Vicarious punishment of moral violations in naturalistic drama narratives predicts cortical synchronization.

Punishment of moral norm violators is instrumental for human cooperation. Yet, social and affective neuroscience research has primarily focused on second- and third-party norm enforcement, neglecting the neural architecture underlying observed (vicarious) punishment of moral wrongdoers. We used naturalistic television drama as a sampling space for observing outcomes of morally-relevant behaviors to assess how individuals cognitively process dynamically evolving moral actions and their consequences. Drawing on Affective Disposition Theory, we derived hypotheses linking character morality with viewers' neural processing of characters' rewards and punishments. We used functional magnetic resonance imaging (fMRI) to examine neural responses of 28 female participants while free-viewing 15 short story summary video clips of episodes from a popular US television soap opera. Each summary included a complete narrative structure, fully crossing main character behaviors (moral/immoral) and the consequences (reward/punishment) characters faced for their actions. Narrative engagement was examined via intersubject correlation and representational similarity analysis. Highest cortical synchronization in 9 specifically selected regions previously implicated in processing moral information was observed when characters who act immorally are punished for their actions with participants' empathy as an important moderator. The results advance our understanding of the moral brain and the role of normative considerations and character outcomes in viewers' engagement with popular narratives.

The complicated impact of media use before bed on sleep: Results from a combination of objective EEG sleep measurement and media diaries.

Media use has been linked to sleep disturbance, but the results are inconsistent. This study explores moderating conditions. A media diary study with 58 free-living adults measured the time spent with media before bed, the location of use, and multitasking. Electroencephalography (EEG) captured bedtime, total sleep time, and the percent of time spent in deep (Stage N3), and rapid eye movement (REM) sleep. Media use in the hour before sleep onset was associated with an earlier bedtime. If the before bed use did not involve multitasking and was conducted in bed, that use was also associated with more total sleep time. Media use duration was positively associated with (later) bedtime and negatively associated with total sleep time. Sleep quality, operationalised as the percent of total sleep time spent in N3 and REM sleep, was unaffected by media use before bed. Bedtime media use might not be as detrimental for sleep as some previous research has shown. Important contextual variables moderate the relationship, such as location, multitasking, and session length.

Self-regulation as a key boundary condition in the relationship between social media use and well-being.

The use of social media can have positive and negative effects on psychological well-being. The present article proposes that self-regulation and the related concept of self-control act as central boundary conditions of this relationship. Successfully self-regulated social media use can bolster psychological well-being through mood management and emotion-focused coping as well as through intrinsic need satisfaction. In contrast, poorly self-regulated forms of social media use can result in goal conflict, i.e., the displacement of, and distraction from other activities, which may negatively affect well-being. The article covers relevant factors that influence (un-)successful self-regulation of social media use, including media affordances, social dynamics, as well as trait and state user characteristics, including media habits and mindfulness.

Media for Coping During COVID-19 Social Distancing: Stress, Anxiety, and Psychological Well-Being.

In spring 2020, COVID-19 and the ensuing social distancing and stay-at-home orders instigated abrupt changes to employment and educational infrastructure, leading to uncertainty, concern, and stress among United States college students. The media consumption patterns of this and other social groups across the globe were affected, with early evidence suggesting viewers were seeking both pandemic-themed media and reassuring, familiar content. A general increase in media consumption, and increased consumption of specific types of content, may have been due to media use for coping strategies. This paper examines the relationship between the stress and anxiety of university students and their strategic use of media for coping during initial social distancing periods in March-April 2020 using data from a cross-sectional survey. We examine links between specific types of media use with psychological well-being concepts, and examine the moderating roles of traits (hope, optimism, and resilience) as buffers against negative relationships between stress and anxiety and psychological well-being. Our findings indicate that stress was linked to more hedonic and less eudaimonic media use, as well as more avoidant and escapist media-based coping. Anxiety, on the other hand, was linked to more media use in general, specifically more eudaimonic media use and a full range of media-based coping strategies. In turn, escapist media was linked to negative affect, while reframing media and eudaimonic media were linked to positive affect. Avoidant coping was tied to poorer mental health, and humor coping was tied to better mental health. Hedonic and need-satisfying media use were linked to more flourishing. Hope, optimism, and resilience were all predictive of media use, with the latter two traits moderating responses to stress and anxiety. The findings give a nuanced portrait of college students' media use during a pandemic-induced shutdown, showing that media use is closely intertwined with well-being in both adaptive and maladaptive patterns.

Problematic social media use is associated with increased risk-aversion after negative outcomes in the Balloon Analogue Risk Task.

Around the world, people display maladaptive, problematic use of online social networking sites (SNSs), like Facebook, Snapchat, and Instagram. The symptoms of this problematic SNS use are similar to symptoms of substance use and behavioral addictive disorders, such as relapse when attempting to quit. Individuals with substance use and behavioral addictive disorders also display increased risk-taking when making decisions, but little research has investigated decision making with respect to problematic SNS use. We therefore assessed risky decision making and problematic SNS use by utilizing the Balloon Analogue Risk Task (BART). In line with previous research on behavioral addictive disorders, we hypothesized that greater problematic SNS use would be linked with greater risk-taking. To address our hypothesis, we conducted three studies in which we administered the Bergen Social Media Addiction Scale to assess problematic SNS use and related scores to BART performance. Collectively, and counter to our initial hypothesis, we found a negative association between problematic SNS use and risk-taking. Specifically, the more problematic one's SNS use, the less risk they took, but this risk aversion only occurred after receiving negative feedback on previous decisions and then encountering a situation with less actual risk. Implications of this novel finding are discussed. (PsycInfo Database Record (c) 2020 APA, all rights reserved).

Meal-Concurrent Media Use is Associated with Increased Dietary Intake with no Evidence of Next Meal Compensation in Free-Living Adults.

OBJECTIVE: This study aimed to determine the effects of concurrent and prior media use on dietary intake and dietary compensation over 3 days in a free-living population. METHODS: Participants recorded food intake and media use for a 3-day period. The US Department of Agriculture multiple-pass method was used to ensure completeness of food records. Energy, protein, fiber, carbohydrates, sugar, added sugar, fat, saturated fat, trans fat, and sodium intake were assessed. RESULTS: Meals consumed while participants used media included 149.3 more calories on average than meals consumed without media. Media meals were higher in protein, carbohydrates, fat, and saturated fat. There was no evidence of dietary compensation at the meal following the media meal. CONCLUSIONS: Energy and macronutrient intake increased during media-paired meals. Dietary compensation at the subsequent meal did not occur, suggesting that the effects of media-paired meals are additive over the short term.

Identifying Sustainable Population Segments Using a Multi-Domain Questionnaire: A Five Factor Sustainability Scale.

This study presents the creation of a measurement device to determine and define sustainability attitudes into identifiable sustainability segments. These segments were profiled with behavioral and sociodemographic data. Based on previous literature, key sustainability topics were identified from which a 31-item questionnaire was developed, the Five Factor Sustainability Scale (FFSS). With the FFSS, multiple domains of environmental sustainability can be assessed. We present results validating this measure using a factor-cluster segmentation approach in a nationally representative sample (N = 508). Five sustainability factors emerged: (1) sustainable spending, (2) sustainable skepticism, (3) sustainable responsibility, (4) sustainable support, and (5) sustainable mobility. A cluster analysis on this sample yielded four segments in which people were grouped according to their sustainable attitudes: (1) Convinced Sustainers, (2) Sustainable Wannabes, (3) Sustainable Non-Believers, and (4) Non-Sustainers. Results linking these segments to behavioral and demographic data show discernable differences between the segments, making the FFSS a valuable tool for future intervention studies aiming at sustainable behavior change.

Spontaneous Hedonic Reactions to Social Media Cues.

Why is it so difficult to resist the desire to use social media? One possibility is that frequent social media users possess strong and spontaneous hedonic reactions to social media cues, which, in turn, makes it difficult to resist social media temptations. In two studies (total N = 200), we investigated less-frequent and frequent social media users' spontaneous hedonic reactions to social media cues using the Affect Misattribution Procedure-an implicit measure of affective reactions. Results demonstrated that frequent social media users showed more favorable affective reactions in response to social media (vs. control) cues, whereas less-frequent social media users' affective reactions did not differ between social media and control cues (Studies 1 and 2). Moreover, the spontaneous hedonic reactions to social media (vs. control) cues were related to self-reported cravings to use social media and partially accounted for the link between social media use and social media cravings (Study 2). These findings suggest that frequent social media users' spontaneous hedonic reactions in response to social media cues might contribute to their difficulties in resisting desires to use social media.