Notes from the Underground: Seeking the top personality correlates of self-referencing

OBJECTIVE

Self-focused language use has been frequently assumed to reflect narcissism; however, research indicates that the association between first-person singular pronouns (i.e., "I-talk") and grandiose narcissism is negligible.

METHOD

To extend this literature, we progressively identify vulnerable narcissism and rumination as positive correlates of I-talk in five studies (valid Ns = 211, 475, 1253, 289, 1113).

RESULTS

The first study revealed positive correlates of I-talk suggestive of vulnerable narcissism. The second study showed more directly that vulnerable narcissism was a positive correlate but that this association was attributable to shared variance with neuroticism. The third study, a preregistered effort, replicated and extended the results of the second study. The fourth and fifth studies focused on rumination in a preregistered manner.

CONCLUSIONS

All the studies point to a clear distinction: While grandiose narcissism is negligibly related to I-talk, vulnerable narcissism is positively related to I-talk; moreover, rumination is a robust predictor of I-talk. A research synthesis revealed the following constructs significantly capture I-talk: depression (r = 0.10), neuroticism (r = 0.15), rumination (r = 0.14), and vulnerable narcissism (r = 0.12). The association between I-talk and neuroticism was partially mediated by rumination, providing a testable candidate mechanism for neuroticism interventions.

Anger is eliminated with the disposal of a paper written because of provocation

Anger suppression is important in our daily life, as its failure can sometimes lead to the breaking down of relationships in families. Thus, effective strategies to suppress or neutralise anger have been examined. This study shows that physical disposal of a piece of paper containing one's written thoughts on the cause of a provocative event neutralises anger, while holding the paper did not. In this study, participants wrote brief opinions about social problems and received a handwritten, insulting comment consisting of low evaluations about their composition from a confederate. Then, the participants wrote the cause and their thoughts about the provocative event. Half of the participants (disposal group) disposed of the paper in the trash can (Experiment 1) or in the shredder (Experiment 2), while the other half (retention group) kept it in a file on the desk. All the participants showed an increased subjective rating of anger after receiving the insulting feedback. However, the subjective anger for the disposal group decreased as low as the baseline period, while that of the retention group was still higher than that in the baseline period in both experiments. We propose this method as a powerful and simple way to eliminate anger.

Words matter: The use of generic "you" in expressive writing in an oncology setting

The use of generic "you" (GY) in writing samples fosters psychological distancing and functions as a linguistic mechanism to facilitate emotion regulation. This method of creating psychological distance from the traumatic experience of cancer may be used by patients processing emotions. We used behavioral coding to analyze expressive writing samples collected from 138 cancer patients to examine the association between the use of "you" and cancer-related symptoms and psychological outcomes. Occurrences of GY were low, but our qualitative results showed how the use of GY could create a universal experience of cancer. The use of GY was not associated with cancer-related symptoms and depressive symptoms, but longitudinal analyses revealed that those using GY had fewer intrusive thoughts and avoidance behaviors across the follow-up period of 1, 4, and 10 months after the intervention. The development of psychological self-distancing prompts to use in writing interventions or as a clinical tool for cancer patients should be explored.

Re-appraising stressors from a distance: effects of linguistic distancing on cognitive appraisals and emotional responses to interpersonal conflict

Reflecting on stressors from a detached perspective - a strategy known as distancing - can facilitate emotional recovery. Researchers have theorised that distancing works by enabling reappraisals of negative events, yet few studies have investigated specifically how distancing impacts stressor appraisals. In this experiment, we investigated how participants' (N = 355) emotional experience and appraisals of an interpersonal conflict differed depending on whether they wrote event-reflections from a linguistically immersed (first-person) or distanced (second/third-person) perspective. Partly replicating previous findings, distanced reflection predicted increases in positive affect, but not reductions in negative affect, relative to immersed reflection. Linguistic distancing also predicted increases in motivational congruence appraisals (i.e. perceived advantageousness of the event), but did not influence other appraisal dimensions. We discuss how linguistic distancing may facilitate emotional recovery by illuminating the benefits of stressful experiences, enabling people to "see the good in the bad".

Sensory emotion regulation

Decades of evidence reveal intimate links between sensation and emotion. Yet, discussion of sensory experiences as tools that promote emotion regulation is largely absent from current theorizing on this topic. Here, we address this gap by integrating evidence from social-personality, clinical, cognitive-neuroscience, and animal research to highlight the role of sensation as a tool that can be harnessed to up- or downregulate emotion. Further, we review evidence implicating sensation as a rapid and relatively effortless emotion regulation modality and highlight future research directions. Notably, we emphasize the need to examine the duration of sensory emotion regulation effects, the moderating role of individual and cultural differences, and how sensory strategies interact with other strategies.

Mapping Linguistic Shifts During Psychological Coping With the COVID-19 Pandemic

How does language change reveal the psychological trajectories of people coping with a COVID-19 infection? This study examined writings on social media over 12 weeks from people who self-reported having tested positive for COVID-19. People used fewer words reflecting anxiety and distancing but more words indicating reinterpretation over time. The language patterns for describing the experience of COVID-19 infections differed from those for describing other unrelated topics. The findings reveal the temporal dynamics of psychological adjustment to an unfolding crisis.

Self-Reflection at Work: Why It Matters and How to Harness Its Potential and Avoid Its Pitfalls

It is difficult to fathom how an organization could be successful without its employees engaging in self-reflection. Gone would be its personnel's capacity to problem-solve, learn from past experiences, and engage in countless other introspective activities that are vital to success. Indeed, a large body of research highlights the positive value of reflection. Yet, as both common experience and a wealth of findings demonstrate, engaging in this introspective process while focusing on negative experiences often backfires, undermining people's health, well-being, performance, and relationships. Here we synthesize research on the benefits and costs of self-reflection in organizational contexts and discuss the role that psychological distance plays in allowing people to harness the potential of self-reflection while avoiding its common pitfalls.

Learning the rules of the game: The role of generic "you" and "we" in shaping children's interpretations of norms

A critical skill of childhood is learning social norms. We examine whether the generic pronouns "you" and "we," which frame information as applying to people in general rather than to a specific individual, facilitate this process. In one pre-registered experiment conducted online between 2020 and 2021, children 4- to 9-year-old primarily living in the midwestern U.S. (N = 146, 75 girls, 71 boys, M_age  = 7.14, SD = 1.69, 82% White) interpreted actions described with generic pronouns (vs. "I") as normatively correct and selected the speaker who used generic pronouns as the rule-follower, particularly when generic pronouns were presented first. There were no significant effects of age. These results illustrate how generic pronouns influence how children discern unfamiliar norms and form interpersonal judgments.

Linguistic distancing predicts response to a digital single-session intervention for adolescent depression

Examining the linguistic characteristics of youths' writing may be a promising method for detecting youth who are struggling. In this study, we examined linguistic patterns of adolescent responses to writing prompts in a large, well-powered trial of an evidence-based, digital single-session intervention teaching malleability beliefs about personal traits and symptoms ("growth mindset"). Participants who completed the intervention as part of a larger randomized control trial were included in this preregistered study (n = 638, https://osf.io/zqmxt). Participants' responses were processed using Linguistic Inquiry and Word Count. We tested correlations between linguistic variables (i.e., linguistic distancing, positive affect, negative affect, insight, certainty), baseline outcome variables, post-intervention outcome variables, and 3-month post-intervention outcome variables. We also used Least Absolute Shrinkage and Selection Operator (LASSO) regression models to identify key predictors of treatment outcomes. As hypothesized, greater use of linguistic distancing was associated with lower levels of baseline hopelessness and higher levels of perceived agency. Additionally, per LASSO models including all linguistic variables, greater use of linguistic distancing predicted larger reductions in depressive symptoms from baseline to three-month follow-up. Linguistic distancing appeared to account for 27% of the variance in depression trajectories when also accounting for baseline depression. CLINICAL REGISTRATION NO: NCT04634903.

The effectiveness of self-distanced versus self-immersed reflections among adults: Systematic review and meta-analysis of experimental studies

Stressor events can be highly emotional and disruptive to our functioning, yet they also present opportunities for learning and growth via self-reflections. Self-distanced reflections in which one reasons about target events in ways that maximise their removal of the current self from the experiential reality are said to facilitate this reflective process. We tested the expectation that self-distanced reflections offer an advantage over self-immersed vistas via a pre-registered systematic review of seven electronic databases (Scopus, Medline, Web of Science, PsycInfo, CINAHL Plus, Embase, and ProQuest Dissertations and Theses Global) to identify experimental tests with adults aged 18-65 years where the focus of the reflection was a stressor or adverse event that participants had already experienced. A three-level, random effects meta-analysis of 25 experiments (N = 2,397, 68 effects) revealed a small-to-moderate advantage of self-distanced reflections (g = 0.19, SE = 0.07, 95% CI [0.05, 0.33]) and were most effective when they targeted a stressor experience that emphasised one's emotional state or lifetime. Nevertheless, our assessment of the overall quality of evidence including risk of bias suggested uncertainty regarding the benefit of this pragmatic self-regulatory tactic and therefore the need for future high-powered, high-quality experiments.

An event-related potential investigation of distanced self-talk: Replication and comparison to detached reappraisal

Emotion regulation is critical for managing stress, but many regulatory strategies consume high levels of cognitive resources to implement, which are depleted under stress. This raises a conundrum: the tools we have to feel better may be ineffective when they are most needed. Recent event-related potential (ERP) research indicates that distanced self-talk (i.e., reflecting on one's experiences using non-first-person singular pronouns and one's name) reduces negative emotional reactivity without overtaxing cognitive resources. Here, we report the first direct replication of this work and extend it by examining how distanced self-talk compares to detached reappraisal, one of the most frequently studied regulatory techniques. Sixty-seven participants were randomly assigned to an emotion regulation picture task and instructed to reflect on the feelings they experienced in response to viewing negative emotional images using distanced self-talk or detached reappraisal while ERPs were measured. Directly replicating past findings, distanced self-talk led to a reduction in an affective arousal ERP, the late positive potential (LPP), without increasing stimulus preceding negativity (SPN), an ERP that reflects anticipatory and preparatory processing. These results further bolster support for distanced self-talk as a relatively effortless emotion regulation strategy. On the other hand, detached reappraisal was neither associated with the modulation of the LPP nor the SPN. Due to the failed replication of the reappraisal effect, a direct comparison between emotion regulation strategies was not conducted. Methodological limitations that may have contributed to the reappraisal failure and future directions for comparisons between emotion regulation strategies comparison are discussed.

Distanced self-talk increases rational self-interest

Does stepping back to evaluate a situation from a distanced perspective lead us to be selfish or fair? This question has been of philosophical interest for centuries, and, more recently, the focus of extensive empirical inquiry. Yet, extant research reveals a puzzle: some studies suggest that adopting a distanced perspective will produce more rationally self-interested behavior, whereas others suggest that it will produce more impartial behavior. Here we adjudicate between these perspectives by testing the effects of adopting a third-person perspective on decision making in a task that pits rational self-interest against impartiality: the dictator game. Aggregating across three experiments (N = 774), participants who used third-person (i.e., distanced) vs. first-person (i.e., immersed) self-talk during the dictator game kept more money for themselves. We discuss these results in light of prior research showing that psychological distance can promote cooperation and fairmindedness and how the effect of psychological distance on moral decision-making may be sensitive to social context.

Novel computational algorithms to index lexical markers of psychological distancing and their relationship to emotion regulation efficacy over time

The degree to which one employs an objective or spatially/temporally distant perspective via language, i.e., linguistic distancing, has previously been shown to be positively associated with well-being. We sought to further elucidate relationships among language and emotion over time as a function of the implementation of sub-tactics of psychological distancing. In Study 1, we developed novel deep machine learning algorithms to identify the degree to which linguistic patterns reflect two types of psychological distancing, namely objective (OBJ) and spatial/temporal (FAR) distancing. In Study 2, in an expressive writing-based longitudinal emotion regulation training task, participants transcribed their thoughts while viewing negative or neutral stimuli over 5 sessions in one of three ways: by implementing objective language (Objective group), by implementing spatially/temporally distant language (Far group), or by responding naturally. We found that the OBJ and FAR algorithms significantly predicted changes in task-based self-reported negative affect in the Objective group and found no significant associations in the Far group. The relationship between the algorithm scores and self-reported negative affect was stronger in the Objective group compared to the Far group. These findings describe sensitive linguistic distancing algorithms that are capable of tracking changes in self-reported negative affect. These results may be useful in developing novel, unobtrusive emotion regulation assessments and interventions that utilize natural language processing.

Training for Wisdom: The Distanced-Self-Reflection Diary Method

How can people wisely navigate social conflict? Two preregistered longitudinal experiments (Study 1: Canadian adults; Study 2: American and Canadian adults; total N = 555) tested whether encouraging distanced (i.e., third-person) self-reflection would help promote wisdom. Both experiments measured wise reasoning (i.e., intellectual humility, open-mindedness about how situations could unfold, consideration of and attempts to integrate diverse viewpoints) about challenging interpersonal events. In a month-long experiment (Study 1), participants used either a third- or first-person perspective in diary reflections on each day's most significant experience. Compared with preintervention assessments, assessments made after the intervention revealed that participants reflecting in the third person showed a significant increase in wise reasoning about interpersonal challenges. These effects were statistically accounted for by shifts in diary-based reflections toward a broader self-focus. A week-long experiment (Study 2) replicated the third-person self-reflection effect on wise reasoning (vs. first-person and no-pronoun control conditions). These findings suggest an efficient and evidence-based method for fostering wise reasoning.

"You" speaks to me: Effects of generic-you in creating resonance between people and ideas

Creating resonance between people and ideas is a central goal of communication. Historically, attempts to understand the factors that promote resonance have focused on altering the content of a message. Here we identify an additional route to evoking resonance that is embedded in the structure of language: the generic use of the word "you" (e.g., "You can't understand someone until you've walked a mile in their shoes"). Using crowd-sourced data from the Amazon Kindle application, we demonstrate that passages that people highlighted-collectively, over a quarter of a million times-were substantially more likely to contain generic-you compared to yoked passages that they did not highlight. We also demonstrate in four experiments (n = 1,900) that ideas expressed with generic-you increased resonance. These findings illustrate how a subtle shift in language establishes a powerful sense of connection between people and ideas.

Stronger resting-state neural oscillations associated with wiser advising from the 2nd- but not the 3rd-person perspective

This is the first electroencephalogram study exploring the personal perspective effect on wise advising. Participants advised hypothetical protagonists in life dilemmas from both the 2nd- and 3rd-person perspective. Their advice for each dilemma was rated by two independent raters on wisdom criteria, i.e., metacognitive humility, metacognitive flexibility, and perspective taking. The results revealed that participants felt a significantly shorter psychological distance from protagonists when advising from the 2nd- (vs. the 3rd-) person perspective, p < 0.001. However, there was no significant effect of perspective condition on the wisdom score. Nevertheless, stronger resting-state absolute EEG powers in the frontal lobe were associated with wiser advising from the 2nd-, but not the 3rd-person perspective. Moreover, Z tests revealed that the correlations between the resting-state absolute EEG powers and wisdom scores were significantly stronger during advising from the 2nd- than the 3rd-person perspective. These results suggest that advising from the 2nd-person perspective was more self-related, and mental activities during rest contributed to advising from the 2nd- but not the 3rd-person perspective.

Types of Inner Dialogues and Functions of Self-Talk: Comparisons and Implications

Intrapersonal communication occurs in several modes including inner dialogue and self-talk. The Dialogical Self Theory (Hermans, 1996) postulates a polyphonic self that is comprised of a multiplicity of inner voices. Internal dialogical activity implies an exchange of thoughts or ideas between at least two so-called “I-positions” representing specific points of view. Among the functions served by self-talk are self-criticism, self-reinforcement, self-management, and social assessment (Brinthaupt et al., 2009). This paper explores the relationships among different types of internal dialogues and self-talk functions. Participants included college students from Poland (n = 181) and the United States (n = 119) who completed two multidimensional measures of inner dialogue and self-talk. Results indicated moderately strong relationships between inner dialogue types and self-talk functions, suggesting that there is a significant overlap between the two modes of communication. We discuss several implications of these findings for exploring similarities and differences among varieties of intrapersonal communication.