If you want to know more about the research by Agneta Gulz and Jana Holsanova check out the respective web pages:

Agneta Gulz’s web page

Jana Holsanovas’ Webpage

Agneta Gulz and Jana Holsanova.

“When US presidential candidate Mitt Romney said last year that he was not even going to try to reach 47% of the US electorate, and that he would focus on the 5–10% thought to be floating voters, he was articulating a commonly held opinion: that most voters are locked in to their ideological party loyalty.

But Lars Hall, a cognitive scientist at Lund University in Sweden, knew better. “His calculation, only zeroing in on 10% of voters, is a risky proposition,” he says. When Hall and his colleagues tested the rigidity of people’s political attitudes and voting intentions during Sweden’s 2010 general election, they discovered that loyalty was malleable: nearly half of all voters were open to changing their minds. The team’s work is published today in PLoS ONE1.”

Read the news article about our latest choice blindness finding in Nature News.

Visit our Choice Blindness Lab: http://www.lucs.lu.se/choice-blindness-group/

Political candidates often believe they must focus their campaign efforts on a small number of swing voters open for ideological change. Based on the wisdom of opinion polls, this might seem like a good idea. But do most voters really hold their political attitudes so firmly that they are unreceptive to persuasion? We tested this premise during the most recent general election in Sweden, in which a left- and a right-wing coalition were locked in a close race. We asked our participants to state their voter intention, and presented them with a political survey of wedge issues between the two coalitions. Using a sleight-of-hand we then altered their replies to place them in the opposite political camp, and invited them to reason about their attitudes on the manipulated issues. Finally, we summarized their survey score, and asked for their voter intention again. The results showed that no more than 22% of the manipulated replies were detected, and that a full 92% of the participants accepted and endorsed our altered political survey score. Furthermore, the final voter intention question indicated that as many as 48% were willing to consider a left-right coalition shift. This can be contrasted with the established polls tracking the Swedish election, which registered maximally 10% voters open for a swing. Our results indicate that political attitudes and partisan divisions can be far more flexible than what is assumed by the polls, and that people can reason about the factual issues of the campaign with considerable openness to change.



Read about our findings in Nature News.

Visit our Choice Blindness Lab website: http://lucs.lu.se/choice-blindness-group

http://www.lucs.lu.se/epirob/

(in Swedish

I texten “Lärandet i den svarta boxen”,  Axess nr 2 2013, argumenterar Agneta Gulz för att den svenska skolan kombinerar idéer om 2000-talets kunskaper och kompetenser med 1900-talets former av tester och utvärderingar. Det är hög tid, hävdar hon, att lämna de 1900-talsmässiga ansatserna – exemplifierat bl.a av dagens nationella prov –  bakom oss. Vi bör satsa på nya, digitala, former av tester, utvärderingar och bedömningar, som fokuserar på lärprocesser och utveckling och är ett stöd för lärare och elever – där funktioner som rör likvärdighet mellan skolor och möjlighet att på nationell nivå följa utveckling över tid kan ligga kvar men där det är funktionen som stöd och verktyg för det pedagogiska arbetet som är det primära.

Länk till artikeln i Axess: http://www.axess.se/magasin/default.aspx?article=1667

Link to pdf version of LUM 01/2013 , see page 33 for the article (in Swedish).

The same course was also featured in the local news paper Sydsvenskan: http://www.sydsvenskan.se/lund/sammankoppling-av-studenter-ger-lyckat-resultat/

Type of employment: Limit of tenure, Maximum 4 years
Extent: 100 %
Location: Department of Philosophy, Lund
First day of employment: 1 September 2013
Official Records Number: HTPA 2013/40

Job assignments

Doctoral education. Departmental work can be assigned.

Eligibility/Entry Requirements

Eligibility for doctoral studies in each subject is specified in the relevant general
syllabus, available (in Swedish) at http://www.ht.lu.se/doktorand/allmaennastudieplaner

Basis of Assessment

The selection process will primarily take into account the applicant’s ability to benefit
from research studies. This is assessed from the criteria quality,quantity, progression and relevance.

Apply here before 1 March 2013

At the Department of Philosophy:

1 doctoral studentship in Cognitive Science specialising in Cognitive Zoology

The position is placed within the project “Planning in Apes and Corvids”, financed by the Swedish Research Council. The project involves studies on planning abilities in great apes and corvids. The aim of the project is not only to gain better understanding on corvid and ape planning abilities, but also to get insights into the possible parallel or convergent evolution of these abilities.

Last date for applications: 1 March 2013

Full information and online application here