MIAMI UNIVERSITY the Graduate School Certificate for Approving The

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MIAMI UNIVERSITY the Graduate School Certificate for Approving The MIAMI UNIVERSITY The Graduate School Certificate for Approving the Dissertation We hereby approve the Dissertation of Meghan K. Housley Candidate for the Degree: Doctor of Philosophy ___________________________________ Director Heather M. Claypool ___________________________________ Reader Kurt Hugenberg ___________________________________ Reader Amy Summerville ___________________________________ Graduate School Representative Lawrence B. Nadler ABSTRACT THE POWER OF CRYPTOMNESIA: INTERPERSONAL POWER AND INADVERTENT PLAGIARISM By Meghan K. Housley Plagiarism arouses intense emotions in and out of academic settings. Relatively recently, it has been suggested that not all cases of plagiarism are intentional, and that they may instead be due, at least sometimes, to unconscious influences of memory in which the plagiarized information is incorrectly experienced as novel and self-generated (e.g., Taylor, 1965). Such inadvertent plagiarism (IP) is known as cryptomnesia, which is argued to be due to failures during source monitoring, namely, failing to accurately identify whether the source of information is internal or external (e.g., Johnson, Hashtroudi, & Lindsay, 1993). Asymmetries in power have been shown to influence the degree to which individuals engage in careful processing of sources, with high power individuals processing others superficially and low power individuals processing others carefully (e.g., Fiske, 1993; Goodwin, Gubin, Fiske, & Yzerbyt, 2000). Thus, high power individuals should plagiarize more than non-powerful others. In two experiments, I manipulated power and the timing of this manipulation (occurring before or after an interaction), and then assessed rates of IP. The results of Experiment 1 suggested that high power increases rates of IP, though only when instantiated before an interaction. Experiment 2 yielded only null findings. Implications of the former and possible explanations for the latter findings are discussed. THE POWER OF CRYPTOMNESIA: INTERPERSONAL POWER AND INADVERTENT PLAGIARISM A DISSERTATION Submitted to the Faculty of Miami University in partial fulfillment of the requirements for the degree of Doctor of Philosophy Department of Psychology by Meghan K. Housley Miami University Oxford, Ohio 2010 Dissertation Director: Heather M. Claypool CONTENTS INTRODUCTION ...........................................................................................................................1 Power...................................................................................................................................4 EXPERIMENT 1 .............................................................................................................................6 Method.................................................................................................................................6 Participants and design............................................................................................6 Procedure .................................................................................................................6 Results..................................................................................................................................7 Dependent measures and scoring.............................................................................7 Analysis of errors.....................................................................................................9 Analysis of the Remember-Guess-Know data.......................................................10 Discussion..........................................................................................................................11 EXPERIMENT 2 ...........................................................................................................................12 Method...............................................................................................................................12 Participants and design..........................................................................................12 Procedure ...............................................................................................................13 Results................................................................................................................................14 Discussion..........................................................................................................................15 GENERAL DISCUSSION ............................................................................................................15 REFERENCES ..............................................................................................................................19 APPENDIX....................................................................................................................................21 TABLES ........................................................................................................................................23 FIGURES.......................................................................................................................................29 ii TABLES 1. Mean proportions of generation errors made as a function of power level and power timing (Experiment 1). Separate tables for error type: Self, Other. 2. Mean proportions of intrusion errors made as a function of power level and power timing (Experiment 1). 3. Mean proportions of RKG responses as a function of power level and power timing. Separate tables for response type: IP, Intrusions, Hits. 4. Mean proportions of generation errors made as a function of power level and power timing (Experiment 2). Separate tables for error type: Self, Other. 5. Mean proportions of intrusion errors made as a function of power level and power timing (Experiment 2). iii FIGURES 1. Proportions of inadvertent plagiarism responses as a function of low, medium, and high power when presented before encoding and after encoding (Experiment 1). 2. Proportions of inadvertent plagiarism responses as a function of power level when presented before and after encoding (Experiment 2). 3. Proportions of inadvertent plagiarism responses as a function of power level when presented before and after encoding, with participants that explicitly noted suspicion of “partner” removed (Experiment 2). iv ACKNOWLEDGMENTS I would like to thank my advisor, Heather Claypool, for her many contributions at every stage of this project and throughout the entirety of my graduate education. I would also like to thank the members of my committee, Kurt Hugenberg, Amy Summerville, and Lawrence Nadler, for their valuable advice on this project. It has been both a privilege and a pleasure to work with each of them. I also offer many thanks to my friends for their constant encouragement and inspiration. Last but not least, I would like to thank my family, Stephen, Helen and Matthew Housley for their support in all of my endeavors. v The topic of plagiarism arouses intense emotions both in and beyond academic settings; at a minimum, it is something frowned upon and, often times, it can provoke severe penalties. The disdain held for the plagiarizer may stem from the perception that the individual was not willing to put in the effort necessary to formulate his or her own ideas and that he or she actively intended to pilfer someone else’s work. However, relatively recent research has posed the possibility that plagiarism may not be, at least under some circumstances, a deliberate attempt to take another’s work, but rather may be an inadvertent act. Such a notion has been suggested regarding Helen Keller (Bowers & Hilgard, 1986) and Nietzsche (Jung, 1905/1957), who have both been charged with plagiarizing others. In our own field of psychology, Freud (1901/1960) admitted that his idea for bisexuality was something that he thought was original, but was actually a colleague’s idea. Skinner (1983) even commented on such an occurrence in his own work by saying, “… one of the most disheartening experiences… is discovering that a point you have just made – so significant, so beautifully expressed – was made by you in something you published a long time ago” (p. 242). Though Skinner makes reference here to plagiarizing himself accidentally, the focus of my dissertation will be on the inadvertent plagiarism of others, as it is this type of plagiarism that is considered most problematic. Thus, subsequent references to inadvertent plagiarism will refer to unintentionally claiming others’ work as one’s own. In scientific language, cases of alleged inadvertent plagiarism (IP) have been termed experiences of cryptomnesia – unconscious influences of memory that cause thoughts to be incorrectly experienced as novel (e.g., Taylor, 1965). 1 One explanation for cryptomnesia is that it is due to failures in source monitoring: “the processes involved in making attributions about the origins of memories” (Johnson, Hashtroudi, & Lindsay, 1993, p. 3; see also Macrae, Bodenhausen, & Calvini, 1999). When we engage in the type of monitoring most relevant in cases of IP, we are attempting to determine whether something had an internal or external source (Johnson & Raye, 1981; Johnson, Raye, Foley & Foley, 1981). More specifically, we need to determine if we generated the information or if someone else did. Successful source monitoring is determined by (1) the attributes of the memory representation and (2) the decision processes used to determine that representation’s origin (Johnson
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