Gelotophobia (fear of being laughed at) is an under-researched phenomenon in autistic people, yet can have a significant impact on autistic people's quality of life. A narrative review was undertaken to explore if gelotophobia and being autistic are related and what is currently known in the academic literature regarding gelotophilia (joy of being…

Objective: This study examined symptoms of anxiety, depression and suicidality in a national sample of college students. Participants: Using national survey data from the Healthy Minds Study (HMS), a random sample from 184 U.S. campuses from fall 2016 to spring 2019 was analyzed (N = 119,875). Methods: Prevalence rates were examined with the…

Objective: To examine the trajectory of anger and its psychosocial predictors (i.e., perceived social inequality, relative deprivation, and loneliness) as well as its association with anxiety and depression. Participants/Method: Students (N = 365) completed an online survey three times over a one-year period. Results: Three trajectories of anger…

Depressed mood has attracted little attention in creativity research. By comparison, psychotherapeutic studies have repeatedly associated depressive symptomatology with increased revenge ideation. Combining creativity and retaliatory ideation, the present study examined whether self-reported subclinical depressive symptoms are linked to malevolent…

Objectives: While there are good reasons to assume that mindfulness protects against burnout in students, nothing is known about the role of caring for bliss. This study examined whether caring for bliss moderated the relationship between mindfulness at baseline and aspects of burnout approximately 12 weeks later. Participants: Students (n = 92)…

Adolescent anhedonia is a multidimensional construct defined as the loss of enjoyment or pleasure across multiple domains of life. Anhedonia is concurrently associated with substantial impairment and distress, and it prospectively predicts the onset, severity, and treatment of depression. Despite its demonstrated importance, a limited number of…

Socio-cognitive difficulties in individuals with autism spectrum disorder (ASD) are heterogenuous and often co-occur with irritability symptoms, such as angry/grouchy mood and temper outbursts. However, the specific relations between individual symptoms are not well-represented in conventional methods analyzing aggregated autistic symptoms and ASD…

Background: Suicide among adolescents has long been linked to symptoms of depression. However, limited research has examined the potential buffering effect of hope on the relationship between depression and suicide attempts. Methods: To test the effect of hope on the positive relationship between depression and suicide attempts, we used data (N =…

The study focused on comparing the prevalence and type of psychosomatic symptoms in Czech students aged 14 to 19 years (N = 459) without and with specific learning disabilities (SpLDs), as well as their tendencies towards selected coping strategies. No statistically significant differences were found in the prevalence and type of psychosomatic…

Overemphasis on appearance and strong appearance stereotypes to date are expected to contribute to the challenges and distress of people who live with skin conditions and those with appearance distress. Skin conditions are highly prevalent and are often associated with high levels of distress and disruption in the life and well-being of patients.…

The purpose of this basic qualitative study was to investigate how first-year college students describe their experiences with stress and coping. This study sought to understand what coping mechanisms first-year college students use when they experience stress. Prior to this dissertation, it was not known how first-year college students describe…

A core feature of Autistic Spectrum Condition (ASC) is the presence of difficulties in social interactions. This can be explained by an atypical attentional processing of social information: individuals with ASC may show problems with orienting attention to socially relevant stimuli and/or inhibiting their attentional responses to irrelevant ones.…

Background: Prader-Willi syndrome (PWS) is a rare neurodevelopmental disorder with symptoms that impact health and quality of life (QOL). There is limited data on global health, QOL and the relationship with mood in individuals with PWS. Methods: Parents completed three validated assessments, the Glasgow Depression Scale-Carer Supplement (GDS-CS),…

Autistic people experience high rates of mental health problems. A tendency towards behavioural repetition in autistic individuals could contribute to repetitive negative thinking, which is a transdiagnostic risk factor for mental health problems. Our research aimed to add to the literature by using transdiagnostic measures of both mental health…

Psychological problems are prevalent among adolescents, and previous studies have robustly demonstrated that individual and family factors play a role in the formation and maintenance of these problems. On the other hand, not all adolescents show the same characteristics in terms of these factors and can be categorized into different groups.…