Motivation-focused thinking: Buffering against stress-related physical symptoms and depressive symptomology

Developmental transitions are experienced throughout the life course and necessitate adapting to consequential and unpredictable changes that can undermine health. Our six-month study (n = 239) explored whether selective secondary control striving (motivation-focused thinking) protects against the elevated levels of stress and depressive symptoms increasingly common to young adults navigating the challenging school-to-university transition. Path analyses supplemented with tests of moderated mediation revealed that, for young adults who face challenging obstacles to goal attainment, selective sec-ondary control indirectly reduced long-term stress-related physical and depres-sive symptoms through selective primary control and previously unexamined measures of discrete emotions. Results advance the existing literature by demonstrating that (a) selective secondary control has health benefits for vul-nerable young adults and (b) these benefits are largely a consequence of the process variables proposed in Heckhausen et al.’s (2010) theory

Attribution-based motivation treatment efficacy in an online learning environment for students who differ in cognitive elaboration

Attribution-based motivation treatments can boost performance in competitive achievement settings (Perry and Hamm 2017), yet their efficacy relative to mediating processes and affect-based treatments remains largely unexamined. In a two-semester, pre-post, randomized treatment study (n = 806), attributional retraining (AR) and stress-reduction (SR) treatments were administered in an online learning environment to first-year college students who differed in cognitive elaboration (low, high). Low elaborators who received AR outperformed their SR peers by nearly a letter grade on a class test assessed 5 months post-treatment. Path analysis revealed this AR-performance linkage was mediated by causal attributions, perceived control, and positive and negative achievement emotions in a hypothesized causal sequence. Results advance the literature by showing AR (vs. SR) improved performance indirectly via cognitive and affective process variables specified by Weiner’s (1985a, 2012) attribution theory of motivation and emotion

Two views of self-rated general health status

Global self-evaluations of health have proven to be sensitive predictors of morbidity and mortality. Yet researchers have only a limited understanding of how these self-evaluations are reached. This research compares two interpretations of self-rated health, as reflecting either a spontaneous assessment of one's health status and related practices, or an aspect of one's enduring self-concept. Using longitudinal data from successive waves of the National Population Health Survey in Canada (Statistics Canada, 1994-95, 1996-97, NPHS public use microdata documentation. Ottawa, Ontario: Statistics Canada; n=7505), our analysis tests a model of change in self-rated health as predicted by respondents' baseline physical and mental health symptoms, social support, leisure physical activity, smoking, body mass index, and 2-yr changes in these characteristics. As in past research, self-rated health was sensitive to improvement or decline in these predictors. Much of the explained variance, however, was unique to respondents' self-rated health 2 yr earlier. Moreover, the effect of several predictors on respondents' self-rated health varied according to whether respondents intended to improve specific health-related behaviours in the future. These findings suggest that self-rated health is not only a spontaneous assessment of one's health status and related practices; like a self-concept, self-rated health may be regulated by efforts to achieve one's relatively important health-related goals.Self-rated health Health determinants Self-concept Longitudinal Canada

Paradoxical effects of perceived control on survival

Objectives Appraising health as controllable is typically thought to be adaptive, but recent evidence suggests the paradoxical possibility that perceived control (PC) can be detrimental. We considered the premise that high PC should have a survival benefit when it is part of an adaptive mindset involving high value (importance) for health, but it might be detrimental when it is part of a mindset comprised of low health value (HV). In addition, we examined whether the survival consequences of PC and HV vary with advancing age. Method Interviews were conducted with a heterogeneous sample of community-dwelling adults (n = 341; 72–99 years) to assess appraisals of control and value in the domain of health. Mortality data were obtained over 12 years from a provincial health registry. Results Both age and HV moderated the PC effect on mortality. The predicted beneficial and detrimental PC effects emerged at younger ages: higher PC predicted longer survival times when health was highly valued but shorter survival times when health was less highly valued. Discussion These findings deepen the knowledge regarding the conditions under which PC is or is not adaptive, suggesting the consequences depend on age and the extent to which health is valued

Primary and secondary control in academic development : Gender-specific implications for stress and health in college students

During the first year of college, students are faced with numerous educational and personal stressors which can negatively impact their psychological and physical health. The present study examined the benefits of primary and secondary control for self-rated health in students based on Rothbaum, Weisz, and Synder's (1982) dual-process model of control, and examined stress and gender as potential mediating variables. College students' (n = 888) primary and secondary academic control and perceived stress were assessed in the first semester, and self-rated global health, illness symptoms, and illness-related behaviors were assessed at the end of the academic year. For males, primary control was indirectly related to better overall health and fewer symptoms through lower stress levels, and both primary and secondary control directly corresponded to lower illness behaviors. For females, only secondary control was related to better overall health and illness symptoms, albeit indirectly through reduced stress. The mediational roles of stress and gender in health research on primary/secondary control and potential control-enhancing interventions are discussed