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Biomedical subjects

M Mikulincer

Publications and source records attributed to M Mikulincer.

At least 55 records · Page 3Linked to original sources
PubMed1991

Subjective sleepiness ratings: the effects of sleep deprivation, circadian rhythmicity and cognitive performance.

Computerized self-report sleepiness scales were administered before and after cognitive testing in a 72-hour sleep deprivation study. The cognitive test battery was administered every 2 hours and took approximately 1-1.25 hours. Two computerized measures of subjective sleepiness were used, one a visual analog scale, the other a Hebrew version of the Stanford sleepiness scale. The results indicated that both accumulated sleep loss, circadian and ultradian (2 cycles/day) factors were significant in determining subjective estimates of sleepiness. The extent of the differences between subjective sleepiness ratings before cognitive testing and after testing was dependent upon the phase of the circadian cycle. These differences were greatest at approximately 0200-0600 hours and least around 1000 hours. A second low point occurred at 1800-2000 hours. Analysis by complex demodulation of the individual subjects' sleepiness rating curves indicated that the amount of variance accounted for by the circadian component increased significantly after cognitive testing.

Adult↗
PubMed1991

Attachment style and the structure of romantic love.

Three studies (N = 337) explored adult attachment processes. Studies 1 and 2 examined differences between secure, avoidant and ambivalent people in the concept of romantic love, and Study 3 examined differences between the three groups in actual experiences in ongoing love relationships. Study 3 explored relationships from the point of view of both partners, and examined differences among attachment groups in perceptions of both actual and ideal relationships. Findings indicated that secure people put more emphasis on intimacy than avoidant and ambivalent people, and that their relationships were characterized by high intimacy and congruence of real-ideal and self-partner loves. The romantic relationship of ambivalent people was characterized by their failure to realize their desire for a warm and secure love. Avoidant people experienced less intimacy than secure people, but more commitment than ambivalent people in their relationships. They were found to underestimate partners' love and to want less intense love than secure and ambivalent people.

Adult↗
PubMed1990

The impact of cognitive interference on performance during prolonged sleep loss.

A study was conducted on the effects of off-task cognitions on performance during sleep deprivation. Subjects answered the Thought Occurrence Questionnaire, assessing their proneness to engage in off-task cognitions, and were deprived of sleep for 72 hours, during which they performed a variety of tasks including visual discrimination and three versions of a logical reasoning task in which cognitive load was varied systematically. In addition, every day subjects answered the Cognitive Interference Questionnaire, which taps off-task cognitions during the experiment. Results indicated that subjects who habitually engage in off-task cognitions performed worse during 72 hours of sleep loss than subjects who do not engage in such distracting activities. In addition, it was found that the engagement in off-task cognitions increased during the 72 hours of sleep loss and such an engagement was related to deficits in performance accuracy. The mechanisms of off-task cognitions and sleep loss underlying these effects are discussed.

Adult↗
PubMed1990

Life-events, coping strategies, social resources, and somatic complaints among combat stress reaction casualties.

This study examined the relationships of life-events, coping strategies, and social resources on the one hand and self-report of somatic problems following the stress of combat on the other. The sample consisted of 255 Israeli soldiers who suffered a combat stress reaction episode during the 1982 Lebanon War and were followed up one and two years after their participation in combat. Correlational analyses revealed significant relationships between life-events, coping, and social resources and somatic complaints. However, regression analyses found that after prior somatization and current psychiatric status were controlled for, the level of perceived social resources was the only variable that significantly contributed to somatization. Theoretical and methodological implications of the findings are discussed.

Adaptation, Psychological↗
PubMed1990

Psychological aspects of male infertility.

The aim of this research was to study the effect of suspected infertility on psychological functioning, comparing men who suspect that they are infertile (N = 107) with men who have no such suspicion (N = 30). Infertile men had lower self-esteem, higher anxiety and showed more somatic symptoms than fertile men. The effects of moderating variables on the psychological functioning of the subfertile men were analysed. The findings were that causality of infertility, feelings of hopelessness and global attribution were related to sexual inadequacy. Depression was uniquely related to stress of infertility and global attribution. Global attribution, though predictive of psychological consequences, was not affected by the objective variables of infertility.

Adaptation, Psychological↗
PubMed1989

The implications of life events and social integration in the course of combat-related post-traumatic stress disorder.

This study examined the relationships of life events and social integration with combat-related Post-traumatic stress disorder. The sample consisted of 255 Israeli soldiers who suffered a combat stress reaction episode during the 1982 Lebanon War and were followed one and two years after their participation in combat. Statistical analyses yielded significant effects of positive and negative life events and social integration on the diagnosis of post-traumatic stress disorder. Changes in the diagnosis of post-traumatic stress disorder from time 1 to time 2 were associated with life events and social integration. Theoretical and methodological implications of the findings were discussed.

Adult↗
PubMed1989

Self-serving biases in the perception of freedom: the impact of previously experienced failure.

The purpose of five experiments was to investigate the use by Israeli students of a perceived lack of freedom as a self-protective device against the negative implications of poor performance in an achievement task. I hypothesized that a reduction in perceived freedom might be used to protect self-esteem following failure. A reduction in perceived freedom would weaken a person's sense of responsibility for failure and thereby protect self-esteem. Experiments 1 and 2 showed that subjects exposed to failure retrospectively reported having had less freedom during the experimental sessions than those who experienced success or no feedback at all. Experiments 3, 4, and 5 demonstrated that failure reduces the perception of freedom when other external rationalizations for failure (high consensus, high distinctiveness, low consistency) are unavailable. The results are interpreted in the light of self-protective strategies.

Achievement↗
PubMed1989

Locus of control and combat-related post-traumatic stress disorder: the intervening role of battle intensity, threat appraisal and coping.

The study examined the role of control expectancies in the formation of posttraumatic stress disorder (PTSD) among Israeli soldiers combat stress reactions (battle shock) casualties of the Lebanon War (1982). A random sample of 104 soldiers who fought in the Lebanon War and were identified as combat stress reaction casualties were clinically interviewed and given a battery of self-report questionnaires a year after their participation in combat. In general, the components of Lazarus' stress-illness model were predictive of the severity of PTSD. Greater appraisal of threat, more negative emotions, and more emotion-focused coping were all found to predict a larger number of PTSD symptoms. Path analyses were performed separately for soldiers who reported that they were under high battle intensity and those who were under relatively low battle intensity. For low battle intensity, externals suffered more PTSD than internals. This relationship was due mainly to the indirect effects of locus of control via threat appraisal. These significant relationships were not found when battle intensity was high. The implications of the findings for the study of combat stress reactions and for the stress-illness model are discussed. The relative impact of generalized control expectancies and situational factors are examined for the various components of the model.

Adaptation, Psychological↗
PubMed1989

The effects of 72 hours of sleep loss on psychological variables.

A study was conducted on the effects of 72 hours of sleep loss and modified continuous operations on performance and psychological variables. This paper presents the results of self-report data of 12 subjects for the following psychological variables: sleepiness, affect, motivation, cognitive difficulties, and waking dreams. The relationship between the self-report measures and performance in a visual search and memory task is also examined. Most of the psychological variables are significantly affected by the number of days of sleep deprivation, all are significantly affected by hour of day; but only sleepiness, affect and motivation are also significantly affected by the interaction between these variables. The peak hours for self-reported psychological complaints are generally between 0400 and 0800, while the lowest number of complaints are usually reported in the afternoon/early evening, between 1600 and 2000. In addition, the results showed that (a) the amplitude of the circadian component of the psychological data increased over the period of sleep loss, and (b) psychological data were more highly correlated with a measure of general performance than with accuracy. The mechanisms of sleep deprivation underlying its effects on psychological and performance measures are discussed.

Adult↗
PubMed1989

Control-related beliefs and sleep characteristics of posttraumatic stress disorder patients.

To examine correlations among chronic Posttraumatic Stress Disorder (PTSD), control-related beliefs, and sleep difficulties 7 PTSD casualities and 7 non-PTSD matched subjects were compared in their laboratory sleep patterns as well as in their beliefs about personal control over external and internal events in general and over sleep-related events in particular. Analyses indicated that PTSD casualties had poorer sleep and reported more doubts regarding their ability to control external and internal events than control subjects. Further, we found a significant association between perceived control and sleep difficulties. Results were discussed in terms of Horowitz's conception of intrapsychic processes related to PTSD.

Adult↗
PubMed1988

Reactance and helplessness following exposure to unsolvable problems: the effects of attributional style.

I assessed the effects of internal-external attributional style and amount of unsolvable problems on subsequent task performance. Undergraduate subjects were divided according to their attributional style for bad events into internal, nondefined, and external attributors and were exposed to either one, four, or no unsolvable problems. Following exposure to a single unsolvable problem, internal attributors exhibited greater frustration and hostility and better performance in a subsequent cognitive task than did external attributors. Following exposure to four unsolvable problems, internal attributors exhibited stronger feelings of incompetence and a decrease in performance compared with external attributors. The results are discussed in terms of Wortman and Brehm's (1975) approach to reactance and helplessness.

Adult↗
PubMed1988

Coping, locus of control, social support, and combat-related posttraumatic stress disorder: a prospective study.

We examined the relations between coping, locus of control, and social support and combat-related posttraumatic stress disorder (PTSD). The sample consisted of 262 Israeli soldiers who suffered a combat stress reaction episode during the 1982 Lebanon war and were followed 2 and 3 years after their participation in combat. Cross-sectional analyses revealed significant relations between locus of control, coping, and social support and PTSD at the two points of assessment. Changes in PTSD from Time 1 to Time 2 were also associated with changes in coping. We discuss theoretical and methodological implications of the findings.

Adaptation, Psychological↗
PubMed1988

Causal attribution, cognitive interference, and the generalization of learned helplessness.

We assessed the role of off-task cognitions in mediating the performance effects of global and specific attributions for failure. In Experiment 1, subjects were divided into global and specific attributors and were exposed to either no feedback or failure feedback. In Experiment 2, subjects were exposed to no feedback or to unsolvable problems wherein they received attribution for failure to specific or global causes. Experiment 3 added a condition in which subjects were restrained from engaging in off-task cognitions. Results showed that exposure to unsolvable problems deteriorated performance and increased off-task cognitions mainly among subjects who attributed failure to global causes. In addition, the enhancement of off-task cognitions interfered with performance following unsolvable problems. The introduction of instructions that discouraged subjects from engaging in off-task cognitions eliminated the detrimental effects of global attribution. Results are discussed in terms of test anxiety and excuse-making conceptualizations of learned helplessness.

Adult↗
PubMed1988

Perception of self and parents by second-generation Holocaust survivors.

This study's objectives were to test the emotional stability and self-perceptions of Holocaust survivors' offspring (HSO) and to investigate how HSO perceive their parents. It was assumed that the investigation of these two issues would broaden our understanding of the mediating processes through which the psychological burdens of the survivors might be transmitted to their descendants. Forty-seven subjects, all second-generation Holocaust survivors, were compared with 46 control subjects on measures of emotional stability (anxiety and depressive moods) and measures of self-perception and perception of parents. The groups did not differ on the emotional stability and self-perception measures. However, it was found that the children of Holocaust survivors, compared with the control subjects, perceived their parents as more tense, but also as more attractive. The correlations between self-perception and perception of parents were lower in the HSO group than in the control group. These findings suggest that HSO seem to have developed unique coping mechanisms that enable them to deal with their parent's psychological burdens.

Adult↗
PubMed1988

Characteristic expressions of combat-related posttraumatic stress disorder among Israeli soldiers in the 1982 Lebanon War.

This study assessed the clinical picture of two groups of Israeli soldiers: front-line soldiers who had been treated for combat stress reaction during the 1982 Lebanon War (n = 382); and matched control front-line soldiers who did not sustain combat stress reaction (n = 334). Subjects were screened one year after the war for posttraumatic stress disorder (PTSD) and psychiatric symptomatology using the symptom checklist-90 (SCL-90). Results indicated that anxiety, depression, hostility, and obsessive-compulsive problems were the most salient features of PTSD among combat stress reaction casualties. The contribution of DSM-III criteria as well as their limitations in the diagnosis of PTSD are discussed.

Adult↗
PubMed1988

Psychological sequelae of war. A 2-year follow-up study of Israeli combat stress reaction casualties.

The relationships of two stress-related intrapsychic manifestations--intrusion and avoidance--to combat stress reaction and posttraumatic stress disorder were assessed 1 and 2 years after the 1982 Lebanon War. The sample consisted of 285 combat stress reaction Israeli casualties and 198 comparable control subjects. Results showed that higher rates of intrusion and avoidance were reported by both combat stress reaction and posttraumatic stress disorder casualties at the two points in time. In addition, the level of intrusion tendencies declined with time. Theoretical and methodological implications are discussed.

Combat Disorders↗
PubMed1988

A follow-up of Israeli casualties of combat stress reaction ('battle shock') in the 1982 Lebanon War.

A sample of 104 Israeli soldiers diagnosed as suffering from combat stress reactions (CSR) ('battle shock') during the 1982 Lebanon War were examined by mental health clinicians a year after the war. The clinicians assessed (a) post-traumatic stress disorder (PTSD) as defined in the DSM-III (1980), (b) associated psychological symptoms (somatization, anxiety, and depression), and (c) disturbances in post-war functioning. The clinicians collected background information on sociodemographic characteristics, premilitary and military adjustment, combat experiences, and the extent of the CSR episode. The analysis indicated that PTSD could be predicted fairly well by the extent of the CSR episode and specific combat experiences, while the psychological symptoms were predicted mainly by combat experiences, and post-war functioning was predicted mainly by pre-war factors. The implication of combat experiences and soldiers' immediate reactions during combat in the genesis of subsequent PTSD is discussed. The multifaceted nature of war-related psychological sequelae is delineated.

Adaptation, Psychological↗