Lay theories of suicide

The rank order of a set of 32 causal attributes for depression was similar to that for suicide, as judged by a sample of 66 undergraduates.     

Lay theories of delinquency

This paper is concerned with the range, structure and determinants of lay people's implicit theories of delinquency. The different explicit psychological and sociological theories were reviewed as were studies on lay beliefs about crime and delinquency. After pilot interviews in which people were asked to list what they believed to be the major causes of delinquency, over 350 people completed a questionnaire in which they rated 30 explanations for their importance in explaining delinquency. The results showed numerous sex, age and voting differences. Conservatives tended to blame a person's poor education for his or her delinquency, while Labour voters tended to explain delinquency in terms of societal factors. A factor analysis revealed six clear explanation types for delinquency some of which were clearly related to explicit theories. Results were discussed in terms of the psychology of explanations and the relationship between explicit and implicit theories. Implications of this research were also noted.     

Lay theories of rape

This study examined ‘la’ theories of rape and compared them to numerous academic theories. One hundred and thirty subjects-52 male, 78 female-completed two questionnaires, one regarding attitudes/beliefs to rape in general, the other on the possible causes of the crime. Factor analysis revealed five factors in the attitude/belief items: Subjects generally perceived the rape victim as moral, responsible, and unprovoking; the rapist was perceived as a repressed delinquent. Subjects agreed with two of the six explanation factors, seeing rape as resulting from a desire for aggression induced by societal factors. The rapist was believed to be a psychopath. Lay theories did not correspond to any formal academic rape model or explanations. Beliefs about the causes of, and attitudes to rape, correlated highly. Age was the greatest determinant of perspective; older subjects believed more in victim precipitation. Suggestions are made for further research in this comparatively neglected area.     

Lay theories and consumer perceptions of dietary supplements

Consumers lack awareness and concern of potential adverse reactions, interactions, and inappropriate usage associated with dietary supplements. The lack of strict governmental regulation of supplements accompanied by consumers' lack of knowledge often results in them relying on ordinary lay (naïve) beliefs and theories when making supplement‐based decisions. We use an accessibility–diagnosticity framework to explore the impact of lay theories/beliefs on consumers' perceptions and judgments of dietary supplements. Two experiments prime two lay theories relevant to dietary supplement decision making: “less is more” (LIM: Study 1) and “no‐pain no‐gain” (NPNG: Study 2). Supplement form (single‐ vs. multi‐ingredient) is also manipulated in both studies, and Study 2 includes a Food and Drug Administration disclaimer intervention. Findings show that when a LIM lay theory is primed (Study 1), supplement form is a diagnostic cue. Specifically, consumers perceive that multi‐ingredient supplements possess more severe adverse side effects compared with single‐ingredient supplements. In the presence of an NPNG mindset (Study 2), supplement form was not diagnostic in the decision process, and a disclaimer intervention that draws attention to the lack of government regulation and testing of supplements was ineffective at influencing perceived side effect severity and attitude. The data confirm that lay theories impact dietary supplement decision making and that the observed effects are consistent with an accessibility–diagnosticity framework. Implications for public policy are also discussed.     

Lay theories and intergroup relations: A social-developmental perspective

Abundant research suggests that the study of lay theories helps to explain intergroup relations. Building on this work as well as “interactionist” theories for understanding social behaviour from developmental and social psychology, we propose an integrative social-developmental perspective examining how lay perceivers' characteristics (e.g., age, race, psychological motivations) interact with the environments in which they are nested to impact lay theory use over time and during life transitions. Using this perspective to guide our investigation of the Protestant work ethic (PWE) and colourblind theory, we show that a single lay theory can have a socially tolerant or intolerant meaning. We review work with US children and adults (Asians, Blacks, Latinos, Whites) as well as research with Colombian children and adults (Mestizos), showing similarities and differences in perceivers' uses of PWE and the colourblind theory. Even when both meanings are prevalent in a given culture, they are not necessarily equally emphasised in all environments or for all people living in those environments, nor are they responded to in the same way by all people. We discuss the implications of these results for theorising on lay theories and offer directions for future work in this area.     

Lay theories in affective forecasting: The progression of affect

Various studies have investigated the precision with which individuals forecast the duration of their affective states that result from events. It is hypothesized that these forecasts rely on lay theories about the progression of affect over time such that lay theories of decreasing affect lead to shorter estimates of the duration of affect than do lay theories of continuing affect. Two studies subtly primed lay theories of progression—one priming theories of affect progression specifically, and the other priming theories of progression more generally—and demonstrated that the accessibility of these lay theories influenced affective forecasts as hypothesized. Study 2 demonstrated that the impact of these lay theories was less pronounced under high elaboration conditions. Results and implications for the inaccuracy of affective forecasts are discussed.     

常人疾病观及其对医患关系的影响

常人疾病观是普通人对于某一疾病的认知、解释和态度的集合。与专业医务人员相比, 普通人更关注心理、家庭和社会因素而非生物学因素的致病作用, 就医选择多元而并不遵循标准化的就医模式, 同时更愿意将疾病体验视为个人生活的特殊问题加以建构性理解。常人疾病观与科学医学观之间的不一致性可能降低患者的就医满意、对医信任和医嘱依从性, 从而影响治疗效果。立足中国社会的医学文化与医疗制度, 研究中国人的常人疾病观, 并探讨其对医患关系的影响作用与社会心理机制, 可为改善当下中国医患关系紧张现状提供有益建议。     

Too exhausted to go to bed: Implicit theories about willpower and stress predict bedtime procrastination

While most people are aware of the importance of sleep for their health, well-being, and performance, bedtime procrastination is a pervasive phenomenon that can be conceptualized as a case of self-control failure (Kroese et al., Frontiers in Psychology, 5, 2014, 1). Two daily diary studies (N₁ = 185, N₂ = 137) investigated beliefs about willpower and stress as interactive predictors of bedtime procrastination. Beliefs about willpower capture whether people think of their willpower as limited resource that gets easily depleted (limited theory) or as something that remains regardless of previous acts of self-control (non-limited theory). Results show that after a stressful day, people with a limited versus non-limited theory procrastinate more on going to bed, while there is no difference in bedtime procrastination on less stressful days. Thus, ironically, limited theorists who should be more concerned with recovering their resources after a stressful day sleep less the following night.     

Treatment hurts: Lay theories of graded exposure in the treatment of four anxiety disorders

Objective: This paper concerned the perceived suffering/side effects caused by various well-known treatments for personal problems. It looked at whether people understood whether potentially painful treatments that confront negative aversive affect were effective or not.

Method: In total, 106 participants completed a long questionnaire assessing the ‘psychological pain’ ratings of 30 psychotherapy treatments, varying in fear exposure, for four relatively common anxiety disorders: social phobia, agoraphobia, post-traumatic stress disorder, and obsessive compulsive disorder.

Results: Factor analytic results revealed four clear factors underlying lay efficacy beliefs of psychotherapy interventions, varying in fear exposure: talking therapies, fear confrontation, fear avoidance, and alternative therapies. Talking therapies were rated the most effective across all disorders, but also the most painful. Fear avoidance therapies were rated the least effective and, along with alternative medicine, the least painful. Treatments involving fear exposure were rated the most painful. Regression analysis revealed talking therapies to be rated more efficacious by younger subjects than older subjects.

Conclusion: Most people seem able to differentiate between the efficacies of interventions for different anxiety disorders and hold consensually held optimistic conceptions about the usefulness of psychotherapy treatments and counseling that involve fear exposure, despite knowledge of the psychophysical side effects that these therapies often entail. They favored talking cures over others, but that may have been due to misleading items in the questionnaire.     

Lay theories of self‐control influence judgments of individuals who have failed at self‐control

Individuals who have failed at self‐control are often the targets of negative social judgments. We suggest that in some circumstances, individual differences in lay theories regarding self‐control may help account for these reactions. Specifically, people may believe that the ability to exert self‐control is either a fixed quantity (entity theory) or a malleable quantity (incremental theory), and these beliefs may influence their social judgments. In the current investigation, we found that whether lay theories of self‐control were measured or manipulated, entity views of self‐control predicted more negative judgments about a target whose self‐control failure was made salient.     

The physiology of willpower: linking blood glucose to self-control.

Past research indicates that self-control relies on some sort of limited energy source. This review suggests that blood glucose is one important part of the energy source of self-control. Acts of self-control deplete relatively large amounts of glucose. Self-control failures are more likely when glucose is low or cannot be mobilized effectively to the brain (i.e., when insulin is low or insensitive). Restoring glucose to a sufficient level typically improves self-control. Numerous self-control behaviors fit this pattern, including controlling attention, regulating emotions, quitting smoking, coping with stress, resisting impulsivity, and refraining from criminal and aggressive behavior. Alcohol reduces glucose throughout the brain and body and likewise impairs many forms of self-control. Furthermore, self-control failure is most likely during times of the day when glucose is used least effectively. Self-control thus appears highly susceptible to glucose. Self-control benefits numerous social and interpersonal processes. Glucose might therefore be related to a broad range of social behavior.     

Lay Theories of Happiness

Over 230 young people completed a battery of questionnaires measuring personality, self-esteem, and happiness as well as one developed specifically for this study on their theories of the causes of happiness. The 36 causes factored into six internally coherent and interpretable factors. Self-reported happiness, extraversion and sex were correlated with the lay theory factors. Four of the six factors were modestly (r < 0.20) correlated with the Oxford Happiness Inventory (OHI) scores. Path analysis, using the OHI as the dependent variable, showed self-esteem, extraversion and neuroticism direct predictors of happiness but that among the lay theories, only lay theories about optimism and contentment were direct predictors. Personality and demographic variables did predict the lay theories but the latter did not act as moderator or mediating factors between the former and happiness. The role and function of lay theories with respect to happiness are discussed.     

Lay conceptions of neuroticism

This paper is concerned with various aspects of a lay-person's conceptualization of neuroticism. Three experiments are reported which aim to investigate various determinants of the common-sense conception of neuroticism. In the first experiment subjects completed various standardized psychological tests measuring neuroticism and anxiety, while also estimating the extent of their own anxiety and neuroticism. In the second experiment subjects attempted to detect items measuring neuroticism in a standard personality questionnaire and secondly estimate the extent of their own and the ‘average’ person's neuroticism. Finally, in the third experiment subjects rated the typicality of various neurotic traits and behaviour which had been supplied by subjects in the previous two experiments. The results suggested some similarity in expert explicit theories and lay-person implicit theories, though there appeared to be systematic biases in the subjects' perception of their own neuroticism. The results are discussed in terms of the correspondence between implicit theories and explicit theories, and the functions of each theory in everyday life are considered. Problems associated with these studies and this research in general are discussed.     

Perceived willpower self-efficacy fluctuates dynamically with affect and distress intolerance

People may experience subjective shifts in their self-efficacy for exerting willpower over time and based on context, and people who struggle with self-control may be particularly vulnerable to willpower self-efficacy fluctuations. Across four samples (college students without borderline features: n = 49; borderline features group: n = 50; current smokers: n = 61; chronic dieters: n = 92), participants completed one week of ecological momentary assessment (EMA) where momentary self-efficacy for willpower, positive affect, negative affect, tiredness, and distress intolerance were assessed randomly seven times per day. Results revealed that higher willpower self-efficacy was associated with lower negative affect and greater positive affect, and, lower willpower self-efficacy predicted subsequent distress intolerance via time-lagged analyses for the borderline features group.     

The Narratology of Lay Ethics

The five narratives identified by the DEEPEN-project are interpreted in terms of the ancient story of desire, evil, and the sacred, and the modern narratives of alienation and exploitation. The first three narratives of lay ethics do not take stock of what has radically changed in the modern world under the triple and joint evolution of science, religion, and philosophy. The modern narratives, in turn, are in serious need of a post-modern deconstruction. Both critiques express the limits of humanism. They do not imply, however, that these narratives should not be taken seriously. In particular, the enduring presence of three ancient narratives in laypeople’s symbolic thought is highly significant in terms of the role that the logic of the sacred keeps playing in the workings of modern societies. Lay people’s implicit understanding of how modern technology tends towards catastrophe and apocalypse provides the strongest argument for taking these narratives seriously.     

A hot/cool-system analysis of delay of gratification: dynamics of willpower

A 2-system framework is proposed for understanding the processes that enable--and undermine--self-control or "willpower" as exemplified in the delay of gratification paradigm. A cool, cognitive "know" system and a hot, emotional "go" system are postulated. The cool system is cognitive, emotionally neutral, contemplative, flexible, integrated, coherent, spatiotemporal, slow, episodic, and strategic. It is the seat of self-regulation and self-control. The hot system is the basis of emotionality, fears as well as passions--impulsive and reflexive--initially controlled by innate releasing stimuli (and, thus, literally under "stimulus control"): it is fundamental for emotional (classical) conditioning and undermines efforts at self-control. The balance between the hot and cool systems is determined by stress, developmental level, and the individual's self-regulatory dynamics. The interactions between these systems allow explanation of findings on willpower from 3 decades of research.