Students’ individual interest in physical education: Development and validation of a questionnaire

Identifying the specificity of students’ individual interest in physical education is necessary to capture the different facets of this construct. In contrast to existing questionnaires in education which assess the multidimensionality of individual interest, the current scale used in physical education consists of a single‐item measurement which rates students’ individual interest for multiple physical activities taught during lessons. Even if this single‐item rating provides a basis for classifying interest relative to others, it does not provide information about the nature and internal components of individual interest. Therefore, the purpose of this study was to develop a valid and reliable questionnaire measuring the multidimensionality of students’ individual interest in physical education. Four stages were followed: (1) the development of a preliminary version based on the findings of a literature review on individual interest and a committee process validation; (2) a first study conducted on 481 secondary school students to establish the factor structure, and internal reliability of this questionnaire; (3) a second study based on 243 secondary school students to confirm its factor structure and to test its temporal stability; and finally, (4) a third study with 253 students to test its concurrent validity. The final form of the questionnaire consists of a three‐factor structure based on 14 items that measure students’ individual interest in physical education: positive affect and willingness to reengage (five items), stored utility value (four items), and stored attainment value and knowledge‐seeking intentions (five items).     

Close‐knit ties through thick and thin: Sharing social exclusion and acceptance enhances social bond

Three experiments investigated whether and why sharing experiences of social exclusion or social acceptance with others strengthens social bonds. Participants experienced either social exclusion or social acceptance alongside another co‐participant who either also experienced the same outcome, or experienced a different outcome, as them. Multilevel modeling results showed that participant dyads who shared the experience of social exclusion or social acceptance felt closer to each other than those who experienced different outcomes, and that perceived similarity mediated the effect of shared experiences on social bonds. Interestingly, participants felt closer to one another after having shared social acceptance, more so than when they have shared social exclusion. Implications of the present findings are interpreted in light of theories of social exclusion, shared experiences, and social bonding.     

Adverse caregiving in early life: The trauma and deprivation distinction in young children

Knowledge and understanding about the impact of cumulative adverse experiences on the health and wellbeing of children, adolescents, and adults has rapidly expanded over the past 30 years. Despite the invaluable attention and support this proliferation has drawn to the importance of early childhood experiences, we believe that it is time to move beyond broad indices of risk and toward more specific and individualized understanding of how risk exposures are linked to clinical outcomes in young children. Within infant and early childhood mental health, there is a need for greater specificity in linking adverse caregiving experiences in early life to psychopathology in children. We highlight a framework distinguishing experiences of trauma from experiences of deprivation and use the examples of posttraumatic stress disorder and reactive attachment disorder to demonstrate how greater specificity in our understanding of early adverse caregiving can lead to more accurate and targeted diagnosis and treatment for young children. Both researchers and clinicians benefit from an approach to gain a greater appreciation of the links between specific types of experiences and outcomes in the children that we serve.     

Human Self-Domestication and the Evolution of Pragmatics

As proposed for the emergence of modern languages, we argue that modern uses of languages (pragmatics) also evolved gradually in our species under the effects of human self-domestication, with three key aspects involved in a complex feedback loop: (a) a reduction in reactive aggression, (b) the sophistication of language structure (with emerging grammars initially facilitating the transition from physical aggression to verbal aggression); and (c) the potentiation of pragmatic principles governing conversation, including, but not limited to, turn-taking and inferential abilities. Our core hypothesis is that the reduction in reactive aggression, one of the key factors in self-domestication processes, enabled us to fully exploit our cognitive and interactional potential as applied to linguistic exchanges, and ultimately to evolve a specific form of communication governed by persuasive reciprocity—a trait of human conversation characterized by both competition and cooperation. In turn, both early crude forms of language, well suited for verbal aggression/insult, and later more sophisticated forms of language, well suited for persuasive reciprocity, significantly contributed to the resolution and reduction of (physical) aggression, thus having a return effect on the self-domestication processes. Supporting evidence for our proposal, as well as grounds for further testing, comes mainly from the consideration of cognitive disorders, which typically simultaneously present abnormal features of self-domestication (including aggressive behavior) and problems with pragmatics and social functioning. While various approaches to language evolution typically reduce it to a single factor, our approach considers language evolution as a multifactorial process, with each player acting upon the other, engaging in an intense mutually reinforcing feedback loop. Moreover, we see language evolution as a gradual process, continuous with the pre-linguistic cognitive abilities, which were engaged in a positive feedback loop with linguistic innovations, and where gene-culture co-evolution and cultural niche construction were the main driving forces.     

Prepared to fake? The relationship between applicants’ job interview preparation and faking

Multiple frameworks and models postulate an effect of job interview preparation on faking. Two studies were conducted to examine if applicants’ interview preparation is correlated with higher faking. Besides analyzing the general extent of preparation, we also distinguished between different preparation categories. In Study 1 (N = 237), a presented preparation video led to higher intentions on image protection but did not increase overall faking intentions. Study 2 (N = 206) focused on past preparation and impression management (IM). The total time spent on preparation was positively correlated with faking. Applicants’ preparation via online videos and professional interview preparation was correlated with higher deceptive and honest IM. Preparation via online videos was additionally correlated with a higher perceived interview difficulty.     

Inhibitory control and set shifting describe different pathways from behavioral inhibition to socially anxious behavior

Individuals with a behaviorally inhibited (BI) temperament are more likely to develop social anxiety. However, the mechanisms by which socially anxious behavior emerges from BI are unclear. Variation in different forms of top‐down control, specifically executive functions (EF), may play distinct roles and characterize differential pathways to social anxiety. Here 291 children were assessed for BI in toddlerhood (ages 2 and 3), parent‐reported inhibitory control and set shifting during middle childhood (age 7), and multidimensional assessment of socially anxious behavior completed during late childhood and early adolescence (ages 9 and 12). Structural equation modeling revealed that early variation in BI predicted the development of socially anxious behavior through either higher levels of parent‐reported inhibitory control or lower levels of parent‐reported set shifting. These data reinforce the notion that top‐down control does not uniformly influence relations between temperament and socially anxious behavior. These data suggest novel approaches to thinking about the role of EFs and social anxiety outcomes as children approach adolescence.     

Effects of containment and closure policies on controlling the COVID‐19 pandemic in East Asia

Growing efforts have been made to pool coronavirus data and control measures from countries and regions to compare the effectiveness of government policies. We examine whether these strategies can explain East Asia’s effective control of the COVID‐19 pandemic based on time‐series data with cross‐correlations between the Stringency Index and number of confirmed cases during the early period of outbreaks. We suggest that multidisciplinary empirical research in healthcare and social sciences, personality, and social psychology is needed for a clear understanding of how cultural values, social norms, and individual predispositions interact with policy to affect life‐saving behavioural changes in different societies.     

EDITORIAL Building bridges with mixed methods research?

Mixed methods refers to the use of both qualitative and quantitative approaches and methods in one study or sequentially in two or more studies. Without a mixed methods approach there is – to our minds ‐ a risk that only part of a phenomenon or experience is being explored. Our own involvement in mixed methods research has grown out of a shared interest in the concept ‘research‐practitioner’. Psychotherapy is a notoriously complex and ever‐developing field, and our growing sense has been that mixed methods research can contribute to a more complete – both broad and deep ‐ sense of knowledge and understanding.