Volunteer work as a valuable leisure‐time activity: A day‐level study on volunteer work,non‐work experiences,and well‐being at work

In this 2‐week diary study, with 105 employees providing data on a total of 476 days, we examined relationships between the amount of time spent on volunteer work activities during leisure time, psychological non‐work experiences in the evening (i.e. recovery experiences of psychological detachment from work and mastery as well as need satisfaction), and work outcomes during the following working day (i.e. positive and negative affect, and active listening). Results confirmed the hypothesized positive relationships between the amount of time spent on volunteer work activities and psychological detachment from work, mastery experiences, and need satisfaction in the evening. Psychological detachment from work in the evening was positively related to active listening during the following working day. Need satisfaction in the evening was negatively related to negative affect and positively related to active listening during the following working day. The amount of time spent on volunteer work activities was negatively related to negative affect during the following working day. This relationship was mediated by need satisfaction in the evening.     

Arousal enhanced memory retention is eliminated following temporal lobe resection

The amygdala, situated in the anterior medial temporal lobe (MTL), is involved in the emotional enhancement of memory. The present study evaluated whether anterior MTL-resections attenuated arousal induced memory enhancement for pictures. Also, the effect of MTL-resections on response latencies at retrieval was assessed. Thirty-one patients with unilateral MTL-resections (17 left, 14 right) together with 16 controls participated in a forced choice memory task with pictorial stimuli varying in arousal. Response latencies increased with stimulus arousal in controls but not in patients. This was paralleled by attenuated recognition memory for moderately and highly arousing pictures in MTL-resectioned patients as compared to healthy controls. However, patients and controls did not differ in memory performance for non-arousing pictures. These results suggest that the MTL is necessary for arousal induced memory enhancement.     

Offener und verdeckter Narzissmus

Psychoanalytic theories and clinical practice refer to 2 types of narcissism which differ in the visibility of the narcissistic features: while overt narcissism is observable in open behaviour, covert narcissism is concealed behind an insecure appearance. This distinction was tested empirically by relating the two types of narcissism to self-esteem and the attachment dimensions avoidance and anxiety. Patients in a psychosomatic out-patient department (n=102) were examined with self-report measure. Overt narcissism is associated with a high, covert narcissism with a low self-esteem. Furthermore, while overt narcissism is not related to the attachment dimensions, covert narcissism is accompanied by high levels of attachment anxiety. The results support the theory that narcissism is divided into 2 subtypes which have different profiles in terms of self-esteem and attachment.     

The Relation between Selection Expectations,Perceptions and Organizational Attraction: A test of competing models

Little is known about how applicants' selection expectations and perceptions interplay in predicting applicant attraction outcomes (organizational attractiveness, job pursuit intention, and recommendation intention). In the present study, 340 entry‐level applicants for jobs in a large financial company provided information about their selection expectations before the procedure, and about their perceptions and attraction to the organization after the procedure. Regression analyses indicated that applicant perceptions, and in particular perceptions of warmth/respect, mediated the relationship between selection expectations and organizational attractiveness and job pursuit intention. No support was found for the moderating role of selection expectations in the perception–attraction relationship. Implications for practice and future research are discussed.     

Effects of country size and language similarity on international attitudes: a six-nation study

Linguistically similar neighbouring nations that differ in size are often asymmetrical in their attitudinal relations towards each other: Citizens of smaller nations tend to see larger nations as less likeable and less similar than vice versa. We hypothesized that the smaller nations' reaction is the consequence of a threatened identity due to its relative size combined with too much similarity on a vital part of its identity, namely language. To test this hypothesis, 832 high‐school students from six different ethnic/national entities (France, Germany, Austria, the French‐ and German‐speaking parts of Switzerland, the French‐ and Dutch‐speaking parts of Belgium, and The Netherlands) completed a questionnaire on liking and similarity ratings. The results—to a large extent—showed that differences in size, in combination with linguistic similarity with another nation, pose a threat to the identity of the smaller nation or ethnic group. Differences in size, in combination with linguistic similarity, were associated with asymmetries in mutual liking on one hand and asymmetrical perceptions of similarity to the other country on the other hand. The conclusions of this study are consistent with findings of earlier research and stress the importance of language for a nation's identity. Moreover, the findings support social identity theory as a useful theory for understanding intergroup and international relations.     

Ingratiation and Self‐Promotion in the Selection Interview: The Effects of Using Single Tactics or a Combination of Tactics on Interviewer Judgments

This paper investigates the relative effectiveness of the use of 2 impression‐management tactics—ingratiation and self‐promotion—on interviewers' evaluations of an applicant in a laboratory setting. It was suggested that the use of a single tactic would be better than the use of no tactic; that the use of self‐promotion would be more successful than the use of ingratiation; and, finally, that the use of a combination of tactics would lead to the best evaluations. Results were largely in line with our hypotheses. Interviewer ratings and action recommendations were more positive in the combination condition, followed by the self‐promotion condition, the ingratiation condition, and the neutral condition. Theoretical and practical implications are discussed.     

Active suppression in the mediotemporal lobe during directed forgetting

The aim of the present study was to investigate whether forgetting is merely a passive process or whether it can also be caused by active suppression of memory contents.We investigated effects of directed forgetting by intracranial event-related potentials (ERPs) in 12 patients with mesial temporal lobe epilepsy. In a single-item directed forgetting paradigm, the patients were presented with words either followed by the instruction that this word has to-be-remembered (TBR) or to-be-forgotten (TBF). All patients were implanted with multicontact depth electrodes along the rhinal cortex and hippocampus as part of their presurgical evaluation.Patients recognized significantly less TBF than TBR words in a subsequent recognition test. In the hippocampus, TBF cues that caused subsequent forgetting were associated with decreased negative ERPs. In the rhinal cortex, TBF cues elicited a generally prolonged positivity, as compared to TBR cues.We interpret the decreased hippocampal ERPs following the TBF cues as an indication for an active suppression of hippocampal functions. The increased rhinal activity in response to the TBF cue might indicate an active involvement of this structure in the suppression of hippocampal memory formation.     

Les travailleurs handicapés sont-ils perçus comme des travailleurs compétents ?

Building on recent research in the area of social judgment, this paper examines how persons with disability are evaluated in a professional context. In three studies, participants without disability had to rate persons with or without disability, with or without a job, on traits reflecting the fundamental dimensions of social judgment (social desirability and social utility). Our results showed that persons with disability were systematically judged more negatively on social utility, but more positively on social desirability than persons without disability. Focusing on social utility, persons with disability were perceived as less competent, but more courageous than persons without disability. These results are discussed with regard to chances of persons with disability to succeed in the workplace.     

Cognitive consistency and the formation of interpersonal attitudes: Cognitive balance affects the encoding of social information

Three studies investigated the role of cognitive balance in the formation of interpersonal attitudes. Experiment 1 found evidence for balanced triads when participants first formed an attitude about one person, and then learned about this person’s sentiments about another individual. Interestingly, balanced triads were obtained for both explicitly and implicitly assessed attitudes. Experiment 2 indicated that the pattern of interpersonal relations does not result in balanced triads, when participants first learn about the relationship between two neutral individuals, and then receive evaluative information about one of the two individuals. In this case, observed sentiments and evaluative information affected attitudes in an additive rather than interactive manner. Experiment 3 replicated these findings by manipulating valence, observed sentiments, and order of information acquisition in a single study. Taken together, these results suggest that cognitive balance influences the encoding of social information, rather than the retroactive construal of evaluative judgments.