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Stanford University

Stanford Computation and Cognition Lab

In this study, we are interested in how people read stories and make judgments about behavior.

Legal information: By answering the following questions, you are participating in a study being performed by cognitive scientists in the Stanford Department of Psychology. If you have questions about this research, please contact Desmond Ong at desmond.ong@stanford.edu or Noah Goodman, at ngoodman@stanford.edu. You must be at least 18 years old to participate. Your participation in this research is voluntary. You may decline to answer any or all of the following questions. You may decline further participation, at any time, without adverse consequences. Your anonymity is assured; the researchers who have requested your participation will not receive any personal information about you.

Why do people behave the way they do?

There may be many different reasons why someone does something. In particular, we are interested in 4 types of causes: thoughts, emotions, aims, and situational causes.

Type Definition Example
Thoughts They have some thoughts or beliefs about the way that the world is that makes them behave so. Bob moved to Iowa because he thinks people are nice there.
Emotions They feel a certain emotion that makes them behave so. Bob ran away because he was feeling scared.
Aims They behave that way to achieve a certain aim. Bob kicked the ball because he wanted to win the game.
Situational Causes They behave that way because of the situation. Bob shivered because it was cold outside.


For the next few pages, we will be asking you to think about possible causes of behavior.

Please use the sliders to rate how likely you think the behavior was caused by each type of cause.


because ...


Not at all likely
|
Extremely likely
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... he was motivated by some thoughts or beliefs about the way the world is
 
... he felt some emotions
 
... he wanted to achieve some aims of his
 
... of some situational causes
 

Please answer a few questions about yourself.


What is your gender?   Male   Female   Other   Decline to state  
What is your age range?  
What is your native language?   


Please leave any comments or suggestions regarding this HIT:

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