The psychology of environmental concern—some Australian data

An attempt is made to find out what psychological traits (if any) are characteristic of the environmentalism supporter in the community at large. In an Australia-wide mail survey, ‘environmentalists’ were found to be consumer-conscious, anti-authoritarian, anti-Australia, less interested in personal ‘success’, anti-fashion, counter-culturally oriented and hedonistic. All except the first were however very weak tendencies. They were found to be equally likely to go either way on social conservatism, economic conservatism, sociability and misanthropy.     

Will it be me? Identity,concern and perspective

Self-reflexive or egocentric concern has been taken to present a serious problem for reductionist and eliminativist metaphysical accounts of personal identity. Philosophers have tended to respond in one of three ways: by continuing the search for a metaphysical account of identity that (prudentially if not morally) justifies egocentric concern; by accepting that egocentric concern can hold between persons who are not numerically identical; or by advocating the abandonment of egocentric concern altogether. All these approaches, however, distinguish between metaphysical ‘facts’ and affective responses to them. Exploring a well-known example from Bernard Williams, I argue that egocentric concern presents itself as irreducibly first-personal and as making its own set of numerical personal identity claims on the phenomenal level. Williams' example also points to the need to complicate the first/third person schema by factoring in a further distinction between present-tense and implicitly atemporal perspectives on the self. Once this move is made, we can see that the identity claims figured in first-person present-tense experience and those arrived at through metaphysical deliberation need to be distinguished. We should resist the temptation to privilege one perspective over the other in all instances, or to collapse them into a unitary account of selfhood.     

Can residual lexical knowledge concern word form rather than word meaning?

We described a patient with a dramatic deficit of both word comprehension and naming but with good preservation of visual pictorial semantics. On word-picture matching, his performances were slightly better than expected based on the observed lexical semantic disorder; in addition, the patient, who maintained good preservation of his underlying phonology, showed a tendency to point to the picture phonologically related to the target. In order to interpret these data, we advanced the hypothesis that the patient, in spite of his virtually complete inability to name, would be able, in a word-picture matching task, to "covertly" (i.e., preverbally) retrieve the name from the picture and to use this name to attempt a match with the phonological form of the stimulus word. This mechanism, that we called "phonological" comprehension, would allow the identification of the correct target and would explain the choice of the phonologically related foil that was sometimes selected.     

Applications of covariance structure modeling in psychology: cause for concern?

Methods of covariance structure modeling are frequently applied in psychological research. These methods merge the logic of confirmatory factor analysis, multiple regression, and path analysis within a single data analytic framework. Among the many applications are estimation of disattenuated correlation and regression coefficients, evaluation of multitrait-multimethod matrices, and assessment of hypothesized causal structures. Shortcomings of these methods are commonly acknowledged in the mathematical literature and in textbooks. Nevertheless, serious flaws remain in many published applications. For example, it is rarely noted that the fit of a favored model is identical for a potentially large number of equivalent models. A review of the personality and social psychology literature illustrates the nature of this and other problems in reported applications of covariance structure models.     

Alcohol use trajectories and the ubiquitous cat's cradle: cause for concern?

In recent years, trajectory approaches to characterizing individual differences in the onset and course of substance involvement have gained popularity. Previous studies have sometimes reported 4 prototypic courses: (a) a consistently "low" group, (b) an "increase" group, (c) a "decrease" group, and (d) a consistently "high" group. Although not always recovered, these trajectories are often found, despite these studies varying in the ages of the samples studied and the duration of the observation periods employed. Here, the authors examined the consistency with which these longitudinal patterns of heavy drinking were recovered in a series of latent class growth analyses that systematically varied the age of the sample at baseline, the duration of observation, and the number and frequency of measurement occasions. Data were drawn from a 4-year, 8-wave panel study of college student drinking (N = 3,720). Despite some variability across analyses, there was a strong tendency for these prototypes to emerge regardless of the participants' age at baseline and the duration of observation. These findings highlight potential problems with commonly employed trajectory-based approaches and the need to not over-reify these constructs.     

Who cares about ecology? Personality and sex differences in environmental concern1

This study was designed to identify personality factors that underlie concern for ecological-environmental problems. High and low environmental-concern individuals were given the California Psychological Inventory and were found to differ significantly on many subscales. A factor analysis of the CPI data produced four factors which closely paralleled previous CPI research findings. In conjunction with this analysis, four factorially derived scores were obtained for each individual. Comparison of high and low environmental-concern individuals' factorially derived scores showed high environmental-concern persons as having stronger value orientation, person orientation, and ethical-conscientiousness, but not differing from low environmental-concern individuals in terms of independence of thought or action. Further, high environmental-concern females were found to be significantly more extraverted, “leader-types” than low environmental-concern females; while the opposite relation was obtained for males. Thus, it appears that men and women become involved with the environmental movement for different reasons. Finally, additional implications of the involvement of basic psychological individual differences in determining ecological-environmental concern were discussed.     

Interpreting children's reports of concern about parental drinking: Indicators of risk status?

Examined several self-report items traditionally used to identify children of alcoholics for their utility in identifying mental health risk status. The meaning of children's responses to these items was also examined. Collectively, these items reflected children's concern about their parents' drinking. Across multiple studies, children who reported concern about parental drinking reported higher levels of psychological and behavioral problems. This pattern existed whether or not children had a problem-drinking parent. Discriminant analyses with data from child and mother reports showed that children who reported concern were from homes with greater stress, lower income, and less supportive mother-child relationships.     

That’s not funny: Instrument validation of the concern for political correctness scale

The transformation of common language toward inclusion of all people is the mechanism by which many aim to alter attitudes and beliefs that stand in the way of more meaningful social change. The term for this motivated concern for language is “political correctness” or “PC.” The current project seeks to introduce a new tool for investigations into this phenomenon, the concern for political correctness (CPC) scale. CPC assesses individual differences in concern for politically correct speech. Exploratory and confirmatory structural equation modeling showed consistent factor structure of the two subscales; an emotion subscale measuring negative emotional response to hearing politically incorrect language, and an activism subscale measuring a willingness to correct others who use politically incorrect language. Correlational analyses suggested that concern for political correctness is associated with more liberal beliefs and ideologies and less right-wing authoritarianism. The emotion subscale was also found to be associated with lower emotional well-being and the activism subscale with more frequent arguments. Laboratory-based criterion validation studies indicated that the two subscales predicted negative reactions to politically incorrect humor.     

Ultimate concern, reflection of civilization, and the idea of ��Man�� in Yin Haiguang

Yin Haiguang’s investigation and pursuit of the idea of “Man” reflect not merely a limited historical or parochial academic interest, but indeed address an ultimate concern of humanity which transcends any spatio-temporal limitations. In criticizing “modern man” for its faceless and non-self-identical figure, Yin Haiguang brings the conditions, purposes and noble values of humanity to light. His work has extraordinary significance for the highest aims of humanity and civilization.     

No country for girly men: High instrumentality men express empathic concern when caring is “manly”

Two studies explored the relationship between men’s gender role identity (as measured by the Bem Sex Role Inventory) and their experience of empathic concern (situational empathy). In both, participants read of a man coping with his friend’s death while being exposed to one of three subliminal primes: “real men care”/“caring is strength,” “girly men care”/“caring is weakness,” or “people are walking.” Congruent with previous research, higher femininity (expressivity) predicted greater empathic concern irrespective of prime. The real men/strength primes tended to: (1) increase empathic concern among high instrumentality men; and (2) link empathic concern to predominantly positive projected coping responses when participants thought of themselves in the survivor’s situation, consistent with the broaden-and-build theory of positive emotions. Thus, subtly framing empathic concern as a positive emotional response that is congruent with an agentic self-appraisal seems to boost traditionally masculine men’s willingness to experience it.     

Contagious resource depletion and anxiety? Spreading effects of evaluative concern and impression formation in dyadic social interaction

Two studies examined how adopting an impression formation or evaluative concern mindset affects individuals' own and their interaction partner's experience of potentially stressful social exchanges, such as first meeting situations and interethnic interaction. Our main hypothesis was that adopting an impression formation mindset would, by diverting individuals' focus away from themselves and toward others, reduce both their own and their partner's cognitive resource depletion and negative affect. Consistent with predictions, positive effects of impression formation were evident and were “contagious” in that they were evident across individuals who received the mindset instructions and their partners, who were unaware of the manipulation. The positive effects of impression formation instructions were generally evident both in comparison to evaluative concern instructions, which provided similar structure, and in comparison to no instructions at all. Thus, adopting an impression formation mindset seems an effective strategy for minimizing negative outcomes experienced in stressful social interactions.     

How implicit racial bias and concern about appearing racist shape K-12 teachers’ race talk with students

Social Psychology of Education - Researchers and educators have increasingly recognized the importance of classroom discussions about race and racism—race talk—for student development,...     

Have sex differences in spatial ability evolved from male competition for mating and female concern for survival?

Drawing on the theoretical and empirical foundations of two evolutionary models, we argue that, among humans and other mammals, a twofold selection process would parsimoniously account for sex-linked advantages in spatial contexts. In males, a superiority for both solving navigation-related spatial problems and understanding physical principles that apply to the behavior of projectiles could have been inherited from mating-oriented male competition involving extensive ranging and agonistic displays. In females, a form of superior spatial memory may have been shaped in relation to a costly reproduction system compelling them to safeguard their survival and that of their offspring by fostering low-risk strategies consisting of restricted navigation as well as concentration on nearby spatial cues. Based on the combined action of competition and survival pressures, we submit new predictions as to spatial sex differences in several species including humans.     

Compulsive buying – a growing concern? An examination of gender,age, and endorsement of materialistic values as predictors

Compulsive buying is an understudied, but growing, dysfunctional consumer behaviour with harmful psychological and financial consequences. Clinical perspectives treat it as a psychiatric disorder, whereas recent proposals emphasize the increasing endorsement of materialistic values as a cause of uncontrolled buying (e.g. Dittmar, 2004b ; Kasser & Kanner, 2004 ). The present research aims to improve understanding of compulsive buying through examining gender, age, and endorsement of materialistic values as key predictors in three UK questionnaire studies, which sampled individuals who had contacted a self‐help organization and residentially matched ‘controls’ (N=330), consumer panelists from a multinational corporation (N=250), and 16‐ to 18‐year‐old adolescents (N=195). The results confirmed previously documented gender differences, and showed that younger people are more prone to compulsive buying. The central findings were that materialistic value endorsement emerged as the strongest predictor of individuals' compulsive buying, and that it significantly mediated the observed age differences.     

Seeking revenge or seeking reconciliation? How concern for social‐image and felt shame helps explain responses in reciprocal intergroup conflict

In conflicts with reciprocal violence, individuals belong to a group that has been both perpetrator and victim. In a field experiment in Liberia, West Africa, we led participants (N = 146) to focus on their group as either perpetrator or victim in order to investigate its effect on orientation towards inter‐group reconciliation or revenge. Compared to a perpetrator focus, a victim focus led to slightly more revenge orientation and moderately less reconciliation orientation. The effect of the focus manipulation on revenge orientation was fully mediated, and reconciliation orientation partly mediated, by viewing the in‐group's social‐image as at risk. Independent of perpetrator or victim focus, shame (but not guilt) was a distinct explanation of moderately more reconciliation orientation. This is consistent with a growing body of work demonstrating the pro‐social potential of shame. Taken together, results suggest how groups in reciprocal conflict might be encouraged towards reconciliation and away from revenge by feeling shame for their wrongdoing and viewing their social‐image as less at risk. As victims and perpetrators are widely thought to have different orientations to inter‐group reconciliation and revenge, we suggest that work on reciprocal conflicts should account for the fact that people can belong to a group that has been both perpetrator and victim.     

Usage légal du titre de « psychothérapeute » : stratégies des acteurs concernés

The law proposal of the deputy Bernard Accoyer adopted by the National Assembly the 13th of March 1999, after many debates, finally led to a law article on use of psychotherapist title. Several consultation meetings with professional organizations in the Health Ministry took place about its future application decree, nevertheless without a consensus because of the contradictory interests for people practising psychotherapy. Are concerned two regulated professions — psychologists and physicians — and two types of non-regulated activities, psychoanalysts and “psychotherapists” which are not physicians and not psychologists. These last ones defend in France, as it's the fact in some other european countries, the creation of the independant profession of “psychotherapist”; a minority part of psychoanalysts societies support them, leant upon the principle of practice liberty. The opinion differences are focused on the training criteria in psychopathology required by the law, some organizations disputing that this training be a university monopoly. Another ambiguity deals with the law gives a miss about the actual psychotherapy training, the Senate having chosen for the minimum requirement of a psychopathology training. The subject of this paper is to come back on the strategies and the identity stakes of actors mobilized during the different drafts of this law proposal and to prepare the ground about the ideological positions underlying by these strategies.     

Good citizens to the end? It depends: empathy and concern with future consequences moderate the impact of a short-term time horizon on organizational citizenship behaviors

Organizational citizenship behaviors (OCBs) can be viewed as a social dilemma in which short-term employee sacrifice leads to long-term organizational benefits. With 3 studies, the authors evaluated a set of interrelated hypotheses based on a social dilemma analysis of OCBs. In Study 1, participants rated OCBs as costly to an employee in the short run and beneficial to an organization in the long run, indicating that OCBs were viewed as social dilemmas. In Studies 2 and 3, self-reported (Study 2) and supervisor-rated (Study 3) likelihood of engaging in OCBs was higher among those who adopted a long-term horizon within an organization and those high in empathy (M. H. Davis, 1983). Most important, a short-term time horizon led to a steeper decline in OCBs among employees low in empathy and those concerned with the future consequences of their actions.