Kay Brauer

Objective: How people deal with ridicule and being laughed at plays a role for romantic relationships. Gelotophobia (fear of being laughed at), gelotophilia (joy in being laughed at), and katagelasticism (joy in laughing at others) describe individual differences in dealing with laughter. We studied how differential perceptions among partners' traits and their profiles converge to address the description and effects of congruence. Method: We collected data from 286 opposite‐gender couples (relationship duration: M = 6.8 years), who provided self‐ and partner ratings and ideal partner preferences for these laughter‐related dispositions. We analyzed the congruence between different types of perceptions of the laughter‐related dispositions and whether this congruence was associated with relationship satisfaction. We computed profile‐based congruence analyses and conducted supplementary Dyadic Response Surface Analyses. Results: We found that perceptions are interdependent within and between partners and that profile congruence between partner perceptions and ideal partner preferences is associated with greater relationship satisfaction above and beyond actor, partner, and stereotype effects. Conclusion: Self‐, partner‐, and ideal partner perceptions are differentially interrelated and congruence in their distinctive profiles relates to couples' satisfaction. We discuss the findings from the perspective of the Ideal Standards Model and encourage further research on perceptions less across traits.

The Impostor Phenomenon (IP) is a psychological trait that receives increasing interest across study disciplines. Although the IP is conceptualized as an individual difference variable that describes expressions on a continuum from low to high expressions, some studies still treat the IP as categorical. One consequence of this approach is that prevalence rates are estimated based on arbitrary and unvalidated cutoffs. I discuss the theoretical and methodological flaws of this approach, which are also evident when considering findings from three recent meta-analyses of the IP. Further, I suggest adopting the continuous approach to the IP and illustrate, based on data from 137 samples ( N = 22,552), that aims such as testing differences between populations (i.e., students and employees) and whether the IP increased over time can be well addressed using distributional parameters. I discuss implications of this approach for the field.

The Impostor Phenomenon (IP) describes self-perceptions of intellectual fraudulence despite external and/or objective feedback supporting one’s intellectual abilities [1]. Salari and colleagues [2] provided a meta-analysis of the IP among health service providers, aggregating data from 30 studies and 11,483 participants. One of their major aims was reporting the prevalence (i.e., the proportion of a population affected by a condition) of the IP. Therefore, they analyzed studies reporting prevalence rates. While we applaud the aspiration of Salari and colleagues in their work, we discuss why it is currently not suitable to interpret prevalence rates of the IP from a conceptual and methodological perspective.

Adult playfulness is a personality trait gaining increasing attention, particularly in romantic contexts. We localize four facets of playfulness (Other-directed, Lighthearted, Intellectual, and Whimsical) within dimensions of attachment styles and romantic jealousy. Earlier findings from couples showed that Other-directed playfulness relates to low avoidant attachment and all facets related to lower emotional expressions of jealousy. To expand the knowledge about the generalizability and overcome variance restrictions from couples’ data, we conceptually replicated earlier research using the same measures and analyzed data of N = 384 singles. As expected, singles showed greater insecure attachment than couples, whereas only cognitive jealousy was elevated in comparison to partnered individuals. Our findings replicated associations between playfulness and attachment, with Other-directed playfulness being the strongest predictor of lower avoidant attachment and Lighthearted playfulness showing a small negative association with anxious attachment. However, we found negligible associations with jealousy. We discuss the role of playfulness in singles and couples and whether the reframing process that characterizes playfulness might be less active in singles when it comes to jealousy in the sense of (re)interpreting actual and perceived relationship threats.

The impostor phenomenon (IP) refers to individual differences in difficulties in internalizing positive feedback and success, and fear of being exposed as an intellectual fraud. The 2015 wave of the SOEP-IS study included five of the 20 items of the German-language Clance Impostor Phenomenon Scale. This study analyzed the psychometric properties and validity of the IP measure used in the SOEP-IS data ( N = 2,643). Confirmatory factor analysis supported a unidimensional model and invariance across sex. The internal consistency was good for a very brief measure (α and ω = .78). Correlations with self-esteem, the Big Five traits, sadness and worrying met expectations and were stable across a 2-year interval ( r _change ≤ .05). The findings support the reliability and validity of the abbreviated IP measure. Its use for analyzing panel data such as the SOEP-IS is recommended considering its limitations (e.g., limited reliability and coverage of the IP).