National Narcissism predicts the Belief in and the Dissemination of Conspiracy Theories During the COVID-19 Pandemic: Evidence From 56 Countries

National Narcissism predicts the Belief in and the Dissemination of Conspiracy Theories During the COVID-19 Pandemic: Evidence From 56 Countries. Anni Sternisko et al. Personality and Social Psychology Bulletin, December 7, 2021. https://doi.org/10.1177/01461672211054947

Abstract: Conspiracy theories related to coronavirus disease 2019 (COVID-19) have propagated around the globe, leading the World Health Organization to declare the spread of misinformation an “Infodemic.” We tested the hypothesis that national narcissism—a belief in the greatness of one’s nation that requires external recognition—is associated with the spread of conspiracy theories during the COVID-19 pandemic. In two large-scale national surveys (NTotal = 950) conducted in the United States and the United Kingdom, and secondary analysis of data from 56 countries (N = 50,757), we found a robust, positive relationship between national narcissism and proneness to believe and disseminate conspiracy theories related to COVID-19. Furthermore, belief in COVID-19 conspiracy theories was related to less engagement in health behaviors and less support for public-health policies to combat COVID-19. Our findings illustrate the importance of social identity factors in the spread of conspiracy theories and provide insights into the psychological processes underlying the COVID-19 pandemic.

Keywords: COVID-19, conspiracy theories, collective narcissism, social identity, public health

General Discussion

In three studies, with data from 51,707 participants from 56 countries, we examined the relationships between national narcissism, COVID-19 conspiracy theories, and health behaviors and policy attitudes. Across culturally diverse samples, we found that greater national narcissism was associated with stronger belief in COVID-19 conspiracy theories (Studies 1–3). In the United States and the United Kingdom, national narcissism was also positively related to intentions to disseminate COVID-19 conspiracy theories (Studies 1 and 2). This relationship was mediated by greater belief in COVID-19 conspiracy theories (Studies 1 and 2). These relationships were very robust¹² and persisted when we adjusted for a series of relevant covariates. National narcissism might be an important risk factor for the spread of conspiracy theories during the pandemic.

We found correlational evidence suggesting that belief in COVID-19 conspiracy theories may have serious consequences for the global containment of the pandemic. Across 56 countries, belief in COVID-19 conspiracy beliefs were related to less adherence to public health guidelines (i.e., physical hygiene, physical distancing; Study 3) and less support for public health policies (Studies 2 and 3). These effects were generally small which may partly be due to restricted variance. People reported high engagement in health behavior and policy support but low belief in COVID-19 conspiracy theories. Given the globality and contagiousness of the virus, however, even subtle negligence can be detrimental. We also found that COVID-19 conspiracy theory beliefs mediated a negative relationship between national narcissism and engagement in health behaviors (Study 3) and policy support (Studies 2 and 3).

Theoretical Contributions and Implications

Our study expands previous work on conspiracy theories and public health by examining the role of social identity processes. We found that national narcissism—a defensive belief in the greatness of one’s nation that requires external recognition—was positively related to the readiness to believe and disseminate COVID-19 conspiracy theories. Critically, neither general ingroup positivity (Studies 1–3) nor individual narcissism (Study 3) could fully account for our findings. It was the defensive love for the nation—captured in national narcissism—that seemed to be crucial.

Furthermore, the relationship between national narcissism and belief in COVID-19 conspiracy theories persisted when adjusting for participants’ belief in conspiracy theories unrelated to COVID-19 (Study 1), suggesting that national narcissists are not drawn to simply any kind of conspiracy theories (see Bertin et al., 2021; Cichocka, Marchlewska, & Golec de Zavala, 2016). In fact, national narcissism was unrelated to belief in conspiracy theories about topics like politics (e.g., 9/11 inside job) and other public health issues (e.g., HIV, vaccines; see Supplement Table 9.1). This suggests that at the time of data collection COVID-19 conspiracy theories corresponded to a specific social identity need (Enders & Uscinski, 2021; Sternisko et al., 2020, Uscinski et al., 2020), presumably the desire to deny or deflect national shortcomings exposed by the pandemic.

Even though belief in COVID-19 conspiracy theories and national narcissism were associated with reflexive open-mindedness (Study 1) and low reflection (Study 3), the association between national narcissism and belief in COVID-19 conspiracy theories remained significant when we adjusted for these factors, as well as factual knowledge about COVID-19 (Study 2). These findings highlight that conspiracy theory beliefs among national narcissists are not simply a product of limited cognitive effort and gullibility (Van Bavel & Pereira, 2018; Zmigrod et al., 2018). Certain strategies to reduce the spread of misinformation like accuracy nudges (Pennycook et al., 2020) and media education (Basol et al., 2020) may therefore prove less effective for national narcissists.

Furthermore, we found that the relationship between national narcissism and conspiracy theory beliefs occurs outside the context of intergroup conflict. We found that national narcissists latched onto conspiracy theories specifically related to COVID-19, regardless of who is the alleged conspirator. This suggests that conspiracy theories are a generalized maladaptive ingroup defense strategy among national narcissists (Cislak et al., 2021; Marchlewska et al., 2019).

Little research has examined the psychological risk factors for the spread of conspiracy theories. We found that national narcissism may be a risk factor for the dissemination of conspiracy theories (Hughes & Machan, 2021). At first, our findings may seem obvious: people with stronger conspiracy theory beliefs—people high in national narcissism—should also be more likely to disseminate them. However, the formation and dissemination of people’s public beliefs are much more complex (León-Medina et al., 2020). For instance, people anticipate negative judgment and social exclusion for publicly supporting conspiracy theories (Lantian et al., 2018). In such situations, private and public opinions often become misaligned (León-Medina et al., 2020). Our findings hint at an interesting psychological phenomenon worth future investigation: National narcissists may be more willing than others to imperil their personal image in the interest of defending their ingroup’s image.

Exploratory analyses found evidence that national narcissists’ stronger belief in COVID-19 conspiracy theories is linked to less engagement in health behaviors and less support for policies mitigating the COVID-19 pandemic. However, looking at the total and direct effects of national narcissism a more complicated picture emerged. In Study 2, national narcissism was negatively related to policy support after adjusting for national identification. However, national narcissism was positively albeit weakly, related to policy support and physical hygiene and was not related to physical distancing in Study 3 (Van Bavel, Cichocka et al., 2020). When we accounted for conspiracy theories in our mediation models, the direct relationships remained positive, yet weak. These findings suggest that while national narcissism might be associated with lower willingness to adhere to pandemic related guidelines via conspiracy beliefs, other psychological processes might be operating in parallel motivating national narcissists to support policies and regulations to the extent they view them as beneficial to maintaining the positive ingroup image (Cislak et al., 2021; Gronfeldt et al., 2021). More research is needed to unpack these relationships.

Limitations and Future Directions

We found that the relationship between national narcissism and belief in COVID-19 conspiracy theories was relatively robust across contexts. Nevertheless, some countries deviated from general trends, suggesting that our findings are not universally true. Furthermore, participants from Africa and the Middle East were still underrepresented in our studies. In addition, we only measured dissemination intentions in Studies 1 and 2, both of which were conducted in Western, educated, industrialized, rich and democratic (W.E.I.R.D) countries. This limits the generalizability of the corresponding findings. We encourage research to replicate our findings with these populations and also explore potential moderators (see Supplement Tables S1.7, S1.8, S2.7, S2.8, S3.4 on gender and ethnicity). We also highlight that all measures relied on self-report and slightly varied across studies. Despite these variations in measurements, our results were consistent across studies which lends further confidence in our conclusions. Last, we note that beliefs in conspiracy theories were quite low. As such, our work is best understood as examining the underlying motives of those who depart from a norm of skepticism towards conspiracy theories.

Since national narcissism is relatively stable over time (Cichocka et al., 2018), we suspect that national narcissism motivates the belief in and dissemination of COVID-19 conspiracy theories, which translates into adverse health behaviors and attitudes rather than the reverse. However, our data is cross-sectional. More work is needed to justify this interpretation. If future research finds evidence that national narcissism increases people’s proneness to believe and disseminate COVID-19 conspiracy theories, practical implications are worthwhile exploring. For instance, underscoring that the national in-group is disadvantaged in fighting the pandemic might heighten the need to assert the image of the group and further fuel conspiracy theories (Marchlewska et al., 2018). Conversely, public health messages might benefit from stressing that the adherence to health guidelines such as getting the COVID-19 vaccine helps protect the nation’s image.

Gender Roles in the Millennium: Who Pays and Is Expected to Pay for Romantic Dates?

Gender Roles in the Millennium: Who Pays and Is Expected to Pay for Romantic Dates? Hao Wu et al. Psychological Reports, December 7, 2021. https://doi.org/10.1177/00332941211057144

Abstract: Research on monetary decisions and behaviors in dating relationships is very limited. The purpose of this study was to examine college students’ current practice and expectations for date payment for first and subsequent romantic dates in the framework of gender role theory. A sample of 552 heterosexual college students took an online survey that included questions about their actual and expected payment for their first and subsequent dates. Participants also completed several measures regarding their gender roles. The findings indicated that traditional gender norms in dating continue to be popular in the new millennium because in actual practice, men almost always paid the whole bill of the first dates and paid more for subsequent dates. When asked who should pay for the dates, participants also expected men to pay more for first and subsequent dates. Women did show some willingness to share date expenses, although nowhere close to be completely even. The findings also indicated that gender role attitudes played little role in actual practice but had a stronger role in date payment expectations, showing that individuals subscribing to traditional gender inequality views tended to believe that men should pay more for dates.

Keywords: Sex, gender role, gender norm, gender attitudes, date payment

The nature of privilege: intergenerational wealth in animal societies

The nature of privilege: intergenerational wealth in animal societies. Jennifer E Smith, B Natterson-Horowitz, Michael E Alfaro. Behavioral Ecology, arab137, December 7 2021. https://doi.org/10.1093/beheco/arab137

Abstract: Wealth inequality is widespread across human societies, from pastoral and small-scale agricultural groups to large modern social structures. The intergenerational transfer of wealth privileges some individuals over others through the transmission of resources external to an individual organism. Privileged access to household wealth (e.g., land, shelter, silver) positively influences the destinies of some (and their descendants) over others in human societies. Strikingly parallel phenomena exist in animal societies. Inheritance of nongenetic commodities (e.g., a nest, territory, tool) external to an individual also contributes greatly to direct fitness in animals. Here, we illustrate the evolutionary diversity of privilege and its disparity-generating effects on the evolutionary trajectories of lineages across the Tree of Life. We propose that integration of approaches used to study these patterns in humans may offer new insights into a core principle from behavioral ecology—differential access to inherited resources—and help to establish a broad, comparative framework for studying inequality in animals.

Intergenerational transfer of material wealth within family lineages

Intergenerational transfer of material wealth can drive inequality within family lineages of animals. In North American red squirrels (Tamiasciurus hudsonicus), a mother may store spruce cones on her territory and privilege her daughter by bequeathing a rich territory to her; daughters who receive these resources survive longer and reproduce earlier than those without (Smith 1968). Male food hoarders can also influence the lifetime fitness of subsequent owners of middens and these effects persist across multiple owners (Fisher et al. 2019). Because these food hoards outlive their owners, these indirect effects alter the environments that others experience. Thus, when some offspring receive a cone stash and others do not, this perpetuates inequality across generations privileging some individuals over others. Whereas many species, including the red squirrels described here, modify their local resource distributions (Laland et al. 1999; Olding-Smee 2012), studying the evolutionary dynamics associated with the intergenerational transfer of these constructed niches requires explicit study within a comparative framework.

The material transfer of (nongenetic) material wealth contributes to the extinction (vs. expansion) of family lineages and advantage individuals of the philopatric (vs. dispersing) sex across species. For spotted hyenas (Crocuta crocuta), individuals from multiple maternal lineages join forces to defend a shared territory, but high-born philopatric females and their descendants have privileged access to resources within them (Holekamp et al. 2012) (Figure 2). Differential access promotes the extinction of nonprivileged family lineages but expands land ownership by privileged animals; these effects are further ameliorated by differential access to social support within groups (Smith, Van Horn, et al. 2010; Strauss and Holekamp 2019). In contrast, territory acquisition by a young male red grouse (Lagopus lagopus scotica) is impacted by paternal presence (Watson et al. 1994) (Figure 2). Philopatric sons with nearby fathers gain larger and more defended territories than individuals whose fathers are no longer alive. Thus, the comparative study of wealth transfer across animals should therefore offer insights into the evolutionary dynamics of family groups and the consequences of sex-biased dispersal in animals.

The transgenerational use of activity sites can also contribute to the accumulation of stone tools within lineages. Taï Chimpanzees (Pan troglodytes verus) (Mercader et al. 2002) and bearded capuchin monkeys (Cebus libidinosus) (Elisabetta et al. 2013) inherit tools produced at nut-cracking sites via the paternal and maternal lines, respectively. Individuals that inherit are advantaged over others who do not in terms of their ability to gain access to key food resources; these beneficial effects are further compounded through the transfer of social information (e.g., traditions for how to use inherited materials) across generations. These examples shed light on the direct and indirect role of wealth transfer in shaping legacies of inequality along bloodlines over multiple time scales. These effects of intergenerational wealth mobility are likely stronger for some species than for others, as we discuss below, and therefore should be the subject of a quantitative study by behavioral ecologists to understand the breadth of their influence.

Intergenerational transfer of material wealth among non-kin

Intergenerational transfer of material wealth is not limited to genetic relatives within animal societies and can impose similar disparity-generating effects through preferential treatment by non-kin. For instance, privileged access to shelter (e.g., a nest) can transcend bloodlines in European paper wasps (Polistes dominula). Inheritance of built structures from kin or non-kin advantage wasps fortunate enough to receive them (Leadbeater et al. 2011). As a result, females who share nests with others are more likely to inherit structures and produce offspring than less privileged lone females. Within some termite societies structures may be inherited from kin, but inheritance can also occur when different lineages merge to share “real estate” (Thorne et al. 2003). The merging of families accelerates inheritance, increasing opportunities for resource acquisition for future generations, benefiting some termite lineages over others to further perpetuate the cycle of privilege. In some cases, disadvantaged individuals wait for privileged individuals to perish, as occurs, for example, in the clown anemonefish (Amphiprion percula) which lives in groups composed of non-relatives (Buston 2004). The non-breeding fish queue to inherit high-quality anemones from non-kin, but not all individuals inherit, and these effects can compound across multiple generations. Further inquiry into understanding selective processes shaping resource transfer among non-kin within a comparative perspective could offer new insights into the evolutionary origins of cooperation among non-relatives.

AI-powered mutual funds per se do not outperform the market, but significantly outperform their human-managed peers, show superior stock selection capability and can overcome some prevalent behavioral biases

Do AI-Powered Mutual Funds Perform Better? Rui Chen, Jinjuan Ren. Finance Research Letters, December 4 2021, 102616. https://doi.org/10.1016/j.frl.2021.102616

Highlights

• AI-powered mutual funds per se do not outperform the market.

• AI-powered mutual funds significantly outperform their human-managed peers.

• AI-powered mutual funds show superior stock selection capability and lower turnover ratios to humans.

• AI-powered funds can overcome some prevalent behavioral biases.

Abstract: We evaluate the performance of artificial intelligence (AI)-powered mutual funds. We find that these funds do not outperform the market per se. However, a comparison shows that AI-powered funds significantly outperform their human-managed peer funds. We further show that the outperformance of AI funds is attributable to their lower transaction cost, superior stock-picking capability, and reduced behavioral biases.

Keywords: Artificial IntelligenceMutual fund performanceBehavioral biasesJEL classification: G11, G23, G41

Gifted & Talented Programs and Racial Segregation

Gifted & Talented Programs and Racial Segregation. Owen Thompson. NBER Working Paper 29546, December 2021. https://www.nber.org/papers/w29546

Abstract: Racial segregation can occur across educational programs or classrooms within a given school, and there has been particular concern that gifted & talented programs may reduce integration within schools. This paper evaluates the contribution of gifted & talented education to racial segregation using data on the presence and racial composition of gifted & talented programs at virtually all US elementary schools over a span of nine school years. I first show that, consistent with widespread perceptions, gifted & talented programs do disproportionately enroll white and Asian students while Black, Hispanic and Native American students are underrepresented. However, I also show that accounting for the within-school racial sorting caused by these programs has little or no effect on standard measures of overall racial segregation. This is primarily because gifted & talented programs are a small share of total enrollments and do enroll non-negligible numbers of under-represented minority students. I also estimate changes in race-specific enrollments after schools initiate or discontinue gifted & talented programs, and find no significant enrollment changes after programs are eliminated or initiated. I conclude that gifted & talented education is a quantitatively small contributor to racial segregation in US elementary schools.

Opposition to High Density Development: Across every demographic subgroup analyzed, respondents preferred single-family home developments by a wide margin

You Won't be My Neighbor: Opposition to High Density Development. Jessica Trounstine. Urban Affairs Review, December 6, 2021. https://doi.org/10.1177/10780874211065776

Abstract: Virtually every city in the United States bans multifamily homes in at least some neighborhoods, and in many cities most residential land is restricted to single family homes. This is the case even though many metropolitan areas are facing skyrocketing housing costs and increased environmental degradation that could be alleviated by denser housing supply. Some scholars have argued that an unrepresentative set of vocal development opponents are the culprits behind this collective action failure. Yet, recent work suggests that opposition to density may be widespread. In this research note, I use a conjoint survey experiment to provide evidence that preferences for single-family development are ubiquitous. Across every demographic subgroup analyzed, respondents preferred single-family home developments by a wide margin. Relative to single family homes, apartments are viewed as decreasing property values, increasing crime rates, lowering school quality, increasing traffic, and decreasing desirability.

Keywords: land use, development, experiment, survey

Is Intellectual Humility Associated With Less Political Myside Bias?

Stepping Outside the Echo Chamber: Is Intellectual Humility Associated With Less Political Myside Bias? Shauna M. Bowes et al. Personality and Social Psychology Bulletin, March 10, 2021. https://doi.org/10.1177/0146167221997619

Abstract: In recent years, an upsurge of polarization has been a salient feature of political discourse in America. A small but growing body of research has examined the potential relevance of intellectual humility (IH) to political polarization. In the present investigation, we extend this work to political myside bias, testing the hypothesis that IH is associated with less bias in two community samples (N1 = 498; N2 = 477). In line with our expectations, measures of IH were negatively correlated with political myside bias across paradigms, political topics, and samples. These relations were robust to controlling for humility. We also examined ideological asymmetries in the relations between IH and political myside bias, finding that IH–bias relations were statistically equivalent in members of the political left and right. Notwithstanding important limitations and caveats, these data establish IH as one of a small handful psychological features known to predict less political myside bias.

Keywords: intellectual humility, partisan bias, polarization, humility, myside bias

From 2018... To be funny or not to be funny: Gender differences in student perceptions of instructor humor in college science courses

From 2018... To be funny or not to be funny: Gender differences in student perceptions of instructor humor in college science courses. Katelyn M. Cooper et al. PLoS One, August 15, 2018. https://doi.org/10.1371/journal.pone.0201258

Abstract: For over 50 years instructor humor has been recognized as a way to positively impact student cognitive and affective learning. However, no study has explored humor exclusively in the context of college science courses, which have the reputation of being difficult and boring. The majority of studies that explore humor have assumed that students perceive instructor humor to be funny, yet students likely perceive some instructor humor as unfunny or offensive. Further, evidence suggests that women perceive certain subjects to be more offensive than men, yet we do not know what impact this may have on the experience of women in the classroom. To address these gaps in the literature, we surveyed students across 25 different college science courses about their perceptions of instructor humor in college science classes, which yielded 1637 student responses. Open-coding methods were used to analyze student responses to a question about why students appreciate humor. Multinomial regression was used to identify whether there are gender differences in the extent to which funny, unfunny, and offensive humor influenced student attention to course content, instructor relatability, and student sense of belonging. Logistic regression was used to examine gender differences in what subjects students find funny and offensive when joked about by college science instructors. Nearly 99% of students reported that they appreciate instructor humor and reported that it positively changes the classroom atmosphere, improves student experiences during class, and enhances the student-instructor relationship. We found that funny humor tends to increase student attention to course content, instructor relatability, and student sense of belonging. Conversely, offensive humor tends to decrease instructor relatability and student sense of belonging. Lastly, we identified subjects that males were more likely to find funny and females were more likely to find offensive if a college science instructor were to joke about them.

Since attractive alternatives threaten committed relationships, committed partners protect their relationships by devaluing such alternatives; but there are new technologies that increase access to attractive alternatives & there are more diverse relationships

The changing tides of attractive alternatives in romantic relationships: Recent societal changes compel new directions for future research. Ashlyn Brady, Levi R. Baker. Social and Personality Psychology Compass, December 4 2021. https://doi.org/10.1111/spc3.12650

Abstract: Societal changes over recent decades have drastically transformed the frequency and manner in which people are exposed to attractive alternative relationship partners, arguably resulting in such alternatives posing a greater threat to committed relationships now than ever before. Yet despite a growing need for novel research on attractive alternatives, research on this topic has failed to account for such changes and thus is growing stagnant. Specifically, although interdependence perspectives and supporting research have consistently and robustly demonstrated that (a) attractive alternatives threaten committed relationships and (b) committed partners protect their relationships by devaluing such alternatives, research has yet to examine how the changing nature of attractive alternatives might affect these processes. To this end, the present article first reviews foundational theory and research that guided the study of attractive alternatives and then highlights how recent societal changes (e.g., technology that increases access to attractive alternatives, increasingly diverse relationship types, the emerging desire to remain single) diverge from this research and thus warrant new directions. We encourage researchers to expand how they study attractive alternatives and to ultimately reignite research on this increasingly important topic.

Engaging in more extraverted behavior in everyday life made people feel better and a bit more authentic

Enacted Extraversion as a Well-Being Enhancing Strategy in Everyday Life: Testing Across Three, Week-Long Interventions. Zack M. van Allen; Deanna L. Walker; Tamir Streiner; John M. Zelenski. Collabra: Psychology (2021) 7 (1): 29931. https://doi.org/10.1525/collabra.29931

Abstract: Lab-based experiments and observational data have consistently shown that extraverted behavior is associated with elevated levels of positive affect. This association typically holds regardless of one’s dispositional level of trait extraversion, and individuals who enact extraverted behaviors in laboratory settings do not demonstrate costs associated with acting counter-dispositionally. Inspired by these findings, we sought to test the efficacy of week-long ‘enacted extraversion’ interventions. In three studies, participants engaged in fifteen minutes of assigned behaviors in their daily life for five consecutive days. Studies 1 and 2 compared the effect of adding more introverted or extraverted behavior (or a control task). Study 3 compared the effect of adding social extraverted behavior or non-social extraverted behavior (or a control task). We assessed positive affect and several indicators of well-being during pretest (day 1) and post-test (day 7), as well as ‘in-the-moment’ (days 2-6). Participants who engaged in extraverted behavior reported greater levels of positive affect ‘in-the-moment’ when compared to introverted and control behaviors. We did not observe strong evidence to suggest that this effect was more pronounced for dispositional extraverts. The current research explores the effects of extraverted behavior on other indicators of well-being and examines the effectiveness of acting extraverted (both socially and non-socially) as a well-being strategy.

Keywords:happiness, personality, positive affect, well-being, extraversion

General Discussion

This research further explores the robust link between extraversion and positive affect with a more novel focus on intentionally adding extraverted behaviors to daily life. Consistent with observational data, laboratory-based experiments, and real-world interventions, across three studies, we observed that engaging in extraverted behavior was associated with elevated levels of in-the-moment positive affect compared to introverted behavior and/or other control behaviors (Hypothesis 1). However, general, retrospective reports suggested that participants did not consistently experience increased positive affect from extraverted behavior during the week of the intervention, compared to the preceding week (Hypothesis 2). Further, we did not find clear support for the idea that dispositional extraverts might benefit more from engaging in more extraverted behavior compared to dispositional introverts (Hypothesis 3). These three studies suggest that average levels of momentary positive affect can be increased through the addition of extraverted behavior; however, these results do not support the idea that enacted extraversion interventions of 15-minutes daily behavior change are sufficient to produce lasting changes in well-being.

[Table 12. Correlations Between Trait Extraversion and Well-Being for Post-Test Assessment and Daily Reports]

One strength of our studies was the randomized controlled trial designs in Studies 2 and 3. Interestingly, the effect of extraverted behavior on positive affect in our studies varied depending on the control group. We observed the strongest effect of extraverted behavior when compared to enacted introversion (Studies 1 and 2) or journaling about daily happenings (Study 3). In contrast, when compared to an arguably more ‘active’ control, reflecting on one’s childhood (Study 2), the relative benefits of extraverted behavior were not clear. Taken together with conceptually similar experiments, increases in positive affect appear to be most consistent when compared to enacted introversion (present studies; Margolis & Lyubomirsky, 2020) or tasks which contain several elements of introverted behavior (i.e., a ‘sham’ condition which included instructions to act unassuming, sensitive, calm, modest, and quiet; Jacques-Hamilton et al., 2019). Said another way, some of the suggested benefits of extraverted behavior could be equally well-described as costs of introverted behavior.

When considered with the available observational (e.g., Fleeson et al., 2002; McNiel et al., 2010; McNiel & Fleeson, 2006) and experimental data collected both in laboratory (e.g., Zelenski et al., 2012; Zelenski, Whelan, et al., 2013) and naturalistic settings (e.g., Jacques-Hamilton et al., 2019; Margolis & Lyubomirsky, 2020), our results contribute to the confidence in a robust effect of state extraversion on positive affect. Although we did not find strong evidence that this effect varied as a function of trait extraversion (cf., Jacques-Hamilton et al., 2019), correlational evidence in the present studies did suggest that trait introverts perceived extraverted behavior to require more effort, and that trait extraversion was (inconsistently) related to feelings of authenticity when completing extraverted tasks. These interactions were generally non-significant in regression models, though even our larger studies may be underpowered to detect interactions reliably. To be clear, we did not design our studies to test null trait by condition interactions given the pattern of null interactions in the existing literature. Following planned analysis, we considered the application of equivalence tests (e.g., Lakens et al., 2018; Schuirmann, 1987) to determine if we could rule out interactions that were larger than trivially small (i.e., similar to concluding the null). Recently, the equivalence testing framework has been expanded to apply to interaction terms in multiple regression (Alter & Counsell, 2021). However, post-hoc applications of equivalence testing are problematic, and the size of our samples were not well suited to the use of equivalence testing for multiple regression (Alter & Counsell, 2021). Detecting significant interactions, and persuasively ruling them out, both require substantial power. Additionally, equivalence testing requires the identification of a SESOI (smallest effect size of interest) and after careful consideration we were unable to arrive at a reasonable SESOI based on available research given the scarcity of similar studies employing multiple regression and difficulty of translating ‘just noticeable differences’ to interactions including a continuous (trait) predictor. Ultimately, we believe that any reasonable SESOI would be likely to produce an ‘inconclusive’ result due to our sample sizes. Therefore, while we cannot rule out the possibility that the enacted extraversion-positive affect association depends on dispositional extraversion, we did not observe strong evidence for its influence. Our research is ultimately inconclusive regarding interactions, and future work will likely need substantially larger samples (and to define a SESOI a priori) to provide more definitive answers.

It is also possible that we did not observe stronger evidence of ‘costs’ to acting counter-dispositionally (cf. Jacques-Hamilton et al., 2019) due to methodological differences between studies. For example, participants in our experiments were asked to engage in fifteen extra minutes of introverted or extraverted behavior each day (mirroring the length of time used in lab-based studies), whereas Jacques-Hamilton and colleagues (2019) asked participants to modify their behavior in interactions with others “as much as possible” for one week, and Margolis et al. (2020) likewise instructed participants to ‘be as introverted/extraverted as you can’. Although comparisons of the duration and intensity of extraverted behavior are not possible between studies, it is likely that people engaged in extraverted behavior less frequently in our studies.

Notably, fewer trait interactions have been observed when participants have been asked to report on specific instances of behavior, for example via experience sampling methods or questionnaires on one’s day. Specifically, the moderating effect of trait extraversion on positive affect in the Jacques-Hamilton et al. (2019) study was observed in retrospective accounts but not in momentary data. The difference in task instruction within the present studies (i.e., 15 minutes) may make it more reasonable for introverts to introduce short bursts of extraverted behavior into their daily lives, rather than trying to adjust their general approach when interacting with other people (which would naturally be easier for dispositional extraverts). Therefore, dispositional levels of extraversion may influence the costs and/or benefits derived from extraverted behavior, at least for positive affect, when such behavior is enacted more frequently and is sustained over longer durations of time. Further research is required to determine the trade-offs between short-term and long-term counter-dispositional behavior and the hedonic benefits of sustained enacted extraversion.

Collectively, the accumulating evidence from observational and experimental data supports the trait-state isomorphism hypothesis (Fleeson, 2001). The trait-state isomorphism hypothesis also predicted the association between subjective vitality and state extraversion observed in each of our three experiments. Specifically, the association between trait extraversion and vitality (Ryan & Frederick, 1997) is predicted by the isomorphism hypothesis to hold at the state level, an association we observed consistently. However, given the strong correlations between measures of positive affect and subjective vitality, both measuring high-arousal and high-pleasantness constructs, the tendency for these outcomes to co-vary with state extraversion is perhaps not surprising and has been observed previously (Pickett et al., 2020).

Although consistently observed through a variety of methods, the mechanisms underlying the state extraversion/positive affect association are still not well-understood. One potential hypothesis for this association is that the relationship between extraversion and social interactions may partially explain this link. We attempted to dissociate social from non-social forms of extraversion in Study 3 with separate instructions. Participants who added socially motivated extraverted behavior to their daily lives (e.g., “I made plans with a friend and consciously made the effort to be more talkative and outgoing…”) did not report any more positive affect than did participants who engaged in non-social extraverted behavior (e.g., ”After finishing work, I took the bus down to the market and tried Ethiopian food, I went alone and made my way around the market until I found something that was new to me”). This finding is consistent with mediation analysis (Jacques-Hamilton et al., 2019) which did not detect a mediating role of social activity frequency and the positive affect/state extraversion relationship. Taken together, these results suggest a possible ‘alternative path’ for dispositional introverts who wish to elevate their positive affect through primarily non-social activities or for situations in which social contact is not feasible.

Limitations and Future Research

Our three experiments provide experimental confirmation that intentionally incorporating more extraverted behavior into one’s daily life can increase momentary levels of positive affect. However, four main limitations should be noted. First, the studies are each limited by low compliance rates, with many participants excluded from analysis for failing to complete a minimum number of daily activities or for non-compliance. This could be a result of the length of the study and/or loss of interest over the course of the week (Lefever et al., 2007). However, we cannot rule out the possibility that some degree of selective participation (i.e., person-activity fit) was present and may potentially bias the results, or limit generalizability in ways that would decrease the efficacy of a broad intervention. Additionally, although we attempted to assess participants two weeks following the post-test with the goal of assessing longer-term changes in well-being, significantly high attrition prevented analysis of these data.

Second, the experimental designs in Studies 2 and 3 were implemented entirely online, which we suspect resulted in lower task compliance and the selection of activities which may not be ideal for the purposes of the studies. In our first study, participants’ activities were discussed and selected with the assistance of a researcher; however, the transition to an entirely online intervention (which facilitated scalability) resulted in a reduced capacity for quality control. Although it is tempting to attribute the stronger results observed in Study 1 to this characteristic of the experimental design, especially when identifying significant pre-post changes in well-being, the smaller sample size and possible experimenter effects cannot be overlooked as being limiting factors.

Third, the ‘dosage’ of the experimental manipulation may have been insufficient to produce detectable changes in affect and well-being over time. One tentatively supporting piece of evidence for this suggestion comes from a recent 15-week study where participants who engaged in more enacted extraversion tasks were more likely to report positive changes in trait extraversion over time (Hudson et al., 2019). Although this experiment focused on trait change rather that well-being outcomes, it highlights the possibility that a higher frequency of enacted extraversion may be required for sustained changes in trait-related outcomes (e.g., positive affect, well-being).

Fourth, although the promise of enacted extraversion as a well-being increasing strategy is to provide individuals with a simple behavioural tool to increase their mood and well-being, our experiments are conducted at the group level and results cannot be inferred at the individual level. The findings from our two randomized controlled trials provide some evidence that average levels of positive affect may be enhanced at the group level. However, without further researching using idiographic methods, we must refrain from committing an ecological fallacy (Robinson, 1950) by suggesting that our experiments support enacted extraversion as a strategy for any given individual. Moreover, across the recent acting extraverted studies, there appears a possible trade-off between the amount of activity needed for lasting change and the emergence of concurrent costs for dispositional introverts (cf., Jacques-Hamilton et al., 2019).

Finally, although participants in all conditions received similar behavioural instructions, it is possible the behavioural adjectives of extraversion were more socially desirable than those for introversion and influenced participants’ expectations regarding the purpose of the study. Behavioural instructions in the introversion conditions were designed to counter this potential effect, however, it is unclear whether the study outcomes were influenced by social desirability.

Women's greater compliance levels with preventive health behaviours could, at least in part, be attributed to their higher agreeableness and conscientiousness scores

Pandemic Prevention and Personality Psychology: Gender Differences in Preventive Health Behaviors during COVID-19 and the Roles of Agreeableness and Conscientiousness. Tobias Otterbring, Alexandra Festila. Journal of Safety Science and Resilience, November 30 2021. https://doi.org/10.1016/j.jnlssr.2021.11.003

Abstract: One of greatest public health crises in recent times, the COVID-19 pandemic, has come with a myriad of challenges in terms of health communication and public cooperation to prevent the spread of the disease. Understanding which are the key determinants that make certain individuals more cooperative is key in effectively tackling pandemics and similar future challenges. In the present study (N = 800), we investigated whether gender differences in compliance with preventive health behaviors (PHB) at the onset of the COVID-19 pandemic could be established, and, if so, whether the personality traits of agreeableness and conscientiousness can help explain this presumed relationship. Consistent with our theorizing, we found women to score higher than men on agreeableness and conscientiousness, and to be more willing to comply with a set of PHB. Importantly, both personality traits were found to mediate the gender-compliance link. This means that women's greater compliance levels with PHB could, at least in part, be attributed to their higher agreeableness and conscientiousness scores. A greater understanding of the determinants of PHB in terms of gender and associated personality traits may help identify options for developing more effective communication campaigns, both in terms of communication channel selection and message content.

Keywords: COVID-19pandemicsgender, personalitypsychologyagreeablenessconscientiousnesspreventive health behaviors

DISCUSSION

In the present research, we investigated potential gender differences in individuals’ compliance with a set of preventive health measures (i.e., social distancing, wearing a face mask, hand hygiene), as introduced during the COVID-19 pandemic. Further, we examined whether the personality traits of agreeableness and conscientiousness mediated the role of the hypothesized gender differences in shaping compliance responses. Consistent with our theorizing and previous related research, we found women to score higher than men on agreeableness and conscientiousness, and to be more willing to comply with the preventive health measures studied herein. Importantly, both personality traits were found to mediate the gender-compliance link. Thus, women's greater compliance levels withing the realm of preventive health measures during a public health crisis can, at least in part, be attributed to their higher agreeableness and conscientiousness scores.

Previous research has consistently reported that men appear to be less compliant with multiple PHB. Accordingly, they are generally less likely to engage in self-care techniques when they are sick (e.g., staying in bed), less likely to have regular screenings and check-ups (e.g., for cholesterol, blood pressure, cancer), and less likely to follow preventive treatments (e.g., take medicine for blood pressure), just to name a few examples (for a review, see [13]). There are numerous theories as to why such gender-differentiated patterns emerge, including traditional gender roles and men's perceived invulnerability to risk [14, 16]. Building on previous studies reporting gender differences in agreeableness and conscientiousness [2, 15, 28, 31, 51, 53], our study indicates that such differences in personality could at least partially explain behavioral patterns of this type. Indeed, agreeableness is a dimension associated with maintenance of positive interpersonal relations and conflict avoidance [27], characteristics that might explain a tendency to perform normative behaviors (e.g., compliance with preventive behaviors). As for conscientiousness, certain self-regulatory processes associated with this personality trait (e.g., the ability to control one's behavior and to perform a given task) could aid the performance of otherwise aversive behaviors, including compliance with health behaviors [36], as examined herein.

Although our obtained effect sizes were typically small to moderate by conventional standards [19, 21], our results may still have practical implications. In fact, the strengths of our relationships are at least as strong as the link between extraversion test scores and success in sales or between antihistamine use and reduced sneezing [33]. Thus, multiply our obtained gender differences by the number of men and women in the world and bear in mind the ease with which brief measures of personality traits can be collected, and it should become evident why the current findings are relevant (cf. [42]). For example, a greater understanding of the determinants of PHB in terms of gender and associated personality traits may help identify options for developing more targeted communication campaigns, both in terms of communication channel selection and message content.

One suggestion for future research, which could not be addressed in the current investigation given our country characteristics, is to test whether the gender difference in compliance would be greater in more gender egalitarian countries. Because the gender equality paradox indicates that the greatest gender differences in personality traits and other important aspects of social life exist in the most gender egalitarian cultures (e.g., [7, 10]; Costa et al., 2001; [18, 31, 37, 50, 51, 54]), future research could test whether such findings also extend to compliance with preventive health measures during global health crises.

In closing, some potential limitations should be acknowledged. The present study recruited participants through a crowdsourced online platform without asking questions about participants’ educational, occupational, or socioeconomic status. While a critic may therefore question the representativeness and quality of our data, it should be noted that online panel studies are typically 1) more representative than studies based on other common sample types [8, 22, 43, 46], and 2) often yield comparable or higher data quality when compared to that obtained through traditional samples [5, 25, 44, 48]. Moreover, Prolific participants frequently outperform other online panels in terms of data quality on aspects such as attention, comprehension, and reliability [17]. In fact, even non-probabilistic online panel responses have been shown to generate data quality comparable to face-to-face survey responses by means of reliability and validity [49]. Recent meta-analytic evidence further indicates that online panel data have similar psychometric properties with respect to internal reliability estimates for scales and effect size estimates for the relationships between independent and dependent variables, while simultaneously producing “criterion validities that generally fall within the credibility intervals of existing meta-analytic results from conventionally sourced data” ([60], p. 425). Nevertheless, future studies should optimally collect data on participants’ educational, occupational, and socioeconomic status to ensure generalizability of our results.

Compared to differences among their male patient counterparts, female patients randomly assigned a female doctor are 5.0% more likely to be evaluated as disabled and receive 8.5% more subsequent cash benefits on average

Gender Differences in Medical Evaluations: Evidence from Randomly Assigned Doctors. Marika Cabral & Marcus Dillender. NBER Working Paper 29541, Dec 2021. https://www.nber.org/papers/w29541

Abstract: While a growing body of evidence documents large gender disparities in health care and related social insurance programs, little is known about what drives these disparities. We leverage administrative data and random assignment of doctors to patients inherent within the workers’ compensation insurance claim dispute resolution process to study the impact of gender match between doctors and patients on medical evaluations and subsequent social insurance benefits received. Compared to differences among their male patient counterparts, female patients randomly assigned a female doctor rather than a male doctor are 5.0% more likely to be evaluated as disabled and receive 8.5% more subsequent cash benefits on average. There is no analogous gender-match effect for male patients. The magnitude of these effects implies that having female doctors evaluate patients entirely offsets the observed gender gap in the likelihood of being evaluated as disabled when male doctors evaluate patients. We explore mechanisms through further analysis of the administrative data and complementary survey evidence. In addition, we present broader evidence on gender gaps in workers' compensation insurance and gender homophily in patients' selections of doctors in settings where patients have choice. Combining this evidence, we conduct policy counterfactuals illustrating how policies increasing gender diversity among doctors or increasing gender homophily in patient-doctor matches may impact gender gaps in evaluated disability. Our findings indicate that policies increasing the share of female patients evaluated by female doctors may substantially shrink gender gaps in medical evaluations and associated outcomes.

How Erwin Schrödinger indulged his ‘Lolita complex’ in Ireland. Joe Humphreys, The Irish Times

How Erwin Schrödinger indulged his ‘Lolita complex’ in Ireland. Joe Humphreys. The Irish Times, Sat Dec 11 2021. https://www.irishtimes.com/life-and-style/people/how-erwin-schr%C3%B6dinger-indulged-his-lolita-complex-in-ireland-1.4749204

Nobel Prize-winning physicist, who spent 17 years in Ireland, was a serial groomer of girls

Several years ago Bernard Biggar was doing family tree research online when he came across a reference to his mother which stopped him in his tracks.

He knew his grand-uncle, the mathematician Msgr Pádraig de Brún, had been a friend of Erwin Schrödinger – the Nobel Prize-winning physicist who became an Irish citizen in 1948 during a 17-year stay here. Walter Moore’s biography of Schrödinger detailed how the Irish priest and the Austrian scientist became good friends but one passage about a holiday get-together at Msgr de Brún’s home on the Dingle Peninsula left Biggar shocked:

“The three children of Paddy’s sister Margaret were there at the time, Maire (18), ... Seamus (16) and Barbara (12) ... Despite her dirty nails, Barbara was a beautiful child and Erwin became infatuated with her. She was the third instance of his ‘Lolita complex’, taking her place along with ‘Weibi’ Rella and ‘Ithi’ Junger.

“The situation became so incongruous that someone, probably Paddy Browne [Msgr de Brún], had a serious word with him, and muttering dark imprecations, Erwin desisted from further attentions to Barbara, although he listed her among the unrequited loves of his life.”

Schrödinger was 53-years-old when he made advances on the pre-teenager.

Barbara MacEntee was Biggar’s mother.

Biggar contacted The Irish Times to highlight the episode after I wrote an article in September about a new cycle trail to honour Schrödinger's link to the Dublin Institute for Advanced Studies (Dias). The article made no reference to Schrödinger's record as a sexual predator but, on reflection, it's clear that it should have.

The evidence is hiding in plain sight: Schrödinger was a serial abuser whose behaviour fitted the profile of a paedophile in the widely understood sense of that term.

In the case of Junger, she was 14 when the 39-year-old Schrödinger took advantage of his role as her tutor to sexually abuse her. “As well as the maths, the lessons included ‘a fair amount of petting and cuddling’ and Schrödinger soon convinced himself that he was in love with Ithi,” John Gribbin wrote in his 2012 biography of the physicist.

Over Christmas 1927, Schrödinger “set out on a long campaign of what would now be described as grooming”. He continued to pursue the student, who he called “Ithy-bitty” and by 17 she was his “mistress”. In 1932 she became pregnant and had a disastrous abortion that left her sterile.** By this stage Schrödinger had abandoned her for his next conquest.

Efforts at justification

Since Biggar came across the reference to his mother, he has examined the age difference in Schrödinger’s numerous “relationships”. Rella, the first girl to whom Schrödinger proclaimed love, was several years his junior in high school. His next obsession, Felicie Krauss, was 15 when Schrödinger was 24. Annemarie Bertel was 16 when Schrödinger was 25, and so it continued, the gap in years widening over time.

“I hope [this] gives you some background as to why it disturbs my siblings and I considerably when Schrödinger’s sexual depravity is conveniently overlooked,” Biggar says.

Erwin Schrödinger with Mgr Pádraig de Brún, a close friend while he lived in Ireland: The clergy man may have prevented the scientist from pursuing a young girl.

What makes Schrödinger’s behaviour additionally troubling is how he sought to justify it intellectually. He kept a record of his conquests in personal diaries, called Ephemeridae, and explained his predilection for teenage girls on the grounds that their innocence was the ideal match for his natural genius. He wrote: “Comparable in some way to the end of the spectrum, which in its deepest violet shows a tendency towards purple and red, it seems to be the usual thing that men of strong, genuine intellectuality are immensely attracted only by women who, forming the very beginning of the intellectual series, are as nearly connected to the preferred springs of nature as they themselves. Nothing intermediate will do, since no woman will ever approach nearer to genius by intellectual education than some unintellectuals do by birth so to speak.”

As Moore pointed out, Schrödinger was not only remarkably egotistical but his attitude to the opposite sex “was essentially that of a male supremacist”.

A number of women were attracted to Schrödinger and he had consensual affairs outside of his marriage. For years, he lived openly with both his wife Bertel and mistress Hildegunde March, with whom he had a child. In at least one other case, however, consent – by our current understanding – was absent.

While in Dublin, he fathered two children by two different women. One was Sheila May, an actress and activist; the other is known to us as Kate Nolan. It is not her real name as her family have always wanted to preserve their privacy.

She was 26 when the 57-year-old Schrödinger set eyes on her while she was working as a Red Cross volunteer in the Irish capital.

Contribution vs crimes

“It took Erwin some time to break down her resistance,” Gribbin writes. “He did so in the summer of 1945, and when the inevitable happened Kate confessed to Lena Lean, the Schrödingers’ resident childminder, that she was not quite sure how she had become pregnant. Of all Schrödinger’s ‘conquests’, this is the hardest to justify on the grounds of ‘true love’.”

Reassessing historical figures is tricky territory. How do you weigh Schrödinger's sexual crimes against his unique contribution to science? At Trinity College Dublin, the physicist famously delivered his What Is Life? public lectures, which helped to pave the way for a golden era in molecular biology, and had a major influence on James Watson and Francis Crick's discovery of DNA's double helical structure in 1953.

Schrödinger, by all accounts, could be charming, entertaining and kind. He was aware of the charisma he had and used it to good effect in scientific collaborations. He loved Ireland, having been wooed here by Éamon de Valera to help found Dias in 1940. Despite Ireland’s Catholic conservatism, and the deprivations of the Emergency, he felt entirely free living here.

“In Germany, if a thing was not allowed, it was forbidden. In England if a thing was not forbidden, it was allowed. In Austria and Ireland, whether it was allowed or forbidden, they did it if they wanted to,” he once wrote.

Schrödinger and his wife Anny: Ithi Junger was 14 when the 39-year-old Schrödinger took advantage of his role as her tutor to sexually abuse her.

Schrödinger’s non-conformism has traditionally been portrayed as one of his endearing traits, and his sexual activities have been credited widely with firing the sparks of his imagination. The idea that he “did his great work during a late erotic outburst in his life” – as the mathematician Hermann Weyl put it – became accepted almost without challenge.

This presents scientific institutions today with a dilemma of how to remember, commemorate or honour Schrödinger. The issue is not whether to “cancel” him but whether we can more accurately categorise his dark side. To call it “womanising” is misleading. To call it “eroticism” is to parrot the explanation he gave, and we must be conscious of the fact that there are many people who have no voice in the historical record.

Cycling map

Barbara MacEntee died in 1995 and it was only later that her family discovered how Schrödinger had pursued her. “As you can imagine the subject was never discussed with my mother,” her son says.

The Irish Times asked Dias why the Schrödinger cycling map of Dublin made no reference to the physicist's sexual affairs in the city, particularly his involvement with May and Nolan.

“Schrödinger’s Cycling Map of Dublin offers ‘a glimpse into Schrödinger’s life in Dublin’,” the institute replied. “It focuses on his public life as a scientist, and his role as the first director of the school of theoretical physics at Dias. The cycling route is intended to be enjoyed by people of all ages. It is not intended as a detailed biography.”

Asked whether it was appropriate to be commemorating Schrödinger, given what we know about his record as a sexual predator, Dias said: “Erwin Schrödinger was one of the most high-profile scientists ever to live and work in Ireland. Unfortunately, today, his scientific legacy is significantly flawed due to allegations about his private life. Dias deeply condemns any inappropriate sexual behaviour on the part of Prof Schrödinger or any other persons, past or present.

“In recent years, society as a whole has begun to re-evaluate the legacies of certain individuals and organisations where information has come to light about past misconduct. Dias and the wider scientific community are going through this process.

“Across all sectors of society, it is important to strike a balance between acknowledging the achievements of historical figures and publicly recognising – where appropriate – instances of misconduct on their part.”

* An amendment was made to this article on 13/02/22 to correct the spelling of the name Felicie Krauss.

** An amendment was made on 25/10/22 to give the correct date of Ithi Junger’s pregnancy.