Emotion最新文献

The experience of hope predicts a host of positive outcomes. However, to date, the psychology of hope has paid little attention to hope as an emotion, focusing instead on hope as a sense of effective goal pursuit. Seven studies (N = 3,357) tested various manipulations intended to induce hopeful feelings distinct from general positive mood. Images of infant's faces and tree saplings were found to successfully induce hopeful feelings, even when controlling for happiness, compared with adult faces or full-grown trees, respectively. Infant objects, paintings, or puppies did not produce the same effects. We discuss the necessity of studying the emotion of hope and potential directions with such a hopeful induction. (PsycInfo Database Record (c) 2024 APA, all rights reserved).

Spontaneous mind-wandering has been theorized to increase susceptibility for rumination, contributing to risk for major depressive disorder (MDD). Clarifying whether-and under what circumstances-mind-wandering leads to rumination could inform the development of targeted interventions to reduce risk for ruminative sequelae. Using intensively sampled data in 44 young adults with remitted MDD and 38 healthy volunteers with 1,558 total observations collected from 2018 to 2022, we conducted multilevel models to investigate temporal relationships between mind-wandering and rumination. Contextual factors (e.g., intensity of negative affect; momentary impulsivity) and individual factors (e.g., MDD history) were examined as moderators of these relationships. Mind-wandering predicted increased rumination, whereas rumination did not predict increased mind-wandering. When individuals experienced greater negative affect or acted more impulsively compared to their usual levels, they showed a stronger relationship between mind-wandering and subsequent rumination. Depression history did not significantly moderate temporal relationships between mind-wandering and rumination. Spontaneous mind-wandering may transition into rumination, particularly during moments when people experience more negative affect or impulsivity compared to usual. Delivering interventions in these moments could reduce risk for ruminative sequelae. The tendency to ruminate in response to mind-wandering is suggested to be consistent regardless of depression history, suggesting the transdiagnostic and dimensional nature of rumination as a possible consequence of mind-wandering. Future work is needed to determine whether these associations are generalizable across the lifespan. (PsycInfo Database Record (c) 2024 APA, all rights reserved).

The tendency to maintain a positive outlook during adversity associates with better health. Interventions that help people cope with stress by maintaining a positive perspective have potential to improve health. Mindfulness interventions show promise for enhancing positive affect in daily life, and developing acceptance toward momentary experiences may help people notice more positive experiences under stress. In a sample of 153 healthy stressed adults (M_age = 32 years; 67% female; 53% White, 22% Black, 22% Asian, 4% other race; 5% Hispanic; collected in 2015-2016), we tested whether mindfulness training, and acceptance training in particular, boosts awareness of positive experiences during acute stress. Participants were randomly assigned to one of three matched 15-lesson remote interventions: (1) Monitor + Accept, standard mindfulness instruction in both monitoring and acceptance; (2) Monitor Only, dismantled mindfulness instruction in monitoring only; or (3) Coping control. After the intervention, positive (and negative) experiences during acute stress challenge (using a modified Trier Social Stress Test) were assessed using a new checklist measure. As predicted, Monitor + Accept participants reported noticing significantly more positive experiences during acute stress than Monitor Only (d = .61) and control (d = .58) participants, whereas the number of negative experiences noticed did not differ by condition. Across conditions, positive experiences during acute stress correlated with daily life positive emotions at postintervention (r = .21). Results suggest that mindfulness training, and acceptance training in particular, can broaden awareness to include more positive affective experiences. This work has important implications for understanding coping and affect dynamics following mindfulness interventions. (PsycInfo Database Record (c) 2024 APA, all rights reserved).

One of the richest and most powerful tools in social communication is the face. Facial expressions are a prominent way to convey high-dimensional, dynamic information, such as emotion, motivation, and intentions. Previous research has linked mimicry of facial expressions to positive human interaction (e.g., mutual agreement). In this study, we investigated in a real-world setting whether the mimicry pattern of multiple affective facial expressions depends on the interpersonal attitudinal agreement between interlocutors. We analyzed video clips of Democratic or Republican American politicians being interviewed by either a political ally or an opponent (N_total = 150 videos). The interviews showed either agreement between two Republicans or two Democrats, or disagreement between members of each affiliation. Using image processing tools, we extracted the intensity of the facial action units for each timepoint. In contrast to the prevalent notion that positive social interaction, such as agreement, fosters mimicry, we found mimicry of all facial expressions in both agreement and disagreement. Moreover, the pattern of the facial expressions mimicry depended on the agreement condition such that an artificial classifier could successfully discriminate between the agreement conditions. Our results suggest that not only positive interpersonal communication is characterized by mimicry but also negative one. This implies that in real-life interactions, mimicry may be a tool to understand others and thus successfully communicate, regardless of the positivity of the social interaction. Whereas the existence of mimicry may be indispensable for social communication, the specific pattern of facial expressions mimicry depends on the social context. (PsycInfo Database Record (c) 2024 APA, all rights reserved).

Chronic loneliness has been associated with increased risk for multiple mental disorders. Multiple lines of evidence suggest that problems with emotion regulation (ER) may underlie the course and costs of loneliness, but evidence on the associations between loneliness and ER has not been systematically analyzed until now. The present meta-analysis examined the relations between loneliness and multiple dimensions of ER including the habitual use of common strategies (i.e., rumination, cognitive reappraisal, expressive suppression, distraction), ER difficulties, and ER abilities. A systematic search across four databases returned 4,454 articles, out of which 61 articles (total N = 40,641) were eligible for inclusion. The analyses indicated that there were consistent positive relations between loneliness and rumination (r = 0.38), suppression (r = 0.31), and ER difficulties (r = 0.49). Loneliness was also negatively associated with reappraisal (r = -0.23), distraction (r = -0.21), and ER abilities (r = -0.28). The latter two effects were significantly larger in studies on adults compared to adolescents, as indicated by subgroup analyses, and corroborated by metaregressions. Furthermore, the percentage of women in the sample was a negative predictor of the association between loneliness and ER difficulties, and the country cultural individualism was a positive predictor of the association between loneliness and suppression. There was evidence of publication bias in all analyses, but the effect sizes remained significant after imputing for missing studies. Overall, the present results support consistent associations between loneliness and ER and highlight potential targets for future interventions. (PsycInfo Database Record (c) 2024 APA, all rights reserved).

While extant research on empathy has made significant progress in uncovering the mechanisms underlying the responses of an observer (empathizer) to the distress of another (target), it remains unclear how the interaction between the empathizer and the target contributes to distress regulation in the target. Here, we propose that behavioral and neural coupling during empathic interactions contribute to diminished distress. From November 2020 to November 2022, we recruited 37 pairs of previously unacquainted participants (N = 74) from multicultural backgrounds. They engaged in a 5 min face-to-face emotional sharing task, where one participant shared a distressing biographical experience with the other participant. We used functional near-infrared spectroscopy (fNIRS) to measure interbrain coupling in the emotion regulation system, specifically the dorsolateral prefrontal cortex (dlPFC), and the observation execution system, specifically the inferior frontal gyrus (IFG). Results indicate that during emotional sharing the target and the empathizer emotionally converge, such that the empathizer becomes sadder. Moreover, the levels of empathizers' empathy predicted both emotional convergence and target distress relief. The neuroimaging findings indicate that interbrain coupling in the dlPFC, IFG, and premotor cortex, predicted distress relief in the target, and more critically that interbrain coupling in the dlPFC played a mediating role in the relationship between distress relief and the levels of empathy of the empathizer. Considering the role of the dlPFC in emotion regulation, we conclude that interbrain coupling in this region during emotional sharing plays a key role in dyadic coregulation of distress. (PsycInfo Database Record (c) 2024 APA, all rights reserved).

Objects that typically induce fear capture attention in an automatic, involuntary manner, particularly for individuals fearful of such objects. This study investigates whether attention to these objects can be attenuated through statistical learning. Participants searched for shapes while occasionally being distracted by images of leaves, which appeared with a higher probability at a particular location, resulting in learned spatial suppression (collected in 2024). Subsequently, distractors also included butterfly and spider images. Counter to a control group, individuals with high fear of spiders exhibited heightened attentional capture by spiders compared to neutral distractors. Critically, at high-probability distractor locations, fearful individuals managed to suppress spider images, resulting in reduced interference. This suggests that attention to fear-inducing stimuli can be modulated through learning processes, offering potential for novel training methods to alleviate biases toward threatening stimuli. (PsycInfo Database Record (c) 2024 APA, all rights reserved).

Interpersonal emotion regulation commonly occurs in the context of close relationships. The present study examined whether accurately knowing the emotions that one's romantic partner would feel in a given situation was associated with the effectiveness of interpersonal emotion regulation attempts. One partner from 92 romantic dyads (N = 184) was randomly assigned to the role of the target, and the other was assigned to the role of the regulator. Each participant read four vignettes depicting emotion-inducing scenarios. Targets rated the emotions they would feel in each situation, whereas regulators reported how they thought their partner would feel in each situation. Targets were then asked to describe what their partner could say to help them feel good or better in each situation, using an open-ended response format. The regulators were asked to describe what they would say to their partners to help them feel good or better in each situation. Accuracy was defined as the mean difference in ratings between the regulator's estimates of their partner's emotions and their actual emotion ratings across the scenarios. Effectiveness of regulation was defined as the mean score of similarity between regulator's open-ended responses and target's open-ended responses as rated by independent coders. The results showed that empathic accuracy significantly predicted regulation effectiveness. We also found that individual differences in regulators' emotional clarity scores predicted empathic accuracy. This study sheds light on the importance of accurately perceiving a partner's emotions for effective regulation in close relationships. (PsycInfo Database Record (c) 2024 APA, all rights reserved).

A growing body of literature supports the idea that prosocial behavior, or behavior done on behalf of another person, is beneficial to well-being. However, modern society often places a greater emphasis on self-care or "treating yourself" in the pursuit of well-being. To understand the effects of these differing forms of kindness (to others or the self), we conducted a 2-week intervention study in December 2020. Participants (N = 999) were randomly assigned to an other-kindness, self-kindness, or control condition. Participants in the other- and self-kindness groups were asked to perform three acts of kindness each week, while participants in the control condition were not. Of those who completed the intervention (N = 781), we found that participants in the other-kindness (vs. self-kindness and control) group experienced significant decreases in depression, anxiety, and loneliness from pre- to postintervention, offering compelling evidence for the mental health benefits of prosocial behavior. Unexpectedly, we also found that participants in the self-kindness (vs. other-kindness and control) group experienced significant increases in depression and anxiety. While the self-kindness group reported enjoying their acts of kindness more, the other-kindness group felt more connected. Overall, these findings reaffirm the benefits of prosocial behavior on well-being and suggest that self-kindness might not be as positive as it feels. (PsycInfo Database Record (c) 2024 APA, all rights reserved).

Facial emotion recognition is vital for human social behavior. During the COVID-19 pandemic, face masks were widely adopted for viral mitigation and remain crucial public health tools. However, questions persist about their impact on emotion recognition and neural processing, especially in children, parents, and young adults. We developed the Masked Affective and Social Cognition task, featuring masked and unmasked faces displaying fear, sadness, and anger. We recruited three racial and ethnically diverse samples: 119 college students, 30 children who entered school age at the beginning of the pandemic, and 31 fathers of the aforementioned children. Of the latter two groups, 41 participants (n = 23 fathers, 18 children) did the Masked Affective and Social Cognition task during a neuroimaging scan, while the remaining 20 participants (n = 8 fathers, 12 children) who were not eligible for scanning completed the task during their lab visit. Behaviorally, we found that participants recognized emotions less accurately when viewing masked faces and also found an interaction of emotion by condition, such that accuracy was particularly compromised by sad masked faces. Neurally, masked faces elicited greater activation in the posterior cingulate, insula, and fusiform gyrus. Anterior insula and inferior frontal gyrus activation were driven by sad, masked faces. These results were consistent across age groups. Among fathers, activation to sad masked faces was associated with stress and depression. Overall, our findings did not depend on previous mask exposure or timing of participation during the pandemic. These results have implications for understanding face emotion recognition, empathy, and socioemotional neurodevelopment. (PsycInfo Database Record (c) 2024 APA, all rights reserved).