Chapter 16The Cognitive Approach:

Relevant Research

Cognitive Interpretations of Freudian Defense Mechanisms

A cognitive re-interpretation of the Freudian defense mechanism of projection

A cognitive re-interpretation of the Freudian defense mechanism of projection is that when people seek to repress thoughts about their own threatening motives and characteristics, they paradoxically make thoughts related to that information highly accessible in memory (the paradoxical effect of thought suppression).

Because these thoughts are highly accessible, they readily come to mind when other people’s behavior is even suggestive of the same motives and characteristics, making it very likely that the person will “project” these same attributes onto the other person(s).

Susan Andersen’s research on transference: a cognitive re-interpretation

Susan Andersen and her colleagues have re-intepreted the Freudian concept of transference in terms of pre-existing cognitive representations.

When a new person is sufficiently similar to a familiar one, the cognitive representation of the familiar person is activated and used as a basis for reacting to the new person.

This phenomenon explains why we can have strong cognitive and emotional reactions to people we have just met and don’t yet know at all.

Results of some transference studies conducted by Andersen and her colleagues

After providing descriptions of a person they liked and a person they disliked, research participants reported for a “getting acquainted” study several weeks later. They read an “interviewer’s evaluation” of the person they would meet and interact with. In the transference conditions of the study, these characteristics resembled those of either the participant’s “liked other” or the participant’s “disliked other.”

In one of these studies (Andersen & Baum, 1994), the participants later “remembered” characteristics of the new person that had not appeared on the evaluation form they read, but were consistent with their own description of the familiar other who the new person resembled.

Participants in this same study also transferred their emotional feeling about the familiar (liked or disliked) other to the new person.

Feelings toward a “stranger” waiting in the next room (Andersen & Baum, 1994)

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0.5

1

1.5

2

2.5

3

3.5

4

4.5

5

"Positive" person "Negative" person

Resembles familiarother

Resembles unknownother

A cognitive re-interpretation of the Freudian defense mechanism of repression

Research on coping styles has placed people along a dimension of repression-sensitization (Byrne, 1964).

These studies suggest that repressors differ from sensitizers in how they process information associated with stress and anxiety.

When placed in stressful situations, repressors typically report feeling less anxiety than sensitizers. However, their physiological responses reveal that repressors are, in fact, reacting strongly to the stress.

For example, in one study people had to give a short speech about “the most undesirable aspect of their personality” (Newton & Contrada, 1992). In the crucial conditions, the speech was videotaped and monitored by several other people in a nearby room. As expected, repressors reported low levels of negative emotion but were found to have strongly elevated blood pressure. This pattern was not found when the participants were led to believe that no one would be watching their speech.

Results of other studies comparing repressors versus nonrepressors

In another study, participants were videotaped while discussing situations in which they had behaved “particularly unsuccessfully.” When trained judges viewed the tapes, they rated the repressors as displaying more subtle signs of anxiety (i.e., fidgeting and anxious facial expressions). Again, however, the repressors rated themselves as being less anxious than the nonrepressors did.

A similar study analyzed the way participants spoke when nervous (Harrigan et al., 1994). The researchers found that repressors displayed more speech disturbances (e.g., stuttering, repeating what they just said) than nonrepressors.

Cognitive processing differences between repressors and nonrepressors

When asked to recall experiences from their childhoods, repressors recalled fewer upsetting or unpleasant experiences than nonrepressors (Davis & Schwartz, 1987).

In a related study, when given four minutes to recall experiences in which either they or another person felt happy, sad, angry, or afraid, the repressors recalled fewer emotionally laden personal experiences than the nonrepressors did. Interestingly, the repressors did a better job of remembering sad and fearful experiences for other people (Davis, 1987).

Number of early negative emotional experiences recalled (sad and fearful)

Number of experiences recalled

4

5

6

7

8

9

Repressors Nonrepressors

About others

About self

Repression, selective attention (i.e., “tuning out”), and threat to self-esteem

In a study of repression and selective attention, participants were told that they had performed either well or poorly on an anagram test.

The participants then took a “familiarity test” in which they rated how familiar they were with various words, many of which conveyed either positive or negative emotions. They were then given a surprise recall test.

Repressors who had previously “failed” the anagram test had particular difficulty recalling the negative emotion words (e.g., disturbed, sorry, and anxious).

In another study, participants were required to push a button to identify the color of 40 words as each word appeared on screen.

For the subset of words that had been selected because the participant found them personally threatening, nonrepressors—but not repressors—took significantly longer to identify their color.

Mean reaction times in response to personally threatening versus nonthreatening words

650

660

670

680

690

700

710

720

730

740

750

Repressors Nonrepressors

Nonthreatening words

Threatening words

Gender Schemas and Gender Differences

Sandra Bem’s gender schema theory

According to Bem’s gender schema theory, masculine males and feminine females are likely to perceive, evaluate, and remember information in terms of gender.

In contrast, androgynous and undifferentiated people are less likely to process information in terms of a gender schema. They occasionally classify people or objects as masculine or feminine, but they do not consider this an important way to sort information.

Sandra Bem’s gender schema theory

In one study, Bem (1981) used the recall clustering technique to test how sex-typed people versus non-sex-typed people remembered items from a list of 61 words.

The 61 words could be clustered in terms of categories such as proper names (Henry, Debra), animal names (gorilla, butterfly), verbs (hurling, blushing, and articles of clothing (trousers, bikini) or in terms of gender (masculine, feminine).

Bem found more recall clustering in terms of gender for her sex-typed participants than for participants who were cross-sex-typed, androgynous, or undifferentiated.

Mean percentage of clustered word pairs (Bem, 1981)

22

26

30

34

Sex-typed Cross-sex typed Androgynous Undifferentiated

Sandra Bem’s gender schema theory In another study, sex-typed people were more likely than non sex-

typed people to cluster statements into masculine and feminine categories when asked to describe themselves (Larsen & Seidman, 1986).

In a reaction time study, the 60 adjectives of the Bem Sex Role Inventory were projected onto a screen, one at a time. As predicted, sex-typed people were quicker than others when deciding if a schema-consistent adjective described them (pressing a ME button instead of a NOT ME button), but slower when deciding about a schema-inconsistent adjective (Bem, 1981).

In another relevant study, sex-typed women used feminine constructs more than androgynous women did when placing people into categories on Kelly’s Rep Test (Tunnell, 1981).

Cognitive Representations of Self

Studies of differences in what men and women recall

In a study asking men and women to recall either personal events from the past three years or events from American history, the women recalled more personal events whereas the men recalled more impersonal events (Seidlitz & Diener, 1998).

Two differences between men’s and women’s recall help to explain this finding:– Men and women differ in the extent to which self-relevant (i.e.,

personal) information is associated with emotions.

– Men and women also differ in the extent to which information about themselves is associated with information about their personal relationships.

Gender differences in the recall of emotional memories

Because females in our culture are socialized to pay attention to their own emotions and other people’s emotions from an early age, women should be more likely than men to attend to and process information about emotions.

Memories for both positive and negative emotional events should therefore be more accessible for women than for men.

This prediction was confirmed in a study by Davis (1999). The participants in this study were cued with a series of emotional words and phrases such as “feeling rejected” and “getting something you really wanted.” In response to these cues, women were able to remember more childhood events relevant to the emotions than men were.

Number of emotional childhood memories recalled (Davis, 1999)

5

10

15

20

25Women

Men

Gender differences in self-concept and in memories about relationships

Because females in our culture are socialized to develop more interdependent self-construals than males, the content of women’s self-concepts should reflect this difference.

In a study by Mackie (1983) that used the “Who Am I?” test, women’s spontaneous self-descriptions included more statements than the men’s about their role relationships as parents and family members.

In a study by Clancy and Dollinger (1993), women and men were given 12-exposure cameras and asked to use them to “describe who you are as you see yourself.” The women’s photos more often showed self with others than self alone, whereas the men’s photos more often showed self alone than self with others.

Who Am I?

1. I am:

2. I am:

3. I am:

4. I am:

5. I am:

6. I am:

7. I am:

8. I am:

9. I am:

10. I am:

Gender differences in self-concept and in memories about relationships

Because females in our culture are socialized to develop more interdependent self-construals than males, the content of women’s self-concepts should reflect this difference.

In a study by Mackie (1983) that used the “Who Am I?” test, women’s spontaneous self-descriptions included more statements than the men’s about their role relationships as parents and family members.

In a study by Clancy and Dollinger (1993), women and men were given 12-exposure cameras and asked to use them to “describe who you are as you see yourself.” The women’s photos more often showed self with others than self alone, whereas the men’s photos more often showed self alone than self with others.

Number of photographs used to portray self with others versus self alone (Clancy & Dollinger, 1993)

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Self with others Self alone

Men

Women

Cognitions and Depression

The depressive cognitive triad (Beck,1972)

Depressed people:– typically have negative thoughts

about themselves.– are pessimistic about the future.– tend to interpret ongoing

experiences in a negative manner.

In other words, depressed people look at the world through very dark glasses.

Depressive schemas In a study by Derry and Kuiper (1981), depressed patients and two

groups of nondepressed individuals responded to a list of adjectives by pressing a YES or NO button to indicate if the word described them or not.

Half of the words were related to depression (bleak, dismal, helpless), whereas the other half were not.

The researchers then surprised the participants by giving them 3 minutes to recall and write down as many of the stimulus words as they could.

As predicted, the depressed patients remembered the depression-associated words better, whereas nondepressed patients and normals remembered the other words better, suggesting the operation of a depressive schema in the depressed patients.

Proportion of self-descriptive words recalled (Derry & Kuiper, 1981)

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D patients ND patients ND normals

D words

ND words

Depressive schemas

Pace and Dixon (1993) compared the tendency to recall depression-related words before and after receiving cognitive therapy for depression. They found that the treatment resulted in a reduced recall of depression-related words, and this effect was still evident one month after the completion of therapy.

Clark and Teasdale (1982) gave depressed clients a series of words such a train and ice and asked them to recall real-life experiences that each word brought to mind. Each client was tested twice, once when feeling particularly depressed and once when feeling less depressed. Significantly more of the experiences recalled during the depressed period were unhappy ones.

Percentage of depression-related words recalled by therapy clients (Pace & Dixon, 1993)

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Beforetreatment

After treatment One-monthfollow-up

Depressive schemas

Pace and Dixon (1993) compared the tendency to recall negative words before and after receiving cognitive therapy for depression. They found that the treatment resulted in a reduced recall of depressing words, and this effect was still evident one month after the completion of therapy.

Clark and Teasdale (1982) gave depressed clients a series of words such a train and ice and asked them to recall real-life experiences that each word brought to mind. Each client was tested twice, once when feeling particularly depressed and once when feeling less depressed. Significantly more of the experiences recalled during the depressed period were unhappy ones.

Percentages of happy and unhappy experiences recalled (Clark & Teasdale, 1982)

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35

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55

When depressed When less depressed

Happy experiences

Unhappy experiences

Learned Helplessness Revisited:Attributional Model and Explanatory Style

Examples of attributions by a failing student (Abramson et al., 1978)

Internal External

Stable Unstable Stable Unstable

Global

Lack of general

intelligence

Laziness

Exhaustion

I was ill and couldn’t think clearly

ETS gives unfair tests

ETS tests for boring, useless information

Bad luck: today is Friday the 13th

The new proctor is inexperienced and gives confusing instructions

Specific

I lack ability in mathematics

Math always bores me

I got fed up doing the math items

I confused sines with cosines just long enough to miss all the trigonometry items

ETS gives unfair math tests

Math tests are hard for most people

My copy of the math test was numbered 13

The copies of the math test were blurred