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Recent research: four papers from the Journal of Personality and Social Psychology

I routinely scan quite a few journals every month.  Sometimes it's disappointing and there's nothing in the issue of a particular journal that interests me much.  Sometimes a particular journal contains a bunch of stimulating articles.  January's edition of the Journal of Personality and Social Psychology was a good find.  Below are four papers from it.  The DeWall et al study is on how social exclusion leads to hostility and aggression.  It adds to the large body of research on the very powerful effects of being socially rejected.  Putting "rejection (psychology)" into the top search bar of PubMed today and clicking on "Go" pulls out 2,741 paper

Friendship, life planning, & expressing emotions

Yesterday and today are a check-in time with my friend Larry.  I've written in a previous blog post how Larry and I have met every three or four months for many years specifically to review how our lives are going and to plan and prioritize our goals for the next few months.  "Taking charge" of our lives in this kind of way makes huge sense.  For example the self-determination literature (S-DT)  highlights the importance of making autonomous decisions about what we put our energy into.  This S-DT research and much other work (e.g. a recent study on goal-setting) also emphasises that this kind of approach is a core component of growing wellbeing in one's life.  Yeats wrote something like "A friend is someone who sees the potential in you and helps you to live it."  Meeting with an old friend in the way Larry and I have done, is certainly an example of what Yeats was talking about.

Wellbeing, time management, self-control & self-determination

“ The life I touch for good or ill will touch another life, and that in turn another, until who knows where the trembling stops or in what far place my touch will be felt. ” - Frederick Buechner

This is a bit of a ragbag section.  It contains a mixture of handouts on wellbeing, time management and related topics.  A lot of my work involves helping people face fear and anxiety.  The "Determination training" and more straightforward monthly "Practice record" are often helpful here.  The "Respected figures exercise" is one of the most frequent forms that I ask people to fill in - it clarifies values and so highlights how one wants to act.  The handout on Kohlberg's work is relevant to values too, especially at times when the focus is on fairness and assertiveness.  I often move from the "Respected figues exercise" to the five "Goals for roles" handouts.  They build from clarifying "Role areas" and using this for the "Funeral speeches" or "80th birthday party exercise&qu

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