Unverfälschbarkeit stellt ein wichtiges Gütekriterium psychologischer Testverfahren dar. Dieses Kriterium gilt dann als erfüllt, wenn das Testverfahren auf Grund seiner Konstruktion keine Steuerung oder Verzerrung der Ausprägung von Testwerten seitens der Versuchspersonen ermöglicht (vgl. Moosbrugger & Kelava, 2012). Im Gegensatz zu direkten Verfahren (z.B. Fragebogen und Interviews), bei welchen die Ausprägung hinsichtlich eines Merkmales durch Selbstbeschreibung der Versuchspersonen erfragt wird und eine Verfälschung (z.B. durch sozial erwünschtes Antwortverhalten) nicht ausgeschlossen werden kann, wurde indirekten Verfahren (z.B. dem Impliziten Assoziationstest; IAT; Greenwald, McGhee, & Schwartz, 1998) lange Zeit Immunität gegen Fälschungsversuche unterstellt. Diese begründet sich unter anderem durch die Annahme, dass mittels indirekter Verfahren implizite Merkmale gemessen werden. Implizite Merkmale unterscheiden sich von den „eher klassischen“ expliziten Merkmalen, welche vorwiegend mittels direkter Verfahren gemessen werden. Ein wesentlicher Unterschied besteht darin, dass Versuchspersonen nicht notwendigerweise um die Ausprägung hinsichtlich ihrer impliziten Merkmale wissen und dass sie diese Ausprägung auch nicht kontrollieren können (vgl. De Houwer, 2006; De Houwer & Moors, 2007, in press). Die theoretischen Annahmen bezüglich der Eigenschaften impliziter Merkmale bzw. Messergebnisse legen zwei Implikationen nahe. Erstens: Wir können implizite Merkmale ausschließlich über indirekte Zugänge erfassen, da diese nicht notwendigerweise bewusst sind und so eine Selbstauskunft nicht möglich erscheint. Zweitens: Personen können ihre impliziten Messergebnisse nicht kontrollieren und folglich auch nicht verfälschen. Vermutlich gab es auch aus diesem Grund vor wenigen Jahren einen regelrechten Boom, der zu der Entwicklung einer Vielzahl indirekter Verfahren zur Erfassung impliziter Merkmale geführt hat. Ob jedoch die Messergebnisse dieser Verfahren tatsächlich implizit und damit nicht verfälschbar sind, darf nicht nur theoretisch unterstellt, sondern muss empirisch überprüft werden (vgl. De Houwer, 2006). Der IAT gilt als das bekannteste, reliabelste und valideste indirekte Verfahren (Bosson, Swan, & Pennebaker, 2000; Rudolph, Schröder-Abé, Schütz, Gregg, & Sedikides, 2008). In meiner Dissertation habe ich mich aus diesem Grund der empirischen Überprüfung auf Verfälschbarkeit des IATs gewidmet. Die vorliegende Dissertation besteht aus insgesamt fünf Kapiteln. Das 1. Kapitel bildet eine theoretische Einführung zu den Themen Fälschung im diagnostischen Kontext und zum IAT. Grundlegende Befunde und Fragen zur Verfälschbarkeit des IATs werden dargestellt. Kapitel 2 bis 4 bilden empirische Beiträge meiner Forschung, die sich jeweils schwerpunktmäßig mit unterschiedlichen Aspekten der Verfälschbarkeit des IATs beschäftigen. In Kapitel 2 wird der Frage nachgegangen, unter welchen Bedingungen der IAT verfälschbar ist. Bis dato haben die wenigen existierenden Studien ein sehr widersprüchliches Bild bezüglich der Verfälschbarkeit des IATs aufgezeigt. Ein Grund hierfür könnte sein, dass potentiell relevante Faktoren, welche die Verfälschbarkeit des Verfahrens beeinflussen können, noch nie gemeinsam in einer Studie untersucht wurden. Die vorliegende Studie wurde genau mit diesem Ziel konstruiert und durchgeführt. Die Ergebnisse verweisen auf ein komplexes Zusammenspiel verschiedener Faktoren und zeigen auf, unter welchen Bedingungen der IAT verfälschbar ist. Implikationen dieser Ergebnisse werden kritisch diskutiert. In Kapitel 3 werden die Fragen beantwortet, wie Personen den IAT verfälschen und ob Fälschung im IAT detektierbar ist. Die Forschung hat sich bislang nur bedingt damit beschäftigt, was fälschende Personen tun, um ihre Messergebnisse wie gewünscht zu beeinflussen. Es wurde auch noch nicht untersucht, ob Versuchspersonen unter verschiedenen Bedingungen (z.B. Fälschungsziel: hohe vs. niedrige Testwerte) unterschiedliche Strategien anwenden. Dennoch wurden Indices vorgeschlagen, welche in der Lage sein sollen, Fälschung im IAT zu detektieren (Agosta, Ghirardi, Zogmaister, Castiello, & Sartori, 2011; Cvencek, Greenwald, Brown, Gray, & Snowden, 2010). In der vorgestellten Studie habe ich einerseits untersucht, welche Strategien fälschende Personen anwenden und ob sie, je nach Bedingung, zu unterschiedlichen Strategien greifen. Andererseits habe ich untersucht, welche dieser Strategien tatsächlich mit erfolgreicher Fälschung des IATs einhergehen. Schließlich habe ich untersucht, ob die in der Vergangenheit vorgeschlagenen Indices tatsächlich in der Lage sind, erfolgreiche FälscherInnen zu detektieren. Meine Ergebnisse zeigen, dass fälschende Personen unterschiedliche Strategien anwenden, um ihr Ziel zu erreichen. Damit verbunden zeigte sich auch, dass es schwerer ist als bislang angenommen, erfolgreiche FälscherInnen im IAT zu detektieren. Implikationen dieser Ergebnisse werden kritisch diskutiert. Kapitel 4 beschäftigt sich mit der Frage, ob kognitive Fähigkeiten ein erfolgreiches Fälschen im IAT erleichtern. Bisher wurden diese Fähigkeiten nur mit Fälschungserfolg in direkten Verfahren in Verbindung gebracht (vgl. Hartshorne & May, 1928; Nguyen, Biderman, & McDaniel, 2005; Ones, Viswesvaran, & Reiss, 1996; Pauls & Crost, 2005; Snell, Sydell, & Lueke, 1999; Tett, Freund, Christiansen, Fox, & Coaster, 2012; Weiner & Gibson, 2000). In der vorgestellten Studie habe ich untersucht, ob sie auch beim Fälschen des IATs eine Rolle spielen. Besonders habe ich mich dabei für die Rolle des g Faktors der Intelligenz, der Verarbeitungsgeschwindigkeit und der Konzentrationsfähigkeit interessiert. Die Ergebnisse meiner Studie zeigen auf, dass einige dieser Prädiktoren tatsächlich einen Einfluss auf den Fälschungserfolg im IAT haben. Implikationen dieser Ergebnisse werden kritisch diskutiert. Das 5. Kapitel bildet eine Zusammenführung und Integration der Befunde meiner Forschung in die bestehende Theorie. Zudem werden ein Ausblick für die weitere Forschung sowie Empfehlungen für die Praxis gegeben.

Understanding why people become involved in terrorism is vital to inhibiting recruitment and radicalisation, and therefore preventing terrorist attacks. The question of why people support, engage with, and participate in terrorism is addressed in this thesis. Insights into the causes of terrorism and the process of radicalisation are garnered from social and evolutionary psychology in an effort to add an additional interdisciplinary layer of theoretical understanding to existing political science research. The central argument made in this thesis is that certain psychological processes (social identity), and mechanisms (parochial altruism), influence people to favour ingroups and disfavour outgroups in light of particular intergroup cues. Although social identity theories and the concept of parochial altruism pertain to the same argument for bias towards ingroups, which may also entail bias against outgroups, they arrive at this position in different ways and therefore offer alternative insights into what conditions trigger this bias, and responses to it. A novel experimental paradigm with student participants generated data to investigate the evolved mechanism parochial altruism. Social identity theories were applied to certain features of the radicalisation process to explain how and why identification with the Muslim Umma (worldwide community) occurs, which is a central feature of radicalisation in Al-Qaeda type groups. The insights challenge some of the assumptions made by scholars about the nature of radicalisation and terrorism. This thesis considers the process of radicalisation to be rooted in, and influenced by, normal psychological processes and mechanisms that are present in all humans. Although there are caveats, this thesis provides new avenues of exploration and further research to investigate terrorism, radicalisation, and intergroup conflict more generally.

Despite becoming a greater public health concern, the suicide rate among adolescents has not decreased significantly in recent years (Center for Disease Control and Prevention [CDC], 2015). In fact, suicide is the second leading cause of death for individuals between 12-18 years (CDC, 2015). Nonsuicidal self-injury (NSSI), the deliberate destruction of one’s own body tissue without suicidal intent and for reasons not socially sanctioned (Nock, 2009), has been identified as a robust predictor of suicide, above and beyond other risk factors such as depression and hopelessness (Asarnow et al., 2011; Guan, Fox, & Prinstein, 2012). Therefore, understanding risk factors for NSSI is an important area of research not only for prevention of NSSI, but also suicide. Recently, an association between poor sleep and suicide ideation in adolescents has been highlighted (Franic, Kralj, Marcinko, Knez, & Kardum, 2014; Park, Yoo, & Kim, 2013). However, very little attention, both globally and within the United States, has been given to understanding the impact sleep may have on NSSI. Given the strong role that emotion regulation has been identified as having in both poor sleep and NSSI separately, it is important to look at the interaction of these two factors in the prediction of NSSI. Data were collected from 154 adolescents in high school. Results indicated that poor sleep was a significant predictor of both NSSI engagement and self-reported suicide ideation. Additionally, emotion regulation successfully moderated the relationship between poor sleep quality and suicide ideation severity. Results support that sleep is an important risk factor for NSSI engagement and suicide ideation and that emotion regulation may play an important role in strengthening the relationship for between sleep and suicide ideation only. These findings suggest that clinicians should be aware of and work with their clients on both emotion regulation and sleep quality to reduce risk of NSSI engagement and suicide ideation.

The purpose of this study was to build upon the growing body of knowledge relating to music improvisation by investigating the processes used by high school music instrumentalists when improvising music and the factors that influence those processes. Many factors contribute to music improvisation skill and they must all be taken into account when investigating the music improvisation processes of high school music students. The theoretical framework of this study was based on the complex interactions that take place simultaneously between three identified ensembles of factors. The three ensembles of factors were: I . The student profile which included general information and detailed aspects of prior music experience. 2. Enabling skills which included audiation ability, the ability to play music by ear and kinaesthetic abilities. 3. Improvisation processes including, creative processes, cognitive strategies and group or solo contexts for music improvisation. Taking into account the exploratory nature of this study, the single embedded case study design, involving 12 high school music instrumentalists aged between 13 and 15 years, offered the necessary potential to cope with the wide variety of evidence. The formal survey was used to gather information that would establish a detailed profile of each student. The Test of Ability to Audiate and Ability to Play by Ear (TAAAPE) was used to measure students' ability to audiate and play music by ear. Similarly, in order to explore the relationships between improvisation processes, enabling skills and the profile of each student, the Improvisation Ability Test (IAT) was used. This test provided authentic music improvisation experiences in both group and solo contexts. Both tests were scored by two independent judges and the researcher. Finally, the focused interview was used to establish the cognitive strategies used by the students when undertaking the various music improvisation tasks. The ability of the case study design to handle both qualitative and quantitative data proved to be useful in this study. Two major findings emerged from the analysis of the data: 1. The first was that the processes used by this small group of students when engaged in music improvisation were unpredictable. 2. The second major finding relates to evidence that supports the theory of an interaction between the three ensembles of factors as presented in the theoretical framework of this study. However, contrary to what might have been expected, the study further indicated that the interaction of these factors, in the context of the music improvisation processes used by these individual students, did not follow or produce any specific patterns. It was not within the scope of this study to seek the emergence of a model for teaching music improvisation to high school music instrumentalists. However, it has opened the path for further research which could result in the development of such a model.

Rape remains a significant problem in the U.S., with the majority of victims reporting a drug-or-alcohol facilitated rape (DAFR) or incapacitated rape (IR). Many DAFR/IR victims do not acknowledge the incident as a rape, and are therefore are the least likely to report or disclose the assault. Rape scripts theory is one theory that could be used to explain why DAFR/IR victims are more likely than other victims to not acknowledge the incident. In addition, individuals are more likely to blame the victim of a DAFR/IR rape. Furthermore, DAFR/IR victims experience more self-blame for the incident. Taken together, when alcohol is involved in a rape, the victim is viewed as more responsible for the assault. The majority of studies that examine blame for a sexual assault rely on explicit self-report methods. However, implicit beliefs may be more accurate in measuring unbiased beliefs that individuals hold. Implicit attitudes are commonly measured using an Implicit Association Task (IAT). Moreover, hyperfemininity (HF) is a personality characteristic that may influence blame for a sexual assault. Women higher in HF value relationships with men and are willing to use their sexuality as a means to maintain the relationships. Therefore, the present study hypothesized that women higher in HF who read a scenario of a rape involving alcohol will be more likely to implicitly blame the victim. A sample of undergraduate college women completed a battery of questionnaires, read a written scenario depicting a rape in which the victim and perpetrator consumed either alcohol or soda, and completed an IAT. The IAT instructed participants to correctly categorize two sets of stimuli. The stimuli used for the IAT were words that described the victim (innocent-related words) and perpetrator (guilt-related words) of the scenario, and pictures of alcohol and soda. Faster reaction times of categorization indicated a stronger IAT effect; that is, more blame towards the victim of an alcohol involved assault. Results indicated that HF did not influence the relationship between written scenario condition and implicit blame for the rape. Because Women who have not been sexually victimized may hold strong rape myth acceptance and thus may assign more blame to the victim of a sexual assault (Mason et al., 2004), an exploratory analysis was conducted to determine if sexual victimization history impacted the relationship between rape myth acceptance and implicit blame for a sexual assault. Results showed that women without a history of sexual victimization may hold certain rape myths, but implicitly believe that alcohol can be associated with guilt or blame towards the perpetrator of a rape. Additionally, women with a history of SV who hold certain rape myths may be less likely to blame the perpetrator of a rape when alcohol is involved. Detailed results of the present study, policy and public health implications, and future directions are discussed.

Today the world faces some of the most unprecedented environmental challenges ever seen. Many of these challenges are driven by human behaviour. Subsequently, solutions involving human behavioural change are essential to mitigate the environmental threats faced. Although many people express concern about environmental issues and report intentions to engage in pro-environmental activities, often these two factors do not align with behaviour. One possibility for this discrepancy is that environmental goals are not always salient during decision-making contexts. Based on theories which propose that goals can be automatically activated, this thesis aims to investigate whether environmental goals can be automatically activated to produce pro-environmental goal consistent behaviour. It also aims to explore some of the psychological mechanisms involved in the pursuit of environmental goals. These aims are explored across five quantitative experiments which form the three empirical chapters of this thesis. The first empirical chapter comprises three experiments which examine whether environmental goal priming influences environmental behaviour and whether goal pursuit is driven by changes in the automatic evaluation of goal relevant objects. The second empirical chapter investigates whether environmental goal priming enhances attention to environmental product labelling. Lastly, the third empirical chapter explores the efficacy of behavioural feedback as a tool to enhance environmental behaviour. The findings from this thesis reveal that environmental goals can be automatically activated and that this can lead to behaviour consisted with the primed goal. Environmental goals also exhibit features typical of goal pursuit, such as persistence over time. This thesis also provides evidence that environmental labelling is partly goal-dependent, as participants who report stronger motivation to protect the environment devote greater eye gaze towards environmental labelling. Finally, this thesis provides evidence that negative feedback is an effective tool in promoting compensatory environmental behaviour. A key conclusion of this research is that while environmental goals are important, to be effective in promoting pro-environmental behaviour they must be salient during decision-making. Techniques which focus on activating environmental goals may therefore be an important tool to facilitate more sustainable consumer behaviour.

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Syftet med den här studien var att undersöka om mental trötthet leder till ökad diskriminering av överviktiga. Genom att använda en dual process-modell, inleddes undersökningen med en bedömningsuppgift som deltagarna fick utföra i labbmiljö. Vid ett senare tillfälle fick var och en ombesörja att de genomförde ett implicit associationstest (IAT), följt av en explicit graderingsfråga, där deltagarna uppskattade en eventuell skillnad i normal- kontra överviktigas mentala prestation. Syftet med dessa tester var att ta reda på om diskriminering mot överviktiga existerade inom gruppen i sin helhet på såväl implicit som explicit nivå. Hälften av gruppen hade genomgått en kraftig mental trötthetsbelastning före bedömningsuppgiften, med avsikt att se om bias mot överviktiga ökade vid mental trötthet. Resultatet för alla testningar var för sig visade på diskriminering mot överviktiga, men inte att det förekom någon högre diskriminering vid mental trötthet. Möjliga förbättringar i undersökningsdesignen diskuteras, liksom praktiska implikationer. / This study examined whether mental fatigue leads to increased discrimination against the obese. Using a dual process model, participants took part in an assessment task in a controlled laboratory setting, and thereafter completed an implicit association test (IAT), followed by an explicit question, where participants were asked to grade variances in the mental capacity between normal- versus overweight individuals. The intention was to explore possible obesity discrimination. Half of the group previously completed a strenuous memory task, with the purpose of achieving severe fatigue, in order to explore whether the bias increases with mental fatigue. Although the results revealed discrimination in all tests, there was no evidence of increased discrimination in mental fatigue. Possible improvement in the research design is discussed, as well as practical implications.

Individuals with disabilities face various types of social stigma. Research suggests that the presence of an assistance dog leads to an increase in social interactions. The purpose of this study was to determine whether people’s attitudes toward individuals with disabilities differ when pairing that person with an assistance dog. Undergraduate students (N= 244) were randomly assigned to view an individual with a disability either alone or with an assistance dog. Participants rated their attitudes toward the individual, completed a newly developed Implicit Association Test, and answered behavioral intention questions. Results of a hierarchical multiple regression analysis indicated that individuals with more positives attitudes toward dogs had significantly more positive social attitudes toward the individual with a disability paired with a dog, after accounting for gender and dog ownership history. Additionally, individuals had an implicit bias toward an individual with a disability paired with an assistance dog over the individual alone.