Mitigating and managing COVID-19 conspiratorial beliefs.

BACKGROUND/AIM: Belief in COVID-19 related conspiracy theories is a widespread and consequential problem that healthcare leaders need to confront. In this article, we draw on insights from social psychology and organisational behaviour to offer evidence-based advice that healthcare leaders can use to reduce the spread of conspiratorial beliefs and ameliorate their negative effects, both during the current pandemic and beyond. CONCLUSION: Leaders can effectively combat conspiratorial beliefs by intervening early and bolstering people's sense of control. Leaders can also address some of the problematic behaviours that result from conspiratorial beliefs by introducing incentives and mandates (e.g., vaccine mandates). However, because of the limitations of incentives and mandates, we suggest that leaders complement these techniques with interventions that leverage the power of social norms and increase people's connections to others.

Managing my shame: Examining the effects of parental identity threat and emotional stability on work productivity and investment in parenting.

We identify parental identity threat as a blended work-family experience (i.e., when the family domain becomes a salient aspect of the work domain) that prompts working parents to attend to their parenting identities while at work. By integrating theoretical arguments related to role identities, self-conscious emotions, and identity maintenance, we propose that parental identity threat provokes working parents' shame, which then results in disparate cross-domain outcomes in the form of reduced work productivity and enhanced investment in parenting. We further explain that emotional stability serves as a first-stage moderator of the proposed mediated relationships. Specifically, working parents with higher (vs. lower) emotional stability respond to parental identity threat with weaker shame reactions that then lessen the effects onto work productivity and investment in parenting. We tested our predictions across three studies: an experiment, a multisource field study involving working parent-spouse dyads, and a time-lagged experience sampling study across 15 days also using working parent-spouse dyads. Altogether, our findings generally support our predictions. Theoretical and practical implications and future direction are discussed. (PsycInfo Database Record (c) 2022 APA, all rights reserved).

Culture and Patterns of Reciprocity: The Role of Exchange Type, Regulatory Focus, and Emotions.

Reciprocity is a fundamental mechanism for sustained social relationships. Escalation-based theories suggest that reciprocity intensifies over time. In contrast, equity-based theories propose that people reciprocate behaviors in kind. We reconcile these conflicting perspectives by examining social exchanges across different cultural contexts. Using three complementary experiments, we investigate when, how, and why individuals in East Asian settings and those in North American settings differentially reciprocate positive versus negative behaviors over time. Study 1 demonstrated that in positively framed exchanges (i.e., giving) Americans escalated their reciprocity, but Singaporeans reciprocated in kind. However, in negatively framed exchanges (i.e., taking), Singaporeans escalated their reciprocity, but Americans reciprocated in kind. Study 2 replicated the results using Hong Kongers and showed that cultural differences in regulatory focus were associated with specific emotions (i.e., anxiety and happiness), which then escalated reciprocity. To establish causality, Study 3 manipulated regulatory focus within one culture and replicated the pattern of results.