Galvanic skin response to Negro and white experimenters.

"Forty white male subjects participated in what was nominally a word association test with GSR being recorded. Two Es, one Negro and one white, alternated in making simulated readjustments of a dummy apparatus attached to the S's left wrist… . A highly significant difference in GSR response to the two Es was found. A significant adaptation process was manifested in lessening degrees of response during the successive contacts." (PsycINFO Database Record (c) 2010 APA, all rights reserved)     

A preliminary study of an attraction-barrier model of patients' commitment and responses to dissatisfaction in psychotherapy.

In a cross-sectional study, 168 psychotherapy patients (mean age 24.57 yrs) reported on how they dealt with problems pertaining to the therapist or the therapy process. Ss were asked to think about a session in therapy when they experienced a problem or dissatisfying event pertaining to the therapist or the therapy process. It was found that commitment to therapy mediated the effect of level of Ss' disclosure in therapy in endorsing constructive accommodation (voice and loyalty as opposed to exit and neglect) to deal with the dissatisfying events. Severity of the dissatisfying event with the therapist had direct effects on increasing the use of voice and exit and decreasing loyalty; it also had indirect effects on accommodation via the mediating variable of commitment. The results are explained jointly in terms of G. Levinger's (1999) attraction-barrier model of commitment and C. E. Rusbult et al.'s (1991) model of accommodation processes. It is concluded that the proposed conceptual framework, derived from theory and research on the social psychology of personal relationships, may be useful in understanding when interpersonal problems between patients and therapists encourage patients to withdraw or drop out of therapy before it is therapeutically appropriate. (PsycINFO Database Record (c) 2010 APA, all rights reserved)     

Studies in efficiency: Muscle-action patterns in reaction time as related to GSR conditioning.

A significant interaction between degree of efficiency in reaction time and in meeting task requirements in the GSR conditioning situation was found, such that efficient Ss tended to take longer to reach criterion under instructions to relax, while there was no difference between the groups when the requirement was to solve a problem. Under the relax instructions the correlation of right- to left-arm tension with trials to successive CRs was .60; under problem instructions it was -.04. Taken together with the previous studies, these results are interpreted as support for the method of analysis implied by the concept of efficiency. They prepare the way for further tests of the hypothesis that efficiency will be related to degrees of psychopathology. (PsycINFO Database Record (c) 2010 APA, all rights reserved)     

Mechanism and measurement of the galvanic skin response.

The measurement of the GSR is subject to error from many sources. Recent work has elucidated the peripheral mechanism of the response and has provided an appropriate electrical model. This review considers the measurement and analysis of the GSR in the light of this recent work. The relative merits of constant current (resistance) and constant voltage (conductance) measurements are discussed; the optimal electrode systems are defined, and dc and ac methods are compared. A brief survey of the organismic and environmental variables which influence the response is included. (2 p. ref.) (PsycINFO Database Record (c) 2010 APA, all rights reserved)     

Extinction during psychotherapy of GSR accompanying embarrassing statements.

"Statements by a therapy patient acknowledging personal sexual behavior or desires were frequently accompanied during early hours of therapy with galvanic skin responses, but not during later hours, following a progressive decline. This finding is taken as evidence that the GSR is associated with such feelings as fear or embarrassment in the interpersonal relationship with the therapist and that such feelings extinguish during therapy." (PsycINFO Database Record (c) 2010 APA, all rights reserved)     

Conditioning and generalization of GSR as a function of awareness.

"This study was essentially a replication of… (an) experiment on the unconscious conditioning of autonomic responses. When… (the previous) methods of data analysis were used, their results in general were confirmed." Limitations and critique of the previous methodology is offered, and its effect on the results obtained is discussed. (PsycINFO Database Record (c) 2010 APA, all rights reserved)     

The effects of competition on reaction time and palmar skin conductance.

"Ninety-two Ss were tested on reaction time tasks under normal and competitive conditions. The speed of the simple reaction and of the discriminative reaction increased under the competitive condition… . Under the competitive condition, the level of palmar skin conductance increased and self-rated alertness increased, but these measures were not related to the decrease in reaction time. Thus the speed of performance and some measures of the level of motivation both increased in a competitive situation, but there was no evidence… for a causal relationship between them." (PsycINFO Database Record (c) 2010 APA, all rights reserved)     

Effects of music upon GSR of depressives and schizophrenics.

Using GSR as a measure of emotionality, 2 groups of patients (depressives and schizophrenics) were exposed to 2 kinds of music (exciting and calming). In general, the music was seen to have the predicted effect on all the patients. The depressives responded more to the music characterized as exciting than the schizophrenics. Music was seen to be a factor which could alter the subjective emotional experience of psychotic patients. (PsycINFO Database Record (c) 2010 APA, all rights reserved)     

Reaction time as a measure of perceptual vigilance.

Reviews the use made of reaction time as an index of performance deterioration in monitoring tasks, with special reference to the hypothesis that reaction time and detection rate are correlated indices of perceptual vigilance. It is concluded that this is the case, and a theoretical model relating the 2 indices to changes in vigilance occurring with time on task is proposed. (2 p. ref.) (PsycINFO Database Record (c) 2010 APA, all rights reserved)     

The Manifest Anxiety Scale as a measure of drive.

"A group of Ss was given the Taylor MAS and 6 weeks later the Heinman forced-choice version of the scale. Skin conductance measures were obtained for each S under 2 conditions: A rest period; and a task period involving shock threat for some Ss, and no shock threat for others. The results indicated that the forced-choice scale was positively related to the readings taken under rest condition, and negatively related to changes in conductance obtained under the threat of shock. The MAS did not correlate with any of the conductance readings." 18 references. (PsycINFO Database Record (c) 2010 APA, all rights reserved)     

Acquiescent response set as a measure of acquiescence.

The degree to which acquiescent response set (ARS), as measured psychometrically, is related to behavioral acquiescence, was investigated. Performance on paper-and-pencil tests of acquiescence was found to be related to conformity and compliance in a social situation. The 2 assumed measures of "acquiescence" were not related statistically. From Psyc Abstracts 36:04:4HF55F. (PsycINFO Database Record (c) 2010 APA, all rights reserved)     

Toward a theory of hypnotic behavior: Effects on suggestibility of defining the situation as hypnosis and defining response to suggestions as easy.

96 Ss participated in a 2 X 2 factorial experiment which was designed to assess the effects on suggestibility of: defining the situation as hypnosis or as control, and defining response to suggestions as easy or as difficult. The dependent variables consisted of responses to 8 standardized test suggestions (Barber Suggestibility Scale). Ss told "You are in the hypnosis group" were more responsive to suggestions than Ss told "You are in the control group." Ss told that it was easy to respond to test suggestions were more suggestible than Ss told that it was difficult. The suggestibility-enhancing effects of the independent variables were additive: the level of suggestibility was highest when the situation was defined as hypnosis and the test suggestions as easy; next highest when either the situation was defined as hypnosis or the suggestions as easy; and lowest when the situation was defined as control and the suggestions as difficult. (PsycINFO Database Record (c) 2010 APA, all rights reserved)     

Interaction of set and awareness as determinants of response to verbal conditioning.

The utility of an operant conditioning model to psychotherapy was evaluated by studying the definition of the situation given S and S's focus on E's behavior. Instructions induced either a positive or negative set, identifying a story telling task as a test of empathy or personal problems. Awareness was induced in ? of the Ss by calling attention to E's reinforcement "mm-hmm." 12 undergradate students served as Ss in each of the 4 experimental groups. Positive set-Aware Ss increased use of emotional words, while Negative set-Aware Ss decreased use of emotional words. The results were interpreted as evidence that awareness can either facilitate or inhibit conditioning, depending upon S's set. (26 ref.) (PsycINFO Database Record (c) 2010 APA, all rights reserved)     

Brief successful psychotherapy of a chronic phobic reaction.

A report demonstrating the use of hypnosis in the therapy of a phobic reaction. Hypnotic and posthypnotic suggestions were used to help uncover the affectively-laden but forgotten experiences which elucidated the meaning of the phobia, as well as to help the patient relive, work through, and accept the insights gleaned therefrom, both during the therapeutic hour, between therapeutic hours, and after termination. It was felt the use of hypnosis in this case helped shorten the duration of the therapy. (PsycINFO Database Record (c) 2010 APA, all rights reserved)     

Complexity of response as a factor in the vocabulary performance of schizophrenics.

"Equated pairs of schizophrenics and attendants were tested on two tasks differing in the complexity of the responses required. The performance of the schizophrenic group was significantly poorer than that of the attendants where the more complex response was involved. Where the less complex response was involved, the groups did not differ." (PsycINFO Database Record (c) 2010 APA, all rights reserved)     

The URICA as a measure of motivation to change among treatment-seeking individuals with concurrent alcohol and cocaine problems.

The original 4-factor structure of the University of Rhode Island Change Assessment (URICA; C. C. DiClemente & S. 0. Hughes, 1990) was replicated, and the scale's internal consistency was found to be acceptable in a sample of 106 cocaine- and alcohol-dependent participants receiving either disulfiram or no medication in a psychotherapy trial. In addition, participants categorized as having high Committed Action (CA), a new URICA composite, had a significantly greater percentage of days abstinent from both alcohol and cocaine (85.6%) than low-CA participants (72.7%, p     

Patient's and therapist's views of early alliance building in dynamic psychotherapy: Patterns and relation to outcome.

Patients and therapists have somewhat divergent perspectives of alliance. Usually in psychotherapy research, the focus is on the patient's view of alliance, predicting parts of outcome. This study questions this hypothesis by applying the shape-of-change procedure to patient's and therapist's view of alliance-building processes in dynamic psychotherapy. The results of this naturalistic study indicate that none of the 3 patient patterns is related to outcome at the end of psychotherapy, but a specific therapist's pattern--out of 2--is linked to positive symptom change. These results are discussed in the context of present research on therapeutic alliance, especially in terms of level and process, its measurement, and potential in predicting outcome in dynamic psychotherapy. (PsycINFO Database Record (c) 2010 APA, all rights reserved)     

Enduring effects of prenatal cocaine exposure on attention and reaction to errors.

Rats exposed to cocaine prenatally were administered a series of 3-choice visual attention tasks, with the most pronounced deficits seen in a task in which the onset time, location, and duration of a visual cue varied unpredictably between trials. The cocaine-exposed rats were less accurate than controls but did not differ in the rate of premature responses or omission errors. The pattern of errors, coupled with response latency data, implicated deficits in the ability to rapidly engage attention and maintain a high level of alertness to the task. The cocaine-exposed rats also exhibited a blunted reaction to an error on the previous trial, possibly reflecting an alteration in emotional regulation and/or error monitoring. Implications for underlying neuropathology are discussed. (PsycINFO Database Record (c) 2010 APA, all rights reserved)     

Facial EMG as an index of affective response to nicotine.

Negative affect reduction has been postulated to be a key feature of cigarette smoking. In the present study, facial electromyography (EMG), heart rate (HR), and skin conductance response (SCR) were used to evaluate the affective significance of acute nicotine administration and overnight withdrawal. Smokers (N = 115) attended four 90-min laboratory assessment sessions scheduled approximately 3 days apart. The sessions provided a complete crossing of 2 prelaboratory deprivation conditions (12-hr deprived vs. nondeprived) with 2 drug conditions (nicotine vs. placebo nasal spray). During each session, smokers viewed affective slides while facial EMG, HR, and SCR were recorded. Results indicated that for women, nicotine nasal spray resulted in lower corrugator EMG activity during both smoking-deprived and nondeprived sessions, compared with placebo. However, nondeprived women also showed an increase in zygomaticus EMG when given nicotine compared with placebo spray, whereas smoking-deprived women demonstrated a decrease in the zygomaticus response to nicotine compared with placebo. With men, nicotine also appeared to lower corrugator during deprivation, but not nondeprivation, compared with placebo spray, though the contrast only approached significance. With zygomaticus EMG, nicotine spray decreased men's zygomaticus responding during nondeprivation but not during deprivation, compared with placebo spray. The HR results reflected the stimulatory properties of the drug rather than nicotine's affective properties, whereas SCR was unresponsive to our experimental manipulations. The corrugator EMG results support negative reinforcement models of smoking that postulate that acute nicotine use reduces withdrawal-driven negative affect. (PsycINFO Database Record (c) 2010 APA, all rights reserved)     

Acquiescent response set as a measure of acquiescence: Further evidence.

This study reconfirms evidence that acquiescent response set (ARS) does not reflect an underlying personality tendency to conform or acquiesce as assumed in the literature. ARS scores derived from 3 additional types of instruments failed to correlate with acquiescence to simulated judgments of others in an Aschlike conformity situation. (PsycINFO Database Record (c) 2010 APA, all rights reserved)