The Social Psychology of Tanning and Sunscreen Use: Self-Presentational Motives as a Predictor of Health Risk1

To the extent that many people seek and maintain a suntan because they believe it makes them more attractive, people who are particularly motivated to make good impressions on others or to be seen as physically attractive are at increased risk for skin cancer. This study examined cognitive, motivational, and attitudinal predictors of two factors that are associated with increased risk for skin cancer: engaging in behaviors that increase one's exposure to UV radiation and inadequate use of sunscreen. Self-presentational motives involving a concern for one's personal appearance and the belief that being tan enhances one's attractiveness were the strongest predictors of the degree to which respondents exposed themselves to natural and artificial sources of UV radiation. Sunscreen use was best predicted by knowing someone with skin cancer. Implications for attempts to promote safe-sun practices are discussed.     

From sex differences to gender role beliefs: Exploring effects on six dimensions of religiosity

Regardless of the particular dimension of religiosity under consideration, women are generally found to be more religious than men. To date, empirical data has not been used to explore the importance of gender role ideology in explaining these differences. Using the 1988 Akron Area Survey, the effects of sex differences and gender role beliefs on six dimensions of religiosity are explored. The major findings include the following: (1) sex differences in religiosity are not supported for most dimensions of religiosity when other demographic variables are considered; (2) gender role ideology, while not sex related, does improve the explanation of variance in most dimensions of religiosity; and (3) sex is a predictor of the closeness of an individual's relationships to God, while gender role ideology is not. We suggest that stereotypes about women being more religious are misleading and that gender role ideology has an important effect on religiosity. However, sex is more indicative of the level of religious intimacy, measured by perceived closeness to God. We discuss the implications of this finding for changes in family structure and relationships between men and women.An earlier version of this paper was presented at the Association for the Sociology of Religion annual meeting, Washington, DC, August 1990.     

Making Sense of Self-Esteem

Sociometer theory proposes that the self-esteem system evolved as a monitor of social acceptance, and that the so-called self-esteem motive functions not to maintain self-esteem per se but rather to avoid social devaluation and rejection. Cues indicating that the individual is not adequately valued and accepted by other people lower self-esteem and motivate behaviors that enhance relational evaluation. Empirical evidence regarding the self-esteem motive, the antecedents of self-esteem, the relation between low self-esteem and psychological problems, and the consequences of enhancing self-esteem is consistent with the theory.     

Correlates of body satisfaction and self-concept in third- and sixth-graders

The purpose of this correlational study was to examine the relationship between body satisfaction and self-concept in elementary school children. Participants were twentythree boys and twenty-eight girls from the third and sixth grades of a rural public school. Demographic information, body satisfaction scores, self-concept scores, and measures of parental attitudes were obtained from the participants through a questionnaire. It was hypothesized that body satisfaction and self-concept would be related in elementary school children. It was expected that this relationship would be impacted by grade, sex, and parental attitudes. A significant relationship existed between body satisfaction and self-concept in girls, but not boys. No grade differences were detected in the relationship. Body satisfaction was significantly correlated with body criticism from peers among sixth graders. A parent's body satisfaction appeared to be a significant predictor of the body satisfaction of his/her opposite sex child for both third — and sixth-graders.     

Interplay of Literacy and Orality in Inaugural Rhetoric

Inaugural addresses require a complex interplay of literacy and orality. They are written to be performed, but oral performance is not explicable in terms of textual analyses alone. Texts of the 55 inaugurals of the 42 U.S. presidents and audio recordings of the 16 dating from F. D. Roosevelt were the corpus for this study. The general hypothesis was that changes in media technology and in Presidential governance have moved both text and performance of inaugurals in the twentieth century in the direction of conversational style. Textual response measures were frequency-of-occurrence ratios of words (per paragraph, sentence, punctuation, and discourse marker), of syllables (per paragraph, sentence, word, punctuation, and discourse marker), and of first-person pronominal forms. Performance response measures were speech and articulation rates, percentage of pause time, pause duration, and phrase length. Use of contractions was also analyzed. Textual analyses showed a shortening of units and a shift from singular to plural first-person pronominal forms in the course of 200 years. Performance of the inaugurals over the past 60 years showed no diachronic changes, but was dramatically slower than that of other speech genres. Use of contractions was limited to three recent inaugurals. Various published texts of Reagan's first inaugural and Bush's and Clinton's inaugurals were compared with one another and with the audio recordings and were found to differ from one another in text, punctuation, and format, and from the audio recordings in text. The notion of conversational style is critically discussed, particularly in terms of the boundaries imposed upon it by the norms of both literacy and orality.     

Sex of leader and subordinate role stress: A field study

This research examines the relationship between sex of leader and subordinate perceptions of two dimensions of role stress — role conflict and role ambiguity — as moderated by subordinate job level, age, and sex. Interaction effects for sex of leader also are investigated. Subjects are 184 supervisory and nonsupervisory employees of a psychiatric hospital. Results suggest that sex of leader does not significantly affect subordinate role conflict and role ambiguity. Most interactions were nonsignificant.     

Group performance and interpersonal evaluations as determinants of egotistical attributions in groups1

Group members often try to claim personal credit for the successes of their group while avoiding blame for group failures. Two experiments examined the effects of evaluations from their fellows on such egotism in groups. In Experiment 1, 96 subjects participated in four-person, problem-solving groups, and, after completing the group tasks, rated the competency and worth of each of the other group members. Subjects then received bogus written feedback indicating that the group had either succeeded or failed, and that the other members had considered them: (a) the most competent member of the group, (b) the least competent, or (c) of average competence. Group performance and personal evaluations interacted in influencing subjects' perceptions of their personal performances, relative responsibility for the group performance, and potency within the group, generally supporting predictions derived from self-esteem and equity theory. Subjects claimed more responsibility for success than for failure only when they were favorably evaluated by their peers, and claimed the least responsibility for group success when they were unfavorably evaluated. The latter acceptance of negative peer evaluations was examined in Experiment 2, which manipulated the consensus of the evaluations given 76 high or low self-esteem subjects. Regardless of their self-esteem or the consensus of the evaluations, subjects again seemed to accept unfavorable evaluations. High self-esteem subjects did, though, rate their personal performance and relative responsibility higher than low self-esteem subjects.