Interest in and research on disgust has surged over the past few decades. The field, however, still lacks a coherent theoretical framework for understanding the evolved function or functions of disgust. Here we present such a framework, emphasizing 2 levels of analysis: that of evolved function and that of information processing. Although there is…

The current authors reply to a response by Bowers on a comment by the current authors on the original article. Bowers (2010) mischaracterizes the goals of parallel distributed processing (PDP research)--explaining performance on cognitive tasks is the primary motivation. More important, his claim that localist models, such as the interactive…

This article had four goals. First, the authors identified a set of general challenges and questions that a life-span theory of development should address. Second, they presented a comprehensive account of their Motivational Theory of Life-Span Development. They integrated the model of optimization in primary and secondary control and the…

Psychological need theories offer much explanatory potential for behavioral scientists, but there is considerable disagreement and confusion about what needs are and how they work. A 2-process model of psychological needs is outlined, viewing needs as evolved functional systems that provide both (a) innate psychosocial motives that tend to impel…

One of the most exciting issues in psychology is, What are the psychological mechanisms underlying human tool use? The computational approach assumes that the use of a tool (e.g., a hammer) requires the extraction of sensory information about object properties (heavy, rigid), which can then be translated into appropriate motor outputs (grasping,…

This article describes a new model that provides a framework for understanding people's reactions to threats to social acceptance and belonging as they occur in the context of diverse phenomena such as rejection, discrimination, ostracism, betrayal, and stigmatization. People's immediate reactions are quite similar across different forms of…

The authors present a reconciliation of 3 distinct ways in which the research literature has defined overconfidence: (a) overestimation of one's actual performance, (b) overplacement of one's performance relative to others, and (c) excessive precision in one's beliefs. Experimental evidence shows that reversals of the first 2 (apparent…

The authors argue that human desire involves conscious cognition that has strong affective connotation and is potentially involved in the determination of appetitive behavior rather than being epiphenomenal to it. Intrusive thoughts about appetitive targets are triggered automatically by external or physiological cues and by cognitive associates.…

Anthropomorphism describes the tendency to imbue the real or imagined behavior of nonhuman agents with humanlike characteristics, motivations, intentions, or emotions. Although surprisingly common, anthropomorphism is not invariant. This article describes a theory to explain when people are likely to anthropomorphize and when they are not, focused…

The 1954 article by Eliot Stellar provided the theoretical focus for a great deal of research on the biological bases of human behavior. Future attention to the infrastructure of behaviors being studied, combined with reductionistic studies of neurons, will fulfill the potential contribution to behavioral neuroscience implicit in Stellar's…

Surveys some of the difficulties currently confronting the reinforcement concept and cosiders some alternatives to reinforcement as the fundamental basis of learning. Two specific alternatives considered are: an incentive motivation approach and a cognitive approach. (Author)

The authors hypothesize that the symptoms of obsessive-compulsive disorder (OCD), despite their apparent nonrationality, have what might be termed an epistemic origin-that is, they stem from an inability to generate the normal "feeling of knowing" that would otherwise signal task completion and terminate the expression of a security motivational…

The basic theory of achievement motivation as developed by Atkinson is reviewed, and the implications of the inertial-tendency postulate are examined. (Editor)

This article proposes a theoretical framework for accommodating psychological aspects of incentive relationships. (Author)

A recent article by Nicholls on achievement motivation is criticized on three points: (1) definitions of achievement motives are ambiguous; (2) behavioral consequences predicted do not follow from explicit theoretical assumptions; and (3) Nicholls's account of the relation between his theory and other achievement theories is factually incorrect.…