Enhancing Congruence between Implicit Motives and Explicit Goal Commitments: Results of a Randomized Controlled Trial

Young adults looking back at their experiences of treatment and care for nonsuicidal self-injury during adolescence: a qualitative study

BACKGROUND

Nonsuicidal self-injury (NSSI) is associated with stigma, and negative attitudes among healthcare professionals toward NSSI have been reported. A person-centered approach that focuses on how individuals with lived experience of NSSI perceive the treatment and care they receive is invaluable in reducing barriers to help-seeking and improving treatment and mental healthcare services. The aim of the current qualitative study was to explore the perceptions of young adults when they look back upon their experiences of psychiatric treatment for NSSI during adolescence.

METHODS

Twenty-six individuals with lived experience of NSSI who were in contact with child and adolescent psychiatry during adolescence were interviewed. The interviews were analyzed using thematic analysis.

RESULTS

Three main themes were developed: Changed perceptions in retrospect, The importance of a collaborative conceptualization and Lasting impression of the relationship. Participants' perception of themselves as well as the treatment changed over time. The importance of a joint understanding of NSSI and an agreed-upon treatment focus was emphasized. The relationship to the mental health professionals, and experiences of how NSSI was communicated, were salient several years later.

CONCLUSIONS

Healthcare professionals need to communicate about NSSI in a respectful manner and include the perspective of the adolescent with lived experience of NSSI in a joint conceptualization of NSSI and treatment focus.

Value Fulfillment from a Cybernetic Perspective: A New Psychological Theory of Well-Being

Value Fulfillment Theory (VFT) is a philosophical theory of well-being. Cybernetic Big Five Theory (CB5T) is a psychological theory of personality. Both start with a conception of the person as a goal-seeking (or value-pursuing) organism, and both take goals and the psychological integration of goals to be key to well-being. By joining VFT and CB5T, we produce a cybernetic value fulfillment theory in which we argue that well-being is best conceived as the fulfillment of psychologically integrated values. Well-being is the effective pursuit of a set of nonconflicting values that are emotionally, motivationally, and cognitively suitable to the person. The primary difference in our theory from other psychological theories of well-being is that it does not provide a list of intrinsic goods, instead emphasizing that each person may have their own list of intrinsic goods. We discuss the implications of our theory for measuring, researching, and improving well-being.

Perceived Intrinsic Motivation Mediates the Effect of Motive Incongruence on Job Burnout and Job Satisfaction

Job burnout is a profound concern in modern society producing enormous financial and emotional costs for companies, health insurances, and the individual employee. In this study, we aimed at contributing to the literature on determinants of job burnout by investigating the indirect effects of implicit and explicit motive discrepancies (IED) through intrinsic motivation, with the aim of replicating previous findings from the literature. In addition, we extended this research by adding job satisfaction as an outcome variable in the mediation model, as well as volition as a moderator in these relationships. We preregistered our study and collected data from 136 participants (82 females; M_age = 29.33 years, SD_age = 6.30) using indirect measures (for implicit motives) and self-report measures (for explicit motives, job burnout, job satisfaction and volition). IED was shown to have an indirect effect on both job burnout and job satisfaction through intrinsic motivation. Additionally, these indirect effects were mitigated by high levels volition. We discuss implications of our findings for research and practice.Supplemental data for this article is available online at https://doi.org/10.1080/00223980.2021.1980758.

Guided Goal Setting in Therapy Towards Being Fully Functioning

This qualitative study considered whether the provision of a framework of potential goals based on Rogers’ idea of the fully functioning person would be of any benefit to therapy clients in their goal setting process. It also considered addressed whether client goal setting was methodologically acceptable to integrative therapists who used Rogers’ non-directive principles as the foundation to their approach. We provided a goal setting instrument to 9 therapists and 23 of their clients, enabling them to define therapy goals, and feedback on the process. The clients set their goals using the instruments, before having at least six sessions with their therapist. We then sought joint views on the process from the therapists through a questionnaire or an interview. The data from the responses were analyzed using Thematic Analysis. The majority of the therapists considered that guided goal setting using a description of the ‘fully functioning’ individual was helpful. In terms of the applicability of goal setting to an integrative approach based on non-directive, person-centered principles, the results were mixed and in some cases contrary to those expected. For example, some of the more directive therapists disliked guided goal setting processes, whilst the more non-directive therapists appreciated the approach.

The Relationship Between Multidimensional Motivation and Endocrine-Related Responses: A Systematic Review

Multidimensional motivational theories postulate that the type of motivation is as important as the quantity of motivation, with implications for human functioning and well-being. An extensive amount of research has explored how constructs contained within these theories relate to the activation of the endocrine system. However, research is fragmented across several theories, and determining the current state of the science is complicated. In line with contemporary trends for theoretical integration, this systematic review aims to evaluate the association between multidimensional motivational constructs and endocrine-related responses to determine which theories are commonly used and what inferences can be made. Forty-one studies were identified incorporating five distinct motivation theories and multiple endocrine-related responses. There was evidence across several theories that high-quality motivation attenuated the cortisol response in evaluative environments. There was also evidence that motivational needs for power and affiliation were associated with lower and higher levels of salivary immunoglobulin A, respectively. The need for power may play a role in increasing testosterone when winning a contest; however, this evidence was not conclusive. Overall, this review can shape the future integration of motivational theories by characterizing the nature of physiological responses to motivational processes and examining the implications for well-being.

A systematic review and meta-analysis of psychological interventions to improve mental wellbeing

Our current understanding of the efficacy of psychological interventions in improving mental states of wellbeing is incomplete. This study aimed to overcome limitations of previous reviews by examining the efficacy of distinct types of psychological interventions, irrespective of their theoretical underpinning, and the impact of various moderators, in a unified systematic review and meta-analysis. Four-hundred-and-nineteen randomized controlled trials from clinical and non-clinical populations (n = 53,288) were identified for inclusion. Mindfulness-based and multi-component positive psychological interventions demonstrated the greatest efficacy in both clinical and non-clinical populations. Meta-analyses also found that singular positive psychological interventions, cognitive and behavioural therapy-based, acceptance and commitment therapy-based, and reminiscence interventions were impactful. Effect sizes were moderate at best, but differed according to target population and moderator, most notably intervention intensity. The evidence quality was generally low to moderate. While the evidence requires further advancement, the review provides insight into how psychological interventions can be designed to improve mental wellbeing.

Future orientation in successful therapies: Expanding the concept of goal in the working alliance

OBJECTIVE

To better understand how therapists facilitate client goal attainment in therapy, we analyzed therapists' future-oriented actions in good outcome cases in which clients recorded high ratings on goal items in the Working Alliance Inventory-Short Revised.

METHOD

We selected clients who were within the clinical range (OQ-45.2) at pretreatment, demonstrated reliable change at the end of treatment, and recorded high WAI client goals scores early in treatment. Qualitative analyses of transcripts of the initial three sessions and client posttreatment interviews were integrated into a combined analysis to identify themes across the two separate sets of findings.

RESULTS

Therapist future-oriented activity included: (1) Picking up explicit and implicit intentions; (2) using linguistic devices, such as meta-communication, action language, and hedging; (3) using evocative interventions; and (4) nudging the client into practicing change. Core finding: Therapists aligned with clients' directionality in a forward-driven, gradually evolving process.

CONCLUSION

Conceptual and clinical implications are discussed.

Implicit Motives, Laterality, Sports Participation and Competition in Gymnasts

The implicit motivational needs for power, achievement, and affiliation are relevant for sports performance. Due to their hypothesized association with functions of the right hemisphere (McClelland, 1986), they may influence lateralized perceptual and motor processes. And due to their interactions with motive-specific incentives, they may influence performance conditional on the presence of suitable incentives. This preregistered study, conducted mostly online, examines motivational needs using a standard picture-story exercise (PSE) and their associations with indicators of perceptual and motor laterality and sports performance in gymnasts (N = 67). Further it explores how implicit motives interact with suitable motivational incentives in the prediction of sports performance. Results partly confirm a link between indicators of cerebral rightward laterality and implicit motives: the implicit affiliation and achievement motives are positively associated with an indicator of emotional-perceptional laterality (chimeric-faces task), but not with an indicator of motor laterality (turning bias). Moreover, the implicit achievement motive was positively correlated with training hours. The implicit affiliation motive was negatively associated with the highest attained competition level. The presence of achievement incentives (perceived control, failure) and affiliation incentives (training together or alone) did not interact with corresponding motives to predict sports performance.

The Interplay of Achievement Motive-Goal Incongruence and State and Trait Self-Control: A Pilot Study Considering Cortical Correlates of Self-Control

Objective: This study utilized different theoretical perspectives to better understand motor performance. We refered to concepts of achievement motive-goal incongruence and assessed cortical correlates of self-control. We assumed that more self-control is required when people act in conformance with an incongruent goal which, in turn, results in impaired performance. We considered the activation of a brain area associated with self-control (dorsolateral prefrontal cortex, dLPFC) as a consequence of motive-goal incongruence. Furthermore, we analyzed whether trait self-control buffers the negative effects of achievement motive-goal incongruence. Method: Twenty-eight participants (17 women, mean age: 24 years), whose implicit achievement motives were assessed at the beginning of the study, performed a handgrip task in an achievement goal condition and in three incongruent conditions, while their dLPFC oxygenation was monitored continuously (using functional near-infrared spectroscopy, fNIRS). Results: None of the two-way interactions (motive × goal condition) reached significance. A significant three-way interaction (motive × trait self-control × goal condition) showed that trait self-control buffered the detrimental effects of incongruence on motor performance. The nature of the three-way interaction predicting dLPFC oxygenation was unexpected. Conclusions: Although our results have to be treated with caution due to a small sample size, we see them as an encouraging starting point for further research on the interplay between motive-goal incongruence and trait and cortical correlates of state self-control that we assume to be important to understand performance in strenuous tasks.

Stability of and Changes in Implicit Motives. A Narrative Review of Empirical Studies

Although growing research indicates that certain personality traits change over the lifespan, implicit motives are often deemed to be rather stable personality characteristics. Researchers have been interested in implicit motives for several decades, but our understanding of how these dispositions change still lacks clarity. This article gives an overview and a discussion of the current evidence for the stability of and the changes in implicit motives. After elaborating on the theoretical background of the motive construct and its measurement, we present an overview of studies that have investigated the trainability of implicit motives and their dispositional stability and changes using cross-sectional and longitudinal methods. Although the results are inconclusive concerning the direction of change, the reviewed studies suggest that implicit motives adapt to life circumstances much like other personality traits. This review sets out to contribute to a better understanding of the functioning of implicit motives and to present a roadmap for further research.