“Tears of joy” & “smiles of joy” prompt distinct patterns of interpersonal emotion regulation

Close relationship partners often respond to happiness expressed through smiles with capitalization, i.e. they join in attempting to up-regulate and prolong the individual’s positive emotion, and they often respond to crying with interpersonal down-regulation of negative emotions, attempting to dampen the negative emotions. We investigated how people responded when happiness was expressed through tears, an expression termed dimorphous. We hypothesised that the physical expression of crying would prompt interpersonal down-regulation of emotion when the onlooker perceived that the expresser was experiencing negative or positive emotions. When participants were asked how they would behave when faced with smiles of joy, we expected capitalization responses, and when faced with tears of joy, we expected down-regulation responses. In six experimental studies using video and photographic stimuli, we found support for our hypotheses. Throughout our investigations we test and discuss boundaries of and possible mechanisms for such responsiveness.     

Experiences of surgery readiness assessments in British Columbia

Abstract

Background: A surgical readiness assessment is a major step in the medical journey of trans people seeking gender-affirming surgery. Much of the peer-reviewed literature surrounding surgical readiness assessments emphasizes the perspectives of academics and clinicians, leaving the voices of trans and gender diverse patients largely unheard.

Aims: This paper foregrounds patient experiences with surgery readiness assessments to discuss the tensions, challenges and opportunities they generate.

Methods: We conducted a thematic analysis of 35 in-depth interviews with trans people who accessed or were seeking to access gender-affirming surgery in British Columbia.

Results: We developed three main themes to capture participants’ narratives of their surgical assessment experiences. The first, assessments as gatekeeping, explores the stories of people who described their assessments as outdated and even discriminatory processes. The second, assessments as a barrier to care, discusses the informational missteps, bureaucratic regulations, economic issues, and geographic concerns that made assessments difficult to access. The third, assessments as useful, includes positive stories about assessments that often involved feeling supported by an assessor and feeling prepared for the next steps.

Discussion: These narratives demonstrate how much variation exists among people’s experiences of readiness assessments for gender-affirming surgery. No matter how their actual assessment turned out, many participants approached their appointments with a great deal of anxiety and trepidation. We attributed this stress was to challenges ranging from lengthy wait times, arbitrary medical gatekeeping, a lack of access to knowledgeable and supportive providers, unclear or changing administrative processes, and insufficient communication. To address these challenges, it is crucial for the medical system to create more accessible pathways with centralized, up-to-date information for people trying to access assessments. Patients are best served by multi-disciplinary gender-affirming teams that provide individualized care.     

Making snacking less sinful: (Counter-)moralising obesity in the public discourse differentially affects food choices of individuals with high and low perceived body mass

Objective: As public discourse surrounding obesity highlights the societal costs of obesity and individual’s own responsibility for their weight, being overweight is often framed as immoral. Such ‘moralizing’ messages about being overweight may be a psychological threat for those with high body mass. Attempting to counter-moralise the public discourse (i.e. actively arguing that there is nothing ‘immoral’ about being overweight) may relieve this threat, inducing people, especially those with higher (perceived) weight, to engage in healthier behaviours.

Method: Two experiments were performed among Dutch and US participants. (Counter-)moralisation was manipulated. Body mass and weight-related self-perceptions were measured. The dependent variable was healthy vs. unhealthy snack choice.

Results: (Counter-)moralisation and (perceived) overweight jointly predicted snack choice: counter-moralising messages induced healthy snacking, but only among those who regarded themselves to have a high body mass.

Conclusions: The effects of moralising vs. counter-moralising obesity depended on one’s (perceived) overweight. This suggests that, for people with relatively high weight, the current moralising public discourse on obesity works in counterproductive ways. Campaigns that ‘counter-moralize’ obesity (i.e. that refute moralising messages) are more productive, although they should be tailored to those who see themselves as being overweight.     

Care of the transgender or gender-nonconforming patient undergoing in vitro fertilization

Background: Assisted reproductive technologies, including in vitro fertilization (IVF), can be utilized for fertility preservation and family building in the transgender and gender-nonconforming population.

Methods: This is a retrospective case series from an academic tertiary care center.

Results: We present three couples with a transgender or gender-nonconforming member who pursued IVF to build their families. The first case involves a transgender man who suspends hormone therapy to undergo IVF. The second involves a transgender woman who uses her previously banked sperm to undergo IVF with her wife. The third involves a gender nonbinary patient and their cisgender wife who create and transfer embryos from both partners.

Conclusion: IVF can provide unique family-building opportunities to transgender and gender-nonconforming patients, and providers should seek to broaden their clinical experience with this population.     

Beyond the big five as predictors of dispositions toward ridicule and being laughed at: The HEXACO model and the dark triad

We aimed to extend research on dispositions toward ridicule and being laughed at by testing the localization of the fear of (gelotophobia) and the joy in (gelotophilia) being laughed at, and the joy in laughing at others (katagelasticism) in the HEXACO model and the Dark Triad traits (both have not been examined so far). Study 1 (HEXACO model: N = 216) showed that gelotophobia was related to low extraversion, high emotionality, and low honesty‐humility; gelotophilia to high extraversion and high openness to experience; and katagelasticism to low agreeableness and low honesty‐humility. These results were similar to prior findings based on the Five‐Factor model, and supported the notion that the honesty‐humility trait contributes to the prediction of individual differences in gelotophobia and katagelasticism. Study 2 (Dark Triad: N = 204) showed that gelotophobia was related to high Machiavellianism and low narcissism; gelotophilia to high narcissism; and katagelasticism to high psychopathy and high Machiavellianism. These data helped to clarify our findings on the honesty‐humility trait, showing that gelotophobes and katagelasticists differ in their socially aversive characteristics. Overall, this research provides empirical evidence that dark (but subclinical) traits can be seen as relevant personality predictors of how people deal with laughter and ridicule.     

An experimental test of the relationship between voice intonation and persuasion in the domain of health

Objective: In the process of behaviour change, intonation of speech is an important aspect that may influence persuasion when auditory messages are used. In two experiments, we tested to what extent different levels of intonation are related to persuasion and whether for some recipients the threat posed by the message information might become too strong to face.

Design: In Study 1, 130 respondents listened to a health message with either a low, moderate or high level of intonation. In Study 2 (N?=?143), the same manipulations of intonation were applied but half of the respondents were affirmed before they listened to the persuasive message. Intention to increase fruit and vegetable intake was used as a dependent variable.

Results: Both studies showed that high intonation led to a significant drop in intention among respondents who perceived their own health as good. After self-affirmation, persuasion was increased.

Conclusion: A high level of intonation seems to induce self-regulatory defences in people who do not see the necessity to change their health behaviour, whereas people with poor perceived health might perceive potential to change. The use of a normal level of intonation in auditory health messages is recommended.     

Positive affect and physical activity: Testing effects on goal setting,activation, prioritisation,and attainment

Objective: The present research tested whether incidental positive affect promotes pursuit of physical activity goals. Four key features of goal pursuit were examined – setting physical activity goals (Study 1), goal activation (Study 2), and goal prioritization and goal attainment (Study 3).

Design: Participants (N_s = 80, 81, and 59, in Studies 1–3, respectively) were randomized to positive affect (joy, hope) or neutral affect (control) conditions in each study.

Main Outcome Measures: Questionnaire measures of goal level, goal commitment, and means selection (Study 1); a lexical decision task indexed goal activation (Study 2), a choice task captured goal prioritization and MET minutes quantified goal attainment (Study 3).

Results: Study 1 showed that positive affect led to a greater number of intended physical activities, and that joy engendered greater willingness to try activities. In Study 2, a positive affect induction led to heightened activation of the physical activity goal compared to the control condition. The joy induction in Study 3 led to greater physical activity, and a trend towards greater goal prioritization.

Conclusion: These findings suggest that positive affect enhances the pursuit of physical activity goals. Implications for health behavior theories and interventions are outlined.     

Intellectual arrogance and intellectual humility: correlational evidence for an evolutionary-embodied-epistemological account

Abstract

We outline an evolutionary-embodied-epistemological (EEE) account of intellectual arrogance (IA), proposing that people psychologically experience their important beliefs as valued possessions – mental materialism – that they must fight to keep – ideological territoriality – thereby disposing them toward IA. Nonetheless, IA should still vary, being higher among people taking a hostile and domineering epistemic stance (rejecting reality, resisting evidence) than among those taking an open and deferential one (embracing reality, respecting evidence). Such variations can be predicted from people’s standing on the communion-agency circumplex at multiple levels of analysis (i.e. from their social inclusion and status; dispositional warmth and competence; and behavioral amiability and assertiveness). Using pre-validated indices of mental materialism and ideological territoriality, and an argument evaluation task permitting the quantification of rational objectivity and egotistical bias, we obtained consistent correlational evidence that, as hypothesized, IA is the highest when agency is high and communion low, validating the EEE account.     

Emotional imagery: Strategies and correlates

Abstract

The purpose of the study was, first, to identify the strategies people use when imagining different emotions, and secondly, to test the hypothesis that persons high in role-playing (acting) ability are better able to become ideationally involved in emotional situations than are persons low in role-playing ability. Seventy-two female subjects, preselected on role-playing ability, were asked to imagine situations of fear, sadness, anger, and joy. Emotional involvement was assessed through self-reports and physiological responses. Situations of sadness were the easiest to imagine, followed by anger, joy, and fear. Although there were some commonalities in the strategies subjects used to become involved, there also were significant differences as a function of the particular emotion imagined. Finally, good role-players showed greater physiological reactivity during emotional imagery than did poor role-players.     

Is love a “basic” emotion?

This article documents the neglect of love in many contemporary emotion theories, despite its prominence in the lay psychology of emotion. We argue that love should be considered a basic emotion, like anger, sadness, happiness, and fear. We discuss the criteria that various theorists use to distinguish basic from nonbasic emotions, and we marshal arguments and evidence from a variety of sources suggesting that love fits the criteria for basicness. We conclude that a number of controversies over the status of love can be resolved by distinguishing between the momentary surge form of love, a basic emotion having properties similar to joy, sadness, fear, etc., and relational love, a bond that develops between people, associated with states that include not only surge love, but many other emotions such as distress and anxiety. Finally, we suggest that “love” is the broad, everyday name for emotions related to three interrelated behavioral systems discussed by Bowlby (1979): attachment, caregiving, and sex.     

Supporting the spiritual needs of people with dementia in residential aged care

ABSTRACT

Objective: To describe how an Australian age care provider, BaptistCare NSW & ACT, has embraced the National Guidelines for Spiritual Care in Aged Care for people with dementia.

Method: A 12-month study was conducted in 19 Baptistcare residential homes, including 14 dementia units. Data were obtained from selected items of the Person-Centred Environment and Care Assessment Tool using interviews, observation, and document review.

Results: The person-centred approach was instituted in adhering to the Guidelines for people with dementia. Conclusion: The person-centred approach assists in actioning the Guidelines for people with dementia.     

Parental desire and fertility preservation in assigned male at birth transgender people living in Belgium

Abstract

Introduction: Transgender people who chose to proceed with gender affirming hormonal and/or surgical therapy, may face reduced options for fulfilling their parental desire in the future. The ideas and concerns of adult transgender people regarding fertility preservation and parental desire have never been reported in a large, non-clinical sample of assigned male at birth (AMAB) transgender people.

Methods: A web-based survey on fertility and parenthood in (binary and non-binary) transgender people was conducted in Belgium. AMAB people were selected for this analysis.

Results: We included 254 AMAB persons, of which 196 (77.2%) self-identified as transgender women (TW), 14 (5.5%) as cross-dressers and 44 (17.3%) as gender non-binary (GNB) people. Fifty-five (21.6%) respondents had a current/future parental desire, parental desire was already fulfilled in 81 (31.9%) and not present in 57 people (22.4%) (other: 19.2%). TW were more likely to express a parental desire, compared to GNB people and cross-dressers (P?=?0.004). In total, 196 AMAB people previously sought medical assistance, of which 30 (15.3%) considered the loss of fertility due to the transitioning process undesirable. The majority (68.2%) did not want fertility preservation (FP). Fourteen people (9.8%) had proceeded with FP. The main reasons not to proceed with FP included not feeling the need (70; 68.0%), not desiring a genetic link with (future) child(ren) (20; 19.4%) and having to postpone hormone treatment (15; 14.6%). TW were more likely to have a parental desire and to have cryopreserved or to consider cryopreserving gametes, compared to GNB people.

Conclusion: Parental desire and FP use were lower in the current non-clinical sample than in previous research on clinical samples. This can possibly be explained by the barriers transgender people face when considering fertility options, including postponing hormone therapy. Also, GNB persons have different needs for gender affirming treatment and FP.     

Automatic affective-motivational regulation processes underlying supportive dyadic coping: the role of increased implicit positive attitudes toward communal goals in response to a stressed relationship partner

Background and objectives: We examined the implicit affective mechanisms underlying provision of support in intimate dyads. Specifically, we hypothesized that in individuals with high relationship satisfaction, the perception that one’s partner is stressed leads to increased implicit positive attitudes toward communal goals. In turn, this change in implicit attitudes facilitates supportive behavior.

Design and methods: In two studies, we induced partner stress by instructing participants to either recall a situation where their partner was highly stressed (Study 1; N?=?47 university students) or imagine a specific stressful event (excessive workload; Study 2; N?=?85 university students). Subsequently, implicit attitudes toward communal goals were assessed with an Implicit Association Test.

Results: In both studies, we found that among participants with high relationship satisfaction partner stress increases preferences for communal goals. In addition, implicit preferences for communal goals predicted stronger inclinations to engage in supportive dyadic coping (Study 2).

Conclusions: The current findings provide important insights into the implicit cognitive-affective mechanics of dyadic coping. Moreover, they can explain how people manage to avoid experiencing motivational conflicts between partner-oriented and self-oriented goals in situations characterized by high partner stress.     

Does “putting on your thinking cap” reduce myside bias in evaluation of scientific evidence?

Abstract

The desire to maintain current beliefs can lead individuals to evaluate contrary evidence more critically than consistent evidence. We test whether priming individuals’ scientific reasoning skills reduces this often-observed myside bias, when people evaluate scientific evidence about which they have prior positions. We conducted three experiments in which participants read a news-style article about a study that either supported or opposed their attitudes regarding the Affordable Care Act. We manipulated whether participants completed a test posing scientific reasoning problems before or after reading the article and evaluating the evidence that it reported. Consistent with previous research, we found that participants were biased in favor of evidence consistent with their prior attitudes regarding the Affordable Care Act. Priming individuals’ scientific reasoning skills reduced myside bias only when accompanied by direct instructions to apply those skills to the task at hand. We discuss the processes contributing to biased evaluation of scientific evidence.     

Emotional processes in risky and multiattribute health decisions

Objective: Here, we develop an integrative account of the roles of emotion in decision-making. In Part I, we illustrate how emotional inputs into decisions may rely on physiological signals from emotions experienced while making the decision, and we review evidence suggesting that the failure to represent the emotional meaning of options can often reduce decision quality. We propose that health-related decrements in the ability to generate emotional reactions lead people to inaccurately represent emotional responses and compromise decisions, particularly about risk. Part II explores complex decisions in which choice options involve trade-offs between positive and negative attributes. We first review evidence showing that difficult trade-off decisions generate negative affect and physiological arousal. Next, we propose that medical decision-making will be linked to short- and long-term stress and health outcomes.

Conclusion: In sum, this article proposes and reviews initial evidence supporting the effective use and management of emotional inputs as important to both clinical and non-clinical populations. Our approach will contribute to the understanding of patient-centred emotional decision-making and will inform medical decision aids.     

Mental Health,Culture and Spirituality: Implications for the Effective Psychotherapeutic Care of Australia's Ageing Migrant Populations

SUMMARY

In this essay, attention is given to discussing the notions of and influences of culture, mental health and spirituality. Research shows that people who came to Australia either as immigrants or refugees are at risk of suffering a disproportionate incidence of mental problems relative to the rest of the Australian population. Older male immigrants are particularly at risk. A key variable influencing the mental health of immigrants/refugees in Australia is the social conditions in which they live. Another largely unrecognised variable influencing mental health is spirituality. The extent to which the expression of spirituality promotes mental health and healing, however, will depend on cross-cultural perceptions of what spirituality is, and how it influences mental health, illness and recovery. Whatever the perceptions of spirituality, it is important to understand that its roots are cultural, and its influence is on meaning construction. Meaning construction, in turn, is itself culturally mediated and framed. Given this, it is crucial that culture-what it is and how it influences human experience-is understood by health professionals if they are to be able to provide meaningful and therapeutically effective care to culturally diverse people and their mental health problems. A central aim of this essay is to facilitate this understanding.     

A Study of the Opinions of College Students

ABSTRACT

When judging whether a relationship partner can be counted on to “be there” when needed, people may draw upon knowledge structures to process relevant information. We examined one such knowledge structure using the prototype methodology: indicators of a partner who is likely to be there when needed. In the first study (N = 91), the structure, content, and reliability of the prototype of indicators were examined. Then, using a false recognition study (N = 77), we demonstrated that once activated, the prototype of indicators of a partner who is likely to be there when needed affects information processing. Thus, the prototype of indicators may shape how people process support-relevant information in everyday life, affecting relationship outcomes. Using this knowledge structure may help a person process relevant information quickly and with cognitive economy. However, it may also lead to biases in judgments in certain situations.     

Beyond brands: Happy adolescents see the good in people

How does happiness affect adolescents’ stereotypes of other people? Using a collage methodology with 60 adolescents aged 12–18, we find that happier adolescents hold more positive stereotypes of others compared to those who are less happy. We also find that happier adolescents are less likely to form impressions of people based on surface level cues such as the products and brands that people own. Finally, our results show that happier adolescents have a more nuanced view of others, (e.g., some cool kids wear expensive brands, but some shop at thrift stores), compared to their less happy counterparts, who tend to oversimplify their view of others (e.g., all cool kids wear expensive brands, all doctors drive a BMW).     

The Nature of the Transference Between Anna Freud and Melanie Kleins: Learning from the Controversies

As we work through our theories, we rejoice in discovering the logic of concepts and their articulation in clinical experience. Such joy hides other movements, in which the only stakes are demands for love, sexual curiosity and the satisfaction of hate, transferred from infancy to others worlds, idealised or despised. When we participate in our psychoanalytical institutions, we feel pride or even vanity to be participating in the great historical movement of psychoanalysis. This conceals the working of transference in our institutional life; transference which is crudely sexual at its origins, and implies maternal, paternal or fraternal objects. This is its constraining power. We should be fully aware of this, as Strachey or Balint have already shown, in order to attenuate the violence of transference and stimulate our creativity. Anna Freud and Melanie Klein's controversies had a reality of their own. This reality was quickly forgotten and trapped in various conflicts, as those existing between Jones and Freud or between Glover and the rest of the British Psychoanalytical Society of his times. These re-elaborations gave rise to ideological elements, which have ever since pervaded the history of psychoanalytical theory, influencing psychoanalytical methods and clinics. It is important for us today to elucidate these ideologies in order to improve our achievements.