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Biomedical subjects

P G Zimbardo

Publications and source records attributed to P G Zimbardo.

16 recordsLinked to original sources
PubMed2000

Prosocial foundations of children's academic achievement.

The present longitudinal research demonstrates robust contributions of early prosocial behavior to children's developmental trajectories in academic and social domains. Both prosocial and aggressive behaviors in early childhood were tested as predictors of academic achievement and peer relations in adolescence 5 years later. Prosocialness included cooperating, helping, sharing, and consoling, and the measure of antisocial aspects included proneness to verbal and physical aggression. Prosocialness had a strong positive impact on later academic achievement and social preferences, but early aggression had no significant effect on either outcome. The conceptual model accounted for 35% of variance in later academic achievement, and 37% of variance in social preferences. Additional analysis revealed that early academic achievement did not contribute to later academic achievement after controlling for effects of early prosocialness. Possible mediating processes by which prosocialness may affect academic achievement and other socially desirable developmental outcomes are proposed.

Aggression↗
PubMed1993

Psychophysiological consequences of unexplained arousal: a posthypnotic suggestion paradigm.

This experiment compared the emotional, cognitive, and physiological responses of Ss experiencing induced physiological arousal with and without awareness of the source of their arousal. Nine highly hypnotizable Ss and 9 nonhypnotizable controls were used in a within-subjects design. Each S received posthypnotic suggestions for arousal (increases in heart and respiration rate) with and without amnesia for its source in a two-phase procedure. Only the hypnotizable Ss were expected to differ between conditions. As predicted, for the hypnotizable Ss, unexplained arousal produced significant and dramatic effects when compared with explained arousal, including misattributions. These results are considered within a conceptual framework of the role of discontinuous experiences in the development of psychopathological symptoms in normal persons.

Adult↗
PubMed1989

On the degree of stability of measured hypnotizability over a 25-year period.

Conducted a longitudinal study of hypnotizability, as measured by the Stanford Hypnotic Susceptibility Scale, Form A, that yielded a relatively high degree of stability in hypnotic responsiveness over repeated testings spanning a 25-year period. The 50 Ss were retested in 1985, after tests when they were students, between 1958-1962 and again in 1970. The statistically significant stability coefficients were .64 (10-year retest), .82 (15-year retest), and .71 (25-year retest). The means did not change significantly, and the median change in the scores of individuals was only 1 point on the 12-item scale. A set of score measures and their intercorrelations are insufficient to resolve the issue of why stability occurs. The stability of hypnotizability over time compares favorably with that of other measures of individual differences.

Adult↗
PubMed1981

Induced hearing deficit generates experimental paranoia.

The development of paranoid reactions was investigated in normal people experiencing a temporary loss of hearing. In a social setting, subjects made partially deaf by hypnotic suggestion, but kept unaware of the source of their deafness, became more paranoid as indicated on a variety of assessment measures. The results support a hypothesizes cognitive-social mechanism for the clinically observed relationship between paranoia and deafness in the elderly.

Hearing Loss↗
PubMed1981

Modifying shyness-related social behavior through symptom misattribution.

An experimental misattribution paradigm proved to be a significant intervention treatment of altering social participation among dispositionally shy women. When specific arousal symptoms previously associated with their social anxiety were misattributed to a nonpsychological source, high-frequency noise, these extremely shy women behaved as if they were not shy. Their verbal fluency and interactional assertiveness resembled that of not-shy comparison women given the same treatment. Moreover, their scores on these measures were significantly elevated from the low levels recorded by shy controls who had been led to expect shyness-irrelevant "side effects" from their exposure to noise. A male partner (a confederate) accurately perceived whether or not the women in the two control groups were shy, but he misjudged as "not shy" the shy women in the misattribution group. The greater enjoyment of the interaction by those in this latter group, despite high-frequency noise bombardment, was also reflected in their stronger preference for further affiliation than that shown by either comparison group. The continuously monitored heart rate data provide grounds for speculation as to the relationship of physiological arousal and behavior. However, a paradoxical placebo finding emerged when it appeared that the non-shy women in this same misattribution condition experienced a higher level of arousal, and this anxiety-like arousal was associated with preferences for nonaffiliation.

Adult↗
PubMed1973

Objective assessment of hypnotically induced time distortion.

The objective precision of operant conditioning methodology validates the power of hypnosis to induce alterations in time perception. Personal tempo was systematically modified by instructions to trained hypnotic subjects, with significant behavioral effects observed on a variety of response rate measures.

Adult↗
PubMed1966

Control of pain motivation by cognitive dissonance.

Responses by humans to painful electric shocks are significantly modified at subjective, behavioral, and physiological levels by verbal manipulations of degree of choice and justification for further exposure to the aversive stimuli. Pain perception, learning, and galvanic skin resistance are altered under these conditions of "cognitive dissonance," as they are by reductions in voltage intensity.

Adult↗