Attentional characteristics of different types of individuals with high self-esteem in self-threatening situations

The high self-esteem (HSE) heterogeneity hypothesis provides a new research perspective for investigating differences in the quantity and quality of different types of self-esteem. The present study adopted the emotional Stroop paradigm and the odd-one-out search task to explore how individuals with different types of self-esteem process social information in self-threatening situations. The results showed that individuals with different types of self-esteem had an attentional bias toward negative information and had different attentional biases toward angry faces in self-threatening situations. Individuals with fragile HSE and low self-esteem showed facilitated attention to angry faces and had difficulty drawing attention away from them; secure HSE individuals only showed difficulty disengaging attention from angry faces.

     

The effect of shame on anger at others: awareness of the emotion-causing events matters

Numerous studies have found that shame increases individuals’ anger at others. However, according to recent theories about the social function of shame and anger at others, it is possible that shame controls individuals’ anger at others in specific conditions. We replicated previous findings that shame increased individuals’ anger at others’ unfairness, when others were not aware of the individual’s experience of shameful events. We also found for the first time that shame controlled or even decreased individuals’ anger at others’ unfairness, when others were aware of the individual’s experience of shameful events. The results were consistent when shame was induced by either a recall paradigm or an imagination paradigm, and in either the ultimatum game or the dictator game. This suggests that shame strategically controls individuals’ anger at others to demonstrate that they are willing to benefit others, when facing the risk of social exclusion. Our findings highlight the interpersonal function of shame and deepen the understanding of the relationship between shame and anger at others.     

The effects of ongoing task absorption on event-based prospective memory in preschoolers

The current study applied a 2 × 2 experimental design to investigate the effects of ongoing task absorption on event-based prospective memory performance of children aged 3 and 5 years. Children were required to label pictures as ongoing task but to remember to refrain from picture naming and to respond to the target cues in a different way as the prospective memory task. Two differently absorbing ongoing tasks (high absorbing scenario game task vs. low absorbing computer-based task) were administered. Results indicated that prospective memory performance of 5-year-old children was significantly better than that of 3-year-old children. Ongoing task absorption affected the ongoing task performance of preschoolers, but not overall prospective memory performance. Only the 3-year-olds were negatively affected by high ongoing task absorption, which was not the case for the 5-year-olds. The findings are discussed within the light of the multiprocess theory.     

Antecedents of bridge employment: a longitudinal investigation

Bridge employment is the labor force participation pattern increasingly observed in older workers between their career jobs and their complete labor force withdrawal. It serves as a transition process from career employment to full retirement. Typical bridge employment decisions include full retirement, career bridge employment, and bridge employment in a different field. In the current study, 3 dominant theories (i.e., role theory, continuity theory, and life course perspective) on retirement processes were reviewed. On the basis of these theories, the authors proposed 4 categories of antecedents (i.e., individual attributes, job-related psychological variables, family-related variables, and a retirement-planning-related variable) of different types of bridge employment decisions. The authors used longitudinal data of a large, nationally representative sample from the Health and Retirement Study (F. Juster & R. Suzman, 1995) to test the current hypotheses. These data were analyzed with multinomial logistic regression, and most of the hypotheses were supported by the results. The implications of this study are discussed at both theoretical and practical levels.     

留守青少年的社会支持网络与其自尊、交往主动性之间的关系——基于变量中心和个体中心的视角

以来自河南省农村的400名双亲外出、单亲外出和非留守青少年为被试,采用变量中心和个体中心的分析策略.探讨了个体的社会支持网络与其自尊、交往主动性的关系.变量中心的分析发现,不同来源社会支持对于青少年自尊的重要性因留守状况的不同而不同:母亲支持是双亲外出青少年自尊的最佳预测变量,老师支持是非留守青少年自尊的最佳预测变量,父亲支持和老师支持则能够显著地预测单亲外出青少年的自尊;对于三类青少年的交往主动性,老师支持最为重要.个体中心的分析发现,处于高母亲倩父亲倩同学倩老师支持网络中青少年的自尊和交往主动性水平最高.     

元认知监控活动对认知负荷和多媒体学习的影响

在多媒体学习的不同时段呈现元认知监控提示,考察其对认知负荷和学习成绩的影响.结果表明,有意识的监控活动增加了被试总的认知负荷,对学习的迁移有积极影响.元认知监控活动提高了迁移测试成绩,但对记忆成绩没有显著影响.在内在、外在元认知负荷较低情况下,增加元认知监控活动有更好的学习迁移效果.     

在读护生的职业认同研究

目的研制在读护生的护士职业认同评价工具,并检测其信度和效度.方法运用访谈法、专家咨询法和文献法设计原始问卷,并运用调查法对145名护生进行试测,系统分析问卷的信效度.结果在读护生的护士职业认同问卷自我认知纬度包古五个因子,累计贡献率64.072%,共18项题目;自我体验纬度包吉五个因子,累计贡献率66.419%,共22项题目;自我控制纬度包含两因子累计贡献率53.766%,共11项题目,该问卷有较好的信效度.结论在读护生的护士职业认同问卷可以作为护理教育者对在读护生进行职业心理素质教育的评价依据.     

Upregulation of hippocampal TrkB and synaptotagmin is involved in treadmill exercise-enhanced aversive memory in mice

Cognitive functions usually involve various synaptic proteins and neurotrophic factors in the hippocampus. However, whether treadmill exercise can improve learning and memory by upregulating some of these molecules remain unraveled. To address this question, male BALB/c mice were divided into control and exercise groups, the latter group went through 4 weeks of treadmill exercise training. At the end of exercise training period, they were either tested for passive avoidance (PA) performance or sacrificed for quantifying the hippocampal levels of brain-derived neurotrophic factor (BDNF), tropomyosin-related kinase B (TrkB, the BDNF receptor), synaptotagmin (a Ca²⁺-dependent synaptic vesicle protein), and SNAP-25 (a presynaptic vesicular fusion protein). Our results showed that treadmill exercise training (1) increased the retention latency without affecting the fear acquisition in the PA test, (2) transiently increased the hippocampal BDNF level at 1, 2, and 4 h after the completion of exercise training, and (3) persistently increased the hippocampal protein levels of full-length TrkB, phosphorylated TrkB and synaptotagmin, but not truncated TrkB or SNAP-25. Moreover, the protein expression level of full-length TrkB or synaptotagmin was positively correlated with PA performance in mice. Finally, inhibition of TrkB signaling by K252a abolished the exercise-facilitated PA performance and upregulation of TrkB and synaptotagmin. Taken together, these data suggest that the upregulation of TrkB and synaptotagmin in the hippocampus contributes to the exercise-facilitated aversive memory.     

Differential Genetic and Environmental Influences on Reactive and Proactive Aggression in Children

While significant heritability for childhood aggression has been claimed, it is not known whether there are differential genetic and environmental contributions to proactive and reactive forms of aggression in children. This study quantifies genetic and environmental contributions to these two forms of aggression in an ethnically diverse urban sample of 9–10 year old twins (N = 1219), and compares results across different informants (child self-report, mother, and teacher ratings) using the Reactive–Proactive Aggression Questionnaire (RPQ). Confirmatory factor analysis of RPQ items indicated a significant and strong fit for a two-factor proactive–reactive model which was significantly superior to a one-factor model and which replicated across gender as well as the three informant sources. Males scored significantly higher than females on both self-report reactive and proactive aggression, findings that replicated on mother and teacher versions of the RPQ. Asian–Americans scored lower than most ethnic groups on reactive aggression yet were equivalent to Caucasians on proactive aggression. African–Americans scored higher than other ethnic groups on all measures of aggression except caregiver reports. Heritable influences were found for both forms of aggression across informants, but while boys’ self-reports revealed genetic influences on proactive (50%) and reactive (38%) aggression, shared and non-shared environmental influences almost entirely accounted for girls’ self-report reactive and proactive aggression. Although genetic correlations between reactive and proactive aggression were significant across informants, there was evidence that the genetic correlation was less than unity in boys self reported aggression, indicating that genetic factors differ for proactive and reactive aggression. These findings provide the first evidence for varying genetic and environmental etiologies for reactive and proactive aggression across gender, and provide additional support for distinction between these two forms of aggression.