The Psychology of Live Theatre: Can Seeing Theatre Increase Empathy?

While some theatres are beginning to open this fall, much of the world has spent a year and a half without live theatre because of the COVID-19 pandemic. Many theatre artists are currently unemployed, and without funding, some theatres will struggle to survive past the pandemic.

Why do we need live theatre? Many artists suggest that theatre can improve empathy for those who are different from ourselves, but until recently, there has been little research on the psychology of attending live shows. This is surprising, since theatre has been a major part of our lives both recently and throughout history. For example, before the pandemic, according to Americans for the Arts, about 44 million Americans attended non-profit theatres in the United States each year.

My colleagues and I set out to investigate the effects of attending live theatre.

We collaborated with two theatre companies—the Public Theatre in New York and Artists Repertory Theatre in Portland, Oregon—to measure the effects of attending three different plays: Skeleton Crew, written by Dominque Morisseau, Wolf Play by Hansol Jung, and the Pulitzer-Prize winning play Sweat by Lynn Nottage. These plays covered different themes that could be expected to evoke concern about social issues: Skeleton Crew was about auto workers in Detroit after the 2008 financial crisis, Wolf Play was about a same-sex couple trying to adopt a child, and Sweat was about working-class factory workers in Detroit.

We surveyed over 1,600 audience members either immediately before or immediately after watching these plays (alternating every other night). In these surveys, we asked about their empathy toward groups depicted in the plays. Specifically, we asked about their ability to take the perspective of groups in the shows, as well as how much they felt concern and compassion for groups in the shows—both of which are considered to be components of the umbrella term “empathy.” Additionally, we asked people about their beliefs about political issues related to the plays—such as income inequality for Skeleton Crew, or attitudes about same-sex parents for Wolf Play.

We also measured whether these plays increased charitable donations. We entered all participants in a lottery to receive a gift card, but also gave participants the opportunity to donate a proportion of this reward to a charity related to the play, as well as a charity unrelated to the play.

After—as opposed to before—seeing the plays, audience members reported feeling more empathy toward the groups of people depicted in them—in other words, they felt like they could take the perspective of groups of people in the play and felt more compassion for them. Additionally, audience members after the show reported more concern for socio-political issues related to the themes of the play. Seeing theatre also led the post-show group to donate more to charity as compared to the pre-show group—whether or not the charity was related to the themes in the play. That is intriguing, because it means theatre may increase generous behavior about issues unrelated to the specific themes explored in the play they just saw.

These effects correlated with how “transported” people felt by the plays. In other words, people who felt more “immersed” or “lost” in the narrative of the plays reported higher levels of empathy, agreement with attitudes related to the show, and donated more to charity.

Given the tens of millions of people who see theatre across the globe every year, we believe that even a small increase in empathy and generosity among theatre-goers can make a sizable impact in creating a more compassionate society.

Our findings build on past research about the effects of other art forms. For instance, other studies show that taking acting classes or reading works of fiction can improve empathy.

Since we published these studies, we have been delighted by the positive responses that we have received from the theatre community. For instance, we recently held an online conversation with Hamilton star Phillipa Soo discussing this study, as well as theatre and empathy more broadly. Many theatre artists believe that the work they do has important social impact, and we hope our study helps demonstrate that impact.

In a time when theatre is struggling, and when arts funding or arts programs in schools are being threatened, it is necessary to provide scientific evidence on the benefits of the arts. While arts funding is often perceived as a luxury, our studies point to the tangible benefits of art forms like live theatre. We hope studies like ours will inspire future collaborations between artists and scientists to understand the role of the arts in society.


For Further Reading

Rathje, S., Hackel, L., & Zaki, J. (2021). Attending live theatre improves empathy, changes attitudes, and leads to pro-social behavior. Journal of Experimental Social Psychology.. doi: https://doi.org/10.1016/j.jesp.2021.104138

Goldstein, T. R., & Winner, E. (2012). Enhancing empathy and theory of mind. Journal of Cognition and Development13(1), 19-37. doi: https://doi.org/10.1080/15248372.2011.573514

Dodell-Feder, D., & Tamir, D. I. (2018). Fiction reading has a small positive impact on social   cognition: A meta-analysis. Journal of Experimental Psychology: General, 147(11),          1713-1727. doi: https://doi.org/10.1037/xge0000395
 

Steve Rathje is a PhD student at the University of Cambridge, where he studies as a Gates scholar. He has published studies on topics such as the arts, social media, and polarization. You can follow him on Twitter @steverathje2.

 

Your Tears Can Function as a Social Glue

Have you ever wondered what is the purpose of shedding tears? This question has puzzled scientists for many decades, especially since humans seem to be the only species that cries in response to emotional situations. Other bodily responses have obvious functions: sweating to cool down the body, urinating to rid waste, and shedding basal tears to keep the eye lubricated. But what exactly is the purpose of emotional tears?

For infants and children, the vocal cry—accompanied by tears as children get older—functions to alert a caregiver of a need or problem. It acts like a siren, requesting help and thereby increasing the infant’s chances of survival. However, why would humans continue to shed tears after childhood?

Researchers have considered two main functions of emotional crying:

  • that it helps the crier feel better by releasing tension or restoring a bodily balance, and
  • that it—similar to the vocal cry in infants—signals to other people that we need their attention and support.

Evidence for the first proposition has been mixed, as people typically think that their tears will improve their mood, but they report no improved—or even a worsened—state, if asked right after shedding a tear.

We tested the second proposition—a communicative function—in a recent study. We presented people in 41 countries, across all populated continents, with a large pool of photographs of adults with neutral expressions from different backgrounds for whom tears were either digitally added or not. Expressions were embedded in different neutral, positive, or negative written scenarios (for example, the photographs were taken while the person attended a funeral or reunited with an old friend). We asked participants to evaluate the depicted person (did they seem warm, friendly, competent?) and how they would react to them (would they offer to help them?).

It’s Similar Around The World

In all countries, people said that they would be more likely to support a crying person in contrast to people showing no tears—regardless of their gender, ethnicity, or the reason why they cried. This tendency was influenced by the fact that criers appeared warmer, more sympathetic, and more helpless, and raters felt a stronger connection towards them.

Tears do indeed function as a social glue—they facilitate support when we feel helpless and need it most. So, does that mean that tears mainly fulfill a communicative function? What about a recovery function? The answer is not straightforward, as previous research has shown that shedding tears improves mood when criers receive support from others. This suggests that emotional crying can actually fulfill both functions. People seem to cry to send a potent signal that they’re in need, which then triggers support behavior by others, which helps the crier regulate their emotions and recover, mentally and physically. This would suggest that shedding tears when others are around is more effective than shedding tears in private.

Paradoxically, studies suggest that people report crying most often when they are on their own, likely due to social norms. Crying in public isn’t typically seen as appropriate, and crying is considered unmanly in many cultures. However, swallowing your tears because of social conventions might block the helpful effects often associated with letting your tears flow. 

Why is it exactly that tears have evolved as the main signal of being in need in adults, and not other expressions, like vocal cries or the position of the eyebrows? While we can only speculate, there are several possible evolutionary reasons for this. Vocal cries are a potent signal that can be heard over distance; however, loud cries can attract potential predators. This may be why they’re replaced with silent tears as one grows older and can seek out support.

At the same time, tears can be easily recognized from a large distance, as they can reflect the light. There are also studies suggesting that people are even able to recognize tears subliminally (that is, without being completely aware of them), so they are an extremely noticeable signal—likely more noticeable than positions of the eyebrows.

Additionally, for the crier, shedding tears results in a blurred vision, restricting the performance of tasks that require a clear sight and most importantly aggressive actions such as attacks. Bystanders could therefore infer that the crier is harmless and approach them without fearing any negative consequences, so assistance would be more likely.

Some researchers have argued that emotional tears represent an action that makes us ultimately human. Shedding emotional tears seems to serve an important purposeful bodily function, just as sweating or urinating, that signals to others a need for help and binds us together like a social glue.


For Further Reading

Gračanin, A., Bylsma, L. M., & Vingerhoets, A. J. (2018). Why only humans shed emotional tears. Human Nature, 29(2), 104-133. https://doi.org/10.1007/s12110-018-9312-8

MacArthur, H. J., & Shields, S. A. (2019). How you cry, when you cry, why you cry, and who you are: Responses to adult crying in social contexts. In U. Hess & S. Hareli (Eds.), The social nature of emotion expression (pp. 209-225). Springer. https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-030-32968-6_12

Zickfeld, J. H., van de Ven, N., Pich, O., Schubert, T. W., Berkessel, J. B., Pizarro, J. J., ... & Vingerhoets, A. (2021). Tears evoke the intention to offer social support: A systematic investigation of the interpersonal effects of emotional crying across 41 countries. Journal of Experimental Social Psychology. https://doi.org/10.1016/j.jesp.2021.104137


Janis Zickfeld is a postdoctoral researcher at the Department of Management and Center for Integrative Business Psychology at Aarhus University, Denmark. His research focuses on the causes and effects of social emotions and moral behavior.

The Chicken and Egg of Pride and Social Rank


Think, for a moment, about the last time you accomplished something big. How did you feel afterward? Did the achievement change the way you thought about yourself, or the way others see you?

If you’re like most people, you probably felt pride in your accomplishment. Others who learned about your success also probably admired you for it, and your social status may have risen a notch. Indeed, studies show that achievements bring feelings of pride along with increases in social status, and that pride and status are therefore closely related. People who have high social rank tend to feel pride often, whereas those lower in rank feel pride much less.

But what is the cause of this relationship? Do achievements promote both pride and social rank separately, or might feeling pride cause an increase in social rank? Or vice versa?

Perhaps feeling pride following success is reinforcing; pride is a pleasurable emotional experience that motivates people to continue working hard toward status-gaining future successes, with the goal of feeling that pleasurable emotion again. Yet it is also possible that an increase in social rank is a pride-worthy event itself, such that part of why you felt pride after that achievement was because you knew that it increased your status.

Two Kinds of Pride

To answer the chicken and egg question, we need to address the complexity of pride, which is not simply one thing. Instead, pride has two distinct facets, which we call authentic and hubristic. Authentic pride refers to feelings of confidence and fulfillment; this is the “bright side” of pride that makes you feel good about yourself and your accomplishments, but not necessarily superior to others. Hubristic pride, in contrast, refers to feelings of arrogance and egotism; it is the “dark side” of pride that is well known as one of Dante’s seven deadly sins, and is associated with antisocial behaviors like aggression and dishonesty.

And Two Kinds of Status

Interestingly, there are also two distinct ways of attaining status. Prestigious leaders get ahead by earning others’ respect and admiration, whereas dominant leaders forcibly take power, intimidating and threatening would-be followers to ensure they are in control.

We sought to determine the causal direction of the association between pride and social rank—to figure out which comes first—while taking into account the different types of pride and social status.

In the Fall, we asked university students to report their daily feelings of pride and their relative social rank among their peers, and then we asked them these same questions again the following Spring.

Our analyses showed it was a two-way street: both pride and social rank contribute to changes in the other. Students’ feelings of pride in the Fall led to increases in their status by the Spring, and, their status in the Fall led to increased pride experiences by Spring.

Furthermore, each kind of pride was linked in this two-way manner to one kind of social rank, but not the other. Students who reported high levels of authentic pride showed increases in prestige, whereas those who reported high levels of hubristic pride showed increases in dominance. Yet, authentic pride was not associated with any change in dominance, nor was hubristic pride associated with change in prestige. Likewise, individuals with high levels of prestige in the Fall showed increases in authentic but not hubristic pride by the Spring, whereas those who started the Fall high in dominance showed increases in hubristic but not authentic pride by Spring.

Thus, feelings of authentic pride may motivate individuals to work hard and develop important skills—behaviors that ultimately cause others to see them as prestigious. Correspondingly, feelings of hubristic pride may motivate individuals to arrogantly and aggressively take power; their sense of superiority may allow them to dominate others without fear of retaliation or concern about others’ well-being. At the same time, prestigious individuals who earn others’ respect and admiration likely feel authentic pride as a result, and dominant individuals who successfully intimidate others into falling in line are likely to respond with heightened hubristic pride.

The relationship between pride and social rank thus seems to be a feedback loop; pride promotes gains in status, which then lead to increased pride. Climbing the social ladder via dominance or prestige provides the emotional reward of pride, but pride is more than a reward; it is also the impetus underlying the next status gain.  


For Further Reading

Cheng, J. T., Tracy, J. L., & Henrich, J. (2010). Pride, personality, and the evolutionary foundations of human social status. Evolution and Human Behavior, 31(5), 334–347. https://doi.org/10.1016/j.evolhumbehav.2010.02.004

Tracy, J. L., Mercadante, E.J., Witkower, Z., & Cheng, J. T. (2020). The evolution of pride and social hierarchy. Advances in Experimental Social Psychology, 62, 51-114. https://doi.org/10.1016/bs.aesp.2020.04.002

Witkower, Z., Mercadante, E. J., & Tracy, J. L. (2021). The chicken and egg of pride and social rank. Social Psychological and Personality Science. https://doi.org/10.1177/19485506211023619
 

Eric Mercadante is a PhD student studying Social/Personality Psychology at the University of British Columbia. He is interested in relationships between stable personality traits and emotional processes, specifically in the context of navigating social hierarchies.

Zak Witkower is a post-doctoral researcher in the Department of Psychology at the University of Toronto. He researches how facial, head, and body movements are used to communicate emotion, personality, and social rank.

Jessica Tracy is a Professor of Psychology at the University of British Columbia and a Sauder Distinguished Scholar. Her research focuses on emotions, self, and nonverbal behavior.

What Makes College Students Anxious?


In 1947, when W. H. Auden published The Age of Anxiety in the shadow of the First and Second World Wars, it made sense to argue that the world was an unstable and disturbing place. That was especially true for younger generations, who were forcibly drafted into those wars, and into other wars in the 1960s and 1970s. In contrast, one might expect today's youth to be less anxious. Yet scientific journals are filled with articles debating whether young people today are even more anxious and neurotic than their earlier counterparts.

Much of this scientific debate has revolved around statistics from annual surveys, but another route is to travel back in time and examine whether people worried less intensely and had fewer concerns. Although literal time travel is impossible, a researcher can interview people who’ve had long careers in counseling and have treated similar clients for most of that career. I took this route and interviewed several psychotherapists who had long tenures at college counseling centers to probe some questions about rising anxiety. You can find the full interview transcripts of my interviews online.

This method allowed me to probe into why college students, a relatively privileged group, might be more anxious than they formerly were. Counselors may not only have distinct recollection of changes in their work—more clients with more severe complaints—but also keep statistical records that show whether things have changed over time.

Was Anxiety Going Up Or Down?

On the question of rising anxiety, directors were almost unanimous—college students in the U.S. are more anxious than they were a generation ago. Some directors brought data to the table, documenting more demand. One recalled, “To the extent that we refer on a fairly regular basis to an intensive outpatient program that specializes in OCD, we're just seeing presentations at a rate and at an intensity that we never used to see before.” She had “close to zero” referrals when she started her 27-year career. A West Coast psychiatrist whose career stretched back 40 years mentioned that he and several colleagues had repeatedly witnessed students being more fragile or sensitive than those from previous generations.

When they asserted these facts, counselors also noted that there is less stigma around seeking help and that colleges are now more accessible, which means more economically stressed students and students with disabilities, who carry additional burdens. On top of that, my interviewees noted, more students enter college with a pre-existing diagnosis.

When I mentioned several potential causes, center directors agreed that competition had risen because a larger population was striving to get into roughly the same number of college and job slots. College rankings have also become a legitimate arbiter of worth. Some talented students are upset they’re attending a college that is ranked 20th. They had been aiming for the top five.

And Then There Are The Parents…

There was also some consensus about helicopter parenting. Even though one center director argued that parents were an effective battering ram against an unresponsive bureaucracy, many told me that technology has made it easier for parents to give advice and students to solicit advice, which means students make fewer independent decisions. Parents now attempt to initiate and monitor their children’s therapy sessions! Even though this interference violates privacy statutes, some tried to fake signatures on waivers to get around those restrictions.

On the other hand, center directors were more ambivalent about whether students were more focused on gaining external approval than they formerly were. A few directors stated that their clients had unrealistic ideals—some students believed that indecision about one’s life course signified failure.

Therapists were also ambivalent about the distinctiveness problem, which is the difficulty of achieving something unique, which sets one apart from the anonymous crowd. Some students have been insulated from failure experiences, giving them the unrealistic sense that they could easily achieve something distinctive.

But Wait, There’s More…

Of course, there was also the perennial challenge of coping with the small fish in a big pond: overachieving high-school students find they are merely average college students, having enrolled in a selective college where everyone used to be above average.

Lastly, center directors agreed that societal problems and threats can impinge upon students. This thesis, which comes from Jean Twenge’s contentious but influential research, is that terrorism, unemployment, wars, and the AIDS epidemic heightened mental distress in younger generations. The center directors whom I interviewed stated that police shootings and the election campaign of Donald Trump were particularly stressful because students tend to be progressive and sympathize with disadvantaged groups. They noted that economic recessions can be more painful today because students have greater debt—and higher aspirations.

Furthermore, in an earlier time, students who lived in dorms were also set apart from the world, but social media has erased that boundary—students can get exposed to disturbing news several times a day.

The most striking finding was that the boundaries between parents and students have now blurred to the point that college students, who are nominally young adults, are now in a phase of extended adolescence. Can we reverse this trend so that students once again use their college years to practice some fledgling autonomy before they become adults? If that goal isn’t attainable, colleges may at least take some steps to discourage helicopter parenting. Even so, overly concerned parents are just one factor; we may have to get used to a world where college students, like adults overall, are more frequently diagnosed with a mental illness.


For Further Reading

Martin, C. C. (2020). Why do college counselors perceive anxiety as increasing? A semi-structured examination of five causes. Journal of College Student Psychotherapyhttps://doi.org/10.1080/87568225.2020.1753611

Reed, K., Duncan, J. M., Lucier-Greer, M., Fixelle, C., & Ferraro, A. J. (2016). Helicopter parenting and emerging adult self-efficacy: Implications for mental and physical health. Journal of Child and Family Studies, 253136–3149. https://link.springer.com/article/10.1007/s10826-016-0466-x\

Sharkin. B. S. (2012). Being a college counselor on today’s campus. New York, NY: Taylor & Francis.

 

Chris C. Martin is Visiting Assistant Professor of Psychology at Oglethorpe University. He immigrated to the U.S. after living in Saudi Arabia and India.

 

Positive Beliefs About Being Black Can Protect Against the Harm of a Negative Racial Climate at School

If you take a moment to think about your own K-12 school experiences, a lot of what you remember is likely connected with the climate of the school. School climate involves many aspects of a student’s educational experience including safety, relationships (between school personnel, students, and parents), learning and instruction, and the physical environment. Not surprisingly, research shows that a positive school climate is critical for school success. A positive school climate can improve attendance, classroom grades, retention, and even graduation rates.

As you might expect, groups of students may experience school climate in different ways. For Black youth, race and racial equity (or lack thereof) are critical aspects of school climate. A positive school climate for Black youth involves a space where teachers and peers respect and value diversity and individual cultural differences and make intentional efforts to reduce racial inequality. These aspects of what we call school racial climate contribute to positive academic outcomes for Black youth.

The Value of Positive Beliefs About Being Black 

Identity formation is a major part of adolescence. Black adolescents who possess a positive sense of their racial identity and orientation toward their racial group (known in research as private regard) may be able to protect themselves against the harm of racial discrimination and perceptions of unfair treatment and exclusion in school.

In our study, we surveyed 151 Black adolescents at their school to investigate the relationship between two dimensions of school racial climate—(a) interpersonal interactions measured as teacher and peer discrimination and (b) fair treatment/racial equity—and school engagement (behavioral, emotional, and cognitive dimensions). Importantly, we also examined whether positive beliefs about being Black might refute negative attitudes, beliefs, and behaviors from teachers and peers, so that Black students remained engaged in school despite a negative school racial climate.

Our high school participants ranged in age from 14 to 19 years old and attended two demographically similar public high schools located in the southeastern region of the United States. Some findings were as expected: students who perceived their school environment to be equitable for Black students also reported higher behavioral, emotional, and cognitive engagement. We also found that more teacher discrimination was associated with less emotional engagement, whereas more peer discrimination was associated with lower behavioral engagement and cognitive engagement. Crucially we found that among Black students who reported less positive beliefs about being Black, teacher discrimination was associated with lower emotional engagement, and peer discrimination was associated with lower cognitive engagement. On the other hand, we found that among Black students who reported more positive beliefs about being Black, there was no association between teacher discrimination and emotional engagement or peer discrimination and cognitive engagement. These findings show that more positive beliefs about being Black can protect Black youth against the harm of a negative school racial climate.

Lessons for Educators 

Our findings underscore the importance of educators using strategies that promote a positive school racial climate and encourage positive beliefs about being Black. Using Afrocentric or Black empowerment educational practices and interventions that emphasize cultural pride might include:

  • Displaying pictures of Black historical figures and cultural artifacts, such as a djembe drum
  • Celebrating Kwanzaa
  • Reading texts by Black authors, and
  • Using curricula guided by core values and beliefs, such as pan-Africanism

Unfortunately, research shows that Black students are likely to deal with negative racial experiences at school, such as teacher and peer discrimination and unfair treatment toward those who look like them, which can lead to a school climate that is difficult to navigate. While these types of experiences may be detrimental to Black youth’s school outcomes, our study demonstrates the value of positive beliefs about being Black for protecting them from the harmful impact of such negative experiences.


For Further Reading

Griffin, C. B., Cooper, S. M., Metzger, I. W., Golden, A. R., & White, C. N. (2017). School racial climate and the academic achievement of African American high school students: The mediating role of school engagement. Psychology in the Schools54(7), 673-688. https://doi.org/10.1002/pits.22026

Griffin, C. B., Metzger, I. W., Halliday-Boykins, C. A., & Salazar, C. A. (2020). Racial fairness, school engagement, and discipline outcomes in African American high school students: The important role of gender. School Psychology Review49(3), 222-238. https://doi.org/10.1080/2372966X.2020.1726810

Griffin, C. B., Stitt, R. L., & Henderson, D. X. (2020). Investigating school racial climate and private racial regard as risk and protector factors for Black high school students’ school engagement. Journal of Black Psychology46(6-7), 514-549. https://doi.org/10.1177/0095798420946895
 

Charity Brown Griffin is an Associate Professor of Psychological Sciences at Winston-Salem State University. Her work focuses on race and Black youth’s schooling experiences.

Bottle or Breast? Shame or Guilt, Either Way

Mummy wars still persist! One of the most intense battlegrounds has to do with infant feeding, where both breastfeeders and bottle feeders can feel let down and confronted. Infant feeding is often a moralized issue, with breastfeeding being tied to beliefs about “good mothering.” Despite these beliefs, breastfeeding rates are low across the globe and postnatal mental health issues in mothers are prevalent.

Many women do not achieve their breastfeeding goals, or alternatively some women decide not to breastfeed, which can cause women in both contexts to experience emotions like shame and guilt. Additionally, many women who do breastfeed feel uncomfortable feeding in public. As a result, women who breastfeed, bottle feed, and combination feed can experience self-conscious emotions for different reasons.

Shame and guilt are self-conscious emotions. They are very similar but also different. We experience both emotions when we think we have done something wrong. However, shame is more strongly related to body and image concerns. Shame is more damaging to how we view ourselves and is closely related to feelings of stigma and feeling unworthy. Stigma can also become internalized. This can happen when we become aware of others’ negative attitudes and then we believe them ourselves.

We conducted two studies to examine how shame and guilt relate to feelings of internalized stigma and breastfeeding behaviors. We also looked at how self-esteem, self-efficacy, and social support relate to feelings of stigma. In both studies, women with babies answered questions about their breastfeeding intentions, feelings of stigma, emotions experienced when feeding their babies, and other questions.

Where Shame and Guilt Diverged

The results highlighted some unique relationships for shame and guilt with stigma and infant feeding:

  • Women who breastfed and women who formula-fed experienced similar levels of shame. Thus, shame was experienced across feeding types.
  • Women who bottle-fed experienced more guilt, and in the second study they experienced more feelings of stigma.
  • Guilt, but not shame, was related to whether women had the desire to carry on breastfeeding, that is, from 3 months to 2 years. This suggests that women experience guilt when they have not reached their breastfeeding goals and had to switch to the bottle. Thus, women feel guilt when they think about how they haven’t fed their baby in the way they intended.  
  • Both shame and guilt were related to feeling more stigmatized for one’s feeding choice.
  • Lower self-esteem was related to experiencing more stigma because of underlying feelings of shame and guilt.
  • Lower parenting self-efficacy (i.e., feelings about general parenting competency) was related to higher stigma because of shame and guilt.
  • Lower breastfeeding self-efficacy, that is, feeling that you cannot achieve your feeding goals, was related to feelings of higher stigma because of experiencing guilt, not shame.

These results suggest that guilt is more closely tied to breastfeeding choices while shame impacts more global views of oneself, e.g., parenting as a whole. In sum, shame played a role in self-esteem and parenting self-efficacy versus guilt played a role in parenting and breastfeeding self-efficacy.

Researchers and the medical community must pay attention to ways to reduce feelings of shame and guilt in mothers, as both self-conscious emotions are related to feelings of stigma, self-esteem, and self-efficacy, regardless of infant feeding type. One way to reduce these negative feelings is to make sure that positive emotions are elicited through wider support networks, as it has been shown that positive emotions can override negative experiences. Another possible avenue is to make women feel positive in other areas of parenting to boost their self-views, and hopefully as a by-product have less stress and feel less pressure from others with regard to feeding choices.


For Further Reading

Russell, P. S., Birtel, M. D., Smith, D. M., Hart, K., & Newman, R. (2021). Infant feeding and internalized stigma: The role of guilt and shame. Journal of Applied Social Psychology. https://doi.org/10.1111/jasp.12810

Russell, P. S., Smith, D. M., Birtel, M. D., Hart, K. H., & Golding, S. E. (2021). The role of emotions and injunctive norms in breastfeeding: A systematic review and meta-analysis. Health Psychology Review. doi: 10.1080/17437199.2021.1893783
 

Sophie Russell is a Lecturer in Social Psychology at University of Surrey. She conducts research on moral emotions and how they impact our daily lives.

Post-Breakup Conflict Between Parents Harms Children


It can be messy when relationships end, particularly when children are involved. Many parents are able to protect their children from conflicts when they arise. Unfortunately, there are other parents who are unable to put their differences aside—and they use their children against the other parent. When children are dragged into the fight, they often suffer serious consequences such as found with other forms of child abuse, like anxiety and depression. It may seem unsurprising that being used as a weapon in their parents’ conflicts has multiple negative consequences for children. However, parents caught up in their fight with their ex seem to fail to recognize this. In my research, we examine the toxic nature of this family dynamic for all involved.

Impact of Parental Conflict on Children

There are two primary ways children respond to this conflict. Some children feel “stuck in the middle” of their parents’ conflict, which triggers what we call a “loyalty conflict.” Children in loyalty conflicts want to love both parents, but they are pressured to pick a side. In these cases, the parents have similar amounts of power and the child often distances from both parents to avoid their conflict.

In contrast, there are other children who experience “parental alienation.” This is when the child picks a side: they align with one parent and reject their other parent for reasons that are objectively not legitimate. In this case, the child has usually been influenced by their preferred parent to adopt a story in which the preferred parent is an innocent victim and the other parent is a villain who never loved them, abandoned them, and is unsafe to be around. A growing number of scholars have considered the behaviors that cause parental alienation a form of child abuse.

Recognizing Parental Alienation as Abuse

My research shows that parental alienation may not be just child abuse, but rather an extension of “coercively controlling” intimate partner abuse whereby one partner seeks to dominate and control the other. This view runs contrary to the views of legal and mental health professionals who have called these types of cases “high conflict families,” which insinuates that both parents are to blame for their ongoing disputes. My research has shown that this “high conflict” label is too general to apply to all families because not all conflict is the same. Further, assuming there is “wrong on both sides” can, in fact, be blaming a parent who is the target of abusive behaviors.

In my most recent study, we analyzed the stories shared with us in interviews with 79 parents who had been alienated from their children. Consistent with current understanding of coercively controlling abuse, the majority of situations described by alienated parents were ones where they had almost no power. In most instances, the alienating parent controlled their outcomes, provoked public arguments, limited access to their children, and manipulated the children to align against the alienated parent. Provoking public arguments was a particularly effective way of setting up a lose-lose situation for the alienated parent. If they walk away? Then they are accused of not engaging in a dialogue. If they dive into the conflict? Now they are being combative. It is a no win situation.

Also common in these stories were descriptions of many incidents of victimization both before and after leaving the relationship. This finding suggests that the intentional alienation of their child from the alienated parent was just another way for the alienating parent to continue to victimize their ex. While this research relied on the perceptions of alienated parents, some of whom may have been motivated to cast themselves as a victim, it is unlikely that all would independently portray themselves in this way. Indeed, many of the alienated parents rejected the label of “innocent victim” and even blamed themselves for situations where they had little to no power or control.

What became clear in these discussions was that many parents, regardless of gender, still engage in coercively controlling abuse post-breakup and will use their children to do so. We need wider recognition that the behaviors used by alienating parents to turn their children against their other parent are the same as those used by coercively controlling abusers. When we recognize that not all “high conflict families” are the same, and look closer at the power dynamics at work, we can find more effective strategies to intervene and protect children from rejecting a loving parent. Telling everyone to “just get along” just isn’t cutting it. We need to do better. 


For Further Reading

Harman, J. J., Leder-Elder, S., & Biringen, Z. (2019). Prevalence of adults who are the targets of parental alienating behaviors and their impact: Results from three national polls. Child & Youth Services Review, 106, 1-13. https://doi.org/10.1016/j.childyouth.2019.104471

Harman, J. J., Matthewson, M. L., & Baker, A. J. L. (2022). Losses experienced by children alienated from a parent. Current Opinion in Psychology. https://doi.org/10.1016/j.copsyc.2021.05.002

Harman, J. J., Kruk, E., & Hines, D. (2018). Parental alienating behaviors: An unacknowledged form of family violence. Psychological Bulletin, 14 (12), 1275-1299. http://dx.doi.org/10.1037/bul0000175
 

Jennifer J. Harman is an Associate Professor of Psychology at Colorado State University whose primary area of research is on the study of parental alienation and other forms of family violence.

 

Eating Frogs and Other Time Management Tips

With an ever-growing list of priorities and deadlines, managing time effectively is a constant challenge. In our most recent #SPSPChat on Twitter, we asked three experts to share their top tools and insights for using time effectively.

Here are just a few of the tools shared by Drs. Sa-kiera Hudson, Ashley Whillans, and Elizabeth Page-Gould:

7 Resources for Time Management

Eating the Frog First

This study tests a popular adage which states that “if it's your job to eat a frog, it's best to do it first thing,” which advises completing challenging tasks first. The research examines how people misunderstand how the difficulty-ordering of tasks influences efficacy, acknowledging that people tend to take on tasks of lower difficulty first. Their research supports the “eat-the-frog-first” approach, finding that people can build efficacy by starting with their hardest task.

What Is Block Scheduling? (And How it Boosts Productivity)

This Lifehack article explores the benefits of the practice of allocating large chunks of time to related tasks, known as block scheduling. This approach aims to combat procrastination, help people create realistic time estimates, and develop more focus and attention by cutting down on open space in their calendar.

The Action Priority Matrix

The Action Priority Matrix is a simple diagram designed to help people choose activities they should prioritize and which ones to avoid. The matrix achieves this by encouraging people to place tasks into one of four categories: Quick Wins (High Impact, Low Effort), Major Projects (High Impact, High Effort), Fill Ins (Low Impact, Low Effort), and Thankless Tasks (Low Impact, High Effort). We also encouraging learning about the Eisenhower’s Urgent/Important Principle, which features a similar process.

The LOT Planner: Life On Track!

Dr. Sa-kiera Hudson developed the Life-on-Track (LOT) Planner during her time in graduate school, when she struggled to find a planner that kept track of her responsibilities while allowing her to practice self-care. The planner combines goal-tracking with personal reflection time, as well as a sticky note system to accommodate changing goals and timelines. 

Pimp My Gmail: Productivity Email Tips from an Ex-Google Employee

Former Google employee Ashlyee Freeman describes Gmail as her “personal assistant and first line of defense from endless distractions.” She has developed a series of YouTube videos designed to leverage the email client’s settings and services to use time more effectively.

How to Do it All

This model, developed by Dr. Elizabeth Page-Gould to share with incoming graduate students at the University of Tennesee, encourages the user to list their main work goals for the semester, as well as how much time per week they should be spending on them. Once the table is complete, the user can arrange their weekly calendar accordingly using block scheduling. View Dr. Page-Gould's time estimate chart and a sample weekly schedule.

Getting Your Team to Do More than Meet Deadlines

This article, published in Harvard Business Review and co-authored by Ashley Whillans, cites research which shows that managers can help combat procrastination and burnout by encouraging employees to set aside proactive time for work that is important but not urgent.

This recap only scratches the surface of what was discussed during the #SPSPChat. Read the full recap of the conversation, including the valuable personal advice and anecdotes shared by our panelists.

Get Hitched or Get Ditched? Why Some Marriage Proposals Fail

You see someone on one knee, proclaiming their love, and proposing marriage. The person they are with looks shocked. You can almost feel everyone around you holding their breath: will the proposal be accepted? We analyzed 400 personal marriage proposal stories (200 accepted proposals and 200 rejected proposals) to find out.

Marriage proposals tend to follow a script—like what an actor reads for a play. The script involves the proposer (usually a man) kneeling on one knee, offering a ring, and asking “Will you marry me?” The exact timing of the proposal is often a surprise for the person being proposed to, but the prospect of marriage is hopefully not. Nonetheless, proposals tend to be designed to be memorable…for better or for worse.

Tell Us a Story

Given how popular marriage proposals are in Canada and the U.S., we were surprised to learn that there isn’t much research on them. So, we set out to learn about the qualities of accepted and rejected proposals between men and women by reading stories found on the online forums Reddit and Weddingbee.

We analyzed stories that people told about their own proposal, excluding any stories that were obviously fake (e.g., one described a proposal that occurred on the show The Office). We focused on opposite-sex proposals between, because same-gender proposals were few (likely because same-sex marriage wasn’t legal in most of the U.S. when these 2015 data were collected). However, we do know from other research that same-sex and queer couples often alter the ritual to feel more authentic. For example, sometimes both partners propose to each other.

Other research also finds that women proposing can be seen as a joke or illegitimate because it’s not part of the conventional script. Thus, we weren’t too surprised to find that few women proposed and that there were more women whose proposals were rejected (20 out of 25) than accepted. For comparison, 180 men were rejected and 195 men were accepted (one proposal was a mutual decision). Because so few women proposed to men, we mainly focused on the 374 stories of men proposing to women.

Did It Have A Happy Ending?

Aside from the gender of the proposer, here are other ways that rejected proposals differed from accepted proposals:

  • Rejected proposals came about 2 years earlier in the relationship than accepted proposals
  • Women often rejected a proposal because they thought it was too soon in the relationship, they were too young, they were experiencing relationship problems (for example, they had broken up), or they thought they were incompatible with their partner
  • Rejected proposals were more likely to take place in public and without talking about marriage in advance of the proposal
  • Rejected men often proposed for the same reasons as accepted men, but one reason not mentioned in accepted proposals was proposing to “save” the relationship
  • Rejected men were also less likely to propose with a ring and bend on one knee than accepted men.

These rejected proposals start to paint a picture of miscommunication, poor timing, and last-ditch efforts for some. Showing up at your partner’s door after a breakup doesn’t tend to be a winning strategy, despite what the movies may show.

It should be noted that while most couples who experienced a rejected proposal broke up after the proposal and some had broken up before, about 30% stayed together and a few even got married. Thus, a rejection doesn’t mean the end for everyone.

Check That You Are On The Same Page In Your Love Story

Details of the proposal like location can be a surprise, but the intent to propose shouldn’t be a surprise to your partner. Talking in advance about where the relationship is going and ensuring that you’re both on the same page is important. In our research, people sometimes assumed that they were on the same page when they weren’t, and they said that this had devastating consequences for them.

Talking about marriage proposal preferences can also be helpful (and fun) to avoid a proposal that makes the other person uncomfortable. While some people may want that big, public proposal on the jumbotron, others do not. So, have that conversation and ensure you’re on the same page about marriage, timing, and proposal preferences. If in doubt, propose in private.


For Further Reading

Hoplock, L.B. & Stinson, D. A. (2021). Rules of engagement: A content analysis of accepted and rejected marriage proposals. Journal of Family Psychology. https://doi.org/10.1037/fam0000903 PDF

Robnett, R. D., & Leaper, C. (2013). “Girls don’t propose! Ew.” A mixed-methods examination of marriage tradition preferences and benevolent sexism in emerging adults. Journal of Adolescent Research, 28(1), 96–121. https://doi.org/10.1177/0743558412447871

Lisa Hoplock received her PhD at the University of Victoria in Canada and now works in the private sector.

As Seen on TV? What Americans Really Think About Women Who Have Casual Sex

Perhaps no other phenomenon best reflects the twin cultural shifts of the last half-century—toward gender equality in much of the West, and toward greater acceptance of casual sex—than primetime’s women characters. Week after week, these world-class surgeons, gossip girls, and hardboiled detectives engage in no-strings-attached sex. To be clear, these women often ask for sex, enjoy that sex, and move on with heads held high (often to another short-term rendezvous).

But What Do Americans Really Think About Everyday Women Who Have Casual Sex?

In our recent studies, we document for the first time a familiar—but seemingly unfounded—stereotype: Americans believe that women who have casual sex have low self-esteem.

First, we asked participants to read about a 26-year-old woman, man, or person (no gender given), who either has casual sex or long-term sexual relationships (or we didn’t mention sexual behavior). People stereotyped women (but not men) described as having casual sex as having low self-esteem. In contrast, people thought that women (and men) described as having long-term relationships had high self-esteem.

But maybe people simply dislike women who have casual sex and view them as having all sorts of negative traits. For example, people might view women who have casual sex as desperate for attention, sexually undesirable, or physically unattractive. To find out, we asked participants to tell us how physically attractive they thought the target was. People tended to think that women who had casual sex were more attractive!

Is this low self-esteem stereotype pervasive? Intuition suggests that this stereotype might exist only among certain Americans—maybe those who are sexist, highly religious, or politically conservative. But the stereotype held regardless of these factors, and regardless of our participants’ own self-esteem or sexual behavior.

The stereotype also held when we asked about it less obviously—simply having people read about a man or woman who was having either casual or long-term sex, and asking whether this target person was more likely to be (a) an English major or (b) an English major with low self-esteem. Answers revealed that people viewed women who have casual sex as having low self-esteem—answering (b) more often, despite the fact that statistically, answer (b) is always less likely.

Next, we asked what drives this stereotype. People might assume that women only have short-term sex if they cannot secure long-term relationships. Indeed, people tended to think that women who have short-term involvements (versus long-term) were not having sexual relationships that were happy or fulfilling.

This suggested a path forward: Describing women who have casual sex as being satisfied with their sexual behavior might break the stereotype.

In our final experiment, we did just that—we told participants that women who had casual sex were satisfied with their sexual lifestyles. These women were still stereotyped as having low self-esteem. More striking, people rated women described as having longer-term sex but being dissatisfied with it as having higher self-esteem.

Where Does This Stereotype Come From?

One possibility is that people hold this stereotype because it reflects reality—that is, women who have casual sex really do have lower self-esteem. Across most of our experiments, we asked about participants’ own sexual behavior and self-esteem. But in line with other work, we found virtually no relationship between our participants’ own short-term sexual strategies and their self-esteem.

Another possibility is that this stereotype is instilled via media. The trope that women who have short-term sex come from unloving households has certainly been fodder for artists, from humorist Amy Schumer to rapper Lil Dicky. But at the same time, TV creator/producer Shonda Rhimes—of Grey’s Anatomy fame—has built her empire on strong women characters who have no qualms about using men for sex.

An important reality is that our modern minds house stone-aged brains, which have been attuned to real asymmetries in the costs of short-term sex that men and women faced throughout human history. For example, a sex act that can cost a man only several minutes can cost his woman partner months of pregnancy, then lactation, and further infant care. Only in recent years have technologies like birth control and legal abortions helped to free women from some of short-term sex’s costly, unwanted consequences.

Right now, you might be rolling your eyes, thinking that being perceived as having low self-esteem only matters for Millennials and ‘influencers.’ You would be wrong. Research has demonstrated that perceptions of a person’s self-esteem play an important role in how we treat them. For example, women perceived as having low self-esteem are likely to face diminished social, economic, and political opportunities; they are less likely to be asked on dates, hired for jobs, or voted into office.

Women who have casual sex might “have it all” on-screen, but women who do this in the real world face serious consequences—despite increases in gender equality and the increasing acceptance of casual sex.


For Further Reading

Garcia, J. R., Reiber, C., Massey, S. G., & Merriwether, A. M. (2012). Sexual hookup culture: A review. Review of General Psychology, 16(2), 161–176. https://doi.org/10.1037/a0027911

Schmitt, D. P. (2005). Sociosexuality from Argentina to Zimbabwe: A 48-nation study of sex, culture, and strategies of human mating. Behavioral and Brain Sciences28(2), 247-275. https://doi.org/10.1017/s0140525x05000051.

Zeigler‐Hill, V., Besser, A., Myers, E. M., Southard, A. C., & Malkin, M. L. (2013). The status‐signaling property of self‐esteem: The role of self‐reported self‐esteem and perceived self‐esteem in personality judgments. Journal of Personality81(2), 209-220. https://doi.org/10.1111/j.1467-6494.2012.00790.


Jaimie Arona Krems is an assistant professor of psychology, and a member/co-founder of the Oklahoma Center for Evolutionary Analysis (OCEAN) at Oklahoma State University. Her research investigates how women actively cooperate, strategically compete, and are perceived by others.