Culture,morality, and the effect of prosocial behavior motivation on positive affect

We investigated the effect of culture, moral discourse, and motivation to engage in prosocial behavior on benefactors’ positive affect. Participants from three cultures (Japan, Romania, and the United States) responded to scenarios in which they could perform small acts of kindness for different targets. A stronger relationship between agentic and obligated motivation to perform acts of kindness, as well as between obligated motivation and positive affect, was observed for participants from Japan, and for individuals with higher endorsement of the Community Ethic. Agentic motivation to engage in prosocial behavior was related to benefactors’ positive affect, regardless of relationship type.     

To Belong or Not to Belong. Affective Self-Nationalization in Thailand

Through analyzing conflict narratives regarding Khao Phra Wihan, a territorial conflict important for nationalists in Thailand, this article aims to detangle how nationalization is experienced and performed on an individual level. In this article, the concept “affective self-nationalization” is proposed to analyze the emotional and embodied practices through which individuals fashion themselves into nationalized subjects. In Thailand, self-nationalization is instigated by the governing agency through repeated, regular, mandatory, public performances of loyalty through which individuals create the nation collectively. These performances create automatic feelings to the nation, establishes national others as fearsome, and rule through the basic human need of belonging. At the same time, individuals’ emotions shape the society through how they decide to perform nationalization. The concept of “affective self-nationalization” captures the connections between the official nationalizing program of “outside” society in a form of nationalist emotional socialization with individual experience of nationalizing.     

‘Pissed Off and Confused’/‘Grateful and (Re)Moved’: Affect,Privilege and National Commemoration in Aotearoa New Zealand

This article explores affect, colonial privilege, and the cultural politics of national commemoration in Aotearoa New Zealand. Based on focus-group interviews around two major national days, we examine means through which feelings and emotions are deployed in ways that enable the reproduction of social advantage. Situating affect within patterns of relationship, four interrelated affective-discursive practices are explored. In relation to Waitangi Day, agents tend to work under the rubric of anger and confusion. For Anzac Day, being grateful and moved shapes the interaction, although participants often indicate preferences towards “having a day off.” Given the colonial context in which these practices circulate, analysis observes the associated freedom and ease by which affective-discursive privilege is (re)produced. Often incongruent and rarely challenged, privilege allows associated actors to do what they want, when they want, however they want. This affective climate authorizes the ongoing reproduction of, and justification for, membership to a higher-status ethnic group of which unearned opportunities and entitlements remain its everyday, expected currency.     

The engageable personality: Personality and trait EI as predictors of work engagement

Work engagement is seen as a critical antecedent of various organizational outcomes such as citizenship behavior and employee productivity. Though defined as a state, recent research has hinted at potential individual differences in engagement, meaning that employees differ in their tendencies to engage at work. This study investigated the effects of the Big Five personality traits, work-specific personality, and trait emotional intelligence, on work engagement among a sample of 1050 working adults. Hierarchical multiple regression analyses identified trait EI, openness to experience, interpersonal sensitivity, ambition, extraversion, adjustment, and conscientiousness as predictors of engagement. Trait EI predicted work engagement over and above personality. Practical and theoretical implications are discussed.     

Stress and affective experiences: The importance of dark personality features

Personality has been shown to play an important role in the negative outcomes associated with stress. The purpose of the present study was to examine whether Dark Triad personality features (i.e., psychopathy, narcissism, and Machiavellianism) moderated the associations between stress and affective experiences. This was accomplished using a sample of 193 Israeli community participants who completed measures concerning dark personality features and affective expectations for their vacation prior to checking-into exclusive hotels in a resort city in southern Israel. Follow-up assessments concerning affective experiences and stress during vacation were completed by participants before checking-out. Results showed that psychopathy moderated the associations between stress and affective experiences such that individuals with high levels of psychopathy were more reactive to stress.     

The Trait Emotional Intelligence Questionnaire in Lebanon and the UK: A comparison of the psychometric properties in each country

The aim of this study was to validate the Trait Emotional Intelligence Questionnaire (TEIQue v. 1.5) in a Lebanese sample and compare its factorial structure to that of a UK sample. There were similar gender and age distributions in both samples as well as satisfactory structural reliabilities at the global, factor, and facet levels. Results from exploratory factor analysis showed a four-factor structure similar to that originally obtained by the author of the questionnaire. There were strong correlations between the factor scores derived from the two datasets (≥.90). Tucker congruence supported the similarity between the Lebanese and UK factors. Independent-samples t tests showed that Lebanese participants scored higher on the Sociability factor and the facets of self-esteem, social awareness and emotion perception, whereas UK participants scored higher on the facets of stress management, optimism and relationships. Gender differences are also reported, and recommendations for future research discussed.     

Does integral affect influence intentions to use artificial intelligence for skin cancer screening? A test of the affect heuristic

Objective: This study investigated how affect influences people’s processing of messages about risks and benefits of using autonomous artificial intelligence (AI) technology to screen for skin cancer. We examined integral affect (emotion derived during decision making) separately from incidental affect (extraneous mood states).

Design: Using the affect heuristic framework, we randomly assigned 273 participants to conditions featuring risk (high, low, uncertain) or benefit (high, low, uncertain) messages about AI. Following ‘affect-as-spotlight’, we also explored whether people’s integral affect towards skin cancer moderated the relationship between risk/benefit messages and AI screening intentions.

Outcomes: Perceived risk, perceived benefit, positive and negative affect toward AI, intention to use AI screening.

Results: After controlling for incidental affect and risk perceptions, we found that compared to low risk messages, uncertain risk messages increased participants’ negative affect toward AI, decreased positive affect toward AI, increased AI risk evaluations and reduced AI benefit evaluations. Perceptual variables significantly mediated participants’ intentions to use AI for risk messages but not benefit messages. No moderation effects were found.

Conclusions: Results suggest extending the affect heuristic framework to include uncertain risk conditions. Integral AI affect influenced people’s interpretation of messages, which then impacted likelihood to use AI technology for health.