Feeling activated and acting unethically: The influence of activated mood on unethical behavior to benefit a teammate

Research on the effects of mood in organizations tends to focus on the valence dimension of mood (positive vs. negative), overlooking the activation dimension (activated vs. deactivated). We suggest that activation level prompts unethical behavior. Based on the affective infusion model (AIM; Forgas, 1995), we predict that positive activated and negative activated moods facilitate unethical behavior to benefit a teammate, via the mediating mechanism of a creative mindset. We test our full model using an experience sampling method over 2 weeks, in which mood and creative mindset were assessed in the morning and unethical behavior conducted that day was assessed in the evening. We found that activated moods (both positive and negative) were positively related to unethical behavior to benefit a teammate. Further, creative mindset mediated the relationship between positive activated mood and unethical behavior to benefit a teammate. Consistent with AIM's claim that mood should influence decisions more when they are not personally relevant, we found that moral disengagement propensity moderated this indirect effect. In addition, we conducted two experiments to examine further the mood-creative mindset and creative mindset-unethical behavior to benefit a teammate relationship. Our findings affirm that activated versus deactivated moods facilitate a creative mindset, and that a creative mindset encourages unethical behavior to benefit a teammate. Our findings suggest that activation level of mood plays a critical role in unethical behavior.     

A study of student assessment of the lexical and emotional characteristics of cancer-related words

IntroductionThe aim of this study was to clarify students’ knowledge and emotional feelings about words used in the announcement of cancer diagnoses.MethodA total of 465 students registered in a higher education institution rated familiarity, valence and arousal, and responded to questions about the definition and the contextual use of 20 cancer-related target words.ResultsThe words were estimated as being unfamiliar and negative, and were poorly defined by the majority of students. Many of these indicators varied according to whether the students reported having a relative diagnosed with cancer, and to their level of vocabulary.DiscussionThis study provides explanatory leads that should help to shed light on the nature of the difficulties students have in understanding medical messages.     

Experimental comparison of physical activity self-efficacy measurement: Do vignettes reduce motivational confounding?

ObjectivesSelf-efficacy is one of the most reliable correlates of physical activity, yet a growing body of literature has demonstrated that traditional self-efficacy measures may be flawed because they measure perceived capability and other constructs such as motivation. This study adds to this evidence base by comparing a standard self-efficacy measurement group and two measurement conditions that may provide greater validity: motivation held constant (i.e., adding “If you really wanted to” at the beginning of the item) and vignette (i.e., adding a clarifying vignette before the item). The first objective of this study was to compare these groups regarding self-efficacy scores. The second objective was to examine whether physical activity level (i.e., adhering to physical activity guidelines or not) interacted with measurement condition.DesignRandomized cross-sectional design with three independent groups.MethodParticipants were 444 undergraduate students (M age in years = 21.10, SD = 3.73) who completed an online survey measuring physical activity self-efficacy and behaviour.ResultsThe vignette group had higher self-efficacy scores than the standard and motivation held constant groups. Scores were also higher among those adhering to guidelines and there were no differences between the groups for physically active individuals. Finally, among those not adhering to the guidelines, the vignette group had especially high scores compared to the other groups.ConclusionsThis study demonstrated that reading a vignette prior to completing a self-efficacy item clarifies the meaning of the item thereby improving validity of the measure.     

Cultural differences related to positive and negative valence

Differences between North American and East Asian cultures were examined in terms of the valence of psychological constructs. Americans were more likely than Japanese to focus on positive things. In contrast, Japanese ( vs Americans) were more likely to attend to negative information of the self, but not more or less likely to focus on negative things about others. Based on within-culture analyses, the Americans' data were better described by their tendency to focus on positive things over negative things than by their tendency for self-enhancement. In contrast, the Japanese data were better described by their self-critical tendency. This result was replicated in a second study. In addition, correlations between constructs with opposite valences were negative in the USA, but positive or absent in Japan.     

The mood-enhancement function of autobiographical memories: Comparisons with other functions in terms of emotional valence

In two studies, we examined the emotional valence of memories used for mood-enhancement in relation to memories serving self, social and directive functions. Our sample included a total of 263 participants aged between 45 and 82 years. In Study 1, participants recalled memories in response to 51 cue words. In Study 2, participants recalled 32 memories that served the four functions (eight memories per function). We used multilevel modeling to take into consideration the hierarchical nature of our datasets (memories nested within individuals). Study 1 showed that emotional valence was positively associated with mood-enhancement and social functions, whereas negatively related to self and directive functions. This relation was strongest for the mood-enhancement function. In Study 2, mood-enhancing memories were rated as more positive than self, social and directive memories. We discussed results in terms of the tripartite model of memory functions and proposed that mood-enhancement should represent a distinct function.     

Understanding perfectionism and depression in an adult clinical population: Is outcome expectancy relevant to psychological functioning?

Perfectionism is a personality trait defined by high standards of performance, which has been identified as a risk factor for major depressive disorder (MDD). The present study examined if outcome expectancy involved in perfectionism differs for individuals with depression compared to non-depressed controls, and how outcome expectancy relates to depression symptoms. This study included 49 depressed and 42 non-depressed participants. Perfectionism and depression severity were measured via self-report instruments. This study is the first to provide preliminary evidence that outcome expectancies involved in perfectionism may be related to psychological functioning in depression. Individuals with depression demonstrated higher negative and lower positive outcome expectancies associated with perfectionism compared to non-depressed participants. Perfectionism outcome expectancies are also related to depression severity and symptoms. Future research should prospectively investigate relationships of outcome expectancy involved in perfectionism in individuals at risk for depression.     

Can Culture Influence Body‐Specific Associations Between Space and Valence?

People implicitly associate positive ideas with their dominant side of space and negative ideas with their non‐dominant side. Right‐handers tend to associate “good” with “right” and “bad” with “left,” but left‐handers associate “bad” with “right” and “good” with “left.” Whereas right‐handers' implicit associations align with idioms in language and culture that link “good” with “right,” left‐handers' implicit associations go against them. Can cultural conventions modulate the body‐specific association between valence and left‐right space? Here, we compared people from Spanish and Moroccan cultures, which differ in the strength of taboos against the use of the left hand, and therefore in their preference for the right. Results showed stronger explicit associations between space and valence in Moroccan participants than in Spaniards, but they did not show any increased tendency for right‐handed Moroccans to associate “good” with “right” implicitly. Despite differences in cultural conventions between Spaniards and Moroccans, we find no evidence for a cross‐cultural difference in the implicit association between space and valence, which appears to depend on patterns of bodily experience.     

Conscious and unconscious processing of facial expressions: Evidence from two split‐brain patients

We investigated how the brain's hemispheres process explicit and implicit facial expressions in two ‘split‐brain’ patients (one with a complete and one with a partial anterior resection). Photographs of faces expressing positive, negative or neutral emotions were shown either centrally or bilaterally. The task consisted in judging the friendliness of each person in the photographs. Half of the photograph stimuli were ‘hybrid faces’, that is an amalgamation of filtered images which contained emotional information only in the low range of spatial frequency, blended to a neutral expression of the same individual in the rest of the spatial frequencies. The other half of the images contained unfiltered faces. With the hybrid faces the patients and a matched control group were more influenced in their social judgements by the emotional expression of the face shown in the left visual field (LVF). When the expressions were shown explicitly, that is without filtering, the control group and the partially callosotomized patient based their judgement on the face shown in the LVF, whereas the complete split‐brain patient based his ratings mainly on the face presented in the right visual field. We conclude that the processing of implicit emotions does not require the integrity of callosal fibres and can take place within subcortical routes lateralized in the right hemisphere.     

A longitudinal investigation of children internationally adopted at school age

Most existing research on children adopted internationally has focused on those adopted as infants and toddlers. The current study longitudinally tracked several outcomes, including cognitive, behavioral, emotional, attachment, and family functioning, in 25 children who had been internationally adopted at school age (M = 7.7 years old at adoption, SD = 3.4, range = 4–15 years). We examined the incidence of clinically significant impairments, significant change in outcomes over the three study points, and variables that predicted outcomes over time. Clinically significant impairments in sustained attention, full-scale intelligence, reading, language, executive functioning, externalizing problems, and parenting stress were common, with language and executive functioning impairments present at higher levels in the current study compared with past research focusing on children adopted as infants and toddlers. Over the three study points, significant improvements across most cognitive areas and attachment functioning were observed, though significant worsening in executive functioning and internalizing problems was present. Adoptive family-specific variables, such as greater maternal education, smaller family size, a parenting approach that encouraged age-expected behaviors, home schooling, and being the sole adopted child in the family were associated with greater improvement across several cognitive outcomes. In contrast, decreased parenting stress was predicted by having multiple adopted children and smaller family sizes were associated with greater difficulties with executive functioning. Child-specific variables were also linked to outcomes, with girls displaying worse attachment and poorer cognitive performance and with less time in orphanage care resulting in greater adoption success. Implications for future research and clinical applications are discussed.     

Prompting reflection and learning in career construction counseling

Adopting the overall framework provided for an international inquiry into career counseling interventions, this article reports on a qualitative study into the efficacy of a relatively new approach to practice in England. Using career construction interviews as the counseling intervention, research involving two adult participants was undertaken. Interpersonal process recall (IPR) was used to explicate the perceptions and understandings of both the participants and the counselor in the process. Outcome analysis framed the approach used to making sense of the data collected. Two contrasting responses were immediately evident from participants in the counseling intervention: one positive and one negative. The use of the IPR process enabled an understanding of the value of a structured process of reflection.