Coping
Life-span development of self-esteem and its effects on important life outcomes
Ulrich Orth, Richard Robins & Keith Widaman
Journal of Personality and Social Psychology, forthcoming
Abstract:
We examined the life-span development of self-esteem and tested whether self-esteem influences the development of important life outcomes, including relationship satisfaction, job satisfaction, occupational status, salary, positive and negative affect, depression, and physical health. Data came from the Longitudinal Study of Generations. Analyses were based on 5 assessments across a 12-year period of a sample of 1,824 individuals ages 16 to 97 years. First, growth curve analyses indicated that self-esteem increases from adolescence to middle adulthood, reaches a peak at about age 50 years, and then decreases in old age. Second, cross-lagged regression analyses indicated that self-esteem is best modeled as a cause rather than a consequence of life outcomes. Third, growth curve analyses, with self-esteem as a time-varying covariate, suggested that self-esteem has medium-sized effects on life-span trajectories of affect and depression, small to medium-sized effects on trajectories of relationship and job satisfaction, a very small effect on the trajectory of health, and no effect on the trajectory of occupational status. These findings replicated across 4 generations of participants - children, parents, grandparents, and their great-grandparents. Together, the results suggest that self-esteem has a significant prospective impact on real-world life experiences and that high and low self-esteem are not mere epiphenomena of success and failure in important life domains.
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Is the Foreclosure Crisis Making Us Sick?
Janet Currie & Erdal Tekin
NBER Working Paper, August 2011
Abstract:
We investigate the relationship between foreclosure activity and the health of residents using zip code level longitudinal data. We focus on Arizona, California, Florida, and New Jersey, four states that have been among the hardest hit by the foreclosure crisis. We combine foreclosure data for 2005 to 2009 from RealtyTrac with data on emergency room visits and hospital discharges. Our zip code level quarterly data allow us to control for many potential confounding factors through the inclusion of fixed effects for each zip code as well as for each combination of county, quarter, and year. We find that an increase in the number of foreclosures is associated with increases in medical visits for mental health (anxiety and suicide attempts), for preventable conditions (such as hypertension), and for a broad array of physical complaints that are plausibly stress-related. They are not related to visits for cancer morbidity, which arguably should not respond as rapidly to stress. Foreclosures also have a zero or negative effect on elective procedures, as one might expect. Age specific results suggest that the foreclosure crisis is having its most harmful effects on individuals 20 to 49. We also find that larger effects for African-Americans and Hispanics than for whites, consistent with the perception that minorities have been particularly hard hit.
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The presence of a best friend buffers the effects of negative experiences
Ryan Adams, Jonathan Bruce Santo & William Bukowski
Developmental Psychology, forthcoming
Abstract:
The goal of the current study was to examine how the presence of a best friend might serve as protection against the effect of negative experiences on global self-worth and the hypothalamic-pituitary-adrenocortical axis (HPA axis). A total of 103 English-speaking male (n = 55) and female (n = 48) participants from Grade 5 (M = 10.27 years) and Grade 6 (M = 11.30 years) completed booklets about their experiences that occurred 20 min previously and how they felt about themselves at the moment, and they provided saliva multiple times per day over the course of 4 consecutive days. Having a best friend present during an experience significantly buffered the effect of the negativity of the experience on cortisol and global self-worth. When a best friend was not present, there was a significant increase in cortisol and a significant decrease in global self-worth as the negativity of the experience increased. When a best friend was present, there was less change in cortisol and global self-worth due to the negativity of the experience.
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Alessandra Mancini et al.
PLoS ONE, October 2011, e26008
Abstract:
Social preferences like interpersonal altruism, fairness, reciprocity and inequity aversion are inherently linked to departures from pure self-interest. During economic interactions, for example, defectors may be punished even if this implies a cost for the punishers. This violation of canonical assumptions in economics indicates that socially oriented decisions may predominate over self-centred stances. Here we explore whether the personal experience of pain changes the balance between self-gain and socially based choices. We used laser stimulation to induce pain or a warm sensation in subjects playing a modified version of the Ultimatum Game (UG) both in the role of responder and proposer. After each shot, responders evaluated the fairness of the offer. Moreover, responders and proposers rated the intensity and unpleasantness of the sensation evoked by the laser stimulation. Results show that suffering proposers decrease fair offers and suffering responders increase their acceptance rate irrespective of economic offer. Crucially, the intensity of painful stimulation has a predictive role on Moderately Unfair offers' acceptance rates. Thus the personal experience of pain may favour the emergence of a self-centered perspective aimed at maximizing self-gain. The results suggest that bodily states play a fundamental role in higher-order interpersonal negotiations and interactions.
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Clarifying the role of pain tolerance in suicidal capability
Joseph Chad Franklin, Elenda Tobi Hessel & Mitchell Jay Prinstein
Psychiatry Research, 30 October 2011, Pages 362-367
Abstract:
Joiner's (2005) interpersonal-psychological theory of suicide hypothesizes that painful and provocative events increase pain tolerance. The theory further proposes that increased pain tolerance represents one component of increased suicidal capability. Although initial studies have been consistent with this model, several key aspects remain untested. In 67 undergraduates, we investigated associations among painful and provocative events, nonsuicidal self-injury, acquired capability for suicide, and pain tolerance, threshold, and perceived intensity. Results were highly consistent with the interpersonal-psychological theory: a multiple mediation model specified that pain tolerance - but not other pain variables - accounted for significant variance within the association between painful and provocative events and acquired capability for suicide. These results held even when the pain tolerance item was removed from the suicidal capability questionnaire. Results also supported the interpersonal-psychological theory hypothesis that nonsuicidal self-injury represents an important painful and provocative event that increases suicidal capability. Specifically, participants with a history of nonsuicidal self-injury displayed increased suicidal capability and decreased pain perception. Overall, these results indicate that pain tolerance plays an important and specific role in suicidal capability.
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The Neural Sociometer: Brain Mechanisms Underlying State Self-esteem
Naomi Eisenberger et al.
Journal of Cognitive Neuroscience, November 2011, Pages 3448-3455
Abstract:
On the basis of the importance of social connection for survival, humans may have evolved a "sociometer" - a mechanism that translates perceptions of rejection or acceptance into state self-esteem. Here, we explored the neural underpinnings of the sociometer by examining whether neural regions responsive to rejection or acceptance were associated with state self-esteem. Participants underwent fMRI while viewing feedback words ("interesting," "boring") ostensibly chosen by another individual (confederate) to describe the participant's previously recorded interview. Participants rated their state self-esteem in response to each feedback word. Results demonstrated that greater activity in rejection-related neural regions (dorsal ACC, anterior insula) and mentalizing regions was associated with lower-state self-esteem. Additionally, participants whose self-esteem decreased from prescan to postscan versus those whose self-esteem did not showed greater medial prefrontal cortical activity, previously associated with self-referential processing, in response to negative feedback. Together, the results inform our understanding of the origin and nature of our feelings about ourselves.
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Michael Vicaro
Rhetoric & Public Affairs, Fall 2011, Pages 401-426
Abstract:
Ongoing debates about the "enhanced interrogation techniques" used in the Global War on Terrorism, and the failure to prosecute officials who authorized these acts, have revealed deep controversy and complexity within popular and legal understandings of the term "torture." One source of this controversy lies in the U.S. federal definition of torture itself. A close reading of 18 U.S.C. § 2340 reveals a uniquely liberal-modernist conception of subjectivity and experience that offers inadequate legal protection against the "no-touch" techniques that have become paradigmatic of contemporary torture. Specifically, the moral and epistemological ambiguities within its legal categories of "pain" and "personhood" result in a law that effectively permits rather than prohibits the preferred torture techniques of liberal-democratic states. Following the critical-analytic work of this argument, the article offers an appeal for the inclusion of a more robustly rhetorical conception of experience in the formulation of a new legal definition of torture.
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Exposure to acute stress is associated with attenuated sweet taste
Mustafa Al'absi et al.
Psychophysiology, forthcoming
Abstract:
This study examined the effects of stress on taste perception. Participants (N = 38; 21 women) completed two laboratory sessions: one stress (public speaking, math, and cold pressor) and one control rest session. The taste perception test was conducted at the end of each session and included rating the intensity and pleasantness of sweet, salty, sour, and savory solutions at suprathreshold concentrations. Cardiovascular, hormonal, and mood measures were collected throughout the sessions. Participants showed the expected changes in cardiovascular, hormonal, and mood measures in response to stress. Reported intensity of the sweet solution was significantly lower on the stress day than on the rest day. Cortisol level poststress predicted reduced intensity of salt and sour, suggesting that stress-related changes in adrenocortical activity were related to reduced taste intensity. Results indicate that acute stress may alter taste perception, and ongoing research investigates the extent to which these changes mediate effects of stress on appetite.
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The consequences of pain: The social and physical pain overlap on psychological responses
Paolo Riva, James Wirth & Kipling Williams
European Journal of Social Psychology, October 2011, Pages 681-687
Abstract:
Current theories suggest that social and physical pain overlap in their neurological and physiological outcomes. We investigated how social and physical pain overlap in their psychological responses by testing the hypothesis that both social and physical pain would thwart satisfaction on four human needs, worsen mood, and increase desire to aggress. In Experiment 1, recalling an experience of social or physical pain produced overlapping effects in the form of thwarted self-esteem and control needs and increased negative affect and desire to aggress. In Experiment 2, we induced social (Cyberball ostracism) or physical pain (cold pressor) within the laboratory session, and found that both pain types produced feelings of being ignored and excluded, and thwarted belonging, self-esteem, control, and meaningful existence. Our results provide further support to pain overlap theories and indicate that social and physical pain cause common psychological consequences, resulting in new ways to understand and manage pain.
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Joseph Zohar et al.
European Neuropsychopharmacology, November 2011, Pages 796-809
Abstract:
High-dose corticosteroids have been reported to reduce symptoms of acute stress and post-traumatic stress in polytrauma patients and in animal studies. The underlying mechanism of action remains largely unclear. These issues were addressed in parallel in the clinical and preclinical studies below. In this preliminary study, 25 patients with acute stress symptoms were administered a single intravenous bolus of high-dose hydrocortisone (100-140mg) or placebo within 6h of a traumatic event in a prospective, randomized, double-blind, placebo-controlled pilot study. Early single high-dose hydrocortisone intervention attenuated the core symptoms of both the acute stress and of subsequent PTSD in patients. High-dose hydrocortisone treatment given in the first few hours after a traumatic experience was associated with significant favorable changes in the trajectory of exposure to trauma, as expressed by the reduced risk of the development of PTSD post-trauma. In parallel, a comparative study of morphological arborization in dentate gyrus and its modulating molecules was performed in stress-exposed animals treated with high-dose hydrocortisone. Steroid-treated stressed animals displayed significantly increased dendritic growth and spine density, with increased levels of brain-derived neurotrophic factor (BDNF) and obtunded postsynaptic density-95 (PSD-95) levels. The animal study provided insights into the potential mechanism of this intervention, as it identified relevant morphological and biochemical associations to the clinical observations. Thus, evidence from clinical and animal studies suggests that there is a "window of opportunity" in the early aftermath of trauma to help those who are vulnerable to the development of chronic PTSD.
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Oxytocin receptor gene (OXTR) is related to psychological resources
Shimon Saphire-Bernstein et al.
Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences, 13 September 2011, Pages 15118-15122
Abstract:
Psychological resources - optimism, mastery, and self-esteem - buffer the deleterious effects of stress and are predictors of neurophysiological and psychological health-related outcomes. These resources have been shown to be highly heritable, yet the genetic basis for this heritability remains unknown. Here, we report a link between the oxytocin receptor (OXTR) SNP rs53576 and psychological resources, such that carriers of the "A" allele have lower levels of optimism, mastery, and self-esteem, relative to G/G homozygotes. OXTR was also associated with depressive symptomatology. Mediation analysis indicates that the effects of OXTR on depressive symptoms may be largely mediated by the influence of OXTR on psychological resources.
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Franziska Plessow et al.
Journal of Cognitive Neuroscience, November 2011, Pages 3218-3227
Abstract:
Dynamically adjusting the right amount of goal shielding to varying situational demands is associated with the flexibility of cognitive control, typically linked with pFC functioning. Although stress hormones are found to also bind to prefrontal receptors, the link between stress and cognitive control remains elusive. Based on that, we aimed at investigating effects of acute psychosocial stress on dynamic control adjustments. Forty-eight healthy volunteers were exposed to either a well-established stress induction protocol (the Trier Social Stress Test, TSST) or a standardized control situation before a selective attention (Simon) task involving response conflicts. The individual physiological stress response was monitored by analyzing levels of free cortisol and α-amylase activity in saliva samples showing that the TSST reliably induced an increase of endogenous stress hormone levels. Acute stress did not inevitably impair cognitive functioning, however, as stressed participants showed tonically increased goal shielding (to reduce interference) at the expense of decreased cognitive flexibility. Importantly, as a novel finding in humans, stress effects on cognitive functions were not present immediately after the stress experience but developed gradually over time and, therefore, paralleled the time course of the hypothalamus-pituitary-adrenal (HPA) stress response. In addition, the total increase of individual cortisol levels reflecting HPA activity, but not the total changes in α-amylase activity associated with sympathetic activity, was reversely related to the amount of cognitive flexibility in the final block of testing. Our study provides evidence for a stress-induced time-dependent decrease of cognitive flexibility that might be related to changes in cortisol levels.
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Mind over matter: Reappraising arousal improves cardiovascular and cognitive responses to stress
Jeremy Jamieson, Matthew Nock & Wendy Berry Mendes
Journal of Experimental Psychology: General, forthcoming
Abstract:
Researchers have theorized that changing the way we think about our bodily responses can improve our physiological and cognitive reactions to stressful events. However, the underlying processes through which mental states improve downstream outcomes are not well understood. To this end, we examined whether reappraising stress-induced arousal could improve cardiovascular outcomes and decrease attentional bias for emotionally negative information. Participants were randomly assigned to either a reappraisal condition in which they were instructed to think about their physiological arousal during a stressful task as functional and adaptive, or to 1 of 2 control conditions: attention reorientation and no instructions. Relative to controls, participants instructed to reappraise their arousal exhibited more adaptive cardiovascular stress responses - increased cardiac efficiency and lower vascular resistance - and decreased attentional bias. Thus, reappraising arousal shows physiological and cognitive benefits. Implications for health and potential clinical applications are discussed.
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The Impact of Environmental Experiences on Symptoms of Anxiety and Depression Across the Life Span
Kenneth Kendler et al.
Psychological Science, October 2011, Pages 1343-1352
Abstract:
Symptoms of anxiety and depression are relatively stable over time. Can this stability be explained by genetic influences, or is it caused by the long-lasting effects of accumulating environmental experiences? To address this question, we analyzed longitudinally assessed symptoms of anxiety and depression in eight samples of monozygotic twins of widely varying ages. These samples were drawn from American and European population-based registries. Using hierarchical linear modeling, we examined individual differences and individual changes in the level of symptoms over time. This method enabled us to decompose the variance into the predictable variance shared by both members of each pair of twins, the differences between individuals within pairs, and the residual variance. We then modeled how these components of individual variation changed over time. Within pairs, the twins' predicted levels of symptoms increasingly diverged from childhood until late adulthood, at which point the divergence ceased. By middle adulthood, environmental experiences contributed substantially to stable and predictable interindividual differences in levels of anxiety and depression.
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Marjan De Vries-Bouw et al.
Psychophysiology, November 2011, Pages 1597-1604
Abstract:
Low autonomic (re)activity is a consistent correlate of antisocial behavior in juveniles. However, longitudinal research relating autonomic measures to persistent antisocial behavior has remained scarce. Therefore, in the present study we examined the predictive value of heart rate (HR) and heart rate variability (HRV, often studied as respiratory sinus arrhythmia) for reoffending in delinquent male adolescents. At initial assessment, HR and HRV were measured at rest and in response to a public speaking task. Registered reoffending was assessed after 5-year follow-up. Attenuated HR response and stronger HRV response to stress predicted higher reoffending rates. Results provide evidence that HR/HRV reactivity are neurobiological markers for persistent juvenile antisocial behavior. Although effect sizes were small to moderate, our findings underscore the consistency of the relationship between autonomic markers and antisocial behavior.
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Adolescent Well-Being in Washington State Military Families
Sarah Reed, Janice Bell & Todd Edwards
American Journal of Public Health, September 2011, Pages 1676-1682
Objectives: We examined associations between parental military service and adolescent well-being.
Methods: We used cross-sectional data from the 2008 Washington State Healthy Youth Survey collected in public school grades 8, 10, and 12 (n=10606). We conducted multivariable logistic regression analyses to test associations between parental military service and adolescent well-being (quality of life, depressed mood, thoughts of suicide).
Results: In 8th grade, parental deployment was associated with higher odds of reporting thoughts of suicide among adolescent girls (odds ratio [OR]=1.66; 95% confidence interval [CI]=1.19, 2.32) and higher odds of low quality of life (OR=2.10; 95% CI=1.43, 3.10) and thoughts of suicide (OR=1.75; 95% CI=1.15, 2.67) among adolescent boys. In 10th and 12th grades, parental deployment was associated with higher odds of reporting low quality of life (OR=2.74; 95% CI=1.79, 4.20), depressed mood (OR=1.50; 95% CI=1.02, 2.20), and thoughts of suicide (OR=1.64; 95% CI=1.13, 2.38) among adolescent boys.
Conclusions: Parental military deployment is associated with increased odds of impaired well-being among adolescents, especially adolescent boys. Military, school-based, and public health professionals have a unique opportunity to develop school- and community-based interventions to improve the well-being of adolescents in military families.
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Social Exclusion and Pain Sensitivity: Why Exclusion Sometimes Hurts and Sometimes Numbs
Michael Bernstein & Heather Claypool
Personality and Social Psychology Bulletin, forthcoming
Abstract:
Some research indicates that social exclusion leads to increased emotional- and physical-pain sensitivity, whereas other work indicates that exclusion causes emotional- and physical-pain numbing. This research sought to examine what causes these opposing outcomes. In Study 1, the paradigm used to instantiate social exclusion was found to moderate the social exclusion-physical pain relation: Future-life exclusion led to a numbing of physical pain whereas Cyberball exclusion led to hypersensitivity. Study 2 examined the underlying mechanism, which was hypothesized to be the severity of the "social injury." Participants were subjected to either the standard future-life exclusion manipulation (purported to be a highly severe social injury) or a newly created, less-severe version. Supporting our hypothesis, the standard (highly severe) future-life exclusion led to physical-pain numbing, whereas the less-severe future-life exclusion resulted in hypersensitivity. Implications of these results for understanding the exclusion-pain relation and other exclusion effects are discussed.