Dispositional happiness and affective forecasting: General or specific effect?

Recent findings suggest that dispositional traits can influence personal affective forecasting. In this study, we investigated the relationship between dispositional happiness and affective prediction about academic performance among undergraduate students. Participants were asked to predict their emotional reactions on a 7-point Likert scale in regard to an important exam’s result two months prior obtaining their results. All the participants were contacted by SMS (Short Text Message) 8 h after the results were available and were requested to rate their actual emotional feelings on the same scale. According to their scores on the subjective happiness scale, participants were assigned into ‘happy’ and ‘unhappy’ groups. Results show no emotional prediction differences between the two groups for extreme results (i.e. good and bad results). In contrast, happy participants predicted less negative emotional feelings than unhappy ones for moderate results. No differences appear for the emotional feelings assessed the day they received their exam’s scores. These findings support the idea that dispositional happiness is related to emotional prediction and, more particularly, indicate that happiness induces more positive feelings concerning moderate future events, but not for extreme ones. This study suggests that happiness induces a positive view about emotional coping for future intermediate accomplishments only and not a positive view of the future in general.     

Burnout and work engagement: Independent factors or opposite poles?

Burnout researchers have proposed that the conceptual opposites of emotional exhaustion and cynicism (the core dimensions of burnout) are vigor and dedication (the core dimensions of engagement), respectively ( [Maslach and Leiter, 1997] and [Schaufeli et al., 2002]). We tested this proposition by ascertaining whether two sets of items, exhaustion-vigor and cynicism-dedication, were scalable on two distinct underlying bipolar dimensions (i.e., energy and identification, respectively). The results obtained by means of the non-parametric Mokken scaling method in three different samples (Ns = 477, 507, and 381) supported our proposal: the core burnout and engagement dimensions can be seen as opposites of each other along two distinct bipolar dimensions dubbed energy and identification.     

Negative priming and stimulus familiarity: What causes opposite results?

There has been a discrepancy among past studies with regard to the relation between negative priming and familiarity of stimuli. That is, Malley and Strayer (1995; Strayer & Grison, 1999) reported that the more familiar the stimuli were, the larger negative priming became (i.e., a positive correlation), whereas DeSchepper and Treisman (1996; Treisman & DeSchepper, 1996) reported that the less familiar the stimuli were, the larger negative priming became (i.e., a negative correlation). These studies differ not only in their experimental tasks (identification vs. matching) but also in their respective manners of arranging unfamiliar stimuli (pure vs. mixed). In the present study, using an identical set of stimuli, we examined whether these factors caused the opposite results. An identification task with a pure arrangement produced a positive correlation, and a matching task with a mixed arrangement produced a negative correlation. These results suggest that the past opposing results are both replicable and that they have reflected the different causal mechanisms of negative priming.     

When are puppies receptive to emotion-induced human chemosignals? The cases of fear and happiness

Animal Cognition - We report an observational, double-blind, experimental study that examines the effects of human emotional odors on puppies between 3 and 6 months and adult dogs...     

Workaholism and work engagement: how are they similar? How are they different? A systematic review and meta-analysis

Workaholism and work engagement can be depicted, respectively, as the pathological and the healthy form of heavy work investment. In spite of their different definitions and outcomes on individual and organizational life, workaholism and work engagement are not clearly and adequately distinguished by scholars and researchers as they appear to show some overlapping features. The aim of this investigation was to meta-analyze available studies, selected by systematic review, on the relations between subdimensions of workaholism and work engagement. Thirty-five studies were eligible for analysis. Associations emerged between Working Excessively and Absorption (g = .34), Working Compulsively and Absorption (g = .28), and Working Excessively and Dedication (g = .14). Moreover, the results were not influenced by publication bias and showed nationality to be a significant moderator. Overall, these findings suggest that further research is necessary to extend our knowledge of workaholism, work engagement, and the relationship between the two, in order to disentangle commonalities and differences between them.     

Does physical attractiveness buy happiness? Women’s mating motivation and happiness

Motivation and Emotion - Given the centrality of physical attractiveness in women’s mate value, we predicted that mating motive salience would increase the weight of physical attractiveness...     

New age advice: ticket to happiness?

The ‘New Age’ movement emerged in the second half of the 20th century and New Age ideas became the vogue in the Western world. New Age is much concerned with personal quality of life and offers both a philosophy of life and various therapeutic practices, presumed to raise happiness. This paper first describes the main recommendations to be found in New Age books. Next it considers the probable effects on happiness of these, by examining both the theoretical plausibility and the empirical conditions of happiness. This paper concludes that several recommendations are likely to produce beneficial consequences. It is argued, however, that the advice will not fit everybody equally well and that some New Age practices may reduce happiness, e.g., practices that undermine a realistic outlook on reality.     

Commentary: What are behavior systems and what use are they?

The contributions of this symposium on behavior systems are summarized and evaluated by considering two questions: (1) What is a behavior system? (2) What use to the learning theorist are behavior systems? Two examples of behavior systems from the classical ethological literature are compared with the behavior systems discussed in the symposium, and some similarities and differences in the type of analyses used are discussed. Analysis of the pre-organized species-typical behavior systems relevant to the unconditioned stimuli or reinforcers in learning experiments can contribute performance rules and better understanding of the conditions and contents of learning. The organization of behavior systems can also provide important clues to the neural circuitry underlying behavior, and a behavior systems approach can raise novel questions concerning learning and behavioral development. Possible future directions for the behavior systems approach are briefly discussed.     

Suicide and public policy: A critique of the “New consensus”

Several writers have recently developed proposals calling for a public policy that would allow a number of individuals to commit suicide if they so choose. Suicide, it is argued, is a fundamental matter of personal liberty and as such only very minimal restrictions should be placed on it. In this essay I offer a critique of these views and the public policies they entail. The result is a defense of the general outlines of current professional and legal policies which permit intervention, even coercive intervention, with suicidal persons in almost every case.     

The paradox of happiness: Why are we not doing what we know makes us happy?

Achieving and maintaining happiness can be difficult, especially when people are not engaging in the activities they know facilitate it. ‘Flow’ activities require clear rules, challenge, a high investment of energy, and have been shown to promote long-term happiness better than low investment, passive activities. Do people know this? In two studies, we found that, despite recognizing that flow activities are more likely to facilitate happiness, people nevertheless participated in passive leisure significantly more often in a typical week. Participants rated passive activities as being significantly more enjoyable, requiring less effort, and being less daunting to get started than flow activities. Participants’ engagement in flow activities was significantly predicted by how enjoyable the activities were perceived to be, whereas how daunting those activities were rated predicted non-engagement. Passive activity engagement was only significantly predicted by enjoyment. Suggestions for enabling people to rise above the barriers to flow activities are offered.     

Nomic Universals and Particular Causal Relations: Which are Basic and Which are Derived?

Armstrong holds that a law of nature is a certain sort of structural universal which, in turn, fixes causal relations between particular states of affairs. His claim that these nomic structural universals explain causal relations commits him to saying that such universals are irreducible, not supervenient upon the particular causal relations they fix. However, Armstrong also wants to avoid Plato’s view that a universal can exist without being instantiated, a view which he regards as incompatible with naturalism. This construal of naturalism forces Armstrong to say that universals are abstractions from a certain class of particulars; they are abstractions from first-order states of affairs, to be more precise. It is here argued that these two tendencies in Armstrong cannot be reconciled: To say that universals are abstractions from first-order states of affairs is not compatible with saying that universals fix causal relations between particulars. Causal relations are themselves states of affairs of a sort, and Armstrong’s claim that a law is a kind of structural universal is best understood as the view that any given law logically supervenes on its corresponding causal relations. The result is an inconsistency, Armstrong having to say that laws do not supervene on particular causal relations while also being committed to the view that they do so supervene. The inconsistency is perhaps best resolved by denying that universals are abstractions from states of affairs.

Number and language: how are they related?

Does the ability to develop numerical concepts depend on our ability to use language? We consider the role of the vocabulary of counting words in developing numerical concepts. We challenge the 'bootstrapping' theory which claims that children move from using something like an object-file - an attentional process for responding to small numerosities - to a truly arithmetic one as a result of their learning the counting words. We also question the interpretation of recent findings from Amazonian cultures that have very restricted number vocabularies. Our review of data and theory, along with neuroscientific evidence, imply that numerical concepts have an ontogenetic origin and a neural basis that are independent of language.     

Structures and strategies: Where are we now?

Summary Psychological opinion tends to sway between a view that people are almost infinitely flexible and a view that there are definite and unchangeable fundamental mechanisms that always work in the same way and set limits of flexibility. A popular compromise has been to suppose that lower mechanisms are as determinate as typewriters, while higher ones are unanalysable, autonomous, and perhaps even beyond scientific enquiry. The point of view in this paper favours a different compromise; very early and elementary operations are thought to be done in different ways, depending on the goals and experience of the person. There is, however, a good deal of constraint, which allows laws and principles to be laid down. Yet, there is also a degree of strategic flexibility in the operations actually performed that goes further than would be allowed by theorists of a different persuasion. The selective operations of attention are not due to unalterable mechanisms, nor does there seem to be convincing evidence of universal and invariant computation of all aspects of the input. What is computed, briefly, is the minimum necessary to perform the task before the person.     

Religion and medicine: How are they related?

This paper provides a comprehensive and dynamic profile of religion-medicine interrelationships. This profile is drawn from the respective characteristics of religion and medicine, as well as from historic and contemporary literature regarding their interconnections. Six symbiotic functions are identified and discussed with respect to their bearing on clinical practice, medical education, and research.The authors thank Drs. Chester R. Burns, Thomas H. Murray, and Ronald A. Carson for their comments on drafts of this paper.     

“State of happiness”? Petroreligion and petromelancholia in Norway

This article discusses the intersection between the symbol systems of petroculture and religion in development of the Norwegian oil age. The public TV series State of Happiness (2018-now) dramatizes Norway's adventure with oil and gas, beginning in 1969. Drawing parallels to Darren Dochuk's work on the mutual construction of petroculture and American religion in Anointed with Oil, this essay argues that State of Happiness retells the story of Norway's adventure with oil framed by some in terms of salvation, as a blessing and as the arrival of a better, messianic age. The characters in the series negotiate their religious commitments with the enchantments of the emerging petroculture in the Stavanger region, engaging the themes of Advent, Christmas, Baptism, and Trinity.     

Mood over matter: can happiness be your undoing?

Existing empirical literature has typically treated meaning and purpose as identical. Based on previous theoretical propositions of these two constructs as distinct, we hypothesized that meaning (defined as a sense of comprehension and significance in life) and purpose (defined as a sense of goals, aims, and direction in life) would have different predictors and correlates. We utilized a longitudinal design and collected data from 167 cancer survivors at two time points one year apart. Although meaning and purpose were strongly correlated, they had different predictors and correlates. Regression analyses showed Time 2 meaning was predicted by Time 1 spirituality, whereas Time 2 purpose was predicted by Time 1 social support. At Time 2, meaning was positively correlated with posttraumatic growth and negatively with posttraumatic depreciation, whereas purpose was negatively correlated with intrusive thoughts pertaining to cancer. Implications of an understanding of meaning and purpose as distinct constructs are discussed.