Neuroscience
Human immodesty knows no bounds. Most people think they're better looking than average, more intelligent, better at driving and less likely to get ill. Psychologists seeking to explain this common delusion have suggested it serves a protective role: a shield against the depressing realities of fate, fallibility and social spite. However, a surprising new study by Sander Thomaes and colleagues directly contradicts this account. Their investigation with older children suggests that a realistic self view is more protective.
Two hundred and six children aged between nine and twelve years rated how much they liked each of their classmates and how much they thought each of their classmates liked them. This gave the researchers a measure of how realistic each child's self-view was. Two weeks later, the children were invited to play a "Survivor Game" - a kind of internet popularity contest in which the least popular of four players would be voted out of the group. The game was fixed and half the children were told that they were the least popular. The other children received neutral feedback: another child had been voted out.
Using a measure of mood before and after the game, the researchers found that children with a more realistic view of their popularity at school were the least badly affected by rejection in the Survivor Game. By contrast, children with an inflated view of their popularity, or a deflated view, experienced a far greater drop in their mood after being told they'd been voted out.
"Our results suggest that vulnerable children holding positively or negatively distorted self-views may benefit from interventions that target their biased social-reasoning processes," Thomaes and his colleagues concluded.
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Thomaes, S., Reijntjes, A., Orobio de Castro, B., & Bushman, B. (2009). Reality Bites-or Does It? Realistic Self-Views Buffer Negative Mood Following Social Threat. Psychological Science DOI: 10.1111/j.1467-9280.2009.02395.x
Post written by Christian Jarrett (@psych_writer) for the BPS Research Digest.
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Neuroscience
Realistic view of their popularity protects children against effects of social rejection
Human immodesty knows no bounds. Most people think they're better looking than average, more intelligent, better at driving and less likely to get ill. Psychologists seeking to explain this common delusion have suggested it serves a protective role: a shield against the depressing realities of fate, fallibility and social spite. However, a surprising new study by Sander Thomaes and colleagues directly contradicts this account. Their investigation with older children suggests that a realistic self view is more protective.Two hundred and six children aged between nine and twelve years rated how much they liked each of their classmates and how much they thought each of their classmates liked them. This gave the researchers a measure of how realistic each child's self-view was. Two weeks later, the children were invited to play a "Survivor Game" - a kind of internet popularity contest in which the least popular of four players would be voted out of the group. The game was fixed and half the children were told that they were the least popular. The other children received neutral feedback: another child had been voted out.
Using a measure of mood before and after the game, the researchers found that children with a more realistic view of their popularity at school were the least badly affected by rejection in the Survivor Game. By contrast, children with an inflated view of their popularity, or a deflated view, experienced a far greater drop in their mood after being told they'd been voted out.
"Our results suggest that vulnerable children holding positively or negatively distorted self-views may benefit from interventions that target their biased social-reasoning processes," Thomaes and his colleagues concluded.
_________________________________
Thomaes, S., Reijntjes, A., Orobio de Castro, B., & Bushman, B. (2009). Reality Bites-or Does It? Realistic Self-Views Buffer Negative Mood Following Social Threat. Psychological Science DOI: 10.1111/j.1467-9280.2009.02395.xPost written by Christian Jarrett (@psych_writer) for the BPS Research Digest.
- A Child's Popularity Is Related To Where The Teacher Seats Them In The Classroom
Teacher training doesn't usually include a module on how to arrange the seating of pupils. Perhaps it should - a new study by psychologists finds that where children are placed in the classroom is associated with how well-liked they are by their classmates....
- Inflated Praise For Your Children: An 'incredibly' Bad Idea?
When you’ve done something good, or performed a task well, it feels great to get some praise for it. And parents and teachers, especially in Western cultures, are encouraged to dole out praise to children in an increasingly generous manner. A drawing...
- Children's Reasoning About When It's Okay To Reject Their Peers
The playground sight of a group friends rejecting a lone child betrays an ugly side of human nature. An intriguing new cross-cultural study has examined the development of reasoning about social rejection in young children and teenagers, revealing a surprising...
- How To Praise Children
When we praise a child, our wording can either be specific (e.g. “You did a good job drawing”) or generic (e.g. “You are a good drawer”). According to Andrei Cimpian and colleagues this subtle distinction can make a big difference to children's...
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Children's drawings of the Earth as flat, or hollow with people inside, have led some psychologists to believe children develop naive, but coherent, mental models of what the planet is like based on their own observations. Such accounts predict that...