Minna Lyons

Mind-reading and manipulation — Is Machiavellianism related to theory of mind?

Theory of Mind (ToM), the capacity to read mental states of other people, is a tool that allows individuals to function efficiently during social interactions. Although ToM has been stud- ied extensively in clinical populations, few studies have focused on ToM capacity in the general population. In this study, the relationship between ToM and the personality construct Machiavel- lianism are investigated. In evolutionary terms, a link between exploitative strategy and ToM would be expected - in order to be a successful manipulator, an individual should have a good understanding of the emotions and intentions of others. We found that Machiavellianism was, in fact, negatively correlated with both hot and cold measures of Theory of Mind. We suggest that high-Machs have deficits in empathizing ability, which allows them to exploit others. The find- ings also question the idea of Machiavellian Intelligence as a driving force behind evolution of social intelligence in humans.

Cross cultural variation in men's preference for sexual dimorphism in women's faces

Both attractiveness judgements and mate preferences vary considerably cross-culturally. We investigated whether mens preference for femininity in womens faces varies between 28 countries with diverse health conditions by analysing responses of 1972 heterosexual participants. Although men in all countries preferred feminized over masculinized female faces, we found substantial differences between countries in the magnitude of mens preferences. Using an average femininity preference for each country, we found mens facial femininity preferences correlated positively with the health of the nation, which explained 50.4% of the variation among countries. The weakest preferences for femininity were found in Nepal and strongest in Japan. As high femininity in women is associated with lower success in competition for resources and lower dominance, it is possible that in harsher environments, men prefer cues to resource holding potential over high fecundity.

Gratitude for Help among Adult Friends and Siblings

Although gratitude is a key prosocial emotion reinforcing reciprocal altruism, it has been largely ignored in the empirical literature. We examined feelings of gratitude and the importance of reciprocity in same-sex peer relations. Participants were 772 individuals (189 men; mean age = 28.80) who completed an online survey using a vignette design. We investigated (i) differences in reported gratitude and the importance of reciprocity among same-sex siblings and same-sex friends, and (ii) how relationship closeness moderates these associations. Based on the theory of kin altruism, we expect that people would feel more grateful towards friends than towards their siblings, and that lack of gratitude or failure to pay back a loan would bother more with friends than with siblings, irrespective of emotional closeness. Results showed that levels of gratitude and expectations of reciprocity were higher towards friends compared to siblings. This was the case also after controlling for emotional closeness. Being close generally made participants feel more grateful and expect lower displays of gratitude in the other. Closeness was also strongly associated with emotional gratitude among siblings compared to friends. We conclude that feelings and displays of gratitude have a special role in friendships. Although a close sibling may elicit as much gratitude as a friend does, even a very close friend is not exempt from the logic of reciprocity in the same way that a sibling is.

Global citizens: Who are they?

A growing desire to instigate global citizenship programmes in higher education has led to the development of optional structured opportunities for students to engage in prosocial activities. One of the challenges facing such programmes is to demonstrate and plan for the personal growth of those students. This article reports the dispositional, prosocial and attitudinal characteristics; knowledge and skills; and perceptions of social justice that students who undertake these activities bring to their initial participation. The findings indicate, that in comparison to a control group, the students differ significantly in a number of important ways (for example, conscientiousness, extraversion, openness; Machiavellianism, prosocial behaviour; self-esteem; skills relating to social action and tolerance and understanding and their concern regarding social problems). However, consideration should be given to the ways in which those students can be developed within a framework for social justice. Further, recruitment procedures for citizenship programmes in general should encourage the participation of a more diverse group of students than currently appears to be the case.

Who are the Heroes? Characteristics of People Who Rescue Others

Heroic rescuing behaviour is a male-typical trait in humans, and it is possible that life risking acts represent a costly signal, showing that a rescuing male has good underlying genetic quality. Previous research has shown that males with low status occupations are more frequent rescuers than males who have higher socio-economic statuses. This study looked at news archives of local papers in the UK in order to discover what kind of characteristics rescuers possess. It was found that males were highly more likely to rescue than females were, and that a typical rescuer was a low status male rescuing another male. Males with low socio-economic status were more likely to rescue in all the contexts (fire, drowning, violence and traffic accidents). Socio-economic status and heroism are discussed in relation to the evolutionary theory. It is suggested that heroism could be a condition dependent life history strategy and could be related to steep future discounting.

Evidence for an Evolutionary Cheater Strategy—Relationships Between Primary and Secondary Psychopathy, Parenting, and Shame and Guilt

ABSTRACT In the present study, shame and guilt proneness were investigated in relation to primary and secondary psychopathy, looking at parental care as a possible mediator. A sample of 388 volunteers participated in an on-line study, completing several self-report measurements. Primary psychopathy, robust to parental care and sex of the participant, was associated with lower guilt proneness after a private transgression and lower negative self-evaluations after a public transgression. Secondary psychopathy was not associated with guilt or shame proneness. Paternal care played a mediating role between primary psychopathy and guilt, but only in male participants. High paternal care was associated with lower guilt repair in high psychopathy males, suggesting that a positive father-son relationship might be essential for development of exploitive strategies in primary psychopathy. The results highlight the fundamental differences between primary and secondary psychopathy, and provide support for the idea that primary psychopathy is an evolutionary cheater-strategy.

Why does relative deprivation affect mental health? The role of justice, trust and social rank in psychological wellbeing and paranoid ideation

Purpose – Relative deprivation is associated with poor mental health but the mechanisms responsible have rarely been studied. The purpose of this paper is to hypothesize that childhood perceived relative deprivation (PRD) would be linked to sub-syndromal psychotic symptoms and poor wellbeing via beliefs about justice, trust and social rank. Design/methodology/approach – In total, 683 undergraduate students were administered measures of childhood PRD, hallucination-proneness, paranoia and wellbeing and measures of trust, social rank and beliefs about justice. A subsample supplied childhood address data. Multiple mediation analysis was used to assess pathways from childhood experiences to outcomes. Findings – Childhood PRD was associated with all three outcomes. The relationship between PRD and paranoia was fully mediated by perceptions that the world is unjust for the self and low social rank. The same variables mediated the relationship between PRD and poor wellbeing. There were no significant mediators o...

Gaze Properties of Women Judging the Attractiveness of Masculine and Feminine Male Faces

Most studies of female facial masculinity preference have relied upon self-reported preference, with participants selecting or rating the attractiveness of faces that differ in masculinity. However, researchers have not established a consensus as to whether womens general preference is for male faces that are masculine or feminine, and several studies have indicated that women prefer neither. We investigated womens preferences for male facial masculinity using standard two-alternative forced choice (2AFC) preference trials, paired with eye tracking measures, to determine whether conscious and non-conscious measures of preference yield similar results. We found that women expressed a preference for, gazed longer at, and fixated more frequently on feminized male faces. We also found effects of relationship status, relationship context (whether faced are judged for attractiveness as a long- or short-term partner), and hormonal contraceptive use. These results support previous findings that women express a preference for feminized over masculinized male faces, demonstrate that non-conscious measures of preference for this trait echo consciously expressed preferences, and suggest that certain aspects of the preference decision-making process may be better captured by eye tracking than by 2AFC preference trials.

MACHIAVELLIANISM IN STRANGERS AFFECTS COOPERATION

People form impressions of others in relation to how trustworthy they are, and let these judgments affect their subsequent behaviour. There is some evidence that people can accurately predict who cooperates in an experimental setting. However, it is unclear what kind of cues lead to correct predictions. This study reports findings of a Prisoners Dilemma game between pairs of strangers (N = 40) and pairs of friends (N = 40). It was found that the personality construct of Ma- chiavellianism in the partner predicted perceptions of trustworthiness. People rated high-Machs as less likely to cooperate, but only in pairs of strangers. In addition, duration of eye gaze of a stranger had a positive correlation with predictions of cooperation, but smiling strangers were rated as less likely cooperators. Machiavellianism in strangers was not related to non-verbal communication. It is possible that we have evolved the capacity to detect how Machiavellian a stranger is, but the exact mechanism is still unknown.

Response to Bayesian advice for gaydar-based picking up: commentary on Lyons, Lynch, Brewer, and Bruno (2013) by Plöderl.

We wish to thank Ploderl (2013) for the commentary written in response to our article (Lyons, Lynch, Brewer, & Bruno, 2013) and especially for raising the issue of ecological validity. Moreover,wetoowish towarnreadersagainstmisinterpretingormisunderstanding the results of our study. Unfortunately, we fear that Ploderl’s Letter may actually contribute to the confusion, rather thandiminishit.Specifically,whileweagreethat thereaders shouldbecarefulnot to‘‘apply thefindingsdirectly to the real world,’’at leastuncritically,wefeelPloderlmakesasimilarerror by directly transposing our laboratory-based results into a real, albeit hypothetical, world. In addition, Ploderl appears to misinterpret how gaydar effectiveness was measured in our study. The main issue is clear. In our study, we adopted a 50:50 target-to-lureratio,whichis typicalofdiscriminationtasks,whereas, in the real world, the homosexual-to-heterosexual ratio is closer to 5:95. The commentary contests that the difference in ratio is critical and that we should be careful in drawing conclusions from the data for this reason. Although we agree that changing the base rate to reflect the real world is an interesting empirical question,wedisagreewithPloderl’sconclusionsthat,oncetransposed into the realworld,our resultswouldsuggestgaydareffectiveness to be on average very low and nearing 16 %. Our study investigated whether people were able to correctly categorize individuals (as homosexual or heterosexual) at an above-chancelevel,whenviewingblackandwhitephotographs— thus partly simulating the conditions experienced on dating websites. In other words, we asked whether it was possible to claim that a gaydar exists at all, at least under our experimentally designed condition, or whether correct categorization is mainly the product of lucky (or unlucky, in some cases) guessing. Our results indicated that people could, in fact, categorize sexual orientationcorrectlyatalevel thatwasabovemereguessing.Therefore,ourstudysuggestedthatgaydarcaneffectivelyexist,at least under certain circumstances. In addition, we were interested in determining whether gaydar was more or less effective in raters who were themselves homosexual as compared to heterosexual raters, but we did not find evidence that either group performed better than the other. As stated, our experiment was based on a 50:50 target-to-lure ratio and participants were not made aware of the ratio prior to engaging in the task. This type of procedure is quite common in discrimination research (e.g., Bruno, Higham, & Perfect, 2009), sinceitallowsafairamountofbothpositiveandnegativetrials to judge performance. The likely result of an experimental design with a ratio set to 5:95 is, to us, an empirical rather than a theoretical question (the number of overall items used would need significant increasetoallowforsufficient targettrialsandpower). It is also a question that does not necessarily address real-world relevance. Before addressing the issue of real-world relevance, we raise an important caveat. In our study, we calculated both hit (HR) and false alarm rates (FAR), which Ploderl discusses, and the signal detection statistics d0 and c, which measure discrimination accuracy and bias, respectively. Importantly, d0 and c are independent from each other, meaning that the discrimination abilityofan individualcanbemeasuredindependently fromthat person’s inclination to over/under-use the ‘‘homosexual’’ label (oranyother label, for thatmatter).Therefore,d0 is amuchbetter indexofgaydarability thansimplylookingatHRandFAR—the D. Bruno (&) M. Lyons Department of Psychology, Liverpool Hope University, Hope Park, Liverpool L16 9JD, UK e-mail: brunod@hope.ac.uk