Lazarus

Question 1

What can this study be used for?

Answer 1

Cognitive explanation of stress, biopsychosocial model

Question 2

Year

Answer 2

1963

Question 3

Aim

Answer 3

See how cognitive appraisals affect the physiological stress response.

Question 4

Research design

Answer 4

True experiment

Question 5

Participants

Question 6

Procedure

Answer 6

• Participants watched a 17 minute video of an Australian aboriginal ritual involving the genital mutilation of young boys using stone-aged tools. It’s a highly disturbing video to watch and generates a physiological stress response.
• The participants’ emotional states and stress responses were measured by taking their pulse, breathing rate and skin conductance (when you’re stressed your skin becomes a better conductor of electricity so this can be a measure of your stress response).
• Control condition: no voice
• INTELLECTUALISATION: a narrator’s voice-over was added whereby the narrator sounded like an anthropologist who was viewing the films as an analytical, neutral observer, without reference to any feelings or emotions. They were simply “observing an interesting specimen of human behaviour and describing it analytically.”
• DENIAL: the narrator begins by denying that the procedures were damaging or affected their health and that the boys.
• TRAUMA: the narrator tried to emphasize all the possible elements of threat in the film, including “ the filth, the pain, the danger of the operation, and the sadism of the procedure,” although their tone of voice was flat, neutral and emotionless like the other conditions.

Question 7

Results

Answer 7

• The results of the skin conductance measures showed that the stress response of participants in the silent, denial and intellectualization groups was quite similar. However, the trauma condition had a much higher stress response.

Cognitive appraising something as “threatening” will result in an increased stress response, compared to an appraisal of harmless or challenging.

Question 8

Evaluation

Answer 8

☑️ High construct validity: effectively change appraisals
☑️ Measures biological parameters
☑️ Sample matched with appropriate control group
🚫 Biased male-only psychology students sample
🚫 Conflicting responses from self reported data and biological response

Question 9

Evaluation

Answer 9

☑️ High construct validity: effectively change appraisals
☑️ Measures biological parameters
☑️ Sample matched with appropriate control group
🚫 Biased male-only psychology students sample
🚫 Conflicting responses from self reported data and biological response
🚫Ethical considerations: deception, protection from harm