Gonzalo Hervás

Satisfaction with Life Scale in a Representative Sample of Spanish Adults: Validation and Normative Data

The Satisfaction with Life Scale (SWLS) is a measure widely used to assess life satisfaction. This paper aims to test its psychometric properties, factor structure, and distribution scores across age, gender, education, and employment status. For this purpose, a representative sample of the Spanish population (N = 2,964) was used. Although analyses showed no significant differences across age or gender, participants with higher education level and those who held an occupation were more satisfied with their lives. Confirmatory factor analysis revealed a unifactorial structure with significant correlations between the SWLS, and subjective happiness and social support. The internal consistency of the scale was .88. Thus, our results indicate that the Spanish version of the SWLS is a valid and reliable measure of life satisfaction within the Spanish context.

Construction and validation of a measure of integrative well-being in seven languages: The Pemberton Happiness Index

PurposeWe introduce the Pemberton Happiness Index (PHI), a new integrative measure of well-being in seven languages, detailing the validation process and presenting psychometric data. The scale includes eleven items related to different domains of remembered well-being (general, hedonic, eudaimonic, and social well-being) and ten items related to experienced well-being (i.e., positive and negative emotional events that possibly happened the day before); the sum of these items produces a combined well-being index.MethodsA distinctive characteristic of this study is that to construct the scale, an initial pool of items, covering the remembered and experienced well-being domains, were subjected to a complete selection and validation process. These items were based on widely used scales (e.g., PANAS, Satisfaction With Life Scale, Subjective Happiness Scale, and Psychological Well-Being Scales). Both the initial items and reference scales were translated into seven languages and completed via Internet by participants (N = 4,052) aged 16 to 60 years from nine countries (Germany, India, Japan, Mexico, Russia, Spain, Sweden, Turkey, and USA).ResultsResults from this initial validation study provided very good support for the psychometric properties of the PHI (i.e., internal consistency, a single-factor structure, and convergent and incremental validity).ConclusionsGiven the PHI’s good psychometric properties, this simple and integrative index could be used as an instrument to monitor changes in well-being. We discuss the utility of this integrative index to explore well-being in individuals and communities.

What else do you feel when you feel sad? Emotional overproduction, neuroticism and rumination.

Numerous experimental and naturalistic studies have shown the relevant role of ruminative styles in the onset, duration and severity of depressive episodes. Recent research has increasingly focused on the precursors of these ruminative responses. Neuroticism has been found to be closely related to ruminative styles, but the nature of this relationship is unknown. Across three studies, we explored the role of emotional overproduction, conceptualized as the tendency to simultaneously experience an elevated number of negative emotions and feelings during sad episodes. Study 1 showed that emotional overproduction is independently and strongly associated with ruminative styles. Furthermore, emotional overproduction was found to mediate the relationship between neuroticism and ruminative styles. Study 2 replicated these findings in a large community sample even after controlling for mood, personality, and other emotion-related variables. In Study 3, we conducted a laboratory study to increase the internal and external validity of our findings. Implications for personality, for coping and stress literature, and for clinical research and treatment are suggested.

Chronic thought suppression and posttraumatic symptoms: data from the Madrid March 11, 2004 terrorist attack.

Although a considerable number of people either witnessed directly or in the mass media the traumatic scenes of the terrorist attack that took place on March 11th, 2004 in Madrid, only a fraction of Madrid citizens developed posttraumatic symptoms. In this study, posttraumatic stress-related symptoms, degree of exposure, coping strategies related to the attack, and chronic attempts to avoid intrusive thoughts (i.e., thought suppression) were assessed in a general population Madrid sample (N=503) 2-3 weeks after the attacks. Our results showed that participants with higher scores in chronic thought suppression exhibited higher levels of PTSD symptoms. Higher scores in chronic thought suppression also correlated positively with the use of avoidant coping strategies after the attacks. We discuss the possible common roots of avoidance of intrusive thoughts and avoidant coping strategies and the implications of this relationship for the emergence of stress-related symptoms as well as for public health policies.

Priming the mental time-line: effects of modality and processing mode

The notion of a mental time-line (i.e., past corresponds to left and future corresponds to right) supports the conceptual metaphor view assuming that abstract concepts like “time” are grounded in cognitively more accessible concepts like “space.” In five experiments, we further investigated the relationship between temporal and spatial representations and examined whether or not the spatial correspondents of time are unintentionally activated. We employed a priming paradigm, in which visual or auditory prime words (i.e., temporal adverbs such as yesterday, tomorrow) preceded a colored square. In all experiments, participants discriminated the color of this square by responding with the left or the right hand. Although the temporal reference of the priming adverb was task irrelevant in Experiment 1, visually presented primes facilitated responses to the square in correspondence with the direction of the mental time-line. This priming effect was absent in Experiments 2, 3, and 5, in which the primes were presented auditorily and the temporal reference of the words could be ignored. The effect, however, emerged when attention was oriented to the temporal content of the auditory prime words in Experiment 4. The results suggest that task demands differentially modulate the activation of the mental time-line within the visual and auditory modality and support a flexible association between conceptual codes.

Percepción de beneficios y bienestar en niños con enfermedades amenazantes para la vida: Un estudio integrador

Objetivo. Examinamos en que medida la percepcion de beneficios o benefit finding (BF) en ninos con una enfermedad amenazante para la vida (como el cancer o el trasplante de organos) estaria relacionado con un rango de medidas positivas y negativas de funcionamiento psicologico asi como con algunas variables medicas. Metodo. Una muestra de ninos con una enfermedad amenazante para la vida (N=67, edad entre 7 y 18 anos) completaron la Escala de Percepcion de Beneficios para Ninos (Benefit Finding Scale for Children, BFSC) y otras medidas positivas y negativas de funcionamiento psicologico. Resultados. Los ninos expuestos a una enfermedad de gravedad moderada mostraron niveles mas altos de BF. BF se asocio positivamente a diferentes dimensiones de bienestar. Sin embargo, no se encontro relacion con medidas de malestar, a excepcion de algunos dominios de calidad de vida relacionados con la enfermedad. Conclusion. Estos resultados mostraron que el BF refleja un resultado positivo en si mismo y no una mera reduccion de malestar. A pesar de eso, deben considerarse algunos dominios de calidad de vida relacionados con la salud a la hora de realizar intervenciones terapeuticas para facilitar la percepcion de beneficios.

Perceived benefits after terrorist attacks: the role of positive and negative emotions

Terrorist attacks have been related to the onset of several mental disorders. These events may also trigger positive psychological consequences in some individuals. In this research, we collected data several weeks after the 11 March 2004 Madrid terrorist attacks. We evaluated perceived benefits as well as a broad range of positive and negative emotions. All positive emotion factors (Strength, Excitement, Pride, and Joy) were positively associated with perceived benefits. Of negative emotion factors (Distress, Hate, and Shame), only Hate was related, negatively, to perceived benefits. These results highlight the important role of positive emotions in the research of perceived benefits as well as the wide array of positive and negative emotions that can be elicited after a terrorist attack.

Evaluative beliefs as mediators of the relationship between parental bonding and symptoms of paranoia and depression

This study was aimed to explore the distinct pathways that lead to depression and paranoia. We first examined the association of dysfunctional parenting experiences and negative self-evaluations in depression and paranoia. Furthermore, we also examined whether different self-evaluative beliefs could mediate the relationships between dysfunctional parenting experiences (i.e. parental overprotection or lack of care) and the development of depression and paranoia. A sample composed of 55 paranoid patients, 38 depressed patients and 44 healthy controls completed the Parental Bonding Instrument (PBI), the Evaluative Beliefs Scale (EBS) and some clinical scales. Our analyses revealed that lack of parental care and negative self-self evaluations were associated with depression symptoms. Analyses also revealed that parental overprotection and negative other-self evaluations were associated with paranoid symptoms. Furthermore, negative self-self and other-self evaluations fully mediated the relationship of parental overprotection and paranoia, whereas negative self-self evaluations partially mediated the relationship between lack of parental care and depression. These findings suggest that distinct patterns of parental practices may contribute to the development of different dysfunctional schemas which in turn may lead to either depression or paranoia.

Addressing Current Challenges in Cross-Cultural Measurement of Well-Being: The Pemberton Happiness Index

In this chapter, we detail some of the main challenges of cross-cultural studies on well-being. We argue that these challenges revolve around underlying problems concerning the definition and assessment of well-being. Our specific focus is on three main challenges: (a) what to measure, (b) how to measure, and (c) the need for time- and cost-efficient measures. We argue that these challenges are relevant for an accurate analysis and understanding of cross-cultural differences in well-being. Finally, we describe the development of a new instrument designed to address some of the problems raised. The Pemberton Happiness Index, a brief measure of integrative well-being, taps into general, hedonic, eudaemonic, and social well-being and combines two methodologies to comprise both remembered and experienced well-being.

Overt head movements moderate the effect of depressive symptoms on mood regulation.

A dysfunction in the regulation of negative mood states is one of the core symptoms of depression. Research has found that levels of depression are associated with the intensity of the mood-regulation deficit. The present study aimed to explore the role the body plays in mood-regulation processes. More specifically, we studied whether head movements can influence mood persistence in dysphoric states. Subsequent to a sad-mood induction, participants were presented with a set of positive pictures immediately after performing either vertical (i.e., nodding) or lateral (i.e., shaking) head movements. We considered changes in mood from before to after the experimental task as an index of the effectiveness of mood regulation. As expected, the results showed that higher initial levels of depressive symptoms were associated with greater persistence of sad mood. More importantly, this association was present in participants who shook their heads, but not in those who nodded. These results show that body movements can contribute to mood-regulation processes, thus expanding our knowledge of the psychopathology of mood disorders.