The relationship between implicit and explicit motives, goal pursuit, and autobiographical memory content during a diary study

This online diary study investigated how motives interact with goal pursuit to predict daily autobiographical experiences. Participants (N = 141) completed measures of implicit and explicit achievement, provided daily memories and reports of their goal pursuit during a 3-week diary period. A stronger implicit achievement motive at the onset of the study was associated with more agentic (and fewer communal) autobiographical content. Goal progress was linked with using more agentic words, while goal attainability was related to using more communal words. Interactions between motives and goal pursuit on autobiographical memory suggests a trade-off: Favorable goal pursuit conditions may prompt people not motivated for achievement to shift their focus from agentic to communal themes, while individuals motivated for achievement maintain their priorities.     

Motives and Likelihood of Bribery: An Experimental Study of Managers in Taiwan

Many studies of bribery acknowledge the important role of bribe-givers, but their true motives remain unclear. We propose that the likelihood of bribery depends on the willingness of an organization to affiliate with local parties or to be successful in a host country, or to have power over local parties. We further argue that different opportunities, either pervasive or arbitrary, facilitate different types of motives that affect the likelihood of bribery. In addition, we investigate the effect of perceived fairness on the likelihood of bribery. We employ a 3 (motives: affiliation vs. achievement vs. power)?×?2 (opportunities: pervasiveness vs. arbitrariness)?×?2 (perceived fairness: high vs. low) factorial design in experimental settings among Executive MBA students in southern Taiwan. Our findings indicate that, when companies perceive a higher level of distributive fairness, high-achieving organizations are more likely to offer a bribe when the condition is pervasive. When they have a powerful motive, arbitrariness engenders a higher likelihood of bribery. When they perceive less distributive fairness, there are no significant differences between motive and opportunity.     

Some Thoughts on Supervision

Quite often we have the experience that adolescents do not accept an offer of treatment, in spite of the fact that they feel miserable. Or, that they do start in treatment and then change their minds and break off contact. The author reflects about factors and conditions contributing to these analytic failures. He discusses elements of analytic method, setting, neutral position, analytic relationship, and how the frames are put under pressure in work with adolescents. He thereafter presents some vignettes and examples of analytic work, where intuitive interventions and interpretations appear against a background of ordinary psychoanalytic method. For the analyst, these interventions can feel unexpected, incidental, like ideas out of the blue. On second thoughts, we may sometimes be able to trace and understand how these intuitions are based on non-conscious processes, like counter-transference feelings, an understanding of the patient still unclear and unarticulated for the analyst or perhaps a last desperate attempt to reach the patient and get in contact at a decisive or critical moment. Finally, the author reflects on the double face of psychoanalysis: both a contemplated, carefully described and systematic method and a craft with elements of intuition, creativity and, sometimes, inspiration.     

高趋近动机积极情绪对注意灵活性的影响

该研究通过两个实验探讨不同趋近动机强度的积极情绪对注意灵活性的影响。实验一中40名大学生被试分别在高趋近和低趋近动机积极情绪条件下完成隐性注意朝向任务;实验二以35名大学生为被试,考察高趋近动机积极情绪和中性情绪条件下的注意灵活性。两项实验结果表明,与低趋近动机积极情绪和中性情绪条件相比,高趋近动机积极情绪下个体的注意灵活性降低,实验结果支持情绪的动机维度模型。     

Are Nonfatal Suicide Attempts Instrumental in Achieving Personal and Interpersonal Goals?

This study focused on the well-being of the survivors of suicide attempts and the well-being of their interpersonal relationships after the attempt. The data came from a sample of 392 college students from 10 Muslim majority countries who reported having attempted suicide in the last 4 years. Suicide was conceptualized as a goal-directed behavior embedded in a sociocultural context and motivated by personal or interpersonal goals. We tested a process that linked culturally shaped self-construal to the postsuicidal personal and interpersonal well-being. We posited that this process would operate through the attitudes towards suicide, motives for suicide, the strength of the intention to die. Our model indicated that the acceptability of suicide was positively associated with escape motives, and this association was even stronger for the individuals with interdependent self-construals. Escape motives were negatively associated with postsuicidal personal and interpersonal well-being, but communication motives were not associated with these outcomes. We also found evidence that having an interdependent self-construal might be beneficial for postsuicidal personal and interpersonal well-being. Our results further suggested that the postsuicidal personal and interpersonal well-being of highly interdependent individuals may depend on the interpretation of their act of suicide by their close others.     

Perceived Norms,Outcome Expectancies,and Collegiate Drinking: Examining the Mediating Role of Drinking Motives

The authors examined the mediational role of drinking motives in explaining the associations among psychosocial antecedents and collegiate drinking. Results indicated that drinking motives partially mediated the relationships between outcome expectancies, perceived norms, alcohol use intensity, and alcohol‐related negative consequences.     

Motives to (not) forgive deviant group members: A comparison within and between cultures

This study examines people's motives to (not) forgive group members who violate an important group norm. More specifically, we attempt to determine what is the primary focus in such a situation (the group, the offender, the relationship, or the self), and whether this depends on how important the group is and on the cultural context (more individualist or more collectivist). Our sample includes Moluccans living in Indonesia (more collectivist) and Moluccans in the Netherlands (more individualist). Participants were asked to evaluate a scenario in which a group member (close or nonclose other) violated an important group norm. We find that Indonesian Moluccans are more likely not to forgive group members who violate a group norm than Dutch Moluccans. This finding suggests that the group is more important to Indonesian Moluccans. Across the two samples, however, participants were more inclined to forgive an ingroup deviant for the benefit of this person or their relationship than for the benefit of the group. Interestingly, self‐focused concerns were more important among Indonesian Moluccans and differences between the samples in the relative importance of the different motives could not be explained by people's self‐definition (i.e., more independent or interdependent). Implications of these findings for the literature on forgiveness and on individualism–collectivism are discussed.     

Maternal avoidance,anxiety cognitions and interactive behaviour predicts infant development at 12 months in the context of anxiety disorders in the postpartum period

BackgroundFew studies have examined the relation between anxiety disorders in the postpartum period and cognitive as well as language development in infancy.AimsThis longitudinal study investigated whether anxiety disorder in the postpartum period is linked to infant development at twelve months. A closer look was also taken at a possible link between maternal interaction and infant development.Study designSubjects were videotaped during a Face-to-Face-Still-Face interaction with their infant (M = 4.0 months). Specific maternal anxiety symptoms were measured by self-report questionnaires (Anxiety Cognition Questionnaire (ACQ), Body Sensations Questionnaire (BSQ), Mobility Inventory (MI)) to check for a connection with infant development. The Bayley Scales of Infant and Toddler Development-III (Bayley-III) were used to assess infant language and cognitive development at one year of age.Subjectsn = 34 mothers with anxiety disorder (SCID-I; DSM-IV) and n = 47 healthy mothers with their infant.Outcome measuresInfant performance on Bayley-III language and cognitive scales.ResultsInfants of mothers with anxiety disorder yielded significantly lower language scores than infants of controls. No significant group differences were found regarding infant cognitive development. Exploratory analyses revealed the vital role of “maternal avoidance accompanied” in infant language and cognitive development. Maternal neutral engagement, which lacks positive affect and vocalisations, turned out as the strongest negative predictor of cognitive development. Maternal anxiety cognitions and joint activity in mother-infant interaction were the strongest predictors of infant language performance.ConclusionsResults underline the importance to also consider the interaction behaviour of women with anxiety disorders to prevent adverse infant development.     

Young adult e-cigarette users’ reasons for liking and not liking e-cigarettes: A qualitative study

Objective: To gain an in-depth understanding of what young adult electronic- or e-cigarette users like or dislike about e-cigarettes. We aimed to determine the reasons that may encourage young adults to use e-cigarettes or discourage them from using e-cigarettes.

Design: Twelve focus group discussions were conducted with 62 current daily e-cigarette users (63% men) of mean age = 25.1 years (standard deviation = 5.5). Data were analysed following principles of inductive content analysis.

Results: Results indicated 12 categories of reasons for liking e-cigarettes (e.g. recreation, smoking cessation) and 6 categories of reasons for not liking e-cigarettes (e.g. poor product quality, poor smoking experience).

Conclusions: Young adults’ motives for using or not using e-cigarettes appear to be varied and their relative importance in terms of predicting e-cigarette use initiation, dependence, and cigarette/e-cigarette dual use needs to be carefully studied in population-based, empirical studies. The current findings suggest that e-cigarettes may serve social, recreational, and sensory expectancies that are unique relative to cigarettes and not dependent on nicotine. Further, successful use of e-cigarettes in smoking cessation will likely need higher standards of product quality control, better nicotine delivery efficiency and a counselling component that would teach smokers how to manage e-cigarette devices while trying to quit smoking cigarettes.     

The Chronotype-Academic Performance Model (CAM): Daytime sleepiness and learning motivation link chronotype and school performance in adolescents

Many adolescents experience a discrepancy between their biological time, which is shifted toward eveningness, and early school starting times. Due to this social jetlag, eveningness is negatively correlated with school performance. On the basis of the here presented data, we derived a model for the association of chronotype and school performance, the Chronotype-Academic Performance Model (CAM), including daytime sleepiness and achievement motivation as mediating factors. The sample comprised N = 273 adolescents aged 14–16 years. Circadian preference, daytime sleepiness, learning and achievement motivation, and information about participants’ last school certificate were assessed online. Chronotype was not directly related to academic performance, but was mediated by daytime sleepiness and learning motivation. Morning-orientation was negatively associated with daytime sleepiness and positively with learning motivation, which, in turn, affected performance. In evening-types, we found the strongest association between sleepiness and refusal to work. The CAM suggests that chronotype may not directly influence academic performance, but be mediated by daytime sleepiness and learning motivation. Evening types seem to be at high risk to suffer from daytime sleepiness and to display dysfunctional attitudes toward work. Measures of reducing sleepiness and modifying attitudes toward academic achievement might attenuate the disadvantages of evening-types due to social jetlag.