When thinking you are better leads to feeling worse: Self-other asymmetries in pro-social behavior and increased anxiety during Covid-19.
When thinking you are better leads to feeling worse: Self-other asymmetries in pro-social behavior and increased anxiety during Covid-19.
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DOI：
10.1371/journal.pone.0291329
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发表时间：
2023
期刊：
影响因子：
3.7
通讯作者：
中科院分区：
文献类型：
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自私的偏见（例如，认为一个人往往比同龄人表现得更好）通常与积极的心理结果有关，如增加自尊和恢复力。然而，这种倾向在集体行动问题的背景下可能是有问题的，其中个人依赖于他人的亲社会行为来实现更大的目标。我们在2019冠状病毒病大流行的背景下研究了这个问题，并于2020年春季从一个大学社区招募了参与者（n = 1023）进行在线研究。我们发现了在Covid相关知识和限制行为中自我同伴不对称的证据，例如参与者报告说，他们对Covid相关症状了解更多，为阻止疾病传播做了更多工作，并且比同龄人更具亲社会动机。实际的同行报告表明，这些都是高估。这种自我增强是有代价的：在封锁早期，自我-同伴限制行为的不对称性对特定于Covid的担忧和感知压力与一般焦虑症状强度之间的正相关关系产生了间接影响。当人们更担心新冠肺炎疫情时，当他们报告感受到更大的压力时，尤其是当他们低估了他人对公共卫生行动的贡献时，他们往往会有更严重的焦虑症状。这表明，对他人的亲社会性缺乏信任可能对心理健康造成个人适应不良。
Self-serving biases (e.g., beliefs that one tends to perform better than peers) are generally associated with positive psychological outcomes like increased self-esteem and resilience. However, this tendency may be problematic in the context of collective action problems, wherein individuals are reliant on others’ pro-social behaviors to achieve larger goals. We examined this question in the context of the Covid-19 pandemic, and recruited participants for an online study (n = 1023) from a university community in Spring 2020. We found evidence for self-peer asymmetries in Covid-related knowledge and restriction behavior, such that participants reported that they knew more about Covid-related symptoms, were doing more to stop the spread of the disease, and were more pro-socially motivated in doing so than peers. Actual peer reports indicated that these were overestimations. This self-enhancement comes with a cost: the perceived self-peer restriction behavior asymmetry had an indirect effect on the positive relationships both from Covid-specific worry and from perceived stress to general anxiety symptom intensity during the early lockdown period. People tended to have more severe symptoms of anxiety when they were more worried about Covid-19 and when they reported greater perceived stress, especially when they underestimated others’ contributions to public health action relative to their own. This suggests that lack of trust in others’ pro-sociality may be personally maladaptive for mental health.