Journal of Personality and Social Psychology

Publications in this journal

• Article: Social Mindfulness: Skill and Will to Navigate the Social World.

  Niels J Van Doesum, Dion A W Van Lange, Paul A M Van Lange
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  ABSTRACT: Although one may not always see it, social life often involves choices that make people act in ways that are mindful of others or not. We adopt an interdependence theoretical approach to the novel concept of social mindfulness, which we conceptualize in terms of other-regarding choices involving both skill (to see it, e.g., theory of mind, perspective taking) and will (to do it, e.g., empathic concern, prosocial orientation) to act mindfully toward another person's control over outcomes. We operationalized social mindfulness in a new social decision-making paradigm that focuses on leaving or limiting choice options for others that we tested across 7 studies. Studies 1a through 1c showed that people with other-oriented mindsets left interdependent others more choice than people with self-oriented and/or unspecified mindsets. Studies 2a and 2b revealed that people developed more favorable judgments of a socially mindful than of a socially unmindful person. Study 3 revealed that unknown others with trustworthy (vs. untrustworthy) faces were met with more social mindfulness. Study 4 revealed that social mindfulness could be traced in personality by being positively related to Honesty-Humility and Agreeableness (HEXACO Personality Inventory-Revised) as well as to Empathy (Interpersonal Reactivity Index) and a prosocial value orientation (SVO). Together, these studies contribute to explaining how social mindfulness can help people to navigate the social world by aiming to maximize other people's control over their situational outcomes. (PsycINFO Database Record (c) 2013 APA, all rights reserved).
  Journal of Personality and Social Psychology 05/2013;
• Article: Correction to meleady, hopthrow, and crisp (2012).

  Rose Meleady, Tim Hopthrow, Richard J Crisp
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  ABSTRACT: Reports an error in "Simulating Social Dilemmas: Promoting Cooperative Behavior Through Imagined Group Discussion" by Rose Meleady, Tim Hopthrow and Richard J. Crisp (Journal of Personality and Social Psychology, Advanced Online Publication, Dec 31, 2012, np). In the article there was an error in Table 6. The standard deviations listed under the Cooperative commitments heading are incorrect. The correct SD values are: 1.90 (6 person), 1.66 (12 person), and 0.86 (24 person). (The following abstract of the original article appeared in record 2012-34997-001.) A robust finding in social dilemmas research is that individual group members are more likely to act cooperatively if they are given the chance to discuss the dilemma with one another. The authors investigated whether imagining a group discussion may represent an effective means of increasing cooperative behavior in the absence of the opportunity for direct negotiation among decision makers. Five experiments, utilizing a range of task variants, tested this hypothesis. Participants engaged in a guided simulation of the progressive steps required to reach a cooperative consensus within a group discussion of a social dilemma. Results support the conclusion that imagined group discussion enables conscious processes that parallel those underlying the direct group discussion and is a strategy that can effectively elicit cooperative behavior. The applied potential of imagined group discussion techniques to encourage more socially responsible behavior is discussed. (PsycINFO Database Record (c) 2013 APA, all rights reserved).
  Journal of Personality and Social Psychology 05/2013; 104(5):940.
• Article: Isms dimensions: Toward a more comprehensive and integrative model of belief-system components.

  Gerard Saucier
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  ABSTRACT: Psychological research on beliefs, values, worldview, and ideology has been limited by inadequate structural models to organize the plethora of constructs. The present studies investigate the potential of a dimensional model based on lexical, dictionary-represented -ism concepts to form an organizing structural model. Four isms factors found previously in college samples are shown to replicate in community-sample data with better controls for acquiescent responding. But analyses also reveal a 5th factor involving egalitarianism and inequality-aversion, increasing the comprehensiveness of the structural model. Relations of frequently used constructs (values, authoritarianism, social dominance orientation) to the isms dimensions are detailed, demonstrating both the integrative and value-adding potentials of the model. The possibility of potential additional nonlexical factors (Trust in Government, Ethnocentrism, Xenophobia, and Nativism) is evaluated. Factors identified in these studies are demonstrated to show interesting relations with political-party preference, subjective well-being, and change over time in the Big Five personality dimensions. (PsycINFO Database Record (c) 2013 APA, all rights reserved).
  Journal of Personality and Social Psychology 05/2013; 104(5):921-39.
• Article: Does life seem better on a sunny day? Examining the association between daily weather conditions and life satisfaction judgments.

  Richard E Lucas, Nicole M Lawless
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  ABSTRACT: Weather conditions have been shown to affect a broad range of thoughts, feelings, and behaviors. The current study examines whether these effects extend to life satisfaction judgments. We examine the association between daily weather conditions and life satisfaction in a representative sample of over 1 million Americans from all 50 states who were assessed (in a cross-sectional design) over a 5-year period. Most daily weather conditions were unrelated to life satisfaction judgments, and those effects that were significant reflect very small effects that were only detectable because of the extremely high power of these analyses. These results show that weather does not reliably affect judgments of life satisfaction. (PsycINFO Database Record (c) 2013 APA, all rights reserved).
  Journal of Personality and Social Psychology 05/2013; 104(5):872-84.
• Article: The Nature and Correlates of Self-Esteem Trajectories in Late Life.

  Jenny Wagner, Denis Gerstorf, Christiane Hoppmann, Mary A Luszcz
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  ABSTRACT: Is it possible to maintain a positive perspective on the self into very old age? Empirical research so far is rather inconclusive, with some studies reporting substantial declines in self-esteem late in life, whereas others report relative stability into old age. In this article, we examine long-term change trajectories in self-esteem in old age and very old age and link them to key correlates in the health, cognitive, self-regulatory, and social domains. To do so, we estimated growth curve models over chronological age and time-to-death using 18-year longitudinal data from the Australian Longitudinal Study of Ageing (N = 1,215; age 65-103 years at first occasion; M = 78.8 years, SD = 5.9; women: 45% of sample). Results revealed that self-esteem was, on average, fairly stable with minor declines only emerging in advanced ages and at the very end of life. Examination of the vast between-person differences revealed that lower cognitive abilities and lower perceived control independently related to lower self-esteem. Also, lower cognitive abilities were associated with steeper age-related and mortality-related self-esteem decrements. In our discussion, we consider a variety of challenges that potentially shape self-esteem late in life and highlight the need for more mechanism-oriented research to better understand the pathways underlying stability and change in self-esteem. (PsycINFO Database Record (c) 2013 APA, all rights reserved).
  Journal of Personality and Social Psychology 04/2013;
• Article: The Hobgoblin of Consistency: Algorithmic Judgment Strategies Underlie Inflated Self-Assessments of Performance.

  Elanor F Williams, David Dunning, Justin Kruger
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  ABSTRACT: People often hold inflated views of their performance on intellectual tasks, with poor performers exhibiting the most inflation. What leads to such excessive confidence? We suggest that the more people approach such tasks in a "rational" (i.e., consistent, algorithmic) manner, relative to those who use more variable or ad hoc approaches, the more confident they become, irrespective of whether they are reaching correct judgments. In 6 studies, participants completed tests involving logical reasoning, intuitive physics, or financial investment. Those more consistent in their approach to the task rated their performances more positively, including those consistently pursuing the wrong rule. Indeed, completely consistent but wrong participants thought almost as highly of their performance as did completely consistent and correct participants. Participants were largely aware of the rules they followed and became more confident in their performance when induced to be more systematic in their approach, no matter how misguided that approach was. In part, the link between decision consistency and (over)confidence was mediated by a neglect of alternative solutions as participants followed a more uniform approach to a task. (PsycINFO Database Record (c) 2013 APA, all rights reserved).
  Journal of Personality and Social Psychology 04/2013;
• Article: Paradoxical Consequences of Prohibitions.

  Sana Sheikh, Ronnie Janoff-Bulman
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  ABSTRACT: Explanations based in attribution theory claim that strong external controls such as parental restrictiveness and punishment undermine moral internalization. In contrast, 3 studies provide evidence that parental punishment does socialize morality, but of a particular sort: a morality focused on prohibitions (i.e., proscriptive orientation) rather than positive obligations (i.e., prescriptive orientation). Study 1 found young adults' accounts of parental restrictiveness and punishment activated their sensitivity to prohibitions and predicted a proscriptive orientation. Consistent with the greater potency of temptations for proscriptively oriented children, as well as past research linking shame to proscriptive morality, Study 2 found that restrictive parenting was also associated with greater suppression of temptations. Finally, Studies 3A and 3B found that suppressing these immoral thoughts is paradoxically harder for those with strong proscriptive orientations; more specifically, priming a proscriptive (versus prescriptive) orientation and inducing mental suppression of "immoral" thoughts led to the most ego depletion for those with restrictive parents. Overall, individuals who had restrictive parents had the lowest self-regulatory ability to resist their "immoral" temptations after prohibitions were activated. In contrast to common attributional explanations, these studies suggest that harsh external control by parents does not undercut moral socialization but rather undermines individuals' ability to resist temptation. (PsycINFO Database Record (c) 2013 APA, all rights reserved).
  Journal of Personality and Social Psychology 04/2013;
• Article: Loving Freedom: Concerns With Promotion or Prevention and the Role of Autonomy in Relationship Well-Being.

  Chin Ming Hui, Daniel C Molden, Eli J Finkel
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  ABSTRACT: Close relationships fulfill many important needs. However, not all of these needs are equally salient under all circumstances. This article investigated how the broad motivational context in which people evaluate relationships affects the salience of particular needs, thereby altering how the fulfillment of these needs predicts relationship well-being. Across 5 studies, participants reported how well their current romantic relationship met their needs for self-direction and autonomy, either by providing support for the fulfillment of these needs (Studies 1-3) or by allowing them to feel that they autonomously choose to remain in the relationship (Studies 4 and 5). In motivational contexts emphasizing personal growth and advancement (promotion), one's own independent priorities could become more salient, increasing the relevance of autonomy experiences when evaluating relationship well-being. However, in motivational contexts emphasizing safety and security (prevention), autonomy experiences might not be especially salient and thus might not have any special relevance when evaluating relationship well-being. Both measurements and manipulations of participants' motivations for growth or security consistently supported these hypotheses. (PsycINFO Database Record (c) 2013 APA, all rights reserved).
  Journal of Personality and Social Psychology 04/2013;
• Article: Liberals and Conservatives Rely on Common Moral Foundations When Making Moral Judgments About Influential People.

  Jeremy A Frimer, Jeremy C Biesanz, Lawrence J Walker, Callan W Mackinlay
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  ABSTRACT: Do liberals and conservatives have qualitatively different moral points of view? Specifically, do liberals and conservatives rely on the same or different sets of moral foundations-care, fairness, loyalty, authority, and purity (Haidt, 2012)-when making moral judgments about influential people? In Study 1, 100 experts evaluated the impact that 40 influential figures had on each moral foundation, yielding stimulus materials for the remaining studies. In Study 2, 177 American liberal and conservative professors rated the moral character of the same figures. Liberals and conservatives relied on the same 3 moral foundations: For both groups, promoting care, fairness, and purity-but not authority or loyalty-predicted moral judgments of the targets. For liberals, promoting authority negatively predicted moral judgments. Political ideology moderated the purity-moral and especially authority-moral relationships, implying that purity and authority are grounds for political disagreement. Study 3 replicated these results with 222 folk raters. Folk liberals and conservatives disagreed even less about the moral standing of the targets than did experts. Together, these findings imply that moral foundation theory may have exaggerated differences between liberals and conservatives. The moral codes of liberals and conservatives do differ systematically; however, their similarities outweigh their differences. Liberals and conservatives alike rely on care, fairness, and purity when making moral judgments about influential people. (PsycINFO Database Record (c) 2013 APA, all rights reserved).
  Journal of Personality and Social Psychology 04/2013;
• Article: Personality and Affective Forecasting: Trait Introverts Underpredict the Hedonic Benefits of Acting Extraverted.

  John M Zelenski, Deanna C Whelan, Logan J Nealis, Christina M Besner, Maya S Santoro, Jessica E Wynn
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  ABSTRACT: People report enjoying momentary extraverted behavior, and this does not seem to depend on trait levels of introversion-extraversion. Assuming that introverts desire enjoyment, this finding raises the question, why do introverts not act extraverted more often? This research explored a novel explanation, that trait introverts make an affective forecasting error, underpredicting the hedonic benefits of extraverted behavior. Study 1 (n = 97) found that trait introverts forecast less activated positive and pleasant affect and more negative and self-conscious affect (compared to extraverts) when asked to imagine acting extraverted, but not introverted, across a variety of hypothetical situations. Studies 2-5 (combined n = 495) found similar results using a between-subjects approach and laboratory situations. We replicated findings that people enjoy acting extraverted and that this does not depend on disposition. Accordingly, the personality differences in affective forecasts represent errors. In these studies, introverts tended to be less accurate, particularly by overestimating the negative affect and self-consciousness associated with their extraverted behavior. This may explain why introverts do not act extraverted more often (i.e., they overestimate hedonic costs that do not actually materialize) and have implications for understanding, and potentially trying to change, introverts' characteristically lower levels of happiness. (PsycINFO Database Record (c) 2013 APA, all rights reserved).
  Journal of Personality and Social Psychology 04/2013;
• Article: Attitudes Without Objects: Evidence for a Dispositional Attitude, Its Measurement, and Its Consequences.

  Justin Hepler, Dolores Albarracín
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  ABSTRACT: We hypothesized that individuals may differ in the dispositional tendency to have positive vs. negative attitudes, a trait termed the dispositional attitude. Across 4 studies, we developed a 16-item Dispositional Attitude Measure (DAM) and investigated its internal consistency, test-retest reliability, factor structure, convergent validity, discriminant validity, and predictive validity. DAM scores were (a) positively correlated with positive affect traits, curiosity-related traits, and individual preexisting attitudes; (b) negatively correlated with negative affect traits; and (c) uncorrelated with theoretically unrelated traits. Dispositional attitudes also significantly predicted the valence of novel attitudes while controlling for theoretically relevant traits (such as the Big 5 and optimism). The dispositional attitude construct represents a new perspective in which attitudes are not simply a function of the properties of the stimuli under consideration, but are also a function of the properties of the evaluator. We discuss the intriguing implications of dispositional attitudes for many areas of research, including attitude formation, persuasion, and behavior prediction. (PsycINFO Database Record (c) 2013 APA, all rights reserved).
  Journal of Personality and Social Psychology 04/2013;
• Article: When Low Self-Esteem Encourages Behaviors That Risk Rejection to Increase Interdependence: The Role of Relational Self-Control.

  Levi R Baker, James K McNulty
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  ABSTRACT: Increasing interdependence in an intimate relationship requires engaging in behaviors that risk rejection, such as expressing affection and asking for support. Who takes such risks and who avoids them? Although several theoretical perspectives suggest that self-esteem plays a crucial role in shaping such behaviors, they can be used to make competing predictions regarding the direction of this effect. Six studies reconcile these contrasting predictions by demonstrating that the effects of self-esteem on behaviors that risk rejection to increase interdependence depend on relational self-construal-that is, the extent to which people define themselves by their close relationships. In Studies 1 and 2, participants were given the opportunity to disclose negative personal information (Study 1) and feelings of intimacy (Study 2) to their dating partners. In Study 3, married couples reported the extent to which they confided in one another. In Study 4, we manipulated self-esteem and relational self-construal, and participants reported their willingness to engage in behaviors that increase interdependence. In Studies 5 and 6, we manipulated the salience of interpersonal risk, and participants reported their willingness to engage in behaviors that risk rejection to increase interdependence. In all 6 studies, self-esteem was positively associated with behaviors that can increase interdependence among people low in relational self-construal but negatively associated with those behaviors among people high in relational self-construal. Accordingly, theoretical descriptions of the role of self-esteem in relationships will be most complete to the extent that they consider the degree to which people define themselves by their close relationships. (PsycINFO Database Record (c) 2013 APA, all rights reserved).
  Journal of Personality and Social Psychology 04/2013;
• Article: Collective Narcissism Moderates the Effect of In-Group Image Threat on Intergroup Hostility.

  Agnieszka Golec de Zavala, Aleksandra Cichocka, Irena Iskra-Golec
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  ABSTRACT: Results of 4 experiments demonstrated that under in-group image threat collective narcissism predicts retaliatory intergroup hostility. Under in-group criticism (vs. praise) collective narcissists expressed intention to harm the offending out-group but not other, nonoffending out-groups. This effect was specific to collective narcissism and was replicated in studies that accounted for the overlap between collective narcissism and individual narcissism, in-group positivity (in-group identification, blind and constructive patriotism), social dominance orientation, and right wing authoritarianism. The link between collective narcissism and retaliatory intergroup hostility under in-group image threat was found in the context of national identity and international relations and in the context of a social identity defined by university affiliation. Study 4 demonstrated that the relationship between collective narcissism and intergroup hostility was mediated by the perception of in-group criticism as personally threatening. The results advance our understanding of the mechanism driving the link between collective narcissism and intergroup hostility. They indicate that threatened egotism theory can be extended into the intergroup domain. (PsycINFO Database Record (c) 2013 APA, all rights reserved).
  Journal of Personality and Social Psychology 04/2013;
• Article: The Use of Traits and Contextual Information in Free Personality Descriptions Across Ethnocultural Groups in South Africa.

  Velichko H Valchev, Fons J R van de Vijver, J Alewyn Nel, Sebastiaan Rothmann, Deon Meiring
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  ABSTRACT: The present study investigates the differences between 3 ethnocultural groups in South Africa in the use of traits and contextual information for personality descriptions and the interaction of these differences with social distance from the target person and with personality domains. Semistructured interviews asking for self- and other-descriptions were conducted with 1,027 Blacks, 84 Coloureds and Indians, and 105 Whites, representing the country's 11 official languages. In Part 1 we found similarities in the total set of categories used most often for personality description across the 3 groups-traits, behaviors, preferences, and perceptions (over 86%), which were context-free (over 66%)-as well as substantial differences between the groups in the relative use of these categories. In Part 2 we found that distance from the target person plays a role in cross-cultural differences in trait use and contextualization. In Part 3 we found significant interactions of culture with the use of traits and contextual information across agency-communion and 9 indigenous South African personality clusters similar to the Big Five. The responses of Blacks confirmed expectations for collectivistic groups (fewer traits and more contextualization) and of Whites for individualistic groups (more traits and less contextualization), and Coloureds and Indians had an intermediate pattern. The results are discussed in the framework of the trait and cultural psychology perspectives on personality. (PsycINFO Database Record (c) 2013 APA, all rights reserved).
  Journal of Personality and Social Psychology 04/2013;
• Article: Do you use your head or follow your heart? Self-location predicts personality, emotion, decision making, and performance.

  Adam K. Fetterman, Michael D. Robinson
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  ABSTRACT: The head is thought to be rational and cold, whereas the heart is thought to be emotional and warm. Eight studies (total N = 725) pursued the idea that such body metaphors are widely consequential. Study 1 introduced a novel individual difference variable, one asking people to locate the self in the head or the heart. Irrespective of sex differences, head-locators characterized themselves as rational, logical, and interpersonally cold, whereas heart-locators characterized themselves as emotional, feminine, and interpersonally warm (Studies 1-3). Study 4 found that head-locators were more accurate in answering general knowledge questions and had higher GPAs and Study 5 found that heart-locators were more likely to favor emotional over rational considerations in moral decision-making. Study 6 linked self-locations to reactivity phenomena in daily life – e.g., heart-locators experienced greater negative emotion on high stressor days. Study 7 manipulated attention to the head versus the heart and found that head-pointing facilitated intellectual performance, whereas heart-pointing led to emotional decision-making. Study 8 replicated Study 3’s findings with a nearly year-long delay between the self-location and outcome measures. The findings converge on the importance of head-heart metaphors for understanding individual differences in cognition, emotion, and performance.
  Journal of Personality and Social Psychology 04/2013; In press.
• Article: Automatic Effort Mobilization and the Principle of Resource Conservation: One Can Only Prime the Possible and Justified.

  Nicolas Silvestrini, Guido H E Gendolla
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  ABSTRACT: Two experiments tested the idea that the principle of resource conservation moderates and limits automaticity effects on effort mobilization. Effort-related cardiovascular response was assessed in cognitive tasks with different levels of task difficulty (Experiment 1) and success incentive (Experiment 2) during which participants were exposed to suboptimally presented action versus inaction primes. As expected, implicit activation of the action concept resulted in stronger effort-related cardiovascular response than activation of the inaction concept-but only when the task was feasible and success incentive was sufficiently high. Effects on task performance were compatible with those on effort. The findings indicate that the automaticity effect of action/inaction primes on effort mobilization is situated, sensitive to task context, and limited by extreme task difficulty and low incentive. The findings facilitate a theoretical integration of automaticity in effort mobilization with the principle of resource conservation. (PsycINFO Database Record (c) 2013 APA, all rights reserved).
  Journal of Personality and Social Psychology 03/2013;
• Article: Perspective Taking and Automatic Intergroup Evaluation Change: Testing an Associative Self-Anchoring Account.

  Andrew R Todd, Pascal Burgmer
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  ABSTRACT: The current research adopted a multipronged mediational approach to test an associative self-anchoring account of automatic intergroup evaluation change following perspective taking. We contend that actively contemplating outgroup members' perspectives strengthens associative links between that outgroup and the self, enabling a transfer of positive automatic self-evaluations to the group. A first set of experiments, using both measurement-of-mediation and experimental-causal-chain designs, supported a model in which strengthened self-outgroup associations underlie perspective taking's positive effects on automatic intergroup evaluations. Additional experiments, using a moderation-of-process design, found that the benefits of perspective taking were attenuated when measured or manipulated automatic self-evaluations were relatively negative, preventing positive associative transfer. A final experiment uncovered a practical downstream implication of our causal model, as perspective-taking-induced changes in automatic intergroup evaluations were still evident 1 day later. Overall, these findings supported our associative self-anchoring account; additional analyses found no support for an alternative, empathy-based account. (PsycINFO Database Record (c) 2013 APA, all rights reserved).
  Journal of Personality and Social Psychology 03/2013;