The present research investigates the effects of social categorization on the intervention behavior of third parties who engage in the hybrid dispute resolution procedure of mediation-arbitration (Ross & Conlon, 2000). Specifically, it was predicted that an affiliation to a disputant leads third parties to favor the affiliated ingroup disputant over an unaffiliated outgroup disputant. Two studies support these predictions by demonstrating that unilaterally affiliated third parties engage in ingroup favoritism during arbitration, whereas non-affiliated third-parties (Study 1 & 2) and third parties affiliated to both disputants (Study 2) imposed balanced settlements. In addition to this, both studies identify third parties’ decision control, inherent to the two phases of mediation-arbitration as a relevant moderating variable for the emergence of this effect.

Discovering the antecedents of technology use is of major importance in the field of technology adoption. This study investigates the relationship between the personality dimensions of TRI (Technology Readiness Index) and the system specific dimensions of TAM (Technology Acceptance Model). Data was collected from 186 employees in various Norwegian organisations. Structural equation modelling was used to test the relationship between dimensions of TRI and TAM. The results show that optimism and innovativeness significantly influences perceived usefulness and perceived ease of use. Further, perceived usefulness has a significant positive influence on actual usage. The results imply that both personality dimensions and system specific dimensions are of major importance when adopting new technology. This should be considered when organisations develop implementation strategies.

The goal of the present research is to investigate pet attachment and measure the connection between owner-pet attachment and interpersonal attachment characteristics of dog owners and cat owners, social support and loneliness. From a sample of 268 dog and 97 cat owners, significant differences on pet attachment appeared between pet owners’ gender, owners living location, kinds of pets and the length of ownership. The pedigree of pets influenced owner-pet attachment levels.

Guth, Schmittberger and Schwarze’s (1982) ultimatum game result is replicated with mean earnings of £59.98 (N = 51) S.D. = £11.45, from a possible £80, and a linear relationship between offer size and acceptance rate. Results indicate a significant interaction effect between offer size and response, F(3, 31) = 3.69, p < 0.05 on response time. Our novel adjustment introduced the proposer’s most ‘common offer’ to responders. Results were in accord with prior work (Knez & Camerer, 1995); social comparisons between the participant, and a hypothesised responder – the receiver of the ‘common offer’ – were made only at mid-range offers (£2), for which low common offers were accepted more from proposers making low common offers than high t(45) = 3.28, p< 0.05.

Using implicit measures in psychological assessment is new in research. The Attentional Blink is a widely supported phenomenon in the cognitive literature. It has been reported that emotionally salient stimuli, particularly those of a sexual nature, can produce it, leading to lower recall of a neutral target presented after the stimulus item. This study looked at the Attentional Blink as a measure of sexual interest. It also looked at the use of computer-generated (CG) images as an alternative to real images. Findings showed that nude images produced the largest Attentional Blink, real images are most effective, and CG images produced some effect. These finding are promising for the development of CG images of children for use in paedophile assessment.

Proponents of a Universal Grammar argue that humans are born with a dedicated language system that shapes and restricts the number of grammars found in human languages (Chomsky, 2005). It is essentially innate and has a genetic manifestation. Such an innate system is necessary because human grammars are too complex to be passed on through social interactions and probabilistic learning alone. However, this view is contested by a combination of emergentist approaches and a number of studies suggest that many of the core assumptions of Universal Grammar are either unnecessary or do not hold. Furthermore, this review will explore theoretical criticism of the Universal Grammar research programme.

The present deconstruction of Gilles de la Tourette’s Syndrome introduces this complex disorder using an existential paradigm. An analysis of the history of constructed reason and power highlights the assumptions of ‘disorder’ that infiltrate society and serves to critique predisposed thought with reference to Tourette’s. The review considers the representationalist theory of language and concepts within psychiatric discourse. A brief analysis of previous case studies shows Tourettic energy as part of the individual ‘self’ and introduces a comparison of Tourettic movement to more mutual human experience, such as music and poetry. Past research that explores preventative social interaction is introduced, which show positive advancements in treatment by challenging the conventions of internal etiology and which highlights the importance of reducing attached stigma.

Placebo treatment and hypnosis are both examples of top-down regulation and are used to treat pain. However, it is unclear whether hypnosis produces anything more than a placebo effect when measuring brain activity changes. This literature review examines research articles published from 1997 onwards regarding the neurophysiology of pain relief during hypnosis or placebo treatments using functional brain imaging (fMRI or PET). The focus was on acute produced nociceptive pain. There seems to be both similarities and clear differences in the brain activity changes between hypnosis and placebo treatments. These results show that hypnosis is not equal to common placebo in terms of brain activity thus questioning the suggestion that the pain reducing properties of hypnosis are just one form of placebo effect.