Cognitive-affective responses to online positive-psychological interventions: The effects of optimistic, grateful, and self-compassionate writing

Growing evidence suggests that online positive-psychological interventions effectively increase well-being, and a wealth of evidence describes cognitive-affective responses to such interventions. Few studies, however, have directly compared responses across popular exercises such as the best-possible-self intervention, the gratitude letter, or self-compassionate writing. In addition, current evidence is ambiguous regarding the effects of potential moderator variables such as trait gratitude and emotional self-awareness. To address these issues, we randomized 432 German adults to perform either optimism, gratitude, self-compassion, or control writing interventions in an online setting. Participants reported trait gratitude and trait emotional self-awareness before the interventions, as well as momentary optimism, gratitude, self-compassion, positive affect, and current thoughts immediately after the interventions. Results indicate higher momentary optimism after the best-possible-self intervention and higher momentary gratitude after the gratitude letter than after the control task. There were no differences when comparing the best-possible-self intervention with the gratitude letter. Both interventions increased the number of positive self-relevant thoughts. The self-compassion condition showed no effects. Moderation analysis results indicate that neither emotional self-awareness nor trait gratitude moderated the intervention effects. Future studies should compare responses across different positive-psychological interventions using more comprehensive exercises to ensure larger effects

When Robots Enter Our Workplace: Understanding Employee Trust in Assistive Robots

This study is about assistive robots as internal service provider within the company Merck KGaA and examines how the physical appearance of a service representative (humanoid robot, android robot, human) affects employees’ trust. Based on the uncanny valley paradigm, we argue that employees’ trust is the lowest for the android robot and the highest for the human. Further, we will examine the effects of task complexity and requirements for self-disclosure on employees’ trust in assistive robots. According to script theory and media equation theory, we propose that high task complexity and high requirements for self-disclosure increase employees’ trust. We developed a research design to test our model by deploying a humanoid robot and an android robot within a company as robotic assistants in comparison to a human employee. In a next step, we will run a corresponding study with 300 employees

Requirements for Standard Elliptic Curves

Currently, the Internet Research Task Force (IRTF) discusses requirements for new elliptic curves to be standardized in TLS and other internet protocols. This position paper discusses the view of the members of the ECC Brainpool on these requirements, in particular with respect to hardware implementations

Cognitive-affective responses to online positive-psychological interventions: The effects of optimistic, grateful, and self-compassionate writing

Growing evidence suggests that online positive-psychological interventions effectively increase well-being, and a wealth of evidence describes cognitive-affective responses to such interventions. Few studies, however, have directly compared responses across popular exercises such as the best-possible-self intervention, the gratitude letter, or self-compassionate writing. In addition, current evidence is ambiguous regarding the effects of potential moderator variables such as trait gratitude and emotional self-awareness. To address these issues, we randomized 432 German adults to perform either optimism, gratitude, self-compassion, or control writing interventions in an online setting. Participants reported trait gratitude and trait emotional self-awareness before the interventions, as well as momentary optimism, gratitude, self-compassion, positive affect, and current thoughts immediately after the interventions. Results indicate higher momentary optimism after the best-possible-self intervention and higher momentary gratitude after the gratitude letter than after the control task. There were no differences when comparing the best-possible-self intervention with the gratitude letter. Both interventions increased the number of positive self-relevant thoughts. The self-compassion condition showed no effects. Moderation analysis results indicate that neither emotional self-awareness nor trait gratitude moderated the intervention effects. Future studies should compare responses across different positive-psychological interventions using more comprehensive exercises to ensure larger effects

A Population Based Regional Dynamic Microsimulation of Germany: The MikroSim Model

Microsimulation models are widely used to evaluate the potential effects of different policies on social indicators. Most microsimulation models in use operate on a national level, disregarding regional variations. We describe the construction of a national microsimulation model for Germany, accounting for local variations in each of the more than 10,000 communities in Germany. The database used and the mechanisms implementing the population dynamics are described. Finally, the further development of the database and microsimulation programs are outlined, which will contribute towards a research lab that will be made available to the wider scientific community

Modeling plasticity and dysplasia of pancreatic ductal organoids derived from human pluripotent stem cells

Personalized in vitro models for dysplasia and carcinogenesis in the pancreas have been constrained by insufficient differentiation of human pluripotent stem cells (hPSCs) into the exocrine pancreatic lineage. Here, we differentiate hPSCs into pancreatic duct-like organoids (PDLOs) with morphological, transcriptional, proteomic, and functional characteristics of human pancreatic ducts, further maturing upon transplantation into mice. PDLOs are generated from hPSCs inducibly expressing oncogenic GNAS, KRAS, or KRAS with genetic covariance of lost CDKN2A and from induced hPSCs derived from a McCune-Albright patient. Each oncogene causes a specific growth, structural, and molecular phenotype in vitro. While transplanted PDLOs with oncogenic KRAS alone form heterogenous dysplastic lesions or cancer, KRAS with CDKN2A loss develop dedifferentiated pancreatic ductal adenocarcinomas. In contrast, transplanted PDLOs with mutant GNAS lead to intraductal papillary mucinous neoplasia-like structures. Conclusively, PDLOs enable in vitro and in vivo studies of pancreatic plasticity, dysplasia, and cancer formation from a genetically defined background