Sex differences in emotional responses to erotic literature.

Compared the effect on male and female undergraduates (n = 112) of reading an erotic passage from a novel; control Ss (n = 112) read a passage from a psychology textbook. Men reported more sexual arousal, interest, and joy in response to the erotic passage, and women reported more disgust. Differences were significant but not large. The sexes did not differ as to fear or guilt reactions. (PsycINFO Database Record (c) 2010 APA, all rights reserved)     

Sex differences in emotional responses to "erotic literature."

32 males and 32 females read either a chapter from C. Willingham's Eternal Fire, an erotic and essentially exploitative passage, or a series of sections from Lady Chatterly's Lover which were modified to portray a clearly positive sexual experience for Lady Chatterly. Data from the Differential Emotions Scale and the Sexual Arousal Scale indicate that sex differences in response to erotic literature are complex and depend on the interpersonal as well as the erotic content of the passages. (PsycINFO Database Record (c) 2010 APA, all rights reserved)     

The menstrual cycle and response to erotic literature

133 undergraduate females responded to a pre-experimental questionnaire assessing their contraceptive use (28% on contraceptive pills), sexual experience (71% had had sexual intercourse), and present phase of menstrual cycle. Ss then read an erotic story intended to induce sexual arousal. Results of a self-report postexperimental questionnaire assessing sexual arousal and genital stimulation show no significant response differences based on menstrual cycle phases for Ss not using contraceptive pills. Greatest degree of arousal and sensation was experienced by Ss on contraceptive pills who were in the menstrual phase of the cycle; least arousal and sensation was experienced by Ss on contraceptive pills who were in the premenstrual phase of the cycle. (PsycINFO Database Record (c) 2010 APA, all rights reserved)     

Sex guilt and males' preference for reading erotic magazines.

Measured the time 27 males spent reading erotic or nonerotic magazines while ostensibly waiting to partake in an experiment. Ss then completed a forced choice Sex Guilt scale (D. Mosher), read for another 5 min., and completed a mood adjective checklist, and a double-entendre word association test (G. Galbraith). High erotic readers had significantly lower sex guilt scores than low erotic readers (p     

Automatic affective responses to smoking cues.

The authors examined automatic emotional reactions to smoking cues among 35 smokers and 25 nonsmokers (32 women and 28 men), using a novel implicit measure, the Affect Misattribution Procedure. Associative-learning theories of addiction suggest that smokers develop positive responses to cues linked to the rewarding effects of nicotine. Prior research, however, has yielded mixed evidence for whether smokers have favorable or unfavorable automatic responses to smoking cues. These findings may depend on the methods used to measure implicit responses. Using the Affect Misattribution Procedure, the authors found that nonsmokers responded to smoking cues with clear negative affect, whereas smokers' responses depended on individual differences in current smoking withdrawal. Smokers having withdrawal symptoms and those most motivated to smoke showed favorable emotional responses to smoking cues, but those with no withdrawal or low motivation to smoke showed negative responses. These results help integrate previous studies finding that smokers have negative automatic responses to cigarettes with those studies finding that smokers' responses were relatively positive. The results are important for theories that emphasize the role of cue conditioning in maintaining addiction because these theories assume, consistent with the current findings, that smoking cues can take on positive reward value. (PsycINFO Database Record (c) 2010 APA, all rights reserved)     

Biographical and self-report correlates of female guilt responses to visual erotic stimuli.

Divided 60 female undergraduates into high- and low-sex guilt groups on the basis of their responses to D. L. Mosher's True-False Guilt Inventory. All Ss reported an increase in state of sexual arousal after viewing erotic stimuli. None of the Ss reported any significant difference in state of guilt after viewing the stimuli. Low-sex guilt Ss rated the masturbation, coitus, and petting stimuli as more sexually arousing, better, more pleasant, safer, and more appealing than did high-sex-guilt Ss. (21 ref) (PsycINFO Database Record (c) 2010 APA, all rights reserved)     

Resting frontal brain asymmetry predicts affective responses to films.

This article assessed whether resting electroencephalographic (EEG) asymmetry in anterior regions of the brain can predict affective responses to emotion elicitors. Baseline EEG was recorded from 32 female adults, after which Ss viewed film clips preselected to elicit positive or negative affect. Resting alpha power asymmetry in the frontal region significantly predicted self-reported global negative affect in response to clips and predicted the difference between global positive and negative affect. Analyses of discrete emotions revealed a strong relation between frontal asymmetry and fear responses to films. Effects were independent of Ss' mood ratings at the time at which baseline EEG was measured. Resting anterior asymmetry may be a state-independent index of the individual's predisposition to respond affectively. (PsycINFO Database Record (c) 2010 APA, all rights reserved)     

Novice critical care nurses'' affective responses to orientation

Separate analysis and quantitative determination of the viscous and elastic parameters of hair performed in 5 patients with trichothiodystrophy and in 20 sex- and age-matched control subjects revealed an abnormal pattern of the mechanical behavior of trichothiodystrophic hair. The change of the viscous parameter is probably associated with the profound alterations in the high-sulfur proteins of the interfilamentary matrix; the changes in the elastic parameters may be related to the reduced stability of the irregularly arranged microfibrils of trichothiodystrophic hair caused by the marked reduction of the disulfide cross-links.     

Attributions as moderators of affective and behavioral responses to social failure.

Undergraduate women with a helpless or nonhelpless attributional style as measured by the Attributional Style Questionnaire were subjected to social failure or success (interaction with unresponsive or responsive confederates). Subsequently, each interacted with a second naive subject. As predicted, individuals with a helpless attributional style became depressed and hostile (as measured by the Multiple Affect Adjective Check List) after interacting with an unresponsive confederate. Furthermore, in comparison with nonhelpless subjects, helpless subjects who interacted with the unresponsive confederate evidenced more tension in their voices during both interactions and less pleasantness in their nonverbal behavior during the second interaction. Overall, the second group of subjects did not respond differently to the first group of subjects as an interactive function of attributions and experimental condition of the initial subjects. However, helpless subjects in the second group spoke less, were less nonverbally pleasant, and became more hostile than did nonhelpless subjects after interacting with individuals who had previously interacted with an unresponsive confederate. A consistent but unexpected pattern was found for nonhelpless subjects: They responded more adaptively to stressful than to nonstressful interactions. Results are interpreted as providing support for a vulnerability model of depression. (PsycINFO Database Record (c) 2010 APA, all rights reserved)     

Interaction with demonstrator rats changes observer rats' affective responses to flavors.

The authors examined whether exposing naive rats (observers) to recently fed conspecific demonstrator rats changed the observers' later affective responses to foods their demonstrators ate. In Experiment 1, observers learned an aversion to a flavored fluid, then interacted with demonstrators that had drunk that fluid. These observers, but not those interacting with demonstrators that had drunk water, increased their intake of the averted fluid and exhibited fewer negative responses when the averted fluid was infused into their mouths. Rats in Experiment 2 entered the arm of a T maze known to lead to banana-flavored pellets more frequently after interacting with demonstrators fed banana-flavored pellets than after interacting with demonstrators fed chow-flavored pellets. Results of both experiments indicated that interaction with demonstrator rats changed observer rats' affective responses to flavors. (PsycINFO Database Record (c) 2010 APA, all rights reserved)     

Social cognitions as organizers of autonomic and affective responses to social challenge.

Autonomic and affective responses to children were assessed as a function of adult perceptions of interpersonal control. Women (N?=?160) interacted with and provided feedback to computer-simulated children who behaved responsively or unresponsively on a computer game. Women were categorized as low in perceived control (PC) if they attributed high control to children but low control to self over negative events on the Parent Attribution Test. As predicted, low-PC women were maximally reactive to child characteristics, manifesting peak levels of defensive arousal (increased level of heart rate and electrodermal activity) and negative affect with unresponsive children and minimal levels of arousal and negative affect with responsive children. Intermediate response levels were shown by high-PC Ss. We interpreted results as suggesting mediating factors that may operate in dysfunctional interaction patterns previously found for low-PC caregivers. (PsycINFO Database Record (c) 2010 APA, all rights reserved)     

Cognitive and affective bases of opinion survey responses.

Two experiments investigated the determinants of agreement with propositions that advocated social privileges for either people in general or specific social groups. Liking for the group to which a group-specific proposition referred had a contrast effect on agreement with a related general proposition that was considered immediately after it, but had a positive influence of agreement with a general proposition that did not occur until several items later. The latter effect was eliminated by instructing Ss to base their judgments on the consequences of the policies described in the propositions. Instructions to base judgments on affective reactions to the propositions produced contrast effects of group-specific propositions on judgments of general ones regardless of whether these items were separated or together in the questionnaire. (PsycINFO Database Record (c) 2010 APA, all rights reserved)     

The competition of affective responses in human subjects.

"The present study is an attempt to study competing responses in human affective behavior. The following hypothesis was tested: a reduction of the magnitude of a conditioned anxiety response can be produced by the simultaneous elicitation of certain other affects. The procedure… consisted of the simultaneous tachistoscopic presentation of two letters, one having an anxiety response conditioned to it under hypnosis, and the other a response of either sadness, contentment, or delight. In the control condition the other letter was affectively neutral. The competing affects hypothesis was confirmed for the pairing of contentment and anxiety (only)." (PsycINFO Database Record (c) 2010 APA, all rights reserved)     

Attributional, perceptual, and affective responses to depressed and nondepressed marital partners.

Husbands of wives with (n?=?22) or without (n?=?23) a history of a depressive disorder indicated their attributions about and affective reactions to real and hypothetical positive and negative events occurring to their wives, rated their wives on personality traits categorized as depression-related and depression-neutral, and reported their own marital satisfaction. Husbands of depressed, relative to nondepressed, wives made more dispositional attributions, reported more negative affect in reaction to negative events, and indicated less marital satisfaction. Depressed wives were rated more negatively on both depression-related and depression-neutral personality traits. Results are interpreted as suggesting that spouses of depressed wives have a generalized negative view of their wives, which may also be operating within distressed marriages. (PsycINFO Database Record (c) 2010 APA, all rights reserved)     

Emotional responses to affective displays in others: The distinction between empathy and sympathy.

Attempted to establish independent operational definitions of the 2 affective responses (empathy and sympathy) and examined the determinants of each. The Adjective Checklist was used to assess personality attributes in 94 undergraduates. Ss responded to 1 of 2 videotapes of a young woman in emotional distress. One centered on the theme of personal rejection and the other on the theme of parental conflict. Measures of empathy and sympathy were significantly related in the former but independent in the latter. Sympathy, but not empathy, depended on an interaction between the personality of the observer and the nature of the other's conflict and was related across conditions to 2 cognitive variables: how disposed Ss were to imagine themselves in the place of the other and how justified they thought the other's response to be. Empathy, in contrast, seemed more a function of stable personal attributes. Results support the argument that empathy and sympathy are indeed distinct processes. (25 ref) (PsycINFO Database Record (c) 2010 APA, all rights reserved)     

Using the Job-Related Affective Well-Being Scale (JAWS) to investigate affective responses to work stressors.

Prior research linking job stressors to psychological strains has been limited to a small number of emotional reactions. This article describes research linking job stressors to a wide range of affective states at work. In Study 1, a multidimensional scaling procedure was used on a matrix of similarity judgments by 51 employees of 56 job-related affective statements to support a 2-dimensional view of affective well-being. In Study 2, ratings of the affect statements by 100 employees further supported the contention that the dimensions were pleasure–displeasure and degree of arousal. In Study 3, 114 full-time university employees responded to the Job-Related Affective Well-Being Scale, which was found to be related to measures of job stressors as well as job satisfaction and physical symptoms. (PsycINFO Database Record (c) 2010 APA, all rights reserved)     

Influence of reinforced smiling on affective responses in an interview.

48 female undergraduates participated in an interview study under 1 of 4 conditions; Ss were reinforced for smiling during the interview with a "biofeedback" light, given noncontingent biofeedback, given noncontingent biofeedback and instructed to smile whenever a signal light was illuminated, or asked to simulate affective responses after hearing the same instructions given to participants in the smile-instructed group. Smile-reinforced Ss smiled significantly more than control and smile-instructed Ss and reported significantly more positive feelings with buttonpresses and on a rating form. Results are interpreted as supporting facial feedback theories of emotion. (33 ref) (PsycINFO Database Record (c) 2010 APA, all rights reserved)     

A theory of erotic orientation development.

It has been proposed that the content of an individual's erotic fantasies and the erotic stimuli that are sexually arousing to an individual (i.e., an individual's erotic orientation) is the core psychological dimension underlying sexual orientation. Although considerable research has been conducted on the basic processes by which individuals acquire erotic stimuli, it has not been integrated into a theory of erotic orientation development. Previous research is reviewed in this article, and a theoretical model is offered. It is proposed that erotic orientation emerges from an interaction between sex drive development and social development during early adolescence. Hypotheses are presented concerning the effects of variations in the timing of sex drive development and in patterns of social bonding on sexual orientation, and data relevant to those hypotheses are examined. Finally, the proposed theory is compared to extant theories of the causes of homosexuality. (76 ref) (PsycINFO Database Record (c) 2010 APA, all rights reserved)     

Female preschoolers' perceptions of affective responses and interpersonal behavior in videotaped episodes.

Constructed an empathy measure to test whether 3- and 4-yr-old children can perceive affective states as indicated by H. Borke (see record 1972-00686-001). 8 filmed episodes had congruous and incongruous stimulus features-4 episodes represented incongruity and 4 represented parallel congruous episodes where positive or negative affect was matched to the appropriate positive or negative interpersonal behavior. 48 female 2-5 yr old preschoolers were divided into high and average mental age groups and were asked to tell the story about each episode. Findings reveal that on the congruous episodes, there was a significant main effect of Mental Age for reasons for affective responses, for affective responses, and for intrapersonal behavior; however, this main effect was only significant for the latter 2 measures on incongruous episodes. Ss scored significantly higher on the congruous than on the incongruous episodes. There was no significant main effect of Chronological Age for any measure. (22 ref) (PsycINFO Database Record (c) 2010 APA, all rights reserved)