Sampling Conscious Thought: Influences of Repression—Sensitization and Reporting Conditions

Abstract

Because of growing evidence that persons classified psychometrically as repressors may be at risk in terms of physical as well as mental health this study explored the ongoing thought processes of repressors, true low anxious, and high anxious individuals. A combination of high and low scores on manifest anxiety and defensiveness scales served to identify the three groups. It was hypothesized that thought samples of individuals in the three groups would reflect a bipolar repression-sensitization continuum. To investigate the possible influence of impression-management, approximately equal members of males and females (N-32) were assigned to two between-Ss reporting conditions designed to yield expectations of safety (Anonymity) or fear of public evaluation (Disclosure-threat). Content analyses of thought reports by trained judges revealed that thoughts in the Disclosure-threat condition were more emotional, more concerned with others, involved less fantasy, and were reported as being more difficult to control. The three personality categories did not produce significant main effects on thought quality, but did interact with the reporting conditions. Analyses of simple one-way effects for each personality category independently indicated that the high anxious participants had more emotional and difficult to control thoughts in the Disclosure-threat condition, while the repressor and low anxious participants showed no differences. The possible implications of these results in distinguishing competing explanations of the repression-sensitization phenomenon are discussed.