Warding off the evil eye: when the fear of being envied increases prosocial behavior

The fear of being envied makes people act prosocially, in an attempt to ward off the potentially destructive effects of envy. In three experiments, people who were in a superior position and could be envied were more likely than control participants to give time-consuming advice to a potentially envious person or to help a potentially envious person pick up erasers she had accidentally scattered. However, helping behavior increased only if envy was likely to be malicious rather than benign. People who were better off did not increase their helping behavior toward people in general, but increased their helping only toward the potentially envious. This finding is consistent with the idea that the better off act more prosocially as an appeasement strategy. The fear of being envied serves useful group functions, because it triggers prosocial behavior that is likely to dampen the potentially destructive effects of envy and simultaneously helps to improve the situation of people who are worse off.     

Social change in the aftermath of successful minority influence

This chapter describes a programme of research on group dynamics in the aftermath of successful minority influence that reverses minority and majority positions within a group. Supporting the authors' gain - loss asymmetry model of change, converging evidence suggests that loss of the majority position generates strong disidentification from the superordinate group whereas gaining the majority position does not yield comparable identification. This overall decrease in identification is associated with a general increase in hostility, reduced helpfulness, and a desire to exit the group. Thus groups may be especially fragile following internal changes in the majority - minority positions. Additional research suggests that such a pattern of reactions to majority - minority change is a specifically group phenomenon (versus aggregates of individuals) and occurs when majority - minority reversals follow the attitude change of existing group members (versus an influx of new members). New majorities will increase their identification with the group when converts provide genuine support or when their new majority position persists over time. Implications of these findings for intra-group relations in the aftermath of social change are discussed.     

A longitudinal assessment of relationship characteristics that predict new parents' relationship satisfaction

Drawing on the relational turbulence model, this study queries whether it is the amount of relational uncertainty and partner interference in a relationship, or the magnitude of an increase in these mechanisms over time, that accounts for decreased relationship satisfaction for new parents. To test these competing hypotheses, a longitudinal study of 78 couples was conducted in which both partners completed surveys about their relationship at 4 time points during the transition to parenthood. Multilevel modeling revealed that the amount and the increase of relational uncertainty and partner interference were negatively associated with relationship satisfaction when considered separately, but when evaluated in combination, the magnitude of an increase in these variables was the stronger predictor of relationship satisfaction.     

Dissociation of facial attractiveness and distinctiveness processing in congenital prosopagnosia

According to the influential model of Bruce and Young (1986) socially relevant facial information is processed separately from facial information leading to individual face recognition. In recent years functional imaging has identified a network of distinct occipitotemporal cortex areas for the processing of these two kinds of information. Functionally it is not clear at which processing level the “social” and the “recognition” pathways diverge. The study of subjects with a profound face recognition and learning deficit (congenital prosopagnosia—cPA) promises for a better understanding of this issue. We therefore tested the perception of attractiveness (a cue of prime social importance) and distinctiveness (a facial feature related to recognition) in 14 people with cPA. Although attractiveness ratings were highly consistent with controls, cPA subjects' distinctiveness ratings showed random patterns. This dissociation of normal attractiveness processing and impaired distinctiveness processing in cPA helps to specifies the nature of the impairment in this condition while shedding light on the functional architecture of normal face processing.