Religion and politics: examining the impact of faith on political participation

This study examines the relationship between religion and political activity. It theorises religious influences on political activity and tests the impact of various religious factors on political participation in a large cross-national sample (1981–2014). This study integrates longitudinal data from the aggregated World Values Survey with country-level data in the hierarchical multilevel analysis that allows teasing out the individual-level religious influences, including membership in religious organisations, religiosity and self-identification with various religious denominations, and the country-level impacts. The temporal and spatial coverage of the data used in the study includes more than 65% of the world’s population. The seven types of political participation examined in the study include signing petitions, joining in boycotts, participating in demonstrations, taking part in unofficial strikes, occupying buildings and factories, voting and membership in political parties. We find that religion matters but not always in the expected ways. Religiosity, by itself, often serves as a deterrent rather than mobilising force for political engagement, regardless the denominational differences. It is the membership in religious organisations and other voluntary associations of a secular nature that make individuals more likely to engage in political activity.     

Fluctuating confidence: the dynamic consequences of true/false affirmatives and denials on how a listener appraises their personal past

The present study examined the mnemonic consequences of true/false denials and affirmatives on how a listener appraises their personal past. To this end, participants (listeners) rated the extent to which they were confident certain events occurred during their childhood. They rated these events both before and after a confederate (speaker) denied or affirmed the occurrence of four different childhood events each, for a total of eight “rehearsed” events. For each set (denials and affirmatives) of events, half were true and half were false. In turn, this created four types of events (two each): true denials, true affirmatives, false denials, and false affirmatives. Additionally, half of the participants were told that the speaker was provided independent information about the veracity of the event’s occurrence (“expert” condition). Overall, listeners were less confident in the occurrence of false denial events, but more so when they believed the speaker to be more knowledgeable of the listeners memories, more confident in false affirmative events and, counter intuitively, more confident in the occurrence of true denial events. These results underscore the importance of a nuanced approach to the mnemonic consequences of true and false denials and affirmations in the course of social interactions.     

Équivalence de la version en français pour le Canada et de la version originale états-unienne de l’Adult Self-Report

The aim of the present study was to evaluate the equivalence of the French-Canadian version of the Adult Self-Report (ASR; Achenbach & Rescorla, 2003) to its original English (USA) version. Both the original English version and the newly translated French-Canadian version were administered to 251 bilingual students from four Canadian provinces (Manitoba, New-Brunswick, Ontario, and Quebec), with a one to two weeks interval. Correlations varying from 0.72 to 0.87 indicated a high degree of correspondence between the scales of the two versions. Cohen's d calculated using Morris and DeShon's (2002) formula for within-subjects designs indicate that differences between mean scores varied from near-zero (d = 0.01) to small (d = 0.19), and suggest that they are not clinically significant. Ordinal alpha coefficients for the scales of the French-Canadian version varied from 0.66 to 0.96 but are inferior to those of the English version in seven of the eleven scales. Globally, results indicate that the equivalence of the French-Canadian version to the original English version of the ASR is sufficient to recommend its use.     

Situational meaninglessness and state boredom: Cross-sectional and experience-sampling findings

Theories of boredom assert that boredom is a product of situational meaninglessness. We conducted two studies to test if the perceived meaningfulness of a situation is associated with state boredom, above and beyond sadness, personality traits, and boredom proneness. In Study 1, 105 participants (72.4% female: mean age?=?33.9 years, SD?=?17.5) described situations in which they experienced boredom, no boredom, engagement, or sadness. They then rated the level of state boredom, sadness, and meaninglessness that they experienced in that situation. As hypothesized, state boredom was associated with situational meaninglessness, before and after controlling for sadness. In Study 2, 148 participants (73.0% female; mean age?=?19.2 years, SD?=?1.8) first provided baseline data on personality traits and boredom proneness. Through a smartphone app-based experience-sampling method, they then responded to a brief questionnaire multiple times a day, across 7 days. The questionnaire asked about the nature of their current activity, whether the activity was done alone or with other people, and their affective state. Results from multilevel modelling of 3022 entries suggest that perceived meaningfulness of the activity was negatively associated with state boredom, above and beyond sadness, personality, and boredom proneness. We also found that being with others during the activity acted as a moderator; activities lower in perceived meaningfulness were associated with higher ratings of state boredom when done with others than when done alone. These results demonstrate that perceptions of meaninglessness characterize state boredom.     

Workplace discrimination: A meta‐analytic extension,critique, and future research agenda

Despite a large and growing literature on workplace discrimination, there has been a myopic focus on the direct relationships between discrimination and a common set of outcomes. The aim of this meta‐analytic review was both to challenge and advance current understanding of workplace discrimination and its associations with outcomes by identifying the pathways through which discrimination affects outcomes, examining boundary conditions to explain when discrimination is most harmful for employees, and exploring a potential third variable explanation for discrimination–outcome relationships. Mediation tests indicated that workplace discrimination is associated with employee outcomes through both job stress and justice. Moderator analyses showed that discrimination appears to be most detrimental when it is observed rather than personally experienced, interpersonal rather than formal, and measured broadly rather than specifically. We also found that discrimination–outcome relationships differ across work and nonwork contexts and as a function of the social identity targeted by discrimination. Discrimination generally explained meaningful incremental variance in outcomes after controlling for the effects of negative affectivity, but the relationships between discrimination and health were substantially decreased. We conclude by offering a constructive critique of the empirical discrimination literature and by detailing an agenda for future research.     

Assessing Stimulus Control in a Discrimination Task with Compound Stimuli: Evaluating Testing Procedures and Tracking Eye Fixations

The Psychological Record - Experiments with pigeons have suggested that the way stimuli are arranged in tests affects the demonstration of the stimulus control established during training. The...     

Religious Confession and Symptom Severity: A Prospective Comparative Study

Little research has been done on comparing confessions regarding mental health. In the present study, 320 people (78 Buddhists, 77 Catholics, 89 Protestants and 79 Muslims) were compared in terms of their symptom severity. Buddhists and Protestants had lower scores than Catholics and Muslims for obsessive–compulsive behavior and hostility. Muslim group had the highest comparative scores for psychoticism. Buddhists and Protestants had comparatively low scores for paranoid ideation and overall symptom severity, with Catholics and Muslims having high ones. Results reveal that confession should be taken in account in psychological research and diagnosis, since it is explicitly associated with psychological well-being.     

Potential Job Facilitation Benefits of “Water Cooler” Conversations: The Importance of Social Interactions in the Workplace

This study looked at the extent to which personality and cultural factors predicted participants’ perceptions of the importance private interactions played in the workplace. The 134 participants read a vignette (where a new employee socially interacted at low or high levels with co-workers) and completed the Big Five Inventory, Social Axioms Survey, and questions concerning expected workplace experiences. Results indicated employees who engaged in high levels of private interaction with co-workers were expected to be better liked, to receive better performance evaluations, were more likely to receive co-worker assistance, and were thought to be more likely chosen for future projects. However, the personality and social axiom variables studied did not significantly interact with social interaction to influence expectations of workplace outcomes.     

The Relationship Between Racial Identity Status Attitudes and Acculturation Among Chinese and Korean Americans: A Criterion Profile Analysis

This study tested the relationship between racial identity and acculturation among 223 Asian Americans self‐identifying as Chinese American or Korean American. Findings showed within‐group variations among the study participants with regard to their racial identity status attitudes and acculturation. Using criterion profile analysis, the authors found 2 distinctive criterion profiles of racial identity status attitudes that significantly related to higher levels of acculturation among Chinese American and Korean American participants. Implications for multicultural counseling, racial identity, and acculturation research are discussed. Este estudio puso a prueba la relación entre identidad racial y aculturación entre 223 individuos asiático‐americanos que se identifican a sí mismos como chino‐americanos o coreano‐americanos. Los resultados mostraron variaciones dentro del miso grupo entre los participantes del estudio en cuanto a su aculturación y sus actitudes hacia el estatus de su identidad racial. Usando un análisis de perfil de criterio, los autores encontraron 2 perfiles de criterio distintivos para las actitudes hacia el estatus de identidad racial que estaban relacionados significativamente con niveles más altos de aculturación entre los participantes chino‐americanos y coreano‐americanos. Se discuten las implicaciones para investigaciones sobre consejería multicultural, identidad racial y aculturación.