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Basic psychological needs theory postulates that a social environment that satisfies individuals’ three basic psychological needs of autonomy, competence, and relatedness leads to optimal growth and well-being. On the other hand, the frustration of these needs is associated with ill-being and depressive symptoms foremost investigated in non-clinical samples; yet, there is a paucity of research on need frustration in clinical samples. Survey data were compared between adult individuals with major depressive disorder (MDD; n = 115; 48.69% female; 38.46 years, SD = 10.46) with those of a non-depressed comparison sample (n = 201; 53.23% female; 30.16 years, SD = 12.81). Need profiles were examined with a linear mixed model (LMM). Individuals with depression reported higher levels of frustration and lower levels of satisfaction in relation to the three basic psychological needs when compared to non-depressed adults. The difference between depressed and non-depressed groups was significantly larger for frustration than satisfaction regarding the needs for relatedness and competence. LMM correlation parameters confirmed the expected positive correlation between the three needs. This is the first study showing substantial differences in need-based experiences between depressed and non-depressed adults. The results confirm basic assumptions of the self-determination theory and have preliminary implications in tailoring therapy for depression., Zweitveröffentlichungen der Universität Potsdam : Gesundheitswissenschaftliche Reihe; 8

Study into the longitudinal association between parental anxiety and depression symptomatology and the quality of the parent-child relationship.

Earlier findings support the view that people are at increased risk of experiencing psychological problems and psychopathology following childhood trauma. Likewise, previous literature showed that social exclusion has a negative effect on psychological well-being, need satisfaction, and adaptive regulation of emotions. However, to our knowledge, no previous study has been conducted to investigate the moderating role of childhood trauma in the relation from social exclusion to basic psychological needs, emotion regulation, and well-being. Childhood traumatic events are serious adverse events experienced during childhood, such as physical abuse, sexual abuse, neglect, and domestic violence. Such events have been shown to negatively affect children's and adults' development, being related for instance to a reduced ability to regulate negative emotions, lower life satisfaction, and a greater risk of having psychopathological outcomes in adult life. One of the mechanisms through which childhood trauma relates to maladjustment is a stronger reaction to social rejection. Based on the Self- Determination Theory (SDT), the aim of the current study is to examine the degree to which childhood trauma moderates reactions to social rejection. By doing so, we focus on key outcomes as identified within SDT: emotion regulation, basic psychological needs, well-being, and ill-being. This study consists of an online survey (including an information letter and informed consent) where participants fill out questionnaires on sociodemographic information, childhood trauma, resilience, a manipulation check, and state questionnaires on the above-outlined outcomes. Before the manipulation check and state questionnaires, participants will be randomly assigned to one of the Cyberball conditions (i.e., exclusion, inclusion). Cyberball is a well-known virtual ball-tossing game to induce feelings of social rejection, where individuals in the exclusion condition receive the ball less from two other players (who are not actual players) compared to participants in the control condition. Immediately after Cyberball, participants fill out questions on perceived social exclusion (i.e., manipulation check) and the outcomes. Credibility and familiarity related to Cyberball will also be assessed at the end of the study. Finally, participants will be debriefed.

Extant literature has demonstrated rather systematically the detrimental role of parental psychological control (i.e., autonomy-suppressing parenting involving manipulative and intrusive practices) in youths’ adjustment across culturally diverse samples. However, whether parental guilt-induction, a specific and relational element of psychological control, relates to offspring’s maladaptation in the same way across cultures is an issue of ongoing debate. Based on the Self-Determination Theory, it can be expected that parental guilt-induction generally undermines children’s functioning by thwarting their basic and universal psychological needs. Accordingly, in this theory guilt-induction is expected to be more detrimental to youths’ adjustment than more autonomy-supportive parental practices, an effect that would occur across cultures. On the other hand, according to the culture-specific perspective, guilt-inducing practices may not be harmful among people and families espousing collectivistic values as these practices could be considered part of the normative socialization process. Guilt-induction would then be consistent with the cultural values of relatedness and group harmony and might therefore not be harmful. There is evidence that parents endorsing collectivistic values more often rely on psychological control and guilt-induction than their counterparts who endorse individualistic ones. However, it is less clear whether such differences in cultural values moderate the relation of parental guilt-induction to children’s adjustment. It is also unclear whether the presence of parental warmth and care attenuates the relations of parental guilt-induction to children’s adjustment across families promoting collectivistic rather than individualistic values. Hence, in the present research, we are particularly interested in how young adults who differ in individualistic and collectivistic cultural values perceive and deal with guilt-induction in the presence and absence of maternal warmth. Participants from Turkey, Greece and Bulgaria will be randomly assigned to one of the three vignette conditions depicting maternal autonomy support, guilt-induction with warmth and guilt-induction without warmth. Participants’ perceived maternal guilt-induction, autonomy support and warmth, and need satisfaction, need frustration and emotion regulation strategies in response to the vignette will be investigated.

The following study is investigating the link between memory detailedness and social support. The researchers want to establish why memory detailedness is associated with better social support from others. The researchers want to test if memory detailedness elicits more empathy and likeability from others. It seeks to build on previous research findings that indicate a link between memory detailedness and social support from others. The study will be an experimental within subjects design whereby applicants are shown a series of written memories that represent multiple fictional persons. Half the memories they will be shown will be specific and high in detail, and half will be specific and low in detail. After each memory they will be asked a series of questions to measure if the level of detailedness in the memories elicits empathy and likeability from the participants in our survey. The memories have been constructed by researchers in a previous study, the research area of which is concerned with the social implications of autobiographical memory. Their study indicates a link between memory detailedness and the level of social support one receives from others (Barry et al., 2021). The present study aims to investigate why those with greater memory detailedness have been found to receive more social support from others. Permission has been granted by the researchers of this study to use the memories that they constructed. The participants will be measured for trait empathy to gain a baseline mark to compare with the participants scores on state empathy. The participants will also be asked to complete a CES-D depression scale at baseline.

This study examines how detailedness during autobiographical memory (AM) sharing affects social support received from others. Various emotional disorders, most commonly depression, have been associated with the inability to retrieve specific memories—a phenomenon widely known as overgeneral memory (OGM). Recent studies have found that difficulties with retrieving those memories increase depressive symptoms when accompanied by perceived poor social support. Furthermore, people are more willing to offer social support to those who report specific memories than general ones. However, detailedness over specificity in memories might play a more significant role in eliciting social support from others. Specific memories are commonly rich in detail, and those that have difficulty retrieving them also have difficulties recalling episodic details. It is unclear whether sharing memories rich with internal details that are considered to reflect episodic reexperiencing and external details that are regarded as semantic information elicit the same response. The question at hand is whether the willingness to offer social support through memory sharing is different when memories are either rich in internal or external details. Participants will be asked to answer some general questions and the CES-D depression scale. They will read a series of written memories on four levels of detail; high internal detail, low internal detail, high external detail, and low external detail. Following each memory, participants will be asked to answer questions that measure their emotional and instrumental support towards the storyteller.

Intrinsic motivation is often regarded as the ideal when developing computer-mediated technology for health and rehabilitation activities in HCI-research. Even though intrinsic motivation is indeed a sustainable and self-rewarding form of motivation, arguably both extrinsic and intrinsic types of motivation are influential factors to an individual's self-regulation that ultimately drives human behavior. Thus, HCI-researchers should embrace instruments that encompasses the wider continuum of motivation rather than just intrinsic motivation alone. To this end we propose a (yet unvalidated) instrument based on SIMS, and encourage researchers to include the RAI to detect changes in motivational quality during interventions involving exergames or virtual rehabilitation. Intrinsic motivation is often regarded as the ideal when developing computer-mediated technology for health and rehabilitation activities in HCI-research. Even though intrinsic motivation is indeed a sustainable and self-rewarding form of motivation, arguably both extrinsic and intrinsic types of motivation are influential factors to an individual's self-regulation that ultimately drives human behavior. Thus, HCI-researchers should embrace instruments that encompasses the wider continuum of motivation rather than just intrinsic motivation alone. To this end we propose a (yet unvalidated) instrument based on the Situational Motivation Scale (SIMS). We encourage researchers to utilize scales that measures the wider variety of motivational quality during interventions involving older adults and exergames in virtual rehabilitation.