The purpose of this study is to examine the relationship between stereotype confirmation concerns (SCC) and fear of negative evaluation (FNE). It is hypothesized that SCC will predict FNE, and that this effect will be moderated by race, such that SCC and FNE will be stronger among African Americans than among European Americans. A sample of 53 Caucasians and 41 African Americans were diagnosed with social anxiety. A hierarchical multiple regression was run to predict FNE with SCC, race, and the product of the two. The final model explained 27.9% of the variance in participants’ FNE. Race significantly moderated the effects of SCC on FNE; SCC had a stronger effect on FNE for Caucasian (b = .380, p < .01) than for African Americans (b = .140, p < .05). This study shows that it may be helpful in treatment of social anxiety to address stereotype confirmation concerns and to discuss social situations during which negative stereotypes become salient.

Fear of crime influences people’s daily habits (Lavrakas, 1982), as well as entire communities’ feelings of safety and cohesion (Gates, 1987). Gender has been identified as the strongest and most consistent predictor of fear of crime (for a review, see Hale, 1996). The literature consistently finds that women report greater fear of crime than do men. This finding is paradoxical when compared with the concurrent finding that men experience greater criminal victimization than do women. This phenomenon is referred to as the fear victimization paradox (Rennison, 2000). At first, it was accepted that women were more afraid of crime than were men and investigators offered many different theories to explain the paradox (e.g., Fisher & Sloan, 2003, Killias & Clerici, 2000, & Sacco, 1990). However, Sutton and Farrall (2005) investigated the possibility that masculinity was creating a social desirability bias in men’s reporting of fear of crime and when they accounted for this social desirability bias, they found that men actually experienced greater fear of crime than did women. The current investigation replicated and extended this research with 1009 university students and 508 Winnipeg residents. It extended Sutton and Farrall’s study by including measures of fear of crime and social desirability that have greater validity and by testing whether the findings apply differentially to fear of sexual versus non-sexual types of criminal victimization. The influence of age, location of residence within the city of Winnipeg, history of victimization, and masculinity on fear of crime was explored. This investigation was able to replicate Sutton and Farrall’s finding, but only in the community sample. The findings from this investigation suggest that there is a shift as men leave university from actually being less afraid of crime than women to being more afraid of crime. However, despite their increased fear, men in the community seem to maintain the façade of fearlessness. It was also found that women were consistently more afraid of sexual victimization than men, regardless of the influence of social desirability. Masculinity and social desirability had similar negative relationships to fear of crime and the implications of this are discussed.

Introduction: A review of the literature shows that standard clinical balance measures do not adequately predict fall risk in community-dwelling older individuals. There is significant evidence demonstrating the interactions of fear, anxiety, and confidence with the control of standing posture. Little is known however about the nature of this relationship under more challenging balance conditions, particularly in the elderly. The primary purpose of this work was to evaluate the relationship between fear of falling, clinical balance measures and fall-risk. Methods: Three studies were conducted evaluating the effects of postural threat (manipulated by support surface elevation) and/or cognitive loading (working memory secondary task) on clinical balance performance and task-specific psychological measures. Predictive and construct validity as well as test-retest reliability was evaluated for measures used to assess fear of falling and related psychological constructs . Results: Postural threat resulted in reduced balance confidence and perceived stability as well as increased state anxiety and fear of falling. These changes were significantly correlated to decrements in performance of clinical balance tasks. Neither standard clinical scales of balance and mobility nor generalized psychological measures, alone or in combination, could predict falls in community-dwelling elderly. However, combined scores on selected challenging clinical balance tasks could significantly predict falls. Furthermore, improved predictive precision resulted from having these tasks performed under combined postural threat and cognitive loading. Finally, the inclusion of task-specific psychological measures resulted in further improvements to predictive precision. Psychological measures demonstrated fair to excellent test-retest reliability in both healthy young and independent-living older individuals. Conclusions: Clinical balance tasks performed under more challenging conditions likely better reflect everyday experiences in which a fall is likely to occur. Incorporating easy-to-administer task-specific psychological evaluations and self-reported health estimates with clinical balance assessments might improve the likelihood of correctly identifying community-dwelling individuals at risk for falls. Improved estimates of fall-risk may lead to a reduction in the number of falls experienced in this population, thereby reducing the significant burden of fall-related hospitalizations, treatments and rehabilitation on the individual, families and health care system.

Thesis (M.A.)--University of Hawaii at Manoa, 2004. / Includes bibliographical references (leaves 46-52). / 52 leaves, bound ill. 29 cm

Thesis (M.A.)--University of Hawaii at Manoa, 2004. / Includes bibliographical references (leaves 52-58). / viii, 58 leaves, bound ill. 29 cm

Thesis (Ph. D.)--University of Hawaii at Manoa, 2005. / Includes bibliographical references. / Also available by subscription via World Wide Web / vi, 92 leaves, bound ill. 29 cm

Thesis (MPsy(Specialisation))--University of South Australia, 2003.

The experiments reported in the present thesis examined the behavioural processes of Pavlovian fear extinction and latent inhibition. The first series of experiments studied the reacquisition of extinguished fear responses following different amounts of extinction training. Rapid reacquisition occurred when rats were reconditioned after moderate extinction, showing that the original learning remained intact across this extinction. In contrast, when reconditioning was given after massive extinction, reconditioned responding was first depressed but then spontaneously recovered over time. This suggests that massive extinction produces a relatively permanent loss of the originally learned responding, while additionally imposes on the extinguished CS a transient latent inhibitory process that prevented the immediate but not the delayed expression of reconditioning. The second series of experiments studied the impact of spontaneous recovery of extinguished fear responses on their additional extinction. These experiments demonstrated that a CS that had time to show spontaneous recovery underwent greater response loss across additional extinction than one lacking recovery. They also showed that an excitor extinguished in compound with a CS showing recovery suffered greater response loss than an excitor extinguished in compound with a CS lacking recovery. Further, extinction of a compound composed of two CSs, one showing recovery and a second lacking recovery, produced greater extinction to the CS that showed recovery. These results show that spontaneous recovery of extinguished responses deepens their extinction through an error-correction mechanism regulated by both common and individual error terms. The third series of experiments studied the spontaneous recovery of latently inhibited and extinguished fear responses in within-subject designs. Using a compound test procedure, a CS that had received extensive preexposure or extensive extinction was found to have undergone greater spontaneous recovery relative to a CS just moderately preexposed or moderately extinguished. A CS given a mixed history of preexposure and extinction also underwent greater recovery relative to a CS just preexposed or just extinguished. These results suggest that both latent inhibition and extinction share a transient depressive process, and that the resulting recovery of responding is proportional to the amount of this depression.

The experiments reported in the present thesis examined the behavioural processes of Pavlovian fear extinction and latent inhibition. The first series of experiments studied the reacquisition of extinguished fear responses following different amounts of extinction training. Rapid reacquisition occurred when rats were reconditioned after moderate extinction, showing that the original learning remained intact across this extinction. In contrast, when reconditioning was given after massive extinction, reconditioned responding was first depressed but then spontaneously recovered over time. This suggests that massive extinction produces a relatively permanent loss of the originally learned responding, while additionally imposes on the extinguished CS a transient latent inhibitory process that prevented the immediate but not the delayed expression of reconditioning. The second series of experiments studied the impact of spontaneous recovery of extinguished fear responses on their additional extinction. These experiments demonstrated that a CS that had time to show spontaneous recovery underwent greater response loss across additional extinction than one lacking recovery. They also showed that an excitor extinguished in compound with a CS showing recovery suffered greater response loss than an excitor extinguished in compound with a CS lacking recovery. Further, extinction of a compound composed of two CSs, one showing recovery and a second lacking recovery, produced greater extinction to the CS that showed recovery. These results show that spontaneous recovery of extinguished responses deepens their extinction through an error-correction mechanism regulated by both common and individual error terms. The third series of experiments studied the spontaneous recovery of latently inhibited and extinguished fear responses in within-subject designs. Using a compound test procedure, a CS that had received extensive preexposure or extensive extinction was found to have undergone greater spontaneous recovery relative to a CS just moderately preexposed or moderately extinguished. A CS given a mixed history of preexposure and extinction also underwent greater recovery relative to a CS just preexposed or just extinguished. These results suggest that both latent inhibition and extinction share a transient depressive process, and that the resulting recovery of responding is proportional to the amount of this depression.

The experiments reported in the present thesis examined the behavioural processes of Pavlovian fear extinction and latent inhibition. The first series of experiments studied the reacquisition of extinguished fear responses following different amounts of extinction training. Rapid reacquisition occurred when rats were reconditioned after moderate extinction, showing that the original learning remained intact across this extinction. In contrast, when reconditioning was given after massive extinction, reconditioned responding was first depressed but then spontaneously recovered over time. This suggests that massive extinction produces a relatively permanent loss of the originally learned responding, while additionally imposes on the extinguished CS a transient latent inhibitory process that prevented the immediate but not the delayed expression of reconditioning. The second series of experiments studied the impact of spontaneous recovery of extinguished fear responses on their additional extinction. These experiments demonstrated that a CS that had time to show spontaneous recovery underwent greater response loss across additional extinction than one lacking recovery. They also showed that an excitor extinguished in compound with a CS showing recovery suffered greater response loss than an excitor extinguished in compound with a CS lacking recovery. Further, extinction of a compound composed of two CSs, one showing recovery and a second lacking recovery, produced greater extinction to the CS that showed recovery. These results show that spontaneous recovery of extinguished responses deepens their extinction through an error-correction mechanism regulated by both common and individual error terms. The third series of experiments studied the spontaneous recovery of latently inhibited and extinguished fear responses in within-subject designs. Using a compound test procedure, a CS that had received extensive preexposure or extensive extinction was found to have undergone greater spontaneous recovery relative to a CS just moderately preexposed or moderately extinguished. A CS given a mixed history of preexposure and extinction also underwent greater recovery relative to a CS just preexposed or just extinguished. These results suggest that both latent inhibition and extinction share a transient depressive process, and that the resulting recovery of responding is proportional to the amount of this depression.