When are dysphoric individuals distressing to others and vice versa? Effects of friendship, similarity, and interaction task.

Examined several factors hypothesized to affect how dysphoric and nondysphoric individuals react to each other. 92 pairs of female college students participated in the study. Ss interacted with either a friend or stranger who had a similar or dissimilar dysphoria status in 3 tasks: a casual conversation, disclosure of a personal problem to the partner, and response to the partner's disclosure of a personal problem. Ss' moods, evaluations of their partners, and verbal behaviors were assessed. Dysphoric Ss exhibited characteristic negative mood and verbal content but did not elicit negative reactions from their partners. Negative reactions were most evident in dysphoric Ss' responses to dissimilar (nondysphoric) strangers, underscoring the need for greater attention to dysphoric individuals' perspective on their social interactions. (PsycINFO Database Record (c) 2010 APA, all rights reserved)     

Passionate love and the misattribution of arousal.

Two studies provide evidence that misattribution of arousal facilitates romantic attraction. In Exp I, arousal of 54 male undergraduates was manipulated through exercise. Arousal Ss liked an attractive female confederate more and an unattractive female less than did controls. In Exp II, arousal of 66 Ss was manipulated in a positive (comedy tape) or negative (mutilation tape) way; other Ss heard a nonarousing tape (textbook excerpt). Results replicate the interaction found in Exp I: Valence of initial arousal did not affect attraction to the confederate. Salience of plausible labels for arousal is hypothesized to mediate the misattribution effect. (15 ref) (PsycINFO Database Record (c) 2010 APA, all rights reserved)     

Effects of sex role attitudes and similarity on men's rejection of male homosexuals.

Investigated 120 male undergraduates' reactions to homosexuals. Ss preselected on the basis of their profeminist, moderate, or antifeminist scores on the Attitude Toward Feminism Scale were assigned at random to 1 of 4 experimental conditions. Using a standard attraction paradigm design, Ss rated a bogus "partner," who was represented as either homosexual or heterosexual and as having attitudes either similar or dissimilar to theirs. Consistent with prediction, similar partners were liked more than dissimilar partners, and heterosexual partners were liked more than homosexuals. Homosexuals were seen as more dissimilar to the Ss in all conditions. Liberals were more accepting of homosexuals and dissimilar partners than were traditionals. Results are discussed in terms of the relationship between sex role attitudes and tolerance of dissimilarity. (25 ref) (PsycINFO Database Record (c) 2010 APA, all rights reserved)     

In smoke's way: Socioemotional reactions to another's smoking.

Assessed the immediate impact of second-hand cigarette smoke on interpersonal attraction and personal feelings. 75 US Army and Air Force enlisted men who were either nonsmokers or smokers and who either refrained or indulged during the session interacted with a stranger who either did not smoke, smoked courteously, or smoked discourteously. Following the encounter, Ss rated the other person on several evaluative dimensions and also rated their own affective state. Nonsmoking Ss made more favorable evaluations and reported a more pleasant affective experience after interacting with a nonsmoking stranger as compared to either a courteous or a discourteous smoker. Smoking Ss who refrained made their most positive ratings in the presence of a courteous smoking other and their most negative ratings in the company of a discourteous one. In contrast to both nonsmokers and smokers who refrained, smokers who indulged during the session made the most favorable ratings when exposed to an indiscriminant smoking stranger. (PsycINFO Database Record (c) 2010 APA, all rights reserved)     

Feminine self-esteem, self-ratings of competence, and maternal career commitment.

Conducted a study with 71 college females to examine the relationship between self-esteem (as measured by Coopersmith's Self-Esteem Inventory) and self-ratings of competence on Rosenkrantz's Sex-Role Stereotype Questionnaire. Comparisons were made of Ss whose mothers differed in work history and attitudes toward careers. Higher self-esteem was predicted for Ss who rated themselves highly on competence-related traits; this hypothesis was supported. Higher self-esteem and higher self-ratings on competence were expected for Ss whose mothers worked and Ss whose mothers desired a career. Findings were that maternal preference for a career had a positive effect upon Ss' self-esteem and evaluations of their own competence; maternal employment did not. (PsycINFO Database Record (c) 2010 APA, all rights reserved)     

Interactional approach to interpersonal attraction.

Believing they were exchanging attitude surveys with a stranger, 270 undergraduates of high or low self-esteem (Texas Social Behavior Inventory) were randomly assigned to 0, 50, or 100% attitude similarity conditions. They indicated on the Interpersonal Judgment Scale their attraction to the stranger and estimates of the stranger's probable attraction to them. Attitude similarity significantly affected Ss' attraction to the stranger and estimates of strangers' attraction to the S. Ss closely approximated predictions of D. Byrne and D. Nelson's (1965) formula in estimating attraction from the stranger. Moreover, attitude similarity influenced goodness of fit between formula predictions and attraction estimates and influenced assumptions about attraction reciprocity. Self-esteem did not influence attraction to the stranger or expected attraction from the stranger. (12 ref) (PsycINFO Database Record (c) 2010 APA, all rights reserved)     

Interpersonal attraction and attitude similarity.

It "was hypothesized that (a) a stranger who is known to have attitudes similar to those of the subject is better liked than a stranger with attitudes dissimilar to those of the subject, (b)… is judged to be more intelligent, better informed, more moral, and better adjusted… and (c)… is evaluated more positively on… four [other] variables." The first 2 hypotheses were confirmed. From Psyc Abstracts 36:04:4GE13B. (PsycINFO Database Record (c) 2010 APA, all rights reserved)     

Attitude similarity, topic importance, and psychotherapeutic attraction.

Studied the effect of attitude similarity and topic importance on attraction in a natural setting by exposing 75 prison inmates, incarcerated for public intoxication, to varying attitudes of a psychotherapist prior to hearing him in a taped therapy session. The therapist's attitudes were either similar or dissimilar to the S's and pertained to either alcoholism (important) or general (unimportant) issues. Attraction was assessed using the Client's Personal Reaction Questionnaire developed by J. D. Ashby et al. A group of control Ss received no attitudinal information. Ss were more attracted to the therapist after receiving alcohol items regardless of degree of similarity expressed. (PsycINFO Database Record (c) 2010 APA, all rights reserved)     

The evaluation of chance-determined outcomes.

Examined responses to chance-determined outcomes in 2 experiments in which 454 undergraduates received a positive or negative outcome on the basis of chance. Ss evaluated both outcomes prior to and after learning which outcome they had received. Overall, there were no changes in evaluation of the positive outcome. The negative outcome was rated more positively on the 2nd rating. Those receiving the negative outcome rated it more positively than those receiving the positive outcome. The negative outcome was evaluated more positively when the post-outcome rating was delayed rather than assessed immediately after Ss learned of their outcome. Ss were more surprised to get the positive than the negative outcome, suggesting a lower pre-outcome subjective probability of receiving the positive outcome (i.e., pessimism). Outcome evaluations of 15 control Ss who did not expect to receive either outcome were compared to pre-outcome evaluations of experimental Ss. There were no differences for the positive outcome, but the negative outcome was evaluated more positively by experimental Ss. Results indicate that pre- and post-outcome reevaluations occurred, both of which have the effect of decreasing the aversiveness of (potentially) receiving a negative outcome. (French abstract) (11 ref) (PsycINFO Database Record (c) 2010 APA, all rights reserved)     

Believing another likes or dislikes you: Behaviors making the beliefs come true.

Tested the idea that when target persons believe that a perceiver has a general negative evaluation of them, especially after a personal encounter, the targets would be unlikely to believe that the perceiver's behavior can be modified easily, resulting in an expectancy confirmation. This expectancy confirmation should occur regardless of the target's self-perceptions. 60 undergraduates participated in a 2 (expectancy [like or dislike])?×?2 (role [perceiver or target])?×?2 (self-likability [high or low]) factorial study. Results show that falsely leading Ss to believe that another liked or disliked them led Ss to be actually liked or disliked. Ss who believed they were liked after a personal encounter self-disclosed more, disagreed less, expressed dissimilarity less, and had a more positive tone of voice and general attitude than Ss who believed they were disliked. These behaviors led to reciprocal behaviors on the part of the other. No differences were obtained in number of conversations initiated, compliments, eye gaze, forward leaning, or placement of the chair. Being liked was also correlated with self-disclosure, expressions of similarity and dissimilarity, voice tone, and general attitude. Perceived self-likability was correlated with the belief that one was liked and tended to be correlated with actually being liked. (25 ref) (PsycINFO Database Record (c) 2010 APA, all rights reserved)     

Locus of control and interpersonal evaluations.

21 male and 21 female undergraduates took Rotter's internal-external (I-E) scale, then participated in a group test with 2 peers during which they exchanged evaluations of one another's answers. The evaluations Ss received were experimentally controlled so that they received mostly positive evaluations from 1 peer (positive evaluator) and mostly negative evaluations from the other peer (negative evaluator). As a manipulation of the perceived controllability of others' evaluations, 1/2 of the Ss were told that the test measured an ability and that there were right and wrong answers to the items (ability condition), and 1/2 were told that the answers represented personal opinions and that there were no right and wrong answers (opinion condition). Differences in Ss' evaluations of the answers given by the positive and negative evaluators showed that externals reciprocated more than internals and that this difference tended to be stronger in the opinion condition than in the ability condition. (16 ref.) (PsycINFO Database Record (c) 2010 APA, all rights reserved)     

Self-advocacy and self-esteem.

Explored the utility of treating self-esteem as an attitude that might be vulnerable to the same kinds of experimental manipulations usually directed at more traditional, less consequential attitudinal issues. Within an attitudinal advocacy paradigm, 109 undergraduates wrote 3 essays either about their personality attributes or about social propositions. Half the Ss writing on each of these topics were told to advocate a positive position (i.e., self-laudatory or proposition supporting) in their essays. The remaining Ss, although induced to advocate positive positions, were led to believe that they could elect to write negative (self-deprecatory or issue-opposing) essays. As anticipated, Ss who wrote the self-laudatory essays subsequently rated themselves more favorably than did Ss who wrote in support of social propositions. The latter Ss showed a corresponding advocacy effect with regard to the social proposition that they had espoused. The manipulation of perceived choice did not influence the magnitude of the advocacy effect. The results are regarded as encouraging with respect to the application of laboratory-derived attitude change procedures to issues of high personal relevance and clinical importance. (24 ref) (PsycINFO Database Record (c) 2010 APA, all rights reserved)     

The repulsion hypothesis revisited: Similarity irrelevance or dissimilarity bias?

Rosenbaum (1986b) proposed a reinterpretation of attraction research and theory in which similar attitudes constitute irrelevant stimuli; only dissimilar attitudes affect either attraction or performance in a learning task. He presented data seemingly consistent with these propositions, but Byrne, Clore, and Smeaton (1986) criticized the adequacy of his designs and suggested appropriate empirical tests of the competing hypotheses. This article reports two experiments in which the results are clearly inconsistent with the repulsion hypothesis. With number of dissimilar attitudes held constant, attraction toward a stranger increased as the number of similar attitudes increased. In a discrimination learning task, response acquisition occurred when correct responses were followed by similar attitude statements and incorrect responses by nonsense syllables, or when correct responses were followed by nonsense syllables and incorrect responses by dissimilar attitude statements. Despite the inadequacy of the repulsion hypothesis, Rosenbaum's analysis has raised several new and interesting possibilities for attraction research. (PsycINFO Database Record (c) 2010 APA, all rights reserved)     

Interpersonal engagement in social perception: The consequences of getting into the action.

Examined the effects on person perception of varying levels of observer-actor engagement using 60 undergraduates. Ss observed a male actor (confederate) responding to interview questions on a prerecorded videotape under 3 conditions of interpersonal engagement: Ss in a detachment condition knew that they were simply observing a tape; Ss in an anticipated-interaction condition knew that they were observing a tape but expected to interact subsequently with the actor; Ss in an actual-interaction condition thought that they were interacting with the actor over a video hook-up. Half of the Ss observed the actor preface his responses with a positive comment regarding the interviewer's question (positive actor); the other half observed the actor preface his responses with a negative comment (negative actor). It was predicted that anticipated-interaction Ss would demonstrate hopefulness by attributing the positive actor's behavior dispositionally and the negative actor's behavior situationally but that actual-interaction Ss would show the opposite causal attribution pattern in an attempt to protect or enhance their own self-esteem. Results confirm these predictions. (23 ref) (PsycINFO Database Record (c) 2010 APA, all rights reserved)     

Interpersonal liking and self-disclosure.

66 female college students viewed a videorecording of a female stranger who discussed her opinions about 10 social issues. After this, Ss rated the stranger on the Interpersonal Judgment Scale and indicated on the Self-Disclosure Questionnaire what topics they would be willing to discuss with the stranger. What the Ss would discuss was found to be positively related to their characteristic level of disclosure and their attraction toward the stranger. Implications for therapist–client interactions are discussed. (9 ref) (PsycINFO Database Record (c) 2010 APA, all rights reserved)     

Evidence for terror management theory II: The effects of mortality salience on reactions to those who threaten or bolster the cultural worldview.

Three experiments were conducted to test the hypothesis, derived from terror management theory, that reminding people of their mortality increases attraction to those who consensually validate their beliefs and decreases attraction to those who threaten their beliefs. In Study 1, subjects with a Christian religious background were asked to form impressions of Christian and Jewish target persons. Before doing so, mortality was made salient to half of the subjects. In support of predictions, mortality salience led to more positive evaluations of the in-group member (the Christian) and more negative evaluations of the out-group member (the Jew). In Study 2, mortality salience led to especially negative evaluations of an attitudinally dissimilar other, but only among subjects high in authoritarianism. In Study 3, mortality salience led to especially positive reactions to someone who directly praised subjects' cultural worldviews and especially negative reactions to someone who criticized them. The implications of these findings for understanding in-group favoritism, prejudice, and intolerance of deviance are discussed. (PsycINFO Database Record (c) 2010 APA, all rights reserved)     

Student locus of control and response to expectations about self and teacher.

85 female undergraduates with either an internal or external locus of control (LOC) (Rotter's Internal–External Locus of Control Scale) were used to investigate the relationship between LOC and responsivity to expectations regarding their own and their teacher's competence. Internal and external Ss, acting as students, were led to expect that they would perform well or poorly on a lesson and independently to expect that their teacher was competent or incompetent. After receiving a standardized lesson from a confederate acting as teacher, Ss' attitudes and performance were assessed. As predicted, internal Ss were more receptive to the expectation regarding self than external Ss. In contrast, the teacher expectation manipulation had no differential effect on internal and external Ss. Results suggest that students respond both to expectations about themselves and about their teacher and that LOC plays an important role in determining how an individual responds to such expectations. (11 ref) (PsycINFO Database Record (c) 2010 APA, all rights reserved)     

Psychotherapists view their personal therapy.

Studied the long-term effects of intensive psychotherapy or psychoanalysis on a sophisticated group of patients—practicing psychotherapists who had previously been in treatment. A comprehensive questionnaire was distributed to 97 30–60 yr old psychotherapists preselected by having completed personal psychotherapy or psychoanalysis. The items focused on subjective experiences in psychotherapy, the elucidation of intrapsychic effects, and Ss' perception of outcome. Positive benefits of treatment involved improvements in self-esteem as well as interpersonal relations. Symptom alleviation was ranked as the least important benefit. Improvement in all areas (including self-esteem, work function, sex life, social relations, character change, and alleviation of symptoms) positively correlated with the feeling of being liked by and liking the therapist. The emotional "tone" of the treatment situation as exemplified by aspects of the patient–therapist relationship appeared to be critical to a positive outcome. 21% of the Ss reported that their treatment was also harmful in some fashion. Data suggested that unresolved transference issues were central to a negative effect. (11 ref) (PsycINFO Database Record (c) 2010 APA, all rights reserved)     

A relationship between self-esteem and persuasibility.

It was found that Ss high in self-esteem were influenced more by optimistic communications than by threatening communications, while Ss low in self-esteem showed the opposite pattern. These results occurred only among Ss who received communications from sources dissimilar to Ss with respect to personality characteristics. (PsycINFO Database Record (c) 2010 APA, all rights reserved)