Leaning in
The Power in Being Yourself: Feeling Authentic Enhances the Sense of Power
Muping Gan, Daniel Heller & Serena Chen
Personality and Social Psychology Bulletin, forthcoming
Abstract:
Across five experiments (total N = 715), we propose that people can gain a subjective sense of power by being authentic — in other words, state authenticity breeds power. Supporting this, participants reported feeling more powerful when they visualized themselves behaving authentically versus inauthentically (Study 1), or recalled a time when they felt authentic versus inauthentic (Studies 2-4). Studies 3 and 4 revealed that authenticity (vs. inauthenticity) likely drives the authenticity-to-power effect. Finally, Study 5 showed that perceivers infer others’ power and make important downstream judgments (i.e., likelihood of being an effective negotiator and leader), based on others’ authenticity. Importantly, our findings could not be explained by positive affect or by preexisting power differences, and held across diverse situations (e.g., those absent of social pressure). Implications for state authenticity as a strategic means to attain power and for understanding its dynamic nature and effects are discussed.
Revisiting the Marshmallow Test: A Conceptual Replication Investigating Links Between Early Delay of Gratification and Later Outcomes
Tyler Watts, Greg Duncan & Haonan Quan
Psychological Science, forthcoming
Abstract:
We replicated and extended Shoda, Mischel, and Peake’s (1990) famous marshmallow study, which showed strong bivariate correlations between a child’s ability to delay gratification just before entering school and both adolescent achievement and socioemotional behaviors. Concentrating on children whose mothers had not completed college, we found that an additional minute waited at age 4 predicted a gain of approximately one tenth of a standard deviation in achievement at age 15. But this bivariate correlation was only half the size of those reported in the original studies and was reduced by two thirds in the presence of controls for family background, early cognitive ability, and the home environment. Most of the variation in adolescent achievement came from being able to wait at least 20 s. Associations between delay time and measures of behavioral outcomes at age 15 were much smaller and rarely statistically significant.
The Rationality of Literal Tide Pod Consumption
Ryan Murphy
Southern Methodist University Working Paper, April 2018
Abstract:
At the conclusion of 2017, to the dismay of journalists, pundits, and academics, large numbers of adolescents began consuming Tide Pods, a form of laundry detergent that is candy-like in appearance. This paper argues that purposeful consumption of laundry detergent may in fact be individually rational for adolescents, although with negative externalities. The consumption of Tide Pods may allow adolescents to successfully signal status in accordance with the Handicap Principle, which explains the beauty of a peacock’s tail and the practice of stotting by gazelles in the wild. The Handicap Principle is also a common explanation of adolescents’ willingness to engage in dangerous activities such as drug use. Public policy implications of this theoretic argument would include discouraging Tide Pod consumption, although this would follow from the negative externalities associated with positional goods, as opposed to paternalistic concern for the health of adolescents.
Effects of Testosterone Administration on Threat and Escape Anticipation in the Orbitofrontal Cortex
Sarah Heany et al.
Psychoneuroendocrinology, forthcoming
Abstract:
Recent evidence suggests that the steroid hormone testosterone can decrease the functional coupling between orbitofrontal cortex (OFC) and amygdala. Theoretically this decoupling has been linked to a testosterone-driven increase of goal-directed behaviour in case of threat, but this has never been studied directly. Therefore, we placed twenty-two women in dynamically changing situations of escapable and inescapable threat after a within-subject placebo controlled testosterone administration. Using functional magnetic resonance imaging (fMRI) we provide evidence that testosterone activates the left lateral OFC (LOFC) in preparation of active goal-directed escape and decouples this OFC area from a subcortical threat system including the central-medial amygdala, hypothalamus and periaqueductal gray. This LOFC decoupling was specific to threatening situations, a point that was further emphasized by an absence of such decoupling in a second experiment focused on resting-state connectivity. These results not only confirm that testosterone administration decouples the LOFC from the subcortical threat system, but also show that this is specifically the case in response to acute threat, and ultimately leads to an increase in LOFC activity when the participant prepares a goal-directed action to escape. Together these results for the first time provide a detailed understanding of functional brain alterations induced by testosterone under threat conditions, and corroborate and extend the view that testosterone prepares the brain for goal-directed action in case of threat.
The Future and the Will: Planning requires self-control, and ego depletion leads to planning aversion
Hallgeir Sjåstad & Roy Baumeister
Journal of Experimental Social Psychology, May 2018, Pages 127-14
Abstract:
Planning is a future-directed thought process that is highly beneficial, but it requires mental effort. Informed by the strength model of self-regulation, four studies (N = 546) tested the hypothesis that willingness to plan is linked to good self-control. A correlational study (N = 201) found that people high in trait self-control had done more planning than other people and also intended to make more plans during the upcoming week. A laboratory experiment (N = 105) induced a state of ego depletion (i.e., impaired self-control) by having some participants continuously break pre-established motoric habits, and afterward these participants were less willing to make plans for the next four weeks than control participants. A field experiment (N = 112) used a naturally occurring induction of decision fatigue (IKEA shopping) and again found that ego depletion reduced planning. Specifically, fatigued shoppers exiting the store expressed more reluctance to make long-term plans than shoppers who were just arriving at the store. A final laboratory experiment (N = 128) found that ego-depleted participants were only half as likely to choose a planning task as control participants, and identified effort avoidance as a mediator mechanism. Crucially, the three experimental manipulations were longer and stronger than the 5-min depletion tasks often used in previous research (24 min; 2 h; 30 min), and manipulation checks confirmed severe and significant ego depletion. Depletion had no effects on aspirational goals or the desire to relax. We conclude that wants and desires come easily, while planning requires mental work akin to self-control. Theoretical and methodological implications are discussed.
Can Ego-Depletion Be Helpful? Testing the Process Model Implication That Ego-Depletion Reduces Irrational Persistence
Jeffrey Osgood
Basic and Applied Social Psychology, May/June 2018, Pages 161-170
Abstract:
The present research investigated the effect of state self-control on irrational persistence, which refers to pursuing a course of action beyond when the effort can no longer be justified given the cost of persisting and/or probability of success. In 3 studies, ego-depletion reduced the level of irrational persistence displayed by participants. In Study 1, ego-depleted participants were less tolerant of ineffective default computer settings that wasted their time. In Study 2, ego-depleted participants solved more anagrams than nondepleted participants when given only a limited amount of time to solve anagrams that ranged from easy to difficult and skipping was allowed. Study 3 conceptually replicate the effect of Study 2 but produced a smaller effect size.
Temptations of Friends: Adolescents’ Neural and Behavioral Response to Best Friends Predicts Risky Behavior
Marigrace Ambrosia et al.
Social Cognitive and Affective Neuroscience, May 2018, Pages 483–491
Abstract:
Adolescents are notorious for engaging in risky, reward-motivated behavior, and this behavior occurs most often to social reward, typically in the form of peer social contexts involving intense positive affect. A combination of greater neural and behavioral sensitivity to peer positive affect may characterize adolescents who are especially likely to engage in risky behaviors. To test this hypothesis, we examined 50 adolescents’ reciprocal positive affect and neural response to a personally relevant, ecologically valid pleasant stimulus: positive affect expressed by their best friend during a conversation about past and future rewarding mutual experiences. Participants were typically developing community adolescents (age 14-18 years, 48.6% female), and risky behavior was defined as a factor including domains such as substance use, sexual behavior, and suicidality. Adolescents who engaged in more real-life risk-taking behavior exhibited either a combination of high reciprocal positive affect behavior and high response in the left ventrolateral prefrontal cortex — a region associated with impulsive sensation-seeking — or the opposite combination. Behavioral and neural sensitivity to peer influence could combine to contribute to pathways from peer influence to risky behavior, with implications for healthy development.
Inspired to Create: Awe Enhances Openness to Learning and the Desire for Experiential Creation
Melanie Rudd, Christian Hildebrand & Kathleen Vohs
Journal of Marketing Research, forthcoming
Abstract:
Automated fabrication, home services, and premade goods pervade the modern consumer landscape. Against this backdrop, this research explored how an emotion — awe — could motivate consumers to instead partake in experiential creation (i.e., activities wherein one actively produces an outcome) by enhancing their willingness to learn. Across eight experiments, experiencing awe (vs. happiness, excitement, pride, amusement, and/or neutrality) increased people's likelihood of choosing an experiential creation gift (vs. one not involving experiential creation), willingness to pay for experiential creation products (vs. comparable ready-made products), likelihood of creating a bespoke snack (vs. taking a premade one), preference for experiential creation solutions (vs. solutions without experiential creation), likelihood of purchasing a product when it was framed as high (vs. low) in experiential creation, preference for high (vs. low) experiential creation meals, and likelihood of creating a knickknack (vs. taking a premade one). This greater desire for experiential creation was mediated by openness to learning and moderated by need for closure. These findings, relevant for firms encouraging creation-oriented products and behaviors, offer fresh insights on engaging consumers.