Lying in everyday life.

In 2 diary studies of lying, 77 college students reported telling 2 lies a day, and 70 community members told 1. Participants told more self-centered lies than other-oriented lies, except in dyads involving only women, in which other-oriented lies were as common as self-centered ones. Participants told relatively more self-centered lies to men and relatively more other-oriented lies to women. Consistent with the view of lying as an everyday social interaction process, participants said that they did not regard their lies as serious and did not plan them much or worry about being caught. Still, social interactions in which lies were told were less pleasant and less intimate than those in which no lies were told. (PsycINFO Database Record (c) 2010 APA, all rights reserved)     

Social comparison in everyday life.

94 college students recorded details of their social comparisons over 2 wks using a new instrument, the Rochester Social Comparison Record. Major results were (1) comparison direction varied with relationship with the target; (2) precomparison negative mood led more often to upward comparison than to downward comparison, supporting a selective affect–cognition priming model in which dysphoria primes negative thoughts about the self (G. H. Bower, 1991; J. P. Forgas et al, 1990) rather than a motivational self-enhancement model (T. A. Wills, 1981, 1991); (3) upward comparison decreased subjective well-being, whereas downward comparison increased it; and (4) high self-esteem individuals engaged in more self-enhancing comparison. (PsycINFO Database Record (c) 2010 APA, all rights reserved)     

Internal comparisons in everyday life.

According to the internal/external frame of reference (I/E) model (H. W. Marsh, 1986), students not only compare their own abilities in a domain with those of other students (social comparison), they also compare their own achievements in different domains (internal comparison). The main purpose of this study was to investigate internal comparison processes in everyday life using an introspective methodology. Over 2 weeks, 67 university students (Study 1) and 65 high school students (Study 2) using a diary instrument recorded more upward than downward internal comparisons, most of them triggered by academic achievement situations. In both studies, multilevel analyses showed links between the direction of comparison and affective state: (a) upward internal comparisons were associated with negative mood states; (b) downward internal comparisons were associated with positive mood states; (c) upward internal comparisons increased positive and decreased negative mood states; (d) downward internal comparisons decreased positive and increased negative mood states. (PsycINFO Database Record (c) 2010 APA, all rights reserved)     

Behavioral activation and inhibition in everyday life.

Joint effects of daily events and dispositional sensitivities to cues of reward and punishment on daily positive affect (PA) and negative affect (NA) were examined in 3 diary studies. Study 1 showed that positive events were strongly related to PA but not NA, whereas negative events were strongly related to NA but not PA. Studies 2 and 3 examined how the dispositional sensitivities of independent appetitive and aversive motivational systems, the Behavioral Activation System (BAS) and the Behavioral Inhibition System (BIS), moderated these relationships. Participants in Study 2 with higher BAS sensitivity reported more PA on average; those with more sensitive BIS reported more NA. Also, BIS moderated reactions to negative events, such that higher BIS sensitivity magnified reactions to negative events. Study 3 replicated these findings and showed that BAS predisposed people to experience more positive events. Results demonstrate the value of distinguishing within-person and between-person effects to clarify the functionally independent processes by which dispositional sensitivities influence affect. (PsycINFO Database Record (c) 2010 APA, all rights reserved)     

Emotional experience in everyday life across the adult life span.

Age differences in emotional experience over the adult life span were explored, focusing on the frequency, intensity, complexity, and consistency of emotional experience in everyday life. One hundred eighty-four people, age 18 to 94 years, participated in an experience-sampling procedure in which emotions were recorded across a 1-week period. Age was unrelated to frequency of positive emotional experience. A curvilinear relationship best characterized negative emotional experience. Negative emotions declined in frequency until approximately age 60, at which point the decline ceased. Individual factor analyses computed for each participant revealed that age was associated with more differentiated emotional experience. In addition, periods of highly positive emotional experience were more likely to endure among older people and periods of highly negative emotional experience were less stable. Findings are interpreted within the theoretical framework of socioemotional selectivity theory. (PsycINFO Database Record (c) 2011 APA, all rights reserved)     

Situations and moods associated with smoking in everyday life.

On 4 days, in everyday situations, 21 female and 26 male smokers used an electronic diary to record situations and moods at times of smoking and at control nonsmoking occasions. Self-reports of particular locations, activities, posture, consumption, social context, moods, and internal states were specifically associated with smoking. Real-time assessments in everyday situations provide useful information about the interplay of environmental factors and internal states in smoking. The findings suggest that conditioning and learning processes play a role in smoking and should be considered in smoking cessation programs. (PsycINFO Database Record (c) 2010 APA, all rights reserved)     

Beyond reciprocity: Gratitude and relationships in everyday life.

The emotion of gratitude is thought to have social effects, but empirical studies of such effects have focused largely on the repaying of kind gestures. The current research focused on the relational antecedents of gratitude and its implications for relationship formation. The authors examined the role of naturally occurring gratitude in college sororities during a week of gift-giving from older members to new members. New members recorded reactions to benefits received during the week. At the end of the week and 1 month later, the new and old members rated their interactions and their relationships. Perceptions of benefactor responsiveness predicted gratitude for benefits, and gratitude during the week predicted future relationship outcomes. Gratitude may function to promote relationship formation and maintenance. (PsycINFO Database Record (c) 2010 APA, all rights reserved)     

Some everyday life consequences of disability and bereavement for older adults.

The study analyzed daily event differences between groups experiencing the major stressors of conjugal bereavement and physical disability, and analyzed the association of everyday events with self-reports of mental health for different groups across a 3-month time span. Monthly interviews were conducted with 61 recently conjugally bereaved, 62 recently physically disabled, and 123 matched-comparison older adults between the ages of 60 and 80. The purpose of these interviews was to obtain a comprehensive assessment of the monthly frequencies of everyday life events. Self-reports of mental health were obtained from paper-and-pencil measures filled out after each interview. Causal models were used to analyze the best-fitting structure of event/mental health relationships for the first 3 monthly interviews. Undesirable events showed uniformly adverse effects on mental health. Desirable events benefited the psychological well-being of the disabled the most and had no positive effects on the mental health of the bereaved. The bereaved also evidenced less stability over time than other groups in the frequency of small undesirable events. (PsycINFO Database Record (c) 2010 APA, all rights reserved)     

Emotional responses to other persons in everyday life situations.

Several times a day over a 4-wk period, 24 West German housewives recorded (a) characteristics of their momentary situation (place, activities, other persons present), (b) their mood states, and (c) their subjective explanations of those mood states. In addition to this time-sampling diary, Ss completed the 16PF twice. The type of social situations and the frequency with which they occurred to the Ss were significantly related to personality measures. Mood states, causal attributions of mood states, actualization, and satisfaction of motives were dependent on characteristics of the person and the environment. Results are discussed in terms of interaction between a person and the social situation. (32 ref) (PsycINFO Database Record (c) 2010 APA, all rights reserved)     

A self-rating scale for evaluating memory in everyday life.

A memory self-rating scale is described that includes 21 ability-to-remember items, 24 items assessing frequency of occurrence of memory failures, and 4 global rating items assessing overall comparison to others, comparison to the best one's memory has ever been, speed of recall, and concern or worry over memory function. Factor analysis yielded 5 orthogonal Ability to Remember and 5 orthogonal Frequency of Occurrence factors. The factor structure was not affected by age or sex, and level of complaint on the factor scores was not strongly associated with age. (PsycINFO Database Record (c) 2010 APA, all rights reserved)     

Habits in everyday life: Thought, emotion, and action.

To illustrate the differing thoughts and emotions involved in guiding habitual and nonhabitual behavior, 2 diary studies were conducted in which participants provided hourly reports of their ongoing experiences. When participants were engaged in habitual behavior, defined as behavior that had been performed almost daily in stable contexts, they were likely to think about issues unrelated to their behavior, presumably because they did not have to consciously guide their actions. When engaged in nonbabitual behavior, or actions performed less often or in shifting contexts, participants' thoughts tended to correspond to their behavior, suggesting that thought was necessary to guide action. Furthermore, the self-regulatory benefits of habits were apparent in the lesser feelings of stress associated with habitual than nonhabitual behavior. (PsycINFO Database Record (c) 2010 APA, all rights reserved)     

Do people's self-views matter? Self-concept and self-esteem in everyday life.

Recent scholars have dismissed the utility of self-esteem as well as programs designed to improve it. The authors challenge these contentions on conceptual, methodological, and empirical grounds. They begin by proposing that the scope of recent analyses has been overly narrow and should be broadened to include specific as well as global self-views. Using this conceptualization, the authors place recent critiques in historical context, recalling that similarly skeptical commentaries on global attitudes and traits inspired theorizing and empirical research that subsequently restored faith in the value of both constructs. Specifically, they point to 3 strategies for attaining more optimistic assessments of the predictive validity of self-views: recognizing the utility of incorporating additional variables in predictive schemes, matching the specificity of predictors and criteria, and using theoretically informed standards for evaluating predictor- criterion relationships. The authors conclude that self-views do matter and that it is worthwhile and important to develop and implement theoretically informed programs to improve them. (PsycINFO Database Record (c) 2010 APA, all rights reserved)     

Self-evaluation and subjective life expectancy among suicidal and nonsuicidal psychotic males.

Self-evaluation and expectancy scales were administered to 96 psychotic males, and protocols were later divided into suicidal (N = 43) and nonsuicidal (N = 53) groups, on the basis of record information. Self-evaluation (SE) was relatively low for covertly suicidal Ss, but not for Ss who had made actual suicide attempts. Suicidal Ss did not have a shorter subjective life expectancy (SLE) than nonsuicidals, but SLE was directly associated with SE regardless of suicidal tendencies. Constricted, "work-only" future plans were associated with SE and SLE among suicidals only, suggesting that the content of the subjective future may mediate the relationship between SE and SLE in suicidal patients. (20 ref.) (PsycINFO Database Record (c) 2010 APA, all rights reserved)     

Racial microaggressions in everyday life: Implications for clinical practice.

Racial microaggressions are brief and commonplace daily verbal, behavioral, or environmental indignities, whether intentional or unintentional, that communicate hostile, derogatory, or negative racial slights and insults toward people of color. Perpetrators of microaggressions are often unaware that they engage in such communications when they interact with racial/ethnic minorities. A taxonomy of racial microaggressions in everyday life was created through a review of the social psychological literature on aversive racism, from formulations regarding the manifestation and impact of everyday racism, and from reading numerous personal narratives of counselors (both White and those of color) on their racial/cultural awakening. Microaggressions seem to appear in three forms: microassault, microinsult, and microinvalidation. Almost all interracial encounters are prone to microaggressions; this article uses the White counselor-client of color counseling dyad to illustrate how they impair the development of a therapeutic alliance. Suggestions regarding education and training and research in the helping professions are discussed. (PsycINFO Database Record (c) 2010 APA, all rights reserved)     

Self-focused attention, coping responses, and distressed mood in everyday life.

Several questions concerning the relation between self-focused attention and depressed mood were examined: (a) Does the association involve global negative affect, rather than sadness per se? (b) is self-focus associated with specific negative affects other than sadness? and (c) does the association occur at the between-subjects or within-subject level? Also hypothesized was that self-focus is associated with coping responses that may perpetuate negative mood. In an idiographic/nomothetic design, 40 male community residents completed daily reports for 30 days. Results suggest that self-focus is linked with global negative mood as well as specific negative affects other than sadness and that the association occurs on a between-persons, rather than a day-to-day within-person, basis. In addition, highly self-focused men reported using passive and ruminative coping styles, which in turn were associated with distressed affect. (PsycINFO Database Record (c) 2010 APA, all rights reserved)     

Depressive personality styles, dysphoria, and social comparisons in everyday life.

Sociotropic people are supposedly vulnerable to dysphoria after negative interpersonal events, whereas autonomous people are supposedly vulnerable to achievement-related failures. The present study examined whether these personality styles are borne out in social comparison processes. For 3 weeks, 27 sociotropic and 35 autonomous undergraduates completed records of their social comparisons. Depressive personality style moderated comparison frequency and the affective consequences of comparisons, especially for dysphoric individuals: Dysphoric respondents were especially likely to make comparisons in domains that were congruent with their personalities, and comparisons in congruent domains were associated with greater mood change than comparisons in other domains, perhaps especially for dysphoric respondents. These results have implications for the literatures on social comparison and on depressive personality styles. (PsycINFO Database Record (c) 2010 APA, all rights reserved)     

Memory and learning abilities in everyday life of the elderly

Self-evaluations by adults (varying in age from 45-92 years) of their memory and learning abilities were investigated and related to performance on laboratory and ecological memory tasks. Hardly any association was found between subjective and objective measures. Self-evaluations were strongly influenced by (systematically varied) frames of reference: optimistic in comparisons with other people, pessimistic in comparisons with their own previous level of functioning. The most frequent problems were 'learning something new' and 'remembering names'. In contrast to external memory aids, cognitive strategies were rarely used spontaneously. Strategy training led to significant improvement of performance, that remained stable at follow-up. A further opportunity for improving performance was realized by ergonomic adaptations of computerized systems (teleshopping). Problems in learning to use such systems were strongly reduced by decreasing the load on working memory and by adapting the system to existing knowledge and skills of the users. A general observation in the different projects was that age-differences could explain only a small percentage of the variance in subjective and objective memory measures.     

Elements of the Socratic method: VI. Promoting virtue in everyday life.

The Socratic method in psychotherapy includes a systematic series of questions designed to help clients confront broad life issues, respect their lack of knowledge, and make philosophical changes in their approach to life through therapeutic dialog. The Socratic method also helps clients explore aspects of virtue and vice as related to their current psychological problems and life goals. The cardinal virtues of wisdom, courage, moderation, justice, and piety are discussed as they pertain to contemporary psychotherapy. By evaluating virtues in general as well as in specific terms, clients can make life changes in their attitudes and behaviors. (PsycINFO Database Record (c) 2010 APA, all rights reserved)     

Prejudice and politics: Symbolic racism versus racial threats to the good life.

Although theories of prejudice have been extensively catalogued, empirical confrontations between competing theories are rare. The present study tested 2 major theoretical approaches to prejudice by Whites against Blacks: realistic group conflict theory, which emphasizes the tangible threats Blacks might pose to Whites' private lives; and a sociocultural theory of prejudice termed symbolic racism, which emphasizes abstract, moralistic resentments of Blacks, presumably traceable to preadult socialization. The main dependent variable was suburban Whites' voting behavior in 2 mayoral elections in Los Angeles, both strongly influenced by racial issues, that matched the same 2 candidates, 1 Black and 1 White. In both elections, symbolic racism (sociocultural prejudice) was the major determinant of voting against the Black candidate for people removed from possible personal threats posed by Blacks as well as for those at risk. Direct racial threats to Whites' private lives (to their jobs, their neighborhoods, their children's schooling, their families' safety) had little effect on either anti-Black voting behavior or symbolic racism. Implications for theories of prejudice and for interpretations of the effects of voters' private lives on their political behavior are discussed. (32 ref) (PsycINFO Database Record (c) 2010 APA, all rights reserved)     

Attraction and repulsion by life and death in suicidal and in normal children.

Attraction and repulsion by life and death in 52 suicidal and 58 normal 6–12 yr olds were measured through responses to questions that followed fairy-tale stories. Each story represented 1 of the 4 attitudes. Parallel forms of the test were administered in a time interval of 4 wks. Analyses showed that the 4 attitudes were distinguishable from each other and that the response profile of the suicidal Ss was significantly different from that of normal Ss. Suicidal Ss, in contrast to normal Ss, showed a high degree of repulsion by life and attraction to death and a low degree of attraction to life and repulsion by death. In addition, in suicidal Ss the 4 attitudes were more distinguishable from each other but at the same time were more conflictual. The correlations between the scores of the 1st administrations indicate that 3 of the 4 attitudes have a moderate reliability for both normal and suicidal children. (19 ref) (PsycINFO Database Record (c) 2010 APA, all rights reserved)