Moderators of the Relationship Between Implicit and Explicit Evaluation.

Abstract

Automatic and controlled modes of evaluation sometimes provide conflicting reports of the quality of social objects. This article presents evidence for 4 moderators of the relationship between automatic (implicit) and controlled (explicit) evaluations. Implicit and explicit preferences were measured for a variety of object pairs using a large sample. The average correlation was r ϭ .36, and 52 of the 57 object pairs showed a significant positive correlation. Results of multilevel modeling analyses suggested that (a) implicit and explicit preferences are related, (b) the relationship varies as a function of the objects assessed, and (c) at least 4 variables moderate the relationship: self-presentation, evaluative strength, dimensionality, and distinctiveness. The variables moderated implicit-explicit correspondence across individuals and accounted for much of the observed variation across content domains. The resulting model of the relationship between automatic and controlled evaluative processes is grounded in personal experience with the targets of evaluation.Keywords: implicit attitudes, explicit attitudes, moderation, implicit-explicit correspondence, dualprocess models A persistent question for psychologists concerns how conscious experience corresponds with the content and processes of the mind. It is clear that conscious experience is not a direct reflection of mental operations and a variety of mental activities are unavailable to introspection (Nisbett & Wilson, 1977). This observation has been extended to attitudes, the association between a concept and an evaluation (Fazio, Chen, McDonel, & Sherman, 1982), by making a theoretical distinction between implicit and explicit evaluations. The former reflects evaluative information activated automatically and perhaps without intention or awareness; the latter reflects evaluations produced by controlled processes (Greenwald & Banaji, 1995;Wilson, Lindsey, & Schooler, 2000).Measurement innovation has paralleled this theoretical innovation with the development of indirect means for assessing conceptevaluation associations. Results from indirect measures have surprised psychologists and respondents by often revealing evaluations that contradict those assessed directly. In comparison to explicit measures, implicit measures assess evaluation in constrained conditions that include one or more hallmarks of automaticity: unawareness, uncontrollability, lack of intention, or efficiency of processing (Bargh, 1994). Comparisons of implicit and explicit measures suggest that they tap related but distinct constructs (Cunningham, Preacher, & Banaji, 2001;Greenwald & Farnham, 2000;Nosek & Smyth, 2005) and that both modes of evaluation may have important implications for social perception, judgment, and action (Banaji, 2001;Chen & Bargh, 1999;Devine, 1989;Dovidio, Kawakami, Johnson, Johnson, & Howard, 1997;Fazio, Jackson, Dunton, & Williams, 1995;Greenwald & Banaji, 1995;Greenwald & Nosek, 2001;Poehlman, Uhlmann, Greenwald, & Banaji, 2004). The purpose of this article is to...

Explicit- and Implicit Bullying Attitudes in Relation to Bullying Behavior

“…In the future, it could possibly be a suitable instrument to use in schools because data can be obtained relatively quickly and easily. Even more, IATs can also be administered and processed through the internet which makes it an even more attractive instrument to use (Nosek 2005). Furthermore, our findings may also have some implications for anti-bullying programs.…”

“…We expect that implicit bullying attitudes could be an additional factor explaining bullying given their relevance for related behaviors, such as aggression (Gollwitzer et al 2007;Hofmann et al 2008;Wiers et al 2009). Furthermore, as bullying is considered to be socially unacceptable behavior, explicit bullying attitudes could be more influenced or controlled by factors such socially desirable answering (Nosek 2005) than implicit bullying attitudes. Consequently, it could be the case that although children explicitly reject bullying in questionnaires, they have more relaxed implicit attitudes towards bullying which are more in accordance with their bullying behavior.…”

“…However, there is some indication of this relation from studies in other research areas which have shown that implicit attitudes are directly related to many kinds of behavior (Gawronski and Bodenhausen 2006;Nosek 2005) including socially disapproved behavior such as aggression (e.g., Gollwitzer et al 2007). The predictive value of implicit (self-related) aggression attitudes in relation to aggressive behavior was found in a study of Gollwitzer et al (2007).…”

“…Both processes can influence behavior independently . However, these attitudes and underlying processes are often related to each other (Nosek 2005) which could mean that they also influence each others' effects on behavior.…”

When less is more – Implicit preference for incomplete bodies in xenomelia

“…Similarly, a literature review on attitudes towards individuals with disabilities concluded that there is weak to no association between explicit and implicit measures (Wilson and Scior, 2014). A low correspondence between explicit and implicit measures has been shown to be associated with four factors (Nosek, 2005): a) self-representation, which describes the modification of an explicit preference for personal or social reasons, b) evaluative strength, which predicts higher associations for personally important and frequently emerging contexts, c) dimensionality, with unipolar categories causing lower associations compared to bipolar ones, and d) distinctiveness, which characterizes the perceived incongruence between one's own and societal norms. We can only speculate about which factor might have driven the missing relationship between implicit and explicit measures in the present study.…”