Emotionality of encoding activity in face memory

The effects of emotionality of study tasks on face recognition were examined. Subjects made either personality decisions or self-comparisons about the people shown in a series of photographs. The personality traits judged during the encoding tasks had been selected to be either arousing or relatively nonarousing. Face recognition performance was best after an emotional nonself study task, on both immediate and delayed tests. In a companion study examining these manipulations in verbal memory, self-reference study tasks produced the best word recognition, with no difference due to the emotionality of nonself tasks. These results suggest emotionality and self-awareness have different effects on facial and verbal memory. A final study indicated that the effect of emotionality disappeared if it was added to self-reference. As regards self-reference differences in face and verbal memory, this series of experiments seems to rule out an emotionality confounding. It was concluded that self-images are less effective mnemonic aids than the propositional self-concept.     

Dating Relationships and the Demand/Withdraw Pattern of Communication

This study examines whether afemale-demand/male-withdraw pattern occurs in datingrelationships and whether this response increases duringdiscussions of difficult topics. One hundred and eightindividuals (women = 60, men = 48) currently in a datingrelationship completed the Communication PatternsQuestionnaire, Short Form (CPQSF) regarding either adifficult or nondifficult discussion. The racialcomposition of the undergraduate student population at thetime the study was conducted was 68.8% Caucasian, 8.9%Hispanic, 8.9% International, 6.0% African American,5.6% Asian American, and 1.8% Native American (data on socioeconomic status were unavailable).Results show that dating couples do employ apredominantly female-demand/male-withdraw pattern, whichincreases in response to difficult discussions. However, this study also found that many dating couplesemployed male-demand/female-withdraw or equaldemand/withdraw patterns. Post hoc tests also showedthat couples exhibiting eitherfemale-demand/male-withdraw or male-demand/female-withdraw patterns weremore ingrained in specific negative behavior patterns,employed more demand/withdraw behaviors, and exhibitedless positive behaviors than couples with an equal demand/withdraw pattern.     

A Developing Model Of Exploratory Psychotherapeutic Research: The Process Within The Process

A method to facilitate exploratory or discovery-oriented psychotherapy process research is presented. The personal and professional contexts out of which the need for this new approach to psychotherapy process research arose are described. Several changes in scientific values and beliefs that have occurred as a consequence of the development and use of this methodology are noted.     

Confirming Gender Stereotypes: A Social Role Perspective

In this research we examined whether emotional vulnerability leads women and men to confirm gender stereotypes. Emotional vulnerability is a state where one is open to having one's feelings hurt or to experiencing rejection. Drawing on the tenets of social role theory and research related to normative expectations, we propose that emotional vulnerability leads to stereotype confirmation, as normative expectations are less risky and easier to enact than nonnormative behavior. Fifty-nine dating couples were randomly assigned to a high emotional vulnerability or low emotional vulnerability discussion with their partners. When the degree of emotional vulnerability was high men confirmed gender-stereotypes. Women's behavior, on the other hand, was not significantly affected by condition. We discuss these findings in terms of the domain in which gender-typed behaviors occur and the social pressures to act in accordance with gender norms.     

Changing men's male gender-role attitudes by applying the elaboration likelihood model of attitude change

The traditional male gender role has been associated with a host of psychological and physical problems. In this study, 118 male university students viewed one of two videotaped interventions based on R. E. Petty and J. T. Cacioppo's [(1986) Communication and Persuasion: Central and Peripheral Routes to Attitude Change, New York: Springer-Verlag) elaboration likelihood model of attitude change (ELM) or were in a control group. One intervention was designed to create less traditional male gender-role attitudes, the other to enhance participants' attitudes toward seeking psychological help. Both interventions significantly changed male gender-role attitudes on Brannon Masculinity Scale scores, but not their Gender Role Conflict Scale—I scores, and neither influenced help-seeking attitudes. The overall pattern of scores suggests that men's attitudes about the male role may be less resistant to change than attitudes about one's own gender role or one's fear of femininity.     

Vocational behavior and career development, 1983: A review

This article reviews the literature related to vocational behavior and career development published during 1983. Journals in the fields of psychology, sociology, and organizational behavior were examined, and 445 relevant articles published in 42 different journals were identified. The review is organized around issues pertinent to the counseling psychology perspective (i.e., career development, vocational choice, vocational behavior of women, assessment, intervention strategies) and the industrial/organizational psychology perspective (i.e., personnel functions, worker adjustment problems, work adjustment) on vocational behavior.     

Predictors of decision-making style among cancer patients: An empirical test of theory

Abstract

Patient decision-making has been shown to be far from data-driven which results in serious consequences for physical health and psychological well-being. Cancer patients were found to have made their medical decisions in four ways: information-seeking, information-processing, advice-following, and ruminating. These four ways represent two routes of cognitive processing. The first two exemplify central route processing and the second two exemplify peripheral route processing. Medical decisions have also been shown to be highly influencable based on message presentation. This study represents the first step in applying social influence theory to medical decision-making. The elaboration likelihood model was used to determine whether the variables shown to have influenced routes of processing could predict which decisional style the cancer patients used. Specifically, the elaboration likelihood model of Petty and Cacioppo (1986) was applied as predictors of decisional processing style. Using a discriminant function analysis, the variables motivation (both cognitive and emotional), ability to process, and cognitive responding predicted whether cancer patients made their medical decisions using the four categories of decisional styles.     

Social Perceptions of Religiosity: Dogmatism Tarnishes the Religious Halo

Researchers have provided much evidence in support of a religious halo effect—the tendency for people to evaluate a religious target more favorably than a nonreligious counterpart. This experimental study (N = 361 U.S. adults) extended previous work beyond the dichotomy of religious versus nonreligious by varying a fictional target's degree of belief. Only religious participants exhibited a nonspecific pro-religious bias consistent with the religious halo effect, favoring religious over not religious and very over somewhat religious targets. However, indicators of dogmatic thinking (e.g., I am so sure I am right about the important things in life, there is no evidence that could convince me otherwise) degraded target evaluations by religious and nonreligious participants alike. Results suggest that religiosity's positive associations depend upon an assumption of strong but flexible belief and underscore the importance of studying social perceptions of religious fundamentalists.     

The Media’s Sexual Objectification of Women,Rape Myth Acceptance,and Interpersonal Violence

A new trend has emerged in print advertisements by which women’s bodies are literally morphed into objects. This study begins to explore this phenomenon by examining the effects of viewing these types of advertisements on attitudes toward rape and violence, as well as rape likelihood. In addition, this study examined the degree to which moral disengagement and dehumanization influences rape likelihood through rape myth acceptance. Three hundred eighty participants viewed 1 of 3 conditions—control, sexual objectification of women, or women as objects—and then filled out a number of questionnaires to assess their rape myth acceptance, acceptance of interpersonal violence, rape likelihood, and moral disengagement. Results indicated that although viewing sexually objectified women in advertising did not increase any of the dependent variables for individuals in the experimental conditions compared to the control condition, there was a main effect of sex for several dependent measures, as well as a full mediation of moral disengagement and rape likelihood by rape myth acceptance in male participants. These findings suggest that education aimed at correcting men’s endorsement of rape myths might be a key pathway to decreasing rape likelihood. Despite these conclusions, this study’s primary limitation was that it was conducted with collegiate participants with an unequal gender distribution.     

My Place or Yours?

A common stereotype holds that men are more preoccupied with sex than women are. To test the validity of this stereotype, and the degree to which women and men conform to sexually restrictive gender roles, we asked participants to describe and rate their beliefs about sex. We then factor analyzed these beliefs and achieved a simple structure of four factors: (a) Personally and Physically Pleasurable, (b) Beneficial to the Self-in-relationship, (c) Personally Costly, and (d) Sex as a Violation of Social Injunctions. We used scores on these subscales to compare women’s and men’s sexual stereotypes and behaviors. Although men showed significantly greater interest in sex on three of the four factors, when we examined sex in an intimate relationship, women and men were more alike than different. The data provide evidence that gender roles are malleable and that women and men are free to choose the degree to which they conform to sexually restrictive gender roles. Limitations and future directions are discussed.