Effect of depression level and length of acquaintance on reaction of others to a request for help.

Examined an interpersonal-process view of depression by assessing 60 undergraduates' reactions to a request for help from a hypothetical depressed or nondepressed person with whom they had been acquainted for a relatively short (2 wks) or long (1 yr) period of time. Ss responded to each of the 4 hypothetical persons by indicating their probable affective reactions to the request, the number of minutes they would be willing to help, their desire for future social contact with the hypothetical person, and their expectations of future requests for help. Results indicate that Ss felt significantly more concern and were willing to provide significantly more time for long-term acquaintances. Requests from depressed persons elicited significantly more anger and social rejection but equal amounts of concern and willingness to help. This mixed response pattern was interpreted as providing partial support for an interpersonal-process view of depression. A path analysis provided limited support for J. C. Coyne's (see record 1979-01146-001) hypothesis that rejection of depressed persons results from the negative mood they induce in others. (34 ref) (PsycINFO Database Record (c) 2010 APA, all rights reserved)     

When do individuals help close others improve? The role of information diagnosticity.

On the basis of the self-evaluation maintenance model (SEM; Tesser, 1988), it was hypothesized that individuals give less improving information to relationally close (rather than distant) others, out of concern for being outperformed by close others in the future. Further, this effect only occurs if diagnostic and valid criteria for success are present. Three studies confirmed the hypotheses. In Studies 1 and 2, participants gave less improving information to familiar than to unfamiliar others in a domain (academics) in which diagnostic assessment criteria (grades) were available. This pattern was not found in a domain (social life) without diagnostic criteria. These results were replicated in Study 3, in which relative performance and diagnosticity of assessment criteria were manipulated and amount of improving information given to friends and strangers was measured. Diagnosticity of comparison information is an important addition to the SEM model. (PsycINFO Database Record (c) 2010 APA, all rights reserved)     

On Recognition paid to eminent figures and to the others.

Comments on an article by J. H. Korn, et al (see record 1991-34516-001) regarding eminent psychologists. The author distinguishes between effort-based and value-based acclaim. Thus, it is unnecessary to abolish the disciplinary practice of eminence ranking or its periodic assessment by research in order to recognize achievements by seldom-recognized psychologists. Their achievements can be praised without suggesting that their contributions match those of the most eminent. (PsycINFO Database Record (c) 2010 APA, all rights reserved)     

Reactance in relation to different supervisory environments and counselor development.

The purpose of this study was to examine counselor trainees' preference for structure in supervision as moderated by level of experience, reactance potential, and the content of supervision. Reactions of 78 practicum counselors to two of four audiotaped supervision sessions which varied on (a) amount of supervisor structure and (b) supervision content (suicidal client or client with relationship issues) were assessed. Beginning students preferred the structured supervision. The preference of structure for advanced students was moderated by reactance and content. For the relationship content, advanced students who were high on reactance preferred the low-structure supervision, while those with low reactance preferred the high-structure condition. In suicide content condition, advanced students preferred the structured supervision regardless of their level of reactance. (PsycINFO Database Record (c) 2010 APA, all rights reserved)     

Acceptance by others and its relation to acceptance of self and others: a revaluation.

"Analysis of the data indicated that individuals with high self-acceptance scores tend also to accept others, to feel accepted by others, but actually to be neither more nor less accepted by others than those with low self-acceptance scores. Individuals with high acceptance-of-others scores tend in turn to feel accepted by others, and tend toward being accepted by them." (PsycINFO Database Record (c) 2010 APA, all rights reserved)     

Children's ascriptions of knowledge to others.

Piaget believed that young children were egocentric and would ascribe their own knowledge to another. In contrast, Wimmer, Hogrefe, and Perner (1988) found that children did not perform egocentrically when assessing another's knowledge. The present study was carried out to determine which claim was right. A familiar object was secretly placed in a box, and a child and others either looked in the box or did not look. Two of the main findings were that (a) 6-year-olds were significantly better than 3- to 4-year-olds at assessing the other's knowledge, even though both assessed the other's perception correctly (p?p?     

About postmodernism: Reply to Gergen and others.

In his reply, M. B. Smith comments on the issues between K. J. Gergen (see record 1994-37275-001) and himself (see record 1994-37277-001) and replies to comments by R. L. Russell and M. D. Gaubatz (see record 1995-36714-001); B. Denner (see record 1995-36711-001); D. Mente (see record 1995-36713-001); and D. White and A. Wang (see record 1995-36716-001). (PsycINFO Database Record (c) 2010 APA, all rights reserved)     

Demographic parameters of self-disclosure to psychotherapists and others.

Administered a 42-item self-disclosure scale to 223 Ss selected at public locations. On the basis of demographic data, 180 Ss were assigned to gender, race, and SES subgroups for response analysis. Data partially support the hypothesis that SES relates to self-disclosure patterns. Analysis showed, however, that SES was not a significant determinant of reported willingness to self-disclose except in interaction with gender. Males reported greater willingness than females to discuss with clergy 1 or more of the topics presented, and similar directional differences were observed on 5 of the 6 topics (sex, emotion, family, relationship, work, and morality). Whites reported significantly greater willingness than Blacks to disclose to spouse and psychiatrist, but no differences were observed for the listener categories of close friend, clergyman, and family doctor. (28 ref) (PsycINFO Database Record (c) 2010 APA, all rights reserved)     

Depression and the response of others.

Tested the hypotheses that (a) normal Ss respond differentially to the behavior of depressed patients, (b) this differential response is due to the fact that the target individuals are depressed, and not that they are patients, and (c) this pattern can be related to the symptomatology of depression. Each of 45 normal female undergraduates conversed on the telephone with either a depressed patient ( n = 15), a nondepressed patient ( n = 15), or a normal control ( n = 15). It was found that following the phone conversation, Ss who had spoken to depressed patients were themselves significantly more depressed, anxious, hostile, and rejecting. Measures of activity, approval responses, hope statements, and genuineness did not distinguish between S groups or between target groups, but important differences were found in the Ss' perception of the patients. It was proposed that environmental response may play an important role in the maintenance of depressed behavior. Furthermore, special skills may be required of the depressed person to cope with the environment his behavior creates. (21 ref) (PsycINFO Database Record (c) 2010 APA, all rights reserved)     

Getting by with a little help from self and others: Self-esteem and social support as resources during early adolescence.

Influences of social support and self-esteem on adjustment in early adolescence were investigated in a 2-year longitudinal study (N=350). Multi-informant data (youth and parent) were used to assess both overall levels and balance in peer- versus adult-oriented sources for social support and self-esteem. Findings obtained using latent growth-curve modeling were consistent with self-esteem mediating effects of social support on both emotional and behavioral adjustment. Lack of balance in social support and self-esteem in the direction of stronger support and esteem from peer-oriented sources predicted greater levels and rates of growth in behavioral problems. Results indicate a need for process-oriented models of social support and self-esteem and sensitivity to patterning of sources for each resource relative to adaptive demands of early adolescence. (PsycINFO Database Record (c) 2010 APA, all rights reserved)     

Stereotypes help people connect with others in the community: A situated functional analysis of the stereotype consistency bias in communication.

Communicators tend to share more stereotype-consistent than stereotype-inconsistent information. The authors propose and test a situated functional model of this stereotype consistency bias: stereotype-consistent and inconsistent information differentially serve 2 central functions of communication--sharing information and regulating relationships; depending on the communication context, information seen to serve these different functions better is more likely communicated. Results showed that stereotype-consistent information is perceived as more socially connective but less informative than inconsistent information, and when the stereotype is perceived to be highly shared in the community, more stereotype-consistent than inconsistent information is communicated due to its greater social connectivity function. These results highlight the need to examine communication as a dynamic and situated social activity. (PsycINFO Database Record (c) 2010 APA, all rights reserved)     

Exploring parent-teacher relationships: Joining and communication to others.

Explored parent–teacher relationships at the elementary school level, by applying 2 modified family systems constructs (cohesion and adaptability). In a pilot study, 82 teachers and 82 parents completed separate forms of the Parent-Teacher Relationship Scale (PTRS). All participants were instructed to respond in reference to 1 specific relationship of their choosing and to provide relevant informal comments about the PTRS. Data from the pilot study were used to refine the PTRS and a final scale was completed by 213 teachers and 212 parents. Results suggest joining and communication as important elements of parent–teacher relationships. Communication items were shared across the 2 factors. Communication from the other contributes to a sense of joining, whereas communication to other comprises its own factor. Factor scores accurately reflected Ss' global ratings of the relationships being assessed. (PsycINFO Database Record (c) 2010 APA, all rights reserved)     

Social desirability and the description of others.

Ss were asked to use Leary's Interpersonal Check List (ICL) to describe people they liked, disliked, and knew well but neither liked nor disliked. Social Desirability Scale (SD) values had been obtained on each of the 12 items of the ICL in a previous study by Edwards (see 32: 464). The present list selections were evaluated in terms of this dimension. Liked people are characterized by items high in SD; disliking people correlates less, but in the predicted direction. A positive relationship also exists between a Ss own SD score and that he attributes to others. (PsycINFO Database Record (c) 2010 APA, all rights reserved)     

Reactance theory and therapeutic paradox: A compliance-defiance model.

Instances of noncompliance or resistance to influence in psychotherapy have been interpreted as "reactance phenomena" that derive from a motive to restore threatened behavioral freedoms. While reactance is commonly seen as a negative, complicating factor in therapy, reactance phenomena can be used, even mobilized in the service of therapeutic change. In fact, the utilization of reactance provides a rationale for a class of potent paradoxical interventions. It is suggested that there are 2 fundamentally different rationales for using therapeutic paradox. Compliance-based paradoxical strategies effect change by virtue of the client's attempting to comply with a therapeutic directive. Defiance-based interventions, by contrast, work because the client rebels against the therapist's directive. Applications to specific clinical problems are discussed. (20 ref) (PsycINFO Database Record (c) 2010 APA, all rights reserved)     

Reactance and helplessness following exposure to unsolvable problems: The effects of attributional style.

I assessed the effects of internal–external attributional style and amount of unsolvable problems on subsequent task performance. Undergraduate subjects were divided according to their attributional style for bad events into internal, nondefined, and external attributors and were exposed to either one, four, or no unsolvable problems. Following exposure to a single unsolvable problem, internal attributors exhibited greater frustration and hostility and better performance in a subsequent cognitive task than did external attributors. Following exposure to four unsolvable problems, internal attributors exhibited stronger feelings of incompetence and a decrease in performance compared with external attributors. The results are discussed in terms of Wortman and Brehm's (1975) approach to reactance and helplessness. (PsycINFO Database Record (c) 2010 APA, all rights reserved)     

Introduction to symposium on constructing self with others.

The notion that the self is interpersonally embedded can be found throughout psychology's history. This article presents convergent work from different areas of contemporary psychology that supports and elaborates this notion. M. Baldwin's (1997) experimental work in social cognition demonstrates that self-evaluation varies with the relational schema that is activated. C. R. Snyder and R. L. Higgins (1997) present a social–cognitive personality theory of how people maintain their self theories to satisfy internal and external audiences. S. J. Blatt, J. S. Auerbach, and K. N. Levy's (1997) object-relations theory of the role of mental representations of self and others in psychopathology is supported by research that changes in these representations are associated with improvement in psychotherapy. J. Martin and J. Sugarman's (1997) social–cognitive theory of counseling and psychotherapy as conversational reconstructions of self theories also has research support and raises the issue of whether the self is agentic if socially constructed. (PsycINFO Database Record (c) 2010 APA, all rights reserved)     

Mood, self-awareness, and willingness to help.

Two experiments using female subjects investigated the effects of mood and self-focused attention on the willingness to help another. Experiment 1 induced a positive, negative, or neutral mood and also two kinds of high self-awareness (by either the mirror procedure or requiring essays) as well as a low self-awareness condition. Experiment 2 used a different technique to induce the three moods and also established either high or low attention to the self with the mirror procedure. In both studies, self-awareness did not interact significantly with mood in affecting the subjects' reported feelings, although there were indications in Experiment 2 of an intensification of the negative mood under self-focus. Furthermore, in both studies self-awareness operated together with the positive mood to increase the subjects' effort in behalf of the supplicant, whereas the joint operation of self-focus and negative mood was much weaker. Also in the second experiment, self-awareness raised the frequency of positive ideas about the self in the happy subjects and increased the frequency of negative self-ideas in the negative mood group. In a multiple regression analysis, these frequencies of positive and negative ideas about the self, but not a mood index, successfully predicted the amount of work the subject did for the supplicant. (PsycINFO Database Record (c) 2010 APA, all rights reserved)