Social structure, infectious diseases, disasters, secularism, and cultural change in America

Worldwide divergence of values

Social scientists have long debated the nature of cultural change in a modernizing and globalizing world. Some scholars predicted that national cultures would converge by adopting social values typical of Western democracies. Others predicted that cultural differences in values would persist or even increase over time. We test these competing predictions by analyzing survey data from 1981 to 2022 (n = 406,185) from 76 national cultures. We find evidence of global value divergence. Values emphasizing tolerance and self-expression have diverged most sharply, especially between high-income Western countries and the rest of the world. We also find that countries with similar per-capita GDP levels have held similar values over the last 40 years. Over time, however, geographic proximity has emerged as an increasingly strong correlate of value similarity, indicating that values have diverged globally but converged regionally.

Self- and Other-Orientation in High Rank: A Cultural Psychological Approach to Social Hierarchy

PUBLIC ABSTRACT

Social hierarchy is one fundamental aspect of human life, structuring interactions in families, teams, and entire societies. In this review, we put forward a new theory about how social hierarchy is shaped by the wider societal contexts (i.e., cultures). Comparing East Asian and Western cultural contexts, we show how culture comprises societal beliefs about who can raise to high rank (e.g., become a leader), shapes interactions between high- and low-ranking individuals (e.g., in a team), and influences human thought and behavior in social hierarchies. Overall, we find cultural similarities, in that high-ranking individuals are agentic and self-oriented in both cultural contexts. But we also find important cross-cultural differences. In East Asian cultural contexts, high-ranking individuals are also other oriented; they are also concerned about the people around them and their relationships. We close with a call to action, suggesting studying social hierarchies in more diverse cultural contexts.

When expert predictions fail

We examine the opportunities and challenges of expert judgment in the social sciences, scrutinizing the way social scientists make predictions. While social scientists show above-chance accuracy in predicting laboratory-based phenomena, they often struggle to predict real-world societal changes. We argue that most causal models used in social sciences are oversimplified, confuse levels of analysis to which a model applies, misalign the nature of the model with the nature of the phenomena, and fail to consider factors beyond the scientist's pet theory. Taking cues from physical sciences and meteorology, we advocate an approach that integrates broad foundational models with context-specific time series data. We call for a shift in the social sciences towards more precise, daring predictions and greater intellectual humility.

Norm Dynamics: Interdisciplinary Perspectives on Social Norm Emergence, Persistence, and Change

Social norms are the glue that holds society together, yet our knowledge of them remains heavily intellectually siloed. This article provides an interdisciplinary review of the emerging field of norm dynamics by integrating research across the social sciences through a cultural-evolutionary lens. After reviewing key distinctions in theory and method, we discuss research on norm psychology-the neural and cognitive underpinnings of social norm learning and acquisition. We then overview how norms emerge and spread through intergenerational transmission, social networks, and group-level ecological and historical factors. Next, we discuss multilevel factors that lead norms to persist, change, or erode over time. We also consider cultural mismatches that can arise when a changing environment leads once-beneficial norms to become maladaptive. Finally, we discuss potential future research directions and the implications of norm dynamics for theory and policy.

Living alone and cancer mortality by race/ethnicity and socioeconomic status among US working-age adults

BACKGROUND

Previous studies have shown an association between living alone and cancer mortality; however, findings by sex and race/ethnicity have generally been inconsistent, and data by socioeconomic status are sparse. The association between living alone and cancer mortality by sex, race/ethnicity, and socioeconomic status in a nationally representative US cohort was examined.

METHODS

Pooled 1998-2019 data for adults aged 18-64 years at enrollment from the National Health Interview Survey linked to the National Death Index (N = 473,648) with up to 22 years of follow-up were used to calculate hazard ratios (HRs) for the association between living alone and cancer mortality.

RESULTS

Compared to adults living with others, adults living alone were at a higher risk of cancer death in the age-adjusted model (HR, 1.32; 95% CI, 1.25-1.39) and after additional adjustments for multiple sociodemographic characteristics and cancer risk factors (HR, 1.10; 95% CI, 1.04-1.16). Age-adjusted models stratified by sex, poverty level, and educational attainment showed similar associations between living alone and cancer mortality, but the association was stronger among non-Hispanic White adults (HR, 1.33; 95% CI, 1.25-1.42) than non-Hispanic Black adults (HR, 1.18; 95% CI, 1.05-1.32; p value for difference < .05) and did not exist in other racial/ethnic groups. These associations were attenuated but persisted in fully adjusted models among men (HR, 1.13; 95% CI, 1.05-1.23), women (HR, 1.09; 95% CI, 1.01-1.18), non-Hispanic White adults (HR, 1.13; 95% CI, 1.05-1.20), and adults with a college degree (HR, 1.22; 95% CI, 1.07-1.39).

CONCLUSIONS

In this nationally representative study in the United States, adults living alone were at a higher risk of cancer death in several sociodemographic groups.

The cultural policies of schistosomiasis control in China: a historical analysis

China has a history of using cultural policies to control infectious diseases, including schistosomiasis, which was once hyperendemic in the country. Since the founding of the People's Republic of China, significant achievements have been made in schistosomiasis control, with a decrease in the number of cases and infection rates. This study provides a historical analysis of cultural policies in schistosomiasis control in China. During the Mao era (1949-1976), socialist ideology shaped cultural policies that included mass mobilization campaigns, propaganda, and cultural education to promote health practices, and community participation and empowerment. During the Reform era (1978-2012), there was a shift towards market-oriented policies and individual responsibility, and cultural policies promoted behavioral change, but there were challenges in implementing them in a rapidly changing society. In the "New Era" of socialism (2012-now), cultural policies are focused on promoting comprehensive schistosomiasis control strategies, technological advancements and innovation, and international cooperation. The Chinese experience in schistosomiasis control provides valuable lessons for other countries facing similar challenges and underscores the importance of cultural policies in promoting health and well-being.

How Rice Fights Pandemics: Nature-Crop-Human Interactions Shaped COVID-19 Outcomes

Wealthy nations led health preparedness rankings in 2019, yet many poor nations controlled COVID-19 better. We argue that a history of rice farming explains why some societies did better. We outline how traditional rice farming led to tight social norms and low-mobility social networks. These social structures helped coordinate societies against COVID-19. Study 1 compares rice- and wheat-farming prefectures within China. Comparing within China allows for controlled comparisons of regions with the same national government, language family, and other potential confounds. Study 2 tests whether the findings generalize to cultures globally. The data show rice-farming nations have tighter social norms and less-mobile relationships, which predict better COVID outcomes. Rice-farming nations suffered just 3% of the COVID deaths of nonrice nations. These findings suggest that long-run cultural differences influence how rice societies-with over 50% of the world's population-controlled COVID-19. The culture was critical, yet the preparedness rankings mostly ignored it.

Cultural distances between home and host countries inspire sojourners to engage in intercultural exchange upon repatriation

We examine how cultural distance between sojourners' country of origin and their host country influences their engagement in intercultural exchange upon return. One might expect intercultural exchange to be much harder between culturally-distant countries than culturally-close ones, given that the former vary more in norms or expected behaviors from one's home country. Our novel theorizing, however, leads to precisely the opposite expectations. In particular, we hypothesized that cultural distance between the repatriates' home and host countries would be positively associated with being inspired by the host culture. In turn, this heightened inspiration would predict an increased sharing of knowledge about the host culture upon returning home (intercultural exchange). We combined measurement-of-mediation (Study 1) and experimental-causal-chain (Studies 2-3) approaches to test and confirm these hypotheses in three large samples of repatriates. We first examined whether cultural distance predicted greater intercultural exchange via repatriates' heightened inspiration (Study 1). We then tested the individual links in this postulated causal chain. In Study 2, a quasi-experiment, we examined the causal path from cultural distance to inspiration. In Study 3, we experimentally manipulated inspiration to test its causal effect on intercultural exchange. The findings advance theory and application around multicultural experience and intercultural exchange.

Barriers and enablers around radical sharing

Multiple social and ecological crises are currently unfolding, the tackling of which requires a thorough understanding of their interlinkages and root causes. More sharing of essential resources while increasing access to valuable goods and services, especially for the most vulnerable in society, has been proposed as an effective strategy to reduce environmental and social damage. However, a more reflective approach to sharing is needed to make sure that it does not worsen some of the issues that it aims to address. In this Personal View, we outline the principles of radical sharing, which highlight the salience of environmental limits, access to essential goods and services, and non-exploitative relationships. Furthermore, we discuss key enablers and barriers to radical sharing and a more successful integration into sharing practices that prioritise needs satisfaction for all within planetary boundaries. Critical perspectives on the sharing economy need to account for the role of power, politics, capitalism, and citizenship alongside the more widely discussed issues around exploitation, discrimination, and greenwashing.

Political Attitudes and Disease Threat: Regional Pathogen Stress Is Associated With Conservative Ideology Only for Older Individuals

What environmental factors are associated with individual differences in political ideology, and do such associations change over time? We examine whether reductions in pathogen prevalence in U.S. states over the past 60 years are associated with reduced associations between parasite stress and conservatism. We report a positive association between infection levels and conservative ideology in the United States during the 1960s and 1970s. However, this correlation reduces from the 1980s onwards. These results suggest that the ecological influence of infectious diseases may be larger for older people who grew up (or whose parents grew up) during earlier time periods. We test this hypothesis by analyzing the political affiliation of 45,000 Facebook users, and find a positive association between self-reported political affiliation and regional pathogen stress for older (>40 years) but not younger individuals. It is concluded that the influence of environmental pathogen stress on ideology may have reduced over time.

The impact of pandemic mental cognition on cultural values: an empirical study based on social media

BACKGROUND

COVID-19 has triggered a global public health crisis, and had an impact on economies, societies, and politics around the world. Based on the pathogen prevalence hypothesis suggested that residents of areas with higher infection rates are more likely to be collectivists as compared with those of areas with lower infection rates. Many researchers had studied the direct link between infectious diseases and individualism/collectivism (infectious diseases→ cultural values), but no one has focused on the specific psychological factors between them: (infectious diseases→ cognition of the pandemic→ cultural values). To test and develop the pathogen prevalence hypothesis, we introduced pandemic mental cognition and conducted an empirical study on social media (Chinese Sina Weibo), hoping to explore the psychological reasons behind in cultural value changes in the context of a pandemic.

METHODS

We downloaded all posts from active Sina Weibo users in Dalian during the pandemic period (January 2020 to May 2022) and used dictionary-based approaches to calculate frequency of words from two domains (pandemic mental cognition and collectivism/individualism), respectively. Then we used the multiple log-linear regression analysis method to establish the relationship between pandemic mental cognition and collectivism/individualism.

RESULTS

Among three dimensions of pandemic mental cognition, only the sense of uncertainty had a significant positive relationship with collectivism, and also had a marginal significant positive relationship with individualism. There was a significant positive correlation between the first-order lag term AR(1) and individualism, which means the individualism tendency was mainly affected by its previous level.

CONCLUSIONS

The study found that more collectivist regions are associated with a higher pathogen burden, and recognized the sense of uncertainty as its underlying cause. Results of this study validated and further developed the pathogen stress hypothesis in the context of the COVID-19 pandemic.

Coronavirus-Related Searches on the Internet Predict COVID-19 Vaccination Rates in the Real World: A Behavioral Immune System Perspective

According to the smoke detector and functional flexibility principles of human behavioral immune system (BIS), the exposure to COVID-19 cues could motivate vaccine uptake. Using the tool of Google Trends, we tested that coronavirus-related searches-which assessed natural exposure to COVID-19 cues-would positively predict actual vaccination rates. As expected, coronavirus-related searches positively and significantly predicted vaccination rates in the United States (Study 1a) and across the globe (Study 2a) after accounting for a range of covariates. The stationary time series analyses with covariates and autocorrelation structure of the dependent variable confirmed that more coronavirus-related searches compared with last week indicated increases in vaccination rates compared with last week in the United States (Study 1b) and across the globe (Study 2b). With real-time web search data, psychological scientists could test their research questions in real-life settings and at a large scale to expand the ecological validity and generalizability of the findings.

Effect of IUCN Red List category on public attention to mammals

Cultural data is a powerful tool to analyze public awareness of key societal issues, including the conservation of nature. I used two publicly available repositories of cultural data, Google Trends and Google Ngram, to quantify the effect of the International Union for the Conservation of Nature (IUCN) Red List conservation status on public attention toward 4539 mammal species. With Google Trends, I calculated whether Google searches for their common and scientific names have been increasing or decreasing over time. I also ran an anomaly detection analysis to investigate whether a change in red-list status directly results in an increase in Google searches. Additionally, I quantified the mentions of species' common and scientific names in English texts with Google Ngram. Overall, Google searches for most mammal species remained at similar levels or increased since 2008. The severity of species' IUCN Red List status was a significant predictor of increasing Google searches, although the effect size was relatively small. Red-list status seemed strongly confounded with mammal body size. Species that moved to a higher-risk category spiked significantly in Google searches directly after the new designation. The mention of species' common names in the Google Ngram's English 2019 corpus significantly increased as the red-list category increased. These results provide valuable insight into the importance of the IUCN Red List for increasing public awareness and the usefulness of publicly available cultural data on examining the effectiveness of specific conservation efforts and thus evaluating targets for support and funding.

Chinese culture became more individualistic: Evidence from family structure, 1953-2017

Previous research has indicated that some aspects of Chinese culture became more individualistic. However, prior studies have suggested a decrease in individualism in other aspects of China. Thus, it was unclear whether China became more individualistic. Therefore, the current research investigated whether Chinese culture became more individualistic by examining historical changes in family structure. Specifically, I analyzed temporal shifts in the divorce rate and household size, which have been confirmed as valid representative indicators of individualism. Results showed that the divorce rate increased between 1978 and 2017 and household size decreased between 1953 and 2017, indicating a rise in individualism. Moreover, analyses suggested that the one-child policy was unlikely the sole and major factor in the decrease in household size. Additionally, the aggregated score of divorce rate and household size demonstrated a clear increase in individualism. Therefore, the present research provided further evidence of the rise in individualism in China.

When Interdependence Backfires: The Coronavirus Infected Three Times More People in Rice-Farming Areas During Chinese New Year

Interdependent cultures around the world have generally controlled COVID-19 better. We tested this pattern in China based on the rice theory, which argues that historically rice-farming regions of China are more interdependent than wheat-farming areas. Unlike earlier findings, rice-farming areas suffered more COVID-19 cases in the early days of the outbreak. We suspected this happened because the outbreak fell on Chinese New Year, and people in rice areas felt more pressure to visit family and friends. We found historical evidence that people in rice areas visit more family and friends for Chinese New Year than people in wheat areas. In 2020, rice areas also saw more New Year travel. Regional differences in social visits were correlated with COVID-19 spread. These results reveal an exception to the general idea that interdependent culture helps cultures contain COVID-19. When relational duties conflict with public health, interdependence can lead to more spread of disease.

A Socioecological-Genetic Framework of Culture and Personality: Their Roots, Trends, and Interplay

Culture and personality are two central topics in psychology. Individuals are culturally influenced influencers of culture, yet the research linking culture and personality has been limited and fragmentary. We integrate the literatures on culture and personality with recent advances in socioecology and genetics to formulate the Socioecological-Genetic Framework of Culture and Personality. Our framework not only delineates the mutual constitution of culture and personality but also sheds light on (a) the roots of culture and personality, (b) how socioecological changes partly explain temporal trends in culture and personality, and (c) how genes and culture/socioecology interact to influence personality (i.e., nature × nurture interactions). By spotlighting the roles of socioecology and genetics, our integrative framework advances the understanding of culture and personality.

Loneliness across time and space

People feel lonely when their social needs are not met by the quantity and quality of their social relationships. Most research has focused on individual-level predictors of loneliness. However, macro-level factors related to historical time and geographic space might influence loneliness through their effects on individual-level predictors. In this Review, we summarize empirical findings on differences in the prevalence of loneliness across historical time and geographical space and discuss four groups of macro-level factors that might account for these differences: values and norms, family and social lives, technology and digitalization, and living conditions and availability of individual resources. Regarding historical time, media reports convey that loneliness is on the rise, but the empirical evidence is mixed, at least before the COVID-19 pandemic. Regarding geographical space, national differences in loneliness are linked to differences in cultural values (such as individualism) but might also be due to differences in the sociodemographic composition of the population. Research on within-country differences in loneliness is scarce but suggests an influence of neighbourhood characteristics. We conclude that a more nuanced understanding of the effects of macro-level factors on loneliness is necessary because of their relevance for public policy and propose specific directions for future research.

Complexifying Individualism Versus Collectivism and West Versus East: Exploring Global Diversity in Perspectives on Self and Other in the Gallup World Poll

A wealth of research has suggested the West tends toward individualism and the East toward collectivism. We explored this topic on an unprecedented scale through two new items in the 2020 Gallup World Poll, involving 121,207 participants in 116 countries. The first tapped into orientations toward self-care versus other-care (“Do you think people should focus more on taking care of themselves or on taking care of others?”). The second enquired into self-orientation versus other-orientation (“Which of the following is closest to your main purpose in life? Being good at what you do in your daily life, Caring for family and close friends, or Helping other people who need help?”). We anticipated that self-care and self-orientation would index individualism (hence be higher in the West), while other-care and other-orientation would index collectivism (hence be higher in the East). However, contrary to expectation, there was greater self-care in the East (45.82%) than in the West (41.58%). As predicted though, there was greater self-orientation in the West (30.20%) than in the East (23.08.%). Greater self-care in the East invites one of two interpretations. Either these items: (a) index individualism and collectivism as anticipated, so in some ways the East is more individualistic and the West less individualistic than assumed; or (b) do not index individualism and collectivism as anticipated, so the concepts are more complex than often realized (e.g., collectivism may involve prioritizing self-care over other-care). Either way, the findings help complexify these concepts, challenging common cross-cultural generalizations in this area.

The Impact of Universal Varicella Vaccination on Herpes Zoster Incidence in the United States: Comparison of Birth Cohorts Preceding and Following Varicella Vaccination Program Launch

When the US varicella vaccination program was introduced in 1995, its impacts on the epidemiology of herpes zoster (HZ) were not precisely known. We used a large claims database to examine HZ incidence in the US during 1998-2019 among persons aged ≥30 years (the prevaccine cohort, born before 1990), and aged 1-29 years (includes the postvaccine cohort, born since 1990). We defined incident HZ as the first instance of an outpatient or emergency department (ED) claim with an HZ diagnostic code. Additionally, we examined the proportion of HZ visits among all ED visits as a complementary method to assess for healthcare-seeking artifacts in the findings. In persons aged ≥30 years (prevaccine cohort), we observed age-specific increases in HZ incidence during the earlier study years, with decelerations in later years, starting in 2007 with oldest age groups. Similar patterns were seen when we examined HZ visits as a proportion of all ED visits. For persons aged 1-29 years, age-specific HZ incidence increased early in the study period for the oldest age groups who were born prevaccine, but later declined in a stepwise pattern once each age group was comprised of persons born in the postvaccine period. Our results, corroborated with previously published studies, do not support prior modeling predictions that the varicella vaccination program would increase HZ incidence among adult cohorts who previously experienced varicella. Our findings also suggest that continued declines in age-specific HZ incidence as varicella-vaccinated cohorts age are likely.

Impacts of the COVID-19 Pandemic upon Chinese Positive Traits

Will Chinese people change in terms of their character strengths when disasters strike? As far as the most recent COVID-19 pandemic is concerned, we provide an explorative answer from the impacts of positive traits included in the Values in Action Classification of Strengths upon Chinese people. We conducted a large-scale online survey from 1 January 2019 to 13 February 2020, with 12,878 respondents nationwide, covering all the administrative regions in China and all age intervals. The changes in the 24 character strengths before and during the pandemic were compared. Results revealed a significant increase in teamwork triggered by the pandemic among Chinese people. Fine-grained differences in demographic variables were also examined. Results showed that the COVID-19 pandemic significantly boosted teamwork for both males and females. Concerning age differences, only younger adults (18-25-year-old) showed a significant increase in teamwork. Besides this, it was also discovered that females always performed a higher teamwork tendency than males, and the elderly higher than the younger, regardless of the pandemic.

The many geographical layers of culture

Uchiyama et al. present a dual inheritance framework for conceptualizing how behavioural genetics and cultural evolution interact and affect heritability. We posit that to achieve a holistic and nuanced representation of the cultural environment and evolution against which genetic effects should be evaluated, it is imperative to consider the multiple geographic cultural layers impacting individuals and genetic heritability.

Volunteer community service providers during the COVID‐19 crisis response in China: What are their personal needs and how to respond?

The needs of volunteer community service providers (VCSPs), who are the main responders to community crises, have received significantly less attention for the contributions they have been making during the COVID‐19 crisis. A mixed‐method research framework was used in this study, which involved semi‐structured interviews with 13 NGOs and questionnaire responses from 430 VCSPs in Hubei, China to assess the VCSPs' personal needs based on Maslow's hierarchy of needs. It was found that the VCSPs had safety, love, belonging, self‐esteem, and self‐actualization personal needs, all of which were closely related to family, partners, organizations, society and the government. The discussions revealed that the more experienced VCSPs needed special attention and family support was extremely significant for VCSPs in crisis. Several recommendations to meet VCSPs' personal needs are proposed that could have valuable reference value for emergency managers when organizing and supporting VCSPs in contingencies.

Social bias insights concern judgments rather than real-world decisions

Judgments differ from decisions. Judgments are more abstract, decontextualized, and bear fewer consequences for the agent. In pursuit of experimental control, psychological experiments on bias create a simplified, bare-bone representation of social behavior. These experiments resemble conditions in which people judge others, but not how they make real-world decisions.

Does Economic Growth Raise Happiness in China? A Comprehensive Reexamination

Has China’s vigorous economic growth raised its citizens’ happiness? Existing studies have portrayed, if not a pessimistic picture, a complicated one. We conducted two studies to clarify this issue. In Study 1, we used data from available national surveys between 1990 and 2018 (64 samples) and demonstrated a significant quadratic U-shaped trend and a rising tendency. In Study 2, we conducted a cross-temporal meta-analysis from 2001 to 2019 (689 samples) and found that Chinese happiness manifested a linear rising trend, although this trend was more salient in the community sample than in the student one. In both studies, Granger causal analysis suggested that economic growth was the Granger cause of the increase in Chinese happiness. These findings indicate that economic growth has raised happiness in China since 1990, particularly since 2001, and highlight the importance of moving beyond the Easterlin Paradox.

Abundance Causes Greed in Appropriation from Common Resources

Three experiments investigated the possibility that greed is not just a consequence of scarcity but may also result from abundance of common resources. It was predicted that abundance causes greed not through increasing competition but because it reduces social concerns for the outcomes of others, resulting in resource waste. Consistent with these predictions, we found that people take and waste more from common resources if these resources are more—rather than less—abundant. These findings were robust to different types of resources (chocolates and money). Implications of these findings for attempts at sustainable resource use are discussed.

Scarcity Mindsets and Generational Differences in India: The Role of Cognitive and Affective Factors

This article addressed the question of the role played by certain cognitive and affective factors in explaining the differences in scarcity mindsets of Gen Z, Millennials, and the Pre-millennial generations. Three cognitive factors, namely, horizontal individualism, belief in a just world and a spiritual belief factor, anasakti (non-attachment) along with five affective factors, personal relative deprivation, greed, need for achievement, positive and negative emotions were used as predictors of the scarcity mindsets. Pre-millennials showed a weaker scarcity mindset compared to the Millennials, who among the three had the strongest scarcity mindset. In the case of Gen Z, a downward trend in the scarcity mindset was observed. Male respondents had stronger scarcity mindset than females. Sequential Regression Analysis was used to understand the role played by cognitive and affective factors in predicting scarcity mindset for each generation. It found that cognitive factors were better predictors than affective factors in the case of all three generations. In the case of Gen Z, belief in a just world and anasakti significantly predicted a weak scarcity mindset. Belief in a just world also predicted a weaker scarcity mindset in case of the Millennials and Pre-millennial generations. Personal relative deprivation, an affective factor, was significantly associated with a weak scarcity mindset in the case of Millennials but inversely for the Pre-millennials. A high need for achievement raised the level of scarcity mindset, but only for the Millennial generation. Horizontal individualism and greed did not come out as significant predictors of the scarcity mindset for any generation. The results are discussed in the changing context of globalisation and the digital revolution.

From Self-Transcendence to Collective Transcendence: In Search of the Order of Hierarchies in Maslow’s Transcendence

Maslow’s Human Motivation extended Theory, in its late version, proposed transcendence as one of the highest levels, inclusive or holistic in the Human consciousness. Through Meaning Theory, Victor Frankl and Paul Wong suggested that self-transcendence is a fundamental expression of our spiritual nature and a distinctive concept. However, it is not clear whether at present, with an extensive offer of individualistic currents, transcending involves a personal issue or is rather a collective issue, related to community and culture. The objective of this research is to determine if seeking personal transcendence and seeking collective transcendence are two differentiable categories, and if there is a priority among them, which would suggest an extension of the Theory. With the participation of 402 business students in Mexico, and with the help of a structured equation model, it was determined that there is a significant difference between orientation toward “I transcend” and the orientation toward “I help others transcend.” The results obtained from the selected sample indicate that individual transcendence and collective transcendence are distinguishable categories. In addition, it was found that young people prefer to seek a personal meaning rather than a collective one, which suggest that dimension of collective transcendence is prior to personal transcendence. These findings can be used to design job profiles for positions that require staff development, and it can serve as a positive pattern for life education and society.

Self-construal and Insecure Attachment Variation and Co-variation During a Period of Economic Crisis

Changes in socioeconomic conditions can affect how people understand themselves. The present analyses tested hypotheses on individuals’ self-construal and insecure attachment variation and co-variation during a period of severe and prolonged economic downturn in Greece, a typically more collectivist culture. Adult attachment and self-construal were surveyed in 15 independent samples of young adults collected consecutively between 2004 and 2016. Significantly lower independence, but not higher interdependence, was observed in recent crisis-stricken years of higher unemployment compared to earlier (pre-crisis) years. Participants also reported higher insecure attachment, particularly higher anxious attachment in recent years. However, it were temporal changes in avoidance that were associated with a greater decline in independent self-construal during the time period studied. Avoidance also preceded temporal variability in independent self-construal during this period. The results highlight links between socioeconomic conditions and individual-level variation in cultural understandings of the self and insecure attachment, and point to socio-cognitive processes that may explain interrelationships between two constructs that partly lie at different levels of understanding the self.

Buying to Cope With Scarcity During Public Emergencies: A Serial Mediation Model Based on Cognition-Affect Theory

Panic buying is a common phenomenon that occurs during public emergencies and has a significant undesirable impact on society. This research explored the effect of scarcity on panic buying and the role of perceived control and panic in this effect through big data, an online survey and behavior experiments in a real public emergency (i.e., COVID-19) and simulative public emergencies. The findings showed that scarcity aggravates panic buying (Studies 1–3), and this aggravation effect is serially mediated by perceived control and panic (Studies 2–3). Moreover, this serial mediation model is more suitable for public health emergencies (Study 3). These findings enrich the understanding of panic buying and provide important enlightenment for guiding rational public behavior and managing public opinion during public emergencies.

When danger strikes: A linguistic tool for tracking America's collective response to threats

In today's vast digital landscape, people are constantly exposed to threatening language, which attracts attention and activates the human brain's fear circuitry. However, to date, we have lacked the tools needed to identify threatening language and track its impact on human groups. To fill this gap, we developed a threat dictionary, a computationally derived linguistic tool that indexes threat levels from mass communication channels. We demonstrate this measure's convergent validity with objective threats in American history, including violent conflicts, natural disasters, and pathogen outbreaks such as the COVID-19 pandemic. Moreover, the dictionary offers predictive insights on US society's shifting cultural norms, political attitudes, and macroeconomic activities. Using data from newspapers that span over 100 years, we found change in threats to be associated with tighter social norms and collectivistic values, stronger approval of sitting US presidents, greater ethnocentrism and conservatism, lower stock prices, and less innovation. The data also showed that threatening language is contagious. In all, the language of threats is a powerful tool that can inform researchers and policy makers on the public's daily exposure to threatening language and make visible interesting societal patterns across American history.

Novel Evidence for the Increasing Prevalence of Unique Names in China: A Reply to Ogihara

In this study, we aimed to address three comments proposed by Ogihara on a recent study where we found that unique names in China have become increasingly popular from 1950 to 2009. Using a large representative sample of Chinese names (N = 2.1 million), we replicated the increase in uniqueness of Chinese names from 1920 to 2005, especially since the 1970s, with multiple uniqueness indices based on name-character frequency and name-length deviation. Over the years, Chinese characters that are rare in daily life or naming practice were more often used in given names, and the length of given names became more deviant from typical practice (i.e., more one-character and three-character given names and higher standard deviation of name length). Taken together, these findings not only reconfirmed the increasing prevalence of unique names but also demonstrated the validity of various indices in assessing name uniqueness in China.

What do people mean when they talk about mindfulness?

Psychological theories cast mindfulness as a form of awareness in which accepting the presence of stressful thoughts and feelings facilitates engaged exploration and identification of adaptive responses. Critics of mindfulness' popularization suggest that lay people misconstrue acceptance as a passive endorsement of experience, undermining engaged problem-solving. To evaluate this criticism, we traced the contemporary semantic meaning of mindfulness in three of the most extensive linguistic corpora of English language and found that general public's depictions of mindfulness highlight engagement-related processes. We further analyzed the nomological network of mindfulness. While mindfulness theories suggest a general convergence of facets representing awareness and acceptance, in a meta-analysis (k = 145; N = 41,966) of the Five Facet Mindfulness Questionnaire only expert- and clinical samples reported convergence, whereas lay people showed absent or even antagonistic associations. Further, contrary to the synergistic model of awareness and acceptance contributing to greater engagement, empirical probes of two lay samples (N_total = 406) show that acceptance is either unrelated or inversely related to markers of engagement. To overcome resulting conceptual and methodological challenges, we highlight the need for a contextualized mindfulness framework whereby acceptance enables the process of engaging with life's challenges rather than avoiding them.

The role of ingroup assortative sociality in the COVID-19 pandemic: A multilevel analysis of google trends data in the United States

This study tested how family ties and religiosity, two extended elements of ingroup assortative sociality, would predict group-level COVID-19 severity in the U.S. and how COVID-19 threat would predict ingroup assortative sociality at a weekly level. Multilevel models which analyzed the state-level archival (e.g., religious participation) and Google trends data (e.g., marriage for family ties; prayer for religiosity) on ingroup assortative sociality showed that religious search volume (from 2004 to 2019) significantly and negatively predicted COVID-19 severity (i.e., shorter time delay of first documented cases, shorter overall doubling times, higher reproductive ratio and higher case fatality ratio) across states (Study 1a) and counties (Study 1b) while search volume for family ties only significantly and negatively predicted county-level COVID-19 severity. Multilevel analyses also found that weekly COVID-19 severity weakly predicted weekly search volume of marriage and religion (Study 2a), but when COVID-19 threat was in the collective consciousness in a given week (i.e., Google search volume for coronavirus within 52 weeks), collective levels of ingroup assortative sociality increased from the previous week (Study 2b). Evidence across studies suggested that religiosity, compared with family ties, could serve a more important role for the U.S. people during the deadly pandemic.

A Data-Driven Analysis of Sociocultural, Ecological, and Economic Correlates of Depression Across Nations

The prevalence of depression varies widely across nations, but we do not yet understand what underlies this variation. Here we use estimates from the Global Burden of Disease study to analyze the correlates of depression across 195 countries and territories. We begin by identifying potential cross-correlates of depression using past clinical and cultural psychology literature. We then take a data-driven approach to modeling which factors correlate with depression in zero-order analyses, and in a multiple regression model that controls for covariation between factors. Our findings reveal several potential correlates of depression, including cultural individualism, daylight hours, divorce rate, and GDP per capita. Cultural individualism is the only factor that remains significant across all our models, even when adjusting for spatial autocorrelation, mental healthcare workers per capita, multicollinearity, and outliers. These findings shed light on how depression varies around the world, the sociocultural and environmental factors that underlie this variation, and potential future directions for the study of culture and mental illness.

The salience of choice fuels independence: Implications for self-perception, cognition, and behavior

More than ever before, people across the world are exposed to ideas of choice and have opportunities to make choices. What are the consequences of this rapidly expanding exposure to the ideas and practice of choice? The current research investigated an unexamined and potentially powerful consequence of this salience of choice: an awareness and experience of independence. Four studies (n = 1,288) across three cultural contexts known to differ in both the salience of choice and the cultural emphasis on independence (the United States, Singapore, and India) provided converging evidence of a link between the salience of choice and independence. Singaporean students who recalled choices rather than actions represented themselves as larger than their peers (study 1). Conceptually replicating this finding, study 2 found that Americans who recalled choices rather than actions rated themselves as physically stronger. In a word/nonword lexical decision task (study 3), Singaporean students who recalled choices rather than actions were quicker at identifying independence-related words, but not neutral or interdependence-related words. Americans, Singaporeans, and Indians all indicated that when working in an organization that emphasized choice, they would be more likely to express their opinions. Similarly, Americans, Singaporeans, and Indians reported a preference for working in such an organization (studies 4a and 4b). The findings suggest that the salience of personal choice may drive an awareness and experience of independence even in contexts where, unlike in the United States, independence has not been the predominant ethos. Choice may be an unmarked and proximate mechanism of cultural change and growing global individualism.

Worldwide increases in adolescent loneliness

INTRODUCTION

Several studies have documented increases in adolescent loneliness and depression in the U.S., UK, and Canada after 2012, but it is unknown whether these trends appear worldwide or whether they are linked to factors such as economic conditions, technology use, or changes in family size.

METHODS

The Programme for International Student Assessment (PISA) survey of 15- and 16-year-old students around the world included a 6-item measure of school loneliness in 2000, 2003, 2012, 2015, and 2018 (n = 1,049,784, 51% female) across 37 countries.

RESULTS

School loneliness increased 2012-2018 in 36 out of 37 countries. Worldwide, nearly twice as many adolescents in 2018 (vs. 2012) had elevated levels of school loneliness. Increases in loneliness were larger among girls than among boys and in countries with full measurement invariance. In multi-level modeling analyses, school loneliness was high when smartphone access and internet use were high. In contrast, higher unemployment rates predicted lower school loneliness. Income inequality, GDP, and total fertility rate (family size) were not significantly related to school loneliness when matched by year. School loneliness was positively correlated with negative affect and negatively correlated with positive affect and life satisfaction, suggesting the measure has broad implications for adolescent well-being.

CONCLUSIONS

The psychological well-being of adolescents around the world began to decline after 2012, in conjunction with the rise of smartphone access and increased internet use, though causation cannot be proven and more years of data will provide a more complete picture.

Collectivism predicts mask use during COVID-19

Since its outbreak, COVID-19 has impacted world regions differentially. Whereas some regions still record tens of thousands of new infections daily, other regions have contained the virus. What explains these striking regional differences? We advance a cultural psychological perspective on mask usage, a precautionary measure vital for curbing the pandemic. Four large-scale studies provide evidence that collectivism (versus individualism) positively predicts mask usage-both within the United States and across the world. Analyzing a dataset of all 3,141 counties of the 50 US states (based on 248,941 individuals), Study 1a revealed that mask usage was higher in more collectivistic US states. Study 1b replicated this finding in another dataset of 16,737 individuals in the 50 US states. Analyzing a dataset of 367,109 individuals in 29 countries, Study 2 revealed that mask usage was higher in more collectivistic countries. Study 3 replicated this finding in a dataset of 277,219 Facebook users in 67 countries. The link between collectivism and mask usage was robust to a host of control variables, including cultural tightness-looseness, political affiliation, demographics, population density, socioeconomic indicators, universal health coverage, government response stringency, and time. Our research suggests that culture fundamentally shapes how people respond to crises like the COVID-19 pandemic. Understanding cultural differences not only provides insight into the current pandemic, but also helps the world prepare for future crises.

Development and Validation of the Win-Win Scale

Accumulating evidence has shown that win-win is necessary for both individuals and the society. This research, including two studies, aimed to develop and validate a measurement of the win-win scale. In the first study, we screened the items by item analysis and extracted common factors using exploratory factor analysis (EFA), thus determining a total of 25 items in the initial scale consisted of five dimensions including integrity, advancement, altruism, harmoniousness, and coordination. In the second study, we used first- and second-order confirmatory factor analysis (CFA) to test the scale’s construct validity. The results indicated a good fit between the five-factor model and the data. Based on our results, we have formed a win-win scale by keeping 16 items from the original project pool.

Changing cultures, changing brains: A framework for integrating cultural neuroscience and cultural change research

Cultural neuroscience research has provided substantial evidence that culture shapes the brain by providing systematically different sets of experiences. However, cultures are ever-changing in response to the physical and social environment. In the present paper, we integrate theories and methods from cultural neuroscience with the emerging body of research on cultural change and suggest several ways in which the two fields can inform each other. First, we propose that the cultural change perspective helps us reexamine what is meant by culturally typical experiences, which are shaped by the dynamic interaction between cultural norms, values, meanings, and other environmental constraints on behavior. It also allows us to make predictions about the variability/stability of cultural neural differences over time. Then, we discuss how methods used in cultural change research may be applied to cultural neuroscience research and vice versa. We end with a "blue sky vision" for a neuroscience of cultural change.

Time-Space Distanciation as a Decolonizing Framework for Psychology

Coloniality describes the way in which racialized conceptions of being, personhood, and morality inherent in colonial regimes are maintained long after the formal end of colonial enterprises. Central to coloniality has been the material and psychological colonization of space and time, largely by Western and industrialized nations. We propose the importance of understanding the coloniality of time and space through a historically grounded framework called time-space distanciation (TSD). This framework posits that via the global spread of capitalism through colonization, psychological understandings of time and space have been separated from one another, such that they are now normatively treated as distinct entities, each with their own abstract and quantifiable value. We discuss the construct and its centrality to coloniality, as well as the ways in which contemporary psychology has been complicit in proliferating the coloniality of psychologies of time and space. Finally, we discuss ways to employ the decolonial strategies of denaturalization, indigenization, and accompaniment in the context of future research on the psychology of time and space. TSD contributes to decolonial efforts by combatting the reification of hegemonic psychological constructs, showing how these constructs arise as a function of historical changes in understanding, experience, and use of time and space.

Culture, ecology, and grounded procedures

We propose that grounded procedures may help explain psychological variations across cultures. Here we offer a set of novel predictions based on the interplay between the social and physical ecology, chronic sensorimotor experience, and cultural norms.

Friendship Importance Around the World: Links to Cultural Factors, Health, and Well-Being

Prioritizing friendship is associated with many health and well-being benefits. However, to date, there have been relatively few studies that have examined cultural moderators of the link between friendship and important outcomes. In other words, is prioritizing friendships more beneficial in some contexts than others? In the current study, we examined how culture- and country-level factors were associated with the importance people place on friendships and the benefits derived from this importance. The sample comprised of 323,200 participants (M = 40.79 years, SD = 16.09 years) from 99 countries from the World Values Survey. Multilevel analyses revealed that women, people with higher levels of education, and people living in countries that are more economically equal and high in indulgence placed more value on friendships. Prioritizing friendships in life was associated with better health and well-being, but these associations depended on many cultural factors. The findings are discussed in the context of the ways in which friendships can enrich health and well-being across different settings.

Why are song lyrics becoming simpler? a time series analysis of lyrical complexity in six decades of American popular music

Song lyrics are rich in meaning. In recent years, the lyrical content of popular songs has been used as an index of culture's shifting norms, affect, and values. One particular, newly uncovered, trend is that lyrics of popular songs have become increasingly simple over time. Why might this be? Here, we test the idea that increasing lyrical simplicity is accompanied by a widening array of novel song choices. We do so by using six decades (1958-2016) of popular music in the United States (N = 14,661 songs), controlling for multiple well-studied ecological and cultural factors plausibly linked to shifts in lyrical simplicity (e.g., resource availability, pathogen prevalence, rising individualism). In years when more novel song choices were produced, the average lyrical simplicity of the songs entering U.S. billboard charts was greater. This cross-temporal relationship was robust when controlling for a range of cultural and ecological factors and employing multiverse analyses to control for potentially confounding influence of temporal autocorrelation. Finally, simpler songs entering the charts were more successful, reaching higher chart positions, especially in years when more novel songs were produced. The present results suggest that cultural transmission depends on the amount of novel choices in the information landscape.

Shifts in ecology, behavior, values, and relationships during the coronavirus pandemic: Survival threat, subsistence activities, conservation of resources, and interdependent families

What are the psychological effects of the coronavirus pandemic? Greenfield's Theory of Social Change, Cultural Evolution, and Human Development predicts that when survival concerns augment, and one's social world narrows toward the family household. life shifts towards activities, values, relationships, and parenting expectations typical of small-scale rural subsistence environments with low life expectancy. Specific predictions were that, during the pandemic, respondents would report intensified survival concerns (e.g., thinking about one's own mortality); increased subsistence activities (e.g., growing food); augmented subsistence values (e.g., conserving resources); more interdependent family relationships (e.g., members helping each other obtain food); and parents expecting children to contribute more to family maintenance (e.g., by cooking for the family). All hypotheses were confirmed with a large-scale survey in California (N = 1,137) administered after about a month of stay-at-home orders during the coronavirus pandemic; results replicated in Rhode Island (N = 955). We posited that an experience of increased survival concerns and number of days spent observing stay-at-home orders would predict these shifts. A structural equation model confirmed this hypothesis.