Postactional goal pursuit: Consequences of task completion for thought content,affect, and behavioral intentions

Postactional goal pursuit remains an underexplored area of the mindset theory of action phases. According to the theory, individuals enter a postactional phase following the completion of an intention. This phase focuses on evaluating goal outcomes, answering questions such as: Was the goal completed successfully? Was it worth the effort? Contrasting postactional phase with predecisional and actional goal pursuit, the present research examines differences in cognitive orientation, affective responses to feedback, and functional benefits for adapting subsequent goal pursuit. Five experiments show that postactional goal pursuit engenders outcome-focused deliberation, more intense affect in reaction to the current state of goal pursuit, and increased readiness to adapt subsequent goal pursuit to experienced outcomes. Moving beyond conceptual arguments, the present work provides initial evidence that postactional goal pursuit provokes a mindset-like shift suitable for a phase-specific task of outcome evaluation.     

Psychological and neurological predictors of abusive supervision

Although the negative effects of abusive supervision are well documented, less is known about the individual differences that drive supervisors to be abusive. We use a self‐control perspective to understand the unique roles of both psychological and neurological characteristics of supervisors in the prediction of abusive behavior. Specifically, we find a positive relationship between narcissism and abusive supervision, whereas political skill and intrinsic neurological connectivity in executive control regions of the brain negatively relate to abusive supervision. Our results further show that the relationship between narcissism and abusive supervision diminishes for those who are strong in terms of political skill. In addition, neurological executive control moderates the relationship between political skill and abusive behavior. When connectivity in executive control regions of the brain is lower, political skill becomes a more important factor in reducing the display of abusive behavior. Overall, we demonstrate how combinations of characteristics (both psychological and neurological) can provide a more in‐depth understanding of the emergence of abusive supervision.     

The experience of being envied at work: How being envied shapes employee feelings and motivation

We develop and test a theoretical framework delineating the dual affective and motivational experiences arising from perceptions of being envied in the workplace. We theorize that being envied can be pleasantly or unpleasantly experienced with opposite downstream effects on motivation and job performance. We test our model in two field studies using a sample of government employees (Study 1) and a sample of employees in the financial industry (Study 2). Our results indicate that being envied can elicit unpleasant mood and anxiety that influence work engagement and job performance in negative ways. In addition, we found that positive emotional experiences from being envied bolster work engagement and performance through positive mood but not pride. Implications of our findings are discussed.     

Tumor Screening in Beckwith-Wiedemann Syndrome: Parental Perspectives

Children with Beckwith-Wiedemann Syndrome (BWS) and Isolated Hemihypertrophy (IHH) are at an increased risk for developing tumors. Tumor screening in this population is currently being reassessed by several groups and the effect on patients and patient-families has been argued both as a reason to screen and not to screen. Parental perspectives on this topic have never been systematically addressed for the BWS population. Here, we conducted a parent-based survey to evaluate knowledge and attitudes toward tumor screening in patients affected by BWS/IHH. A total of 261 surveys were completed. Overall, parents reported that screening decreased their worry and did not feel that screening increased worry or created a burden. This effect was observed across various demographic variables and other factors examined. Almost all significant differences observed could be attributed to parental knowledge of tumor risk. Parents who correctly identified their child’s tumor risk were more likely to agree with stratified screening recommendations according to BWS type and risk, and were less likely to feel worried if recommendations were changed. These results highlight the need to educate families about their child’s genetic type and tumor risk in order to facilitate an informed decision about tumor screening.     

Cross-species referential signalling events in domestic dogs (<Emphasis Type="Italic">Canis familiaris</Emphasis>)

Referential gestures are used by a signaller to draw a recipient’s attention to a specific object, individual or event in the environment. These gestures have received much research attention in relation to human and non-human primates with great apes being shown to possess impressive gestural repertoires. Domestic dogs (Canis familiaris) meanwhile provide an ideal non-primate candidate for investigating referential signalling due to their unique relationship with humans that centres on non-verbal communication with frequent interaction. Here we observed 37 pet dogs in their own homes. Owners recorded 242 videos containing 47 potential referential gesture events. We analysed those recordings to reveal evidence of 19 referential gestures performed by domestic dogs during everyday communicative bouts with humans, showing that the gestures conform to the five features of referential signalling. Our study exposes impressive gesturing abilities in a non-primate mammal; especially when viewed in the context of the cross-species rather than intraspecific communication.     

Meditation buffers medical student compassion from the deleterious effects of depression

Increasing data suggest that for medical school students the stress of academic and psychological demands can impair social emotions that are a core aspect of compassion and ultimately physician competence. Few interventions have proven successful for enhancing physician compassion in ways that persist in the face of suffering and that enable sustained caretaker well-being. To address this issue, the current study was designed to (1) investigate the feasibility of cognitively-based compassion training (CBCT) for second-year medical students, and (2) test whether CBCT decreases depression, enhances compassion, and improves daily functioning in medical students. Compared to the wait-list group, students randomized to CBCT reported increased compassion, and decreased loneliness and depression. Changes in compassion were most robust in individuals reporting high levels of depression at baseline, suggesting that CBCT may benefit those most in need by breaking the link between personal suffering and a concomitant drop in compassion.     

Moderators of the relationships between coworkers' organizational citizenship behavior and fellow employees' attitudes

The authors developed and tested the prediction that the relationship hetween coworkers' organizational citizenship behaviors (OCBs) and fellow employees' attitudes depends on the supervisors' abusiveness. Results of a longitudinal study using data collected from 173 supervised employees at 2 points in time (separated by 7 months) suggested that coworkers' OCB was positively related to fellow employees' job satisfaction and affective commitment when abusive supervision was low. However, when abusive supervision was high, coworkers' OCB was negatively related to job satisfaction and was unrelated to organizational commitment. The results of a 2nd study were consistent with the idea that the attributions employees make for their coworkers' OCB explains the moderating effect of abusive supervision on the relationship between coworkers' OCB and job satisfaction.     

The effects of behavioral history on response acquisition with immediate and delayed reinforcement

Effects of prior exposure to the experimental chamber with levers present or absent and variable-time (VT) 60-s water deliveries arranged during one, five, or no 1-hr sessions were examined in rats during a 6-hr response-acquisition session in which presses on one lever produced water delivery immediately or after a 15-s resetting delay, and presses on the other lever canceled scheduled water deliveries. Response acquisition was (a) slower to occur when water deliveries were delayed, (b) most consistent in groups that had received five VT sessions, and (c) impaired by the presence of levers only when there had been five VT sessions and water deliveries were delayed during the acquisition session.     

Memory for targets in a multilevel simulated environment: Evidence for vertical asymmetry in spatial memory

In two experiments, adult participants explored a symmetrical three-tiered computer-simulated building that contained six distinctive objects, two on each floor. Following exploration, the objects were removed, and the participants were asked to make direction judgments from each floor, indicating the former positions of the objects on that floor and on higher and lower floors. Relative tilt error scores indicated a bias, in that targets that were higher than the test location were judged as consistently lower than their actual positions and targets that were lower than the test location were judged as consistently higher than their actual positions. Absolute tilt errors revealed an asymmetry, with more accurate and less variable tilt errors for judgments directed to lower floors than for judgments directed to higher floors. Experiment 3 ruled out an account of the findings that does not relate them to spatial memory. The results suggest that the superiority of downward over upward spatial judgments, previously reported in two-dimensional visual-spatial tasks, extends to navigational spatial memory.     

The Galileo bias: a naive conceptual belief that influences people's perceptions and performance in a ball-dropping task

This research introduces a new naive physics belief, the Galileo bias, whereby people ignore air resistance and falsely believe that all objects fall at the same rate. Survey results revealed that this bias is held by many and is surprisingly strongest for those with formal physics instruction. In 2 experiments, 98 participants dropped ball pairs varying in volume and/or mass from a height of 10 m, with the goal of both balls hitting the ground simultaneously. The majority of participants in both experiments adopted a single strategy consistent with the Galileo bias, showing no improvement across trials. Yet, for participants reporting intentions of dropping both balls at the same time, the differences between release points were significantly greater than 0 ms. These findings support separate but interacting cognition and perception-action systems.