치문제를 명확하게 인식하고 해결의 필요성을 느끼게 하는 가치문제 파악 단계, 가치문제와 관련된 사실을 수집하여 가치판단을 위한 사실전제 확인 단계, 가치문제와 관련된 사실적 근거와 가치원리를 살펴보고 가치판단의 근거를 마련하는 가치판단 검토 단계, 학습자가 자신이 내린 가치판단 속에 내재되어 있는 가치원리를 받아들일 수 있는지를 결정하는 가치원리 수용 여부 판단 단계, 가치문제의 전반을 확인하고 나와 다른 가치를 인정하고 존중하며 가치판단을 행동으로 실천하는 가치에 대한 내면화 및 행동화 단계로 구성된다. 본 연구에서는 재구성된 가치분석 모형을 초등학교 사회과 4학년 2학기 ‘다양한 문화에 대한 이해와 존중’에 적용한 사례를 제시함으로써 가치분석을 통한 사회과 반편견교육의 이론적 탐색을 실질적 적용으로 논의를 확장시키고자 한다.Prejudice is formed through the value judgment of an object based on one s knowledge or thinking system. Considering that negative prejudice based on false value judgment leads to harmful discrimination and problems in society, it needs to examine the value judgment process that leads to such prejudice. This study, focuses on the importance of anti-bias education in social studies and proposes a re-organized value analysis model to allow students to self-reflect on value problems and to participate in the process of rational value determination, thereby promoting student’s participation in value problem solving and internalizing desirable values. The first step of the value analysis model is to recognize the value problem and identify the value problem that should be resolved. In the second step, facts related to the value problem are collected and are verified for value judgment. The third step examines the factual basis and value principles related to the value problem, and reviews the value judgment to prepare the basis for the value judgment. The fourth step is to evaluate whether or not to accept the value principle, which determines whether the learner can accept the value principle within the value judgment made by the learner. The final step consists of internalizing and acting on values, such as recognizing and respecting different values of others. This study extends the discussion on the theoretical search and practical application of anti-bias education through a value analysis model.

Cultural Values and Perceived Audit Quality: A Conceptual Framework

Objective – This paper aims to propose a framework for cultural values and perceived audit quality Methodology/Technique – The methodology used in this study is the content analysis of the published papers in relation to cultural values and perceived audit quality Findings – There is a strong relationship between cultural values and accounting values in the judgement process of auditing and they determine the quality of audit. Novelty – There is not much information published in the area of the roles of cultural values and perceived audit quality. Therefore, this paper offers a conceptual framework on cultural values and perceived audit quality. Type of Paper: Review Keywords: Culture; Cultural Values; Perception; Audit Quality Reference to this paper should be made as follows: Dunakhir, S; Idrus, M. (2020). Cultural Values and Perceived Audit Quality: A Conceptual Framework, J. Fin. Bank. Review, 5 (3): 78 – 83. https://doi.org/10.35609/jfbr.2020.5.3(2) JEL Classification: M4, M42.

Covid-19 Pandemi Sürecinin Türk Yargı Sistemine Etkileri

The impact of the new type corona virus, which is thought to spread from the marine animal market in Wuhan, China and announced as a "pandemic" by the World Health Organization of the United Nations, has deeply affected the relations in social life. The effect of this epidemic, which affects the whole world, especially on the judicial system, constitutes the main theme of the study. The judicial process and changes in the judicial order are carried out by legal regulations. In the 1st paragraph of the 6th article of the European Convention on Human Rights; stated that the individual has the right to be tried in line with the principle of fair trial. Accordingly, the fulfillment of the judicial activity within the framework of legal rules is the most important right that provides the legal guarantee of the individual. During the corona epidemic process, regulations were made in order to reduce the human circulation and social relations created by the human factor, the source of contamination, in courthouses and other institutions, with regulatory actions and recommendations. Effective use of material and human resources should be taken into account in the administration's implementation of measures in the crisis management process. During the pandemic process, while digital law practices such as the National Judicial Network Project (UYAP), Sound and Video Information System (SEGBİS) were required to be implemented, following the policy of stopping caused some problems. In order to prevent the liability arising from the violation of fundamental rights and independence,  digital legal instruments should be put into use. However, with this situation, backlogs in the judicial system can be prevented. In the judicial system, it is a great deficiency that UYAP system, which was regarded as "digital courthouse" before the epidemic, is not actively used by all stakeholders. The law, Presidential circular and other regulatory procedures should be supported in a way that will improve the remote judgment process and allow technical studies in accordance with the digitalization process, in line with the legal principles. It is thought that such studies will provide effective use of crisis management by significantly reducing the human circulation in the courthouse environment.

Conexões entre o julgamento moral e determinantes biológicos do comportamento na governança corporativa

O presente artigo analisa os comportamentos antissociais ou antiéticos no contexto da Governança Corporativa, pautado pela necessidade de se acompanhar com instrumentos próprios seus efeitos, à luz dos avanços neste campo de conhecimento. Ao preconizar a sua validação adequada, postula-se a necessidade de considerar os diferentes aspectos do comportamento humano quanto aos processos de julgamento. Neste sentido, objetiva-se identificar as conexões teóricas entre o julgamento moral e o comportamento ético organizacional, notando-se uma lacuna em relação às normativas existentes. A metodologia do estudo é descritiva de natureza exploratória, utilizando a abordagem mista – qualitativa e quantitativa, iniciando-se com uma pesquisa bibliométrica para identificação de estudos anteriores e da revisão da literatura pertinente ao julgamento moral à luz do comportamento organizacional. Identifica-se na literatura que o julgamento moral do indivíduo é influenciado por fatores genéticos, socioambientais e biossociais, que influenciam o comportamento por meio do julgamento moral. Foram coletados dados utilizando uma escala validada de mensuração desenvolvida por outros autores e adaptada ao contexto local. Não foi possível concluir a respeito das possíveis diferenças de julgamento moral utilitarista no comportamento de profissionais da área comercial. Já em relação à idade, foi confirmada uma tendência ao comportamento deontológico para a amostra de maior idade e uma tendência utilitarista para a amostra masculino. A partir destas evidências, sugerem-se novas hipóteses que são relevantes para o desenvolvimento da teoria neste campo de conhecimento, além de evidenciar a necessidade por parte da Governança Corporativa em criar os seus próprios métodos de validação e políticas adequadas.

De-stereotyping Public Performance Evaluation

Experimental evidence suggests that citizens’ judgments of service quality often rely on prior beliefs about providers’ characteristics, such as sectoral or racial stereotypes. Such a biased judgment process prevents the public from understanding performance information accurately and choosing high-quality service providers. To address this, we studied the relation between performance information and the evaluation mode and propose that presenting information jointly (joint evaluation) rather than separately (separate evaluation) may help people avoid stereotyping and consider actual performance. We compared people’s perceived performance and preferences through the separate and joint evaluation modes (SE and JE) in three online experiments (N > 3,000), and obtained similar results in these studies: Subjects used sectoral or racial stereotypes to evaluate school performance in the SE condition, but the stereotyping decreased in the JE condition. Our findings provide an effective tool to de-stereotype performance evaluations, which also has implications for other public management research areas in reducing stereotyping behaviors.

EPA-based assessment: Clinical teachers’ challenges when transitioning to a prospective entrustment-supervision scale

Background This study explores the challenges clinical teachers face when first using a prospective entrustment-supervision (ES) scale in a curriculum based on Entrustable Professional Activities (EPAs). A prospective ES scale has the purpose to estimate at which level of supervision a student will be ready to perform an activity in subsequent encounters. Methods We studied the transition to prospective assessment of medical students in clerkships via semi-structured interviews with twelve purposefully sampled clinical teachers, shortly after the introduction of a new undergraduate EPA-based curriculum and EPA-based assessment employing a prospective ES scale. Results While some clinical teachers showed a correct interpretation, rating strategies also appeared to be affected by the target supervision level for completion of the clerkship. Instructions to estimate readiness for a supervision level in the future were not always understood. Further, teachers' interpretation of the scale anchors relied heavily on the phrasing. Discussion Prospective assessment asks clinical teachers to make an extra inference step in their judgement process from reporting observed performance to estimating future level of supervision. This requires a change in mindset when coming from a retrospective, performance-oriented assessment method, i.e., reporting what was observed. Our findings suggest optimizing the ES-scale wordings and improving faculty development.

Connecting Judgment Process and Accuracy of Student Teachers: Differences in Observation and Student Engagement Cues to Assess Student Characteristics

Teachers' ability to assess student cognitive and motivational-affective characteristics is a requirement to support individual students with adaptive teaching. However, teachers have difficulty in assessing the diversity among their students in terms of the intra-individual combinations of these characteristics in student profiles. Reasons for this challenge are assumed to lie in the behavioral and cognitive activities behind judgment processes. Particularly, the observation and utilization of diagnostic student cues, such as student engagement, might be an important factor. Hence, we investigated how student teachers with high and low judgment accuracy differ with regard to their eye movements as a behavioral and utilization of student cues as a cognitive activity. Forty-three participating student teachers observed a video vignette showing parts of a mathematics lesson to assess student characteristics of five target students, and reported which cues they used to form their judgment. Meanwhile, eye movements were tracked. Student teachers showed substantial diversity in their judgment accuracy. Those with a high judgment accuracy showed slight tendencies toward a more “experienced” pattern of eye movements with a higher number of fixations and shorter average fixation duration. Although all participants favored diagnostic student cues for their assessments, an epistemic network analysis indicated that student teachers with a high judgment accuracy utilized combinations of diagnostic student cues that clearly pointed to specific student profiles. Those with a low judgment accuracy had difficulty using distinct combinations of diagnostic cues. Findings highlight the power of behavioral and cognitive activities in judgment processes for explaining teacher performance of judgment accuracy.

Why (a Theory of) Opportunity Matters: Refining the Austrian View of Entrepreneurial Discovery

The concept of entrepreneurial opportunity has undergone a period of useful critique and refinement since Venkataraman (1997) and Shane and Venkataraman (2000) employed the term as one of the defining features of entrepreneurship studies. This paper presents a novel Austrian reinterpretation of this concept as an intersubjective phenomenon that emerges from the dual entrepreneurial process of discovery and judgment. Just as markets can be described as price discovery procedures for existing goods, services, and resources, entrepreneurship can be usefully described as a price discovery procedure for future goods, services, and resources. This view retains the essential elements of Kirzner’s (1973) approach while also refining the opportunity discovery concept within an evolutionary realist framework for understanding entrepreneurial motivation and action.

La voz de las mujeres en las guerras de la Independencia de Colombia: del anonimato a las reivindicaciones

En el marco de la conmemoración del Bicentenario de la Independencia de Colombia, este trabajo tiene como propósito examinar una recopilación de veintiséis cartas escritas por mujeres en medio de la guerra de emancipación. A través de estas cartas es posible asomarnos al complejo mundo que ellas debieron afrontar en estos tiempos de convulsión política y militar. Algunas cartas son declaraciones de defensa, testimonios y denuncias presentadas en el marco de los procesos de juzgamiento a adversarios políticos. Pero la gran mayoría corresponde a los trámites y esfuerzos que ellas debieron emprender ante las instituciones legalmente establecidas con miras a aliviar la crítica situación económica de sus familias y a lograr mejores condiciones sociales y de subsistencia para sus esposos, hijos y demás seres queridos comprometidos en la lucha militar.

Cultural cognition and endorser scandal: Impact of consumer information processing mode on moral judgment in the endorsement context

Robust evidence suggests that cultural variation affects consumer information processing. However, how different cultural orientations lead consumers to different moral judgments toward celebrity endorsers’ unethical behaviors is less appreciated. Drawing on the dual agency model, we show through two experiments that consumers’ information processing mode (holistic vs. analytic) leads to different moral judgment outcomes. This study contributes to the literature by (1) identifying the substantial roles of consumers’ cultural background and cognitive processing style on their response to negative publicity about celebrity athletes, (2) demonstrating the influence of cultural cognition on moral reasoning for both chronic (study 1) and working self-concepts (study 2), and (3) empirically testing the mediating role of the information processing mode on the effect of cultural cognition on moral judgment processes and its subsequent outcomes for celebrity athlete evaluation. The findings shed important managerial insights for managers dealing with athlete’s unethical behaviors in different cultural contexts.

"Beauty Is How You Feel Inside": Aesthetic Judgments Are Related to Emotional Responses to Contemporary Music.

While it has extensively been argued that aesthetic categories such as beauty have a direct relationship to emotion, there has only been limited psychological research on the relationship between aesthetic judgments and emotional responses to art. Music is recognized to be an art form that elicits strong emotional responses in listeners and it is therefore pertinent to study empirically how aesthetic judgments relate to emotional responses to music listening. The aim of the presented study is to test for the impact of aesthetic judgment on various psychophysiological response measures of emotion that were assessed in parallel in two contemporary music concerts, each with a different audience and program. In order to induce different levels of aesthetic judgments in participants, we assigned them randomly to one of two groups in a between-subjects design in both concerts: One group attended a talk on the music presented, illustrating its aesthetic value, while the other group attended an unrelated talk on a non-musical topic. During the concerts, we assessed, from 41 participants in Concert 1 (10 males; mean age 23 years) and 53 in Concert 2 (14 males; mean age 24 years), different emotional response components: (a) retrospective rating of emotion; (b) activation of the peripheral nervous system (skin conductance and heart rate); (c) the activity of two facial muscles associated with emotional valence (only Concert 1). Participants listened to live performances of a selection of contemporary music pieces. After each piece, participants rated the music according to a list of commonly discussed aesthetic judgment criteria, all thought to contribute to the perceived aesthetic value of art. While preconcert talks did not significantly impact value judgment ratings, through factor analyses it was found that aesthetic judgments could be grouped into several underlying dimensions representing analytical, semantic, traditional aesthetic, and typicality values. All dimensions where then subsequently shown to be related to subjective and physiological responses to music. The findings reported in this study contribute to understanding the relationship between aesthetic judgment processes and emotional responses to music. The results give further evidence that cognitive-affective interactions have a significant role in processing music stimuli.

Pain Modulates Responses to Emotional Stimuli

Pain and emotion are common subjective experiences that play vital roles in daily life. Pain has been clinically confirmed to increase depressive mood. However, little is known about how pain modulates cognitive emotional judgment processing. A better understanding of this may help explain the effect of pain on the development of depressive moods. We recruited 30 adult participants to test their responses to pictures of scenes (Experiment 1) and faces (Experiment 2) that represented happy, neutral, and sad emotions, while experiencing painful (induced via topical capsaicin cream) and control (hand cream) treatments. Results showed that participants in the painful condition showed lower accuracy to emotional scene stimuli and longer reaction times to both emotional scene and face stimuli, relative to the control condition. In addition, the difference values of the reaction times between the painful and control conditions were larger for sad scenes than for happy or neutral scenes. These results suggest that pain alters attentional processing of emotional stimuli, especially with regards to sad scene stimuli, which may explain how painful stimuli affect the development of depressive moods.