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PERSONALITY and SOCIAL PSYCHOLOGY bulletin Journal of the Society for Personality and Social Psychology, Inc. |
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PSPB
now receives manuscript submissions through a web-based system called RAPID
REVIEW. |
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Editor: Frederick Rhodewalt Editorial Office: Associate Editors: Vicki S. Helgeson Margo J. Monteith Paula M. Niedenthal William S. Rholes William von Hippel Stephen C. Wright New Associate Editors, 2004 Jeffrey W. Sherman Carol Sansone Kipling D. Williams |
The following articles
have been accepted for publication 6/18/2003 Address Correspondence To: Daniel Ames, Columbia Business School, 3022 Broadway Ave., New York, NY 10027. Email: da358@columbia.edu Abstract: How do people react to those who have helped them? We propose that a recipient’s evaluation of a helper’s intentions and the recipient’s own attitudes about future interactions with the helper depend partly on the recipient’s perceptions of how the helper decided to assist: on the basis of affect, of role, or of cost-benefit calculation. When a recipient perceives that the decision was based on affect (i.e., positive feelings about her), she will be more inclined toward future interaction and reciprocation than if she perceives the decision as based on role or cost-benefit calculation. We propose that these “decision modes” signal the helper’s underlying attitudes about the recipient, which, in turn, clarify their relationship. We also identify a boundary: the negative impact of apparent cost-benefit thinking is greatest when the amount of help provided is small. We confirmed our predictions in four studies of actual and experimentally-manipulated helping episodes. 6/27/2003 Address Correspondence To: Adam D. Galinsky, Department of Management and Organizations, Leverone Hall, 2001 Sheridan Road, Kellogg School of Management, Northwestern University, Evanston, Illinois 60208. Email: agalinsky@kellogg.northwestern.edu Abstract: Perspective-taking, by means of creating an overlap between self and other cognitive representations, has been found to effectively decrease stereotyping and in-group favoritism (Galinsky & Moskowitz, 2000). In the present investigation, we examined the potential moderating role of self-esteem on the effects of perspective-taking on prejudice. In two experiments, we found that perspective-takers, but not control participants, with temporarily or chronically high self-esteem evaluated an out-group more positively than perspective-takers with low self-esteem. This finding suggests an irony of perspective-taking: it builds off egocentric biases to improve out-group evaluations. The discussion focuses on how debiasing inter-group thought is often best accomplished by working through the very processes that produced the bias in the first place. 6/30/2003 Address Correspondence To: Paul J. E. Miller, Department of Human Ecology, University of Texas at Austin, Austin, Texas 78712. Email: pjmiller@mail.utexas.edu Abstract: Trust and Partner-Enhancing Attributions in Close Relationships A cross-lagged panel design was used to examine the links between trust and attributional processes in a sample of 75 married couples over a period of two years. During the first phase of the study, participants completed a measure of marital trust, engaged in a laboratory problem-solving discussion of a recurrent conflict-related issue, and then rated their partner's behavior and motives. Approximately two years later, 54 couples were again contacted and measures of trust were obtained. Forty of these couples also viewed a videotape of their laboratory problem-solving discussion from two years previously and rated their partner's behavior and motives. Results suggested a reciprocal causal pattern by which partner-enhancing attributions predict changes in trust and trust predicts changes in partner-enhancing attributions. 7/2/2003 Address Correspondence To: Garth Fletcher at the Psychology Department, University of Canterbury, Private Bag 4800, Christchurch, New Zealand. Email: G.Fletcher@psyc.canterbury.ac.nz Abstract: Prior research and theory suggest that people use three main sets of criteria in mate selection: Warmth/Trustworthiness, Attractiveness/Vitality, and Status/Resources. In two studies men and women made mating choices between pairs of hypothetical potential partners, and were forced to make tradeoffs among these three criteria (e.g., warm and homely versus cold and attractive). As predicted, women (relative to men) placed greater importance on Warmth/Trustworthiness and Status/Resources in a potential mate, but less importance on Attractiveness/Vitality. In addition, as expected, (a) ratings of ideal standards partly mediated the link between sex and mate choices, (b) ideal standards declined in importance from long-term to short-term relationships, with the exception of Attractiveness/Vitality, and, unexpectedly, (c) sex differences were higher for long-term (compared to short-term) mate choice. Explanations and implications are discussed. 7/4/2003 Address Correspondence To: Stefania Paolini, School of Behavioural Sciences, Psychology Building, University of Newcastle, Callaghan, NSW2308, Australia. Email: Stefania.Paolini@Newcastle.edu.au Abstract: Recent evidence suggests that both direct (Pettigrew, 1997) and indirect friendship with out-group members (knowledge of in-group members’ friendship with out-group members; Wright et al., 1997) can reduce prejudice towards the out-group. Two surveys of cross-community relationships in Northern Ireland, using a student sample (N = 341) and a representative sample of the general population (N = 735), tested whether (1) direct and indirect friendships had generalized effects on both prejudice and perceived out-group variability and (2) reduced anxiety about future encounters with out-group members mediated such relationships. Structural equation modeling confirmed that, in both samples, direct and indirect cross-group friendships between Catholics and Protestants were associated with reduced prejudice towards the religious out-group and increased perceived out-group variability, via an anxiety-reduction mechanism. We argue that emerging generalization hypotheses help to integrate both cognition and affect and interpersonal and intergroup approaches to contact. 7/4/2003 Address Correspondence To: Derek D. Rucker, The Ohio State University, Department of Psychology, 1885 Neil Avenue Mall, Columbus, OH 43210-1222. Email: rucker.46@osu.edu Abstract: This article reports experiments assessing how general threats to social order and severity of a crime can influence punitiveness. Results consistently showed that when participants feel that the social order is threatened, they behaved more punitively toward a crime perpetrator, but only when severity associated with a crime was relatively moderate. Evidence is presented to suggest that people can correct -- at least to a degree -- for the "biasing" influence of these inductions. Finally, threats to social order appear to increase punitiveness by arousing a retributive desire to see individuals pay for what they have done, as opposed to a purely utilitarian desire to deter future wrongdoing. The authors suggest that individuals sometimes act as intuitive prosecutors when ascribing punishment to an individual transgressor based on their perception of general societal control efficacy. 7/7/2003 Address Correspondence To: Natalie A. Wyer, Social Psychology, FPP, van der Boechorststraat 1, 1081 BT Amsterdam, NL. Email: n.wyer@psy.vu.nl Abstract: Stereotype confirming biases are well documented in the social psychological literature. However, motivations to disconfirm social stereotypes may be more influential for unprejudiced individuals. Three experiments are presented which test the hypothesis that extremely unprejudiced people exhibit a bias towards stereotype disconfirmation. Experiment 1 investigates stereotype disconfirmation in information-seeking preferences. Experiments 2 and 3 explore attributional strategies for stereotype disconfirmation. In all experiments, unprejudiced participants respond in ways reflecting a motivation to disconfirm social stereotypes. Implications for stereotype change and stereotypic influences on judgment and behavior are discussed. 7/8/2003 Address Correspondence To: Thomas E. Ford, Department of Sociology, Western Michigan University, Kalamazoo, MI 49008. Email: fordt@wmich.edu Abstract: Two studies demonstrated that coping sense of humor buffered women against the effects of stereotype threat on math performance. Using a correlational design, Study 1 demonstrated that women low in coping sense of humor assessed their performance on standardized math tests lower than men, or women high in coping sense of humor. Using an experimental design, Study 2 showed that coping sense of humor was positively related to women's performance on a math test taken under conditions of stereotype threat, but not under conditions of no stereotype threat. Mediation analyses suggest that, in the stereotype threat condition, state anxiety mediated the relationship between coping sense of humor and test performance. Women higher in coping sense of humor performed better because they felt less anxiety while taking the test. 7/9/2003 Address Correspondence To: C. Raymond Knee, Department of Psychology, University of Houston, Houston, TX, 77204-5022. Email: knee@uh.edu Abstract: In two studies, implicit theories of relationships were examined as moderators of the association between experienced conflict and commitment. Study 1 involved 118 individuals in heterosexual romantic relationships and employed an event-contingent diary procedure in which disagreements were recorded over a 10-day period. Study 2 was conducted in the laboratory and involved 75 heterosexual couples who discussed problems in their relationship, with commitment measured before and after discussion. Multilevel random coefficient models revealed that conflict was generally associated with lower commitment, but less so with growth belief. Also, growth belief was most beneficial under negative relationship conditions, such as when one possessed a less favorable view of the partner to begin with, and when the issue remained unresolved after discussion. 7/9/2003 Address Correspondence To: Gráinne Fitzsimons, Department of Psychology, New York University, 6 Washington Place, New York, NY, 10003, or Aaron Kay, Department of Psychology, Stanford University, Jordan Hall, Stanford, CA, 94305. Email: to gmf214@nyu.edu or to aaronk@psych.stanford.edu Abstract: Four studies examined the hypothesis that subtle language variations can have a causal impact on perceptions of relationships. In interpersonal interactions, language can function implicitly to reflect, perpetuate, and communicate relationship perceptions. Previous research has shown that interpersonal closeness and plural pronoun use are correlated (Agnew, Van Lange, Rusbult, & Langston, 1998); the current research demonstrates that manipulating pronoun use can lead people to perceive their own and other relationships as closer and higher in quality. In Study 1, participants who read about a relationship that was described using the pronoun ‘we’ vs. ‘she and I’ perceived the relationship to be closer and of higher quality. Study 2 showed that pronoun variations similarly affected perceptions of participants’ own ongoing relationships; Study 3 showed similar effects for perceptions of an actual interpersonal interaction. Study 4 examined potential mechanisms of this effect. 7/14/2003 Address Correspondence To: Lilia M. Cortina at the Department of Psychology, University of Michigan, 525 East University, Ann Arbor, MI 48109-1109. Email: lilia@umich.edu Abstract: Bridging the social support, sexual victimization, and cultural psychology literatures, this study examines social-support processes in the context of sexual harassment and Hispanic American culture. Surveys were administered to a community sample of Hispanic American working women, 249 of whom described some encounter with sexual harassment at work. Regression results provided mixed backing for hypotheses about support-seeking behavior, which appeared largely dependent on the social power of the harassment perpetrator. Additional findings upheld predictions about support-perception patterns; harassed women perceived more supportive social reactions when they turned to informal networks of friends and family, but responses were less positive when they turned to formal, organizational sources. Finally, as expected, perceived support and acculturation interacted to moderate relations between sexual harassment and job satisfaction. The article concludes with implications for research and interventions related to social support and sexual harassment. 7/23/2003 Address Correspondence To: Crystal L. Park, Department of Psychology, University of Connecticut, 406 Babbidge Rd. Box U-1020, Storrs, CT 06269. Email: clpark@uconnvm.uconn.edu Abstract: Using an Internet daily diary methodology, this study tested the goodness of fit hypothesis, which highlights the importance of the match between controllability appraisals and coping efforts in adjustment to stressful events. For 28 days, 190 undergraduates described their most stressful event and its controllability, how they coped, and their daily positive and negative mood. Individuals demonstrated fit across situations, with control appraisals associated positively with problem-focused coping and negatively with emotional approach coping and avoidance coping. A pooled within-person interaction indicated that problem-focused coping had a stronger positive association with positive mood when dealing with high versus low control stressors. Significant variation was also found in several other within-person interactions between control appraisals and coping, and some evidence was found for the notion that individual differences in the degree of matching coping to control appraisals were associated with person-level adjustment. 8/4/2003 Address Correspondence To: Teresa Garcia-Marques, Instituto Superior de Psicologia Aplicada, Rua Jardim do Tabaco, 34, 1149-041, PORTUGAL. Email: gmarques@ispa.pt Abstract: Given that familiarity is closely associated with positivity, we sought evidence for the idea that positivity would increase perceived familiarity. In Experiment 1, smiling and thus positively perceived novel faces were significantly more likely to be incorrectly judged as familiar than novel faces with neutral expressions. In Experiment 2, subliminal association with positive affect (a positively valenced prime) led to false recognition of novel words as familiar. In Experiment 3, validity judgments, known to be influenced by familiarity, were more likely to occur if participants were in happy mood states than neutral mood states. Despite their different paradigms and approaches, the results of these three studies converge on the idea that, at least under certain circumstances, the experience of positivity itself can signal familiarity, perhaps because the experience of familiarity is typically positive. 8/10/2003 Address Correspondence To: Michael Sargent, Department of Psychology, Bates College, 4 Andrews Road, Lewiston, Maine, 04240. Email: msargent@bates.edu Abstract: Two studies examined whether a criminal defendant’s race influences Whites’ sensitivity to legally relevant information. In Study 1, prosecution case strength ratings and guilt likelihood ratings were more sensitive to the strength of the defendant’s alibi when he was Black than when he was White, if the experimental task was designed to elicit low processing motivation. Under high motivation, participants were equally sensitive to alibi strength, regardless of defendant race. In Study 2, the alibi strength manipulation was replaced with a manipulation of the effectiveness of the district attorney’s cross-examination. As predicted, defense case strength ratings were more sensitive to the strength of the prosecutor’s cross-examination with a Black defendant than with a White defendant—under low motivation. Under high motivation, sensitivity did not depend on defendant race. These results suggest that a Black defendant can elicit greater sensitivity to legally relevant information than will a White defendant. 8/19/2003 Address Correspondence To: Jean-Claude Croizet, Laboratoire de Psychologie Sociale de la Cognition (UMR CNRS 6024), Université Blaise Pascal, 34 avenue Carnot, 63000 Clermont-Ferrand, France. Email: croizet@srvpsy.univ-bpclermont.fr Abstract: Research on stereotype threat has repeatedly demonstrated that the intellectual performance of social groups is particularly sensitive to the situational context in which tests are usually administered. In the present experiment an adaptation of the Raven Advanced Progressive Matrices Test was introduced as a measure of cognitive ability. Results showed that individuals targeted by a reputation of intellectual inferiority scored lower on the test than other people. However, when the identical test was not presented as a measure of cognitive ability, the achievement gap between the target and the control group disappeared. Using heart rate variability indices to assess mental workload, our findings showed that the situational salience of a reputation of lower ability undermined intellectual performance by triggering a disruptive mental load. Our results indicate that group differences in cognitive ability scores can reflect different situational burdens and not necessarily actual differences in cognitive ability. 8/22/2003 Address Correspondence To: Linda J. Skitka, Ph.D., University of Illinois at Chicago, Department of Psychology (m/c 285), 1007 W. Harrison St., Chicago, IL, 60607-7137. Email: lskitka@uic.edu Abstract: This study tested hypotheses generated from an integrative model of political tolerance that derived hypotheses from a number of different social psychological theories (e.g., appraisal tendency theory, intergroup emotion theory, and value protection models) to explain political tolerance following the September 11, 2001 terrorist attacks. A national field study (N = 550) found that immediate post-attack anger and fear had different implications for political tolerance four months later. The effects of anger on political tolerance were mediated through moral outrage and out-group derogation, whereas the effects of fear on political tolerance were mediated through personal threat, in-group enhancement, and value affirmation. Value affirmation led to increased, whereas moral outrage, out-group derogation, in-group enhancement, and personal threat led to decreased, political tolerance. Value affirmation, moral outrage, and out-group derogation also facilitated post-9/11 psychological closure, and increased psychological closure led to greater political tolerance. 8/28/2003 Address Correspondence To: John Sabini, Department of Psychology, University of Pennsylvania, 3815 Walnut Street, Philadelphia, PA 19104. Email: Sabini@psych.upenn.edu Abstract: We conducted four studies (total N = 292) about character and mate desirability. In Study1 undergraduates judged stimuli for attractiveness – physically, and as a casual or long-term date. The target was described as faithful, having cheated but stayed with mates, or having cheated and left. Contrary to our hypothesis, males and females were equally affected by both kinds of cheaters. Study 2 replicated Study 1 with non-student adults. In Study 3 undergraduates rated a stimulus on the same attractiveness variables. This target had $14 million from winning a lottery or selling a dot-com company. Females, but not males, found the dot-com creator to be more physically attractive than the lottery winner. In Study 4 undergraduates rated someone who sold a cookie-making company or profited from a lucky real-estate transaction. Both males and females preferred the cookie-company seller on all three measures of attractiveness. 9/2/2003 Address Correspondence To: Georgia Pomaki, Leiden University, Department of Psychology, Health Psychology Section, PO Box 9555, 2300 RB Leiden, The Netherlands. Email: pomaki@fsw.leidenuniv.nl Abstract: Although previous theory and research suggest that employee well-being should be predicted by work conditions (viz., Karasek and colleagues’ job demands-control-social support [J?DCS] model), other factors are also likely to be important. In this study we consider correlates of employee psychological distress and well-being using a goal-focused approach grounded in Ford’s (1992) motivational systems theory. Specifically, work conditions and mid-level work goal processes (WGP) were examined in a questionnaire study of health care employees. Regarding predictions derived from the J-DCS model, we found full support for the iso-strain, partial support for the non-linearity and weak support for the buffer hypothesis. Importantly, however, WGP (i.e., cognitions and emotions involved in the pursuit of self-set work goals) explained variance in job satisfaction, burnout, depression and somatic complaints, over and above that of the J-DCS model. This suggests that investigation of WGP can enhance our understanding of employee psychological distress and well-being. 9/3/2003 Address Correspondence To: Robert Eisenberger, Psychology Department, University of Delaware, Newark, DE 19716. Email: eisenber@udel.edu Abstract: We report that beliefs favoring the reciprocation of unfavorable treatment form a unitary factor that is distinct from beliefs favoring the reciprocation of favorable treatment. Individual differences in endorsement of this negative reciprocity norm were related to (a) beliefs that people are generally malevolent, (b) inclination toward anger in everyday life, (c) anger, disagreement, and ridicule directed toward a new acquaintance who treated participants unfavorably, and (d) reduced anxiety, positive emotional engagement, and encouragement of a new acquaintance who treated participants favorably. These findings suggest that individual differences in endorsement of the negative norm of reciprocity influence the extent of vengeance. 9/11/2003 Address Correspondence To: William A. Jellison, Department of Psychology, Michigan State University, East Lansing, MI, 48824. Email: jellison@msu.edu Abstract: The relations among implicit and explicit measures of sexual orientation attitudes, and sexual-orientation-related behavior and beliefs among gay men (Study 1) and straight men (Studies 1 and 2) were explored. Study 1 found relations between implicit and explicit measures of sexual orientation attitudes, large differences between gay and straight men on both implicit and explicit measures, and that these measures predicted sexual-orientation-related behaviors among gay men. Also, only straight men exhibited a negative relation between their attitudes toward homosexuality and heterosexuality. Study 2 found that as straight men held more negative attitudes toward homosexuality, they more strongly endorsed the importance of heterosexual identity and of traditional masculine gender roles. These endorsements mediated the negative relation between their attitudes toward heterosexuality and homosexuality. Implications for assessing attitudes toward sexual orientation and their relations for sexual orientation identity are discussed. 9/11/2003 Address Correspondence To: Peter Salovey, Department of Psychology, Yale University, P.O. Box 208205, New Haven, Connecticut 06520-8205. Email: peter.salovey@yale.edu or paulo.lopes@yale.edu Abstract: Two studies found positive relationships between the ability to manage emotions and the quality of social interactions, supporting the predictive and incremental validity of an ability measure of emotional intelligence, the MSCEIT (Mayer-Salovey-Caruso Emotional Intelligence Test, 2002). In a sample of 118 American college students (Study 1), higher scores on the managing emotions subscale of the MSCEIT were positively related to the quality of interactions with friends, evaluated separately by participants and two friends. In a diary study of social interaction with 103 German college students (Study 2), managing emotions scores were positively related to the perceived quality of interactions with opposite sex individuals. Scores on this subscale were also positively related to perceived success in impression management in social interactions with individuals of the opposite sex. In both studies, the main findings remained statistically significant after controlling for Big Five personality traits. 9/12/2003 Address Correspondence To: Aaron Brownstein, Department of Psychology, SGM 501, University of Southern California, Los Angeles, California, 90089-1061. Email: aaronb@usc.edu Abstract: These studies were designed to test cognitive dissonance theory’s assertion that alternatives are not reevaluated before a choice (Festinger, 1957, 1964). Participants viewed information about horses in a simulated race and rated each one’s chance of winning three times before placing their bet, and once after placing it. We found that ratings of the chosen horse increased within the pre-decision period as well as after betting. Pre-decision bolstering occurred even when participants did not expect to bet, and pre-decision preference increased with task importance and participant expertise. We attribute our findings to maintenance of consistency throughout a cognitive system. 9/12/2003 Address Correspondence To: Sherri P. Pataki, or Margaret S. Clark, Department of Psychology, Carnegie Mellon University, Pittsburgh, PA 15213. Email: sp3n@andrew.cmu.edu or mc0z@andrew.cmu.edu Abstract: Two studies addressed the meaning of expressed happiness in social relationships. In the first study males expected to interact with a socially desirable or a socially undesirable female. We predicted that: a) when about to meet a socially undesirable female, males would display more happiness publicly than is felt privately and b) when about to meet a socially desirable female, males would display less happiness publicly than felt privately. Results supported the former and tended to support the latter prediction. In the second study we predicted that females would mistrust males’ expressions of happiness upon meeting them such that: a) unattractive females would suspect males of inflating happiness and b) attractive females would suspect males of suppressing happiness. Results supported the former but not the latter hypothesis. Taking relationship specific goals into account appears to be important in determining whether emotion will be accurately conveyed and can be trusted. 9/14/2003 Address Correspondence To: Matthew Weeks, Dept. of Psychology, Centenary College of Louisiana, Shreveport, LA 71134. Email: RMWEEKS@centenary.edu Abstract: While racial stereotyping and prejudice research has received considerable attention, the important element of social class has received far less attention in social psychological research. Using the Statement Recognition Procedure, two experiments investigated social categorization along race and social class dimensions, the influence of racial and social class prejudice on these categorizations, and differences between White and Black perceivers. Analyses conducted at the subtype of race and social class memberships demonstrating differing patterns of categorization based on subtype membership. For example, lower-class black targets were primarily categorized by race while middle-class black targets were primarily categorized by social class. The results demonstrate the importance of considering social class membership independent of and in conjunction with race. Theoretical and methodological implications regarding the study of race and social class categorizations are discussed. 9/15/2003 Address Correspondence To: Brian P. Meier, Department of Psychology, North Dakota State University, Fargo, ND, 58105. Email: brian.p.meier@ndsu.nodak.edu Abstract: Two studies investigated agreeableness, the accessibility of blame, and their potential interactive effects on anger. To measure the chronic accessibility of blame, we created a choice reaction time task that required participants to classify words as blameworthy or not. We found that, for individuals low in agreeableness, blame accessibility was positively related to anger and arguments during the course of daily life, hostile feelings during the course of a semester, and anger in response to a short video involving a blameworthy action. This same straightforward relationship between the accessibility of blame and anger did not characterize those high in agreeableness. The results suggest that agreeableness plays an important role in facilitating (low agreeableness) or inhibiting (high agreeableness) the link between accessible blame and anger. 9/19/2003 Address Correspondence To: Diane Quinn, Department of Psychology, University of Connecticut, 406 Babbidge Rd U-1020, Storrs, CT, 06269-1020. Email: diane.quinn@uconn.edu Abstract: In three studies we examined the effect of revealing a concealable social stigma—mental illness—on intellectual performance. We hypothesized that revealing this deeply discrediting stigma would result in performance decrements. College students either with or without a history of mental illness (MI) treatment participated. In Study 1, the type of mental illness was left unselected. In Study 2, only participants who reported a history of depression participated. In Study 3 we included a comparison group of participants with a history of eating disorder. Results showed that the MI participants who revealed their history did worse on the reasoning test than those in the no reveal condition. There was a trend in the opposite direction for participants with no MI. As predicted, revealing a narrower stigma, eating disorder, did not affect performance. The results are discussed in terms of identity threat and concealable stigmas. 9/22/2003 Address Correspondence To: Mark Burgess, Department of Psychology, Green Lane Building, Liverpool Hope University, Hope Park, Liverpool, England, L16 9JD. Email: burgesm@hope.ac.uk Abstract: We interviewed people to determine whether they devise strategies to offset the damaging effect that externally imposed deadlines have on intrinsic motivation. Interviewees’ “practitioners’ rules-of-thumb” strategies were consistent with the tenets of self-determination theory and were tested empirically in three experiments. In each of the experiments, complete or partial self-determination of initially externally-imposed time limits negated the otherwise deleterious effects of deadlines on intrinsic motivation. Participants who actively co-opted a deadline as their own (Experiment 1), who self-imposed subdeadlines within an overall externally-imposed deadline (Experiment 2), and who self-imposed more stringent deadlines than those imposed externally (Experiment 3), spent significantly more free-choice time engaged in target tasks than did their counterparts in externally-imposed deadline conditions where no self-determination was permitted (p < .05). Given the ubiquity of deadlines, our results can directly be implemented by both deadline setters and deadline recipients in order to protect peoples’ interest in their work. 9/24/2003 Address Correspondence To: P. Niels Christensen, Department of Psychology, San Diego State University, 5500 Campanile Drive, San Diego, CA 92182-4611. Email: niels@sunstroke.sdsu.edu Abstract: An event-contingent diary methodology was used to study the impact of intergroup and intragroup factors on self-evaluations in naturally occurring groups. Participants reported their contextual group-status, group-identification, and self-evaluations each time they self-categorized as a group member over one week. Indicators of global group-status, interdependence, and permeability of group boundaries were also obtained. Multilevel modeling revealed that contextual status and global status interacted to predict self-evaluations. Contextual status had a stronger relationship with self-evaluations for members of global low-status groups than members of high-status groups. Analyses of intragroup factors revealed that greater group interdependence, but not permeability of group boundaries, was also associated with higher self-evaluations. The effects of both contextual status and group interdependence were mediated by group identification. 9/24/2003 Address Correspondence To: Russell Spears, School of Psychology, Cardiff University, PO Box 901, Cardiff, Wales, CF10 3YG, UK. Email: SpearsR@Cardiff.ac.uk Abstract: Whereas previous research has shown automatic behavior conforming to out-group stereotypes (e.g., Bargh, Chen & Burrows, 1996), we demonstrate automatic behavioral contrast away from a stereotype/trait associated with an out-group (Study 1 and 2), and point to the importance of an “us-them” intergroup comparison in this process. In Study 1 participants colored pictures more messily when neatness was associated with an out-group rather than the in-group. In Study 2, using a different behavior, participants primed with busy business people reacted faster than controls (assimilation), but became slower when their student in-group identity was activated (contrast). Subliminally priming an “us-them” intergroup comparison set undermined the accessibility of out-group stereotypic words (Study 3), especially for those higher in prejudice (Study 4). This suggests that people automatically distance themselves from out-group attributes when intergroup antagonism is cued or chronic. Implications for the role of self and comparison processes in automatic behavior are discussed. 9/26/2003 Address Correspondence To: R. Chris Fraley, Department of Psychology, University of Illinois at Chicago, Chicago, IL 60607-7137 or George A. Bonnano, Department of Counseling and Clinical Psychology, 525 West 120th Street, Teachers College, Box 218, Columbia University, New York, NY 10027. Email: fraley@uic.edu or gab38@columbia.edu Abstract: It is widely assumed that emotionally avoidant or defensive individuals will have a difficult time adjusting to the loss of a loved one. However, recent research suggests that defensive individuals tend to adapt quite well to loss (e.g., Bonanno et al., 1995). Such findings pose a number of challenges to attachment theory—a theory that has traditionally held that emotional avoidance is indicative of poor psychological adjustment. In this article the authors argue that contemporary models of individual differences in adult attachment allow the derivation of at least three competing hypotheses regarding the relationship between avoidant attachment and adaptation to loss. These hypotheses are tested using two-wave data on fifty-nine bereaved adults. Results indicate that whereas some avoidant individuals (i.e., those who are fearfully avoidant) have a difficult time adapting to the loss of a loved one, other avoidant adults (i.e., those who are dismissingly avoidant) show a pattern of resilience to loss. 9/26/2003 Address Correspondence To: Alain Van Hiel, Department of Developmental, Personality and Social Psychology, H. Dunantlaan 2, 9000 Gent, Belgium. Email: Alain.VanHiel@UGent.be Abstract: The present study explores the influence of need for closure as well as authoritarian submission (= Right-Wing Authoritarianism or RWA) and authoritarian dominance (= Social Dominance Orientation or SDO) on the genesis of conservative beliefs and racism. For this purpose, two structural equation models were compared. In Model 1, RWA and SDO were entered as independent variables and the need for closure facets Decisiveness and Need for Simple Structure acted as mediator variables. In Model 2, the need for closure facets served as independent variables and RWA and SDO acted as mediators. In two student samples (Sample 1, N = 399; Sample 2, N = 330) and one adult sample (Sample 3, N = 379), Model 2 showed superior fit to the data. These results corroborate the hypothesis that authoritarianism should be interpreted in terms of generalized beliefs rather than in terms of personality characteristics. In addition, analyses show that the effects of Need for Simple Structure on conservative beliefs and racism are fully mediated by RWA but only partly by SDO. These results suggest a differential genesis of RWA and SDO. 10/1/2003 Address Correspondence To: Yoshihisa Kashima, Department of Psychology, The University of Melbourne, Parkville, Vic 3010, Australia. Email: y.kashima@psych.unimelb.edu.au Abstract: Although differences in self-conception across cultures have been well researched, regional differences within a culture have escaped attention. The present study examined individual, relational, and collective selves, which capture people’s conceptions of themselves in relation to their goals, significant others, and ingroups, comparing Australians and Japanese participants living in regional cities and metropolitan areas. Culture, gender, and urbanism were found to be related to individual, relational, and collective selves, respectively. Australians emphasized individual self more than Japanese; women stressed relational self more than men; and residents in regional cities regarded collective self as more important than their counterparts in metropolitan areas. These findings provide support for the tripartite division of the self, and suggest a need to construct a culture theory that links self and societal processes. 10/1/2003 Address Correspondence To: to Lorraine Chen Idson, Harvard Business School, Mellon Hall C3-4, Soldiers Field, Boston, MA 02163. Email: lidson@hbs.edu Abstract: We propose that how people imagine they would feel about making a choice is affected not only by the outcome's anticipated pleasure or pain but also by regulatory fit. Regulatory fit occurs when people pursue a goal in a manner that sustains their regulatory state and it intensifies the motivation to pursue that goal (Higgins, 2000). Considering positive outcomes fits a promotion focus more than a prevention focus, whereas the reverse is true for negative outcomes. Thus, we propose that anticipating a desirable choice is more intensely positive for promotion than prevention, and anticipating an undesirable choice is more intensely negative for prevention than promotion. The results of three studies support these predictions. Studies 2 and 3 also demonstrate that motivational intensity underlies the stronger responses. Thus, to understand fully what it means to feel good or bad about a prospective choice, motivational experiences from regulatory fit must be considered. 10/15/2003 Address Correspondence To: Jill N. Kearns, Psychology Department, University at Buffalo, Buffalo, NY 14260. Email: jkearns@acsu.buffalo.edu Abstract: Many definitions of forgiveness currently exist in the literature. The current research adds to this discussion by utilizing a prototype approach to examine lay conceptions of forgiveness. A prototype approach involves categorizing objects or events in terms of their similarity to a good example whereas a classical approach requires that there are essential elements that must be present. In Study 1, participants listed the features of forgiveness. Study 2 obtained centrality ratings for these features. In Studies 3 and 4, central features were found to be more salient in memory than peripheral features. Study 5 showed that feature centrality influenced participants’ ratings of victims involved in hypothetical transgressions. Thus, the two criteria for demonstrating prototype structure (that participants find it meaningful to judge features in terms of their centrality and that centrality affects cognition) were met. 10/20/2003 Address Correspondence To: Ying-yi Hong, Department of Psychology, University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign, 603 East Daniel Street, Champaign, IL 61820. Email: yyhong@uiuc.edu Abstract: This research sought to integrate the implicit theory approach and the social identity approach to understanding biases in intergroup judgment. We hypothesized that a belief in fixed human character would be associated with negative bias and prejudice against a maligned group regardless of the perceiver’s social identity. By contrast, a belief in malleable human character would allow the perceiver’s social identity to guide intergroup perception, such that a common ingroup identity that includes the maligned group would be associated with less negative bias and prejudice against the maligned group than would an exclusive identity. To test these hypotheses, a correlational study was conducted in the context of the Hong Kong 1997 political transition to examine Hong Kong Chinese’s perceptions of Chinese Mainlanders, and an experimental study was conducted in the United States to examine Asian Americans’ perception of African Americans. Results from both studies supported our predictions. 10/22/2003 Address Correspondence To: Frederick X. Gibbons, Dept. of Psychology, W112 Lagomarcino Hall, Iowa State University, Ames, IA 50011. Email: fgibbons@iastate.edu Abstract: This study examined the cognitions thought to mediate the impact of context on adolescent substance use, and also the extent to which context moderates the relations between these cognitions and use. Risk cognitions and behaviors were assessed in a panel of 746 African American adolescents (M age 10.5 at Wave 1, 12.5 at Wave 2). Results indicated that adolescents living in high risk neighborhoods were more inclined toward substance use and more likely to be using at Wave 2. These context effects were mediated by the adolescents’ risk cognitions: their risk images, willingness to use, and intentions to use. Also, context moderated the relation between willingness and use (the relation was stronger in high risk neighborhoods), but it did not moderate the intentions to use relation. 10/24/2003 Address Correspondence To: Dr. Michael Halloran, School of Psychological Science, La Trobe University, Bundoora, Victoria, Australia, 3083. Email: m.halloran@latrobe.edu.au Abstract: In this paper, we report an investigation of the relationship between terror management and social identity processes by testing for the effects of social identity salience on worldview validation. Two studies, with distinct populations, were conducted to test the hypothesis that mortality salience would lead to worldview validation of values related to a salient social identity. In Study 1, reasonable support for this hypothesis was found with bicultural Aboriginal-Australian participants (N = 97). It was found that thoughts of death led participants to validate ingroup and reject outgroup values depending on the social identity that had been made salient. In Study 2, when their student and Australian identities were primed, respectively, Anglo-Australian students (N = 119) validated values related to those identities, exclusively. The implications of the findings for identity-based worldview validation are discussed. 10/28/2003 Address Correspondence To: Ulrich Schimmack, Department of Psychology, UTM, 3359 Mississauga Road North, Mississauga, Ontario, L5L 1C6, Canada. Email: uli.schimmack@utoronto.ca Abstract: At the global level of the Big Five extraversion and neuroticism are the strongest predictors of life satisfaction. However, extraversion and neuroticism are multifaceted constructs that combine more specific traits. This article examined the contribution of facets of extraversion and neuroticism to life satisfaction in four studies. The depression facet of neuroticism and the Positive emotions/cheerfulness facet of extraversion were the strongest and most consistent predictors of life satisfaction. These two facets often accounted for more variance in life satisfaction than neuroticism and extraversion. The findings suggest that measures of depression and positive emotions/cheerfulness are necessary and sufficient to predict life satisfaction from personality traits. The results also lead to a more refined understanding of the specific personality traits that influence life satisfaction: depression is more important than anxiety or anger, and a cheerful temperament is more important than being active or sociable. 11/3/2003 Address Correspondence To: Thomas Schubert, Universität Jena, Lehrstuhl Sozialpsychologie, Humboldtstraße 26, 07743 Jena, Germany. Email: schubert@igroup.org Abstract: Men and women differ in the meaning they attribute to physical coercion and bodily force. Men associate bodily force with gaining power, while women associate bodily force with expressing loss of power. It is hypothesized that because of these associations, performing bodily forceful behavior feeds back on appraisals of one’s power, and that bodily feedback effects will mirror the gender differences in associations. Supporting these hypotheses, it was found that unobtrusively inducing behavior related to bodily force (making a fist) activated the concept of power in a Stroop task for both genders, but that it increased hope for power and positive judgments of an assertively acting target for men, while it decreased hope for power and led to negative judgments of an assertively acting target for women. 11/3/2003 Address Correspondence To: Dr. Deborah Davis, Department of Psychology, Mail Stop 296, University of Nevada, Reno, NV 89557. Email: debdavis@unr.nevada.edu Abstract: The relation of attachment style to subjective motivations for sex was investigated in an Internet survey of 1999 respondents. The relations of attachment anxiety and avoidance to overall sexual motivation, and to the specific motives for emotional closeness, reassurance, self-esteem enhancement, stress reduction, partner manipulation, protection from partner’s negative affect and behavior, power exertion, physical pleasure, nurturing one’s partner, and procreation were explored. As predicted, attachment anxiety was positively related to overall sexual motivation and to all specific motives for sex, with the exception of physical pleasure. Avoidance was negatively related to emotional closeness and reassurance as goals of sex, and positively to manipulative use of sex, but minimally related to most other motives. Sexual passion was positively related to attachment anxiety and negatively related to avoidance; and anxiety was related to the maintenance of passion over time, whereas avoidance was related to loss of passion over time. 11/5/2003 Address Correspondence To: : Dr. L. Kubzansky, Department of Society, Human Development, and Health, Harvard School of Public Health, 677 Huntington Ave., Boston, MA 02115. Email: Lkubzans@hsph.harvard.edu Abstract: One difficulty plaguing research on dispositional optimism and health is whether optimism and pessimism are bipolar opposites or constitute distinct constructs. The present study examined the Life Orientation Test, to determine whether the two-factor structure is explained by method bias (due to measurement) or substantive differences. We compared three measurement models: bipolar, bivariate, method artifact. Optimism and pessimism emerged as distinct constructs, due to substantive differences. We also considered the validity of optimism and pessimism, examining their relations with psychological and physical health outcomes. Optimism and pessimism were more similar in relation to psychological health than to other health-related behavior or physical health outcomes. However, a strongly interpretable pattern for the relation of optimism and pessimism to the health outcomes did not emerge. Further research may benefit from considering optimism and pessimism as bivariate, and should also consider the conceptual components and behavioral mechanisms specific to each variable. 11/5/2003 Address Correspondence To: Paul J. Silvia, Department of Psychology, P. O. Box 26170, University of North Carolina at Greensboro, Greensboro, NC, 27402-6170. Email: p_silvia@uncg.edu Abstract: The present research examined when self-evaluation influences creativity. Based on objective self-awareness theory (Duval & Silvia, 2001), we predicted that feeling able to improve would buffer against the detrimental effects of self-evaluation on creativity. Two experiments manipulated self-evaluation (varying self-awareness, Study 1; providing objective performance standards, Study 2) and perceived ability to improve potential failure on the creativity task. Self-evaluation reduced creativity (generating remote associates, finding unusual uses for a knife) in both experiments, but only when people did not expect to improve. When people felt able to improve, self-evaluation did not affect creativity. Connections between self-motives, creativity, and defensiveness are discussed. 11/11/2003 Address Correspondence To: Andrew J. Elliot, Human Motivation Program, Department of Clinical and Social Sciences in Psychology, University of Rochester, Rochester, NY, 14627. Email: andye@scp.rochester.edu Abstract: The intergenerational transmission of fear of failure was examined in two studies with undergraduates and their parents. Parent-undergraduate concordance in fear of failure was documented for mothers and fathers, controlling for parents’ and undergraduate’s impression management and self-deceptive enhancement response tendencies. Love withdrawal was validated as a mediator of parent-undergraduate concordance in fear of failure for mothers, but not for fathers. Mothers’ and fathers’ fear of failure was also a positive predictor of undergraduate’s adoption of performance-avoidance goals in the classroom, and undergraduate’s fear of failure was shown to mediate this relationship. Fathers’ fear of failure was also a negative predictor of undergraduate’s mastery goal adoption, and this relationship was likewise mediated by undergraduate’s fear of failure. The results are discussed in terms of the reorienting of positive, appetitive achievement motivation toward negative, aversive achievement motivation. 11/11/2003 Address Correspondence To: Cynthia Pickett, Department of Psychology, University of Chicago, 5848 S. University Avenue, Chicago, IL 60637. Email: cpickett@uchicago.edu Abstract: To successfully establish and maintain social relationships, individuals need to be sensitive to the thoughts and feelings of others. In the current studies, we predicted that individuals who are especially concerned with social connectedness—individuals high in the need to belong—would be particularly attentive to and accurate in decoding social cues. In Study 1, individual differences in the need to belong were found to be positively related to accuracy in identifying vocal tone and facial emotion. Study 2 examined attention to vocal tone and accuracy in a more complex social sensitivity task (an empathic accuracy task). Replicating the results of Study 1, need to belong scores predicted both attention to vocal tone and empathic accuracy. Study 3 provided evidence that the enhanced performance shown by those high in the need to belong is specific to social perception skills rather than to cognitive problem solving more generally. 11/12/2003 Address Correspondence To: Icek Ajzen, Department of Psychology, Tobin Hall - Box 37710, University of Massachusetts, Amherst, MA 01003-7710. Email: aizen@psych.umass.edu Abstract: An experiment was designed to account for intention-behavior discrepancies by applying the theory of planned behavior (Ajzen, 1991) to contingent valuation. College students (N = 160) voted in hypothetical and real payment referenda to contribute $8 to a scholarship fund. Overestimates of willingness to pay in the hypothetical referendum could not be attributed to moderately favorable latent dispositions. Instead, this hypothetical bias was explained by activation of more favorable beliefs and attitudes in the context of a hypothetical than a real referendum. A corrective entreaty was found to eliminate this bias by bringing beliefs, attitudes, and intentions in line with those in the real payment situation. As a result, the theory of planned behavior produced more accurate prediction of real payment when participants were exposed to the corrective entreaty. 11/12/2003 Address Correspondence To: Andreas Birgegard or Pehr Granqvist, Department of Psychology, Uppsala University, Box 1225, S-75142 Uppsala, Sweden. Email: andreas.birgegard@psyk.uu.se or pehr.granqvist@psyk.uu.se Abstract: Attachment theoretical studies have increased our understanding of the socioemotional foundations for religious development. However, since these studies have been correlational and based on self-reports, they are vulnerable to concerns of self-presentation bias and lack of basis for causal inference. Three subliminal stimulation experiments were therefore performed, where activation of the attachment system was attempted by way of unconsciously administered separation stimuli. In Experiments 1 and 3 (N=29 and 89) the separation stimulus alluded to God, and in Experiment 2 (N=47) it alluded to mother. Responses were moderated by perceived attachment history with parents in all experiments. Participants with secure histories increased in religious attachment behaviors while those with insecure histories decreased following attachment system activation compared with control stimulation. There were also suggestions of experimental group increase in proximity seeking in relation to God. The main conclusion supports correspondence between internal working models of parents and God. 11/24/2003 Address Correspondence To: Fiona Lee, Department of Psychology, University of Michigan, 525 East University, Ann Arbor, MI 48109-1109. Email: tito@psych.colorado.edu or fionalee@umich.edu Abstract: People’s causal attributions for events in their lives have been shown to relate to individual and interpersonal outcomes. Groups and organizations also make causal attributions, and this paper examines whether their publicly communicated attributions predict organizational-level outcomes. By content analyzing attributions contained in corporate annual reports from 14 companies over a 21-year period, we found that organizations that made “self dis-serving” attributions—internal and controllable attributions for negative events—had higher stock prices one year later. We argue that claiming personal responsibility for negative events made the organization appear more in control, leading to more positive impressions. 11/26/2003 Address Correspondence To: Tiffany A. Ito, Department of Psychology, University of Colorado, 345 UCB, Boulder, CO 80309-0345, or to John T. Cacioppo, Department of Psychology, The University of Chicago, 5848 South University Avenue, Chicago, Illinois 60637. Email: tito@psych.colorado.edu or cacioppo@uchicago.edu Abstract: Event-related potentials were used to track social perception processes associated with viewing faces of racial ingroup and outgroup members. We detected activity associated with three distinct processes. First, peaking at approximately 170 ms, faces were distinguished from non-face stimuli. Second, peaking at approximately 250 ms, ingroup members were differentiated from outgroup members, with a larger component suggesting greater attention to ingroup members. This effect may reflect the spontaneous application of a deeper level of processing to ingroup members. Third, peaking at approximately 520 ms, evaluative differentiation of ingroup and outgroup members occurred, with greater ingroup bias displayed by those with higher levels of prejudice on an explicit measure. Together, the results demonstrate the promise of using neural processes to track the presence, timing, and degree of activation of components relevant to social perception, prejudice, and stereotyping. 12/1/2003 Address Correspondence To: Lee Ross, Department of Psychology, Jordan Hall, Building 420, 450 Serra Mall, Stanford University, Stanford, CA 94305-2130. Email: ross@psych.stanford.edu Abstract: Two experiments, one conducted with American college students and one with Israeli pilots and their instructors, explored the predictive power of reputation-based assessments versus the stated “name of the game” (Wall Street Game vs. Community Game) in determining players’ responses in an N-move Prisoner’s Dilemma. The results of these studies showed that the relevant labeling manipulations exerted far greater impact on the players’ choice to cooperate versus defect—both in the first round and overall—than anticipated by the individuals who had predicted their behavior. Reputation-based prediction, by contrasts, failed to discriminate cooperators from defectors. A supplementary questionnaire study showed the generality of the relevant shortcoming in naďve psychology. The implications of these findings, and the potential contribution of the present methodology to the classic pedagogical strategy of the demonstration experiment are discussed. 12/2/2003 Address Correspondence To: Terence J. G. Tracey, Arizona State University, 302 Payne Hall, MC 0611, Tempe AZ 85287-0611. Email: ttracey@asu.edu Abstract: The relations among different measures of interpersonal behavior and complementarity across level were examined in a one session of a sample of therapy dyads (N = 26) and in an interaction between college students (N = 108). Four levels of complementarity, trait, aggregate situation, behavioral interchanges and behavioral interchanges with base-rates removed, were examined as they covaried among themselves and with interaction evaluations. The four levels of complementarity were found to be fit by a simplex structure and this structure was related to interaction evaluation in both samples. The complementarity-evaluation relation was mediated by base-rate corrected complementarity. Implications relative to the operationalization of complementarity are discussed. 12/2/2003 Address Correspondence To: Carolin J. Showers at the Department of Psychology, University of Oklahoma, Norman, Oklahoma 73019. Email: cshowers@ou.edu Abstract: This study examined the association between organization of knowledge about a romantic partner (partner structure) and relationship status (ongoing or ended) one year later. Ironically, partner structures that were associated with more positive feelings about one’s partner at time 1 were associated with greater rates of breakup by time 2. These results are interpreted in terms of the vulnerability of compartmentalized partner structures to shifts in the salience of negative beliefs and the hypothesized difficulty of maintaining integrative structures over an extended period of time. Change in partner structure over one year’s time was consistent with the predictions of the dynamic model that evaluative integration should increase when negative beliefs become salient. Such change (which may represent a transient shift) was associated with couples’ longevity when relationship conflict was low, supporting the view that integration reflects a struggle with negative attributes that may or may not be successful. 12/2/2003 Address Correspondence To: Terry F. Pettijohn II, Department of Psychology, Mercyhurst College, Erie, Pennsylvania, 16546-0001. Email: terrypet@usa.com Abstract: Past research has investigated ideals of beauty and how these ideals have changed across time. In the current study, facial and body characteristics of Playboy Playmates of the Year from 1960-2000 were identified and investigated to explore their relationships with U.S. social and economic factors. Playmate of the Year age, body feature measures, and facial feature measurements were correlated with a general measure of social and economic hard times. Consistent with Environmental Security Hypothesis (Pettijohn & Tesser, 1999, 2003) predictions, when social and economic conditions were difficult, older, heavier, taller Playboy Playmates of the Year with larger waists, smaller eyes, larger waist-to-hip ratios, smaller bust-to-waist ratios, and smaller body mass index values were selected. These results suggest that environmental security may influence perceptions and preferences for females with certain body and facial features. 12/10/2003 Address Correspondence To: Stephanie L. Brown, Institute for Social Research, The University of Michigan, 426 Thompson Street, PO Box 1248, Ann Arbor, Michigan, 48106-1248. Email: stebrown@isr.umich.edu Abstract: Based on recent applications of attachment theory to religion, we predicted that the loss of a spouse would cause widowed individuals to increase the importance of their religious/spiritual beliefs. We examined this hypothesis using the Changing Lives of Older Couples sample from which pre-loss measures of religiosity were available for widowed individuals and matched controls. A total of 103 widowed individuals provided follow-up data, including reports of religious beliefs and grief, at 6 months, 24 months, and 48 months after the loss. Results indicated that widowed individuals were more likely than controls to increase their religious/spiritual beliefs. This increase was associated with decreased grief, but did not influence other indicators of adjustment such as depression. Finally, insecure individuals were most likely to benefit from increasing the importance of their beliefs. Results are discussed in terms of the potential value of applying psychological theory to the study of religion. 12/10/2003 Address Correspondence To: Lora E. Park, Department of Psychology, Department of Psychology, 525 E. University Ave., Ann Arbor, MI 48109-1109. Email: lepark@umich.edu Abstract: Previous research on attachment theory has focused on mean differences in level of self-esteem among people with different attachment styles. The present study examines the associations between attachment styles and different bases of self-esteem, or contingencies of self-worth, among a sample of 795 college students. Results showed that attachment security was related to basing self-worth on family support. Both the preoccupied attachment style and fearful attachment style were related to basing self-worth on physical attractiveness. The dismissing attachment style was related to basing self-worth less on others’ approval, family support, and God’s love. 12/10/2003 Address Correspondence To: Jeanne Tsai, Department of Psychology, Stanford University, Bldg. 420 Jordan Hall, Stanford, CA 94305. Email: jtsai@psych.stanford.edu Abstract: Empirical findings suggest that Chinese and Americans differ in the ways that they describe emotional experience, with Chinese using more somatic and social words than Americans. No one, however, has investigated whether this variation is related to differences between Chinese and American conceptions of emotion or to linguistic differences between the English and Chinese languages. Therefore, in two studies, we compared the word use of individuals who varied in their orientation to Chinese and American cultures (European Americans [EA], more acculturated Chinese Americans [CA], and less acculturated CA) when they were speaking English during emotional events. Across both studies, less acculturated CA used more somatic (e.g., dizzy) and more social (e.g., friend) words than EA. These findings suggest that even when controlling for language spoken, cultural conceptions of emotion may shape how people talk about emotion. 12/10/2003 Address Correspondence To: Jennifer M Ostovich, Department of Psychology, University of Pennsylvania, 3720 Walnut Street, Philadelphia, PA 19104. Email: ostovich@cattell.psych.upenn.edu Abstract: In two studies (ns = 277 and 221), we examined the relationships among sex drive, sociosexuality, lifetime number of sex partners, and gender identity. We found that sex drive is highly and positively correlated with sociosexual orientation, and that both sex drive and sociosexual orientation are positively correlated with lifetime number of sex partners. However, partial correlations revealed that sociosexual orientation is an independent predictor of lifetime number of sex partners, whereas sex drive is not. We were also able to replicate and extend Mikach and Bailey’s (1999) finding that gender identity is related to females’ lifetime number of sex partners. More masculine females had more sex partners and had a less restricted sociosexual orientation than did less masculine females; less masculine males had a higher sex drive than did more masculine males. We discuss our findings with regard to theory and research on sex drive and sociosexuality. 12/22/2003 Address Correspondence To: Charles G. Lord, Department of Psychology, Texas Christian University, TCU Box 298920, Fort Worth, TX 76129. Email: c.lord@tcu.edu Abstract: Attitude Representation Theory (ART; Lord & Lepper, 1999) holds that attitude-relevant responses are informed by mental representations of the attitude object, which include the individual’s actions toward that object. Action Identification Theory (AIT; Vallacher & Wegner, 1985) holds that the same action can be identified at multiple levels. Individuals who identify their actions at lower levels have less flexibility in how they perform the action, and thus enact the action less consistently. An integration of ART and AIT suggested that individuals who spontaneously (Expt. 1) or through manipulation (Expts. 2 and 3) identify their attitude-relevant actions toward a social group at lower levels might display less attitude-intention congruence than would individuals who identify their attitude-relevant actions at higher levels. ART and AIT are discussed as having links with each other and with other theories of attitude and judgment processes. 12/23/2003 Address Correspondence To: Christopher M. Federico, Department of Psychology, University of Minnesota, 75 E. River Road, Minneapolis, MN 55455. Email: federico@umn.edu Abstract: Research on attitude extremity suggests that schemas containing more information about a particular attitude domain are more likely to be associated with extreme attitudes toward objects in that domain when perceivers’ responses toward features of the domain are evaluatively integrated. The present study argues that a high need to evaluate may play an important role in determining when schema development will be associated with the integrated responses to different domain features necessary for extremity. Consistent with this argument, data from a nationally-representative survey of political attitudes indicated that the need to evaluate was associated with increased extremity across two different indices of the latter, that it moderated the relationships between schema development (in the form of political expertise), on one hand, and increased extremity and integration, on the other; and that the moderating effects of the need to evaluate vis-ŕ-vis extremity were mediated by integration. 12/27/2003 Address Correspondence To: William A. Cunningham, Department of Psychology, University of Toronto, 100 St. George Street, Toronto, ON, M5S3G3. Email: william.cunningham@utoronto.ca Abstract: Two studies investigated relationships among individual differences in implicit and explicit prejudice, right-wing ideology, and rigidity in thinking. The first study examined these relationships focusing on White Americans’ prejudice toward Black Americans. The second study provided the first test of implicit ethnocentrism and its relationship to explicit ethnocentrism by studying the relationship between attitudes toward five social groups. Factor analyses found support for both implicit and explicit ethnocentrism. In both studies, mean explicit attitudes toward outgroups were positive, whereas implicit attitudes were negative, suggesting that implicit and explicit prejudices are distinct; however, in both studies, implicit and explicit attitudes were related (r = .37, .47). Latent variable modeling indicates a simple structure within this ethnocentric system, with variables organized in order of specificity. These results lead to the conclusion that (a) implicit ethnocentrism exists, and (b) it is related to and distinct from explicit ethnocentrism. 12/30/2003 Address Correspondence To: P. Niels Christensen, Department of Psychology, San Diego State University, 5500 Campanile Drive, San Diego, CA 92182-4611. Email: niels@sunstroke.sdsu.com Abstract: Two studies demonstrated that greater identification with a group was associated with more positive emotions for members who conformed with versus violated the group’s norms. These effects were found with injunctive norms, which specify what members should do or what they ideally would do, but emerged less consistently with descriptive norms, which specify what members typically do. Descriptive norms affected emotional responses when they acquired identity-relevance by differentiating an important ingroup from a rival outgroup. For these descriptive norms, much like injunctive norms, greater identification yielded more positive emotions following conformity than violation. We suggest that positive emotions and self-evaluations underlie conformity with the norms of self-defining groups. 12/30/2003 Address Correspondence To: François Ric, Université Paris 5, Laboratoire de Psychologie Sociale, 71, av. Edouard Vaillant, 92 100 Boulogne Billancourt, France. Email: francois.ric@univ-paris5.fr Abstract: Two studies explored the impact of mere activation of affective information on the use of stereotypes in social judgment. These studies provided consistent results showing that the activation of information related to sadness increases reliance on stereotypes, whereas the activation of information related to happiness decreases it. These results were obtained in the absence of affective state changes among the participants and with the use of two different priming procedures (Study 1: scrambled sentences; Study 2: subliminal priming) and two different judgment tasks (Study 1: impression formation; Study 2: guilt judgment). Complementing the informational view of affective states (Schwarz, 1990), it is suggested that affective information of which people are not conscious activates behavioral tendencies of approach or of avoidance associated with the related emotion. 12/31/2003 Address Correspondence To: Eden King, Rice University, Department of Psychology-MS 25, 6100 S. Main St., Houston, TX 77005. Email: edenking@aol.com Abstract: Self-objectification theory posits and past research has found that Caucasian women’s body image is negatively impacted by a stigma of obesity and sociocultural norm of thinness that leads women to self-focus from a critical external perspective (Fredrickson, Roberts, Noll, Quinn, & Twenge, 1998). However, research in this area is limited by its methodology and the restricted demographic composition of its study participants. The current study tested 176 men and 224 women of Caucasian, African American, Hispanic, and Asian American descent in a situation that induced a state of self-objectification (e.g., wearing a one-piece Speedo™ bathing suit) or that served as a control condition (e.g., wearing a sweater). Contrary to previous research, when put in a self-objectifying situation, men and women of every ethnicity experienced negative outcomes (e.g., lower math performance) that parallel those previously found for Caucasian women. 1/1/2004 Address Correspondence To: Lawrence J. Sanna, Department of Psychology, CB# 3270 Davie Hall, University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill, Chapel Hill, NC 27599-3270. Email: sanna@unc.edu Abstract: Three studies tested the hypothesis that thoughts about alternatives become increasingly accessible over time, leading poor outcomes to feel subjectively farther away and less inevitable. This subjective temporal distance bias was obtained even though actual time since poor and good outcomes was identical. In Study 1, participants who recalled distant poor team outcomes thought of alternatives easily, and outcomes felt farther away and less inevitable. Thoughts about outcomes were most easily accessible after good outcomes, which felt closer and more inevitable. In Study 2, with measures obtained immediately or at a later time on a negotiation task, changes over time occurred primarily for poor team outcomes. In Study 3, team performance on an investment task indicated it is whether alternatives are thought of easily, not thought content, which produces this effect. Discussion centers on temporal appraisals, other temporal biases, and teams. 1/2/2004 Address Correspondence To: Clay Routledge Department of Psychological Sciences, University of Missouri, Columbia, MO. 65211. Email: cdrwbc@mizzou.edu Abstract: According to the dual defense model of terror management, proximal defenses are engaged to reduce the conscious impact of mortality salience whereas thoughts of death outside of conscious awareness motivate distal defenses aimed at maintaining self-esteem. Two experiments examined these ideas by assessing women’s intentions to engage in tanning-related behavior. In Study 1, when concerns about death (relative to dental pain) were in focal attention, participants increased intentions to protect themselves from dangerous sun-exposure. In contrast, when thoughts about death were outside of focal attention, participants decreased interest in sun protection. In Study 2, participants primed to associate tanned skin with an attractive appearance responded to mortality concerns outside of focal attention with increased interest in tanning products and services. These findings are discussed in relation to the dual defense model of terror management, societal determinants of self-esteem, and implications for health risk and promotion. 1/20/2004 Address Correspondence To: John Sabini, Department of Psychology, University of Pennsylvania, 3720 Walnut Street, Philadelphia PA 19104. Email: Sabini@psych.upenn.edu Abstract: In three studies (total N = 619) we tested an evolutionary hypothesis: males are more bothered by sexual than emotional infidelity while the reverse is true of females. We used more diverse samples (in age) and measures than is typical. In Study 1 we found across gender, sample, and method that sexual infidelity was associated with anger and blame, but emotional infidelity with hurt feelings. We replicated the evolutionary effect with undergraduates but not with the non-student sample. In Study 2 we used narrative scenarios, and found that non-student males and females were more hurt and upset by emotional infidelity, but were made angrier by sexual. In Study 3, using Likert scales, scenarios, and a non-student sample, we found that both genders were more upset, hurt, and angrier over sexual than emotional transgressions when rating one kind without hearing the opposite type. We discuss implications for how emotional responses evolved. 1/22/2004 Address Correspondence To: Jennifer A. Bartz, Department of Psychology, McGill University, 1205 Dr. Penfield Avenue, Montreal, Quebec, Canada H3A 1B1. Email: jbartz@ego.psych.mcgill.ca Abstract: Two studies investigated how contextually activating attachment relationships influences the working self-concept in terms of agency and communion. In Study 1, 245 participants were primed with a secure, avoidant, or anxious-ambivalent relationship and the implicit accessibility of agency and communion was assessed using word-fragments. Activating a secure relationship increased the accessibility of communion, whereas activating an anxious-ambivalent relationship increased the accessibility of agency. In Study 2, 123 participants were primed with a secure, preoccupied, avoidant-dismissive, or avoidant-fearful relationship and explicit self-perceptions of agency and communion traits were assessed using the EPAQ (1979). Gender interacted with the attachment prime, such that men primed with a secure relationship reported higher communion than did men primed with an avoidant (dismissive or fearful) relationship, whereas women primed with an anxious (preoccupied or fearful) relationship reported higher agency than did women primed with a secure relationship. 1/26/2004 Address Correspondence To: Per F. Gjerde, Department of Psychology, Social Sciences II, 1156 High Street, University of California at Santa Cruz, Santa Cruz, California 95064. Email: gjerde@cats.ucsc.edu Abstract: This study compared the personality attributes associated with self-report versus interview assessment of romantic attachment. Twenty-three-year-olds (N = 83) completed the Romantic Attachment Interview, the Experiences in Close Relationship Inventory, and measures of response bias, self-enhancement, and self-insight. Five psychologists evaluated the participants’ personality. Although both self-report and interview assessment were related to attachment-relevant personality attributes, interview assessment was slightly more likely to explain unique variance in personality, especially regarding intra-psychic attributes. Self-enhancement was negatively related to secure attachment and positively related to dismissing attachment. The opposite pattern emerged for self-insight. A sub-group of 12 vulnerable individuals who described themselves as securely attached on self-report was judged as dismissing according to interview assessment. These individuals scored low on self-insight, and high on self-enhancement and psychological vulnerability. The results are discussed with reference to the relative strengths of different measures of romantic attachment and relations among dismissing attachment, self-enhancement, and narcissism. 1/27/2004 Address Correspondence To: Julie Spencer-Rodgers, M.S., Institute of Personality and Social Research, Dept. of Psychology, University of California, Berkeley, 4143 Tolman Hall, MC 5050, Berkeley, CA 94720. Email: rodgers@socrates.berkeley.edu Abstract: A well-documented finding in the literature is that members of many East Asian cultures report lower self-esteem and psychological well-being than do members of Western cultures. We present the results of four studies that examined cultural differences in reasoning about psychological contradiction and the effects of naive dialecticism (Peng & Nisbett, 1999) on self-evaluations and psychological adjustment. Mainland Chinese and Asian Americans exhibited greater “ambivalence” or evaluative contradiction in their self-attitudes than did Western synthesis-oriented cultures on a traditional self-report measure of self-esteem (Study 1) and in their spontaneous self-descriptions (Study 2). Naive dialecticism, as assessed with the Dialectical Self Scale (Spencer-Rodgers, Srivastava, & Peng, 2001), mediated the observed cultural differences in self-esteem and well-being (Study 3). In Study 4, we primed naive dialecticism and found that increased dialecticism was related to decreased psychological adjustment. Implications for the conceptualization and measurement of self-esteem and psychological well-being across cultures are discussed. 1/28/2004 Address Correspondence To: E. Ashby Plant, Department of Psychology, Florida State University, Tallahassee, FL 32306-1270. Email: plant@psy.fsu.edu Abstract: The current work tested and expanded upon Plant and Devine’s (2003) model of the antecedents and implications of interracial anxiety by examining people’s experiences with interracial interactions at two time points. Study 1 explored nonBlack people’s responses to interactions with Black people and Study 2 explored Black people’s responses to interactions with White people. NonBlack participants’ expectancies about coming across as biased in interracial interactions and Black participants’ expectancies about White people’s bias predicted their interracial anxiety and whether they had positive interactions with outgroup members during the two weeks between assessments. Across both studies, interracial anxiety predicted the desire to avoid interactions with outgroup members. In addition, participants who were personally motivated to respond without prejudice reported more positive expectancies. The findings are discussed in terms of the implications for understanding the course and quality of interracial interactions. 1/28/2004 Address Correspondence To: Zakary Tormala at the Department of Psychology, Indiana University, 1101 E. 10th St., Bloomington, IN 47405. Email: ztormala@indiana.edu Abstract: Recent research (Tormala & Petty, 2002) has demonstrated that when people resist persuasive attacks, they can under specifiable conditions become more certain of their initial attitudes. The present research explores the role of elaboration in determining when this effect will occur. Using both self-reported differences in situational elaboration (Study 1) and chronic individual differences in the need for cognition (Study 2), it is demonstrated that resisting persuasion increases attitude certainty primarily when elaboration is high. When elaboration is low, resisting persuasion does not appear to impact attitude certainty. These findings shed light on the role of metacognitive factors in resistance to persuasion, pinpointing the conditions under which these factors come into play. 1/28/2004 Address Correspondence To: Manuela Barreto at Leiden University, Social and Organizational Psychology, P. O. Box 9555, 2300 RB Leiden, the Netherlands. Email: barreto@fsw.leidenuniv.nl Abstract: Two studies investigated the impact of past ingroup experiences on individual aspirations and effort. Participants were told that in the past members of their group had either been offered no opportunities (closed), few opportunities (token), or equal opportunities (open) to achieve a desired outcome. The results show that past group experiences determine responses to current opportunities, and affect the perceived feasibility of individual success as well as individual performance. Exposure to a token system has different effects, depending on whether the group is historically advantaged or disadvantaged. Whereas those with a collective history of success see token mobility as a challenge and show superior performance, the same situation constitutes a threat to members of an historically disadvantaged group, who fail to take advantage of the opportunities offered to them and perform sub-optimally. 2/2/2004 Address Correspondence To: Michael Sargent, Department of Psychology, Bates College, 4 Andrews Road, Lewiston, Maine, 04240. Email: msargent@bates.edu Abstract: Three studies examined the relationship between need for cognition and support for punitive responses to crime. The results of Study 1 (N = 110) indicated that individuals high in need for cognition were less supportive of punitive measures than their low need for cognition counterparts. This finding was replicated in Study 2 (N = 1,807), which employed a nationally representative probability sample and included a more extensive battery of control variables. The purpose of Study 3 (N = 255) was to identify a third variable that might explain this relationship. This final study’s results suggest that attributional complexity mediates the relationship between need for cognition and punitiveness. High need for cognition individuals are less supportive of punitive measures because they endorse more complex attributions for human behavior than their low need for cognition peers. 2/18/2004 Address Correspondence To: Renae Franiuk at Psychology Department, University of Wisconsin at Stevens Point, Stevens Point, WI 54481. Email: rfraniuk@uwsp.edu Abstract: Two studies demonstrated the causal role of relationship theories in influencing relationship satisfaction and the processes affecting satisfaction. In both studies, participants were induced to hold either the soulmate or work-it-out theory. Feelings that one’s partner was ideal (or not) were associated with relationship satisfaction more strongly for people induced to hold the soulmate theory than the work-it-out theory (Study 1). In Study 2, participants’ beliefs about their relationships were threatened, and strategies for responding to this threat were assessed. Inducing people to hold the soulmate theory resulted in more relationship-enhancing cognitions if participants believed they were with the right person but more relationship-detracting cognitions if participants did not believe they were with the right person. These polarizing tendencies were enhanced under threat. In contrast, inducing people to hold a work-it-out theory produced almost no biased processing, leading people to process information similarly, regardless of their feelings about their partner. 3/5/2004 Address Correspondence To: Cynthia Frantz, Department of Psychology, Oberlin College, Oberlin OH 44074. Email: cindy.frantz@oberlin.edu Abstract: Three experiments test whether the threat of appearing racist leads White participants to perform worse on the race Implicit Association Test (IAT), and whether self-affirmation can protect from this threat. Experiments 1 and 2 suggest that White participants show a stereotype threat effect when completing the race IAT, leading to stronger pro-White scores when the test is believed to be diagnostic of racism. This effect increases for domain-identified (highly motivated to control prejudice) participants (Experiment 2). In Experiment 3, self-affirmation inoculates participants against stereotype threat while taking the race IAT. These findings have methodological implications for use of the race IAT, and theoretical implications concerning the malleability of automatic prejudice and the potential interpersonal effects of the fear of appearing racist. 4/23/2004 Address Correspondence To: Michael Robinson, Psychology Department, North Dakota State University, Fargo, ND 58105. Email: Michael.D.Robinson@ndsu.nodak.edu Abstract: Seven studies involving 146 undergraduates examined the effects of stimulus valence and arousal on direct and indirect measures of evaluative processing. Stimuli were emotional slides (Studies 1-6) or words (Study 7) that systematically varied in valence and arousal. Evaluative categorization was measured by reaction times to evaluate the stimuli (Studies 2, 3, & 7), latencies related to emotional feelings (Study 3), and incidental effects on motor performance (Studies 4 & 5). We observed a consistent interaction such that evaluation latencies were faster if a negative stimulus was high in arousal or if a positive stimulus was low in arousal. Studies 1, 6, and 7 establish that the findings are not due to stimulus identification processes. The findings therefore suggest that people make evaluative inferences on the basis of stimulus arousal. |