Previous research in regulatory focus theory and regulatory fit (Higgins, 1997, 2000) has identified two primary orientations and preferred means that people employ in-pursuit of a desired outcome. Promotion focus use eagerness means to approach gains, while prevention focus use vigilance means to avoid losses. These established theories have contributed to our understanding of individual-level differences in various description-based decision tasks, where people learn about choice outcomes through explicit descriptions (Hertwig, Barron, Weber, & Erev, 2004). The primary purpose of this dissertation was to examine the effect of ‘trait-level’ regulatory focus and regulatory fit on decision behavior in a decisions-from-experience task, where choice outcomes are unknown and can only be learned through experience. Specifically, the present studies examine decision behavior in the sampling paradigm (Hertwig et al., 2004; Weber, Shafir, & Blais, 2004), where participants may sample outcomes from the presented decision options before making a consequential decision. In the reported studies, individual differences in regulatory focus orientation were predicted to influence decision behavior (i.e., sampled outcomes and risky choices) above and beyond other relevant dispositional variables, specifically, financial risk tolerance and broad (Big-5) personality traits. Decision behavior was expected to vary by motivational orientation and by its interaction with choice domain (i.e., gain vs. loss problems). A secondary purpose was to examine the effect of financial risk tolerance on risky choices, as well as to explore the relationships between broad personality traits and decision behavior. Three studies (pilot and two main) were conducted. In each study, participants were given a set of four questionnaires and participated in an interactive computer-based (sampling paradigm) game. Because of data quality concerns with the pilot study and Study 1, the interpretations rely on the results from Study 2. Study 2 found trait-level regulatory fit to significantly predict participants’ exploratory (i.e., sampling) behavior. Moreover, Study 2 provided evidence that the frequency of risky choices varied by risk tolerance level. The theoretical implications for regulatory focus orientation and experience-based decision behavior are discussed, and potential avenues for future research are proposed.

This session shares digital learning and instructional design tools used in elementary social studies teacher education with a focus on how digital spaces and tools can cultivate intellectual curiosity towards transformative social studies teaching and learning.

The science of curiosity is not fully understood, yet it seems to be a key component of nature which drives both humans and animals to seek out new information. Humans actively seek out to solve problems for the sake of solving them, with evidence suggesting that the seeking and obtaining of new knowledge is itself inherently rewarding. This study uses new methods to collect data to investigate how humans react when presented with novel environments and a problem to solve. Information gain was tracked using Shannon’s entropy, a measure of how effective a communication is at communicating its message across. The study investigates if participants feelings of satisfaction will increase the more information they receive, as measured by a change in Shannon’s entropy. A total of 44 participants with complete data were recruited accross two conditions A and B, with A containing a complete knowlege graph to determine what knowledge is gained through interactions with the environment and B containing more uncertainty so that the participant can be observed building their own knowledge-graph. Participants entered a virtual enviroment named Omosa where they were told about a mystery involving the deaths of herbivores on the island. Participants were given free reign to explore and investigate for a minimum 6 minutes. In increments of 90s, participants were asked questions about what they thought was killing the herd and how confident they were of their answer. After 6 minutes final questions were presented collecting player satisfaction and trait curiosity. Additional meta-data including trajectory and interactions were also collected. No significant results were gleaned due to high drop out and incomplete data. Methodology could be altered in future renditions to increase participation and reduce drop out. / Vetenskapen om nyfikenhet förstås inte helt, men det verkar vara en nyckelkomponent i naturen som driver både människor och djur att söka ny information. Människor försöker aktivt lösa problem för att lösa dem, med bevis som tyder på att att söka och få ny kunskap i sig är givande i sig. Denna studie använder nya metoder för att samla in data för att undersöka hur människor reagerar när de presenteras för nya miljöer och ett problem att lösa. Informationsvinster spårades med hjälp av Shannons entropi, ett mått på hur effektiv en kommunikation är för att kommunicera sitt budskap. Studien undersöker om deltagarnas känslor av tillfredsställelse kommer att öka mer information de får, mätt med en förändring i Shannons entropi. Totalt rekryterades 44 deltagare med fullständig data enligt två villkor A och B, där A innehöll en fullständig kunskapsgraf för att bestämma vilken kunskap som erhålls genom interaktioner med miljön och B som innehåller mer osäkerhet så att deltagaren kan observeras bygga sin egen kunskaps grafen. Deltagarna gick in i ett virtuellt miljö med namnet Omosa där de fick höra om ett mysterium som involverade djur av växtätare på ön. Deltagarna fick fri tid att utforska och undersöka i minst 6 minuter. I steg från 90-talet ställdes deltagarna frågor om vad de trodde dödade besättningen och hur säkra de var på svaret. Efter 6 minuter presenterades de sista frågorna för att samla spelarnas nöjdhet och dragkänslighet. Ytterligare metadata inklusive bana och interaktioner samlades också in. Inga signifikanta resultat samlades in på grund av högt bortfall och ofullständig data. Metodik kan ändras i framtida versioner för att öka deltagandet och minska bortfallet.

I call my project COLORUM - A ceramic investigation of form in relation to balance and spatiality. Colorum means colors in Latin. Dividing the word, color from English, and rum is space in Swedish. I have investigated the ceramic process through basic geometric shapes. Trying to understand, learn, feel and master the material. Work with and against it, control, and let go of control. I have been working with casting techniques and exploring the primary forms, challenging the material, pushing the clay norms to their edge. By relating to geometry, I defy myself to create these precise forms in ceramics. I combine soft, colorful glazes on the surface with a strict body that creates a juxtaposition that opposes each other. The journey continued by challenging the precise forms through gravity movement creating imploding bodies. I'm curious about the dialogue and the meeting between different expressions in shapes, material, and volumes.

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Curious Cycles responds to the tensions that arise when designing technologies for menstruation and menstrual cycles, touching upon notions of curiosity, noticing, sharing, taking or making space, and our relationships with our bodies and their fluids. The project follows a Research through Design approach, guided by Soma Design and feminist research methods. Curious Cycles are a set of cultural probes; objects and interactions designed to gather experiences and insights from ve people who menstruate, throughout the duration of a cycle (approximately one month). The objects are meant to "cultivate curiosity", provoking reections on the ways we currently relate to our bodies and bodily uids and speculating on how we might relate to them in the future. This work seeks to approach the design method of cultural probes from a feminist perspective and contributes through the concept of "cultivating curiosity", a way to design menstrual cycle technologies by attending closely to the changing social and material experiences of the body, which in turn can challenge the cultural taboos surrounding menstruation. / Curious Cycles svarar mot spänningarna som uppkommer när teknologier designas för menstruation och menstruationscykeln, genom idéer kring nykenhet, att märka, att dela med sig, att ta eller göra plats, och våra relationer med våra kroppar och deras vätskor. Projektet följer en Research through Design metodik, guidad av Soma Design och feministiska forskningsmetoder. Curious Cycles är en uppsättning cultural probes; föremål och interaktioner designade för att samla erfarenheter och insikter från fem menstruerande personer genom deras hela menstruationscykel (vilka pågår cirka en månad). Föremålen är menade att kultivera nykenhet för att framkalla reektioner kring de sätt vi för närvarande relaterar till våra kroppar och kroppsliga vätskor på, och även för att spekulera kring hur vi kan relatera till de i framtiden. Detta arbete närmar sig cultural probes från feministiska perspektiv och bidrar med konceptet "cultivating curiosity", ett sätt att designa teknologier för menstruationscykeln genom att ingående uppmärksamma förändringar av sociala och materiella erfarenheter av kroppen, vilket i sin tur kan utmana kulturella tabun kring menstruation.

Our tendency to be curious about our environment and our capacity to effectively explore it are central to human intelligence. This dissertation takes a functional approach to investigating curiosity and exploration, examining the systematic, and at times approximate, manner humans seek information in service of their varied goals. In chapter one, I examine exploratory behavior in the service of a prescribed goal using a paradigm that allows for tight experimental control. Comparing participants’ choices to the optimal strategy for this task, I show that humans explore as if balancing seeking goal-relevant information with managing their limited cognitive resources. Chapters two and three focus on epistemic information-seeking driven by curiosity in more naturalistic contexts. In chapter two I chart the relationship between information seeking and motivation, asking how an acute change to motivation impacts information seeking. By measuring the profound changes to motivation affected by the onset of the COVID-19 pandemic in the United States, as well as information seeking behavior and expectations of usefulness, I show that motivation both directs information seeking to goal-relevant information, as well as energizing the seeking of information of any kind. In chapter three, I examine how fine-scale changes to motivation, brought about by previous learning experiences, influence curiosity in a continual manner. I find that learning satisfying information both enhances curiosity for similar information and decreases curiosity for dissimilar information. Combined, these three chapters demonstrate the sophistication of human information-seeking strategies, which are efficient, flexible, and adapted to the constraints of human cognition.

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Although the significance of curiosity in motivating and directing learning has received substantial scholarly support, little information exists about curiosity's importance in adult learning. The purpose of this study was to investigate curiosity's possible relevance in an adult learning context, the workplace. Specifically, this study was an examination of adult curiosity's relationship to socialization-related learning, and ultimately job performance. Four curiosity instruments (the Novelty Experiencing Scale; State-Trait Personality Inventory; Melbourne Curiosity Inventory; and the Sensation Seeking Scale), one socialization-related learning questionnaire (Workplace Adaptation Questionnaire), and one job performance instrument (developed to assess technical and interpersonal job performance) were administered in four service-industry organizations. Demographic data were also collected and the final sample included 233 employees. Two-, three-, and four-factor curiosity models were examined to clarify the nature of the curiosity construct. Curiosity factor scores were subsequently used as independent variables in multiple regression equations to assess their research utility. Three a priori determined, recursive path models suggesting a causal influence of curiosity on socialization-related learning and job performance were tested as well. Standardized partial regression coefficients were calculated from a combination of the correlational matrix containing the three main study variables (curiosity, socialization-related learning, and job performance), and their standard deviations, using the EQS for Windows 5.4 routine. Multiple loadings of several of the curiosity subscales on the curiosity factors indicate a conceptual overlap between the Sensation Seeking and Venturesomeness curiosity factors; thus, the nature of curiosity may be best represented by a Cognitive Curiosity and Sensation Seeking factor interpretation. The findings also suggest that the two-factor curiosity model may have had the best research utility for the purposes of this study. The three- and four-factor curiosity solutions did not explain a significant amount of additional variance in the multiple regression models predicting socialization-related learning and job performance. Results suggest, too, that curiosity has both a direct and an indirect causal influence on job performance. This research indicates that curiosity or the desire for information has a weak but significant direct effect on total job performance, and its effect on total job performance can also be mediated by the learning associated with the socialization process. When examining curiosity's effect on the two separate job performance dimensions, i.e., technical and interpersonal, curiosity's only significant effect on both job performance dimensions was mediated through the socialization-related learning variable. Overall, this study's findings suggest support for adult curiosity as being relevant in the socialization process and in job performance as well. / Ph. D.

Guy de Maupassant's short stories "Une Aventure Parisienne" and "Le Signe" tell the tales of two female protagonists caught by curiosity. In "Une Aventure Parisienne," a notary's wife (the petite provinciale) leaves her home and ventures to Paris in search of an affair with a celebrity. After finding one and sleeping with him, the petite provinciale becomes disillusioned with her fantasy: she returns home deflated from the realization that her celebrity snores and drools just as her husband does. The high-society protagonist in "Le Signe," Madame de Grangerie, is also disenchanted with her interest in imitating the gesture of a prostitute she notices across the street. When faced with a male client she frantically gives in to what she has offered. Needing to reaffirm her identity as an "honnête femme," she solicits advice from her friend on what to do if the client returns. While both protagonists do not face legal punishment for their affairs, they do confront personal consequences. The petite provinciale's dreams about celebrities burst and Madame de Grangerie's reputation appears at risk. Maupassant not only comments on feminine curiosity and adultery, but also on the internal effects such actions could potentially have on women of his time. In this thesis I argue that even though both protagonists act on their curiosities and flirt with private/public boundaries, the petite provinciale and Madame de Grangerie are ultimately presented through masculinized lenses. I also show how discursive nineteenth-century traditions of a limited view of female sexuality are reconstructed in Maupassant's tales. / Master of Arts