The association between religiosity and alcohol use: the mediating role of meaning in life and media exposure

We examined whether meaning in life and exposure to media mediate the association between religiosity and alcohol use among members of the Jewish-orthodox community in Israel. One hundred and ten young adult men self-identified as orthodox (n?=?57) or secular (n?=?53) participated in the study. Participants completed self-report measures designed to assess meaning in life, media exposure, alcohol use, and craving. Our findings show that orthodox participants consumed less alcohol and reported less alcohol craving compared to their secular counterparts. Importantly, search for meaning in life and media exposure mediated the relationship between religiosity and alcohol craving. Our findings suggest that religion provides a sense of meaning that serves as a protective factor against alcohol craving, supporting existential theories. Furthermore, our studies show that practices that are associated with a religious lifestyle such as low exposure to mass media also serve as protective factors for alcohol use and craving.     

Interpersonal conflict and meaning making in early adulthood: a self-regulation perspective

The aim of this study was to explore meaning making in response to interpersonal conflict in a group of young adults. A self-regulatory perspective was taken to explore and elaborate on current approaches to meaning making. Participants were 127 young adults aged between 19 and 30. Interactive Qualitative Analysis was applied to first identify significant factors that play a role in interpersonal conflict, and second to develop a conceptual model based on perceived relations between these factors. A model with 11 themes in which 43.6% of the total number of relational pairs explained 71.8% of the variance, was developed. Findings support current approaches to meaning making as a dynamic self-regulated process, while new avenues for exploring meaning making as part of a larger complex system of psychological processes emerged.     

Unpacking grit: Motivational correlates of perseverance and passion for long-term goals

In two cross-sectional studies, we explored the motivational orientations correlates of the character strength of grit and its two component facets: perseverance of effort and consistency of interests over time. Specifically, we examined how individual differences in grit are explained by distinct approaches to pursuing happiness in life: pleasure in immediately hedonically positive activities, meaning in activities that serve a higher, altruistic purpose, and engagement in attention-absorbing activities. In both samples, grit demonstrated medium-sized associations with an orientation toward engagement, small-to-medium associations with an orientation toward meaning, and small-to-medium (inverse) associations with an orientation toward pleasure. These motivational orientations differentially related to the two facets of grit: pursuing engagement was more strongly associated with perseverance of effort, whereas pursuing pleasure was more strongly (inversely) associated with consistency of interests over time. Collectively, findings suggest that individual differences in grit may derive in part from differences in what makes people happy.     

The role of attachment to God and spiritual self-awareness in predicting evangelical Christians’ appraisals of suffering

The present study examined how attachment to God and spiritual self-awareness are related to evangelical Christians’ appraisals of suffering. Specifically, we were interested in whether attachment anxiety and attachment avoidance with God were related to the appraised meaning of stressful life experiences as transformational and whether spiritual self-awareness mediated this relationship. A national sample (N?=?988) of students from Christian institutions completed an online survey. The results indicated that individuals with high levels of attachment anxiety or attachment avoidance with God were less likely to view suffering as a means of spiritual growth and connection with God. Mediation analyses also showed that higher levels of avoidant attachment to God were related to lower levels of spiritual self-awareness, which in turn were related to reduced ability to appraise suffering as transformational. Clinical implications and directions for future research are discussed.     

Intimacy and Complicated Grief among Chinese Elders Having Lost their Spouses: Mediating Role of Meaning Making

This study aims to investigate the mediating role of meaning making in the relationship between intimacy and complicated grief among bereaved elders. A sample of 352 bereaved elders in rural China participated in the study. Both the linear and quadratic effects of meaning making illustrated a model that mediated the effect of intimacy on complicated grief. Essentially, findings revealed that only high levels of meaning making predicted low levels of complicated grief. This study thereby supplements existing research about meaning-making theory.     

The role of activation charge in an emotional categorisation task for words: insight from the perspective of a dual process theory of the activation mechanisms

The role of activation (arousal and subjective significance) was investigated for word processing in an explicit emotional judgement task using a 3?×?3 manipulation. We expected to find dissociative effects for both factors. The behavioural results showed that the fraction of words perceived as emotional increases with increasing arousal or subjective significance. The electrophysiological (EEG) results showed that both factors influence ERP amplitudes. General effects of subjective significance were found for early (60–120?ms and 120–250?ms, low subjective significant stimuli evoked higher amplitude than other conditions) and late (350–490?ms, high subjective significant stimuli evoked higher amplitude than other conditions) time ranges. Localised arousal effects were found in 250–350?ms and 350–490?ms time ranges at posterior (amplitude for high arousing stimuli was less positive than for other conditions) and left frontal ROIs (diverse pattern). Localised subjective significance effects were found for the 350–490?ms time range at the posterior ROIs (amplitude for high subjective significant stimuli was more positive than for other conditions). The results of this study suggest that the effects of arousal reported in earlier studies might account for a more complex form of activation that was recently postulated, namely subjective significance.     

Indexical and symbolic referencing: what role do they play in children's success on theory of mind tasks?

Numerous measures have been employed in the last 17 years to assess theory of mind (ToM). The literature reports marked variability in the age at which children succeed on these measures. To account for this variability, researchers have provided explanations ranging from cognitive shifts and voids to the inability to understand the language of the tasks or to social/pragmatic considerations, all of which tell us little if anything about the internal mechanism underlying ToM. The main purpose of this paper is to provide a comprehensive theoretical account of children's success and the discrepancies found across different ToM tasks. We test the hypothesis that children's understanding of ToM is sensitive to the basic elements of language, that is, to whether the language is indexical or symbolic. Support for this account was found in the analysis of selected test protocols in four published studies of ToM, and new data collected from 53 children (4--6 years) which showed that a higher percentage of children succeeded on tasks with a high ratio of indexical to symbolic references than on tasks with a high ratio of symbolic to indexical references. There was also a main effect of age with older children succeeding at higher rates on both tasks than younger children. Our findings suggest that indexical representation can afford ToM understanding in 4-year-olds, but is not sufficient for a more mature ToM. The latter requires symbolic representation that was demonstrated by the majority of 5--6-year-olds.     

情绪对职业价值观的影响——意义建构的中介作用

为了考察情绪对于职业价值观的影响,本研究采用情绪量表、意义建构量表、职业价值观量表以及社交媒体依赖程度量表等,对938名员工数据进行检验,结果表明:(1)情绪对于职业价值观具有显著的正向影响;(2)意义建构在情绪与职业价值观之间起完全中介作用;(3)社交媒体依赖程度负向调节了情感与意义建构之间的关系。情绪通过意义建构的中介作用对职业价值观产生影响,并且社交依赖在路径的前半段起调节作用。探究情绪与职业价值观关系,对于科学树立合理的职业价值观具有重要意义。     

汉语双音节同音词词汇歧义消解过程的研究

使用跨通道词汇判断任务和语义启动技术,两个实验分别考察了孤立状态下和句子语境中汉语双音节同音词意义通达的情况,结果发现(1)在孤立状态下,无论ISI为0毫秒还是-150毫秒,与同音词主要或次要意义有关的探测词都受到了促进;(2)当ISI为0毫秒时,在语境一致的条件下,与同音词主要或次要意义有关的探测词均受到了促进,在语境不一致的条件下,则未发现任何促进效应;(3)当ISI为-150毫秒时,只是在语境一致并且探测词与同音词的主要意义有关的条件下才观察到促进效应。