MEEC: Second workshop on momentary emotion elicitation and capture

Recognizing human emotions and responding appropriately has the potential to radically change the way we interact with technology. However, to train machines to sensibly detect and recognize human emotions, we need valid emotion ground truths. A fundamental challenge here is the momentary emotion elicitation and capture (MEEC) from individuals continuously and in real-time, without adversely affecting user experience nor breaching ethical standards. In this virtual half-day CHI 2021 workshop, we will (1) have participant talks and an inspirational keynote presentation (2) ideate elicitation, sensing, and annotation techniques (3) create mappings of when to apply an elicitation method

Reviewing the potential of the Experience Sampling Method (ESM) for capturing second language exposure and use

Frequent language exposure and use are among the most important conditions for successful language learning whether in classrooms, during study abroad, or in other informal contexts. Research probing exposure and usage often relies on one-off self-report questionnaires in which participants estimate their typical level of language exposure over extended periods of time, often long after it occurred. This may negatively affect the validity of the resulting data. This paper instead explores the potential of methods used in medical and psychological research, variably known as the ‘Experience Sampling Method’ (ESM; Csíkszentimihályi and Larson, 1987), ‘Ecological Momentary Assessment’ (EMA; Stone and Shiffman, 1994), or ‘diary methods’ (Bolger et al., 2003). These methods are often combined with electronic and mobile survey applications to elicit self-report assessments at frequent, sometimes randomised intervals. We consider the possibilities of these methods for strengthening research into language exposure and use, second language acquisition more broadly, and study abroad research specifically. The methods have the potential to drastically reduce biases associated with summative recall. Additionally, they enable researchers to collect richer data about how individuals engage with language differently over time, and the contexts in which they do so, thus ultimately contributing to our understanding of individual differences in language acquisition

Somebody’s Watching Me: Smartphone Use Tracking and Reactivity

Like all media use, smartphone use is mostly being measured retrospectively with self-reports. This leads to misjudgments due to subjective aggregations and interpretations that are necessary for providing answers. Tracking is regarded as the most advanced, unbiased, and precise method for observing smartphone use and therefore employed as an alternative. However, it remains unclear whether people possibly alter their behavior because they know that they are being observed, which is called reactivity. In this study, we investigate first, whether smartphone and app use duration and frequency are affected by tracking; second, whether effects vary between app types; and third, how long effects persist. We developed an Android tracking app and conducted an anonymous quasi-experiment with smartphone use data from 25 people over a time span of two weeks. The app gathered not only data that were produced after, but also prior to its installation by accessing an internal log file on the device. The results showed that there was a decline in the average duration of app use sessions within the first seven days of tracking. Instant messaging and social media app use duration show similar patterns. We found no changes in the average frequency of smartphone and app use sessions per day. Overall, reactivity effects due to smartphone use tracking are rather weak, which speaks for the method's validity. We advise future researchers to employ a larger sample and control for external influencing factors so reactivity effects can be identified more reliably

Modeling dynamic personality theories in a continuous‐time framework: An illustration

Objective Personality psychology has traditionally focused on stable between-person differences. Yet, recent theoretical developments and empirical insights have led to a new conceptualization of personality as a dynamic system (e.g., Cybernetic Big Five Theory). Such dynamic systems comprise several components that need to be conceptually distinguished and mapped to a statistical model for estimation. Method In the current work, we illustrate how common components from these new dynamic personality theories may be implemented in a continuous time-modeling framework. Results As an empirical example, we reanalyze experience sampling data with N = 180 persons (with on average T = 40 [SD = 8] measurement occasions) to investigate four different effects between momentary happiness, momentary extraverted behavior, and the perception of a situation as social: (1) between-person effects, (2) contemporaneous effects, (3) autoregressive effects, and (4) cross-lagged effects. Conclusion We highlight that these four effects must not necessarily point in the same direction, which is in line with assumptions from dynamic personality theories.Peer Reviewe

Effect of experience sampling schedules on response rate and recall accuracy of objective self-reports

Abstract The Experience Sampling Method is widely used to collect human labelled data in the wild. Using this methodology, study participants repeatedly answer a set of questions, constructing a rich overview of the studied phenomena. One of the methodological decisions faced by researchers is deciding on the question scheduling. The literature defines three distinct schedule types: randomised, interval-based, or event-based (in our case, smartphone unlock). However, little evidence exists regarding the side-effects of these schedules on response rate and recall accuracy, and how they may bias study findings. We evaluate the effect of these three contingency configurations in a 3-week within-subjects study (N=20). Participants answered various objective questions regarding their phone usage, while we simultaneously establish a ground-truth through smartphone instrumentation. We find that scheduling questions on phone unlock yields a higher response rate and accuracy. Our study provides empirical evidence for the effects of notification scheduling on participant responses, and informs researchers who conduct experience sampling studies on smartphones

Relationships among behavioural regulations, physical activity, and mental health pre- and during COVID–19 UK lockdown

Freely available in Elsevier's COVID-19 archive for the duration of the pandemic at https://doi.org/10.1016/j.psychsport.2021.101945A nationwide survey was conducted during the first UK lockdown to further understanding of the degree to which motives for exercise were associated with physical activity (PA) behaviours and, in turn, how PA behaviours were associated with mental health. A cross-sectional design was employed and data were collected by use of a one-off online survey (N = 392; 18–85 years; MBMI = 25.48; SDBMI = 5.05; 314 women). Exercise motives, PA, and mental health were measured by use of the Behavioural Regulations in Exercise Questionnaire-3, Brunel Lifestyle Physical Activity Questionnaire, and General Health Questionnaire-12, respectively. Participants were also asked to specify their average step count per day, if they used a mobile device for this purpose (n = 190). Analyses comprised hierarchical regressions and partial correlations. Results indicated that behavioural regulations were more strongly associated with planned PA pre-lockdown, compared to during lockdown. There were no differences observed in explained variance between pre- and during lockdown for unplanned PA and steps per day. Planned and unplanned PA were significant explanatory variables for mental health both pre- and during lockdown, but sedentary behaviour was not. Partial correlations, with BMI and age partialled out, showed that steps per day were not correlated with mental health either pre- or during lockdown. The range of variables used to explain planned and unplanned PA and mental health suggest that people's motives to exercise were tempered by lockdown. For those who routinely measured their steps per day, the step count was unrelated to their mental health scores both pre- and during lockdown. It appears that engagement in regular PA confers some minor benefits for mental health

Psychological research in the digital age

The smartphone has become an important personal companion in our daily lives. Each time we use the device, we generate data that provides information about ourselves. This data, in turn, is valuable to science because it objectively reflects our everyday behavior and experiences. In this way, smartphones enable research that is closer to everyday life than traditional laboratory experiments and questionnaire-based methods. While data collected with smartphones are increasingly being used in the field of personality psychology, new digital technologies can also be leveraged to collect and analyze large-scale unobtrusively sensed data in other areas of psychological research. This dissertation, therefore, explores the insights that smartphone sensing reveals for psychological research using two examples, situation and affect research, making a twofold research contribution. First, in two empirical studies, different data types of smartphone-sensed data, such as GPS or phone data, were combined with experience-sampled self-report, and classical questionnaire data to gain valuable insights into individual behavior, thinking, and feeling in everyday life. Second, predictive modeling techniques were applied to analyze the large, high-dimensional data sets collected by smartphones. To gain a deeper understanding of the smartphone data, interpretable variables were extracted from the raw sensing data, and the predictive performance of various machine learning algorithms was compared. In summary, the empirical findings suggest that smartphone data can effectively capture certain situational and behavioral indicators of psychological phenomena in everyday life. However, in certain research areas such as affect research, smartphone data should only complement, but not completely replace, traditional questionnaire-based data as well as other data sources such as neurophysiological indicators. The dissertation also concludes that the use of smartphone sensor data introduces new difficulties and challenges for psychological research and that traditional methods and perspectives are reaching their limits. The complexity of data collection, processing, and analysis requires established guidelines for study design, interdisciplinary collaboration, and theory-driven research that integrates explanatory and predictive approaches. Accordingly, further research is needed on how machine learning models and other big data methods in psychology can be reconciled with traditional theoretical approaches. Only in this way can we move closer to the ultimate goal of psychology to better understand, explain, and predict human behavior and experiences and their interplay with everyday situations

Bonus pay, organisational justice and turnover intention: research into affective, social exchange relationship and social comparison processes

This thesis aims to examine the relationship between bonus pay, organisational justice and turnover intention across a range of corporate organisations in the UK in order to better understand the effect of bonus pay on organisational outcomes. It considers the effects of bonus pay on the four distinct scales of organisational justice, the referents selected by recipients of a bonus to determine justice, and the subsequent bonus satisfaction and turnover intention appraisals of participants. It also considers bonus pay as a workplace event, both in isolation and in comparison with other events which occur during the research period, considering the effects of bonus pay on organisational justice, emotion, social exchange relationships and turnover intention, therefore attempting to close gaps in the justice literature identified by previous researchers. In the first of two studies, a questionnaire based, cross-sectional analysis of bonus pay as an event issued as close as administratively possible to the bonus pay announcement in a sample of 599 professionals in corporate organisations found that bonus amount has only weak or non-significant relationships with justice, satisfaction and turnover intention, and no direct effect on satisfaction or turnover intention. Justice scales and bonus satisfaction did predict turnover intention with differing direct and mediating effects. This study demonstrated some complex mediating effects of different scales of justice, with the type of bonus calculation (whether calculated as an absolute amount or as a percentage of salary) playing a role in which types of justice mediated bonus pay-satisfaction and bonus pay-turnover intention relationships. Referent selection also predicted bonus satisfaction and turnover intention, with the choice of referent in bonus situations proving different to those identified in ‘general’ pay situations in previous literature. In the second study, an experience sampling investigation using repeat measures with 31 participants, results showed that in comparison with events in general bonus pay elicited the predominantly negative emotions of anger and disappointment in participants. For bonus pay as an event in comparison with other events, organisational justice and social exchange predicted variation in turnover intention to a greater extent, demonstrating that bonus pay is an event which is particularly important in determining turnover intention. Social exchange relationship quality had the strongest direct effect on turnover intention, with organisational justice also having a direct effect. There were no direct emotional effects on turnover intention for any of the individual events under consideration, though emotion mediated the relationships between justice and social exchange relationship quality and justice and turnover intention, with the indirect paths through emotion proving stronger than direct effects