Theses and Dissertations from UMD

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New submissions to the thesis/dissertation collections are added automatically as they are received from the Graduate School. Currently, the Graduate School deposits all theses and dissertations from a given semester after the official graduation date. This means that there may be up to a 4 month delay in the appearance of a give thesis/dissertation in DRUM

More information is available at Theses and Dissertations at University of Maryland Libraries.

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2011 - 20132

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Author: search.filters.author.Klein, KristenSubject: search.filters.subject.extremism

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    Tracking the Cost Heuristic: A Rule of Thumb in Choice of Counterfinal Means
    (2013) Klein, Kristen; Kruglanski, Arie W; Psychology; Digital Repository at the University of Maryland; University of Maryland (College Park, Md.)
    Domain-specific empirical evidence shows that people sometimes infer a correlation between the cost of an item or behavior (e.g., price, effort) and its quality or efficacy (e.g., Labroo & Kim, 2009; Shiv, Carmon, & Ariely. 2005). In the present research, I proposed and tested a general mechanism that may underlie these instantiations. I termed this mechanism the cost heuristic, whereby people may infer that if a means is costly or detrimental to alternative goal(s) (i.e., counterfinal), then it must be highly instrumental to whatever focal goal it serves. Three preliminary studies provided inconsistent support for the cost heuristic. However, two of these studies suggested that a reverse halo effect (Thorndike, 1920) might have interfered with the cost heuristic. In three additional studies, I controlled for this reverse halo effect and tested more nuanced hypotheses about conditions under which the cost heuristic might be particularly likely to emerge. In Study 1, after statistically controlling for reverse halo effects, I found marginal support for a general cost heuristic, but not for the proposed moderators of alternative goal magnitude and the perceived ecological validity of the cost heuristic. In Study 2, the alternative goal magnitude manipulation was only effective in one goal domain; however, in this domain the results fully supported the hypothesis. Those who perceived the cost heuristic as ecologically valid were more likely to exhibit it under high (vs. low) alternative goal magnitude, whereas for those who did not perceive it as ecologically valid, alternative goal magnitude did not make a difference. In Study 3, the results did not support my hypothesis, but rather suggested that the vignettes' length/complexity may have obscured the detrimentality cue on which the cost heuristic is based. Taken together, the evidence from these studies is suggestive but inconclusive with regard to a cost heuristic and the conditions under which it might manifest. Limitations and future directions are discussed.
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    The Augmentation Effect: When Cost Enhances the Perceived Benefit of Extreme Means
    (2011) Klein, Kristen; Kruglanski, Arie W; Psychology; Digital Repository at the University of Maryland; University of Maryland (College Park, Md.)
    In the present research, I introduce a new type of means under goal systems theory (Kruglanski et al., 2002): a costly means, which is instrumental to a focal goal but detrimental to alternative goal(s). An attributional inference similar to the augmentation effect (Kelley, 1971) may occur for costly means, suggesting that because they are detrimental to alternative goal(s), they must be especially instrumental to a focal goal. Moreover, individuals under high (vs. low) commitment to this focal goal may perceive a costly means as less extreme. Findings from Study 1 provide evidence for both hypotheses, and Study 2 showed that alternative goal primes lead to perceptions of costly means as more extreme. These findings recommend the integration of rational choice and goal systems theories, provide evidence for the augmentation effect as a heuristic tool, and highlight potential interventions to combat extremist cognition and behavior.