Positive emotions co-experienced with strangers and acquaintances predict COVID-19 vaccination intentions through prosocial tendencies.

BACKGROUND: The efficacy of vaccination depends on its widespread adoption, making vaccine uptake not just a personal health behavior but also a prosocial one. Previous research has shown that everyday moments of co-experienced positive emotions (positivity resonance) are associated with higher prosocial tendencies, and these moments, in turn, prospectively predict people's pandemic hygiene behaviors. Yet, limited research has explored how moments of positivity resonance may have predicted greater COVID-19 vaccine intentions during the early months of the pandemic. METHODS: We longitudinally surveyed a national U.S. sample across four weeks during the fall of 2020. We tested the hypothesis that positivity resonance with strangers and acquaintances indirectly predicts COVID-19 vaccine intentions, as statistically mediated by prosocial tendencies. We also aimed to replicate the indirect effects of positivity resonance on hygiene behaviors (such as mask wearing and hand washing), effects that have been demonstrated in previous research. RESULTS: In a pre-registered structural equation model, we found that perceived positivity resonance experienced with strangers and acquaintances prospectively predicted prosocial tendencies, which in turn amplified people's COVID-19 vaccine intentions (ß = 0.053) and hygiene behaviors - i.e., social distancing (ß = 0.032), mask wearing (ß = 0.027), hand washing (ß = 0.049). CONCLUSIONS: Understanding the effects of high-quality social interactions with strangers and acquaintances on vaccine intentions and hygiene behaviors is critical, particularly given the likelihood of emerging pandemics and novel vaccines. We discuss theoretical and practical implications related to perceived positivity resonance, prosocial tendencies, and vaccination uptake for novel vaccines.

Listen to resonate: Better listening as a gateway to interpersonal positivity resonance through enhanced sensory connection and perceived safety.

Although often experienced individually, emotions are at times co-experienced with others, collectively. One type of collective emotion, termed positivity resonance, refers to coexperienced positive affect accompanied by caring non-verbal behavioral synchrony and biological synchrony across persons. Growing evidence illustrates the contributions of positivity resonance to individual, relational, and community well-being. Two conditions theorized as conducive for the emergence of positivity resonance are real-time sensory connection and perceived safety. Here, we explore listening as an interpersonal process that can serve to enhance real-time sensory connection and perceived safety and thereby increase positivity resonance among conversation partners. Specifically, we present evidence that connects listening to direct gaze (i.e., real-time sensory connection) and psychological safety (i.e., perceived safety). We close by offering a framework to guide future research that can test whether and how conversational listening functions to create more moments of positivity resonance in interpersonal contexts.

Effect of Mindfulness Versus Loving-kindness Training on Leukocyte Gene Expression in Midlife Adults Raised in Low-Socioeconomic Status Households.

Objectives: People raised in low socio-economic status (SES) households are at an increased risk for physical illness in adulthood. A shift in gene expression profiles in the immune system is one biological mechanism thought to account for elevated disease susceptibility, with a frequently-investigated profile being the conserved transcriptional response to adversity (CTRA), characterized by increased expression of proinflammatory genes and decreased expression of antiviral and antibody-related genes. Methods: The present study investigated, in a sample of at-risk midlife adults (N = 88), whether those randomized to learn loving-kindness meditation (LKM) in a 6-week workshop, would show a reduction in CTRA gene expression, compared to those randomized to learn mindfulness meditation (MM). We assessed emotions daily and hypothesized positive emotions to account for the expected effect of LKM on gene expression. Results: Results showed significant group differences from pre- to post-intervention, yet in the opposite direction as hypothesized: Participants randomized to the MM group showed significant declines in CTRA gene expression, whereas those in the LKM group showed significant increases in CTRA gene expression. Both groups showed increases over the 6 weeks in daily reports of positive emotions, b=.007, p <.001 alongside decreases in negative emotions b=-.005, p <.001. Thus, positive emotions were not pursued as a candidate mediator of observed group effects. Conclusion: This study is the first to examine whether the biological impact of childhood low-SES can be reversed in mid-life through meditation interventions. Results suggest mindfulness meditation may be a viable option for improving health outcomes in this at-risk population. Trial Registration: ClinicalTrials.gov NCT02400593.

The goods in everyday love: Positivity resonance builds prosociality.

The positivity resonance theory of coexperienced positive affect (Fredrickson, 2016) identifies the emotion of love as a collective state. This state, termed positive resonance, is defined by the presence of three key features: shared positive affect, caring nonverbal synchrony, and biological synchrony. The current study examined whether a modest behavioral intervention focused on increasing social connectedness could increase study participants' perceptions of day-to-day positivity resonance with corollary impacts on their tendencies for prosociality and self-centeredness. Adults (N = 416, M age = 33.8) were randomized to one of four study conditions: either of two variants of the social connectedness intervention or either of two control groups. Positivity resonance, prosociality, and self-centeredness were measured nightly for 35 consecutive days. Dynamic multilevel factor models of nightly reports showed significant growth in positivity resonance, relative to a passive control group, for the two intervention groups and higher mean levels of prosociality for one of them. In addition, significant dose-response relations were evident (both between persons and within persons), linking positivity resonance to both prosociality and self-centeredness. The within-persons effect for prosociality (but not self-centeredness) was significantly stronger for those randomized to the intervention groups, relative to both passive and active control groups. Taken together, findings suggest that the affective quality of people's day-to-day social encounters may have implications for community flourishing. Discussion centers on theoretical and practical implications as well as directions for future research. (PsycInfo Database Record (c) 2022 APA, all rights reserved).

How the Affective Quality of Social Connections May Contribute to Public Health: Prosocial Tendencies Account for the Links Between Positivity Resonance and Behaviors that Reduce the Spread of COVID-19.

Although behaviors such as handwashing, mask wearing, and social distancing are known to limit viral spread, early in the COVID-19 pandemic, many individuals in the United States did not adopt them. The positivity resonance theory of co-experienced positive affect (Fredrickson, 2016) holds that shared pleasant states that include the key features of mutual care and a sense of oneness through behavioral synchrony function to build prosocial tendencies (e.g., self-transcendent and other-oriented dispositions of felt unity, empathy, altruism, and general positivity toward humanity). We tested the theory-driven hypothesis that prosocial tendencies are associated with high-quality social connections characterized by the affective state of positivity resonance and, in turn, account for behaviors to slow the spread of COVID-19. We measured perceived positivity resonance at the level of social episodes either during the COVID-19 pandemic (study 1, N = 1059, April-May 2020) or before it (study 2, N = 227, March-November 2019). In both studies, cross-sectionally and prospectively, results suggest that perceived positivity resonance had a positive indirect effect on self-reported hygienic behaviors (e.g., handwashing and mask wearing), which was mediated by a latent measure of prosocial tendencies. Sensitivity analyses confirmed these mediation effects to be independent of competing predictors of prosocial tendencies (e.g., overall positive and negative affect, frequency of social interaction) and competing predictors of health behaviors (e.g., political orientation, high-risk status, illness symptoms). Effects for social distancing were mixed. Overall, findings are consistent with the view that positivity resonance builds self-transcendent prosocial tendencies that motivate behaviors to protect community health. SUPPLEMENTARY INFORMATION: The online version contains supplementary material available at 10.1007/s42761-021-00035-z.