We experimentally investigated the influence of context-based biases, such as prestige and popularity, on the preferences for quotations. Participants were presented with random quotes associated to famous or unknown authors (experiment one), or with random quotes presented as popular, i.e. chosen by many previous participants, or unpopular (experiment two). To exclude effects related to the content of the quotations, all participants were subsequently presented with the same quotations, again associated to famous and unknown authors (experiment three), or presented as popular or unpopular (experiment four). Overall, our results showed that context-based biases had no (in case of prestige and conformity), or limited (in case of popularity), effect in determining participants’ choices. Quotations preferred for their content were preferred in general, despite the contextual cues to which they were associated. We conclude discussing how our results fit with the well-known phenomenon of the spread and success (especially digital) of misattributed quotations, and we draw some more general implications for cultural evolution research.

中文翻译：

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爱因斯坦真的这样说吗？在报价的文化选择中测试内容与上下文

我们通过实验研究了基于语境的偏见（例如声望和受欢迎程度）对报价偏好的影响。为参与者提供了与著名或未知作者相关的随机报价（实验一），或被呈现为受欢迎（即由许多先前的参与者选择或不受欢迎）的随机报价（实验二）。为了排除与报价内容有关的影响，随后为所有参与者提供相同的报价，再次与著名和未知作者联系在一起（实验三），或者以受欢迎或不受欢迎的形式出现（实验四）。总体而言，我们的结果表明，基于上下文的偏见对确定参与者的选择没有影响（在声望和整合的情况下），也没有（在受欢迎度的情况下）影响。尽管有上下文提示，但通常首选内容首选的报价。我们最后讨论了我们的结果如何与不正确的报价的传播和成功（尤其是数字形式）的众所周知的现象相吻合，并对文化进化研究得出了一些更一般的含义。