Emotional Arousal as a Factor in Communication-Mediated Aggressive Behavior

Under conditions where a salient social problems gets coupled with an equally intense interest in an aspect of human social behavior, it is to be expected that a substantial amount of scholarly speculation and empirical research would be generated. Such would appear to be the case in recent years in connection with the considerable volume of work that has been and continues to be produced in the area of human aggression. The wide prevalence of violent and aggressive acts in the world at large and, particularly, in the United States, has provided a focus of attention and research on the part of scholars and scientists from a variety of fields. At the same time, and possibly for different reasons, there has been renewed interest in the question of man\u27s basic and intrinsic aggressive nature, and in the stimulus conditions under which such behavior -- whether inherited or learned -- is apt to be more readily elicited

Effects of Victim Exemplification in Television News on Viewer Perception of Social Issues

Two broadcast news stories were manipulated to show victimization (food poisoning, handgun violence) in one of three versions: without victim exemplification, with exemplification by unemotional victims, and with exemplification by highly emotional victims. Male and female respondents, whose empathic sensitivity had been predetermined, recorded their own perceptions of each issue addressed: its severity as a national problem, the likelihood of it becoming a local problem, and the likelihood that they themselves might be placed at risk. They also indicated their reaction to each news story. Emotional victim exemplification fostered perceptions of greater problem severity than unemotional and no victim exemplification. Additionally, emotional victim exemplification, compared with no exemplification, fostered perceptions of increased victimization risk to self, whereas unemotional victim exemplification failed to do so. Empathic sensitivity did not interact with exemplar emotionality, but produced a main effect. Highly empathic persons perceived the severity of danger and risk to themselves as greater than did less empathic persons. Respondent gender similarly produced a main effect without interacting with exemplar emotionality. Female respondents assessed all dangers and risks as higher than did their male counterparts. Finally, exposure to emotional exemplification, but not unemotional exemplification, fostered reports of greater distress reactions than did exposure to the news stories without exemplification. Women reported greater distress than did men, and highly empathic persons reported greater distress than did less empathic persons

Loneliness of Adolescents and Their Choice and Enjoyment of Love-Celebrating Versus Love-Lamenting Popular Music

Black and white male and female high school students subdivided into high and low loneliness groups in relation to romantic deprivation rated their enjoyment of love-lamenting and love-celebrating videos of popular romantic music. Loneliness proved inconsequential for the enjoyment of love-lamenting songs. However, highly lonely males enjoyed love-celebrating songs markedly less than less lonely males; in contrast, highly lonely females enjoyed love-celebrating songs more than less lonely females. Indications of music choices in hypothetical situations of romantic success and failure yielded strikingly different results, with most students reporting that they would choose music that matched their mood

Were they really laughed at? That much? Gelotophobes and their history of perceived derisibility

The List of Derisible Situations (LDS; Proyer, Hempelmann and Ruch, List of Derisible Situations (LDS), University of Zurich, 2008) consists of 102 different occasions for being laughed at. They were retrieved in a corpus study and compiled into the LDS. Based on this list, information on the frequency and the intensity with which people recall being laughed at during a given time-span (12 months in this study) can be collected. An empirical study (N = 114) examined the relations between the LDS and the fear of being laughed at (gelotophobia), the joy of being laughed at (gelotophilia), and the joy of laughing at others (katagelasticism; Ruch and Proyer this issue). More than 92% of the participants recalled having been laughed at at least once over the past 12 months. Highest scores were found for experiencing an embarrassing situation, chauvinism of others or being laughed at for doing something awkward or clumsy. Gelotophobia, gelotophilia, and katagelasticism were related about equally to the recalled frequency of events of being laughed at (with the lowest relation to katagelasticism). Gelotophobia, gelotophilia, and katagelasticism yielded a distinct and plausible pattern of correlations to the frequency of events of being laughed at. Gelotophobes recalled the situations of being laughed at with a higher intensity than others. Thus, the fear of being laughed at exists to a large degree independently from actual experiences of being laughed at, but is related to a higher intensity with which these events are experienced

The fear of being laughed at: Individual and group differences in gelotophobia

Single case studies led to the discovery and phenomenological description of Gelotophobia anti its definition as the pathological fear of appearing to social partners as a ridiculous object (Titze 1995, 1996, 1997). The aim of the present study is to empirically examine the core assumptions about the fear of being laughed at in a sample comprising a total of 863 clinical and non-clinical participants. Discriminant function analysis yielded that gelotophobes can be separated from other shame-based neurotics, non-shame-based neurotics, anti controls. Separation was best for statements specifically describing the gelotophobic symptomatology and less potent for more general questions describing socially avoidant behaviors. Factor analysis demonstrates that while Gelotophobia is composed of a set of correlated elements in homogenous samples, overall the concept is best conceptualized as unidimensional. Predicted and actual group membership converged well in a cross-classification (approximately 69% of correctly classified cases). Overall, it can be concluded that the fear of being laughed at varies tremendously among adults and might hold a key to understanding certain forms of humorlessness