Anxiety,Depression, and Procrastination Among Students: Rumination Plays a Larger Mediating Role than Worry

Procrastination is prevalent among students and is associated with negative outcomes, including poor academic performance and psychological distress. Research also suggests that anxiety and depression can exacerbate procrastination; however, the mechanisms associated with the development of procrastination are less understood. The current study aimed to clarify the role of negative repetitive thought (i.e., rumination and worry) in the links between anxiety and procrastination, and depression and procrastination. Ninety-one undergraduate students completed self-report measures of anxiety, depression, worry, brooding rumination, and procrastination, and two multiple mediator models were tested. Procrastination was positively correlated with the study variables, including medium effects for anxiety and depression, a large effect for rumination, and a small effect for worry. Rumination independently mediated the relationships between anxiety and procrastination, and depression and procrastination. Worry did not independently mediate these relationships. The current findings suggest rumination plays a larger role in the links between anxiety, depression, and procrastination than worry. Thus, students with higher levels of anxiety and depression engage in more negative repetitive thought, which may contribute to procrastinatory behavior as a result of a preoccupation with depressing or painful thoughts about the past.     

Emotion regulation and peer-rated social functioning: A 4-year longitudinal study

Different emotion regulation strategies have been linked to distinct social outcomes, but only concurrently or in the short-term. The present research employed a 4-year longitudinal design with peer-reported measures of social functioning to examine the long-term social effects of emotion regulation. Individual differences in suppression before entering college predicted weaker social connections (e.g., less close relationships) at the end of college, whereas reappraisal predicted stronger social connections and more favorable sociometric standing (e.g., higher social status). These effects of emotion regulation remained intact even when controlling for baseline social functioning and Big Five personality traits. These findings suggest that individual differences in the use of particular emotion regulation strategies have an enduring impact, shaping the individual’s social environment over time.     

Suppression sours sacrifice: emotional and relational costs of suppressing emotions in romantic relationships

What happens when people suppress their emotions when they sacrifice for a romantic partner? This multimethod study investigates how suppressing emotions during sacrifice shapes affective and relationship outcomes. In Part 1, dating couples came into the laboratory to discuss important romantic relationship sacrifices. Suppressing emotions was associated with emotional costs for the partner discussing his or her sacrifice. In Part 2, couples participated in a 14-day daily experience study. Within-person increases in emotional suppression during daily sacrifice were associated with decreases in emotional well-being and relationship quality as reported by both members of romantic dyads. In Part 3, suppression predicted decreases in relationship satisfaction and increases in thoughts about breaking up with a romantic partner 3 months later. In the first two parts of the study, authenticity mediated the costly effects of suppression. Implications for research on close relationships and emotion regulation are discussed.     

Analysing the perceptions of pedestrians and drivers to shared space

Shared space is an approach to improving streets and places where both pedestrians and vehicles are present, with layouts related more to the pedestrian scale and with features encouraging drivers to assume priority having been reduced or removed. It creates a more pedestrian-friendly environment than conventional street layouts, which are based on greater segregation between pedestrians and vehicles, while at the same time introducing uncertainty, which makes drivers engage more fully with their surroundings, leading to lower vehicle speeds and improved safety. This paper investigates the importance of certain person-, context- and design-specific factors affecting the perceptions of pedestrians and drivers to shared space. Using two web-based stated-preference surveys, two sets of responses are collected from pedestrians and drivers, who are presented with different combinations of binary factors forming scenarios. Regression analysis is carried out with logit models for each survey. The results suggest that pedestrians feel most comfortable in shared space under conditions which ensure their presence is clear to other road users – these conditions include low vehicular traffic, high pedestrian traffic, good lighting and pedestrian-only facilities. Conversely, the presence of many pedestrians and, in particular, children and elderly, makes drivers feel uneasy and, therefore, enhances their alertness.     

Rationalism,irrationalism and taylorism

From Taylorism to Fordism: A Rational Madness, by Bernard Doray, London: Free Association Books, 1988, 229 pages, hb £27.50, pb £11.95.     

Psychological treatment and reconstruction with a chronic pain patient

This article describes the psychological treatment of a chronic pain patient using a single case design methodology in order to evaluate changes in symptomatic measures as well as in Repertory Grid Test scores. These changes included a substantial reduction in levels of subjective pain and anxiety as well as a reduction in symptom superordinacy, level of self-dissatisfaction, and positive meaning (“payoff”) of anxiety. Results are discussed in relation to the literature on pain and on personal construct theory.     

Why are Extraverts more Satisfied? Personality,Social Experiences,and Subjective Well‐being in College

It is widely appreciated that extraversion is associated with greater subjective well‐being. What is not yet clear is what mechanisms relate the two. In two longitudinal studies, we explored whether extraversion is prospectively associated with higher levels of satisfaction during college through influencing college social experiences using longitudinal cross‐lagged mediation models. In both studies, students' extraversion at the beginning of college predicted their subjective well‐being 4 years later. In both studies, extraversion at the beginning of college predicted a variety of self‐reported and peer‐reported social experiences (e.g. feelings of belonging and size of social network). We tested whether qualitative or quantitative aspects of social experiences explained the association between extraversion and subjective well‐being. In the first study, neither type of social experience explained the effect of extraversion on satisfaction. Only qualitative social experiences in the second study were instrumental in explaining this effect. The results suggest that extraversion's ability to create better social experiences can play a role in extraverts' greater subjective well‐being, but these experiences are not the only reason extraverts are happier and more satisfied. Copyright © 2017 European Association of Personality Psychology     

Emotion regulation strategy selection in daily life: The role of social context and goals

Recent studies have begun to document the diversity of ways people regulate their emotions. However, one unanswered question is why people regulate their emotions as they do in everyday life. In the present research, we examined how social context and goals influence strategy selection in daily high points and low points. As expected, suppression was particularly tied to social features of context: it was used more when others were present, especially non-close partners, and when people had instrumental goals, especially more interpersonal ones (e.g., avoid conflict). Distraction and reappraisal were used more when regulating for hedonic reasons (e.g., to feel better), but these strategies were also linked to certain instrumental goals (e.g., getting work done). When contra-hedonic regulation occurred, it primarily took the form of dampening positive emotion during high points. Suppression was more likely to be used for contra-hedonic regulation, whereas reappraisal and distraction were used more for pro-hedonic regulation. Overall, these findings highlight the social nature of emotion regulation and underscore the importance of examining regulation in both positive and negative contexts.     

ACTIONS,HABITS AND CONSTITUTION

In this paper I offer a critique of the view made popular by Davidson that rationalization is a species of causal explanation, and propose instead that in many cases the explanatory relation is constitutive. Given Davidson’s conception of rationalization, which allows that a huge range of states gathered under the heading ‘pro attitude’ could rationalize an action, I argue that whilst the causal thesis may have some merit for some such ‘attitudes’, it has none for others. The problematic ‘attitudes’ are those which can be attributed to the agent only on the basis of her history of doing a certain sort of thing. In other words, they are among the agent’s habits. I argue that such temporally extended states cannot be the causes of any present occurrence. Instead, I suggest we should think of the present action as partly constituting the state in question, and give a corresponding interpretation of the explanatory relation. Such explanations invite us to abandon a conception of agency narrowly based on psychology, in favour of an enriched one which takes an agent’s habits to partly constitute the agent.