On being happy and gullible: Mood effects on skepticism and the detection of deception

Are we more likely to believe or disbelieve another person depending on our mood state? Based on past research on interpersonal communication and recent work on affect and social cognition, we predicted and found that negative mood increased and positive mood decreased people’s skepticism and their ability to detect deception, consistent with the more externally focused, accommodative processing style promoted by negative affect. After a mood induction using positive, neutral or negative films, participants viewed deceptive or truthful interviews with individuals who denied committing a theft. Judgments of the targets’ guilt and their truthfulness were collected. As predicted, negative mood increased judges’ skepticism towards the targets, and improved their accuracy in detecting deceptive communications, while judges in a positive mood were more trusting and gullible. The relevance of these findings for everyday judgments of trust and the detection of deception are considered, and their implications for recent affect-cognition theories are discussed.     

The Mistreatment of My People: Victimization by Proxy and Behavioral Intentions to Commit Violence Among Muslims in Denmark

Islamist extremism is often explained by the suffering endured by Muslims in Islamic countries as a result of Western‐led wars. However, many terrorist attacks have been carried out by European Muslims with no personal experiences of war. Across two studies among Danish Muslims, we tested if what we call “victimization‐by‐proxy processes” motivate behavioral intentions to commit acts of violence. We used Muslim identification, perceived injustice of Western foreign policies, and group‐based anger to predict violent and nonviolent behavioral intentions. More importantly, we compared path models of Danish Muslims from conflict zones with those without direct personal experience of Western‐led occupation. We found similar effects among the participants in each category, that is, vicarious psychological responses mimicked those of personally experienced adversity. In fact, participants born in Western Europe were, on average, more strongly identified with Muslims, more likely to perceive Western foreign policy as more unjust, reported greater group‐based anger, and were more inclined to help Muslims both by nonviolent and violent means.     

Islamic piety and masculinity

Barbara Metcalf suggested some years ago that a well-known contemporary Islamic movement of pietist inclinations, the Tabligh-i Jama’at, acted in effect to produce a gentler, more feminised male Muslim identity among its adherents. Some other contemporary Islamic movements have similar tendencies. Ritual practices among the Hijaz Community, a mostly Pakistani organisation in the British Midlands, for example, are explicitly aimed to produce a gentler, less aggressive orientation among their followers. Can we see these new movements as part of the evolution of new forms of masculinity among Muslim men, both in Muslim-majority and diasporic populations? I explore this question through field research carried out as part of an ESRC-funded research project on young Muslims in the UK and Bangladesh.     

Framing (implicitly) matters: The role of religion in attitudes toward immigrants and Muslims in Denmark

Denmark is currently experiencing the highest immigration rate in its modern history. Population surveys indicate that negative public attitudes toward immigrants actually stem from attitudes toward their (perceived) Islamic affiliation. We used a framing paradigm to investigate the explicit and implicit attitudes of Christian and Atheist Danes toward targets framed as Muslims or as immigrants. The results showed that explicit and implicit attitudes were more negative when the target was framed as a Muslim, rather than as an immigrant. Interestingly, implicit attitudes were qualified by the participants’ religion. Specifically, analyses revealed that Christians demonstrated more negative implicit attitudes toward immigrants than Muslims. Conversely, Atheists demonstrated more negative implicit attitudes toward Muslims than Atheists. These results suggest a complex relationship between religion, and implicit and explicit prejudice. Both the religious affiliation of the perceiver and the perceived religious affiliation of the target are key factors in social perception.     

Muslim Dilemmas in the Republic of Ireland: Anti-Extremism and Self-Regulation in the Context of Super-Diversity

Since the 1990s, a very small Muslim community in the Republic of Ireland has expanded rapidly and become increasingly diverse. For all that research has identified growing expressions of anti-Muslim racism, mainstream Irish political discourse and political responses to Ireland’s Muslim communities have not reflected the antipathy towards Islam that is identifiable in a number of other European countries. The response of the Irish state towards Muslims has been one of apparent neglect, benign and otherwise, whilst Muslims, for their part, appear to have lived unobtrusively. We examine the position of Muslims in Ireland through the lens of three issues that have been debated within Muslim communities in recent years: the alleged threat of terrorist activity within Muslim communities; calls for regulation of Muslim/Islamic activities; and a 2018 controversy relating to comments made by a leading Islamic figure in Ireland on the topic of female genital mutilation. Our analysis, framed by Steven Vertovec’s concept of super-diversity, emphasizes the need for policymakers to avoid presumptions of homogeneity.     

Internalized equality and protest against injustice: The role of disadvantaged group members’ self-respect in collective action tendencies

Recent research shows that self-respect (defined as seeing yourself as a person with equal rights) predicts assertive but not aggressive responses to injustice in interpersonal contexts. The present research focuses on the antecedents of self-respect and its consequences for collective action tendencies among members of disadvantaged groups. Across three studies (N = 227, N = 454, N = 131) using different contexts and samples (discrimination of Muslims in Germany; women regarding gender inequality), experiences with equality-based respect (defined as being treated as someone of equal worth) predicted self-respect. Moreover, across all three studies, self-respect predicted intentions for cooperative or normative but not support for hostile or non-normative protest. The results demonstrate the potential of self-respect for facilitating collective action in the face of injustice while still enabling positive intergroup relations.     

RETRACTED ARTICLE: Happiness as alchemy: Positive mood leads to self-serving responses to social comparisons

People in a positive mood process information in ways that reinforce and maintain this positive mood. The current studies examine how positive mood influences responses to social comparisons and demonstrates that people in a positive mood interpret ambiguous information about comparison others in self-benefitting ways. Specifically, four experiments demonstrate that compared to negative mood or neutral mood participants, participants in a positive mood engage in effortful re-interpretations of ambiguously similar comparison targets so that they may assimilate to upward comparison targets and contrast from downward comparison targets.     

Acute aerobic exercise helps overcome emotion regulation deficits

Although colloquial wisdom and some studies suggest an association between regular aerobic exercise and emotional well-being, the nature of this link remains poorly understood. We hypothesised that aerobic exercise may change the way people respond to their emotions. Specifically, we tested whether individuals experiencing difficulties with emotion regulation would benefit from a previous session of exercise and show swifter recovery than their counterparts who did not exercise. Participants (N?=?80) completed measures of emotion response tendencies, mood, and anxiety, and were randomly assigned to either stretch or jog for 30?minutes. All participants then underwent the same negative and positive mood inductions, and reported their emotional responses. Analyses showed that more perceived difficulty generating regulatory strategies and engaging in goal-directed behaviours after the negative mood induction predicted more intense and persistent negative affect in response to the stressor, as would be expected. Interactions revealed that aerobic exercise attenuated these effects. Moderate aerobic exercise may help attenuate negative emotions for participants initially experiencing regulatory difficulties. This study contributes to the literature on aerobic exercise’s therapeutic effects with experimental data, specifically in the realm of emotional processing.     

The Effect of Music‐Induced Mood on Aggressive Affect,Cognition, and Behavior1

Two studies explored the role of pleasant music in buffering the adverse effects of provocation. In the first study, 111 participants listened to aversive, pleasant, or no music before receiving a provocation and completing a measure of aggressive behavior. Participants exposed to pleasant music reported more positive mood. Those in the aversive music condition reported more negative mood than did those in the no‐music control condition. The more positive the music‐induced mood, the less anger was experienced and aggressive behavior was shown after provocation. In Study 2 (N = 142), listening to pleasant music reduced anger following provocation, compared to aversive music and a no‐music control condition. Pleasant music also increased response latencies in recognizing aggressive words after provocation.     

Negative incidental affect and mood congruency in crossed categorization

Examined the effects of incidental sadness and anger on affiliative responses to crossed categorization targets. Affect manipulations included an anger-provoking frustration (Study 1), a sad film clip (Study 2), and autobiographical essays about sad or anger-provoking topics (Studies 3 and 4). By comparison with a neutral mood, anger (Study 1) reduced affiliative tendencies toward persons possessing an out-group membership but not toward those possessing only in-group memberships. Study 2 showed a similar pattern for sadness. Studies 3 and 4 replicated these effects in designs including both types of negative mood. Meta-analytic integration showed the pattern of greater rejection of targets with an out-group membership to be stronger under anger than sadness. Study 4 also showed that despite yielding a consistent pattern for affiliation, sadness and anger differentially elicited aggressive tendencies toward the same targets.     

Individual differences in hedonic capacity,depressed mood,and affective states predict emotional reactivity

Identifying factors that contribute to inter-individual differences in emotional reactivity is central to understanding the basic mechanisms that give rise to adaptive emotion reactivity and to disruptions that may occur in psychopathology. The current study related emotional reactivity in an unselected young adult sample (N?=?101) to individual difference factors relevant to emotional functioning and mood pathology, specifically anhedonia, depressed mood, and current affective state. To assess emotional reactivity, participants rated their emotional responses to 100 pictures from the International Affective Picture System. Increased self-reported anhedonia (i.e. reduced hedonic capacity) predicted blunted emotional reactivity to both positive and negative images, relative to neutral images, while elevated depressed mood predicted potentiated emotional reactivity to negative vs. neutral images. Anhedonia also accounted for far greater variance in emotional reactivity than depressed mood. Further, more positive affective state predicted potentiated reactivity to positive versus neutral images while more negative affective state predicted potentiated reactivity to negative versus neutral images beyond effects of anhedonia and depressed mood. The current study identified separable effects of anhedonia, depressed mood, and current affect on emotional reactivity.     

Acculturation preferences and behavioural tendencies between majority and minority groups: The mediating role of emotions

The main goal of this research was twofold. First, we aimed at determining how acculturation preferences and emotions were related to specific intergroup behavioural tendencies towards majority and minority groups. Second, we aimed at developing an intergroup behavioural tendencies scale that differentiates between valence (facilitation and harm) and intensity (active and passive). The role of intergroup contact was also examined, as it is a known predictor of intergroup prejudice. In order to fulfil these goals, we carried out two studies. In Study 1 , Spanish participants (N = 279) answered a questionnaire about Moroccans (a devalued group) or Ecuadorians (a valued group) by reporting their acculturation preferences for immigrants, their positive and negative emotions, quantity of contact with them and behavioural tendencies towards them. In Study 2 , Moroccans (N = 92) and Ecuadorians (N = 87) assessed Spaniards on these measures. Results confirmed the structure of the new behavioural tendencies scale across four groups of participants. Overall, findings also showed that acculturation preferences and quantity of contact indirectly predicted behavioural tendencies through positive emotions. This research contributes to knowledge on how the majority and minority's acculturation preferences are related to their emotions and specific dimensions of intergroup behavioural tendencies, confirming the predominant mediating role of positive emotions in this process.     

Dangerous Enough: Moderating Racial Bias with Contextual Threat Cues

Research shows that participants shoot armed Blacks more frequently and quickly than armed Whites, but make don't-shoot responses more frequently and quickly for unarmed Whites than unarmed Blacks. We argue that this bias reflects the perception of threat — specifically, threat associated with Black males. Other danger cues (not just race) may create a similar predisposition to shoot, and if these cues promote shooting when the target is White, they should attenuate racial bias. We embedded targets in threatening and safe backgrounds. Racial bias was evident in safe contexts but disappeared when context signaled danger, and this reduction was largely due to an increased tendency to shoot White targets.     

Queer Muslims: between orthodoxy,secularism and the struggle for acceptance

ABSTRACT

The aim of this paper is to concentrate on responses by Muslim scholars to both the Orlando incident and the United States Supreme Court Judgment on same-sex marriage. I first provide some comments on the Orlando incident in relation to the issue of Muslims, violence and homophobia. More importantly and central to my argument, I consider what the import of these responses are for Muslims – especially Muslims who identify as LGBTIQ or at least experience same-sex sexual attraction or participate in same-sex sexual conduct – and also what do such responses suggest about the prospect of same-sex sexuality being seriously considered, understood and accepted within the contemporary Islamic tradition and the possible consequences thereof. I make the case that the Islamic tradition, by way of its self-identified and proclaimed scholarly interpreters and representatives, urgently need to engage with the issue of same-sex sexuality in a more robust, dynamic and imaginative manner or risk a deepening epistemological crisis.     

The influence of stereotypes on decisions to shoot

Using a videogame to simulate encounters with potentially hostile targets, three studies tested a model in which racial bias in shoot/don't-shoot decisions reflects accessibility of the stereotype linking Blacks to danger. Study 1 experimentally manipulated the race-danger association by asking participants to read newspaper stories about Black (vs. White) criminals. As predicted, exposure to stories concerning Black criminals increased bias in the decision to shoot. Studies 2 and 3 manipulated the number of White and Black targets with and without guns in the context of the videogame itself. As predicted, frequent presentation of stereotypic (vs. counterstereotypic) targets exacerbated bias (Study 2) and—consistent with our process account—rendered stereotypes more accessible (Study 3). Copyright © 2007 John Wiley & Sons, Ltd.     

Living under threat: Mutual threat perception drives anti‐Muslim and anti‐Western hostility in the age of terrorism

This research demonstrates a common psychology of outgroup hostility driven by perceived intergroup threat among three groups and seven cultural contexts: non‐Muslim Westerners, Muslims in Western societies, and Muslims in the Middle East. In Study 1, symbolic, but not realistic and terroristic threats, predicted non‐Muslim Norwegians' intentions to join anti‐Islamic movements. In Study 2, symbolic and realistic, but not terroristic threat, predicted non‐Muslim Americans' willingness to persecute Muslims. In Studies 3 and 4, symbolic threat predicted support and behavioral intentions against the West among Swedish and Turkish Muslims. Finally, in Study 5, a comparison demonstrated that symbolic and realistic threats had the same effects on violent intentions among non‐Muslim and Muslim Danes, and Muslims in Afghanistan. Meta‐analysis showed that symbolic threat was most strongly associated with intergroup hostility. Across studies, participants with high religious group identification experienced higher levels of threat. Implications for intergroup research and prejudice reduction are discussed.     

Empathy towards individuals of the same and different ethnicity when depicted in negative and positive contexts

Individuals can show different empathy responses towards others depending on in-group and out-group biases. The present research tested empathy biases related to ethnicity when targets were depicted in negative and positive contexts. Caucasian (n = 99) and Asian (n = 99) participants gave subjective ratings for images depicting same or other ethnicity individuals in socially-relevant negative and positive contexts. Participants rated significantly higher on all three dimensions of empathy (affect, perspective taking, and understanding) for same ethnicity targets than for other ethnicity targets. However, this bias was found only for targets depicted in negative contexts. Moreover, no ethnicity bias was found for ratings of valence, arousal, distress, and interest. The results suggest that ethnicity-related biases in empathy are present, are limited to negative contexts, and are not merely a manifestation of a more general cognitive or affective bias.     

Forgive and Forget? Antecedents and Consequences of Intergroup Forgiveness in Bosnia and Herzegovina

The present study examines the effects of contact and common-ingroup identification on intergroup forgiveness and outgroup behavioral tendencies. A sample of Bosnian Muslims (N  =  180) were asked to report their readiness to forgive the misdeeds committed by Bosnian Serbs during the 1992–95 war in Bosnia and Herzegovina. A path analysis of the presumed antecedents and consequences of forgiveness revealed that frequent and good quality contact with members from the perpetrator group predicted forgiveness (positively) and desire for social distance (negatively). Moreover, the positive relationship between contact and forgiveness was mediated by empathy and trust towards the outgroup and by perceived outgroup heterogeneity. Common-ingroup identification was also found to be positively associated with forgiveness and negatively with social distance towards the outgroup. Finally, intergroup forgiveness also predicted social distance from the outgroup. The theoretical and applied implications of these findings are discussed.     

The impact of rumination on internal attention switching

The present study explored the nature of attention control problems associated with ruminative traits. Experiment 1 aimed to establish the validity of a modified mental counting task that assesses individuals' ability to switch attention between internal mental representations. Reaction time and brain activity (event related potential; ERP) measures were examined, and results showed that the task was sensitive to internal attention switching effects. Experiment 2 assessed how the relationship between ruminative tendencies and switching performance differs when participants attend to neutral versus affective materials under different mood states. Although reaction-time analysis suggested that both mood condition and stimulus affectivity were not significant in altering this association, ERP analysis suggested otherwise. A significant task type×trait rumination × mood condition effect was found for switch-related ERP responses, whereby high ruminators were found to deploy more neuronal resources when switching affective materials in sad mood state.