Body image trends among Icelandic adolescents: a cross-sectional national study from 1997 to 2010

The aim of this study was to evaluate trends in body image among Icelandic adolescents from 1997 to 2010. Data from five cross-sectional surveys conducted among national samples of 9th and 10th graders in Iceland using five time points (1997, 2000, 2006, 2009, and 2010) were compared to examine changes in body image. In total, 32,397 adolescents participated in the study. Body image among 14-15-year-old adolescents in Iceland improved significantly over the 13-year period. Girls reported more negative body image than boys at all time points. However, the positive change in body image from 1997 to 2010 was more pronounced for girls than boys, resulting in a narrower gap between the genders. The current results are encouraging and indicate that in an age of increased overweight and obesity, the body image of Icelandic adolescents is becoming more positive.     

Teaching Exegesis in Historically Black Theological Schools

This Forum collects the papers presented at a 2010 panel at the Society of Biblical Literature, an outcome of a Wabash Center funded grant project. The project examined the unique dimensions and experiences of teaching Biblical exegesis at the six historically black theological schools (HBTSs), including discussion of the unique needs of HBTS students and their communities, and appropriate learning goals and effective teaching practices for this context. None of the biblical studies faculty were prepared as graduate students for the unique challenges that they have encountered teaching at a HBTS, so they have all had to “learn on the job” how best to approach the unique needs of the student body. The brief statements collected here summarize the findings from the project, describe and analyze some effective teaching strategies, and offer suggestions for continuing the conversation.     

Semantic components in the literal and metaphorical use of movement verbs

The study analyzes acceptability judgments relating to sentences that have the same syntactic structure (subject-verb-locative) and varying possibilities of semantic anomaly. Twelve movement verbs were used—that is, 12 verbs indicating a change in position or location; a componential analysis of these verbs was carried out beforehand by the authors. In all, 288 sentences were constructed by combining these 12 verbs with 24 subject-locative pairs. The subjects (university students) were asked to judge the acceptability of the sentences on a 5-step scale. The data were subjected to two methods of factor analysis; in this way three factors were revealed. By examining the verbs loaded on the three factors in the light of the abovementioned componential analysis, it was found that certain components, if present, reduced the probability that a sentence would be judged acceptable in a metaphorical sense; this was especially true of the components use of instruments and typically human character of the action, which, in the sentences with nonhuman subject, are contradictory with the meaning of the subject, and of medium-specific, often contradictory with the meaning of the locative. The results are discussed in relation to some theoretical and methodological problems in current research on the comprehension of metaphor.     

A Chinese perspective on Kohlberg's theory of moral development

This essay uses the Chinese culture as an example to underline the culturally specific contextual problems regarding Kohlberg's theory of moral development and to point to a new direction for cross-cultural research in this area. The Western view of man as an autonomous being who makes free and rational choices as a moral agent is clearly reflected in Kohlberg's stages of moral development as well as his methodology. The Confucian view of man as an integral part of an orderly universe with an innate moral sense to maintain harmony is quite different. Further, the preferred mode of resolving human conflict in China is reconciliation and collective decision making rather than individual choice, commitment, and responsibility as in the West. In the light of these fundamental differences in the two cultural traditions, an alternative to Kohlberg's theory is suggested.     

Gratitude in buyer-seller relationships: a dyadic investigation

In addressing the call for research to understand affect in sales, this research uses moral affect theory and literature on emotional contagion to examine the effects of salesperson gratitude and customer gratitude on downstream relationship outcomes. The findings of this work suggest that salesperson prosocial behaviors account for the positive association between salesperson gratitude and customer gratitude. These prosocial behaviors – information sharing and extra-role behaviors – combined with customer gratitude serve as explanatory mechanisms for the positive effects of salesperson gratitude on customer commitment, which is an important result of buyer-seller interactions and an essential component of long-term relationships. Further, this research finds that salesperson extra-role behaviors and relationship length interact such that salesperson extra-role behaviors cultivate customer gratitude within developing and established relationships, but that these behaviors are particularly beneficial for less mature relationships. Understanding the role of salesperson gratitude and customer gratitude in driving relational outcomes contributes to both a theoretical understanding of the role of affect in sales and practical applications of emotions within buyer-seller relationships.     

Improving Intergroup Relations with Extended Contact among Young Children: Mediation by Intergroup Empathy and Moderation by Direct Intergroup Contact

A correlational study investigated extended contact as a strategy to improve outgroup attitudes and stereotyping and to prepare children for future contact. Additional aims were to investigate when and why the effects of extended contact occur. In particular, intergroup empathy was tested as a mediator and direct contact (i.e. cross‐group friendship) as a moderator of extended contact. Participants were Italian and immigrant elementary school children. Results showed that extended contact was associated with improved intergroup empathy, which, in turn, was associated with more positive outgroup attitudes, stereotypes and behavioural intentions. These effects were significant only among participants with a low or moderate level of direct contact. The theoretical and practical implications of findings are discussed. Copyright © 2016 John Wiley & Sons, Ltd.     

Longitudinal effects of contact on intergroup relations: The role of majority and minority group membership and intergroup emotions

A field study was conducted in the Italian context to examine the longitudinal effects of contact on improved intergroup relations, and to test whether the effects were different for majority and minority group members. Furthermore, we examined the processes underlying contact effects. Participants were 68 Italian (majority) and 31 immigrant (minority) secondary school students, who completed a questionnaire at two time points. The results of regression analyses showed that, consistent with the contact hypothesis (Allport, 1954 ), quantity and quality of contact longitudinally improved outgroup evaluation and increased the attribution of positive stereotypes to the outgroup; the reverse paths were non‐significant. Notably, whereas quantity of contact improved intergroup attitudes and stereotypes for both majority and minority participants, quality of contact had reliable effects only for the majority group. Intergroup anxiety and empathy mediated the longitudinal effects of quantity of contact for both Italians and immigrants; the cross‐lagged effects of contact quality on criterion variables for the Italian group were mediated by intergroup empathy. The theoretical and practical implications of findings are discussed. Copyright © 2010 John Wiley & Sons, Ltd.     

The greatest magic of Harry Potter: Reducing prejudice

Recent research shows that extended contact via story reading is a powerful strategy to improve out‐group attitudes. We conducted three studies to test whether extended contact through reading the popular best‐selling books of Harry Potter improves attitudes toward stigmatized groups (immigrants, homosexuals, refugees). Results from one experimental intervention with elementary school children and from two cross‐sectional studies with high school and university students (in Italy and United Kingdom) supported our main hypothesis. Identification with the main character (i.e., Harry Potter) and disidentification from the negative character (i.e., Voldemort) moderated the effect. Perspective taking emerged as the process allowing attitude improvement. Theoretical and practical implications of the findings are discussed in the context of extended intergroup contact and social cognitive theory.     

Bayesian inference for psychology,part III: Parameter estimation in nonstandard models

We demonstrate the use of three popular Bayesian software packages that enable researchers to estimate parameters in a broad class of models that are commonly used in psychological research. We focus on WinBUGS, JAGS, and Stan, and show how they can be interfaced from R and MATLAB. We illustrate the use of the packages through two fully worked examples; the examples involve a simple univariate linear regression and fitting a multinomial processing tree model to data from a classic false-memory experiment. We conclude with a comparison of the strengths and weaknesses of the packages. Our example code, data, and this text are available via https://osf.io/ucmaz/.