The hypothesis that human reasoning obeys the laws of quantum rather than classical probability has been used in recent years to explain a variety of seemingly "irrational" judgment and decisionmaking findings. This article provides independent evidence for this hypothesis based on an a priori prediction, called the quantum question (QQ) equality, concerning the effect of asking attitude questions successively in different orders. We empirically evaluated the predicted QQ equality using 70 national representative surveys and two laboratory experiments that manipulated question orders. Each national study contained 651-3,006 participants. The results provided strong support for the predicted QQ equality. These findings suggest that quantum probability theory, initially invented to explain noncommutativity of measurements in physics, provides a simple account for a surprising regularity regarding measurement order effects in social and behavioral science.attitude judgment | national surveys | quantum theory | measurement effects U nderstanding human reasoning under uncertainty is fundamental for improving decisions about environmental policies, economic planning, public health, and many other important areas. Fifty years of behavioral decision-making research has established that humans do not always follow the "rational" rules of Bayesian probability theory (1). Recently, a group of psychologists and physicists have formulated new rules for human reasoning under uncertainty based on quantum probability theory (2-4). This article reports a test of this theory based on results from a quite different paradigm. We show that the theory implies an a priori and precise prediction called the quantum question (QQ) equality (5). This parameter-free prediction concerns the effect of question order on human judgments. The prediction was tested with the results of 70 national representative surveys, most containing more than 1,000 participants per survey, and two laboratory studies, that manipulated question order. This article presents the QQ equality, its surprisingly strong empirical support, and the key quantum principle, called the law of reciprocity, upon which the QQ equality was mathematically derived. Finally, we explain why human judgments follow quantum rules even if the brain may not be a quantum computer. The QQ EqualityTo introduce the QQ equality, consider three examples of context effects on answers to attitude questions in surveys, illustrated in Table 1. These are the results of three Gallup polls reported in a seminal article on question order effects (6). Each poll included a representative sample of around 1,000 US adults. The participants in one random half of the sample were asked two questions in one order, and those in the other half were asked the same two questions in the opposite order. In the first poll, people were asked whether Bill Clinton was honest and trustworthy, and whether Al Gore was honest and trustworthy. In the second poll, people were asked whether white people dislike black people, ...

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In the theoretical framework of dynamic motivational activation, this study reveals the dynamics of antimarijuana public service announcement (PSA) processing, especially the processing of co-occurring positive and negative content. It specifies the important role of endogenous feedback dynamics of the information processing system and teases them apart from exogenous message effects. As suggested by real-time psychophysiological responses (heart rate, skin conductance level, and facial electromyography), the copresence of positive and negative content is most attention eliciting and is not moderated by individuals' marijuana experience. Marijuana experience, however, increases attention to arousing content in the PSAs, increases smiling responses to positive content, and escalates arousal to the PSAs in general. Implications for designing and evaluating PSAs and health campaigns are discussed.

Prior research shows that discrete emotions, notably anger and fear, can explain effects of news articles on health and alcohol-control policy support. This study advances prior work by coding expressed emotional responses to messages (as opposed to directly manipulated emotions or forced responses), incorporating and controlling for central thoughts, including sadness (a particularly relevant response to tragic stories), and examining concern’s mediating role between emotion and policy support. An experiment with a national online adult panel had participants read one of 60 violent crime or accident news stories, each manipulated to mention or withhold alcohol’s causal contribution. Multi-group structural equation models suggest that stories not mentioning alcohol had a direct effect on policy support via fear and central thoughts, unmediated by concern. When alcohol was mentioned, sadness and anger affects alcohol-control support through concern. Findings help confirm that emotional responses are key in determining news story effects on public support of health policies.