Relevant Beliefs Research Articles

Exploring the individual adoption of human resource analytics: Behavioural beliefs and the role of machine learning characteristics

The technological capabilities of Human Resource Analytics (HRA), enhanced by recent innovations in Machine Learning (ML), offer exciting opportunities. However, organisations often fail to realise these potentials because of a limited understanding of why individuals choose to adopt or disregard respective tools. Prior research on innovation adoption offers preliminary insights but fails to aggregate the determinants of individual adoption into actionable suggestions for decisions in the ML adoption process. Our study applies focused interviews to examine non-ML experts' reasoning for using a specific tool tailored to a public sector organisation, which corresponds to the usual end-user perspective of ML-based HRA adoption. By drawing from the HRA adoption framework, provided by Vargas et al. (2018), we contribute to the literature by identifying relevant beliefs and experiences influencing one's intention to adopt ML-based HRA and by qualitatively linking these beliefs to ML characteristics such as transparency, automation and fairness. For practitioners, we provide actionable guidance emphasising the need to ensure fairness proactively, as interviewees do not consider this aspect when deciding to adopt ML-based HRA.

Allowing time for 8+ hours of sleep: identification and validation of important beliefs using the reasoned action approach.

The present studies advance research using the Reasoned Action Approach to understand sleep behavior. Identification of the modal salient beliefs that individuals hold regarding their sleep habits is necessary to understand the attitudes, perceived normative pressure, and perceived behavioral control (PBC) that individuals hold. Belief elicitation (Study 1) and follow-up validation (Study 2) studies of undergraduates at a Midwestern USA university were conducted to identify readily accessible and important beliefs regarding allowing time for 8+ hours of sleep each night. Important attitude relevant beliefs included positive effects on mood, thinking, health, and productivity. Important normative beliefs were perceived injunctive pressure from family, health professionals, and significant others. Because of the strong influence of PBC on intentions/behavior, most important were control beliefs about the need for good time management. The present studies increased our understanding why many individuals do not allow time to obtain adequate sleep. Identification of the beliefs that distinguish between those who intend to allow time for adequate sleep and those who do not is a necessary step toward the design of effective interventions to improve sleep duration. The results indicate that a focus on increasing time management skills and PBC may be an effective approach for sleep interventions.

Predicting Food Waste Avoidance: Analysis of an Extended Model of the Theory of Planned Behavior and of Relevant Beliefs

ABSTRACT This research adopted the Theory of Planned Behavior (TPB) to predict intention and behavior to avoid food waste. In a pilot study, behavioral, normative, and control beliefs were identified. In the main study, a TPB model extended with descriptive and moral norms was assessed using a two-wave design and applying SEM. The associations between beliefs and TPB constructs were analyzed by MIMIC models. Attitude, descriptive and moral norms, and perceived behavioral control were associated with intention to avoid food waste, which predicted behavior. Considering the most important beliefs in forming intentions has important implications for designing food waste prevention interventions.

Relations between motivation, social and emotional learning (SEL), and English learning achievements in Hong Kong primary schools

ABSTRACT Against the backdrop of declining motivation and growing social and emotional challenges in English learning experienced by Hong Kong primary school students, the study aimed to profile an interactive pattern between relevant motivational beliefs (i.e., self-efficacy, interest, and growth mindset), social and emotional learning (SEL) skills and English learning achievements. Data was collected from 913 4th graders with questionnaires and an English test. Results indicated a medium-high level of motivation among the participants, and a high level of self-awareness and social awareness skills but a medium level of self-management and social management skills in terms of SEL. More importantly, structural equation modeling (SEM) analyses confirmed the intricate interplay where the motivational beliefs predicted English learning achievements through the mediation of self-awareness and self-management skills. Our findings also underscore the relatively higher importance of interest and growth mindset than self-efficacy in English learning for young children. Pedagogical implications are discussed.

Training of Physical Education and Sports Specialists for the Organization of Active Leisure in Places of Mass Recreation of the Population

The purpose of the article is to update the role of active leisure in preserving the health of the population, popularizing a healthy lifestyle, and analyzing the specifics of the training of physical education and sports specialists for the organization of active leisure in places of mass recreation of the population. The issue of professional training of physical education and sports specialists has been updated in the context of the expansion of the areas of sports and health work with various population groups and the organization of active leisure. The orientations of professional training for specialists in physical education and sports recreational and recreational activities have been determined, the main aspects of training specialists in the field of physical culture and sports have been revealed. Approaches in the process of training physical education and sports specialists to the organization of active leisure (epistemological, axiological, systemic, personal, activity-based, and competence-based) are highlighted. The content of the training of physical education and sports specialists for the organization of active leisure in places of mass recreation has been determined (understanding of the basic concepts, legal bases and program and normative requirements for the organization of active leisure of the population; availability of systemic and integral knowledge regarding the forms and methods of organizing active leisure; the formation of relevant beliefs, views, value attitudes, social norms, positive motivation; integration of theoretical and practical tools; ability to independently design means of sports and health activities, etc.).

Proactive health behavior in middle-aged and older adult females with urinary incontinence: A grounded theory study.

To develop a conceptual framework for proactive health behavior among middle-aged and older adult females with urinary incontinence. Qualitative grounded theory study. There is a growing body of research emphasizing the pivotal significance of proactive health behavior. Proactive health behavior can empower patients to actively manage their illnesses and facilitate disease recovery. Clearly defining patients' relevant beliefs and assumptions regarding proactive health behavior can effectively promote their adoption. However, there is currently a lack of relevant research in this area. We conducted in-depth interviews with middle-aged and older adult females with urinary incontinence (n = 17) and nursing caregivers (n = 9). We used theoretical sampling, whlie conducting continuous comparative analysisi and data collection. The study has yielded a substantive theory to facilitate healthcare professionals' comprehension of proactive health behavior in middle-aged and older adult females with urinary incontinence. The foundation for middle-aged and older adult females to adopt proactive health behavior is having a certain level of health literacy regarding their conditions. Patients' internal motivation to engage in proactive health behavior includes a sense of health responsibility and health demands. Additionally, external support received by patients can also facilitate their adoption of proactive health behavior. The proactive health behavior practices of middle-aged and older adult females mainly include proactive medical care behavior and establishing a healthy lifestyle. The conceptual framework established in this study offers theoretical support for middle-aged and older adult females with urinary incontinence to adopt proactive health behavior. It provides a basis for future exploration of proactive health behavior among this demographic and informs the development of more effective health interventions and support measures tailored to their needs. The study specifically elucidates the mechanisms and manifestations of proactive health behavior adopted by middle-aged and older adult females with urinary incontinence, laying the foundation for clarifying the level of proactive health among patients and implementing corresponding intervention measures. Additionally, it can also serve as a reference for related research on other diseases.

Understanding residents’ risk information seeking, processing and sharing regarding waste incineration power projects

Waste incineration power projects (WIPP) may face suspicion and resistance due to potential environmental and health risks. Information behavior has become a crucial way for residents to manage the risks. By integrating the risk information seeking and processing (RISP) model with the protective action decision model (PADM), the study develops a four-stage model that incorporates information acquisition and perceived benefits to understand the determinants of residents’ information behaviors regarding WIPP. A total of 1726 respondents were interviewed. The results indicate that 77.5 % respondents frequently use social media. Of the twenty-five hypothesized paths, twenty-one were found to be significant. Information acquisition from social media plays a larger predictive role than that from official media. Perceived risks, benefits, and knowledge positively predict information sharing, systematic processing, and information seeking, respectively. Perceived knowledge has the strongest direct influence on information insufficiency (β = 0.24, p < 0.001) with the explained variance of systematic processing being the highest (R2 = 0.51). Interesting, the relationship between information insufficiency and information sharing, as well as between relevant channel beliefs and information sharing, are negative. Theoretical insights into extending the PADM and the RISP model are provided, as well as managerial implications for risk communication about WIPP.

Performance-oriented measurement of teachers’ competence in linguistically responsive teaching, relevant learning opportunities and beliefs

Performance-oriented measurement of teachers’ competence in linguistically responsive teaching, relevant learning opportunities and beliefs

How and why aversive personality is expressed in political preferences.

Political orientation reflects beliefs, opinions, and values that are, at least in part, rooted in stable interindividual differences. Whereas evidence has accumulated with regard to the relevance of basic personality dimensions, especially concerning the sociocultural dimension of political ideology, less attention has been paid to the more specific dispositional tendency to assign a higher weight to one's own utility above others' (i.e., socially aversive personality), which is likely to play a pivotal role concerning the economic dimension of political ideology in particular. In three studies with over 66,000 participants from 38 countries, we show that individuals with elevated levels in aversive personality tend to endorse more right-wing political orientations in terms of a single left-right dimension, hold relevant ideological beliefs tied to both sociocultural and economic conservatism, and report corresponding electoral voting behavior. We further provide support for the idea that this overlap between a dispositional tendency toward aversive behavior and a right-wing political orientation can be attributed to shared belief systems. (PsycInfo Database Record (c) 2024 APA, all rights reserved).

Should Communication Campaigns Promoting Vaccination Address Misinformation Beliefs? Implications from a Nationally Representative Longitudinal Survey Study among U.S. Adults

Public health communication campaign planners must carefully consider whether misinformation beliefs are important to target and, ideally, correct. Guided by the reasoned action approach, we hypothesized that behavior-specific beliefs regarding COVID-19 vaccination would account for any observed relationship between general coronavirus misinformation beliefs (misinformation beliefs that are not specific to the anticipated consequences of COVID-19 vaccination) and subsequent vaccine uptake. To test our hypothesis, we used panel data from a two-wave nationally representative sample of U.S. adults pre- and post-vaccine availability (T1: July 2020, T2: April/June 2021, analytic sample: n = 665). Contrary to our hypothesis, we find a residual observed relationship between general coronavirus misinformation beliefs and subsequent vaccine uptake (AOR = 0.40, SE = 0.10). Intriguingly, our post-hoc analyses do show that after also adjusting for T2 behavioral beliefs, this association was no longer significant. With this and other justifications, we recommend that messages promoting vaccination prioritize targeting relevant behavioral beliefs.

Beliefs about losing control and other OCD-related cognitions: An experimental investigation

Background and objectivesCognitive theories of obsessive-compulsive disorder (OCD) suggest that dysfunctional beliefs influence symptoms. However, well-established belief domains do not fully explain OCD symptomatology, suggesting other cognitive mechanisms may be involved. An additional belief domain which may play a role in OCD is beliefs about losing control. Indeed, these beliefs have been found to be associated with OCD symptoms. However, the relationships between beliefs about losing control and other OCD phenomena, including other relevant dysfunctional beliefs, is unclear. The aim of this study was to examine the relationships between beliefs about losing control and appraisals hypothesized to be relevant to OCD. MethodsA total of 163 participants completed the experimental protocol, wherein they received false (positive or negative) feedback regarding the likelihood they may lose control and completed a vignette task asking them to read hypothetical scenarios relevant to OCD concerns (checking, and aggressive thoughts). Vignettes were followed by questions and prompts used to measure OCD-relevant appraisals. ResultsBased on MANOVAs, beliefs about losing control had a significant impact on appraisals in the checking, F (151) = 5.55, p = .001, and aggressive thoughts, F (151) = 2.898, p = .037, vignettes. However, planned comparison indicated that in the aggressive thoughts vignettes, this effect was in the opposite direction than was hypothesized. LimitationsThe losing control induction may have inadvertently influenced participants’ beliefs about the utility of thought control. ConclusionsFindings provide preliminary evidence for an association between beliefs about losing control and OCD-relevant appraisals.

Beliefs about technological and contextual features drive biofuels’ social acceptance

To make the transition towards renewable and sustainable energy possible, there is a need to make new relevant technologies, including biofuels more acceptable and accepted. To promote biofuels acceptance and thus adoption means to improve both their perceived technological features and the surrounding context supporting their adoption, as well as some social-psychological features of the target adopters. Achieving the ultimate goal of biofuels adoption thus requires a complex and holistic approach to foster this new energy technology's acceptability and acceptance considering several biofuels features. For this aim, the integrated Sustainable Energy Technology Adoption Model (i-SETA) was developed and tested with newly piloted tools to measure the relevant biofuels' beliefs profile. A Path Analysis tested the relationship between the investigated variables. Results revealed the importance of beliefs belonging to each one of the different considered domains (technological, contextual, and personal variables). Several of them had a direct impact on the cognitive and affective biofuels evaluation, and subsequently on biofuels acceptability and acceptance, for European Union both laypeople and expert stakeholders (total sample of 1017 participants). The main results thus revealed that very specific beliefs, across all the three beliefs classes, can be identified as either barriers or drivers with respect to the aim of boosting biofuels' acceptability and acceptance. Each one of these specific beliefs could thus be properly targeted in the audiences to cope with the barriers and capitalize on the drivers.

Despite popular intuition, positive world beliefs poorly reflect several objective indicators of privilege, including wealth, health, sex, and neighborhood safety.

We tested whether generalized beliefs that the world is safe, abundant, pleasurable, and progressing (termed "primal world beliefs") are associated with several objective measures of privilege. Three studies (N = 16,547) tested multiple relationships between indicators of privilege-including socioeconomic status, health, sex, and neighborhood safety-and relevant world beliefs, as well as researchers and laypeople's expectations of these relationships. Samples were mostly from the USA and included general population samples (Study 2) as well as focused samples of academic researchers (Study 1) and people who had experienced serious illness or trauma (Study 3). Studies 1-2 found mostly negligible relationships between world beliefs and indicators of privilege, which were invariably lower than researcher predictions (e.g., instead of the expected r = 0.33, neighborhood affluence correlated with Abundant world belief at r = 0.01). Study 3 found that people who had experienced serious illness (cancer, cystic fibrosis) only showed modest differences in beliefs from controls. While results do not preclude that some individuals' beliefs were meaningfully affected by life events, they imply that such changes are smaller or less uniform than widely believed and that knowing a person's demographic background may tell us relatively little about their beliefs (and vice versa).

Differential responses to ethical vegetarian appeals: Exploring the role of traits, beliefs, and motives.

This research examines differential responses to ethical vegetarian appeals as a fuction of individuals' personalities. Ethical vegetarian appeals are persuasive messages promoting the adoption of a plant-based diet on moral grounds. Individuals may vary in their receptivity to such appeals, depending on their morally relevant traits (e.g., agreeableness), beliefs (e.g., speciesism), and motives (e.g., concerns about animal welfare). We explored (Study 1, N = 907) and then attempted to confirm (Study 2, N = 980) differential responses to three vegetarian appeals-two highlighting moral concerns (animal welfare, the environment) and a third focusing on individual health (control condition). Both studies revealed several differential effects of our vegetarian appeals on the perceived effectiveness of the appeal and resultant intentions to reduce meat consumption. These mostly consisted of differences in receptivity to appeals focused on animal welfare. However, only one such effect observed in Study 1 was clearly replicated in Study 2: People who more strongly believed that eating meat was "normal" rated the vegetarian appeals focused on animal welfare as less effective. Ethical vegetarian appeals may elicit different responses from different people, particularly those focused on animal welfare, depending on how normative one believes meat-eating to be. Such insights can inform behavior change efforts in this area.

When to give weight to weighty religious disagreement

AbstractWhen we encounter a disagreeing interlocutor in the weighty domains of religion, philosophy, and politics, what is the rational response to the disagreement? I argue that the rational response is to proportion the degree to which you give weight to the opinion of a disagreeing interlocutor to the degree to which you and your interlocutor share relevant beliefs. I begin with Richard Fumerton's three conditions under which we can rationally give no weight to the opinions of a disagreeing peer. I argue that his conditions are incomplete; I propose a fourth condition that maintains that disagreeing interlocutors (whether they are peers or not) need not give weight to each other's opinions when the interlocutors do not share rationally held relevant beliefs. By contrast, when rationally held relevant beliefs are shared, rationality demands that we re-evaluate and even moderate or change beliefs in the face of disagreement. I then defend my condition against two objections. First, I argue that the condition does not entail a coherence theory of justification. Second, I consider the charge that my condition recommends operating within an epistemic bubble.

A Drop in the Ocean? Fostering Water-Saving Behavior and Spillover Through Information Provision and Feedback

Pro-environmental change is essential to address climate change. Impact from behavior change interventions increases if non-target behaviors also change. Here, we explore such behavioral spillover effects following a water conservation behavioral intervention and examine whether they are mediated by changes in relevant identities and beliefs. We used a persuasive intervention to encourage 150 participants to reduce daily shower-times over 14 days to conserve water. The intervention comprised information-provision, eliciting a shower time reduction commitment, and (for half the sample) progress feedback. We found that participants reduced shower time (by 38%) and intended to engage more in water-saving and pro-environmental activities, but we found no evidence of behavioral spillover (i.e., non-targeted intention change was not mediated by change in the target behavior). There was no additional effect on behavior change of receiving feedback. We discuss the implications of these findings for spillover in theory and practice.

What motivates German consumers to reduce their meat consumption? Identifying relevant beliefs

High levels of meat consumption cause problems related to public health, the environment, and animal welfare. Therefore, it is crucial to improve our understanding of the drivers and barriers involved in reducing meat consumption. Using the Theory of Planned Behavior (TPB), we examined to what extent attitude, subjective norm, and perceived behavioral control (PBC) affect intention and willingness to reduce meat consumption. In line with the TPB and going beyond existing literature, we also explored which specific beliefs determine these three constructs. In 2021, we conducted an online survey with a sample representative of the German population (N = 1093). Hierarchical regression models revealed that after controlling for sociodemographic characteristics, the TPB constructs explained 55% of the variance in intention and 61% of the variance in willingness. Importantly, each of the three TPB constructs affected intention and willingness to reduce meat consumption, with attitude having the largest impact. Habit strength and past behavior in addition to the TPB constructs did not improve prediction. Multiple linear regression models showed that attitude was determined by the beliefs that reducing meat consumption leads to a healthier diet, a reduced risk of developing certain diseases, a more natural diet, and the feeling of missing meat. In contrast, environmental and animal welfare concerns showed no significant effect on attitude. Both family and friends contributed to the perceived social pressure. The beliefs of being able to prepare meat-free meals, having enough time to spend on one's diet, and being able to easily purchase meat substitutes led to higher PBC. Based on these findings, we provide recommendations for intervention strategies and derive implications for future research.

Agents, audiences and peers: why international organizations diversify their legitimation discourse

Abstract In the face of public contestation, international organizations (IOs) invoke norms in their public communication to enhance relevant audiences' legitimacy beliefs. This article offers the first comprehensive analysis of what we term normative diversity in IOs' discursive legitimation by drawing on a novel dataset on norm-based justifications in more than 32,000 paragraphs of text published by 28 regional IOs between 1980 and 2019. We show that IOs vary strikingly in this respect: whereas some IOs invoke a narrow set of norms, often focused on economic welfare and functional capability, others engage a wide variety that includes security, national sovereignty, democracy or human rights. To explain this variance, we specify and test an explanatory framework that emphasizes IO audiences, agents and peer organizations as distinct origins. Our statistical analysis reveals that IOs diversify their discursive legitimation to 1) address heterogeneous audiences, 2) reconcile competing beliefs amongst agents themselves, and 3) integrate the legitimation of peer IOs. These findings indicate that IOs respond to the growing complexity of international cooperation in their discursive legitimation and may raise policy-makers' awareness of the difficulties in contemporary legitimation efforts.

Revisiting the South African Unicorn: Rock Art, Natural History and Colonial Misunderstandings of Indigenous Realities

European ideas about unicorns spread across the world in the colonial era. In South Africa, hunts for that creature, and indigenous rock paintings of it, were commonplace. The aim was proof from ‘terra incognita’, often with the possibility of claiming a reward. There has, however, been little consideration of the independent, local creature onto which the unicorn was transposed. During cross-cultural engagements, foreign beliefs in the mythical unicorn and a desire for evidence of its natural history intermixed to an extraordinary degree with local beliefs in a one-horned animal. For over two centuries, colonists and researchers alike failed to realize that the local creature, by chance, resembled the European unicorn. A new synthesis of southern African ethnography, history and the writings of early travellers, missionaries and colonial politicians provides unambiguous evidence that one-horned creatures obtained in local beliefs before the arrival of colonists. Moreover, it shows that these creatures are depicted in South African rock art, and that they are a manifestation of San (Bushman) rain-animals. By ignoring relevant beliefs and images, previous scholars have failed to acknowledge that the South African unicorn was, apart from its four legs and single horn, a creature wholly different from the European one.

Bayesian belief protection: A study of belief in conspiracy theories

ABSTRACT Several philosophers and psychologists have characterized belief in conspiracy theories as a product of irrational reasoning. Proponents of conspiracy theories apparently resist revising their beliefs given disconfirming evidence and tend to believe in more than one conspiracy, even when the relevant beliefs are mutually inconsistent. In this paper, we bring leading views on conspiracy theoretic beliefs closer together by exploring their rationality under a probabilistic framework. We question the claim that the irrationality of conspiracy theoretic beliefs stems from an inadequate response to disconfirming evidence and internal incoherence. Drawing analogies to Lakatosian research programs, we argue that maintaining a core conspiracy belief can be Bayes-rational when it is embedded in a network of auxiliary beliefs, which can be revised to protect the more central belief from disconfirmation. We propose that the (ir)rationality associated with conspiracy belief lies not in a flawed updating method, but in their failure to converge toward well-confirmed, stable belief networks in the long run. This approach not only reconciles previously disjointed views, but also points toward more specific hypotheses explaining why some agents may be prone to adopting beliefs in conspiracy theories.