Attitudinal ambivalence, rumination, and forgiveness of partner transgressions in marriage

Although positive and negative attitudes toward a transgressor are related to increased and decreased forgiveness, respectively, prior research has failed to investigate forgiveness among those who feel both positively and negatively toward a transgressor. Therefore, the authors examined such ambivalence and its relationship to forgiveness. It was hypothesized that spouses with ambivalent attitudes toward their partner will be less forgiving of a partner transgression because such an event is likely to prime the negative component of their ambivalence. Because ruminating about a transgression also has the potential to prime the negative component of one's ambivalence, an interaction between rumination and ambivalence was predicted. Data from 87 married couples showed that greater attitudinal ambivalence toward the partner was associated with decreased forgiveness only when husbands and wives thought about the transgression frequently; ambivalence was not related to forgiveness in the absence of rumination. The implications of these findings for understanding forgiveness in marriage and for increasing forgiveness among married couples are discussed.     

Processes operative during delay of gratification

Sixty-four middle-class preschool children chose between waiting for a preferred item and receiving a less desired item immediately. The items were of different classes, i.e., one food and one toy, and subjects waited with one, both, or neither of the rewards available for viewing. The likelihood that a subject would continue waiting for the delayed reward was found to increase as a function of previous waiting time rather than decrease or remain constant as required by two current theories of delay of gratification processes, an aversive affect model implied by Mischel and Ebbesen (1970) and Atkinson and Birch's (1970) dynamics of action. Although display of rewards impaired successful delay, replicating previous results, dynamics of action predictions of differential effects for display of immediately available and delayed outcomes of different classes were not confirmed. Systematic observation of spontaneous subject activities during the delay period offered additional support for the notion that distraction facilitates successful waiting behavior. A decision-attention model is proposed to account for the present results as well as those of previous studies of delay of gratification.We would like to thank the director, Mr. Jack Lewis, and the staff of the Red Bell Nursery of Plymouth, Michigan, for helping us obtain subjects for this study and providing access to their facilities. We are also grateful to Ms. Shirley St. Peter and Ms. Carolyn Jagacinski for their work as experimenters.     

Negative dominance in hedonic integration of noun-noun pairs

Subjects in Experiment 1 rated the pleasantness of nouns and of noun pairs. Although pair pleasantness was highly correlated with average component-word pleasantness, it was systematically lower than this average. In Experiment 2, subjects rated all combinations of 18 nouns on either pleasantness or unpleasantness of the pair, in a within-subject factorial design. Significant interactions in the two studies were interpreted in the context of algebraic integration theory as indicating a context-sensitive differential weighting of components: the more unpleasant noun of a pair had a greater effect on pair ratings than the more pleasant noun. The potential reliability and generality of this negative dominance effect was considered, and it was contrasted with the Pollyanna effect discussed by previous authors.The authors would like to thank Ronald Fox for his valuable help with the data analysis.     

Social support, positive states of mind, and HIV treatment adherence in men and women living with HIV/AIDS.

Numerous studies have linked social support to better medication adherence among illness groups, but few have examined potential mechanisms for this relationship. Relationships were examined between social support, depression, positive states of mind (PSOM), and medication adherence among HIV positive men who have sex with men (n = 61) and women (n = 29) on highly active antiretroviral therapy. Depression and PSOM were evaluated as potential mediators of the relationship between support and adherence. Cross-sectional data showed that greater social support and PSOM related to better adherence whereas higher depression scores related to nonadherence. PSOM partially mediated the relationship between social support and adherence. PSOM may be an important mechanism through which social support is related to better medication adherence in this population.     

The Use of the MMPI-2 Infrequency–Psychopathology Scale in the Assessment of Posttraumatic Stress Disorder in Male Veterans

This study evaluated the use of the F_P (Infrequency–Psychopathology) scale of the Minnesota Multiphasic Personality Inventory—2 (MMPI-2) as a measure of symptom overreporting among 423 service-seeking male veterans with and without PTSD. Results were consistent with several predictions based on the logic of the F_P scale. F_P produced lower scores for PTSD and non-PTSD patients than the other two MMPI-2 measures of infrequent responding; F and F_B. F_P also resulted in fewer invalid protocols than did F or F_B. Finally, F_P yielded lower correlations with MMPI-2 and other measures of psychopathology than did F or F_B. Consistent with previous studies, compensation-seeking status was associated with extreme elevations across clinical and validity scales. Contrary to previous findings, however, compensation-seeking veterans were also more likely to receive a PTSD diagnosis. Implications for the relationship between compensation seeking and symptom overreporting are discussed.     

Explaining the Appeal of Populist Right‐Wing Parties in Times of Economic Prosperity

The assumption that populist right‐wing parties (PRWPs) thrive when the economy slows down is remarkably pervasive. What is often neglected is evidence showing PRWPs can thrive in times of economic prosperity. To examine this, we conducted an experiment in which participants were exposed to different appraisals of the future of the national economy and were subsequently asked to evaluate an anti‐immigration speech (Study 1). Results showed stronger anti‐immigrant sentiments when the national economy was presented as prospering rather than contracting. We then analyzed speeches by PRWP leaders who secured electoral victories during economic prosperity (Study 2) and found that these leaders encourage a sense of injustice and victimhood by portraying ordinary citizens as the victim of an alliance between powerful groups (the elite) and less powerful groups (refugees, immigrants, minorities). More specifically, Study 2 showed that PRWP leaders are crafty identity entrepreneurs who are able to turn objective relative gratification into perceived relative deprivation. We conclude that it is hence problematic to treat PRWP support as evidence of “resonance” with public sentiments and urge PRWP scholars interested in supply‐side factors to engage with the social identity literature on leadership, followership, and social influence.     

Inheritance of Religiosity Among Muslim Immigrants in a Secular Society

This study examined the intergenerational transmission of religiosity within Muslim immigrant families who live in the Netherlands, a rather secular society. We studied whether transmission of religiosity within immigrant families is influenced by warm family relations on the one hand, and integration into the host country on the other hand. Two analyses were carried out on a nationally representative sample of Turkish and Moroccan first- and second-generation immigrants aged 15–45, in the Netherlands. The findings support the hypotheses to some extent: warm family ties are found to facilitate religious transmission but transmission is stronger when parents have different national backgrounds. A stronger transmission is found within families that are stronger embedded in religious communities; however there are large differences between men and women. Our research shows that the influence of parental religiosity cannot be ignored in the study of immigrants’ religiosity.     

Do You ‘See’ What I ‘See’? Differentiation of Visual Action Words

Dickinson and Szeligo (Can J Exp Psychol 62(4):211–222, 2008) found that processing time for simple visual stimuli was affected by the visual action participants had been instructed to perform on these stimuli (e.g., see, distinguish). It was concluded that these effects reflected the differences in the durations of these various visual actions, and the results were compared to participants’ subjective ratings of word meaning but it was also possible that word characteristics like length might have influenced response times. The present study takes advantage of word length differences between French and English visual action words in order to address this issue. The goals of the present study were to provide evidence that (1) the processing time differences previously found were due to differences in the cognitive actions represented by these words (and not due to characteristics to the words themselves), and (2) that individuals subjectively differentiate visual action words in such a way that allows for predictable differences in behaviour. Participants differentiated 14 French visual action words along two dimensions. Four of these words were then used in the instructions for a size-discrimination task. Processing time depended on the visual action word in the instruction to the task and differed in a predictable manner according to word meaning but not word length.     

Crime Scene Investigation: The Chief Inspectors’ Display Rules

Television as one factor in the “cycle of role division” (Eagly 1987; Shields 2002) can aid to perpetuate traditional role attitudes as well as set new norms. The aim of the study is to examine gender differences in facial expression of emotion on TV as well as changes of these differences over time. A content analysis of 12 episodes of a prominent German crime series from two time samples (1979–1981 / 2005) was done by employing the Emotional Facial Action Coding System (EmFACS, Friesen and Ekman 1983). Results show that there are gender differences in stereotypically male emotions: Male actors express these emotions significantly more frequently than female actors, while the latter show more “social smiles”. These differences are reduced over time.