Influence of mood on health-relevant cognitions

Three experiments assessed the effects of mood on symptom appraisal, health behavior self-efficacy, outcome expectations, and perceptions of vulnerability. Ss in Experiments 1 and 2 were acutely ill, whereas Ss in Experiment 3 were healthy. In each experiment, happy, sad, and neutral moods were induced. In Experiment 1, Ss who experienced sadness reported more aches and pains and greater discomfort than happy Ss. Sad Ss were less confident that they could carry out illness-alleviating behaviors. Experiments 2 and 3 demonstrated that mood's influence on vulnerability perceptions is moderated by health status. Although mood had little impact on perceptions of vulnerability among ill Ss, probability estimates of future negative health-relevant events among healthy Ss were mood sensitive. Seeing oneself as invulnerable to future negative events was accentuated among happy Ss and attenuated among sad Ss. Mood may be an important determinant of care seeking, adherence, and recovery from illness.     

The etiology of children's stereotypes about sex differences in emotionality

Contemporary preschool-aged children have pronounced sex-role stereotypes about emotionality. They feel that anger is a male characteristic, while fear, sadness, and happiness are female characteristics. Four studies investigated several possible sources of these stereotypes, including parental stereotypes, parental reinforcement practices, television programming, and actual sex-differences in emotionality. The results suggest that each of these sources may potentially contribute to children's stereotypes about emotionality.     

Judgmental illusion produced by contrast with expectancy

Judgments of the numerousness of dots vary inversely with the size of the background on which the dots are presented. An expectancy-contrast model is proposed and tested in an experiment with this size-numerosity illusion. According to the model, the expectancy for numerousness depends upon the subjective correlation between size and numerosity; judgments-of numerousness are assumed to reflect an additive contrast with the expectancy. In agreement with the model, the data demonstrate that the effects of size depend upon the correlation between size and numerosity; when this correlation is negative, the illusion is reversed. The model received tentative support from quantitative tests of fit, based on functional measurement procedures.     

Influencing College Attendance Plans

This study compared the effectiveness of a filmstrip with that of a filmstrip- and-counseling program in influencing the college attendance plans of high school juniors. Students in a “typical” New York City high school were matched on certain variables and randomly assigned to a filmstrip group which viewed a 15-minute filmstrip about community colleges, a counseling group which saw the filmstrip and had a 15-minute personal interview with a community college counselor, and a control group. Students then completed a post-secondary school plans questionnaire. Analysis of their responses indicated that the combination of the filmstrip and the counseling significantly increased the number of students considering community college attendance compared with the control group, but that the filmstrip alone had no effect. The results indicate the importance of personal counseling compared with the sole use of mass media in efforts to influence post-high school plans.     

Dominance violations in judged prices of two- and three-outcome gambles

The dominance principle states that one should prefer the option with consequences that are at least as good as those of other options for any state of the world. When applied to judged prices of gambles, the dominance principle requires that increasing one or more outcomes of a gamble should increase the judged price of the gamble, with everything else held constant. Previous research has uncovered systematic violations of the dominance principle: people assign higher prices to a gamble with a large probability of winning an amount, Y, otherwise zero, than they do to a superior gamble with the same chance of winning Y, otherwise winning a small amount, X! These violations can be explained by a configural-weight theory in which two-outcome gambles are represented with two sets of decision weights; one set for outcomes having values of zero and another set for lower-valued outcomes that have nonzero values. The present paper investigates whether dominance violations are limited to two-outcome gambles. Results show that people violate the dominance principle with three-outcome gambles even with financial incentives. Furthermore, results could be predicted from the configural-weight theory. The data do not support the view that configural weighting is caused by a shift in strategy that would apply only to two-outcome gambles.     

VIOLATIONS OF MONOTONICITY AND CONTEXTUAL EFFECTS IN CHOICE-BASED CERTAINTY EQUIVALENTS

Abstract —This article investigates choices between gambles and amounts of money to explore two issues in decision making First, in recent studies, judgments of the values of gambles violated monotonicity (dominance), yet choices between the same gambles satisfied monotonicity, producing reversals of preference This experiment tested whether certainty equivalents based on choices between gambles and money would violate monotonicity Results indicated that these choices violated monotonicity in the same way as had judgments Second, this experiment investigated whether the certainty equivalent of a gamble would depend on the distribution of amounts offered for comparison It was found that certainty equivalents based on choices depended on the context m the same fashion as psychophysical comparisons Apparently, paradoxes of behavioral decision making are not eliminated by using choices instead of judgments to investigate human preferences     

The thin line between reality and imagination: attachment orientations and the effects of relationship threats on sexual fantasies

The authors examined the effects of relationship threats on sexual fantasies. In two studies, participants described a sexual fantasy following an imagination task and reported their attachment orientations. In Study 1, participants imagined relationship or nonrelationship threat scenes. Results indicated that relationship threat led to fantasies that involved interpersonal distance and hostility themes. Furthermore, following relational threat, women and more anxiously attached individuals were most likely to use relationship-maintaining strategies in their fantasies. More anxiously attached individuals were also particularly likely to represent themselves as alienated. In Study 2, participants imagined sexual or emotional threat scenes. The findings showed that sexual threat elicited self-enhancement, whereas emotional threat led to fantasies involving both self-enhancement and attachment-related themes. Emotional threat was also most likely to induce negative views of others in more avoidant women. Implications for understanding the underlying functions of sexual fantasies within the context of romantic relationships are discussed.