Sex differences in intensity of emotional experience: a social role interpretation

Awakening the soul during travel: influence mechanism of memorable tourism experience on university students' life meaning

In recent years, the mental health issues of university students have received increasing attention. Research has shown that meaningful life experiences, such as memorable tourism experiences, can enhance individuals' sense of meaning in life and promote mental health. This study explores the mechanisms through which memorable tourism experiences influence the sense of meaning in life among university students, focusing on the mediating roles of positive affect, self-reflection, and personality traits, as well as the moderating role of gender. Using a questionnaire survey, data were collected from 880 university students. Validated scales, including the "Memorable Tourism Experience Scale, ""Positive Affect Scale," "Self-Reflection Scale," "Personality Trait Scale," and "Meaning in Life Scale," were employed to measure key constructs. Data were analyzed using structural equation modeling (SEM) and multi-group analysis to test the hypothesized relationships and moderating effects. The results indicate that memorable tourism experiences have a significant positive impact on university students' sense of meaning in life. Positive affect, self-reflection, and personality traits all partially mediate this relationship, with positive affect exhibiting the strongest mediating effect, while personality traits show relatively weaker mediation. Furthermore, gender moderates the relationship between memorable tourism experiences and positive affect, as well as the relationship between personality traits and meaning in life. These findings support Self-Determination Theory, demonstrating that memorable tourism experiences can fulfill individuals' basic psychological needs and enhance their sense of meaning in life through multiple psychological mechanisms. This study provides practical insights for mental health interventions targeting university students, particularly highlighting the importance of reflective activities and personalized support in amplifying the psychological benefits of positive experiences.

The mediating role of cognitive flexibility in the relationship between social support and non-suicidal self-injury among adolescents: a multicenter cross-sectional study

Background

Non-suicidal self-injury (NSSI) is a prevalent and concerning behavior among adolescents worldwide, particularly in China. This study aimed to investigate the relationships between social support, cognitive flexibility, and NSSI, and to examine the potential mediating role of cognitive flexibility in the association between social support and NSSI among adolescents.

Method

A multicenter cross-sectional study was conducted with 2,109 adolescents (aged 12-18 years, mean age 15.00 ± 1.65 years, 52.3% female) recruited from 14 psychiatric hospitals/outpatient clinics. Participants completed self-report measures of social support and NSSI, along with a cognitive flexibility assessment using the Wisconsin Card Sorting Test. Structural equation modeling was employed to test the hypothesized mediation model.

Results

Social support was negatively associated with NSSI frequency (β = -0.11, p < 0.001) and positively related to cognitive flexibility (β = 0.09, p < 0.001). The mediation effect of cognitive flexibility was statistically significant [β = -0.01, 95% CI (-0.01, -0.01)] accounting for 8.33% of the total effect of social support on NSSI. Multi-group analysis revealed that the association between social support and cognitive flexibility was stronger in females (β = 0.11, p < 0.001) compared to males (β = 0.02, p > 0.05).

Conclusion

This multicenter study provides evidence for the protective roles of social support and cognitive flexibility against NSSI in adolescents. The findings suggest that cognitive flexibility partially mediates the relationship between social support and NSSI, with notable gender differences. These results highlight the importance of enhancing both social support and cognitive flexibility in interventions aimed at reducing NSSI among adolescents.

Deciphering the mechanism of women's mental health: a perspective of urban-rural differences

Background

Mental health accounts for a significant proportion of holistic health and affects women more significantly than men. Livelihood capital, defined as an indicator of these sources available for individuals or households to survive and develop, is a cost-effective field for ameliorating women's mental health. However, the impact of these multiple factors of livelihood capital on mental health still requires further research Therefore, this study evaluates women's mental health and investigates the correlation between livelihood capital (including human capital, physical capital, social capital, and financial capital) and women's mental health.

Methods

Based on the 2018 China Labor-force Dynamics Survey, this study explores the relationship and pathways between livelihood capital and women's mental health, with the structural equation model. It also aimed to examine the impact of relative deprivation under the influence of livelihood capital on women's mental health, focusing on urban-rural differences.

Results

The results of this study are as follows: (1) Human capital, social capital and physical capital were positively correlated with women's mental health, while financial capital showed a negative correlation; (2) Relative deprivation mediates the impact of livelihood capital on women's mental health; (3) The impact of livelihood capital on women's mental health is different between urban and rural regions. Urban women were more likely to be influenced by financial capital, whereas human capital, social capital and physical capital were key factors affecting rural women's mental health. (4) Relative deprivation mediates the impact of livelihood capital on mental health in the rural sample, but not in the urban sample.

Discussion

This study shows a complex relationship among livelihood capital, relative deprivation, and women's mental health, with notable urban-rural differences. In rural areas, human, social, and physical capital positively affect women's mental well-being. For example, better education reduces relative deprivation. Social support and improved housing also help. Conversely, financial capital has a negative link with mental health, more so in urban areas, likely due to urban pressure and the wealth-mental health relationship. Based on the findings, several actions are warranted. In social welfare, allocate more resources to rural areas for stronger women's livelihood capital. Public services should improve rural housing and community integration. Expand and enhance mental health education for rural women. These steps can ease rural women's mental health challenges and promote fairness in mental health outcomes.

Adolescents' Self and Bullying Victimisation: The Key Role of Gender

Background/Objectives: The primary factors influencing victimisation in bullying have recently become a topic of debate in the psychological literature. This research sought to explore the association between self-criticism (as captured in terms of inadequate self, hated self, and reassured self) and bullying victimisation, also addressing the moderating effects of gender. Methods: This study relies on a cross-sectional research design, enrolling a sample of 328 adolescents (Mage = 14.93; SDage = 0.81; 162 females, 49.4%). Participants completed a short questionnaire about their age, gender, and family's socio-economic status. They also answered questions from the Forms of Self-Criticising/Attacking and Self-Reassuring Scale and the Florence Bullying and Victimisation Scales. Results: Statistical analysis indicated gender moderated only the interplay between hated self and bullying victimisation. Conclusions: Through a multidimensional approach, these findings provided further insight into the primary factors of self to the phenomenon of bullying victimisation, also yielding further evidence about the key role of gender during a critical developmental stage, such as adolescence. Limitations, implications, and future research directions are discussed.

A stress-activated mid-insula to BNST pathway regulates susceptibility to abstinence-induced negative affect in female mice

Stress is central to many neuropsychiatric conditions, including alcohol use disorder (AUD). Stress influences the initiation and continued use of alcohol, the progression to AUD, and relapse. Identifying the neurocircuits activated during stress, and individual variability in these responses is critical for developing new treatment targets for AUD, particularly to mitigate stress-induced relapse. Using a longitudinal approach, this study examined the relationship between sub-chronic stress exposure and negative affect during protracted abstinence following chronic ethanol exposure. Sub-chronic restraint stress heightened negative affect-like behavior in protracted abstinence. Interestingly, this was driven by a subset of "stress-susceptible" female mice. We examined the mid-insula, a hub in the brain's salience network, as a driver of this effect, given its role in emotional regulation and links to alcohol craving, consumption, and abstinence-induced negative affect. Mid-insula GCaMP fiber photometry revealed that GCaMP activity during stress exposure was positively correlated with activity during the novelty-suppressed feeding test (NSFT) two weeks into abstinence. A distinct subset of mice exhibited increasing activity during the consummatory phase, implicating the mid-insula as a neural basis for heightened negative affect in abstinence. Chemogenetic inhibition of mid-insula neurons projecting to the dorsal BNST during stress disrupted the emergence of stress susceptibility, highlighting this circuit as a key determinant of susceptibility to abstinence-induced negative affect. These outcomes were female-specific, addressing a critical gap in understanding AUD risk in women. Furthermore, female mice exhibited higher struggling behavior during stress than males. However, this effect was blocked by chemogenetic inhibition of the insula-BNST pathway during stress. By linking pre-alcohol stress response with abstinence outcomes, this work positions the insula-BNST pathway as a potential AUD circuit activity biomarker and therapeutic target.

Effect of Sound Genre on Emotional Responses for Adults With and Without Hearing Loss

OBJECTIVES

Adults with permanent hearing loss exhibit a reduced range of valence ratings in response to nonspeech sounds; however, the degree to which sound genre might affect such ratings is unclear. The purpose of this study was to determine if ratings of valence covary with sound genre (e.g., social communication, technology, music), or only expected valence (pleasant, neutral, unpleasant).

DESIGN

As part of larger study protocols, participants rated valence and arousal in response to nonspeech sounds. For this study, data were reanalyzed by assigning sounds to unidimensional genres and evaluating relationships between hearing loss, age, and gender and ratings of valence. In total, results from 120 adults with normal hearing (M = 46.3 years, SD = 17.7, 33 males and 87 females) and 74 adults with hearing loss (M = 66.1 years, SD = 6.1, 46 males and 28 females) were included.

RESULTS

Principal component analysis confirmed valence ratings loaded onto eight unidimensional factors: positive and negative social communication, positive and negative technology, music, animal, activities, and human body noises. Regression analysis revealed listeners with hearing loss rated some genres as less extreme (less pleasant/less unpleasant) than peers with better hearing, with the relationship between hearing loss and valence ratings being similar across genres within an expected valence category. In terms of demographic factors, female gender was associated with less pleasant ratings of negative social communication, positive and negative technology, activities, and human body noises, while increasing age was related to a subtle rise in valence ratings across all genres.

CONCLUSIONS

Taken together, these results confirm and extend previous findings that hearing loss is related to a reduced range of valence ratings and suggest that this effect is mediated by expected sound valence, rather than sound genre.

Neighborhood social environment and mental health of older adults in China: the mediating role of subjective well-being and the moderating role of green space

Introduction

With the continuous development of the global aging trend, the mental health of older adults has been a concern by the world. The living space of older adults is limited due to the decline of their activity function. Neighborhood environment, especially the neighborhood social environment, has become an important factor affecting the mental health of older adults. Therefore, this study explores the mechanism that influences the social environment of the neighborhood and the mental health of older adults, the mediating effect of subjective well-being (SWB), and the moderating effect of green space.

Methods

Based on the 2018 China Labor Dynamics Survey, this study used the structural equation model to explore the mediating effect of neighborhood social environment (neighborhood ties, social trust, community security) on the mental health of older adults through SWB and the moderating effect of green space.

Results

Social trust and community security are both directly and positively associated with older adults' mental health. At the same time, neighborhood ties, social trust, and community security can promote the mental health of older adults by positively affecting SWB, while green space has an enhanced moderating effect between neighborhood ties and mental health.

Discussion

This study enriches the empirical research on neighborhood social environment and mental health. First of all, older adults living in communities with good safety conditions and high social trust are less affected by negative emotions and tend to have good mental health. Second, deeper neighborhood ties, higher social trust, and safer community environments help older adults to be less disturbed by negative situations, have a positive effect on their SWB, and indirectly promote mental health. At the same time, green space can provide a place for older adults to socialize, enhance the positive impact of neighborhood ties on SWB, and further promote the mental health of older adults. Finally, this study suggests that the government and community managers pay attention to the construction of neighborhood social environment and green space, and provide support for "healthy community" and "healthy aging" planning.

Development of the psychopathological vulnerability index for screening at-risk youths: a Rasch model approach

Accumulating research on mental health emphasizes the general factor of psychopathology (p-factor) that unites various mental health issues. This study develops a psychopathological vulnerability assessment for youths, evaluating its psychometric properties and clinical utility. An umbrella review conceptualized multifactor psychopathological vulnerability, leading to a 57-item pool. A total of 11,224 individuals participated in this study. The resulting 22-item psychopathological vulnerability index (PVI) fitted the unidimensional Rasch model, demonstrating a person separation reliability of 0.78 and a Cronbach's alpha of 0.84. Cut-off points of 11 and 5, derived from latent class analysis, were used to distinguish vulnerable and high-protection populations. The PVI's concurrent and predictive hit rates ranged from 36.00% to 53.57% in clinical samples. The PVI concretized the vulnerability-stress model for identifying at-risk youths and may facilitate universal interventions by integrating the theoretical foundations of bifactor S-1 models with key symptoms from network models for theoretically grounded approaches.

Prevalence of anxiety and its risk factors in burn patients: A systematic review and meta-analysis

The primary objective of this systematic review and meta-analysis was to ascertain the prevalence of anxiety and identify associated risk factors among individuals who have suffered burn injuries. We conducted a thorough and systematic search across various international electronic databases, including Scopus, PubMed and Web of Science, as well as Persian electronic databases like Iranmedex and the scientific information database (SID). Our search encompassed the period from the earliest available records up to 8 August 2023. We employed keywords derived from Medical Subject Headings (MeSH) such as "Prevalence", "Anxiety" and "Burns". In total, 2586 burn patients participated in 13 cross-sectional studies. The mean age of the participants was 32.88 (SD = 2.51). In a compilation of 13 studies, the documented overall occurrence rate of anxiety among burn patients stood at 16.1% (95% CI: 10.0% to 24.7%; I2  = 93.138%; p < 0.001). The outcomes of a meta-regression analysis, which examined the association between anxiety in burn patients and the year of publication, did not uncover any significant correlation (p = 0.442). Furthermore, there was a notable association between anxiety in burn patients and factors such as gender, TBSA affected, educational level and the types of burn injuries. Therefore, healthcare providers need to recognize the substantial prevalence of anxiety in burn patients as a fundamental consideration. This recognition should prompt a proactive approach toward early detection and timely intervention. Developing personalized intervention strategies tailored to each patient's unique risk factors and needs is paramount. These strategies may encompass a range of therapeutic options such as counselling, psychotherapy or consultations with mental health specialists.

Understanding the impact of sisu on workforce and well-being: A machine learning-based analysis

This study investigates the construct of sisu, a Finnish attribute representing mental resilience and fortitude when confronted with difficult situations. By leveraging advanced analytical methods and explainable Artificial Intelligence, we gain insights into how sisu factors influence well-being, work efficiency, and overall health. We investigate how the beneficial aspects of sisu contribute significantly to mental and physical health, satisfaction, and professional accomplishments. Conversely, we analyze the harmful sisu and its adverse impacts on the same domains. Our findings, including intriguing trends related to age, educational level, emotional states, and gender, pave the way for developing tailored solutions and initiatives to nurture the beneficial aspects of sisu and curtail the damaging consequences of sisu within professional settings and personal welfare.

How Male and Female Literary Authors Write About Affect Across Cultures and Over Historical Periods

A wealth of literature suggests the existence of sex differences in how emotions are experienced, recognized, expressed, and regulated. However, to what extent these differences result from the put in place of stereotypes and social rules is still a matter of debate. Literature is an essential cultural institution, a transposition of the social life of people but also of their intimate affective experiences, which can serve to address questions of psychological relevance. Here, we created a large corpus of literary fiction enriched by authors' metadata to measure the extent to which culture influences how men and women write about emotion. Our results show that even though before the twenty-first century and across 116 countries women more than men have written about affect, starting from 2000, this difference has diminished substantially. Also, in the past, women's narratives were more positively laden and less arousing. While the difference in arousal is ubiquitous and still present nowadays, sex differences in valence vary as a function of culture and have dissolved in recent years. Altogether, these findings suggest that historic evolution is associated with men and women writing similarly about emotions and reveal a sizable impact of culture on the affective characteristics of the lexicon.

Supplementary Information

The online version contains supplementary material available at 10.1007/s42761-023-00219-9.

Gender differences in the association between physical frailty and life satisfaction among older adults in India

BACKGROUND

One of the sustainable development goals' (SDGs) primary goals (Goal 3) is to ensure healthy lives and promote well-being for persons of all ages. While extensive literature documents the link between physical frailty and low life satisfaction (LLS) among older adults, research of this nature is limited within low and middle-income countries including India. The purpose of this study was to examine the association between physical frailty and life satisfaction among community-dwelling older men and women in India.

METHODS

Data come from the 2017-18 wave 1 of the Longitudinal Ageing Study in India (LASI), with a sample of 30 390 individuals aged 60 and above (14 559 men and 15 831 women). Physical frailty was assessed using an adapted version of the frailty phenotype developed by Fried and colleagues. Ordered logistic regression models are employed to examine the association between physical frailty and life satisfaction.

RESULTS

The prevalence of frailty was higher in older women than men (32.2% vs. 27.5%). Nearly 30.4% of men and 33.8% of women reported having LLS. However, after adjusting for the selected confounders, women were less likely (adjusted odds ratio [aOR]: 0.92; CI: 0.87-0.97) to report LLS compared to men. The physically frail older adults were more likely (aOR: 1.40; CI: 1.27-1.55) to report LLS relative to their physically stronger counterparts. Moreover, we found that frail older men had higher odds of reporting LLS than non-frail older men (aOR: 1.25; CI: 1.09-1.43). Also, non-frail older women had lower odds of reporting LLS than non-frail older men (aOR: 0.80; CI: 0.67-0.95).

CONCLUSIONS

Findings of our study suggest that policies and programs to address later life well-being need to consider gender differences. Doing so would not only help identify older adults most at risk of LLS, but gender differentiated policies would help streamline health expenditures and costs typically relegated to assist all older adults without proper focus on the uniqueness of their social location.

Mental health of South Korean adolescents in the COVID-19 Era: Web-based survey focused on suicide-related factors

BACKGROUND

The coronavirus disease 2019 (COVID-19) pandemic has negatively impacted many aspects of life. Measures for preventing the spread of COVID-19 (e.g., school lockdowns, remote and hybrid classes, group and outdoor activity restrictions, and social distancing in the classroom and meal time) could have led to adolescents to experience anxiety and depressive symptoms. Such mental health impacts could increase the risk of suicidal ideation in this population. Moreover, according to a report by the Organization for Economic Co-operation and Development, although the total number of suicide deaths in South Korea decreased in 2021, the suicide rate of those aged 10-29 years increased. One factor affecting the result is adolescent mental health by COVID-19. This study examines the mental health status of South Korean adolescents amid the prolonged COVID-19 pandemic, and identifies and analyzes predictors of suicidal ideation, suicide planning, and suicide attempts.

METHODS

The study used data from 54,948 adolescents who participated in the 2020 Korea Youth Risk Behavior Web-based Survey. Based on their responses to suicide-related questions, the sample was divided into a healthy group, suicide-ideation group, suicide-planning group, and suicide-attempt group. The descriptive statistics of these groups were then analyzed. An analysis of covariance, post-hoc tests, and multiple logistic regression analysis were performed on the four groups.

RESULTS

Overall, 6.9% of the participants reported suicidal ideation, 2.2% reported planning suicide, and 1.9% reported attempting suicide in the previous 12 months.

CONCLUSIONS

During the prolonged COVID-19 pandemic, there is a strong need for various individualized programs that identify and intervene to support adolescents at risk of suicide by accurately assessing their mental health risk factors, such as stress, sadness and despair, loneliness, and generalized anxiety disorder. Accordingly, it is necessary to develop and distribute a mental health and well-being curriculum, strengthen suicide prevention programs and support services, expand mental health diagnostic tests, and school-based mental health programs.

Breaking the cycle of emotional flooding: the protective role of women's emotional intelligence in couple's conflict

Introduction

One of the most damaging aspects, both for people's well-being and for close relationships, is conflict. Beyond different stressors, the emotions evoked, their regulation and an appropriate conflict resolution strategy will reduce negative consequences. Emotional Intelligence facilitates social relationships, but little applied research has been done on the relationship with couple conflict and emotional flooding, particularly from the perspective of women. Therefore, the present study analyzes the role of Perceived Emotional Intelligence (PEI) and the mediating effect of Positive Conflict Resolution strategies (PCR) in couples' conflicts from women's perspective, examining its effect on Emotional Flooding (EF) and Satisfaction.

Methods

Through a cross-sectional design, the relationships between variables were analyzed using group comparisons and means of a structural equation model (SEM) in a sample of 692 women.

Results

Significant differences were found between the groups by age, length of relationship, and motherhood. The SEM revealed a good fit. PEI predicted 71.8% of the variance in EF and 35% in Satisfaction through PCR and Conflict.

Relationship Between Non-Suicidal Self-Injury and Emotion Dysregulation Among Male and Female Young Adults

Over recent years, non-suicidal self-injury (NSSI) has been associated with emotion dysregulation. However, only a few quantitative studies have empirically investigated differences in emotion dysregulation among people who self-harm, while none have explored gender differences in this regard. Thus, this research study aimed to further examine the association between NSSI and emotion regulation deficits and strategies in young adults. A total of 201 participants (mean age = 21.82 years) were recruited from different support groups dedicated to NSSI and from health care centres and were divided into two groups: a control group (CG, n = 100, mean age = 21.92 years, comprised of 30% males) and an NSSI group (NSSIG, n = 101, mean age = 21.72 years, comprised of 16% males). All participants completed the Deliberate Self-Harm Inventory, the Difficulties in Emotion Regulation Scale, and the Emotion Regulation Questionnaire. The results showed that compared to the CG participants, those from the NSSIG had increased emotion regulation deficits, higher expressive suppression scores, and lower cognitive re-evaluation scores. Within the NSSIG, females had higher impulse control difficulties and limited access to emotion regulation strategies, while males had higher expressive suppression scores. Factors associated with NSSI also differed by gender. These results indicate the necessity to take gender into account when planning treatment, since treatment protocols must be adapted to the specific emotion regulation difficulties concerned.

When mothers are more negative while fathers are less positive: Offspring's temporary feelings of depression affect parental work engagement via the asymmetric effects of emotions transmission

There is a sharp rise in depressive moods from childhood to adolescence. Since moods can cross over from a child to a parent and spill over from family to work, offspring's temporary feelings of depression represent potential risks for parents' occupational health and well-being. In the current study, the authors investigate the impacts of offspring's temporary feelings of depression on mothers' work engagement via the transfer of negative moods, and on fathers' work engagement via the transfer of positive moods. Participants were 265 full-time employees and their adolescent offspring. The results confirmed our hypotheses. Offspring's temporary feelings of depression were associated with less maternal work engagement via increased maternal negative moods and endangered paternal work engagement via decreased paternal positive moods. The finding implies that negative emotions may be related to the occupational health of working mothers, while positive emotions may be related to the occupational health of working fathers.

The Perinatal Assessment of Paternal Affectivity (PAPA): Italian validation of a new tool for the screening of perinatal depression and affective disorders in fathers

BACKGROUND

Questionnaires for the screening of paternal perinatal psychological distress are based on clinical manifestations expressed by women, showing limitations in capturing the wide array of signs and symptoms exhibited by men. The current study aimed to validate the Perinatal Assessment of Paternal Affectivity, a new self-report tool for the screening of paternal depressive and affective disorder.

METHOD

This study used a cross-sectional design with a 3-month test-retest, involving respectively 385 (T1) and a sub-sample of 111(T2) fathers. Confirmatory factor analysis (CFA) was performed to test structural validity and concurrent validity was assessed by Spearman correlations. We assessed reliability using McDonald's ω and ordinal alpha. Group differences in PAPA scores based on sociodemographic were also tested.

RESULTS

The CFA reported a one factor structure as the optimal solution. The PAPA also showed adequate reliability and internal consistency as well as acceptable test-retest indices. Concurrent validity was confirmed by significant correlations between PAPA total score and standardized test scores. Non-Italian fathers and fathers who experienced recent stressful life events reported higher PAPA scores.

LIMITATIONS

Our sample was not homogeneous in terms of nationality and most of the participants, were from Northern Italy. Some risk factors associated with paternal parental psychological distress (e.g., unplanned pregnancy) have not been considered.

CONCLUSION

This study provides initial evidence of validity and reliability of the PAPA as a brief and sensitive screening tool to detect signs and symptoms of paternal affective disorder during both prenatal and postnatal period.

Masculine men do not like feminine wording: The effectiveness of gendered wording in health promotion leaflets in the UK

Following mixed-methods sequential design and drawing on the message-audience congruence concept and homophily theory, across three studies in the UK, we examined the effect of gendered wording and endorser’s gender on the effectiveness of leaflets promoting walking. In Study 1, a mall-intercept study achieved 247 completed questionnaires. Results demonstrated that men and women indicated the highest behavioural intentions for communal wording presented by a male endorser. However, pairwise comparisons revealed that when the wording of the advert was agentic and the endorser was male, males indicated significantly higher scores of behavioural intentions compared with females. Attitude towards the ad for women was highest for communal wording/female endorser; for men it was for agentic wording/male endorser. In Study 2, consumers’ views towards the gendered content were explored in 20 semi-structured interviews. In study 3 we examined the impact of the respondent’s gender role identity on gendered content effectiveness. Overall, when controlled for level of gender role identity, only masculine males evaluated leaflets featuring communal wording negatively which suggests that wording matters only for masculine males, but not for other men and women. Theoretically, we identified that gender-based message-respondent congruence is not a necessary aspect of communications to be effective, except for one group: masculine males. Our study identified dominant gender role identity as a factor that explained respondents’ preferences for presented stimuli. Specifically, males who display masculine gender role identity differ in evaluations of communal wording from all other groups. Social and commercial marketers who target men and women with exercise-related services should consider the use of agentic wording endorsed by a male endorser when targeting masculine men to increase the likelihood of eliciting positive attitudes towards the communication. However, such distinctions should not be associated with differences in women’s evaluations or men who do not report masculine gender role identity.

Microblog data analysis of emotional reactions to COVID-19 in China

To explore the emotional attitudes of microblog users in the different COVID-19 stages in China, this study used data mining and machine-learning methods to crawl 112,537 Sina COVID-19- related microblogs and conduct sentiment and group difference analyses. It was found that: (1) the microblog users' emotions shifted from negative to positive from the second COVID-19 pandemic phase; (2) there were no significant differences in the microblog users' emotions in the different regions; (3) males were more optimistic than females in the early stages of the pandemic; however, females were more optimistic than males in the last three stages; and (4) females posted more microblogs and expressed more sadness and fear while males expressed more anger and disgust. This research captured online information in real-time, with the results providing a reference for future research into public opinion and emotional reactions to crises.

Female advantage in threat avoidance manifests in threat reaction but not threat detection

Threat avoidance involves both detection of a threatening stimulus and reaction to it. We demonstrate with empirically validated stimuli (that are threatening, nonthreatening-negative, neutral, or positive) that threat detection is more pronounced among males, whereas threat reactivity is more pronounced among females. Why women are less efficient detectors of threat challenges Benenson et al.'s conceptual analysis.

Sex differences in emotional and meta-emotional intelligence in pre-adolescents and adolescents

The study focuses on sex differences in emotional and meta-emotional intelligence in a sample of 355 pre-adolescents and 164 adolescents. Emotional and meta-emotional intelligence were measured using the multi-trait multi-method IE-ACCME test, allowing to define individuals' profiles of ability EI, emotional self-concept, meta-emotional knowledge, meta-emotional ability in self-evaluation and meta-emotional beliefs. Meta-emotional dimensions refer to the awareness of individuals about their emotional abilities and to their beliefs about the functioning of emotions in everyday life. Results demonstrated that girls scored better than boys in ability-EI, in particular in adolescents' group, whereas boys reported higher score than girls in emotional self-concept in both groups of age. Result about meta-emotional knowledge and meta-emotional ability in self-evaluation revealed that boys systematically overestimate their emotional abilities whereas girls, particularly in the adolescent group, tend to underestimate them. Finally, in both age groups, girls scored higher than males in metaemotional beliefs. The adoption of the meta-emotional intelligence framework may help to explain the discordances about sex differences found in previous studies using self-report vs. performance measures of EI. Moreover, it may contribute to shed light on the nature-nurture debate and on the role of meta-emotional variables for explaining sex differences in EI.

The Avatar's Gist: How to Transfer Affective Components From Dynamic Walking to Static Body Postures

Dynamic virtual representations of the human being can communicate a broad range of affective states through body movements, thus effectively studying emotion perception. However, the possibility of modeling static body postures preserving affective information is still fundamental in a broad spectrum of experimental settings exploring time-locked cognitive processes. We propose a novel automatic method for creating virtual affective body postures starting from kinematics data. Exploiting body features related to postural cues and movement velocity, we transferred the affective components from dynamic walking to static body postures of male and female virtual avatars. Results of two online experiments showed that participants coherently judged different valence and arousal levels in the avatar's body posture, highlighting the reliability of the proposed methodology. In addition, esthetic and postural cues made women more emotionally expressive than men. Overall, we provided a valid methodology to create affective body postures of virtual avatars, which can be used within different virtual scenarios to understand better the way we perceive the affective state of others.

Shared Reality Can Reduce Stressor Reactivity

When a person faces a stressor alongside someone else, do they get more or less stressed when the other person agrees that the situation is stressful? While an equally stressed partner could plausibly amplify stress by making the situation seem more real and worthy of distress, we find that social validation during co-experienced stressors reduces reactivity. Specifically, the psychological experience of shared reality calms some people down. In Study 1, 70 undergraduate females who jointly faced a stressful event with someone else reported feeling less anxious when the other person felt the same way about the stressor, relative to when the other person appraised the situation in the opposite way or provided no indication of their appraisal. These findings were reflected in participants' physiological reactivity, especially in the parasympathetic nervous system. In Study 2, we generalize these findings to co-experienced stressors in the daily lives of 102 heteronormative romantic couples in the New York City area. In line with tend-and-befriend theory, we found that shared reality during co-experienced stressors reduced anxiety for almost all females (99% of the sample) and for a minority of males (42% of the sample). Together, these findings unify major theories in health and social psychology by implying that shared reality reduces stressor reactivity, and that this effect is partially moderated by sex.

Air pollution and increased number of psychiatric emergency room visits: A case-crossover study for identifying susceptible groups

BACKGROUND

Ambient particulate matter is a leading risk factor for disease globally. Particulate matter 10 (PM₁₀) and particulate matter 2.5 (PM_2.5) are derived from different sources, including operating motor vehicles as well as from industrial activities. In this study we investigate the association between increased concentrations of PM and total daily visits to the psychiatric emergency unit (PEV). Further, the aim is to identify specific risk groups who are more susceptible to the effects of air pollution exposure by studying sex, age, ongoing psychiatric follow-up and diagnoses of depression/anxiety or substance use.

MATERIAL AND METHODS

The sample was comprised of data from 2740 days to 81 548 PEVs at Sahlgrenska University Hospital in Gothenburg and daily mean concentrations of PM₁₀ and PM_2.5. A time-stratified case-crossover design was used to analyse associations between air pollution and PEVs.

RESULTS

Mean number of daily PEVs were 35 and sex distribution was even. PM exposure was associated with total PEV at lag 0 (the same day), by RR 1.016 (95% confidence interval [CI] 1.004-1.028) and RR 1.020 (95%CI 1.003-1.038) per 10 μg/m³ increase in PM₁₀ and PM_2.5, respectively. In females, PEV were increased at lag 0 and lag 1, and in males at lag 1 and lag 2. In the age-stratified analysis, PEVs significantly increased following PM exposure amongst individuals aged 35-65 years by lag 0-2 and in individuals who had contact with outpatient care at lag 0 to lag 1. There were no associations between air pollution and PEVs for any specific diagnostic group evaluated (amongst depression, anxiety and substance use disorder).

CONCLUSIONS

The results indicate that acute exposure to PM₁₀ and PM_2.5 may trigger acute worsening in mental health in both males and females, especially among 35-65 year old individuals. However, in subgroups of the most common psychiatric diagnoses, we did not observe statistically significant associations with PM exposure.

Effects of Increasing the Overall Level or Fitting Hearing Aids on Emotional Responses to Sounds

Adults with hearing loss demonstrate a reduced range of emotional responses to nonspeech sounds compared to their peers with normal hearing. The purpose of this study was to evaluate two possible strategies for addressing the effects of hearing loss on emotional responses: (a) increasing overall level and (b) hearing aid use (with and without nonlinear frequency compression, NFC). Twenty-three adults (mean age  =  65.5 years) with mild-to-severe sensorineural hearing loss and 17 adults (mean age  =  56.2 years) with normal hearing participated. All adults provided ratings of valence and arousal without hearing aids in response to nonspeech sounds presented at a moderate and at a high level. Adults with hearing loss also provided ratings while using individually fitted study hearing aids with two settings (NFC-OFF or NFC-ON). Hearing loss and hearing aid use impacted ratings of valence but not arousal. Listeners with hearing loss rated pleasant sounds as less pleasant than their peers, confirming findings in the extant literature. For both groups, increasing the overall level resulted in lower ratings of valence. For listeners with hearing loss, the use of hearing aids (NFC-OFF) also resulted in lower ratings of valence but to a lesser extent than increasing the overall level. Activating NFC resulted in ratings that were similar to ratings without hearing aids (with a moderate presentation level) but did not improve ratings to match those from the listeners with normal hearing. These findings suggest that current interventions do not ameliorate the effects of hearing loss on emotional responses to sound.

Boosting Job Satisfaction Through Emotional Intelligence: A Study on Health Care Professionals

Emotional intelligence (EI) is possibly one of the most studied psychological factors of the twenty-first century. EI is very much relevant in service industry particularly in management, academics, life sciences or psychology. The purpose of the empirical study is to test the relationship between the defined constructs of EI and job satisfaction ( JS) amongst health care professionals of Delhi NCR region of India. It further tried to understand whether gender moderates the EI and JS relationship. Structured survey was used to solicit response from 260 health care professionals comprising doctors and nurses belonging to different hospitals of Delhi NCR region. Standardised instruments were used to assess the data. Linear and moderated regression were used to test hypotheses developed. The findings suggest that EI constructs significantly impact the level of JS among health care professionals. The result of moderated regression suggested that the relationship of EI and JS is significantly moderated by gender. The construct of EI is relevant in providing high quality health care service delivery to the patients.

Voice Emotion Recognition by Mandarin-Speaking Children with Cochlear Implants

Objectives

Emotional expressions are very important in social interactions. Children with cochlear implants can have voice emotion recognition deficits due to device limitations. Mandarin-speaking children with cochlear implants may face greater challenges than those speaking nontonal languages; the pitch information is not well preserved in cochlear implants, and such children could benefit from child-directed speech, which carries more exaggerated distinctive acoustic cues for different emotions. This study investigated voice emotion recognition, using both adult-directed and child-directed materials, in Mandarin-speaking children with cochlear implants compared with normal hearing peers. The authors hypothesized that both the children with cochlear implants and those with normal hearing would perform better with child-directed materials than with adult-directed materials.

Design

Thirty children (7.17-17 years of age) with cochlear implants and 27 children with normal hearing (6.92-17.08 years of age) were recruited in this study. Participants completed a nonverbal reasoning test, speech recognition tests, and a voice emotion recognition task. Children with cochlear implants over the age of 10 years also completed the Chinese version of the Nijmegen Cochlear Implant Questionnaire to evaluate the health-related quality of life. The voice emotion recognition task was a five-alternative, forced-choice paradigm, which contains sentences spoken with five emotions (happy, angry, sad, scared, and neutral) in a child-directed or adult-directed manner.

Results

Acoustic analyses showed substantial variations across emotions in all materials, mainly on measures of mean fundamental frequency and fundamental frequency range. Mandarin-speaking children with cochlear implants displayed a significantly poorer performance than normal hearing peers in voice emotion perception tasks, regardless of whether the performance is measured in accuracy scores, Hu value, or reaction time. Children with cochlear implants and children with normal hearing were mainly affected by the mean fundamental frequency in speech emotion recognition tasks. Chronological age had a significant effect on speech emotion recognition in children with normal hearing; however, there was no significant correlation between chronological age and accuracy scores in speech emotion recognition in children with implants. Significant effects of specific emotion and test materials (better performance with child-directed materials) in both groups of children were observed. Among the children with cochlear implants, age at implantation, percentage scores of nonverbal intelligence quotient test, and sentence recognition threshold in quiet could predict recognition performance in both accuracy scores and Hu values. Time wearing cochlear implant could predict reaction time in emotion perception tasks among children with cochlear implants. No correlation was observed between the accuracy score in voice emotion perception and the self-reported scores of health-related quality of life; however, the latter were significantly correlated with speech recognition skills among Mandarin-speaking children with cochlear implants.

Conclusions

Mandarin-speaking children with cochlear implants could have significant deficits in voice emotion recognition tasks compared with their normally hearing peers and can benefit from the exaggerated prosody of child-directed speech. The effects of age at cochlear implantation, speech and language development, and cognition could play an important role in voice emotion perception by Mandarin-speaking children with cochlear implants.

Sex-related differences in brain dynamism at rest as neural correlates of positive and negative valence system constructs

Clinical anxiety and depression are the most prevalent mental illnesses, likely representing maladaptive expressions of negative valence systems concerned with conditioned responses to fear, threat, loss, and frustrative nonreward. These conditions exhibit similar, striking sex/gender-related differences in onset, incidence, and severity for which the neural correlates are not yet established. In alarge sample of neurotypical young adults, we demonstrate that intrinsic brain dynamism metrics derived from sex-sensitive models of whole-brain network function are significantly associated with valence system traits. Surprisingly, we found that greater brain dynamism is strongly positively correlated to anxiety and depression traits in males, but almost wholly decoupled from traits for important cognitive control and reappraisal strategies associated with positive valence. Conversely, intrinsic brain dynamism is strongly positively coupled to drive, novelty-seeking and self-control in females with only rare or non-significant directional negative correlation with anxiety and depression traits. Our results suggest that the dynamic neural correlates of traits for valence, anxiety and depression are significantly different in males/men and females/women. These findings may relate to the known sex/gender-related differences in cognitive reappraisal of emotional experiences and clinical presentations of anxiety and depression, with potential relevance to gold standard therapies based on enhancing cognitive control strategies.

Gender differences in functional connectivity during emotion regulation

Gender differences in emotion regulation (ER) have been postulated, yet their neural basis remains poorly understood. The goal of this study was to investigate this issue from a functional connectivity (FC) perspective. Utilizing a region of interest (ROI) analysis, we investigated whether men and women (N = 48) differed in their FC pattern while viewing versus regulating negative emotion induced by highly salient pictures, and whether this pattern related to their self-reported negative affect and suppression success. Despite women reporting more negative affect, both genders had comparable suppression success. Moreover, differences emerged between men and women's FC patterns. During the regulation of negative emotion, better suppression in women was associated with stronger FC within a cingulo-opercular network, while men exhibited stronger FC within posterior regions of the ventral attentional network. We conclude that due to their propensity for higher emotional reactivity, women may employ a frontal top-down control network to downregulate negative emotion, while men may redirect attention away from the negative stimulus by using posterior regions of the ventral attention network. The findings may have significant implications for understanding women's vulnerability for developing affective disorders and developing targeted individualized treatment.

Strategies for Coping With Stress in Athletes During the COVID-19 Pandemic and Their Predictors

The aim of the study was to compare the strategies of coping with stress during the COVID-19 epidemic in athletes involved in Olympic preparations (57 potential Olympians) and students of physical education (54 extramural students), and to determine their depending on the variable gender. The research was conducted in the form of an on-line survey in the period of April 7–28 during the COVID-19 pandemic. Four standard psychological questionnaires were used. Elite athletes and physical education students practicing sports most often dealt with the stress of the COVID-19 pandemic using cognitive and behavioral coping strategies. The sports level depended on the strategies of coping with the stress of the COVID-19 pandemic more strongly than gender. The relationship between the sense of coherence (mainly comprehensibility) and the hope for success treated as a generalized immune resource with coping strategies in the case of the COVID-19 pandemic postulated by Antonovsky was confirmed.

Attitudes of Anatomy Students toward Commemorations for Body Donors: A Multicultural Perspective

Many medical schools practice commemorative ceremonies to honor body donors. Attitudes of medical education stakeholders toward these ceremonies have not yet been fully investigated. The aim of this study was to explore anatomy students' attitudes toward commemorations at a multicultural institution which has not introduced these ceremonies yet. A survey was carried out on different groups of anatomy students that were exposed and not yet exposed to human remains. The survey was used to record basic demographic data from the respondents, ask if they would support the establishment of an anatomy commemoration and in which format. A total of 756 anatomy students participated in the survey (response rate 69.8%). The majority (76.3%) were in favor of introducing a commemoration for donors. The associations of students' gender, attitude toward body donation, and level of exposure to human remains with attitudes toward commemoration for donors were identified (P < 0.05), whereas ethnicity and religion seemed to have no influence on attitudes (P > 0.05). Most students believed that anatomy staff and students should organize the commemoration. There was a preference for the commemoration to be secular with revealed identities of donors, and not recorded for social media. The support for the establishment of commemorations transcended cultural and religious differences and confirmed students' respectful attitude toward donors. Anatomy commemorations seem to have potential not only to engage students with one another, and donor families, but also to pave the way for students to become life-long ethical and empathetic learners and practitioners.

Prior trauma-related experiences predict the development of posttraumatic stress disorder after a new traumatic event

BACKGROUND

Many reports have documented the relationship between previous traumatic experiences, including childhood trauma, and the development of later life psychopathology, including posttraumatic stress disorder (PTSD). Identification of individuals at greatest risk for the development of PTSD could lead to preventative interventions. The present study examined the developmental course of PTSD after trauma exposure, using histories of previous traumatic experiences and the severity of the reaction to the trauma as predictors.

METHODS

Participants (N = 713) were recruited from Emergency Departments in Miami and Atlanta immediately following a traumatic experience. Histories of previous traumatic experiences and the immediate reaction to the new trauma were examined at baseline. Follow-up assessments of PTSD severity were conducted at 1, 3, and 6 months.

RESULTS

Histories of child abuse and pre-existing trauma symptoms predicted the immediate response to stress (R²  = .21, p < .001) and the initial trauma reaction (p < .005).) A mixed-model repeated-measures analysis of variance found that immediate stress response and a history of prior trauma (p < .001) significantly predicted the course of PTSD symptoms. Area under the curve (AUC) analyses suggested that the presence of PTSD at each successive assessment was predicted most substantially by the severity of PTSD at the immediately prior follow-up assessment (AUC > 0.86).

CONCLUSIONS

The current findings suggest that previous traumatic experiences lead to a greater immediate reaction to trauma and combine to predict the development of PTSD, the maintenance of which is not moderated by these earlier experiences. The identification of people likely to develop PTSD may be aided by the assessment of prior experiences and immediate reactions.

Emotional sensitivity predicts internship performance of medical students enrolled under different admission screening protocols

BACKGROUND AND PURPOSE

People with heightened emotional sensitivity can perceive better how others feel. Students admitted to medical school by interviews for assessing pre-set personal qualities, such as emotional sensitivity, may be more likely to meet patients' satisfaction in the future. We tested whether a student enrolled by passing the interview would have more emotional sensitivity than those by taking an exam. We also investigated what impact the enrolment protocols might have on students' internship performance.

METHODS

Participants were first- and second-year medical students and assigned into the interviewed group or examined group according to the entrance protocols. Two emotion-related tasks and one control task were adopted. Subsequently, the performance evaluation of clinical work from students' advisors about these two groups of participants were collected after they finished the internship training at the hospital.

CONCLUSIONS

Students selected through the pre-programmed interview which is based on personal qualities showed greater emotional sensitivity than those selected by the exam. Those students with better emotional sensitivity also performed better when they were in the internship training. Emotional sensitivity is a valid index to predict students' future performance and could be used in the selection protocol for medical students.

Test anxiety components: an intra-individual approach testing their control antecedents and effects on performance

BACKGROUND AND OBJECTIVES

Although anxiety consists of multiple components, including cognitive, affective, motivational, and physiological, and some findings suggest that there might be differences regarding their control antecedents and effects on performance, previous studies have largely neglected to examine these components separately and for reasons of convenience often assessed test anxiety as a unified construct using a single-item. Therefore, this study investigated the different test anxiety components with the goal to: (1) examine the relative impact of the anxiety components in the mediating mechanism that connects control and performance - as proposed by Pekrun's control-value theory, and (2) determine which specific anxiety component is underlying common single-item anxiety measures.

METHODS

The research questions were investigated using an intra-individual approach in a sample of N = 137 German 8th graders during a mathematics exam.

RESULTS

As expected, control was negatively related to all anxiety components, but associations varied in strength. Additionally, the components differed in their relative impact on performance, with the cognitive component being central for this outcome. Furthermore, common single-item measures seem to specifically assess the affective component, and thus not the component most relevant for test performance.

CONCLUSION

Consequently, our study strongly recommends to distinguish between the anxiety components depending on the research question at hand.

Slimy worms or sticky kids How caregiving tasks and gender identity attenuate disgust response

Disgust is derived from evolutionary processes to avoid pathogen contamination. Theories of gender differences in pathogen disgust utilize both evolutionary psychological and sociocultural perspectives. Drawing on research that suggests that masculine and feminine gender identities are somewhat orthogonal, we examine how gender identity intersects with pathogen disgust. In addition, building on evolutionary psychological and sociocultural accounts of how caregiving and parental investment affect pathogen disgust, we present a new measure of caregiving disgust and compare its properties across gender, parental status, and political ideology with those of a conventional pathogen disgust measure. This registered report finds that how masculinity and femininity affect disgust varies by gender, disgust domain, and their intersection; that parental status effects vary by disgust domain but not gender; that reframing disgust in terms of caregiving eliminates the gender gap in disgust; and that the caregiving frame unexpectedly strengthens the relationship between disgust and political ideology.

Investigating the roles of age, sex, depression, and anxiety for valence and arousal ratings of words: a population-based study

BACKGROUND

The perception of the affective quality of stimuli with regard to valence and arousal has mostly been studied in laboratory experiments. Population-based research may complement such studies by accessing larger, older, better balanced, and more heterogeneous samples. Several characteristics, among them age, sex, depression, or anxiety, were found to be associated with affective quality perception. Here, we intended to transfer valence and arousal rating methods from experimental to population-based research. Our aim was to assess the feasibility of obtaining and determining the structure of valence and arousal ratings in the setting of the large observational BiDirect Study. Moreover, we explored the roles of age, sex, depression, and anxiety for valence and arousal ratings of words.

METHODS

704 participants provided valence and arousal ratings for 12 written nouns pre-categorized as unpleasant, neutral, or pleasant. Predictors of valence and arousal ratings (i.e. age, sex, depression, and anxiety) were analyzed for six outcomes that emerge by combining two affective dimensions with three words categories. Data were modeled with multiple linear regression. Relative predictor importance was quantified by model-explained variance decomposition.

RESULTS

Overall, average population-based ratings replicated those found in laboratory settings. The model did not reach statistical significance in the valence dimension. In the arousal dimension, the model explained 5.4% (unpleasant), 4.6% (neutral), and 3.5% (pleasant) of the variance. (Trend) effects of sex on arousal ratings were found in all word categories (unpleasant: increased arousal in women; neutral, pleasant: decreased arousal in women). Effects of age and anxiety (increased arousal) were restricted to the neutral words.

CONCLUSIONS

We report results of valence and arousal ratings of words in the setting of a large, observational, population-based study. Method transfer yielded acceptable data quality. The analyses demonstrated small effects of the selected predictors in the arousal dimension.

Tracking Fluctuations in Psychological States using Social Media Language: A Case Study of Weekly Emotion

Personality psychologists are increasingly documenting dynamic, within–person processes. Big data methodologies can augment this endeavour by allowing for the collection of naturalistic and personality–relevant digital traces from online environments. Whereas big data methods have primarily been used to catalogue static personality dimensions, here we present a case study in how they can be used to track dynamic fluctuations in psychological states. We apply a text–based, machine learning prediction model to Facebook status updates to compute weekly trajectories of emotional valence and arousal. We train this model on 2895 human–annotated Facebook statuses and apply the resulting model to 303 575 Facebook statuses posted by 640 US Facebook users who had previously self–reported their Big Five traits, yielding an average of 28 weekly estimates per user. We examine the correlations between model–predicted emotion and self–reported personality, providing a test of the robustness of these links when using weekly aggregated data, rather than momentary data as in prior work. We further present dynamic visualizations of weekly valence and arousal for every user, while making the final data set of 17 937 weeks openly available. We discuss the strengths and drawbacks of this method in the context of personality psychology's evolution into a dynamic science. © 2020 European Association of Personality Psychology

Daily Monitoring of Emotional Responses to the Coronavirus Pandemic in Serbia: A Citizen Science Approach

The COVID-19 pandemic, a health emergency with international consequences, has brought serious impact on all aspects of society and affects not only health and economy, but psychological functioning and mental health as well. This research was conducted in order to examine and further our understanding of emotional reactions to the ongoing pandemic. Change in emotional reactions during the pandemic and relations with specific pandemic related behaviors and personality traits from the revised Reinforcement sensitivity theory were explored. The research was conducted in Serbia for 35 days while the country was in a state of emergency, as a citizen science project. Out of the 1526 participants that joined the study, 444 (67% female) had measures for all five weeks. Longitudinal changes in four emotional states during the pandemic were examined: worry, fear, boredom, and anger/annoyance. Results indicate a decrease in all four emotional states over time. The biggest decrease was present in case of worry, followed by fear and boredom. Regression analysis showed that personality dimensions, as well as behavioral responses in this situation significantly predicted emotional reactions. Findings revealed the Behavioral activation system was significantly related to worry, fear and boredom, Fight with boredom and anger, and the Behavioral inhibition system with anger. Adherence to protection measures, as well as increased exposure to the media, had significant positive relations with worry and fear. These results indicate that both stable characteristics and specific pandemic-related behaviors are significantly related to emotional response during the pandemic.

Types of motivation and eudemonic well-being as predictors of academic outcomes in first-year students: A self-determination theory approach

Grounded in self-determination theory (SDT), the purpose of this study is to analyze how academic outcomes, such as hedonic well-being and achievement, are affected by the students' reasons for attending university. Additionally, the extent to which eudemonic well-being predicts academic outcomes beyond the types of motivation is also explored. In an initial sample of 3,392 first-year students, the motivation and well-being variables were measured at the beginning of the course (Time 1); and after the end of the academic year (Time 2) the academic achievement variables were collected from 366 participants belonging to the initial sample. Hierarchical regression analyses reveal that the types of motivation and eudemonic well-being differentially predicted hedonic well-being; the results related to academic achievement show the predictive power of intrinsic motivation and amotivation although these remain less conclusive. The implications for both research and practice are included.

Gender Differences in the Prediction of Acute Stress Disorder From Peritraumatic Dissociation and Distress Among Victims of Violent Crimes

Peritraumatic dissociation and distress are strong predictors of acute stress disorder (ASD) and posttraumatic stress disorder (PTSD) development. However, there is limited data concerning gender differences in these relations, particularly among victims of violent crimes (VVC). The objective of this study is to examine whether peritraumatic dissociation and distress predict the number of ASD symptoms differently for men and women VVC. In all, 162 adults (97 women, M age = 39.6 years), 63% of whom experienced physical assaults, completed the Acute Stress Disorder Interview, the Peritraumatic Dissociative Experience Questionnaire, and the Peritraumatic Distress Inventory. Analyses included t tests and multiple hierarchical regressions models controlling for known PTSD risk factors. The regression model showed dissociation and distress to be significant predictors of ASD for both men and women (β = .349 and β =.312 respectively; all p < .001). A significant three-way interaction was also observed between peritraumatic distress (PDI), past potentially traumatic experiences, and gender. In simple slopes analyses, the combination of high levels of PDI and of a high number of past potentially traumatic events were associated with greater risk of ASD in men only (b = 3.78, p < .001). However, women experienced greater PDI, t(157) = 5.844, p = .005, than men, and elevated distress was associated with more ASD symptoms independently of past traumatic events. Gender differences were revealed as a function of past potentially traumatic experiences. There is a cumulative impact of past potential traumas and current distress that predicts ASD in men, while in women, it contributes to ASD via increased distress.