Unstable high self-esteem and the eliciting conditions of self-doubt

Lupien, Shannon P.; Seery, Mark D.; Almonte, Jessica L.

doi:10.1016/j.jesp.2012.01.009

Cited by 16 publications

(13 citation statements)

References 24 publications

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“…Following well-established protocol (e.g., Blascovich, Seery, Mugridge, Norris, & Weisbuch, 2004; Cihangir, Scheepers, Barreto & Ellemers, 2013; de Wit, Scheepers & Jehn, 2012; Lupien, Seery & Almonte, 2012; Moore, Vine, Wilson & Freeman, 2012; Scheepers, de Wit, Ellemers & Sassenberg, 2012; Seery, Leo, Lupien, Konrack & Almonte, 2013), we computed a single Threat-Challenge Reactivity Index (TCRI) for ease of analysis and discussion. We calculated the TCRI by converting each participant’s TPR and CO reactivity values during the memory task into z-scores and summing them.…”

Section: Methodsmentioning

confidence: 99%

Suspicion of motives predicts minorities' responses to positive feedback in interracial interactions

Major

Kunstman

Malta

et al. 2016

Journal of Experimental Social Psychology

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Strong social and legal norms in the United States discourage the overt expression of bias against ethnic and racial minorities, increasing the attributional ambiguity of Whites’ positive behavior to ethnic minorities. Minorities who suspect that Whites’ positive overtures toward minorities are motivated more by their fear of appearing racist than by egalitarian attitudes may regard positive feedback they receive from Whites as disingenuous. This may lead them to react to such feedback with feelings of uncertainty and threat. Three studies examined how suspicion of motives relates to ethnic minorities’ responses to receiving positive feedback from a White peer or same-ethnicity peer (Experiment 1), to receiving feedback from a White peer that was positive or negative (Experiment 2), and to receiving positive feedback from a White peer who did or did not know their ethnicity (Experiment 3). As predicted, the more suspicious Latinas were of Whites’ motives for behaving positively toward minorities in general, the more they regarded positive feedback from a White peer who knew their ethnicity as disingenuous and the more they reacted with cardiovascular reactivity characteristic of threat/avoidance, increased feelings of stress, heightened uncertainty, and decreased self-esteem. We discuss the implications for intergroup interactions of perceptions of Whites’ motives for nonprejudiced behavior.

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Section: Methodsmentioning

confidence: 99%

Suspicion of motives predicts minorities' responses to positive feedback in interracial interactions

Major

Kunstman

Malta

et al. 2016

Journal of Experimental Social Psychology

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“…Given that activated self‐doubt should lead to threat, this suggests that people with unstable high self‐esteem are not always as confident as their high trait self‐esteem would indicate, but instead experience self‐doubt in the face of difficulties. Lupien et al () further specified the eliciting conditions of this self‐doubt by manipulating the difficulty of a reasoning ability test and how it was described. Participants heard either that the test could reveal only exceptionally high ability or very low ability.…”

Section: Recent Applicationsmentioning

confidence: 99%

The Biopsychosocial Model of Challenge and Threat: Using the Heart to Measure the Mind

Seery

2013

Social & Personality Psych

Self Cite

124

167

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The biopsychosocial model of challenge and threat (BPS) holds that during active goal pursuit, psychological processes reliably lead to specific patterns of cardiovascular responses. Because psychological experience during goal pursuit is not otherwise easily accessible, using cardiovascular responses to infer psychological states can provide valuable insight. In this context, challenge results from evaluating high resources and low demands, whereas threat results from evaluating low resources and high demands. Both challenge and threat lead the heart to beat faster and harder than during rest, but challenge results in dilation in arteries and more blood pumped, whereas threat results in constriction and less blood pumped. This article summarizes the BPS, presents recent research applications, and discusses remaining questions and future directions, including how research from other theoretical perspectives may clarify the nature of task engagement and how the BPS can inform the study of resilience to stressors.As college students wait, pencil in hand and scantron ready, for the final exam in a course to be passed out, and then begin working on that exam once they receive it, consider how their bodies might respond. All students remain seated at their desks, perhaps moving only enough to fill in their answers on the page in front of them; none are likely to stand up until they have completed the exam. Despite this, their hearts may be beating as fast and as hard as though they were running around campus. The culmination of a cascade of physiological changes these students may be experiencing during their final exam, such cardiovascular responses not only suggest that the body is at a state of physical readiness but also may reveal what has occurred in the mind to precipitate those physiological changes. In other words, cardiovascular responses can be used to infer psychological states and processes, which lends them great utility as a methodological tool for testing research questions in social and personality psychology. The biopsychosocial model of challenge and threat accounts for such a relationship between physiology and psychology. In this article, a description of the model is followed by a review of recent research and a discussion of remaining questions and future directions. The Biopsychosocial Model of Challenge and ThreatThe biopsychosocial model of challenge and threat (BPS;Blascovich, 2008a;Blascovich & Tomaka, 1996) provides a theoretical rationale for a connection between specific psychological states and patterns of physiological responses. Importantly, the BPS holds that it is psychological processes that lead to physiological changes. These physiological responses occur quickly -in a matter of seconds -and affect the functioning of the cardiovascular system. Cardiovascular changes, in turn, can be measured relatively easily and noninvasively, with negligible discomfort for research participants. This provides the opportunity to measure cardiovascular responses and reliably infer the psychologic...

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“…In contrast, the effects of HPA axis activation is slower, partly because cortisol has a half-life of over an hour and is more slowly released into the blood stream (Seery, 2013). Threat-like cardiovascular responses during motivated performance situations have been well-documented in the literature (e.g., Lupien et al, 2012;Mendes et al, 2007;Seery et al, 2004;Vick et al, 2008), however, our exploratory results suggest that the slower-acting cortisol release could also result in more threat-like responses after the task has finished too.…”

Section: Discussionmentioning

confidence: 67%

In-task auditory performance-related feedback promotes cardiovascular markers of a challenge state during a pressurized task

Crowe

Moore

Harris

et al. 2020

Anxiety, Stress, & Coping

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Background and Objectives: Individuals evaluate the demands and resources associated with a pressurized situation, which leads to distinct patterns of cardiovascular responses. While it is accepted that cognitive evaluations are updated throughout a pressurized situation, to date, cardiovascular markers have only been recorded immediately before, or averaged across, these situations. Thus, this study examined the influence of in-task performance-related feedback on cardiovascular markers of challenge and threat to explore fluctuations in these markers. Methods and Design: Forty participants completed a pressurized visual search task while cardiovascular markers of challenge and threat were recorded. During the task, participants received either positive or negative feedback via distinct auditory tones to induce a challenge or threat state. Following task completion, cardiovascular markers were recorded during a recovery phase. Results: Participants' cardiovascular responses changed across the experimental protocol. Specifically, while participants displayed a cardiovascular response more reflective of a challenge state following intask performance-related feedback, participants exhibited a response more akin to a threat state later during the recovery phase. Conclusions: In-task auditory performance-related feedback promoted cardiovascular markers of a challenge state. These markers fluctuated over the experiment, suggesting that they, and presumably underlying demand and resource evaluations, are relatively dynamic in nature.

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Unstable high self-esteem and the eliciting conditions of self-doubt

Cited by 16 publications

References 24 publications

Suspicion of motives predicts minorities' responses to positive feedback in interracial interactions

Suspicion of motives predicts minorities' responses to positive feedback in interracial interactions

The Biopsychosocial Model of Challenge and Threat: Using the Heart to Measure the Mind

In-task auditory performance-related feedback promotes cardiovascular markers of a challenge state during a pressurized task

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