Observing the earth from space: Does a virtual reality overview effect experience increase pro-environmental behaviour?

Astronauts (and recently businessmen) often express a renewed sense of responsibility for taking care of the environment, after observing the overwhelming beauty of Earth from space. Despite recent attention for this "overview effect", it is unclear whether experiencing the effect directly impacts pro-environmental behaviour. Using a virtual reality experience, the current research tests in two experimental studies the direct impact of an immersive overview effect experience on both short-term and longer term subsequent pro-environmental behaviours (donating to an environmental NGO, consuming less diary and meat). Furthermore, it investigates whether the technological immersiveness of the VR experience amplifies the effect, and the mediating role of connectedness to nature. Results show no effects of the short (7 minutes) overview effect VR video on pro-environmental behaviour (Study 1). For the longer video (15 minutes, Study 2), the results showed that the most immersive experience (video featuring meditative music and voice-over) appeared to increase connection with nature and higher donation amounts to an eco-NGO, but not significantly. No effects were found for subsequent meat and dairy consumption behaviours (measured on day 2, 4, and 6). These findings contribute to a deeper understanding of the specific features determining the effectiveness of the overview effect experiences on actual pro-environmental behaviour, providing important insights to businesses and educational institutions.

From scanner to court: A neuroscientifically informed "reasonable person" test of trademark infringement.

Many legal decisions center on the thoughts or perceptions of some idealized group of individuals, referred to variously as the "average person," "the typical consumer," or the "reasonable person." Substantial concerns exist, however, regarding the subjectivity and vulnerability to biases inherent in conventional means of assessing such responses, particularly the use of self-report evidence. Here, we addressed these concerns by complementing self-report evidence with neural data to inform the mental representations in question. Using an example from intellectual property law, we demonstrate that it is possible to construct a parsimonious neural index of visual similarity that can inform the reasonable person test of trademark infringement. Moreover, when aggregated across multiple participants, this index was able to detect experimenter-induced biases in self-report surveys in a sensitive and replicable fashion. Together, these findings potentially broaden the possibilities for neuroscientific data to inform legal decision-making across a range of settings.

What we talk about when we talk about hope: A prototype analysis.

Although hope is a well-studied topic, there is no consensus on its definition. Using a prototype analysis (a bottom-up approach collecting laypeople's views on hope), the present research defines hope and provides insights into its associations with other related constructs. Study 1 identified a list of features of hope derived from characteristics generated by laypeople in the Netherlands and the United States when asked to think about hope. Study 2 determined the centrality of each of these features of hope, where the most frequently mentioned features were classified as "central features," whereas the less frequently as "peripheral features." Studies 3-5 then tested the validity of this classification and showed that central features (compared with peripheral ones) were more often recalled and recognized (Study 3), were classified as a feature of hope more quickly (Study 4), and were more representative in autobiographical situations involving hope (Study 5). Our findings are in part consistent with the definitions of hope reported in previous literature, and suggest in addition that some features deserve more attention than before. Based on our findings and previous literature, we propose the following core elements of hope: belief, positive, future, desire, and possibility. Accordingly, we propose the working definition that hope is a belief that a positive future outcome is possible combined with a desire for that outcome. As our research provides a more nuanced understanding of hope and its associations with other related constructs, we hope the current findings will contribute to future research on this important topic. (PsycInfo Database Record (c) 2022 APA, all rights reserved).

Increasing saving intentions through leaderboards: A gamification approach.

Saving money is important but challenging. To spur financial saving intentions, we propose a new strategy-gamification. Specifically, we investigate the effectiveness of competitive leaderboards in increasing individuals' saving intentions. The results of two studies (total N = 618) show consistently that people's saving intentions are higher when presented with a leaderboard than when not. Further, as leaderboards elicit social comparison, we explore whether the height of the comparison standard and individuals' social comparison orientation moderate the effect. We find that the effect of leaderboards on saving intentions is more pronounced when people compare with a higher (as compared to a lower) standard (Study 1), but that the effect is not influenced by individuals' social comparison orientation (Study 2). Taken together, this research provides a new and simple-to-implement strategy to facilitate saving intentions in order to help improve people's financial well-being.

Experimental Research Examining How People Can Cope with Uncertainty Through Soft Haptic Sensations.

Human beings are constantly surrounded by uncertainty and change. The question arises how people cope with such uncertainty. To date, most research has focused on the cognitive strategies people adopt to deal with uncertainty. However, especially when uncertainty is due to unpredictable societal events (e.g., economical crises, political revolutions, terrorism threats) of which one is unable to judge the impact on one's future live, cognitive strategies (like seeking additional information) is likely to fail to combat uncertainty. Instead, the current paper discusses a method demonstrating that people might deal with uncertainty experientially through soft haptic sensations. More specifically, because touching something soft creates a feeling of comfort and security, people prefer objects with softer as compared to harder properties when feeling uncertain. Seeking for softness is a highly efficient and effective tool to deal with uncertainty as our hands are available at all times. This protocol describes a set of methods demonstrating 1) how environmental (un)certainty can be situationally activated with an experiential priming procedure, 2) that the quality of the softness experience (what type of softness and how it is experienced) matters and 3) how uncertainty can be reduced using different methods.

Accountability Accentuates Interindividual-Intergroup Discontinuity by Enforcing Parochialism.

Interindividual-intergroup discontinuity is the tendency for relations between groups to be more competitive than relations between individuals. We examined whether the discontinuity effect arises in part because group members experience normative pressure to favor the ingroup (parochialism). Building on the notion that accountability enhances normative pressure, we hypothesized that the discontinuity effect would be larger when accountability is present (compared to absent). A prisoner's dilemma game experiment supported this prediction. Specifically, intergroup (compared to interindividual) interaction activated an injunctive ingroup-favoring norm, and accountability enhanced the influence of this norm on competitive behavior.