Adolescents' Reactions to the Evacuation of the Sinai Settlements: A Longitudinal Study

This study investigated psychological reactions of adolescents to a severe stress situation—the evacuation of the Sinai settlements. The research focused on emotional reactions of anxiety and anger to this stress situation. Two central problems were investigated: (a) The intensity of the emotional responses of anxiety and anger of the adolescents to the stress situation, before and after the evacuation, and (b) the impact of three intervening variables on these emotional reactions—cognitive perception of the political situation, family functioning, and personality characteristics. Data for this study were collected in a regional high school in Israel from 418 pupils in 9th through 12th grades. Seventy-eight of the pupils lived in the Yamit area. Measurements were obtained at three points in time: 6 weeks and 1 week before the evacuation and 2 months after it. The results supported the predicted trend that adolescents in the Yamit group before the evacuation would score higher on state anxiety and state anger than would those in the comparison group. Two months after the evacuation there was a significant drop in those scores. The trait measures remained stable in both groups and no significant differences were found between the two groups on these scores. Concerning the impact of the three intervening variables on the intensity of the state emotional responses, the results did not support any of the hypotheses.     

Job stress,emotion, and work environment: Toward a causal model

Based on a theoretical job stress model, a causal structure linking antecedent variables, intervening processes, and a physiological response variable has been proposed. Antecedent variables comprise work environment, trait-anxiety, age and weight. Cognitive appraisal processes are conceived as intervening variables that may be assessed by two questionnaire scales ‘General Job Pressure’ and ‘General Job Dissatisfaction’. It is hypothesized that job pressure results from an accumulation of negative conditions, whereas job dissatisfaction arises from a lack of positive conditions. The model was tested by a sample of 98 male Ss involved in different occupations. Emotions were incorporated into the model assuming that job pressure leads to emotional reactions of anxiety and anger, while job dissatisfaction is connected with anger only. The total model was supported by the data, although consistent relationships of work environment with job stress variables could not be established. The personality and emotion measures displayed relations expected with the subjective job stress variables. There was no relationship between blood pressure and the variables associated with stress or emotion. The results are interpreted within the theoretical framework of a general job stress model.     

Emotional Responses to a Romantic Partner's Imaginary Rejection: The Roles of Attachment Anxiety, Covert Narcissism, and Self-Evaluation

ABSTRACT These studies tested the associations between responses to an induced imaginary romantic rejection and individual differences on dimensions of attachment and covert narcissism. In Study 1 ( N =125), we examined the associations between attachment dimensions and emotional responses to a vignette depicting a scenario of romantic rejection, as measured by self-reported negative mood states, expressions of anger, somatic symptoms, and self-evaluation. Higher scores on attachment anxiety, but not on attachment avoidance, were associated with stronger reactions to the induced rejection. Moreover, decreased self-evaluation scores (self-esteem and pride) were found to mediate these associations. In Study 2 ( N =88), the relative contributions of covert narcissism and attachment anxiety to the emotional responses to romantic rejection were explored. Higher scores on covert narcissism were associated with stronger reactions to the induced rejection. Moreover, covert narcissism seemed to constitute a specific aspect of attachment anxiety.     

Moderating factors explaining stress reactions: comparing chronic-without-acute-stress and chronic-with-acute-stress situations

The author compared patterns of moderating factors explaining stress reactions during 2 states: chronic-without-acute-stress and chronic-with-acute-stress. She hypothesized that personal dispositions would contribute more to understanding stress reactions during a prolonged stress state than during an acute state. The participants were Israeli Jewish adolescents living in West Bank settlements during the prolonged (chronic-without-acute-stress) state of the intifada (the Palestinian uprising against Israeli occupation) and during the chronic-with-acute-stress state, immediately after the assassination of Prime Minister Rabin. The author examined 5 variables as moderating factors--trait anxiety, sense of coherence, cognitive appraisal of the political situation, family sense of coherence, and sense of community--and measured 2 stress reactions--state anxiety and psychological distress. Data were collected from 266 8th-grade students during the chronic-without-acute-stress state and 448 students at the same grade level at the chronic-with-acute-stress state. The overall magnitude of variance explanation was different at each state: The author found a relatively high explained variance of state anxiety and psychological distress in the chronic-without-acute-stress situation but not in the chronic-with-acute stress state. These data support the value of developing a model that would recognize the different types of stress situations for moderating the effects of stress.     

Stopping anger and anxiety: Evidence that inhibitory ability predicts negative emotional responding

Research has begun to suggest that cognitive ability contributes to emotional processes and responses. The present study sought novel evidence for this hypothesis by examining the relationship between individual differences in the capacity for inhibitory control and responses to a common emotion-induction procedure involving autobiographical memories. Participants first completed a stop-signal task to measure inhibitory control and then underwent an anger, anxiety, or neutral emotion induction. Performance on the stop-signal task predicted emotional responses such that participants with poorer inhibitory control reported larger increases in anger following the anger induction and larger increases in anxiety across emotion induction conditions, relative to better inhibitors. These results suggest that individual differences in cognitive ability may influence the intensity of emotional states induced by common laboratory methods of emotion induction.     

Anger management style and emotional reactivity to noxious stimuli among chronic pain patients and healthy controls: the role of endogenous opioids.

OBJECTIVE: Previous work suggests that elevated trait anger-out exacerbates pain responses in part through endogenous opioid dysfunction. The authors examined whether this opioid dysfunction affects not only perceived pain intensity, but also emotional responses to being hurt. DESIGN: 79 chronic low back pain (LBP) patients and 46 healthy controls received opioid blockade (8 mg naloxone i.v.) and placebo in randomized, counterbalanced order in separate sessions. During each session, participants sequentially experienced finger pressure pain and ischemic forearm pain tasks, with emotional state assessed at baseline and postpain. MAIN OUTCOME MEASURES: Blockade effects indexing opioid modulation of emotional reactivity were derived by subtracting placebo from blockade condition emotional reactivity. RESULTS: Significant Participant Type x Anger-Out interactions on blockade effects indicated that in LBP participants but not in controls, greater anger-out was associated with deficient opioid modulation of anxiety, anger, and fear reactivity to noxious stimulation. Across participant types, greater anger-in was associated with impaired opioid modulation of anxiety and fear reactivity. Anger-in opioid effects were partially due to overlap with general negative affect. CONCLUSIONS: Opioid dysfunction associated with trait anger-out may affect not only perceived pain intensity, but also pain-related suffering in individuals with chronic pain conditions. Implications for understanding the health effects of anger management styles are discussed.     

Anger and cardiovascular risk in adolescents

The present investigation examined the relationship between anger and elevations in cardiovascular risk among adolescents (n = 213). The adolescents were assessed on an anger index and also on certain physical (e.g., blood pressure, cholesterol) and psychological (e.g., anxiety, life dissatisfaction) variables associated with increased risk of cardiovascular diseases. The anger index, a composite of items from various sources, was factor analyzed, producing a terminal solution of two factors: frequent anger directed outward (FAO) and anger-producing situations (AS). Two factor scores were then computed for each subject. Regression analyses, controlling for age and sex, showed that the factor scores were predictive of the physical and psychological measures of cardiovascular risk, and that the factor scores were differentially related to these indices. These preliminary findings are supportive of systematic study both of the multidimensional nature of anger and of the associations of the dimensions of anger with indices of cardiovascular risk.     

Gender differences in emotional and overt/covert aggressive responses to stress

We examined the role of stress exposure on gender differences in hostile (emotional and behavioral) reactions within the context of a laboratory paradigm. Aggressive behavior was indexed via the intensity (overt) and the duration (covert) of putative shocks delivered to a confederate. Half of the participants were exposed to a chronic stressor (high stress) and half were not (low stress). Participants' emotional responses were measured via self-report mood ratings before and after the experiment. Men displayed higher aggression in both stress conditions, which corresponded to their ratings of state hostility. On the other hand, women in high stress delivered lower intensity shocks, and this decreased overt aggression was positively correlated with sadness ratings. However, women did not decrease their levels of shock duration (covert aggression) under high stress and showed equivalent shock duration compared with men in high stress. These findings are discussed in terms of differential overt manifestations of distress between men and women.     

Adolescents’ regulatory emotional self-efficacy beliefs and daily affect intensity

Self-efficacy beliefs in emotion regulation were shown to foster well-being and psychosocial adaptation over time. In this study, we investigated their relationship with daily affect intensity among 199 adolescents aged 15–19. Participants completed the Regulatory Emotional Self-Efficacy Scale measuring perceived capability to manage the experience and expression of negative emotions (SE-NE) and positive emotions (SE-PO). Through Experience Sampling Method, for 1 week they also repeatedly rated their positive affect (happiness and contentment) and negative affect (anger, anxiety, sadness). Multilevel regression models revealed an additive intensifying predictive effect of SE-PO and SE-NE on happiness and contentment, and a single direct negative effect of SE-NE on sadness. Models also highlighted an interactive effect of SE-PO and SE-NE on all negative affect variables, such that only at low SE-PO levels did high SE-NE predict lower negative affect. Findings support the relation between adolescents’ regulatory emotional self-efficacy beliefs and their daily affect intensity, bringing forward suggestions for intervention.     

Anger After Childbirth: An Overlooked Reaction To Postpartum Stressors

Other than postpartum depression, little is known about women's emotional responses to childbirth and subsequent stressors. Anger was explored on the basis of theory and evidence that it is a likely emotional response in this context. During their third trimester of pregnancy and approximately six weeks after delivery, 163 participants completed the Beck Depression Inventory and the anger subset of the Affect Balance Scale. A number of childbirth–relevant variables were examined as predictors of postpartum emotional response, controlling for prepartum levels and for the association between anger and depressed mood. As expected, a substantial group of women reported high levels of anger irrespective of depressed mood. Although the majority of variables predicted depressed mood, childcare stress, age, and religious self–identification were independently predictive of postpartum anger (all p values > .05). Implications for research and clinical intervention are discussed.     

The effects of exposure to an acute naturalistic stressor on working memory, state anxiety and salivary cortisol concentrations

Exposure to an acute naturalistic stressor induces both psychological and physiological changes in humans. The two studies reported here explored the impact of exposure to an acute naturalistic stressor on state anxiety, working memory and HPA axis activation (salivary cortisol). In both experiments, ten healthy male participants were exposed to an acute naturalistic stressor, helicopter underwater evacuation training (HUET), and their physiological and behavioural responses before (first study) and after (second study) the stressor were compared to ten non-stressed controls. The results of both experiments showed that working memory performance was preserved during anticipation of an acute stressor, but impairments were observed immediately after stress exposure. Participants reported significantly higher state anxiety levels during anticipation and following stress exposure, whereas significant elevations in cortisol levels were only observed 25 min post exposure to stress, but not before or immediately after stress exposure. The results of both experiments demonstrated a dissociation between behavioural and biochemical measures and provided evidence for a dissociation of the effects of stress on cognitive and physiological measures depending on the time of testing, with cognitive impairments most evident following stress exposure.     

Comparison of Cognitive-Behavioral Stress Management Techniques With Adolescent Boys

This study examined the effectiveness of two cognitive-behavioral interventions to help adolescent boys cope with stress and other forms of negative emotional arousal. One group of youths, those receiving cognitive restructuring, learned how to identify and monitor stress-promoting cognitions, restructure these cognitions into more adaptive thoughts, and practice and apply these acquired skills. Another group of youths received anxiety management training, and they were taught to recognize cues that signal the onset of anxiety and to react to these cues using various relaxation skills to reduce the anxiety. The youths who received training were compared with a waiting list control group on measures of anxiety, anger, self-esteem, depression, and reports of anxious self-statements. Both groups that received the intervention showed significant reductions in levels of state and trait anxiety, state anger, anger expression, and depression. These treatment gains were maintained at an 11-week follow-up.     

Affective correlates of trichotillomania

Affective correlates of hair pulling were investigated in a sample of 44 participants diagnosed with trichotillomania (TM). Participants completed the Hair Pulling Survey on which they rated the intensity of ten different affective states across three different phases of hair pulling (before, during and after). Repeated measures analysis of variance was used to examine the change of emotional experience across the hair pulling cycle. Results indicated significant decreases in boredom, anxiety and tension, and significant increases in guilt relief, sadness and anger across time (p<0.005). The role of co-existent anxiety and mood disorders also was examined using repeated measures analysis of variance. Results of these analyses indicated that patients with and without co-existent disorders differed only on patterns of anger across time, and therefore do not support affective subtypes of TM patients based on co-existent diagnosis. Implications of these findings for conceptualization and treatment of TM are discussed.     

Responses to Conflict and Cooperation in Adolescents with Anxiety and Mood Disorders

This study examined patterns of behavioral and emotional responses to conflict and cooperation in adolescents with anxiety/mood disorders and healthy peers. We compared performance on and emotional responses to the Prisoner’s Dilemma (PD) game, an economic exchange task involving conflict and cooperation, between adolescents with anxiety/depressive disorders (A/D) (N=21) and healthy comparisons (n = 29). Participants were deceived to believe their co-player (a pre-programmed computer algorithm) was another study participant. A/D adolescents differed significantly from comparisons in patterns of play and emotional response to the game. Specifically, A/D participants responded more cooperatively to cooperative overtures from their co-players; A/D girls also reported more anger toward co-players than did comparison girls. Our findings indicate that A/D adolescents, particularly females, respond distinctively to stressful social interchanges. These findings offer a first step toward elucidating the mechanisms underlying social impairment in youth with internalizing disorders. This research was supported by the Intramural Research Program of the NIH, NIMH.     

Anger proneness in women: Development and validation of the anger situation questionnaire

In the present series of studies existing hostility and anger trait questionnaires were examined. We found them to be unsuitable for our subjects and purpose, A new questionnaire based on novel principles, the Anger Situation Questionnaire (ASQ), was developed to measure anger proneness in women. The ASQ consists of 33 vignettes or scenarios, Each vignette has three dimensions: emotional experience, intensity of emotional experience, and action readiness mode. The ASQ was administered to 146 female students. Out of this sample two extreme groups were selected of 30 subjects each: one group scoring low on self-reported anger and angry readiness, the other group scoring high on both aspects. An anger-induction paradigm was developed consisting of essentially three elements: a physically aversive situation, the performance of some frustrative tasks, as well as an unpleasantly acting female experimenter. The ASQ was validated in this paradigm: subjects scoring high on the ASQ became more angry due to these manipulations; moreover, in most of the subjects at one moment or another a state of anger was induced. © 1994 wiley-Liss, Inc.     

Frequency, determinants, and consequences of different drivers’ emotions: An on-the-road study using self-reports, (observed) behaviour, and physiology

In the present study, the frequency, determinants and consequences of three relevant emotions in traffic were investigated. Based on appraisal theory, it was predicted that the combination of three appraisal components (goal congruence, blame and threat) affects the occurrence of anger, anxiety and happiness. Participants (n = 44) filled in a questionnaire containing background and personality variables, and performed a test drive in an instrumented car. During the drive, speed and heart rate were registered and the traffic environment was recorded on video. Participants verbally reported scores for emotions and perceived risk. The most frequently occurring emotion was anxiety, followed by anger and happiness. Emotions while driving were related to emotional traits. Emotions while driving were also related to traffic events: anger and anxiety were both associated with goal incongruent events, and happiness with goal congruent events. Anger was mostly associated with other-blame and anxiety with situation-blame. Anger was mostly associated with events affecting impeded progress, and anxiety with events affecting safety. Anxiety, but not anger or happiness, was associated with increased perceived risk and with increased heart rate. Participants who reported anger drove faster and exceeded the speed limit more often on a 100 km/road section than participants who did not report anger. These and other results are discussed in terms of appraisal theory and state-trait differences in emotion.     

Self‐esteem and emotional health in adolescents – gender and age as potential moderators

Moksnes, U. K. & Espnes, G. A. (2012). Self‐esteem and emotional health in adolescents – gender and age as a potential moderators. Scandinavian Journal of Psychology 53, 483–489. The present paper investigates possible gender and age differences on emotional states (depression and anxiety) and self‐esteem as well as the association between self‐esteem and emotional states. The cross‐sectional sectional sample consists of 1,209 adolescents 13–18 years from public elementary and secondary schools in mid‐Norway. The results showed that girls reported higher scores on state anxiety and state depression, whereas boys consistently scored higher on self‐esteem in all age groups. Self‐esteem was strongly and inversely associated with both state depression and state anxiety. An interaction effect of gender by self‐esteem was found on state depression, where the association was stronger for girls than for boys. The associations found give support for the positive role of self‐esteem in relation to adolescents’ emotional health and well‐being.     

The influence of situational and personal variables on the effectiveness of social support during childbirth

Abstract

This study examined the proposition that the efficacy of social support depends upon situational and personality variables. Specifically, it was hypothesized that women high on trait anxiety or undergoing their first experience of childbirth, would profit more from the presence of the husband during delivery than women low on trait anxiety or who had previously given birth. One hundred and twenty new mothers were asked to rank the level of state anxiety, state anger, tension and pain they had experienced during childbirth. Changes in their blood pressure and the amount of tranquilizing medication they had received were also measured. Results obtained with negative affectivity measures almost fully confirmed the hypotheses. Hypotheses regarding blood pressure were confirmed in part, but no support was found when using pain level and amount of tranquilizing medication as dependent variables. The findings are discussed in relation to the stress-buffering hypothesis and the manner in which trait anxiety might mediate the relationship between level of social support and individuals' stress reactions.     

Trait anxiety moderation of the effects of life stress on state anxiety

Many theories of anxiety have predicted and much previous research has indicated a person × situation interaction between stressors and trait anxiety. This study examined the hypothesized role of individual differences in trait anxiety in the relationship between naturally occurring stressors and state anxiety scores. Two hundred eighty-seven college undergraduates completed the State-Trait Anxiety Inventory, which provides both state and trait anxiety measures, and the Life Experiences Survey, which provides a measure of the amount of stress a person has undergone in the previous year. Trait anxiety scores were divided into quartiles and correlations between state anxiety scores and Life Experiences Survey scores and multiple regressions for trait anxiety and life stress to predict state anxiety were computed within each quartile. The results were that only in the first quartile was there a significant correlation between life stress and state anxiety, which was contrary to the predictions of state-trait anxiety theory. The validity of state-trait anxiety theory, as it relates to life stress, was questioned.     

Emotional adjustment in victims and perpetrators of cyberbullying and traditional bullying

Given the rise in cyberbullying among secondary education students and the importance of certain psychological adjustment variables for the comprehension of this type of violent behavior, both in bullies and in victims, the purpose of the present study was to analyse the emotional adjustment of those involved in cyber- and traditional bullying. The adjustment variables studied were self-concept, perceived stress, loneliness, depressive symptomatology, social anxiety, life satisfaction, and emotional intelligence. Using a sample of 1318 adolescents (47% boys), aged between 11 and 17 years, four groups were established to compare victims and cybervictims (uninvolved students, traditional victims, cybervictims, and traditional–cybervictims). The analysis of variance showed that students who performed the same role (bully or victim) in both contexts (at school and online). In particular, those who suffered traditional or cyberbullying or both conjointly presented lower scores in physical and social self-concept, life satisfaction, emotional clarity, and emotion regulation, as well as higher scores in perceived stress, loneliness, depression, and social anxiety. In bullies—traditional, cyberbullying or both simultaneously—higher scores were observed in perceived stress, loneliness, depressive symptomatology, fear of negative assessment, avoidance, and general social anxiety, and lower scores in the dimensions of academic and family self-concept, life satisfaction, emotional clarity, and emotion regulation. In general, the findings indicate that students who were involved in bullying situations, both victims and bullies, presented more damaged emotional profiles than those who are uninvolved, especially students who performed the same role (bully or victim) in both contexts (at school and online).