Physiological coregulation during social support discussions.

Close relationships are proposed to function as dynamic regulatory systems, whereby partners jointly regulate each other's emotions and physiology to maintain an equilibrium level of responding--a process known as coregulation. Little is known, however, regarding when coregulation emerges. We hypothesized that because social support interactions involve explicit interpersonal emotion regulation attempts, they might be especially likely to engender stabilizing patterns of coregulation that entrain partners' responses toward an equilibrium level. We conducted a dyadic laboratory experiment in which romantic couples engaged in social support and control discussions as cardiovascular responses were measured. To assess dyadic coregulation, we used dynamical systems modeling with Bayesian estimation to capture the frequency of oscillations around an equilibrium level and changes in amplitudes over time. Results indicated there was coregulation across discussions as a whole, as well as differences in coregulation by discussion type and gender. Stabilizing coregulatory dynamics-indicated by patterns of oscillations around an equilibrium level and decreases in amplitudes as the discussions progressed-were more pronounced during social support (vs. control) discussions, especially when the male partner received support. There was also substantial between-dyad heterogeneity in couples' coregulation trajectories, whereby some couples showed pronounced coregulatory dynamics whereas other did not. Overall, this work suggests that social support interactions may be a key context when coregulation emerges and thereby offers novel insights into how relationships might contribute to well-being. (PsycInfo Database Record (c) 2023 APA, all rights reserved).

Merged minds: Generalized shared reality in dyadic relationships.

Many everyday conversations, whether between close partners or strangers interacting for the first time, are about the world external to their relationship, such as music, food, or current events. Yet, the focus of most research on interpersonal relationships to date has been on the ways in which partners perceive each other and their relationship. We propose that one critical aspect of interpersonal interactions is developing a sense of dyadic, generalized shared reality-the subjective experience of sharing a set of inner states (e.g., thoughts, feelings, or beliefs) in common with a particular interaction partner about the world in general, including the world external to the relationship. Across 9 studies, we use mixed methods to investigate the unique role of generalized shared reality in interpersonal interactions, both between close partners and strangers. We hypothesize that generalized shared reality predicts how people connect with each other and perceive the world around them. We also investigate the observable, dyadic behavioral signatures of generalized shared reality in interpersonal interactions. Finally, we examine the motivation to uphold an existing sense of generalized shared reality. We hypothesize that couples high on baseline generalized shared reality exhibit motivated, dyadic interaction behaviors to reaffirm their generalized shared reality in the face of experimentally manipulated threat. By identifying a unique dimension of everyday interactions, these studies aim to capture a critical aspect of the lived subjective experience of human relationships that has not been captured before. (PsycInfo Database Record (c) 2021 APA, all rights reserved).

Regulatory effectiveness of social support.

Receiving social support can entail both costs and benefits for recipients. Thus, theories of effective support have proposed that support should address recipients' needs to be beneficial. This paper proposes the importance of support that addresses recipients' self-regulatory needs. We present a novel construct-regulatory effectiveness of support (RES)-which posits that support that addresses recipients' needs to understand their situation (truth) and to feel capable of managing their situation (control) will engender support benefits. We hypothesized that receiving support higher on RES would predict beneficial support outcomes. We further hypothesized that these effects would be especially pronounced for self-regulation relevant outcomes, such as better mood and increased motivation, which, in turn, can be important for successful self-regulation. We established the construct validity of RES and then investigated its effects in daily life and in laboratory support discussions. In 8 studies and a meta-analysis pooling across studies, results showed that RES predicted self-regulation relevant support outcomes, and these effects of RES were stronger than the effects of perceived responsiveness, a construct that is known to enhance interpersonal relationships. Furthermore, RES was linked to self-regulatory success: Participants who received support higher on RES were more motivated to perform well on a stressful speech, which subsequently predicted better speech performance. These findings enhance knowledge of effective social support by underscoring the importance of addressing recipients' self-regulatory needs in the support process. (PsycInfo Database Record (c) 2021 APA, all rights reserved).

High-quality relationships strengthen the benefits of a younger subjective age across adulthood.

Feeling younger than one's chronological age-a younger subjective age bias-has been consistently linked to healthy aging. However, little is known about conditions under which such benefits are strengthened. In high-quality relationships, partners affirm individuals' self-views and offer support that can encourage individuals to engage in behaviors compatible with their subjective age. Thus, we hypothesized the benefits of a younger subjective age bias would be stronger among adults in high-quality relationships. Hypotheses were supported in a 10-year longitudinal study of married adults (ages 34-84; N > 600): Relationship quality moderated the effect of subjective age bias on memory performance and heart rate variability, such that individuals in higher-quality relationships showed stronger beneficial effects of a younger subjective age bias. Results suggest psychological and relational resources may work together to jointly influence healthy aging. (PsycINFO Database Record (c) 2019 APA, all rights reserved).

Causal processes in psychology are heterogeneous.

All experimenters know that human and animal subjects do not respond uniformly to experimental treatments. Yet theories and findings in experimental psychology either ignore this causal effect heterogeneity or treat it as uninteresting error. This is the case even when data are available to examine effect heterogeneity directly, in within-subjects designs where experimental effects can be examined subject by subject. Using data from four repeated-measures experiments, we show that effect heterogeneity can be modeled readily, that its discovery presents exciting opportunities for theory and methods, and that allowing for it in study designs is good research practice. This evidence suggests that experimenters should work from the assumption that causal effects are heterogeneous. Such a working assumption will be of particular benefit, given the increasing diversity of subject populations in psychology. (PsycINFO Database Record (c) 2019 APA, all rights reserved).

Motivation moderates the effects of social support visibility.

Social support can sometimes have negative consequences for recipients. One way of circumventing these negative effects is to provide support in an 'invisible' or indirect manner, such that recipients do not construe the behavior as a supportive act. However, little is known about how recipients' motivational states influence when visible (direct) support or invisible support is more beneficial. Using the framework of Regulatory Mode Theory, we predicted that recipients motivated to engage in critical evaluation (i.e., those with a predominant assessment motivation) would find invisible support more beneficial than visible support, whereas recipients motivated to initiate action (i.e., those with a predominant locomotion motivation) would find visible support more beneficial than invisible support. Findings from one 2 × 2 experiment (Study 1), two laboratory experiments (Studies 2-3), one dyadic study involving support conversations between friends (Study 4), and a meta-analysis aggregating data from all four studies supported these hypotheses. As predicted, support outcomes were better for assessment predominant recipients following invisible support, but were better for locomotion predominant recipients following visible support. Results indicate that support attempts could be made more effective by considering both support visibility and recipient motivation. (PsycINFO Database Record

Giving the Help That Is Needed: How Regulatory Mode Impacts Social Support.

Social support is most effective when it meets recipients' needs. Guided by regulatory mode theory, this article examines how support providers' chronic motivational concerns with assessment and locomotion shape help provision. We hypothesized that stronger assessment concerns motivate helpers to "tailor" support efforts by offering support that meets helpees' specific motivational concerns and not offering support that would fail to address these concerns. In contrast, we predicted that stronger locomotion concerns motivate helpers to offer both support that fits helpees' needs and support that does not. The results of Studies 1 and 2, using hypothetical scenarios, were consistent with these hypotheses. Study 3 replicated these findings in support interactions among friend pairs, and also found that helper assessment predicted greater support tailoring, which in turn predicted helpees' negative mood improvement. Chronic assessment and locomotion concerns direct support efforts and influence the extent to which support is beneficial.