Sarah D Pressman
Biographic Data
| ID | 1561349 |
|---|---|
| NAME | Sarah D Pressman |
| GIVEN NAMES | Sarah D |
| FAMILY NAME | Pressman |
| SIGNATURE | PRESSMAN S D |
| AFFILIATIONS | University of California, Irvine |
| ORCID | 0000-0003-1576-6466 |
| VERIFIED | Yes |
| TOTAL WORKS | 22 |
| TOTAL CITATIONS | 100 |
| AUTHOR COUNT | 22 |
| EDITOR COUNT | 0 |
| FIRST PUBLICATION YEAR | 2004 |
| LATEST PUBLICATION YEAR | 2025 |
| H-INDEX | 3 |
Superwoman schema and arterial stiffness in Black American women: Assessing the Role of Environmental Mastery
BACKGROUND: Emerging evidence suggests that the Superwoman Schema (SWS)-the sociocultural representation of Black women as naturally strong, independent, and nurturing-may play an important role in Black women's cardiovascular health; but findings have been relatively mixed. One interesting possibility is that environmental mastery, a sense of control over one's environment, may mitigate negative aspects of SWS. PURPOSE: We investigated whether m…
Psychology Meets Biology in Covid-19: What We Know and Why It Matters for Public Health
Psychosocial factors are related to immune, viral, and vaccination outcomes. Yet, this knowledge has been poorly represented in public health initiatives during the COVID-19 pandemic. This review provides an overview of biopsychosocial links relevant to COVID-19 outcomes by describing seminal evidence about these associations known prepandemic as well as contemporary research conducted during the pandemic. This focuses on the negative impact of t…
The subcomponents of affect scale (SAS): Validating a widely used affect scale
OBJECTIVE: There is a need for a brief affect scale that also encompasses different components of affect relevant for researchers interested in physiological and health outcomes. The Subcomponents of Affect Scale (SAS) meets this need. This 18-item scale has nine positive and nine negative affect items encompassing six subscales (calm, well-being, vigour, depression, anxiety, anger). Previous research using the SAS has demonstrated its predictive…
Associations Between Gut Microbes and Social Behavior in Healthy 2-Year-Old Children
OBJECTIVE: Emerging research has connected abundances of specific bacteria to differences in psychosocial behaviors in animals and adult humans. However, research assessing mind-microbiome associations in children is sparse with extant work primarily focused on populations with autism, making it unclear whether links are also present in typically developing children. The current study fills this gap by examining associations between prosocial-sel…
A multi-lab test of the facial feedback hypothesis by the Many Smiles Collaboration
Vacation’s lingering benefits, but only for those with low stress jobs
Background Vacationing provides potential recovery from work stress and is associated with cardiovascular disease morbidity and mortality. This study considered psychological variables that might change as a vacation is approaching (fade-in) or after a vacation ends (fade-out) and how these associations might vary as a function of ongoing work stress. Methods: Sixty workers eligible for paid time off were recruited from the community. Multiple as…
Smile (or grimace) through the pain? The effects of experimentally manipulated facial expressions on needle-injection responses
Smiling has been previously shown to improve stress responses. We replicated and expanded this work by testing whether smiling helps with a potent real-world stressor: a vaccination-like needle injection. We also extended past research by examining grimacing, a facial expression known to naturally occur during stress and pain and one that shares some of the same facial action units as smiling. Participants (n = 231; [M]age = 19.2) were randomized…
Say cheese? The connections between positive facial expressions in student identification photographs and health care seeking behavior
This study examined whether positive facial expressions in student identification photographs were connected with a health-relevant behavior: visits to a health care center in the last year for preventive and non-preventive (e.g. illness, injury) purposes. Identification photographs were coded for degree of smile. Smiling participants were more likely to have sought preventive care versus those not smiling in their photographs, but there was no d…
Positive Affect and Health: What Do We Know and Where Next Should We Go?
Positive affect (PA) is associated with better health across a wide range of physical health outcomes. This review reflects on why the study of PA is an essential component of our understanding of physical health and expands on pathways that connect these two variables. To encourage forward movement in this burgeoning research area, measurement and design issues in the study of PA and health are discussed, as are the connections between PA and a …
Affect variability and predictability: Using recurrence quantification analysis to better understand how the dynamics of affect relate to health
Changes in affect over time have been associated with health outcomes. However, previously utilized measurement methods focus on variability of affect (e.g., standard deviation, root mean squared successive difference) and ignore the more complex temporal patterns of affect over time. These patterns may be an important feature in understanding how the dynamics of affect relate to health. Recurrence quantification analysis (RQA) may help alleviate…
What does it mean to feel loved: Cultural consensus and individual differences in felt love
Cultural consensus theory is a statistical framework (CCT) for the study of individual differences in the knowledge of culturally shared opinions. In this article, we demonstrate how a CCT analysis can be used to study individual differences and cultural consensus on what makes people feel loved, or more generally any social behaviors that are governed by cognitive schemata. To highlight the advantages of the method, we describe a study in which …
The Use of Smartphones as a Digital Security Blanket: The Influence of Phone Use and Availability on Psychological and Physiological Responses to Social Exclusion
OBJECTIVE: Mobile phones are increasingly becoming a part of the social environment, and when individuals feels excluded during a socially stressful situation, they often retreat to the comfort of their phone to ameliorate the negativity. This study tests whether smartphone presence does, in fact, alter psychological and physiological responses to social stress. METHODS: Participants (N = 148, 84% female, mean age = 20.4) were subjected to a peer…
If, Why, and When Subjective Well‐Being Influences Health, and Future Needed Research
We review evidence on whether subjective well‐being ( SWB ) can influence health, why it might do so, and what we know about the conditions where this is more or less likely to occur. This review also explores how various methodological approaches inform the study of the connections between subjective well‐being and health and longevity outcomes. Our review of this growing literature indicates areas where data are substantial and where much more …
The whole is not the sum of its parts: Specific types of positive affect influence sleep differentially
Given the known detrimental effects of poor sleep on an array of psychological and physical health processes, it is critical to understand the factors that protect sleep, especially during times of stress when sleep particularly suffers. Positive affect (PA) arises as a variable of interest given its known associations with health and health behaviors and its ability to buffer stress. In 2 studies, we examined which types of PA (distinguished by …
When the Love Hormone Leads to Violence: Oxytocin Increases Intimate Partner Violence Inclinations Among High Trait Aggressive People
Does oxytocin influence intimate partner violence (IPV)? Clues from prior research suggest that oxytocin increases prosocial behavior, but this effect is reversed among people with aggressive tendencies or in situations involving defensive aggression. Animal research also indicates that oxytocin plays a central role in defensive maternal aggression (i.e., protecting pups from intruders). Among highly aggressive people, a boost of oxytocin may cau…
Optimism Is Universal: Exploring the Presence and Benefits of Optimism in a Representative Sample of the World
Current theories of optimism suggest that the tendency to maintain positive expectations for the future is an adaptive psychological resource associated with improved well‐being and physical health, but the majority of previous optimism research has been conducted in industrialized nations. The present study examined (a) whether optimism is universal, (b) what demographic factors predict optimism, and (c) whether optimism is consistently associat…
Association of Enjoyable Leisure Activities With Psychological and Physical Well-Being
OBJECTIVE: To examine whether engaging in multiple enjoyable activities was associated with better psychological and physiological functioning. Few studies have examined the health benefits of the enjoyable activities that individuals participate in voluntarily in their free time. METHOD: Participants from four different studies (n = 1399 total, 74% female, age = 19-89 years) completed a self-report measure (Pittsburgh Enjoyable Activities Test (…
Use of Social Words in Autobiographies and Longevity
OBJECTIVE: To analyze the relationship between social word use in autobiographies and longevity. Although there is substantial evidence that our social relationships are associated with mortality, interpretation of this work is weakened by the limitations of assessing the social environment with structured questionnaires and interviews. By analyzing the word content of autobiographies, we could assess spontaneous indicators of important social re…
Positive Affect and Health
Negative affective styles such as anxiety, depression, and hostility have long been accepted as predictors of increased risk for illness and mortality. In contrast, positive affective styles have been relatively ignored in the health literature. Here we highlight consistent patterns of research associating trait positive affect (PA) and physical health. The evidence we review suggests an association of trait PA and lower morbidity and decreased s…
Loneliness, Social Network Size, and Immune Response to Influenza Vaccination in College Freshmen.
Antibody response to the influenza immunization was investigated in 83 1st-semester healthy university freshmen. Elevated levels of loneliness throughout the semester and small social networks were independently associated with poorer antibody response to 1 component of the vaccine. Those with both high levels of loneliness and a small social network had the lowest antibody response. Loneliness was also associated with greater psychological stres…
Does positive affect influence health
This review highlights consistent patterns in the literature associating positive affect (PA) and physical health. However, it also raises serious conceptual and methodological reservations. Evidence suggests an association of trait PA and lower morbidity and of state and trait PA and decreased symptoms and pain. Trait PA is also associated with increased longevity among older community-dwelling individuals. The literature on PA and surviving ser…
Psychological Stress and Antibody Response to Influenza Vaccination: When Is the Critical Period for Stress, and How Does It Get Inside the Body
OBJECTIVES: This study attempted to determine whether stress of moderate intensity could modulate the antibody response to an influenza vaccination in healthy young adults, identify critical periods during which stress could influence antibody response, and delineate behavioral and biological pathways that might explain relations between stress and antibody. METHODS: A cohort of 83 healthy young adults underwent 13 days of ambulatory monitoring b…
Does positive affect influence health
This review highlights consistent patterns in the literature associating positive affect (PA) and physical health. However, it also raises serious conceptual and methodological reservations. Evidence suggests an association of trait PA and lower morbidity and of state and trait PA and decreased symptoms and pain. Trait PA is also associated with increased longevity among older community-dwelling individuals. The literature on PA and surviving ser…
A multi-lab test of the facial feedback hypothesis by the Many Smiles Collaboration
What does it mean to feel loved: Cultural consensus and individual differences in felt love
Cultural consensus theory is a statistical framework (CCT) for the study of individual differences in the knowledge of culturally shared opinions. In this article, we demonstrate how a CCT analysis can be used to study individual differences and cultural consensus on what makes people feel loved, or more generally any social behaviors that are governed by cognitive schemata. To highlight the advantages of the method, we describe a study in which …
Psychological Stress and Antibody Response to Influenza Vaccination: When Is the Critical Period for Stress, and How Does It Get Inside the Body
OBJECTIVES: This study attempted to determine whether stress of moderate intensity could modulate the antibody response to an influenza vaccination in healthy young adults, identify critical periods during which stress could influence antibody response, and delineate behavioral and biological pathways that might explain relations between stress and antibody. METHODS: A cohort of 83 healthy young adults underwent 13 days of ambulatory monitoring b…
Loneliness, Social Network Size, and Immune Response to Influenza Vaccination in College Freshmen.
Antibody response to the influenza immunization was investigated in 83 1st-semester healthy university freshmen. Elevated levels of loneliness throughout the semester and small social networks were independently associated with poorer antibody response to 1 component of the vaccine. Those with both high levels of loneliness and a small social network had the lowest antibody response. Loneliness was also associated with greater psychological stres…
Does positive affect influence health
This review highlights consistent patterns in the literature associating positive affect (PA) and physical health. However, it also raises serious conceptual and methodological reservations. Evidence suggests an association of trait PA and lower morbidity and of state and trait PA and decreased symptoms and pain. Trait PA is also associated with increased longevity among older community-dwelling individuals. The literature on PA and surviving ser…
Positive Affect and Health
Negative affective styles such as anxiety, depression, and hostility have long been accepted as predictors of increased risk for illness and mortality. In contrast, positive affective styles have been relatively ignored in the health literature. Here we highlight consistent patterns of research associating trait positive affect (PA) and physical health. The evidence we review suggests an association of trait PA and lower morbidity and decreased s…
Use of Social Words in Autobiographies and Longevity
OBJECTIVE: To analyze the relationship between social word use in autobiographies and longevity. Although there is substantial evidence that our social relationships are associated with mortality, interpretation of this work is weakened by the limitations of assessing the social environment with structured questionnaires and interviews. By analyzing the word content of autobiographies, we could assess spontaneous indicators of important social re…
Association of Enjoyable Leisure Activities With Psychological and Physical Well-Being
OBJECTIVE: To examine whether engaging in multiple enjoyable activities was associated with better psychological and physiological functioning. Few studies have examined the health benefits of the enjoyable activities that individuals participate in voluntarily in their free time. METHOD: Participants from four different studies (n = 1399 total, 74% female, age = 19-89 years) completed a self-report measure (Pittsburgh Enjoyable Activities Test (…
Optimism Is Universal: Exploring the Presence and Benefits of Optimism in a Representative Sample of the World
Current theories of optimism suggest that the tendency to maintain positive expectations for the future is an adaptive psychological resource associated with improved well‐being and physical health, but the majority of previous optimism research has been conducted in industrialized nations. The present study examined (a) whether optimism is universal, (b) what demographic factors predict optimism, and (c) whether optimism is consistently associat…
When the Love Hormone Leads to Violence: Oxytocin Increases Intimate Partner Violence Inclinations Among High Trait Aggressive People
Does oxytocin influence intimate partner violence (IPV)? Clues from prior research suggest that oxytocin increases prosocial behavior, but this effect is reversed among people with aggressive tendencies or in situations involving defensive aggression. Animal research also indicates that oxytocin plays a central role in defensive maternal aggression (i.e., protecting pups from intruders). Among highly aggressive people, a boost of oxytocin may cau…
If, Why, and When Subjective Well‐Being Influences Health, and Future Needed Research
We review evidence on whether subjective well‐being ( SWB ) can influence health, why it might do so, and what we know about the conditions where this is more or less likely to occur. This review also explores how various methodological approaches inform the study of the connections between subjective well‐being and health and longevity outcomes. Our review of this growing literature indicates areas where data are substantial and where much more …
The whole is not the sum of its parts: Specific types of positive affect influence sleep differentially
Given the known detrimental effects of poor sleep on an array of psychological and physical health processes, it is critical to understand the factors that protect sleep, especially during times of stress when sleep particularly suffers. Positive affect (PA) arises as a variable of interest given its known associations with health and health behaviors and its ability to buffer stress. In 2 studies, we examined which types of PA (distinguished by …
The Use of Smartphones as a Digital Security Blanket: The Influence of Phone Use and Availability on Psychological and Physiological Responses to Social Exclusion
OBJECTIVE: Mobile phones are increasingly becoming a part of the social environment, and when individuals feels excluded during a socially stressful situation, they often retreat to the comfort of their phone to ameliorate the negativity. This study tests whether smartphone presence does, in fact, alter psychological and physiological responses to social stress. METHODS: Participants (N = 148, 84% female, mean age = 20.4) were subjected to a peer…
Positive Affect and Health: What Do We Know and Where Next Should We Go?
Positive affect (PA) is associated with better health across a wide range of physical health outcomes. This review reflects on why the study of PA is an essential component of our understanding of physical health and expands on pathways that connect these two variables. To encourage forward movement in this burgeoning research area, measurement and design issues in the study of PA and health are discussed, as are the connections between PA and a …
Affect variability and predictability: Using recurrence quantification analysis to better understand how the dynamics of affect relate to health
Changes in affect over time have been associated with health outcomes. However, previously utilized measurement methods focus on variability of affect (e.g., standard deviation, root mean squared successive difference) and ignore the more complex temporal patterns of affect over time. These patterns may be an important feature in understanding how the dynamics of affect relate to health. Recurrence quantification analysis (RQA) may help alleviate…
What does it mean to feel loved: Cultural consensus and individual differences in felt love
Cultural consensus theory is a statistical framework (CCT) for the study of individual differences in the knowledge of culturally shared opinions. In this article, we demonstrate how a CCT analysis can be used to study individual differences and cultural consensus on what makes people feel loved, or more generally any social behaviors that are governed by cognitive schemata. To highlight the advantages of the method, we describe a study in which …
Smile (or grimace) through the pain? The effects of experimentally manipulated facial expressions on needle-injection responses
Smiling has been previously shown to improve stress responses. We replicated and expanded this work by testing whether smiling helps with a potent real-world stressor: a vaccination-like needle injection. We also extended past research by examining grimacing, a facial expression known to naturally occur during stress and pain and one that shares some of the same facial action units as smiling. Participants (n = 231; [M]age = 19.2) were randomized…
Say cheese? The connections between positive facial expressions in student identification photographs and health care seeking behavior
This study examined whether positive facial expressions in student identification photographs were connected with a health-relevant behavior: visits to a health care center in the last year for preventive and non-preventive (e.g. illness, injury) purposes. Identification photographs were coded for degree of smile. Smiling participants were more likely to have sought preventive care versus those not smiling in their photographs, but there was no d…
Vacation’s lingering benefits, but only for those with low stress jobs
Background Vacationing provides potential recovery from work stress and is associated with cardiovascular disease morbidity and mortality. This study considered psychological variables that might change as a vacation is approaching (fade-in) or after a vacation ends (fade-out) and how these associations might vary as a function of ongoing work stress. Methods: Sixty workers eligible for paid time off were recruited from the community. Multiple as…
Associations Between Gut Microbes and Social Behavior in Healthy 2-Year-Old Children
OBJECTIVE: Emerging research has connected abundances of specific bacteria to differences in psychosocial behaviors in animals and adult humans. However, research assessing mind-microbiome associations in children is sparse with extant work primarily focused on populations with autism, making it unclear whether links are also present in typically developing children. The current study fills this gap by examining associations between prosocial-sel…
A multi-lab test of the facial feedback hypothesis by the Many Smiles Collaboration
Psychology Meets Biology in Covid-19: What We Know and Why It Matters for Public Health
Psychosocial factors are related to immune, viral, and vaccination outcomes. Yet, this knowledge has been poorly represented in public health initiatives during the COVID-19 pandemic. This review provides an overview of biopsychosocial links relevant to COVID-19 outcomes by describing seminal evidence about these associations known prepandemic as well as contemporary research conducted during the pandemic. This focuses on the negative impact of t…
The subcomponents of affect scale (SAS): Validating a widely used affect scale
OBJECTIVE: There is a need for a brief affect scale that also encompasses different components of affect relevant for researchers interested in physiological and health outcomes. The Subcomponents of Affect Scale (SAS) meets this need. This 18-item scale has nine positive and nine negative affect items encompassing six subscales (calm, well-being, vigour, depression, anxiety, anger). Previous research using the SAS has demonstrated its predictive…
Superwoman schema and arterial stiffness in Black American women: Assessing the Role of Environmental Mastery
BACKGROUND: Emerging evidence suggests that the Superwoman Schema (SWS)-the sociocultural representation of Black women as naturally strong, independent, and nurturing-may play an important role in Black women's cardiovascular health; but findings have been relatively mixed. One interesting possibility is that environmental mastery, a sense of control over one's environment, may mitigate negative aspects of SWS. PURPOSE: We investigated whether m…
Psychology (21 works) · Medicine (14 works) · Social Psychology (14 works) · Clinical Psychology (9 works) · Psychiatry (7 works) · Psychological Well-being and Life Satisfaction (7 works) · Communication (5 works) · Developmental psychology (5 works) · Gerontology (5 works) · Affect (linguistics) (4 works)