Eckardt, Elias (2025) If only judgments were different in a foreign language. Bachelor thesis, Psychology.
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Abstract
This study investigates whether the Foreign Language Effect influences blame assignment in a counterfactual scenario and if thinking in a foreign language mitigates the halo effect. Centered around the dual-process theory and the reduced affect hypothesis, we hypothesized that processing in a foreign language (English) would decrease heuristic and emotional thinking while promoting analytical processing. In a counterfactual scenario, we expected a decrease in blame assignment and the mitigation of the halo effect, specifically for unrelated traits. A 2x2 between-subjects experiment (Language: native vs. foreign; scenario mutability: mutable vs. immutable) was conducted with 595 native Spanish-speaking participants. Results showed that, contrary to our hypothesis, participants in the foreign language (vs. native) condition assigned significantly more blame. Although blame scores increased in the counterfactual scenarios, this effect was not robust across the non-parametric analyses. In support of the hypothesis, centered around the trait "hard-working," unrelated traits were rated significantly lower in the Foreign Language (vs. native) condition, suggesting a reduction in the halo effect. Traits related to a central trait were rated similarly across both language conditions. The study encountered a limitation in that the scenario failed to induce emotional involvement and lacked moral ambiguity in the attribution of blame. As this serves as a possible explanation for the rejection of our hypotheses, future research could improve on the study design to build on our findings regarding counterfactual blame attribution in a foreign language. The mitigation of the halo effect in a foreign language contributes to the understanding of how the Foreign Language Effect mitigates cognitive biases. Keywords: blame, foreign language effect, counterfactuals, halo effect, reduced affect, dual-process theory
| Item Type: | Thesis (Bachelor) |
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| Supervisor name: | Epstude, K. |
| Degree programme: | Psychology |
| Differentiation route: | None [Bachelor Psychology] |
| Date Deposited: | 24 Jul 2025 09:09 |
| Last Modified: | 24 Jul 2025 09:09 |
| URI: | http://gmwpublic.studenttheses.ub.rug.nl/id/eprint/5724 |
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