Explicit and implicit approach motivation interact to predict interpersonal arrogance

Self-reports of approach motivation are unlikely to be sufficient in understanding the extent to which the individual reacts to appetitive cues in an approach-related manner. A novel implicit probe of approach tendencies was thus developed, one that assessed the extent to which positive affective (versus neutral) stimuli primed larger size estimates, as larger perceptual sizes co-occur with locomotion toward objects in the environment. In two studies (total N = 150), self-reports of approach motivation interacted with this implicit probe of approach motivation to predict individual differences in arrogance, a broad interpersonal dimension previously linked to narcissism, antisocial personality tendencies, and aggression. The results of the two studies were highly parallel in that self-reported levels of approach motivation predicted interpersonal arrogance in the particular context of high, but not low, levels of implicit approach motivation. Implications for understanding approach motivation, implicit probes of it, and problematic approach-related outcomes are discussed.     

The hubris penalty: Biased responses to “Celebration” displays of black football players

We posit that pride and arrogance are tolerated for high-status group members but are repudiated for low-status group members. Thus, we predict that Blacks, but not Whites, who behave arrogantly will be penalized. Specifically, we investigated the context of penalties against football players for “celebrating” after touchdowns. We propose that such celebrations reflect a racially biased “hubris penalty” because: (1) celebrations are primarily perceived as displays of arrogance (rather than exuberance), and (2) arrogance is penalized for Black but not White players. Three experiments demonstrate that all players who celebrated after touchdowns were perceived as more arrogant than those who did not celebrate. Although celebratory Black and White players were perceived as being equally arrogant, Black players were penalized with lower compensation whereas White players were not. Mediation analyses show that perceived arrogance mediated the effect of celebration on compensation, even when controlling for perceived aggression.     

Loneliness,HPA stress reactivity and social threat sensitivity: Analyzing naturalistic social challenges

Loneliness has been linked to poor health through an increased activation of threat surveillance mechanisms, such as the hypothalamic‐pituitary‐adrenal axis (HPA ). The socio‐cognitive model (Cacioppo & Hawley) proposes that lonely people have an increased social threat sensitivity which activates the HPA axis. The current study examined the impact of loneliness on HPA stress reactivity and social threat sensitivity in response to naturally occurring social challenges. Participants (N = 45) were prospective undergraduates attending a 3‐day university preparation programme over the summer, prior to commencing their university studies. Cortisol levels and perceived stress were measured before and after an ice breaker session on Day 1 and a lecture session on Day 3. Social threat sensitivity was also measured on the first and third day. When meeting unfamiliar peers in the ice breaker session, HPA stress reactivity was evident, but it was not markedly different in those who reported high levels of loneliness than those with low levels. The high loneliness group had higher levels of perceived stress and increased social threat sensitivity than the low loneliness group on both testing days. The findings show partial support for the socio‐cognitive model of loneliness because increased threat sensitivity was demonstrated in the high loneliness group. The findings indicate that lonely people do not respond in a physiologically different way to specific social challenges, but they typically report higher social threat sensitivity and higher perceived stress than their non‐lonely peers.     

Benevolently bowing out: the influence of self-construals and leadership performance on the willful relinquishing of power

Sometimes a group's best interest is served when powerful people relinquish power, but little theory or empirical research has investigated when and by whom power is willingly given-up. Using a simulated, online team competition, two studies demonstrated that people who were dispositionally high in interdependent self-construals were more likely to relinquish their position of leadership within a group when they perceived that their leadership performance on the task was unambiguously poor versus good. However, when given the ability to attribute performance to others rather than the self, leader's level of interdependent self-construal did not significantly influence their decisions to relinquish power. Overall, these findings suggest that factors such as perceived leadership performance, interdependent self-construals, and ability to defer blame all converge when making decisions in regards to how much power should be relinquished.     

Affiliation‐seeking among the powerless: Lacking power increases social affiliative motivation

Although it is well known that many people possess fundamental desires for both social affiliation and power, research has only begun to investigate the interplay between these two core social motives. The current research tested the hypothesis that an individual's level of power would influence that person's level of social affiliative motivation. We predicted that, compared with participants in a control condition, (1) individuals who possess power would exhibit less social affiliative motivation; and (2) individuals who lack power would display greater social affiliative motivation. Although we found little evidence to support the former prediction, we observed consistent evidence across two experiments that supported the latter. In Experiment 1, priming participants with low power (versus control) led them to display greater interest in joining a campus service aimed at fostering new friendships among students. In Experiment 2, placing participants in a position of low power (versus control) led them to seek greater proximity to a partner. Together, these results suggest that lacking power motivates people to seek social affiliation. Copyright © 2015 John Wiley & Sons, Ltd.     

Socially motivated projection: Need to belong increases perceived opinion consensus on important issues

In three studies, we tested whether the need to belong would motivate people to perceive consensus for their opinions on important social issues. In Study 1, a nationally representative telephone survey, participants with a high dispositional need to belong perceived greater consensus for their opinions on immigrant naturalization than did those with a low need to belong. However, this relationship was strongest among participants who reported that the issue was personally important to them. In Study 2, participants primed with rejection‐related (versus acceptance‐related) words, and who reported high levels of issue importance, demonstrated greater false consensus for their opinions on a proposed alcohol tax increase. In Study 3, participants who received random feedback that they held a common (versus uncommon) opinion had a lower subsequent need to belong when the issue was important to them, suggesting that consensus perceptions can in fact mitigate belongingness needs. Copyright © 2011 John Wiley & Sons, Ltd.     

How basic need satisfaction and dispositional motives interact in predicting flow experience in sport

We have integrated the basic psychological needs approach from self‐determination theory with motive disposition theory in order to enhance the prediction of flow experience in sports. We hypothesize that an environment that enables people to fulfill their basic psychological needs for competence and social relatedness results in flow. Additionally, we assume that the effect of competence need satisfaction is moderated by the achievement motive and that the effect of need‐for‐relatedness satisfaction is moderated by the affiliation motive. Four studies show the expected positive effects of need satisfaction on flow and further confirm that high achievement and affiliation‐motivated individuals benefit more from competence and relatedness sports environments, respectively, than individuals low in these motives.     

Consumer response to interruption features and need for cognitive closure

Prior research on interruptions focuses entirely on the process being interrupted and assumes interruption homogeneity. Across two studies, we examine how heterogeneous features of interruptions (i.e., timing, frequency, and perceived pleasantness) and consumer individual differences (i.e., need for cognitive closure (NFCC)) impact consumer response toward a product. We find interruption features have opposing effects on consumer response for consumers high versus low in NFCC—depending upon the perceived valence of the interruption. Specifically, individuals with high NFCC respond better to a product when interruptions are perceived to be pleasant and occur late or infrequently. In contrast, those who have low NFCC respond better to a product when interruptions are perceived to be pleasant and occur early or perceived to be unpleasant and occur infrequently. The role of interruption pleasantness is discussed in terms of its predictive power for perceived pleasant but not perceived unpleasant interruptions. Finally, study findings are placed within marketing contexts that guide managerial implications. Copyright © 2013 John Wiley & Sons, Ltd.     

The Higher Your Implicit Affiliation‐Intimacy Motive,the More Loneliness Can Turn You Into a Social Cynic: A Cross‐Cultural Study

Research has shown that the strength of the implicit affiliation‐intimacy motive moderates the effects of satisfaction and frustration of the need for affiliation‐intimacy: Low relatedness was more closely related to envy for people high in the implicit affiliation‐intimacy motive. The present study tests a moderating effect of the strength of the implicit affiliation‐intimacy motive on the association between low relatedness and social cynicism in samples of elderly people from Germany, the Czech Republic, and Cameroon. A total of 616 participants provided information on their implicit affiliation‐intimacy motive, relatedness, and social cynicism. As hypothesized, a moderation effect of the strength of the implicit affiliation‐intimacy motive was found that held true regardless of participants’ culture of origin: For people high in the implicit affiliation‐intimacy motive, a lack of relatedness was associated with higher levels of social cynicism. Our findings complement other theories stating that positive relationships with others are a significant part of successful aging.     

Group boundary permeability moderates the effect of a dependency meta‐stereotype on help‐seeking behaviour

Previous studies have found that when low‐status group members are aware that their in‐group is stereotyped as dependent by a specific out‐group (i.e. a dependency meta‐stereotype is salient), they are reluctant to seek help from the high‐status out‐group to avoid confirming the negative meta‐stereotype. However, it is unclear whether low‐status group members would seek more help in the context of a salient dependency meta‐stereotype when there is low (vs. high) group boundary permeability. Therefore, we conducted two experiments to examine the moderating effect of permeability on meta‐stereotype confirmation with a real group. In study 1, we manipulated the salience of the dependency meta‐stereotype, measured participants' perceived permeability and examined their help‐seeking behaviour in a real‐world task. Participants who perceived low permeability sought more help when the meta‐stereotype was salient (vs. not salient), whereas participants who perceived high permeability sought the same amount of help across conditions. In study 2, we manipulated the permeability levels and measured the dependency meta‐stereotype. Participants who endorsed a high‐dependency meta‐stereotype sought more help than participants who endorsed a low‐dependency meta‐stereotype; this effect was particularly strong in the low‐permeability condition. The implications of these results for social mobility and intergroup helping are discussed.     

Uncertainty enhances the preference for narcissistic leaders

Narcissistic leaders present us with an interesting paradox, because they have positive as well as negative characteristics. As such, we argue that the nature of the context determines how suitable narcissists are perceived to be as leaders. Here we propose that a specific contextual factor, that is, uncertainty, increases the preference for narcissists as leaders. As an initial test of this prediction, the first study showed that narcissistic characteristics were evaluated as more desirable in a leader in an uncertain context rather than a certain context. In Studies 2 and 3, we further hypothesized and found that high narcissists are chosen as leaders more often than low narcissists, especially in uncertain (rather than certain) contexts. In all of the studies, individuals were shown to be aware of the negative features of narcissistic leaders, such as arrogance and exploitativeness, but chose them as leaders in times of uncertainty, regardless. Thus, a narcissistic leader is perceived as someone who can help reduce individual uncertainty. These results reveal the importance of contextual uncertainty in understanding the allure of narcissistic leaders. Copyright © 2013 John Wiley & Sons, Ltd.     

Episode Type,Attachment Orientation,and Frame Salience: Evidence for a Theory of Relational Framing

Relational framing theory asserts that dominance‐submission and affiliation‐disaffiliation tend to displace each other as frames for processing social interaction; involvement is argued to be a content‐free intensifier variable that contributes to judgments of dominance or affiliation as a function of the salient relational frame. The present study seeks to replicate and extend previous tests of these claims by evaluating three hypotheses: (a) The differential salience of dominance‐submission and affiliation‐disaffiliation frames as a function of the type of social episode is robust across same‐sex and cross‐sex friendship dyads; (b) the magnitude of the association between involvement and dominance and affiliation varies as a function of frame salience instantiated by the type of episode; and (c) attachment anxiety is positively correlated with the perceived relevance of both dominance‐submission and affiliation‐disaffiliation to social episodes. Results are consistent with all three of the hypotheses, but relational framing is unrelated to subscales operationalizing the comfort with closeness dimension of attachment orientation.     

Self‐Regulation and Power: How Self‐Regulatory Failures Can Enhance Social Power

Low self‐control is often associated with poor life outcomes. Here, we propose that self‐control failures may also provide social benefits by signaling and maintaining power. We identify several pathways by which reduced self‐control can assist in ascending social hierarchies. First, the self‐enhancing tendencies adopted by people with low self‐control may contribute to making positive first impressions and advertising power to new acquaintances. The direct and disinhibited communication styles that stem from self‐control failures may also enhance power and lubricate difficult social interactions. Disinhibited aggression can help people maintain and acquire material resources and establish dominance over rivals. Finally, the parallels between the behavior of people with low self‐control and people with power (e.g., self‐enhancement, disinhibition, approach‐orientation, aggression) suggest that people with impaired self‐control will be perceived as more powerful than people with intact self‐control. Evidence for these propositions and directions for future research are discussed.     

Do people turn to visible reminders of group identity under stress?

How do people cope with stress? Research suggests that people have a number of strategies, including turning to the groups to which they belong, increasing feelings of identification and affiliation. We examine a novel extension of this strategy: adopting visible reminders of one's group identity. In two experiments (Ns = 103 and 194), we explore whether students are more likely to use an artifact that displays their university identity in situations of high, compared to low, evaluative stress. In Experiment 1, students were more likely to choose a university‐branded pen (vs. an identical unbranded pen) to complete exam questions when their performance would be evaluated versus not. In Experiment 2, we found the tendency to use a university‐branded pen in the face of evaluative stress emerged only among people who found the evaluation personally relevant. In addition, we present converging results from two observational studies suggesting that students are more likely to wear clothing that signals their university identity on exam days compared to control days. These findings suggest that people may turn to visible reminders of group membership when facing evaluative stress. Although we found no consistent evidence for a psychological mechanism underlying this effect, we speculate about theoretically relevant possibilities.     

Individuals with intellectual and developmental disabilities: Do educators assign them a fully human status?

The present research investigates the humanity attributions to individuals with intellectual and developmental disabilities (IDD). In three studies, professional educators, who worked in day‐care or community centers, were examined. Humanity attributions were assessed using emotion‐based and trait‐based measures. As expected, individuals with IDD were denied a fully human status: they were perceived as having more non‐uniquely than uniquely human attributes. Furthermore, a lower human status was assigned to individuals with IDD in relation to educators. We also discovered that humanity attributions, but not attitudes, were related to approach/avoidance responses. Altogether, findings show the importance of considering humanity perceptions in the study of social relationships of individuals with IDD. Dehumanizing perceptions can explain the differential treatment these individuals face in various social settings.     

In search of the true group animal: the effects of affiliation orientation and social comparison orientation upon group satisfaction

A study among 653 undergraduate students examined the effects upon group satisfaction of social comparison orientation (Gibbons & Buunk, 1999) and affiliation orientation, i.e. the preference for doing things together and in groups versus a preference for doing things alone. Affiliation orientation correlated positively with extraversion and agreeableness, and social comparison orientation correlated negatively with emotional stability and openness to experience. A multi‐level analysis showed that individual level variance in group satisfaction was explained by an interaction effect of affiliation orientation and social comparison orientation: a high level of affiliation orientation was associated with high group satisfaction of individual group members, but only among those low in social comparison orientation. Among those high in social comparison orientation, a high level of affiliation orientation was even associated, though not very strongly, with low group satisfaction. These effects were upheld when simultaneously controlling for all ‘Big Five’ personality dimensions. It was concluded that the typical ‘group animal’ is someone who has a strong preference for affiliation, combined with a low tendency to compare him‐ or herself with others. Copyright © 2005 John Wiley & Sons, Ltd.     

Religion,religiosity, and South Korean consumer switching behaviors

• This study investigated the relationship between religious affiliation and level of religiosity and consumer product‐ and store‐switching behavior among South Korean consumers. Comparisons in switching behavior are reported for three different denominational groups prevalent in South Korea (Buddhism, Catholicism, and Protestantism), non‐religious affiliated respondents, and among persons exhibiting different levels of religiosity. Religious affiliation, including non‐affiliation, was not found to be significantly related to switching behavior. However, consumers reporting high levels of religiosity were found to be significantly less likely to engage in product purchase‐ and store‐switching behaviors than those reporting lower levels of religiosity. Consumers reporting high levels of religiosity are also less likely to engage in product purchase switching behavior than non‐religious affiliated consumers (i.e., no religiosity consumers). This pattern held across denominations. Statistically significant differences in switching behavior were not obtained between consumers reporting low levels of religiosity and those respondents who expressed no religious affiliation.

Copyright © 2009 John Wiley & Sons, Ltd.     

Interpersonal patterns in close relationships: The role of sociotropy–autonomy

Sociotropy and autonomy are conceptualized as two personality dimensions that relate to an individual's vulnerability to depression. Sociotropy is characterized as an excessive investment in interpersonal relationships and autonomy is characterized as an excessive concern with personal achievement and control over the environment. The present research project consisted of two studies examining the relationships between sociotropy–autonomy and interpersonal patterns in close relationships. Data collected via self‐report and behavioural observations suggested that highly sociotropic individuals have a tendency to be high in control and low in affiliation towards individuals who are close to them. In contrast, the data suggested that highly autonomous individuals may be low in both control and affiliation towards people who are close to them. These findings are discussed in the context of the literature regarding the interpersonal characteristics of sociotropic and autonomous individuals.     

Facial reactions to facial expressions in subjects high and low in public speaking fear

This study investigated whether subjects high and low in public speaking fear react with different facial electromyographic (EMG) activities when exposed to negative and positive social stimuli. A High-fear and Low-fear group were selected by help of a questionnaire and were exposed to slides of angry and happy faces while facial-EMG from the corrugator and zygomatic muscle regions were measured. The subjects also rated the stimuli on different emotional dimensions. Consistent with earlier research it was found that Low fear subjects reacted with increased corrugator activity to angry faces and increased zygomatic activity to happy faces. The High fear group, on the other hand, did not distinguish between angry and happy faces. Rating data indicated that the High fear group perceived angry faces as being emotionally more negative. The present results are consistent with earlier studies, indicating that the facial-EMG technique is sensitive to detect differential responding among clinical interesting groups, such as people suffering from social fears.