Short Online Compassionate Intervention Based On Mindful Self-compassion Program

Objectives. The Mindful Self-Compassion (MSC) program is an empirically-developed group intervention aimed to cultivate self-compassion. Sample and setting. A randomized control trial was conducted with pre-, post-measurements, and two-month follow-up. A total of 122 participants were recruited from a general community by convenience sampling. They were randomly allocated to the Compassionate intervention (CI) based on MSC and to a control condition with no treatment. Hypotheses. The authors hypothesised that participation in the CI based on the MSC would decrease self-criticism and increase self-reassurance and self-compassion. Statistical analysis. SPSS Statistics-20, program R, and the package nparLD for the statistical analysis. Non-parametric rank-based test for longitudinal data (pretest-postest design) was employed. Results. This version of the CI based on the MSC significantly increased levels of selfcompassion and self-reassurance as reported immediately post intervention and at two-month follow-up. The CI based on the MSC was also effective at reducing self-uncompassionate responding, which was only present immediately post intervention. Self-compassion is responsive to improvement following a short-term online intervention of CI based on the MSC which suggests that interventions designed to increase self-compassion can be provided online to broader populations without direct involvement of mental health professionals. Study limitation. Participants allocated to the CI were not exposed to the full experience of the MSC but only to a selected number of exercises from the MSC program

Effect of a Short-Term Online Version of a Mindfulness-Based Intervention on Self-criticism and Self-compassion in a Nonclinical Sample

Our goal was to investigate the efficacy of a Mindfulness-Based Intervention (MBI) in the form of a short-term, online intervention using exercises from Mindfulness-Based Stress-Reduction program on self-compassion, self-reassurance and self-criticism in a non-clinical population. We conducted pre-, post- and two-month follow-up measures of self-compassion, self-reassurance and self-criticism. A total of 146 participants, recruited through convenience sampling, were randomly allocated to the intervention with daily exercises for consecutive 15 days and to a control condition with no treatment. The intervention group reported a significant reduction in self-criticism and self-uncompassionate responding with effects present at two-month follow-up. There was a short-term effect of the training on self-compassion with no effect present at the two-month follow-up and no significant effect on self-reassurance. A limitation of the study is that participants’ previous experience with meditation was not assessed, and thus the findings may be a result of previous meditation practice and not the intervention itself. Despite this limitation, the findings show that an online short-term MBI may be helpful in reducing selfcriticism in general population, but a larger study taking into account the limitations needs to be conducted to replicate this effect before recommendations for clinical practice can be made

Moral parochialism misunderstood: a reply to Piazza and Sousa

Our paper [1] compared two competing hypotheses. The hypothesis that we label universalistic moral evaluation holds that a definitional feature of reasoning about moral rules is that, ceteris paribus, judgements of violations of rules concerning harm, rights or justice will be insensitive to spatial or temporal distance or the opinions of authority figures. The hypothesis that we label moral parochialism, consonant with a variety of theories of the evolutionary origins of morality, holds that, because moral judgements primarily serve to navigate local social arenas, remote events will not activate the mechanisms that generate negative moral evaluation to the same extent as events occurring in the here and now, whereas the consent of local authority figures will temper condemnation. Hence, moral parochialism predicts that the collective output of the faculties responsible for moral judgement will exhibit a reduction in the severity of judgement as a function of spatial or temporal distance or the opinions of local authority figures. We provided evidence from seven diverse societies, including five small-scale societies, showing that such reductions in severity judgements exist in all of the societies examined. Piazza and Sousa [2] argue that our data do not support parochialism, and instead support universalism, because (1) Only a minority of our participants reversed their initial judgement of the wrongness of an action (from wrong to not wrong or good) when it was subsequently framed as having occurred long ago or far away, or as having been sanctioned by authority figures. (2) Our use of graduated moral judgements, rather than dichotomous judgements, is inappropriate. (3) Only a minority of our participants diminished the severity of their initial judgement of the wrongness of an action when it was subsequently framed as having occurred long ago or far away, or as having been sanctioned by an important person. These objections stem from misunderstandings of moral parochialism and the evolutionary reasoning behind it

Small-scale societies exhibit fundamental variation in the role of intentions in moral judgment.

Intent and mitigating circumstances play a central role in moral and legal assessments in large-scale industrialized societies. Although these features of moral assessment are widely assumed to be universal, to date, they have only been studied in a narrow range of societies. We show that there is substantial cross-cultural variation among eight traditional small-scale societies (ranging from hunter-gatherer to pastoralist to horticulturalist) and two Western societies (one urban, one rural) in the extent to which intent and mitigating circumstances influence moral judgments. Although participants in all societies took such factors into account to some degree, they did so to very different extents, varying in both the types of considerations taken into account and the types of violations to which such considerations were applied. The particular patterns of assessment characteristic of large-scale industrialized societies may thus reflect relatively recently culturally evolved norms rather than inherent features of human moral judgment

Improvements in Compassion and Fears of Compassion throughout the COVID-19 Pandemic: A Multinational Study

During large-scale disasters, social support, caring behaviours, and compassion are shown to protect against poor mental health outcomes. This multi-national study aimed to assess the fluctuations in compassion over time during the COVID-19 pandemic. Respondents (Time 1 n = 4156, Time 2 n = 980, Time 3 n = 825) from 23 countries completed online self-report questionnaires measuring the flows of compassion (i.e., Compassionate Engagement and Action Scales) and fears of compassion toward self and others and from others (i.e., Fears of Compassion Scales) and mental health at three time-points during a 10-month period. The results for the flows of compassion showed that self-compassion increased at Time 3. Compassion for others increased at Time 2 and 3 for the general population, but in contrast, it decreased in health professionals, possibly linked to burnout. Compassion from others did not change in Time 2, but it did increase significantly in Time 3. For fears of compassion, fears of self-compassion reduced over time, fears of compassion for others showed more variation, reducing for the general public but increasing for health professionals, whilst fears of compassion from others did not change over time. Health professionals, those with compassion training, older adults, and women showed greater flows of compassion and lower fears of compassion compared with the general population, those without compassion training, younger adults, and men. These findings highlight that, in a period of shared suffering, people from multiple countries and nationalities show a cumulative improvement in compassion and reduction in fears of compassion, suggesting that, when there is intense suffering, people become more compassionate to self and others and less afraid of, and resistant to, compassion

Small-scale societies exhibit fundamental variation in the role of intentions in moral judgment

Intent and mitigating circumstances play a central role in moral and legal assessments in large-scale industrialized societies. Although these features of moral assessment are widely assumed to be universal, to date, they have only been studied in a narrow range of societies. We show that there is substantial cross-cultural variation among eight traditional small-scale societies (ranging from hunter-gatherer to pastoralist to horticulturalist) and two Western societies (one urban, one rural) in the extent to which intent and mitigating circumstances influence moral judgments. Although participants in all societies took such factors into account to some degree, they did so to very different extents, varying in both the types of considerations taken into account and the types of violations to which such considerations were applied. The particular patterns of assessment characteristic of large-scale industrialized societies may thus reflect relatively recently culturally evolved norms rather than inherent features of human moral judgment

The Experiment That did not Fail: Image and Reality in the Israeli Kibbutz

The kibbutzim of Israel show the world that communal living can be successful, and many observers have asked the questions: Can this success be repeated elsewhere? What are its lessons for other societies? In sociology, the validity and importance of comparative study and the intrinsic interest of the kibbutz way of life cannot be denied

mRNA Display Selection of an Optimized MDM2-Binding Peptide That Potently Inhibits MDM2-p53 Interaction

p53 is a tumor suppressor protein that prevents tumorigenesis through cell cycle arrest or apoptosis of cells in response to cellular stress such as DNA damage. Because the oncoprotein MDM2 interacts with p53 and inhibits its activity, MDM2-p53 interaction has been a major target for the development of anticancer drugs. While previous studies have used phage display to identify peptides (such as DI) that inhibit the MDM2-p53 interaction, these peptides were not sufficiently optimized because the size of the phage-displayed random peptide libraries did not cover all of the possible sequences. In this study, we performed selection of MDM2-binding peptides from large random peptide libraries in two stages using mRNA display. We identified an optimal peptide named MIP that inhibited the MDM2-p53 and MDMX-p53 interactions 29- and 13-fold more effectively than DI, respectively. Expression of MIP fused to the thioredoxin scaffold protein in living cells by adenovirus caused stabilization of p53 through its interaction with MDM2, resulting in activation of the p53 pathway. Furthermore, expression of MIP also inhibited tumor cell proliferation in a p53-dependent manner more potently than DI. These results show that two-stage, mRNA-displayed peptide selection is useful for the rapid identification of potent peptides that target oncoproteins