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We are living in a world where environmental crises come to a head. To curb aggravation of these problems, a socio-ecological transformation within society is needed, going along with human behavior change. How to encourage such behavior changes on an individual level is the core issue of this dissertation. It takes a closer look at the role of individuals as consumers resulting in purchase decisions with more or less harmful impact on the environment. By using the example of plastic pollution, it takes up a current environmental problem and focuses on an understudied behavioral response to this problem, namely reduction behavior. More concrete, this dissertation examines which psychological factors can encourage the mitigation of plastic packaging consumption. Plastic packaging accounts for the biggest amount of current plastic production and is associated with products of daily relevance. Despite growing awareness of plastic pollution in society, behavioral responses do not follow accordingly and plastic consumption is still very high. As habits are often a pitfall when implementing more resource-saving behavior, this dissertation further examines if periods of discontinuity can open a ’window of opportunity’ to break old habits and facilitate behavior change. Four manuscripts approach this matter from the gross to the subtle. Starting with a literature review, a summary of 187 studies addresses the topic of plastic pollution and human behavior from a societal-scientific perspective. Based on this, a cross-sectional study (N = 648) examines the deter-minants of plastic-free behavior intentions in the private-sphere and public-sphere by structural equation modeling. Two experimental studies in pre-post design build upon this, by integrating the determinants in intervention studies. In addition, it was evaluated if the intervention presented during Lent (N = 140) or an action month of ‘Plastic Free July’ (N = 366) can create a ‘window of opportunity’ to mitigate plastic packaging consumption. The literature review emphasized the need for research on behavioral solutions to reduce plastic consumption. The empirical results revealed moral and control beliefs to be the main determinants of reduction behavior. Furthermore, the time point of an intervention influenced the likelihood to try out the new behavior. The studies gave first evidence that a ‘window of opportunity’ can facilitate change towards pro-environmental behavior within the application field of plastic consumption. Theoretical and practical implications of creating the right opportunity for individuals to contribute to a socio-ecological transformation are finally discussed.
Schizophrenia is a chronic mental health disorder, which changes rapidly the life of the persons and their families, who suffer from it. It causes high biological and psychological vulnerability as well as cognitive, emotional and behavioral disorders. Nowadays, evidence-based pharmacotherapy and psychotherapy are available aiming the rehabilitation and recovery of individuals with schizophrenia. A democratic society is obliged to give these people the opportunity to have an access to those treatments.
The following three published studies present this dissertation thesis and have a common focus on the implementation of evidence-based psychotherapy in individuals with schizophrenia.
The first study evaluates the efficacy of the Integrated Psychological Therapy (IPT) in Greece, one of the most evaluated rehabilitation programs. IPT was compared to
Treatment as Usual (TAU) in a randomized controlled trial (RCT) with 48 individuals with schizophrenia. Significant effects favouring IPT were found in working memory,
in social perception, in negative symptoms, in general psychopathology and in insight. This study supports evidence for the efficacy of IPT in Greece.
The second study evaluates a second hypothesis, when IPT is more and less effective regarding treatment resistant schizophrenia (TRS) and non treatment resistant
schizophrenia (NTRS). It is a part of the first paper. Significant effects favouring NTRS were found for verbal memory, for symptoms, for functioning and quality of
life. Effect sizes showed superiority of NTRS in comparison to TRS. IPTTRS showed on the other side some significant improvements. This study presents the initial findings of a larger study to be conducted internationally for the first time.
The third study is a systematic review, which aims to evaluate the efficacy of Cognitive Behavioral Therapy (CBT), of Meta Cognitive Therapy (MCT), Metacognitive Training (MCTR), Metacognitive Reflection and Insight Therapy
(MERIT), of various Rehabilitation Programs and Recovery Programs in individuals with schizophrenia. 41 RCTs and 12 Case Studies were included. The above interventions are efficacious in the improvement of cognitions, symptoms, functional outcome, insight, self-esteem, comorbid disorders and metacognitive capacity.
The three studies provide insight regarding the importance of evidence-based psychotherapy in persons with schizophrenia leading to recovery and reintegration into
society. Future RCTs with larger samples and long-term follow up, combining evidence-based psychotherapies for individuals with schizophrenia need to be done.
In this thesis we examined the question whether personality traits of early child care workers influence process quality in preschool.
Research has shown that in educational settings such as preschool, pedagogical quality affects children’s developmental outcome (e.g. NICHD, 2002; Peisner-Feinberg et al., 1999). A substantial part of pedagogical quality known to be vital in this respect is the interaction between teacher and children (e.g., Tietze, 2008). Results of prior classroom research indicate that the teachers’ personality might be an important factor for good teacher-child-interaction (Mayr, 2011). Thus, personality traits might play a vital role for the interaction in preschool. Therefore, the aims of this thesis were to a) identify pivotal personality traits of child care workers, b) assess ideal levels of the identified personality traits and c) examine the relationship between pivotal personality traits and process quality. On that account, we conducted two requirement analyses and a video study. The results of these studies showed that subject matter experts (parents, child care workers, lecturers) partly agreed as to which personality traits are pivotal for child care workers. Furthermore, the experts showed high consensus with regard to the minimum, ideal and maximum personality trait profiles. Furthermore, child care workers whose profiles lay closer to the experts’ ideal also showed higher process quality. In addition, regression analyses showed that the child care workers’ levels of the Big Two (Communion and Agency) related significantly to their process quality.
The history of human kind is characterized by social conflict. Every conflict can be the starting point of social change or the escalation into more destructive forms. The social conflict in regard to rising numbers of refugees and their acceptance that arose in most host countries in 2015 already took on destructive forms – in Germany, right-wing extremists attacked refugee shelters and even killed multiple people, including political leaders who openly supported refugees. Thus, incompatible expectancies and values of different parts of the society led to violent action tendencies, which tremendously threaten intergroup relations. Psychological research has developed several interventions in past decades to improve intergroup relations, but they fall short, for example, when it comes to the inclusion of people with extreme attitudes and to precisely differentiate potential prosocial outcomes of the interventions. Thus, this dissertation aimed to a) develop psychological interventions, that could also be applied to people with more extreme attitudes, thereby putting a special emphasis on collecting a diverse sample; b) gain knowledge about target- and outcome specific effects: Who benefits from which intervention and how can specific prosocial actions be predicted in order to develop interventions that guide needs-based actions; and c) shed light on potential underlying mechanisms of the interventions.
The dissertation will be introduced by the socio-political background that motivated the line of research pursued, before providing an overview of the conceptualization of social conflicts and potential psychological inhibitors and catalyzers for conflict transformation. Based on past research on socio-psychological interventions and their limitations, the aims of the dissertation will be presented in more detail, followed by a short summary of each manuscript. Overall, the present thesis comprises four manuscripts that were summarized in the general discussion into a road map for social-psychological interventions to put them into a broader perspective. The road map aspires to provide recommendations for increasing – either approach-oriented or support-oriented actions – by the socio-psychological interventions for a variety of host society groups depending on their pre-existing attitude towards refugees.
A Paradoxical Intervention targeting central beliefs of people with negative attitudes towards refugees influenced inhibitory and catalyzing factors for conflict transformation over the course of three experiments – thereby providing an effective tool to establish approach-oriented action tendencies, such as the willingness to get in contact with refugees. Further, the dissertation presents a novel mechanism – namely Cognitive Flexibility – which could explain the Paradoxical Interventions’ effect of past research. By positively affecting a context-free mindset, the Paradoxical Intervention could impact more flexible thought processes in general, irrespective of the topic tackled in the Paradoxical Intervention itself. For people with rather positive attitudes addressing emotions may increase specific support-oriented action tendencies. The dissertation provides evidence of a positive relation between moral outrage and hierarchy-challenging actions, such as solidarity-based collective action, and sympathy with prosocial hierarchy-maintaining support-oriented actions, such as dependency-oriented helping. These exclusive relations between specific emotions and action intentions provide important implications for the theorizing of emotion-behavior relations, as well as for practical considerations. In addition, a diversity workshop conducted with future diplomats showed indirect effects on solidarity-based collective action via diversity perception and superordinate group identification, thereby extending past research by including action intentions and going beyond the focus on grassroot-initiatives by presenting an implementable intervention for future leaders in a real world context.
Taken together, this dissertation provides important insights for the development of socio-psychological interventions. By integrating a diverse sample, including members of institutions on meso- and macro-levels (non-governmental organizations and future politicians) of our society, this dissertation presents a unique multi-perspective of host society members on the social conflict of refugee acceptance and support. Thereby, this work contributes to theoretical and practical advancement of how social psychology can contribute not only to negative peace – by for example (indirectly) reducing support of violence against refugees – but also to positive peace – by for example investigating precursors of hierarchy-challenging actions that enable equal rights.
The scientific interest in nonsuicidal self-injury (NSSI) has increased in the last two decades. High prevalence and comorbidity rates, low quality of life and increased risk of suicidality highlight the importance of this research field. The present thesis focuses on intra- and interpersonal factors associated with the development and maintenance of NSSI.
The aim of study 1 was the examination of personality traits of adolescents with NSSI without Borderline Personality Disorder (NSSI-BPD), adolescents with NSSI and BPD (NSSI+BPD), clinical controls (CC) and nonclinical controls (NC). Results showed that adolescents with NSSI disorder scored significantly higher on novelty seeking and harm avoidance and lower on persistence, self-directedness, and cooperativeness than CC. In adolescents with NSSI+BPD this personality pattern was even more pronounced than in adolescents with NSSI-BPD.
Adolescents´ NSSI leads to distress that affects the whole family system, often resulting in conflicts and disrupted family communication and functioning. Parents report feelings of distress, insecurity and helplessness. Adolescents with NSSI report more parental criticism and control and less support than adolescents without NSSI. Study 2 investigated the parenting behavior in families of adolescents with NSSI. Adolescents with NSSI reported less maternal warmth and support than NC adolescents. Mothers of adolescents with NSSI showed higher psychopathology scores than NC mothers and less parental satisfaction than CC and NC mothers.
Siblings are also reported to suffer from changes in family dynamics. The aim of study 3 was to examine the sibling relationship quality of adolescents with NSSI, CC and NC. Siblings reported a wide range of negative emotional and familial consequences as a result of their sister´s NSSI. Siblings of adolescents with NSSI experienced significantly more coercion in the relationship with their sister compared to CC and NC siblings. Adolescents with NSSI reported significantly less warmth and empathy in the sibling relationship and higher rivalry scores between their siblings and themselves than NC adolescents. For both, adolescents with NSSI and their siblings, associations were found between sibling relationship quality and internalizing problems.
Study 4 aimed to further explore the family emotional climate. Therefore, the level of expressed emotion (EE) was assessed in adolescents with NSSI, CC, NC and their mothers. Parental high EE (HEE) is linked to adolescent NSSI, especially parental criticism seems to be strongly associated with NSSI. Previous research into NSSI and EE has focused on parental EE, however, the conceptualization of EE as a unidirectional construct from parent to child may present an incomplete picture. Therefore, the current study included both, adolescent and maternal EE. Adolescents in the NSSI and CC group more often met criteria for HEE than NC. Adolescents with NSSI exhibited significantly more covert criticism and critical tone toward their mothers than CC and NC. HEE of adolescents with NSSI was associated with a range of difficulties in emotion regulation. For the total sample, moderate concordance was found between adolescents and mothers EE-status.
The research presented in this thesis has important clinical implications. The differences in personality traits of adolescents with NSSI with and without BPD underline the need for a dimensional personality assessment as well as specific treatment programs for adolescents with NSSI-BPD. Problems within the family are frequent triggers for NSSI. Therefore, interventions for adolescents with NSSI should include both, the improvement of emotion regulation and family interaction and communication. Along with the reduction of negative relationship aspects, psychotherapy should also focus on the enhancement of positive relationship quality. The emotional burden of family members stresses the need for emotional and practical support for parents and siblings.
Die vorliegende Dissertation beschäftigt sich mit euroskeptischen Äußerungen in der Parteienkommunikation und der Medienberichterstattung im Vorfeld der Europawahl 2014. Die Arbeit verwendet ein akteurszentriertes Forschungsdesign, welches eine differenzierte Betrachtung der öffentlichen Debatte europäischer Themen erlaubt. Die Analyse deckt auf, welche nationalen Parteien euroskeptische Positionen vertreten und inwiefern diese Einzug in die mediale Berichterstattung finden. Auch die Positionierung der Medien selbst wird durch die Untersuchung meinungsbezogener Artikel berücksichtigt. Die den Studien zu Grunde liegende Konzeptualisierung des Euroskeptizismus-Begriff umfasst neben globalen und konkreten negativen Bewertungen der EU auch die Zuschreibung von Problemverantwortung als weitere Spielart euroskeptischer Äußerungen. Die Arbeit nimmt weiterhin eine international vergleichende Perspektive ein, um den Einfluss nationaler Kontextfaktoren auf die Verbreitung euroskeptischer Positionen aufzuzeigen.
Die Ergebnisse der Analyse decken zunächst auf, dass das Vorhandensein erstarkender euroskeptischer Oppositionsparteien nicht zwangsläufig zu einer Politisierung der europäischen Debatte führt, da sich die europhilen Mainstream-Parteien verschiedener Strategien zur Vermeidung einer solchen Kontroversen bedienen. Die Analysen ergeben weiterhin, dass europhile Regierungsparteien zwar mehrheitlich vor konkreten negativen Bewertungen der EU zurückschrecken, diese aber in Bezug auf die europäische Finanzkrise vorwiegend als Verursacher von Problemlagen skizzieren. Letztlich verdeutlichen die Ergebnisse, dass die mediale Berichterstattung zu Themen mit EU-Bezug eine starke Synchronizität zwischen Nachrichten- und Meinungsteil aufzeigt. Dies gilt sowohl in Bezug auf die geäußerten Bewertungen zur Europäischen Union als auch hinsichtlich der Darstellung von Verantwortlichkeit.
This dissertation deals with the opportunities and restrictions that parties face in an election campaign at the supranational level of the EU. Using communication science concepts of agenda-setting (focus: media) and agenda-building (focus: political parties), the first part of the study is based on the election campaign for the European Parliament (EP) in 2014. It analyses to what extent political parties put the EU on the agenda. Second, it is examined whether parties have used their structural advantage of being able to influence the media agenda at the supranational level during the election campaign in the context of the EP election campaign. Third, it is examined whether parties can gain an advantage for the visibility of their campaigns by rejecting EU integration and the associated conflictual communication. Fourth and final, it will be explored whether agenda-building can influence the rankings of specific policy issues on the media agenda in the European context.
First, the analyses show that a European political focus of election campaign communication can no longer be found only on the part of the small (eurosceptic) parties. Second, parties have a good chance of being present in media coverage if the they pursue a European political focus in their campaign communication. Third, a negative tone in party communication turns out not to be decisive for the parties' visibility in the election campaign. Fourth, a clear positioning on political issues also prepares parties for restrictions of the further development of a European thematic agenda. After a discussion of these results, the paper concludes with an assessment of the analysis limitations and an outlook on further research approaches.
Previous research revealed that teachers hold beliefs about gifted students combining high intellectual ability with deficits in non-cognitive domains, outlined in the so-called disharmony hypothesis. Since teachers’ beliefs about giftedness can influence which students they identify as gifted, the empirical investigation of beliefs is of great practical relevance. This dissertation comprises three research articles that investigated teacher beliefs about gifted students’ characteristics in samples of pre-service teachers using an experimental vignette approach. Chapter I starts with a general introduction into beliefs, and presents the research aims of the present dissertation. The first article (Chapter II) focused on the interaction of beliefs about giftedness and gender in a sample of Australian pre-service teachers and tested if social desirability occurred when using the vignette design. Beside evidence for beliefs in line with the disharmony hypothesis, results revealed typical gender stereotypes. However, beliefs about giftedness appeared not to be gender specific and thus, to be similar for gifted girls and boys. The vignette approach was found to be an adequate design for assessing teacher beliefs. The second article (Chapter III) investigated teacher beliefs and their relationship to motivational orientations for teaching gifted students in a cross-country sample of German and Australian pre-service teachers. Motivational orientations comprise cognitive components (self-efficacy) and affective components (enthusiasm). Findings revealed beliefs in the sense of the disharmony hypothesis for pre-service teachers from both countries. Giftedness when paired with beliefs about high maladjustment was found to be negatively related to teachers’ self-efficacy for teaching gifted students. The third article (Chapter IV) examined the role of teachers’ belief in a just world for the formation of beliefs using a sample of Belgian pre-service teachers. It was found that the stronger pre-service teachers’ belief in a just world was, the more they perceived gifted students’ high intellectual ability as unfair and thus, neutralized that injustice by de-evaluating students’ non-cognitive abilities. In a general discussion (Chapter V), findings of the three articles are combined and reflected. Taken together, the present dissertation showed that teacher beliefs about gifted students’ characteristics are not gender specific, generalizable over countries, negatively related to teacher motivation and can be driven by fairness beliefs.
Student misbehavior and its treatment is a major challenge for teachers and a threat to their well-being. Indeed, teachers are obliged to punish student misbehavior on a regular basis. Additionally, teachers’ punishment decisions are among the most frequently reported situations when it comes to students’ experiences of injustice in school. By implication, it is crucial to understand teachers’ treatment of student misbehavior vis-à-vis students’ perceptions. One key dimension of punishment behavior reflects its underlying motivation and goals. People generally intend to achieve three goals when punishing misbehavior, namely, retribution (i.e., evening out the harm caused), special prevention (i.e., preventing recidivism of the offender), and general prevention (i.e., preventing imitation of others). Importantly, people’s support of these punishment goals is subject to hierarchy and power, implying that teachers’ and students’ punishment goal preferences differ. In this dissertation, I present three research projects that shed first light on teachers’ punishment and its goals along with the students’ perception of classroom intervention strategies pursuing these goals. More specifically, I first examined students’ (i.e., children’s) general support of each of the three punishment goals sketched above. Furthermore, I applied an attributional approach to understand and study the goals teachers intend to achieve when punishing student misbehavior. Finally, I investigated teachers’ and students’ support of the punishment goals regarding the same student misbehavior to directly compare their views on these goals and reactions pursuing them. In sum, the findings show that students generally prefer retribution and special prevention to general prevention, whereas teachers prefer general prevention and special prevention to retribution. This ultimately translates into a "mismatch" of teachers and students in their preferences for specific punishment goals, and the findings suggest that this may indeed enhance students’ perception of injustice. Overall, the results of the present research program may be valuable for the development of classroom intervention strategies that may reduce rather than enhance conflicts in student-teacher-interactions.
Maßnahmen der Führungskräfteentwicklung verfolgen das Ziel den Führungsnachwuchs des Unternehmens zu bilden und für einen reibungslosen Einstieg in die Füh-rungsaufgabe zu sorgen. In der Literatur gibt es zahlreiche Theorien und Modelle zu Führung und deren Entwicklung, doch offen bleibt meist, wie es um den praktischen Einsatz und die Effektivität steht. Das Ziel dieser Arbeit ist die Identifikation wesentlicher Bestandteile der Führungskräfteentwicklung, die effektiv Einfluss auf (Nachwuchs-)Führungskräfte nehmen. Drei Studien beschäftigen sich jeweils mit unter-schiedlichen Schwerpunkten mit der Gestaltung und Wirksamkeit von modularen Programmen der Führungskräfteentwicklung. Zur Beschreibung der Gestaltung wurde eine Expertenbefragung unter Verantwortlichen für Führungskräfteentwicklung in 4 Großunternehmen durchgeführt. Zur Prüfung der Wirksamkeit wurden zwei Prädiktoren erfolgreichen Führens, die praktische Führungsintelligenz und die Führungswirksamkeitserwartung (FWE), in zwei repräsentativen modularen Programmen gemessen. Dafür wurden zwei quasiexperimentelle Designs mit Prätest-Posttest durchgeführt: ein Design mit zusätzlicher Kontrollgruppe (Nexp = 14, Nkontr = 12), ein Design mit zusätzlicher Fremdeinschätzung (N = 11 bis N =57 je nach Messzeitpunkt und beteiligten Variablen). Die praktische Führungsintelligenz wurde anhand eines für die Untersuchung entwickelten Situational Judgment Tests (SJTs) gemessen. Neben der FWE (in Anlehnung an die Skala zur Erfassung der beruflichen Selbstwirksamkeitserwartung, BSW-Skala) wurden weitere Konstrukte wie Selbstregulation (Locomotion-Assessment-Fragebogen, L-A-F), Optimismus (Skala Optimismus-Pessimismus-2, SOP2) Selbstmanagement (Fragebogens zur Erfassung von Ressourcen und Selbstmanagementfähigkeiten, FERUS) erfasst, sowie explorativ entwicklungsförderliche Merkmale erhoben. Entsprechend der Annahme verdichten sich die Ergebnisse auf drei Merkmale wirksamer Trainingsgestaltung: Erfahrungssammlung, Feedback, Selbstreflexion. Es konnte nachgewiesen werden, dass Programme mit hohem erfahrungsorientiertem Trainingsanteil, die Erfolgserlebnisse und Modelllernen fördern sowie persönliche Gespräche und Feedback beinhalten, die FWE (ŋ2 = .24, ŋ2 = .50) und die praktische Führungsintelligenz (ŋ2 = .54). signifikant (p<.05) steigern. Deutlich wurde auch der enge Zusammenhang zwischen Merkmalen der Person (wie Ausprägung der FWE oder Selbstregulationsfähigkeiten) und der Wirksamkeit der Programme. Aus den Ergebnissen werden Empfehlungen zur praktischen Umsetzung in der Führungskräfteentwicklung abgeleitet und Anregungen für zukünftige Forschung diskutiert.
