Approach and avoidance of social information.

Examined how an approach or avoidance tendency to information influences the perception of related social behaviors. The sexual attitudes of 50 male and 54 female undergraduates were assessed prior to viewing either a birth control, conservative social values, or educational issues lecture. Ss indicated the number of meaningful actions in the sequence by pressing a thumb switch. It was hypothesized that more units would be indicated when the topic was consistent with the S's sexual attitudes, due to an attempt to gain more informational content. Ss with positive sexual attitudes (erotophiles) indicated more units in the birth control condition, whereas Ss with negative sexual attitudes (erotophobes) indicated more units in the social values condition. Results suggest that there are chronic differences in the segmentation patterns of individuals, reflecting affective orientations toward social information. (French abstract) (PsycINFO Database Record (c) 2010 APA, all rights reserved)