Browsing by Subject "Well-being"

Marketers seek to create and consumers seek to cultivate a variety of positive emotional experiences. Despite their importance to consumer behavior, researchers have lacked a clear understanding of the distinct behavioral consequences of specific positive emotions. My dissertation examines how different positive emotions (e.g., hope, love, and pride) can differentially affect consumers' decisions and behaviors. I find that positive emotions can not only be differentiated but also that specific positive emotions lead to distinctly different patterns of consumption behavior, such as considering more options, donating in different ways, engaging in more effortful actions, or performing more socially conscious consumption behaviors benefiting distant others. I find important differences both with momentary emotional experiences and downstream consequences of chronic emotional experiences.

Positive emotions differ reliably in the degree to which they create a lens of problem-solving, social connection, and perceived control. For example, I find that positive emotions characterized by a social connection lens (e.g., love and gratitude) lead to increases in socially conscious behaviors benefiting distant others. The tendency to perceive one's environment through a problem-solving lens (which characterizes hope and interest but not love and gratitude) leads to larger consideration sets and engagement in more effortful environmental actions. I also examine how positive emotions characterized by different lenses, such as perceived control (e.g., pride) and social connection (e.g., love), produce distinct behaviors within the same consumption context (e.g., giving in different ways in response to a fundraising appeal). Five studies demonstrate that positive emotions can be characterized in ways that allow prediction of distinct forms of broadening and specific consumption behaviors.

Consumers are increasingly being encouraged to engage in consumption with the specific intention of improving their own emotional well-being (called “self-gifting consumption”). As a result, the market around self-care and self-gifting has been growing over the last several years. At the same time, however, consumers are also experiencing what has been called a “time famine,” or the sense of not having enough time to accomplish what they need or want to do. Leveraging the academic literatures on self-gifting consumption and time perceptions, this dissertation explores this tension, its psychological underpinnings, and possible solutions. Specifically, two essays explore antecedents of consumer interest in self-gifting, consequences of engaging in self-gifting, and the role of time perceptions in shaping these relationships.

Essay 1 examines the role of perceived time availability in driving consumers’ attitudes toward “self-gifting appeals,” or marketing appeals that communicate the intention to improve one’s emotional well-being through the purchase or consumption of a given offering. Six studies reveal that perceiving time as more (vs. less) abundant leads consumers to resonate more with self-gifting appeals, compared to when the same offerings are positioned in other ways. This occurs because perceived time abundance triggers a heightened sense of contentment—a positive, emotion-like state of feeling complete, and characterized by a desire to focus on one’s emotions—which, in turn, increases attitudes towards appeals that involve a personal, emotional focus (as with self-gifting appeals).

Turning from antecedents to consequences, Essay 2 tests whether engaging in a brief self-gifting experience provides emotional well-being benefits, whether consumers can correctly intuit this outcome, and the potential moderating role of time perceptions. Four studies demonstrate that, despite consumers’ expectations that time scarcity will hamper their ability to derive emotional benefit from self-gifting experiences, time- scarce consumers in fact derive amplified emotional well-being boosts, relative to time- abundant consumers. In addition to improving emotional well-being, self-gifting experiences can also expand one’s sense of available time, particularly for the time-scarce.

Overall, this dissertation contributes to the literatures on time perceptions, self- gifting, affective forecasting, and consumer well-being and has implications for the role that consumption and marketing can play in improving consumers’ lives.

People regularly monitor and control the impressions others form of them but differ in the degree to which they both convey impressions that are consistent with their private self-views (self-presentational congruence) and present different images of themselves to different targets (self-presentational variability). Based on three models described in the literature, variability and incongruence were hypothesized to be either negatively, positively, or curvilinearly related to psychological and social well-being. Three studies examined the self-reported psychosocial implications of self-presentational congruence and variability—assessed by the impressions participants desired to make on nine targets in their lives (Study 1a), a behavioral measure of video-recorded self-presentations to bogus targets (Study 1b), and self-reported self-presentational variability and congruence in people’s daily interactions with targets in their lives (Study 2). Overall, the results supported the first two hypotheses—showing both positive and negative relationships between congruence/variability and well-being—but not the third hypothesis. Participants who desired or actually conveyed more congruent self-presentations reported greater psychosocial well-being. Participants who tried to be perceived differently across their everyday interactions—particularly with distant targets—reported lower psychosocial well-being and less positive social interactions as well; such variability also showed accelerating or decelerating effects at particularly low and high levels for some outcomes. In addition, some support was obtained for the psychosocial benefits of variability with reasonably congruent self-presentations, and even benefits for incongruence at times. Thus, both self-presentational congruence and self-presentational variability are associated with immediate and general positive psychosocial outcomes.

As a psychological principle, the golden rule represents an ethic of universal empathic concern. It is, surprisingly, present in the sacred texts of virtually all religions, and in philosophical works across eras and continents. Building on the literature demonstrating a positive impact of prosocial behavior on well-being, the present study investigates the psychological function of universal empathic concern in Indian Hindus, Christians, Muslims and Sikhs.

I develop a measure of the centrality of the golden rule-based ethic, within an individual’s understanding of his or her religion, that is applicable to all theistic religions. I then explore the consistency of its relationships with psychological well-being and other variables across religious groups.

Results indicate that this construct, named Moral Concern Religious Focus, can be reliably measured in disparate religious groups, and consistently predicts well-being across them. With measures of Intrinsic, Extrinsic and Quest religious orientations in the model, only Moral Concern and religiosity predict well-being. Moral Concern alone mediates the relationship between religiosity and well-being, and explains more variance in well-being than religiosity alone. The relationship between Moral Concern and well-being is mediated by increased preference for prosocial values, more satisfying interpersonal relationships, and greater meaning in life. In addition, across religious groups Moral Concern is associated with better self-reported physical and mental health, and more compassionate attitudes toward oneself and others.

Two additional types of religious focus are identified: Personal Gain, representing the motive to use religion to improve one’s life, and Relationship with God. Personal Gain is found to predict reduced preference for prosocial values, less meaning in life, and lower quality of relationships. It is associated with greater interference of pain and physical or mental health problems with daily activities, and lower self-compassion. Relationship with God is found to be associated primarily with religious variables and greater meaning in life.

I conclude that individual differences in the centrality of the golden rule and its associated ethic of universal empathic concern may play an important role in explaining the variability in associations between religion, prosocial behavior and well-being noted in the literature.

When behavior is directed toward activities, people, and experiences that people find most important in their lives, they are engaged in valued living. Given that valued living is associated with well-being, quality of life, and happiness, understanding ways in which value-concordant behavior can be promoted, enhanced, and maintained is of utmost importance. Two studies sought to examine the associations between mindfulness--as a dispositional trait and as developed through training--and valued living. In Study 1 dispositional mindfulness was strongly related to three aspects of valued living: the general tendency for people to understand their values and act in value-consistent ways; directing behavior toward valued activities; and clarity of, action toward, and feelings of success and satisfaction with action toward specific important values. Study 2 compared valued living scores of people participating in a Mindfulness Based Stress Reduction (MBSR) program to a control group. Mindfulness training was related to increased general valuing processes and value-relevant behavior but was not related to increased clarity of, action, or success or satisfaction with action toward specific values.

The two studies also explored the mechanisms underlying the relationship between mindfulness and valued living. In Study 1, self-compassion, psychological flexibility, and self-clarity each partially mediated the relationship between dispositional mindfulness and valued living, but decentering did not. In Study 2, change in attention mediated the relationship between group (MBSR or control) and valued living, but acceptance, self-compassion, psychological flexibility, self-clarity, and decentering did not. Lastly, both studies found that valued living mediated the relationship between mindfulness and well-being. Taken together, these findings add to the growing body of literature demonstrating the benefits of mindfulness and highlight the important influence that clearly identifying and behaving in accordance with important values has on well-being.

Material consumption has increased exponentially in recent decades, establishing most American consumers today as the most materially wealthy humans in history. But what is all of our stuff really buying us? Despite our material wealth, Americans suffer from many poverties and illnesses that seem to be exacerbated rather than alleviated by our culture of consumerism. Even more clear is the threat that our consumption behavior poses to the environment. In seeking solutions to overconsumption, interest in minimalism as a lifestyle has rapidly expanded over the past decade. Given a lack of academic research on this topic, the current work relies on four datasets using quantitative surveys (total N = 1,117) and in-depth qualitative interviews (N = 30 minimalists) to explore the following questions: what does it mean to practice minimalism, what motivates people to adopt minimalism, and what impacts do people report experiencing as a result of practicing minimalism? I find that minimalism is a practice of centering one's values and intentionally allocating and cultivating one's resources across a variety of domains. By investing one’s time, money, attention, energy, and space into that which is most valued and divesting from that which is not, minimalists seek to maximize value and minimize costs. As a result, I suggest that minimalism is a consumption orientation and practice that is value-driven and resource-building. I find that minimalist consumers often adopt minimalism during periods of significant change and transition and are primarily motivated by a desire to reduce stress and increase their psychological well-being. Minimalists report a high number of benefits from practicing minimalism, including increased financial security, improved psychological well-being, less stress, more free time, fewer distractions, and a greater sense of control. In conceptualizing minimalism more broadly, I adapt and extend Antonovsky’s theory of salutogenesis (1979, 1987) to argue that minimalism can be viewed as a case of a salutogenic (vs. pathogenic) consumption orientation – that is, consumption that is focused on building well-being through the active cultivation of valued resources (as compared to consumption that threatens well-being and depletes valued resources). I conclude that minimalism is a promising pathway to greater individual well-being with positive second-order environmental effects.

The purpose of this dissertation is to understand the experiences and support needs of nurses during and after the COVID-19 pandemic. Chapter one introduces the necessary background information regarding the nursing profession, the COVID-19 pandemic, and the need for continued research on nurse well-being. Chapter two analyzes commonly used and intertwined psychological and emotional concepts impacting nurse well-being during and after the COVID-19 pandemic through concept delineation and the development of an occupational trauma conceptual model. Chapter three describes the perspectives of nurses (n = 8) on the psychological and emotional concepts of compassion fatigue, second victim, burnout, and moral injury that have impacted the nursing profession during and after the COVID-19 pandemic and how they relate to these concepts using a qualitative descriptive design. Chapter four describes the experiences of chronic and ongoing psychological trauma that nurses (n = 8) have endured during and after the COVID-19 pandemic using a qualitative descriptive design. Chapter five describes the experiences and desired support needs of nurses (n = 13) during and after the COVID-19 pandemic utilizing a qualitative descriptive design and photovoice methods for data collection. Lastly, chapter six concludes the dissertation by summarizing key findings while discussing future directions and implications for nursing practice and research.

Self-compassion has been shown to predict well-being, possibly by buffering people against the unpleasant emotional and cognitive reactions that accompany negative life events. Although most previous research has been conducted with young adults, preliminary studies show that self-compassion may be beneficial for older adults. Three studies tested self-compassion's impact on thoughts, emotions, and behaviors associated with aging using samples of individuals between the ages of 62 and 104. Study 1 examined self-compassion as it relates to health promotion behaviors, specifically use of assistance and trying new activities. Although some findings supported the hypotheses, results showed that high and low self-compassionate individuals did not differ in their use of assistance or willingness to try new activities. Study 2 implemented a brief self-compassion manipulation to test its effects on thoughts and emotions. Unfortunately, random assignment failed to equate the experimental conditions, rendering the results difficult to interpret. After controlling for baseline self-compassion, the manipulation did not have the predicted effects on well-being. In fact, participants seemed to benefit more when merely writing about negative events than when writing about them in a self-compassionate fashion. Finally, Study 3 examined self-compassionate cognitions, specifically whether or not self-compassionate thoughts mediate the relationship between trait self-compassion and emotional well-being. Self-compassionate participants did think differently than their low self-compassion counterparts, and these cognitions mediated the relationship between self-compassion and positivity of their responses. However, cognitions did not mediate the relationship between trait self-compassion and emotion outcomes. Two possible explanations for the unexpected results of the three studies include the relatively healthy nature of the sample and the strength of the self-compassion manipulation. Suggestions for future research include examining how self-compassion relates to the motivations behind engaging in health promotion, allowing participants to write more freely in the self-compassion manipulations, and bringing self-compassion research with older adults into controlled laboratory settings.