Intolerance of sexy peers: intrasexual competition among women

Intrasexual competition among males of different species, including humans, is well documented. Among females, far less is known. Recent nonexperimental studies suggest that women are intolerant of attractive females and use indirect aggression to derogate potential rivals. In Study 1, an experimental design was used to test the evolutionary-based hypothesis that women would be intolerant of sexy women and would censure those who seem to make sex too readily available. Results provide strong empirical support for intrasexual competition among women. Using independent raters, blind to condition, we found that almost all women were rated as reacting negatively ("bitchy") to an attractive female confederate when she was dressed in a sexually provocative manner. In contrast, when she was dressed conservatively, the same confederate was barely noticed by the participants. In Study 2, an experimental design was used to assess whether the sexy female confederate from Study 1 was viewed as a sexual rival by women. Results indicated that as hypothesized, women did not want to introduce her to their boyfriend, allow him to spend time alone with her, or be friends with her. Findings from both studies are discussed in terms of evolutionary theory.     

To a young basic scientist, about to embark on a program of translational research

From recent commentaries about the role of basic behavior scientists in translational research, I distill some advice to young investigators who seek to apply their basic science training to translational studies. Among the challenges are (a) devising use-inspired research programs that complement, and are not redundant with, existing efforts in basic and applied behavior analysis; and (b) making tactical decisions, such as the selection of methods and collaborators, based on the research topic rather than, necessarily, the existing traditions in behavioral research. Finally, it must be recognized that although use-inspired basic research has the potential to attract support to basic laboratories and contribute to "saving the world," neither of these outcomes is guaranteed. I discuss the relative risks for basic scientists who proceed with use-inspired basic research rather than ignore such translational questions.     

Outsourcing inspiration: The performance effects of ideological messages from leaders and beneficiaries

Although ideological messages are thought to inspire employee performance, research has shown mixed results. Typically, ideological messages are delivered by leaders, but employees may be suspicious of ulterior motives—leaders may merely be seeking to inspire higher performance. As such, we propose that these messages are often more effective when outsourced to a more neutral third party—the beneficiaries of employees’ work. In Study 1, a field quasi-experiment with fundraisers, ideological messages from a beneficiary—but not from two leaders—increased performance. In Study 2, a laboratory experiment with an editing task, participants achieved higher task and citizenship performance when an ideological message was delivered by a speaker portrayed as a beneficiary vs. a leader, mediated by suspicion. In Study 3, a laboratory experiment with a marketing task, the beneficiary source advantage was contingent on message content: beneficiaries motivated higher task and citizenship performance than leaders with prosocial messages but not achievement messages.     

Justice sensitivity and the processing of justice‐related information

We investigated how Justice Sensitivity (JS) shapes the processing of justice‐related information. We proposed that due to frequently perceiving and ruminating about injustices, persons high in JS develop highly accessible and differentiated injustice concepts that shape attention, interpretation and memory for justice‐related information. Three studies provided evidence for these assumptions. After witnessing injustice, persons high in JS attended more strongly to unjust stimuli than to negative control stimuli (Study1) and interpreted an ambiguous situation as less just than persons low in JS (Study2). Finally, they displayed a memory advantage for unjust information (Study3). Results suggest that JS involves the availability and accessibility of injustice concepts as parameters of cognitive functioning and offer explanations for effects of JS on justice‐related behaviour. Copyright © 2010 John Wiley & Sons, Ltd.     

Social strategies in self-deception

How do people deceive themselves? I argue that although self-deception tends to be conceptualized as something that happens ‘within an individual’, it can also be a process that is distributed across the social context of a self-deceiver. In this paper I will, first, conceptually distinguish different strategies of such ‘social self-deception’. Second, I will incorporate these into the two main conceptualizations of self-deception: intentionalism and deflationism. Finally, I will show how the proposed re-conceptualization of self-deception can be beneficial to conceptual, moral and empirical research.     

Supervising away from home: clinical,cultural and professional challenges

This paper explores some challenges of supervising clinical work of trainees, known as ‘routers’, who live in countries with diverse cultural, social and political traditions, and the analysts who travel to supervise them. It is written as an evolving dialogue between the authors, who explore together the effects of their own culture of origin, and in particular the legacy and values of their own training institutes on the styles and models of analytic supervision. Their dialogue is framed around the meaning of home and experiences of homesickness for analysts working away from home in an interactive field of strangeness in countries where analytical psychology is a relatively new discipline. The authors outline the findings from their own qualitative survey, where other supervisors working abroad, and those they have supervised, describe their experiences and their encounters with difference. The dialogue ends with both authors discussing what they have learned about teaching and supervising abroad, the implications for more flexible use of Jungian concepts, and how such visits have changed their clinical practice in their home countries.     

Predicting the Emergence of Community Psychology and Community Development in 91 Countries with Brief Case Studies of Chile and Ghana

Using a mixed‐method analysis, we propose and test a framework for predicting the international development of community psychology (CP) and community development (CD) as two examples of applied community‐based research (CBR) disciplines aiming to link local knowledge generation with social change. Multiple regressions on an international sample of 91 countries were used to determine the relative influences of preexisting grassroots activism, population size, social and economic development, and civil liberties on estimates of the current strength of CP and CD based on Internet search and review of training courses and programs, published articles and journals, and professional organizations and conferences in these countries. Our results provide support for the proposed model and suggest that grassroots activism positively accounts for the development of CP and CD, above and beyond the influences of the other predictors. Brief qualitative case‐study analyses of Chile (high CP, low CD) and Ghana (high CD, low CP) explore the limitations of our quantitative model and the importance of considering other historical, sociopolitical, cultural, and geographic factors for explaining the development of CP, CD, and other applied community studies.     

Ensuring Community Participation During Program Planning: Lessons Learned During the Development of a HIV/STI Program for Young Sexual and Gender Minorities

HIV/STI incidence has shifted to a younger demographic, comprised disproportionately of gay and bisexual men, transgender women, and people of color. Recognizing the importance of community organizing and participatory engagement during the intervention planning process, we describe the steps taken to engage diverse constituents (e.g., youth and practitioners) during the development of a structural‐level HIV/STI prevention and care initiative for young sexual and gender minorities in Southeast Michigan. Our multi‐sector coalition (MFierce; Michigan Forward in Enhancing Research and Community Equity) utilized a series of community dialogues to identify, refine, and select programmatic strategies with the greatest potential. Evaluation data (N = 173) from the community dialogues highlighted constituents’ overall satisfaction with our elicitation process. Using a case study format, we describe our community dialogue approach, illustrate how these dialogues strengthened our program development, and provide recommendations that may be used in future community‐based program planning efforts.     

Reflexivity in Counterspaces Fieldwork

Reflexivity is an important tool for navigating ethically important moments in fieldwork. It may be particularly useful in situations where the researcher has the potential to undermine the conduct of the study and/or the well‐being‐enhancing role of counterspaces. In this article, I explore my use of reflexivity to traverse ethically important moments I encountered while investigating a counterspace for African‐American youth who had been incarcerated. The ethical challenge concerned whether and how to continue this study in light of realizing that I held implicit biases toward the research participants. I describe my process for arriving at a decision and propose key considerations for the use of reflexivity in supporting ethical fieldwork within counterspaces.     

Anxiety,Sophistication, and Resistance to Persuasion: Evidence from a Quasi‐Experimental Survey on Global Climate Change

Our contribution deals with the emotional and cognitive foundations of resistance to persuasive information. We rely on an original quasi‐experimental protocol that simulates the flow of information and the respondents' reactions to persuasive arguments on global climate change. Respondents in a representative sample (N = 604) were asked if they supported reduction of economic activity to reduce climate warming and were then provided, based on their support or disapproval for this first argument, with counterattitudinal arguments to test their resistance to persuasion. This article highlights that sophistication strengthens resistance to persuasion, whereas anxiety has a double effect: directly, it decreases resistance; indirectly, it interacts with political sophistication and makes sophisticates less likely to resist persuasion when facing arguments inconsistent with their previous beliefs. Nonanxious citizens, in turn, are more likely to resist persuasion when their political sophistication increases. We also provide evidence that the joint effect of anxiety and sophistication is moderated by the ideological identification of respondents.