Over the last ten years, Oosterhof and Todorov's valence-dominance model has emerged as the most prominent account of how people evaluate faces on social dimensions. In this model, two dimensions (valence and dominance) underpin social judgments of faces. Because this model has primarily been developed and tested in Western regions, it is unclear whether these findings apply to other regions. We addressed this question by replicating Oosterhof and Todorov's methodology across 11 world regions, 41 countries, and 11,570 participants. When we used Oosterhof and Todorov's original analysis strategy, the valence-dominance model generalized across regions. When we used an alternative methodology to allow for correlated dimensions we observed much less generalization. Collectively, these results suggest that, while the valence-dominance model generalizes very well across regions when dimensions are forced to be orthogonal, regional differences are revealed when we use different extraction methods, correlate and rotate the dimension reduction solution.

Objectives. Assessing late-life anxiety using an instrument with sound psychometric properties including cross-cultural invariance is essential for cross-national aging research and clinical assessment. To date, no cross-national research studies have examined the psychometric properties of the frequently used Geriatric Anxiety Inventory (GAI) in depth. ), this study used bifactor modelling to analyze the dimensionality of the GAI. We evaluated the "fitness" of individual items based on the explained common variance for each item across all nations. In addition, a multigroup confirmatory factor analysis (MG-CFA) was applied, testing for measurement invariance across the samples.Results. Across samples, the presence of a strong G factor provides support that a general factor is of primary importance, rather than subfactors. That is, the data support a primarily unidimensional representation of the GAI, still acknowledging the presence of multidimensional factors. A GAI score in one of the countries would be directly comparable to a GAI score in any of the other countries tested, perhaps with the exception of Singapore. Discussion.Although several items demonstrated relatively weak common variance with the general factor, the unidimensional structure remained strong even with these items retained.Thus, it is recommended that the GAI be administered using all items.

Over the last ten years, Oosterhof and Todorov’s valence-dominance model has emerged as the most prominent account of how people evaluate faces on social dimensions. In this model, two dimensions (valence and dominance) underpin social judgments of faces. Because this model has primarily been developed and tested in Western regions, it is unclear whether these findings apply to other regions. We addressed this question by replicating Oosterhof and Todorov’s methodology across 11 world regions, 41 countries, and 11,570 participants. When we used Oosterhof and Todorov’s original analysis strategy, the valence-dominance model generalized across regions. When we used an alternative methodology to allow for correlated dimensions we observed much less generalization. Collectively, these results suggest that, while the valence-dominance model generalizes very well across regions when dimensions are forced to be orthogonal, regional differences are revealed when we use different extraction methods, correlate and rotate the dimension reduction solution.

Couple relationship standards (beliefs about what makes for a satisfying couple relationship) have not included standards held about religion, which is surprising given how important religion is in many parts of the world. In the current study, we developed the Importance of Religion in Couple Relationships Scale (IRCRS) with the aim of having a scale suitable for use across different cultural and religious groups. The IRCRS was administered to three samples: 354 Pakistani residents (178 females, 176 males) who identified as Muslim; 274 Thai residents (157 females, 117 males) who identified as Buddhist; and 165 Westerners (resident in Australia or the United States, 60 males, 105 females) who identified as either not religious (n = 74) or Christian (n = 91). We developed a 13‐item measure with a two level structure yielding an overall importance of religion score. The items in the IRCRS had acceptable cross‐cultural structural invariance in a multi‐group confirmatory factor analysis of the Pakistani Muslims, Thai Buddhists, and Westerners. Pakistani Muslims endorsed IRCRS standards most strongly, Western Christians next most strongly, Thai Buddhists next, and Westerners with no religion least strongly. There were no gender differences, and only very small differences by relationship status. The IRCRS can be used in future research to investigate the association of religious relationship standards with couple relationship satisfaction and might be a useful clinical tool to assess the importance of religion to couples.

Are narcissistic athletes mentally tough? Here we examined the effect of narcissistic admiration and rivalry on mental toughness. Based on their contrasting behavioural correlates and cognitive affective-motivational basis, we predicted that admiration (i.e., agentic narcissism) would be positively associated with mental toughness, whereas rivalry (i.e., antagonistic narcissism) would be negatively related to mental toughness. In a sample of elite Thai athletes (N = 297), we assessed narcissistic admiration and rivalry, self-esteem, self-reported mental toughness, and coach ratings of mental toughness for a subset of athletes. Narcissistic admiration was positively associated with self and coach-ratings of mental toughness. In contrast, narcissistic rivalry was negatively associated with self and coach-ratings of mental toughness. These effects were independent of self-esteem and stress the importance of considering both the agentic and antagonistic sides of narcissism when addressing narcissism's relationship with mental toughness.

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Mindfulness has been widely studied in Western psychology for reducing psychological distress. However, several scholars noted that in the East, where the concept originated, mindfulness may be understood differently. In Eastern cultures such as Thailand, mindfulness is not only employed to deal with suffering but also to promote well-being. To the best of our knowledge, no studies have been undertaken to evaluate the relationship between traditional mindfulness and eudaimonic well-being in Eastern contexts. In the present study, we investigated the relationships between mindfulness and eudaimonic well-being in Thai contexts. We also explored the mediating roles of rumination and emotion dysregulation on this relationship. Data were collected from 312 Thai undergraduates who completed a measure of Eudaimonic Well-Being, the Freiburg Mindfulness Inventory, the Rumination–Reflection Questionnaire, and the Difficulties in Emotion Regulation Scale. Results largely supported our hypotheses. Mindfulness was found to have a positive and direct association with eudaimonic well-being. Rumination and emotion dysregulation partially mediated this association. Additionally, both rumination and emotion dysregulation had negative and direct association with eudaimonic well-being. The findings highlight the positive influences of mindfulness on well-being. The benefits of mindfulness for improvement of eudaimonic well-being through reducing rumination and emotion dysfunction are discussed.

ObjectivesHigh school has been recognized as a critical period for many students. With the upcoming competition for university admission, they tend to encounter significant stress. Exceeding its optimal level, stress became debilitating and could escalate into school burnout, which entailed various negative outcomes. The current study, hence, was aimed to identify a protective factor that helped mediate the relationship between stress and school burnout in Thai high school students. Self-compassion was selected here, given its relevant conceptual grounds and its cultural relevance (i.e., Thai individuals shown to be particularly oriented toward self-compassion).MethodsData were collected from 170 Thai high school students, who responded to measures of stress, self-compassion, and school burnout. A structural equation model (SEM) was used to test the hypothetical model where the positive association between stress and school burnout was mediated by self-compassion.ResultsAll indices of the model fits were confirmed, and the proposed model explained 80% of the variance in school burnout.ConclusionThe role of self-compassion in alleviating the impact of stress on school burnout was shown and relevant implications were discussed.