Evaluation is central to human experience, and multiple literatures have studied it. This article pulls from research on attitudes, human and nonhuman mating preferences, consumer behavior, and beyond to build a more comprehensive framework for studying evaluation. First, we distinguish between evaluations of objects (persons, places, things) and evaluations of attributes (dimensions, traits, characteristics). Then, we further distinguish between summarized attribute preferences (a valenced response to a direction on a dimension, such as liking sweetness in desserts) and functional attribute preferences (a valenced response to increasing levels of a dimension in a set of targets, such as the extent to which sweetness predicts liking for desserts). We situate these constructs with respect to existing distinctions in the attitude literature (e.g., specific/general, indirect/direct). Finally, new models address how people translate functional into summarized preferences, as well as how attribute preferences affect (a) subsequent evaluations of objects and (b) situation selection.

评价是人类经验的中心，许多文献对此进行了研究。本文从对态度，人类和非人类交配偏好，消费者行为等方面的研究中汲取灵感，以建立一个更全面的框架来研究评估。首先，我们区分对象的评估（人，地点，事物）和属性的评估（维度，特征，特征）。然后，我们进一步区分归纳的属性偏好（对维度上某个方向的化价响应，例如甜点中的甜味）和功能属性偏好之间的区别（对一组目标中某个维度的水平不断提高的有价反应，例如甜度预测甜点的喜好程度）。我们根据态度文献中的现有区别（例如，特定/一般，间接/直接）来定位这些构造。最后，新模型解决了人们如何将功能转换为摘要的偏好，以及属性偏好如何影响（a）对象的后续评估和（b）情况选择。