Theses and Dissertations at Montana State University (MSU)
Permanent URI for this communityhttps://scholarworks.montana.edu/handle/1/732
Browse
3 results
Search Results
Item Unconscious thought and stereotypes: how posteriori stereotype activation biases unconscious thought(Montana State University - Bozeman, College of Letters & Science, 2019) Reiter, Lucca Aleksandr; Chairperson, Graduate Committee: Ian M. HandleyUnconscious Thought Theory (UTT) proposes that people can actively process goal-relevant information when they are distracted from consciously thinking about it (Dijksterhuis & Nordgren, 2006). Further, unconscious thought (UT) is purported to process the information in an aschematic bottom-up manner (Bos, Dijksterhuis, & van Baaren, 2008). Supporting this claim is experimental evidence that UT is less susceptible to stereotype use compared to the top-down schema-driven process of conscious thought (CT; Bos & Dijksterhuis, 2011). Based on these findings, UTT has proposed that UT does not utilize stereotypes when forming impressions. However, other research suggests that participants may form biased impressions in experimental contexts arguably suitable to the operation of UT if a stereotype is non-consciously activated during distraction periods following information acquisition (van Knippenberg & Dijksterhuis, 1996). Further, goal-relevant information is actively integrated during UT, therefore stereotype activation during UT could lead to more biased impressions compared to conditions where negligible thinking occurs. The aim of this thesis was to compare how the active processes of UT and the passive process of being merely distracted are differentially impacted by stereotype activation. In the present experiment, participants were presented with information about a hypothetical person, 'Person 1,' some of which implied traits that are consistent and inconsistent with the stereotype of African-American men. Then, they either received an evaluation goal (UT) or no goal (MD) prior to being distracted for 3min. During distraction, some participants were primed with the stereotype of African- American men. Then, accessibility of the stereotype-consistent and inconsistent traits were measured using a lexical decision task (LDT). Lastly, participants provided their impressions' of 'Person 1' on various trait dimensions. Results supported the hypotheses that among participants in UT conditions, stereotype activation inhibited the accessibility of stereotype-inconsistent concepts relative to consistent concepts. However, this biased accessibility did not impact impressions of 'Person 1.' Possible limitations, implications, and future directions are discussed.Item A subsystem questionnaire as a tool for differentiating states of consciousness(Montana State University - Bozeman, College of Letters & Science, 1976) McCarthy, Toren DoyleItem Testing the existence of unconscious thought through a memory perspective(Montana State University - Bozeman, College of Letters & Science, 2012) Yosai, Erin Rachelle; Chairperson, Graduate Committee: Ian M. HandleyResearch indicates that engaging in unconscious thought processes may aid individuals in making optimal decisions (e.g. Bos et al., 2008, Bos et al., 2011, Dijksterhuis, 2004; Dijksterhuis & Nordgren, 2006) when conscious processing capabilities are limited. Experiments within this domain have dubbed the result of optimal complex decision making after delay in which conscious thought is distracted, relative to no conscious distraction the 'Unconscious Thought Effect' (Strick et al., 2011). However, skeptics of unconscious thought processes assert that the 'unconscious thought effect' may be an artifact of conscious or memorial-based processing (e.g. Lassiter et al., 2009; Reyna, 2003). The current experiment hypothesized that measuring individuals' working memory capacity (Unsworth et al., 2005), or attentional control, would clarify whether controlled memorial processes or unconscious thinking produces this effect. Namely, the control and effortful direction of attention influences conscious processes, but unconscious thought processes do not require attention (Dijksterhuis & Nordgren, 2006). Specifically, it was hypothesized that individual WMC would moderate decisions within conditions where conscious thought processes and attention were necessary to car evaluations. This thesis' specific interest is the 'unconscious thought condition.' Results indicating that individual WMC moderates car evaluation following a distraction period would support a memorial-based explanation for unconscious thought effects. Conversely, results indicated no effect of individual WMC on object evaluations following a distraction period would support the existence of independent, sophisticated unconscious thought processes (e.g. Dijksterhuis & Nordgren, 2006). Although this experiment failed to clearly support either hypothesis regarding WMC, several possible explanations of the null and inconsistent results were identified. Attending to experimental issues and theoretical inconsistencies in future research may improve the understanding of the existence and boundarit.es of unconscious thought.