Realness is a core feature of authenticity

Psychological change before and after religious conversion and deconversion

OBJECTIVE

Theory and anecdotal evidence suggest that people undergo psychological changes before and after religious conversion and deconversion. Yet, existing research provided inconclusive evidence. Here, we examined psychological change before, during, and after institutional conversion and deconversion in a large-scale longitudinal study.

METHOD

We used 11-wave longitudinal data from a nationally representative sample of Dutch adults (N ~ 20,000) to assess changes in religious beliefs and practices, personality traits, and well-being before, during, and after conversion to and deconversion from Christianity.

RESULTS

Converts (N = 181) increased in service attendance and prayer, but not in their belief in God, as they approached conversion. Deconverts (N = 450) declined in religious beliefs and practices before, during, and after deconversion. In terms of personality, converts displayed small, unexpected declines in emotional stability, extraversion, and agreeableness at time of conversion. Deconverts declined in agreeableness, conscientiousness, and openness at time of deconversion. Neither group showed changes in their well-being.

CONCLUSION

The present findings suggest that psychological changes during religious conversion and deconversion are generally small and mostly manifest as changes in people's religious beliefs and practices. Findings are discussed in the context of person-religion fit, meaning-making, and sociocultural motive perspectives on religious change.

Scorn Not Its Simplicity: Examining the Effectiveness of Simple Generalist Treatment for Personality Disorders

Treatment guidelines for personality disorders have typically recommended specialized psychotherapeutic interventions. In this review, the author suggests that an intervention's effectiveness may be determined less by the specific method than by therapist competence, team culture, clinical process structure, and institutional context. The author argues that these elements determine variance in effectiveness between and within methods. Whereas initial studies of a specialized treatment may reflect the exceptional competencies of the treatment's developers and early adopters, in daily clinical practice, therapists with an average level of skill may struggle with the theoretical and methodological complexities of these treatments, which can hinder genuine connection with patients. This interference may particularly affect treatment outcomes when therapists encounter the intense emotions and interpersonal hypersensitivity experienced by patients with personality disorders. Most therapists would benefit from a set of simple generalist principles that determine the context for their work and offer a framework for dealing with clinical challenges while enabling them to be true to themselves and use their previously learned competencies. The Guideline-Informed Treatment for Personality Disorders is an enhanced common-factors approach that summarizes the core principles of effective treatment and can be feasibly implemented by most therapists.

Character strength traits, states, and emotional well-being: A daily diary study

OBJECTIVE

Does whole trait theory work for character strengths? This study examines the daily within- and between-person variability of the manifestations of positively valued lower-order personality characteristics, namely character strengths, their convergence with trait character strengths, and their relationships to daily measures of affect.

BACKGROUND

Manifestations of personality traits vary both between- and within people. So far, research has focused on between-person differences in character strengths, while within-person differences have been neglected.

METHODS

German-speaking participants (N = 199, 84.3% women; mean age = 26.0 years) participated in a two-week daily diary study. They completed a baseline measure of character strength traits and daily measures of character strength states and positive and negative affect.

RESULTS

Results suggested that character strength traits converged well with aggregated states. Further, we observed high within-person variability in most character strengths. The trait-state convergence and the amount of within-person variability were predicted by whether the character strengths were rather phasic (i.e., more dependent on situational characteristics) or rather tonic (i.e., less dependent on situational characteristics). Higher within-person variability in character strengths was related to trait levels of perspective, honesty, social intelligence, and fairness. Regarding relationships between character strengths and affect, within-person associations were widely parallel to previously reported between-person associations and largely independent of trait levels of character strengths.

CONCLUSION

These findings inform research on whole trait theory and character-strengths-based interventions.

Unlocking the self: Can microdosing psychedelics make one feel more authentic?

Background and aim: In the present study, we focus on the relationship between state authenticity - the experience of being true to oneself in a particular moment - and microdosing - a practice that implies repeatedly ingesting very small doses of psychedelics that do not reach the threshold for perceptual alterations. We propose that microdosing could increase state authenticity through influencing people's mood and the number and satisfaction with daily activities. Methods: We used self-assessments of state authenticity collected from 18 microdosers in the Netherlands across the period of 1 month for a total of 192 observations. Results: We found that on the microdosing day and the day thereafter, state authenticity was significantly higher. Furthermore, the number of activities and the satisfaction with them were higher on the day when participants microdosed, while the following day only the number of activities was higher. Both the number or activities and the satisfaction with them were positively related to state authenticity. Conclusion: We propose that feeling and behaving authentically could have a central role in explaining the positive effects of microdosing on health and wellbeing that are reported by current research.

Development of a psychotherapy process prototype for the Real Relationship

OBJECTIVE

The Real Relationship (RR) describes the aspect of the psychotherapy relationship that is based on a genuine connection and a realistic view between patient and therapist. In the current study, we aimed to develop a Psychotherapy Process Q-set (PQS) prototype of the RR to facilitate post-hoc assessment of the RR in psychotherapy session recordings. We also aimed to measure the association between the RR-PQS and current PQS measures of theoretical treatment principles and the working alliance.

METHOD

We developed an RR-PQS prototype based on ratings of an ideal RR session by eight RR experts. We assessed the associations between the RR-PQS and existing cognitive behavioral and psychodynamic process prototypes, and seven PQS items known to predict the working alliance.

RESULTS

RR experts agreed on the ideal RR session ratings to a high degree (ICC = 0.89). The RR-PQS was moderately related to both cognitive behavioral (r = 0.66, p < 0.01), and psychodynamic prototypes (r = 0.56, p < 0.01). PQS items predictive of the working alliance were characteristic of the RR-PQS.

CONCLUSION

The RR-PQS prototype appears to behave in theoretically predicted ways and may be a valid measure of the RR.

Collective Stressors Affect the Psychosocial Development of Young Adults

Young adulthood is a critical developmental life stage and a period of enhanced vulnerability to stress. In 2020, young adults in Northern California were faced with a series of unforeseen, collective stressors: the COVID-19 pandemic, extreme wildfires, social tension associated with the murder of George Floyd, and a contentious election that culminated in an attack on the nation’s capital. In a natural experiment, we compared the psychosocial development of 415 young adults across 8 monthly assessment waves during 2020 to a control cohort ( n = 465) who completed the same assessment protocol in 2019, prior to the onset of stressors. Results of latent growth curve models indicated that the 2020 cohort had less adaptive trajectories of affective well-being and lower levels and less adaptive trajectories of social functioning, suggesting detrimental effects of cumulative, collective stressors on the socio-emotional development of young adults.