Minority influence and social categorization

In this article, a theoretical distinction is proposed between representative outgroup minorities (representative of a minority category in the society, e.g. gays) and dissident outgroup minorities (defined as a minority subgroup within a larger outgroup category). Two studies are reported comparing the social influence of dissident outgroup minorities with that of ingroup minorities (belonging to the subject's own social category). It was predicted that a position advocated by a dissident outgroup minority would be more readily accepted than that of an ingroup minority, but that the ingroup minority would be more likely to elicit the generation of new, alternative solutions. A first experiment in which subjects were either exposed to an ingroup minority, an outgroup minority, or no influence source confirmed these predictions. In a second experiment, subjects were either exposed to a majority or to a minority source either belonging to the subject's own social category or to the outgroup. The results indicate that the position of an ingroup majority was readily accepted whereas the otherwise identical message of an outgroup majority was rejected; neither ingroup nor outgroup majority stimulated the development of alternative proposals. Again, in line with Nemeth' (1986a) theory, the position of an ingroup minority was rejected but stimulated the generation of new, alternative proposals. The differential role of social category membership in minority and majority influence and the applicability of Nemeth' (1986a) theory to the attitude change area are discussed.     

Cognitive Biases and Political Party Affiliation in Intergroup Conflict

Employing the motivational basis of the false consensus bias, this study hypothesized that the degree of assumed similarity to in-group attitudes would differ among supporters of various political groups in intergroup conflict. We defined a conflict-maintaining bias, the adversary's extremity bias, and examined how the degree of the bias would also differ among supporters of various political groups. Data were gathered from Arab and Jewish high school and university students in Israel. Our hypotheses, that in intergroup conflict assumed similarity to in-group attitudes and the adversary's extremity bias would be greater among supporters of less conciliatory political parties than among supporters of more conciliatory political parties, were supported for one group in the conflict but not the other. Explanations of our findings are based on the differential power status of the 2 groups in the particular conflict.     

Coping Strategies as Predictors of Distress in Survivors of Single and Multiple Sexual Victimization and Nonvictimized Controls

This study investigated the relationship between coping strategies and distress symptomatology in survivors of sexual revictimization. Coping strategies were assessed with the revised Ways of Coping Scale (Aldwin & Revenson, 1987). Distress symptoms included global distress, depression, anxiety, and somatization. Subjects were 44 survivors of sexual victimization in both childhood and adulthood; 54 survivors of a single incident of sexual victimization in childhood; and 256 nonvictimized individuals. All were drawn from a subject pool of female undergraduate students. Multivariate analysis of variance revealed significant differences between groups on reported symptomatology and coping strategies. Victimized groups reported more distress than did the nonvictimized group. The multiple victimization group indicated greater use of coping strategies than did the nonvictimized group, and both victimized groups reported greater use of the escapism strategy than did the nonvictimized group. Multiple backward regression analysis found that coping strategies were predictive of distress symptomatology in all three groups, with escapism as the most potent predictor of distress for each group. Coping strategies were the most powerful predictors of distress in the multiply victimized group. The results of this study provide strong support for the importance of addressing coping strategies in clinical intervention of distress, particularly with survivors of multiple sexual victimization.     

Division of labor in conversations: Are Fishman's results replicable and generalizable?

Fishman's (1978a) conclusion that women do the bulk of the support work in their conversations with male partners has had widespread appeal. In this article, we present the results of two studies designed to assess the generalizability and replicability of her findings. In Study 1. the get-acquainted conversations of 20 mixed-sex, 10 male same-sex, and 10 female same-sex dyads were analyzed for the support strategies identified by Fishman. No support for a sexual division of labor was found. In Study 2, we analyzed the casual, at-home conversations of 17 intimate male-female couples. Again, we found no evidence that the women used more of the support strategies than their male partners. Rather, our findings suggest that the women may have helped to sustain the conversations with their male partners simply by talking more. The appeal of Fishman's conclusions in the absence of empirical evidence suggests that she has touched on a mythic truth.This article is based on a Master's thesis by the second author (Study 1) and an Honour's thesis by the third author (Study 2) under the supervision of the first author.     

Judgments and definitions of sexual harassment by high school students

This study considers how high school students perceive incidents of possible sexual harassment toward students and how they define sexual harassment. Thirty-five male and 38 female high school seniors (44% Asian-American; 40% white, non-Hispanic; 6% Indian-American; 4% African-American; 3% Hispanic; and 3% other ethnic groups) evaluated scenarios that varied the type of sexual harassment, the status of the initiator (either teacher or student), and the gender composition of the dyad (either male toward female or female toward male). As predicted, type of harassment influenced ratings of severity. Compared to male respondents, female respondents rated the scenarios as more severe. Teachers were judged more critically than students. Differences in status were more apparent at less severe levels of harassment. In defining harassment, students relied on four factors: the behavior itself, the target's reaction to the behavior, the perpetrator's intentions, and the relationship that existed between the two people. Overall, the findings underline the importance of examining high schools as a locale for harassment.This study was originally conducted by the first author as a Westinghouse Science project at Stuyvesant High School, with the guidance of the second and third authors.     

Session helpfulness and session evaluation in short‐term counselling

The relationship between perceived session helpfulness and session evaluation was examined in 11 dyads during eight sessions of short‐term counselling. Results based on the Session Evaluation Questionnaire (Stiles, 1980) showed that, for clients, while depth, arousal, and positivity correlated with perceived session helpfulness, only depth and positivity entered a stepwise regression, yielding a multiple correlation of 0.76. For counsellors, while depth and positivity correlated with session perceived helpfulness, only depth entered the stepwise regression analysis, with a correlation of 0.70. Session depth also consistently correlated with change in perceptions of helpfulness from one session to another. Clients had higher depth scores for sessions that both participants rated as helpful. They had lower depth scores for sessions rated as less helpful by both participants or for sessions where participants disagreed in their helpfulness ratings. The centrality of counselling depth in affecting experiences of counselling helpfulness is discussed.     

Human Resource Management Group,University of Nottingham,UK

In a new series of regular reports, research groups active in personnel psychology from a number of countries will present a briefing on work-in-progress. In the first in this series, the HRM Group at the Department of Psychology, University of Nottingham, describe their ongoing work into organization change and training validation, employee socialization, computer-based testing, and personality test construction and assessment centre validation.     

Multiaxial taxonomy of fibromyalgia syndrome patients

Pain, disability, and depression are present in various degrees in patients with fibromyalgia syndrome. Cluster analysis was used in this research to ascertain the existence of subgroups of patients in a fibromyalgia sample based on these variables. Two clusters were defined: one characterized by high levels of pain, disability, and depression (n=51) and another characterized by low levels of pain, disability, and depression (n=67). Multivariate analysis of variance (MANOVA) confirmed differences between clusters on these health status factors and a second MANOVA revealed that the subgroup with a poorer health status reported greater passive coping, helplessness, and stress, and less satisfaction with social support, than the subgroup with better health status. Logistic regression indicated that the best discriminator of subgroup membership was helplessness. These results suggest that different approaches to patient management, particularly intervention strategies aimed at reducing helplessness, may be beneficial for patients with high levels of pain, disability, and depression.     

Menstrual-related perceptual changes in women with premenstrual syndrome: Factors to consider in treatment

The state-dependent model of premenstrual syndrome (PMS) suggests that women's perceptions of daily stressors are affected by menstrual cycle phase. Our objective was to further examine the applicability of this model to perceptions of specific kinds of daily stressors and to explore its generalizability to perceptions involving significant others. Thirty-two undergraduate women, 10 PMS and 22 asymptomatic controls, completed the Daily Stress Inventory (DSI) and the Daily Rating Form (DRF) for 35 days. Questionnaires measuring perceived social support and self-esteem were completed premenstrually and postmenstrually. Results indicated that all women perceived a greater number of stressors as being severe premenstrually as compared to postmenstrually. Furthermore, all women perceived a lesser number of signifcant others as being present in their social support network premenstrually. However, only the PMS women were less satisfied with their social support and had more negative self-esteem premenstrually as compared to postmenstrually. Results are discussed within the context of designing treatment intermentions for women with PMS.