Current research in ecological and social psychology最新文献

Referring to Greenfield's (2009) theory of social, cultural, and developmental change, this study examines value and epistemological differences among three generations of women of Ethiopian origin whose families immigrated to Israel. Adapted from social dilemmas used with other populations, we created 12 short stories about people of Ethiopian origin facing dilemmas, with one character giving a response reflecting values or epistemology consistent with the social ecology prevalent in the rural villages of Ethiopia and the other character giving responses reflecting mainstream values and epistemology consistent with the dominant social ecology found in Israel. 13 grandmothers, 23 mothers, and 21 adolescent high-school girls were asked to say which characters they agreed with in the dilemmas. As predicted by Greenfield's theory, quantitative analyses indicate a historical trend towards the value of gender equality and relativistic epistemology across the three generations. Responses to family commitment dilemmas were less consistent than for the other topics. Qualitative analyses of three of the dilemmas, one from each category, did reflect the shifts expected according to the theory. Grandmothers tended to endorse values of gender hierarchy and assigned roles, obligation to the family, and a single, authoritative perspective on knowledge. The adolescent girls tended to endorse greater gender equality and choice of roles, commitment to individuals in the close family while maintaining autonomy, and diverse sources and perspectives on knowledge. The mothers’ responses tended to fall between those of the other two generations. Many interviewees of each generation explicitly contrasted the values and epistemologies of Ethiopia and Israel.

Confinement and isolation have negative mental health consequences. It is however unknown how the characteristics of these singular situations interact with psychological vulnerability factors in the development of psychological disorders.

The present study was designed to test the extent to which trait anxiety is a predictor of the level of repetitive negative thinking in individuals and how this relationship may be moderated by the environmental characteristics in which individuals experience confinement. An internet survey was conducted on a sample of 435 participants aged 18 to 85, including 82 % women and mainly students (65 %). The results showed that the level of repetitive negative thinking was significantly higher for participants who exhibited a high level of trait anxiety and this was even more the case for participants who had the most detrimental environmental characteristics during confinement.

Future studies should replicate these results in other contexts, and also test the mediating role of repetitive negative thinking in the relationship between psychological vulnerability factors and psychological disorders, and whether such mediation is moderated by environmental characteristics.

Social identity theory posits that individuals perceive the in-group as a homogenous entity comprised of depersonalized individuals, and this theory has provided a foundation to understand intergroup processes for many years. Cross-cultural research has suggested social identity theory may not apply to East Asians, who conceptualize their in-groups differently than those in from Western cultures. Specifically, Yuki and colleagues contend that East Asians perceive in-groups as networks wherein each individual is connected through personal ties, rather than homogenous entity comprised of depersonalized individuals. Furthermore, prior research has shown that East Asians are more likely to trust out-group members with potential personal connections, similarly to how they trust actual in-group members. This reflects their group boundary perception based on personal linkages rather than categorical membership. Conversely, individuals from Western cultures tend to trust in-group members more than out-group members, regardless of potential personal connections. Our preregistered study (N = 332 Japanese and 345 American university students) aimed to conceptually replicate key findings that support Yuki's account and expand upon the theory in the context of intergroup cooperation. Overall, we failed to find evidence for the network-based and category-based cooperation and trust among Japanese and Americans, respectively. Consequently, our results highlight the need for further experimental investigation and validation of Yuki and colleagues' theoretical framework.

When mentalization fails, dehumanization can occur. Perceiving others as lacking fundamental mental states is the basic principle of dehumanization. Past research has already demonstrated the influence of both perceptual and contextual information on mentalization, while a recent line of research has tried to distinguish mentalization in a two-stage process: a mind detection phase in which we first identify a mind in others thanks to primary visual cues and a mind attribution phase in which both perceptual and contextual information are integrated to finalize the attribution of mental states to others. The current research aimed at deepening our understanding of the timeline of the mentalization process by specifically manipulating a perceptual, visual cue that has been related to dehumanization: the configural face process. This process was tested adapting the inversion effect that allowed us to show for the first time how and when this effect impacts and modulates the timeline of mentalization. Results indicated that the inversion effect impacted the early mind detection phase and resulted later in time in the elaboration of inverted human stimuli as more object-like.

This study examines people's understanding of who is a ‘true’ local and its intergroup implications. We expected to find two general understandings – one based on ascribed (i.e., ethnic) and the other on acquired (i.e. civic) characteristics – which would be differently associated with attitudes towards newcomers. In four studies conducted in Poland, we found that people consistently make an empirical distinction between these two understandings of local city belonging (Study 1, N = 148, Study 2, N = 1016, Study 3, N = 400, Study 4, N = 686). Further, stronger endorsement of an ascribed local belonging was related to a tendency to essentialize the ingroup and support for autochthony belief (Study 1), lower acceptance of both international and internal migrants, as well as established and recent migrants (Studies 2–4), higher perceived local threat from migrants, and higher intention for collective action against migrants (Study 4). In contrast, an acquired local understanding was associated with positive attitudes and behavioral intentions towards newcomers. In sum, our results suggest that the ascribed vs. acquired distinction of local belonging is relevant for the way people relate to newcomers in their local environments.

Discussions about refugee status often center around two assumed characteristics of their circumstances. One, that, because they fled their countries to seek safety, their migration decisions lacked choice. And two, that their migration will be temporary, as they may wish to return to their home country after things stabilize. However, it is unclear how these perceptions are related to refugee inclusion. To address this gap, we conducted two studies with members of communities that host refugees from the recent wars in Syria and Ukraine. Participants were surveyed in Lebanon, Jordan, Germany, the Netherlands (Study 1, N = 762), and Poland (Study 2, N = 798). We found that the more residents of receiving communities perceived refugees as deprived of choice over their migration and willing to return to their home country as soon as possible, the more they supported more accommodating policies toward refugees. We also surveyed Syrian refugees in Lebanon, Jordan, Germany, and the Netherlands (N = 910) about their control over migration and future migration intentions. Their responses suggest that members of host communities may underestimate the sense of control experienced by refugees.

Beautism reflects the phenomenon of a widespread positivity bias that physically attractive people enjoy. This bias results in more attractive people receiving more positive social judgments, interactions, and economic outcomes. However, the literature has largely focused on third-party judgments of physical attractiveness, neglecting examinations of how self-rated attractiveness may predict self-evaluations. We sought to address this gap by examining how self-rated attractiveness predicts self-inferred social status, which is related to a myriad of psychosocial outcomes. Across one pilot test, one cross-sectional study, and a between-subjects experiment, we find converging evidence for the notion that self-rated physical attractiveness positively predicts higher self-inferred status. We discuss how this finding may have implications for status-navigating strategies in light of the malleability of self-rated attractiveness in a variety of social and occupational contexts.

Dehumanization often underlies the social ostracism, exclusion, and discrimination experienced by stigmatized group members. Given findings that people can detect sexually transmitted infection (STI) status from nonverbal facial cues, we tested whether people would dehumanize and discriminate against STI-positive individuals from detecting their stigmatized status. Specifically, we hypothesized that nonverbal stigma cues would stimulate dehumanizing reactions that lead to biases against hiring STI-positive individuals. Results showed that people dehumanize STI-positive individuals based on their nonverbal stigma cues (i.e., negative affect; Study 1), except when STI status is explicitly disclosed (Study 2), which leads to potential hiring biases (Study 3). Dehumanization and discrimination against STI-positive individuals may therefore depend on the stigma's legibility from nonverbal cues but may be tempered by explicit information about STI status.

People are aware that climate change is happening, yet many do not act on this information. Increasing the awareness that some pro-environmental behaviors have a larger impact than others has the potential to be a piece of the puzzle needed to increase climate action. The current study aims to create an intervention, by combining feedback about the efficacy of pro-environmental behaviors and a novel mental imagery task, intended to help people update their impact beliefs and increase their intention to engage in pro-environmental behavior. The participants (N = 1012) were recruited online and randomized to one of three conditions: 1) Environmentally themed mental imagery in combination with efficacy feedback; 2) Efficacy feedback only; 3) Control. As predicted, we found that efficacy feedback affected the intention to act pro-environmentally, however, the intention to act increased more when the feedback was combined with a mental imagery task. In addition, we found that combining the two interventions increased the perceived impact of pro-environmental behaviors to a higher degree than efficacy feedback alone. Mediation analyses indicated that the change of impact beliefs mediated the change in pro-environmental intention in the combination condition, but not in the other conditions. These results suggest the potential aggregated effect of using mental imagery with efficacy feedback in behavioral interventions aimed at mitigating climate change.