Browsing by Author "Deffler, Samantha A"

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Open Access
All my children: The roles of semantic category and phonetic similarity in the misnaming of familiar individuals.
(Mem Cognit, 2016-10) Deffler, Samantha A; Fox, Cassidy; Ogle, Christin M; Rubin, David C
Despite knowing a familiar individual (such as a daughter) well, anecdotal evidence suggests that naming errors can occur among very familiar individuals. Here, we investigate the conditions surrounding these types of errors, or misnamings, in which a person (the misnamer) incorrectly calls a familiar individual (the misnamed) by someone else's name (the named). Across 5 studies including over 1,700 participants, we investigated the prevalence of the phenomenon of misnaming, identified factors underlying why it may occur, and tested potential mechanisms. We included undergraduates and MTurk workers and asked questions of both the misnamed and the misnamer. We find that familiar individuals are often misnamed with the name of another member of the same semantic category; family members are misnamed with another family member's name and friends are misnamed with another friend's name. Phonetic similarity between names also leads to misnamings; however, the size of this effect was smaller than that of the semantic category effect. Overall, the misnaming of familiar individuals is driven by the relationship between the misnamer, misnamed, and named; phonetic similarity between the incorrect name used by the misnamer and the correct name also plays a role in misnaming.
Open Access
Cognitive and Interpersonal Features of Intellectual Humility.
(Personality & social psychology bulletin, 2017-06) Leary, Mark R; Diebels, Kate J; Davisson, Erin K; Jongman-Sereno, Katrina P; Isherwood, Jennifer C; Raimi, Kaitlin T; Deffler, Samantha A; Hoyle, Rick H
Four studies examined intellectual humility-the degree to which people recognize that their beliefs might be wrong. Using a new Intellectual Humility (IH) Scale, Study 1 showed that intellectual humility was associated with variables related to openness, curiosity, tolerance of ambiguity, and low dogmatism. Study 2 revealed that participants high in intellectual humility were less certain that their beliefs about religion were correct and judged people less on the basis of their religious opinions. In Study 3, participants high in intellectual humility were less inclined to think that politicians who changed their attitudes were "flip-flopping," and Study 4 showed that people high in intellectual humility were more attuned to the strength of persuasive arguments than those who were low. In addition to extending our understanding of intellectual humility, this research demonstrates that the IH Scale is a valid measure of the degree to which people recognize that their beliefs are fallible.
Open Access
Participant, rater, and computer measures of coherence in posttraumatic stress disorder.
(J Abnorm Psychol, 2016-01) Rubin, David C; Deffler, Samantha A; Ogle, Christin M; Dowell, Nia M; Graesser, Arthur C; Beckham, Jean C
We examined the coherence of trauma memories in a trauma-exposed community sample of 30 adults with and 30 without posttraumatic stress disorder. The groups had similar categories of traumas and were matched on multiple factors that could affect the coherence of memories. We compared the transcribed oral trauma memories of participants with their most important and most positive memories. A comprehensive set of 28 measures of coherence including 3 ratings by the participants, 7 ratings by outside raters, and 18 computer-scored measures, provided a variety of approaches to defining and measuring coherence. A multivariate analysis of variance indicated differences in coherence among the trauma, important, and positive memories, but not between the diagnostic groups or their interaction with these memory types. Most differences were small in magnitude; in some cases, the trauma memories were more, rather than less, coherent than the control memories. Where differences existed, the results agreed with the existing literature, suggesting that factors other than the incoherence of trauma memories are most likely to be central to the maintenance of posttraumatic stress disorder and thus its treatment.
Open Access
Scenes enable a sense of reliving: Implications for autobiographical memory.
(Cognition, 2019-02) Rubin, David C; Deffler, Samantha A; Umanath, Sharda
Autobiographical memory has been defined by the phenomenological properties of reliving, vividness, and belief that an event occurred. Neuropsychological damage that results in the inability to recall the layout of a scene also results in amnesia suggesting a possible milder effect in people without such neurological damage. Based on this and other observations, we hypothesized that the degree to which the layout of a scene is recalled will correlate positively with ratings of reliving, vividness, and belief, and will explain more variance in multiple regressions than recalling the scene's contents. We also hypothesized that a lack of layout underlies nonspecific autobiographical memories which are common in aging, future events, and clinical disorders, whereas currently such memories are most commonly measured by reports of extended duration. We tested these theory-driven novel hypotheses in three studies to replicate our results. In each study, approximately 200 participants rated the layout, content, and other properties of personal events. Correlational analyses in each study and a structural equation model for the combined studies provide strong support for the role of mental scene construction in an integrative neurocognitive approach to clarify cognitive theory and clinical phenomena.
Open Access
Scientific evidence versus outdated beliefs: A response to Brewin (2016).
(Journal of abnormal psychology, 2016-10) Rubin, David C; Berntsen, Dorthe; Ogle, Christin M; Deffler, Samantha A; Beckham, Jean C
We find Brewin's (2016) critiques of the narratives, power, and coherence measures in Rubin et al. (2016) without merit; his suggestions for a "revised formulation" (p. 1015) of coherence are contradicted by data readily available in the target article but ignored. We place Brewin's commentary in a historical context and show that it reiterates views of trauma memory fragmentation that are unsupported by data. We evaluate an earlier review of fragmentation of trauma memories (Brewin, 2014), which Brewin uses to support his position in the commentary. We show that it is contradicted by more comprehensive reviews and fails to include several studies that met Brewin's inclusion criteria but provided no support for his position, including 3 studies by the present authors (Rubin, 2011; Rubin, Boals, & Berntsen, 2008; Rubin, Dennis, & Beckham, 2011). In short, the commentary's position does not stand against scientific evidence; attempts to rescue it through arguments unsupported by data advance neither science nor clinical practice. (PsycINFO Database Record
Open Access
Self-narrative focus in autobiographical events: The effect of time, emotion, and individual differences.
(Memory & cognition, 2019-01) Rubin, David C; Berntsen, Dorthe; Deffler, Samantha A; Brodar, Kaitlyn
Individuals may take a self-narrative focus on the meaning of personal events in their life story, rather than viewing the events in isolation. Using the Centrality of Event Scale (CES; Berntsen & Rubin in Behaviour Research and Therapy, 44, 219-231, 2006) as our measure, we investigated self-narrative focus as an individual differences variable in addition to its established role as a measure of individual events. Three studies, with 169, 182, and 190 participants had 11, 10, and 11 different events varied across the dimensions of remembered past versus imagined future, distance from the present, and valence. Imagined future events, events more distant from the present, and positive events all had increased self-narrative focus, in agreement with published theories and findings. Nonetheless, CES ratings for individual events correlated positively with each other within individuals (r ~ .30) and supported a single factor solution. These results are consistent with a stable individual differences tendency toward self-narrative focus that transcends single events. Thus, self-narrative focus is both a response whereby people relate individual events to their life story and identity and an individual differences variable that is stable over a range of events. The findings are discussed in relation to narrative measures of autobiographical reasoning.