Capturing the Structure of Distinct Types of Individual Differences in the Situation‐specific Experience of Emotions: The Case of Anger

The aim of this paper was to understand why some people experience certain emotions in a specific situation, whereas others do not. We postulate that these individual differences arise from individual differences in two underlying processes of emotion elicitation: (i) individual differences in the emotion components (appraisals and action tendencies) that situations activate in a person and (ii) individual differences in how these emotion components are related to subjective emotional experience. In this paper, we re‐analysed data from two studies on anger to capture the structure of these two types of individual differences by using clustering modelling techniques. Consistent results across the two studies demonstrated that individuals differ in anger because they (i) differ in how easy they experience anger‐relevant appraisals (Studies 1 and 2) and action tendencies (Study 2) in increasingly negative situations and (ii) differ in which of these components are necessary to experience anger. Copyright © 2011 John Wiley & Sons, Ltd.     

中学生消费决策风格的特点及其与家庭理财教育方式的关系

该研究以377名中学生为被试,探讨了中学生消费决策风格的特点及其与家庭理财教育方式的关系。结果表明:(1)中学生消费决策风格部分符合Shim(1996)提出的二阶模型(包括质量导向、非理性导向、享乐导向和价格导向等四个二阶因子);(2)中学生消费决策风格的年级差异不显著,性别差异显著,男生在品牌导向上高于女生,在流行导向和娱乐导向上低于女生;(3)中学生消费决策风格可划分为决策随意型、决策紊乱型、决策理智型和决策实惠型;(4)父母消极的理财教育方式会导致中学生形成非理性导向或享乐导向的消费决策风格,而积极的教育引导则能在一定程度上减弱中学生的非理性决策风格,促进其形成质量导向的决策风格。     

Harcèlement moral au travail et pro/antisocialité du salarié victime : quels effets sur les jugements,les émotions et les intentions d’aide des témoins ?

Bullying at work is characterized by negative, repetitive and frequent acts towards a person, bearing reached with her physical and psychic health (Einarsen, Hoel, Zapf, & Cooper, 2003; Leymann, 1996). On the basis of research of Weiner (1996) and Rudolph, Roesch, Greitemeyer, and Weiner (2004), we postulated that the bullying acts, the behaviors of the bullied employee and it revictimisation would influence the judgments and the emotions of the witnesses. Research was carried out within the framework of the paradigm of the judges of 72 participants. The variance analyses show that the gravity of the acts decreases the feeling of equity, increases the attribution of responsibility towards the harcelor, decreases the attribution of responsibility to the victim and increases the help. The bullying acts always interact with the victim’s pro or antisocial behaviors. The emotions of the judges are mainly positive with regard to the victim and negative towards the harcelor except when bullied employee has emitted an antisocial behavior. The gravity of the bullying acts increases on the one hand sympathy, fear and sadness towards the victims, on the other hand, anger and dislike towards the harcelor.     

Ingroup ambivalence and experienced discomfort: the moderating roles of affective versus cognitive attitudinal basis, group identification, as mediated by negative beliefs about the ingroup

Prior research has found individuals' reactions to vary depending on whether such associations are activated by emotions (an affective basis) or by beliefs (a cognitive basis) about the object's properties. Accordingly, this conceptual distinction should be relevant also for the discomfortive responses to one's ambivalent attitudes regarding fellow group members (or the ingroup). Findings from two studies support the argument that ambivalence-associated discomfort a) is a general tendency when it regards affect-based ambivalence towards fellow group members, while b) only holds for the more identified group members when ambivalence concerns beliefs about the ingroup, and for this latter group members c) this tendency is driven by the strength of their negative beliefs about the ingroup or fellow group members.     

Public Self-Presentations and Self-Conceptions: The Moderating Role of Identity Status

Abstract

The effect of level of identity status on the internalization of a public self-presentation was investigated. American late adolescents, pretested on identity status and sociability, were instructed to portray themselves positively or negatively during a face-to-face interview, in a written interview, or on an anonymous questionnaire. Participants internalized positive presentations and resisted internalizing negative ones. Regression analyses indicated that differences in identity-status scores moderated shifts in private self-appraisals. Increased susceptibility was associated with moratorium scores, but only in the negative role conditions. Foreclosure scores accounted for enhanced resistance, but only in the positive role conditions. Evidence for the moderating effect of identity diffusion was obtained only in actual face-to-face encounters.     

Up-regulating positive emotions in everyday life: Strategies, individual differences, and associations with positive emotion and well-being

This research aimed to identify strategies people use to up-regulate positive emotions, and examine associations with personality, emotion regulation, and trait and state positive experience. In Study 1, participants reported use of 75 regulation strategies and trait emotional experience. Principal component analysis revealed three strategy domains: engagement (socializing, savoring), betterment (goal pursuit, personal growth), and indulgence (substance use, fantasy). In Study 2, participants reported state-level regulation and emotional experience. Engagement correlated with greater state and trait positive emotion, and overall greater well-being. Betterment correlated with less state, but greater trait, positive emotion. Indulgence correlated with greater state, but less trait positive emotion and overall lower well-being. This research suggests trade-offs between short-term and long-term emotional consequences of different strategies.     

Investigating associations between empathy, morality and psychopathic personality traits in the general population

Although atypical moral and empathy processing are considered core features of psychopathic personality, little is known about how these constructs are associated with psychopathic traits in the general population. One-hundred and twenty-four adult males from the community were administered the Self-Report Psychopathy Scale 4 Short Form, as well as a wide battery of affect, empathy and morality tasks and questionnaires. Our findings indicate that both core affective-interpersonal, as well as lifestyle-antisocial features of psychopathy are associated with weaker empathic responses to fearful faces. However, only the unique variance of the affective-interpersonal features is associated with weaker empathic response to happy stories, lower propensity to feel empathic concern and less difficulty in making decisions on moral dilemmas. In contrast, the unique variance of the lifestyle-antisocial features is associated with greater propensity to feel empathic concern. These preliminary findings extend previous research and suggest that, while the joint variance between affective-interpersonal and lifestyle-antisocial features might drive some ‘deficits’ associated with psychopathy, there also appears also to be unique ‘deficits’ associated with the core affective-interpersonal features, particularly in relation to affective aspects of moral processing.     

Empathy, values, morality and Asperger's syndrome

The aims of this study were, first, to re-address the issue of empathy among people with autism conditions; second, to explore the relationships between empathy and values among autistic populations and controls; and third, to explore the capacity for moral agency among those affected by autism. We compared responses of an Asperger group (N = 41) and a control group (N = 139) to measures of self-reported empathy (Davis's IRI) and value priorities (Schwartz's PVQ). Control group results were largely in line with previous studies, such that empathy subscales of perspective taking and empathic concern showed their strongest positive and negative relations to the Schwartz self-transcendence/self-enhancement dimensions. Results for the Asperger group showed that although on the one hand there were self-reported difficulties in perspective taking and the cognitive recognition of affect, and that on the other hand there were less connections between the empathy and value measures, there was nevertheless a comparable prioritization of moral values. Conclusions suggest that different people may acquire moral values through different mechanisms.     

Compassion for one reduces punishment for another

The ability of compassion felt toward one person to reduce punishment directed at another was examined. The use of a staged interaction in which one individual cheats to earn higher compensation than others resulted in heightened third-party punishment being directed at the cheater. However, among participants who were induced to feel compassion toward a separate individual, punishment of the cheater disappeared even though the cheater clearly intended to cheat and showed no remorse for doing so. Moreover, additional analyses revealed that the reduction in punishment was directly mediated by the amount of compassion participants experienced toward the separate individual.