The purpose of the current study was to verify the hypothesis on the role of alexithymia in the narratization of a romantic relationship. Assuming that the skills of experiencing, regulating, and verbalizing emotions constitute an important structural element of a self-narrative with an expressive thread, we hypothesized that the narratives of individuals with high levels of alexithymia, in whom these skills are impaired, would be characterized by a lower clarity of the self-narrative thread, which may be particularly evident when describing romantic relationships. In addition, we assumed that alexithymia would be negatively associated with self-narrative inclinations. The study was conducted online and involved 359 adults who had been in a romantic relationship for at least six months. Two questionnaires were used, namely, the TAS-20 to investigate alexithymia and the IAN to investigate romantic inclinations. In addition, participants described, in accordance with the instructions received, the romantic relationships they were in. The participants’ narratives were then evaluated in terms of the degree of clarity of the self-narrative thread by competent assessors. A significant positive relationship of narrative clarity with self-narrative inclinations was found, as well as a negative relationship of narrative clarity with the level of alexithymia. In addition, the mediating role of narrative inclinations on the relationship between the difficulty in naming emotions and externally oriented thinking and narrative clarity was confirmed.
The study examined how following a vegetarian diet affects the attractiveness of a potential dating partner among those who do not follow a vegetarian diet. Participants, 404 heterosexual meateaters, took part in an online experiment in which they evaluated the dating profile of a target person who was described as following a vegetarian diet for health, ethical, or environmental reasons, and a control condition that had no description of the target’s diet. Participants rated the target in terms of a feeling thermometer, willingness to date, gender congruence, and possession of masculine and feminine traits. Participant’s level of identification as a meat-eater was also measured. A series of two (participant gender) by four (target diet) ANOVAs found significant interactions in the analyses of the feeling thermometer ratings, showing that women viewed ethically motivated targets less positively than men did. We also found significant main effects of target diet in willingness to date, gender congruence, and possession of feminine and masculine traits. Meat-eaters evaluated targets with no diet information more positively than the healthmotivated target. Controlling for identification as a meat-eater, women evaluated ethicallymotivated targets as having less feminine traits than men did. The present results suggest that being a vegetarian makes a person less attractive as a potential partner among omnivores, who constitute the majority of people in most Western, industrialized countries.
The article offers an analysis of the intergenerational relationships among different age cohorts in Poland, whose context is the social polarization connected to the society’s ageing. The text relies on the material gathered through the individual in-depth interviews conducted in Warsaw in 2023 with young individuals (16–20) and the elderly (68–80). Adopting the generational approach, the article presents the narratives of both cohorts from the two interlinked perspectives: the potential intergenerational conflicts, on the one hand, and the potential for building generational solidarity, on the other. The analysis has allowed to coin the concept of generational ambivalence. Drawing on the sociological concept of ambivalence from a generational perspective, the proposed category allows to capture contradictions in the relationships between different generations’ members. The article shows how the concept of ambivalence can be applied to foster a better understanding of intergenerational relationships in contemporary Poland.
Our longitudinal study aimed to investigate relationships between identity development and the vision of one’s adult life (VOAL) in emerging adults. In the first measurement, 299 emerging adults aged 17 to 27 participated, and 177 participated in the second measurement (9-10 months later). Participants were asked to complete the Dimensions of Identity. Development Scale and write about their envisioned future adult life. Written answers about the VOAL were coded by trained judges to allow for quantitative analyses. The results indicated that both identity exploration and commitment were related to the structure of the emerging adults’ VOAL and their subjective attitudes toward the possessed VOAL but in different ways. We also observed that changes in identity processes over time turned out to be related to changes in the VOAL. Our results suggest the presence of a reciprocal relationship between identity development and thinking about the future in emerging adults.
Cognitive processes underlying inferences regarding inferring mental states (i.e. intentionality ascription) are still to be investigated. To assess how people accumulate social cues in order to attribute intentionality, a measure of gaze transition entropy (GTE) seems indicated to throw some light on these processes. Violent behavior is associated with distorted attributional processes but also with deficiencies in attention to socially relevant cues. Therefore, the current study compared the level of entropy between both violent male and female offenders and non-offenders and explore the association between GTE and ascribing intentionality. The sample (N = 128) consisted of violent inmates (N = 63, 31 women) and adults living in the community (N = 65, 31 women). Lower entropy characterized violent offenders to a greater extent as compared to those with no history of volent crimes. Moreover, lower entropy predicted greater intentionality ascription especially in judging ambiguous and hostile harmful events but only in the violent offender group. Findings imply that hostile attributions in violent offenders not only depend on a predisposition to interpret external reality in a hostile manner but can be the result of an inferential processing based on insufficient and incomplete information.
Pozostałe osiągnięcia naukoweArtykuły (zamknięty dostęp)Journal article
