Not all happy people are lazy or stupid: Evidence of systematic processing in happy moods

Two experiments investigated the effects of mood on the use of global trait information in impression formation tasks. Participants in both experiments formed an impression of a target based on traits and a series of behaviors that were both consistent and inconsistent with the traits. In Experiment 1, participants in happy moods, relative to those in unhappy moods, made impression judgments that reflected the evaluative implications of the trait information to a greater extent than the behaviors, regardless of the order in which they received the information. In Experiment 2, both happy and sad participants engaged in systematic processing, as reflected by the recall data, but only happy participants’ recall of target information was significantly biased by the global trait information they received. These findings are consistent with the affect-as-information model in which affective cues influence the extent to which individuals rely on general knowledge and, importantly, are inconsistent with models that posit that happiness results in reduced motivation or ability to process information carefully.     

Mourning the person one could have become: The existential transition for the psychotherapy clients experienced by abuse or neglect

Mourning the “Person One Could Have Become” (POCHB) is an existential transition for traumatized individuals. In order to survive, they tend to mystify their existence, hoping that one day they will eventually turn into POCHB. POCHB is conceptualized as personality and physical characteristics that could have emerged if an individual at the right time had received an appropriate quantity and quality of nurturing and developmental stimuli, which consequently would have enabled the person to make more mature choices. The process of mourning the POCHB is part of the group therapy. The role of the therapist in facilitating such mourning is discussed. Possible obstacles to the process of mourning are depicted. Theoretical assumptions are illustrated with cases of two clients.     

Seeing power in action: The roles of deliberation, implementation, and action in inferences of power

Six experiments investigate the hypothesis that social targets who display a greater action orientation are perceived as having more power (i.e., more control, less dependence, and more influence) than less action-oriented targets. I find evidence that this inference pattern is based on the pervasive belief that individuals with more power experience less constraint and have a greater capacity to act according to their own volition. Observers infer that targets have more power and influence when they exhibit more implementation than deliberation in the process of making decisions in their personal lives (Study 1a), in a public policy context (Study 1b), and in small groups (Study 2). In an organizational context, observers infer that a target who votes for a policy to change from the status quo has more power than a target who votes not to change from the status quo (Study 3). People also infer greater intra-organizational power and higher hierarchical rank in targets who take physical action toward a personal goal than in those who do not (Studies 4-5).     

Who is approachable?

The consequences of social interaction can be variable, sometimes harmful, but often rewarding. The adaptive social perceiver must therefore determine which interactions are worthwhile pursuing and which are not. The present research investigated whether subtle but meaningful differences in facial expressions are perceived in terms of the affordance of approachability. Participants engaged in simulated social encounters with targets displaying enjoyment smiles, non-enjoyment smiles or neutral expressions while fluctuations in their posture were measured. The results indicated systematic differences in perceived approachability as a function of facial expression and target sex. These findings are discussed in terms of the functional coupling between social perception and action with respect to the information that specifies the affordance of approachability.     

Person perception by active versus passive perceivers

Person perception research is dominated by studies of passive perceivers who exert no control over the information they receive. In contrast, perceivers in everyday life can often actively choose the type and quantity of information they receive. In this study, active and yoked passive perceivers formed impressions of individuals based on information from Facebook. Compared to active perceivers, passive perceivers reported greater confidence and ease in their judgments. Passive perceivers exhibited greater confidence (though not greater accuracy) with increased information, but active perceivers did not show this effect, placing a boundary condition on past research. Passive perceivers also liked targets more than active perceivers, a finding that is not explained by valence-dependant sampling by active participants, or by misattribution of fluency or greater sensitivity among passive participants. These provocative findings highlight the need to account for active and interactive processes in person perception rather than continuing to focus on passive perceivers.     

Is It Necessary to Discuss Person‐Oriented Research in Community Psychology?

A brief overview of the person orientation is provided. It is then argued that research in community psychology, similar to every other field in psychology, has mainly focused on variables, not individuals. Suggestions are provided for how the person orientation can be applied to understanding settings and environments as well as the theoretical and methodological contributions community psychologists can make to further person oriented methods.     

What Carries a Mediation Process? Configural Analysis of Mediation

Mediation is a process that links a predictor and a criterion via a mediator variable. Mediation can be full or partial. This well-established definition operates at the level of variables even if they are categorical. In this article, two new approaches to the analysis of mediation are proposed. Both of these approaches focus on the analysis of categorical variables. The first involves mediation analysis at the level of configurations instead of variables. Thus, mediation can be incorporated into the arsenal of methods of analysis for person-oriented research. Second, it is proposed that Configural Frequency Analysis (CFA) can be used for both exploration and confirmation of mediation relationships among categorical variables. The implications of using CFA are first that mediation hypotheses can be tested at the level of individual configurations instead of variables. Second, this approach leaves the door open for different types of mediation processes to exist within the same set. Using a data example, it is illustrated that aggregate-level analysis can overlook mediation processes that operate at the level of individual configurations.     

知觉经验对汉学字形知觉整体性的影响

三项实验通过部件识别法探讨了知觉经验对字形知觉整体性的影响。实验一要求三组不同发展水平的被试命名单独呈现的部件字,结果证实了本实验所用的各组部件字之间的识别难度均等和小学三年级学生的字识别技能明显不如小学六年级和大学学生。实验二使大学生在三种字度和两种字频条件下,分别进行单、双部件的命名,主要得到非字中的部件命名反应时快于假字,后者又快于真字的“字劣效应”以及在真、假字组中的“左>右”或“上>下”的“部位效应”,但未发现字频对部件命名的效应。实验三比较了三组不同年级被试的部件命名作业,发现小六和小三学生在真、假字中的部件命名反应时无明显差异,而大学生较明显,说明前者受字形整体知觉的影响比后者小。这些结果支持了字形知觉整体性随字的知觉经验增长而加强的假设,并在一个基于联结主义框架的字词识别模型中得到了较好解释。     

Explaining the Durable Effects of Verbal Person‐Centered Supportive Communication: Indirect Effects or Invisible Support?

Researchers have documented benefits from receiving supportive messages high in verbal person‐centeredness (VPC), but the processes through which such messages produce longitudinal effects remain unclear. This study evaluated two perspectives (i.e., indirect effects and invisible support) that address how supportive messages can produce durable effects and tested sex differences in those effects. 255 dyads completed a laboratory‐based interaction in which level of VPC and sex of the support provider were manipulated. 3 weeks later, support receivers evaluated the conversations and their stressor. Variations in VPC produced durable effects both when messages were positively evaluated initially and when they were evaluated as supportive by providers or third‐party observers but judged low in supportiveness by receivers. Provider sex moderated the results.