Bachelorarbeitsthemen

Beschreibung: Individuals have two motivational systems (McClelland, 1989): explicit motives, tapping more into the cognitive and elaborative process, and implicit motives, tapping into the spontaneous and affective process. According to McClelland (1989), implicit motives reflect individuals' ability to "derive rewards from certain affective incentives". However, this is unclear in three regards: 1. Whether different motives are related to different affective experiences (e.g., the achievement motive is related to feelings of pride and impatience); 2. Whether individuals with different motives tend to experience different affects more or less intensively (e.g., individuals high in achievement motive are more likely to experience impatience and pride); and 3. Whether individuals with different motives are incentivized by different affective experiences (e.g., individuals high in achievement motive enjoy feeling proud or do not mind feeling impatient).
This Bachelor thesis will review the previous literature, summarizing empirical and theoretical evidence for the three speculations above, and pointing to a gap in research for future studies.
Kontakt: Zhixuan (Molly) Lin, E-Mail

Beschreibung: Wie Doerflinger et al. (2021) in ihrem Artikel einführend erläutern, streben Individuen gemäss der Theorie der symbolischen Selbstergänzung (Wicklund & Gollwitzer, 1982) nach erwünschten Identitätszielen (z. B. eine gute Sportlerin sein, ein erfolgreicher Pfadileiter sein, eine kompetente Musikerin sein), indem sie sich einerseits Kompetenzen, andererseits aber auch Symbole aneignen, die den Besitz eben dieser Identität signalisieren (z. B. sich teures Sportequipment anschaffen, einen Blog zu Pfadi-Outdoor-Aktivitäten betreiben, einen Meisterkurs belegen). Die Theorie nimmt weiter an, dass im Hinblick auf ein Identitätsziel ein Zustand der «Unvollständigkeit» entsteht, wenn die Person einen Rückschlag auf dem Weg zu ihrem Identitätsziel erlebt oder ihr entsprechende Symbole fehlen. Dies sollte wiederum Verhalten auslösen, das auf die Erreichung des Identitätsziels gerichtet ist (genannt Selbstergänzung durch den Erwerb neuer Identitätssymbole; Doerflinger et al., S. 451).

In der Bachelorarbeit sollen die neuesten Studien zur Selbstergänzungstheorie (Theory of symbolic self-completion) zusammenfassend dargestellt werden.

Ausgangsliteratur zur ersten Orientierung:

Doerflinger, J. T., Byrka, K., Spychalska-Waszek, H., Zaman, S., & Gollwitzer, P. M. (2021). Committed professionals who are also engaged parents: Can they self-symbolize across identity goals?. Motivation Science, 7(4), 451-474.

Wicklund, R. A., & Gollwitzer, P. M. (1981). Symbolic self-completion, attempted influence, and self-deprecation. Basic and Applied Social Psychology, 2(2), 89-114.


Kontakt: Prof. Dr. Veronika Brandstaetter, E-Mail

Beschreibung: Why do many people grant full moral standing to humans but not to pigs or fish? This thesis will review the emerging psychology of speciesism - the systematic devaluation of non-human animals relative to humans -and chart factors that expand or constrict the moral circle. Experimental work shows that speciesist attitudes are stable, correlate with social-dominance orientation, and predict support for animal testing and meat consumption. Developmental and cross-cultural studies reveal early-emerging human preference that is amplified (or attenuated) by cultural practices, religion, perceived intelligence, and empathy gaps. Students might integrate evolutionary accounts (in-group protection, pathogen avoidance) with contemporary moral-frame interventions that may reduce speciesism. Concrete research questions are up to the student.The thesis can also explore links to environmental ethics, animal-welfare policy, and plant-based dietary shifts, encouraging the student to formulate testable sub-questions about attitude-behaviour gaps or cross-species moral consistency.

Example Literature:

Piazza, J., & Loughnan, S. (2016). When meat gets personal, animals? minds matter less: Motivated use of intelligence information in judgments of moral standing. Social Psychological and Personality Science, 7(8), 867-874.

Caviola, L., Everett, J. A., & Faber, N. S. (2019). The moral standing of animals: Towards a psychology of speciesism. Journal of personality and social psychology, 116(6), 1011.
Kontakt: Matthias Forstmann, E-Mail