Improving Implicit Attitude Measurement

最近对态度和偏好的研究中最重要的一个见解是，它们可以被隐含地测量，而无需要求一个人内省和自我报告。 内隐测量允许研究人员研究受访者可能不愿意或不能明确报告的态度。 因此，它们对于研究社会敏感话题是有价值的，在这些话题中，回答者可能不那么坦率。 然而，尽管取得了这一进展，目前的方法有几个心理测量的局限性，以克服。 隐式方法的可靠性和预测有效性通常低于显式测量方法。 对同一主题的态度的外显和内隐测量往往同时在多个方面存在差异，这使得混淆和替代解释成为可能。 这个项目开发了一种新的方法来含蓄地测量态度，情感错误归因程序。 它通过无意中将情感反应从一个来源错误归因到另一个来源来衡量态度。 三组研究，侧重于种族态度和酗酒，比较的方法，目前可用的方法。 第一组研究测试了这种方法预测种族歧视和酗酒行为的能力，并与两种常用的内隐方法进行了比较。 第二组测试对社会期望的抵制。 第三组使用的方法等同的内隐和外显措施的所有维度，除了关键的差异，表达一个人的态度的意图。 与其他隐式方法不同，此方法的度量是评估而不是响应时间。 因此，自我报告和内隐反应可以在相同的量表上直接进行比较。 通过消除隐式和显式方法之间的无关差异，可以比以前更直接地测试隐式和显式测量之间的关系。该项目具有潜在的重要的更广泛的影响，提高了在种族歧视和药物滥用等重要领域的测量的准确性。 该项目将通过公开提供一种新的经过验证的内隐态度测量方法，帮助推进社会和行为科学的研究基础设施。 更精确的测量将有助于理论测试和未来的努力，以确定破坏性行为的原因和补救措施。

One of the most important recent insights in the study of attitudes and preferences is that they can be measured implicitly, without asking a person to introspect and self-report. Implicit measurements allow researchers to study attitudes that respondents may be unwilling or unable to report explicitly. They therefore are valuable for studying socially sensitive topics, where respondents may be less than candid. Yet despite this progress, current methods have several psychometric limitations to overcome. Reliability and predictive validity for implicit methods are often lower than accepted for explicit measurement methods. And explicit and implicit measurements of attitudes toward the same topic often differ in multiple ways at the same time, allowing for confounds and alternative explanations. This project develops a novel method for implicitly measuring attitudes, the Affect Misattribution Procedure. It measures attitudes by using the tendency to unintentionally misattribute affective responses from one source to another. Three sets of studies, focusing on racial attitudes and alcohol abuse, compare the method to currently available methods. The first set of studies tests the ability of this method to predict racial discrimination and alcohol abuse behaviors, in comparison to two commonly used implicit methods. The second set tests for resistance to social desirability. The third set uses the method to equate implicit and explicit measures on all dimensions except the crucial difference of intent to express one's attitude. Unlike other implicit methods, the metric for this method is an evaluation rather than response time. Therefore, self-reports and implicit responses can be directly compared on the same scales. By eliminating extraneous differences between implicit and explicit methods, the relationship between implicit and explicit measures can be tested more directly than previously has been possible. The project has potentially important broader impacts, increasing the fidelity of measurement in important domains such as racial discrimination and substance abuse. The project will help advance research infrastructure for social and behavioral science by making publicly available a new validated method for implicit attitude measurement. More accurate measurement will facilitate theory testing and future efforts to identify causes of, and remedies for, destructive behavior.