Attitudes toward children: Distinguishing affection and stress

BACKGROUND

Adults' views and behaviors toward children can vary from being supportive to shockingly abusive, and there are significant unanswered questions about the psychological factors underpinning this variability.

OBJECTIVE

The present research examined the content of adults' attitudes toward children to address these questions.

METHOD

Ten studies (N = 4702) identified the factor structure of adults' descriptions of babies, toddlers, and school-age children and examined how the resulting factors related to a range of external variables.

RESULTS

Two factors emerged-affection toward children and stress elicited by them-and this factor structure was invariant across the United Kingdom, the United States, and South Africa. Affection uniquely captures emotional approach tendencies, concern for others, and broad positivity in evaluations, experiences, motivations, and donation behavior. Stress relates to emotional instability, emotional avoidance, and concern about disruptions to a self-oriented, structured life. The factors also predict distinct experiences in a challenging situation-home-parenting during COVID-19 lockdown-with affection explaining greater enjoyment and stress explaining greater perceived difficulty. Affection further predicts mentally visualizing children as pleasant and confident, whereas stress predicts mentally visualizing children as less innocent.

CONCLUSIONS

These findings offer fundamental new insights about social cognitive processes in adults that impact adult-child relationships and children's well-being.

Exploring the roles of human values and self-discrepancies in postnatal depression in first-time mothers

OBJECTIVES

Postnatal depression is the most prevalent psychopathology experienced within the perinatal period and has been associated with a range of adverse outcomes for both mother and infant. In the present research, we combine two influential theories, Schwartz's theory of human values and Higgins' self-discrepancy theory (SDT), to test new hypotheses about postnatal depression.

METHODS

We recruited 80 first-time mothers who had given birth within the last 6 months and who self-reported experiencing low mood or postnatal depression. Participants anonymously completed measures of postnatal depression, value importance, self-discrepancies, and subjective value fulfillment.

RESULTS

Contrary to our hypotheses, actual-ought self-discrepancies, but not actual-ideal self-discrepancies, predicted postnatal depression. Interestingly however, self-discrepancies were negatively correlated with value fulfillment. The findings within this study diverge from the relation predicted within SDT and highlight how motherhood may represent a unique circumstance, in which the "ideal self" has evolved to become a self that one feels morally obligated to embody. Further exploratory analyses revealed that depression was predicted by the difference between value fulfillment and value importance in conservation values, but not by differences between value fulfillment and value importance regarding any of the other value types.

DISCUSSION

We discuss potential impact on discourses around motherhood, alongside clinical implications for practitioners who work with mothers during the perinatal period.

Value fulfillment and well-being: Clarifying directions over time

OBJECTIVE

We investigate for the first time in a 9-day dairy study whether fulfillingone's values predicts well-being or whether well-being predicts valuefulfilment over time.

BACKGROUND

The empirical associations between the importance of human values to individuals and their well-being are typically weak and inconsistent. More recently, value fulfillment (i.e., acting in line with one's values) has shown to be more strongly correlated with well-being.

METHOD

The present research goes beyond past research by integrating work from clinical, personality, and social psychology to model associations between value fulfillment and positive and negative aspects of well-being over time.

RESULTS

Across a nine-day diary study involving 1434 observations (N = 184), we found that people who were able to fulfill their self-direction values reported more positive well-being on the next day, and those who fulfilled their hedonism values reported less negative well-being on the next day. Conversely, people who reported more positive well-being were more able to fulfill their achievement, stimulation, and self-direction values on the next day, and those who reported more negative well-being were less able to fulfill their achievement values. Importantly, these effects were consistent across three countries/regions (EU/UK, India, Türkiye), the importance people attributed to values, period of the week, and their prestudy well-being.

CONCLUSION

These results help to understand the fundamental interconnections between values and well-being while also having relevance to clinical practice.

Values in Romantic Relationships

There are substantive theoretical questions about whether personal values affect romantic relationship functioning. The current research tested the association between personal values and romantic relationship quality while considering potential mediating mechanisms related to pro-relational attitudes, communal strength, intrinsic relationship motivation, and entitlement. Across five studies using different measures of value priorities, we found that the endorsement of self-transcendence values (i.e., benevolence, universalism) was related to higher romantic relationship quality. The findings provided support for the mediating roles of pro-relational attitudes, communal strength, and intrinsic relationship motivation. Finally, a dyadic analysis in our fifth study showed that self-transcendence values mostly influence a person's own relationship quality but not that of their partner. These findings provide the first evidence that personal values are important variables in romantic relationship functioning while helping to map the mechanisms through which this role occurs.

Using self-affirmation to increase intellectual humility in debate

Intellectual humility, which entails openness to other views and a willingness to listen and engage with them, is crucial for facilitating civil dialogue and progress in debate between opposing sides. In the present research, we tested whether intellectual humility can be reliably detected in discourse and experimentally increased by a prior self-affirmation task. Three hundred and three participants took part in 116 audio- and video-recorded group discussions. Blind to condition, linguists coded participants' discourse to create an intellectual humility score. As expected, the self-affirmation task increased the coded intellectual humility, as well as participants' self-rated prosocial affect (e.g. empathy). Unexpectedly, the effect on prosocial affect did not mediate the link between experimental condition and intellectual humility in debate. Self-reported intellectual humility and other personality variables were uncorrelated with expert-coded intellectual humility. Implications of these findings for understanding the social psychological mechanisms underpinning intellectual humility are considered.

The Salience of Children Increases Adult Prosocial Values

Organizations often put children front and center in campaigns to elicit interest and support for prosocial causes. Such initiatives raise a key theoretical and applied question that has yet to be addressed directly: Does the salience of children increase prosocial motivation and behavior in adults? We present findings aggregated across eight experiments involving 2,054 adult participants: Prosocial values became more important after completing tasks that made children salient compared to tasks that made adults (or a mundane event) salient or compared to a no-task baseline. An additional field study showed that adults were more likely to donate money to a child-unrelated cause when children were more salient on a shopping street. The findings suggest broad, reliable interconnections between human mental representations of children and prosocial motives, as the child salience effect was not moderated by participants’ gender, age, attitudes, or contact with children.

Mental Representations of Values and Behaviors

The present research provides the first direct assessment of the fit of diverse behaviors to putatively related personal and social values from Schwartz’s theory. Across three studies, we examined spatial representations of value-related behaviors that were explicitly derived from people’s mental representations of the values. Participants were asked how similar the behaviors were to each other and various values, and these judgments were used to specify multidimensional scaling solutions. The results indicated that the spatial representation of the behaviors was consistent with the two-dimensional space described in Schwartz’s model of values, although several deviations occurred. For example, self-enhancement behaviors were widely spread, indicating more variation in the way individuals interpret these behaviors, which are often associated with other value types. These data provide evidence that a range of behaviors can at least partly be reduced to underlying motivations expressed by values. Furthermore, our findings indicate that behaviors are often expressed by several values, which might help to explain why value–behavior associations in previous studies were weak. Finally, they illustrate a new approach to learning which behaviors might relate to multiple values.

Neural coding of human values is underpinned by brain areas representing the core self in the cortical midline region

The impact of human values on our choices depends on their nature. Self-Transcendence values motivate us to act for the benefit of others and care for the environment. Self-Enhancement values motivate us to act for our benefit. The present study examines differences in the neural processes underlying these two value domains. Extending our previous research, we used fMRI to explore first of all neural correlates of Self-Transcendence vs Self-Enhancement values, with a particular focus on the putative role of the medial prefrontal cortex (MPFC), which has been linked to a self-transcendent mind-set. Additionally, we investigated the neural basis of Openness to Change vs Conservation values. We asked participants to reflect on and rate values as guiding principles in their lives while undergoing fMRI. Mental processing of Self-Transcendence values was associated with higher brain activity in the dorsomedial (BA9, BA8) and ventromedial (BA10) prefrontal cortices, as compared to Self-Enhancement values. The former involved activation and the latter deactivation of those regions. We did not detect differences in brain activation between Openness to Change vs Conservation values. Self-Transcendence values thus shared brain regions with social processes that have previously been linked to a self-transcendent mind-set, and the "core self" representation.

Seeing and treating the out-group like family: Transference effects in an ethnic context

Transference effects occur when our impressions are guided by our mental representations of significant others. For instance, if a target resembles an individual’s significant other, then that person’s feelings toward their significant other will be transferred onto the target. The present research examines whether transference effects emerge even when the target belongs to an ethnic out-group. In two experiments, participants received descriptions of in-group and out-group targets who partly resembled their own (or another’s) positive significant other. The findings showed that resemblance to one’s own significant other improves attitudes and behavior toward both in-group and ethnic out-group targets, as found across 2 nations and 3 different ethnic out-groups. The present research hence provides evidence of robust transference effects across ethnic group boundaries.

Well-being as a function of person-country fit in human values

It is often assumed that incongruence between individuals' values and those of their country is distressing, but the evidence has been mixed. Across 29 countries, the present research investigated whether well-being is higher if people's values match with those of people living in the same country or region. Using representative samples, we find that person-country and person-region value congruence predict six well-being measures (e.g., emotional well-being, relationship support; N = 54,673). Crucially, however, value type moderates whether person-country fit is positively or negatively associated with well-being. People who value self-direction, stimulation, and hedonism more and live in countries and regions where people on average share these values report lower well-being. In contrast, people who value achievement, power, and security more and live in countries and regions where people on average share these values, report higher well-being. Additionally, we find that people who moderately value stimulation report the highest well-being.

The importance of (shared) human values for containing the COVID-19 pandemic

The COVID-19 pandemic poses an exceptional challenge for humanity. Because public behaviour is key to curbing the pandemic at an early stage, it is important for social psychological researchers to use their knowledge to promote behaviours that help manage the crisis. Here, we identify human values as particularly important in driving both behavioural compliance to government guidelines and promoting prosocial behaviours to alleviate the strains arising from a prolonged pandemic. Existing evidence demonstrates the importance of human values, and the extent to which they are shared by fellow citizens, for tackling the COVID-19 crisis. Individuals who attach higher importance to self-transcendence (e.g., responsibility) and conservation (e.g., security) values are likely to be more compliant with COVID-19 behavioural guidelines and to help others who are struggling with the crisis. Further, believing that fellow citizens share one's values has been found to elicit a sense of connectedness that may be crucial in promoting collective efforts to contain the pandemic. The abstract nature of values, and cross-cultural agreement on their importance, suggests that they are ideally suited to developing and tailoring effective, global interventions to combat this pandemic.

The effect of self-focus on personal and social foraging behaviour

The continuous balancing of the risks and benefits of exploiting known options or exploring new opportunities is essential to human life. We forage for new opportunities when they are deemed to be more attractive than the available option, but this decision to forage also entails costs. People differ in their propensity to exploit or forage, and both the social circumstances and our individual value orientations are likely influences. Here, participants made foraging decisions for themselves and for a charity of their choice in two paradigms: one that features two distinct modes of decision-making (foraging vs classical economic decision-making) and one which is more directly related to the classical animal foraging and ethology literature. Across both paradigms, individuals who possessed a stronger self-focused value orientation obtained more rewards when they were allowed to forage for themselves rather than the charity. Neuroimaging during the tasks revealed that this effect was associated with activity in the dorsal anterior cingulate cortex (dACC) in that more self-focused individuals showed lower activity in dACC for the self-condition relative to the other condition. This evidence reveals a dynamic interplay between foraging outcomes and the higher-order value system of individuals.

Anti-immigrant prejudice: Understanding the roles of (perceived) values and value dissimilarity

Although human values and value dissimilarity play pivotal roles in the prejudice literature, there remain important gaps in our understanding. To address these gaps, we recruited three British samples (N = 350) and presented Muslim immigrants, refugees, and economic migrants as target groups. Using polynomial regression analyses, we simultaneously tested effects of individuals' own values, their perceptions of immigrant values, and self-immigrant value dissimilarities on prejudice. Results indicated that favorability toward immigrants is higher when individuals hold higher self-transcendence values (e.g., equality) and lower self-enhancement values (e.g., power), and when they perceive immigrants to hold higher self-transcendence values and lower self-enhancement values. In addition, prejudice toward immigrants is higher when individuals who hold higher conservation values (e.g., security) perceive immigrants to value openness (e.g., freedom) more, suggesting a value dissimilarity effect. No value dissimilarity effects emerged when immigrants were perceived to be higher in conservation, self-transcendence, or self-enhancement values. Overall, these results showed that effects of values and value dissimilarity differ depending on which value dimension is considered. Additionally, the results revealed support for a novel mechanism with the motivation to be nonprejudiced underpinning the links between individuals' values and prejudice. Our discussion highlights the multifaceted manner in which values are linked to prejudice. (PsycINFO Database Record (c) 2019 APA, all rights reserved).

A new way to look at the data: Similarities between groups of people are large and important

Most published research focuses on describing differences, while neglecting similarities that are arguably at least as interesting and important. In Study 1, we modified and extended prior procedures for describing similarities and demonstrate the importance of this exercise by examining similarities between groups on 22 social variables (e.g., moral attitudes, human values, and trust) within 6 commonly used social categories: gender, age, education, income, nation of residence, and religious denomination (N = 86,272). On average, the amount of similarity between 2 groups (e.g., high vs. low educated or different countries) was greater than 90%. Even large effect sizes revealed more similarities than differences between groups. Studies 2–5 demonstrated the importance of presenting information about similarity in research reports. Compared with the typical presentation of differences (e.g., barplots with confidence intervals), similarity information led to more accurate lay perceptions and to more positive attitudes toward an outgroup. Barplots with a restricted y-axis led to a gross underestimation of similarities (i.e., a gross overestimation of the differences), and information about similarities was rated as more comprehensible. Overall, the presentation of similarity information achieves more balanced scientific communication and may help address the file drawer problem.

Need for Affect and Attitudes Toward Drugs: The Mediating Role of Values

Human values and affective traits were found to predict attitudes toward the use of different types of drugs (e.g., alcohol, marijuana, and other illegal drugs). In this study (N = 196, M_age = 23.09), we aimed to gain a more comprehensive understanding of those predictors of attitudes toward drug use in a mediated structural equation model, providing a better overview of a possible motivational path that drives to such a risky behavior. Specifically, we predicted and found that the relations between need for affect and attitudes toward drug use were mediated by excitement values. Also, results showed that excitement values and need for affect positively predicted attitudes toward the use of drugs, whereas normative values predicted it negatively. The pattern of results remained the same when we investigated attitudes toward alcohol, marijuana, or illegal drugs separately. Overall, the findings indicate that emotions operate via excitement and normative values to influence risk behavior.

An Empirical Comparison of Human Value Models

Over the past century, various value models have been proposed. To determine which value model best predicts prosocial behavior, mental health, and pro-environmental behavior, we subjected seven value models to a hierarchical regression analysis. A sample of University students (N = 271) completed the Portrait Value Questionnaire (Schwartz et al., 2012), the Basic Value Survey (Gouveia et al., 2008), and the Social Value Orientation scale (Van Lange et al., 1997). Additionally, they completed the Values Survey Module (Hofstede and Minkov, 2013), Inglehart’s (1977) materialism–postmaterialism items, the Study of Values, fourth edition (Allport et al., 1960; Kopelman et al., 2003), and the Rokeach (1973) Value Survey. However, because the reliability of the latter measures was low, only the PVQ-RR, the BVS, and the SVO where entered into our analysis. Our results provide empirical evidence that the PVQ-RR is the strongest predictor of all three outcome variables, explaining variance above and beyond the other two instruments in almost all cases. The BVS significantly predicted prosocial and pro-environmental behavior, while the SVO only explained variance in pro-environmental behavior.

Cross-Cultural Differences and Similarities in Human Value Instantiation

Previous research found that the within-country variability of human values (e.g., equality and helpfulness) clearly outweighs between-country variability. Across three countries (Brazil, India, and the United Kingdom), the present research tested in student samples whether between-nation differences reside more in the behaviors used to concretely instantiate (i.e., exemplify or understand) values than in their importance as abstract ideals. In Study 1 (N = 630), we found several meaningful between-country differences in the behaviors that were used to concretely instantiate values, alongside high within-country variability. In Study 2 (N = 677), we found that participants were able to match instantiations back to the values from which they were derived, even if the behavior instantiations were spontaneously produced only by participants from another country or were created by us. Together, these results support the hypothesis that people in different nations can differ in the behaviors that are seen as typical as instantiations of values, while holding similar ideas about the abstract meaning of the values and their importance.

Questionário de Necessidade de Emoções (NAQ-S): Validade de Construto, Invariância e Fidedignidade

Resumo Dois estudos (N = 457) examinaram as propriedades psicométricas da versão reduzida do Questionário de Necessidade de Emoções (Need for Affect Questionnaire: NAQ-S) no contexto brasileiro. No primeiro estudo, uma análise de componentes principais indicou uma estrutura bifatorial, com cinco itens cada: aproximação (α = 0,70) e evitação (α = 0,75). Confirmou-se essa estrutura no segundo estudo (GFI = 0,92; CFI = 0,90), mostrando-se invariante quanto ao sexo. Para verificar os correlatos do NAQ-S, utilizou-se, nos dois estudos, medidas que visam avaliar os valores humanos, a solidão e a necessidade de pertença, além dos cinco fatores da personalidade no segundo estudo. Os resultados demonstraram que uma maior necessidade de emoção foi associada com maior extroversão, maiores escores em valores de experimentação e interativos, e escores mais baixos de solidão. Os estudos apresentam suporte de validade do NAQ-S no Brasil, mostrando sua utilidade para fins de pesquisa.

Timing rather than user traits mediates mood sampling on smartphones

Objective

Recent years have seen an increasing number of studies using smartphones to sample participants’ mood states. Moods are usually collected by asking participants for their current mood or for a recollection of their mood states over a specific period of time. The current study investigates the reasons to favour collecting mood through current or daily mood surveys and outlines design recommendations for mood sampling using smartphones based on these findings. These recommendations are also relevant to more general smartphone sampling procedures.

Results

N=64 participants completed a series of surveys at the beginning and end of the study providing information such as gender, personality, or smartphone addiction score. Through a smartphone application, they reported their current mood 3 times and daily mood once per day for 8 weeks. We found that none of the examined intrinsic individual qualities had an effect on matches of current and daily mood reports. However timing played a significant role: the last followed by the first reported current mood of the day were more likely to match the daily mood. Current mood surveys should be preferred for a higher sampling accuracy, while daily mood surveys are more suitable if compliance is more important.

Electronic supplementary material

The online version of this article (doi:10.1186/s13104-017-2808-1) contains supplementary material, which is available to authorized users.

Affective and Cognitive Orientations in Intergroup Perception

Three studies examined the role of need for affect (NFA) and need for cognition (NFC) in intergroup perception. We hypothesized that NFA predicts a preference for stereotypically warm groups over stereotypically cold groups, whereas NFC predicts a preference for stereotypically competent groups over stereotypically incompetent groups. Study 1 supported these hypotheses for attitudes toward stereotypically ambivalent groups, which are stereotyped as high on one of the trait dimensions (e.g., high warmth) and low on the other (e.g., low competence), but not for stereotypically univalent groups, which are seen as high or low on both dimensions. Studies 2 and 3 replicated this pattern for stereotypically ambivalent groups, and yielded provocative evidence regarding several putative mechanisms underlying these associations. Together, these findings help integrate and extend past evidence on attitude-relevant individual differences with research on intergroup perception.

Effects of Promotion and Compunction Interventions on Real Intergroup Interactions: Promotion Helps but High Compunction Hurts

HIGHLIGHTS  We show the promotion intervention has positive effects during intergroup contact, but that high levels of compunction can have negative effects. Intergroup contact is probably the longest standing and most comprehensively researched intervention to reduce discrimination. It is also part of ordinary social experience, and a key context in which discrimination is played out. In this paper, we explore two additional interventions which are also designed to reduce discrimination, but which have not yet been applied to real intergroup interactions. The promotion intervention encourages participants to relax and enjoy an interaction, while the compunction intervention motivates participants to avoid discrimination. Across two studies, we tested the separate effects of promotion (Study 1) and then compunction (Study 2) on participants' interactions with a confederate whom they believed to have a history of schizophrenia. In Study 1, participants received either a promotion intervention to "relax and have an enjoyable dialogue" or no intervention (control; n = 67). In Study 2, participants completed a Single-Category Implicit Attitude Test before being told that they were high in prejudice (high compunction condition) or low in prejudice (low compunction condition; n = 62). Results indicated that promotion was associated with broadly positive effects: participants reported more positive experience of the interaction (enjoyment and interest in a future interaction), and more positive evaluations of their contact partner (increased friendliness and reduced stereotyping). There were no effects on participants' reported intergroup anxiety. In contrast, high compunction had broadly negative effects: participants reported more negative experiences of the interaction and more negative evaluations of their contact partner (using the same dependent measures outlined above). In addition, participants in the high compunction condition reported increased intergroup anxiety and increased self-anxiety (anxiety around thinking or doing something that is prejudiced). Participants in the high compunction condition also reported reduced expectancies of self-efficacy (i.e., they were less confident that they would be able to make a good impression).

The genetics of neuroticism and human values

Human values and personality have been shown to share genetic variance in twin studies. However, there is a lack of evidence about the genetic components of this association. This study examined the interplay between genes, values and personality in the case of neuroticism, because polygenic scores were available for this personality trait. First, we replicated prior evidence of a positive association between the polygenic neuroticism score (PNS) and neuroticism. Second, we found that the PNS was significantly associated with the whole human value space in a sinusoidal waveform that was consistent with Schwartz's circular model of human values. These results suggest that it is useful to consider human values in the analyses of genetic contributions to personality traits. They also pave the way for an investigation of the biological mechanisms contributing to human value orientations.

Nonlinear associations between human values and neuroanatomy

Human values guide behavior and the smooth functioning of societies. Schwartz's circumplex model of values predicts a sinusoidal waveform in relations between ratings of the importance of diverse human value types (e.g., achievement, benevolence) and any variables psychologically relevant to them. In this neuroimaging study, we examined these nonlinear associations between values types and brain structure. In 85 participants, we found the predicted sinusoidal relationship between ratings of values types and two measures of white matter (WM), volume and myelin volume fraction, as well as for grey matter (GM) parameters in several frontal regions. These effects reveal new functional associations for structural brain parameters and provide a novel cross-validation of Schwartz's model. Moreover, the sinusoidal waveform test can be applied to other circumplex models in social, affective and cognitive neuroscience.

A Hedonism Hub in the Human Brain

Human values are abstract ideals that motivate behavior. The motivational nature of human values raises the possibility that they might be underpinned by brain structures that are particularly involved in motivated behavior and reward processing. We hypothesized that variation in subcortical hubs of the reward system and their main connecting pathway, the superolateral medial forebrain bundle (slMFB) is associated with individual value orientation. We conducted Pearson's correlation between the scores of 10 human values and the volumes of 14 subcortical structures and microstructural properties of the medial forebrain bundle in a sample of 87 participants, correcting for multiple comparisons (i.e.,190). We found a positive association between the value that people attach to hedonism and the volume of the left globus pallidus (GP).We then tested whether microstructural parameters (i.e., fractional anisotropy and myelin volume fraction) of the slMFB, which connects with the GP, are also associated to hedonism and found a significant, albeit in an uncorrected level, positive association between the myelin volume fraction within the left slMFB and hedonism scores. This is the first study to elucidate the relationship between the importance people attach to the human value of hedonism and structural variation in reward-related subcortical brain regions.

Effects of Intergroup Ambivalence on Information Processing: The Role of Physiological Arousal

Previous research has found that people who are ambivalent toward a group process new information about the group more carefully than people who are nonambivalent toward the group. It has been suggested that this effect occurs because people who are ambivalent toward a group (a) experience a high level of physiological arousal when they think about the group and (b) seek to reduce this arousal by carefully processing new information about the group. To test these hypotheses, we conducted a correlational study (Study 1) and an experimental study (Study 2). Unexpectedly, Study 1 found that intergroup ambivalence is negatively correlated with the physiological arousal that is experienced when target outgroups are salient. Study 2 replicated this pattern and demonstrated an effect of intergroup ambivalence on information processing, while also discovering that the effects of ambivalence on arousal and on information processing were independent. Overall, these results indicate that arousal is not a necessary mediator of the relation between intergroup ambivalence and information processing.

Does Spontaneous Favorability to Power (vs. Universalism) Values Predict Spontaneous Prejudice and Discrimination?

Objective

We conducted five studies testing whether an implicit measure of favorability toward power over universalism values predicts spontaneous prejudice and discrimination.

Method

Studies 1 (N = 192) and 2 (N = 86) examined correlations between spontaneous favorability toward power (vs. universalism) values, achievement (vs. benevolence) values, and a spontaneous measure of prejudice toward ethnic minorities. Study 3 (N = 159) tested whether conditioning participants to associate power values with positive adjectives and universalism values with negative adjectives (or inversely) affects spontaneous prejudice. Study 4 (N = 95) tested whether decision bias toward female handball players could be predicted by spontaneous attitude toward power (vs. universalism) values. Study 5 (N = 123) examined correlations between spontaneous attitude toward power (vs. universalism) values, spontaneous importance toward power (vs. universalism) values, and spontaneous prejudice toward Black African people.

Results

Spontaneous positivity toward power (vs. universalism) values was associated with spontaneous negativity toward minorities and predicted gender bias in a decision task, whereas the explicit measures did not.

Conclusions

These results indicate that the implicit assessment of evaluative responses attached to human values helps to model value‐attitude‐behavior relations.

Attitudinal Ambivalence Toward Parents and Attachment Style

Two studies tested whether children’s attitudinal ambivalence toward their parents is related to their attachment styles within relationships. Across both studies, children who were ambivalent toward their father were less securely attached in their relationships than were children who were nonambivalent toward their father. Study 1 also showed that the relation between attitudinal ambivalence and secure attachment in relationships was independent of attitude valence, attitudinal embeddedness, attitudinal inconsistency, and attitudinal commitment. Study 2 demonstrated that the relation between attitudinal ambivalence and general attachment style was mediated by children’s secure attachment to their father. There were similar relations between participants’ ambivalence toward their mother and their attachment styles in relationships, but these relations were weaker and less consistent across studies. An explanation for the unique effect of ambivalence toward fathers is discussed.

The Social Consequences of Affirmative Action: Deleterious Effects on Perceptions of Groups

It has been suggested that the existence of affirmative action programs may create or exacerbate negative perceptions of groups that benefit from these programs. To test this hypothesis, the authors presented 51 participants with a (fictitious) editorial describing a relatively unfamiliar immigrant group in a positive manner and manipulated whether the group was described as being able to benefit from affirmative action programs. Participants then rated their perceptions of and attitudes toward the group. Participants also indicated their attitudes and thoughts about the group's immigration and their attitudes toward immigration in general. Results indicated that when affirmative action was mentioned, participants expressed less favorable perceptions of and attitudes toward the group and were less favorable toward immigration by the group. Interestingly, when affirmative action was mentioned, participants were also less favorable toward immigration in general. Overall, these findings indicate that the existence of affirmative action programs can have far-reaching effects on attitudes toward groups.

The Epistemic-Teleologic Model of Deliberate Self-Persuasion

Although past theory and research point to the importance of understanding deliberate self-persuasion (i.e., deliberate self-induced attitude change), there have been no empirical and theoretical efforts to model this process. This article proposes a new model to help understand the process, while comparing the process of deliberate self-persuasion with relevant theory and research. The core feature of this model is a distinction between epistemic processes, which involve attempting to form new valid attitudes, and teleologic processes, which involve self-induced attitude change but with minimal concerns for validity. The epistemic processes employ tactics of reinterpretation, reattribution, reintegration, retesting, changing comparators, and changing dimensions of comparison. The teleologic processes include suppression, preemption, distraction, and concentration. By mapping these processes, this model helps to generate many novel and testable hypotheses about the use of deliberate self-persuasion to cope with ambivalent attitudes.

Cultural Differences in Values as Self-Guides

Three studies tested whether individualism–collectivism moderates the extent to which values are endorsed as ideal self-guides and ought self-guides, and the consequences for regulatory focus and emotion. Across Studies 1 and 2, individualists endorsed values that are relatively central to the self as stronger ideals than oughts, whereas collectivists endorsed them as ideals and oughts to a similar degree. Study 2 found that individualists justified central values using reasons that were more promotion focused than prevention focused, whereas collectivists used similar amount of prevention-focused and promotion-focused reasons. In Study 3, individualists felt more dejected after violating a central (vs. peripheral) value and more agitated after violating a peripheral (vs. central) value. Collectivists felt a similar amount of dejection regardless of values centrality and more agitation after violating central (vs. peripheral) values. Overall, culture has important implications for how we regulate values that are central or peripheral to our self-concept.

The Role of Affective and Cognitive Individual Differences in Social Perception

Three studies explored the connection between social perception processes and individual differences in the use of affective and cognitive information in relation to attitudes. Study 1 revealed that individuals high in need for affect (NFA) accentuated differences in evaluations of warm and cold traits, whereas individuals high in need for cognition (NFC) accentuated differences in evaluations of competent and incompetent traits. Study 2 revealed that individual differences in NFA predicted liking of warm or cold targets, whereas individual differences in NFC predicted perceptions of competent or incompetent targets. Furthermore, the effects of NFA and NFC were independent of structural bases and meta-bases of attitudes. Study 3 revealed that differences in the evaluation of warm and cold traits mediated the effects of NFA and NFC on liking of targets. The implications for social perception processes and for individual differences in affect-cognition are discussed.

On implicit racial prejudice against infants

Because of the innocence and dependence of children, it would be reassuring to believe that implicit racial prejudice against out-group children is lower than implicit prejudice against out-group adults. Yet, prior research has not directly tested whether or not adults exhibit less spontaneous prejudice toward child targets than adult targets. Three studies addressed this issue, contrasting adults with very young child targets. Studies 1A and B revealed that participants belonging to an ethnic majority group (White Europeans) showed greater spontaneous favorability toward their ethnic in-group than toward an ethnic out-group (South Asians), and this prejudice emerged equally for infant and adult targets. Study 2 found that this pattern occurred even when race was not a salient dimension of categorization in the implicit measure. Thus, there was a robust preference for in-group children over out-group children, and there was no evidence that this prejudice is weaker than that exhibited toward adults.

Hostile sexism (de)motivates women's social competition intentions: The contradictory role of emotions

In the present research, we examine the ways in which exposure to hostile sexism influences women's competitive collective action intentions. Prior to testing our main model, our first study experimentally induced high versus low levels of security-comfort with the aim of providing experimental evidence for the proposed causal link between these emotions and intentions to engage in social competition. Results showed that lower levels of security-comfort reduced women's readiness to compete socially with men. Experiment 2 investigated the effect of hostile sexism on women's emotional reactions and readiness to engage in social competition. Consistent with the proposed model, results showed that exposure to hostile beliefs about women (1) increased anger-frustration and (2) decreased security-comfort. More specifically, exposure to hostile sexism had a positive indirect effect on social competition intentions through anger-frustration, and a negative indirect effect through security-comfort.

Development and preliminary evaluation of an internet-based healthy eating program: randomized controlled trial

BACKGROUND

The HealthValues Healthy Eating Programme is a standalone Internet-based intervention that employs a novel strategy for promoting behavior change (analyzing one's reasons for endorsing health values) alongside other psychological principles that have been shown to influence behavior. The program consists of phases targeting motivation (dietary feedback and advice, analyzing reasons for health values, thinking about health-related desires, and concerns), volition (implementation intentions with mental contrasting), and maintenance (reviewing tasks, weekly tips).

OBJECTIVE

The aim was to examine the effects of the program on consumption of fruit and vegetables, saturated fat, and added sugar over a 6-month period.

METHODS

A total of 82 females and 18 males were recruited using both online and print advertisements in the local community. They were allocated to an intervention or control group using a stratified block randomization protocol. The program was designed such that participants logged onto a website every week for 24 weeks and completed health-related measures. Those allocated to the intervention group also completed the intervention tasks at these sessions. Additionally, all participants attended laboratory sessions at baseline, 3 months, and 6 months. During these sessions, participants completed a food frequency questionnaire (FFQ, the Block Fat/Sugar/Fruit/Vegetable Screener, adapted for the UK), and researchers (blind to group allocation) measured their body mass index (BMI), waist-to-hip ratio (WHR), and heart rate variability (HRV).

RESULTS

Data were analyzed using a series of ANOVA models. Per protocol analysis (n=92) showed a significant interaction for fruit and vegetable consumption (P=.048); the intervention group increased their intake between baseline and 6 months (3.7 to 4.1 cups) relative to the control group (3.6 to 3.4 cups). Results also showed overall reductions in saturated fat intake (20.2 to 15.6 g, P<.001) and added sugar intake (44.6 to 33.9 g, P<.001) during this period, but there were no interactions with group. Similarly, there were overall reductions in BMI (27.7 to 27.3 kg/m(2), P=.001) and WHR (0.82 to 0.81, P=.009), but no interactions with group. The intervention did not affect alcohol consumption, physical activity, smoking, or HRV. Data collected during the online sessions suggested that the changes in fruit and vegetable consumption were driven by the motivational and maintenance phases of the program.

CONCLUSIONS

Results suggest that the program helped individuals to increase their consumption of fruit and vegetables and to sustain this over a 6-month period. The observed reduction in fat and sugar intake suggests that monitoring behaviors over time is effective, although further research is needed to confirm this conclusion. The Web-based nature of the program makes it a potentially cost-effective way of promoting healthy eating.

Social values as arguments: similar is convincing

Politicians, philosophers, and rhetors engage in co-value argumentation: appealing to one value in order to support another value (e.g., “equality leads to freedom”). Across four experiments in the United Kingdom and India, we found that the psychological relatedness of values affects the persuasiveness of the arguments that bind them. Experiment 1 found that participants were more persuaded by arguments citing values that fulfilled similar motives than by arguments citing opposing values. Experiments 2 and 3 replicated this result using a wider variety of values, while finding that the effect is stronger among people higher in need for cognition and that the effect is mediated by the greater plausibility of co-value arguments that link motivationally compatible values. Experiment 4 extended the effect to real-world arguments taken from political propaganda and replicated the mediating effect of argument plausibility. The findings highlight the importance of value relatedness in argument persuasiveness.

The influence of referees' expertise, gender, motivation, and time constraints on decisional bias against women

The influence of player gender on referees' decision making was experimentally investigated. In Experiment 1, including 145 male handball referees, we investigated (a) the influence of referees' level of expertise on their decisional biases against women and (b) the referees' gender stereotypes. Results revealed that biases against women were powerful regardless of the referees' level of expertise and that male referees' stereotype toward female players tends to be negative. In Experiment 2, including 115 sport science students, we examined the influence of the participants' gender, motivation to control bias, and time constraints on gender bias. Results indicated that participants' gender had no impact on gender bias and that participants were able to reduce this bias in conditions in which they were motivated to control the bias.

Feeling Torn When Everything Seems Right

The co-occurrence of positive and negative attributes of an attitude object typically accounts for less than a quarter of the variance in felt ambivalence toward these objects, rendering this evaluative incongruence insufficient for explaining felt ambivalence. The present research tested whether another type of incongruence, semantic incongruence, also causes felt ambivalence. Semantic incongruence arises from inconsistencies in the descriptive content of attitude objects’ attributes (e.g., attributes that are not mutually supportive), independent of these attributes’ valences. Experiment 1 manipulated evaluative and semantic incongruence using valence norms and semantic norms. Both of these norm-based manipulations independently predicted felt ambivalence, and, in Experiment 2, they even did so over and above self-based incongruence (i.e., participants’ idiosyncratic perceptions of evaluative and semantic incongruence). Experiments 3a and 3b revealed that aversive dissonant feelings play a role in the effects of evaluative incongruence, but not semantic incongruence, on felt ambivalence.