Family Life Around Screens: Some Thoughts on the Impact of ICTs on Psychological Development and the Development of Relationships

ICTs mediate family life even before children are born, from the moment that future parents post their foetus’s ultrasound image on social media. Based on theories and research on the impact of ICTs on psychological development and the development of relationships, this paper attempts to outline the new mediated context within which today’s children are born and grow. The discussion is set around two main properties of ICTs, closely interwoven with the everyday life of children and their families: (i) the oversupply of (globally) pre-constructed homogeneous images and information diffused by all kinds of screens, which occupy mental space and often surpass the child’s cognitive and emotional capacity to handle, and (ii) the new form of mediated relationships promoted by ICTs, where the other is physically absent. The discussion is focused on the impact that ICTs instill on emotional and cognitive development, and the development of relationships.     

One executive function never comes alone: monitoring and its relation to working memory,reasoning, and different executive functions

Monitoring is involved in many daily tasks and is described in several theoretical approaches of executive functioning. This study investigated the relative relationship of cognitive processes that are theoretically relevant to monitoring, such as concept formation, reasoning, working memory, and general cognitive control functions. Data from 699 participants who performed the Balanced Switching Task, aiming at capturing monitoring, were used. Subsamples also performed standard tasks assessing the processes assumed to be related to monitoring. Structural equation modeling revealed that general cognitive control processes are particularly relevant. They mediate the relationship between working memory, reasoning, and monitoring. Updating and maintaining information, as well as concluding from information which strategies can guide behavior toward predefined goals, is required for the ability to exert general cognitive control, which again may be relevant for implementing strategies in a goal-directed way. Together, these processes seem to be necessary to adequately monitor behavior in complex tasks.     

Mental contrasting and conciliatory behavior in romantic relationships

When people in a relationship offend each other, it is important for them to behave in a conciliatory manner if they wish to reconcile. We tested in two studies if mental contrasting (versus other modes of thoughts) is an effective strategy for people to self-regulate their conciliatory behavior. In Study 1, we assessed student participants’ spontaneous mode of thought when thinking about an unresolved interpersonal transgression and measured their commitment to reconcile. Eight days later, we assessed their conciliatory behavior. Participants who spontaneously mentally contrasted reported more commitment to reconcile and showed sensible conciliatory behavior (i.e., based on their expectations of solving their interpersonal concern). In Study 2, romantic couples were invited into the lab and asked to identify unresolved incidents in which one partner (the perpetrator) had offended the other (the victim). After perpetrators were induced to mentally contrast or indulge about a successful reconciliation, we videotaped the couples discussing the incident. Only perpetrators who mentally contrasted showed sensible conciliatory behavior and reached effective reconciliation (measured right after the experiment and 2 weeks later). The findings imply that mental contrasting supports perpetrators to show conciliatory behavior when it promises to be successful, but discourages it when it seems futile or adverse, thereby protecting the relationship from further harm.

     

Assimilation and contrast in social comparisons as a consequence of self‐construal activation

We extended existing research about self‐construal activation to the study of social comparisons, specifically to self–other similarity ratings. Independent self‐knowledge substantiates the notion of dissimilarity, whereas interdependent self‐knowledge implies similarity with others. Therefore, perceived self–other similarity was predicted to decrease after independent and increase after interdependent self‐knowledge priming. However, we expected such assimilation effects to occur only if the priming was subtle, but contrast effects if it was overt. In order to test this hypothesis, we developed a scrambled sentences test for priming the respective self‐knowledge. The unscrambled sentences described the self either in terms of independence or interdependence. The subtlety of this priming was manipulated by having participants write down either the full sentences (overt priming) or only the remaining word in each item (subtle priming). Results confirmed the predictions. Underlying cognitive processes of the effects are discussed. Copyright © 2000 John Wiley & Sons, Ltd.     

Collectible toys and decisions to share: I will gift you one to expand my set

Two studies were used to examine the collecting behaviour of preschool children. Prior studies of collecting have defined the behaviour as exhibited by older children and adults. To understand childhood collecting, existing theoretical perspectives were discussed in terms of how they might apply to children's behaviour as collectors. Results showed that some preschool children are motivated to engage in collecting and possess the developmental capacities required for successful collecting. Individual differences in executive functioning (Study 1, N= 57) and theory of mind (Study 2, N= 46) explained why some preschoolers were more oriented towards collecting than others. Study 2 showed that the motivational pull of collectible toys can be very strong, with some children agreeing to pay the ‘cost’ of sharing with a confederate child in order to obtain a collectible toy. This research highlights similarities and differences between adult and child collecting. Suggestions are provided for parents and for policy considerations regarding the appropriateness of marketing collectible toys to preschoolers.     

Suicide Ideation and Attempts among Low‐Income African American Adolescents

We examined the impact of risk and protective factors on the odds that African American adolescents seriously think about or attempt suicide. Data from students in grades 5–12 in a mostly urban, southeastern U.S. school district were analyzed. Findings support earlier work documenting differences in gender and grades. Risk factors were uniformly significant in understanding both ideation and attempts. Protective factors were not consistent predictors; the lowering role of religious protective factors was limited, though student's belonging to or their perception of belonging to a spiritual community was a significant factor in lowering the odds of suicide ideation.     

Self-regulatory cognitions,social comparison,and perceived peers’ behaviors as predictors of nutrition and physical activity: a comparison among adolescents in Hungary,Poland, Turkey,and USA

This study investigated whether the effects of self-regulatory cognitions and social influence variables on healthy behaviors – nutrition and physical activity – vary across countries. Adolescents (N?=?2387) from Hungary, Poland, Turkey, and the USA participated in the study. Measures included self-efficacy, future orientation, social comparison orientation (SCO), perceived behaviors of peers, as well as age and gender. These variables were included in the path model as predictors of healthy behaviors. The role of a country as a moderator was also examined. Results showed that self-efficacy, SCO, and perceived behaviors of peers predicted both health-promoting behaviors in all four countries. Some differences were found regarding the role of future orientation and gender.     

Deferred imitation in 18-month-olds from two cultural contexts: The case of Cameroonian Nso farmer and German-middle class infants

Imitative learning has been described in naturalistic studies for different cultures, but lab-based research studying imitative learning across different cultural contexts is almost missing. Therefore, imitative learning was assessed with 18-month-old German middle-class and Cameroonian Nso farmer infants – representing two highly different eco-cultural contexts associated with different cultural models, the psychological autonomy and the hierarchical relatedness – by using the deferred imitation paradigm. Study 1 revealed that the infants from both cultural contexts performed a higher number of target actions in the deferred imitation than in the baseline phase. Moreover, it was found that German middle-class infants showed a higher mean imitation rate as they performed more target actions in the deferred imitation phase compared with Cameroonian Nso farmer infants. It was speculated that the opportunity to manipulate the test objects directly after the demonstration of the target actions could enhance the mean deferred imitation rate of the Cameroonian Nso farmer infants which was confirmed in Study 2. Possible explanations for the differences in the amount of imitated target actions of German middle-class and Cameroonian Nso farmer infants are discussed considering the object-related, dyadic setting of the imitation paradigm with respect to the different learning contexts underlying the different cultural models of learning.     

Overt head movements moderate the effect of depressive symptoms on mood regulation

A dysfunction in the regulation of negative mood states is one of the core symptoms of depression. Research has found that levels of depression are associated with the intensity of the mood-regulation deficit. The present study aimed to explore the role the body plays in mood-regulation processes. More specifically, we studied whether head movements can influence mood persistence in dysphoric states. Subsequent to a sad-mood induction, participants were presented with a set of positive pictures immediately after performing either vertical (i.e., nodding) or lateral (i.e., shaking) head movements. We considered changes in mood from before to after the experimental task as an index of the effectiveness of mood regulation. As expected, the results showed that higher initial levels of depressive symptoms were associated with greater persistence of sad mood. More importantly, this association was present in participants who shook their heads, but not in those who nodded. These results show that body movements can contribute to mood-regulation processes, thus expanding our knowledge of the psychopathology of mood disorders.