In many films, story is presented in an order different from chronological. Deviations from the chronological order in a narrative are called anachronies. Narratological theory and the evidence from psychological experiments indicate that anachronies allow stories to be more interesting, as the non-chronological order evokes curiosity in viewers. In this paper we investigate the historical dynamics in the use of anachronies in film. Particularly, we follow the cultural attraction theory that suggests that, given certain conditions, cultural evolution should conform to (...) our cognitive preferences. We study this on a corpus of 80 most popular mystery films released in 1970–2009. We observe that anachronies have become used more frequently, and in a greater proportion of films. We also find that films that made substantial use of anachronies, on average, distributed the anachronies evenly along film length, while the films that made little use of anachronies placed them near the beginning and end. We argue that this can reflect a functional difference between these two types of using anachronies. The paper adds further support to the argument that popular culture may be influenced to a significant degree by our cognitive biases. (shrink)

Individual differences related to emotions are typically represented as emotion traits. Although important, these descriptive models often do not address the psychological dynamics that underlie the trait. Appraisal theories of emotion assume that individual differences in emotions can be traced to differences in patterns of appraisal, but this hypothesis has largely gone untested. The present research explored whether individual differences in the emotion of interest, known as trait curiosity, consist of patterns of appraisal. After completing several measures of trait curiosity, (...) participants read complex poems (Experiment 1) or viewed simple and complex pictures (Experiment 2) and then gave ratings of interest and interest's appraisal components. The effect of trait curiosity on interest was fully mediated by appraisals. Multilevel analyses suggested that curious people differ in the amount of appraisal rather than in the kinds of appraisals relevant to interest. Appraisal theories can offer a process-oriented explanation of emotion traits that bridges state and trait emotional experience. (shrink)

In this article, we discuss the importance of emotions for ethical reflection on technological developments, as well as the role that art can play in this. We review literature that argues that emotions can and should play an important role in the assessment and acceptance of technological risk and in designing morally responsible technologies. We then investigate how technologically engagedartcan contribute to critical, emotional-moral reflection on technological risks. The role of art that engages with technology is unexplored territory and gives (...) rise to many fascinating philosophical questions that have not yet been sufficiently addressed in the literature. (shrink)

Some researchers claim that uncertainty prolongs the duration of emotional experiences because uncertainty toward an emotion-eliciting event prolongs attention to that event. However, some results contradict this claim. We assumed that curiosity rather than uncertainty prolongs the duration of emotional experience via attention, and that attention and emotional experience are prolonged only when uncertainty elicits curiosity. This assumption is based on the information gap theory, which proposes that curiosity increases with uncertainty, but that curiosity decreases at a certain level of (...) uncertainty. We conducted a survey study to investigate the relationships among curiosity, uncertainty, attention and duration of positive and negative emotional experiences. The results showed that curiosity, but not uncertainty, prolonged the duration of emotional experiences and the process was completely mediated by attention both for positive and negative emotions. Moreover, uncertainty prolonged the duration of emotional experiences only when uncertainty elicited curiosity, which in turn prolonged attention to the emotion-eliciting event. (shrink)

In addition to natural curiosity, science is characterized by a number of psychological processes and perceptions. Among the psychological features, scientific enquiry relates to uncovering—or discovering—aspects of a world perceived as hidden from humans. A speculative theoretical model is presented, suggesting the evolution of science reflects psychological repercussions of wearing clothes. Specifically, the natural world is perceived as hidden due to the presence of clothing. Three components of scientific enquiry may arise from clothing: detachment from sensual experience, a perception that (...) the world is veiled in mystery, and an intellectual desire to uncover the hidden structure of nature. Rather than beginning with the emergence of Homo sapiens, the proposed connection with clothing implies that psychological foundations for science began to develop during the last ice age, with the invention of complex clothes that fully covered the human body. After the end of the last ice age, elements of scientific thinking began to emerge in societies where clothing was worn routinely for psychosocial reasons, including modesty. Notably, a scientific attitude was essentially absent in hunter-gatherer communities where nakedness remained the norm. This novel perspective aims to advance the history and philosophy of science, revealing the emergence of science as a situated phenomenon contingent on humans being covered. (shrink)

We received several commentaries both challenging and supporting our hypothesis. We thank the commentators for their thoughtful contributions, bringing together alternative hypotheses, complementary explanations, and appropriate corrections to our model. Here, we explain further our hypothesis, using more explicitly the framework of evolutionary social sciences. We first explain what we believe is the ultimate function of fiction in general (i.e., entertainment) and how this hypothesis differs from other evolutionary hypotheses put forward by several commentators. We then turn to the proximate (...) features that make imaginary worlds entertaining and, therefore, culturally successful. We finally explore how these insights may explain the distribution of imaginary worlds across time, space, age, and social classes. (shrink)

Whether the hands-on experience of creating inventions can promote Students’ interest in pursuing a science, technology, engineering, and mathematics (STEM) career has not been extensively studied. In a quantitative study, we drew on the attitude-behavior-outcome framework to explore the correlates between hands-on making attitude, epistemic curiosities, and career interest. This study targeted students who joined the selection competition for participating in the International Exhibition of Young Inventors (IEYI) in Taiwan. The objective of the invention exhibition is to encourage young students (...) to make innovative projects by applying STEM knowledge and collaborative design. We collected 220 valid data from participants in the 2021 Taiwan IEYI selection competition and conducted a confirmatory factor analysis and structural equation modeling to test the hypotheses. Results indicated that: (1) hands-on making attitude was positively related to two types of epistemic curiosity; (2) interest-type epistemic curiosity (IEC) and deprivation-type epistemic curiosity (DEC) were positively associated with STEM career interest; additionally, DEC had a higher coefficient on STEM career interest than IEC; (3) both types of EC had a mediating role between hands-on making attitude and STEM career interest. It is expected that encouraging students to participate in invention exhibition competitions can raise both types of EC and increase their interest in pursuing STEM careers. (shrink)

In this conceptual paper, we propose that both skill set development and mindset development would be desirable dimensions of negotiation training. The second dimension has received little attention thus far, but negotiation mindsets, i.e., the psychological orientations by which people approach negotiations, are likely to have a considerable influence on the outcome of negotiations. Referring to empirical and conceptual mindset studies from outside the negotiation field, we argue that developing mindsets can leverage the effectiveness of skills and knowledge, increase learning (...) transfer, and lead to long-term behavioral changes. We introduce an integrative negotiation mindset that comprises three inclinations which complement each other: a collaborative, a curious, and a creative one. We also discuss activities that help people to develop and enhance this mindset both in and out of the classroom. Our general claim is that by moving beyond the activities of conventional negotiation training, which focuses on skills and knowledge, mindset-oriented negotiation training can increase training effectiveness and enable participants to more often reach what we define as sustainable integrative agreements. (shrink)

Preparing students for the real challenges in life is one of the most important goals in education. Constructivism is an approach that uses real-life experiences to construct knowledge. Problem-Based Learning (PBL), for almost five decades now, has been the most innovative constructivist pedagogy used worldwide. However, with the rising popularity, there is a need to revisit empirical studies regarding PBL to serve as a guide and basis for designing new studies, making institutional policies, and evaluating educational curricula. This need has (...) led the researchers to do a meta-analysis to analyse the effectiveness of PBL on secondary students’ achievement in different scientific disciplines. Following the set of inclusion and exclusion criteria, 11 studies in Eurasia, Africa, and America conducted from 2016 to 2020 have qualified for this study. Six of which focused on JHS (n = 1047) and five on SHS (n = 375). Studies were obtained from various meta-search engines including Google, ERIC, and JSTOR. Further, the researchers used Harzing’s Publish and Perish software to exhaust the search process. Sample size, mean, and standard deviation were analysed using the Comprehensive MetaAnalysis version 3 to determine the effect sizes (Hedge’s g) and the results of moderator analysis, forest plot, funnel plot, and Begg-Mazumdar test. Findings have shown that PBL, as an approach to teaching science, had a large and positive effect (ES = .871) on the achievement of secondary students. However, grade levels and various scientific disciplines did not influence students’ learning achievement. The conduct of more studies on the different factors affecting PBL implementation and specific effects of PBL on various student domains is recommended to facilitate comparative educational research in the future. (shrink)