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Introduction: Facial attractiveness has recently been considered an indicator of underlying immunocompetence. However, studies examining this relationship have yielded mixed findings. Previous research suggested that these discrepant findings could be due to the common influence of lifestyle factors upon both rated facial attractiveness and health. Methods: Young men (N = 162) provided standardized facial photos with a neutral expression subsequently rated by eight women for overall attractiveness. Saliva was assayed for immunoglobulin A, testosterone (T) and cortisol (C), and body fat was measured using a skinfold caliper. Self-reports of poor health, and lifestyle factors that could influence health status (age, sleep habits, smoking, drinking alcohol, family stress, and exercising) were collected. Results: Results showed that symptoms of poor health and skinfold negatively predicted facial attractiveness. There was a modest but statistically nonsignificant T x C interaction where higher T lower C men trended toward having more attractive faces. A sequential mediation model examining the influence of lifestyle showed support for an indirect effect on facial attractiveness. Specifically, skinfold and poor health symptoms mediated the links between exercise, stress, and facial attractiveness. Discussion: These findings suggest links between facial attractiveness and immunocompetence could be linked to some common lifestyle and hormonal variables, but that more comprehensive research involving lifestyle indicators (such as nutrition) are necessary. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Introduction: Previous research has highlighted the putative role of intrasexual competition (IC) in predicting women’s body dissatisfaction, weight loss effort, and, at its extreme, eating disorders. However, extant research reporting on these links is limited by its exclusion of potential confounds, including psychopathologies such as depression. Moreover, it is presently unclear whether women higher in body mass index (BMI) may be more prone to the influence of IC in taking dieting risks. Methods: To address these gaps in the literature, 189 young adult women completed measures of IC, depressive symptoms, willingness to use a risky diet pill, and had their height and weight measured. Results: Results showed that IC interacted with BMI to predict willingness to use a risky diet pill, such that women high in both IC and BMI were most likely to take the risky diet pill. Further exploratory analyses considering potential directional links between BMI and depression supported mediating roles of depression (from BMI) and BMI (from depression) in predicting willingness to use a risky diet pill. Discussion: Results suggest that links between IC and dieting risks may be moderated by women’s BMI, and that these links hold when considering depressive symptoms. Future longitudinal research would benefit from a better understanding of the potential directional links between BMI, depression, and diet pill use. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The authors examined the efficacy of a two-factor model of consideration of future consequences (CFC) in understanding environmentally sustainable behaviors. In Study 1, individual differences in CFC-Immediate and CFC-Future were examined as predictors of environmental concern (EC) and behavior motivation (EB), controlling for values and sociodemographic variables. Results showed that low scores on the CFC-Immediate predicted EC and EB, with nonsignificant effects for CFC-Future. A prospect-concept priming task was used in Study 2 to implicitly activate future thinking which resulted in increases in ECs and behaviors, and these links were partially mediated by CFC-Immediate but not CFC-Future. The findings show that the associations between future time perspective and sustainable behaviors are driven by reduced immediate concerns. Implications for the role of time perspective in understanding and affecting sustainability efforts are discussed. [ABSTRACT FROM PUBLISHER]

The present study tested whether a greater level of emotional empathy in women mediates the commonly reported relationship between gender and environmental concern and action. In an undergraduate sample (N=202), it was found that gender differences existed in altruistic environmental concerns as well as in willingness to cooperate and compete for resources in a self-report commons dilemma. It was found that gender differences were fully mediated (i.e., reduced to non-significance) by emotional empathy.. Implications and suggestions for future study of this issue are offered. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

A new measure to assess friendship jealousy in the context of social media was developed. This one-factor, seven-item measure was psychometrically sound, showing evidence of validity and reliability in three samples of North American adults (Study 1, n= 491; Study 2, n=494; Study 3, n=415) and one-, two-, and three-year stability (Study 3). Women reported more social media friendship jealousy than men (Studies 2 and 3) and younger women had the highest levels of social media friendship jealousy (compared with younger men and older men and women; Study 2). Social media friendship jealousy was associated with lower friendship quality (Study 1) and higher social media use and trait jealousy (Study 2). The relation between social media friendship jealousy and internalizing symptoms indicated positive within time associations and longitudinal bidirectional relations (Study 3). Specifically, social media friendship jealousy predicted increases in internalizing problems, and internalizing problems predicted greater social media friendship jealousy accounting for gender and trait levels of social media friendship jealousy and internalizing problems. Anxious and depressed adults may be predisposed to monitor threats to their friendships via social media and experience negative consequences because of this behavior. Although social media interactions can be associated with positive wellbeing and social connectedness, our results highlight that they can also undermine friendships and mental health due to jealousy [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Jealousy may have evolved to motivate adaptive compensatory behavior in response to threats to a valued relationship. This suggests that jealousy follows a temporal sequence: A perceived relational threat induces state feelings of jealousy which in turn motivates compensatory behavior, such as mate retention effort. Yet to date, tests of this mediation model have been limited to cross-sectional data. This study is the first to experimentally test this theoretical model. Men and women ( N  = 222) who were currently in committed romantic relationships were primed with an imagined partner infidelity (versus control) scenario. Participants then completed measures of state jealousy and intended mate retention behavior. Results found that those primed with the infidelity threat scenario experienced an increase in state jealousy, which in turn predicted more intended benefit-provisioning and cost-inflicting mate retention. Findings suggest that jealousy mediated the relationship between infidelity threat and intended mate retention behavior, supporting the evolutionary account of state jealousy., Competing Interests: Declaration of Conflicting InterestsThe authors declared no potential conflicts of interest with respect to the research, authorship, and/or publication of this article.