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Recognizing emotional expressions is central to understanding the feelings and intentions of other people. Little is known about how social anxiety affects the recognition of emotional expressions. Recent research finds a recognition advantage for happy expressions over negative expressions. In two experiments, social anxiety moderated the recognition advantage of happy faces. People low and high in social anxiety recognized sad faces (Experiment 1) and angry faces (Experiment 2) equally quickly, but people high in social anxiety took longer to recognize happy faces. Both groups showed a significant recognition advantage for happy faces, although the advantage was at least twice as large in the low social-anxiety group. The discussion focuses on mechanisms connecting social anxiety to face processing and on the role of expression recognition in other emotional-processing biases.

To evaluate Litman and Jimerson's (2004) Interest/Deprivation (I/D) model of curiosity, 355 students (269 women, 86 men) responded to 6 trait curiosity measures including the Curiosity/Interest in the World scale (C/IW; Peterson & Seligman, 2004), the Curiosity and Exploration Inventory (CEI; Kashdan, Rose, & Fincham, 2004), the Perceptual Curiosity scale (PC; Collins, Litman, & Spielberger, 2004), the Epistemic Curiosity scale (EC; Litman & Spielberger, 2003), and the Curiosity as a Feeling-of-Deprivation scales (CFD; Litman & Jimerson, 2004). Consistent with expectations, the results of confirmatory factor analyses demonstrated that the C/IW, CEI, PC, EC scales defined an Interest (I) curiosity factor, whereas the CFD scales formed a Deprivation (D) curiosity factor. However, as compared to the other interest-based curiosity measures, one of the EC subscales was found to be less differentiated from the CFD scales, presumably because these instruments assess overlapping aspects of Berlyne's (1954) concept of epistemic curiosity. The results of this study indicated that I and D curiosity are related but differentiated curiosity dimensions, providing evidence for the validity of the I/D model.

Many experiments show that threats to attitudinal freedom create reactance, but the underlying dynamics of reactance-based disagreement have not received much attention. The present experiments identified two paths from threats to disagreement. In one path, threats to attitudinal freedom directly motivate disagreement; in the other, negative cognitive responses mediate the threat’s effect on disagreement. Two experiments demonstrated the causes and consequences of each path from threat to persuasion. When a communicator threatened freedom at the beginning of the message, unfavorable cognitive responses (counterarguing, negative perceptions of the source’s credibility) fully mediated the effect of threat on disagreement. When the threat appeared at the end of the message, however, threat had a direct, unmediated effect on disagreement (Experiment 1). The two paths had different consequences for sleeper effects: disagreement rooted in negative cognitive responses persisted, whereas disagreement directly motivated by the threat declined when the threat was removed (Experiment 2). Implications for reactance and for threat-based sleeper effects are discussed.

Many studies have correlated dispositional reactance scales with other self-report scales, but no experiments have tested whether ?trait reactance? replicates ?state reactance? effects. Using a conventional reactance paradigm, an experiment examined the construct validity of dispositional reactance. College students (n = 78) read a communication that did or did not threaten their freedom to disagree, and then they reported their agreement. Threatening attitudinal freedom increased disagreement, thus replicating many reactance experiments. Dispositional reactance interacted with threats to freedom, but in a manner contrary to the construct’s predictions—?high reactance? people were more likely to agree with a pushy, coercive message. The findings question the construct validity of dispositional reactance.

Two experiments examined how people respond to upward social comparisons in terms of the extent to which they categorize the self and the source of comparison within the same social group. Self-evaluation maintenance theory (SEM) suggests that upward ingroup comparisons can lead to the rejection of a shared categorization, because shared categorization makes the comparison more meaningful and threatening. In contrast, social identity theory (SIT) suggests that upward ingroup comparisons can lead to the acceptance of shared categorization because a high-performing ingroup member enhances the ingroup identity. We attempted to resolve these differing predictions using self-categorization theory, arguing that SEM applies to contexts that make salient one's personal identity, and SIT applies to contexts that make collective identity salient. Consistent with this perspective, the level of identity activated in context moderated the effect of an upward ingroup comparison on the acceptance of shared social categorization. Copyright (c) 2006 John Wiley & Sons, Ltd.

Emotions and art are intimately related (Tan, 2000). From ancient to modern times, theories of aesthetics have emphasized the role of art in evoking, shaping, and modifying human feelings. The experimental study of preferences, evaluations, and feelings related to art has a long history in psychology. Aesthetics is one of the oldest areas of psychological research, dating to Fechner's (1876) landmark work. Psychology has had a steady interest in aesthetic problems since then, but art has never received as much attention as one would expect (see Berlyne, 1971a; Tan, 2000; Valentine, 1962). The study of art and the study of emotions, as areas of scientific inquiry, both languished during much of the last century. It is not surprising that the behavioral emphasis on observable action over inner experience would lead to a neglect of research on aesthetics. In an interesting coincidence, both art and emotion resurfaced in psychology at about the same time. As emotion psychologists began developing theories of basic emotions (Ekman & Friesen, 1971; Izard, 1971; Tomkins, 1962), experimental psychologists began tackling hedonic qualities of art (Berlyne, 1971a, 1972, 1974). Since then, the psychology of emotion and the psychology of art have had little contact (see Silvia, in press-b; Tan, 2000).

On the basis of the approach-avoid dynamics assumed by reactance theory (S. S. Brehm & J. W. Brehm, 1981) and other models (E. S. Knowles & J. A. Linn, 2004), it was predicted that interpersonal similarity can reduce reactance by increasing compliance and by reducing resistance. A communicator's similarity to the participant was manipulated by identical first names and birthdays (Experiment 1) and by congruent values (Experiment 2). People then read essays in which the communicator did or did not threaten their attitudinal freedom. Threats caused boomerang effects only when the communicator's similarity was low or unknown. When the communicator was highly similar to the participant, people agreed strongly, regardless of threat. Similarity increased the force toward persuasion by increasing liking, and it decreased the force toward resistance by making the message seem less threatening. Implications for reactance theory and for resistance to persuasion are discussed.

Since Berlyne’s seminal research, the study of experimental aesthetics has examined interest as a response to art. The present research explores the implications of appraisal theories of emotion for the study of interest as an emotion relevant to aesthetics. Participants viewed pictures of modern experimental visual art and rated each picture for interest and for appraisals of complexity and comprehensibility. Multilevel modeling assessed the within-person effects of appraisals on interest. As predicted by appraisal theories, both appraisals significantly and strongly predicted interest at the within-person level. The within-person relationships were not moderated by individual-differences relevant to interest in art (e.g., trait curiosity). Theories of “aesthetic response” should capitalize on modern theories and findings in emotion psychology. In the decades following Berlyne’s (1971, 1974) seminal research on “the new experimental aesthetics,” a large literature has accumulated on people’s subjective reactions to art. Much of this research has been guided by Berlyne’s theorizing about the role of collative variables and arousal in determining the reward value of artistic stimuli. The collative–arousal theory of motivation that underlies Berlyne’s research has proved surprisingly resilient, given that psychology has moved away from arousal models of reward and from the concept of “arousal” itself (e.g., Neiss, 1988). Modern research on experimental aesthetics still takes inspiration from Berlyne’s ideas about how collative variables affect arousal, interest, and preference. The influence of the Berlyne tradition may be best seen in

How moods influence self-focused attention is controversial. One model (Sedikides & Green, 2000) predicts that different moods have different effects on self-focus; another model (Salovey, 1992) predicts that all moods increase self-focus. Both models, however, imply that moods have fixed effects on self-focused attention. We suggest that mood has flexible effects on self-focus depending on contextual variables. An experiment manipulated mood (positive vs. neutral) and situational demand (low vs. high) and then measured self-focus. Positive mood decreased self-focus when people expected to work on a subsequent self-relevant task; positive mood increased self-focus when people were not informed of the task. The results demonstrate how mood interacts with situational factors to influence self-focused attention. The discussion considers implications for theories of how emotions affect self-awareness.

The study of self-focused attention explores both state self-focus (objective self-awareness) and individual-differences in trait self-focus (self-consciousness). Trapnell and Campbell (1999) proposed a motivational model of individual-differences in self-focused attention, based on rumination and reflection as types of self-focus. Two studies, with Internet-based (Study 1, n = 101) and college student samples (Study 2, n = 115), assessed the construct validity of rumination and reflection. Self-focus was measured by recognition latencies for self-relevant words (Study 1) and the completion of ambiguous sentences with first-person pronouns (Study 2). Neither rumination nor reflection predicted self-focused attention in either study. Rumination and reflection seem to be types of self-relevant motivation, not types of self-focused attention.

Relative to other emotions, interest is poorly understood. On the basis of theories of appraisal process and structure, it was predicted that interest consists of appraisals of novelty (factors related to unfamiliarity and complexity) and appraisals of coping potential (the ability to understand the new, complex thing). Four experiments, using in vivo rather than retrospective methods, supported this appraisal structure. The findings were general across measured and manipulated appraisals, interesting stimuli (random polygons, visual art, poetry), and measures of interest (self-reports, forced-choice, behavioral measures). Furthermore, the appraisal structure was specific to interest (it did not predict enjoyment, a related positive emotion), and appraisals predicted interest beyond relevant traits (curiosity, openness). The appraisal perspective offers a powerful way of construing the causes of interest.

Human-rights organizations and prisoner advocacy groups try to create positive attitudes toward liberal prison reform by emphasizing similarities between the public and prisoners. Theories of similarity and attraction, however, suggest that this strategy can backfire. Although it commonly increases liking, similarity can increase rejection when the similar other is stigmatized. An experimen1 tested the efficacy of appeals to similarity in changing prison reform attitudes. Republicans and Democrats listed aspects of themselves that made them similar to or different from prisoners, and then they completed a measure of prison reform attitudes (Silvia, 2003). Emphasizing similarity between the participant and prisoners did not always cause positive attitudes. After focusing on similarity to prisoners, Democrats reported more liberal prison reform attitudes, and Republicans reported more punitive attitudes. Implications for changing attitudes toward prison reform are discussed.

When do people focus attention on the self? Based on Gestalt notions of figure–ground assignment, two experiments demonstrated that making self figural against a background induces self-focused attention. In Experiment 1, perceiving figural self-symbols increased self- awareness relative to perceiving background self-symbols. In Experiment 2, making self figural against the background of a 6-person decision-making group increased self-awareness. These experiments clarify the antecedents of self-awareness and connect objective self-awareness theory to research on interpersonal deviancy.

The present research examined when self-evaluation influences creativity. Based on objective self-awareness theory, the authors predicted that feeling able to improve would buffer against the detrimental effects of self-evaluation on creativity. Two experiments manipulated self-evaluation (varying self-awareness, Study 1; providing objective performance standards, Study 2) and perceived ability to improve potential failure on the creativity task. Self-evaluation reduced creativity (generating remote associates, finding unusual uses for a knife) in both experiments, but only when people did not expect to improve. When people felt able to improve, self-evaluation did not affect creativity. Connections between self-motives, creativity, and defensiveness are discussed.

Self-awareness-the capacity to focus attention on oneself, and thus to self-evaluate-has a bad reputation in social-clinical psychology because of its ties to negative affect, depression, suicide, and dysfunction. Using Rollo May's (1967) analysis of "the human dilemma," we outline self-awareness's beneficial contributions to psychological functioning. Without self-awareness, people could not take the perspectives of others, exercise self-control, produce creative accomplishments, or experience pride and high self-esteem. Research suggests that the positive and negative facets of self-awareness are reconciled when people have reasonable self-standards and when they are optimistic about meeting their standards.

Conventional manipulations of self-focused attention are poorly suited for Internet experiments and for group-based administration. The authors present a self-novelty manipulation that effectively induces self-awareness for such contexts. In the high self-focus condition, people write about how they differ from their family and friends and from people in general. In the control conditions, people write about neutral topics or do no writing. Three experiments using different measures of self-focus (the situational self-awareness scale, a pronoun selection task, and the private self-consciousness scale) showed that the self-novelty manipulation significantly increased self-focused attention. This effect appeared in Internet-based experiments (Experiment 1) and in laboratory experiments with groups (Experiments 2 and 3). The self-novelty manipulation appears promising for self-awareness research conducted outside of conventional laboratory contexts.

The American prison system is larger than ever and ranks among the largest in the world. Yet, prisons have received little research attention relative to other issues in forensic psychology. In an effort to study one facet of the prison system, a scale for measuring attitudes toward prison reform was developed. The 12-item scale has a single factor measuring whether people feel prisons should be tougher or softer on inmates. Several studies with diverse samples found that 1he scale has a consistent factor structure, good reliability, and a coherent pattern of relationships to other psychological variables. The scale appears to be a promising tool for studying how people want to treat those who have been officially rejected by society.

Self-focused attention is difficult to measure. Two studies developed an implicit measure of self-focus based on word recognition latencies. Self-focused attention activates self-content, so self-focused people should recognize self-relevant words more quickly. Study 1 measured individual-differences in self-focused attention. People scoring high in private self-consciousness recognized self-relevant words more quickly. Study 2 manipulated objective self-awareness with a writing task. People who wrote about distinctive self-aspects (high self-awareness) recognized self-relevant words more quickly compared to people who wrote about a neutral topic (low self-awareness) and people who did no writing (control). The discussion considers implications for future research on self-focused attention.

How does self-efficacy affect interest? The interest-and-interests model assumes that factors that induce interest—novelty, complexity, conflict, and uncertainty—do so non-linearly. Self- efficacy should thus affect interest quadratically, because it reflects uncertainty about an activity's outcome. When self-efficacy is low, interest is low because the activity's outcome is certain. When self-efficacy is moderate, the person's success on the task seems likely, but not inevitable. But as self-efficacy becomes very high, success seems completely certain, and the task is thus uninteresting. Two experiments tested these predictions. Experiment 1 asked people to rate the interestingness of differentially difficult activities; Experiment 2 manipulated self-efficacy regarding a fuzzy dart game. In both experiments, interest was a quadratic function of self-efficacy. Implications for theories of vocational interest development and change are considered.

Some studies find that positive affect can induce self-focused attention, but other studies find no effect. We suggest that the contrary findings result from how self-awareness was measured. One group of participants listened to happy or neutral music; another group imagined and described a happy or neutral event. Two measures of self-focus were then taken. The experiment replicated past findings: Positive affect increased self-focus on a pronoun selection task, but had no effect on a modified private self-consciousness scale. The results were slightly stronger when affect was induced using music. Implications for future research are discussed.

Does self-awareness amplify or dampen the intensity of emotional experience? Early research argued that self-awareness makes emotional states salient, resulting in greater emotional intensity. But these studies induced a standard for emotional intensity, confounding the salience of the emotional state with the self-regulation effects of self-awareness. Three experiments suggest high self-awareness can dampen the intensity of emotional experience in the absence of this confound. In Study 1, participants were led to feel sad in the presence or absence of a mirror; a standard for emotionality was or was not induced. High self-awareness amplified sadness when there was a standard for emotionality; it dampened sadness when there was no standard. Additional experiments using a self-novelty writing task (Study 2) and a mirror (Study 3) showed that self-awareness can also dampen positive affect. A fourth study found that trait private self-consciousness did not affect emotional intensity after controlling for the effects of neuroticism. The intersections of self-focused attention and emotional experience are discussed.

Evidence for the self-serving bias (attributing success internally and failure externally) is inconsistent. Although internal success attributions are consistently found, researchers find both internal and external attributions for failure. The authors explain these disparate effects by considering the intersection of 2 systems, a system comparing self against standards and a causal attribution system. It was predicted that success and failure attributions are moderated by self-awareness and by the ability to improve. When self-focus is high (a) success is attributed internally, (b) failure is attributed internally when people can improve, (c) failure is attributed externally when people cannot improve, and (d) these attributions affect state self-esteem. Implications for the self-serving bias are discussed.

People often regulate their feelings by striving for particular emotional states. The self-regulation of emotions should be influenced by self-awareness, which is a primary instigator of self-regulation. Because the outcome of self-regulation depends, in part, on the relevant comparison standards, self-focus will have a flexible effect on emotional intensity depending on the standard. But an earlier view (Scheier C self-focus was then manipulated using a large mirror. Consistent with the self-regulation view, persons with”inhibition” standards were significantly less happy when highly self- focused. Persons with”no regulation” standards, in contrast, were unaffected by high self-focus; the two groups didn’t differ when self-focus was low. Some implications for the intersection of self-awareness and emotional experience are considered.

Creativity research has suggested that creative people are low in agreeableness. To explore this issue, we applied the HEXACO model of personality structure, which offers an expanded representation of interper- sonal traits, particularly a distinction between Honesty-Humility and Agreeableness. A sample of 1304 adults completed the HEXACO-60 and several measures of creative achievement and activities. Latent variable models found that Agreeableness had no relationship with creativity, but Honesty-Humility did: people lower in Honesty-Humility had higher creativity scores, consistent with past work on arro- gance and pretentiousness among creative people.

The role of attention in creative cognition remains controversial. Neuroimaging studies have reported activation of brain regions linked to both cognitive control and spontaneous imaginative processes, raising questions about how these regions interact to support creative thought. Using functional magnetic resonance imaging (fMRI), we explored this question by examining dynamic interactions between brain regions during a divergent thinking task. Multivariate pattern analysis revealed a distributed network associated with divergent thinking, including several core hubs of the default (posterior cingulate) and executive (dorsolateral prefrontal cortex) networks. The resting-state network affiliation of these regions was confirmed using data from an independent sample of participants. Graph theory analysis assessed global efficiency of the divergent thinking network and network efficiency was found to increase as a function of individual differences in divergent thinking ability. Moreover, temporal connectivity analysis revealed increased coupling between default and salience network regions (bilateral insula) at the beginning of the task, followed by increased coupling between default and executive network regions at later stages. Such dynamic coupling suggests that divergent thinking involves cooperation between brain networks linked to cognitive control and spontaneous thought, which may reflect focused internal attention and the top-down control of spontaneous cognition during creative idea production.

Motivational approaches to depression emphasize the role of dysfunctional motivational dynamics, particularly diminished reward and incentive processes associated with anhedonia. A study examined how anhedonic depressive symptoms, measured continuously across a wide range of severity, influenced the physiological mobilization of effort during a cognitive task. Using motivational intensity theory as a guide, we expected that the diminished incentive value associated with anhedonic depressive symptoms would reduce effort during a “do your best” challenge (also known as an unfixed or self-paced challenge), in which effort is a function of the value of achieving the task’s goal. Using impedance cardiography, two cardiac autonomic responses were assessed: pre-ejection period (PEP), a measure of sympathetic activity and our primary measure of interest, and respiratory sinus arrhythmia (RSA), a measure of parasympathetic activity. As expected, PEP slowed from baseline to task as anhedonic depressive symptoms increased (as measured with the Depression Anxiety Stress Scale), indicating diminished effort-related sympathetic activity. No significant effects appeared for RSA. The findings support motivational intensity theory as a translational model of effort processes in depression and clarify some inconsistent effects of depressive symptoms on effort-related physiology found in past work.

Self-focused attention is fundamental to self-regulation. When people focus attention on the self, they compare the self against standards and goals. Since the 1970s, researchers have shown that self-evaluation brought about by self-focused attention motivates people to try harder to meet their goals, although nearly all of the literature uses self-report measures or behavioral performance, rather than physiological outcomes, to assess effort. This chapter provides an integrated biobehavioral analysis of self-focused attention’s role in self-regulation. The chapter’s first section integrates two bodies of work: social-psychological theories of self-focused attention (Carver and Scheier, On the self-regulation of behavior, 1998; Duval and Wicklund, A theory of objective self awareness, 1972) and Brehm’s theory of motivational intensity (Brehm and Self, Annu Rev Psychol, 40:109–131, 1989). The integrative analysis reveals how Brehm’s model of effort can link self-focus to biological measures of motivation and suggest novel predictions. The second section reviews research on self-focus and effort, measured by the sympathetic nervous system’s influence on cardiovascular activity. A program of recent experiments reveals that (1) the predictions made by motivational intensity theory receive strong support; (2) many manipulations of self-focus, ranging from video cameras to mirrors to nonconscious first-name priming, have the same effects, indicating that they evoke the same underlying self-regulatory processes; and (3) individual differences in self-focus—known as self-reflection or private self-consciousness—replicate the effects of manipulated self-focus. Integrating these two theories thus offers some new insights into biobehavioral aspects of striving to meet goals and standards.

The dorsal and ventral aspects of the prefrontal cortex (PFC) are the two regions most consistently recruited in divergent thinking tasks. Given that frontal tasks have been shown to be vulnerable to sleep loss, we explored the impact of a single night of sleep deprivation on fluency (i.e., number of generated responses) and PFC function during divergent thinking. Participants underwent functional magnetic resonance imaging (fMRI) scanning twice while engaged in the Alternate Uses Task (AUT)—once following a single night of sleep deprivation and once following a night of normal sleep. They also wore wrist activity monitors, which enabled us to quantify daily sleep and model cognitive effectiveness. The intervention was effective, producing greater levels of fatigue and sleepiness. Modelled cognitive effectiveness and fluency were impaired following sleep deprivation, and sleep deprivation was associated with greater activation in the left inferior frontal gyrus during AUT. The results suggest that an intervention known to temporarily compromise frontal function can impair fluency, and that this effect is instantiated in the form of an increased haemodynamic response in the left inferior frontal gyrus.

A conceptual look at the distinction between expressed and measured interests is undertaken. Instead of denoting two different aspects of "vocational interests," expressed and measured interests refer to distinct psychological constructs. Expressed interests are specific intentions and measured interests are what people conventionally mean by "vocational interests." Using research on how intentions and attitudes predict behavior, I suggest an explanation for why expressed interests have and will always better predict career choice. This analysis concludes that the terms "expressed" and "measure" should be reconsidered— using parallel terms for different concepts obscures important differences and can create unproductive problems.

How is introspection related to accurate self-perception? Self-focused attention is said to facilitate accurate judgments of cognitive aspects (attitudes, standards, and attributions) and somatic aspects (sensations, arousal, physical symptoms, emotions) of self. The present skeptical review concludes that the “perceptual accuracy hypothesis” is unsupported. There is simply little direct evidence, and the indirect evidence is better explained by objective self-awareness theory's core tenet: Self-focus increases consistency motivation. Most studies have also failed to appreciate the complexity of establishing the accuracy of self-judgment. The authors discuss some conceptual issues that future work should recognize, such as the logics of accuracy research, the role of honesty standards in accurate self-reports, differences in self-perception and object perception, and the implications of different self-theories for accuracy.

The abiding interest that sustains scientific research has only rarely been displaced onto interest itself. What little research there is, however, has pursued one of two parallel paths. The first path is the study of interest as a transient affective state. Emotion psychology—this path's primary traveler—has historically viewed interest as the black sheep in the flock of basic emotions. The ?prototypical? negative emotions such as anger and fear have received the lion's share of research, leaving interest and the other positive emotions in relative obscurity (Fredrickson, 1998). But mere neglect aside, many venerable shepherds have kicked interest out of the flock entirely. Interest isn't included in many major emotion theories, beginning with Darwin (1872/1998) and continuing with contemporary models (Carver & Scheier, 1998; Lazarus, 1991; Oatley & Johnson-Laird, 1996; Ortony, Clore, & Collins, 1988).

Objective self-awareness theory has undergone fundamental changes in the 3 decades since Duval and Wicklund's (1972) original formulation. We review new evidence that bears on the basic tenets of the theory. Many of the assumptions of self-awareness theory require revision, particularly how expectancies influence approach and avoidance of self-standard discrepancies; the nature of standards, especially when they are changed; and the role of causal attribution in directing discrepancy reduction. However, several unresolved conceptual issues remain; future theoretical and empirical directions are discussed.

People will, under certain conditions, attribute failure to an external target to avoid an unfavorable self-evaluation. But to what external target do people attribute failure? Based on Fritz Heider’s analysis of similarity and attribution, we predicted that failure—a negative event—would be attributed to a similarly negative external target. Participants worked on a task ostensibly created by three other people and received failure feedback. Self-awareness was either high or low, and people believed that their likelihood of improving in the future was either high or low. The valence of the fictional group members was manipulated such that one member was positive, another was mildly negative, and the third was highly negative. As in past research, highly self-aware persons who could not improve their failure attributed failure externally, relative to the other conditions. Consistent with Heider’s analysis, these participants perceived the negative group members as being responsible for their failure relative to self and the positive group member. Implications for the self-serving bias are discussed.

The human capacity for self‐awareness allows people to envision their eventual death and thus creates the potential for debilitating anxiety. Terror management research has shown that self‐awareness exacerbates the experience of mortality salience. I suggest that self‐awareness alone can induce mortality salience through dialectical thinking. If constructs include a concept and its opposite, then focusing on one aspect should also increase awareness of the opposite. Focusing on the existing object self should thus lead to the recognition of the non‐existent self that is implied. In study 1, participants experienced one of two self‐awareness manipulations (exposure to a mirror, perceiving the self as distinctive) or no manipulation; mortality salience was measured using a death‐relevant word completion task. Both self‐awareness conditions reported significantly higher mortality salience than the control condition. In study 2, participants exposed to their reflection reported increased death salience and life salience (as measured by death‐ and life‐relevant word completion tasks) than a control group, which directly suggests that self‐awareness leads people to dialectically consider opposing facets of the self. Terror management and objective self‐awareness theories might thus be more intimately tied than was previously thought. Copyright © 2001 John Wiley & Sons, Ltd.

In two studies, the authors explore the integration of the self-evaluation maintenance (SEM) model and social identity theory (SIT) by focusing on each perspective’s predictions for the evaluation of members of one’s ingroup. SEM’s predictions apply to personal identity concerns, whereas SIT’s predictions are applicable to concerns for a group identity. In Study 1, participants evaluated an ingroup member who highly outperformed them. High- and low-identified participants did not differ in their ratings of the target in an interpersonal context but high identifiers did like the target more than lows in an intergroup context. In Study 2, highly identified participants preferred a poorly performing target in an interpersonal context, but in an intergroup context, they preferred the one who outperformed them. Results are discussed in terms of the theoretical overlap between SEM and SIT and how self-categorization theory can help integrate interpersonal and intergroup perspectives on self-evaluation.

Based on factor analyses of the private self-consciousness scale, Creed and Funder (1998) posit ‘two faces of private self-consciousness’: self-reflectiveness, which relates to negative outcomes, and internal state awareness, which relates to positive outcomes. The significance of this distinction is questioned. I contend (i) that the existence of two subfactors is a fatal deficiency in the private self-consciousness scale, not a benefit; (ii) that factor analysis can never discover aspects of personality; (iii) that only an underlying theoretical network, not unique variance, makes a scale useful; and (iv) that the SR and ISA distinction exemplifies the undesirable Aristotelian approach (Lewin, 1931) to personality. Copyright © 1999 John Wiley & Sons, Ltd.

In the article, the words aesthetic and aesthetics erroneously appear with a capital A throughout the text. These errors were introduced after the page proofs had been returned, and did not appear in the original manuscript or proofs. Readers should not interpret these capitalized forms as proper nouns or as specialized technical terms.] Scientific interest in expertise in the arts is growing, but measures of expertise have largely been brief and informal. The present research examines Smith and Smith's (2006) Aesthetic fluency scale, which measures expertise by assessing domain knowledge in the arts. A latent variable study examined Aesthetic fluency in relation to fluid intelligence and the Big Five dimensions of personality. Openness to experience had a large effect, and all other effects were small. Aesthetic fluency appears to be associated with the artistic values and interests typical of people high in openness to experience.

Experience-sampling research involves trade-offs between the number of questions asked per signal, the number of signals per day, and the number of days. By combining planned missing-data designs and multilevel latent variable modeling, we show how to reduce the items per signal without reducing the number of items. After illustrating different designs using real data, we present two Monte Carlo studies that explored the performance of planned missing-data designs across different within-person and between-person sample sizes and across different patterns of response rates. The missing-data designs yielded unbiased parameter estimates but slightly higher standard errors. With realistic sample sizes, even designs with extensive missingness performed well, so these methods are promising additions to an experience-sampler's toolbox. ispartof: Behavior Research Methods vol:46 issue:1 pages:41-54 ispartof: location:United States status: published

Current conceptualizations of schizophrenia indicate that the underlying vulnerability for the disorder is expressed across a broad continuum of impairment referred to as schizotypy. Trait-like anhedonia has long been recognized as a central component of schizophrenia and schizotypy. Our understanding of the etiology, experience, and expression of anhedonia, however, has evolved in large part due to advances in social and emotion psychology regarding the nature of pleasure, advances in the neurosciences regarding the brain mechanisms underlying hedonic capacity and experience, and the integration of measures from clinical, social, and biological psychology. Current studies have differentiated deficits in anticipatory pleasure from deficits in consummatory pleasure. The study of anhedonia has also been enhanced by the use of experience sampling research methods that expand investigations from the laboratory and the clinic to real world environments. Anhedonia appears to be a core component of the negative or deficit symptom dimension of schizotypy and schizophrenia, whereas the positive or psychotic-like dimension appears to be characterized by affective dysregulation. Furthermore, schizotypic anhedonia is differentiated from conditions such as depression, which involve episodic anhedonia combined with elevated negative affect. The present chapter presents an overview of theoretical conceptualizations of anhedonia in schizotypy, reviews cross-sectional, longitudinal, and daily life research findings, and considers issues and directions for future study of the construct.

Neuroscience research has thoroughly studied how nonliteral language is processed during metaphor comprehension. However, it is not clear how the brain actually creates nonliteral language. Therefore, the present study for the first time investigates the neural correlates of metaphor production. Participants completed sentences by generating novel metaphors or literal synonyms during functional imaging. Responses were spoken aloud in the scanner, recorded, and subsequently rated for their creative quality. We found that metaphor production was associated with focal activity in predominantly left-hemispheric brain regions, specifically the left angular gyrus, the left middle and superior frontal gyri—corresponding to the left dorsomedial prefrontal (DMPFC) cortex—and the posterior cingulate cortex. Moreover, brain activation in the left anterior DMPFC and the right middle temporal gyrus was found to linearly increase with the creative quality of metaphor responses. These findings are related to neuroscientific evidence on metaphor comprehension, creative idea generation and episodic future thought, suggesting that creating metaphors involves the flexible adaptation of semantic memory to imagine and construct novel figures of speech. Furthermore, the left DMPFC may exert executive control to maintain strategic search and selection, thus facilitating creativity of thought., Highlights • Figurative language production was studied for the first time with fMRI. • Verbal responses were recorded and analyzed for quality. • Generation of novel metaphors relies on activity in left AG and the PCC. • Activity in left DMPFC increases linearly as a function of metaphor creativity.

Background: Current models theorize that affective temperaments underlie the development and expression of mood psychopathology. Recent studies support the construct validity of affective temperaments in clinical and non-clinical samples. However, one concern is that affective temperaments may be describing characteristics that are better captured by models of normal personality. We conducted two studies examining: (a) the association of affective temperaments with domains and facets of normal personality, and (b) whether affective temperaments accounted for variance in mood symptoms and disorders, impairment, and daily-life experiences over-and-above variance accounted for by normal personality. Methods: Study 1 included 522 young adults who completed the TEMPS-A and the NEO-PI-3. Study 2 included 145 participants who were administered the TEMPS-A, NEO-FFI, interviews assessing psychopathology and impairment, and an assessment of daily life experiences. Results: Study 1 revealed that personality domains and facets accounted for one-third to one-half of the variance in affective temperaments. However, study 2 demonstrated that affective temperaments accounted for unique variance in measures of psychopathology, impairment, and daily-life experiences after partialling variance associated with personality domains. Specifically, cyclothymic/irritable temperament predicted bipolar disorders, impairment, borderline personality traits, urgency, and anger in daily life. Hyperthymic temperament predicted hypomanic episodes, grandiosity, sensation seeking, and increased activity in daily life. Limitations: The study was limited by the fact that only domain, not facet-level, measures of FFM were available in study 2. Conclusions: The findings support the validity of hyperthymic and cyclothymic/irritable temperaments as indicators of clinical psychopathology and indicate that they provide information beyond normal personality.

A broad range of primes presented outside of awareness — ranging from emotional faces to people's first names — can influence the physiological mobilization of effort during active coping tasks. Who responds more strongly to implicit cues? Based on models of self-awareness, the present research examined how individual differences in self-focused attention influence sensitivity to nonconscious primes. Adults completed a challenging cognitive task in which two kinds of primes were presented (people's first names and words related to the task's difficulty). Trait self-focus significantly interacted with both primes to predict effort, measured as systolic blood pressure (SBP) reactivity. People high in trait self-focus had significantly higher SBP reactivity when primed with words that made the task seem more important (their first names) and harder (high difficulty words). These findings thus expand the evidence for motivational intensity theory's analysis of implicit processes.