The role of skin color and facial physiognomy in racial categorization: Moderation by implicit racial attitudes

Previous research has not sufficiently addressed factors that define and moderate racial categorization judgments. This study independently manipulated skin color and facial physiognomy to determine their relative weighting in racial categorization. Participants (N = 250) judged faces varying on 10 levels of facial physiognomy (from Afrocentric to Eurocentric) and 10 levels of skin color (from dark to light) under either no time constraints, a modest time constraint, and under a stringent time constraint. Skin color was a powerful predictor of racial typicality ratings at all levels of facial physiognomy, but participants relied upon facial physiognomy more when rating faces of light than dark skin color. Skin color was a more important cue than facial physiognomy under no time constraints, but as time constraints became more severe, skin color's importance decreased, yet it remained a more important cue at extreme physiognomy levels. The relationship between skin color and racial typicality ratings was stronger for those with more negative implicit racial attitudes. These findings suggest the primary role of skin color in racial categorization and underscore the importance of implicit attitudes in explicit categorization judgments.     

Sexual behavior in Spanish adolescents of divorced parents

Marital breakup has been associated with numerous behavioral problems in children, such as sexual risk behaviors. This research is the first to examine sexual behaviors of Spanish adolescents related to whether their parents were married or divorced. Participants were 342 boys and girls aged between 14 and 18 years. The sample provided confidential information about their sexual behavior and birth control methods. Significant differences were only found in percentages of adolescents who had engaged in mutual masturbation, intercourse, or oral sex, and who had practiced these sexual relations in the last six months, in both cases, they were higher when the parents had broken their marital relationship. Regarding adolescents of divorced parents, engaging in intercourse is more likely in older teenagers who live with a stepparent. Moreover, older adolescents who were younger when parents divorced and who live in a reconstituted family, have more sexual partners. These and other findings are discussed.     

The representation of abstract words: why emotion matters

Although much is known about the representation and processing of concrete concepts, knowledge of what abstract semantics might be is severely limited. In this article we first address the adequacy of the 2 dominant accounts (dual coding theory and the context availability model) put forward in order to explain representation and processing differences between concrete and abstract words. We find that neither proposal can account for experimental findings and that this is, at least partly, because abstract words are considered to be unrelated to experiential information in both of these accounts. We then address a particular type of experiential information, emotional content, and demonstrate that it plays a crucial role in the processing and representation of abstract concepts: Statistically, abstract words are more emotionally valenced than are concrete words, and this accounts for a residual latency advantage for abstract words, when variables such as imageability (a construct derived from dual coding theory) and rated context availability are held constant. We conclude with a discussion of our novel hypothesis for embodied abstract semantics.     

Sources of Cognitive Exploration: Genetic Variation in the Prefrontal Dopamine System Predicts Openness/Intellect

The personality trait Openness/Intellect reflects the tendency to be imaginative, curious, perceptive, artistic, and intellectual - all characteristics that involve cognitive exploration. Little is known about the biological basis of Openness/Intellect, but the trait has been linked to cognitive functions of prefrontal cortex, and the neurotransmitter dopamine plays a key role in motivation to explore. The hypothesis that dopamine is involved in Openness/Intellect was supported by examining its association with two genes that are central components of the prefrontal dopaminergic system. In two demographically different samples (children: N = 608; adults: N = 214), variation in the dopamine D4 receptor gene (DRD4) and the catechol-O-methyltransferase gene (COMT) predicted Openness/Intellect, as main effects in the child sample and as a gene-gene interaction in adults.     

Evidence against the myth of adjustment problems of people with high intellectual abilities

Personal and social adjustment of high-ability children and adolescents is a very important issue in the specialized literature. The differences found between data for and against appropriate adjustment in gifted children and adolescents could be explained by conceptual or methodological biases. In this work, the relation between adjustment and high abilities are contrasted in a sample of teenagers from the Canary Islands, using a screening procedure based on their scores in intelligence tests. Results show that, although gifted adolescents differ significantly from their peers in the control group in socio-economic variables and academic performance, there are no differences in personal, social and educational adjustment. We conclude that adjustment problems and high ability are independent variables, and there is no evidence to support that gifted individuals have adjustment problems.     

Differentiating intolerance of uncertainty from three related but distinct constructs

Individual differences in uncertainty have been associated with heightened anxiety, stress and approach-oriented coping. Intolerance of uncertainty (IU) is a trait characteristic that arises from negative beliefs about uncertainty and its consequences. Researchers have established the central role of IU in the development of problematic worry and maladaptive coping, highlighting the importance of this construct to anxiety disorders. However, there is a need to improve our understanding of the phenomenology of IU. The goal of this paper was to present hypotheses regarding the similarities and differences between IU and three related constructs – intolerance of ambiguity, uncertainty orientation, and need for cognitive closure – and to call for future empirical studies to substantiate these hypotheses. To assist with achieving this goal, we conducted a systematic review of the literature, which also served to identify current gaps in knowledge. This paper differentiates these constructs by outlining each definition and general approaches to assessment, reviewing the existing empirical relations, and proposing theoretical similarities and distinctions. Findings may assist researchers in selecting the appropriate construct to address their research questions. Future research directions for the application of these constructs, particularly within the field of clinical and health psychology, are discussed.     

At the core of cyberaggression: A group-based explanation

In this study, prototypicality of the aggressor was tested as a group-level factor predicting social media users’ active participation in cyberaggression. Participants were exposed to a fictitious conversation, in which either a prototypical versus non-prototypical user posted an aggressive comment as a reply to a provocative comment. In line with self-categorization theory, we hypothesized that bystander participants would post an aggressive comment and rate the aggression as acceptable to a greater extent in the prototypical than in the non-prototypical condition. Furthermore, we predicted that perceived normativity of aggression would mediate the effect of prototypicality. Results supported these predictions and showed that prototypical members affect the extent to which collective aggressive behaviors in online interactions are approved and enacted. These findings highlight the importance of group-level factors in the study of cyberaggression and provide important information for understanding the psychological underpinnings of collective forms of online aggression.     

Review of: Svetlana Klimova: Russian Intelligentsia in Search of an Identity (Between Dostoevsky’s Oppositions and Tolstoy’s Holism), Leiden,Brill, 2020, Hardcover,ISBN 978-90-04-44060-9, $ 82,80

Studies in East European Thought -     

The relationship between sensory responsiveness profiles,attachment orientations,and anxiety symptoms

Individual variations in the way people respond to sensory stimuli can sometimes lead to maladaptive representations of the world. Indeed, sensory responsiveness profiles were found to be associated with mood symptoms such as depression and anxiety. The goal of the current study was to investigate whether attachment orientations can account for the relationship between sensory responsiveness profiles and anxiety symptoms. Participants (N = 194) completed a battery of questionnaires assessing sensory responsiveness profiles, attachment orientations, and anxiety symptoms. As expected, various associations between sensory responsiveness profiles and anxiety symptoms were accounted for by attachment anxiety and avoidance. We suggest a possible causal path, in which early‐developing sensory responsiveness profiles lead to attachment insecurities, which in turn may lead to mood symptoms such as anxiety.