Emotional disruption and industrial productivity.

Will the emotional disturbances of operators have more effect during a changeover than when things are stereotyped? A number of assembly line situations, involving small numbers of workers, were studied. "In there experiments, involving four independent comparisons, we find precisely the same pattern of results. Emotional disturbance has little effect on stereotyped activity, but does have a disrupting effect on nonstereotyped activity." From Psyc Abstracts 36:04:4LH01S. (PsycINFO Database Record (c) 2010 APA, all rights reserved)     

The relationship between socioeconomic status, hostility, and blood pressure reactions to mental stress in men: Data from the Whitehall II study.

This study investigated the relationship among blood pressure reactions to mental stress, cynical hostility, and socioeconomic status (SES) in 1,091 male public servants. Occupational grade served to index SES and cynical hostility was assessed using the Cook-Medley scale. (Cook & Medley, 1954). The magnitude of systolic, but not diastolic, blood pressure change scores to stress was positively associated with occupational grade: the higher the grade, the greater the reactions. Mental stress task performance also varied with occupational grade but was unrelated to reactivity. Ratings of task difficulty did not vary with occupational grade. Cynical hostility was negatively related to occupational grade, and, contrary to previous findings, negatively related to systolic blood pressure reactivity. Cynical hostility was also negatively related to mental stress task performance but unrelated to ratings of task difficulty. (PsycINFO Database Record (c) 2010 APA, all rights reserved)     

When reality monitoring fails: The role of imagination in stereotype maintenance.

Research on reality monitoring (the process by which people distinguish memories of real events from memories of imagined events) suggests that the occurrence of imagined events can inflate the perceived frequency of corresponding real events. Two experiments examined how such failures in reality monitoring can contribute to the maintenance of social stereotypes. When subjects imagined members of occupational groups in the initial experiment, they tended to incorporate stereotyped traits into their imaginations, with specific traits determined by the contexts being imagined. This suggests that imagined events do correspond with stereotype-confirming real events. In the second experiment, subjects read sentences that presented traits (stereotyped and nonstereotyped) in association with occupations with uniform frequency. They also imagined members of each occupation in situations relevant to particular stereotypic traits. In subsequent judgments of presentation frequency, subjects overestimated their exposure to stereotypic occupation–trait combinations, which replicated earlier studies. Subjects further overestimated the presentation frequency of imagined stereotypic combinations, which indicated the failure to distinguish self-generated images from actual presentations. (PsycINFO Database Record (c) 2010 APA, all rights reserved)     

Looking for truth in all the wrong places? Asymmetric search of individuating information about stereotyped group members.

Two experiments examined how category-based expectancies (CBEs) influence individuating information sought when trying to make accurate judgments about the attitudes of targets who were members of social categories that strongly or weakly implied the judged attitude. CBEs produced marked asymmetries in the number and content of participants' questions. Specifically, participants addressed fewer questions to stereotyped targets (STs) than to nonstereotyped targets (NSTs), thus acquiring relatively little individuating information about STs prior to judgment. Questions asked STs were diagnostically asymmetric—a response could better confirm than disconfirm the expected attitude, but questions to NSTs were diagnostically symmetric—a response could equally confirm or disconfirm the attitude. The authors discuss asymmetric search as a mechanism that may protect CBEs against disconfirmation independent of biased processing of acquired information. (PsycINFO Database Record (c) 2010 APA, all rights reserved)     

Categorical and contextual bases of person memory and stereotyping.

In 3 studies, a total of 207 White university summer school students observed slide and type portrayals of interacting small groups that were of mixed sex or mixed race. Hypotheses were that (a) social perceivers encode person information by race and sex; (b) this fact leads to minimizing within-group and exaggerating between-group differences; (c) perceivers stereotype accordingly; (d) within-group attributes, both stereotyped and nonstereotyped, are exaggerated in inverse proportion to the size of the minority subgroup; (e) better discriminations are made within smaller subgroups; (f) imputations of attributes to groups as a whole are also sensitive to the makeup of the group; and (g) all these behaviors are attenuated when the perceiver is a member of the subgroup evaluated. All but the last hypothesis received at least partial support. Results are discussed in terms of categorization processes and suggest that normal cognitive processes explain the process of stereotyping quite well. (32 ref) (PsycINFO Database Record (c) 2010 APA, all rights reserved)     

Cardiovascular and emotional responses in women: The role of hostility and harassment.

The relation of hostility and harassment to cardiovascular and emotional responses was examined by having 51 women (aged 18–26 yrs) high and low in hostility complete a task with or without harassment. Harassed high hostile Ss showed greater systolic blood pressure (SBP) increases during task and recovery periods than did harassed low hostile Ss and nonharassed Ss. Harassed low hostile Ss evidenced greater SBP increases during task and recovery periods than did nonharassed Ss. Among high hostile women, cardiovascular elevations during the task were associated with self-reported levels of negative affect. Antagonistic hostility, relative to neurotic hostility, was positively associated with harassment-induced SBP changes. These results support the hypothesis that hostile people exhibit excessive behaviorally induced cardiovascular responses to interpersonally challenging tasks that evoke anger-related emotional states. (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)     

The stereotyped task engagement process: The role of interest and achievement motivation.

Competence-based stereotypes can negatively affect women's performance in math and science (referred to as stereotype threat), presumably leading to lower motivation. The authors examined the effects of stereotype threat on interest, a motivational path not necessarily mediated by performance. They predicted that working on a computer science task in the context of math-gender stereotypes would negatively affect undergraduate women's task interest, particularly for those higher in achievement motivation who were hypothesized to hold performance-avoidance goals in response to the threat. Compared with when the stereotype was nullified, while under stereotype threat an assigned performance-avoidance (vs. -approach) goal was associated with lower interest for women higher in achievement motivation (Study 1), and women higher (vs. lower) in achievement motivation were more likely to spontaneously adopt performance-avoidance goals (Study 2). The motivational influence of performance-avoidance goals under stereotype threat was primarily mediated by task absorption (Study 3). Implications for the stereotyped task engagement process (Smith, 2004) are discussed. (PsycINFO Database Record (c) 2010 APA, all rights reserved)     

Prospective associations from family-of-origin interactions to adult marital interactions and relationship adjustment.

To test the social learning-based hypothesis that marital conflict resolution patterns are learned in the family of origin, longitudinal, observational data were used to assess prospective associations between family conflict interaction patterns during adolescence and offspring's later marital conflict interaction patterns. At age 14 years, 47 participants completed an observed family conflict resolution task with their parents. In a subsequent assessment 17 years later, the participants completed measures of marital adjustment and an observed marital conflict interaction task with their spouse. As predicted, levels of hostility and positive engagement expressed by parents and adolescents during family interactions were prospectively linked with levels of hostility and positive engagement expressed by offspring and their spouses during marital interactions. Family-of-origin hostility was a particularly robust predictor of marital interaction behaviors; it predicted later marital hostility and negatively predicted positive engagement, controlling for psychopathology and family-of-origin positive engagement. For men, family-of-origin hostility also predicted poorer marital adjustment, an effect that was mediated through hostility in marital interactions. These findings suggest a long-lasting influence of family communication patterns, particularly hostility, on offspring's intimate communication and relationship functioning. (PsycINFO Database Record (c) 2010 APA, all rights reserved)     

Cooperation and competition in means-interdependent triads.

A task was presented to 40 male triads wherein the performance of each participant was maximally determined by the behavior of the other 2. 20 triads received cooperative instructions, 20 received competitive instructions. As predicted the differences between cooperative and competitive groups were particularly great in such a task: cooperative triads, as compared to competitive triads, were more rapid in solving the problem, evaluated fellow team members more favorably, showed less indication of hostility, were more attracted to the task, were more likely to develop leaders. In addition, and contrary to prediction, there was greater concern for personal performance in the cooperative triads. Hypotheses regarding concern for team performance, coalition formation, and the effects of interference with the operations of one member were not supported. (20 ref.) (PsycINFO Database Record (c) 2010 APA, all rights reserved)     

Self-criticism and conflict resolution in romantic couples.

120 heterosexual college student couples (mean age 21.5 yrs) completed measures of self-criticism and relational schemas and then attempted to resolve 2 conflicts while being videotaped. Overt hostility was rated from the videotapes. In both girlfriends and boyfriends, self-criticism was associated with negative relational schemas and more negative cognitive-affective reactions during the conflict resolution task. Self-critical women displayed greater overt hostility towards their partners. Structural equation modeling (SEM) demonstrated that negative relational schemas functioned as mediating variables that explained negative cognitive affective reactions during the task. The SEM also showed that, in women, negative cognitive-affective reactions predicted overt hostility, which in turn predicted partners' distress and overt hostility. The results bolster cognitive interpersonal analyses of depression by illustrating how cognitive structures associated with a hypothesized vulnerability (self-criticism) can have important interpersonal correlates. (PsycINFO Database Record (c) 2010 APA, all rights reserved)     

Magnitude and duration of cardiovascular response to anger in Vietnam veterans with and without posttraumatic stress disorder.

This study investigated the cardiovascular responses to a relived anger task in 118 male Vietnam combat veterans (62 with posttraumatic stress disorder [PTSD] and 56 without PTSD). Participants completed standardized diagnostic measures, hostility measures, and a laboratory session in which they relived a self-chosen anger memory while heart rate (HR), systolic blood pressure, and diastolic blood pressure (DBP) were measured continuously using an Ohmeda Finapres monitor. Compared with veterans without PTSD, PTSD veterans took less time to feel anger, had greater mean HR and DBP response during relived anger, and reported greater anger and anxiety during the task. There was a significant relationship between covert hostility and anger response during and after the anger task only in participants with PTSD. (PsycINFO Database Record (c) 2010 APA, all rights reserved)     

Hostility and Distraction Have Differential Influences on Cardiovascular Recovery From Anger Recall in Women.

This study investigated the relation of dispositional hostility to cardiovascular reactivity during an anger-recall task and of hostility and distraction to posttask recovery in 80 healthy women (ages 18-30). Half were randomly assigned to distraction during recovery. Hostility predicted slower systolic blood pressure and preejection period during recovery. Distraction was related to faster cardiac recovery, higher high-frequency (HF) power, lower low-frequency (LF) power and LF:HF ratios, and lower state anger and rumination during recovery. These results indicate deleterious influences of hostility on cardiovascular recovery but not during anger recall. The findings also show beneficial effects of distraction in expediting cardiovascular recovery, possibly through reducing rumination and anger. (PsycINFO Database Record (c) 2010 APA, all rights reserved)     

"I Am Us": Negative Stereotypes as Collective Threats.

Collective threat is the fear that an ingroup member's behavior might reinforce a negative stereotype of one's group. In a field study, self-reported collective threat was higher in stereotyped minorities than in Whites and was linked to lower self-esteem in both groups. In 3 experimental studies, a potentially poor performance by an ingroup member on a stereotype-relevant task proved threatening, as evidenced by lower self-esteem among minority students in 2 experiments and women in a 3rd experiment. The latter study demonstrated the generality of collective threat. Collective threat also undermined academic performance and affected self-stereotyping, stereotype activation, and physical distancing from the ingroup member. Results further suggest that group identification plays a role in whether people use an avoidance or challenge strategy in coping with collective threat. Implications for theories of social identity and stigmatization are discussed. (PsycINFO Database Record (c) 2010 APA, all rights reserved)     

Effects of amount of helplessness training and internal–external locus of control on mood and performance.

Based on C. B. Wortman and J. W. Brehm's (1975) integration of reactance theory with M. E. Seligman's (1972, 1975) model of learned helplessness, the present study examined the effects of amount of helplessness training and internal–external locus of control on subsequent task performance and on self-ratings of mood. 90 undergraduates were divided into internal and external groups on the basis of their scores on Rotter's Internal–External Locus of Control Scale and were then given either high, low, or no helplessness training on a series of concept-formation problems. After completing the Multiple Affect Adjective Check List, all Ss worked on an anagram task presented as a 2nd experiment by a 2nd experimenter. Internals exhibited greater performance decrements and reported greater depression under high helplessness than did externals. In the low helplessness conditions, internals tended to perform better than control Ss, while externals tended to perform worse than control Ss; low helplessness Ss also reported the highest levels of hostility. The results are discussed within the context of Wortman and Brehm's integration of reactance and learned helplessness theories. (25 ref) (PsycINFO Database Record (c) 2010 APA, all rights reserved)     

Use of sequential medical trials in rehabilitation research

We tested the hypotheses that the hostility and anger scales of the Buss and Perry (1992) [Buss, A. H. & Perry, M. (1992). The Aggression Questionnaire. Journal of Personality and Social Psychology, 63, 452-459.] Aggression Questionnaire would predict anger in college students in response to mistreatment. We found low and high hostility groups did not differ in anger at baseline or after completing a task without provocation, but the high hostility group reported greater anger than the low group after the onset of provocation, which required all students to redo completed tasks because some students (confederates) were observed cheating. Hostility also influenced anxiety and depression, but only anger was greater as a result of the provocation in the high than in the low hostility group. The anger scale did not predict anger in response to provocation, but anger was higher in the high than the low anger group before the provocation. These findings support the construct validity of the Aggression Questionnaire hostility scale as a measure of suspicion, resentment and sensitivity to mistreatment.     

Awareness during drowsiness: Dynamics and electrophysiological correlates.

Examined performance patterns and concurrent EEG spectra in 4 Ss (mean age of 30.5 yrs) performing a continuous visuomotor compensatory tracking task in 15–20 min bouts during a 42-hr sleep deprivation study. During periods of good performance, participants made compensatory trackball movements about twice per second, attempting to keep a target disk near a central ring. Results indicate that autocorrelations of time series representing the distance of the target disk from the ring center showed that during periods of poor performance marked near-18-sec cycles in performance again appeared. There were phases of poor or absent performance accompanied by an increase in EEG power that was largest at 3–4 Hz. These studies show that in drowsy humans, opening and closing of the gates of behavioral awareness is marked not by the appearance of (12–14 Hz) sleep spindles, but by prominent EEG amplitude changes in the low theta band. Further, both EEG and behavioral changes during drowsiness often exhibit stereotyped 18-sec cycles. (PsycINFO Database Record (c) 2010 APA, all rights reserved)     

Affective and cognitive characteristics of depression in 10- and 11-year-old children.

Used an index of childhood depression to regress indices of emotion experiences, attribution style, and intellectual performance of 82 male and 64 female 5th graders from a rural public school. All Ss completed a children's depression inventory, a differential emotion scale, and an attributional style questionnaire. Teachers rated Ss on their frequency of expression of 3 categories of emotion. 45 Ss whose scores were high, low, or intermediate on the depression inventory also completed the PPVT and the Block Design subscale of the WISC. Results indicate that the depressed Ss were like depressed adults in that they reported experiencing a pattern of emotions including sadness, anger, self-directed hostility, and shame, and they tended to explain negative events in terms of internal, stable, and global causes. The similarity between depressed children and depressed adults on these measures was greater for girls than for boys. Depression was not related to performance on a verbal task, but depressed girls performed worse than nondepressed girls on the Block Design task. The measures of emotion experiences accounted for 78.1 and 46.1% of the variance in girls' and boys' depression scores, respectively, after the variance accounted for by attribution style was partialed out. (20 ref) (PsycINFO Database Record (c) 2010 APA, all rights reserved)     

Work style and the expression of hostility in boys.

The concept of work style denotes the unique, idiosyncratic stylistic variations in how one works, variations which override the demands of the job and which express the person in relation to the task. 5 dimensions of work style are defined in the context of the role of early work experience in personality development. 52 white 8-14 yr. old males who worked at a variety of part-time jobs were rated on these dimensions on the basis of extensive interview data. Ratings correlated positively with both the pervasiveness and intensity of hostility expressed in imaginative though products (TAT stories). The relation between work-style dimensions and hostility expression is examined in the context of psychoanalytic ego-psychology theory. (PsycINFO Database Record (c) 2010 APA, all rights reserved)