An intrinsically motivated behavior is one undertaken and enjoyed for its own sake, apart from external controls or ends. Expectancies are competence cues which focus on an individual's ability without providing objective information for ongoing comparison and competence development. This study focused on the role of affect in mediating the…

This study assessed attributions made to an attractive or unattractive person who took either a proximal or distal seating position following task performance. Greater attributions of success were made to an attractive person, regardless of the proximity, which suggests pervasive influence of physical attractiveness on attributions in behavioral…

Affective and physiological responses, interpersonal interaction, and alcohol consumption have been significantly correlated with cognitive factors in defining the behavioral effects of alcohol. To investigate alcohol reinforcement expectancies at the abusive end of the drinking continuum, 305 male and female adult alcoholics enrolled in alcohol…

Self-destructiveness can be viewed in two ways: as performing an act which one knows cognitively is not conducive to one's welfare but nonetheless leads to some pleasurable affect (e.g., overeating, smoking); or not performing an act one knows one should perform but which has some negative affective consequences (e.g., dental checkups, saving…

It was hypothesized that if perceived reality is an important factor in determining children's reactions to television, radical differences in the structure of perceived reality should lead to radical differences in its functioning as well. Questionnaires were answered by 153 children from first, third, and sixth grades in a suburban Wisconsin…

Empathy has been hypothesized as a mediator facilitating prosocial behaviors such as altruism. Definitions and measures of empathy disagree as to the extent to which the observer's response is affective and the necessity for the observer to understand the other's point of view. A conceptualization of empathy which includes these considerations has…

Recent studies have indicated that bulimia, characterized by binge eating followed by depressed mood and purging, is increasing. To investigate the behavioral and emotional antecedents and consequences of binge eating in women, 22 female college students (14 diagnosed bulimics, 8 binge eaters) completed self-monitoring forms for four binges.…

Although research has been conducted on who will relapse after having quit smoking in clinics, little has been done to determine the immediate precipitants of recidivism. A telephone hotline, manned by four experienced interviewers, was set up to receive calls from ex-smokers who had relapsed or who felt at high risk for relapse. A structured…

Theories and descriptions of various infant fear behaviors are presented in this paper. Five examples of fear are given: (1) learned fear, in which the infant associates some unpleasant action with an agent, (2) unlearned fear, in which the infant experiences an intense sensory phenomena such as a loud noise, (3) stranger anxiety, (4) fear caused…

Discusses new research directions in the study of emotions, including postulations that emotion is relational rather than intrapsychic; emotion and an individual's goals are closely related; emotion "expressions" are social signals, not merely outward signs of internal states; and the physiology of emotion can regulate and be regulated.…

Reference group theory suggests that a perceived similarity between interacting individuals leads to future interaction, increased source credibility, and more frequent agreement on specific issues. This study shows how the reference group theory applies to the authoritarian television character Archie Bunker and television viewers that watch…

Literature from organizational and social psychology has suggested that three types of factors influence performance, i.e., cognitive, affective and behavioral. A model was developed to test a set of propositions concerning the relationship between the three kinds of factors, and included attributions, expectancies, general emotional responses to…

Although stressful life change events are thought to influence the development of alcoholism and to enhance the probability of relapse after treatment, the actual coping responses to specific events among alcoholics remain largely unexplored. Efforts were made to operationalize and classify coping responses and to explore their relationship to…

This study explored the relationship between young children's affective states and general expectancies for rewarding or punishing events. Subjects were 24 children, ages 4 and 5, from middle-class families. Positive, neutral, or negative affect was induced by having the children think happy, neutral, or sad thoughts for a short period. Two tasks…

This essay argues that humans are capable of a large number of affect states; a distinction should be made among acute emotions, chronic moods, and temperamental vulnerabilities to a particular emotion state; and research on human effects will profit from a return to, and reinterpretation of, Sigmund Freud's suggestion of unconscious affect…