Truth or Truthiness? How Desires Influence Truth Associations
Institution: | University of Virginia |
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Department: | Social Psychology |
Degree: | PhD |
Year: | 2015 |
Keywords: | implicit social cognition; implicit measures; Implicit Association Test; attitudes; truth associations; aIAT; desires |
Record ID: | 2061960 |
Full text PDF: | http://libra.virginia.edu/catalog/libra-oa:8657 |
What people want to happen and what actually happens often differs. How do people resolve this discrepancy between desires and reality within memory? One possibility is that they don’t. I argue that truth evaluations arise from automatic processes that produce associations with truth and controlled processes that compare the validity of different beliefs. Further, I contend that desires shape associations with the truth. In Studies 1-3 I use real-world events to demonstrate that desires are related to truth associations, even when those desires do not reflect reality. Study 4 examines how desires causally impact truth associations and Study 5 examines how desires and knowledge about an outcome interact in influencing truth associations. Studies 2, 3, and 5 also explore how truth associations mediate the effects of desires on expectations and beliefs about events. I find that desires influence associations with the truth and that truth associations mediate the impact of desires on beliefs about events.