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An information processing model was developed to describe how information used by pharmacists in providing pharmacy services is processed. The process is hypothesized to be sequential and to consist of perception, recognition, judgment, decision making and response control components which continuously interact and are influenced by memory, particularly long term memory. Information in long term memory was hypothesized to be organized according to the perceived typicality of the stimulus. A laboratory methodology using a microcomputer was developed to test the effect of typicality on three of the process components, recognition, judgment and decision making. Three groups of ten subjects were tested, practicing pharmacists, pharmacy technicians and fourth year PharmD students. For the recognition task, subjects were shown a drug name on the computer screen then asked to indicate which of two drug names, one typical and one atypical, was shown. Pharmacists' responses were most likely to be biased toward the typical drug, technicians' responses were less likely to be biased and students' responses were least likely to be biased. For the judgment task, subjects were shown a drug name and a brief description of a typical or atypical patient; subjects were asked to indicate whether the drug was likely to be appropriate therapy for the patient. Pharmacists' responses were most likely to be biased by the perceived typicality of the patient, technicians, less likely and students, least likely. The decision task was identical to the judgment task except subjects were asked to indicate whether they would dispense the prescription as written or whether they would contact the prescriber. Pharmacists' choices were most likely to be influenced by the perceived typicality of the patient, and technicians were less likely to be influenced by typicality. Students' responses appeared not to be influenced at all. When between groups comparisons were made on difference scores, only the comparison between pharmacists and students on the decision task was significant. No statistically significant differences were found on the reaction time dependent variable for any of the subject groups.

This thesis investigated the interaction of stress and decoding accuracy through the vocalic and facial kinesic channels and with regard to gender. Stress (high and low) was created for 372 undergraduate students using the Stroop Color-Word Test. Overall, results did not show that an increase in stress led to a decrease in decoding accuracy. However, the findings did suggest that stress was impacting on the decoding process. The researcher uncovered a main effect for channel such that the facial kinesic channel was the most accurate for decoding emotions. In addition, an ordinal interaction was found during the first time period which showed that stress was differentially affecting the four groups (kinesic, high and low stress; vocalic, high and low stress). Males and females were affected in a similar manner by stress, with females being consistently more accurate decoders than males regardless of the amount of stress or channel used.

This dissertation offers a theory of political persuasion rooted in a Bayesian model of information processing. I support this theory with the results of 20 survey experiments, conducted variously on convenience samples and nationally-representative surveys. From these data, I draw four main conclusions. First, when confronted with persuasive messages, individuals update their views in the direction of information. Second, people change their minds about political issues in small increments. Third, persuasion in the direction of information occurs regardless of background characteristics, initial beliefs, or ideological position. Finally, these changes in political attitudes are not ephemeral, in most cases lasting at least 10 days. These findings stand in contrast to the predictions of the attitude polarization literature, which posits that the effects of persuasion attempts will be positive for some, but negative for others. Across these 20 experiments, I was unable to find any evidence of negative effects (defined as attitude changes away from treatment information) for any subgroup defined by standard demographics, prior attitudes, or their intersections. Instead, people appear to update their views in a manner consistent with Bayes' rule, i.e., as a weighted average of prior beliefs and new information.

Bibliography: p. 185-196. Electronic publication; Full text available in PDF format; abstract in HTML format. Electronic reproduction.[Australia] :Australian Digital Theses Program,2001.