In this article, the author describes a new theoretical perspective on positive emotions and situates this new perspective within the emerging field of positive psychology. The broaden-and-build theory posits that experiences of positive emotions broaden people's momentary thought-action repertoires, which in turn serves to build their enduring personal resources, ranging from physical and intellectual resources to social and psychological resources. Preliminary empirical evidence supporting the broaden-and-build theory is reviewed, and open empirical questions that remain to be tested are identified. The theory and findings suggest that the capacity to experience positive emotions may be a fundamental human strength central to the study of human flourishing.

http://www.elaborer.org/cours/A13/lectures/Fredrickson2001.pdf

The role of positive emotions in positive psychology. The broaden-and-build theory of positive emotions.

Attachment--and loss.

Erik Eriksen is a remarkable individual. He has no college degrees yet is Professor of Human Development at Harvard University. He came to psychology via art, which explains why the reader will find him painting contexts and backgrounds rather than stating dull facts and concepts. He has been a training psychoanalyst for many years as well as a perceptive observer of cultural and social settings and their effect on growing up. This is not just a book on childhood. It is a panorama of our society. Anxiety in young children, apathy in American Indians, confusion in veterans of war, and arrogance in young Nazis are scrutinized under the psychoanalytic magnifying glass. The material is well written and devoid of technical jargon. The theme of the volume is that it is human to have a long childhood which will leave a lifelong residue of emotional immaturity in man. Primitive groups and

Childhood and Society.

We are in the midst of a technological revolution whereby, for the first time, researchers can link daily word use to a broad array of real-world behaviors. This article reviews several computerized text analysis methods and describes how Linguistic Inquiry and Word Count (LIWC) was created and validated. LIWC is a transparent text analysis program that counts words in psychologically meaningful categories. Empirical results using LIWC demonstrate its ability to detect meaning in a wide variety of experimental settings, including to show attentional focus, emotionality, social relationships, thinking styles, and individual differences.

/pdf/the-psychological-meaning-of-words-liwc-and-computerized-4sd1bn03dk.pdf

The psychological meaning of words: LIWC and computerized text analysis methods

Policy-makers are considering large-scale programs aimed at self-control to improve citizens’ health and wealth and reduce crime. Experimental and economic studies suggest such programs could reap benefits. Yet, is self-control important for the health, wealth, and public safety of the population? Following a cohort of 1,000 children from birth to the age of 32 y, we show that childhood self-control predicts physical health, substance dependence, personal finances, and criminal offending outcomes, following a gradient of self-control. Effects of children's self-control could be disentangled from their intelligence and social class as well as from mistakes they made as adolescents. In another cohort of 500 sibling-pairs, the sibling with lower self-control had poorer outcomes, despite shared family background. Interventions addressing self-control might reduce a panoply of societal costs, save taxpayers money, and promote prosperity.

/pdf/a-gradient-of-childhood-self-control-predicts-health-wealth-5fdg5ylocq.pdf

A gradient of childhood self-control predicts health, wealth, and public safety

The limited strength model of self-control predicts that acts of self-control impair subsequent performance on tasks that require self-control (i.e., “ego depletion”), and the majority of the published research on this topic is supportive of this prediction. Additional research suggests that this effect can be alleviated by manipulating participants’ motivation to perform—for instance, by having participants swish a drink containing carbohydrates, which is thought to function as a reward—or by requiring participants to complete two initial acts of self-control rather than only one. Here, we explore both the effect of having participants perform two initial tasks thought to require self-control (versus two less self-control-intensive tasks) and the effect of swishing a drink containing sucrose (compared to control drinks) on subsequent self-control. Outcomes were analyzed using standard null hypothesis significance testing techniques (e.g., analysis of variance, t-tests). In some cases, test statistics were transformed into Bayes factors to aid in interpretation (i.e., to allow for acceptance of the null hypothesis). We found that performing two self-control-intensive tasks actually improved subsequent self-control when participants swished a drink containing sucrose between tasks. For participants who swished control drinks, we found no evidence of ego depletion. We conclude that claims that self-control failure is caused by the depletion of a resource (or that it functions as if it relies on a limited resource) merit greater circumspection. Our results—all of which were either null or contrary to predictions from the limited strength model—are important for researchers interested in patterns of self-control failure.

/pdf/after-a-pair-of-self-control-intensive-tasks-sucrose-4077ed5ymp.pdf

After a pair of self-control-intensive tasks, sucrose swishing improves subsequent working memory performance

We conducted 4 experiments to examine how people incorporate visual information about strangers’ religious identities—religious badges—into their decisions about how much to trust them. Experiment 1 revealed that Christian and non-Christian participants were more trusting (as measured by self-report) of targets who wore a religious badge associated with Christianity (Ash Wednesday ashes) than toward targets who did not wear such a badge. Experiment 2 replicated Experiment 1 and also revealed that the effects of Ash Wednesday ashes on Christians’ and non-Christians’ trust extended to a behavioral measure of trust (i.e., monetary allocations in a multiplayer trust game). Experiment 3 replicated Experiments 1 and 2 with a different religious badge (a necklace with the Christian cross on it). Experiment 4 ruled out a potential confound. Consistent with a stereotype interpretation, these results suggest that U.S. students regard visual cues to people’s espousal of Christian religious beliefs as signals of their trustworthiness.

Christian religious badges instill trust in Christian and non-Christian perceivers.

Religion and spirituality in rehabilitation psychology.

Religion, self-control, and self-regulation: How and why are they related?

In this response, we address eight issues concerning our proposal that human minds contain adaptations for revenge and forgiveness. Specifically, we discuss (a) the inferences that are and are not licensed by patterns of contemporary behavioral data in the context of the adaptationist approach; (b) the theoretical pitfalls of conflating proximate and ultimate causation; (c) the role of development in the production of adaptations; (d) the implications of proposing that the brain’s cognitive systems are fundamentally computational in nature; (e) our preferred method for considering the role of individual differences in computational systems; (f) applications of our proposal to understanding conflicts between groups; (g) the possible implications of our views for understanding the operation of contemporary criminal justice systems; and (h) the question of whether people ever “genuinely” forgive.

Michael E. McCullough

Papers

After a pair of self-control-intensive tasks, sucrose swishing improves subsequent working memory performance

Christian religious badges instill trust in Christian and non-Christian perceivers.

Religion and spirituality in rehabilitation psychology.

Religion, self-control, and self-regulation: How and why are they related?

Putting revenge and forgiveness in an evolutionary context.