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An exploration of hostility and social support : a focus on joint cognitive mechanisms Habra, Martine E.
Abstract
Although past research has consistently demonstrated that hostile individuals report fewer satisfactory sources of social support, it remains unclear whether their evaluation is based on an objective assessment of their social environment or is coloured by hostile cognitions. To evaluate this question, 120 young adults, falling in the upper or lower tercile groups on a hostility measure, participated in a social cognition experiment. Participants were randomly assigned to one of three priming conditions (Hostility, Support, or Neutral) designed to activate cognitive schemata. They then read through vignettes depicting stressful situations typically encountered by students and evaluated how supportive various offers of help would be perceived in response to these problems. A 2 Hostility (high, low) x 3 Condition (hostility, support, or neutral) MANOVA examined the impact of personality and primed schemata on judgments of social support. Analyses yielded a significant Hostility x Condition interaction. Simple main effect analyses indicated that individuals low in hostility made the most negative judgments of perceived helpfulness in the Hostility condition, supporting the prediction that an active hostile schema biases people to view offers of help in a more pejorative way. However, hostile participants made their most negative judgments in the Support condition, which could indicate that an active social support schema is associated with increased mistrust and guardedness about offers of help in hostile individuals. These data suggest that hostile and non-hostile individuals process support-related information differently, which has important implications for interventions designed to augment social resources in at risk individuals.
Item Metadata
Title |
An exploration of hostility and social support : a focus on joint cognitive mechanisms
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Creator | |
Publisher |
University of British Columbia
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Date Issued |
2005
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Description |
Although past research has consistently demonstrated that hostile individuals report fewer
satisfactory sources of social support, it remains unclear whether their evaluation is based on an
objective assessment of their social environment or is coloured by hostile cognitions. To evaluate
this question, 120 young adults, falling in the upper or lower tercile groups on a hostility
measure, participated in a social cognition experiment. Participants were randomly assigned to
one of three priming conditions (Hostility, Support, or Neutral) designed to activate cognitive
schemata. They then read through vignettes depicting stressful situations typically encountered
by students and evaluated how supportive various offers of help would be perceived in response
to these problems. A 2 Hostility (high, low) x 3 Condition (hostility, support, or neutral)
MANOVA examined the impact of personality and primed schemata on judgments of social
support. Analyses yielded a significant Hostility x Condition interaction. Simple main effect
analyses indicated that individuals low in hostility made the most negative judgments of
perceived helpfulness in the Hostility condition, supporting the prediction that an active hostile
schema biases people to view offers of help in a more pejorative way. However, hostile
participants made their most negative judgments in the Support condition, which could indicate
that an active social support schema is associated with increased mistrust and guardedness about
offers of help in hostile individuals. These data suggest that hostile and non-hostile individuals
process support-related information differently, which has important implications for
interventions designed to augment social resources in at risk individuals.
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Genre | |
Type | |
Language |
eng
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Date Available |
2010-01-17
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Provider |
Vancouver : University of British Columbia Library
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Rights |
For non-commercial purposes only, such as research, private study and education. Additional conditions apply, see Terms of Use https://open.library.ubc.ca/terms_of_use.
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DOI |
10.14288/1.0092842
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URI | |
Degree | |
Program | |
Affiliation | |
Degree Grantor |
University of British Columbia
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Graduation Date |
2006-05
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Campus | |
Scholarly Level |
Graduate
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Aggregated Source Repository |
DSpace
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Item Media
Item Citations and Data
Rights
For non-commercial purposes only, such as research, private study and education. Additional conditions apply, see Terms of Use https://open.library.ubc.ca/terms_of_use.