Family still matters: Human social motivation across 42 countries during a global pandemic.

The COVID-19 pandemic caused drastic social changes for many people, including separation from friends and coworkers, enforced close contact with family, and reductions in mobility. Here we assess the extent to which people's evolutionarily-relevant basic motivations and goals-fundamental social motives such as Affiliation and Kin Care-might have been affected. To address this question, we gathered data on fundamental social motives in 42 countries (N = 15,915) across two waves, including 19 countries (N = 10,907) for which data were gathered both before and during the pandemic (pre-pandemic wave: 32 countries, N = 8998; 3302 male, 5585 female; M age  = 24.43, SD = 7.91; mid-pandemic wave: 29 countries, N = 6917; 2249 male, 4218 female; M age  = 28.59, SD = 11.31). Samples include data collected online (e.g., Prolific, MTurk), at universities, and via community sampling. We found that Disease Avoidance motivation was substantially higher during the pandemic, and that most of the other fundamental social motives showed small, yet significant, differences across waves. Most sensibly, concern with caring for one's children was higher during the pandemic, and concerns with Mate Seeking and Status were lower. Earlier findings showing the prioritization of family motives over mating motives (and even over Disease Avoidance motives) were replicated during the pandemic. Finally, well-being remained positively associated with family-related motives and negatively associated with mating motives during the pandemic, as in the pre-pandemic samples. Our results provide further evidence for the robust primacy of family-related motivations even during this unique disruption of social life.

Invariances in the architecture of pride across small-scale societies.

Becoming valuable to fellow group members so that one would attract assistance in times of need is a major adaptive problem. To solve it, the individual needs a predictive map of the degree to which others value different acts so that, in choosing how to act, the payoff arising from others' valuation of a potential action (e.g., showing bandmates that one is a skilled forager by pursuing a hard-to-acquire prey item) can be added to the direct payoff of the action (e.g., gaining the nutrients of the prey captured). The pride system seems to incorporate all of the elements necessary to solve this adaptive problem. Importantly, data from western(-ized), educated, industrialized, rich, and democratic (WEIRD) societies indicate close quantitative correspondences between pride and the valuations of audiences. Do those results generalize beyond industrial mass societies? To find out, we conducted an experiment among 567 participants in 10 small-scale societies scattered across Central and South America, Africa, and Asia: (i) Bosawás Reserve, Nicaragua; (ii) Cotopaxi, Ecuador; (iii) Drâa-Tafilalet, Morocco; (iv) Enugu, Nigeria; (v) Le Morne, Mauritius; (vi) La Gaulette, Mauritius; (vii) Tuva, Russia; (viii) Shaanxi and Henan, China; (ix) farming communities in Japan; and (x) fishing communities in Japan. Despite widely varying languages, cultures, and subsistence modes, pride in each community closely tracked the valuation of audiences locally (mean r = +0.66) and even across communities (mean r = +0.29). This suggests that the pride system not only develops the same functional architecture everywhere but also operates with a substantial degree of universality in its content.

Cross-cultural invariances in the architecture of shame.

Human foragers are obligately group-living, and their high dependence on mutual aid is believed to have characterized our species' social evolution. It was therefore a central adaptive problem for our ancestors to avoid damaging the willingness of other group members to render them assistance. Cognitively, this requires a predictive map of the degree to which others would devalue the individual based on each of various possible acts. With such a map, an individual can avoid socially costly behaviors by anticipating how much audience devaluation a potential action (e.g., stealing) would cause and weigh this against the action's direct payoff (e.g., acquiring). The shame system manifests all of the functional properties required to solve this adaptive problem, with the aversive intensity of shame encoding the social cost. Previous data from three Western(ized) societies indicated that the shame evoked when the individual anticipates committing various acts closely tracks the magnitude of devaluation expressed by audiences in response to those acts. Here we report data supporting the broader claim that shame is a basic part of human biology. We conducted an experiment among 899 participants in 15 small-scale communities scattered around the world. Despite widely varying languages, cultures, and subsistence modes, shame in each community closely tracked the devaluation of local audiences (mean r = +0.84). The fact that the same pattern is encountered in such mutually remote communities suggests that shame's match to audience devaluation is a design feature crafted by selection and not a product of cultural contact or convergent cultural evolution.

Mindfulness and wellbeing in older adults' survivors of herdsmen attack. The mediating effect of positive reappraisal.

Objective: The Fulani herdsmen are pastoralists who move from place to place in search of vegetation for their herds cattle. The random movement of cattle has frequently led to the destruction of crops belonging to farmers. This has resulted to violent clashes between the two groups. Such events are capable of impacting on the wellbeing of the older adult survivors and affected individuals may need adequate psychological resources such as mindfulness and positive emotions such as positive appraisal to be able to cope successfully. There is substantial evidence supporting the association of mindfulness and psychological wellbeing, but little is known about the mechanism through which mindfulness exert its influence on wellbeing. The present study aimed to examine the mediating role of positive reappraisal in the relation between mindfulness and wellbeing among older adult survivors of Fulani herdsmen attack.Methods: A sample of older adult survivors of Fulani herdsmen attack (N = 308, mean age = 59.72 years) were drawn from a community in southeast, Nigeria. Participants completed self-report measures of mindfulness, positive reappraisal, life satisfaction, perceived stress and depression.Results: Hierarchical multiple regression analysis showed that Mindfulness and positive reappraisal were independently associated with wellbeing (better life satisfaction, lower perceived stress and fewer depressive symptoms), yet this association was fully mediated by positive reappraisal.Conclusion: The findings underscore the potential value of mindfulness meditation intervention programs for the vulnerable as it is capable of promoting positive emotional live and wellbeing in late life.

Role of Career Satisfaction in Basic Psychological Needs Satisfaction and Career Commitment of Nurses in Nigeria: A Self-Determination Theory Perspective.

PURPOSE: The purpose of this study was to test how basic psychological needs satisfaction contributes to career commitment through career satisfaction among nurses. BACKGROUND: There is an increasing rate of turnover among nurses and a general shortage of nurses in many countries. This has made it necessary for researchers to focus on the career satisfaction of nurses and their commitment to their careers. DESIGN AND METHODS: A cross-sectional design was employed in a survey of 233 nurses in public hospitals in southeastern Nigeria. Participants responded to self-report measures of career commitment, career satisfaction, and work-related basic needs satisfaction. FINDINGS: In the regression-based path analysis, basic psychological needs satisfaction was positively related to career satisfaction (p < .001) and career commitment (p < .001) of nurses. Career satisfaction was positively related to career commitment (p < .05). Career satisfaction mediated the relationship between basic psychological needs satisfaction and career commitment (95% confidence interval [.009, .068]). CONCLUSIONS: The results show that basic psychological needs are relevant for employee commitment, giving support to the self-determination theory. Career satisfaction provides further explanations for the relationship between psychological needs satisfaction and career commitment, although there could be reverse causal links. CLINICAL RELEVANCE: The results advance knowledge on how satisfaction of basic psychological needs can increase career satisfaction and foster more career commitment. Designing work environments that help employees to fulfil their basic psychological needs is important in the retention of nurses.

Type A behavior pattern, accident optimism and fatalism: an investigation into non-compliance with safety work behaviors among hospital nurses.

Safety work behavior has continued to attract the interest of organizational researchers and practitioners especially in the health sector. The goal of the study was to investigate whether personality type A, accident optimism and fatalism could predict non-compliance with safety work behaviors among hospital nurses. One hundred and fifty-nine nursing staff sampled from three government-owned hospitals in a state in southeast Nigeria, participated in the study. Data were collected through Type A Behavior Scale (TABS), Accident Optimism, Fatalism and Compliance with Safety Behavior (CSB) Scales. Our results showed that personality type A, accident optimism and fatalism were all related to non-compliance with safety work behaviors. Personality type A individuals tend to comply less with safety work behaviors than personality type B individuals. In addition, optimistic and fatalistic views about accidents and existing safety rules also have implications for compliance with safety work behaviors.

Cross-cultural variation in men's preference for sexual dimorphism in women's faces.

Both attractiveness judgements and mate preferences vary considerably cross-culturally. We investigated whether men's preference for femininity in women's faces varies between 28 countries with diverse health conditions by analysing responses of 1972 heterosexual participants. Although men in all countries preferred feminized over masculinized female faces, we found substantial differences between countries in the magnitude of men's preferences. Using an average femininity preference for each country, we found men's facial femininity preferences correlated positively with the health of the nation, which explained 50.4% of the variation among countries. The weakest preferences for femininity were found in Nepal and strongest in Japan. As high femininity in women is associated with lower success in competition for resources and lower dominance, it is possible that in harsher environments, men prefer cues to resource holding potential over high fecundity.

Perceiving societal pressure to be happy is linked to poor well-being, especially in happy nations.

Happiness is a valuable experience, and societies want their citizens to be happy. Although this societal commitment seems laudable, overly emphasizing positivity (versus negativity) may create an unattainable emotion norm that ironically compromises individual well-being. In this multi-national study (40 countries; 7443 participants), we investigate how societal pressure to be happy and not sad predicts emotional, cognitive and clinical indicators of well-being around the world, and examine how these relations differ as a function of countries' national happiness levels (collected from the World Happiness Report). Although detrimental well-being associations manifest for an average country, the strength of these relations varies across countries. People's felt societal pressure to be happy and not sad is particularly linked to poor well-being in countries with a higher World Happiness Index. Although the cross-sectional nature of our work prohibits causal conclusions, our findings highlight the correlational link between social emotion valuation and individual well-being, and suggest that high national happiness levels may have downsides for some.

Social mindfulness predicts concern for nature and immigrants across 36 nations.

People cooperate every day in ways that range from largescale contributions that mitigate climate change to simple actions such as leaving another individual with choice - known as social mindfulness. It is not yet clear whether and how these complex and more simple forms of cooperation relate. Prior work has found that countries with individuals who made more socially mindful choices were linked to a higher country environmental performance - a proxy for complex cooperation. Here we replicated this initial finding in 41 samples around the world, demonstrating the robustness of the association between social mindfulness and environmental performance, and substantially built on it to show this relationship extended to a wide range of complex cooperative indices, tied closely to many current societal issues. We found that greater social mindfulness expressed by an individual was related to living in countries with more social capital, more community participation and reduced prejudice towards immigrants. Our findings speak to the symbiotic relationship between simple and more complex forms of cooperation in societies.

Attitudes and behaviour toward snakes on the part of Igbo people in southeastern Nigeria.

Snakes play a crucial role in natural ecosystems, providing ecological services to people by decreasing rodent populations which may cause disease transmission and impair agricultural production. Despite these benefits, snakes are historically a target of persecution and negative attitudes across cultures, and many of them are threatened. Understanding the predictors of snake-human conflicts is essential to improve conservation efforts. We investigated the degree to which emotions, myth beliefs, experience with snakes (via exposure, bites, and knowledge of mortality from a snakebite), and education would predict attitudes toward snakes in a sample of southeastern Nigerian people. We further examined whether attitudes would predict intentional killing of snakes. Ordinal regression analyses revealed that fear, disgust, and belief in the myth that snakes are evil were related to low tolerance of snakes. More frequent encounters with snakes and higher education were associated with higher tolerance of snakes. Furthermore, higher tolerance of snakes was associated with a reduced likelihood of intentionally killing snakes, even when controlling for the influence of the other psychological and experiential variables. Wildlife management education interventions may be important to change attitudes and decrease intentional killing of snakes.

An exploratory, cross-cultural study on perception of putative cyclical changes in facial fertility cues.

Although many researchers have argued that facial traits evolved as honest cues to women's current fertility (possibly via changes in facial femininity), evidence that women's facial attractiveness is significantly, positively related to probability of conception throughout menstrual cycle is mixed. These mixed results could reflect differences among studies in the methods used to assess facial attractiveness (i.e., forced choice versus rating-scale methods), differences in how fertility was assessed, differences in perceiver characteristics (e.g., their own attractiveness), and facial preferences possibly being moderated by the characteristics of the living environment. Consequently, the current study investigated the putative effect of cyclical changes in fertility on women's facial attractiveness and femininity (1) using forced choice and rating-scale method, (2) conducting both ovulation tests and repeated daily measures of estradiol assessing the conception probability, (3) based on a culturally diverse sample of perceivers, while (4) controlling for inter-individual variation. Although we found some limited evidence that women's faces became more attractive when conception probability increased, these effects differed depending on the methods used to assess both attractiveness and fertility. Moreover, where statistically significant effects were observed, the effect sizes were extremely small. Similarly, there was little robust evidence that perceivers' characteristics reliably predicted preferences for fertility cues. Collectively, these results suggest that mixed results in previous studies examining cyclical fluctuation in women's facial attractiveness are unlikely to reflect inter-cultural differences and are more likely to reflect differences in the methods used to assess facial attractiveness and fertility.

Perceived leader integrity as a mediator between ethical leadership and ethical climate in a teaching context.

BACKGROUND: Scandalous incidents occurring in prominent organisations in the world have brought to limelight the role of leaders in shaping the ethical climate of their organisations. As a result, several studies across different organisational/occupational contexts and climes have examined and unanimously proven that ethical leadership was positively related to ethical climate. However, there is rarely any of these studies that was conducted in teaching context. Besides, the mechanisms involved between ethical leadership and ethical climate seems not to have been addressed in literature. Thus, this paper reports the findings of a study that investigated the mediating role of perceived leader integrity in the ethical leadership-ethical climate relationship among teachers. METHODS: Data were collected from 336 teachers (105 male and 231 female) in three-time periods using measures of ethical leadership, perceived leader integrity, ethical climate, and demographics. RESULTS: The results from OLS regression-based path analysis showed that: 1) ethical leadership was positively related to perceived leader integrity, 2) perceived leader integrity was positively related to ethical climate, 3) ethical leadership was positively related to ethical climate, and 4) the positive relationship between ethical leadership and ethical climate was mediated by perceived leader integrity. CONCLUSIONS: The current study extends the social learning theory by identifying perceived leader integrity as a mechanism underlying the relationship between ethical leadership and ethical climate. The findings have some implications for personnel selection especially in relation to selection of ethical leaders.

Women's preferences for men's facial masculinity are strongest under favorable ecological conditions.

The strength of sexual selection on secondary sexual traits varies depending on prevailing economic and ecological conditions. In humans, cross-cultural evidence suggests women's preferences for men's testosterone dependent masculine facial traits are stronger under conditions where health is compromised, male mortality rates are higher and economic development is higher. Here we use a sample of 4483 exclusively heterosexual women from 34 countries and employ mixed effects modelling to test how social, ecological and economic variables predict women's facial masculinity preferences. We report women's preferences for more masculine looking men are stronger in countries with higher sociosexuality and where national health indices and human development indices are higher, while no associations were found between preferences and indices of intra-sexual competition. Our results show that women's preferences for masculine faces are stronger under conditions where offspring survival is higher and economic conditions are more favorable.

The Associations of Dyadic Coping and Relationship Satisfaction Vary between and within Nations: A 35-Nation Study.

OBJECTIVE: Theories about how couples help each other to cope with stress, such as the systemic transactional model of dyadic coping, suggest that the cultural context in which couples live influences how their coping behavior affects their relationship satisfaction. In contrast to the theoretical assumptions, a recent meta-analysis provides evidence that neither culture, nor gender, influences the association between dyadic coping and relationship satisfaction, at least based on their samples of couples living in North America and West Europe. Thus, it is an open questions whether the theoretical assumptions of cultural influences are false or whether cultural influences on couple behavior just occur in cultures outside of the Western world. METHOD: In order to examine the cultural influence, using a sample of married individuals (N = 7973) from 35 nations, we used multilevel modeling to test whether the positive association between dyadic coping and relationship satisfaction varies across nations and whether gender might moderate the association. RESULTS: RESULTS reveal that the association between dyadic coping and relationship satisfaction varies between nations. In addition, results show that in some nations the association is higher for men and in other nations it is higher for women. CONCLUSIONS: Cultural and gender differences across the globe influence how couples' coping behavior affects relationship outcomes. This crucial finding indicates that couple relationship education programs and interventions need to be culturally adapted, as skill trainings such as dyadic coping lead to differential effects on relationship satisfaction based on the culture in which couples live.

Corrigendum: The Associations of Dyadic Coping and Relationship Satisfaction Vary between and within Nations: A 35-Nation Study.

[This corrects the article on p. 1106 in vol. 7, PMID: 27551269.].