Matching Items (82)
Description
Previous research on experiences of the endowment effect and buyer's remorse has often failed to compare the two seemingly related phenomena. The current study attempts to provide a framework in which the two can be compared and to offer a possible suggestion as to when it may be beneficial to experience either the endowment effect or buyer's remorse, namely situations of resource scarcity versus abundance. The current study employed an online dating paradigm in which resource scarcity was operationalized as the sex ratio of users on the site. Two hundred and one participants were exposed to a favorable sex ratio, an unfavorable sex ratio, or a no information control condition and asked to bid on potential dates. Once matched with a potential date, participants were asked how willing they would be to give up their date and the minimum amount of points they would request to do so. These dependent variables served as indicators of experiences of the endowment effect or buyer's remorse. Results indicated that the sex ratio of the online dating site did not influence experiences of the endowment effect versus buyer's remorse. Potential mediators and moderators were also investigated although no significant effects were found. Possible reasons for the null results are discussed as well as future directions.
ContributorsMeyer, Kaitlin (Author) / Cohen, Adam B. (Thesis advisor) / Kenrick, Douglas (Committee member) / Neuberg, Steven (Committee member) / Arizona State University (Publisher)
Created2014
Description
Ephemeral streams in Arizona that are perpendicularly intersected by the Central Arizona Project (CAP) canal have been altered due to partial or complete damming of the stream channel. The dammed upstream channels have experienced decades long cycles of sediment deposition and waterlogging during storm events causing the development of "green-up" zones. This dissertation examines the biogeomorphological effects of damming ephemeral streams caused by the CAP canal by investigating: (1) changes in the preexisting spatial cover of riparian vegetation and how these changes are affected by stream geometry; (2) green-up initiation and evolution; and (3) changes in plant species and community level changes. To the author's knowledge, this is the only study that undertakes an interdisciplinary approach to understanding the environmental responses to anthropogenically-altered ephemeral stream channels. The results presented herein show that vegetation along the upstream section increased by an average of 200,872 m2 per kilometer of the CAP canal over a 28 year period. Vegetation growth was compared to channel widths which share a quasi-linear relationship. Remote sensing analysis of Landsat TM images using an object-oriented approach shows that riparian vegetation cover gradually increased over 28 years. Field studies reveal that the increases in vegetation are attributed to the artificial rise in local base-level upstream created by the canal, which causes water to spill laterally onto the desert floor. Vegetation within the green-up zone varies considerably in comparison to pre-canal construction. Changes are most notable in vegetation community shifts and abundance. The wettest section of the green-up zone contains the greatest density of woody plant stems, the greatest vegetation volume, and a high percentage of herbaceous cover. Vegetation within wetter zones changed from a tree-shrub to a predominantly tree-herb assemblage, whereas desert shrubs located in zones with intermediate moisture have developed larger stems. Results from this study lend valuable insight to green-up processes associated with damming ephemeral streams, which can be applied to planning future canal or dam projects in drylands. Also, understanding the development of the green-up zones provide awareness to potentially avoiding flood damage to infrastructure that may be unknowingly constructed within the slow-growing green-up zone.
ContributorsHamdan, Abeer (Author) / Schmeeckle, Mark (Thesis advisor) / Myint, Soe (Thesis advisor) / Dorn, Ronald (Committee member) / Stromberg, Juliet (Committee member) / Arizona State University (Publisher)
Created2014
Description
Reciprocity is considered one of the most potent weapons of social influence. Yet, little is known about when reciprocity appeals are more or less effective. A functional evolutionary approach suggests that reciprocity helps people survive in resource-scarce environments: When resources are limited, a person may not be able to obtain enough resources on their own, and reciprocal relationships can increase the odds of survival. If true, people concerned about resource scarcity may increasingly engage in reciprocal relationships and feel more compelled to reciprocate the favors done for them by others. In a series of experiments, I test this hypothesis and demonstrate that: (1) chronic concerns about resource scarcity (low socioeconomic status) predict increased reciprocity, (2) experimentally activating resource scarcity enhances the effectiveness of reciprocity appeals, (3) this effect is moderated by cues of persuasive intent, and (4) this relationship is mediated by increased gratitude.
ContributorsWhite, Andrew (Author) / Kenrick, Douglas T. (Thesis advisor) / Cialdini, Robert (Committee member) / Morales, Andrea (Committee member) / Neuberg, Steven (Committee member) / Arizona State University (Publisher)
Created2014
Description
ABSTRACT
What does it mean to feel an emotion? The nature of emotional
experience has often been described in terms overall conscious experience, termed affect. However, even within affective research there are multiple contradicting theories about the nature and structure of affect. I propose that these contradictions are due to methodological issues in the empirical research examining these underlying dimensions. Furthermore, I propose that subjective emotional experience should be examined separately from overall affect. The current study attempts to address past methodological issues by focusing solely on emotional experiences, developing a comprehensive list of emotion items, and including a broad range of emotional experiences. In Study 1, participants were asked to recall an emotional experience and then report their experience of 76 different emotions during that experience. A factor analysis of the emotion ratings revealed a 5-factor categorical structure with categories of Joy, Anger, Sadness, Fear, and Shame/Jealousy. In Study 2, the 76 emotion words from Study 1 were compared in a semantic space derived from a large collection of text samples in an attempt to compare to the results of Study 1. A semantic space derived from a broad range of texts would reflect relationships of emotional concepts. Study 2 revealed a 1-factor structure, drastically different from the structure in Study 1. The implications from Study 2, however, are limited because of the limited range of literature that was used to create the semantic space in which the words were compared. Overall, the results from these studies suggest that subjective emotional experience should be treated as categorical.
What does it mean to feel an emotion? The nature of emotional
experience has often been described in terms overall conscious experience, termed affect. However, even within affective research there are multiple contradicting theories about the nature and structure of affect. I propose that these contradictions are due to methodological issues in the empirical research examining these underlying dimensions. Furthermore, I propose that subjective emotional experience should be examined separately from overall affect. The current study attempts to address past methodological issues by focusing solely on emotional experiences, developing a comprehensive list of emotion items, and including a broad range of emotional experiences. In Study 1, participants were asked to recall an emotional experience and then report their experience of 76 different emotions during that experience. A factor analysis of the emotion ratings revealed a 5-factor categorical structure with categories of Joy, Anger, Sadness, Fear, and Shame/Jealousy. In Study 2, the 76 emotion words from Study 1 were compared in a semantic space derived from a large collection of text samples in an attempt to compare to the results of Study 1. A semantic space derived from a broad range of texts would reflect relationships of emotional concepts. Study 2 revealed a 1-factor structure, drastically different from the structure in Study 1. The implications from Study 2, however, are limited because of the limited range of literature that was used to create the semantic space in which the words were compared. Overall, the results from these studies suggest that subjective emotional experience should be treated as categorical.
ContributorsOsborne, Elizabeth (Author) / Shiota, Michelle N. (Thesis advisor) / Glenberg, Arthur (Committee member) / Neuberg, Steven (Committee member) / Becker, David V. (Committee member) / Arizona State University (Publisher)
Created2014
Description
The China smog is a severe air pollution issue that has damaging effects on the health of millions of Chinese nationals and contributes to global warming. In the context of the China smog, this study examined civic engagement on social network sites (SNS) and in real life among Chinese nationals utilizing theories of uses and gratification, the effects of Internet use, media exposure, Internet censorship, political efficacy, trust and social capital. Six hundred and eighty eight Chinese nationals who are currently studying, working or residing in China completed online questionnaires. In general, the results of this study showed that a combination of high needs for recognition of SNS use and low needs for entertainment of SNS use is related with increased civic engagement. The results of this study also revealed that civic engagement is positively related with attention to content about the China smog on mobile Internet, external political efficacy and social capital.
ContributorsChen, Yashu (Author) / Cheong, Pauline (Thesis advisor) / Guerrero, Laura (Committee member) / Neuberg, Steven (Committee member) / Arizona State University (Publisher)
Created2017
Description
Trees serve as a natural umbrella to mitigate insolation absorbed by features of the urban environment, especially building structures and pavements. For a desert community, trees are a particularly valuable asset because they contribute to energy conservation efforts, improve home values, allow for cost savings, and promote enhanced health and well-being. The main obstacle in creating a sustainable urban community in a desert city with trees is the scarceness and cost of irrigation water. Thus, strategically located and arranged desert trees with the fewest tree numbers possible potentially translate into significant energy, water and long-term cost savings as well as conservation, economic, and health benefits. The objective of this dissertation is to achieve this research goal with integrated methods from both theoretical and empirical perspectives.
This dissertation includes three main parts. The first part proposes a spatial optimization method to optimize the tree locations with the objective to maximize shade coverage on building facades and open structures and minimize shade coverage on building rooftops in a 3-dimensional environment. Second, an outdoor urban physical scale model with field measurement is presented to understand the cooling and locational benefits of tree shade. The third part implements a microclimate numerical simulation model to analyze how the specific tree locations and arrangements influence outdoor microclimates and improve human thermal comfort. These three parts of the dissertation attempt to fill the research gap of how to strategically locate trees at the building to neighborhood scale, and quantifying the impact of such arrangements.
Results highlight the significance of arranging residential shade trees across different geographical scales. In both the building and neighborhood scales, research results recommend that trees should be arranged in the central part of the building south front yard. More cooling benefits are provided to the building structures and outdoor microclimates with a cluster tree arrangement without canopy overlap; however, if residents are interested in creating a better outdoor thermal environment, open space between trees is needed to enhance the wind environment for better human thermal comfort. Considering the rapid urbanization process, limited water resources supply, and the severe heat stress in the urban areas, judicious design and planning of trees is of increasing importance for improving the life quality and sustaining the urban environment.
ContributorsZhao, Qunshan (Author) / Wentz, Elizabeth (Thesis advisor) / Sailor, David (Committee member) / Wang, Zhi-Hua (Committee member) / Arizona State University (Publisher)
Created2017
Description
Individuals differ in the extent to which they feel connected to their future selves, which predicts time preference (i.e., preference for immediate versus delayed utility), financial decision-making, delinquency, and academic performance. Future self-connectedness may also predict how individuals compare themselves with their past selves, future selves, and other people. Greater connectedness may lead to more self-affirming types of temporal self-comparison, less self-deflating types of temporal self-comparison, and less social comparison. Two studies examined the relation between future self-connectedness and comparison processes, as well as effects on emotion, psychological adjustment, and motivation. In the first study, as expected, future self-connectedness positively predicted self-affirming temporal self-comparison and negatively predicted self-deflating temporal self-comparison and social comparison. In addition, future self-connectedness had beneficial direct and indirect effects on adjustment, emotion regulation, and motivation. Unlike previous research, this study examined all three components of future self-connectedness, as opposed to only one. Exploratory analyses examined the items comprising the similarity-connectedness component and found that the relation of these items to the other variables in the model did not differ, though some of the relations in the model were moderated by college generation status. The second study tested whether increasing future self-connectedness would have similar effects on comparison, adjustment, emotion, and motivation. It implemented a pilot future self-connectedness manipulation, an established identity-stability manipulation, and a control condition. The pilot manipulation and identity-stability manipulation failed to affect future self-connectedness relative to control, and did not affect comparison, motivation, adjustment, or emotion. Future research should ascertain whether there is a causal link between connectedness and social comparison or temporal self-comparison processes. Overall, this research links future self-connectedness to social comparison and temporal self-comparison processes, as well as well-being, emotion, and motivation, which demonstrates the importance of connectedness in new, important areas.
ContributorsAdelman, Robert Mark (Author) / Kwan, Virginia S. Y. (Thesis advisor) / Grimm, Kevin (Committee member) / Aktipis, Athena (Committee member) / Neuberg, Steven (Committee member) / Arizona State University (Publisher)
Created2018
Description
Deforestation is a common phenomenon in Bangladesh, leaving the country under a great threat of losing its natural habitat. The increasing rate of natural habitat loss has raised questions regarding the country’s forest resource management practices. These practices were originally adopted to protect the forest ecosystem and secure the livelihood of the people dependent on forest resources. Despite the support from development partners like the United States Agency for International Development (USAID), the country is still struggling to protect its forest resources from human encroachment. One of the major problems is the lack of inconclusiveness in current approaches. Most initiatives are not evidence-based and are project-based for only a certain period of time. This has failed to ensure sustainable outcomes. This study looks at Bangladesh’s Himchari National Park forest management system to generate evidence regarding deforestation from 1991-2018 and highlight existing gaps. To identify and analyze the gaps, the study uses a social-ecological system (SES) lens. Results reveal deforestation across different time periods, articulates the overall governance structure regarding forest resource management, and provides an overview of the major gaps within the system. The study also offers a set of recommendations for improving the existing management system and policy implications.
ContributorsMahid, Yousuf (Author) / Pijawka, David (Thesis advisor) / Myint, Soe (Thesis advisor) / Liao, Chuan (Committee member) / Arizona State University (Publisher)
Created2020
Description
Resource transfers can confer many adaptive benefits such as specialization, helping genetically related individuals, future compensation, and risk-pooling. Need-based transfers are a risk-pooling mechanism in which partners mitigate unpredictable losses by transferring resources based on need. Need-based transfers are likely to be most useful for resources that are necessary and unpredictable because being unable to reliably obtain essential resources would be devastating. However, need-based transfers make people vulnerable to two types of exploitation: a person can be greedy by asking when not in need and a person with a surplus of resources can be stingy by not giving to someone in need. Previous research suggests that people might have cognitive mechanisms for detecting greediness and stinginess, which would serve to protect against exploitation by cheaters. This study investigated whether resources that are necessary and unpredictable are most likely to trigger greediness and stinginess detection mechanisms. Participants saw four types of rules. One rule could be violated through greedy behavior, another through stingy behavior, another by not paying a debt, and another was a descriptive rule that could be violated by not finding one type of resource near another type of resource. Then, participants saw information about events relating to one of the rules and indicated whether the rule in question could have been violated. Consistent with past research, participants were better at detecting greediness, stinginess, and debts not paid than at detecting violations of a descriptive rule. However, contrary to my predictions, the necessity and unpredictability of resources did not impact people’s ability to detect greediness and stinginess. The lack of support for my hypothesis might be because the benefits of detecting greediness and stinginess might outweigh the costs even for situations in which need-based transfer rules are unlikely to apply, because people might be able to consciously activate their greediness and stinginess mechanisms even for resources that would not naturally trigger them, or because of methodological limitations.
ContributorsMunoz Castro, Andres (Author) / Aktipis, Athena (Thesis advisor) / Hruschka, Daniel (Committee member) / Neuberg, Steven (Committee member) / Arizona State University (Publisher)
Created2019
Description
ABSTRACT
Domestic dogs have assisted humans for millennia. However, the extent to which these helpful behaviors are prosocially motivated remains unclear. To assess the propensity of pet dogs to spontaneously and actively rescue distressed humans, this study tested whether sixty pet dogs would release their seemingly trapped owners from a large box. To examine the causal mechanisms that shaped this behavior, the readiness of each dog to open the box was tested in three conditions: 1) the owner sat in the box and called for help (“Distress” test), 2) an experimenter placed high-value food rewards in the box (“Food” test), and 3) the owner sat in the box and calmly read aloud (“Reading” test).
Dogs were as likely to release their distressed owner as to retrieve treats from inside the box, indicating that rescuing an owner may be a highly rewarding action for dogs. After accounting for ability, dogs released the owner more often when the owner called for help than when the owner read aloud calmly. In addition, opening latencies decreased with test number in the Distress test but not the Reading test. Thus, rescuing the owner could not be attributed solely to social facilitation, stimulus enhancement, or social contact-seeking behavior.
Dogs displayed more stress behaviors in the Distress test than in the Reading test, and stress scores decreased with test number in the Reading test but not in the Distress test. This evidence of emotional contagion supports the hypothesis that rescuing the distressed owner was an empathetically-motivated prosocial behavior. Success in the Food task and previous (in-home) experience opening objects were both strong predictors of releasing the owner. Thus, prosocial behavior tests for dogs should control for physical ability and previous experience.
Domestic dogs have assisted humans for millennia. However, the extent to which these helpful behaviors are prosocially motivated remains unclear. To assess the propensity of pet dogs to spontaneously and actively rescue distressed humans, this study tested whether sixty pet dogs would release their seemingly trapped owners from a large box. To examine the causal mechanisms that shaped this behavior, the readiness of each dog to open the box was tested in three conditions: 1) the owner sat in the box and called for help (“Distress” test), 2) an experimenter placed high-value food rewards in the box (“Food” test), and 3) the owner sat in the box and calmly read aloud (“Reading” test).
Dogs were as likely to release their distressed owner as to retrieve treats from inside the box, indicating that rescuing an owner may be a highly rewarding action for dogs. After accounting for ability, dogs released the owner more often when the owner called for help than when the owner read aloud calmly. In addition, opening latencies decreased with test number in the Distress test but not the Reading test. Thus, rescuing the owner could not be attributed solely to social facilitation, stimulus enhancement, or social contact-seeking behavior.
Dogs displayed more stress behaviors in the Distress test than in the Reading test, and stress scores decreased with test number in the Reading test but not in the Distress test. This evidence of emotional contagion supports the hypothesis that rescuing the distressed owner was an empathetically-motivated prosocial behavior. Success in the Food task and previous (in-home) experience opening objects were both strong predictors of releasing the owner. Thus, prosocial behavior tests for dogs should control for physical ability and previous experience.
ContributorsVan Bourg, Joshua Lazar (Author) / Wynne, Clive D (Thesis advisor) / Gilby, Ian C (Committee member) / Aktipis, C. Athena (Committee member) / Arizona State University (Publisher)
Created2019