Calderon Sofia, Ask Karl, Mac Giolla Erik, Granhag Pär Anders
Department of Psychology, University of Gothenburg, P.O. Box 500, 405 30, Gothenburg, Sweden.
Norwegian Police University College, Oslo, Norway.
Cogn Res Princ Implic. 2019 Aug 5;4(1):29. doi: 10.1186/s41235-019-0173-4.
True and false intentions (i.e., lies and truths about one's future actions) is a relatively new research topic, despite the high societal value of being able to predict future criminal behavior (e.g., in the case of an alleged terrorist attack). The current study examined how true and false intentions are mentally represented - the knowledge of which can aid the development of new deception detection methods. Participants (N = 151) were asked either to form a true intention about a future task (i.e., retrieve objects from an office) or to form a false intention about the same task (i.e., prepare a cover story about retrieving objects from an office) to conceal their actual intention (i.e., leave a secret note in the office). The schema consistency of the task was manipulated by presenting participants with a list of office supplies (schema-consistent) or random objects (schema-inconsistent) to be retrieved from the office. The abstractness of mental construal was operationalized as the number of categories used by participants to organize the task-relevant objects into thematic groups. We predicted, based on construal level theory (CLT) and action identification theory, that participants would mentally represent true intentions more concretely (i.e., use a larger number of categories) than false intentions, particularly for schema-inconsistent (versus schema-consistent) future tasks. The results of the study lend no support for these predictions. Instead, a Bayesian analysis revealed strong evidence in favor of the null hypothesis. The findings indicate that predictions from CLT do not readily translate into deception contexts. The results are discussed in light of recent failed attempts to apply CLT to research on true and false intentions, and highlight the need for alternative approaches to the topic.
真实意图与虚假意图（即关于个人未来行为的谎言和真相）是一个相对较新的研究课题，尽管能够预测未来的犯罪行为具有很高的社会价值（例如，在所谓的恐怖袭击案件中）。当前的研究考察了真实意图和虚假意图在心理上是如何表征的——了解这一点有助于开发新的欺骗检测方法。研究参与者（N = 151）被要求要么就未来的一项任务形成真实意图（即从办公室取回物品），要么就同一任务形成虚假意图（即编造一个从办公室取回物品的掩饰故事）以隐瞒其实际意图（即在办公室留下一张秘密纸条）。通过向参与者展示一份办公用品清单（与图式一致）或随机物品清单（与图式不一致）来操纵任务的图式一致性，这些物品是要从办公室取回的。心理建构的抽象程度通过参与者用于将与任务相关的物品组织成主题组的类别数量来衡量。基于解释水平理论（CLT）和行动识别理论，我们预测，参与者对真实意图的心理表征会比虚假意图更具体（即使用更多类别），特别是对于与图式不一致（相对于与图式一致）的未来任务。该研究结果不支持这些预测。相反，贝叶斯分析显示有强有力的证据支持零假设。研究结果表明，CLT的预测并不能直接应用于欺骗情境。我们根据最近将CLT应用于真实意图与虚假意图研究的失败尝试对结果进行了讨论，并强调了针对该主题需要采用替代方法。
