Relationships between Hostility Guilt and Several Measures of Hostility

Abstract

Scores on Mosher's forced-choice Hostility Guilt Scale for females were related to a projective and an objective measure of hostility. The projective measure was the extent to which 70 female undergraduates used the hostile alternative in making up sentences to a list of homonyms with hostile and neutral meanings. The objective measure was the Buss-Durkee Hostility Inventory. Hostility guilt correlated negatively and significantly with the projective measure and with the following Buss-Durkee scales: Assault, Negativism, Resentment, Suspicion, Verbal and Total Hostility, summing over all subscales except Guilt. The projective measure correlated positively and significantly with the Assault and Suspicion Scales, as well as the Total Hostility Score.