The effect of aggressive fantasizing on aggressive inclinations: Moderating effects of dispositional anger expression

Experiencing victimization or mistreatment often induces feelings of anger. The catharsis hypothesis suggests that venting anger may aid in alleviating these negative emotions. Although this hypothesis has faced criticism, therapeutic interventions rooted in catharsis are employed to assist victims in managing their anger. One notable application of the catharsis principle in psychotherapeutic practice with victims involves engaging in aggressive fantasies: Victims who harbor aggressive fantasies against their offenders are supported in working with these fantasies to navigate the complex emotions arising from their victimization. Research investigating the effects of aggressive fantasizing on victims has yielded inconsistent findings, with some studies indicating positive and others suggesting negative outcomes. Herein, we examine whether (instructed) aggressive fantasizing diminishes (catharsis hypothesis) or heightens (escalation hypothesis) subsequent aggressive inclinations compared to non-aggressive fantasizing. Additionally, the moderating role of victims' dispositional tendencies to express anger, specifically Anger Expression-out and Anger Expression-control, in the relationship between aggressive fantasizing and aggressive inclinations was examined. We recruited individuals (N = 245) who had experienced victimization through highly unfair treatment and instructed them to imagine confronting their wrongdoer using either aggressive or non-aggressive communication. Participants then reported their aggressive inclinations. Data supported the escalation hypothesis, revealing that aggressive fantasizing amplifies subsequent aggressive inclinations. Importantly, individuals with higher Anger Expression-out demonstrated greater susceptibility to this effect; whereas, Anger Expression-control did not moderate the link between aggressive fantasizing and inclinations. These findings further challenge the catharsis hypothesis and underscore the role of dispositional anger expression tendencies on the effects of aggressive fantasizing.

Making sense of punishment: Transgressors' interpretation of punishment motives determines the effects of sanctions

Punishment is expected to have an educative, behaviour-controlling effect on the transgressor. Yet, this effect often remains unattained. Here, we test the hypothesis that transgressors' inferences about punisher motives crucially shape transgressors' post-punishment attitudes and behaviour. As such, we give primacy to the social and relational dimensions of punishment in explicating how sanctions affect outcomes. Across four studies using different methodologies (N = 1189), our findings suggest that (a) communicating punishment respectfully increases transgressor perceptions that the punisher is trying to repair the relationship between the transgressor and their group (relationship-oriented motive) and reduces perceptions of harm-oriented and self-serving motives, and that (b) attributing punishment to relationship-oriented (vs. harm/self-oriented, or even victim-oriented) motives increases prosocial attitudes and behaviour. This research consolidates and extends various theoretical perspectives on interactions in justice settings, providing suggestions for how best to deliver sanctions to transgressors.

Social disparities in students' intention to enter higher education during the COVID-19 pandemic

Research consistently shows that students from academic households are more likely to enter higher education than students from non-academic households. These inequalities are only secondarily due to differences in performance (i.e., primary effects), but mostly due to students' decision making behavior (i.e., secondary effects). The relative share to which primary effects and secondary effects mediate the effect of students' educational background on their intention to enter higher education is affected by external conditions. One significant external influence that may have had an impact on social disparities in students' educational choices is the COVID-19 pandemic. Herein, we present data from N = 596 upper secondary students (41.6% from non-academic households) that were collected in Germany in April 2021. Building on rational choice theory, we scrutinized students' expected benefits (i.e., employment prospects and personal significance), costs (i.e., direct costs and opportunity costs), and subjective probability of success in pursuing higher education as important psychological pillars for their intention to enter higher education. Results show that about 14% of social differences in students' intention to enter higher education were due to primary effects, whereas almost 77% were explained by secondary effects. Specifically, we found that differences in the evaluation of benefits most strongly contributed to social inequalities in students' intention to enroll in higher education. Compared to research on pre- COVID-19 cohorts, our results point to shifts in existing patterns of inequalities in the wake of the COVID-19 pandemic.

What Motivates Direct and Indirect Punishment?

Abstract. Punishment represents a key mechanism to deter norm violations and is motivated by retribution and/or general deterrence. Retribution-motivated punishment is tailored to offense severity, whereas deterrence-motivated punishment is tailored to different factors, including punishment observability. This study aimed to replicate and extend prior work by testing how offense severity and punishment observability motivate direct, confrontational punishment versus indirect, covert punishment. Participants ( N = 308) read vignettes describing offenses with varying severity (high vs. low) and punishment observability (high vs. low). We then assessed their punishment tendencies – overall, direct, and indirect – and their endorsement of retribution and deterrence motives. Findings supported a “strong version” of intuitive retributivism. Manipulating retribution-relevant information consistently influenced punishment: participants reported stronger overall, direct, and indirect punishment tendencies when severity was high (vs. low). Self-reported deterrence (but not retribution) motives positively related to overall, direct, and indirect punishment tendencies. However, manipulating deterrence-relevant information did not influence punishment.

Victims need more than power: Empowerment and moral change independently predict victims' satisfaction and willingness to reconcile

Punishing offenders for their misdeeds can restore a sense of justice achieved (i.e., justice-related satisfaction) among victims and increase their willingness to reconcile, especially if offenders signal that they understand why punishment has been inflicted on them. In this article, we theoretically disentangle and empirically test two explanations for this effect. One possible interpretation for this effect is that offender feedback empowers the victim and that empowerment is the crucial prerequisite for reconciliation. An alternative interpretation is that offender feedback benefits the victim because it suggests that the punishment had an educational effect and initiated a positive "moral change" in the offender. Six studies-four scenario and two autobiographic recall studies (combined N = 2,134)-suggest that the positive effects of offender feedback on victims' justice-related satisfaction and willingness to reconcile cannot be reduced to empowerment. Empowerment and moral change rather constitute two independent mechanisms explaining when and why punishment facilitates the posttransgression process. We discuss the theoretical and practical implications of these findings (e.g., for restorative justice procedures). (PsycInfo Database Record (c) 2022 APA, all rights reserved).

Does Lockdown Compliance Reflect a Latent Trait?

Imposing and enforcing lockdown rules are effective means to decelerate the spread of SARS-CoV-2. That said, the effectiveness of these rules strongly depends on citizens’ compliance. Here, we investigate the extent to which lockdown compliance varies as a function of (a) time-variant factors (i.e., infection wave), (b) rule-related factors (i.e., length, intensity, and flexibility of lockdown), and/or (c) stable individual differences. Using latent-state trait modeling with panel data from 1,098 German individuals who reported on their willingness to comply with five lockdown scenarios at two time points (April and November, 2020), we show that a substantial amount of variance can be attributed to a latent trait. Using data from a third time point (January 2021; N = 834), we show that this latent trait is associated with honesty/humility and conscientiousness above and beyond social desirability. We discuss the theoretical and practical implications of these findings.

Imagery Rescripting Helps Victims Cope With Experienced Injustice

Abstract. In clinical psychology, imagery rescripting (ImRs) is a promising intervention to target negative emotional memories after victimization experiences. The present research tested the effects of ImRs in “minor” cases of experienced injustice. After imagining being the victim of an injustice, participants ( N = 272) were randomly assigned to one of four conditions in a univariate design (treatment: active ImRs, passive ImRs; control: pleasant imagery, imagery rehearsal). Dependent variables were positive and negative affect; mediator variables were justice-related satisfaction and empowerment. Both justice-related satisfaction and empowerment increased positive and decreased negative affect, but empowerment was higher in the active than in the passive ImRs condition (while justice-related satisfaction was increased by both ImRs conditions). These results suggest that ImRs can be beneficial even in minor victimization experiences and that these beneficial effects are mediated by both empowerment and justice-related satisfaction.

Three Pillars of Physical Distancing: Anxiety, Prosociality, and Rule Compliance During the COVID-19 Pandemic

The outbreak of a global pandemic such as COVID-19 poses a challenge for societies across the world. Lacking both vaccination and medical treatment, the only way to combat the spread of a virus in its early stages are behavioral measures, particularly physical distancing behavior. The present work proposes three pillars of individuals’ engagement in physical distancing: anxiety, prosociality, and rule compliance. In a large (N = 1,504), pre-registered study among German adults, we studied both situation-specific tendencies and stable personality traits that are theoretically associated with these pillars in relation to self-reported physical distancing behavior and underlying motives. Results supported the importance of each of the proposed pillars for physical distancing behavior. That is, for each pillar, we found (some) relations of the corresponding tendencies and personality traits with physical distancing (motives) as expected. Overall, the project provides a comprehensive picture of physical distancing behavior during the COVID-19 pandemic.

The motivational basis of third-party punishment in children

People willingly accept personal costs to sanction norm violations even if they are not personally affected by the wrongdoing and even if their sanctioning yields no immediate benefits—a behavior known as third-party punishment. A notable body of literature suggests that this behavior is primarily driven by retribution (i.e., evening out the harm caused), rather than by the utilitarian motives of special prevention (i.e., preventing recidivism), or general prevention (i.e., preventing imitation). This has led to the conclusion that laypeople are “retributivists” in general. More recent evidence, however, raises doubts about the ubiquity of retributivism, showing that punishment is driven by multiple motives. The present research adds to this debate by investigating the motives underlying punishment in children around age 10. Specifically, we investigate children’s (N = 238) punishment motives in an economic game paradigm, isolating punishment motives by experimentally manipulating the extent to which the offender and a bystander learn about the punishment. This offers the possibility to examine whether (and to what extent) children engage in punishment even when it is devoid of any preventive effects. Results show that children’s punishment is motivated by retributive, special preventive, and general preventive purposes. These results point to a clear need for further theory specification on the motivational basis of punishment in humans and provide practical implications for the treatment of child misbehavior.

Punishment goals in classroom interventions: An attributional approach

Individuals' punishment goals depend on the perceived cause of the misbehavior. However, a corresponding attributional model of punishment goals has only been studied in legal domains-but was largely ignored in others, such as the educational domain, in which student misbehavior is a main stressor for both teachers and students. Thus, we investigated teachers' punishment goals in classroom settings depending on their attribution of student misbehavior. Specifically, we asked laypeople (Experiment 1), pre-service teachers (Experiment 2), and in-service teachers (Experiment 3) to read several versions of a scenario describing a student destroying the belongings of another student. Using a 2 × 2 within-subjects design, we manipulated the stability (stable vs. unstable) and controllability (controllable vs. uncontrollable) of the cause of the misbehavior. Results show that the support of retribution as a punishment goal in classroom interventions is largely independent of the perceived cause of the misbehavior. By contrast, the support of special prevention (preventing future misbehavior by the offending student) and general prevention (preventing future misbehavior by other students) is primarily subject to the perceived controllability of the misbehavior. Overall, this shows that models of punishment behavior developed in other domains cannot simply be applied to teachers' classroom intervention strategies. (PsycINFO Database Record (c) 2020 APA, all rights reserved).