Consistency of the Yamauchi/Templer Money Attitude Scale

In a sample of 139 community residents, three of the four subscales from the Yamauchi and Templer Money Attitude Scale were replicated.     

Sex,Power, and Money: Prediction from the Dark Triad and Honesty–Humility

Data were collected from two undergraduate student samples to examine (i) the relations of the ‘Dark Triad’ variables (Machiavellianism, Psychopathy, and Narcissism) with the HEXACO personality dimensions, as well as (ii) the ability of the aforementioned characteristics and of the Big Five personality factors to predict outcome variables related to sex, power, and money. Results indicated that the common variance of the Dark Triad was very highly correlated with low Honesty–Humility and that the unique variance of each of the Dark Triad variables also showed theoretically meaningful relations with the other five HEXACO factors. Furthermore, the Dark Triad and Honesty–Humility were strong predictors of three domains of outcome variables—Sex (short‐term mating tendencies and sexual quid pro quos), Power (Social Dominance Orientation and desire for power), and Money (conspicuous consumption and materialism)—that were not well predicted by the dimensions of the Big Five. Copyright © 2012 John Wiley & Sons, Ltd.     

Social exclusion modulates pre-reflective interpersonal body representation

Perception of affordance is enhanced not only when that object is located in one’s own peripersonal space, as compared to when it is located within extrapersonal space, but also when the object is located in another person’s peripersonal space [as measured by a spatial alignment effect (SAE)]. It has been suggested that this reflects the existence of an interpersonal body representation (IBR) that allows us to represent the perceptual states and action possibilities of others. Here, we address the question of whether IBR can be modulated by higher level/reflective social cognition, such as judgments about one’s own social status. Participants responded with either the right or the left hand as soon as a go signal appeared. The go signal screen contained a task-irrelevant stimulus consisting of a 3D scene in which a mug with a left- or right-facing handle was positioned on a table. The mug was positioned either inside or outside the reaching space of the participants. In a third of the trials, the mug was positioned within the reaching space of an avatar seated at the table. Prior to this task we induced an experience of social ostracism in half of the participants by means of a standardized social exclusion condition. The results were that the SAE that normally occurs when the mug is in the avatar’s reaching space is extinguished by the induced social exclusion. This indicates that judgments about one’s own social status modulate the effect of IBR.     

In the eye of the beholder? Universality and cultural specificity in the expression and perception of emotion

Do members of different cultures express (or “encode”) emotions in the same fashion? How well can members of distinct cultures recognize (or “decode”) each other's emotion expressions? The question of cultural universality versus specificity in emotional expression has been a hot topic of debate for more than half a century, but, despite a sizeable amount of empirical research produced to date, no convincing answers have emerged. We suggest that this unsatisfactory state of affairs is due largely to a lack of concern with the precise mechanisms involved in emotion expression and perception, and propose to use a modified Brunswikian lens model as an appropriate framework for research in this area. On this basis we provide a comprehensive review of the existing literature and point to research paradigms that are likely to provide the evidence required to resolve the debate on universality vs. cultural specificity of emotional expression. Applying this fresh perspective, our analysis reveals that, given the paucity of pertinent data, no firm conclusions can be drawn on actual expression (encoding) patterns across cultures (although there appear to be more similarities than differences), but that there is compelling evidence for intercultural continuity in decoding, or recognition, ability. We also note a growing body of research on the notion of ingroup advantage due to expression “dialects,” above and beyond the general encoding or decoding patterns. We furthermore suggest that these empirical patterns could be explained by both universality in the underlying mechanisms and cultural specificity in the input to, and the regulation of, these expression and perception mechanisms. Overall, more evidence is needed, both to further elucidate these mechanisms and to inventory the patterns of cultural effects. We strongly recommend using more solid conceptual and theoretical perspectives, as well as more ecologically valid approaches, in designing future studies in emotion expression and perception research.     

Does how I look at what you're doing depend on what I'm doing?

Previous studies showed that people proactively gaze at the target of another's action by taking advantage of their own motor representation of that action. But just how selectively is one's own motor representation implicated in another's action processing? If people observe another's action while performing a compatible or an incompatible action themselves, will this impact on their gaze behaviour? We recorded proactive eye movements while participants observed an actor grasping small or large objects. The participants' right hand either freely rested on the table or held with a suitable grip a large or a small object, respectively. Proactivity of gaze behaviour significantly decreased when participants observed the actor reaching her target with a grip that was incompatible with respect to that used by them to hold the object in their own hand. This indicates that effective observation of action may depend on what one is actually doing, being actions observed best when the suitable motor representations may be readily recruited.     

Out of your hand's reach, out of my eyes' reach

When witnessing another's action, people recruit the same motor resources that enable them to efficiently perform that action, thus gazing at its target well before the agent's hand. But just to what extent does this recruitment help people in grabbing another's action target? If the latter seems to be out of the agent's reach, will this impact on people's gaze behaviour? We recorded proactive eye movements while participants witnessed someone else trying to reach for and grasp objects located either within or outside his reach. Proactivity of gaze was impaired when the targets were just out of the agent's reach. This effect is likely to be due to an interpersonal bodily space representation that allows one to map another's reaching space, thus prompting proactive eye movements towards the target just in case the agent is in the position to act upon it.     

Supportive Organizations,Work–Family Enrichment,and Job Burnout in Low and High Humane Orientation Cultures

The present study draws on the work–family and cross-national management literature to examine the relationships between Family-Supportive Organizational Perceptions (FSOP), work–family enrichment, and job burnout across five countries with different cultural backgrounds: Malaysia, New Zealand, France, Italy, and Spain. Using a combined sample of 980 employees, we find support for a partial mediation model in which FSOP is positively associated with work–family enrichment, which in turn is negatively related to job burnout. Given our focus on support, we test the moderating role of the cultural value humane orientation, that is, the extent to which a society values altruism, kindness, and compassion. The five countries in our sample offer variation in their country-level scores as determined by the GLOBE study (House et al., 2004). We found that individuals from cultures that scored higher in “as is” humane orientation (i.e., scores for actual practices) experienced lower job burnout when FSOP increased. This pattern was reversed when considering “should be” humane orientation (i.e., scores for ideal values). The implications for the work–family and the cross-national management literature, and for practice, are discussed.     

Assessing Private and Public Need for Uniqueness: Validation of French Versions of the Need for Uniqueness (NfU) and Self-Attributed Need for Uniqueness (SANU) Scales

Need for uniqueness represents the need for people to feel different and distinguish themselves from others. Two major scales exist that measure this need: the Need for Uniqueness scale (NfU; Snyder &; Fromkin, 1977 Snyder, C. R., &; Fromkin, H. L. (1977). Abnormality as a positive characteristic: The development and validation of a scale measuring need for uniqueness. Journal of Abnormal Psychology, 86, 518–527. https://doi.org/10.1037/0021-843X.86.5.518[Crossref], [Web of Science ®] , [Google Scholar]) and the Self-Attributed Need for Uniqueness scale (SANU; Lynn &; Harris, 1997b Lynn, M., &; Harris, J. (1997b). Individual differences in the pursuit of self-uniqueness through consumption. Journal of Applied Social Psychology, 27, 1861–1883. https://doi.org/10.1111/j.1559-1816.1997.tb01629.x[Crossref], [Web of Science ®] , [Google Scholar]). We propose here a French version of both scales. Through a dual approach of exploratory and confirmatory factorial analyses, we investigated the scales' structure in student samples from two French-speaking countries (France and Switzerland, N = 1,348) as well as measures of internal and external validity. Both scales presented good psychometric properties in French. Additionally, we investigated differences between the scales, as literature suggests that the NfU relies mostly on public and risky displays of uniqueness, whereas the SANU focuses on private and more socially acceptable means to acquire a feeling of uniqueness. Differences arose in the links with several personality characteristics (emotionality, extraversion, agreeableness, sensation seeking, and self-consciousness), suggesting that the NfU corresponds rather to a need to demonstrate uniqueness through public displays and the SANU to a need to feel unique through more private means. We discuss implications for research and provide advice on choosing by the scale most appropriate to the researcher's aims.