Current Psychology最新文献

Research has established distinct categories of support-seeking behaviors, including direct, indirect, emotional, and instrumental support-seeking. However, no existing scale incorporates all four types of support-seeking within romantic relationships in one measure. Understanding how individuals seek support from romantic partners is crucial for managing stress, relationship satisfaction, and well-being. We aimed to create and validate the Romantic Support-Seeking (RoSS) scale, grounded in theory and empirical data. In Study 1 (N = 117 students), we used open-ended questions to gain knowledge on support-seeking behaviors and inform item development. In Study 2 (N = 491), we conducted an exploratory factor analysis to assess the factor structure and select the highest-loading items. In Study 3 (N = 355 students), we used confirmatory factor analysis to confirm the factor structure and provide preliminary construct validity evidence by correlating the subscales with measures of attachment, relationship quality, and coping. We identified four reliable subscales: direct emotional support-seeking; direct instrumental support-seeking; indirect support-seeking; and no support wanted. This accounts for each type of support-seeking, and individuals who choose to manage distress alone instead of seeking support. The RoSS is a significant advancement over existing measures because it captures the full spectrum of romantic support-seeking. The samples were predominantly young, White, and female so future work should address whether the scale applies to other demographic groups. This has clinical and research implications for understanding support dynamics in relationships and their links to individual and relational outcomes, which may be used in counselling to help couples navigate distress effectively.

Supplementary information: The online version contains supplementary material available at 10.1007/s12144-025-08749-0.

The rising prevalence of mental health problems among adolescents has prompted increased scrutiny of social media as a contributing factor. Previous research has produced mixed results, likely due to the varying impact of social media on different dimensions of mental health. To advance understanding in this area, this study examined how social media use affects three critical dimensions of adolescent mental health - well-being, self-esteem, and friendship closeness. Specifically, we examined whether adolescents experienced consistent (unity) or contrasting (duality) effects across these dimensions by analyzing 44,211 daily diaries from 479 adolescents over 100 days. We found that the majority of adolescents (60%) experienced unity in negative effects of social media, suggesting that social media use is a notable contributor to mental health issues. Moreover, 13.6% of adolescents experienced duality in effects, indicating that social media use simultaneously harms and benefits different dimensions of their mental health. Exploratory analyses demonstrated the importance of examining platform-specific effects, revealing negative impacts of TikTok, YouTube, and Instagram use and positive or null effects of Snapchat and WhatsApp use on the three dimensions of mental health. Our findings highlight the need for tailored strategies that account for the varying impacts of social media on adolescent mental health.

Epistemic injustice refers to wrongs done to individuals in their capacity as knowers, often due to prejudice or stereotypes. People living with dementia (PLWD) are particularly vulnerable to epistemic injustice due to the cognitive, emotional and social aspects of their condition and this could negatively affect their quality of life. This scoping review aims to map the available evidence on how epistemic injustice can influence the experience of PLWD. By adopting the PRISMA and Joanna Briggs Institute guidance for scoping reviews, we included peer-reviewed and grey literature in English that describe the relation between the presence of epistemic injustice (concept) and the experience of PLWD (population) across different geographical and cultural contexts (context). Searches in academic databases (Web of Science, Proquest, PubMed, Scopus and EbscoHost) and among grey literature (OpenAlex and AlmaStart Discovery Tool) were conducted in November 2024. Two independent reviewers screened abstracts and full texts. A thematic analysis of the results was carried out. We included 10 studies, of which 7 from database searches, 2 from grey literature and 1 from reference lists of included studies. There was high methodological heterogeneity but most of the included studies were theoretical reflections. PLWD can experience epistemic injustice and are often excluded from clinical interactions and academic research due to communication challenges and difficulties in obtaining informed consent. Even when included in clinical practice and research, their voices are often not valued, limiting their involvement in decisions like advance directives, reinforcing negative stereotypes.

Obsessive-Compulsive Symptoms (OCS) arise from maladaptive appraisal of intrusive thoughts, for which Adverse Childhood Experiences (ACE) can be a major risk factor, due to distorted senses of responsibility and control. Emerging research suggests Mindfulness-Based Interventions (MBIs) can be beneficial for reducing OCS, but existing mechanistic understandings are still based on exposure therapy theories. This pilot study analyzed exploratory measures from a previous mechanistic randomized controlled trial (RCT) with young adult ACE survivors that compared MBI (N=21) vs. active control (N=19). Path analyses revealed that only in the MBI arm, post-intervention score changes (Δ) of "non-attachment" directly influenced ΔOCS (β=-0.50, p<0.05) after controlling for ΔDepression and ΔAnxiety. Such mechanistic finding highlights "non-attachment" as a potential psychological mechanism for MBI's effects on OCS, i.e., through cultivating the mentality of "letting go" of the desire of control over external and internal experiences.

Objectives: Mindfulness interventions are associated with improvements in multiple areas of health, including chronic pain functioning, but little is known about how these improvements are best achieved in clinical settings.

Methods: The present study examined clinical outcomes in a structured mindfulness training protocol in a sample of 112 veterans with chronic pain. Mindfulness practice time and quality, as well as pain- and health-related outcome measures were collected at baseline, 1 month, and 2 months. Multilevel models were used to examine changes in outcomes from baseline to 2 months.

Results: Practice time and quality improved over the course of treatment. Self-reported well-being and health satisfaction also improved over time, although pain acceptance and pain interference did not. Those reporting steeper increases in practice quality over time reported greater improvements in quality of life. No associations were observed between practice quality and other outcomes nor between practice time and outcomes.

Conclusions: Results support a potential role of practice quality in producing improvements in quality of life among veterans with chronic pain. In contrast, practice time was not linked with outcomes. Future randomized trials comparing this protocol to a control group are warranted to further elucidate clinical effects and mechanisms and to clarify the roles of practice time and practice quality within this population.

Self-concealment and secrecy, although conceptually distinct, are often conflated or inadequately distinguished in existing literature. In this correlational study, we aimed to elucidate the relationship between self-concealment and three dimensions of secrecy: the use of secrecy, the ability to keep secrets, and attitude toward secrecy. The sample consisted of 220 individuals (76% identified as female), between the ages of 18 to 78 (M = 24.27, SD = 8.88). Participants completed an online survey which included the Self-Concealment Scale (SCS), the Common Secrecy Questionnaire (CSQ) and the newly developed Secrecy Ability Scale (SAB) and Secrecy Attitude Scale (SAT). Data were screened to mitigate both positive and negative response biases. The results revealed that high self-concealers tend to keep more secrets and have a more positive attitude toward secrecy compared to low self-concealers. No significant group difference emerged concerning the subjective ability to keep secrets. Limitations and future implications of the findings are discussed.

This study investigates effects of choice in a reading comprehension task. It hypothesises that choice will act as a trigger for situational interest, impacting engagement with the reading text, and will therefore improve children's performance in a reading comprehension task, and promote higher levels of enjoyment for that task. Participants were 110 Grade 3 pupils (61 boys, 49 girls). Reading comprehension performance and task enjoyment were measured in a cross-over, repeated measures design where children were either allocated a short story or offered a perceived choice of story to read. In fact, all children read the same story in each condition. Reading comprehension scores and post-test reported enjoyment scores were gathered and analysed. Choice was found to significantly affect comprehension scores (Cohen's d = 0.52) and reported task enjoyment (Cohen's d = 0.23), indicating that choice impacts engagement with a reading text. Effects did not vary by gender or ability. Reading motivation promoted by situational interest may play an important role in reading comprehension and choice may be an effective trigger for situational interest in a reading task and a powerful intrinsic motivator. Situational interest, triggered by choice, may be effective in raising enjoyment levels for a reading task.

Despite the societal impact of inter-group dishonesty, the specific circumstances and moral dispositions that influence this (immoral) behavior remain elusive. In this study, we examined the effect of different levels of shared Sense of Agency (s-SoA) with own team members and the type of moral dispositions on the tendency to deceive outgroups. To this end, we developed an online version of the Tone Tapping Task (TTT) to modulate s-SoA through partner predictability. Next, we run a within-subject experiment where 72 participants experienced a weak or strong s-SoA with their partner and then played the Multi-player Temptation to Lie Card Game, a moral task we devised to capture participants' decisions to lie to increase their team's monetary reward. Participants were presented with either favorable (own team win) or unfavorable (other team win) scenarios leading to low, medium, or high reward levels. Our analyses did not show a modulation of deceptive behavior based on the objective partner's predictability. However, we found that lower s-SoA ratings with the partner and lower group-oriented "binding" morality were associated with an increased frequency of outgroup-favouring lies for lower rewards. Furthermore, participants with higher scores in dispositional "binding" morality showed a positive correlation between s-SoA levels and the likelihood of committing ingroup-favoring lies. These results contribute to existing frameworks by integrating Moral Foundations Theory with research on shared sense of agency, highlighting how subjective experiences of coordination can enhance the effect of group-centered moral tendencies.

Supplementary information: The online version contains supplementary material available at 10.1007/s12144-025-08026-0.

Transitional-age youth (TAY; 15 to 25 years old) are more likely to experience psychological problems compared to other age groups. This study aimed to identify the most relevant transdiagnostic factors underlying internalizing and externalizing symptoms in TAY, including perfectionism, perceived stress, self-compassion, psychological flexibility, adaptive and maladaptive emotion regulation, self-esteem, and autonomy. The sample consisted of 87 TAY from a clinical and 649 from a community sample (M = 20.71, 64.1% female). Confidence Interval Based Estimation of Relevance (CIBER) was used to detect the most relevant transdiagnostic factors, and Latent Profile Analyses (LPA) were used to identify groups of TAY sharing similar patterns of transdiagnostic factors. CIBER showed that all transdiagnostic factors were associated with both internalizing and externalizing symptoms, with most factors being more strongly associated with internalizing symptoms. LPA identified six groups of TAY: low resilience (6.5%), moderate low resilience (20.5%), average resilience (29.3%), moderate high resilience (26.8%), moderate high resilience - high perfectionism and autonomy (1.8%) and high resilience (15.1%). Generally, TAY in the lower resilience groups were more likely to be in the clinical sample than in the community sample and showed more symptoms compared to TAY in the higher resilience groups. Conversely, TAY in the moderate high resilience - high perfectionism and autonomy group were most likely to be in the community sample. The study highlights the importance of focusing on transdiagnostic factors in research and clinical practice for TAY.

Bullying is a serious public health issue for adolescents in the United States. Previous studies have demonstrated associations between self-esteem, anxiety/depressive symptoms, and bullying victimization (BV); however, these relationships have not been extensively studied considering the overlap of social identities of Latinx adolescents living with obesity and overweight (LAWO), who are more likely to be victims of bullying. The current study aims to address these gaps by examining the relationship between BV and anxiety/depressive symptoms and the role of self-esteem while considering sex differences among LAWO (N = 139; female: n = 77, 55.4%; mean age = 12.9 years). Results for overall group showed that BV significantly predicted anxiety/depressive symptoms and self-esteem significantly mediated this relationship. Multigroup mediation analysis resulted in significant mediation by self-esteem for females. Results suggest that interventions that target self-esteem and consider culture would be beneficial for female LAWO.