This thesis explores the moral significance of agent beliefs and epistemic states. In particular it will explore the following question: is an agent's moral obligation a function of her actual circumstances, what she believes those circumstances to be, or what her evidence indicates those circumstances are? Three corresponding views are explored and it is argued that each of these views is subject to one of two substantial worries, which are developed in this thesis (i.e. the manipulation worry and the unreasonableness worry).

En del personer med övervikt vill gå ner i vikt, men det kan vara svårt att lyckas. Studiens syfte var att ta reda på deltagares upplevelse av sin viktminskning på Itrim. En kvalitativ studie med 9 personer, varav 7 kvinnor som deltagit i Itrims viktminskningsprogram intervjuades och datamaterialet analyserades genom meningskoncentrering. Enligt motivationsteorin Self-Determination Theory (SDT) så ökar sannolikheten för att beteendeförändringar blir bestående om de är autonoma och motivationen intern. Resultatet visade att deltagarna upplevde sin viktminskning som positiv och att Itrims koncept fungerar bra. Deltagarna motiverades genom olika uppsatta mål, använde sig av olika strategier och upplevde ett bra stöd. Genom att gå på ett viktminskningsprogram känner personerna en stark samhörighet och ser sig själva som en del av en helhet. De känner sig inte ensamma i sin situation. Svårast är beteendeförändringen då den tar tid och kräver energi, men till hjälp använder deltagarna egna personliga strategier.

Psychological closure is the feeling that a life experience is complete and a part of the past (Beike, Adams, and Wirth-Beaumont 2007). While research on psychological closure primarily deals with traumatic or highly aversive life experiences, psychological closure is frequently experienced and sought after in more typical consumption settings. My dissertation extends our current knowledge about the role of psychological closure by exploring emotional, cognitive, perceptual, and behavioral implications of psychological closure across a broad range of consumer experiences. The first essay aims to demonstrate that closure makes events seem distant in time and probability through emotion. It also explores resulting consumer decisions such as warranty purchase intentions. The second essay proposes and tests how psychological closure of a consumer learning experience can lead to an abstract representation of that learning experience, and consequently a heightened sense of subjective knowledge. / text

Background. Although nutritional deficiency is known to be both common and multifactorial in the post-liver transplant population, a global systematic method of assessing nutritional status has not been widely implemented. The Subjective Global Assessment has been validated in many clinical populations, but to this investigator's knowledge there are no reports on its use in the post-acute liver transplant population. The purpose of this Doctorate of Nursing Practice project was to assess nutritional risk using a Nutritional Assessment Tool, consisting of the Subjective Global Assessment plus additional indicators, for use in the post-acute liver transplant population, defined as one week or less after hospital discharge from liver transplant. The additional indicators consist of age, body mass index, Model for End-Stage Liver Disease score, hospital length of stay for liver transplant, and diagnosis of diabetes mellitus. Methods. This was a practicality study in which a Nutritional Assessment Tool was administered by advanced practice nurses to post-acute liver transplant patients in an outpatient clinic. Each advanced practice nurse completed a practicality survey. Dependence of the additional indicators on the Subjective Global Assessment classification was evaluated using ANOVA and Fisher's exact test. Time to administer the tool was also collected. Results. Seventeen participants were enrolled over a period of three months. Among these, 70.5% were ranked as well-nourished, 23.5% as moderately malnourished, and 5.9% as severely malnourished. No statistically significant dependence of the indicators on the Subjective Global Assessment classification was found. The average time to administer the tool was 9.7+/- 2.4 minutes. Based on the survey from advanced practice nurses, the Nutritional Assessment Tool was found to be practical in this outpatient clinic setting. Conclusions. Implementing a Nutritional Assessment Tool, or the Subjective Global Assessment at minimum, in the post-acute liver transplant population in this setting served to be a practical method of evaluating global nutritional risk.

The emphasis given to probability and statistics in the K-12 mathematics curriculum has brought attention to the various approaches to probability and statistics concepts, as well as how to teach these concepts. Teachers from fourth, fifth, and sixth grades from a small suburban Catholic school engaged their students (n=87) in a study to compare learning traditional probability concepts to learning traditional and subjective probability concepts. The control group (n=44) received instruction in traditional probability, while the experimental group (n=43) received instruction in traditional and subjective probability. A Multivariate Analysis of Variance and a Bayesian t-test were used to analyze pretest and posttest scores from the Making Decisions about Chance Questionnaire (MDCQ). Researcher observational notes, teacher journal entries, student activity worksheet explanations, pre- and post-test answers, and student interviews were coded for themes. All groups showed significant improvement on the post-MDCQ (p < .01). There was a disordinal interaction between the combined fifth- and sixth-grade experimental group (n=28) and the control group (n=28), however the mean difference in performance on the pre-MDCQ and post-MDCQ was not significant (p=.096). A Bayesian t-test indicated that there is reasonable evidence to believe that the mean of the experimental group exceeded the mean of the control group. Qualitative data showed that while students have beliefs about probabilistic situations based on their past experiences and prior knowledge, and often use this information to make probability judgments, they find traditional probability problems easier than subjective probability. Further research with different grade levels, larger sample sizes or different activities would develop learning theory in this area and may provide insight about probability judgments previously labeled as misconceptions by researchers.

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This thesis is concerned with (i) how to estimate the perceived mortality risk, (ii) how to calculate the welfare change of mortality risk reduction and (iii) whether ambiguity aversion influences subjects' treatment decision. This study is an important topic in environmental and resource economics, and the attempt to introduce ambiguity preference into the models might shed light on future research in nonmarket valuation. In this study, I estimate the economic value of reducing mortality risk relating to arsenic in drinking water employing contingent valuation in U.S. arsenic hot spots. Re-cent studies have shown that perceived risk is a more reliable variable than scientific assessments of risk when applied to interpret and predict individual's averting behavior. I am also interested in the confidence level of perceived risk, which was elicited and treated as the degree of risk ambiguity in this paper. I develop a formal parametric model to calculate the mean willingness to pay (WTP) for mortality risk reduction, and find weak evidence of ambiguity aversion.

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Four studies provide support for the development and validation of a framework for understanding the range of social psychological outcomes valued subjectively as consequences of negotiations. Study 1 inductively elicited and coded elements of subjective value among students, community members, and negotiation practitioners, revealing 20 categories that negotiation theorists in Study 2 sorted to reveal four underlying dimensions: Feelings about Instrumental Outcomes, the Self, Process, and Relationship. Study 3 proposed a new Subjective Value Inventory (SVI) questionnaire and confirmed its 4-factor structure, and Study 4 presents convergent, discriminant, and predictive validity data for this SVI. Results suggest the SVI is a promising tool to systematize and encourage research on the subjective outcomes of negotiation.

abstract: Variability in subjective response to alcohol has been shown to predict drinking behavior as well as the development of alcohol use disorders. The current study examined the extent to which individual differences in alcohol pharmacokinetics impact subjective response and drinking behavior during a single session alcohol administration paradigm. Participants (N = 98) completed measures of subjective response at two time points following alcohol consumption. Pharmacokinetic properties (rate of absorption and metabolism) were inferred using multiple BAC readings to calculate the area under the curve during the ascending limb for absorption and descending limb for metabolism. Following the completion of the subjective response measures, an ad-libitum taste rating task was implemented in which participants were permitted to consume additional alcoholic beverages. The amount consumed during the taste rating task served as the primary outcome variable. Results of the study indicated that participants who metabolized alcohol more quickly maintained a greater level of subjective stimulation as blood alcohol levels declined and reported greater reductions in subjective sedation. Although metabolism did not have a direct influence on within session alcohol consumption, a faster metabolism did relate to increased ad-libitum consumption indirectly through greater acute tolerance to sedative effects and greater maintenance of stimulant effects. Rate of absorption did not significantly predict subjective response or within session drinking. The results of the study add clarity to theories of subjective response to alcohol, and suggest that those at highest risk for alcohol problems experience a more rapid reduction in sedation following alcohol consumption while simultaneously experiencing heightened levels of stimulation. Variability in pharmacokinetics, namely how quickly one metabolizes alcohol, may be an identifiable biomarker of subjective response and may be used to infer risk for alcohol problems. / Dissertation/Thesis / Doctoral Dissertation Psychology 2014