各位老师，你好，
由实验室刘超老师邀请了University of Michigan的Spike Lee  博士过来做个学术报告，欢迎感兴趣的老师参加，谢谢！
题目：Wiping the slate clean: Psychological  consequences of physical  cleansing
时间：5月19号（周四）上午10点
地点：脑成像中心三层大会议室
报告人：Dr. Spike Lee

Universityof Michigan, Ann Arbor, USA

Abstract: People make an  intuitive distinction between the metaphoric “dirty mouth” (as in frequent  swearing) and “dirty hands” (as in corrupt politics). It cannot be that we  literally feel an urge for mouth-rinsing after unethical utterances, but an urge  for hands-cleaning after immoral acts—or can it? Results from our experiment and  re-analysis of published data suggest so. It makes sense from the embodied  cognition perspective that pays serious attention to modality (Barsalou, 2008).  In our experiment, we manipulated motor modality by having people leave a voice  message or write an email, acting unethical (telling a lie) or acting ethical  (telling the truth). An unethical mouth made mouthwash more attractive; a pair  of unethical hands made hand sanitizer more attractive. Moral transgressions  thus increase the appeal of products that cleanse the specifically tainted body  part. Given the fundamental role of modality in embodiment, testing for its  causal significance in embodied metaphors holds promise for theoretical  progress.
     Note, however, that metaphors involving physical cleanliness  extend beyond moral issues. By “wiping the slate clean,” people move on to new  endeavors, which suggests that physical cleansing may not only restore moral  purity but also metaphorically “wash away” traces of past behaviors that have no  moral implications at all. Two experiments tested this possibility in the  context of decision-making. We gave people a free choice between two similarly  attractive music albums or fruit jams. After choosing one, they completed a  “product evaluation survey” that involved either merely examining or actually  testing a cleaning product. Finally, they rated the music albums or fruit jams  again. Replicating the classic post-decisional dissonance effect, the chosen  item became more attractive after the choice, and the rejected album became less  attractive. However, this was observed only for participants who merely examined  the soap. For participants who tested the soap by washing their hands, their  post-choice ratings were unaffected by their decision, indicating that  dissonance was “washed away.” Hence, the psychological impact of physical  cleansing extends beyond the domain of morality. Theoretical implications and  follow-up research that further supports clean-slate effects will be  discussed.

Biography: Dr. Lee was the only Hong Kong researcher won the R  C Lee Centenary Scholarship (~US$330,000), from Drs. Richard Charles and Esther  Yewpick Lee Charitable Foundation.

Selected Publications:
Lee,  S. W. S., & Schwarz, N. (2010). Washing away postdecisional  dissonance.Science, 328,709.
Lee, S. W. S., &  Schwarz, N. (2010). Dirty hands and dirty mouths: Embodiment of  the
moral-purity metaphor is specific to the motor modality involved in moral  transgression.
Psychological Science, 21, 1423-1425.
Lee,  S. W. S., Schwarz, N., Taubman, D., & Hou, M. (2010). Sneezing in  times of a flu
pandemic: Public sneezing increases perceptions of unrelated  risks and shifts preferences
for federal spending.Psychological  Science, 21, 375-377.
Oyserman, D., &Lee, S. W.  S.(2008). Does culture influence what and how we think? Effects
of  priming individualism and collectivism.Psychological Bulletin, 134,  311-342.

             此致

敬礼！

                              杨静

                           2011.05.16