Changing interests: A longitudinal study of intrinsic motivation for personally salient activities

Can Flow Alleviate Anxiety? The Roles of Academic Self-Efficacy and Self-Esteem in Building Psychological Sustainability and Resilience

A growing number of studies suggest that flow experience is associated with life satisfaction, eudaimonic well-being, and the perceived strength of one’s social and place identity. However, little research has placed emphasis on flow and its relations with negative experiences such as anxiety. The current study investigated the relations between flow and anxiety by considering the roles of self-esteem and academic self-efficacy. The study sample included 590 Chinese university students, who were asked to complete a self-report questionnaire on flow, anxiety, self-esteem, and academic self-efficacy. Data were analyzed using structural equation modeling (SEM) with AMOS software, in which both factorial analysis and path analysis were performed. Results revealed that the experience of flow negatively predicted anxiety, and both self-esteem and academic self-efficacy fully mediated the path between flow and anxiety. Specifically, self-esteem played a crucial and complete mediating role in this relationship, while academic self-efficacy mediated the path between self-esteem and anxiety. Our findings enrich the literature on flow experience and help with identifying practical considerations for buffering anxiety and more broadly with fostering strategies for promoting psychological sustainability and resilience.

Differentiating Flow Experiences in Physical Versus Mental Activities: A Sequential Explanatory Study

Flow is a desirable state of consciousness and absorption in an optimally challenging activity. Prior research has investigated individual differences in flow. The present study investigates flow by contrasting physical versus mental activities, using a mixed-methods, sequential explanatory design. The sample from the quantitative phase included 205 undergraduate university students assessed on measures of personality, difficulties in emotion regulation, and flow. The big-five traits intellect and conscientiousness, as well as the emotion regulation subscale “lack of emotional clarity” predicted flow during mental activities, but unexpectedly no variables significantly predicted physical flow activities. The second phase used semi-structured interviews with 10 participants. Analyses of the interviews helped further explain the statistical findings, revealing four main themes: role of stress, source of guilt, presence of others, and satisfaction and fulfillment. We conclude that flow is especially relevant in physical activities which have advantages over mental activities in opportunities to experience flow.

Increased absorption in autonomous sensory meridian response

Background

Autonomous sensory meridian response (ASMR) is a cross-sensory phenomenon characterised by a static-like sensation which typically originates on the scalp and spreads throughout the body leading to a state of deep relaxation. It can be triggered by visual and auditory stimuli in real life, incidentally by various media and via intentionally created ASMR videos. Previously ASMR has been linked to a specific personality profile and this study aimed to further elucidate individual differences associated with this phenomenon.

Methods

To this effect ASMR-Experiencers and age and gender matched controls were compared on measures of flow, absorption and mindfulness.

Results

This revealed that ASMR was associated with elevated absorption but no group differences were found with respect to the other constructs, suggesting that the ability to get deeply immersed with the current experience accompanied by loss of reflective awareness may be an important factor contributing to the experience of ASMR.

Optimal Experience and Personal Growth: Flow and the Consolidation of Place Identity

This study examined the relationship between flow experience and place identity, based on eudaimonistic identity theory (EIT) which prioritizes self-defining activities as important for an individual’s identification of his/her goals, values, beliefs, and interests corresponding to one’s own identity development or enhancement. This study focuses on place identity, the identity’s features relating to a person’s relation with her/his place. The study is also based on flow theory, according to which some salient features of an activity experience are important for happiness and well-being. Questionnaire surveys on Italian and Greek residents focused on their perceived flow and place identity in relation to their own specific local place experiences. The overall findings revealed that flow experience occurring in one’s own preferred place is widely reported as resulting from a range of self-defining activities, irrespective of gender or age, and it is positively and significantly associated with one’s own place identity. Such findings provide the first quantitative evidence about the link between flow experienced during meaningfully located self-defining activities and identity experienced at the place level, similarly to the corresponding personal and social levels that had been previously already empirically tested. Results are also discussed in terms of their implications for EIT’s understanding and enrichment, especially by its generalization from the traditional, personal identity level up to that of place identity. More generally, this study has implications for maintaining or enhancing one’s own place identity, and therefore people–place relations, by means of facilitating a person’s flow experience within psychologically meaningful places.

Optimal Experience and Optimal Identity: A Multinational Study of the Associations Between Flow and Social Identity

Eudaimonistic identity theory posits a link between activity and identity, where a self-defining activity promotes the strength of a person’s identity. An activity engaged in with high enjoyment, full involvement, and high concentration can facilitate the subjective experience of flow. In the present paper, we hypothesized in accordance with the theory of psychological selection that beyond the promotion of individual development and complexity at the personal level, the relationship between flow and identity at the social level is also positive through participation in self-defining activities. Three different samples (i.e., American, Chinese, and Spanish) filled in measures for flow and social identity, with reference to four previously self-reported activities, characterized by four different combinations of skills (low vs. high) and challenges (low vs. high). Findings indicated that flow was positively associated with social identity across each of the above samples, regardless of participants’ gender and age. The results have implications for increasing social identity via participation in self-defining group activities that could facilitate flow.