Using Daily Creativity Planning to Promote Creative Behavior

Research has demonstrated that on the path from a creative idea to a creative outcome, high creativity motivation and self-efficacy do not necessarily lead to creative behavior. The present study proposed and examined the notion that daily creativity planning could promote creative behavior and contribute to the cultivation of creativity. A total of 77 middle school students (39 students in the experimental group and 38 in the control group) participated in this study, for which a quasi-experimental design was administered. The experimental group conducted a two-week daily planning for creative activities, while the control group did not conduct any intervention. The results showed that students' creativity motivation and creative self-efficacy were at relatively high levels overall and were positively and moderately correlated with creative behavior. Daily planning could effectively facilitate students' creative behavior. These findings point to a promising and simple creativity enhancement strategy for cultivating students to develop the habit of making creative plans in their daily lives.     

Teaching self-control to reduce overt food stealing by children with autism and developmental disorders

Food stealing is often a serious behavioral problem among children with diagnoses of autism and other developmental disorders. Very few empirical studies concerning this behavioral challenge have been reported. We applied a correspondence training procedure to teach self-control as replacement behavior to four children with autism and developmental disorders who displayed food stealing in the community. A changing criterion design embedded within a nonconcurrent multiple-probe across participants design was used. The treatment succeeded for all four participants by increasing latency to eating highly preferred food to a predetermined criterion and reducing occurrences of food stealing to zero. Three participants generalized the replacement behavior to natural settings and maintained the behavior for 2 weeks, 1 month, 2 months, 3 months, and 4 months. One participant without expressive language was taught successfully during treatment trials but failed to maintain and generalize the behavior. A functional relation between delaying food eating and Say-Do correspondence training was demonstrated.     

高中生物理和化学学科中同伴学业支持与学业情绪的关系:学习效能感的中介作用和性别的调节作用

研究发现学习效能感会受到同伴支持的影响,同时它又是影响学生学业状况的重要前因变量。根据控制价值理论,本研究通过对3329名高一和高二学生的调查,考察在物理和化学学科中,学习效能感是否会在同伴学业支持和学业情绪中起到中介作用。发现：(1)同伴学业支持和学习效能感呈显著正相关;两者与高兴学业情绪显著正相关,与厌倦学业情绪显著负相关;(2)在控制了年龄、年级、性别和地域后,学习效能感在同伴学业支持和高兴学业情绪中起部分中介作用,在同伴学业支持和厌倦学业情绪中起完全中介作用;(3)在物理学科中,性别调节了学习效能感和学业情绪的关系。本研究验证并拓展了控制价值理论,对于如何提高中学生物理和化学学习的积极情绪有借鉴意义。     

Brain bases of English morphological processing: A comparison between Chinese-English,Spanish-English bilingual,and English monolingual children

How do early bilingual experiences influence children's neural architecture for word processing? Dual language acquisition can yield common influences that may be shared across different bilingual groups, as well as language-specific influences stemming from a given language pairing. To investigate these effects, we examined bilingual English speakers of Chinese or Spanish, and English monolinguals, all raised in the US (N = 152, ages 5–10). Children completed an English morphological word processing task during fNIRS neuroimaging. The findings revealed both language-specific and shared bilingual effects. The language-specific effects were that Chinese and Spanish bilinguals showed principled differences in their neural organization for English lexical morphology. The common bilingual effects shared by the two groups were that in both bilingual groups, increased home language proficiency was associated with stronger left superior temporal gyrus (STG) activation when processing the English word structures that are most dissimilar from the home language. The findings inform theories of language and brain development during the key periods of neural reorganization for learning to read by illuminating experience-based plasticity in linguistically diverse learners.     

Nest box entrance hole size can influence nest site selection and nest defence behaviour in Japanese tits

Animal Cognition - Birds have the ability to assess the risk of predation in their environment and adjust their antipredation strategies based on this risk information. However, whether nest site...     

Fragile promise: The role of justification in promise-breaking

People who consider themselves moral sometimes use self-serving justifications to rationalize their selfish behaviours. Previous studies have tested the role of ambiguity in justifying wrongdoings, but it remains unclear whether ambiguity also plays a role in justifying promise-breaking behaviour and whether heterogeneity exists. To investigate justification in promise-breaking, we introduced a new experimental paradigm called the card-guessing task and used hierarchical cluster analysis to classify participants based on their promise-breaking decisions in unambiguous and ambiguous conditions. Experiment 1 revealed three clusters of solutions: Cluster 1 always kept their promises (i.e., keepers); Cluster 2 only exploited the vague promises and broke their promises in the ambiguous condition (i.e., intermediates); Cluster 3 tended to take advantage of vague promises and broke their promises irrespective of ambiguity (i.e., breakers). Experiment 2 confirmed that participants in the three clusters differed in their norm-abiding preferences and social value orientations. Keepers were more altruistic and had a stronger sense of norm compliance than intermediates and breakers. In conclusion, our study demonstrates that self-serving justifications were more likely to be employed by people who are moderately sensitive to deviation from social norms, which has implications for strategic interventions and policy formulation concerning unethical behaviour.     

The mere possession effect of shareable digital coupons: The mediating role of anticipated self-enhancement

Shareable digital coupons have emerged as a new marketing strategy. Prior literature on shareable coupons assumes that shareable coupons can play a role only after they have been shared with others. Surprisingly, we theorize that shareable coupons can come into play as early as when consumers merely possess them, even before consumers share them with others, an effect that precedes the effect of the actual coupon sharing. In this research, we show that the mere possession of shareable digital coupons (not necessarily the actual sharing) is able to induce anticipated self-enhancement among consumers. Hence shareable digital coupons are more effective than non-shareable digital coupons, and the effect is most pronounced among consumers with high image concerns. The higher coupon effectiveness of shareable digital coupons is reflected in consumers' greater urge/intention to acquire the coupon, intention to revisit, willingness to spend, as well as in firm's sales increase when products are promoted with shareable instead of non-shareable digital coupons. Our work contributes to the literature on shareable coupons, the mere possession effects, anticipated self-enhancement, and other-rewarding promotions, and is of important managerial value given the ease with which the shareability feature can be added to coupons.     

Chinese child unsociability,maternal maladaptive parenting,and peer exclusion among preschoolers: A cross-lagged model

Previous research has consistently found that unsociability is linked to adjustment difficulties in Chinese children. However, far less attention has been paid to how parents and peers react when confronted with unsociable children. In this study, we explored the longitudinal linkages among Chinese preschoolers' unsociability, maladaptive parenting, and peer exclusion. Participants were mothers and teachers of N = 391 (M_age = 4.4 years, SD = 0.91 years; 54.5% boys) preschoolers attending eight kindergartens in Shanghai, People's Republic of China, followed over 8 months. Multi-source assessments were employed. Mothers rated children's unsociability and their maladaptive (physical hostility, verbal hostility, punishment) parenting practices, and teachers rated children's peer exclusion at each time point. Our results indicated that child unsociability contributed to later increases in both maladaptive parenting and peer exclusion. However, maladaptive parenting and peer exclusion could not predict later increases in unsociability. Results are discussed in terms of the implications of unsociability among Chinese children.     

Rice-farming areas report more anxiety across two years of the COVID-19 pandemic in China

Cultures responded to the COVID-19 pandemic differently. We investigated cultural differences in mental health during the pandemic. We found regional differences in people's reports of anxiety in China over two years from 2020 to 2021 (N = 1186). People in areas with a history of rice farming reported more anxiety than people in wheat-farming areas. Next, we explored more proximal mechanisms that could help link the distal, historical factor of rice farming to people's modern experience of anxiety. Rice areas scored higher on collectivism and tight social norms than wheat areas, and collectivism, rather than norm tightness, mediated the rice-anxiety relationship. These findings advance our understanding of the distal sources of cultural differences, the proximal mechanisms, and mental health problems during the pandemics.