Appraisal and coping predict health and well-being during the COVID-19 pandemic: An international approach.

COVID-19 has had a devastating impact on people worldwide. We conducted an international survey (n = 3646) examining the degree to which people's appraisals and coping activities around the pandemic predicted their health and well-being. We obtained subsamples from 12 countries-Bangladesh, Bulgaria, China, Colombia, India, Israel, the Netherlands, Norway, Peru, Portugal, Turkey and the United States. For each, we assessed appraisals and coping strategies as well as indicators of physical and mental health and well-being. Results indicated that, despite mean-level societal differences in outcomes, the pattern of appraisals and coping strategies predicting health and well-being was consistent across countries. Use of disengagement coping (particularly behavioural disengagement and self-isolation) was associated with relatively negative outcomes. In contrast, optimistic appraisals (particularly of high accommodation-focused coping potential and the ability to meet one's physical needs), use of problem-focused coping strategies (especially problem-solving) and accommodative coping strategies (especially positive reappraisal and self-encouragement) were associated with relatively positive outcomes. Our study highlights the critical importance of considering accommodative coping in stress and coping research. It also provides important information on how people have been dealing with the pandemic, the predictors of well-being under pandemic conditions and the generality of such relations.

Mind your meat: Religious differences in the social perception of animals.

While previous work demonstrated that animals are categorised based on their edibility, little research has systematically evaluated the role of religion in the perception of animal edibility, particularly when specific animals are deemed sacred in a religion. In two studies, we explored a key psychological mechanism through which sacred animals are deemed inedible by members of a faith: mind attribution. In Study 1, non-vegetarian Hindus in Singapore (N = 70) evaluated 19 animals that differed in terms of their sacredness and edibility. Results showed that participants categorised animals into three groups: holy animals (high sacredness but low edibility), food animals (low sacredness but high edibility) and neutral animals (low sacredness and low edibility). Holy animals were deemed to possess greater mental life compared to other animal categories. In Study 2, we replicated this key finding with Hindus in India (N = 100), and further demonstrated that the observed pattern of results was specific to Hindus but not Muslims (N = 90). In both studies, mind attribution mediated the negative association between sacredness and edibility. Our findings illustrate how religious groups diverge in animal perception, thereby highlighting the role of mind attribution as a crucial link between sacredness and edibility.

Country-level correlates of the Dark Triad traits in 49 countries.

OBJECTIVES: The Dark Triad traits (i.e., narcissism, psychopathy, Machiavellianism) capture individual differences in aversive personality to complement work on other taxonomies, such as the Big Five traits. However, the literature on the Dark Triad traits relies mostly on samples from English-speaking (i.e., Westernized) countries. We broadened the scope of this literature by sampling from a wider array of countries. METHOD: We drew on data from 49 countries (N = 11,723; 65.8% female; AgeMean  = 21.53) to examine how an extensive net of country-level variables in economic status (e.g., Human Development Index), social relations (e.g., gender equality), political orientations (e.g., democracy), and cultural values (e.g., embeddedness) relate to country-level rates of the Dark Triad traits, as well as variance in the magnitude of sex differences in them. RESULTS: Narcissism was especially sensitive to country-level variables. Countries with more embedded and hierarchical cultural systems were more narcissistic. Also, sex differences in narcissism were larger in more developed societies: Women were less likely to be narcissistic in developed (vs. less developed) countries. CONCLUSIONS: We discuss the results based on evolutionary and social role models of personality and sex differences. That higher country-level narcissism was more common in less developed countries, whereas sex differences in narcissism were larger in more developed countries, is more consistent with evolutionary than social role models.

Being an other-sex crush during early adolescence in India: Investigating socio-behavioral and psychological concomitants.

INTRODUCTION: After years of neglect, there is now strong empirical interest in adolescents' romantic experiences. Most studies, however, focus on adolescents' romantic relationships in Western societies and fail to consider other-types of romantic experiences and adolescents who reside in non-Western societies. METHODS: The present study begins to address these research gaps by examining the social-behavioral and psychological concomitants of being viewed by many other-sex peers as a crush, or having high crush status, in a large (N = 445; 56% male; Mage = 13.77 years, SD = 0.43) longitudinal sample of young adolescents in urban India. RESULTS: Utilizing self- and peer-report data, results provide the first evidence that being viewed by many peers as an other-sex crush in India is related to some of the same (i.e., physical attractiveness), but also different (i.e., shyness) social-behavioral characteristics relative to what has been found in studies of young adolescents from the United States. Further analysis revealed new evidence regarding the unique social-behavioral (i.e., decreased physical aggression) and psychological (i.e., decreased social anxiety) outcomes associated with high crush status in urban India. CONCLUSIONS: Taken as a whole, results underscore the importance of considering the larger cultural context in studies of young adolescents' crush experiences.

Detecting affiliation in colaughter across 24 societies.

Laughter is a nonverbal vocal expression that often communicates positive affect and cooperative intent in humans. Temporally coincident laughter occurring within groups is a potentially rich cue of affiliation to overhearers. We examined listeners' judgments of affiliation based on brief, decontextualized instances of colaughter between either established friends or recently acquainted strangers. In a sample of 966 participants from 24 societies, people reliably distinguished friends from strangers with an accuracy of 53-67%. Acoustic analyses of the individual laughter segments revealed that, across cultures, listeners' judgments were consistently predicted by voicing dynamics, suggesting perceptual sensitivity to emotionally triggered spontaneous production. Colaughter affords rapid and accurate appraisals of affiliation that transcend cultural and linguistic boundaries, and may constitute a universal means of signaling cooperative relationships.

The Perception of Spontaneous and Volitional Laughter Across 21 Societies.

Laughter is a nonverbal vocalization occurring in every known culture, ubiquitous across all forms of human social interaction. Here, we examined whether listeners around the world, irrespective of their own native language and culture, can distinguish between spontaneous laughter and volitional laughter-laugh types likely generated by different vocal-production systems. Using a set of 36 recorded laughs produced by female English speakers in tests involving 884 participants from 21 societies across six regions of the world, we asked listeners to determine whether each laugh was real or fake, and listeners differentiated between the two laugh types with an accuracy of 56% to 69%. Acoustic analysis revealed that sound features associated with arousal in vocal production predicted listeners' judgments fairly uniformly across societies. These results demonstrate high consistency across cultures in laughter judgments, underscoring the potential importance of nonverbal vocal communicative phenomena in human affiliation and cooperation.

Understanding the Association Between Spirituality, Religiosity, and Feelings of Happiness and Sadness Among HIV-Positive Indian Adults: Examining Stress-Related Growth as a Mediator.

This study examined the role of stress-related growth as a mediator of the associations between spirituality, religiosity, and feelings of happiness and sadness in a sample of 178 HIV-positive Indian adults. Results indicated that spirituality, but not religiosity, was associated with feelings of happiness and sadness. Subsequent mediation analyses indicated that stress-related growth fully mediated the relationships involving spirituality and feelings of happiness and sadness. Overall, our findings point to the importance of facilitating greater spiritual development among HIV-positive Indians, as well as promoting strategies that help them develop and apply stress-related growth coping methods in their lives.

Kneel, stand, prostrate: The psychology of prayer postures in three world religions.

Most people practice a religion, often multiple times daily. Among the most visible aspects of these practices are body postures, which according to embodiment theories, likely shape the psychological experience of religion. In a preregistered study, we test this idea among Christians, Muslims, and Hindus in the United States, Turkey, and India (N = 2,458). In a repeated-measures experimental design, participants imagined praying in various typical postures, then reported their affective experiences, perceived relationship with deity, and prayer content for each posture. Compared to downward and constrictive postures, expansive and upward postures led to more positive emotions, dominance, and praise-focused prayers, yet fewer introspective or intercessory prayers. Interestingly, these effects varied based on religious context (e.g., many Hindus found upward and expansive postures offensive, causing no positive affect). We further explored whether these effects varied based on posture familiarity, religiosity, interoceptive sensibility, and personality traits. This research provides unique data on embodied processes shaping affect and cognition in religious practices.

Grandiose narcissism, unfounded beliefs, and behavioral reactions during the COVID-19 pandemic.

A theoretical perspective on grandiose narcissism suggests four forms of it (sanctity, admiration, heroism, rivalry) and states that these forms conduce to different ways of thinking and acting. Guided by this perspective, we examined in a multinational and multicultural study (61 countries; N = 15,039) how narcissism forms are linked to cognitions and behaviors prompted by the COVID-19 pandemic. As expected, differences in cognitions and behaviors across narcissism forms emerged. For example, higher narcissistic rivalry predicted lower likelihood of enactment of COVID-19 prevention behaviors, but higher narcissistic sanctity predicted higher likelihood of enactment of COVID-19 prevention behaviors. Further, whereas the heroism, admiration, and rivalry narcissism forms acted in a typically antisocial manner, with high narcissism predicting greater endorsement of unfounded health beliefs, the sanctity form acted in a prosocial manner, with higher narcissism being linked to lower endorsement of unfounded COVID-19 health beliefs. Thus, the findings (a) support the idea of four narcissism forms acting differently, and (b) show that these differences reflect a double-edged sword, sometimes linking to an anti-social orientation, and sometimes linking to a pro-social orientation.

Emotion regulation strategies and psychological health across cultures.

Emotion regulation is important for psychological health and can be achieved by implementing various strategies. How one regulates emotions is critical for maximizing psychological health. Few studies, however, tested the psychological correlates of different emotion regulation strategies across multiple cultures. In a preregistered cross-cultural study (N = 3,960, 19 countries), conducted during the COVID-19 pandemic, we assessed associations between the use of seven emotion regulation strategies (situation selection, distraction, rumination, cognitive reappraisal, acceptance, expressive suppression, and emotional support seeking) and four indices of psychological health (life satisfaction, depressive symptoms, perceived stress, and loneliness). Model comparisons based on Bayesian information criteria provided support for cultural differences in 36% of associations, with very strong support for differences in 18% of associations. Strategies that were linked to worse psychological health in individualist countries (e.g., rumination, expressive suppression) were unrelated or linked to better psychological health in collectivist countries. Cultural differences in associations with psychological health were most prominent for expressive suppression and rumination and also found for distraction and acceptance. In addition, we found evidence for cultural similarities in 46% of associations between strategies and psychological health, but none of this evidence was very strong. Cultural similarities were most prominent in associations of psychological health with emotional support seeking. These findings highlight the importance of considering the cultural context to understand how individuals from diverse backgrounds manage unpleasant emotions. (PsycInfo Database Record (c) 2023 APA, all rights reserved).

Belief in a just world, teacher justice, and bullying behavior.

The relation between school students' belief in a just world (BJW) and their bullying behavior was investigated in a questionnaire study. The mediating role of teacher justice was also examined. Data were obtained from a total of N = 458 German and Indian high school students. Regression analyses revealed that the more strongly students believed in a personal just world and the more they evaluated their teachers' behavior toward them personally to be just, the less bullying behavior they reported. Moreover, students with a strong BJW tended to evaluate their teachers' behavior toward them personally to be more just, and the experience of teacher justice mediated the relation between BJW and less bullying perpetration. This pattern of results was as expected and consistent across different cultural contexts. It persisted when neuroticism, sex, and country were controlled. The adaptive functions of BJW and implications for future school research are discussed.

Belief in a just world and wellbeing in Indian schools.

This study investigates the meaning of belief in just world (BJW) for students' subjective justice experiences with their parents and teachers and for students' subjective well-being. The hypotheses tested were that the more strongly students endorse BJW, the less the distress at school and depressive symptoms they experience. Two dimensions of BJW were assessed: personal BJW, reflecting the belief that events in one's own life are generally just, and general BJW, reflecting the belief that the world is basically a just place. The participants were 278 Indian students attending ten 10th grade classes at two private English-medium schools. The results showed that only the personal BJW, not the general BJW, was important in explaining justice experiences and wellbeing. The more the students endorsed the belief in personal just world, the more they felt treated justly by their teachers and their parents alike, and the less distress at school and depressive symptoms they experienced. In addition, teacher justice, but not parent justice, explained distress at school. Finally, the effect of personal BJW on depressive symptoms was partly mediated by both teacher and parent justice. This pattern of results persisted when class effects were controlled. Overall, this pattern of results emphasizes the importance of the individual and subjective experience of justice of the teacher behavior for adolescent wellbeing. Implications for further studies on BJW and wellbeing at school are discussed.

The role of revenge, denial, and terrorism distress in restoring just world beliefs: the impact of the 2008 Mumbai attacks on British and Indian students.

Just world beliefs for students (N = 413) from India and the United Kingdom were measured. The participants then read a scenario about the 2008 terrorist attacks on Mumbai. The participants were then assessed for terrorism distress and offered multiple strategies (revenge and denial) to restore their just world beliefs. The findings indicate that students resident in India along with those who hold strong just world beliefs felt more distress, held a greater desire for revenge, and demonstrated more denial than the British students and those who had weak beliefs in a just world. These results indicate the important role just world beliefs play in responding to the threat created by mass casualty terrorist attacks. The implications for just world theory are also discussed.

Longitudinal Associations among Machiavellianism, Popularity Goals, and Adolescents' Cyberbullying Involvement: The Role of Gender.

Drawing on the social-ecological perspective, this longitudinal study investigated the potential moderating effect of gender in the relationships among Machiavellianism, popularity goals, and cyberbullying involvement (i.e. victimization, perpetration) among adolescents from China, Cyprus, India, and the United States. There were 2,452 adolescents (Mage = 14.85; SD = .53; 13-16 years old; 49.1% girls) from China, Cyprus, India, and the United States included in this study. They completed surveys on Machiavellianism, popularity goals, and cyberbullying victimization and perpetration during the fall of 2014 (Time 1). One year later, during the fall of 2015, adolescents completed surveys on cyberbullying victimization and perpetration. Findings revealed that Machiavellianism and popularity goals were both associated positively with Time 2 cyberbullying victimization and perpetration for all adolescents. The associations between Machiavellianism and Time 2 cyberbullying perpetration and between popularity goals and Time 2 cyberbullying perpetration were stronger for Chinese and Indian boys than girls. Opposite patterns were found for popularity goals and Time 2 cyberbullying perpetration for adolescents from the United States. Gender did not moderate any of the associations for Cypriot adolescents or for Time 2 cyberbullying victimization. The social-ecological perspective provides a useful understanding of how various contexts influence bullying.

Coping styles as predictors of negative affective conditions in Asian Indians: does being optimistic still make a difference?

The present study examined the role of optimism, as measured by the Life Orientation Test-Revised, and coping styles, as measured by the COPE scale, in predicting negative affective conditions (viz., depressive symptoms, stress, and negative affect) among 386 Asian Indian young adults (197 females and 189 males). Results from our hierarchical regression analyses indicated that coping styles accounted for a medium-large amount of variance in negative affective conditions, after controlling for demographic factors (i.e. age, gender, parent's education, and monthly income). Five coping styles were significant in predicting negative affective conditions across all three indices; mental disengagement, denial, and venting emotions were found to be maladaptive, while positive reinterpretation and humor were found to be adaptive among Asian Indian young adults. Furthermore, when optimism was included in the prediction model, optimism consistently accounted for additional variance in negative affective conditions, beyond coping styles. Due to the additional variance among negative affective conditions accounted for by optimism when compared to coping, we advise that mental health professionals consider prioritizing the reinforcement of positive expectancy in addition to enhancing adaptive coping styles and reducing the use of maladaptive coping among Asian Indians.

Coping with Public and Private Face-to-Face and Cyber Victimization among Adolescents in Six Countries: Roles of Severity and Country.

This study investigated the role of medium (face-to-face, cyber) and publicity (public, private) in adolescents' perceptions of severity and coping strategies (i.e., avoidant, ignoring, helplessness, social support seeking, retaliation) for victimization, while accounting for gender and cultural values. There were 3432 adolescents (ages 11-15, 49% girls) in this study; they were from China, Cyprus, the Czech Republic, India, Japan, and the United States. Adolescents completed questionnaires on individualism and collectivism, and ratings of coping strategies and severity for public face-to-face victimization, private face-to-face victimization, public cyber victimization, and private cyber victimization. Findings revealed similarities in adolescents' coping strategies based on perceptions of severity, publicity, and medium for some coping strategies (i.e., social support seeking, retaliation) but differential associations for other coping strategies (i.e., avoidance, helplessness, ignoring). The results of this study are important for prevention and intervention efforts because they underscore the importance of teaching effective coping strategies to adolescents, and to consider how perceptions of severity, publicity, and medium might influence the implementation of these coping strategies.

The fear of COVID-19 scale: Its structure and measurement invariance across 48 countries.

Coronavirus disease (COVID-19) has been a source of fear around the world. We asked whether the measurement of this fear is trustworthy and comparable across countries. In particular, we explored the measurement invariance and cross-cultural replicability of the widely used Fear of COVID-19 scale (FCV-19S), testing community samples from 48 countries (N = 14,558). The findings indicate that the FCV-19S has a somewhat problematic structure, yet the one-factor solution is replicable across cultural contexts and could be used in studies that compare people who vary on gender and educational level. The validity of the scale is supported by a consistent pattern of positive correlations with perceived stress and general anxiety. However, given the unclear structure of the FCV-19S, we recommend using latent factor scores, instead of raw scores, especially in cross-cultural comparisons. (PsycInfo Database Record (c) 2022 APA, all rights reserved).

Structure of Dark Triad Dirty Dozen Across Eight World Regions.

The Dark Triad (i.e., narcissism, psychopathy, Machiavellianism) has garnered intense attention over the past 15 years. We examined the structure of these traits' measure-the Dark Triad Dirty Dozen (DTDD)-in a sample of 11,488 participants from three W.E.I.R.D. (i.e., North America, Oceania, Western Europe) and five non-W.E.I.R.D. (i.e., Asia, Middle East, non-Western Europe, South America, sub-Saharan Africa) world regions. The results confirmed the measurement invariance of the DTDD across participants' sex in all world regions, with men scoring higher than women on all traits (except for psychopathy in Asia, where the difference was not significant). We found evidence for metric (and partial scalar) measurement invariance within and between W.E.I.R.D. and non-W.E.I.R.D. world regions. The results generally support the structure of the DTDD.

Self-control, diet concerns and eater prototypes influence fatty foods consumption of adolescents in three countries.

As adolescent overweight has become a widespread problem in the developed world, it is timely to understand commonalities underlying dietary practices across countries. This study examines whether consumption of fruits and vegetables and fatty foods among adolescents in different countries is related to the same individual difference and social influence factors-in particular, adolescents' self-control, diet concerns and perceptions of typical (un)healthy eating peers (prototypes). We included 511 normal weight and overweight adolescents (14-19 years) from the United States, the Netherlands and Hungary, who completed a survey during class hours. After controlling for country and demographics, an additional 8% of the variance in the consumption of fatty foods was explained by self-control, diet concerns and prototypes of unhealthy eaters. Only 3% of fruit and vegetable consumption was explained by these factors, and only the association with self-control was significant. This study demonstrates that the same individual difference and social influence factors may influence adolescents' dietary practices in different countries. In addition to highlighting country differences in dietary practices and the prevalence of overweight, exploring common factors that may shape dietary practices across countries is important for future research. These commonalities may advance conceptual understanding and inform prevention across developed countries.

The relationship between existential well-being and mood-related psychiatric burden in Indian young adults with attachment deficits: a cross-cultural validation study.

BACKGROUND: Attachment and spirituality are thought to have deep evolutionary roots but are always interpreted within the framework of culture, religion and personal beliefs. While insecure attachment has been observed to be positively related with psychopathology, a positive mental health effect has often been described for spirituality. To examine the cross-cultural validation of previous research focused on Austrian young adults with Western socialization, we attempt to replicate our study examining the influence spirituality has on the connection between insecure attachment and mood-related psychiatric burden with Indian young adults. METHODS: We investigated Avoidant (AV) and Anxious (AX) Attachment (ECR-RD), Religious (RWB) and Existential (EWB) Well-Being (MI-RSWB), and mood-related psychiatric burden (Anxiety, Depression, Somatization; BSI-18) in 443 (31% female) Indian young adults (age range: 18-30 years) with a Hindu upbringing. RESULTS: Compared to young adults with a Roman Catholic upbringing in a Western socialization, Indian participants did not differ in AX and EWB but scored higher in mood-related psychiatric burden (eta2 = .04), AV (eta2 = .14), as well as RWB (eta2 = .28; all p < .01). As in previous research only AX (ß = .40) positively predicted mood-related psychiatric burden (ΔR2 = .15, all p < .01), while EWB was an additional negative predictor (ß = -.11, p < .05). CONCLUSIONS: Our findings emphasize the universal importance of attachment and spirituality for mental health as well as the potential influence of socialization on their development. Furthermore, they underline that Existential Well-Being - including hope for a better future, forgiveness, and the experience of sense and meaning - appears to have a compensating effect on the relation between insecure attachment and impaired mental health.