Events That Increase Uncertainty in Personal Relationships II Replication and Extension

Events that change relational knowledge were investigated because they have theoretical implications for uncertainty reduction and relational cognition and they have important consequences in terms of personal trauma and relational damage. Data were gathered in ways that corrected major problems in earlier studies, results were compared between two studies, and hypotheses about differences were tested. Additional information was also gathered concerning how often such events occurred, what led up to them, attributions about causes, coping strategies, and how the experience was viewed in hindsight. The results indicated that although the emotional and cognitive effects of the events were nearly as strong as found in earlier studies, the effects on relationships were not as negative. Other findings and their implications for uncertainty reduction theory and existing models of schema change were also discussed.     

Relationships Between Social Support, Social Coping and Life Events in the Relapse of Schizophrenic Patients

The vulnerability-stress model for schizophrenia posits that relapses are at least partly determined by interacting triggering and protecting psychosocial factors. This study examined social support and general coping style in 42 consecutively admitted DSM:III schizophrenic patients, who were followed prospectively for up to four years. In a second part of the study, a subgroup of the patients were interviewed using the Life Event and Difficulty Schedule 9 months after discharge or at relapse. Patients contented with low social integration had a higher relapse rate over four years than patients lacking of social provisions, but wanting more. We found an excess of life events three weeks before relapse compared to events reported in the non-relapsing group. Suggesting a buffering effect of social factors, time between life event and relapse was significantly extended among patients with a high availability of attachment and a coping strategy characterised of active support seeking.     

Personal Uniqueness and Events

Human Studies - In contrast to Anglophone debates on personal identity initially formed by John Locke’s investigation of personal identity in the sense of personal continuity or persistence...     

青少年无望感与生活事件、控制信念和社会支持的关系

以607名初高中阶段青少年为被试,采用量表法收集收据,探讨了青少年未来无望感的基本状况以及所受压力生活事件、控制信念和社会支持的影响.结果表明,半数青少年无望感在正常范围内,然而余者存在不同程度的无望感,特别是有13.7%的人至少存在中等及以上程度的无望感而需特别帮助.从影响因素角度看,控制信念对无望感的解释率最高(12.6%),其中二级控制中的认知控制有保护作用,而情感控制则是危险因素,初级控制的预测作用不显著;其次是社会支持,解释率为6.2%,其中家庭支持显著有利于减少未来无望感,朋友或一般他人的支持无显著预测作用;最后是压力生活事件(主要是事件影响程度),解释率为2.7%.     

A Personal Synthesis of Social Construction and Phenomenology

In this essay, I narrate five short stories about how I have encountered and struggled with social construction and phenomenology, as well as my ongoing synthesis of the two perspectives.     

Subadditivity in Memory for Personal Events

Abstract—People's subjective probability judgments of external events are often subadditive (i.e., the probability estimates of component parts of a single event sum to greater than one)—a clear violation of the extensional nature of probability theory. We show that people's frequency judgments of personal events can also be subadditive. We found subadditivity even when component events made up a proper subset of a wider composite event. Our findings imply that the somewhat arbitrary choice of the specificity with which questions are asked can produce widely different reports for the same composite events.     

The Social and Personal Identities Scale: A Measure of the Differential Importance Ascribed to Social and Personal Self-Categorizations

A new measure sensitive to differences in the importance that people ascribe to their social (group) and personal identities is described. The Social and Personal Identities (SIPI) scale distinguishes between the interpersonal level of self which differentiates the individual as unique from others, and the social identity level of self whereby the individual is identified by his or her group memberships. In contrast to perspectives that emphasize the context-dependence of self-conception, our measure was designed to capture individual differences in participants' readiness to categorize themselves using group and personal self-categories as measured by the degree of importance or centrality assigned to each. Factor and reliability analyses support the scale's stability as a two-factor structure with high internal consistency, and these factors are modestly correlated. Results from six studies substantiate the scale's criterion and construct validity.     

Saying and Doing: Speech Actions,Speech Acts and Related Events

The question which this paper examines is that of the correct scope of the claim that extra‐linguistic factors (such as gender and social status) can block the proper workings of natural language. The claim that this is possible has been put forward under the apt label of silencing in the context of Austinian speech act theory. The ‘silencing’ label is apt insofar as when one's ability to exploit the inherent dynamic of language is ‘blocked’ by one's gender or social status then one might justly be said to be silenced. The notion that factors independent of any person's linguistic competence might block her ability to exploit the inherent dynamic of language is of considerable social as well as theoretical significance. I shall defend the claim that factors independent of a person's linguistic competence can indeed block her ability to do things with words but I will show that the cases that have been previously considered to be cases of illocutionary failure are instances of rhetic or locutionary act failure instead. I shall refine the silencing claim as previously advanced in the debate in at least one fundamental respect. I also show that considering the metaphysics of speech acts clarifies many of the issues previously appearing as thorny bones of contention between those who hold that the only notion of silencing that is coherent is that of physically preventing someone from speaking or writing and those who hold the opposite sort of claim sketched above.     

Forms and Functions of Intimate Play in Personal Relationships

Two studies are reported on intimate play in same-sex friendships and in opposite-sex romantic relationships. In Study 1, a typology of eight play forms was derived: private verbal coding, role-playing, teasing, prosocial physical play, antisocial physical play, games, gossiping, and public performances. Study 1 also modified the Betcher PQII paper-and-pencil measure of perceived playfulness for use in nonmarital relationships, finding playfulness a strong correlate of relationship closeness. Study 2 examined the multidimensional structure of the play typology, finding three underlying dimensions for the play forms: verbal versus nonverbal, antisocial versus prosocial, and assumed-identity versus self-identity. Study 2 also examined perceptions of the functions performed by the types of play, finding differences among the eight play forms on the functions of indexing intimacy, lessening interpersonal risk, distancing self from the interaction, and conflict management.     

Relationships Between Meaning in Life,Social and Achievement Events,and Positive and Negative Affect in Daily Life

Research on meaning in life has generally focused on global meaning judgments. This study examined how people's daily experiences, represented by events that occur in daily life, influence their perceived sense of meaning on a daily basis. One hundred sixty‐two college students completed daily reports for 2 weeks. We examined the relationships among daily social and achievement events, daily positive and negative affect, and daily meaning in life. In addition, we tested the possible moderating influence of depressive symptoms on these relationships. Positive daily social and achievement events were related to greater daily meaning, above and beyond the contributions of daily positive and negative affect. Negative social and achievement events were related to less daily meaning, and negative achievement events covaried with daily meaning above and beyond positive and negative affect. Depression moderated the relationships between positive events and meaning, such that people who reported more depressive symptoms had greater increases in daily meaning in response to positive social and achievement events than individuals who reported fewer symptoms. These findings suggest the important role that daily events may play in fluctuations in people's affective experiences and sense of meaning in life.     

Social Relationships and Mortality

Social relationships benefit not only mental health but also physical health. This review addresses the following questions: (1) What is the overall magnitude of the effect of social relationships on risk for premature death? (2) How generalized is the effect and are there factors known to influence this association? (3) What are the likely pathways by which social relationships influence longevity? The article concludes by discussing the implications of these findings for potential interventions aimed at reducing risk for mortality.     

Boundaries as Distance Regulators in Personal Relationships

Received wisdom suggests that boundaries are, or should be, important in intimate relationships. In this essay, we focus primarily upon the beliefs and phenomenology relating to a variety of boundaries, and provide a discussion of some conceptual issues, in order to understand better the development, facilitation, and maintenance of, as well as restraints upon, intimacy. Although we attend mainly to dyadic relationships, we believe that our observations and suggestions have application to larger groups.     

The Formation of Social Relationships A Longitudinal Study of Social Penetration

This study investigated three levels of self-disclosure (public, semiprivate, private-personal) in the social penetration process. The study addressed three questions. (1) What is the nature of changes in the three levels of disclosure over time? (2) Is self-disclosure reciprocated at the three levels of intimacy? (3) Does reciprocity vary over time and, if so, how does it vary? Same-sex zero-history dyads participated in a six-week longitudinal study. The half-hour taped conversations were submitted to interaction analysis. Polynomial trend analyses and Markov analyses were used to analyze the data. The results showed: (1) a convex quadratic trend for private-personal disclosures over time; (2) reciprocity at the same level of intimacy as an interactional norm (especially at the beginning and end of the relationship); (3) a cyclical fluctuation of reciprocal interacts over time. These results were interpreted as elaborating the social penetration process.     

Social Anxiety and Social Surrogacy in College Roommate Relationships

The social surrogate hypothesis proposes that people with higher social anxiety (HSA) recruit others to accompany them into social situations. We tested this hypothesis with college roommates using both hypothetical (Study 1) and retrospective (Study 2) measures, while assessing roommate's perceptions of recruitment and how social surrogacy might influence liking between roommates. Across two studies, we found that HSA participants were less likely to enter social situations alone (i.e. higher conditional entry); however, HSA was related to recruitment only when participants considered hypothetical scenarios, not when recruitment was assessed globally or retrospectively. There was little evidence that HSA participants' roommates were aware of these behaviours, although there was preliminary evidence that less social anxiety might increase liking when roommates perceived more conditional entry. We also found preliminary evidence that social anxiety may be negatively related to liking when participants were less likely to recruit an alternate surrogate if their roommate was unavailable. Taken together, these preliminary findings emphasize the importance of studying the surrogacy process from an interpersonal/dyadic perspective and using methods that will differentiate between anticipated (which may be assessed by hypothetical scenarios) and enacted recruitment behaviours. Copyright © 2017 European Association of Personality Psychology     

Life Events and Social Support in Suicide

In a conceptual framework of suicide process, literature on life events and social support in suicide is reviewed. Few studies have centered on these issues, and the existing research has many methodological ambiguities. However, it can be concluded that life events play an important role in suicide process as risk and precipitating factors. The findings on disintegration of social networks and poor social support indicate lack of protective factors. Implications for future research are discussed. Further research focusing on more specific questions on the role of life events and social support as well as their interactions is needed.     

Attitudes Toward Divorce: Embeddedness and Outcomes in Personal Relationships

Divorce attitudes, attitude embeddedness, parental marital status and conflict, and personal relationship outcomes were examined in a sample of 289 undergraduate students. Results indicated that highly embedded divorce attitudes were more predictive of evaluations of divorce issues and relationship scenarios than were less embedded attitudes. Consistent with findings that divorce attitudes influence personal relationships ( Amato & DeBoer, 2001 ), participants with embedded divorce attitudes reported greater conflict and influence of relationship partners. Recollections of high parental conflict were associated with greater relationship conflict; and individuals from high-conflict intact families reported greater relationship closeness, conflict, and embedded divorce attitudes. Consequences of parental divorce and conflict for offspring divorce attitudes are discussed, as well as future research on divorce attitudes and their strength.     

Marital Relationships: A Social Exchange Theory Perspective

The central thesis of this article is the treatment of the marital relationship within the context of social exchange theory. This article opens with a discussion of marital solidarity and marital power from a social exchange perspective. Next, the article addresses the differences between social exchange and economic exchange in order to provide insight in delineating marital relationships in a social exchange context. The conceptualization of couple therapy in terms of social exchange theory is next discussed. Finally, the article closes with a discussion of the deficiencies of social exchange theory as an attempt to delimit the scope of treating marital relationships as a social exchange system.     

Personal and Social Facets of Job Identity: A Person-Centered Approach

Purpose

The purpose of this study was to examine ego-identity (Erikson, Psychol Issues 1:1–171, 1959; Identity, youth and crisis, Norton, New York, 1968; Marcia, J Pers Soc Psychol 3:551–558, 1966) and social identity (Tajfel and Turner, In: Austin WG, Worchel S (Eds.) The social psychology of intergroup relations. Brooks/Cole, Monterey, pp 33–47 1979; Turner et al., Rediscovering the social group: A self-categorization theory. Blackwell, Oxford, 1987) theories within the organizational literature. We adopted a person-centered approach to analyze whether employees classified in various identity statuses and identification profiles exhibited differences in job outcomes (i.e., burnout, job satisfaction, and organizational citizenship behaviors). We also analyzed interconnections among identity statuses and identification profiles.

Design/methodology/approach

Participants were 515 employees (85.4 % women) between 24 and 64 years old. They completed self-reported questionnaires assessing personal identity, social identity, and job outcomes.

Findings

Cluster analysis indicated that participants could be classified into four identity statuses (i.e., achievement, early closure, moratorium, and searching moratorium) and into four identification profiles (i.e., orthogonal combinations of high vs. low organizational and group identification, respectively). Employees classified in the various identity statuses and identification profiles reported meaningful differences on job outcomes. Further, findings highlighted significant associations between identity statuses and identification profiles, giving rise to various identity configurations associated with job outcomes.

Implications

This study highlights the importance of integrating different facets of job identity. These findings have relevant implications in terms of suggesting which dimensions of identity should be promoted in order to reduce workers’ burnout, and enhance their satisfaction and organizational citizenship behaviors.

Originality/value

This study provides evidence for integrating ego-identity and social identity theories. In doing so, it bridges developmental psychology literature on personal identity with social and organizational psychology literature on social identity, setting the basis for a comprehensive line of research.     

Overprotective Relationships: A Nonsupportive Side of Social Networks

Chronically ill adults who feel overprotected by family members tend to be more depressed. However, little is known about the source of these feelings of overly protective care. In this study, three explanations why family members may be seen by stroke patients as overprotective were tested: (a) a discrepancy between patients and caregivers in judging patient functioning; (b) caregiver protective behaviors, such as restricting the patient because of fear for the patient's safety; and (c) caregivers' negative attitudes toward the patient. Consistent with prior work, patients who felt overprotected were more depressed even when the severity of the stroke was controlled for. Caregivers with negative attitudes toward the patient were most likely to be seen as overprotective by the stroke patient. Ways in which negative, resentful attitudes of caregivers are translated into behaviors that engender feelings of overprotection are discussed.