Toivo Aavik

The Attractive Female Body Weight and Female Body Dissatisfaction in 26 Countries Across 10 World Regions: Results of the International Body Project I

This study reports results from the first International Body Project (IBP-I), which surveyed 7,434 individuals in 10 major world regions about body weight ideals and body dissatisfaction. Participants completed the female Contour Drawing Figure Rating Scale (CDFRS) and self-reported their exposure to Western and local media. Results indicated there were significant cross-regional differences in the ideal female figure and body dissatisfaction, but effect sizes were small across high-socioeconomic-status (SES) sites. Within cultures, heavier bodies were preferred in low-SES sites compared to high-SES sites in Malaysia and South Africa (ds = 1.94-2.49) but not in Austria. Participant age, body mass index (BMI), and Western media exposure predicted body weight ideals. BMI and Western media exposure predicted body dissatisfaction among women. Our results show that body dissatisfaction and desire for thinness is commonplace in high-SES settings across world regions, highlighting the need for international attention to this problem.

A World of Lies

This article reports two worldwide studies of stereotypes about liars. These studies are carried out in 75 different countries and 43 different languages. In Study 1, participants respond to the open-ended question “How can you tell when people are lying?” In Study 2, participants complete a questionnaire about lying. These two studies reveal a dominant pan-cultural stereotype: that liars avert gaze. The authors identify other common beliefs and offer a social control interpretation.

Social Desirability and Consensual Validity of Personality Traits

The effect of socially desirable responding (SDR) on the consensual validity of personality traits was studied. SDR was operationalized as the sum of items weighted by their respective social desirability values (Social Desirability Index, SDI), which could be computed for both self‐ and peer‐reports. In addition, the Balanced Inventory of Desirable Responding (BIDR) was used as a measure of SDR. It was shown that both self‐peer and peer‐peer agreement rose significantly for most studied traits when SDI was controlled in both self‐ and peer‐reports. BIDR was a significant suppressor variable in only one of the analyses involving Neuroticism. The SDI detected faking on personality scales somewhat better than the BIDR scales. It is argued that the SDI is a measure of evaluativeness of a person description, and that people agree more on descriptive than on evaluative aspects of a targets personality traits. Copyright

The structure of Estonian personal values: a lexical approach

The main purpose of this paper is to investigate the variety of value describing words and interrelation of value categories in the Estonian language. To accomplish this aim, a psycholexical approach was adopted, during which a set of 560 value‐related words was selected from the Estonian Orthological Dictionary and the results were compared with the Schwartz Values Survey (SVS). When principal‐component analysis was applied on the self‐ratings of a reduced list of 78 value‐related words, six factors emerged and were labelled as benevolence, self‐enhancement, broadmindedness, hedonism, conservatism, and self‐realization. However, all these themes are interrelated and load on a singular secondary dimension. The constructs measured by SVS and the value categories in Estonian were only partially interchangeable; moderate correlations imply an imperfect correspondence: each theme was related to many categories on the other questionnaire. However, a significant general structure refers to the same two‐dimensional level of higher‐order values described by Schwartz in 1992. Copyright

Personal Values that Support and Counteract Utilization of a Screening Test for Prostate Cancer

The main aim of the current research was to discover the personal values that may support mens prostate cancer screening decisions in the future. We asked for participants’ past behavior and future behavioral intentions, and also considered their real-life behavior. The sample consisted of 371 men, of which 93 were first-time patients at the Andrology Unit. The results show that Security value was related to past participation, while Achievement, Stimulation, and Traditions counteracted this. Present prostate-testing behavior was related only to higher Security values. Predictors of future behavioral intentions were Security, Self-direction, and Benevolence, which described 21% of the total variability. Considering informed decision-making processes, our results suggest that men who hold Security, Self-direction, and Benevolence values are more likely to participate in office-based initial screening. The study indicates the need to offer office-based initial screening to those age-eligible men whose values do not support participation.

Principles that People Seek to Avoid in Their Lives

This study concerns the interrelationship between positive and negative values. Previous research has treated personal values as a bipolar process in which negative values can be described merely as desired values with the opposite sign. Contrary to values research, the study of motivation has shown that approach motivation is conceptually distinctive from the motivation of avoidance. The results revealed that, in general, level positive and negative values form two opposite domains that are not completely independent. On a more specific level of analysis the structure of negative values did not mirror the structure of positive values: They formed a single general negativity factor, which had no significant loadings on any of the six positive value factors.

Personality and Utilization of Prostate Cancer Testing

The present study represents the first instance in which participants’ personalities have been systematically measured in relation with prostate cancer (PCa) screening behavior. Cross-sectional data were collected between 2010 and 2011 in Estonia. Subjects were 371 men, 62 of whom were first-time patients of andrology clinic, and 309 were men of probability sample. Neuroticism had a significant inverse association with past, present, and future attendance. In contrary, conscientiousness had a significant positive association with PCa testing attendance in the past and present, and intention to attend PCa testing in the future. In conclusion, as PCa screening is no longer recommended by specialists, it becomes more important to offer personality-based counseling for age-eligible men.

Are They Guilty Because of Their Gender

This paper explores whether sexual acts of varying degrees of misconduct/violence are judged differently depending on the gender of the actor and the subject. It presents pooled data from four countries regarding the actors and subjects involved in a range of sexual activities. In addition, the paper investigates whether the gender of the observer (study participant) influenced the assessment. Our sample consisted of 3416 students from the United States, Israel, Finland, and Estonia. The research instrument contained 8 sexual scenarios where the gender labels of the actors and subjects were manipulated. In several highly revealing cases, it was found that female actors were assessed more benignly compared to male ones. Men were never assessed more benignly. Our research finding is in line with public records showing that women are less frequently perceived and reported as sexual perpetrators. As a consequence, men may find it more difficult to complain of sexual misconduct against them, and sexual misconduct by women against men may have remained uncounted and disregarded in many cases.