In the beginning: role of autonomy support on the motivation, mental health and intentions of participants entering an exercise referral scheme

Self-determination theory (Deci & Ryan, 2000, Intrinsic motivation and self-determination in human behaviour. New York: Plenum Publishing) highlights the impact autonomy supportive environments can have on exercise motivation and positive health outcomes. Yet little is known about whether differential effects occur as a function of which significant other is providing this support. Further, no research has examined the relationship between motivation and the social environment with participants' mental health and intentions to be physically active before entering an exercise intervention. Study participants were 347 British adults who were about to start an exercise referral scheme. Regression analyses revealed that the effects of autonomy support on mental health and physical activity intentions differed as a function of who provided the support (offspring, partner or physician), with the offspring having the weakest effects. A structural model was supported, indicating that autonomy support and more autonomous regulations led to more positive mental health outcomes and stronger intentions to be physically active. Knowledge of the social environmental and personal motivation of those about to commence an exercise programme can provide important insights for professionals supporting such efforts.     

The role of the nucleus accumbens in knowing when to respond

While knowing what to expect is important, it is equally important to know when to expect it and to respond accordingly. This is apparent even in simple Pavlovian training situations in which animals learn to respond more strongly closer to reward delivery. Here we report that the nucleus accumbens core, an area well-positioned to represent information about the timing of impending rewards, plays a critical role in this timing function.     

Automatic and strategic effects in the guidance of attention by working memory representations

Theories of visual attention suggest that working memory representations automatically guide attention toward memory-matching objects. Some empirical tests of this prediction have produced results consistent with working memory automatically guiding attention. However, others have shown that individuals can strategically control whether working memory representations guide visual attention. Previous studies have not independently measured automatic and strategic contributions to the interactions between working memory and attention. In this study, we used a classic manipulation of the probability of valid, neutral, and invalid cues to tease apart the nature of such interactions. This framework utilizes measures of reaction time (RT) to quantify the costs and benefits of attending to memory-matching items and infer the relative magnitudes of automatic and strategic effects. We found both costs and benefits even when the memory-matching item was no more likely to be the target than other items, indicating an automatic component of attentional guidance. However, the costs and benefits essentially doubled as the probability of a trial with a valid cue increased from 20% to 80%, demonstrating a potent strategic effect. We also show that the instructions given to participants led to a significant change in guidance distinct from the actual probability of events during the experiment. Together, these findings demonstrate that the influence of working memory representations on attention is driven by both automatic and strategic interactions.     

When sentimental rules collide: "norms with feelings" in the dilemmatic context

According to a recently prominent account of moral judgment, genuine moral disapprobation is a product of two convergent vectors of normative influence: a strong negative affect that arises from the mere consideration of a given piece of human conduct and a (socially acquired) belief that this conduct is wrong (Nichols, 2002). The existing evidence in favor of this “norms with feelings” proposal is rather mixed, with no obvious route to an empirical resolution. To help shed further light on the situation, we test a previously unexamined prediction that this account logically yields in a novel dilemmatic context: when individuals are faced with a moral dilemma that pits two or more “affectively-charged” moral norms against each other, the norm underwritten by the strongest feeling ought to determine the content of dilemmatic resolution. Across three studies, we find evidence that directly challenges this prediction, offering support for a Kolhberg-style “rationalist” alternative instead. More specifically, we find that it is not the participants’ degree of norm-congruent emotion (whether situationally or dispositionally assessed) or its correlates, but rather their appraisal of the relative costs associated with various alternative courses of action that appears to be most predictive of how they resolve the experimentally induced moral conflict. We conclude by situating our studies within an overarching typology of moral encounters, which, we believe, can help guide future research as well as shed light on some current controversies within this literature.     

Trends and developments in community and applied social psychology: JCASP 1991–2010

This paper looks back on the trends and developments in and of the Journal of Community and Applied Social Psychology since its inception twenty years ago. We review to what extent the aims that were originally set for JCASP have been fulfilled. The trends in nationality of authors, themes of publications and their methodology are discussed. Possible implications of these trends and developments for JCASP and its future are pointed at. Copyright © 2010 John Wiley & Sons, Ltd.     

The random effects prep continues to mispredict the probability of replication

In their reply, Lecoutre and Killeen (2010) argue for a random effects version of p_rep, in which the observed effect from one experiment is used to predict the probability that an effect from a different but related experiment will have the same sign. They present a figure giving the impression that this version of p_rep accurately predicts the probability of replication. We show that their results are incorrect and conceptually limited, even when corrected. We then present a meaningful evaluation of the random effects p_rep as a predictor and find that, as with the fixed effects p_rep, it performs very poorly.     

Rightward collisions and their association with pseudoneglect

Whereas right parietal damage can result in left hemineglect, the general population shows a subtle neglect of the right hemispace-known as pseudoneglect. A recent study has demonstrated that people collide to the right more often and attributed this bias to pseudoneglect. [Nicholls, M. E. R., Loftus, A., Meyer, K., & Mattingley, J.B. (2007). Things that go bump in the right: The effect of unimanual activity on rightward collisions. Neuropsychologia, 45, 1122-1126]. Nicholls examined the effect of unimanual activation by requiring participants to fire projectiles at a target whilst walking and found that the rightward bias was exaggerated or reversed when the left and right hands were active, respectively. However, the act of aiming at a target may have inadvertently biased walking trajectory to the right. The current study addressed this issue by requiring participants (n=149) to walk through a narrow doorway three times whilst entering text into a phone using the (a) left, (b) right or (c) both hands. Despite the fact that entering text into a phone should produce no rightward bias, participants bumped to the right more often. Unlike previous research, no effect of unimanual activation was observed. This lack of effect was attributed to the smaller hand movements for entering numbers compared to firing a toy gun. Finally, this study showed an association for the first time between biases in observable bumping and line bisection performance-suggesting that unilateral bumping is related to pseudoneglect.     

Putting Values into Practice: Public Policy and the Future of Mental Health Consumer-run Organizations

The purpose of the paper is to reflect on value dilemmas in mental health consumer-run organizations and to discuss implications for research, policy, and practice. We review the roots of consumer-run organizations in the self-help movement and the psychiatric survivor liberation movement, focusing on the distinctive values espoused by consumer-run organizations. We also discuss evidence-based and value-based approaches to mental health policy formulation and mental health reform, noting the particular importance of value-based approaches and the role that consumer-run organizations can play in mental health reform. Based on our experiences conducting a participatory action research study of four mental health consumer-run organizations, we identify and examine several value dilemmas, discuss the lessons that we learned about these value dilemmas, and note their implications for future directions in research, policy, and practice.     

The psychology of meta-ethics: exploring objectivism

How do lay individuals think about the objectivity of their ethical beliefs? Do they regard them as factual and objective, or as more subjective and opinion-based, and what might predict such differences? In three experiments, we set out a methodology for assessing the perceived objectivity of ethical beliefs, and use it to document several novel findings. Experiment 1 showed that individuals tend to regard ethical statements as clearly more objective than social conventions and tastes, and almost as objective as scientific facts. Yet, there was considerable variation in objectivism, both across different ethical statements, and across individuals. The extent to which individuals treat ethical beliefs as objective was predicted by the way they grounded their ethical systems. Groundings which emphasize the religious, pragmatic, and self-identity underpinnings of ethical belief each independently predicted greater ethical objectivity. Experiment 2 replicated and extended these findings with a refined measure of ethical objectivism. Experiment 3 demonstrated the robustness of the religious grounding of ethics, and differentiates it from mere religious belief and from political orientation. The results shed light on the nature of ethical belief, and have implications for the resolution of ethical disputes.