Place and the self: An autobiographical memory synthesis

Place and Memory: Revisiting the Past Self Through Autobiographical Memory

Place is everywhere as geography, location, territory, and landscape permeates everyday encounter. In contrast, memory is embedded in the physical setting as the burgeoning narratives of cities. In recent instances, literary settings of novels and characters are interpretations of actual life events. An immigrant from New York City returns to Lagos after a long period in Teju Cole's Every Day is for the Thief (2007) and (2014) investigates the correlation of the past self within the present state of the setting. Exploring interrelated memories and places to revisit the sense of self, the present study aims to analyse how autobiographical memory distinguishes personal memory from social events and defines place attachment and identity in society. This article also explores the lack of conformity to the tendency to find the past self in different time and spatial aspects through which this research tries to bridge the past with the present using narrators' autobiographical memories.

Personal dispositions explain differences in physical health benefits of nature exposure: the role of restorativeness and affect

Introduction

Urbanization processes are constantly increasing, and most of the European population currently live in urban areas. Nevertheless, evidence is consistent in highlighting the positive association between nature exposure and human wellbeing, although individual differences might affect this association.

Methods

The present study aimed to investigate the association among nature connectedness, conceptualized as Love and Care for Nature, place identity, and physical wellbeing, via restorativeness and positive and negative affect. A total of 312 visitors of an urban green area (i.e., Milan's Parco Nord) participated in the study. They completed an anonymous questionnaire.

Results

Findings showed that nature connectedness and place identity positively affect physical wellbeing, via restorativeness and positive affect, but not through the negative ones.

Discussion

Results highlight the importance of the joint role of exposure to nature and individual differences in promoting wellbeing. This study offers implications for interventions aimed at enhancing individuals' health through exposure to nature. Limitations of the study and future research developments are discussed.

Emotion and cognition in personal and collective work-identity formation: variable- and person-oriented analyses

The aim of this study was to investigate emotional and cognitive processes involved in the formation of personal and collective work-identity by variable- and person-oriented analyses. A digitized questionnaire was answered by 768 participants. In line with an autobiographical (personal) memory view, we showed that: (1) emotional processes positively predicted cognitive processes (variable-oriented analyses), and (2) emotional profile had an effect on cognitive processes (person-oriented analyses), with regard to personal work-identity formation. Regarding collective work-identity formation, and in line with a social-identity and self-categorization perspective, we showed that: (1) cognitive processes positively predicted emotional processes (variable-oriented analyses), and (2) cognitive profile had an effect on emotional processes (person-oriented analyses). Our results indicate that emotion and cognition play different roles in personal- and collective work-identity formation; additionally, suggesting that the theoretical views of both personal and social psychology as well as analyses at different levels should be involved in order to gain a deeper understanding of the phenomenon of people-work bonding.

Teachers' Personal and Collective Work-Identity Predicts Exhaustion and Work Motivation: Mediating Roles of Psychological Job Demands and Resources

The aim of this study was to investigate the mediating roles of teachers' psychological job demands and resources regarding personal and collective work-identity, respectively, and exhaustion and self-determined work motivation, respectively. A total of 2,905 members of a Swedish teacher's trade union received an online questionnaire by e-mail; 768 individuals answered the questionnaire and so participated in this study. The data were obtained by self-reported measures (e.g., emotional and cognitive components of work-identity, psychological job demands and resources, exhaustion and work motivation) and analyzed by mediation regression analyses. The results showed that teachers' psychological job demands (prosocial extra-role performance) mediated relationships between cognitive personal work-identity and emotional collective work-identity, respectively, and exhaustion. Teachers' psychological job resources (educational inspiration) mediated relationships between emotional personal work-identity and cognitive collective work-identity, respectively, and self-determined work motivation. Thus, teachers might be disadvantaged by stronger personal work-related thinking and collective work-related feeling when related to exhaustion, to some extent accounted for by psychological job demands, and they might find advantage in stronger personal work-related feeling and collective work-related thinking when related to work motivation, to some extent accounted for by psychological job resources.

Relationships Between Identity, Well-Being, and Willingness to Sacrifice in Personal and Collective Favorite Places: The Mediating Role of Well-Being

In line with research indicating positive associations between well-being and personal and collective people-place bonding, and that collectivistic compared to individualistic commitment may have stronger associations with pro-environmental behavior, we investigated relationships between identity, well-being, and willingness to sacrifice (type of pro-environmental behavior) in personal and collective favorite places. A total of 884 respondents, living in three Swedish municipalities, participated in this study. In line with the hypotheses, we showed congruent positive relationships between place-related: (1) personal identity and personal well-being; (2) collective identity and collective well-being, (3) collective identity and collective willingness to sacrifice; and (4) an incongruent positive association between collective identity and personal willingness to sacrifice. Additionally, a significant role of well-being in mediating the identity → willingness to sacrifice relationship was reported, suggesting that our willingness to pay higher taxes and prices and to accept cuts in standard of living in order to protect our personal and collective favorite places might be accounted for partly by how we feel visiting these places.

Fibromyalgia patients make scarce reference to pain in self-defining memories

OBJECTIVE

Self-defining memories (SDMs) are vivid, emotionally intense and well-rehearsed autobiographical memories that provide fundamental information about one's cognitive affective motivational representation of self. Exploring SDMs in fibromyalgia (FM) is of interest for understanding the psychopathology of this disorder and improving clinical interventions. Our aim was to compare patients and healthy controls (HC) on SDM characteristics.

METHOD

We included 25 patients with FM and 24 HC matched for age, sex and education level. Each participant described five SDMs, which were coded for content, specificity, integration, tension, redemption, contamination, affective response, date, and reference to pain. We statistically controlled our results for the most plausible confounding factors related to FM that could affect SDM recall, namely depression, anxiety, cognitive inhibition, pain severity and medication.

RESULTS

Compared with HC, patients retrieved less specific SDMs with a more negative emotional valence but less tension. They reported more relationship-related memories, and fewer redemptive ones, with less meaning-making. The number of memories referring to physical or psychological pain did not differ between groups. None of the confounding factors we analysed could explain (either alone or in combination) the statistical differences between groups for SDMs characteristics.

CONCLUSION

We discuss functional avoidance and alexithymia as two main factors for poor reference to pain in patients' SDMs that further reveal affective dysregulation in FM. In clinical practice, remediating the way in which pain is integrated into SDMs in FM may help to mitigate its negative impact on everyday life.

Predicting general mental health and exhaustion: the role of emotion and cognition components of personal and collective work-identity

The aim of this study was to investigate relationships between emotion and cognition components of personal and collective work-identity and self-reported general mental health and exhaustion, in Swedish teachers (N = 768). In line with our predictions, we showed that the emotion component of personal work-identity and the cognition component of collective work-identity associated positively with general mental health and negatively with exhaustion. The reverse result was found, however, for the cognition component of personal work-identity and emotion component of collective work-identity. In general, all this indicates that person-work bonding might, to some degree, account for general mental health and exhaustion in employees. In particular, the findings suggest that general mental health and exhaustion may vary symmetrically across the: (1) Type of person-work bonding (personal vs. collective work-identity); and (2) Type of psychological component (emotion vs. cognition) involved in personal- and collective work-identity.

Motivation and Justice at Work: The Role of Emotion and Cognition Components of Personal and Collective Work Identity

The aim of this study was to investigate the role of personal and collective work identity (including emotion and cognition components), in predicting work motivation (operationalized as work self-determined motivation) and organizational justice (operationalized as organizational pay justice). Digitized questionnaires were distributed by e-mail to 2905 members, teachers, of a Swedish trade union. A total of 768 individuals answered the questionnaire and by that participated in this study. Personal- compared to collective work identity was shown to positively associate with self-determined motivation accounted for by the emotion component of personal work identity. Collective compared to personal work identity was reported to positively associate with organizational pay justice accounted for by the cognition component of collective work identity. All this suggests that both work-related motivation and organizational justice might be, to some extent, accounted for by the psychological mechanisms of work identity and that, as predicted, different types of work identity, play different significant roles in predicting motivation and justice at work. More precisely, the emotion component of work identity was more pronounced in personal work-bonding relationships, and the cognitive component, of work identity in contrast, was more pronounced in collective work-bonding relationships.

A framework for assessing urban greenery's effects and valuing its ecosystem services

Ongoing urban exploitation is increasing pressure to transform urban green spaces, while there is increasing awareness that greenery provides a range of important benefits to city residents. In efforts to help resolve associated problems we have developed a framework for integrated assessments of ecosystem service (ES) benefits and values provided by urban greenery, based on the ecosystem service cascade model. The aim is to provide a method for assessing the contribution to, and valuing, multiple ES provided by urban greenery that can be readily applied in routine planning processes. The framework is unique as it recognizes that an urban greenery comprises several components and functions that can contribute to multiple ecosystem services in one or more ways via different functional traits (e.g. foliage characteristics) for which readily measured indicators have been identified. The framework consists of five steps including compilation of an inventory of indicator; application of effectivity factors to rate indicators' effectiveness; estimation of effects; estimation of benefits for each ES; estimation of the total ES value of the ecosystem. The framework was applied to assess ecosystem services provided by trees, shrubs, herbs, birds, and bees, in green areas spanning an urban gradient in Gothenburg, Sweden. Estimates of perceived values of ecosystem services were obtained from interviews with the public and workshop activities with civil servants. The framework is systematic and transparent at all stages and appears to have potential utility in the existing spatial planning processes.

Self-grounding visual, auditory and olfactory autobiographical memories

Given that autobiographical memory provides a cognitive foundation for the self, we investigated the relative importance of visual, auditory and olfactory autobiographical memories for the self. Thirty subjects, with a mean age of 35.4years, participated in a study involving a three×three within-subject design containing nine different types of autobiographical memory cues: pictures, sounds and odors presented with neutral, positive and negative valences. It was shown that visual compared to auditory and olfactory autobiographical memories involved higher cognitive and emotional constituents for the self. Furthermore, there was a trend showing positive autobiographical memories to increase their proportion to both cognitive and emotional components of the self, from olfactory to auditory to visually cued autobiographical memories; but, yielding a reverse trend for negative autobiographical memories. Finally, and independently of modality, positive affective states were shown to be more involved in autobiographical memory than negative ones.

Evaluation of natural sounds in urban greenery: potential impact for urban nature preservation

Most humans now live in cities and their main experience of nature is through urban greenery. An increasing number of studies show the importance of urban green spaces for well-being, although most of them are based on visual perception. A questionnaire examining people's evaluations of natural sounds was answered by 1326 individuals living near one of six urban green areas of varying naturalness in the city of Gothenburg, Sweden. Women and the elderly reported greater calmness when hearing bird song and rustling leaves (and placed a higher importance on the richness of bird species) than did men, younger and middle-aged individuals. Independent of age and gender, urban woodlands (high naturalness) had higher evaluations than parks (low naturalness). Our results suggest that to increase positive experiences of urban green areas, demographic variables of gender and age should be taken into account, and settings that mimic nature should be prioritized in planning.

Toward a Model of Work-Related Self: A Narrative Review

Occupational work as personal and social identification can be conceptualized as one of the life goals that we strive for and find meaning in. A basic categorization of the phenomenon of work-related identity is suggested, based on psychological theories of identity, memory and relational schema. It distinguishes between organizational, workgroup and professional identity. The two former relate to the concepts of social identity and collective self and the latter to the concepts of personal identity and individual self. These are assumed to form functionally independent cognitive structures, leading to separate motivations and influences on work-related satisfaction. Given this, empirical research on the impact of work-related identity on employee satisfaction, in general terms, is reviewed. The article concludes with some prospective directions for future research by sketching a general model of work-related self. It is hypothesized to evolve by a causal progression from employment across time via emotional and cognitive components.