Boosting positive mood during stress: a Daily Coping Toolkit replication in college undergraduates.

Background: College students face significant mental health challenges that were exacerbated by the COVID-19 pandemic. Evidence suggests mental-health burdens are substantial and resources limited. We sought to replicate research supporting a one-time daily ambulatory intervention to facilitate regulation of negative emotion and increase generation of positive emotion.

What drives preventative health behaviors one year into a pandemic? A replication and extension.

: There is continued interest in understanding what leads people to engage in CDC-recommended COVID-19 prevention behaviors. We tested whether fear and COVID-19 worry would replicate as the primary drivers of six CDC recommended prevention behaviors. : We recruited 741 adult participants during the second major peak of the COVID-19 pandemic in the United States (early 2021).

Can the positive buffer the negative? Testing the impact of protective childhood experiences on adjustment in adults following trauma exposure.

Background: It is unclear if protective childhood experiences (PCEs), like emotional support and economic stability, exert influence on adulthood adjustment. Prior research suggests PCEs can promote resilience through increased social connection. In contrast, research has demonstrated potential life-long negative impacts of adverse childhood experiences (ACEs) on psychological health.

Self-care behaviors and affect during the early stages of the COVID-19 pandemic.

Objective: Self-care behaviors aimed at maintaining physical and mental health are often recommended during stressful contexts. We tested emotional predictors of self-care behaviors (healthy eating, exercise, engaging in a hobby, relaxation/meditation, time spent with a supportive person, talking online with friends/family) during the COVID-19 pandemic and their emotional consequences. We hypothesized a reciprocal within-person process whereby positive affect increases self-care behaviors (Hypothesis 1) and self-care behaviors increase positive affect while decreasing negative affect (Hypothesis 2).

Longitudinal Associations of Global and Daily Support with Marital Status.

The provision and receipt of emotional support demonstrates benefits for relationships; however, little research has investigated how either global or day-to-day spousal support influences marital stability. This project assessed how global perception of support from a partner and daily provision and receipt of emotional support over 1 week contributed to divorce 10 years later, accounting for demographic covariates. There were no significant associations of support variables with future divorce.

Math matters: A novel, brief educational intervention decreases whole number bias when reasoning about COVID-19.

At the onset of the coronavirus disease (COVID-19) global pandemic, our interdisciplinary team hypothesized that a mathematical misconception-whole number bias (WNB)-contributed to beliefs that COVID-19 was less fatal than the flu. We created a brief online educational intervention for adults, leveraging evidence-based cognitive science research, to promote accurate understanding of rational numbers related to COVID-19. Participants from a Qualtrics panel (N = 1,297; 75% White) were randomly assigned to an intervention or control condition, solved health-related math problems, and subsequently completed 10 days of daily diaries in which health cognitions and affect were assessed.

What Drives Preventive Health Behavior During a Global Pandemic? Emotion and Worry.

Background & Purpose: Primary prevention of COVID-19 has focused on encouraging compliance with specific behaviors that restrict contagion. This investigation sought to characterize engagement in these behaviors in U.S.

Optimal well-being in the aftermath of anxiety disorders: A 10-year longitudinal investigation.

Background: Although preliminary research has explored the possibility of optimal well-being after depression, it is unclear how rates compare to anxiety. Using Generalized Anxiety Disorder (GAD) and Panic Disorder (PD) as exemplars of anxiety, we tested the rates of optimal well-being one decade after being diagnosed with an anxiety disorder. Based on reward deficits in depression, we pre-registered our primary hypothesis that optimal well-being would be more prevalent after anxiety than depression as well as tested two exploratory hypotheses.

Boosting positive mood in medical and emergency personnel during the COVID-19 pandemic: preliminary evidence of efficacy, feasibility and acceptability of a novel online ambulatory intervention.

Objectives: The aim of this project was to test the efficacy of a brief and novel online ambulatory intervention aimed at supporting psychological health and well-being for medical personnel and first responders during the COVID-19 pandemic.

Methods: Interested participants, n=28, actively employed as medical personnel, support staff and emergency responders, in the Midwestern USA in May-June of 2020, provided informed consent and were randomised to complete either low-dose or high-dose intervention, one time daily for 1 week via smartphone application. Each daily intervention included expressive writing, adaptive emotion regulation activity and (one vs two) positive emotion-generation activities, lasting 3-6 min a day.

Does negative emotion differentiation influence how people choose to regulate their distress after stressful events? A four-year daily diary study.

Much is known about the types of strategies people use to regulate emotions. Less is known about individual differences that influence emotion regulation strategy selection. In this study, we tested the moderating role of negative emotion differentiation (NED; i.

Understanding psychological flexibility: A multimethod exploration of pursuing valued goals despite the presence of distress.

Psychological flexibility (PF), defined as the ability to pursue valued life aims despite the presence of distress, is a fundamental contributor to health (Kashdan & Rottenberg, 2010). Existing measures of PF have failed to consider the valued goals that give context for why people are willing to manage distress. Using 4 independent samples and 3 follow-up samples, we examined the role of PF in well-being, emotional experience and regulation, resilience, goal pursuit, and daily functioning.

The momentary benefits of positive events for individuals with elevated social anxiety.

Understanding how individuals with varying levels of social anxiety respond to daily positive events is important. Psychological processes that increase positive emotions are being widely used as strategies to not only enhance well-being but also reduce the symptoms and impairment tied to negative emotional dispositions and conditions, including excessive social anxiety. At present, it is unclear whether and how levels of social anxiety impact the psychological benefits derived from momentary positive events.

Optimal Well-Being after Major Depression.

Can people achieve optimal well-being and thrive after major depression? Contemporary epidemiology dismisses this possibility, viewing depression as a recurrent, burdensome condition with a bleak prognosis. To estimate the prevalence of thriving after depression in United States adults, we used data from the Midlife Development in the United States (MIDUS) study. To count as thriving after depression, a person had to exhibit no evidence of major depression, and had to exceed cut offs across nine facets of psychological well-being that characterize the top 25% of US nondepressed adults.

The Curious Neglect of High Functioning After Psychopathology: The Case of Depression.

We address a key issue at the intersection of emotion, psychopathology, and public health-the startling lack of attention to people who experience benign outcomes, and even flourish, after recovering from depression. A rereading of the epidemiological literature suggests that the orthodox view of depression as chronic, recurrent, and lifelong is overstated. A significant subset of people recover and thrive after depression, yet research on such individuals has been rare.

Is grit relevant to well-being and strengths? Evidence across the globe for separating perseverance of effort and consistency of interests.

Objective: Researchers conceptualize grit as the combination of two facets: perseverance of effort and consistency of interests toward long-term goals. We tested the reliability of grit facet scores across the globe and examined how differently each grit facet related to well-being and personality strengths.

Method: An international sample of 7,617 participants from six of the seven continents (excluding Antarctica) completed an online survey.

Predicting help-seeking behavior: The impact of knowing someone close who has sought help.

Objectives: This study sought to replicate and extend research on social facilitators of college student's help seeking for psychological problems.

Participants: We collected data on 420 ethnically diverse college students at a large public university (September 2008-May 2010).

Methods: Students completed a cross-sectional online survey.

Psychometric validation of a simplified form of the PICTS for low-reading level populations.

The Psychological Inventory of Criminal Thinking Styles (PICTS) is one of the most widely used measures of criminal thinking. Although the PICTS has adequate psychometric qualities with many general population inmates, the measurement confound of reading ability may decrease its construct validity in low-literacy inmates. To help resolve this confound, we present psychometric evaluation of a simplified version of the PICTS (PICTS-SV) in which item language was simplified but item content was preserved.

Effectiveness of a self-administered intervention for criminal thinking: Taking a Chance on Change.

The current study tested the effectiveness of a self-administered, cognitive-behavioral intervention targeting criminal thinking for inmates in segregated housing: Taking a Chance on Change (TCC). Participants included 273 inmates in segregated housing at state correctional institutions. Reductions in criminal thinking, as assessed by the Psychological Inventory of Criminal Styles-Simplified Version, were found in the general criminal thinking score as well as the proactive and reactive composite scores.

Personality Strengths as Resilience: A One-Year Multiwave Study.

We examined how personality strengths prospectively predict reactions to negative life events. Participants were 797 community adults from 42 countries. At five points over the course of 1 year, participants completed a series of questionnaires measuring seven personality strengths (hope, grit, meaning in life, curiosity, gratitude, control beliefs, and use of strengths), subjective well-being, and frequency and severity of negative life events.

Wise Additions Bridge the Gap between Social Psychology and Clinical Practice: Cognitive-Behavioral Therapy as an Exemplar.

Progress in clinical science, theory, and practice requires the integration of advances from multiple fields of psychology, but much integration remains to be done. The current article seeks to address the specific gap that exists between basic social psychological theories and the implementation of related therapeutic techniques. We propose several "wise additions," based upon the principles outlined by Walton (2014), intended to bridge current social psychological research with clinical psychological therapeutic practice using cognitive behavioral therapy as an example.

Different types of well-being? A cross-cultural examination of hedonic and eudaimonic well-being.

A large international sample was used to test whether hedonia (the experience of positive emotional states and satisfaction of desires) and eudaimonia (the presence of meaning and development of one's potentials) represent 1 overarching well-being construct or 2 related dimensions. A latent correlation of .96 presents negligible evidence for the discriminant validity between Diener's (1984) subjective well-being model of hedonia and Ryff's (1989) psychological well-being model of eudaimonia.