In a series of two experiments, the first involving 121 participants and the second 114, I investigated whether level of racial prejudice is related to performance on a cognitive task and helping behavior in participants who had just interacted with the target of their prejudice. The moderating effect of control was tested and, unlike previous research, the responses of African-American participants were studied too. It was proposed that when people interact with the target of their prejudice, they will experience stress and the aftereffects of stress will lead to a decrement in Stroop task performance and a lower likelihood of helping someone in need. Control was believed to moderate this effect such that those given control would suffer less of a performance decrement and would help more often. Data were analyzed using ANCOVA and logistic regression. Racial prejudice was found to affect European-American but not African-American Stroop performance following the interracial interaction. Control moderated this effect and also influenced whether someone helped a person in need.

Tidigare forskning har visat att implicita och explicita attityder formas och förändras oberoende av varandra, samt att allt fler politiker använder sig av sociala medier för att nå ut till sina väljare. Denna studie syftade till att undersöka hur deltagarnas implicita och explicita attityder, gentemot två fiktiva politiker, påverkas av traditionella och sociala medier. I studien användes en experimentell mellangruppsdesign där deltagarna slumpmässigt fördelades till olika betingelser. Dessa bestod av positiva och negativa nyhetsitems från dels traditionella dels sociala medier. I undersökningen, som genomfördes på internet, deltog 126 personer. För att mäta deltagarnas attitydförändringar användes dels ett Implicit Association Test (IAT), dels ett explicit frågeformulär. Traditionella media påverkade explicita attityder signifikant.

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Implicit prejudice, and in particular, the Implicit Association Test (IAT), are paradigmatic examples of psychological concepts and research methods that have recently enjoyed great publicity and accessibility. However, little is known about the possible reflexive consequences of this popularization for the public understanding of prejudice, and by implication, for the formulation of social policy aimed at the reduction of prejudice and racism. Specifically, how does the public interpret and contextualize the claims of the IAT and implicit prejudice? With what social and political preoccupations does this operationalization of implicit prejudice resonate? Furthermore, how do members of the public experience and interpret the IAT as both a scientific instrument and as a bearer of psychological truth? In answer to these questions, this dissertation comprises a report of two empirical studies of public encounters with the IAT and the concepts of implicit prejudice. The first of these focused on popular responses to IAT research in the New York Times. Employing a discourse analytic approach to reader comments, it identified the social and psychological concerns against which the public makes sense of the IAT. In responding to the IAT, readers drew on skeptical and confessional discourses to position themselves reflexively in relation to its claims. I argue that these discourses constitute a space within which strong injunctions to self-scrutiny, impartiality and objectivity are established as moral-psychological ideals. Building on these findings, the second study examined the IAT as a discursive practice through a focus on the lived experience of taking the test. Recruited participants took the IAT, and were subsequently interviewed to elicit moment-by-moment accounts of this process. Hermeneutic-phenomenological analysis of these accounts revealed thematic concerns that both resonated with and augmented those in the analysis of public discourse. In particular, the IAT was experienced as a vivid demonstration of the operationalization of "implicit bias". I argue that the test embodies and communicates this paradigm to test-takers, and therefore functions as a psychological pedagogical tool. The dissertation closes by discussing the implications of these analyses for public understandings of, and responses to, prejudice.

Implicit prejudice, and in particular, the Implicit Association Test (IAT), are paradigmatic examples of psychological concepts and research methods that have recently enjoyed great publicity and accessibility. However, little is known about the possible reflexive consequences of this popularization for the public understanding of prejudice, and by implication, for the formulation of social policy aimed at the reduction of prejudice and racism. Specifically, how does the public interpret and contextualize the claims of the IAT and implicit prejudice? With what social and political preoccupations does this operationalization of implicit prejudice resonate? Furthermore, how do members of the public experience and interpret the IAT as both a scientific instrument and as a bearer of psychological truth? In answer to these questions, this dissertation comprises a report of two empirical studies of public encounters with the IAT and the concepts of implicit prejudice. The first of these focused on popular responses to IAT research in the New York Times. Employing a discourse analytic approach to reader comments, it identified the social and psychological concerns against which the public makes sense of the IAT. In responding to the IAT, readers drew on skeptical and confessional discourses to position themselves reflexively in relation to its claims. I argue that these discourses constitute a space within which strong injunctions to self-scrutiny, impartiality and objectivity are established as moral-psychological ideals. Building on these findings, the second study examined the IAT as a discursive practice through a focus on the lived experience of taking the test. Recruited participants took the IAT, and were subsequently interviewed to elicit moment-by-moment accounts of this process. Hermeneutic-phenomenological analysis of these accounts revealed thematic concerns that both resonated with and augmented those in the analysis of public discourse. In particular, the IAT was experienced as a vivid demonstration of the operationalization of "implicit bias". I argue that the test embodies and communicates this paradigm to test-takers, and therefore functions as a psychological pedagogical tool. The dissertation closes by discussing the implications of these analyses for public understandings of, and responses to, prejudice.

Non-suicidal self-injury (NSSI) is the intentional destruction of bodily tissue in the absence of suicidal motives. NSSI is strongly associated with self-criticism (Gilbert et al., 2010) and individuals who self-injure often report doing so to punish themselves. Conversely, self-compassion, or the tendency to be caring with oneself, is associated with psychological well-being (Neff et al., 2007). The aim of the present study was to determine whether experimentally inducing self-criticism or self-compassion would lead to changes in implicit identification with NSSI. The Self-Injury Implicit Association Test (SI-IAT; Nock & Banaji, 2007) is an assessment of the strength of the automatic associations that a person holds between themselves and NSSI. Participants were randomly assigned to a self-criticism induction, a self-compassion induction, or a neutral condition and completed the SI-IAT before and after the induction. Results showed that participants in the self-criticism induction experienced an increase in their implicit associations with NSSI while implicit associations in the self-compassion and control conditions generally did not change. Results were not significantly different for those with or without a history of NSSI and highlight the importance of self-criticism in NSSI. Future research should examine increases in self-criticism as a potential precursor of NSSI in longitudinal samples.

Background: Childhood sexual abuse (CSA) has the potential to compromise the socioemotional development of the victim resulting in an increased vulnerability to difficulties regulating emotions and one’s sense of self. Emotion is thought to play a key part in a number of psychological disorders which CSA survivors are at increased risk of developing. A better understanding of the basic emotions experienced in this population and emotion regulation will inform current treatment. Aims: This research aimed to develop a better understanding of the emotions experienced by survivors of CSA and the relationship between “implicit” and explicit emotions and psychopathology. Method: Two empirical studies were conducted. Study 1 employed a cross-sectional consecutive case series design involving 109 survivors of CSA. Participants completed a set of measures relating to basic emotions, emotion regulation and symptoms. Exploratory factor analyses were conducted on the Basic Emotions scale (BES). Regression analyses were used to explore the relationship between emotions experienced, emotion regulation strategies and psychological symptoms. Study 2 examined basic emotions, “implicit disgust self-concept” and psychopathology in a population of CSA survivors (n=26) and a group of individuals currently receiving psychological therapy who reported that they had not experienced childhood trauma (n=25). Participants completed self-report measures pertaining to emotion, emotion regulation, symptoms and cognitive fusion. Participants also completed an implicit association test. Results: Exploratory factor analyses supported the structure of three versions of the BESWeekly, General, and Coping in a sample of survivors of childhood sexual abuse. In all three versions of the scale, disgust explained the largest proportion of variance. The basic emotions of sadness, fear and disgust as well as external dysfunctional coping strategies appear to predict PTSD symptomatology in this sample. The results of Study 2 also support the finding that self-reported disgust is prominent in the emotion profile of CSA survivors. Implicit disgust self-concept was not significantly correlated with other emotions or psychopathology. However, implicit disgust self-concept was found to be significantly associated with cognitive fusion. Discussion: Psychotherapeutic approaches for survivors of childhood sexual abuse should address the emotional experience of this population. In particular, these findings suggest that sadness and disgust should be targeted in therapy.

Following the 9/11 terror attacks, many Americans experienced some form of habit or mood-altering stress though, most had received their impressions of the violence via distributed media reporting rather than firsthand exposure. Researchers have found that the propagating effects of media broadcasting can exasperate the effects of terror. However, little is known of how reports of terror violence affect group dynamics in geographically distant nations. The purpose of this study, following terror management theory, was to understand if terrorist violence influences cognitive and implicit racial evaluations in a culturally similar, but geographically distant, population. The study's design was a quantitative natural experiment. Time of completing the assessment, either before or after the 2015 Paris Bataclan terror attack, comprised the 2-level independent variable; the dependent variables were the Race Implicit Association Test (IAT) and a cognitive evaluation of racial anxiety. Age and religiosity served as covariates. The target population included White citizen residents of the United States over the age of 18; 263 participants were derived from archival data. Comparisons of raw IAT scores showed an 8% increase in negative implicit racial evaluations following the attack; however, the MANCOVA failed to achieve multivariate significance (p > .05). Despite the lack of statistical significance, important details on implicit racial attitudes were uncovered. Results of this study have the potential to foster positive social change by informing individuals on how their implicit associations might be affected following exposure to reports of terrorist violence. Additionally, these findings may guide national security and intelligence professional's development of post-attack response measures and task forces.

Indiana University-Purdue University Indianapolis (IUPUI) / Fibromyalgia Syndrome (FMS) is a chronic, painful rheumatic condition characterized by recurrent musculoskeletal pain, fatigue, and nonrestorative sleep, for which there is currently no biological marker. People who suffer from fibromyalgia are extremely susceptible to the effects of psychological stressors which may in turn exacerbate the symptoms of the disease. As unrelenting pain is the main symptom of fibromyalgia, it follows that patients would experience personal losses and changes in their self-schemas or the way in which they view themselves as a result. This study was particularly focused on identifying the enmeshment of self-schemas and pain-schemas, and the extent to which women with fibromyalgia experience pain and self-schema enmeshment (PSSE). Additionally, this study sought to determine the utility of using the Implicit Association Test as a measure of PSSE. The present study compared FMS patients to a group of diabetes patients on several measures of schema enmeshment, including the IAT. It was hypothesized that the two disease groups would differ significantly on the level of PSSE indicated by the IAT, and the two disease groups would not differ on enmeshment with illness indicated by the IAT. Additionally it was hypothesized that the IAT would be correlated with explicit measures of PSSE. Results did not support either of these hypotheses; however the sample size and statistical power necessary to test these hypotheses was severely lacking and thus they could not be evaluated in an appropriate manner. Results did not support the hypothesis that the IAT would be highly correlated with the explicit measures of PSSE. Based on these results and the existing literature, it is still somewhat unclear as to whether or not the IAT would be an acceptable/feasible tool in assessing PSSE in fibromyalgia patients.

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