Experience Of Deprivation Research Articles

Reactions to naturalistic smartphone deprivation among psychiatrically hospitalized adolescents

The standard of care among youth who are psychiatrically hospitalized typically involves smartphone confiscation for the duration of treatment. However, very little is known regarding how youth respond to this period of smartphone “deprivation,” factors that may influence this response, and ensuing clinical effects. The present exploratory mixed-methods study sought to elucidate the experience of psychiatrically hospitalized adolescents as it relates to smartphone deprivation, and to evaluate the impact of this widespread treatment approach. Psychiatrically hospitalized adolescents (N = 181; Mean age = 15.29 years) completed qualitative and quantitative measures assessing the experience of smartphone deprivation during hospitalization. Associations among reactions to smartphone deprivation and smartphone and social media use patterns were explored. Analyses additionally evaluated whether reactions to smartphone deprivation were associated with clinical symptom severity (e.g., suicidal ideation, internalizing and externalizing symptoms) and readiness for psychotherapy. Negative reactions to smartphone deprivation were significantly positively correlated with daily smartphone hours, addictive patterns of use, and both negative and positive emotional responses to social media use. Reactions to smartphone deprivation were not associated with clinical symptom severity. However, negative reactions to smartphone deprivation were associated with lower readiness for therapy, while positive reactions were associated with greater readiness. This preliminary work illustrates the complexities of smartphone use in adolescents and the potential positive and negative effects of smartphone deprivation during psychiatric hospitalization. Future prospective research with adolescents should clarify optimal smartphone access during inpatient hospitalization.

‘They count us among the dead’: ageing women’s experiences of intergenerational conflict in a changing rural economy in sub-Saharan Africa

Rural economies in sub-Saharan Africa are rapidly changing. While these changes are viewed by policymakers as rural development, limited attention has been paid to how this transformation has precipitated intergenerational conflict. This qualitative research examines the consequences of a rapidly changing cash-crop economy on women’s ageing experiences. Based on a purposive sample of 14 participants, I argue that while agrarian rural development has led to strong marketisation practices aimed at accumulating capital and alleviating poverty, it has also contributed to tension between young people and those ageing in rural villages, most especially older women. This tension has created a sense of invisibility among older women, which some described as ‘being counted among the dead’. Through an inductive analysis of participants’ life stories, three overarching themes are discussed to reveal older women’s experiences of intergenerational conflict: marketisation and distorted land relations; labels of disconnect and broken social bonds; and destructive leisure consumerism. With a focus on Uganda, the paper contributes to articulating new dimensions to older women’s experiences of material and non-material deprivation within shared resource bases in transitioning rural economies of sub-Saharan Africa.

Dynamic-IMD (D-IMD): Introducing activity spaces to deprivation measurement in London, Birmingham and Liverpool

Indicators of deprivation intersect a variety of disciplinary contexts. In this article, we build a multi-space measure of deprivation by introducing urban mobilities derived from location footprints of nearly three million mobile phone users. Traditionally, experiences of deprivation have been estimated through a lens fixed to residential spaces, which overlooks the likelihood individuals experience deprivation beyond that implied by where they live. By quantifying how exposure to deprivation varies by human movement patterns across three English cities, we construct a Dynamic Index of Multiple Deprivation (D-IMD). Analysis of this measure highlights how deprivation exposure converges to a more homogenous middle ground, which implies the deprivation gap lessens as individuals across the socio-economic spectrum coalesce in spaces that exhibit similar environmental conditions. Using a hypothetical example, our D-IMD measure identifies 185 neighbourhoods that would enter England's eligibility criteria for funding opportunity intended to alleviate socio-economic inequality and hardship. These practical implications are extensible to international contexts that mobilise deprivation indices in similar ways to English institutions.

Exploring the need for external input through the prism of social, material and sensation seeking input.

External input is any kind of physical stimulation created by an individual's surroundings that can be detected by the senses. The present research established a novel conceptualization of this construct by investigating it in relation to the needs for material, social and sensation seeking input, and by testing whether these needs predict psychological functioning during long- and short-term input deprivation. It was established that the three needs constitute different dimensions of an overarching construct (i.e. need for external input). The research also suggested that the needs for social and sensation seeking input are negatively linked to people's experiences of long-term input deprivation (i.e. COVID-19 restrictions), and that the need for material input may negatively predict the experiences of short-term input deprivation (i.e. sitting in a chair without doing anything else but thinking). Overall, this research indicates that the needs for social, material and sensation seeking input may have fundamental implications for experiences and actions in a range of different contexts.

Area-level deprivation and adverse childhood experiences among high school students in Maryland

BackgroundNearly one-half of Americans have been exposed to at least one adverse childhood experience (ACE) before turning 18, contributing to a broad array of problems spanning physical health, mental and behavioral health, and psychosocial functioning.MethodsThis was a cross-sectional, survey research study, using 2018 data from a state adolescent health surveillance system, i.e., Maryland Youth Risk Behavior Survey/Youth Tobacco Survey. The population-based sample of Maryland high school students (n = 41,091) is representative at the state and county levels. The outcome variables included five binary measures of ACEs (i.e., food insecurity, parental substance use/gambling, parental mental illness, family member in jail/prison, and caregiver verbal abuse), and number of ACEs. The main exposure variable, area-level socioeconomic disadvantage, was assessed at the county level using a continuous measure of the area deprivation index (ADI). Additional covariates included: rural county status, age, race/ethnicity, sex, and sexual or gender minority (SGM) status. We used mixed-effect multivariate logistic regression to estimate the odds of ACEs in association with socioeconomic deprivation. Models were adjusted for all covariates.ResultsCounty-level ADI was associated with 3 of the 5 ACES [i.e., food insecurity (OR = 1.10, 95% CI: 1.07–1.13), parental substance use/gambling (OR = 1.05, 95% CI: 1.02–1.07), and incarceration of a family member (OR = 1.14, 95% CI: 1.09–1.19)]; and with having at least one ACE (i.e., OR = 1.08, 95% CI: 1.05–1.10). Odds of reporting at least one ACE were higher among girls, older adolescents (i.e., aged 16 and ≥ 17 relative to those aged ≤ 14 years), and among SGM, Black, and Latinx students (all ORs > 1.20).ConclusionsACEs greatly increase risk for adolescent risk behaviors. We observed an increased likelihood of adversity among youth in more deprived counties and among Black, Latinx, or SGM youth, suggesting that social and structural factors play a role in determining the adversity that youth face. Therefore, efforts to address structural factors (e.g., food access, family financial support, imprisonment as a sanction for criminal behavior) could be a critical strategy for primary prevention of ACEs and promoting adolescent health.

Multidimensional Impact Evaluation: The Impact of the Women’s Income Generating Support Program in Northern Uganda

Abstract This paper assesses the impact of a human capital and cash transfer intervention on individual disempowerment. Using a randomised controlled trial across 120 villages in Northern Uganda, we take a multidimensional measurement approach to evaluate the impact of Women’s Income Generating Support Program on the empowerment of ultra-poor and conflict-affected women. Building on the findings of Blattman et al. (2016) who find positive effects of the program on microenterprise ownership and income, we investigate the effects of the program on women who were most disempowered through an analysis of the joint distribution of the impacts and the changes in deprivation profiles of the targeted populations. Using a measure of ten indicators in five dimensions, we find that the intervention is successful in reducing the average number of deprivations by 13.6% on average relative to the control group at endline. Our analysis show that the intervention was successful in reducing the incidence and the severity of disempowerment among those who experience it more severely. However, we find that, even at endline, most of the participants in the sample experienced deprivation in at least two of the ten indicators simultaneously and that the group dynamics arm of the program did not have a significant impact on the beneficiaries’ empowerment.

Epigenetics of early-life adversity in youth: cross-sectional and longitudinal associations

BackgroundAltered DNA methylation (DNAm) may be one pathway through which early-life adversity (ELA) contributes to adverse mental and physical health outcomes. This study investigated whether the presence versus absence of ELA experiences reflecting the dimensions of threat and deprivation were associated with epigenome-wide DNAm cross-sectionally and longitudinally in a community-based sample of children and adolescents.MethodsIn 113 youths aged 8–16 years with wide variability in ELA, we examined associations of abuse (physical, sexual, emotional; indicating threat-related experiences) and neglect (emotional, physical; indicating deprivation-related experiences) with DNAm assessed with the Illumina EPIC BeadChip array, with DNA derived from saliva. In cross-sectional epigenome-wide analyses, we investigated associations of lifetime abuse and neglect with DNAm at baseline. In longitudinal epigenome-wide analyses, we examined whether experiencing abuse and neglect over an approximately 2-year follow-up were each associated with change in DNAm from baseline to follow-up.ResultsIn cross-sectional analyses adjusting for lifetime experience of neglect, lifetime experience of abuse was associated with DNAm for four cytosine-phosphodiester-guanine (CpG) sites (cg20241299: coefficient = 0.023, SE = 0.004; cg08671764: coefficient = 0.018, SE = 0.003; cg27152686: coefficient = − 0.069, SE = 0.012; cg24241897: coefficient = − 0.003, SE = 0.001; FDR < .05). In longitudinal analyses, experiencing neglect over follow-up was associated with an increase in DNAm for one CpG site, adjusting for abuse over follow-up (cg03135983: coefficient = 0.036, SE = 0.006; FDR < .05).ConclusionsIn this study, we identified examples of epigenetic patterns associated with ELA experiences of threat and deprivation that were already observable in youth. We provide novel evidence for change in DNAm over time in relation to ongoing adversity and that experiences reflecting distinct ELA dimensions may be characterized by unique epigenetic patterns.

A Longitudinal Examination of Child Maltreatment Dimensions, Emotion Regulation, and Comorbid Psychopathology.

Childhood maltreatment is a toxic stressor that occurs in the family context and is related to adverse outcomes including elevations in internalizing symptomology and externalizing symptomology. In the present study, we tested the role of threat and deprivation dimensions of child maltreatment in the etiology of comorbid psychopathology in emerging adulthood. Additionally, we investigated emotion regulation and emotion lability/negativity as mechanisms underlying the relationship between child maltreatment dimensions and emerging adult psychopathology. To address these aims, we used a longitudinal sample of emerging adults (N = 413, Mage = 19.67, 78.0% Black, 51.1% female) who had previously participated in research assessments at age 10-12. Using a person-centered approach with latent profile analysis, we identified three classes of emerging adulthood psychopathology characterized by different levels of symptom severity and comorbidity between internalizing and externalizing symptoms. Emerging adults who experienced deprivation only, compared to those who were not maltreated, were more likely to belong to a comorbid and severe psychopathology class versus the other identified psychopathology classes. There was also a significant indirect pathway from experiences of both threat and deprivation to a high externalizing class via emotion lability/negativity. Our results contribute to current models of childhood adversity and psychopathology and have implications for interventions to prevent psychopathology among emerging adults exposed to child maltreatment.

Lived Experiences of Widows of Armed Conflict in Kashmir: A Qualitative Study.

Armed conflicts create significant risks on almost every section of the society, as new forms of violence arise and the existing ones get exaggerated. In Kashmir, the long-standing conflict has resulted in the number of widows, orphans and enforced disappearance; however, little in-depth attention has been given in the literature on widows to the impact of this conflict. This present study examined the lived experiences of Kashmiri widows who had lost their husbands to the on-going conflict. Using the snowball sampling approach, 12 women were recruited for the face-to-face in-depth interviews. The findings of the study gained an in-depth understanding of the experiences of violence, deprivation, social stigma and psychological trauma, followed by their strategies for coping and struggle for justice. Widows are the worst hit victims of armed conflict and, therefore, inclusive interventions are needed to enhance the status of widows in a long run.

An exploration of dimensions of early adversity and the development of functional brain network connectivity during adolescence: Implications for trajectories of internalizing symptoms.

Different dimensions of adversity may affect mental health through distinct neurobiological mechanisms, though current supporting evidence consists largely of cross-sectional associations between threat or deprivation and fronto-limbic circuitry. In this exploratory three-wave longitudinal study spanning ages 9-19 years, we examined the associations between experiences of unpredictability, threat, and deprivation with the development of functional connectivity within and between three brain networks implicated in psychopathology: the salience (SAL), default mode (DMN), and fronto-parietal (FPN) networks, and tested whether network trajectories moderated associations between adversity and changes in internalizing symptoms. Connectivity decreased with age on average; these changes differed by dimension of adversity. Whereas family-level deprivation was associated with lower initial levels and more stability across most networks, unpredictability was associated with stability only in SAL connectivity, and threat was associated with stability in FPN and DMN-SAL connectivity. In youth exposed to higher levels of any adversity, lower initial levels and more stability in connectivity were related to smaller increases in internalizing symptoms. Our findings suggest that whereas deprivation is associated with widespread neurodevelopmental differences in cognitive and emotion processing networks, unpredictability is related selectively to salience detection circuitry. Studies with wider developmental windows should examine whether these neurodevelopmental alterations are adaptive or serve to maintain internalizing symptoms.

Adversity in early childhood: Long-term effects on early academic skills

BackgroundThe dimensional adversity model (McLaughlin & Sheridan, 2016) proposes that deprivation and threat affect child development differently. However, empirical support for the dimensional adversity model stems predominately from adolescent samples. ObjectiveWe aimed to examine if deprivation and threat experiences in infancy have differential effects on pre-academic skills in early childhood. Furthermore, we addressed the effect of chronic vs. temporary adversity exposure in infancy. Participants and SettingThe population-based sample consisted of 3481 infants (49% girls). New-borns and their families were followed longitudinally (6 months to 6 years of age). MethodsBased on parental information, we computed four deprivation variables and three threat variables. Pre-academic cognitive and social-emotional skills were measured with a math and a vocabulary test and parental questionnaires on emotion regulation and behavioral problems. ResultsResults showed that infant deprivation (but not threat) is negatively associated with math scores (β = −0.06) and language skills (β = −0.04) in kindergarten. However, infant threat and deprivation were both associated with behavioral problems (β = 0.06; β = 0.04) and emotion-regulation difficulties (β = 0.04; β = 0.03) in kindergarten. Analyses comparing chronic vs. temporary adversity exposure showed that chronic exposure was strongly related to all cognitive and social-emotional outcomes. ConclusionsWe found partial support for the differential effects of deprivation and threat on pre-academic skills. Furthermore, the results suggest that particularly chronic adversity poses a potential risk for development - across domains of cognition and emotions.

Scales Off My Eyes: Tutors Teaching about Racism at a South African University

Critical whiteness studies (CWS) holds that challenging systemic racism in higher education must include scholarly attention to the everyday conditions under which students engage and produce knowledge about racism. This study examines the context of tutorials on postcolonial literature in a historically-white South African Department of English. Using individual interviews with contractually-employed Tutors, I map how these Tutors assign meaning to discomforting experiences and how they manage their own intersectional subjectivities while engaging undergraduates on systemic racism via postcolonial literature. Specifically, many students attempted to explore marginalization by grounding their essays in lived experiences of material deprivation. How Tutors’ responses might be read within CWS is a core concern of this article.

Association between adverse childhood experiences and brain volumes among Japanese community-dwelling older people: Findings from the NEIGE study

BackgroundAdverse childhood experiences (ACEs) can affect later-life health outcomes via brain structural differences. However, there is no sufficient empirical evidence about whether brain morphological differences remain until old ages. ObjectiveWe examined the association between ACEs and brain volumes among older individuals. Participants and settingResidents aged 65–84 years in Tokamachi City, Japan, were randomly recruited, and 491 participants were included in the analysis. MethodsACEs were assessed with a self-reported questionnaire. The volumes of seven brain regions of interests were evaluated via structural magnetic resonance imaging. ResultsIn total, 143 (27.1%) participants experienced one ACE and 33 (6.7%) two or more ACEs. Participants with two or more ACEs had a larger anterior cingulate cortex volume (B = 0.346, 95% confidence interval [CI] = 0.04 to 0.66) and smaller hippocampal (B = −0.287, 95% CI = −0.58 to 0.001) and amygdala (B = −0.313, 95% CI = −0.59 to −0.03) volumes. Interestingly, we observed a distinct association between deprivation and threat. That is, deprivation was associated with a smaller amygdala volume (B = −0.164, 95% CI = −0.32 to −0.01) and threat with a larger anterior cingulate cortex volume (B = 0.401, 95% CI = 0.11 to 0.70). ConclusionsACEs were associated with the volumes of brain regions such as anterior cingulate cortex, hippocampus, and amygdala, which are responsible for emotion and self-regulation in older population. The effect of ACEs on the amygdala was commonly driven by deprivation experiences and that on the anterior cingulate cortex by threat.

New spiritual movements as autonomous religiosity of Iranian young adults

New religious converts experience many ups and downs before and after conversion and acquire a new and alternative understanding of religion and religiosity. The paper seeks to examine their spiritual experiences before and after converting to NSMs and answer this question: what factors and experiences led to the emergence of such a transformation in their religious life? For this purpose, we examined the narratives of people who had converted to NSMs in Iran using narrative interviews and narrative analysis methods. The findings show that such factors and experiences as the imposition of the official and superficial interpretation of religion, the experience of deprivation in one's personal and social life, distressing experiences of encounters with evil, and the search for meaning all brought about changes in people's religious loyalties. We also identified the most meaningful aspects of the spiritual transformation of the studied converts to NSMs, these promoting "Autonomous Religiosity" over "Heteronomous Religiosity". By examining their narratives, we discovered the following coordinates as the most critical manifestations of their spiritual transformation: adherence to beliefs and rituals in early religious life; the reduction of religion to inner spirituality; anti-superficial esotericism; and maximum tolerance in all aspects of religiosity

Психологические последствия переживания стресса в детском возрасте — феномены «оставленности» и «вовлеченности»

The article deals with the fundamental problem of psychology, devoted to the theoretical analysis of the specifics of the child's experience of stressful situations with different levels of traumatization. Along with the lack of childhood stress understanding and research, the very principles of differentiation between every day and traumatic stress remain the least studied. In the theory of post-traumatic stress, it has been proven that one of the criteria for the danger/safety of a life situation is a person's subjective evaluation of the life threat degree. Such an assessment is based on the individual's representations of psychological safety and its components, such as "internal comfort", "experience/awareness" and "positive environment". In the course of a theoretical analysis of the problem of child's stress, we have shown in the article that a child's feeling of internal comfort and stability depends on the degree of the environment activity, its ability not only to protect the child, but also to provide additional opportunities. In accordance with the purpose of the work, the primary emphasis is not on the resourcefulness of the child's social environment, but on its limitation — the phenomena of "abandonment" and "involvement", which are analyzed taking into account a specific context — the impact on the child of everyday stressors and stressors of high intensity. The methodological basis of the study was the system (B.F. Lomov) and subject-activity approaches (S.L. Rubinshtein, A.V. Brushlinsky and others), the dynamic approach to the study of personality (L.I. Antsyferova). Focusing on these approaches has allowed us to consider the child stress in accordance with a whole system of factors (the nature of the stressor, supporting/non-supporting social environment, etc.). The methods of abstraction, formalization and interpretation are used as theoretical procedures. On the basis of an expert assessment, the features of reactions to everyday stress (situations of interaction of a child with parents and peers) are highlighted, which, unlike traumatic stress (situations of an extreme nature), are not determined by the impact of a specific stressor, but arise as a response to a latent cause of a diffuse nature associated with violation of social and information safety of the child. Manifestations of everyday stress act as a child's reaction to the feeling of "abandonment", which turns out to be associated with emotional, social and informational deprivation, with the leveling or distortion by adults of the child's social roles (the role structure of interaction). The feeling of being "involved" in the context of a traumatic event is accompanied by physical deprivation and a more intense experience of emotional deprivation (emotional rejection), including the child in non-normative social relations and imposing obligations on him that do not correspond to the level of the child's physical, social and mental maturity. The phenomena of abandonment and involvement are analyzed using examples of various situations of everyday and psycho-traumatic nature.

Memory, innocence and nostalgia: other versions of African childhood in two African texts

There are a number of memoirs/autobiographies and biographies by African writers on their childhoods in Africa. However, many of these texts tend to focus mostly on the child protagonist�s experiences of colonialism, slavery, war, death and deprivation. This article moves away from these narratives of deprivation and trauma, focusing on other versions of African childhoods where the child lives a carefree life devoid of danger and scarcity of resources. Using Camara Laye�s The Dark Child and Wole Soyinka�s Ak�: The Years of Childhood and doing a textual analysis of the content, themes and characters, this article argues that these texts can be read as recollections of nostalgia and memories of a carefree time in the life of two African children, a time that the narrators reminisce upon through the act of retelling in order to revisit the joys and innocence of those days.

The precarisation of daily life in Spain: Austerity, social policy and food insecurity

This article examines the extent to which the 2008 economic crisis has led to a shift in ways of eating among people living in precarious conditions in Spain, and the kinds of strategies they have developed to obtain daily food. Building on a literature review on precarisation in Spain and an analysis of action plans to combat food insecurity, participant-observation ethnography was carried out in Catalonia. Fieldwork was conducted during 2017–2019 in public and private spaces focusing on the food practices of 51 first-time applicants for social assistance. Qualitative data obtained from interviews and direct observation were recorded, transcribed and coded using the ATLAS-ti program to facilitate thematic analysis. Study participants’ oral narratives reveal substantial changes in food procurement and eating practices. Strategies include buying different foods, shopping less often and/or in different stores, seeking out cheaper brands, preparing simpler dishes, growing food and recycling leftovers. Their food itineraries reflect increasing reliance on charities, although a common alternative is meals prepared outside the home by family, neighbourhood, activist organisations or themselves. Eating patterns reveal not only experiences of food deprivation and social suffering, but also alternative ways of food procurement. Although food aid is based mainly on an assistance-oriented model, participatory initiatives have the potential to become political spaces that invite us to rethink the distribution of food resources and the limitations of social policies.

Life satisfaction among alumni of youth villages in Israel: A life course perspective.

Empirical evidence on life satisfaction of care leavers is scant and often based on small and nonrepresentative samples. Based on the life course perspective, this study explored the role of objective and subjective factors in explaining life satisfaction among care leavers, both general and domain-specific (work-financial-housing, social relationships-emotional state). The sample was randomly drawn from the whole population of eight graduating birth cohorts of alumni of educational residential care in Israel and consists of 2, 295 alumni (24-31 years old). The study is based on an extensive set of longitudinal administrative records combined with structured phone interviews. Bivariate analysis and multiple regression models were used to assess associations between precare context, in-care and postcare experiences and achievements with general and domain-specific life satisfaction. Gender differences were found in both domain-specific life satisfactions with men having greater satisfaction. Family background indicators were generally more predictive of general and social relationships- emotional state satisfaction. In-care experiences of peer and staff support and postcare experience of material deprivation were strong predictors of general and domain-specific life satisfaction. Postcare contacts with care staff, surprisingly, were associated with lower general satisfaction and satisfaction with social relationships-emotional state. Higher educational attainment at the end of placement and integration into postsecondary education were associated with greater general and work-financial-housing satisfaction. The effects of in-care preparation for independent adult living, employment and parenthood are not consistent across different domains of life satisfaction. Implications for policy and practice during and after care are discussed. (PsycInfo Database Record (c) 2022 APA, all rights reserved).

IDEOLOGIJA IZBORA U ROMANU „SEOBE“ MILOŠA CRNjANSKOG

When in the novel Migration by Miloš Crnjanski the idea of the Serbian choice is articulated in one unfinished, interrupted sentence – „You Serbs prefer to choose military work, so ...” (Crnjanski 2008: 25) – an example of this articulation ironically marks the historical role of the nation. it is not possible to make a choice within the socio-political system of the Austrian monarchy that would stabilize the position of the community in the empire, ensure it in an appropriate way. The incompleteness, the interruption of the sentence that formulates the perspective of the Serbian choice, indicates a strong narrative sense of the historical conditioning of identity. The political affirmation of the military identity of Serbs delegitimizes the heroic ethos that is the basis of the Serbian historical being. The ideological use of the Serbian warrior discourse indicates that a modern mechanism of identity regulation is active in the world of the novel Migration. The nation learns about the experience of ontological deprivation to be realized in the dimension of dying in war, which would provide it with historical and metaphysical meaning. Crnjanski’s novel reveals the fundamental difference between an ideologically constructed stereotype of identity and an ontological inversion of historical experience.

Divine discontent: aspirations and subjective well-being at a time of social mobility and high inequality

ABSTRACT This paper empirically explores processes of adaptation and social comparison advanced in the “hedonic treadmill” explanation for the income-happiness paradox, as well as advances recent theories that point to the roles of poverty, inequality, and connectedness in aspirations behaviour. Subjective well-being and aspirations are measured using the South African Social Attitudes Study of 2006, a year characterised by a peak in post-apartheid economic growth and inequality. Inequality and connectedness are found to play decisive roles in experiences of social comparison and relative deprivation. Income growth paths that contribute to higher inequality and/or lower connectedness are related to narrower aspirations gaps and aspirations failure amongst the objectively poor, whilst also widening the aspirations gaps of those engaged in upward social comparisons. Conversely, inequality tied to greater connectedness inspires aspirations, although not beyond a level that could potentially frustrate. This has implications for subjective well-being, indicated to decrease significantly with aspirations gaps.