Whom to help? Immediacy bias in judgments and decisions about humanitarian aid

People exhibit an immediacy bias when making judgments and decisions about humanitarian aid, perceiving as more deserving and donating disproportionately to humanitarian crises that happen to arouse immediate emotion. The immediacy bias produced different serial position effects, contingent on decision timing (Experiment 1). When making allocation decisions directly after viewing to four emotionally evocative films about four different humanitarian crises, participants donated disproportionately more to the final, immediate crisis, in contrast, when making donation decisions sequentially, after viewing each of the four crises, participants donated disproportionately to the immediate crisis. The immediacy bias was associated with “scope neglect,” causing people to take action against relatively less deadly crises (Experiments 2 and 3). The immediacy bias emerged even when participants were warned about emotional manipulation (Experiment 3). The immediacy bias diminished over time, as immediate emotions presumably subsided (Experiment 2). Implications for charitable giving, serial position effects, and the influence of emotion on choice are discussed.     

Effects of analytical and experiential self-focus on stress-induced cognitive reactivity in eating disorder psychopathology

Previous research suggests distinct modes of self-focus, each with distinct functional properties: Analytical self-focus appears maladaptive, with experiential self-focus having more adaptive effects on indices of cognitive-affective functioning (e.g., Watkins, Moberly, & Moulds, 2008). The authors applied this framework to eating disorder (ED) psychopathology and manipulated the mode of self-focus prior to exposure to a stressor (imagining eating a large meal; Shafran, Teachman, Kerry, & Rachman, 1999). Study 1 showed that students high in ED psychopathology reported lower post-stressor feelings of weight or shape change and less subsequent attempts to neutralise (e.g., imagining exercising) after experiential relative to analytical self-focus. Study 2 found that partially weight restored patients with anorexia nervosa had lower post-stressor estimates of their own weight and reported lower urge to cancel stressor effects following experiential compared to analytical self-focus. Experiential self-focus was also followed by less neutralisation than analytical self-focus. Results suggest that the mode of self-focus affects cognitive reactivity following a stressor in individuals with ED psychopathology. Examining the mode within which individuals with ED psychopathology focus on self and body may raise important implications for understanding of psychopathology and open new possibilities for augmenting current treatments.     

Mood stability versus mood instability in bipolar disorder: a possible role for emotional mental imagery

A cognitive model of bipolar disorder suggests that mental imagery acts as an emotional amplifier of mood and may be heightened in bipolar disorder. First, we tested whether patients with bipolar disorder would score higher on mental imagery measures than a matched healthy control group. Second, we examined differences in imagery between patients divided into groups according to their level of mood stability. Mood ratings over approximately 6-months, made using a mobile phone messaging system, were used to divide patients into stable or unstable groups. Clinician decisions of mood stability were corroborated with statistical analysis. Results showed (I) compared to healthy controls, patients with bipolar disorder had significantly higher scores for general mental imagery use, more vivid imagery of future events, higher levels of intrusive prospective imagery, and more extreme imagery-based interpretation bias; (II) compared to patients with stable mood, patients with unstable mood had higher levels of intrusive prospective imagery, and this correlated highly with their current levels of anxiety and depression. The findings were consistent with predictions. Further investigation of imagery in bipolar disorder appears warranted as it may highlight processes that contribute to mood instability with relevance for cognitive behaviour therapy.     

Daily emotional dynamics in depressed youth: a cell phone ecological momentary assessment study

This study used a new cell phone ecological momentary assessment approach to investigate daily emotional dynamics in 47 youths with major depressive disorder (MDD) and 32 no-psychopathology controls (CON) (ages 7-17 years). Information about emotional experience in the natural environment was obtained using answer-only cell phones, while MDD youths received an 8-week course of cognitive behavioral therapy and/or psychopharmacological treatment. Compared with CON youths, MDD youths reported more intense and labile global negative affect; greater sadness, anger, and nervousness; and a lower ratio of positive to negative affect. These differences increased with pubertal maturation. MDD youths spent more time alone and less time with their families than CON youths. Although differences in emotional experiences were found across social contexts, MDD youths were more negative than CON youths in all contexts examined. As the MDD participants progressed through treatment, diagnostic group differences in the intensity and lability of negative affect decreased, but there were no changes in the ratio of positive to negative affect or in measures of social context. We discuss methodological innovations and advantages of this approach, including improved ecological validity and access to information about variability in emotions, change in emotions over time, the balance of positive and negative emotions, and the social context of emotional experience.     

What the face and body reveal: in-group emotion effects and stereotyping of emotion in African American and European American children

This study examined whether 3- to 7-year-old African American and European American children’s assessment of emotion in face-only, face + body, and body-only photographic stimuli was affected by in-group emotion recognition effects and racial or gender stereotyping of emotion. Evidence for racial in-group effects was found, with European American children being more accurate when assessing emotion in European American photographs than African American photographs for some emotions. African American children were either equally proficient in recognizing emotion in African American and European American photographs or were more accurate with European American photographs for some emotions. Stereotyping of emotion was also found, with boys being more often labeled with “masculine” emotions (e.g., mad) and at least some girls being more often labeled with “feminine” emotions (e.g., happy). However, stereotyping effects were found only when the face was present in the stimuli and were not found with body-only stimuli. In-group effects, however, were not affected by type of photograph (face-only, body-only, or face + body), with children being unable to recognize at least some emotions from just the body postures alone (mad). These results have important implications for how future studies assess emotion recognition in children, particularly in terms of how emotion stimuli are constructed, the diversity of the stimuli, and who judges the stimuli.     

Preschoolers' use of dynamic facial, bodily, and vocal cues to emotion

In daily experience, children have access to a variety of cues to others’ emotions, including face, voice, and body posture. Determining which cues they use at which ages will help to reveal how the ability to recognize emotions develops. For happiness, sadness, anger, and fear, preschoolers (3-5 years, N = 144) were asked to label the emotion conveyed by dynamic cues in four cue conditions. The Face-only, Body Posture-only, and Multi-cue (face, body, and voice) conditions all were well recognized (M > 70%). In the Voice-only condition, recognition of sadness was high (72%), but recognition of the three other emotions was significantly lower (34%).     

学龄儿童不同层次情绪理解发展及其与同伴接纳的关系

采用情绪理解测验和同伴提名法,探讨7-11岁儿童情绪理解层次发展及其与同伴接纳的关系。结果发现,儿童情绪理解随年龄增长而发展,情绪理解层次发展早晚存在差异,混合情绪和道德情绪理解发展最晚。被拒绝和被忽视儿童的情绪理解测验总分显著低于受欢迎、一般型和矛盾型儿童,矛盾型儿童的总分显著低于受欢迎儿童,他们的情绪调节、混合情绪及道德情绪理解得分也各有差异,表明同伴接纳是学龄儿童情绪理解层次发展的影响因素之一。     

Emotional valence of spoken words influences the spatial orienting of attention

The influence of the affective content of speech on the spatial orienting of auditory attention was examined by adapting the dot probe task. Two words, one of which was emotional in one quarter of the trials, were played simultaneously from a left- and a right-located loudspeaker, respectively, and followed (or not) by a lateralized beep to be detected (Experiments 1 and 2) or localized (Experiment 3). Taboo words induced attentional biases towards their spatial location in all experiments, as did negative words in Experiment 3, but not positive words. Thus, in audition, the identification of an emotional word automatically activates the information about its spatial origin. Moreover, for both word types, attentional biases were only observed when the emotional word was presented on the participant's right side, suggesting that the dominant left hemisphere processing of words constrains the occurrence of spatial congruency effects.     

A comparison of retrospective self-report versus ecological momentary assessment measures of affective lability in the examination of its relationship with bulimic symptomatology

Affective lability has been linked to several maladaptive behaviors ( [Anestis et?al., 2009] and [Coccaro, 1991]). Methodology for measuring affective lability varies and includes retrospective self-report and ecological momentary assessment (EMA). In this study, we sought to test these methodologies by examining which better predicted binge eating episodes and general eating disorder symptoms in a sample (n = 131) of women diagnosed with bulimia nervosa (BN). We hypothesized that, while the two forms of measurement would be correlated with one another and predict binge eating episodes, EMA affective lability would be the stronger predictor. Results supported several hypotheses. Specifically, both EMA affective lability and retrospective self-report affective lability significantly predicted global eating disorder symptoms, even when controlling for depression, age, body mass index, and level of education, EMA affective lability exhibited a significantly stronger correlation with binge eating episodes than did retrospective self-report affective lability, and EMA affective lability predicted number of binge eating episodes on any given day controlling for the same list of covariates. Limitations include the use of a clinical sample that may limit the generalizability of our findings. Findings highlight the importance of affect in such behavior.     

Fear and perceived uncontrollability of emotion: Evaluating the unique contribution of emotion appraisal variables to prediction of worry and generalised anxiety disorder

Novel theoretical frameworks place the symptom profile of generalised anxiety disorder (GAD) within the context of dysfunctional emotional processes. It is suggested that fear and intolerance of emotions exacerbate subjective distress and motivate the use of maladaptive coping strategies, such as worry. To date, studies evaluating these models have suffered two key limitations. Firstly, few studies have involved treatment-seeking samples, and secondly, none have evaluated the unique variance attributable to emotion appraisal variables above and beyond previously established predictors of worry and GAD. The present study begins to address these limitations by assessing the contribution of fear and perceived uncontrollability of emotions in predicting worry and clinical GAD status after controlling for variance attributable to depressive symptoms, meta-cognitive beliefs, intolerance of uncertainty, and perceptions of external threat. Supporting current models, results showed that perceived control over emotional reactions was a unique predictor of GAD diagnostic status and both clinical and non-clinical worry.