Browsing by Subject "Self-Control"

Now showing 1 - 5 of 5

Open Access
Culture moderates the relationship between self-control ability and free will beliefs in childhood
(Cognition, 2021-05) Zhao, Xin; Wente, Adrienne; Flecha, María Fernández; Galvan, Denise Segovia; Gopnik, Alison; Kushnir, Tamar
We investigate individual, developmental, and cultural differences in self-control in relation to children's changing belief in "free will" - the possibility of acting against and inhibiting strong desires. In three studies, 4- to 8-year-olds in the U.S., China, Singapore, and Peru (N = 441) answered questions to gauge their belief in free will and completed a series of self-control and inhibitory control tasks. Children across all four cultures showed predictable age-related improvements in self-control, as well as changes in their free will beliefs. Cultural context played a role in the timing of these emerging free will beliefs: Singaporean and Peruvian children's beliefs changed at later ages than Chinese and U.S. children. Critically, culture moderated the link between self-control abilities and free will beliefs: Individual differences in self-control behaviors were linked to individual differences in free will beliefs in U.S. children, but not in children from China, Singapore or Peru. There was also evidence of a causal influence of self-control performance on free will beliefs in our U.S. sample. In Study 2, a randomly assigned group of U.S. 4- and 5-year-olds who failed at two self-control tasks showed reduced belief in free will, but a group of children who completed free will questions first did not show changes to self-control. Together these results suggest that culturally-acquired causal-explanatory frameworks for action, along with observations of one's own abilities, might influence children's emerging understanding of free will.
Open Access
Microinterventions targeting regulatory focus and regulatory fit selectively reduce dysphoric and anxious mood.
(Behav Res Ther, 2015-09) Strauman, Timothy J; Socolar, Yvonne; Kwapil, Lori; Cornwell, James FM; Franks, Becca; Sehnert, Steen; Higgins, E Tory
Depression and generalized anxiety, separately and as comorbid states, continue to represent a significant public health challenge. Current cognitive-behavioral treatments are clearly beneficial but there remains a need for continued development of complementary interventions. This manuscript presents two proof-of-concept studies, in analog samples, of "microinterventions" derived from regulatory focus and regulatory fit theories and targeting dysphoric and anxious symptoms. In Study 1, participants with varying levels of dysphoric and/or anxious mood were exposed to a brief intervention either to increase or to reduce engagement in personal goal pursuit, under the hypothesis that dysphoria indicates under-engagement of the promotion system whereas anxiety indicates over-engagement of the prevention system. In Study 2, participants with varying levels of dysphoric and/or anxious mood received brief training in counterfactual thinking, under the hypothesis that inducing individuals in a state of promotion failure to generate subtractive counterfactuals for past failures (a non-fit) will lessen their dejection/depression-related symptoms, whereas inducing individuals in a state of prevention failure to generate additive counterfactuals for past failures (a non-fit) will lessen their agitation/anxiety-related symptoms. In both studies, we observed discriminant patterns of reduction in distress consistent with the hypothesized links between dysfunctional states of the two motivational systems and dysphoric versus anxious symptoms.
Open Access
Modeling the onset of a depressive episode: A self-regulation perspective.
(Current opinion in psychology, 2021-04-21) Strauman, Timothy J
Major depression is an episodic disorder which, for many individuals, has its onset in a distinct change of emotional state which then persists over time. The present article explores the utility of combining a dynamical systems approach to depression, focusing specifically on the change of state associated with episode onset, with a self-regulation perspective, which operationalizes how feedback received in the ongoing process of goal pursuit influences affect, motivation, and behavior, for understanding how a depressive episode begins. The goals of this review are to survey the recent literature modeling the onset of a depressive episode and to illustrate how a self-regulation perspective can provide a conceptual framework and testable hypotheses regarding episode onset within a dynamical systems model of depression.
Open Access
Self-Regulation and Psychopathology: Toward an Integrative Translational Research Paradigm.
(Annual review of clinical psychology, 2017-05) Strauman, Timothy J
This article presents a general framework in which different manifestations of psychopathology can be conceptualized as dysfunctions in one or more mechanisms of self-regulation, defined as the ongoing process of managing personal goal pursuit in the face of internal, interpersonal, and environmental forces that would derail it. The framework is based on the assertion that self-regulation is a critical locus for the proximal influence on motivation, cognition, emotion, and behavior of more distal factors such as genetics, temperament, socialization history, and neurophysiology. Psychological theories of self-regulation are ideal platforms from which to integrate the study of self-regulation both within and across traditional disciplines. This article has two related goals: to elucidate how the construct of self-regulation provides a unique conceptual platform for the study of psychopathology and to illustrate that platform by presenting our research on depression as an example.
Open Access
The role of psychological science in efforts to improve cardiovascular medication adherence.
(The American psychologist, 2018-11) Bosworth, Hayden B; Blalock, Dan V; Hoyle, Rick H; Czajkowski, Susan M; Voils, Corrine I
Poor adherence to cardiovascular disease medications carries significant psychological, physical, and economic costs, including failure to achieve therapeutic goals, high rates of hospitalization and health care costs, and incidence of death. Despite much effort to design and evaluate adherence interventions, rates of adherence to cardiovascular-related medications have remained relatively stagnant. We identify two major reasons for this: First, interventions have not addressed the time-varying reasons for nonadherence, and 2nd, interventions have not explicitly targeted the self-regulatory processes involved in adherence behavior. Inclusion of basic and applied psychological science in intervention development may improve the efficacy and effectiveness of behavioral interventions to improve adherence. In this article, we use a taxonomy of time-based phases of adherence-including initiation, implementation, and discontinuation-as context within which to review illustrative studies of barriers to adherence, interventions to improve adherence, and self-regulatory processes involved in adherence. Finally, we suggest a framework to translate basic psychological science regarding self-regulation into multicomponent interventions that can address multiple and time-varying barriers to nonadherence across the three adherence phases. The field of psychology is essential to improving medication adherence and associated health outcomes, and concrete steps need to be taken to implement this knowledge in future interventions. (PsycINFO Database Record (c) 2018 APA, all rights reserved).