Explaining away behavior : scientific analysis and the transformation of acts into occurrences / John Monterosso.

Format:

Book

Manuscript

Microformat

Thesis/Dissertation

Author/Creator:

Monterosso, John.

Contributor:

Gleitman, Henry, advisor.

University of Pennsylvania.

Language:

English

Subjects (All):

Penn dissertations--Psychology.

Psychology--Penn dissertations.

Local Subjects:

Penn dissertations--Psychology.

Psychology--Penn dissertations.

Physical Description:

vi, 124 pages ; 29 cm

Production:

1997.

Summary:

In ordinary person perception, observers make a distinction between voluntary and involuntary behaviors. Generally, social accountability is restricted to those behaviors that are considered voluntary. Scientific explanations of behavior can at times undermine the conception that the explained behavior is voluntary. In light of the great many recent advances in the sciences that target human behavior, this is an increasingly important issue. The experiments reported below examine the tendency of explanations to "devoluntarize" behavior as well as impact related judgments such as blame worthiness and deserved punishment. The following three aspects of explanations were manipulated: (1) the prevalence of the behavior given the explanatory antecedent, (2) the deterrability of the behavior given the explanatory antecedent, and (3) the type of explanatory antecedent cited--physiological or experiential. The effects of the first two factors on the degree of devoluntarization were both statistically significant though surprisingly minor. The type of explanation cited had a large and highly reliable effect, and was the only independent variable to reliably effect all dependent measures related to volition. Devoluntarization appears to depend not on the certainty with which the explained behavior is shown to follow from antecedents, but rather on the explanation's effectiveness at getting subjects to adopt an object attributional framework.

Notes:

Supervisor: Henry Gleitman.

Thesis (Ph.D. in Psychology) -- University of Pennsylvania, 1997.

Includes bibliographical references.

Local Notes:

University Microfilms order no.: 98-14890.

OCLC:

187457348