Suchergebnisse

Abstract. Countries differ in their religiosity and these differences have been found to moderate numerous psychological effects. The burgeoning research in this area creates a demand for a country-level religiosity index that is comparable across a large number of countries. Here, we offer such an index, which covers 166 countries and rests on representative data from 1,619,300 participants of the Gallup World Poll. Moreover, we validate the novel index, use it to examine temporal change in worldwide religiosity over the last decade, and present a comprehensive analysis of country-level religiosity's nomological network. The main results are as follows. First, the index was found to be a valid index of global religiosity. Second, country-level religiosity modestly increased between 2006 and 2011 and modestly decreased between 2011 and 2017 – demonstrating a curvilinear pattern. Finally, nomological network analysis revealed three things: it buttressed past evidence that religious countries are economically less developed; it clarified inconsistencies in the literature on the health status of inhabitants from religious countries, suggesting that their psychological and physical health tends to be particularly good once economic development is accounted for; and finally, it shed initial light on the associations between country-level religiosity and various psychological dimensions of culture (i.e., Hofstede's cultural dimensions and country-level Big Five traits). These associations revealed that religious countries are primarily characterized by high levels of communion (i.e., collectivism and agreeableness). We are optimistic that the newly presented country-level religiosity index can satisfy the fast-growing demand for an accurate and comprehensive global religiosity index.

Objective: Personality has long been assumed to be a cause of religiosity, not a consequence. Yet, recent research suggests that religiosity may well cause personality change. Consequently, longitudinal research is required that examines the bi-directionality between personality and religiosity. The required research must also attend to cultural religiosity - a critical moderator in previous cross-sectional research. Method: We conducted four-wave, cross-lagged panel models assessing the bi-directional effects between religiosity (measured as religious attendance) and the Big Five personality traits over 12 years in 14 samples (Ntotal = 44,485). Each sample used population-representative data from a different German federal state - states that vary widely in religiosity. Results: The findings were the following: (1) Agreeableness, openness, and conscientiousness were associated with changes in religiosity, with the latter two effects being culture-contingent. (2) Religiosity was associated with changes in agreeableness and openness, with the latter effect being culture-contingent. (3) The cross-lagged effects of personality on religiosity were overall stronger than the reverse effects. Conclusions: The directionality between the Big Five and religiosity seems to go both ways and culture matters for those effects. We discuss the power of religiosity to alter personality and the role of culture for this effect and for personality change more generally.

We introduce a single-item implicit measure of global self-esteem. The measure is based on the mere-ownership effect and asks participants to indicate how much they like their name. Six studies attested to the validity of this measure. In addition to showing high test–retest reliability (r = .85), the studies found that Name-Liking was (a) unrelated to impression management, (b) positively related to the Name-Letter-Task, the Self-Esteem IAT, explicit self-esteem measures, and self-reported subjective well-being, (c) more strongly related to explicit measures of global than domain-specific self-esteem, (d) more strongly related to self-esteem judgments made spontaneously as well as under cognitive load, and (e) predicted observer-reported anxiety during an anxiety-inducing interview whereas an explicit measure of self-esteem did not.

Past laboratory research has shown that talking about helping others can make a positive impression upon a listener. We tested whether this basic social-cognitive phenomenon can help explain how governments gain the confidence of the public they serve. A computerized text analysis of the debates of the US Congress over the past 20 y found that the density of prosocial language strongly predicted public approval ratings 6 mo later. These results suggest that both individuals and governments can gain social approval by merely talking about cooperating and about helping others.

Living near an unsafe housing block or a landfill is unattractive because of their negative influence on the environment. The question we ask is "Would a nearby attractive location cancel out this negative influence?" In two studies, participants were shown fictitious neighborhoods that contained an unattractive location (an unsafe housing block or a landfill) located close to an attractive location (one's own home or a park). The participants were asked to evaluate how pleasant it would feel to live at increasing distances from these locations. The results showed that positively evaluated locations can mitigate but not entirely neutralize the effects of negatively evaluated locations. The present research elucidates how people combine the effects of sources of positive and negative influence.

There is growing evidence that personality traits are spatially clustered across geographic regions and that regionally aggregated personality scores are related to political, economic, social, and health outcomes. However, much of the evidence comes from research that has relied on methods that are ill-suited for working with spatial data. Consequently, the validity and generalizability of that work is unclear. The present work addresses two main challenges of working with spatial data (i.e., Modifiable Aerial Unit Problem and spatial dependencies) and evaluates data-analytic techniques designed to tackle those challenges. Using analytic techniques designed for spatial data, we offer a practical guideline for working with spatial data in psychological research. Specifically, we investigate the robustness of regional personality differences and their correlates within the U.S. (Study 1: N = 3,387,303) and Germany (Study 2: N = 110,029). To account for the Modifiable Aerial Unit Problem, we apply a mapping approach that visualizes distributional patterns without aggregating to a higher level and examine the correlates of regional personality scores across multiple levels of spatial aggregation. To account for spatial dependencies, we examine the correlates of regional personality scores using spatial econometric models. Overall, our results suggest that regional personality differences are robust and can be reliably studied across countries and spatial levels. At the same time, the 4 results also show that ignoring the methodological challenges of spatial data can have serious consequences for research concerned with regional personality differences.

Lower socioeconomic status (SES) harms psychological well-being, an effect responsible for widespread human suffering. This effect has long been assumed to weaken as nations develop economically. Recent evidence, however, has contradicted this fundamental assumption, finding instead that the psychological burden of lower SES is even greater in developed nations than in developing ones. That evidence has elicited consternation because it suggests that economic development is no cure for the psychological burden of lower SES. So, why is that burden greatest in developed nations? Here, we test whether national religiosity can explain this puzzle. National religiosity is particularly low in developed nations. Consequently, developed nations lack religious norms that may ease the burden of lower SES. Drawing on three different data sets of 1,567,204, 1,493,207, and 274,393 people across 156, 85, and 92 nations, we show that low levels of national religiosity can account for the greater burden of lower SES in developed nations. This finding suggests that, as national religiosity continues to decline, lower SES will become increasingly harmful for well-being—a societal change that is socially consequential and demands political attention.