A “new rhetoric” for a “new dialectic”: Prolegomena to a responsible public argument

This essay offers, as a counterpart to pragma-dialectical argument, a “new rhetoric” produced in the situated discourse of a public forum when a community addresses matters of common urgency and undertakes informed action. Such a rhetoric takes the principles of discourse ethics as its informing dialectic by identifying an interlocutor as one who is obligatedboth to argue effectively,and also to hold open, even reinforce, norms of communicative reason. Implications concerning the study of fallacies and theethos obligations of communicative reasoning are discussed.     

Parenting typologies in Georgian and Belgian adolescents: Associations with self-esteem

The parenting context is of fundamental importance for the optimal development of adolescents. Making use of a person-centered approach, we derived parenting typologies from the perspective of Georgian and Belgian adolescents based on four dimensions of perceived parenting (responsiveness, structure, psychological control, and autonomy support). Further, we examined how perceived parenting typologies were associated with adolescents' self-esteem. The study sample included 511 Georgian and 830 Belgian adolescents (N = 1341; 48% female). A cluster-analytic procedure on the full sample was conducted separately for mothers and fathers. The analysis yielded five parenting typologies: Supportive—Highly structuring (high responsiveness and structure), Highly structuring—Moderately controlling (high structure and psychological control, moderate—responsiveness), Supportive—Low structuring/controlling (high responsiveness and autonomy support, low structure and psychological control), Highly controlling (very high psychological control, low responsiveness and autonomy support) and Uninvolved (low on all dimensions). Results indicated that the Highly structuring—Moderately controlling paternal cluster was more prevalent in the Belgian sample. A country-moderating effect was found with the paternal Uninvolved profile associated with low levels of self-esteem in Belgian adolescents, but with moderate levels of self-esteem in Georgian adolescents.     

“Celebrities to lean on!” Perceived celebrity support across two cultures—Iran and the United States

Though many people loathe celebrities and their lifestyles, celebrities can also be perceived as being available to provide community support. The purpose of this study was to establish the psychometric properties of the Perceived Celebrity Support Inventory. The scale was developed to capture three aspects of perceived celebrity support to the community: instrumental (i.e., providing tangible and concrete assistance), informational (i.e., advice, explanation, and information), and emotional (i.e., empathizing, encouraging, listening, and comforting) support. Factor and item analyses have revealed robust psychometric properties in samples drawn from the United States (US) and Iran. The US sample perceived higher community support from celebrities than the Iranian sample. In the Iranian sample, perceived celebrity support for the community was associated with more positive attitudes and less hatred of celebrity culture. In the US, perceived celebrity support was associated with negative attitudes and elevated hatred towards celebrities. The findings advance the literature by providing an instrument with which to measure positive aspects of celebrity influence across cultures.     

Testing the status-legitimacy hypothesis: Predicting system justification using objective and subjective socioeconomic status in China and the United States

The status-legitimacy hypothesis proposes that those who are most disadvantaged by unequal social systems are even more likely than members of more advantaged groups to provide ideological support for the very social system that is responsible for their disadvantages. Li, Yang, Wu, and Kou (2020, Personality and Social Psychology Bulletin) sought to expand the generalizability of this hypothesis by testing it in China, addressing inconsistencies surrounding the empirical support for this hypothesis by postulating that the construct of status should be separated into an objective and subjective status marker. They reported that objective socioeconomic status (SES; income and education) negatively predicted system justification, while subjective SES positively predicted system justification. In the present study we attempt to replicate and extend the work of Li et al. in a cross-cultural comparison of demographic stratified quota online samples in China and the United States. We test the status-legitimacy hypothesis using objective and subjective SES to predict system justification using cross-sectional and cross-lagged regression analyses. We received partial support for Li et al.'s findings. Specifically, subjective SES positively predicted system justification for both societies during cross-sectional and cross-lagged longitudinal analyses. However, we failed to replicate Li et al.'s findings surrounding objective SES in China during cross-sectional and cross-lagged analyses.     

Unequal but not separate: Emergence of rich–poor cooperation in resource exchange

Addressing inequality is a critical challenge for society as a whole and requires sustained efforts to promote fairness and opportunity for all. Filling in the resource gap across social classes is essential in reducing inequality. Previous studies have revealed that ingroup favouritism hinders the rich from cooperating with the poor and expands the wealth gap. Nevertheless, how to find ways of narrowing the gap between the rich and the poor remains an open question. Inducing rich–poor cooperation could be effective in eliciting resource flow across classes. In this study, two experiments using a modified Prisoner's Dilemma game were conducted in Japan (N = 213) and China (N = 150) to examine whether highlighting partners' cooperativeness under permeable group boundaries induces rich–poor cooperation. All participants were allocated to the rich group and participated in the game with programmed rich- or poor-group partner bots, whose cooperation rates were manipulated. Despite the initial resource disparities between participants and the partner bots, participants were more likely to select and cooperate with cooperative poor-group partners than with non-cooperative rich-group partners. Generalized trust played an important role in the enhancement of rich–poor cooperation. The findings shed light on the possibility of reducing inequality and promoting social mobility in society.     

Temperament and behaviour problems in children: A multilevel analysis of cross-cultural differences

Early temperament attributes have been linked to emerging behaviour problems and significant long-term consequences; however, these relations are rarely examined cross-culturally. The present study addresses this gap, employing multilevel modelling to explain within- and between-culture variances with respect to temperament predicting a spectrum of behaviour problems across 14 nations from the Joint Effort Toddler Temperament Consortium (JETTC). A total of 865 children between 17 and 40 months, with approximately equal age distribution across this developmental period and about equivalent representation of genders, were recruited from 14 nations. Greater negative emotionality was associated with more internalizing problems, whereas higher surgency and effortful control predicted fewer internalizing difficulties. Controlling for age and gender, temperament explained significant within- and between-culture variances in internalizing and externalizing problems (at the broad-band and fine-grained levels), as well as sleep problems. For internalizing difficulties, temperament accounted for more between-culture variance. In contrast, for externalizing difficulties, temperament accounted more for how individuals within the same culture differed from their same-culture counterparts. The within-culture findings suggest universal patterns of temperament-problem relations, informing cultural adaptation of interventions; between-culture findings enhance understanding of the implications of the cultural niche for normative behaviour and adjustment.     

Rhetorical Analysis Within a Pragma-Dialectical Framework

The paper reacts against the strict separation between dialectical and rhetorical approaches to argumentation and argues that argumentative discourse can be analyzed and evaluated more adequately if the two are systematically combined. Such an integrated approach makes it possible to show how the opportunities available in each of the dialectical stages of a critical discussion have been used strategically to further the rhetorical aims of the speaker or writer. The approach is illustrated with the help of an analysis of an `advertorial' published by R. J. Reynolds Tobacco Company.     

Development, Reliability, and Validity of the Beliefs Toward Mental Illness Scale

The present study describes the development of a new scale to measure Beliefs toward Mental Illness (BMI), which was designed to measure cross-cultural differences in such beliefs as well as to predict treatment-seeking behavior among different cultural groups. A total of 216 students participated in this study (114 Asian students and 102 American students). A series of factor analyses examining construct validity for the BMI revealed that the BMI has three dimensions, including dangerousness, poor social and interpersonal skills, and incurability. Examination of the reliability estimates for each factor revealed moderate to high internal consistency of the BMI. Comparisons between American and Asian students revealed the expected cultural differences in their beliefs toward mental illness and treatment preference.     

Opium of the people? National identification predicts well-being over time

Social group membership and its social-relational corollaries, for example, social contact, trust, and support, are prophylactic for health. Research has tended to focus on how direct social interactions between members of small-scale groups (i.e., a local sports team or community group) are conducive to positive health outcomes. The current study provides evidence from a longitudinal cross-cultural sample (N = 6,748; 18 countries/societies) that the prophylactic effect of group membership is not isolated to small-scale groups, and that members of groups do not have to directly interact, or in fact know of each other to benefit from membership. Our longitudinal analyses suggest that national identification (strength of association with the country/society of which one is a citizen) predicts lower anxiety and improved health; national identification was in fact almost as positively predictive of health status as anxiety was negatively predictive. The findings indicate that identification with large-scale groups, like small-scale groups, is palliative, and are discussed in terms of globalization and banal nationalism.     

Young adults' partner preferences and parents' in-law preferences across generations,genders, and nations

To examine cultural, gender, and parent–child differences in partner preferences, in eight countries undergraduates (n = 2,071) and their parents (n = 1,851) ranked the desirability of qualities in someone the student might marry. Despite sizable cultural differences—especially between Southeast Asian and Western countries—participants generally ranked kind/understanding (reflecting interpersonal communion) highest, and intelligent and healthy (reflecting mental/physical agency) among the top four. Students valued exciting, attractive partners more and healthy, religious partners less than parents did; comparisons with rankings by youth in 1984 (i.e., from the parents' generation) suggested cohort effects cannot explain most parent–child disagreements. As evolutionary psychology predicts, participants prioritized wives' attractiveness and homemaker skills and husbands' education and breadwinner skills; but as sociocultural theory predicts, variations across countries/decades in gendered spousal/in-law preferences mirrored socioeconomic gender differences. Collectively, the results suggest individuals consider their social roles/circumstances when envisioning their ideal spouse/in-law, which has implications for how humans’ partner-appraisal capabilities evolved.