Effects of Wearable Fitness Trackers and Activity Adequacy Mindsets on Affect, Behavior, and Health: Longitudinal Randomized Controlled Trial.

BACKGROUND: There is some initial evidence suggesting that mindsets about the adequacy and health consequences of one's physical activity (activity adequacy mindsets [AAMs]) can shape physical activity behavior, health, and well-being. However, it is unknown how to leverage these mindsets using wearable technology and other interventions. OBJECTIVE: This research examined how wearable fitness trackers and meta-mindset interventions influence AAMs, affect, behavior, and health. METHODS: A total of 162 community-dwelling adults were recruited via flyers and web-based platforms (ie, Craigslist and Nextdoor; final sample size after attrition or exclusion of 45 participants). Participants received an Apple Watch (Apple Inc) to wear for 5 weeks, which was equipped with an app that recorded step count and could display a (potentially manipulated) step count on the watch face. After a baseline week of receiving no feedback about step count, participants were randomly assigned to 1 of 4 experimental groups: they received either accurate step count (reference group; 41/162, 25.3%), 40% deflated step count (40/162, 24.7%), 40% inflated step count (40/162, 24.7%), or accurate step count+a web-based meta-mindset intervention teaching participants the value of adopting more positive AAMs (41/162, 25.3%). Participants were blinded to the condition. Outcome measures were taken in the laboratory by an experimenter at the beginning and end of participation and via web-based surveys in between. Longitudinal analysis examined changes within the accurate step count condition from baseline to treatment and compared them with changes in the deflated step count, inflated step count, and meta-mindset conditions. RESULTS: Participants receiving accurate step counts perceived their activity as more adequate and healthier, adopted a healthier diet, and experienced improved mental health (Patient-Reported Outcomes Measurement Information System [PROMIS]-29) and aerobic capacity but also reduced functional health (PROMIS-29; compared with their no-step-count baseline). Participants exposed to deflated step counts perceived their activity as more inadequate; ate more unhealthily; and experienced more negative affect, reduced self-esteem and mental health, and increased blood pressure and heart rate (compared with participants receiving accurate step counts). Inflated step counts did not change AAM or most other outcomes (compared with accurate step counts). Participants receiving the meta-mindset intervention experienced improved AAM, affect, functional health, and self-reported physical activity (compared with participants receiving accurate step counts only). Actual step count did not change in either condition. CONCLUSIONS: AAMs--induced by trackers or adopted deliberately--can influence affect, behavior, and health independently of actual physical activity. TRIAL REGISTRATION: ClinicalTrials.gov NCT03939572; https://www.clinicaltrials.gov/ct2/show/NCT03939572.

Listening to bridge societal divides.

The U.S. is plagued by a variety of societal divides across political orientation, race, and gender, among others. Listening has the potential to be a key element in spanning these divides. Moreover, the benefits of listening for mitigating social division has become a culturally popular idea and practice. Recent evidence suggests that listening can bridge divides in at least two ways: by improving outgroup sentiment and by granting outgroup members greater status and respect. When reviewing this literature, we pay particular attention to mechanisms and to boundary conditions, as well as to the possibility that listening can backfire. We also review a variety of current interventions designed to encourage and improve listening at all levels of the culture cycle. The combination of recent evidence and the growing popular belief in the significance of listening heralds a bright future for research on the many ways that listening can diffuse stereotypes and improve attitudes underlying intergroup division.

Evaluation of the "rethink stress" mindset intervention: A metacognitive approach to changing mindsets.

Experimental research has demonstrated that a stress-is-enhancing mindset can be induced and can improve outcomes by presenting information on the enhancing nature of stress. However, experimental evidence, media portrayals, and personal experience about the debilitating nature of stress may challenge this mindset. Thus, the traditional approach of focusing on the more "desired" mindset without arming participants against encounters with the less desired mindsets may not be sustainable in the face of conflicting information. How might this limitation be resolved? Here, we present three randomized-controlled interventions that test the efficacy of a "metacognitive approach." In this approach, participants are given more balanced information about the nature of stress along with metacognitive information on the power of their mindsets aimed at empowering them to choose a more adaptive mindset even in the face of conflicting information. In Experiment 1, employees of a large finance company randomized to the metacognitive mindset intervention reported greater increases in stress-is-enhancing mindsets and greater improvements in self-reported measures of physical health symptoms and interpersonal-skill work performance 4 weeks later compared to a waitlist control. Experiment 2, adapted to be distributed electronically via multimedia modules, replicates the effects on stress mindset and symptoms. Experiment 3 compares the metacognitive stress mindset intervention with a more traditional stress mindset manipulation. The metacognitive approach led to greater initial increases in a stress-is-enhancing mindset relative to the traditional intervention, and these increases were sustained after exposure to contradictory information. Taken together, these results provide support for a metacognitive approach to mindset change. (PsycInfo Database Record (c) 2023 APA, all rights reserved).

The promise and pitfalls of cross-partisan conversations for reducing affective polarization: Evidence from randomized experiments.

Organizations, activists, and scholars hope that conversations between outpartisans (supporters of opposing political parties) can reduce affective polarization (dislike of outpartisans) and bolster democratic accountability (e.g., support for democratic norms). We argue that such conversations can reduce affective polarization but that these effects are likely to be conditional on topic, being especially likely if the conversations topics avoid discussion of areas of disagreement; usually not persist long-term; and be circumscribed, not affecting attitudes toward democratic accountability. We support this argument with two unique experiments where we paired outpartisan strangers to discuss randomly assigned topics over video calls. In study 1, we found that conversations between outpartisans about their perfect day dramatically decreased affective polarization, although these impacts decayed long-term. Study 2 also included conversations focusing on disagreement (e.g., why each supports their own party), which had no effects. Both studies found little change in attitudes related to democratic accountability.