Restoring balance within cognitive unit or deservingness evaluation? The role of attitudes and deservingness in shaping emotional reactions to others’ outcomes

Based on Heider’s theory I persumed that personal attitudes are stronger predictors of emotional responses to others’ outcomes than deservingness evaluation. I manipulated outcome, attitude and deservingness experimentally, and measured specific emotions. It appeared deservingness to play a secondary role in eliciting joy and sorrow when interpersonal attitudes were involved.

Joy, Schadenfreude, Sorrow, and Resentment as Responses Restoring Balance in Cognitive Units

Based on Heider’s (1958) balance theory we hypothesize that emotional responses to other persons’ outcomes depend on attitudes towards these persons. Positive attitudes towards others lead to empathic responses to their outcomes– joy after a success and sorrow after a failure. Negative attitudes result in paradoxical responses – negative to a success (resentment) and positive to a failure (schadenfreude). These emotions function as responses restoring balance within cognitive units consisting of the perceiver, other persons and their outcomes. Three studies supported these hypotheses and showed that deservingness considerations play a weaker role in shaping emotional responses of joy and sorrow to others’ outcomes when strong interpersonal attitudes are involved. However, deservingness plays an independent role in shaping the emotional response of resentment.

Refining the vulnerability model of low self-esteem and depression: Disentangling the effects of genuine self-esteem and narcissism

A growing body of research supports the vulnerability model of low self-esteem and depression, which states that low self-esteem is a risk factor for depression. The goal of the present research was to refine the vulnerability model, by testing whether the self-esteem effect is truly due to a lack of genuine self-esteem or due to a lack of narcissistic self-enhancement. For the analyses, we used data from 6 longitudinal studies consisting of 2,717 individuals. In each study, we tested the prospective effects of self-esteem and narcissism on depression both separately for each construct and mutually controlling the constructs for each other (i.e., a strategy that informs about effects of genuine self-esteem and pure narcissism), and then meta-analytically aggregated the findings. The results indicated that the effect of low self-esteem holds when narcissism is controlled for (uncontrolled effect = -.26, controlled effect = -.27). In contrast, the effect of narcissism was close to zero when self-esteem was controlled for (uncontrolled effect = -.06, controlled effect = .01). Moreover, the analyses suggested that the self-esteem effect is linear across the continuum from low to high self-esteem (i.e., the effect was not weaker at very high levels of self-esteem). Finally, self-esteem and narcissism did not interact in their effect on depression; that is, individuals with high self-esteem have a lower risk for developing depression, regardless of whether or not they are narcissistic. The findings have significant theoretical implications because they strengthen the vulnerability model of low self-esteem and depression.

Beyond sexist beliefs: How do people decide to use gender-inclusive language?

When people use generic masculine language instead of more gender-inclusive forms, they communicate gender stereotypes and sometimes exclusion of women from certain social roles. Past research related gender-inclusive language use to sexist beliefs and attitudes. Given that this aspect of language use may be transparent to users, it is unclear whether people explicitly act on these beliefs when using gender-exclusive language forms or whether these are more implicit, habitual patterns. In two studies with German-speaking participants, we showed that spontaneous use of gender-inclusive personal nouns is guided by explicitly favorable intentions as well as habitual processes involving past use of such language. Further indicating the joint influence of deliberate and habitual processes, Study 2 revealed that language-use intentions are embedded in explicit sexist ideologies. As anticipated in our decision-making model, the effects of sexist beliefs on language emerged through deliberate mechanisms involving attitudes and intentions.

The influence of gender-stereotyped perfumes on leadership attribution

The classification of perfumes as ‘women's’ and ‘men's’ fragrances is based on certain gender stereotypes. In two experiments, female and male participants were asked to assume the role of a manager. In Experiment 1, they read an application for the position of a junior manager written by a male or female job applicant. Application papers were prepared with a typically masculine perfume, a typically feminine perfume or no perfume at all (control group). In Experiment 2, participants conducted a job interview with a female or male applicant (a confederate) who had applied the respective perfume or no perfume. Persons with a typically masculine perfume were ‘employed’ with a higher degree of certainty compared to persons with a typically feminine perfume.

Name your favorite musician: Effects of masculine generics and of their alternatives in German

Feminist linguists claim that masculine forms used in a generic sense (e.g. he referring to a doctor irrespective of sex) facilitate the cognitive representation of men compared to women and make women less visible. A number of experimental studies have confirmed this assumption with regard to the English language. Concerning other languages, however, this question has been addressed only in very few studies, although gender is a much more pervasive grammatical category and masculine generics are more prominent in languages such as French, Spanish or German. This paper reports three experiments with native speakers of German which were conducted to determine the influence of different types of German generics on the cognitive inclusion of women. Results indicate that inclusion of women is higher with 'non-sexist' alternatives than with masculine generics, a tendency which was consistent over studies. But the different alternative forms show different effects which also vary depending on the context. These results are discussed with regard to their practical consequences in situations such as nominating women and men for awards, political offices etc.

Meta-cognition about biological sex and gender-stereotypic physical appearance: Consequences for the assessment of leadership competence

Previous findings are inconsistent with regard to whether men are judged as being more or less competent leaders than women. However, masculine-relative to feminine-looking persons seem to be judged consistently as more competent leaders. Can this different impact of biological sex and physical appearance be due to the disparate availability of meta-cognitive knowledge about both sources? The results of Study 1 indicated that individuals possess meta-cognitive knowledge about a possible biasing influence of persons’ biological sex, but not for their physical appearance. In Study 2, participants judged the leadership competence of a male versus female stimulus person with either masculine or feminine physical appearance. In addition, the available cognitive capacity was manipulated. When high capacity was available, participants corrected for the influence of stimulus persons’ sex, but they fell prey to this influence under cognitive load. However, the effect of physical appearance was not moderated by cognitive capacity.

Evaluation of Leaders – Does Gender Really Matter?

We examined the leaders’ self-evaluation and their evaluation by subordinates. We found that, over time, female leaders evaluated themselves better than male leaders and that subordinates evaluated female leaders better than male leaders at the beginning of the project. The latter gender differences disappeared over the course of the project.

Narcissism and emotional contagion: do narcissists “catch” the emotions of others?

In this research, we investigated the association between narcissism and one central aspect of empathy, susceptibility for emotional contagion (the transfer of emotional states from one person to another). In an experimental study (N=101), we were able to compare actual susceptibility for emotional contagion (as indicated by a change in emotions that converges with the emotions of another person) and self-reported susceptibility for emotional contagion (assessed via questionnaire). Results showed that in the case of positive emotions, narcissists were actually less susceptible to emotional contagion than individuals low in narcissism. At the same time, however, narcissists believed they were more susceptible to contagion of positive emotions. Thus, narcissists were less likely to “catch the positive emotions” of others than individuals low in narcissism, but at the same time lacked the self-insight capabilities to notice this.

Evaluation of an inventory for the assessment of critical incidents involving football fans

Introduction: Fan violence is a frequent occurrence in Swiss football (Bundesamt für Polizei, 2015) leading to high costs for prevention and control (Mensch & Maurer, 2014). Various theories put forward an explanation of fan violence, such as the Elaborated Social Identity Model (Drury & Reicher, 2000) and the Aggravation Mitigation Model (Hylander & Guvå, 2010). Important observations from these theories are the multi-dimensional understanding of fan violence and the dynamics occurring in the fan group. Nevertheless, none of them deal with critical incidents (CIs) which involve a tense atmosphere combined with a higher risk of fan violence. Schumacher Dimech, Brechbühl and Seiler (2015) tackled this gap in research and explored CIs where 43 defining criteria were identified and compiled in an integrated model of CIs. The defining criteria were categorised in four higher-order themes “antecedents” (e.g. a documented history of fan rivalry), “triggers” (e.g. the arrest of a fan), “reactions” (e.g. fans masking themselves) and “consequences” (e.g. fans avoiding communication with fan social workers). Methods: An inventory based on this model is being developed including these 43 criteria. In an exploratory phase, this inventory was presented as an online questionnaire and was completed by 143 individuals. Three main questions are examined: Firstly, the individual items are tested using descriptive analyses. An item analysis is conducted to test reliability, item difficulty and discriminatory power. Secondly, the model’s four higher-order themes are tested using exploratory factor analysis (EFA). Thirdly, differences between sub-groups are explored, such as gender and agerelated differences. Results: Respondents rated the items’ importance as high and the quota of incomplete responses was not systematic. Two items were removed from the inventory because of low mean or a high rate of “don’t know”-responses. EFA produced a six-factor solution grouping items into match-related factors, repressive measures, fans’ delinquent behaviour, intra-group behaviour, communication and control and inter-group factors. The item “fans consume alcohol” could not be ordered into any category but was retained since literature accentuates this factor’s influence on fan violence. Analyses examining possible differences between groups are underway. Discussion: Results exploring the adequacy of this inventory assessing defining criteria of CIs in football are promising and thus further evaluative investigation is recommended. This inventory can be used in two ways: as a standardised instrument of assessment for experts evaluating specific CIs and as an instrument for exploring differences in perception and assessment of a CI e.g. gender and age differences, differences between interest groups and stakeholders. References: Bundesamt für Polizei. (2015). Jahresbericht 2014. Kriminalitätsbekämpfung Bund. Lage, Massnahmen und Mittel [Electronic Version]. Drury, J., & Reicher, S. (2000). Collective action and psychological change. The emergence of new social identities. British Journal of Social Psychology, 39, 579-604. Hylander, I., & Guvå, G. (2010). Misunderstanding of out-group behaviour: Different interpretations of the same crowd events among police officers and demonstrators. Nordic Psychology, 62, 25-47. Schumacher-Dimech, A., Brechbühl, A. &, Seiler, R. (2016). Dynamics of critical incidents with potentially violent outcomes involving ultra fans: an explorative study. Sport in Society. Advance online publication. doi: 10.1080/17430437.2015.1133597