Cardiovascular reactivity to psychological stress in aerobically trained versus untrained mild hypertensives and normotensives

Cardiovascular reactivity to video game and mental arithmetic stressors was compared among three groups of men: aerobically trained mild hypertensives, untrained mild hypertensives, and a comparison group of untrained normotensives. Relative to the untrained hypertensives, the trained hypertensives reacted to the video game with marginally smaller systolic blood pressure and diastolic blood pressure, but there were no significant differences between these groups in reactivity during the mental arithmetic task. Comparisons between each hypertensive group and the normotensive group showed that blood pressure (BP) reactivity of normotensives during the video game was generally similar to that of trained hypertensives but smaller than that of untrained hypertensives. These results indicate that aerobic training, which has been found to reduce resting BP in mild hypertensives, may also exert a favorable impact in reducing cardiovascular reactivity of hypertensives during some stressful situations.     

The Dynamic Nature of Goals and Message Production as Revealed in a Sequential Analysis of Conflict Interactions

Although message‐production theories often assume that goals behave dynamically to direct communication behavior, few studies consider the interconnectedness of goals and behavior throughout interactions. Here, the interrelationship of communication goals and tactics was examined through a sequential analysis of 47 conflict interactions between close friends or dating partners. It was posited that for both the initiators and resistors in a conflict, the importance of relational or other‐identity goals would be associated with the use of integrative tactics and the importance of instrumental or self‐identity goals would be related to the use of distributive tactics. We examined these predictions within and across partners. Analyses indicated that for both conflict initiators and resistors, the importance of a combination self/instrumental goal predicted the use of distributive tactics and the importance of an other‐identity goal lead to partner‐oriented tactics. For resistors, the importance of an instrumental goal was associated with the use of distributive tactics and the importance of a combination identity/relational goal was aligned with issue‐oriented tactics as well. Across partners, several significant patterns between one partner’s use of distributive or integrative tactics and the other partner’s goals were observed. Implications of the results for understanding conflict and message production are discussed.     

Characteristics of adolescents at risk for compulsive overeating on a brief screening test

As part of a large survey of addictive behavior in high school students, 43% of a sample of 278 (26% of the males, 57% of the females) scored above the cutoff point set by Overeaters Anonymous on their scale for assessing compulsive overeating. While this at-risk group did not report poorer general adjustment, health, or school achievement than did the students not at risk, they did significantly more often perceive their life quality and relationship with the person closest to them as less positive. The at-risk subsample indicated the defensive effectiveness of overeating in their significantly more frequent report of dissociative experiences while eating, and less severe ratings of insecurity, worrying, and daydreaming. One of the most salient findings was the at-risk students' more frequent report of addictive problems in their parents (overeating, alcohol and drug use, and gambling).     

A comparison of two measures of egocentrism

This study examined the relationship between two prominent measures of egocentrism, Enright's Adolescent Egocentrism Scale (AES) and Elkind's Imaginary Audience Scale (IAS), in a sample of 458 adolescents, between 10 and 15 years old. Both correlational and factor analyses indicated that the two measures assess distinctly different phenomena. As predicted, IAS scores were correlated with self-reported levels of shyness, nervousness, and social skills. These results provide partial evidence for the validity of the IAS as a measure of self-consciousness, though not necessarily egocentrism per se. The validity of the AES was not examined.     

Neuroticism, extraversion, and related traits in adult twins reared apart and reared together

The relative importance of genetic and environmental factors for neuroticism, extraversion, impulsivity, and monotony avoidance were estimated in a sample of 99 monozygotic and 229 dizygotic pairs of twins reared apart (TRA) and a matched sample of 160 monozygotic and 212 dizygotic pairs of twins reared together (TRT). The average age was 58.6 (SD = 13.6); 72% of the twins were 50 or older. Model-fitting analyses verified the importance of genetic factors for all four measures; from 23% to 45% of the total variation was attributable to genetic sources. There was considerable evidence that these factors were operating in a nonadditive manner for extraversion and impulsivity. Shared environment accounted for less than 10% of the variance; some evidence for selective placement was found for neuroticism.     

Autonomic arousal feedback and emotional experience: evidence from the spinal cord injured

We interviewed spinal-cord-injured, other handicapped, and nonhandicapped subjects to investigate the relation between the perception of autonomic arousal and experienced emotion. The three groups differed significantly on only one measure of affect intensity, with the spinal-cord-injured subjects more often reporting stronger fear in their lives now compared with the past. In addition, spinal-cord-injured subjects often described intense emotional experiences. Spinal-cord-injured subjects who differed in their level of autonomic feedback differed in intensity on several measures. Subjects with greater autonomic feedback tended to report more intense levels of negative emotions. The findings indicate that the perception of autonomic arousal may not be necessary for emotional experience. There were weak trends in our data, however, suggesting that the perception of arousal may enhance the experience of emotional intensity. The subjective well-being reports of the handicapped groups were comparable to those of nonhandicapped subjects, indicating successful coping with their disability.     

The effects of contextual information and gender on the prediction of hypnotic susceptibility

Council, Kirsch, and Hafner (1986) obtained empirical support for the hypothesis that significant correlations between questionnaire measures of absorption and hypnotic susceptibility are an artifact of subjects' beliefs about their own hypnotizability. We tested this hypothesis in a two-session experiment. During Session 1, subjects completed questionnaire measures of absorption, mystical experience, daydreaming frequency, and paranormal beliefs. During Session 2, subjects were tested for hypnotic susceptibility. Subjects were also exposed to one of three information manipulations: They were told about hypnotic testing either before or after filling out the questionnaires or were not told about hypnotic testing. The information manipulation moderated the prediction of susceptibility by the questionnaire measures for women, but not for men. For women, scores on the absorption questionnaire predicted susceptibility only when subjects were informed about hypnotic testing. In the told-after condition, this effect generalized to all of the remaining questionnaire measures. For men, none of the questionnaires was a reliable predictor of susceptibility.     

Role of visual information in ball catching

The present study is concerned with the perceptual information about the body and space underlying the act of catching a ball. In a series of four experiments, subjects were asked to catch a luminous ball under various visual conditions. In general, catching in a normally illuminated room was contrasted with catching the luminous ball in an otherwise completely dark room. In the third and fourth experiments, intermediate conditions of visual information were included. The results suggest that it is possible to catch a ball with one hand when only the ball is visible, but performance is better when the subject has the benefit of a rich visual environment and two hands. The second experiment indicated that subject performance does improve with practice in the dark, but time spent in the darkened room itself doesn't result in a significant decrement in performance. Results of the third study suggest that vision of one's hand does not aid in the performance of this task whereas the presence of a minimal visual frame appears to aid performance. The final study examined the relation between catching performance and body sway under similar visual conditions. Results of this experiment imply that persons who exhibit relatively little postural sway in full-room lighting performed better at this catching task.