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In a series of studies in the U.S. (total N = 4,828) using both news articles (Studies 1-2) and constructed scenarios (Studies 3-4), we investigated how judgments of responsibility, blame, causal contribution, and punishment for alleged perpetrators and victims of sexual misconduct are influenced by (1) the political orientation of media outlets, (2) participants' political orientation, and (3) the alleged perpetrators' political orientation. Results indicated that participants' political orientation, and the interaction between participants' and alleged perpetrators' political orientation, predicted moral judgments. Conservative participants were generally more likely inculpate and punish alleged victims in all four studies. Both conservative and liberal participants judged politically-aligned alleged perpetrators more leniently than politically-opposed alleged perpetrators. This political ingroup effect was ubiquitous across all tests of the dependent measures for conservative participants; whereas it was muted and unreliable for liberal participants. The findings collectively demonstrate that moral judgments about sexual misconduct are politicized at multiple psychological levels, and in ways that asymmetrically affect victims.

This study examines people's attitudes and perspectives about their dietary preferences.

This research project aims to investigate individual differences and situational influences in the inception, maintainence, and persistence of emotions and attitudes over time. For example, we will investigate what is colloquially referred to as “holding a grudge”. We aim to identify contexts in which participants deem it justifiable to to maintain or cease hard feelings, for example, by demarcating the emotions, attitudes, and concepts that participants associate with grudge holding. We will also investigate whether there are indivividual differences in people’s propensity to maintain a disagreement, or seek to ameliorate the difficult interpersonal situation.

This research proposes that people operate with conditional morality when they believe it is morally right and good that some people deserve and receive more moral regard than others -- e.g., people who share minimal group features (sport team, etc), social identity features, or a relationship through communities like work or neighborhoods. Conditional morality opposes unconditional morality, the belief that all people deserve and should receive some basic threshold of moral regard. The tension between conditional and unconditional morality can be difficult as people balance their social commitments. People strong in conditional morality ostensibly highly value their groups. This research examines how conditional and unconditional morality factor into attitudes about victims. Prior work found that stronger group morality (binding values) was associated with more ascription of blame and causal responsibility to victims (Niemi & Young, 2016). A recent pilot showed that stronger group morality was also associated with more ascription of deservingness of injury to victims, ingroup victims, in particular (Shastry & Niemi, SPSP, 2023); the pilot used ecologically valid group stimuli where US participants evaluated an injured soldier victim who was Ukrainian or Russian. This research assigns participants randomly to arbitrary groups, in a more controlled experimental design. What the design loses in ecological validity, it gains in capacity to clarify the basic connection between victim blame and group-based/conditional morality, and whether the connection should be understood as specific to ingroup victims. Primary research questions: Q1: Is stronger conditional morality (or, unconditional morality) associated with perceiving ingroup victims as more (or less) deserving? Q2: Is stronger conditional morality associated with perceiving ingroup victims as more deserving – or victims in general, including outgroup victims?

Does framing sexual assault as a harm violation vs. an impurity violation affect how people perceive a victim’s credibility, blameworthiness, and capacity to receive empathy?

Does framing sexual assault as a harm violation vs. an impurity violation affect how people perceive a victim’s credibility, blameworthiness, and capacity to receive empathy?

This study examines potential ideological differences between those who classify themselves as vegan as compared to those who classify themselves as vegetarian. Specifically, this study measures dichotomous (vs. continuous) thinking and preference for intention (vs. preference for behavior).

The importance of mathematical sciences is clearly of significance to society, but not enough students proficient in mathematics at school apply for university places and jobs in the field of mathematics, and especially women are underrepresented there. We need more national research about students who do very well in mathematics. This thesis provides valuable information about mathematically high-achieving students’ characteristic features, needs and educational choices, providing information that education policy can profit from. The study is based on the longitudinal data collected by the National Board of Education and the Finnish Education Evaluation Centre. The data consist of pupils belonging to the same age group who were followed from the 3rd grade of primary school to the end of upper secondary level between 2005 and 2015. The data were collected through exams and surveys and consist of information about students’ mathematical competence, attitudes and background variables related to the individual and the social environment. The thesis examines mathematically high-achieving students who do very well in mathematics. The success is seen as a potential that develops according to a socio-cognitive model in the interaction of factors between the individual and the social environment. The definition of high-achieving students was based on success in the national examination of mathematics in the 9th grade (Study I and Study II) and success in the matriculation examination of advanced mathematics (Study III). The thesis focused on answering five main questions in three studies. The aims were to find out 1) what kind of students develop into high-achieving students and what kind of educational choices do they have, 2) what is the connection between mathematically high-achieving student’s mathematical competence and attitudes, 3) how does high-achieving students’ home background explain the development of mathematical competence and educational choices, 4) how do pedagogical teaching solutions explain the development of mathematically high-achieving student’s mathematical competence and attitudes, and 5) how do mathematically high-achieving boys and girls differ from each other. The relationships between the variables were analysed using multivariate methods. The most important methods were the different forms of regression analysis and decision tree analysis. These methods improved each other, recognizing both linear and nonlinear relationships between variables. According to the results, mathematical skills of high-achieving students in the 9th grade varied during primary school. About 40 % of high-achieving students in the 9th grade were in the top ten in the 3rd grade and about 65 % in the top ten in the 6th grade. Almost all high-achieving students (92%) applied to upper secondary general school and about 60 % of high-achieving students in the 9th grade were also highest achieving at the end of upper secondary school. The results indicated that the students’ previous competence, positive self-concept and the educational level of their parents explained the development into a mathematically high-achieving student. Teaching-related solutions did not directly contribute to the students’ development into a high-achieving student, but teaching-related solutions were relevant in reinforcing positive attitudes. The results indicated that special attention should already be paid to strengthening mathematically high-achieving girls’ attitudes in primary school. The attitudes of mathematically high-achieving girls developed to a higher level than mathematically high-achieving boys at the lower secondary level and upper secondary level. This study suggests that solutions related to student-centredness that take into account students’ individual needs were key to strengthening positive attitudes. However, more research is needed on how well the individual needs of mathematically high-achieving students can be supported when there are large differences in skill levels and the need for support between students in the same classroom. Matemaattisten alojen merkitys yhteiskunnalle on suuri, mutta aloille ei hakeudu tarpeeksi matematiikan huippuosaajia, ja erityisesti naiset ovat näillä aloilla aliedustettuina. Matematiikassa erinomaisesti menestyviä osaajia koskevaa kansallista tutkimustietoa tarvitaankin enemmän. Väitöstutkimus tarjoaa arvokasta koulutuspoliittisesti hyödynnettävää tutkimustietoa matematiikassa parhaiten menestyneiden osaajien piirteistä, tarpeista ja koulutusvalinnoista pitkällä aikavälillä. Tutkimus perustuu Opetushallituksen ja Kansallisen koulutuksen arviointikeskuksen keräämään pitkittäisaineistoon, jossa samaan ikäluokkaan kuuluvia oppilaita on seurattu kolmannelta vuosiluokalta toisen asteen loppuun vuosien 2005–2015 välisenä aikana. Aineisto käsittää matematiikan kokeilla ja taustakyselyillä kerättyä dataa oppilaiden matematiikan osaamisesta, asenteista ja erilaisista yksilöön ja ympäristöön liittyvistä taustamuuttujista. Tutkimus käsittelee matematiikan parhaita osaajia. Käsite määrittelee ma-tematiikassa erinomaisesti menestyvien oppilaiden joukkoa. Matematiikassa menestyminen nähdään potentiaalina, joka kehittyy sosiokognitiivisen mallin mukaan yksilön ja ympäristön välisten tekijöiden vuorovaikutuksessa. Matematiikan parhaat osaajat määritettiin tutkimuksessa yhdeksännen vuosiluokan kansallisessa kokeessa (I ja II osatutkimus) ja pitkän matematiikan ylioppilaskokeessa (III osatutkimus) menestymisen mukaan. Tutkimus keskittyi viiteen pääkysymykseen, joihin etsittiin vastauksia kolmessa osatutkimuksessa. Tavoitteena oli selvittää, 1) millaiset oppilaat kehittyvät matematiikan parhaiksi osaajiksi ja miten heidän opintopolkunsa muodostuu, 2) millainen yhteys matematiikan parhaiden osaajien asenteilla on heidän osaamiseensa ja miten heidän asenteensa kehittyvät, 3) miten matematiikan parhaiden osaajien kotitausta selittää osaamisen kehittymistä ja koulutusvalintoja, 4) millainen yhteys opetuksen pedagogisilla ratkaisuilla on matematiikan parhaiden osaajien osaamiseen ja asenteisiin, ja 5) miten matematiikassa parhaiten menestyneet pojat ja tytöt eroavat toisistaan. Muuttujien välisiä yhteyksiä analysoitiin monimuuttujamenetelmin. Keskeisimmät menetelmät olivat regressioanalyysin eri muodot ja päätöspuuanalyysi, jotka täydensivät toisiaan tunnistaen sekä muuttujien välisiä lineaarisia että epälineaarisia yhteyksiä. Tutkimustulosten mukaan yhdeksännen vuosiluokan parhaat osaajat menestyivät matematiikassa vaihtelevasti alakoulun aikana. Noin 40 prosenttia yhdeksännen luokan parhaista osaajista kuului parhaaseen kymmenykseen jo kolmannella luokalla ja noin 65 prosenttia parhaaseen kymmenykseen kuudennella luokalla. Parhaista osaajista lähes kaikki (92 %) hakeutuivat lukioon, ja noin 60 prosenttia yhdeksännen vuosiluokan parhaista osaajista oli parhaita osaajia myös toisen asteen lopussa. Tulosten mukaan oppilaan aikaisempi osaaminen, myönteinen minäkäsitys ja vanhempien suorittama ylioppilastutkinto selittivät parhaiten kehittymistä matematiikan parhaaksi osaajaksi. Opetukseen liittyvät ratkaisut eivät suoranaisesti edesauttaneet oppilaan kehittymistä matematiikan parhaaksi osaajaksi. Sen sijaan opetukseen liittyvät ratkaisut olivat merkityksellisiä myönteisten asenteiden vahvistamisessa. Tulosten mukaan erityisesti tyttöjen asenteiden vahvistamiseen tulisi kiinnittää huomiota jo alakoulussa. Matematiikassa parhaiten menestyneiden tyttöjen asenteet kehittyivät yläkoulussa ja lukiossa jopa parhaiten menestyneitä poikia korkeammalle tasolle. Oppilaskeskeisyyteen liittyvät ratkaisut, joissa otetaan huomioon muun muassa oppijoiden yksilölliset tarpeet, olivat tulosten mukaan keskeisiä myönteisiä asenteita vahvistavia ratkaisuja. Olisi syytä kuitenkin tutkia tarkemmin, miten hyvin matematiikan parhaiden osaajien yksilöllisiä tarpeita pystytään tukemaan sellaisessa opiskeluryhmässä, jossa oppilaiden väliset taitotasoerot ja tukitarpeet ovat suuria.

Study 2 investigating whether, after recalling an instance in which they personally violated a moral principle, participants would agree less strongly with that very principle relative to participants assigned to control conditions where they recalled violations committed by others.

Study 1

Moral Agency at Work: Does encouraging agency or compliance affect unethical behavior?

Do people with particular moral values also use language associated with those values when praising others?

Conditions text

Investigation of the role of politics in interpreting and judging cases of sexual harassment.

This research is interested in the influence of self awareness on moral values, decisions, and beliefs about the self.