A social identity approach to explaining children's aggressive intentions

This study explored the effects of group norms, intra-group position, and age on the direct and indirect aggressive intentions of 247 children (aged 5.50 to 11.83 years). Participants were assigned to a team, with team norms (aggression vs. helping) and the child's position within the team (prototypical vs. peripheral–prototypical vs. peripheral) manipulated. Results showed that children in the aggressive norm condition reported greater aggressive intentions than those in the helping norm condition, although, when age was considered, this effect remained evident for younger, but not older, children. Similarly, intra-group position influenced the aggressive intentions of younger children only. For these children, when group norms supported aggression, prototypical members and peripheral members who anticipated a future prototypical position reported greater aggressive intentions than peripheral members who were given no information about their future position. The implications of these findings for understanding childhood aggression, and for intervention, are discussed.     

Social problem solving in early childhood: Developmental change and the influence of shyness

The purpose of this study was to examine developmental change and the influence of shyness on social problem-solving (SPS). At 24, 36, and 48 months, children (N = 570) were observed while interacting with an unfamiliar peer during an SPS task and at 24 months, maternal report of shyness was collected. Results showed that across the full sample, children displayed low but stable levels of withdrawn SPS and increasing levels of SPS competence over development. In addition, results showed multiple trajectories of withdrawn and competent SPS. Shyness was associated with high-increasing and high-decreasing withdrawn SPS trajectories compared with the low-increasing withdrawn SPS trajectory. Shyness was also associated with the low-increasing compared with the high-increasing SPS competence trajectory. Findings demonstrate the development of SPS competence over early childhood, and the influence of early shyness on this developmental course, with some shy children showing improvement in SPS skills and others continuing to show SPS difficulties over time.     

The Social Psychology of Sustainability

The earth cannot support humanity's increasing population and consumption. Concerned scientists and citizens are therefore wondering how we might work toward a sustainable, survivable human future. Sustainability involves increased technological efficiency and agricultural productivity, but also incentives and attitudes that moderate consumption. Social psychology contributes to changing attitudes and behavior with evidence that a) materialism exacts psychic as well as environmental costs, and b) economic growth has failed to improve human morale. Two principles-the adaptation level phenomenon and social comparison-help explain why materialism and increasing affluence fail to satisfy.     

Does it help to feel your body? Evidence is inconclusive that interoceptive accuracy and sensibility help cope with negative experiences

ABSTRACT

In four studies (total N?=?534), we examined the moderating impact of Interoceptive Accuracy (i.e. IAcc, as measured with the heartbeat counting task) and Interoceptive Sensibility (IS, assessed via questionnaire) on negative affect, following social exclusion or after receiving negative feedback. Results from an integrative data analysis combining the four studies confirmed that the manipulations were successful at inducing negative affect. However, no significant interaction between mood induction (control versus negative affect induction) and interoception on mood measures was observed, and this was true both for objective (i.e. IAcc) and subjective (i.e. IS) measures of interoception. Hence, previous conclusions on the moderating impact of interoception in the relationship between mood induction and self-reported mood were neither replicated nor generalised to this larger sample. We discuss these findings in light of theories of emotion regulation as well as recent concerns raised about the validity of the heartbeat counting task.     

Happy,sad, scary and peaceful musical excerpts for research on emotions

Three experiments were conducted in order to validate 56 musical excerpts that conveyed four intended emotions (happiness, sadness, threat and peacefulness). In Experiment 1, the musical clips were rated in terms of how clearly the intended emotion was portrayed, and for valence and arousal. In Experiment 2, a gating paradigm was used to evaluate the course for emotion recognition. In Experiment 3, a dissimilarity judgement task and multidimensional scaling analysis were used to probe emotional content with no emotional labels. The results showed that emotions are easily recognised and discriminated on the basis of valence and arousal and with relative immediacy. Happy and sad excerpts were identified after the presentation of fewer than three musical events. With no labelling, emotion discrimination remained highly accurate and could be mapped on energetic and tense dimensions. The present study provides suitable musical material for research on emotions.Keywords.     

Towards understanding pleasure at the misfortunes of others: The impact of self-evaluation threat on schadenfreude

In two experiments we demonstrated that a self-evaluation threat intensifies schadenfreude. Moreover, we showed that a self-evaluation threat predicts schadenfreude in both threat-related and threat-unrelated domains and when controlling for feelings of envy and dislike towards the target and evaluations of the misfortune in terms of deservingness. These findings indicate that another's misfortune may be pleasing because it satisfies people's concern for a positive self-view and a sense of self-worth.     

Only your eyes tell me what you like: Exploring the liking effect induced by other's gaze

Our preferences are sensitive to social influences. For instance, we like more the objects that are looked-at by others than non-looked-at objects. Here, we explored this liking effect, using a modified paradigm of attention cueing by gaze. First, we investigated if the liking effect induced by gaze relied on motoric representations of the target object by testing if the liking effect could be observed for non-manipulable (alphanumeric characters) as well as for manipulable items (common tools). We found a significant liking effect for the alphanumeric items. Second, we tested if another type of powerful social cue could also induce a liking effect. We used an equivalent paradigm but with pointing hands instead of gaze cues. Pointing hands elicited a robust attention-orienting effect, but they did not induce any significant liking effect. This study extends previous findings and reinforces the view of eye gaze as a special cue in human interactions.     

Preschoolers’ emotion knowledge: Self-regulatory foundations,and predictions of early school success

Preschoolers (N=322 in preschool, 100 in kindergarten) were assessed longitudinally to examine the self-regulatory roots of emotion knowledge (labelling and situation) and the contributions of emotion knowledge to early school adjustment (i.e., including social, motivational, and behavioural indices), as well as moderation by age, gender, and risk. Age, gender, and risk differences in emotion knowledge were also examined. Emotion knowledge skills were found to be more advanced in older children and those not at economic risk, and in those with higher levels of self-regulation. Overall, the results support the role of emotion knowledge in early school adjustment and academic success even with gender, age, and risk covaried, especially for boys, older preschoolers, and those at economic risk.     

Emotional reactivity,self-control and children's hostile attributions over middle childhood

Hostile attribution bias, a child's tendency to interpret ambiguous social information as threatening or hostile, has been discussed as an important point in which social, emotional and cognitive information intersect. This study explores the natural changes that occur in children's hostile attributions across three grades during middle childhood and examines how emotional reactivity and self-control at third, fourth and fifth grade independently and interactively relate to these trajectories. Participants included 919 children whose mothers reported on their emotional reactivity, whose teachers reported on their self-control and who completed an attribution bias interview, all at grades 3, 4 and 5. Results revealed that among children with a greater tendency to make hostile attributions at third grade, lower self-control at third grade was associated with greater initial hostile attribution bias and less decline in biases over time. Additionally, greater emotional reactivity at fourth grade was associated with declines in these children's hostile attributions, but only when self-control was also higher at fourth grade.     

Worry spreads: Interpersonal transfer of problem-related anxiety

This paper distinguishes processes potentially contributing to interpersonal anxiety transfer, including object-directed social appraisal, empathic worry, and anxiety contagion, and reviews evidence for their operation. We argue that these anxiety-transfer processes may be exploited strategically when attempting to regulate relationship partners’ emotion. More generally, anxiety may serve as either a warning signal to other people about threat (alerting function) or an appeal for emotional support or practical help (comfort-seeking function). Tensions between these two interpersonal functions may account for mutually incongruent interpersonal responses to expressed anxiety, including mistargeted interpersonal regulation attempts. Because worry waxes and wanes over time as a function of other people's ongoing reactions, interpersonal interventions may help to alleviate some of its maladaptive consequences.