Biomedical subjects

Julius Kuhl

Publications and source records attributed to Julius Kuhl.

6 recordsLinked to original sources

PubMed2005

Intention memory and achievement motivation: volitional facilitation and inhibition as a function of affective contents of need-related stimuli.

Replicating findings of J. Kuhl and M. Kazén (1999), reduction or removal of Stroop interference was achieved after short exposure to primes eliciting positive affect. This effect was need specific: Stroop interference removal (volitional facilitation) was found with positive primes related to achievement needs but not with positive primes related to affiliation or power needs. Five studies are reported. College students and unemployed university graduates participated in 2 studies each and branch managers of a large insurance company in 1 study. Whereas Stroop interference reduction or removal was found in all groups after positive-achievement primes, the 2 groups of unemployed persons additionally showed a significant increase of Stroop interference (volitional inhibition) after exposure to primes related to negative achievement episodes. Results are discussed in the context of Kuhl's personality systems interactions theory.

Achievement↗

PubMed2005

Striving for unwanted goals: stress-dependent discrepancies between explicit and implicit achievement motives reduce subjective well-being and increase psychosomatic symptoms.

Three studies investigated the relevance of affect regulation, stressful life events, and congruence between explicit achievement orientation and implicit achievement motive for subjective well-being and symptom formation. According to personality systems interactions (PSI) theory, stressful life events were expected to reduce motive congruence when the ability to self-regulate affect was impaired (i.e., state orientation). Consistent with expectations, the State Orientation x Stress interaction predicted incongruence in healthy participants (Studies 1 and 3) and in patients (Study 2). Furthermore, incongruence partially mediated the direct State Orientation x Stress effect on subjective well-being (Studies 1 and 3) and the course of psychosomatic complaints over 3 months (Study 2). In Study 3, the experimental induction of threat reduced motive congruence in state-oriented participants compared with an acceptance condition. Findings underscore the importance of assessing motive congruence as a "hidden stressor" and validate a new operant multi-motive test.

Achievement↗

PubMed2005

How to resist temptation: the effects of external control versus autonomy support on self-regulatory dynamics.

The purpose of the present study (N=80 undergraduate students) was to examine two issues: first, does external control lead to an increase in resistance to temptation more than the use of autonomy support? Second, what are the long-term effects of these types of educational style? Based on the Personality Systems Interaction (PSI) theory, external control was expected to increase resistance to temptation for those participants who lack initiative and self-motivation (i.e., state-oriented participants). Consistent with expectations, resistance to temptation was greater for state-oriented participants with externally controlled instructions than for individuals who received autonomy-supportive instructions. This was reflected by their performance on a visual discrimination task during distracter, compared to baseline, episodes. However, external control had negative long-term effects on state-oriented participants as indexed by alienation from their own preferences in free-choice behavior. Action-oriented participants were less influenced by experimental conditions.

Adult↗

PubMed2003

Emotion and intuition.

We investigated effects of emotional states on the ability to make intuitive judgments about the semantic coherence of word triads. Participants were presented word triads, consisting of three clue words that either were weakly associated with a common fourth concept (coherent triads) or had no common associate (incoherent triads). In Experiment 1, participants in a neutral mood discriminated coherent and incoherent triads reliably better than chance level even if they did not consciously retrieve the solution word. In Experiment 2, the induction of a positive mood reliably improved intuitive coherence judgments, whereas participants in a negative mood performed at chance level. We conclude that positive mood potentiates spread of activation to weak or remote associates in memory, thereby improving intuitive coherence judgments. By contrast, negative mood appears to restrict spread of activation to close associates and dominant word meanings, thus impairing intuitive coherence judgments.

Adult↗

PubMed2003

Self-infiltration: confusing assigned tasks as self-selected in memory.

Two studies examined determinants of self-infiltration (i.e., false self-attribution of externally controlled goals or activities). According to Personality Systems Interactions (PSI) theory, a sad mood was expected to reduce access to integrated self-representations and lead to self-infiltration for participants who have an impaired ability to cope with negative affect (i.e., state-oriented participants). Consistent with expectations, state-oriented participants had a tendency toward self-infiltration (as indexed by higher rates of false self-ascription of assigned activities) when reporting higher levels of sadness (Study 1) and after the experimental induction of a sad mood (Study 2). Participants who are able to downregulate negative affect (i.e., action-oriented participants), did not show this tendency. Theoretical and practical implications of the process of self-infiltration are discussed.

Adolescent↗

PubMed2002

Intuition, affect, and personality: unconscious coherence judgments and self-regulation of negative affect.

According to personality systems interaction theory, a negative mood was expected to reduce access to extended semantic networks and to reduce performance on intuitive judgments of coherence for participants who have an impaired ability to down-regulate negative affect (i.e., state-oriented participants). Consistent with expectations, state-oriented participants reporting higher levels of perseverating negative mood had a reduced discrimination between coherent and incoherent standard word triples (Study 1) and individually derived word triples describing persons (Study 2). Participants who are able to down-regulate negative affect (i.e., action-oriented participants) did not show this tendency. In addition, Study 2 revealed a dissociation between state orientation and Neuroticism that is discussed in terms of a functional difference between the two constructs.

Adult↗