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Previous studies have suggested that an extremely strong desire for happiness might ironically reduce a person’s well-being, particularly among Western people. According to the goal progress theory and the theory of valuing happiness, rumination might explain the relationship between valuing happiness and well-being. Based on these theoretical rationales, this study examined the following hypotheses: (1) valuing happiness is significantly associated with rumination, (2) people who experience low life stress have a stronger association between valuing happiness and rumination, and (3) people with more interdependent self-construal have a weaker association between valuing happiness and rumination. University students in Japan participated in a cross-sectional study (N = 350; Study 1) and a 4-weeks longitudinal study (N = 329; Study 2). They responded to a packet of questionnaires assessing valuing happiness, trait rumination, depressive symptoms, negative events, and interdependent self-construal. Consistent with our hypothesis, valuing happiness was concurrently and longitudinally associated with increased rumination after controlling for depressive symptoms. However, negative events did not moderate the association between valuing happiness and rumination. Furthermore, Study 1, but not Study 2, indicated that the association between valuing happiness and rumination was stronger among students with highly interdependent self-construal than those with less interdependent self-construal. The preset findings indicated that valuing happiness might be a factor that perpetuates rumination. More sophisticated evidence on the influence of valuing happiness on rumination can lead to effective psychotherapies for decreasing rumination and depression.

Reading literature contributes to the development of language skills and socioemotional competencies related to empathic responding. Despite implications for improving measures of empathy used by p...

Previous studies have suggested that cognitive reappraisal, which is an effective emotion regulation strategy, enhances decentering. On the other hand, other studies have implied the reverse in regard to this relationship: that decentering supports cognitive reappraisal. However, these possibilities have not yet been examined empirically. In the present study, we investigated the causal relationship between decentering and cognitive reappraisal by conducting two wave cross-lagged analysis. One hundred and thirty-eight Japanese university students responded to a questionnaire comprising measures of decentering and cognitive reappraisal tendency; the questionnaire was administered on two occasions, with an interval of one month. Cross-lagged analysis indicated the positive effect of cognitive reappraisal on decentering; however, the reverse possibility, that decentering influences cognitive reappraisal, was not significant. These results suggested that habitual use of cognitive reappraisal fosters decentering.

日本語は表意文字と表音文字の混在という国際的にも非常に希な特徴を持つ言語である. 日本語の習得にあっては, 一般に漢字の起源である中国語を母語とする漢字系学習者が漢字の認識において有利だと言われるが, 実際の教育現場では助詞の軽視等の漢字系学習者に特有の問題点が指摘される. しかし, 教育現場における主観評価ではその原因を探ることは困難である. そこで, 本研究では日本語読解時の外国人の情報処理特性を, 眼球運動計測による視覚人間工学的手法によって分析した. 実験1-a, bでは上級レベルの漢字系学習者と日本人の読解中の眼球運動データの比較を行った. そこから, 漢字系学習者の漢字偏重傾向, 母語に存在しない文法構造の軽視, 読みの精粗性の個人差が明らかになった. また, 一旦習得した読みのストラテジーが膠着化し, 学習歴を重ねてもそれを克服することが困難である傾向が明らかになった. 実験2では, 読みの膠着化を矯正するにあたり, 学習課程においてどの時点が最も有効であるかを検討するため, 初級から上級前半課程に至るまでの学習者の読みの時系列的変動を調査した. その結果, 初級後半から中級へ至る段階において読みの向上幅が大きく, これに至る以前に正しい教育を施すことの重要性が示唆された.

日本語読解時における眼球運動計測から, 日本語読解の特徴を文字情報の視覚的処理に関する形態的側面と, その発音に対応する音韻的側面に分けて考察した. 実験1では, (1) 仮名連続, (2) 仮名分割, (3) 漢字仮名交じり, の3種類の表記形式による日本語刺激を用いた. ここから, (1) では音韻的情報, (2) では空白, (3) では漢字の視覚的特徴が重要な役割を果たしていることが明らかになった. 実験2では (a) 仮名・無意味, (b) 仮名・有意味, (c) 漢字仮名交じり・有意味の日本語刺激に対して発音を意識した読解と通常の読解において, 情報受容量にいかなる差があるかを調べた. その結果, (b), (c) ではそれぞれ有意水準p

When can children speaking Japanese, English, or Chinese map and extend novel nouns and verbs? Across 6 studies, 3- and 5-year-old children in all 3 languages map and extend novel nouns more readily than novel verbs. This finding prevails even in languages like Chinese and Japanese that are assumed to be verb-friendly languages (e.g., T. Tardif, 1996). The results also suggest that the input language uniquely shapes verb learning such that English-speaking children require grammatical support to learn verbs, whereas Chinese children require pragmatic as well as grammatical support. This research bears on how universally shared cognitive factors and language-specific linguistic factors interact in lexical development.

This chapter presents results from a series of cross-linguistic studies which examined how English-, Japanese-, and Chinese-speaking children generalize newly learned nouns and verbs. Based on the results, it evaluates the two competing positions in the noun-verb debate. It then explores universal and language-specific factors which affect the ease or difficulty of early noun and verb learning.