Task performance and magnitude of goal valence

J. W. Brehm and his associates (J. W. Brehm, R. A. Wright, S. Solomon, L. Silka, & J. Greenberg, 1983, Journal of Experimental Social Psychology, 19, 21–48) recently argued that the magnitude of goal valence (the attractiveness or unattractiveness of a potential outcome) varies directly with motivational arousal level. Motivational arousal, in turn, is thought to be a function of the perceived difficulty of goal attainment. This formulation was tested in the present study by examining the relationship between goal attractiveness ratings and performance on an anagram task. According to the Yerkes-Dodson law (R. M. Yerkes & J. D. Dodson, 1908, Journal of Comparative Neurological Psychology, 18, 459–482), the relationship between motivational arousal and performance should be curvilinear; optimal performance is usually observed for moderate levels of motivation relative to either low or very high motivation levels. Consistent with the Brehm et al. hypothesis, optimum performance in the present study was observed for subjects who reported moderate levels of goal attractiveness relative to subjects who reported either low or high levels of goal attractiveness. Anticipatory ratings of the difficulty of the anagrams were also congruent with the Brehm et al. model. These findings converge with data from other studies supporting the utility of goal attractiveness as an index of motivational arousal and provide an additional dimension of support for the model proposed by Brehm et al.     

Distraction and social comparison as mediators of social facilitation effects

Sanders and Baron (Journal of Personality and Social Psychology, 1975, 32, 956–963) suggested that increases in drive produced by the presence of others (social facilitation) are due to the tendency for others to distract task performers as they worked on a task. This Distraction-Conflict theory proposes that socially mediated drive induction will occur whenever there is some reason to shift attention from the task to the social stimuli. In the case of humans, one such reason may be the opportunity to obtain social comparison information from an audience or coactors. The present research demonstrated that social facilitation effects (improved simple task performance and impaired complex task performance produced by the presence of others) occurred only when subjects were motivated to obtain comparison information (Experiment I) and when comparison information was available (Experiment II). The availability of comparison information also led to increased accuracy in estimating the coactor's performance. This indicated that in conditions manifesting social facilitation, subjects were spending some time monitoring the coactor's work, which is an inherently distracting activity. Several supplementary measures of distraction were generally consistent in indicating greater distraction under conditions manifesting social facilitation. The present results offer no support for the explanations of social facilitation suggested by Zajonc and by Cottrell.     

Hope of success and fear of failure components of Mehrabian's scales of resultant achievement motivation

This report is concerned with the factor structure and psychometric properties of the nonprojective Male and Female scales of Resultant Achievement Motivation (RAM) developed by Mehrabian (Educational and Psychological Measurement, 1968, 28, 493–503). The 26-item self-report scales along with Mandler and Sarason's (Journal of Abnormal and Social Psychology, 1952, 47, 166–173) Test Anxiety Questionnaire (TAQ) were administered to 237 males and 225 females in Experiment 1. Unrestricted maximum likelihood factor analyses of the RAM scales revealed four primary factors for each version. Since the first two factors from both analyses resembled measures of Hope of Success and Fear of Failure, two strategies for improving the scales were adopted, both of which eliminated the items loading on factors III and IV. One strategy involved adding the indexes of Hope of Success and Fear of Failure, while the other involved finding their difference. Construct validity coefficients were computed for the 26-item full scales, and the RAM measures formed using the above strategies with student grade point average and TAQ scores as the criterion variables. In Experiment 2, the appropriate RAM scale and the TAQ were administered to 30 males and 38 females. Construct validity coefficients were computed in this cross validation sample with the three RAM measures as predictors and with TAQ scores and student achievement in a course in Social/Personality Psychology as the criterion variables. The three RAM measures were used to predict the performance of 16 males who worked at a common laboratory task (anagrams) in Experiment 3. The results of all three experiments indicate the Hope of Success minus Fear of Failure measure to be the best measure of RAM from a theoretical, psychometric, and pragmatic point of view.     

Selective attention and the processing of integral and nonintegral dimensions: A developmental study

In two experiments, first- and fourth-grade subjects (age 6 and 9 years) performed a speeded card-sorting task with either integral or nonintegral dimensions. The dimensions were so arranged that subjects sorted on three types of task: (1) single dimension, (2) correlated dimensions, and (3) orthogonal dimensions. Results of the first experiment indicate that both first- and fourth-grade subjects sorted integral dimensions in a manner not qualitatively different from that of the adult (Garner & Felfoldy, Cognitive Psychology, 1970, 1, 225–241). In comparison with single-dimension tasks, performance was facilitated on the correlated-dimensions tasks and interference was observed on the orthogonal-dimensions tasks. Performances with nonintegral dimensions revealed an age-related processing difference. Fourth graders sorted nonintegral dimensions like the adult; no differences in performance were observed between the tasks. In contrast, first-graders sorted nonintegral dimensions as if they were integral. Interference was consistently observed on orthogonal-dimensions tasks. On correlated-dimensions tasks, interference was observed on easy tasks and redundancy facilitated difficult tasks. In the second experiment, first graders showed consistent facilitation on the correlated-dimensions task; all other results were indentical to those of Experiment I. The results were interpreted as consistent with perceptual learning theory (Gibson, Principles of perceptual learning and development. New York: Appleton-Century-Crofts, 1969).     

The halo effect revisited: Forewarned is not forearmed

The purpose of the present research was to determine if forewarning subjects about the halo effect eliminated the effect or made people aware of its impact. The research was a replication and extension of R. E. Nisbett and T. D. Wilson's (Journal of Personality and Social Psychology, 1977, 35, 250–256) experiment on the halo effect. Subjects viewed an interview of a college instructor who was either warm or cold and then rated his physical appearance, mannerisms, and French accent. Some subjects were told to introspect about their cognitive processes while viewing the interview and were told that the purpose of the study was to see how aware they were of the determinants of their ratings. Other subjects were also told specifically what the halo effect was and given a motivation either to show it or not to show it. In addition, a measurement technique different from that used by Nisbett and Wilson was utilized to allow a more precise measurement of awareness, and a new cover story was used to make the task more involving and important to subjects. Despite these attempts to eliminate the halo effect (or, at a minimum, to make people aware of it), the results indicated that subjects in all conditions were very susceptible to it. That is, subjects who viewed the warm version of the interview rated the instructor's appearance, mannerisms, and accent significantly higher than did those who viewed the cold version, even when informed and forewarned about this effect. The forewarning and introspection instructions also had no impact on subject's awareness of the halo effect. Subjects in all conditions indicated that their liking for the instructor had had only a minimal effect on their ratings.     

A reexamination of the faithful subject role

Fillenbaum (Journal of Personality and Social Psychology, 1966, 4, 532–537; Fillenbaum & Frey, Journal of Personality, 1970, 38, 43–51) has proposed that a relatively large number of subjects within certain experiments will adopt a faithful subject role, that is, they will intentionally avoid basing their behavior on any suspicions they may have regarding the experimenter's hypothesis. However, examination of the studies on which this conclusion was based casts doubt on whether Fillenbaum's subjects were truly faithful or whether they may have become aware of the nature of the deception after all opportunity for awareness to influence their responses had passed. To test this hypothesis, awareness measures were administered to subjects either before they took an incidental learning test or (as in Fillenbaum's studies) after the test. As predicted, fewer subjects were classified as faithful in the first condition than in the second. It was concluded that, in fact, very few if any subjects are actively faithful. Discussion also concerned the problems associated with role analyses of subject behavior.     

Self-focused attention and reactions to conflicting standards

A fundamental postulate of self-awareness theory that has received considerable empirical support is that self-focused attention increases behavioral consistency with “standards of correctness.” This appears to be true whether the standards are internal (such as attitudes or values) or external (e.g., norms). There is some question, however, as to what happens in situations in which an important personal standard conflicts with a salient external standard. Research by E. Diener and T. K. Srull (Journal of Personality and Social Psychology, 1979, 37, 413–423) has suggested that under such circumstances the social standard is likely to predominate. However, there is reason to believe that the standards employed in their study may not have been very salient nor very important to the subjects. In the present experiment, subjects with either conservative or liberal sexual attitudes were exposed to information suggesting a prevailing norm of sexual liberalism. They were then asked to respond to a number of sexual and nonsexual attitude measures while their attention was or was not self-directed by means of a mirror. Primary results indicated that self-awareness enhanced conformity to the social standard (as in Diener & Srull, 1979) for the conservative subjects; however, correlational analyses within the self-focused and non-self-focused conditions indicated that self-aware subjects did not “abandon” their personal standards when responding to the conformity pressure. Instead, their responses tended to be more in line with their previously expressed attitudes than did the responses of the non-self-focused group. Results are discussed in terms of the effects of self-awareness on reactions to potent, but conflicting behavioral standards.     

Unclogging the bogus pipeline: A critical reanalysis of the Cherry,Byrne, and Mitchell study

The assignment of subjects to conditions on the basis of social desirability scores could not have been done in the manner described by Cherry, Byrne, and Mitchell (Journal of Research in Personality, 1976, 10, 69–75). Even if subject assignment procedures were not challenged the data do not support the authors' conclusions. Additional statistical analyses were carried out to test the hypotheses of the original study. It is concluded that either the demand cue manipulation was not successful or else paper-and-pencil and bogus pipeline measurement procedures are equally reliable measurement devices for the attitude similarity effect.     

Altering information to gain action control: Functional aspects of human information processing in decision making

In recent approaches to social judgment, information distortion has been discussed primarily as a violation of individual rationality, due to unintentionally occurring biases. In contrast to this view, it is argued that frequently individuals make purposive use of selective changes in information processing in order to avoid indecisiveness. In this sense, selective changes in information processing may be considered a functional requirement of a volitional process which protects the current intention (or tentative decision) from being replaced by competing behavioral tendencies. On the basis of J. Kuhl's theory of action control (1981, Journal of Personality and Social Psychology, 40, 155–170; 1982, in W. Hacker, W. Volpert, & M. von Cranach, Eds., Cognitive and Motivational Aspects of Action, Amsterdam: North-Holland, 1984, in B. A. Maher, Progress in Experimental Personality Research, Vol. 13, New York: Academic Press) it was predicted that subjects having a high score on the action-control scale (i.e., action-oriented subjects) should show a stronger tendency to increase the attractiveness rating of a tentatively preferred decision during the process of decision making than subjects scoring low on that scale (i.e., state-oriented subjects). To test this assumption, students searching for an apartment were offered 16 apartments along with a list containing information about the alternatives. The subjects had to rate the attractiveness of each apartment twice before they were asked to indicate which apartments they would like to rent. The results confirmed the predictions. It was found that action-oriented subjects increased the divergence of their attractiveness ratings from the first to the second point of evaluation, whereas state-oriented subjects did not.     

Need for uniqueness,self-schemas,and thought as moderators of the false-consensus effect

L. Ross and his colleagues (L. Ross, D. Greene, & P. House, 1977, Journal of Experimental Social Psychology, 32, 880–892) have demonstrated the tendency for people to expect peer similarity in behavior, termed the “false-consensus” bias. The present study was concerned with factors that might affect the generality of this bias. Specifically, we looked at the impact of level of need for uniqueness (C. R. Snyder & H. L. Fromkin, 1977, Journal of Abnormal Psychology, 5, 518–527), existence of a self-schema (H. Markus, 1977, Journal of Personality and Social Psychology, 35, 63–78), and thought on expectations of peer similarity. It was predicted that thought would polarize the estimates of high and low N Uniq individuals in opposite directions, but only when the individual possessed a self-schema along the relevant behavioral dimension. The results for behaviors reflecting independence supported this prediction. Discussion centered around limits of the false-consensus bias, along with consideration of the complexities involved in the link between availability factors and interpersonal judgments.     

On aspiring to present a developmental theory of occupational aspirations: A reader's guide to Gottfredson

L. S. Gottfredson's preceding comment (Journal of Vocational Behavior 1983, 23, 203–212)is characterized by undocumented and arbitrary assertions. Moreover, we still maintain and cite further evidence that the features of the stages she describes represent an implausible account of development. We conclude that there is nothing in either L. S. Gottfredson's original (Journal of Counseling Psychology 1981, 28, 545–579) article or her preceding paper that leads us to alter our belief that the views we present in our own article (Journal of Vocational Behavior 1983, 23, 179–212) will be useful for the future development of vocational theory and intervention.     

On mediation

The mediation-nonmediation dichotomy proposed by the Kendlers (Psychological Review, 1962, 69, 1–16) and subscribed to by Cole and Medin (Journal of Experimental Child Psychology, 1973, 15, 352–355) is reviewed and critiqued. It is proposed that the appropriate question for research is how children mediate, not when they mediate.     

Young children's free responses to anomalous commands

Twelve children, 21–34 months old, six in R. Brown's Stage I and six in Stages II and III, responded to commands varying in length, grammaticality, and meaning. All of the children responded significantly less often when the commands were situationally anomalous and/or ungrammatical. Results failed to replicate the results of E. Shipley, E. Smith, and L. Gleitman (Language, 1969, 44, 332–342) and J. Wetstone and B. Friedlander (Child Development, 1973, 44, 743–750). The results also suggest that young children rely heavily upon situational cues in their earliest comprehension of adult speech, and this supports arguments made by J. Strohner and K. Nelson (Child Development, 45, 567–576) and R. Chapman and J. Miller (Journal of Speech and Hearing, 1975, 18, 355–371). Since subjects rely upon nonlinguistic cues to respond appropriately, syntactic competence cannot be inferred from apparent comprehension.     

Informational cues and attributions based on role behavior

A recent experiment by Messick and Reeder (Journal of Experimental Social Psychology, 1972, 18, 482–491) attempted to extend Jones, Davis, and Gergen's (Journal of Abnormal and Social Psychology, 1961, 63, 302–310) classic finding that out-of-role behavior.is more informative for person perception than in-role behavior. It is argued, however, that this study confounded two variables, role performance and occupation. Evidence is presented that the occupation variable alone could have produced Messick and Reeder's results. Both variables seem to affect attributions. The importance of these findings for relating attribution theory and role theory is discussed.     

Evaluating a sex-related ability: Comparison with same-, opposite-, and combined-sex norms

A study was conducted to replicate and extend Zanna, Goethals, and Hill's (Zanna, M. P., Goethals, G. R., & Hill, J. F. Journal of Experimental Social Psychology, 1975, 11, 86–93) experiment investigating social comparison choices for evaluating a sex-related ability. In a 2 × 3 design male and female undergraduates received ambiguous feedback about their performance on a test. The test was described as one in which either males typically excel or females typically excel, or no sex differences for performance were mentioned. Subjects were then given the opportunity to select normative comparison information in order to evaluate their performance. Information about same-sex, opposite-sex, and combined (male and female) norms was available. The results showed that interest in same-sex and combined information was high on both first and second choices. Opposite-sex comparisons were of low priority. Same-sex comparisons were of high priority even when sex differences were not made salient. Males and females differed to some extent in their comparison choices. The results suggest that while persons prefer to compare with similar (same-sex) others, they are also interested in making broader kinds of comparisons (with combined-sex norms). The results are discussed in terms of Wilson's (Wilson, S. R. Sociometry, 1973, 36, 600–607) two-process analysis of ability comparison and Goethals and Darley's (Goethals, G., & Darley, J. In J. M. Suls & R. L. Miller (Eds.), Social comparison processes; Theoretical and empirical perspectives. Washington, D. C.: Hemisphere/Halsted/Wiley, 1977) related attribute hypothesis.     

Satiation for social reinforcers: The effects of contingency,vicarious experience,and ambiguous situations

The relative satiation effect, an inverse relationship between the frequency of prior social reinforcement (the word “good”) and the later effectiveness of the social reinforcer in controlling behavior, was studied. In Experiment 1, a discrimination task in which social reinforcement was given for correct responses was administered to first- to fourth-grade children (6 to 10 years of age), who had during a preexposure phase performed a preliminary task or observed another child performing. During the preexposure phase, the experimenter delivered frequent or infrequent social reinforcement that was either contingent or noncontingent. Only performers and observers who had experienced frequent noncontingent reinforcement showed the satiation effect during the discrimination task phase. The results were interpreted as inconsistent with J. L. Gewirtz' (Developmental Psychology, 1969, 1, 2–13) social drive formulation but supportive of an informational analysis in which the children are seen as responding appropriately to unambiguous evidence concerning the reliability of contingency information. In Experiment 2, seating arrangements were varied so that information concerning the direction of reinforcement was made ambiguous. Performers were less responsive during the discrimination phase after experiencing frequent noncontingent reinforcement when seated alone or opposite an observer than when seated next to an observer. The results are interpreted as indicating trust of the reliability of the contingency under ambiguous conditions.     

Perceived infant temperament,locus of control,and maternal physiological response to infant gaze

Maternal physiologic response was used as an index of maternal attention to infant eye contact. Thirty-six women, each of whom had a 3-month-old infant, were shown 10-sec silent images of a 3-month-old infant on a videotape monitor. In one condition the en face position offered eye contact, in the other condition eye contact was not possible. Each woman viewed a sequence of six identical episodes of one condition followed by six episodes of the other condition. Heart rate and skin conductance were recorded continuously during the session. Skin conductance response did not differentiate between reciprocated and unreciprocated gaze. Cardiac response elicited by reciprocated gaze viewed first shifted from a predominately orienting response on early trials to an acceleratory response on Trial 6. The acceleratory response was most pronounced in those women identified as Externals by the Locus of Control Inventory (Rotter, J. B. Psychological Monographs, 1966, 80, [No. 609]). Initial viewing of the infant looking away elicited a predominantly deceleratory heart-rate response that did not habituate. Mothers who described their infants as being difficult as assessed by the questionnaire method (Carey, W. B. Journal of Pediatrics, 1970, 77, 188–194) were physiologically less sensitive to the change from the infant's averted gaze to its direct gaze. Results are discussed in terms of the role of direct and averted gaze during social transactions.