People Stay True to Moral Colors, Studies Find

Newswise, March 9, 2016 — U.S. presidential candidates Hillary Clinton and Donald Trump have been criticized for their seeming willingness to cut corners on core principles when they consider it necessary to make some progress toward a laudable goal.

While philosophers and voters can debate the pros and cons of situational ethics, new research from Washington University in St. Louis suggests that most people stay true to their intrinsic moral colors -- good or bad -- when dealing with day-to-day choices, regardless of extenuating circumstances or well-intended reform efforts.

"Our studies provide new and important evidence for the stability of moral character," said Kathryn Bollich, lead author of two recent studies exploring how evolving personality traits and competing ethical quandaries influence moral behavior.

"Using naturally observed, everyday behaviors and self-reports of moral decision-making, we demonstrate that one’s morality is stable," Bollich said. "These findings suggest that efforts to modify moral character may not be so simple. For example, efforts to make a roommate or romantic partner more helpful and sympathetic, or less condescending and critical of others, may be met with slow and minimal success."

Bollich, a graduate student in the Department of Psychological and Brain Sciences in Arts & Sciences, conducted her research as a member of the Personality Measurement and Development Lab at Washington University. Joshua Jackson, assistant professor of psychology and lab director, is a joint co-author on both studies.

While most morality research looks at situations that influence moral decisions and behaviors, these studies examines whether individual differences in morality persist across time and across situations. Both studies demonstrate that a person's moral fiber can be gauged based on actions that demonstrate their outlook on moral issues, and that these core levels of morality remain fairly consistent across a range of morally challenging situations and surroundings.

The first, "Eavesdropping on Character: Assessing Everyday Moral Behaviors," has been accepted for publication in a forthcoming issue of the Journal of Research in Personality.

This study analyzes naturally occurring moral behaviors that were unobtrusively captured by a small digital audio-recorder that the study's 186 participants carried continuously for a weekend or two. The devices intermittently recorded snippets of conversations and ambient sounds from the participant's everyday environments; these audio snippets were then rated based on how much they exemplified moral or immoral behavior.

The study found substantial individual differences in how often participants engaged in positive moral behaviors, such as showing affection, gratitude, sympathy, hope or optimism, as well as negative moral behaviors, such as being sarcastic, condescending, arrogant, critical, blaming or boastful.

For example, one person expressed gratitude during 17.5 percent of her conversations, and 16 people never expressed gratitude in any of their recordings. In addition, 10 people never criticized others in any of their recordings, whereas one person criticized others in 22.2 percent of his or her conversations.

While these patterns of moral behavior varied widely from person to person, individuals pattern of moral behavior remained surprisingly stable over time -- that is, how helpful or grateful someone is one weekend is similar to how helpful or grateful that person is on a following weekend, the study found.

Bollich's second study, "When Friends' and Society's Expectations Collide: A Longitudinal Study of Moral Decision-Making and Personality across College," was published Jan. 11 in the multidisciplinary open-access journal PLOS ONE. Findings are based on longitudinal survey data collected from hundreds of college students across four years during their freshman and senior years.

This second study found that the students' approach to moral decision-making across the four years of their college experience also remained stable over time, with one important change: As students move from freshman year to senior year, they grow more likely to help a friend even when doing so requires them to ignore other ethical obligations, such as following the law or adhering to accepted social norms.

Since young adulthood and college years are an important time for personality development and maturation, Bollich and colleagues examined the data to determine if these factors might be driving changes in moral decision-making and behavior. Surprisingly, their analysis found that increased maturity and developing personality traits had little or no connection to changes in moral decision-making.

"Future research should continue to extend our understanding of moral character by examining how the combination of large life experiences -- like graduating from college or starting a family -- and smaller situational influences -- like the personality or moral character of interaction partners -- may or may not play a role in one's morality and development. Together, these approaches will help us capture a more complete picture of morality as it is manifested in everyday life and across the lifespan," Bollich said.

People in Their 60s Uniquely Benefit From Giving Advice Despite Fewer Chances to Offer it

Newswise, March 9, 2016 — A new study reveals that individuals in their 60s who give advice to a broad range of people tend to see their lives as especially meaningful. 

At the same time, this happens to be the age when opportunities for dispensing advice become increasingly scarce.

According to the study, which appears in the March issue of Social Psychology Quarterly, individuals in their 60s who report giving advice to a wide variety of people—to family members, friends, neighbors, and strangers—see their lives as highly meaningful, while adults in that age group who dispense advice to fewer types of people are much less likely to report high life meaning.

“This association between advice giving and life meaning is not evident for other age groups,” said Markus H. Schafer, an assistant professor of sociology at the University of Toronto and the lead author of the study.

“Overall, we interpret these findings to suggest that the developmental demands of late midlife—particularly the desire to contribute to others’ welfare and the fear of feeling ‘stagnant’—fit poorly with the social and demographic realties for this segment of the life course. Just when giving advice seems to be most important, opportunities for doing so seem to wane.”

Titled, “The Age-Graded Nature of Advice: Distributional Patterns and Implications for Life Meaning,” the study relies on a nationally representative sample of 2,583 U.S. adults who were 18 and above when they were surveyed in 2006.

Schafer and his co-author Laura Upenieks, a doctoral candidate in sociology at the University of Toronto, found that 21 percent of people in their 60s and 27 percent of people 70 or older reported giving advice to no one in the previous year.

By comparison, only about 10 percent of people in their 20s (this group also included 18 and 19-year-olds), 30s, 40s, and 50s said they gave no advice in the past year.

“Conventional age norms suggest that the ideal mentor or advice-giver is someone who has a lot of life experience,” Schafer said.

“However, compared to their younger counterparts, older adults occupy fewer social roles, are less socially active, and interact with a more restricted range of people. So, while the average 65-year-old may well have more wisdom than the average 30-year-old, demographic and social structure factors seem to provide the latter with more opportunity for actually dispensing advice.”

Some scholars have argued that the essence of mattering—the idea that one is meaningful and consequential to other people—is most under threat during late-middle age when many people retire and enter the “empty nest” phase of life, according to Schafer.

“The mattering perspective helps explain why it is this period of the life span, in particular, when it is important for people to feel like they can still have influence on others through actions such as giving advice,” Schafer said.

In terms of the study’s implications, Schafer said, “The results should prompt reflection on the social fabric of American communities and how late-middle age adults fit into the picture. Our findings underscore the importance of giving older adults occasions to share their wisdom and life experiences.

Schools, churches, civic organizations, and other community groups could consider how to facilitate intergenerational mentorship experiences and to creatively enable more older adults to be advice-givers.”

About the American Sociological Association and Social Psychology Quarterly

The American Sociological Association (www.asanet.org), founded in 1905, is a non-profit membership association dedicated to serving sociologists in their work, advancing sociology as a science and profession, and promoting the contributions to and use of sociology by society.Social Psychology Quarterly is a quarterly, peer-reviewed journal of the ASA.

The research article described above is available by request for members of the media. For a copy of the full study, contact Daniel Fowler, ASA Media Relations Manager, at (202) 527-7885 or pubinfo@asanet.org.

Link Between Sleep and Social Participation May Be Key to Healthy Aging

Newswise, March 3, 2016 – Sleep may be one of the most important factors for well-being; yet, according to the CDC, one in three adults does not get enough. 

Lack of sleep can lead to potential cognitive declines, chronic diseases and death. Now, research from the University of Missouri finds that older adults who have trouble sleeping, could benefit from participating in social activities, in particular attending religious events. 

“Social connectedness is a key component for health and well-being for older adults,” said Jen-Hao Chen, assistant professor of health sciences at the MU School of Health Professions and the Truman School of Public Affairs. “Close connections to, and participation in, social groups provides a sense of belonging and can be essential for healthy aging.”

Yet despite past attention to the link between social participation and many different health outcomes, little research has been dedicated to linking social participation and another critical health outcome for older adults—sleep.

To study the relationship between sleep and social participation for older adults, Chen analyzed two waves of data collected over a five year period from the National Social Life, Health and Aging Project. 

He looked at three aspects of social participation; volunteering, attending religious services and being part of organized group activities. He then compared the data to sleep outcomes measured by actigraphy—wearable wrist sleep trackers. Results showed that older adults with greater levels of social participation were getting better sleep.

However, Chen says despite the strong associations between social participation and sleep, social participation does not necessarily lead to better sleep. The strong associations he found could also be due to those already sleeping well may feel well enough to be more active socially. His future research on sleep will continue to use innovative sleep measurements to understand the role various social relationships have on sleep behaviors and outcomes.

“When it comes to the discussion of healthy lifestyle, being socially connected and sleeping well are not often mentioned together,” Chen said. 

“Yet sleep, just like physical activity and diet, can have significant impacts on our health outcomes, and is profoundly affected by our everyday social life. To promote sleep health we must consider a comprehensive approach that emphasizes the role of engaging in our communities, as well as getting enough and better sleep.”

The study “Social Participation and Older Adults’ Sleep” was published in the Journal of Social Science and Medicine. Chen collaborated with Diane Lauderdale and Linda Waite at the University of Chicago on the study. The research was supported by the National Institute of Aging (R01AG042164 and R37AG030481) and the Basic Behavioral and Social Sciences Research Opportunity Network National Institutes of Health. 

Long-Term Stress Erodes Memory

Study in mice places blame on immune system

Newswise, March 3, 2016 — Sustained stress erodes memory, and the immune system plays a key role in the cognitive impairment, according to a new study from researchers at The Ohio State University.

The work in mice could one day lead to treatment for repeated, long-term mental assault such as that sustained by bullying victims, soldiers and those who report to beastly bosses, the researchers say.

“This is chronic stress. It’s not just the stress of giving a talk or meeting someone new,” said lead researcher Jonathan Godbout, associate professor of neuroscience at Ohio State.

This is the first study of its kind to establish the relationship between short-term memory and prolonged stress. In the case of the mice, that meant repeat visits from a larger, nasty intruder mouse.

Mice that were repeatedly exposed to the aggressive intruder had a hard time recalling where the escape hole was in a maze they’d mastered prior to the stressful period.

“The stressed mice didn’t recall it. The mice that weren’t stressed, they really remembered it,” Godbout said.

They also had measurable changes in their brains, including evidence of inflammation brought on by the immune system’s response to the outside pressure. This was associated with the presence of immune cells, called macrophages, in the brain of the stressed mice.

The research team was able to pin the short-term memory loss on the inflammation, and on the immune system.

Their work, which appears in The Journal of Neuroscience, builds on previous research substantiating the connections between chronic stress and lasting anxiety.

The impact on memory and confirmation that the brain inflammation is caused by the immune system are important new discoveries, Godbout said.

“It’s possible we could identify targets that we can treat pharmacologically or behaviorally,” he said.

It could be that there are ways to interrupt the inflammation, said John Sheridan, who worked on the study and is associate director of Ohio State’s Institute for Behavioral Medicine Research.

The mice used in the study are exposed to repeated social defeat – basically dominance by an alpha mouse – that aims to mimic chronic psychosocial stress experienced by humans.

Researchers at Ohio State seek to uncover the secrets behind stress and cognitive and mood problems with a long-range goal of finding ways to help those who are anxious, depressed and suffer from lasting problems, including post-traumatic stress disorder.

This new research focused on the hippocampus, a hub of memory and emotional response.

The researchers found that the stressed mice had trouble with spatial memory that resolved within 28 days. They found that the mice displayed social avoidance, which measures depressive-like behavior, that continued after four weeks of monitoring.

And they were able to measure deficits in the development of new neurons 10 days and 28 days after the prolonged stress ended.

When they gave the mice a chemical that inhibited inflammation, neither the brain-cell problem nor the depressive symptoms went away. But the memory loss and inflammatory macrophages did disappear.

And that led them to conclude that the post-stress memory trouble is directly linked to inflammation – and the immune system – rather than to other damage to the brain. That type of information can pave the way for immune-based treatments, Godbout said.

“Stress releases immune cells from the bone marrow and those cells can traffic to brain areas associated with neuronal activation in response to stress,” Sheridan said. “They’re being called to the brain, to the center of memory.”

The researchers’ work was supported by the National Institutes of Health, the National Institute of Aging and the National Institute of Dental and Craniofacial Research.

Other Ohio State researchers who worked on the study were Daniel McKim, Anzela Niraula, Andrew Tarr and Eric Wohleb.

Older Workers in Office Support, Service Occupations at Higher Risk for Poor Cardiovascular Health Profile

Newswise, March 3, 2016– Research out of the nationwide REasons for Geographic and Racial Differences in Stroke study looked at 5,566 workers age 45 and older identified that those in sales, office support or service occupations have more risk factors for heart disease and stroke than workers in management and professional jobs.

Fewer than 41 percent of the workers had a ranking of “ideal” in five of the seven cardiovascular health factors (blood pressure, blood sugar, diet, weight, cholesterol, physical activity and smoking.On the other end of the scale, 88 percent were listed as nonsmokers and 78 percent were credited with having ideal glucose levels.

“We wanted to be a bit flexible with the definition of optimum health so we decided to go for five of the seven components as ideal rather than having all seven ideal,” said Suzanne Judd, Ph.D., assistant dean and associate professor at the University of Alabama at Birmingham School of Public Health. “It’s great to see so few people smoking, but ideal cardiovascular health is defined by more than just nonsmoking.”

The study found that none of the older workers achieved ideal levels of cardiovascular health, mostly because of their diet.

“Achieving a healthy diet can be even more challenging for a person working eight to 12 hours per day away from the home,” stated Judd, co-author on this study and co-investigator on the REGARDS study. “This limits the time available to shop for and prepare healthier options.”

Overall diet health was based on workers’ meeting four of five goals: consuming 4.5 or more cups of fruits or vegetables a day, 450 or fewer calories a week in sugary foods, and three or more 1-ounce servings of whole grains daily.

The research, presented at the American Heart Association’s Epidemiology/Lifestyle 2016 meeting, breaks down each occupation as classified by the U.S. Bureau of Labor Statistics, where it found: 

• Transportation and material-moving workers had the highest smoking rate among the occupation groups, where 22 percent were classified as smokers.
• Sixty-eight percent of sales, office and administrative support workers had poor eating habits. Sixty-nine percent of sales professionals did not have ideal total cholesterol levels, and 82 percent of office and administrative support staff did not have ideal scores for physical activity.
• Employees in food preparation and service had the worst diet profile, in which 79 percent had poor diet quality.
• Police, firefighters and their peers were 90 percent more likely to be overweight or obese, with 77 percent not having ideal total cholesterol levels and 35 percent having high blood pressure.
• Generally, management professionals had better cardiovascular health than the others. One-third had ideal body mass, 75 percent were at least moderately active and only 6 percent were smokers. Within this group, 72 percent of those in business and finance had poor eating habits.

The study scored workers as having “ideal,” “intermediate” or “poor” cardiovascular health in the seven areas.

Ideal scores were earned if blood pressure readings were lower than 120/80 mmHg without medicines, total cholesterol was below 200 mg/dL, and blood sugar was lower than 100 mg/dL while fasting or 140 without fasting. Body Mass Index was observed as ideal at 25 or lower. Workers were categorized as smoker or nonsmoker. Physical activity levels were measured as ideal when workers engaged in intense, break-a-sweat activity four or more times a week, including at work.

Lead author, Capt. Leslie MacDonald, Sc.D., senior scientist in the U.S. Public Health Service, National Institute for Occupational Safety and Health, of the Centers for Disease Control, suggests that employees consider taking small steps to improve their overall cardiovascular health, including:
• Going for a walk during lunch or other breaks
• Parking farther away from destinations
• Taking the stairs instead of elevators
• Managing stress through breathing exercises or meditation
• Bringing healthy snacks to work such as fruits, nuts and yogurt
• Drinking water throughout the day

The UAB-led REGARDS is ongoing study sponsored by the National Institute of Neurological Disorders and Stroke with over 30,000 individuals enrolled. It is focused on learning more about the factors that increase a person’s risk of having a stroke.

Americans Who See God as ‘a Secure Base’ Tend to Be More Committed, Satisfied in the Workplace, Baylor Study Finds

Newswise, March 3, 2016 — People who see God as a “secure base” for intimacy and attachment are more likely to be emotionally committed to their workplace and satisfied with their jobs.

They also tend to see their work as a calling from God, which correlates to higher levels of job commitment and satisfaction, according to a Baylor University study of working American adults.

“Attachment to God may relate to a sense of safety and confidence that encourages exploration of the world — and as adults, our primary form of exploration is work,” said Blake V. Kent, lead author and a doctoral candidate in sociology in Baylor’s College of Arts & Sciences.

The study — “Attachment to God, Vocational Calling, and Worker Contentment” — is published online in the journal Review of Religious Research.

The research is an analysis of data from Baylor Religion Survey 2011, a national random survey about Americans’ religious attitudes, beliefs and values that was conducted by The Gallup Organization.

Respondents in this study included 860 adults who are full- or part-time employees or volunteers and who believe in God or a higher power.

While other studies have found a link between job commitment and such religious influences as faith-work integration beliefs and congregational involvement, the Baylor research differs in that it suggests that inner feelings of attachment to God rather than statements about God may relate to attachments elsewhere — as in the workplace.

From a management perspective, research has shown that employees’ work experiences in previous jobs generally trump personal characteristics — such as age, race/ethnicity and gender — when it comes to effectively managing them after hire.

The Baylor study, however, suggests that “divine attachment” may be viewed as a personal characteristic that should be taken into account in the workplace.

“Research suggests that workplaces which allow their employees to engage in spiritual activity at work — even if it’s just 15 minutes a day of meditation — tend to see boosts in employee satisfaction,” Kent said.

“What we’re doing here is providing evidence that how people relate to God matters for their commitment and satisfaction at work.”

For the research, “affective commitment” was measured by individuals’ responses to such statements as “I really feel this organization’s problems are my own” and “I do not feel a strong sense of ‘belonging’ to my organization,” with answers ranging from “strongly disagree” to “strongly agree.”

“This type of commitment is a measure of the emotional bond between a person and an organization, in which employees keep their jobs because they want to rather than because they need or ought to,” Kent said.

Such commitment is linked to lower absenteeism and conflict, lower turnover rates, and higher performance and productivity, previous studies have found.

The measure of “job satisfaction” as used in other published research is broader because many factors can affect satisfaction — among them pay, benefits, co-workers and bosses.

Respondents considered two statements: “In general, I do not like my job” and “All in all, I am satisfied with my job.” Their responses range from “strongly disagree” to “strongly agree.”

Attachment to God may have a “spillover effect,” serving as a buffer against negative emotions and experiences and helping people to cope with workplace challenges, Kent said.

In the study, a “calling” was defined as “a sense of work as a ‘transcendent summons’ for meaning and purpose in the workplace,” he said.

“The work may be seen as a ‘mission from God’ or as serving God, even if it is a very commonplace job without religious orientation.”

Previous research indicates that a sense of vocational calling might sustain people in difficult circumstances, Kent said. Individuals who feel called show higher levels of motivation, stronger coping skills, lower absenteeism and higher work satisfaction.

Types of attachments generally are formed in the first 3 to 5 years of life and affect an individual in future relationships with family, friends, romantic partners, God and work. They include: 

• Secure attachment. “This is when the child knows the primary caretaker — usually a mother — is available to hug and hold you. That creates a certain confidence in the child to explore his or her surroundings but still be confident that the caretaker will be there when the child returns,” Kent said.
• Insecure attachment. “This is formed when the primary attachment figure seems cold or distant and is often unavailable for emotional connection,” Kent said.
• Anxious attachment. “These attachments are ambivalent,” Kent said. “You feel that the caretaker is sometimes there for you with a lot of love to give, but sometimes they’re not.”

Theories differ about how a person’s concept of God — “the ultimate attachment figure” — is developed. One theory is that one’s view of God as caring, personal and responsive — or as impersonal and indifferent — mirrors the relationship with the main childhood caregiver. Another theory holds that a person’s notion of God can change over time and compensate for a lack of attachment to others in early life.

*Co-researchers were Matt Bradshaw, Ph.D., assistant professor of sociology, and Kevin Dougherty, Ph.D., associate professor of sociology, both in Baylor’s College of Arts & Sciences.

Four Simple Factors Can Determine Future Poverty Risk

Newswise, March 3, 2016 — Republicans and Democrats seem to agree on precious little this election cycle. One point of potential concurrence are issues related to income — or lack thereof.

As U.S. median household income has stagnated over the last decade, candidates from both parties have put forth suggestions on how to prop up the middle class and reduce income insecurity.

But how many Americans are truly at risk of financial ruin?

A new poverty risk calculator, developed by two renowned experts on economic hardship, can determine the risk of poverty based on four factors: race, education, marital status and age.

The calculator is the brainchild of Mark Rank, the Herbert S. Hadley Professor of Social Welfare at the Brown School at Washington University in St. Louis, and Thomas Hirschl, professor in the Department of Development Sociology at Cornell University.

The idea behind this tool is similar to the logic behind the heart disease calculators that can be readily found on the Internet, Rank said.

Based on hundreds of thousands of case records taken from the Panel Study of Income Dynamics, an ongoing longitudinal study of Americans begun in 1968, the calculator estimates the percentage of Americans who will experience poverty in the next 5, 10 or 15 years. The poverty line for a family of four in 2015 was approximately $24,000.

What Americans will quickly discover as they use this new tool, Rank said, is that for many, the future risk of poverty is far from trivial. “Take the case of someone who might be thought of as having an overall low risk of poverty,” he said.

“The 15-year risk of poverty for an American who is in their later 30s, white, not married, and with an education beyond the high school level, is 32 percent.”

Nevertheless, the calculator also demonstrates just how vast the inequalities in the U.S. actually are. “Race, education, marital status, and age make a huge difference in terms of who is more or less likely to experience poverty in the years ahead,” Rank said.

“For example, the five-year risk of poverty for an American between the ages of 45-49, who is white, married, and with an education beyond high school, is 5 percent.”

In contrast, Rank said, the risk of poverty for an individual between the ages of 25-29, who is nonwhite, not married, and with an education of high school or less, is “a whopping 72 percent.”

“In many ways, these divides have only been growing wider over time,” Rank said.

As a result, not only can this calculator determine personal poverty risk, it also allows users to see just how profound the demographic fault lines are likely to be in the future

.

“The calculator is a new way for Americans to look into the future and estimate their overall economic risk,” Rank said. “It simply has not been done before. In addition, people can see exactly how much inequality there is in America by comparing their profile with others.”

Rank and Hirschl are co-authors of the influential 2014 book, “Chasing the American Dream: Understanding What Shapes Our Fortunes.”  A paperback version is due out in March.