Self-esteem,evaluative feedback,and preacquaintance attraction: Indirect reactions to success and failure

Two experiments were conducted to investigate the indirect reactions of high-and low-self-esteem persons to evaluative feedback. Indirect reactions are defined as reactions to evaluative feedback directed toward individuals or mechanisms not associated with the feedback. In each experiment, a sample of college students divided according to level of dispositional self-esteem was provided with feedback on a bogus test of social intelligence. Subjects were informed that each of them had been paired randomly with another person in the session and would interact with that person later in the session. Prior to meeting the individual with whom each ostensibly had been paired, subjects indicated their evaluation of and attraction to those persons. In both experiments a cross-over pattern emerged due to greater attraction following success vs. failure feedback among low-self-esteem subjects and greater attraction following failure vs. success feedback among high-self-esteem subjects. This finding indicates an important new class of reactions to evaluative feedback, indirect reactions, that extends beyond the immediate context in which the feedback is received.Preparation of this article was facilitated by a Summer Faculty Research Fellowship to Rick H. Hoyle from the Office of the Vice President for Research and Graduate Studies at the University of Kentucky.This article is based, in part, on a Master's thesis conducted by Rick H. Hoyle under the supervision of Chester A. Insko. We thank Tom Pyszczynski and John Schopler for helpful advice on the design of the second experiment and Charles Carlson and Monica Harris for helpful comments on a draft of the article.Portions of the research reported in this article were presented at the 94th Annual Convention of the American Psychological Association, Washington, DC, 1986; the 58th Annual Meeting of the Eastern Psychological Association, Arlington, Va, 1987; and the 62nd Annual Meeting of the Eastern Psychological Association, New York, NY, 1991.     

Recipients' affective responses to affirmative action interventions: A cross-cultural perspective

This study investigated whether individualism-collectivism (cultural) differences would account for the observed relationship between ethnic group status and affective responses to and fairness perceptions of affirmative action interventions. Forty-nine international (Latin America and East Asia), 116 minority, and 106 majority participants from a major southwestern university and its community provided fairness and affective response ratings to an affirmative action scenario. Implementation policy and qualification of the recipient were also manipulated. Though ethnicity was related to individualism-collectivism, the latter did not explain any variance in affective response ratings. Minority and international participants reported more positive affect and higher agreement and fairness levels than did majority participants. Participants in the preferential treatment and equally qualified conditions had more favorable responses than those in the reverse-discrimination and less qualified conditions.     

Effects of glide slope,noise intensity,and noise duration on the extrapolation of FM glides through noise

Listeners are quite adept at maintaining integrated perceptual events in environments that are frequently noisy. Three experiments were conducted to assess the mechanisms by which listeners maintain continuity for upward sinusoidal glides that are interrupted by a period of broadband noise. The first two experiments used stimulus complexes consisting of three parts: prenoise glide, broadband noise interval, and postnoise glide. For a given prenoise glide and noise interval, the subject’s task was to adjust the onset frequency of a same-slope postnoise glide so that, together with the prenoise glide and noise, the complex sounded as “smooth and continuous as possible.” The slope of the glides (1.67, 3.33, 5, and 6.67 Bark/sec) as well as the duration (50, 200, and 350 msec) and relative level of the interrupting noise (0, ?6, and ?12 dB S/N) were varied. For all but the shallowest glides, subjects consistently adjusted the offset portion of the glide to frequencies lower than predicted by accurate interpolation of the prenoise portion. Curiously, for the shallowest glides, subjects consistently selected postnoise glide onset-frequency values higher than predicted by accurate extrapolation of the prenoise glide. There was no effect of noise level on subjects’ adjustments in the first two experiments. The third experiment used a signal detection task to measure the phenomenal experience of continuity through the noise. Frequency glides were either present or absent during the noise for stimuli like those used in the first two experiments as well as for stimuli that had no prenoise or postnoise glides. Subjects were more likely to report the presence of glides in the noise when none occurred (false positives) when noise was shorter or of greater relative level and when glides were present adjacent to the noise.     

Calculation of additional heart rates using oxygen consumption and carbon dioxide production: A comparative analysis

Research, to date, on the occurrence of additional heart rates during behavioral stressors has employed oxygen consumption as the index of metabolic activity. Although this is the obvious first choice, in certain situations measures of carbon dioxide production may be more readily obtained. The analysis presented in this paper explored the intuitively appealing notion that, since oxygen consumption and carbon dioxide production are themselves intimately related, carbon-dioxide-production measures may also be appropriate in the “additional heart rate” methodology. Data from the most recent additional-heart-rate paper by Turner and colleagues were thus reexamined, and additional heart rates during mental arithmetic and a video game were separately calculated for the 24 subjects by first using oxygen consumption and then by using carbon dioxide production. The values obtained were very highly correlated; the coefficients for the task: periods themselves were 0.99 and 0.96, respectively. Use of carbon-dioxide-production data-in this manner would, therefore, seem to be appropriate.     

Disputation of irrational beliefs about overeating

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Disputation of irrational beliefs about overeating     

Determinants of subjective contour: Bourdon illusions and “unbending” effects

Wenderoth and O’Connor (1987b) reported that, although matches to the straight edge of two triangles placed apex to apex revealed an apparent bending in the direction of the chevron formed by the hypotenuse pair (the Bourdon effect), no perceptual unbending of the bent chevron occurred. Using subjective contour figures, Walker and Shank (1988b) found large and approximately equal bending and unbending effects, consistent with two theories that they proposed. In Experiment 1, using adjustable chevron matching and subjective contours, we found that Bourdon effects, equivalent in magnitude to those reported by Walker and Shank, were 4–5 times larger than unbending effects. In Experiment 2, we used a variation of Walker and Shank’s measurement technique, in which subjects selected a matching angle from a graded series. We obtained Bourdon effects similar to those in Experiment 1, but much larger unbending effects. Nevertheless, Bourdon effects were significantly larger than unbending effects in one set of data; and in another, Bourdon test means were larger than unbending test means. In both data sets, there was a large and significant pretest bending effect, which enhanced the magnitude of unbending test minus pretest scores. These results were consistent with our theory but not the theories of Walker and Shank. The variance of unbending test matches, 3–4 times that of Bourdon test matches, reflected the task difficulty. We propose that subjective obtuse angle contraction that exceeds real obtuse angle contraction explains the fact that unbending effects are larger in subjective than in real contours.     

Why not give your client a counter: A survey of what happened when we did

A perusal of the recent literature of behavior modification shows an increasing emphasis on the use of self-recording as a research tool (see for example, Barlow et al., 1969; Duncan, 1969; McFall, 1970; Johnson and White, 1971 ; and Ackerman, 1972). In addition, self-recording is being more frequently utilized as a method of teaching students, clients and patients to (a) observe themselves more precisely, (b) assess the effects of treatments which they apply to themselves, with or without the guidance of a counsellor or therapist, and finally (c) provide the latter with objective information (see for example, Stuart. 1967; Lindsley, 1969; Kanfer, 1970; Duncan, 1971; Watson and Tharp, 1972; Mahoney and Thoresen, 1974; Thoresen and Mahoney, 1974; Zimmerman, 1975).

Several researchers have suggested and provided evidence for the notion that self-recording of one's own behavior can be a reactive measure which leads to behavior change on the part of the recorder without the addition of further treatment (see for example, McFall, 1970; Johnson and White, 1971; McFall and Hammen, 1971; Kazdin, 1974; and Lipinski and Nelson, 1974). Preliminary results which each of the present authors have observed with some self-recording clients confirms the above observation. Furthermore, we have also observed that self-recording can sometimes lead to unexpected, therapeutic side-effects. For example, the junior author recently gave a golf counter to a 17-year-old female patient who reported having many impulses to “go back and check” things before leaving her home. These impulses were usually acted upon and one of the consequences of this was that the patient usually kept her parents waiting when the three had to go out. This patient was asked to wear a golf counter, which was given to her, to count the number of times each day that she had an “impulse to check”. In an interview with her following a 7-day counting period, she reported that she had not been aware that she had so many impulses (103 the first day of counting); she actually felt revulsion with herself upon clearly seeing how frequently she had these impulses; she had more impulses when nervous and fewer when relaxed; and finally, both the number of impulses and the actual number of times she acted upon them were markedly reduced over the 7-day counting period. This set of results, together with other (albeit less dramatic) results, suggested to us that some clients can benefit merely by self-recording their own behavior. For some the benefit may be greater awareness or knowledge of the self-recorded behavior, for some it could be actual behavior change, and for some both benefits might be achieved.

To our knowledge, no study has been conducted which has surveyed such possible benefits of self-recording across a number of clients and under conditions in which many therapists are involved. The purpose of the present study was to explore the effects of self-recording, per se, across many clients who were being seen by many different therapists. We did so by recruiting therapists who would be interested in trying out the procedure of having one or more clients self-record.     

On resolving conflicting views of cognitive conflict

F. B. Murray's (Developmental Review, 1983, 3, 54–61) conclusion that a theoretically ambiguous relationship exists between cognitive conflict and Piaget's notion of equilibration was considered. It was suggested that theoretical clarity can be achieved if a distinction is drawn between conflict induction (disequilibrium) and conflict resolution (equilibration). Murray's suggestion that in Piaget's theory internal (cognitive) conflict can be mentally created was disputed. G. N. Cantor's (Developmental Review, 1983, 3, 39–53) concerns about the adequacy of the measures of internal conflict in B. J. Zimmerman & D. E. Blom's (Developmental Review, 1983, 3, 18–38) study due to their independence from external conflict manipulations was discussed. We agreed with Cantor that such findings obviate direct disconfirmation of an internal conflict construct; however, we suggested that evidence of conservation learning in the absence of either external or internal conflict renders Piaget's account less tenable.