Previous research has shown that mind wandering has both positive and negative effects. Mind wandering may improve creative problem solving; however, it could also lead to negative moods and poor mental health. It has also been shown that some forms of mental illness are positively related to creativity.
View Article and Find Full Text PDFEnhancing creative problem-solving is increasingly important in a modern globalized society. Previous research has shown that creative problem-solving can be improved if the mind is allowed to wander during time set aside from solving a problem, known as the incubation period. However, some research also suggests that mind wandering leads to negative affect.
View Article and Find Full Text PDFStressful experiences can lead to meaning making that is seen as central in adjustment. Although rumination and negative affect are important factors of meaning making, little is known about the mechanisms involved. This study aimed to examine the meaning making process, focusing on the role of intrusive and deliberate rumination and negative affect.
View Article and Find Full Text PDFShinrigaku Kenkyu
February 2016
This study examined the relationship between meaning making and rumination regarding stressful events. We focused on two facets of rumination: intrusive and deliberate. Participants (N = 121) completed a questionnaire about a stressful event in their life that assessed the possibility of preventing the event, probability of the event occurring, perceived threat of the event, and meaning making.
View Article and Find Full Text PDFAn “incubation period” refers to an individual’s temporary shift away from an unsolved problem, which ultimately facilitates better problem solving. In this study, we experimentally examined whether creative problem solving was facilitated in accordance with the frequency of mind-wandering during an incubation period. Fifty-nine Japanese undergraduate participants (23 men and 36 women) were asked to complete the Unusual Uses Test (UUT) twice; the UUT is a traditional measurement of the various aspects of divergent thinking (including fluency, flexibility, and originality).
View Article and Find Full Text PDFThis study examined the factors that influence meaning making and rumination related to stressful events. Six hypothetical scenarios were used, all of which were contextualized stressful events. Participants (N = 779) completed a questionnaire about one of the six scenarios, which assessed the possibility of preventing the event, the probability of the event occurring, the perceived threat of the event, the frequency of rumination, and meaning making.
View Article and Find Full Text PDFShinrigaku Kenkyu
December 2013
Endo and Yukawa (2012) investigated the process of maintaining anger and demonstrated that a sense of unintegration of thoughts maintained anger by promoting recurrent thinking and avoidance behavior. Our present study examined how personality characteristics and situational factors affected the process of maintaining anger. Undergraduates (N=713) wrote about an anger episode, and completed questionnaires assessing their sense of unintegration of thoughts, recurrent thinking, avoidance behaviors, and maintaining anger.
View Article and Find Full Text PDFThis study explores the impact of mindfulness meditation on anger. A meditation group (N = 37) attended 5-10 minutes of mindfulness meditation daily for a week. They were assessed with self-report scales measuring three aspects of anger (rumination, arousal, and lengthiness) before, just after, and four weeks after their one-week participation.
View Article and Find Full Text PDFThe relationship between a recipient's response to a disclosure of negative emotional experiences, and the resulting negative emotions, hesitation in self-disclosure (interpersonal and intra-personal hesitation), and negatively-confused thoughts of the person making the disclosure were investigated. Female undergraduates (N=271) were asked to write about angry or sad events in their interpersonal relationships that they had disclosed to someone. Then they completed a questionnaire assessing the recipient's responses, negative emotions such as anger and depression caused by the recipient's responses, hesitation in self-disclosure about the events, and negatively-confused thoughts about the events.
View Article and Find Full Text PDFShinrigaku Kenkyu
February 2012
Relationships were investigated between the sense of unintegration of thoughts, recurrent thinking, and avoidance behavior, which are considered to be factors in maintaining anger. Undergraduate students (N = 990) were asked to write about anger episodes that they had experienced a week or more ago. Then, they completed a questionnaire assessing their sense of unintegration of thoughts at the present time and just after the episode, their present recurrent thinking, their avoidance behavior after the episode, and their present degree of anger.
View Article and Find Full Text PDFShinrigaku Kenkyu
October 2009
The present study examined whether burnout and negative ruminations of helping professional were reduced by writing about their dissonant emotional experiences. Twenty helping professionals were randomly assigned to either the experimental condition (writing about emotionally dissonant experiences for three weeks) or the control condition (without writing). The results revealed that participants in the experimental condition had significantly lower scores for emotional dissonance than the control group immediately and three weeks after the experimental intervention.
View Article and Find Full Text PDFAlthough dozens of studies have documented a relationship between violent video games and aggressive behaviors, very little attention has been paid to potential effects of prosocial games. Theoretically, games in which game characters help and support each other in nonviolent ways should increase both short-term and long-term prosocial behaviors. We report three studies conducted in three countries with three age groups to test this hypothesis.
View Article and Find Full Text PDFPsychol Rep
December 2008
Relationships between diary-keeping and tendencies toward alexithymia and rumination were studied in 118 Japanese participants. Participants completed a questionnaire that assessed diary-keeping habits (both regular and Web diaries), alexithymia, and rumination. Individuals who wrote about their daily events epically (i.
View Article and Find Full Text PDFContext: Youth worldwide play violent video games many hours per week. Previous research suggests that such exposure can increase physical aggression.
Objective: We tested whether high exposure to violent video games increases physical aggression over time in both high- (United States) and low- (Japan) violence cultures.
The relationships among attachment style, self-concealment, and interpersonal distance were studied with 71 Japanese undergraduates (33 men and 38 women, ages 18 to 20 years, M = 18.7, SD= .6).
View Article and Find Full Text PDFThis study investigated sex differences in the relationships among an ger, depression, and coping strategies. Undergraduate students, 77 men and 130 women, 3 not identified by sex, voluntarily participated. Participants made ratings on a self-report about anger, depression, coping strategies, and mental health.
View Article and Find Full Text PDFThis study investigated inhibitory factors in anger expressive behaviors among Japanese junior high school students. It also examined the relations between anger experiences and personality traits: verbal expression and narcissism. The result indicated that the factors of "friend relationships" and "cost-reward consciousness" were selected as those which inhibited anger expressive behaviors.
View Article and Find Full Text PDFShinrigaku Kenkyu
February 2004
This study investigated time series changes and relationships of affects, cognitions, and behaviors immediately, a few days, and a week after anger episodes. Two hundred undergraduates (96 men, and 104 women) completed a questionnaire. The results were as follows.
View Article and Find Full Text PDFThis study investigated the affects and behaviors that accompany and follow anger episodes, and examined the relationship among them, in hope of developing self-regulated and effective methods of controlling anger. With an open-ended questionnaire, 42 anger episodes were collected and categorized. Results suggested that typical anger episodes were instigated by selfishness, insult, coercion, and trouble and a close person such as friends was often the cause and target of anger.
View Article and Find Full Text PDFThis study examined the relationship between a diminished sense of self-existence and self-reported aggression among Japanese undergraduate students. Based on the previous scales, 81 items were developed to measure the diminished sense of self-existence and were assumed to represent three dimensions: self, others, and time. 286 undergraduate students rated themselves on the Diminished Sense of Self-existence Scale and the 1992 Buss-Perry Aggression Questionnaire.
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