Effects of containment and closure policies on controlling the COVID‐19 pandemic in East Asia

Growing efforts have been made to pool coronavirus data and control measures from countries and regions to compare the effectiveness of government policies. We examine whether these strategies can explain East Asia’s effective control of the COVID‐19 pandemic based on time‐series data with cross‐correlations between the Stringency Index and number of confirmed cases during the early period of outbreaks. We suggest that multidisciplinary empirical research in healthcare and social sciences, personality, and social psychology is needed for a clear understanding of how cultural values, social norms, and individual predispositions interact with policy to affect life‐saving behavioural changes in different societies.     

EDITORIAL Building bridges with mixed methods research?

Mixed methods refers to the use of both qualitative and quantitative approaches and methods in one study or sequentially in two or more studies. Without a mixed methods approach there is – to our minds ‐ a risk that only part of a phenomenon or experience is being explored. Our own involvement in mixed methods research has grown out of a shared interest in the concept ‘research‐practitioner’. Psychotherapy is a notoriously complex and ever‐developing field, and our growing sense has been that mixed methods research can contribute to a more complete – both broad and deep ‐ sense of knowledge and understanding.     

Explaining identity and distinctness

Philosophical Studies - This paper offers a metaphysical explanation of the identity and distinctness of concrete objects. It is tempting to try to distinguish concrete objects on the basis of...     

‘Personality in Its Natural Habitat’ Revisited: A Pooled,Multi-sample Examination of the Relationships Between the Big Five Personality Traits and Daily Behaviour and Language Use

Past research using the Electronically Activated Recorder (EAR), an observational ambulatory assessment method for the real-world measurement of daily behaviour, has identified several behavioural manifestations of the Big Five domains in a small college sample (N = 96). With the use of a larger and more diverse sample of pooled data from N = 462 participants from a total of four community samples who wore the EAR from 2 to 6 days, the primary purpose of the present study was to obtain more precise and generalizable effect estimates of the Big Five–behaviour relationships and to re-examine the degree to which these relationships are gender specific. In an extension of the original article, the secondary purpose of the present study was to examine if the Big Five–behaviour relationships differed across two facets of each Big Five domain. Overall, while several of the behavioural manifestations of the Big Five were generally consistent with the trait definitions (replicating some findings from the original article), we found little evidence of gender differences (not replicating a basic finding from the original article). Unique to the present study, the Big Five–behaviour relationships were not always comparable across the two facets of each Big Five domain. © 2020 European Association of Personality Psychology     

Providing more or less detailed information in job advertisements—Does it matter?

Job advertising is a common and useful recruitment marketing method that is available to a wide range of candidates and offers a practical way to widen the applicant pool. Frequently, retail advertisements only briefly introduce job requirements, but others provide more detailed information. Existing message studies, however, are inconclusive about the effectiveness of message specificity. A scenario‐based experiment that included 164 participants revealed that the type of decision maker (maximizer or satisficer) moderates the specificity effects in recruitment messages. After receiving a detailed job message, more satisficers stop their search process, but only maximizers perceive the company as more attractive and increase intentions toward the advertised job. A follow‐up qualitative study involving 30 participants provided further insights.     

Building cardiovascular disease competence in an urban poor Ghanaian community: A social psychology of participation approach

This paper describes conceptual, methodological, and practical insights from a longitudinal social psychological project that aims to build cardiovascular disease (CVD) competence in a poor community in Accra, Ghana's capital. Informed by a social psychology of participation approach, mixed method data included qualitative interviews and household surveys from over 500 community members, including people living with diabetes, hypertension, and stroke, their caregivers, health care providers, and GIS mapping of pluralistic health systems, food vending sites, bars, and physical activity spaces. Data analysis was informed by the diagnosis‐psychosocial intervention‐reflexivity framework proposed by Guareschi and Jovchelovitch. The community had a high prevalence of CVD and risk factors, and CVD knowledge was cognitive polyphasic. The environment was obesogenic, alcohol promoting, and medically pluralistic. These factors shaped CVD experiences and eclectic treatment seeking behaviours. Psychosocial interventions included establishing a self‐help group and community screening and education. Applying the “AIDS‐competent communities” model proposed by Campbell and colleagues, we outline the psychosocial features of CVD competence that are relatively easy to implement, albeit with funds and labour, and those that are difficult. We offer a reflexive analysis of four challenges that future activities will address: social protection, increasing men's participation, connecting national health policy to community needs, and sustaining the project.     

Attachment and resource sharing

In three studies we examined the associations between resource sharing (RS) and attachment, and the enhancement of RS using attachment security primes. In Study 1, we showed that attachment avoidance was negatively associated with RS. We also identified differences and similarities between RS and pro‐sociality. In Studies 2 and 3, we showed that research participants were more likely to share their monetary resources after they were primed with attachment security. Study 3 further revealed that security priming affected mainly people low on state attachment anxiety. Our findings extend previous work on pro‐sociality into the specific realm of RS, provide behavioral evidence, and tie attachment and close relationships in with game theory and research on economic decision making.     

Women are not swayed by sugar‐coated acts of verbal sexual coercion

Sexual coercion is receiving much attention with the #MeToo movement. Not all of the tactics that perpetrators use to coerce sex are perceived to be equally unacceptable. This study examined factors that may mitigate negative perceptions, including features of the perpetrator's tactics (verbal vs. physical tactics, relationship‐focused vs. self‐focused reasons to coerce sex) and raters' own current relationship (commitment, dependence, sexually coercive experiences). College women (N = 498) rated whether the perpetrator's behavior was acceptable, was excusable, and would adversely affect a relationship. Verbal (vs. physical) coercion, dependence on a current partner, and sexually coercive experiences in a current relationship mitigated negative perceptions. However, participant ratings were not influenced by the perpetrator's use of relationship‐focused reasons for coercing sex (vs. self‐focused reasons), suggesting that women may resist male attempts to sugar‐coat sexual coercion.