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1. Reference frequency: what do speakers tend to talk about?

   Arnold, J. E. ; Strangmann, I. ; Hwang, H. ; Zerkle, S ( January 2018 , UNC Language Processing Lab Technical Reports)

   he pronoun “they” can refer to an individual who identifies as nonbinary, but it also is commonly used as a plural pronoun. How do listeners identify whether “they” is being used in a singular or plural sense? Arnold, Mayo, & Dong (in press) report three experiments in that test the role of explicitly introducing gender identity via pronouns, e.g. “This is Alex, and they use they/them pronouns.” Participants read short stories like “Alex went running with Liz and they fell down.” Answers to “Who fell down” indicated whether participants interpreted they as Alex or Alex-and-Liz. Singular interpretations of they were more likely when participants hear an explicit statement that Alex uses they/them pronouns, and in supporting discourse contexts. This paper is a companion to the main article, and reports analyses of individual difference measures. Participants self-reported familiarity with individuals who identify as nonbinary, which was expected to increase singular interpretations, but mostly it did not. In experiment 2 we also measured print exposure, but we found that it did not affect interpretation of singular they. In short, we saw virtually no effects of individual difference predictors. 

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2. My pronouns are they/them: Talking about pronouns changes how pronouns are understood

   https://doi.org/10.3758/s13423-021-01905-0  

   Arnold, Jennifer E. ; Mayo, Heather C. ; Dong, Lisa ( April 2021 , Psychonomic Bulletin & Review)

   null (Ed.)

   The pronoun “they” can be either plural or singular, perhaps referring to an individual who identifies as nonbinary. How do listeners identifywhether “they” has a singular or plural sense? We test the role of explicitly discussing pronouns (e.g., “Alex uses they/them pronouns”). In three experiments, participants read short stories, like “Alex went running with Liz. They fell down.” Answers to “Who fell down” indicated whether participants interpreted they as Alex or Alex-and-Liz. We found more singular responses in discourse contexts that make Alex more available: when Alex was either the only person in the context or mentioned first. Critically, the singular interpretation was stronger when participants heard explicit instructions that Alex uses they/them pronouns, even though participants in all conditions had ample opportunity to learn this fact through observation. Results show that the social trend to talk about pronouns has a direct impact on how language is understood. 

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3. Does SES affect pronoun comprehension and prediction in implicit causality scenarios?

   Johnson, E. ; Arnold, J.E. ( January 2021 , UNC Processing Lab Technical Report #4)

   Johnson, E. & Arnold, J. E. (2021). Does SES affect pronoun comprehension and prediction in implicit causality scenarios? Technical Report #4. UNC Language Processing Lab, Department of Psychology & Neuroscience, University of North Carolina – Chapel Hill, Chapel Hill, North Carolina. This paper examines whether individuals’ pronoun resolution varies with respect to their socioeconomic status (SES). It uses the data from the Johnson and Arnold (2021) paper to determine whether the author recognition task (ART) effect that was found could instead be explained by participants’ SES. Both socioeconomic status and the author recognition task have been shown to correlate with measures of reading skill, so as a secondary analysis, SES was included as a possible predictor of individual differences. 

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4. Additional Methods and Analyses for “Who gets mentioned next? The answer depends on the experimental task

   Arnold, J. E. ; Zerkle, S.A. ( January 2021 , UNC Language Processing Lab Technical Report #5)

   Arnold, J. E., & Zerkle, S. A. (2021). Additional Methods and Analyses for “Who gets mentioned next? The answer depends on the experimental task.” Technical Report #5. UNC Language Processing Lab, Department of Psychology & Neuroscience, University of North Carolina – Chapel Hill, Chapel Hill, North Carolina. 

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5. Predictors of Jurors’ Understanding of Evidence Strength

   McCowan, K. ( March 2020 , Annual Conference of the American Psychology-Law Society.)

   Abstract Expert testimony varies in scientific quality and jurors have a difficult time evaluating evidence quality (McAuliff et al., 2009). In the current study, we apply Fuzzy Trace Theory principles, examining whether visual and gist aids help jurors calibrate to the strength of scientific evidence. Additionally we were interested in the role of jurors’ individual differences in scientific reasoning skills in their understanding of case evidence. Contrary to our preregistered hypotheses, there was no effect of evidence condition or gist aid on evidence understanding. However, individual differences between jurors’ numeracy skills predicted evidence understanding. Summary Poor-quality expert evidence is sometimes admitted into court (Smithburn, 2004). Jurors’ calibration to evidence strength varies widely and is not robustly understood. For instance, previous research has established jurors lack understanding of the role of control groups, confounds, and sample sizes in scientific research (McAuliff, Kovera, & Nunez, 2009; Mill, Gray, & Mandel, 1994). Still others have found that jurors can distinguish weak from strong evidence when the evidence is presented alone, yet not when simultaneously presented with case details (Smith, Bull, & Holliday, 2011). This research highlights the need to present evidence to jurors in a way they can understand. Fuzzy Trace Theory purports that people encode information in exact, verbatim representations and through “gist” representations, which represent summary of meaning (Reyna & Brainerd, 1995). It is possible that the presenting complex scientific evidence to people with verbatim content or appealing to the gist, or bottom-line meaning of the information may influence juror understanding of that evidence. Application of Fuzzy Trace Theory in the medical field has shown that gist representations are beneficial for helping laypeople better understand risk and benefits of medical treatment (Brust-Renck, Reyna, Wilhelms, & Lazar, 2016). Yet, little research has applied Fuzzy Trace Theory to information comprehension and application within the context of a jury (c.f. Reyna et. al., 2015). Additionally, it is likely that jurors’ individual characteristics, such as scientific reasoning abilities and cognitive tendencies, influence their ability to understand and apply complex scientific information (Coutinho, 2006). Methods The purpose of this study was to examine how jurors calibrate to the strength of scientific information, and whether individual difference variables and gist aids inspired by Fuzzy Trace Theory help jurors better understand complicated science of differing quality. We used a 2 (quality of scientific evidence: high vs. low) x 2 (decision aid to improve calibration - gist information vs. no gist information), between-subjects design. All hypotheses were preregistered on the Open Science Framework. Jury-eligible community participants (430 jurors across 90 juries; Mage = 37.58, SD = 16.17, 58% female, 56.93% White). Each jury was randomly assigned to one of the four possible conditions. Participants were asked to individually fill out measures related to their scientific reasoning skills prior to watching a mock jury trial. The trial was about an armed bank robbery and consisted of various pieces of testimony and evidence (e.g. an eyewitness testimony, police lineup identification, and a sweatshirt found with the stolen bank money). The key piece of evidence was mitochondrial DNA (mtDNA) evidence collected from hair on a sweatshirt (materials from Hans et al., 2011). Two experts presented opposing opinions about the scientific evidence related to the mtDNA match estimate for the defendant’s identification. The quality and content of this mtDNA evidence differed based on the two conditions. The high quality evidence condition used a larger database than the low quality evidence to compare to the mtDNA sample and could exclude a larger percentage of people. In the decision aid condition, experts in the gist information group presented gist aid inspired visuals and examples to help explain the proportion of people that could not be excluded as a match. Those in the no gist information group were not given any aid to help them understand the mtDNA evidence presented. After viewing the trial, participants filled out a questionnaire on how well they understood the mtDNA evidence and their overall judgments of the case (e.g. verdict, witness credibility, scientific evidence strength). They filled this questionnaire out again after a 45-minute deliberation. Measures We measured Attitudes Toward Science (ATS) with indices of scientific promise and scientific reservations (Hans et al., 2011; originally developed by National Science Board, 2004; 2006). We used Drummond and Fischhoff’s (2015) Scientific Reasoning Scale (SRS) to measure scientific reasoning skills. Weller et al.’s (2012) Numeracy Scale (WNS) measured proficiency in reasoning with quantitative information. The NFC-Short Form (Cacioppo et al., 1984) measured need for cognition. We developed a 20-item multiple-choice comprehension test for the mtDNA scientific information in the cases (modeled on Hans et al., 2011, and McAuliff et al., 2009). Participants were shown 20 statements related to DNA evidence and asked whether these statements were True or False. The test was then scored out of 20 points. Results For this project, we measured calibration to the scientific evidence in a few different ways. We are building a full model with these various operationalizations to be presented at APLS, but focus only on one of the calibration DVs (i.e., objective understanding of the mtDNA evidence) in the current proposal. We conducted a general linear model with total score on the mtDNA understanding measure as the DV and quality of scientific evidence condition, decision aid condition, and the four individual difference measures (i.e., NFC, ATS, WNS, and SRS) as predictors. Contrary to our main hypotheses, neither evidence quality nor decision aid condition affected juror understanding. However, the individual difference variables did: we found significant main effects for Scientific Reasoning Skills, F(1, 427) = 16.03, p <.001, np2 = .04, Weller Numeracy Scale, F(1, 427) = 15.19, p <.001, np2 = .03, and Need for Cognition, F(1, 427) = 16.80, p <.001, np2 = .04, such that those who scored higher on these measures displayed better understanding of the scientific evidence. In addition there was a significant interaction of evidence quality condition and scores on the Weller’s Numeracy Scale, F(1, 427) = 4.10, p = .04, np2 = .01. Further results will be discussed. Discussion These data suggest jurors are not sensitive to differences in the quality of scientific mtDNA evidence, and also that our attempt at helping sensitize them with Fuzzy Trace Theory-inspired aids did not improve calibration. Individual scientific reasoning abilities and general cognition styles were better predictors of understanding this scientific information. These results suggest a need for further exploration of approaches to help jurors differentiate between high and low quality evidence. Note: The 3rd author was supported by an AP-LS AP Award for her role in this research. Learning Objective: Participants will be able to describe how individual differences in scientific reasoning skills help jurors understand complex scientific evidence. 

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