Journal of personality and social psychology最新文献

People are systematically unaware of the mishaps, problems, and failures around them, a phenomenon we dub the failure gap. People underestimate tens of thousands, and in some cases, millions of failures at the individual, national, and international level across 30+ life domains (Study 1). For every three species that go extinct, the public knows of one; for every five weapons undetected by airport security, people think one sneaks by. Why are people unaware of the problems around them? Failure is underreported relative to success (Studies 2-5). The failure gap had policy implications for key decision makers. Closing the failure gap reduced support for harsh punishment (e.g., school suspensions) among educators, lowered support for mass incarceration among voters, led managers to extend paid parental leave to new mothers, and shrank social stigma in the workplace (Studies 6 and 7). Taken together, the failure gap is common, crippling, and encouragingly correctable. (PsycInfo Database Record (c) 2026 APA, all rights reserved).

Individual differences in psychological reactivities (i.e., the degree to which individuals react differently to social interactions) are central to psychological research. Previous theory-based research has identified substantial individual differences in reactivities but few robust predictors of these differences. This work aimed to address two questions: First, can individual differences in reactivities to social interactions be accurately predicted at all? Second, what are the most important person-level variables for this prediction? A data-driven machine learning approach was applied to three large-scale experience sampling data sets (overall N = 5,047) to predict the extent to which individuals reacted with positive and negative affect to momentary social interaction characteristics (e.g., interaction depth). Individual differences in reactivities were extracted via multilevel modeling (i.e., random slopes) and then predicted with machine learning methods using a variety of person-level variables (i.e., sociodemographics, personality traits, and political and societal attitudes). The robustness of predictions was examined by built-in cross-validation and across independent samples. Feature importance and interactions were analyzed with SHapley Additive exPlanations values. Our results suggest that, whereas complex prediction models outperformed a baseline model in predicting individual differences in reactivities in most analyses, the overall predictive performance was limited. This finding underlines the importance of replicating machine learning results across outcomes and independent samples. We revealed several predictive patterns that can stimulate future research, elaborate on limitations of current machine learning approaches for intensive within-person data, and discuss the results against the background of dynamic conceptualizations of personality. (PsycInfo Database Record (c) 2026 APA, all rights reserved).

How do people judge those who commit faux pas? Across six preregistered studies (N = 3,204), we find that the answer depends on how a faux pas is presented to others and the extent to which it harms others. For faux pas that cause minimal or no harm to others, those who display amusement (by laughing at their error) are seen as warmer, more competent, and more authentic (though not significantly more or less moral) than those who display embarrassment. While both amusement and embarrassment displays serve an appeasement function (which reflects positively on actors), observers view those displaying embarrassment as being excessively self-conscious (which limits positive character judgments). In contrast, amusement displays are deemed more emotionally calibrated, since they signal that an actor recognizes the faux pas is benign and therefore not serious enough to warrant negative self-conscious emotions. In other words, observers do not believe actors ought to feel particularly embarrassed upon committing common benign faux pas. However, when a faux pas harms others, those who display amusement are seen as experiencing a deficient level of self-consciousness, since, in this case, amusement indicates a disregard for the welfare of others. As a result, as harm to others increases, the benefits of displaying amusement become either attenuated or reversed relative to displaying embarrassment. Together, these findings provide a simple framework for understanding when amusement and embarrassment displays reflect well on individuals who commit faux pas. (PsycInfo Database Record (c) 2026 APA, all rights reserved).

Knowing how to respond to sexist comments and counteract their harmful consequences remains a challenging task for male allies. In this mixed-methods research, our preregistered qualitative study of 82 male leaders from the United States (Study 1) reveals that most intend to confront perpetrators of sexist remarks, with a preference for doing so privately rather than publicly; relatively few intend to validate the experiences of harmed targets. We contend that allies need to consider actions beyond confrontation-a response commonly recommended by scholars and in practice-as well as appropriate social contexts for these allyship behaviors to ensure the inclusion of women who are directly harmed by such remarks. We hypothesize that targets' sense of belonging and voice intentions are optimally supported when allies not only (a) confront transgressors' sexist remarks in public (vs. private) but also (b) validate targets' harmed experiences in private (vs. public). Three preregistered and one complementary experimental studies (Studies 2-4; N = 1,216 U.S. women) from the perspective of women support our theory. Our findings suggest that confrontation should be enacted in public because it directly reinforces gender civility norms, whereas validation is better provided in private to demonstrate concern for dignity. In our final study (Study 5; N = 253 U.S. men), we provide critical insights into how public confrontation-targets' preferred response-might adversely influence the attitudes and behaviors of confronted perpetrators (e.g., bias regulation). By incorporating multiparty perspectives, our research provides actionable recommendations for potential allies, especially men in leadership roles. (PsycInfo Database Record (c) 2026 APA, all rights reserved).