Bayesian Hypothesis Testing: An Alternative to Null Hypothesis Significance Testing (NHST) in Psychology and Social Sciences

Since the mid-1950s, there has been a clear predominance of the Frequentist approach to hypothesis testing, both in psychology and in social sciences. Despite its popularity in the field of statistics, Bayesian inference is barely known and used in psychology. Frequentist inference, and its null hypothesis significance testing (NHST), has been hegemonic through most of the history of scientific psychology. However, the NHST has not been exempt of criticisms. Therefore, the aim of this chapter is to introduce a Bayesian approach to hypothesis testing that may represent a useful complement, or even an alternative, to the current NHST. The advantages of this Bayesian approach over Frequentist NHST will be presented, providing examples that support its use in psychology and social sciences. Conclusions are outlined

When intuitive Bayesians need to be good readers: The problem-wording effect on Bayesian reasoning

Are humans intuitive Bayesians? It depends. People seem to be Bayesians when updating probabilities from experience but not when acquiring probabilities from descriptions (i.e., Bayesian textbook problems). Decades of research on textbook problems have focused on how the format of the statistical information (e.g., the natural frequency effect) affects such reasoning. However, it pays much less attention to the wording of these problems. Mathematical problem-solving literature indicates that wording is critical for performance. Wording effects (the wording varied across the problems and manipulations) can also have far-reaching consequences. These may have confounded between-format comparisons and moderated within-format variability in prior research. Therefore, across seven experiments (N = 4909), we investigated the impact of the wording of medical screening problems and statistical formats on Bayesian reasoning in a general adult population. Participants generated more Bayesian answers with natural frequencies than with single-event probabilities, but only with the improved wording. The improved wording of the natural frequencies consistently led to more Bayesian answers than the natural frequencies with standard wording. The improved wording effect occurred mainly due to a more efficient description of the statistical information—cueing required mathematical operations, an unambiguous association of numbers with their reference class and verbal simplification. The wording effect extends the current theoretical explanations of Bayesian reasoning and bears methodological and practical implications. Ultimately, even intuitive Bayesians must be good readers when solving Bayesian textbook problems

Individual differences in preference for architectural interiors

Preference for architectural interiors can be explained using three psychological dimensions: Coherence (ease for organizing and comprehending a scene), Fascination (a scene's informational richness and generated interest), and Hominess (how much a space feels personal). We tested the hypothesis that their contributions to preference might vary based on individual differences by analyzing data from design students, participants with autism spectrum disorder, and neurotypical controls who rated images of interiors on liking and approach-avoidance decisions. For design students, only Coherence drove choices, whereas in participants with autism spectrum disorder and neurotypical controls Hominess and Fascination also contributed, respectively. Coherence is paramount for design students because it references the structural organization of spaces, and is informed by formal training. For autism spectrum disorder, Hominess matters because preference for familiarity, physical proximity, and difficulty in mental simulation are relevant to that population, whereas interest in visual exploration can explain Fascination's role in neurotypical controls

Developmental grey matter changes in superior parietal cortex accompany improved transitive reasoning

Publicado (Open access) en: https://doi.org/10.1080/13546783.2018.1481144The neural basis of developmental changes in transitive reasoning in parietal regions was examined, using voxel-based morphometry. Young adolescents and adults performed a transitive reasoning task, subsequent to undergoing anatomical magnetic resonance imaging (MRI) brain scans. Behaviorally, adults reasoned more accurately than did the young adolescents. Neural results showed (i) less grey matter density in superior parietal cortex in the adults than in the young adolescents, possibly due to a developmental period of synaptic pruning; (ii) improved performance in the reasoning task was negatively correlated with grey matter density in superior parietal cortex in the adolescents, but not in the adult group; and (iii) the latter results were driven by the more difficult trials, requiring greater spatial manipulation. Taken together, the results support the idea that during development, regions in superior parietal cortex are fine-tuned, to support more robust spatial manipulation, resulting in greater accuracy and efficiency in transitive reasoning

The impact of SARS-CoV-2 in dementia across Latin America : A call for an urgent regional plan and coordinated response

The SARS-CoV-2 global pandemic will disproportionately impact countries with weak economies and vulnerable populations including people with dementia. Latin American and Caribbean countries (LACs) are burdened with unstable economic development, fragile health systems, massive economic disparities, and a high prevalence of dementia. Here, we underscore the selective impact of SARS-CoV-2 on dementia among LACs, the specific strain on health systems devoted to dementia, and the subsequent effect of increasing inequalities among those with dementia in the region. Implementation of best practices for mitigation and containment faces particularly steep challenges in LACs. Based upon our consideration of these issues, we urgently call for a coordinated action plan, including the development of inexpensive mass testing and multilevel regional coordination for dementia care and related actions. Brain health diplomacy should lead to a shared and escalated response across the region, coordinating leadership, and triangulation between governments and international multilateral networks

The Psychological Science Accelerator: Advancing Psychology Through a Distributed Collaborative Network

Source at https://doi.org/10.1177/2515245918797607.Concerns about the veracity of psychological research have been growing. Many findings in psychological science are based on studies with insufficient statistical power and nonrepresentative samples, or may otherwise be limited to specific, ungeneralizable settings or populations. Crowdsourced research, a type of large-scale collaboration in which one or more research projects are conducted across multiple lab sites, offers a pragmatic solution to these and other current methodological challenges. The Psychological Science Accelerator (PSA) is a distributed network of laboratories designed to enable and support crowdsourced research projects. These projects can focus on novel research questions or replicate prior research in large, diverse samples. The PSA’s mission is to accelerate the accumulation of reliable and generalizable evidence in psychological science. Here, we describe the background, structure, principles, procedures, benefits, and challenges of the PSA. In contrast to other crowdsourced research networks, the PSA is ongoing (as opposed to time limited), efficient (in that structures and principles are reused for different projects), decentralized, diverse (in both subjects and researchers), and inclusive (of proposals, contributions, and other relevant input from anyone inside or outside the network). The PSA and other approaches to crowdsourced psychological science will advance understanding of mental processes and behaviors by enabling rigorous research and systematic examination of its generalizability

R para preparación y visualización de datos - DNSC - UAI

R para preparación y visualización de datos. Doctorado en Neurociencia Social y Cognició

Experiment 2 dataset

<p>Dataset for Experiment 2 of the manuscript titled:</p> <p>Extensional factors in simple probability judgments and the role of representation format</p

Figure 1

<p>Figure 1 of the manuscript titled: </p> <p>Extensional factors in simple probability judgments and the role of representation format</p