Chen Zhihu, Wen Jing, Li Yingcong, Zhang Xinyu, Lv Chenyu, Shao Jingjin
Center for Mental Health Education, Southwest University, Chongqing, China.
Faculty of Psychology, Southwest University, Chongqing, China.
J Appl Gerontol. 2025 Mar;44(3):463-472. doi: 10.1177/07334648241273441. Epub 2024 Aug 23.
Death anxiety arousal is a common tactic in fraud targeting older adults; however, little is known about its impact on vulnerability to fraud and the moderating role of mental simulation. Two experiments were conducted using the mortality salience task. Experiment 1 employed a mortality salience manipulation to examine the causality of death anxiety arousal affecting older adults' vulnerability to fraud using a behavioral experiment. Experiment 2 used the imaginary priming paradigm to manipulate different types of mental simulation to address whether mental simulation could moderate the relationship between death anxiety and vulnerability to fraud. The results showed that death anxiety significantly increased the vulnerability to fraud. Process and downward outcome simulation buffered this effect, while upward outcome simulation exacerbated it. Clinicians may focus on relieving death anxiety, decreasing upward outcome simulation, and enhancing process or downward outcome simulation as promising pathways to protect older adults against fraud.
引发死亡焦虑是针对老年人的欺诈行为中常用的手段；然而，对于其对欺诈易感性的影响以及心理模拟的调节作用却知之甚少。我们使用死亡凸显任务进行了两项实验。实验1采用死亡凸显操纵，通过行为实验来检验引发死亡焦虑对老年人欺诈易感性的因果关系。实验2使用想象启动范式来操纵不同类型的心理模拟，以探讨心理模拟是否能够调节死亡焦虑与欺诈易感性之间的关系。结果表明，死亡焦虑显著增加了欺诈易感性。过程模拟和向下结果模拟缓冲了这种影响，而向上结果模拟则加剧了这种影响。临床医生可能会将重点放在缓解死亡焦虑、减少向上结果模拟以及增强过程模拟或向下结果模拟上，以此作为保护老年人免受欺诈的有效途径。
