Affective Assessment and Dialectical Oppositionality in the Cognitive Processing of Social Descriptors

Abstract

A theory of affection based upon dialectical cognitive processing is put to test. Twenty subjects (equated for sex) are assigned to each of three experimental conditions (N = 60). Experimental task is paired-associates learning of social descriptors like active, realistic, and quiet. In the same condition, subjects learn descriptors that they have seen before in this study and affectively assessed (i.e., liked or disliked a descriptor's meaning). In the opposite condition, subjects learn antonyms learned have not been seen before in this study.) A control group learns the same descriptors as the opposite group without benefit of seeing or affectively assessing their opposites. In the line with predictions (p = .005): (1) subjects in the same condition learn liked descriptors more readily than disliked descriptors; (2) subjects in the opposite condition learn antonyms of disliked descriptors more readily than autonyms of liked descriptors; (3) control subjects fail to demonstrate the dialectical patterning of the opposite subjects to whom they have been yoked. It is shown how an exclusively social (i.e., supra-individual) theoretical explanation of these findings leads to circularity.