The Impact of the Madrid Bombing on Personal Emotions, Emotional Atmosphere and Emotional Climate

This article analyzes the personal emotions, emotional atmosphere, and emotional climate in Spain both one week and two months after the terrorist attacks that took place in Madrid on March 11, 2004. It also examines the relationship among these variables and their effect on various behaviors. Participants consisted of 1,807 people from seven autonomous regions in Spain with a mean age of 27.64 years. Personal emotions were significantly affected by degree of Spanish identification. These personal emotions and the general emotional atmosphere were characterized by high levels of sadness, disgust, anger, and contempt, as well as (to a lesser degree) fear. Personal emotions, emotional atmosphere, and the nation's emotional climate improved after two months, although a high degree of sadness persisted in the atmosphere. The emotional climate was relatively independent and stable. Personal emotions had a low but significant capacity for predicting avoidant and altruistic behaviors. Measures of emotional climate added to this ability to predict specific avoidant and altruistic behavior.     

Parental communication about emotional contexts: Differences across discrete categories of emotion

Parent socialization of emotion is critical for children's emotional development. One mechanism through which parents socialize emotional understanding is in their conversations about emotions with their children. Previous research has investigated parent–child discourse about emotions differing by positive and negative valence. This study examined how parents communicated about and differentially emphasized elements of discrete emotion contexts (anger, sadness, disgust, fear, joy). Caregivers described images of emotional contexts to their 18‐month‐old or 24‐month‐old infant. Findings indicated that parents talked more about sadness images than joy images. Furthermore, parents mentioned the emoter more in anger and sadness contexts and talked about the referent more in disgust, fear, and joy contexts. Parents also posed more questions to female than male infants, particularly when discussing anger, sadness, and disgust images. No age differences were observed for any measure. These findings provide new insight into how parents talk about and highlight aspects of discrete emotional contexts.     

On the Very Idea of "Negative Emotions"

As attention has shifted towards the emotions in general, the notion of so-called negative emotions has come in for renewed interest. The author explores this notion and argues that its invocation cannot be done without cost to our understanding since it obscures all sorts of relevant complexities. There are thus no emotions around to which we can helpfully refer collectively as "negative," although there are of course painful emotions, emotions that negatively evaluate states of affairs, emotions that are negatively morally evaluated, and so forth. Furthermore, while attempts are under way to reappraise various (commonly) negatively evaluated emotions, those attempts involve different kinds of argument which cannot and should not be collected together as "defenses of negative emotions."     

The Development of Dynamic Facial Expression Recognition at Different Intensities in 4- to 18-Year-Olds

The primary purpose of this study was to examine the effect of the intensity of emotion expression on children's developing ability to label emotion during a dynamic presentation of five facial expressions (anger, disgust, fear, happiness, and sadness). A computerized task (AFFECT—animated full facial expression comprehension test) was used to display facial emotion expressions as animations with four levels of intensity (35, 50, 75, and 100 percent). In this study, which employed a cross-sectional design, 240 participants from 4 to 18 years completed the AFFECT. Results indicated that recognition ability developed for each of the emotions, with the exception of disgust, over the age range tested. Girls were more accurate than boys, especially for anger and disgust expressions. Recognition accuracy was found to increase as a function of the intensity of emotional expressions.     

The home visit in child protection social work: Emotion as resource and risk for professional judgement and practice

This article conceptualises the role of emotion in social work home visits. It draws on findings from a qualitative study of initial child protection home visits in the United Kingdom. The research used narrative interviews and focus groups to examine how emotions arising from visits were registered in social workers' narratives. These visits were often challenging; social workers needed to manage their own emotions and those of the family, while at the same time investigating concerns and assessing need. This article identifies seven key emotional experiences associated with the home visit from the perspective of the social worker: going into the unknown; being intrusive; being disliked; fear of harm to self; fear of causing or allowing harm; pain, disgust, and distress; and “absorbing” emotion. It is argued that emotion plays a central role in home visiting and that professionals' emotional responses have important implications for the way they make sense of, and manage, home visits. Emotion is therefore conceptualized as both a potential resource and risk for social workers' professional judgement and practice.     

It's written all over their faces: Preschoolers' emotion understanding

Emotion understanding is a multifaceted construct made up of several components. To identify how several common components of emotion understanding relate to one another, five emotion understanding tasks were compared within the same group of children. Fifty‐four preschool children (M = 3.81 years, SD = 0.40) were asked to display the typical facial expression of six emotions after hearing their corresponding emotion label. They were then read six vignettes and asked to: “use your face to show how [the protagonist] would feel,” provide an emotion label for the main character, and “choose a picture of a face that would look like [the main character].” Finally, they were asked to provide a label for emotions presented to them in photographs. For all tasks, six emotions were examined: happiness, sadness, anger, fear, surprise, and disgust. With the exception of the two modeling tasks, results show correlations among the emotion understanding tasks. There was a significant interaction between task and emotion category for emotion understanding accuracy. However, there was some consistency in the pattern of discrete emotion categorization emergence across the tasks. Additionally, accuracy scores (representing emotion understanding) across tasks were not equivalent. Findings are discussed in the broader context of emotion understanding.     

Parents' perceptions of their children in a context of shared political uncertainty

The study describes the differences and similarities between parents’ feelings and their perception of their children’s feelings in a politically uncertain situation. The study focuses on Israeli families living in Judaea and Samaria (the West Bank) during two periods: the Intifada and the post‐Oslo Agreements years during the first phase of the peace process with the Palestinians. The research combines qualitative and quantitative methods. The results show that most of the feelings evoked by the uncertainty are negative emotions, such as fear, anger, hate, the desire for revenge, and avoidance. These emotions are experienced by parents and, according to the parents’ perceptions, by their children as well. In addition to the correlation between parents’ own experiences and their appraisal of their children’s, the children were perceived as having more negative feelings than the parents. Systemic analysis of the results indicates that the children are often a channel for expression of their parents’ emotions. Based on this finding, suggestions are made regarding intervention with children that takes family processes into account. Some direction for applying the findings of this specific study in other contexts of shared political uncertainty, such as Northern Ireland, are suggested.     

Emotional Climate in Organizations: Applications in Latin American Prisons

Two studies in Latin American prisons analyzed the relation between emotional climate and subclimates, organizational culture, stress, coping, and social support. In the first study, emotional climate was measured in prisons in three different countries by asking employees and prisoners how they perceived the climate in their own group and how they perceived the climate in the outgroup. Employees perceived more positive and less negative emotions in their own group than the prisoners perceived in theirs. The employees correctly perceived high levels of loneliness and sadness in the prisoner group but perceived more guilt and anger and less hope than inmates reported. Within their own group, detainees perceived less joy and confidence in the institution and much more sadness and loneliness than did employees. Participation in institutional activities was associated with a more positive emotional climate. In a second study, using data compiled from five different prisons, it was again found that prisoners perceived high amounts of sadness and loneliness. A negative balance of climate among detainees was associated with a violent and avoidance subculture and with a negative climate among employees. A more positive balance of climate was associated negatively with PTSD and avoidance coping and positively with internal locus of control and subjective social support. The results suggest the importance of distinguishing between positive and negative emotional climate.     

How Mood and Task Complexity Affect Children's Recognition of Others' Emotions

Previous studies examined how mood affects children's accuracy in matching emotional expressions and labels (label‐based tasks). This study was the first to assess how induced mood (positive, neutral, or negative) influenced five‐ to eight‐year‐olds' accuracy and reaction time using both context‐based tasks, which required inferring a character's emotion from a vignette, and label‐based tasks. Both tasks required choosing one of four facial expressions to respond. Children responded more accurately to label‐based questions relative to context‐based questions at the age of five to seven, but showed no differences at the age of eight, and when the emotional expression being identified was happiness, sadness, or surprise, but not disgust. For the context‐based questions, children were more accurate at inferring sad and disgusted emotions compared with happy and surprised emotions. Induced positive mood facilitated five‐year‐olds' processing (decreased reaction time) in both tasks compared with induced negative and neutral moods. Results demonstrate how task type and children's mood influence children's emotion processing at different ages.     

Emotions in Marital Conflict Interactions: Empathic Accuracy, Assumed Similarity, and the Moderating Context of Depressive Symptoms

To examine affectivity in marital interaction, 267 couples participated in laboratory-based marital conflicts and afterward rated their own and their spouses' emotions of positivity, anger, sadness, and fear. Actor-Partner Interdependence Models (Cook & Kenny, 2005) estimated empathic accuracy and assumed similarity effects, with symptoms of depression tested as a moderator. Depressive symptoms moderated spouses' ratings of their partners' negative emotions such that assumed similarity was higher and empathic accuracy was lower in the context of elevated depressive symptoms. The results suggest that depression may influence spouses' judgments of how closely linked partner emotions are (i.e., assumed similarity) and spouses' abilities to accurately perceive their partners' negative emotions (i.e., empathic accuracy), potentially contributing to the established marital dysfunction-psychological distress cycle.     

Low and Middle Income Mothers' Regulation of Negative Emotion: Effects of Children's Temperament and Situational Emotional Responses

The present study investigated the effects of situational (child situational emotions) and dispositional (child temperament) child variables on mothers’ regulation of their own hostile (anger) and nonhostile (sadness and anxiety) emotions. Participants included 94 low and middle income mothers and their children (41 girls; 53 boys) aged 3 to 6 years. Children's situational emotions (anger, sadness, or fear) and parent emotion type (hostile or nonhostile) were important predictors of mothers’ regulation, but their effects were influenced by SES: Middle income mothers were more likely to control hostile than nonhostile emotions in response to child anger and sadness, and more likely than low income mothers to control hostile emotions in response to child sadness and fear. Low income mothers were more likely than middle income mothers to control nonhostile emotions in response to child anger. However, results also suggest that differences in emotion regulation between low and middle income mothers may stem from the link between SES and authoritarian parenting beliefs. Maternal regulation of negative emotion was not predicted by child temperament.     

Children's awareness concerning emotion regulation strategies: Effects of attachment status

The current study evaluated the effects of preschoolers' attachment status on their awareness concerning emotion regulation strategies. A total of 212 children between 3 and 5 years participated in this study and completed two self‐report tasks. The first was the Attachment Story Completion Task (ASCT), which assessed children's internal working models concerning parent–child attachment; the second evaluated children's ability to generate emotion regulation strategies in relation to three negative emotions (anger, sadness, and fear). Statistical analyses involved a mixed models multilinear regression approach controlling for age and gender. The results consistently revealed that the insecure avoidant group was significantly less likely than securely attached children to generate both comforting and self‐regulatory strategies. Surprisingly, the insecure ambivalent group showed no deficits across measured outcomes. When the analyses were conducted separately for each negative emotion, findings for co‐regulatory strategies for fear, and self‐regulatory strategies for anger also suggested that avoidantly attached children exhibited the lowest levels of awareness compared with children from the secure attachment group. These findings stress the importance of children's attachment status, and implicitly, the quality of the parent–child interactions for children's awareness of emotion regulation strategies related to negative emotions.     

Hitting the target without missing the point: New Zealand’s immunisation health target for two year olds

ABSTRACT

The use of health targets as a form of performance measurement has become more prominent internationally as governments have sought to control public expenditure, produce greater efficiency and improve accountability. However, health targets have faced criticism for their potential to produce negative outcomes within a health system. This paper examines how a health target was used as a policy instrument within the New Zealand health system to improve immunisation coverage at two years of age. It explores how the immunisation health target was implemented within four case study sites and discusses the effectiveness of the health target as a policy instrument for improving immunisation coverage and addressing persistent immunisation inequities. Measuring and monitoring performance towards the immunisation health target improved accountability for immunisation coverage within the New Zealand health system and focused attention on improving immunisation coverage in a way that previous policy attempts had failed to do. Health targets may be an effective policy instrument for creating change within specific areas of a health system if their potential for dysfunctional consequences are taken into consideration at the outset.     

Parent–Child Emotional Communication and Children's Coping in Middle Childhood

Parent–child communication regarding children's negative emotions and coping were examined in a sample of 75 5th graders (53% boys) and their mothers and fathers. We predicted that emotionally open communication between a parent and his or her child would be related to children's use of constructive coping strategies. Parents reported on how they react to their child's negative emotions, and children reported on how much they share their negative feelings with each parent. Additionally, emotional communication was measured during a parent–child discussion task involving an event that was upsetting to the child. The results indicated that emotional communication, as reported by mothers, fathers, and children, as well as mother–child observed communication, were related to children's coping strategies. The findings point to a need to assess emotional communication using multiple measures that tap both the child's and the parents’ perspectives and that use different methodologies.     

A genetically informed examination of the relations between inaccurate emotion expression and recognition and experiencing peer victimization

This study examines children's abilities to accurately portray emotions (emotion expression; EE) and to read others' emotions (emotion recognition; ER) as possible genetically influenced behaviors that may increase vulnerability to victimization. In this study of 127 6–10‐year‐old multiples, children were assessed for EE accuracy by being photographed when told to display different emotions; photographs were subsequently rated for emotion accuracy. Children also were assessed for ER accuracy on a computer task by rating the emotions of displayed children's faces. Genetic likelihood scores for angry and fearful EE and ER errors were calculated. Children also completed a victimization questionnaire. Results showed that children who were poor at making angry faces (EE angry misses) were less likely to be victimized, and children who were more likely to rate faces as fearful (ER fearful biases) were more likely to be victimized. ER fearful biases were related to victimization through a shared genetic link. Finally, demonstrating gene–environment correlation, girls with a genetic likelihood for not looking fearful when they were intending to (EE fearful misses) were significantly less likely to be victimized by peers. These results show that emotion skills surrounding expressing and recognizing anger and fear are associated with peer victimization risk.     

Terrorism and Probability Neglect

When strong emotions are involved, people tend to focus on the badness of the outcome, rather than on the probability that the outcome will occur. The resulting “probability neglect” helps to explain excessive reactions to low-probability risks of catastrophe. Terrorists show a working knowledge of probability neglect, producing public fear that might greatly exceed the discounted harm. As a result of probability neglect, people often are far more concerned about the risks of terrorism than about statistically larger risks that they confront in ordinary life. In the context of terrorism and analogous risks, the legal system frequently responds to probability neglect, resulting in regulation that might be unjustified or even counterproductive. But public fear is itself a cost, and it is associated with many other costs, in the form of “ripple effects” produced by fear. As a normative matter, government should reduce even unjustified fear, if the benefits of the response can be shown to outweigh the costs.     

Emotion Situation Knowledge in Elementary School: Models of Longitudinal Growth and Preschool Correlates

We examined individual differences in developmental trajectories of emotion situation knowledge (ESK), at three time points throughout elementary school in a sample of children from economically disadvantaged families. Results showed that ESK and the subscales of joy, fear, anger, shame and interest exhibited positive growth from the first to the fifth grade, whereas scores on the sad subscale declined slightly. Preschool verbal ability predicted first grade scores for joy, fear, and anger, and growth in scores for shame across time. Preschool negative emotional intensity predicted slower growth in overall ESK and the anger and shame subscales. Taken together, these results broaden our basic knowledge of how children's use of situational cues to infer others' emotions develops in middle and late childhood.     

20世纪20年代东北现代散文空间

20世纪20年代的东北现代散文从整体倾向上建立了从独立的个性出发关注社会民生,实现对文学审美追求的路向。但由于发生期固有的稚嫩与生涩,新与旧之间种种的含混、交叉、往复都不同程度地存在,呈现出复合存在的形态。此期散文注重关于“我”的抒写,建立起“我”与社会的相关性向,体现出五四以来的对宗法集体主义价值观的疏离和现代性建设中的中国社会对自我、个性的发现、凸显与尊重。另一方面,又由“我”向社会发散,以此形成观察、表现社会生活的视角,这成为当时绝大多数散文作品的共同的文体特征。新旧文化、文学力量的交锋与消长在散文创作的技术层面也多有体现。     

Are Children More Angered and Distressed by Man–Child than Woman–Child Arguments and by Interadult versus Adult–Child Disputes?

Six to 10‐year‐olds’ responses to witnessing videotapes of five contexts of verbal and physical arguments (man–woman, man–boy, man–girl, woman–boy, and woman–girl) were compared to examine the hypotheses that: (1) man–child disputes would be perceived more negatively and evoke more negative affect in children than woman–child conflict; and (2) man–woman conflict would be viewed more negatively and elicit greater negative emotions in children than adult–child arguments. Results lend support to the two predictions, and consistent with the emotional security hypothesis, reveal that (1) man–child conflict evoked more sadness and fear in children than woman–child disputes; (2) man–woman arguments evoked more intense feelings of sadness and fear than any of the adult–child disputes, and the adult in the conflicts was perceived as more sad and scared when arguing with the spouse than with the girl or boy; and (3) physical conflict evoked more negative affect than verbal disputes.