Social and cognitive strategies for coping with accountability: conformity, complexity, and bolstering

This experiment tested predictions derived from a social contingency model of judgment and choice that identifies 3 distinctive strategies that people rely on in dealing with demands for accountability from important interpersonal or institutional audiences. The model predicts that (a) when people know the views of the audience and are unconstrained by past commitments, they will rely on the low-effort acceptability heuristic and simply shift their views toward those of the prospective audience, (b) when people do not know the views of the audience and are unconstrained by past commitments, they will be motivated to think in relatively flexible, multidimensional ways (preemptive self-criticism), and (c) when people are accountable for positions to which they feel committed, they will devote the majority of their mental effort to justifying those positions (defensive bolstering). The experiment yielded results supportive of these 3 predictions. The study also revealed some evidence of individual differences in social and cognitive strategies for coping with accountability.     

Self-evaluation maintenance and the mediational role of emotion: the perception of friends and strangers

Two studies examined the causal role of emotional arousal in self-evaluation maintenance processes. In previous work, Tesser and Campbell (1982) found that Ss were most charitable in their perception of another's performance when self-relevance was low and the other was close. If emotional arousal mediated this pattern of behavior, then the pattern of behavior should be replicated when arousal is present but attenuated when arousal is misattributed or low. The misattribution hypothesis was tested in Study 1. Study 2 was a correlational study in which physiological arousal and misattribution were measured. The results supported the prediction that SEM processes would be attenuated when arousal was attributed to external sources. The misattribution effect was particularly pronounced among more highly aroused Ss. The results are discussed in terms of their implications for the SEM model and person perception.     

Relation of sympathy and personal distress to prosocial behavior: a multimethod study

Assessed sympathy and personal distress with facial and physiological indexes (heart rate) as well as self-report indexes and examined the relations of these various indexes to prosocial behavior for children and adults in an easy escape condition. Heart rate deceleration during exposure to the needy others was associated with increased willingness to help. In addition, adults' reports of sympathy, as well as facial sadness and concerned attention, were positively related to their intention to assist. For children, there was some indication that report of positive affect and facial distress were negatively related to prosocial intentions and behavior, whereas facial concern was positively related to the indexes of prosocial behavior. These findings are interpreted as providing additional, convergent support for the notion that sympathy and personal distress are differentially related to prosocial behavior.     

The structure of interpersonal traits: Wiggins's circumplex and the five-factor model

Using a sample of 315 adult men and women, self-reports on Wiggins's revised Interpersonal Adjective Scales were jointly factored with self-reports, peer ratings, and spouse ratings on the NEO Personality Inventory to examine the relations between the two models. Results suggest that the interpersonal circumplex is defined by the two dimensions of Extraversion and Agreeableness, and that the circular ordering of variables is not an artifact of response biases or cognitive schemata. Circumplex and dimensional models appear to complement each other in describing the structure of personality, and both may be useful to social psychologists in understanding interpersonal behavior.     

Cardiovascular reactivity and interpersonal influence: active coping in a social context

Previous studies have demonstrated that effortful attempts to secure positive outcomes or avoid negative outcomes produce significant increases in systolic blood pressure (SBP), diastolic blood pressure (DBP), and heart rate (HR). Although these effects of active coping on cardiovascular reactivity are central in current psychosomatic theories, virtually all of the research to date has used impersonal, asocial tasks. Our two studies examined the cardiovascular effects of effortful attempts to influence other people. In Study 1, male subjects attempting to influence the opinions of their discussion partner to improve their own chances of winning money displayed significantly greater SBP, DBP, and HR reactivity. In Study 2, we obtained similar effects on SBP and DBP reactivity in men and women, while both preparing an influence attempt and making that attempt. Furthermore, reactivity levels were larger as the magnitude of incentive for successful persuasion increased. Implications of this interpersonal equivalent of active coping for the development of cardiovascular disease are discussed.     

Perceptions of control, competence, and contingency as influences on the stress-behavior symptom relation in school-age children

Analyzed data from 154 school-age children and their mothers to examine the relations between stress, perceived competence and contingency, and behavior symptoms. Analyses focused on the relative merits of unidimensional vs multidimensional measures of control in predicting symptoms. The stress of undesirable life events and behavior symptoms were related in the expected direction. Multiple regression models with R2 ranging from .11 to .14 (all ps less than .0002) included significant main effects for stress, competence, and control. Analyses supported the relative superiority of the multidimensional measure of control. Models containing main effects and interaction terms were of equivalent magnitudes in accounting for variance in symptom scores. Findings support the idea of perceived control as a moderator of the stress-illness relation and are consistent with earlier suggestions that simple main effects models may be the most useful in examining these relations.     

Boyhood separation anxiety disorder: thought disorder and object relations psychopathology as manifested in Rorschach imagery

Rorschach scales were used to examine the quality of thought disturbance and object relations in boys meeting the Diagnostic and Statistical Manual of Mental Disorders, third edition (DSM-III; American Psychiatric Association, 1980) criteria for separation anxiety disorder (SAD). Nineteen urban, middle and low socioeconomic status (SES), SAD boys were compared to a group of 14 male control subjects. The hypotheses of the study were that SAD boys as compared to controls would: (a) have significantly more thought disordered responses as measured by a Rorschach Thought Disorder Scale (Blatt & Ritzler, 1974), and (b) evidence significantly less adaptive object relations scale scores as measured by the Mutuality of Autonomy Scale (Urist, 1977). Results confirmed both hypotheses. The SAD group had more thought disordered responses and more disrupted object relations scores than the controls. Ideas and images of these boys were found to generally be more unstable, boundary compromised, fluid, idiosyncratic, tangential, and psychotic-like than the controls. It was concluded that these boys possess a significant potential to have thinking abnormalities that will interfere with their independent functioning. Concerning their object relations scores, the SAD subjects were found to have significantly fewer benign, adaptive object interactional percepts, and a greater number of dependent and/or clinging interactional object representations (imagery) than the controls. This study supports the viewpoint that SAD boys are deeply psychologically troubled.     

Rorschach Egocentricity Index and self-concept in children and adolescents

In a sample of 65 child and adolescent psychiatric inpatients, the hypothesized relation between the Egocentricity Index from the Rorschach and standard self-report measures of self-concept was not supported. Although the sample as a group had a markedly low mean Egocentricity Index, self-reported self-concept was at a normative level. The validity of the Egocentricity Index and self-report measures of self-concept is discussed, and guidelines for their interpretation are presented.     

The sensitivity of the Bender-Gestalt Test as a screening instrument for neuropsychological impairment in older adults

We investigated the sensitivity of the Bender (1938) Visual-Motor Gestalt Test (BGT) using the Halstead-Reitan Neuropsychological Battery (HRB) as the criterion for cortical dysfunction. We studied 95 subjects over age 55 who had been diagnosed as having dementia or pseudodementia. Subjects were classified as mild, moderately, or severely impaired on the HRB and as impaired or unimpaired on the BGT. The results indicated that the BGT is less sensitive (36%) than was expected when used on an impaired geriatric population. The data further indicated that false negatives occurred more frequently with the BGT when individuals had mild neuropsychological impairment. Less frequent misclassifications occurred as the severity of impairment on HRB indices increased.     

Delusions and hallucinations as a reflection of the subcultural milieu among psychotic patients of the 1930s and 1980s

Delusions and hallucinations reported in the social histories of 150 patients admitted to an East Texas state hospital during the 1930s and of 150 patients admitted during the 1980s were examined for content that would characterize and contrast the patient subcultural milieu of the two time periods. Patients admitted during the 1930s tended to reflect the material deprivation and personal powerlessness of the great depression in delusions of great wealth and positive "special powers." The hallucinatory visions and voices of the 1980s patients reflected a more threatening and negative subcultural milieu, with more visions of blood, snakes, and dead people or animals. Command hallucinations to hurt, to kill, or to do "perverse things" would also suggest that the subculture milieu of the 1980s had become more dangerous.