The Influence of Smartphone Addiction, Personality Traits, Achievement Motivation on Problem-solving Ability of University Students

This study aimed to analyze the relations between smartphone addiction, personality traits, achievement motivation and problem-solving ability and explore the influence of smartphone addiction, personality traits, achievement motivation on university students' problem-solving ability. 682 students (male = 227, female = 455) from a Chinese public university participated in the research voluntarily. Data were collected by the short-version of the smartphone addiction scale, the ten-item personality inventory, the achievement motives scale, and the social problem-solving inventory. The correlations and multiple hierarchical regression analysis were used to analyze the data. The results were as follows: Firstly, it was found that there was a significant negative correlation between smartphone addiction and achievement motivation and problem-solving ability, a significant positive correlation between achievement motivation and problem-solving ability, and a significant correlation between the factors of personality traits and smartphone addiction and problem-solving ability respectively. Secondly, it was found that emotional stability of personality traits, smartphone addiction and the "fear of failure" sub-dimensions of achievement motivation significantly explained problem-solving ability. Based on these research results, some suggestions were given for the improvement of the educational field.

Disentangling help-seeking and giving up: differential human-directed gazing by dogs in a modified unsolvable task paradigm

Dogs are renowned for ‘looking back’ at humans when confronted with a problem, but it has been questioned whether this implies help-seeking or giving up. We tested 56 pet dogs from two breed groups (herding dogs and terriers) in a modified unsolvable task paradigm. One reward type (food or toy) was enclosed in a box, while the respective other reward was accessible. With both reward types, human-directed gazing in relation to the box was significantly positively correlated with interaction with the box, as long as an alternative was available. This suggests that both behaviours served to attain the unavailable reward and reflected individual motivation for the inaccessible vs the accessible reward. Furthermore, we varied whether the owner or the experimenter was responsible for handling the rewards. In the owner-responsible group, dogs rarely gazed at the experimenter. In the experimenter-responsible group, dogs preferentially directed box-related gazing (prior to or after looking at or interacting with the box) at the owner. Still, they gazed at the experimenter significantly longer than the owner-responsible group. Conversely, toy-related gazing was directed significantly more at the experimenter. Thus, dogs adjust their gazing behaviour according to the people’s responsibility and their current goal (help-seeking vs play). Gaze duration did not differ between herding dogs and terriers. We conclude that dogs use gazing at humans’ faces as a social problem-solving strategy, but not all gazing can be classified as such. Dogs’ human-directed gazing is influenced by the social relationships with the persons, situational associations, and context (unsolvable problem vs play).

Effects of Bystander's Emotional Empathy and Social Problem-Solving Skills on Defending Behaviors Against Bullying in Elementary School: Mediated Through Peer Acceptance

Objectives: Many children are exposed to their peers being bullied, which negatively impacts individuals and the society as a whole. We investigated the effects of elementary school children’s emotional empathy and social problem-solving skills on their defending behaviors. We evaluated the direct and indirect effects of these personal characteristics, mediated through their perceived peer acceptance among classmates. Gender differences were also tested.Methods: The study participants were 386 fourth- and fifth-graders (M = 10.4 yrs.) from six elementary schools in the metropolitan Seoul area of South Korea. Children’s perceived social acceptance, emotional empathy, and problem-solving skills were measured using self-reported questionnaires. Defending behavior was measured using peer nomination. To analyze the data, descriptive statistics and structural equation modeling were conducted using SPSS 21.0 and MPLUS 6.12.Results: Bystanders‘ emotional empathy and social problem-solving skills had significant effects on defending behaviors. Social problem-solving skills directly affected defending behaviors of boys and girls. Girls’ peer acceptance mediated both emotional empathy and social problem-solving skills for defending behaviors, while no mediation effect was found in boys.Conclusion: For children, feeling accepted by classmates is important for defending bullied peers. For girls, peer acceptance magnifies their socio-emotional and socio-cognitive skills, empowering them to defend the bullied peers. However, for boys, having competent socio-cognitive skills alone is sufficient. Based on this study’s findings, it is recommended that interventions are needed to enhance bystanders’ emotional empathy and social problem-solving skills, and thereby, empowering them to be competent defenders against school bullying.

The Mediating Effect of Social Problem-Solving Between Perfectionism and Subjective Well-Being

This study examined the relationship between perfectionism and subjective well-being (SWB) and dimensions of social problem-solving ability. The Almost Perfect Scale-Revised (APS-R), Social problem-solving Inventory-Revised (SPSI-R) and Satisfaction with Life Scale (SWLS) were used to conduct a questionnaire survey of 202 Chinese adults. The results found that: (1) Subjective well-being was significantly negatively correlated with the discrepancy dimension of perfectionism and was also significantly negatively correlated with the negative problem orientation of social problem-solving. (2) The discrepancy dimension reflected in maladaptive perfectionism was significantly positively correlated with the negative aspects of social problem solving (Negative Problem Orientation, NPO; Impulsivity-Carelessness Style, ICS; and Avoidance Style, AS). (3) The negative problem orientation (NPO) dimension in SPSI-R, as a partial mediator, mediated the negative correlation between maladaptive perfectionism and subjective well-being. In conclusion, perfectionism and social problem-solving ability had different degrees of influence on the SWB of Chinese adults, and attention could be paid to dealing with discrepancy and how to reduce negative problem-solving tendency in education and clinical practice.

Beyond IQ: The Importance of Metacognition for the Promotion of Global Wellbeing

Global policy makers increasingly adopt subjective wellbeing as a framework within which to measure and address human development challenges, including policies to mitigate consequential societal problems. In this review, we take a systems-level perspective to assemble evidence from studies of wellbeing, of collective intelligence, and of metacognition and argue for a virtuous cycle for health promotion in which the increased collective intelligence of groups: (1) enhances the ability of such groups to address consequential societal problems; (2) promotes the wellbeing of societies and the individual wellbeing of people within groups; and, finally, (3) enables prosocial actions that further promote collective problem-solving and global wellbeing. Notably, evidence demonstrates that effective collaboration and teamwork largely depend on social skills for metacognitive awareness—the capacity to evaluate and control our own mental processes in the service of social problem-solving. Yet, despite their importance, metacognitive skills may not be well-captured by measures of general intelligence. These skills have instead been the focus of decades of research in the psychology of human judgment and decision-making. This literature provides well-validated tests of metacognitive awareness and demonstrates that the capacity to use analysis and deliberation to evaluate intuitive responses is an important source of individual differences in decision-making. Research in network neuroscience further elucidates the topology and dynamics of brain networks that enable metacognitive awareness, providing key targets for intervention. As such, we further discuss emerging scientific interventions to enhance metacognitive skills (e.g., based on mindfulness meditation, and physical activity and aerobic fitness), and how such interventions may catalyze the virtuous cycle to improve collective intelligence, societal problem-solving, and global wellbeing.

5. Leave It to the People

This chapter treats democracy as a way of approaching problems through involving a variety of interests and actors along with citizens in interactive problem solving within the basic institutional structure of liberal capitalist democracy. It is manifested in for example public consultation, alternative dispute resolution, policy dialogue, lay citizen deliberation, and public inquiries. The turn from government to more decentralized and networked governance can be seen as a kind of democratic pragmatism, though networks do not always enhance democracy. This problem solving must be a flexible process that involves many voices and cooperation across a plurality of perspectives. The degree of participation with which pragmatists are happy often corresponds to existing liberal democracies and enables congruence between the demands of rationality in social problem solving and democratic values, though efforts exist to deepen both the democratic and problem-solving capacity of participation.