Two studies, with a total of 707 participants, developed and examined the reliability and validity of a measure for anticipatory traumatic reaction (ATR), a novel construct describing a form of distress that may occur in response to threat-related media reports and discussions. Exploratory and confirmatory factor analysis resulted in a scale comprising three subscales: feelings related to future threat; preparatory thoughts and actions; and disruption to daily activities. Internal consistency was .93 for the overall ATR scale. The ATR scale demonstrated convergent validity through associations with negative affect, depression, anxiety, stress, neuroticism, and repetitive negative thinking. The scale showed discriminant validity in relationships to Big Five characteristics. The ATR scale had some overlap with a measure of posttraumatic stress disorder, but also showed substantial separate variance. This research provides preliminary evidence for the novel construct of ATR as well as a measure of the construct. The ATR scale will allow researchers to further investigate anticipatory traumatic reaction in the fields of trauma, clinical practice, and social psychology.

As teachers, we want to motivate our students to learn during a unit and to continue learning about the topic after the unit ends. This article describes about a hundred methods we use to help motivate students to learn. The methods form 12 categories: (1) making content relevant to student values and goals, (2) helping students achieve their goals through learning, (3) providing potent models of learning, (4) prompting and persuading students to learn, (5) establishing a positive relationship with students. (6) rewarding student achievement and learning efforts, (7) not de-motivating students, (8) enhancing student learning self-efficacy, (9) using engaging teaching methods, (10) using an appealing teaching style, (11) giving motivational feedback, and (12) monitoring student motivation levels and adjusting motivation methods as needed. Teachers at any level of the educational system may be able to increase their motivational impact by using the methods that suit their personality, their topic, their students, and their setting.

This research examined the extent to which psychological distress is associated with satisfaction with life, and investigated whether trait emotional intelligence moderates this relationship. In a broad-based international sample of 370 adults, psychological distress predicted satisfaction with life after controlling for age, gender, country of origin, and trait emotional intelligence. Trait emotional intelligence was related to lower levels of psychological distress and greater life satisfaction. The relationship between psychological distress and life satisfaction was moderated by trait emotional intelligence. Trait emotional intelligence may act as an adaptive coping resource in that the negative association between psychological distress and life satisfaction became significantly weaker for respondents with high trait emotional intelligence.

This study explored the relationship between the frequency of use of specific motivational teaching techniques and satisfaction of students with their psychology courses. One hundred and thirty-five university students rated the level of use of specific teaching techniques used in psychology courses they had completed and indicated their overall satisfaction with their psychology courses. Higher student ratings of frequency of use of motivational teaching strategies were related to more student satisfaction. The specific motivational teaching techniques that were significantly related to satisfaction spanned nine categories ranging from providing a model of interest in learning to relating course content to student interests. Among the specific motivational teaching techniques significantly related to student satisfaction were expressing interest in facilitating student learning, showing warmth and empathy, giving interesting assignments, praising students for good effort, and providing prompt, constructive feedback. The findings suggest potential value in psychology instructors testing the effects of specific motivational teaching methods.

Academic staff members at 18 randomly selected Australian schools of psychology responded to evaluation questions about the human research ethics review process at their university. Most of the 86 respondents rated the process at their university as working well and gave positive ratings for the clarity and reasonableness of ethics decisions and for the informal guidance provided by the ethics review committee. Ratings were lower for timeliness and predictability of decisions, and for the openness of the committee to suggestions. Written comments by respondents suggested 14 matters of concern, such as that the ethics committee uses guidelines inappropriate for psychological research, goes beyond its expertise, prevents harmless research, makes arbitrary decisions, is not accountable to researchers, and refuses to allow payment of participants. Respondents at seven universities mentioned that they had fast-track, in-school review for low-risk research. Respondents at these universities gave significantly higher total ratings of the review process.

This study focused on publication rates of Australian academic psychologists. A random selection of 12 of the 36 Australian universities with psychology programs produced a total of 272 academics with the academic ranks of lecturer, senior lecturer, associate professor, or professor. A search of the PsycINFO database provided lists of publications for each academic. Using all listed publications except corrections and dissertations, the search found approximately a doubling pattern for number of publications going up each step of the rank ladder. Academics from universities that are members of the research-intensive Group of Eight universities had significantly higher publication averages at every rank than academics at other universities. Male academics had higher publication rates than female academics, but gender differences accounted for only a small amount of variance in the number of publications. The publication rates have potential value in allowing academic psychologists to compare their publication rate with that of their peers, in helping universities make hiring and promotion decisions, and in helping organisations that provide research grants evaluate the publications records of grant applicants.

Two studies examined whether work groups have personality characteristics. In Study 1, 212 workers from different organizations each listed five words that described their work group; 67 characteristics were mentioned by at least 2% of participants. The words mentioned most often to describe a work group were friendly and fun. Study 2 involved workers rating their various work groups on these 67 characteristics. Exploratory factor analysis with 419 workers indicated two factors in the ratings, with the first rotated factor predominant. The highest loading words on Factor 1 were supporting, understanding, and enjoyable, although friendly and fun also loaded highly on it. The overall loadings suggest a construct of group agreeableness. Additional analyses showed that scores on that factor were positively associated with scores on measures of job satisfaction and negatively associated with scores on a measure of intention to resign. The results of the two studies provide preliminary evidence that work groups have a personality-like characteristic that can be called agreeableness.

Both theory and previous research suggest a link between emotional intelligence and emotional well-being. Emotional intelligence includes the ability to understand and regulate emotions; emotional well-being includes positive mood and high self-esteem. Two studies investigated the relationship between emotional intelligence and mood, and between emotional intelligence and self-esteem. The results of these studies indicated that higher emotional intelligence was associated with characteristically positive mood and higher self-esteem. The results of a third study indicated that higher emotional intelligence was associated with a higher positive mood state and greater state self-esteem. The third study also investigated the role of emotional intelligence in mood and self-esteem regulation and found that individuals with higher emotional intelligence showed less of a decrease in positive mood and self-esteem after a negative state induction using the Velten method, and showed more of an increase in positive mood, but not in self-esteem, after a positive state induction. The findings were discussed in the light of previous work on emotional intelligence, and recommendations were made for further study.

The present study reconceptualized the role of hedonic (pleasure) and eudaimonic (engagement) functions as well-being processes and distinguished them from well-being outcomes. Well-being outcomes encompass life satisfaction, positive affect, psychological well-being, social well-being, subjective physical health, and absence of depression, anxiety, and stress. It was hypothesized that trait emotional intelligence (EI) would mediate the relationship between well-being processes and well-being outcomes. Participants (N = 370, mean age = 27.35 years, SD = 10.01) completed measures of hedonic and eudaimonic well-being processes, trait EI, and well-being outcome indices. Path analysis using structural equation modeling showed that trait EI fully mediated the relationship between hedonic and eudaimonic processes and well-being outcomes. Results demonstrated that engagement in meaningful activities as captured by hedonic and eudaimonic well-being processes may promote well-being outcomes.

Greater optimism is related to better mental and physical health. A number of studies have investigated interventions intended to increase optimism. The aim of this meta-analysis was to consolidate effect sizes found in randomized controlled intervention studies of optimism training and to identify factors that may influence the effect of interventions. Twenty-nine studies, with a total of 3319 participants, met criteria for inclusion in the analysis. A significant meta-analytic effect size, g = .41, indicated that, across studies, interventions increased optimism. Moderator analyses showed that studies had significantly higher effect sizes if they used the Best Possible Self intervention, provided the intervention in person, used an active control, used separate positive and negative expectancy measures rather than a version of the LOT-R, had a final assessment within one day of the end of the intervention, and used completer analyses rather than intention-to-treat analyses. The results indicate that psychological interventions can increase optimism and that various factors may influence effect size.