Mapping the Hierarchical Structure of Coping: Unifying Empirical and Theoretical Perspectives

Consumer researchers have become increasingly interested in the study of coping. This research contributes to this emerging paradigm by investigating structural theories of coping using a hierarchical modeling approach to better understand the basic dimensional properties of this multifaceted construct. This research makes gains along several fronts. First, the authors empirically examine a new lower order theory of coping based on a comprehensive synthesis of the literature, reconciling nomenclatural and conceptual redundancies found in the structure of coping literature. Analyses across 2 studies using different methods offer support for a 2‐dimensional higher order model of coping. Finally, a third study using an experimental approach validates these findings by showing unique effects relating an approach‐avoidance based higher order model to theoretically predicted emotional antecedents. By examining the mapping of lower order coping strategies onto several higher order coping theories, this research addresses the extant disjuncture between coping theory and measurement found in the literature and offers reconciliation between these 2 perspectives. The findings suggest the need for future coping research to focus on other 2‐dimensional theories beyond problem‐focused versus emotion‐focused coping. The findings build on the synergies among the many coping perspectives, and the implications of a better understanding of coping's hierarchical structure for consumer researchers is discussed.     

Encoding of others’ beliefs without overt instruction

Under what conditions do people automatically encode and track the mental states of others? A recent investigation showed that when subjects are instructed to track the location of an object but are not instructed to track a belief about that location in a non-verbal false-belief task, they respond more slowly to questions about an agent’s belief, suggesting that belief information was not encoded or tracked automatically [Apperly, I. A., Riggs, K. J., Simpson, A., Samson, D., & Chiavarino, C. (2006). Is belief reasoning automatic? Psychological Science, 17, 841-844]. In the current experiments, we show that if belief probes occur closer in time to the events that signal the content of the agent’s false belief, responses to those probes are faster than responses to probes about reality, and as fast as responses to probes about belief when instructed to track them, suggesting (i) beliefs may get encoded automatically in response to certain cues and (ii) that belief information rapidly decays unless it is maintained via ‘top-down’ instructions.     

Prophetic Words for Psychologists: Particularity,Ethics and Peace

This essay seeks to consider the implications of the prophetic voice of Abraham Joshua Heschel. We argue that Heschel’s work offers important correctives to some of modern psychologies’ universalizing and reductive assumptions and activities. Specifically, we show that Heschel argues for an anthropology characterized by particularity, with a unique emphasis on the person’s standing in relation to God. Relatedly, we show how Heschel’s understanding challenges us to recognize that ethics is to precede ontology. Lastly, this primacy of ethics leads to a prophetic challenge toward becoming people of peace, systemically as well as individually. We conclude by applying Heschel’s admonishment to recent, specific activities of injustice and violence within the field of psychology. Heschel’s arguments are reviewed in a spirit of ecumenism, to pursue the ends of peace as a profession and as a society.

Incidental retrieval of emotional contexts in post-traumatic stress disorder and depression: an fMRI study

In the present study, we used fMRI to assess patients suffering from post-traumatic stress disorder (PTSD) or depression, and trauma-exposed controls, during an episodic memory retrieval task that included non-trauma-related emotional information. In the study phase of the task neutral pictures were presented in emotional or neutral contexts. Participants were scanned during the test phase, when they were presented with old and new neutral images in a yes/no recognition memory task. fMRI results for the contrast between old and new items revealed activation in a predominantly left-sided network of cortical regions including the left middle temporal, bilateral posterior cingulate, and left prefrontal cortices. Activity common to all three groups when correctly judging pictures encoded in emotional contexts was much more limited. Relative to the control and depressed groups the PTSD group exhibited greater sensitivity to correctly recognised stimuli in the left amygdala/ventral striatum and right occipital cortex, and more specific sensitivity to items encoded in emotional contexts in the right precuneus, left superior frontal gyrus, and bilateral insula. These results are consistent with a substantially intact neural system supporting episodic retrieval in patients suffering from PTSD. Moreover, there was little indication that PTSD is associated with a marked change in the way negatively valenced information, not of personal significance, is processed.     

Who I Am Depends on How I Feel: The Role of Affect in the Expression of Culture

ABSTRACT— We present a novel role of affect in the expression of culture. Four experiments tested whether individuals' affective states moderate the expression of culturally normative cognitions and behaviors. We consistently found that value expressions, self-construals, and behaviors were less consistent with cultural norms when individuals were experiencing positive rather than negative affect. Positive affect allowed individuals to explore novel thoughts and behaviors that departed from cultural constraints, whereas negative affect bound people to cultural norms. As a result, when Westerners experienced positive rather than negative affect, they valued self-expression less, showed a greater preference for objects that reflected conformity, viewed the self in more interdependent terms, and sat closer to other people. East Asians showed the reverse pattern for each of these measures, valuing and expressing individuality and independence more when experiencing positive than when experiencing negative affect. The results suggest that affect serves an important functional purpose of attuning individuals more or less closely to their cultural heritage.     

Suppressing Secrecy Through Metacognitive Ease: Cognitive Fluency Encourages Self-Disclosure

ABSTRACT— Understanding when people reveal unfavorable information about themselves is both practically and theoretically important. Existing research suggests that people tend not to adopt stable disclosure strategies, and consequently disclose too much information in some situations (e.g., embarrassing personal information on Facebook) and too little in other situations (e.g., risky sexual behavior to a physician during diagnosis of a possible sexually transmitted disease). We sought to identify a domain-general cue that predicts self-disclosure patterns. We found that metacognitive ease, or fluency, promoted greater disclosure, both in tightly controlled lab studies (Studies 1a, 1b, and 3) and in an ecologically valid on-line field study (Study 4). Disfluency tended to prime thoughts and emotions associated with risk, which might be one reason why people who experience disfluency are less comfortable with self-disclosure (Studies 2 and 3). We conclude by discussing the implications of these results for theory and clinical practice.     

Internet Recruiting: Effects of website content features on viewers' perceptions of organizational culture

This study examined the effects of four ‘careers’ website content features (pictures, testimonials, organizational policies, and awards won) on viewers' perceptions of nine organizational culture attributes. Eight of these culture attributes were more strongly conveyed by culture‐specific website content features than by culture‐neutral website content features. This study also found support for a partial mediated‐moderation model. This model illustrated that participants with weak culture preferences formed less favorable person–organization (P–O) fit perceptions as they perceived an organization to more strongly convey the culture attribute under investigation. Conversely, participants with strong culture preferences formed more favorable P–O fit perceptions as they perceived an organization to more strongly portray the culture attribute in question. Respondents with stronger P–O fit perceptions in turn reported stronger organizational attraction.     

Coping repertoire: Integrating a new conceptualization of coping with transactional theory

This research develops the construct of coping repertoire, a new trait-based conceptualization of coping based on the number of strategies consumers use in coping with consumer stress. We posit that the number of strategies consumers use is an important determinant of consumers' coping confidence appraisals, a key determinant of consumers' ability to effectively manage stress. In five studies, we establish the importance of this construct and the mechanism through which it influences appraisal. These studies establish the theoretical importance of coping repertoire as an important moderator, and we conclude with a discussion of future research related to this coping perspective.     

Moderating the route angularity effect in a virtual environment: Support for a dual memory representation

Research has shown that increasing the number of turns that a route takes through the environment increases estimates of distance—the route angularity effect. This study tested implications of different memory-based explanations of the route angularity effect within a virtual setting. Participants maneuvered through virtual pathways of varying length that included zero, two, or seven turns. After each set of three paths, they estimated relative path lengths on an analog scale. Results demonstrated that both increasing memory load during navigation and making retrieval more difficult by interpolating another spatial task prior to estimation significantly increased the magnitude of route angularity effects. These results are consistent with the idea that the number of turns is categorically encoded and used as a memory heuristic when fine-grained memory for the route distance is degraded either at encoding or prior to retrieval.     

Superordinate identity and intergroup roommate friendship development

A common ingroup identity promotes positive attitudes and behavior toward members of outgroups, but the durability of these effects and generalizability to relationships outside of the laboratory have been questioned. The present research examined how initial perceptions of common ingroup identity among randomly assigned college roommates provide a foundation for the development of intergroup friendships. For roommate dyads involving students who differed in race or ethnicity, respondents who were low on perceived intergroup commonality showed a significant decline in friendship over-time, whereas those high on perceived commonality showed consistently high levels of friendship. Similarly, participants in these dyads demonstrated a significant decline in feelings of friendship when their roommate was low in perceived commonality but not when their roommate was high in perceived commonality. These effects were partially mediated by anxiety experienced in interactions over-time. The implications of a common identity for intergroup relationship development are discussed.