BookSRA 2012

STUDENT RESEARCH
AWARD
2012
Book of Students Articles
20 October, 2012
Singapore
SRA 2012 Book of Students Articles
Paper revision, planning and implementation are performed by

SPS Council:
Bernard Lim
Clare Yeo
Adrian Toh
Ashley Wu
Jason Chan
John Wang
Adrian Koh
Maureen Neihart
Tan Hun Boon
Anna Leybina
Julia Lam
President
Vice-President
Honorary Secretary
Assistant Honorary Secretary
Honorary Treasurer
Council Member (Membership)
Council Member (Co-opted, Membership)
Council Member (SRP)
Council Member (Public Education)
Council Member (Public Education)
Council Member (Ezine)
If you have any questions regarding the contents of this book, please do not
hesitate to contact us:
Block 531 Upper Cross Street,
#03-52 Hong Lim Complex,
Singapore 050531
secretariat@singaporepsychologicalsociety.org
Foreword
A key competency of psychologists is their ability to design and measure human thoughts,
feelings and behaviour. The knowledge and skill to do so usually begin as part of the
introductory programmes in psychology, which anchors this discipline in the realm of the
behavioural sciences.
The Student Research Award (formerly known as the Undergraduate Research Award) was
initiated to encourage local research and exchange in psychology. Since its early days when
this award was open only to university students, we have grown to include students from
other local tertiary institutions and even the polytechnics. From the presentations at the event
as well as the contents in this publication, you would agree with me that local interest in
psychology has grown over the years. This is an important development as few have the
opportunity to interact and share their ideas and findings based on local research beyond their
immediate circles. In doing so, we want to improve awareness and standards of student
psychological research as a basic competency for local psychologists-to-be.
This Book of Student Articles therefore complements the Student Research Awards that was
held on 20 October 2012. This is only the second such publication by the SPS and therefore
we are in the early days of promoting awareness of local student psychological research.
Nonetheless, the Book of Student Articles is a fitting recognition of all who have pursued
excellence in their research. I am sure that you will find the diverse research topics a positive
reflection of the local interest in psychology, as well as a source for new research ideas.
Finally, I would like to thank the committee led by Dr Anna Leybina whose dedication and
hard work made the event and this publication a possibility.
Dr Bernard Lim, PPA(G), PhD, C.Psychol, AFBPsS, MSPS, SRP
President
Singapore Psychological Society

Contents
Education and Public Service Announcement: An effective intervention to reduce stigma and
social distance against schizophrenia
Yuriati Tju.....................................................................................................................................6
The Effects of Bilateral Eye Movement and Presentation Modality on Memory
Lim Aik Meng..............................................................................................................................11
Teacher Perspectives on the Phenomenology, Causes and Impact of Anxiety in Children and
Young People with Autism Spectrum Disorders: A Qualitative Focus Group Study
Tan Wen-Li Julianne...................................................................................................................18
Placebo Effect: The Role of Personality and Expectation
Goh Sok Hui................................................................................................................................32
Effect of Mandatory Volunteering on Intentions to Volunteer
Shaleni Paneerselvam, Aw Chin Bee, V. Thivya Pillai, & Goh Qian Ci....................................38
Object-substitution Masking with Motion: Effect of Moving Object within Stationary Mask
Peh, Chao Xu, Gillon, Colleen, Lin, Vincent, Wong, Kian Foong and Makhijani, Rahul.........43
Hear No Evil: Can Music Attenuate the Irrelevant Speech Effect?
Soh Wei Jie.................................................................................................................................50
Earmarking and Its Effects on Impulse Buying Reduction
Lee Zhi Qi Glenice, Maxine Wong Rui Shi, Alvin Tay An Ge, Lee Dayang..58
The Effects of Normative Evaluation on Buying Intention
Adam Quek Chin Kiat, Jazreel Tan, Sri Nur Idayu Binte Roslan, Hong Dou............................63
Implementation Intentions & Impulse Buying
Abigail Seng Hui Xin,Lim Joyann, Ng Jing Ying........................................................................67
The Effects of Inoculation and Persuasion Knowledge Training on Resisting Sales Persuasion
Kho Kian Hao, Mubarak Johari.................................................................................................72
The Impact of Academic Stress on Depressive Tendencies Among Singaporean
Undergraduates
Emily D. Burton..........................................................................................................................78
Pilot Study of Public Opinions toward Dementia: Awareness, Knowledge and Attitudes
Ng Li Ting..................................................................................................................................88
Effects of Self-Construal Differences on Cognitive Dissonance Examined by Priming the
Independent and Interdependent Self
Jamie Jia Yan Lee.......................................................................................................................94

Association of Adult Attachment Styles and the Big Five Personality Traits in Southeast Asia
Erny Feberina...........................................................................................................................102
Language Background, Non-word Repetition, and Spelling in Bilingual Singaporean Children
Choo Rui Qi..............................................................................................................................110
Motivation and Decision Making Among Young Adults
Amanda Ong Hui Zhong...........................................................................................................115
Executive Functioning and Early Mathematical Ability
Denise Kristen Ng, Maxine Wong, Annabelle Lim, & Gabrielle Lai.......................................121
Understanding the levels of Materialism, Gratitude and Happiness among Asians and
Westerners
Lee Sheue Yee, Nuraishikin Begum..........................................................................................127
Profile and Perceptions of Asian Patients with Irritable Bowel Syndrome
Noradlin Mohamed Yusof................................................................................................................133

Education and Public Service Announcement: An effective intervention to reduce stigma
and social distance against schizophrenia
Yuriati Tju
yuritju@gmail.com
James Cook University Australia, Singapore Campus
Previous studies have established media as one of the contributors to schizophrenia
stigma. As media could perpetuate such beliefs, social scientists believed it could also be used
as change agents to reduce those stigmas. The present study examined the effectiveness of
education materials and Public Service Announcement (PSA) video on reducing stigma and
social distance associated with schizophrenia. Information exposure was manipulated through a
knowledge test paired with either schizophrenia PSA (treatment) or environmental PSA
(control). The dependent variables are the ratings of stigmatisation and social distance
measured before and after the information exposure. Consistent with the hypothesis,
participants in the treatment group had greater decrease in stigma following the exposure. No
significant difference was found for ratings of social distance; nonetheless, the 95% confidence
intervals indicated that those on the treatment group had greater decrease than those in the
control group. The findings have implications for the future mental health awareness or stigma
interventions.
Keywords: media, mental illness, schizophrenia, stigma, education, contact
Over the past decade, media has been

acknowledged as the source of public
perceptions of mental illness (Stout, Villegas,
& Jennings, 2004). Frequent exposures to
inaccurate mental illness portrayals in the
media have helped perpetuate stigmatisation
towards individuals with mental illness
(Penn, Chamberlain, & Mueser, 2003; Wahl
& Lefkowits, 1989). The present study is
based on the belief that media could also
serve as change agents to promote knowledge
and to present positive portrayal of mental
illness (Philo, Henderson, & McCracken,
2010).
Studies have established that providing
education materials increases public mental
health literacy and sympathetic understanding
towards people with mental illness (Stout et
al., 2004; Wahl & Lefkowits, 1989), resulting
in enhanced positive attitudes (Nairn,
Coverdale, & Claasen, 2001; Stout et al.,
2004). Filkenstein, Lapshin, and Wasserman
(2008) have also suggested that education
strategies with active participation, achieved
through multiple-choice questions and
The present study seeks to further
understand the influence of information
exposure through education and indirect
immediate feedback for each questions, were

effective in promoting short-term and longterm positive attitudes towards mental illness
in students.
Another strategy to reduce stigma is to
establish contact with people with mental
illness. Indirect contact achieved through
watching video of a person with mental
illness also appeared to be effective in
decreasing stigma (Corrigan, Larson, Sells,
Niessen, & Watson, 2007; Stuart, 2006). A
form of persuasive advertising through video,
defined as Public Service Announcement
(PSA), have been utilized by public health
campaigns to endorse positive attitude change
towards people with mental illness (Gunther
& Thorson, 1992; Stout et al., 2004). Such
videos delivered positive personal narratives
of people with a diagnosed mental illness,
thereby potentially reducing the stigma
against them (Corrigan, 2012). However,
little is known about the effectiveness of this
approach since relevant studies are virtually
non-existent (Corrigan, 2012; Stout et al.,
2004).
contact through PSAs on reducing mental
illness stigma. It was hypothesised that there
will be a significant decrease in the degree of
6

stigmatisation and social distance for
participants who complete the knowledge test
and watch the schizophrenia PSA, as
compared to those who complete the
knowledge test and watch a control video.
Method
Participants
Recruitment was accomplished through
James Cook University Singapore (JCUS)
online research participation system, research
recruitment notice board, and class
announcements in first-year lectures. 82 firstyear psychology students from JCUS,
consisting of 24 males (age range 18-25
years, M= 21.58, SD= 1.84) and 58 females
(age range 18-38 years, M= 20.12, SD= 2.71)
of Chinese (69.51%), Indian (15.85%), Malay
(6.1%), Eurasians (6.1%), and Vietnamese
(2.44%) ethnicity were recruited. They were
alternately assigned to the treatment (68.3%
females, age M= 20.27, SD= 3.64) or control
(73.2% females, age M= 19.97, SD= 1.42)
group according to order of participation with
41 participants in each group.
Materials
The study was a two (treatment/control)
by two (pretest/posttest) mixed factorial
design. Materials include information sheet
and informed consent as an introduction to
the experiment. The independent variables
are information exposure and time of testing,
which is a repeated measurement.

Information exposure was manipulated
through a 15-item Knowledge About
Schizophrenia Test (Compton, Quintero, &
Esterberg, 2007), with immediate feedback
given after each question, paired with
schizophrenia
PSA
(treatment)
or
environmental PSA (control). The videos
were carefully selected and utilized with
permission from the creators.
The dependent variables are the ratings
of social stigmatisation and social distance.
The 12-item stigma measure was derived from
Links Discrimination-Devaluation Scale (Link
et al., 1989 as cited in Gaebel, Baumann,
Witte, & Zaeske, 2002), consisting of
statements
reflecting
acceptance
and
stigmatisation against people with mental
illness rated on a five-point scale (1 Strongly
Agree, 5 Strongly Disagree). Potential scores
range from 12 to 60, with higher score
indicating higher degree of stigmatisation. The
6-item social distance measure was derived
from the Social Distance Scale (Bogardus,
1925 as cited in Gaebel et al., 2002),
questioning participants willingness to interact
with individuals diagnosed with schizophrenia
on varying degrees of relationship and
intimacy rated on a four-point scale (1 Definitely Not, 4 - Definitely). Potential scores
range from 6 to 24, with higher score
indicating greater social distance. Table 1
indicates the internal reliabilities of the
measurements in the present study.
Table 1.
Internal Reliability of Stigmatisation and Social Distance Measure at Pretest and Posttest
Timing
Pretest
Posttest
Reliability measure
Social Stigmatisation
Social Distance
Cronbachs alpha
.662
.604
Inter-item correlation
.277
.430
Cronbachs alpha
.833
.638
.448
Inter-item correlation

Procedure
The study was conducted in an oncampus research laboratory. Participants
were introduced to the study and were
instructed to complete the stigmatisation and
social distance questionnaire. Participants
then complete the knowledge test followed
by watching the PSA video. Finally,
participants
again
completed
the
stigmatisation and social distance measures.
No immediate debriefing was done and
research outcomes were sent to participants
email addresses provided in the consent
form.
Results
Gain-score analyses were conducted
and scores differences were computed by
subtracting each persons posttest score from
the pretest score. Based on the hypotheses, a
gain is a decrease in scores and it should be
negative, indicating that the posttest score

was less than the pretest score. These scores
were analysed in two separate one-way
ANOVA with groups as the between
subjects factor.
Social Stigmatisation. The decrease in
stigma was significantly greater for
participants in the treatment (M = -4.46, SE =
.85, 95% CI [-6.16, -2.76]) than those in the
control condition (M = -.49, SE = .85, 95%
CI [-2.19, 1.21]), F (1, 80) = 10.82, p = .001.
Inspection of the 95% CI also confirmed
similar result which supported the
hypothesis, suggesting that exposure through
the knowledge test paired with the mental
health PSA was effective in decreasing
stigma
against
individuals
with
schizophrenia. Figure 1 shows the mean gain
scores of stigma for control and treatment
group.
Figure 1. Mean gain scores of social stigmatisation in control and treatment group.
Social Distance. There was no
significant difference in social distance scores
for participants in the treatment (M = -1.10,
SE = .31, 95% CI [-1.72, -.48]) and control
condition (M = -.29, SE = .31, 95% CI [-.91,
.33]), F (1, 80) = 3.32, p = .07. Nonetheless,
inspection of the 95% CI indicated that
participants in the treatment condition had
greater decrease in social distance (i.e. the
95% CI excludes zero) than those in the

control condition (i.e. the 95% CI includes
zero, representing zero gain). It offered
partial support for the hypothesis, suggesting
that information exposure through knowledge
test paired with mental health PSA led to
greater decrease in social distance. Figure 2
shows the mean gain scores for social
distance for control and treatment group.
Figure 2. Mean gain scores of social distance in control and treatment group.
Discussion
As hypothesised, exposure through the
knowledge test paired with mental health PSA
was effective in decreasing stigma against
people with schizophrenia. The results,
integrating a balance of point estimation and
range of confidence, also offered support for the
hypothesis, in which those in the treatment group
had greater decrease in social distance as
compared to those in the control group.
The PSA video offered plausibly accurate
portrayal and provided indirect contact with a
person diagnosed with schizophrenia, which
served as the opportunity for participants to
challenge and examine their perceptions and
beliefs of the stereotyped group. However,
improvement in participants readiness to
establish social relationships with individuals
with schizophrenia was not strongly evident. No
significant difference was found following the
information exposure on social distance ratings,
suggesting that changes in beliefs about mental
illness might not necessarily be reflected in
behavioural changes (Penn et al., 2003).
Nevertheless, inspection of the 95% CI indicated
that those in the treatment group had greater
decrease in social distance than those in the
control group, and it is reasonable to conclude
that the result provides partial support for the
hypothesis. The lack of a statistically significant
effect on social distance ratings could be due to
inadequacies of the measure, which might have

provided a less-than-accurate reflection of
participants intention for future interaction with
individuals diagnosed with schizophrenia.
Several limitations of this study should be
highlighted. First, the sample consisted of only
psychology students. This would limit the
generalisability of the results to the general
population. Second, participants self-reported
measures may not necessarily reflect their actual
behaviour and they might have exhibited social
desirability bias. Third, the intervention involved
a combination of education materials and videobased contact and it is uncertain as to which
component is the strongest contributor to the
decrease in ratings. Nevertheless, it is likely that
the visual stimuli (PSA video) was more
powerful, as participants in the control group
completed the same knowledge test but no
reduction in ratings were evident. Lastly, only
short-term effects were measured and the
stability of attitude changes in the long-term
remains uncertain.
Conclusion
Despite some limitations, results from this
study have shown that media could be used to
reduce mental illness stigma through minimal
resources, while also suggesting an important
practical implications. Mass media producers
should acknowledge the importance of positive
mental illness portrayal in contributing to

positive public beliefs and attitudes towards
individuals with mental health issues. Future
mental health campaigns could also utilize
substantial resources in promoting knowledge
and developing PSA videos as the leading
strategy to eliminate, or at least help reduce,
mental illness stigma. Although more research
should be conducted, the outcomes documented
here could be considered as a promising initial
step for future studies in this area.
References
Compton, M. T., Quintero, L., & Esterberg, M.
L. (2007). Assessing knowledge of
schizophrenia:
Development
and
psychometric properties of a brief,
multiple-choice knowledge test for use
across various samples. Psychiatry
Research,
151,
87-95.
DOI:10.1016/j.psychres.2006.05.019
Corrigan, P. W., Larson, J., Sells, M., Niessen,
N., & Watson, A. C. (2007). Will filmed
presentations of education and contact
diminish mental illness stigma? Community
Mental Health Journal, 43(2), 171-181.
DOI: 10.1007/s10597-006-9061-8
Corrigan, P. W. (2012). Where is the evidence
supporting public service announcements
to eliminate mental illness stigma?
Psychiatric Services, 63(1), 79-82.
Filkenstein, J., Lapshin, O., & Wasserman, E.
(2008). Randomized study of different antistigma media. Patient Education and
Counselling,
71,
204-214.
DOI:
10.1016/j.pec.2008.01.002
Gaebel, W., Baumann, A., Witte, A. M., &
Zaeske, H. (2002). Public attitudes towards
people with mental illness in six German
cities: Results of a public survey under
special consideration of schizophrenia.
European Archives of Psychiatry and
Clinical Neuroscience, 252, 278-287.

DOI:10.1007/S00406-002-0393-2
Gunther, A. C., & Thorson, E. (1992).
Perceived persuasive effects of product
commercials
and
public
service
announcements: Third-person effects in
new domains. Communication Research,
19(5),
574-596.
DOI:10.1177/009365092019005002
Link, B. G., Cullen, F. T., Struening, E. L.,
Shrout, P. E., & Dohrenwend, B. P. (1989).
A modified labeling theory approach in the
area of mental disorders: An empirical
assessment. American Sociological Review,
54, 100-123, 1989.
Nairn, R., Coverdale, J., & Claasen, D. (2001).
From source material to news story in New
Zealand print media: A prospective study
of the stigmatizing processes in depicting
mental illness. Australian and New Zealand
Journal of Psychiatry, 35, 654-659.
Penn, D. L., Chamberlain, C., & Mueser, K. T.
(2003). The effects of a documentary film
about schizophrenia on psychiatric stigma.
Schizophrenia Bulletin, 29(2), 383-391.
Philo, G., Henderson, L., & McCracken, K.
(2010). Making Drama out of a Crisis:
Authentic Portrayals of Mental Illness in
TV
Drama.
Retrieved
from
http://www.shift.org.uk/files/media/shift_tv
_research_full.pdf
Stout, P. A., Villegas, J., & Jennings, N. A.
(2004). Images of mental illness in the
media: Identifying gaps in the Research.
Schizophrenia Bulletin, 30(3), 543-561.
Stuart, H. (2006). Reaching out to high-school
youth: The effectiveness of a video-based
antistigma program. Canadian Journal of
Psychiatry, 51(10), 647-653.
Wahl, O. F., & Lefkowits, J. Y. (1989). Impact
of a television film on attitudes toward
mental illness. American Journal of
Community Psychology, 17(4), 521-528.
10

The Effects of Bilateral Eye Movement and Presentation Modality
on Memory
Lim Aik Meng
limaikmeng@hotmail.com
SIM University
The effects of presentation modality (visual and aural) and eye movement (bilateral and central
fixation) on memory were investigated using a mixed factorial design. The participants were
140 SIM University undergraduates. A two-way factorial ANOVA revealed no main effects of
presentation modality and eye movement on the proportion of falsely-recognised critical lures.
No interaction effect was found as well. Significant main effects of presentation modality and
eye movement were found on the proportion of remember judgements of correctlyrecognised words. However, no corresponding interaction effect was found. The additional
contextual information provided by visual presentation and facilitated by bilateral eye
movements appeared to help participants in remembering details of presented words but not in
rejecting non-presented critical lures. Therefore, the distinctiveness heuristic appeared to be
utilised only for remembering presented words in this sample. The non-utilisation of the
distinctiveness heuristic in the rejection of non-presented critical lures warrants future
investigation.
Keywords: bilateral eye movement, presentation modality, memory, DRM paradigm
One consistent finding using the DRM

paradigm (Roediger & McDermott, 1995)
demonstrated that false memory was reduced
when words presentation mode was visual
rather than auditory (Gallo, McDermott, Percer
& Roediger, 2001; Kellogg, 2001; Pierce,
Gallo, Weiss & Schacter, 2005; Smith & Hunt,
1998). This was explained by the
distinctiveness heuristic monitoring process
whereby participants retrieve distinctive
detailed information during the testing phase,
helping them assess memory accuracy before
recall and recognition (Gallo et al. 2001).
Kelloggs (2001) study demonstrated that by
visualising the orthographic features of aurallypresented words during study, the modality
effect was eliminated, suggesting that while
phonological and semantic codes were
activated by both modalities, an orthographic
code was activated by visual presentation only.
Participants were also more likely to make
remember judgments on visually-presented
words than aurally-presented words, suggesting
that visually-presented words were more
distinctive (Pierce et al., 2005). A remember
judgement was made if the participant had
some recollection of presentation details such
as the image of the word while a know
judgement was made if no details were

remember (Rajaram, 1993).
Some studies had shown that by
performing thirty seconds of bilateral saccadic
eye movement, false memory was reduced and
true memory was improved. (Christman,
Garvey, Propper & Phaneuf, 2003; Christman,
Propper & Dion, 2004; Parker & Dagnall,
2007; Parker, Relph & Dagnall, 2008).
Participants were also more likely to remember
details of correctly-recognised words and less
likely to remember details for falselyrecognised critical lures (Parker et al., 2008).
One finding suggested that bilateral eye
movement lead to enhanced recollection of
contextual information (Parker et al., 2008 Experiment 2). Such enhanced recollection
helped in true recognition by providing
distinctive details of the presented word. The
reduction in false recognition could be due to a
recollection-based monitoring strategy (Parker
et. al, 2008), whereby the retrieved contextual
information allows participants to discriminate
between presented and non-presented word
items. The absence of distinct information
allowed participants to reject non-presented
critical lures and reduce false memory.
11

Although presentation modality and
bilateral eye movement were both found to
affect memory in the DRM paradigm, no
current research investigated the combined
roles of both variables. As past research
suggested a post-retrieval monitoring strategy
determining the reduction of false memory and
remembering in both factors, we would expect
an interaction effect. Visually-presented words
being more distinctive should provide more
contextual information than aurally-presented
words. There would therefore be a magnifying
effect after bilateral eye movement as it
enhances
recollection
of
contextual
information, where false memory will be
reduced more for visually-presented words than
for aurally-presented words. There would also
be a magnifying effect in remember
judgments, whereby after bilateral eye

movements, the increment of remember
judgments on correctly-recognised words
should be more for visually-presented than
aurally-presented words.
The objective of this study was to
determine the combined effects of presentation
modality and eye movement in generating false
memory and their effects in determining
remember judgments of correctly-recognised
words. It was hypothesised that there will be a
main effect of presentation modality, a main
effect of eye movement and an interaction
effect between eye movement and presentation
modality on the proportion of falsely
recognised critical lures (Figure 1) as well as
on the proportion of remember judgements
of correctly recognised words (Figure 2)
MEAN
Eye Movement Conditions

Central Fixation
Bilateral
Visual
Aural
PRESENTATION MODALITY
Figure 1. Graphical representation of hypotheses on the proportion of falsely recognised
critical lures.
12

MEAN
Eye Movement Conditions

Central Fixation
Bilateral
Visual
Aural
PRESENTATION MODALITY
Figure 2. Graphical representation of hypotheses on the proportion of remember
judgements of correctly recognised words.
Method
Participants
140 SIM University undergraduates
were awarded module credit for their
participation in this experiment. The final
data analysis consisted of 124 participants
(48 males and 76 females) as 16 participants
were excluded for not following
instructions.
Design
A 2x2 mixed-participants factorial
design was employed in this experimental
study. The two independent variables were
(1) presentation modality (visual or aural)
and (2) eye movement (bilateral or central
fixation). The presentation modality and eye
movement variables were manipulated
within-participants and between-participants
respectively. The dependent variables were
the proportion of falsely-recognised critical
lures and the proportion of remember
judgements
of
correctly-recognised
presented words.
Materials and Procedure

Participants were tested in 4
different experimental groups. All groups
were presented with eight aural followed by
eight visual word lists or vice versa. The
sixteen word lists were taken from
published norms (Stadler, Roediger &
McDermott, 1999) (Appendix A). Next,
each group underwent one of the eye
movement conditions for 30 seconds. For
the bilateral eye movement conditions,
participants used their eyes to follow the dot
as it flashed (500ms) left and right on the
screen. For the central fixation conditions,
participants were instructed to stare at the
central flashing (500ms) black dot. Lastly,
participants were provided with word
recognition test booklets containing 128
words (Appendix B) where they indicate if a
word was old (presented) or new (not
presented). If a word was indicated as old,
participants were to make remember or
know judgments.
13

Proportion of Falsely-recognised Critical Lures
Table 1
Means and Standard Deviations of Proportion of Falsely Recognised Critical Lures
(N = 124)
IV: Presentation Modality
Visual
IV: Eye Movement
Bilateral
Central Fixation
Total
M
.67
.60
.64
Aural
SD
.21
.26
.24
M
.68
.62
.65
Total
SD
.23
.24
.24
M
.67
.61
SD
.22
.25
Table 2
Analysis of Variance for Proportion of Falsely Recognised Critical Lures
Sphericity Assumed
Source
df
Error
df
MSE
122
122
122
.02
.09
.02
Mixed participants
Presentation Modality (PM)
Eye Movement (EM)
EM PM
1
1
1
.29
3.07
.10
<.01
.02
<.01
.59
.08
.75
Proportion of Remember Judgments of Correctly-recognised Presented Words

Table 3
Means and Standard Deviations of Proportion of Remember Judgements of Correctly
Recognised Words (N = 124)
IV: Presentation Modality
Visual
IV: Eye Movement
Bilateral
Central Fixation
Total
M
.52
.42
.47
SD
.23
.22
.23
Aural
M
.45
.39
.42
Total
SD
.21
.21
.21
M
.49
.40
SD
.22
.22
14

Table 4
Analysis of Variance for Proportion of Remember Judgements of Correctly Recognised
Words
Sphericity Assumed
Source
df
Error
df
MSE
122
122
122
.02
.08
.02
Mixed participants
Presentation Modality (PM)
Eye Movement (EM)
EM PM
*
Note. p < .05. **p < .01.
1
1
1
11.70**
5.32*
1.04
Results
The main effect of presentation
modality (F(1,122) = .29, p = .59) between
visual (M = .64, SD = .24) and aural
presentation (M = .65, SD = .24), the main
effect of eye movement (F(1,122) = 3.07, p
= .08) between bilateral (M = .67, SD = .22)
and central fixation conditions (M = .61, SD
= .25) and the interaction between
presentation modality and eye movement
(F(1,122) = .10, p = .75) on the proportion
of falsely recognised critical lures were all
not statistically significant.
The main effect of presentation
modality (F(1,122) = 11.70, p < .01)
between visual (M = .47, SD = .23) and
aural presentations (M = .42, SD = .21) and
the main effect of eye movement (F(1,122)
= 5.32, p < .05) between bilateral (M = .49,
SD = .22) and central fixation (M = .40, SD
= .22) conditions on the proportion of
remember judgements of correctly
recognised words were both statistically
significant. The interaction between eye
movement and presentation modality on the
proportion of falsely recognised critical
lures was not statistically significant,
F(1,122) = 1.04, p = .31.
Discussion
There were no main effects of
presentation modality and eye movement on
.09
.04
<.01
<.01
<.05
.31
the proportion of falsely recognised critical

lures. This was surprising as the additional
information of visually-presented words
should have allowed participants to reject
more critical lures than those of aurallypresented words. It is possible that
participants visualise aurally-presented
words as a strategy to remember words,
therefore eliminating the modality effect.
Even though bilateral eye movements
facilitated the retrieval of contextual
information, it seemed that the participants
in this sample were unable to use the
additional contextual information to
distinguish between presented and nonpresented words. No corresponding
interaction effect was found as the
distinctiveness heuristic did not seem to be
utilised.
Consistent with previous studies,
main effects of presentation modality and
eye movement on the proportion on the
proportion of remember judgements were
found (Parker et al., 2008; Pierce et al,
2005). No corresponding interaction effect
was found, suggesting that while bilateral
eye movements facilitated the retrieval of
contextual information, it did not lead to
more enhanced retrieval of contextual
information for visually-presented words
than for aurally-presented words. It is
possible that the retrieved contextual
15

information was common to both visually
and aurally presented words, resulting in no
difference in the proportion of remember
judgements for visually and aurally
presented words.
An interesting finding was that the
main effects of eye movement and
presentation modality were found for
remember judgements of correctlyrecognised words but not for falselyrecognised critical lures. In previous studies
(Parker et al., 2008; Pierce et al., 2005), it
was assumed that a monitoring process
would be utilised both in rejecting critical
lures and in remembering presented words.
However, this study cast doubt on this
assumption as it appeared that the
distinctiveness heuristic was only utilised
for remembering presented words but not
for rejecting non-presented critical lures.
The reason why the distinctiveness heuristic
was not employed in the rejection of nonpresented critical lures warrants further
investigation.
There were some limitations to the
results of this study. Previous studies
investigating the effect of eye movement on
memory tested the participants individually
but this study tested the participants in
groups (Parker & Dagnall, 2007). Mental
fatigue which had been shown to be
detrimental to cognitive functioning such as
attention (Boksem, Meijman & Lorist,

2005) may be another limitation as most
participants took the experiment after
working in the day (Boksem & Tops, 2008).
As previous studies were predominantly
based on western samples, there may be
subtle cultural differences in the way local
samples respond to the DRM paradigm. One
study using Taiwanese and American
samples found that the specific critical lure
falsely recalled in the DRM Paradigm were
culturally influenced (Lee, Chiang & Hung,
2008).
Conclusion
The
additional
contextual
information provided by visual presentation
and facilitated by bilateral eye movements
appeared
to
help
participants
in
remembering details of presented words.
However, the additional information did not
appear to help participants in rejecting nonpresented critical lures. Hence, the
distinctiveness heuristic appeared to be
utilised for remembering presented words
but not for rejecting non-presented critical
lures. Further research to determine the
reasons why the distinctiveness heuristic
was not utilised in the rejection of nonpresented critical lures in this sample is
warranted.
References
Boksem, M. A. S., & Tops, M. (2008).
Mental fatigue: Costs and benefits.
Brain Research Reviews, 59, 125-139.
doi:10.1016/j.brainresrev.2008.07.001
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Lorist, M. M. (2005). Effects of mental
fatigue on attention: An ERP study.
Cognitive Brain Research, 25, 107-116.
doi:10.1016/j.cogbrainres.2005.04.011
Christman, S. D., Garvey, K. J., Propper, R.
E., & Phaneuf, K. A. (2003). Bilateral
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Christman, S. D., Propper, R. E., & Dion,
A.
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Gallo, D. A., McDermott, K. B., Percer, J.
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Psychology: Learning, Memory, and
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Cognition,
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10.1007/s10936-007-9058-7
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false recognition in the DRM paradigm.
Brain and Cognition, 63, 221-225.
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Parker, A., Relph, S., & Dagnall, N. (2008).
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contextual
information. Neuropsychology, 22, 136145. doi:10.1037/0894-4105.22.1.136
Pierce, B. H., Gallo, D. A., Weiss, J. A., &
Schacter, D. L. (2005). The modality
effect in false recognition: Evidence for

test-based monitoring. Memory &
Cognition, 33,
1407-1413. doi: 10.3758/BF03193373
Rajaram,S. (1993). Remembering and
knowing: Two means of access to the
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89-102. doi: 10.3758/BF03211168
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(1995). Creating false memories:
Remembering words not present in lists.
Journal of Experimental Psychology:
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803-814.
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10.1037/02787393.21.4.803
Smith, R. E., & Hunt, R. (1998).
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10.3758/BF03208850
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McDermott, K. B. (1999). Norm for
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doi: 10.3758/BF03211543
17

Teacher Perspectives on the Phenomenology, Causes and Impact of Anxiety
in Children and Young People with Autism Spectrum Disorders:
A Qualitative Focus Group Study
Tan Wen-Li Julianne
tan.julianne@gmail.com
National University of Singapore
While a plethora of research on comorbid psychopathology in autism spectrum disorders
(ASDs) exists, there is a knowledge gap regarding the everyday nature of the experience of
anxiety in autism, and how autism-specific factors may play a role in this increased prevalence
of anxiety. Assessment of anxiety in ASD has also largely utilised measures developed for
typically developing children, and parents have been the main informants, raising limitations
with regard to creating a holistic picture of anxiety in ASD. As such, this exploratory study
reports on a series of focus groups with teachers from Special Education schools in Singapore
regarding the anxiety difficulties of their low-functioning students with ASD. Taken together,
the teachers views were strikingly consistent across groups and provided a unique constellation
of findings regarding triggers and signs of anxiety, as well as management/coping strategies.
These findings provide ecological validity to recently proposed theoretical models of anxiety in
ASD, and also suggest the broadening of theoretical conceptualisations for a more complete
view of anxiety across the entire ASD spectrum.
Keywords: Autism Spectrum Disorders (ASD), anxiety, comorbid psychopathology, qualitative
methodology, focus groups, teachers, special education
Autism Spectrum Disorders (ASD)

are complex neurodevelopmental conditions
which share a triad of impairments in the
core domains of reciprocal social
interaction, communication and stereotyped
behaviours and interests (American
Psychiatric Association, 1994). Despite a
plethora of ASD-related research, however,
what is less noted is that ASDs are further
compounded by comorbid psychiatric
psychopathology,
especially
anxiety
disorders. Various types of anxiety are so
frequently exhibited in children with ASDs
that the DSM-IV highlights anxiety-related
behaviours as an associated feature of
autism (American Psychiatric Association,
1994, p.68). This significant overlap
between anxiety and ASD has also been
empirically established, with various metaanalyses and prevalence studies (van
Steensel, Bgels, & Perrin, 2011; Brereton,
Tonge, & Einfeld, 2006) reporting high
rates of comorbidity between anxiety
disorders and ASD (from 39.6%-49%).
Proposed hypothetical model and

theories about the links between anxiety
and ASD
It has been proposed that many of the core
symptoms of ASD can lead to stressful
experiences that promote anxiety, likening
anxiety to a downstream consequence of
ASD. In turn, anxiety may also be a
mediator or a moderator of ASD symptom
severity (Wood & Gadow, 2010). The
hypothetical model proposed by Wood &
Gadow (2010; see Figure 1) consists of two
parts first; the contributions of ASDrelated specific stressors (such as social
confusion and rejection, prevention of
preferred repetitive behaviours and aversive
sensory experiences) are thought to lead to
anxiety (conceptualised as social anxiety
and other forms of negative affectivity), and
second, the increased experiences of anxiety
are hypothesized to further impact the
individuals ASD related behaviours
resulting in increases in avoidance or autism
symptoms, other problem behaviours and
distress that arise from anxiety (Figure 1).
18
Figure 1. Hypothetical model of clinical anxiety in autism spectrum disorders (Wood &
Gadow, 2010)
Current research limitations
Despite the presence of these
hypotheses on the theoretical relationships
and factors between anxiety and ASD, they
have received little empirical validation in
terms
of
obtaining
an
accurate
representation of how anxiety might
manifest itself in children with ASD, on a
behavioural, cognitive and physical level,
and gaining a working knowledge of what
triggers of anxiety exist on an everyday
basis.
Specifically, one limitation of
current research arises from the use of
clinic-based samples in a majority of studies
that have examined anxiety in children and
adolescents with ASD. According to White
et al. (2009), it is unlikely that clinic-based
samples are representative of all children
with ASD in various important respects,
such as the level of behaviour disturbance or
the degree of parental investment, therefore
highlighting the need for non-clinical,
community- and school-based samples to
evaluate the presence of anxiety in the
broader ASD population.
In addition, existing studies that
examined the phenomenology of anxiety in
ASD (i.e. Strang et al., 2011) have primarily

used parent-report measures that have been
designed for typically developing youth and
their manifestations of psychopathology,
such as the Spence Childrens Anxiety
Scale (SCAS; Spence, 1993), that have not
been validated for use with the ASD
population.
As such, given the limitations of
quantitative
methodologies
using
standardized scales designed for typically
developing children, a qualitative approach
may be useful because it would generate
targeted data regarding the actual
experience of anxiety in ASD and not
merely on what the measure is asking. It is
for this reason that this study uses a
qualitative, bottom-up approach, to allow
for a fluid exploration of the atypical
manifestation of anxiety in naturalistic
settings and to obtain a more ecologically
valid picture of the anxiety difficulties of
children with ASD.
Teachers perspectives on anxiety in
children with ASD
As in Ozsivadjian, Knott and
Magiati (2012), a large bulk of the existing
body of literature on anxiety and ASD has

been conducted with parents (for reviews,
see White et al., 2009; van Steensel et al.,
2011). While parents are knowledgeable
informants, teachers perspectives are also
valuable in obtaining a holistic picture of
childrens experiences, as they are able to
yield information about school-specific
triggers and presentation of anxiety, given
that schools are a much more complex
environment than the home, with additional
performance-based and social demands, and
other factors that are not as easy to control
as in the home, such as the level of noise
and activity in the childs surroundings
(Howlin, 1997).
The present study: rationale and
research aims
Using a qualitative methodology and
obtaining teachers perspectives, the aims of
this exploratory study is to add to an
increasing body of knowledge via:
(i) Developing a constellation of findings
that holistically describe the nature of
anxiety in lower-functioning children

with ASD, and establishing a ranking of
the most common triggers and signs of
anxiety, and the strategies used by
children, teachers and schools to cope
and manage with anxiety;
(ii)
Identifying ASD-specific factors
implicated in the development and
maintenance of anxiety in this
population, with particular emphasis in
school-related experiences; and
(iii)
Providing
ecologically
valid
empirical support (or disputes) to
recently
proposed
hypothetical
theoretical models of anxiety in ASD
(Wood & Gadow, 2010)
It also aimed to explore the nature of
anxiety in a population of children ASD
who are lower functioning, as this group of
children has been largely ignored in studies
of psychiatric comorbidity in ASD and most
published studies have focused on children
with high-functioning autism or Aspergers
syndrome.
Method
Data collection approach
The key objective of this exploratory
study was to elicit a rich variety of views
from each group of participants, regarding
the focused topic of anxiety difficulties in
children with ASD, and this objective was
well-suited to the qualitative, bottom-up
methodological approach of focus groups.
Focus groups are planned discussion
sessions that are organised to explore a
particular topic of interest (Krueger &
Casey, 1988), encourage engagement
between participants, and draw out
reflections that would have otherwise not
been obtained via individual interviews or
questionnaires, allowing us to capture a
picture of anxiety in ASD that is as
ecologically valid and complete as possible.
Participants
Teacher-participants were recruited through
their school administrations and signed up
for focus group slots if they were willing to

participate. In total, five teacher focus
groups were conducted, across four
different Special Education schools in
Singapore with educational programmes for
students with ASD and IQ levels of less
than 70. Therefore, dialogue focused mainly
on lower-functioning children with ASD,
from 6-14 years of age. Descriptive
information about the teachers was obtained
via a demographic questionnaire (Appendix
A) and this information is summarised in
Table 1.
Procedure
Focus groups were organised by school, so
that the teachers involved in each group had
a shared knowledge of current students on
which to base their discussion. The teachers
met in groups of 2 to 5 participants for 1-1.5
hours, and all sessions were audio recorded,
20

with participants permission. The topic
guide was loosely based on the similar
study on parent focus groups by Ozsivadjian
et al. (2012), and is presented in detail in
Table 2. The facilitator(s) took care to let
the discussion develop freely and strive for
minimal interference, unless it was
necessary to clarify issues, or encourage
teachers to further reflect on issues they
might have overlooked. Another goal of
facilitation was to ensure that each
participant had equal opportunities to
express their views.
Data analysis
Audio recordings of the sessions
were transcribed verbatim. These five focus
group transcripts constituted the data for
analysis, and were analysed using the
qualitative procedure of thematic analysis
(Vaughn et al., 1996). Firstly, key themes
were identified within the data that related
to the categories used in the topic guide and
the transcripts were reviewed to identify

consistently emerging sub-themes within
each of the predefined categories that
surfaced in the discussion. Secondly,
specific units of information (phrases and
sentences) were coded according to
category and sub-theme headings. Efforts
were made to ensure that category and subtheme headings could parsimoniously
accommodate all the relevant units of
information. Thirdly, these codes and
categories were reviewed with another
researcher as a check for clarity and
agreement, and transcripts were doublecoded between the author and two other
researchers who were blind to the authors
codes. A minimum of 91% agreement was
reached, reflecting the strong consistency in
approach, and reliable interpretation of the
data.
Table 1.
Characteristics of teacher-participants in the present study

Characteristics
Gender
Age
Role
Qualifications (in psychology/

special education)
Years of teaching experience
(overall)
Years of teaching experience
with students with ASD
Participants (n = 15)
Female
Male
24 years old
25 35 years old
36 46 years old
47 years old
Teacher
Senior teacher/Department
Head
Psychologist
Bachelors Degree
Diploma
Postgraduate
Specialist Training Courses
Mean: 10.4 years;
Range: 1-30 years
Mean: 5.9 years;
Range: 1-14 years
Total
14
1
3
4
5
3
12
2
1
5
7
3
14
21

Table 2.
Focus Group Topic Guide
Question
Topic
Triggers of anxiety
Signs of anxiety:
- Behavioural
- Cognitive
- Somatic
How easily is anxiety

recognised?
Strategies and anxiety
management
Comparisons between
typically developing
children and children
with ASD in
mainstream schools
Impact of anxiety
Parent-related issues
1. What are some situations in which your students with ASD

become anxious?
2. How do you know/how can you tell when your students are
anxious?
a. What are the behavioural signs that your students are
anxious?
b. Do they report any thoughts associated with their
anxiety?
c. Do your students have somatic problems associated with
their anxiety?
3. Do you think that someone who didnt know your student well
know that they were getting anxious? Why/why not?
4. What strategies are used when your students are anxious?
a. What strategies do you use in the classroom to manage
your students anxiety?
b. What strategies do you observe the students using to
cope with their anxiety, if any? Are there any strategies
that seem to work more/less well?
c. c. Does the school have any strategies/interventions to
manage anxiety?
5. What is different about your students anxiety compared to
anxiety of children without ASD?
6. Do children with ASD attending mainstream schools
experience similar or different types of anxiety difficulties
compared to their peers in special schools? (If teachers have had
experience teaching in mainstream schools)
7. What do you think is the impact of childrens with ASD
anxiety in:
a. Their life in school and learning?
b. His/her classmates
c. The progress of your teaching
8. Do your students avoid any situations/people/settings because
of their anxiety? Do they seek reassurance from you or others
about their anxieties?
9. How well do parents work with teachers in communicating
and managing their childs anxiety?
Results
Overall, the focus groups generated
rich information and a number of themes
relating to anxiety in low-functioning
children with ASD in the school setting

emerged that were highly consistent across
focus groups. This consistency is reflected
in the data below in the No. of interviews
22

column, which indicates the number of
groups in which the same themes were
mentioned at least one. Percentages of total
responses have also been calculated to
reflect the distribution and proportion of the
themes that emerged across focus groups, to
shed light on which may be considered
more common or more relevant for the ASD
population. These percentages were
calculated by first coding taking the number
of units/sets of comments emitted in
response to each theme and dividing it by
the total number of units emitted in response
to the category to which that theme
belonged. For example, 40 units/sets of
comments were related to changes as
triggers of anxiety, out of a total of 118
units/sets of comments, which therefore
yielded a 33.9% response rate of comments

about triggers of anxiety relating to change
(Table 3). This approach to summarizing the
data alongside qualitative presentations has
been used in other studies employing
similar methodology, such as Frederickson,
Dunsmuir, Lang, & Monsen (2004), and is
useful in showing the consistency of data
and proportion of responses given that are
associated with each specific theme.
Analysis of the focus group
transcripts is reported in the tables below,
alongside illustrations of the codes within
categories. A more in-depth examination of
resultant themes and codes are included in
Appendix B, C and D.
Table 3.
Triggers of anxiety
Types of triggers
Number of responses
(%)
Number of focus
groups
Examples
40 (33.9%)
Disruption of routine, change of

location or route, new person,
new environment
23 (19.5%)
Loud noises, visual overload
13 (11.0%)
Receiving negative feedback,

answering a question wrongly,
pressure to behave normally
14 (11.8%)
Difficulty initiating interaction,

bullying, teasing, not
understanding someone elses
intentions
13 (11.0%)
Of a specific location, e.g. the

library, of a person
11 (9.3%)
Not being allowed to touch a

preferred object, or watch a
television scene on repeat
No immediate trigger, childs

behaviour is instead an effect of
a trigger from home, from the
day/night before
Change
Aversive sensory
experiences
Performance
demands and high
expectations
Social/Communica
tion challenges
Specific fears and

worries
Being prevented
from engaging in
stereotyped
repetitive
behaviours and
interests/activities
Delayed reactions
to earlier
experiences of
anxiety
4 (3.4%)
23
Triggers of anxiety
Within the school setting and according to
teachers experiences, a variety of key
themes emerged within this category of
triggers of anxiety (see Table 3). All of the
responses given in the focus groups could
be classified as triggers relating to change;
performance-related
triggers;
triggers
concerning sensory issues; triggers arising
from social and communication deficits;
specific fears and worries; being disrupted
from engaging in fixations and obsessions;
and triggers from home or a past event that
only manifested after a delay.
Table 4.
Presentation of anxiety
Signs of anxiety
Behavioural:
Challenging
behaviours
- Arousal
(increase in
behaviours)
Avoidance/escape
Number of
responses (%)
Number of
interviews
Examples
38 (27.9%)
Temper tantrums, hitting,

screaming, aggression, crying,
jumping
Intensified behaviours, like
hitting themselves more, or
singing faster and more loudly
than usual
Running away, avoiding
trigger, zoning out
Self-stimulatory behaviours i.e.
tapping, flapping, biting shirt
collar
Asking questions repeatedly,
checking behaviours
9 (6.6%)
21 (15.4%)
18 (13.2%)
11 (8.1%)
11 (8.1%)
Frowning, looking tense
1 (0.7%)
Laughing, even though

inappropriate for the situation
Sensory behaviours
Repetitive behaviours
Anxious facial
expressions and body
language
Other socially
inappropriate or outof-context behaviours
Total = 80%
Expressing thoughts and emotions
Verbal
15 (11.0%)
Non-verbal
7 (5.2%)
Telling teachers their

feelings or identifying
the source of anxiety
Using picture cards,
gestures and drawing to
indicate thoughts and
feelings
Total = 16.2%
Somatic/Physical
Toileting
Other physical/somatic
signs of anxiety
2 (1.5%)
3 (2.2%)
Total = 3.7%
Increased levels of
bowel movement and
urination
Sweaty palms, overall
body muscle tension,
stomach aches
anxiety according to cognitive behavioural

Presentation/Signs of anxiety
Indicators/signs of anxiety were
models of anxiety (Lang, 1968; Beidel &
separated into three main categories, before
Turner, 2005).
being sub-divided into specific codes (see
Strategies to manage anxiety
Table 4). These categories comprise of
Strategies of coping with anxiety were
behavioural signs of anxiety, the expression
categorised into child, teacher, and school,
of thoughts and emotions on the childs
depending on who initiated the use of each
part, and also somatic/physical indicators of
strategy (see Tables 5, 6 and 7).
Table 5.
Child-initiated strategies for coping with anxiety
Childrens
strategies
Challenging
behaviours (fight)
Avoidance (flight)
Number of
responses (%)
7 (12.5%)
Number of
interviews
2
12 (21.4%)
Seeking help or
reassurance
Repetitive
behaviours and
actions
- Selfreassurance
Sensory behaviours
11 (19.6%)
9 (16.1%)
7 (12.5%)
6 (10.7%)
4 (7.1%)
Use of previously
taught strategies
Discussion
The teacher focus groups generated
a holistic, clinically relevant picture of
comorbid ASD and anxiety in the school
context, for a predominantly lowfunctioning group of children and young
people aged 6 to 18 years old, lending some
theoretical evidence towards ASD-specific
and non-specific signs and triggers of
anxiety and generating a number of
implications towards the clinical assessment
of anxiety in children and young people
with ASD.
Specifically, the most consistently
reported triggers were changes and
disruption of routines, sensory issues,
performance/expectations,
social/communication difficulties, specific
fears and worries and being prevented from
Examples
Physical struggle, fighting with
teachers
Running away from the trigger,
requesting for timeout periods,
covering ears or eyes
Approaching teachers for help or
comfort
Echolalia, checking behaviours,
repeating songs or verbal scripts
Verbally calming themselves, i.e. its
gonna be okay repeatedly
Tapping, flapping, making funny
sounds, biting shirt collar
Engaging in coping techniques that had
been previously taught, i.e.
independently requesting for time out,
counting
engaging in stereotyped interests and

activities. With respect to signs of anxiety,
behavioural signs were most significant and
observable,
especially
challenging
behaviours, avoidance/escape, sensory
behaviours, repetitive behaviours, and
anxious facial expressions (though most
teachers said experience with the child was
required
to
recognise
this).
This
constellation of findings obtained in this
study mirrors that of Ozsivadjian et al.s
(2012) research with parental accounts of
higher-functioning children and young
people with ASD, and further extends it
with teacher perspectives and lowerfunctioning children.
Table 6.
Teacher-initiated strategies of managing students anxiety
Number of
Number of
Teachers
responses (%)
interviews
strategies
Timely intervention
22 (24.4%)
14 (15.6%)
11 (12.2%)
7 (7.8%)
7 (7.8%)
6 (6.7%)
6 (6.7%)
6 (6.7%)
10 (11.1%)
Teaching self-calming
strategies
Removal/Timeout
Distraction
Exposure
Supervision without
interference or
intervention
Offering verbal prompts
Seeking additional help
Other preventative
strategies
ASD-specific Triggers and Signs of

Anxiety
Teachers identified the ASD-specific
triggers of changes (unpredictability,
disruptions to routine), aversive sensory
experiences, social difficulties related to
communication and being prevented from
engaging in stereotyped interests and
activities. These triggers reflect common
ASD-related
difficulties
in
sensory
sensitivities, communication difficulties and
Examples
Taking action at appropriate times,
i.e. choosing the right time to
approach the child and calm him or
her down, prevention, preparing the
child for an anticipated event
Teaching students coping techniques
like breathing and counting exercises,
or how to recognise and better
regulate their feelings related to
anxiety using assorted
scrapbooks/collections of pictures and
drawings of different thoughts and
feelings, use of social stories
Removing the trigger of anxiety, or
removing the child from the anxietyinducing situation
Distracting the child with a preferred
object or activity
Gradually exposing the child to
known trigger of anxiety with the aim
of overcoming anxious feelings,
reinforcing progress
Do nothing, i.e. allowing the childs
anxious behaviour to run its course
without interfering
Asking the child you need help? to
encourage them to express their needs
better
Calling for external help, i.e. other
teachers, teaching assistants, or
school psychologists
Maintaining a calm classroom
atmosphere, use of visual aides,
providing high levels of structure
perspective taking, as well as inflexibility

and the insistence of sameness in terms of
processing style (Tantam, 2012; Spiker,
Enjey Lin, Van Dyke, & Wood, 2011;
Wood & Gadow, 2010).
One key theme that appeared across
groups regarding ASD-specific signs of
anxiety were the childrens difficulty in
communicating anxiety clearly via verbal
means, especially during times of
heightened distress. While this difficulty
26

might also apply to typically developing
provided by the teachers show that the high
children, it may be even more significant for
levels of performance/task-based anxiety
children with ASD given their existing
exhibited by their students may be
challenges
with
language,
social
associated
with
perfectionism
and
communication, and understanding and
manifested in terms of obsessive
expressing thoughts and emotions. This
behaviours, such as intense levels of
meant that teachers often had to make
repetitive questioning and checking,
inferences about triggers and their students
requiring a teacher to guide the students
dominant emotions via behavioural signals
work at every step, as the students would
and prior knowledge about their students
often react with high levels of anxiety,
idiosyncrasies. Teachers also consistently
negative affectivity and challenging
gave comments concerning sensory and
behaviour to simple performance feedback
repetitive behaviours as indicators of
such as the marking of a cross on a
anxiety, which referred to a range of
worksheet. According to the teachers in the
behaviours such as echolalia, repetitive
focus groups, these behaviours were
flapping, persistent checking behaviours and
frequently and consistently observed in their
reassurance-seeking behaviours, which
students with ASD, but might not be
sometimes occurred regularly but grew
observed in the general population in a
more intense during periods of anxiety.
similar form or intensity. As such, in
Additionally, the qualitative focus
developing an understanding of the atypical
group results suggest that it might be
presentation of anxiety in children with
important to note how non-ASD-specific
ASD and in using standardized, non-ASD
triggers may be presented in ASD-specific
specific questionnaires and checklists for
ways. For example, though high
assessment, care should be taken to ensure
expectations and performance demands do
that details like these are not lost to
not appear to be triggers of anxiety specific
categorical simplicity.
to ASD, the nature of the comments
Table 7.
School-initiated strategies to manage students anxiety
School strategies
Structural facilities
Special programs or
curriculum
Ensuring familiarity
and structure in every
day school life
Number of
responses (%)
Number of
interviews
7 (50%)
5 (35.7%)
2 (14.3%)
Relevance to Wood & Gadows

theoretical model
The findings from this study largely
provide some ecological validity to Wood
and Gadows (2010) theoretical model
specifically, teachers identified consistent
and frequently emerging themes relating to
Examples
Calm-down rooms, multi-sensory rooms,
creating manageable spaces in the classroom
Targeted intervention sessions to tackle
anxiety difficulties, teaching and reinforcing
coping techniques as part of the curriculum
Keeping a low teacher-student ratio, ensuring
that students are familiar with teacherchaperones on school outings
aversive sensory experiences, prevention of

stereotyped/repetitive
behaviours
and
social/communication challenges, which
appear to map directly onto similar
categories in Wood & Gadows (2010)
model (see Figure 1 in Introduction).
Teachers in the focus groups also identified
27

similar effects of ASD-related stressors
namely arousal, challenging behaviour, and
also commented on the pervasive impact on
their students lives and learning, all of
which map onto Wood and Gadows
proposed effect factors of increased autism
symptom severity, behavioural problems,
and personal distress/reduced quality of life.
However, Wood and Gadows heavy
social component of the proposed
theoretical model (two out of four ASDrelated stressors; see Figure 1 in
Introduction) did not fit entirely well with
the focus group reports. For example, while
the teachers did comment on peer rejection
and victimization related to autism
symptoms, these descriptions were strictly
limited to their knowledge of a few higher
functioning students that had transferred out
of the Special Education schools to
mainstream schools. Furthermore, though
Wood and Gadow highlighted the
unpredictability of social encounters as an
ASD-related stressor, the teachers in the
focus group reports highlighted changes and
unpredictability across all aspects of life as
potential stressors, in addition to
unpredictability arising from socialcommunication challenges. In addition,
Wood and Gadow have proposed that ASD
symptoms could potentially generate stress
for individuals when symptom expression,
in the form of inappropriate repetitive
behaviours for example, is in conflict with
social expectations and demands, and it is
this pressure for social conformity that
brings about anxiety (Wood & Gadow,
2010). While this was also discussed to
some extent in the focus groups, the
teachers felt that anxiety provoked by high
expectations and demands was also
extremely relevant to school-based task
performance and an obsessive need to
complete tasks just right. Greenaway &
Howlin (2010) further support this concept,
and demonstrated that dysfunctional
attitudes and perfectionism, which is related
to cognitive inflexibility, is pertinent to

children with ASD.
As such, while the focus group
findings do provide some ecological validity
for almost all the factors proposed by Wood
and Gadow (2010), the focus group findings
also suggest that there is a need to expand
Wood
and
Gadows
theoretical
conceptualisation of anxiety to include
ASD-specific triggers of anxiety like
changes, and to widen the scope of high
expectations and demands from social
expectations alone, to include task-based
performance anxiety and perfectionism.
Alternatively, the potential inclusion of
these additional factors may also imply that
Wood and Gadows (2010) model may
serve as a better fit for high-functioning
children rather than low-functioning
children, and that it could possibly be
expanded to explore and include factors
relevant
to
the
experience
and
phenomenology of anxiety in ASD across
the entire spectrum of functioning and
severity.
Limitations
Before
expanding
on
the
implications of the findings, it is first
important to note that they need to be
interpreted in light of certain limitations.
One limitation is the small sample size,
which may not be representative enough of
the entire teacher population of ASD
schools. Secondly, as this was an
exploratory
study
into
teachers
perspectives about ASD and anxiety, there
was a lack of detailed information about the
students themselves, such as demographics,
verbal ability, level of cognitive functioning
and adaptive skills. However, based on the
admission criteria of each of the schools, as
well as the teachers descriptions of their
students during the discussions, it is likely
that the findings of this study can be
tentatively generalized to children in the
lower-functioning end of the ASD
spectrum. Furthermore, although the sample
28

might be limited in terms of size and
representativeness, the qualitative study
carried out provided rich, detailed
information that cannot be obtained via
large qualitative studies, and efforts were
made to recruit teachers from a range of
schools, rather than just one school, and the
teachers that participated came from diverse
backgrounds in terms of years of experience
and educational qualifications.
Implications for assessing anxiety in
children and youth with ASD
Having demonstrated some evidence
towards an atypical presentation of anxiety
in ASD that is markedly different in terms
of triggers and signs of anxiety, the present
findings provide further insight into the
inadequacies
of
using
standardized
measures of anxiety that have been
developed for the general population with
children with ASD. As such, these findings,
along with Ozsivadjian et al. (2012), point
towards the usefulness of the development
of an autism-specific or an autism-sensitive
assessment measure/procedure at the very
least, and it remains possible that a number
of anxiety difficulties have not been
adequately identified and assessed.
Implications for clinical practice
These focus group findings also
provide ecological evidence for the use of
cognitive-behavioural
therapy
(CBT)
programs for this population of lowfunctioning children and young people with
ASD, but with ASD-specific modifications
(Davis, May, & Whiting, 2011; Lang,
Regester, Lauderdale, Ashbaugh, & Haring,
2010).
Specifically,
potential
ASD
modifications that could work with children
with lower levels of functioning would deemphasize the traditional mechanism of
creating a change in cognition, and step up
focus on behaviour modifications instead, as
the focus group findings regarding signs of
anxiety show that anxiety in this population
is largely expressed behaviourally. In
addition, special attention should be paid to

increasing the use of structured, simple
visual aids and tools, as well as strategies to
help students better identify their emotions
and prepare themselves in order to cope in
complex social scenarios. At the same time,
environmental modifications are very
important and need to be made to reduce
levels of anxiety in everyday life, such as
attempts to introduce a certain amount of
structure to avoid unnecessary changes or
disruptions to routine, and reducing the
childs exposure to frequent aversive
sensory experiences as well as allowing
some limited time for the children to engage
in their repetitive behaviours and interests
(Howlin, 1997)
Implications for educators and schools
Besides shedding light on the nature
of anxiety in children and young people
with ASD, these teachers focus groups also
provided a vivid and detailed picture of the
challenges that Special Education schools
currently face when it comes to
understanding and managing anxiety in their
students.
Firstly, it was observed via the
nature of the teachers quotes, examples and
discussions that most of them had some
trouble disentangling frustration and anger
from anxiety in their students. Most used
broader terms like upset or referred to
behavioural issues, and often required
clarification from the facilitators of the
focus groups to ensure that the groups were
on topic (anxiety) and did not veer off into
another emotion that is related but distinct
from anxiety, such as anger. For example,
one teacher stated we dont use words like
anxiety, just that they are having a bad day,
or not feeling too good. From a practical
standpoint, this is understandable as it could
be easier for teachers to use layman terms.
However, it is possible that a concerted
effort to identify and understand anxiety
would be beneficial for themselves as
educators, and for their students as well. By
29

being able to more effectively recognise it
in their students, instead of casting their
students behaviour off as merely being
upset or having a bad day, teachers and
schools might be able to gain a more
holistic view of the conditions that afflict
their students, and implement more targeted
coping strategies and treatment options
instead.
Recommendations for future research
Given these additional findings
towards the atypical presentation of anxiety
as observed in the ASD population, the
collective literature could be used to pilot
ASD-specific assessments of anxiety and
explore whether reported rates or types of
anxiety are different when such tools are
used as compared to traditional existing
scales for typically developing children.
Future research could also focus on
replicating the study with larger groups, as
well as with teachers from Special
Education schools with a higher-functioning
student body, or with children with ASD in
mainstream schools, in order to yield a more
descriptive foundational basis across the
educational landscape and autism spectrum.
Summary and Conclusions
In sum, besides being the first of its
kind to tap into the differential views and
experiences of teachers, as a supplement to
parent informants, this study has provided a
holistic picture of anxiety and ASD in the
Special Education school setting in
Singapore, with a special focus on children
References
American Psychiatric Association. (1994).
Diagnostic and Statistical Manual of
Mental
Disorders
(DSM-IV-TR).
Washington, DC: American Psychiatric
Association.
Brereton, A. V., Tonge, B. J., & Einfeld, S.
L. (2006). Psychopathology in children
and adolescents with autism compared
to young people with intellectual
and young people on the lower functioning

end of the autism spectrum. By harvesting
rich, detailed perspectives and data via a
qualitative focus group methodology, the
findings reflected consistent patterns of
themes and frequencies regarding triggers,
indicators and strategies for coping with
anxiety, and has lent ecological validity to
existing hypothesized models of anxiety in
ASD, while also suggesting the addition of
the significant themes of unexpected
changes and task-based performance
anxiety as ASD-related stressors and
triggers of anxiety, and a broadening of
Wood & Gadows (2010) theoretical model
to include factors relating to low
functioning children with ASD.
By contributing towards a better
theoretical understanding of anxiety
difficulties ASD, it is also hoped that a
clearer, more holistic picture of anxiety can
in turn play a significant role in the
development of better assessment and
measurement techniques that will either be
targeted at, or specific to the ASD
population. This can then potentially
enhance the way clinical practitioners and
educators
manage
these
additional
difficulties that pervade the daily wellbeing
of children with ASD and their families,
thereby contributing to a necessary and
significant advancement in the way that
anxiety is theoretically conceptualised,
assessed, treated and managed across the
range of professional settings.
disability. Journal of Autism and

Developmental Disorders , 36 (7), 863870.
Davis, T. E., May, A., & Whiting, S. E.
(2011). Evidence-based treatment of
anxiety and phobia in children and
adolescents: Current status and effects
on the emotional response. Clinical
Psychology Review , 31, 592-602.
30

Frederickson, N., Dunsmuir, S., Lang, J., &
Monsen, J. J. (2004). Mainstream
special school inclusion partnerships:
pupil, parent and teacher perspectives.
International Journal of Inclusive
Education , 8 (1), 37-57.
Greenaway, R. & Howlin, P. (2010).
Dysfunctional
attitudes
and
perfectionism and their relationship to
anxious and depressive symptoms in
boys with autism spectrum disorders.
Journal of Autism and Developmental
Disorders , 40 (10), 1179-1187.
Howlin, P. (1997). Autism: Preparing for
Adulthood. London: Routledge.
Krueger, R. A., & Casey, M. A. (1988).
Focus Group: A Practical Guide for
Applied Research (4th ed.). Newbury
Park: SAGE.
Lang, R., Regester, A., Lauderdale, S.,
Ashbaugh, K., & Haring, A. (2010).
Treatment of anxiety in autism
spectrum disorders using cognitive
behaviour therapy: A systematic review.
Developmental Neurorehabilitation , 13
(1), 53-63.
Ozsivadjian, A., Knott, F., & Magiati, I.
(2012). Parent and child perspectives on
the nature of anxiety in children and
young people with autism spectrum
disorders: a focus group study. Autism ,
0 (0), 1-15.
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symptoms
among
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A
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Spiker, M. A., Enjey Lin, C., Van Dyke, M.,

& Wood, J. J. (2011). Restricted
interests and anxiety in children with
autism. Autism , 0 (0), 1-13.
Spiker, M. A., Enjey Lin, C., Van Dyke, M.,
& Wood, J. J. (2011). Restricted
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autism. Autism , 0 (0), 1-13.
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(2011). Depression and anxiety
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Wood, J. J., & Gadow, K. D. (2010).
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disorders. Clinical Psychology: Science
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31

Placebo Effect: The Role of Personality and Expectation
Goh Sok Hui
sok.hui.g@gmail.com
Our belief about things, people and situations often affects how we feel about them. This paper
examines the role of expectation - the mechanism commonly proposed to underlie the placebo
effect. Additionally, the moderating effect of the personality variable agreeableness is also
investigated. It is hypothesized that participants randomly assigned to a condition where they
were provided with bogus information regarding the beneficial effects of a piece of music will
experience higher affective well-being and demonstrate greater persistence on a difficult task,
as compared to those in the control group. It was found that participants provided with written
information or expectation regarding the effects of a musical piece subsequently experienced
greater increments in positive affect. Implications of this research on clinical therapies and
daily living are discussed.
Keywords: expectation, personality, affective well-being, therapeutic efficacy, judgments,
mind-body interaction
Introduction
Blessed is he who expects nothing, for he
turn affect the subsequent effectiveness and
shall never be disappointed.
reactions to the treatment administered
Franklin, Benjamin
(Shiv et al., 2005). There is good empirical
The above quote aptly illustrates the
evidence for the expectancy theory of the
powerful influence of expectations on our
placebo effect. For example, it has been
affective well-being. The effect of
demonstrated that expectations predict
expectation, however, extends beyond that
placebo analgesia in patients. Moreover,
of an emotional nature to include a wide
neurological changes have been found to
range of physical and even neurobiological
accompany the effect in addition to
responses. One phenomenon that draws
physiological changes, indicating that the
largely on expectation in its mechanism of
effect is not merely the result of response
action is the placebo effect. This effect
bias from participants (Petrovic, Kalso,
refers to the positive physical and/or
Petersson & Ingvar, 2002).
psychological changes induced by an
Given the strong influence of the
inactive stimulus (Stewart-Williams, 2004).
role of expectation in the placebo effect, this
The placebo effect has been widely
paper aims to investigate the effect of
documented in both medicinal and
expectations on individuals susceptibility
psychological literature and found to exert a
to the placebo effect using an experimental
potent influence on both the state of the
paradigm. Much of existing research on the
mind and the body (Kirsch, 2010).
placebo effect involves the use of an
There is now increased acceptance
inactive sugar pill to drive the placebo
of the role of expectation as the basic
response. However, the placebo effect need
mechanism underlying the placebo effect.
not necessarily involve the consumption of
According to the expectancy theory, a
inert substances or sham surgical
substance or procedure produces an effect
procedures. This current research therefore
because the recipient expects it to (Stewartassesses the use of an alternative method
Williams & Podd, 2004). Ones beliefs
music to elicit the placebo effect.
about a placebo activates the expectation
Agreeableness refers to the tendency
that a particular effect will occur, which in
to behave in an altruistic, friendly and
32

nonaggressive manner, and the motivation
to show empathy and sensitivity (Cousin &
Schmid Mast, in press). Consequently,
agreeableness is a personality variable
where individuals high on the trait may be
susceptible to those messages intended to
change ones beliefs about therapeutic
benefits. Hence, this paper also aims to
further elucidate the role of personality, in
particular agreeableness as an individual
difference factor that moderates the placebo
effect.
Two main hypotheses will be
investigated in this study:
Hypothesis 1: It is hypothesized that
participants assigned to a condition where
they were provided with bogus information
regarding the beneficial effects of a piece of
music would experience higher positive
affect; lower negative affect and
demonstrate greater persistence on a
difficult task as compared to those in the
control group.
Hypothesis 2: It is hypothesized that
the personality trait of agreeableness would
moderate the effect of these differences.
Methodology
Participants. Sixty undergraduates
(39 Females and 21 Males), aged between
18 and 24 years (M = 20.6, SD = 1.35) from
National University of Singapore took part
in this study for course credit. The data of
one participant who did not follow
instructions during the experiment was
removed from further analyses. Participants
were randomly assigned to one of two
conditions (Placebo vs Control).
Procedures
and
Materials.
Participants were told that they will be
participating in a study entitled Personality
on Music Perception and Cognition which
investigates the influence of their
personality on how they perceived music.
The withholding of the true hypothesis is to
reduce the possibility of demand
characteristics (Mitchell & Jolley, 2010).
The experiment was completed in its

entirety through the online survey software
tool, Qualitrics (Qualitrics Labs Inc., Provo,
UT).
Self-reported Affect. The first part of
the online experiment required participants
to fill in the state version of the Positive and
Negative Affect Schedule (PANAS; Watson
& Clark, 1991) which provided scores of
their self-reported positive mood and
negative mood prior to the experimental
manipulation. Participants rated the extent
to which they felt each of 20 different
emotions, of which the order was
randomized for each participant. Possible
responses to these items ranged from 1
(Clearly does not describe my feelings) to
7 (Clearly describes my feelings).
Responses were summed to create a score of
participants pre-treatment positive affect
(PA) and negative affect (NA).
Agreeableness. All participants were
also required to fill in a 20-item
agreeableness scale from the International
Personality Item Pool (IPIP) (Goldberg,
1999). In the present sample, Cronbachs
alpha ranged from .79 to .92. Agreeableness
was measured on a 7-point Likert Scale and
possible responses ranged from 1 (Not true
at all) to 7 (Very true). The order of the
items was randomized for each participant.
After
completing
the
two
questionnaires, participants in the control
condition were told to put on their
headphones and close their eyes as they
listened to a two-minute long musical
composition. Those in the experimental
condition were given the same instructions.
In addition, bogus information regarding the
effect of the music was provided to elicit the
placebo
expectation.
The
written
information provided over the computer
screen was:
The music you will be hearing is an
excerpt taken from a music piece
developed by professional music
therapists to increase feelings of
optimism, reduce stress level and
33

decrease muscle tension. The
original
music
piece
costs
approximately SGD 500. It also has
the additional benefit of increasing
mental resources and energy level.
This music has been tried and tested
on 300 volunteers in the United
Kingdom and found to produce the
beneficial effects as listed.
To ensure that the music excerpt did
not evoke strong affective responses on its
own, a pilot test was conducted prior to the
actual experiment with 30 participants. The
music excerpt taken from Melodia Africana
by Ludovico Einaudi was chosen as the
musical stimuli for this experiment.
After listening to the two-minute
long music excerpt played over a
headphone, participants were then required
to fill in a randomized order of the 20-item
PANAS as a measure of their post-treatment
positive and negative affect. Finally,
participants were required to unscramble a

total of eight anagrams, five of which were
unsolvable. The length of time at which
participants persisted at the task was
measured. Upon completion of the
experiment, participants were thanked and
debriefed.
Results
The sample included in the final
analysis consists of 39 females and 20 males
(M= 20.5, SD= 1.34).
Positive Affect. An independent
samples t-test conducted found a significant
difference in self-reported positive affect
between the two conditions, t (57) = 2.28, p
< .05. Significantly greater gain in positive
affect was found in the placebo condition
(M = 2.29, SD = 8.78) as compared to the
control condition (M = -2.32, SD = 6.46)
(Figure 1).
Figure 1: Mean gain in positive affect between placebo and control groups.
Mean Gain in Positive Affect
3
2
1
0
Placebo
Control
Positive Affect
-1
-2
-3
Conditions
Negative Affect. Individuals in the

placebo condition (M = -3.74, SD = 7.24)
and control condition (M = -2.82, SD =
4.74) did not differ significantly on their
self-reported negative affect following the
experimental manipulation, t (57) = -.571, p

= n.s. However, participants in the placebo
condition experienced a greater decrease in
negative affect as compared to those in the
control group (Figure 2).
34

Figure 2: Mean decrease in negative affect between placebo and control groups.
0
Mean Decrease in Negative Affect
Placebo
Control
-0.5
-1
-1.5
-2
Negative Affect
-2.5
-3
-3.5
-4
Conditions
Persistence
on
unsolvable
anagrams. The two groups also did not
differ significantly on their task persistence,
measured by the amount of time spent

trying to unscramble 5 unsolvable
anagrams, t (57) = -.213, p = n.s.
Table 1: Mean and standard deviation of scores for conditions (Placebo vs Control) on
measures of positive affect, negative affect and task persistence.
Placebo (n=31)
Control (n=28)
t
pEffect
value
size
M
M
SD
SD
Positive Affect
2.29
8.78 -2.32
2.28
0.59
6.46
0.03*
Negative Affect -3.74
7.24 -2.82
-0.57
0.57
0.15
4.74
Task Persistence 107.10
68.46 111.07
-0.21
0.83
0.06
(Secs)
74.67
*p< 0.05
Cohens (1988) convention for t-test for independent means: .20 small effect size; .50 medium
effect size; .80 large effect size.
Agreeableness. The value of R2
change when the interaction variable was
added to the predictor and moderator
variables was not significant for all three
DVs. The effect of expectation on selfreported positive and negative affect and
task persistence did not vary as a result of
the personality trait agreeableness.
Discussion
The results from the experiment
conducted found that participants who were
provided with an expectation regarding the
possible therapeutic benefits of a piece of
musical excerpt through a short written
paragraph in turn came to experience higher
35

self-reported positive affect (PA) than those
individuals in the control group who were
not rendered such expectations about the
musical excerpt. This is in line with and
partially supports our first hypothesis that
participants randomly assigned to a
condition where they were provided with
bogus information regarding the beneficial
effects of a piece of music would experience
better subsequent mood or affective ratings.
Participants in the placebo group also
experienced a greater decrease in negative
affect (NA) as compared to those in the
control group, even though this difference
was not significant.
Results of this research, therefore,
suggests that providing written expectations
about the beneficial effects of a relatively
neutral piece of musical excerpt has positive
effect on affective well-being. This finding
supports similar research findings where
positive outcomes have resulted from
patients expectations of therapeutic
benefits (Atlas & Wager, 2009).
Conclusion
In conclusion, this study made use
of an experimental paradigm to investigate
the
placebo
phenomenon,
allowing
conclusions about cause-and-effect to be
drawn. It also assesses the use of a stimulus
other than placebo pills and sham
procedures music, to elicit the placebo
effect. Given the increasing prevalence of
music as a therapeutic agent, this research
suggests that providing information about
the effect of a musical composition is likely
to increase ones subjective reports of
affective well-being.
The results of this study add to
existing literature and research regarding
expectation as a mechanism underlying the
placebo effect. This suggests that it may be
possible to further augment and utilize the
contribution of psychological factors to
psychotherapies. It also highlights the
possibility of integrating placebo effects
more efficiently with existing medicine,
allowing the use of less actual active

chemical ingredients in drugs (StewartWilliams, 2004). Finally, results of the
research likely allow for a greater
understanding and appreciation of how the
mind regulates the body and the powerful
role that our expectation and beliefs has on
everyday experiences and judgments.
References
Atlas, L. Y., & Wager, T. D. (2009). The
placebo response. In W. Banks (Ed.),
Encyclopedia of Consciousness (pp.
201-216). New York: Elsevier Ltd.
Cohen J. (1988). Statistical power analysis
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NJ: Erlbaum.
Cousin, G., & Schmid Mast, M. (in press).
Agreeable patient meets affiliative
physician: How physician behaviour
affects patient outcomes depends on
patient personality. Patient Education
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Goldberg, L. R. (1999). A broad-bandwidth,
public domain, personality inventory
measuring the lower-level facets of
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Mervielde, I. Deary, F. De Fruyt, & F.
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Research design explained. Belmont:
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analgesia: Imaging a shared neuronal
network. Science, 295, 1737-1740.
Shiv, B., Carmon, Z., & Ariely, D. (2005).
Placebo effects of marketing actions:
Consumers may get what they pay for.
Journal of Marketing Research, 42,
383-393.
36

Stewart-Williams, S. (2004). The placebo
puzzle: Putting together the pieces.
Health Psychology, 23 (2), 198-206.
Stewart-Williams, S., & Podd, J. (2004).
The placebo effect: Dissolving the
expectancy versus conditioning debate.
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Watson, D., & Clark, L. A. (1991). Selfversus

peer-ratings
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Evidence
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Journal of Personality and Social
Psychology, 60, 927-940.
37

Effect of Mandatory Volunteering on Intentions to Volunteer
Shaleni Paneerselvam, Aw Chin Bee, V. Thivya Pillai, & Goh Qian Ci
tyk4@np.edu.sg
School of Humanities & Social Sciences, Ngee Ann Polytechnic
This study investigated the effect of mandatory volunteering and perceived external control on
individuals intentions to volunteer. After the 51 participants (M= 18.50, SD =1.36) had
completed a questionnaire to determine their perceived levels of external control (high or low)
on their volunteering behaviours, they were assigned to either the mandatory volunteering
condition which required them to type out contents of a childrens book on a laptop for at least
25 minutes, or the free choice condition in which they could type as long as they like up to a
maximum of 60 minutes. Results indicated that the participants with low level of external
control in volunteering reported greater intentions to volunteer than those with high level of
external control. Furthermore, participants in the free choice volunteering condition were also
more willing to volunteer in future than those in the mandatory condition. Implications of
mandatory volunteering were discussed.
Keywords: mandatory volunteering, perceived external control
The National Volunteer and

Philanthropy Centre (NVPC) (2011)
reported
that
most
Singaporeans
volunteered, however only 44% volunteered
regularly. Phua, Teo, Ee and Ng (n.d.)
found that 34 out of the 50 Singaporean
students surveyed volunteered for onceoff events. They suggested that most
students volunteered to fulfil the
requirements
of
the
Community
Involvement Programme (CIP). This
mandatory CIP aims to encourage continued
volunteerism among students (Wee, 2010).
However, Helms, Angner, Scott and
Culver (2009) questioned whether mandated
volunteering programs, such as CIP, would
increase subsequent volunteering. In a
longitudinal study, Yang (2010) found that
while the Ontario education ministrys
mandated community services seemed to
increase volunteering behaviours among
high school students, this positive effect
was not sustained after high school
graduation. This was also supported by a
National Educational Longitudinal Study in
which Planty, Bozick and Regnier (2006)
suggested that only students who
participated
in
community services
voluntarily showed sustained volunteering 8
years after graduation from high school.
Furthermore, Marks and Jones (2004)

suggested that students who were required
to volunteer in high school might be more
likely to discontinue community service
than those from schools without mandatory
community service requirements.
Does mandated community service
inevitably undermine the elements of free
choice and altruistic motivation in
volunteering? Warburton and Smith (2003)
raised concerns about the potential counterproductive effects of mandated community
service which may challenge its aim to
encourage volunteering.
Brehm
and
Brehms
(1981)
reactance theory provides support for such
concerns. According to this theory,
requirements that impede ones sense of
freedom can increase resistance and anticonformity behaviours. Individuals reestablish their lost freedom by resisting
persuasion and discontinuing a previously
mandated behaviour (Stukas, Snyder &
Clary, 1999). Specifically, students would
discontinue involvement in community
services once they had fulfilled the
mandatory community service requirements
(Jones & Hill, 2003).
Besides the potential effects of
restrictions of freedom on future intentions
38

to volunteer, Stukas and colleagues (1999)
found that students who perceived greater
external control over their volunteering
behaviours expressed weaker future
intentions to volunteer than students with
lower levels of perceived external control
after they were required to engage in
compulsory community services. This
suggested that the effects of mandatory
volunteering may vary depending on the
participants perceived level of external
control.
The current study examined the
effect
of
mandatory
volunteering
requirement and perceived external control
on ones future intentions to volunteer. It
was hypothesized that participants who
were required to complete a compulsory
task would express weaker intentions to
volunteer than those who could choose
whether to volunteer. In addition,
participants with higher perceived levels of
external control (i.e., individuals who would
not volunteer freely) would express weaker
intentions to volunteer than those with
lower perceived levels of external control
(i.e., individuals who would volunteer
freely).
Method
Participants
The convenience sample of 51
participants comprised of 30 males and 21
females (M = 18.5, SD = 1.36). Participants
were recruited from the experimenters
circle of friends and from social network
sites (i.e., Facebook and Twitter). Informed
consent was obtained.
Materials
Perceived External Control (Stukas
et al., 1999). The 2-item questionnaire
assesses the participants perceived level of
external control pertaining to volunteering
(Appendix A). They rated each statement on
a 6-point Likert scale ranging from 1
(Strongly Disagree) to 6 (Strongly Agree).
The scale had a Cronbachs of .63.

Participants were classified under either low
(1 3.5 points) or high (3.6 6 points) level
of perceived external control based on their
average scores.
Intentions to Volunteer (Stukas et
al., 1999). The 4-item questionnaire
assesses the participants intentions to
volunteer (Appendix B) on a Likert scale
from 1 (Strongly Disagree) to 6 (Strongly
Agree). The scale had a favourable internal
consistency with a Cronbachs of .83.
Manipulation Check (Stukas et al.,
1999). Two items (i.e., I freely chose the
duration of time I participated in the present
study and I stayed in the present study for
as long as I did only because it was
compulsory) were included to verify the
effectiveness
of
the
experimental
manipulation for the mandatory and free
choice volunteering conditions. Participants
in the mandatory condition (M = 5.26, SD =
.58) perceived greater external control (e.g.,
it was compulsory) over their
volunteering as compared to those in the
free choice condition (M = 4.83, SD = .88)
volunteering conditions, t(49) = 2.10, p =
.041. This demonstrated the effectiveness of
the experimental manipulations.
Other Materials. The titles of the
storybooks were Kidnapped in the Kafue,
The Chinese Cinderella, Letters from
Sam, Charlottes Web and The Five
People You Meet in Heaven. Laptops with
Microsoft Word program and stopwatches
were also used in the experiment.
Procedures
Preceding
the
experiment,
participants completed the Perceived
External Control questionnaire. The average
score was used to match the participants
before assigning them to either the
mandatory or free choice volunteering
conditions. Subsequently, participants in the
mandatory condition were instructed to type
the assigned pages of a storybook for at
least 25 minutes, while those in the free
choice condition were informed that they
39

could type as long as they liked. All
participants could type up to a maximum of
60 minutes. After the participants indicated
that they would like to stop the task, they
completed the Intentions to Volunteer
questionnaire and the manipulation check
items. All participants were debriefed.
Results
A 2 (volunteering conditions:
mandatory or free choice) x 2 (perceived
external of control: high or low) betweensubjects ANOVA was conducted to assess
the effects of mandatory volunteering and
perceived external control on intentions to
volunteer.
Participants in the free-choice
condition (M = 4.41, SD = .87) expressed
stronger intentions to volunteer than
participants in the mandatory condition (M
= 3.83, SD = 1.14), F(1,47) = 4.83, p = .033,
= .093. Furthermore, participants with
low external control (M = 4.45, SD = .82)
had stronger intentions to volunteer than
those with high external control (M = 3.76,
SD = 1.15), F(1,47) = 6.60 , p = .013, =
.12. There was no significant interaction
between volunteering condition and
perceived external control, F(1,47) = 1.31, p
= .26, = .027.
Discussion
Consistent with previous research
(e.g., Stukas et al., 1999; Yang, 2010), the
present study found that participants who
were required to type for at least 25 minutes
expressed weaker future intentions to
volunteer than those who were given a
choice to decide how much time they
wanted to spend on the task. These findings
suggested that mandatory volunteering can
potentially inhibit future intentions to
volunteer. In line with the reactance theory
(Brehm & Brehm, 1981), it appears that the
restriction of freedom to decide whether to
volunteer can potentially lead to resistance
towards future volunteering. These posed a
question to the implementation and
effectiveness of mandatory community

service programs.
Furthermore, the findings also
showed that the participants with higher
levels of external control over their
volunteering acts had weaker intentions to
volunteer than those with lower levels of
external control as indicated by Stukas et al.
(1999). This highlighted the need to take
into
consideration
the
students
characteristics in selecting appropriate
strategies
to
encourage
sustained
volunteering.
In addition, Henderson, Brown,
Pancer and Ellis-Hale (2007) proposed that
previous volunteer experience might have
an effect on individuals attitude towards
volunteering. Jones, Segar and Gasiorski
(2008) found that students who were
required to participate in community
services lacked a sense of civic
responsibility and transformation from their
involvement. Jones et al., (2008) also
discovered that students opposed the
mandate to serve but not the essence of
community service itself. This resistance
seemed to arise from unfavourable service
structure and the perceived lack of impact of
the voluntary activities. Thus, it may be
critical to focus on enhancing volunteers
experiences and the quality of the voluntary
projects, so that participants will be
motivated to continue their involvement in
community services.
Furco and Billig (2002) suggested
that institutions should adopt the servicelearning model that aims to expand
students service experiences and influence
their identity development. This can
potentially enhance participants intrinsic
motivation to engage in future community
services (Jones et al., 2008).
The current findings should be
interpreted with consideration of the
following limitations. The generalizability
of the findings may be limited by the use of
convenience sampling, small sample size
and the typing task adopted may not be
40

representative of the commonly available
volunteering activities. In addition, the
internal consistency of the 2-item Perceived
External Control questionnaire can be
improved. The self-report measure of the
participants intentions to volunteer may
also not translate into actual involvement in
volunteering.
In conclusion, the study cautioned
against the potential adverse impact of
mandatory volunteering on future intentions
to volunteer. The findings suggested that
References
Brehm, S. S., & Brehm, J. W. (1981).
Psychological reactance: A theory of
freedom and control (2nd ed.). New
York: Academic Press.
Furco, A., & Billig, S. H. (Eds.). (2002).
Service-learning: The essence of the
pedagogy (pp. 23-47). Charlotte,
North Carolina: Information Age
Publishing.
Retrieved
from
http://books.google.com.sg/books?hl=
en&lr=&id=BAizTqaFT5kC&oi=f
Helms, S., Angner, E., Scott, B., &
Culver, S. (2009). Mandated
volunteering: An experimental
approach.
Retrieved
from
http://www.thearda.com/asrec/arch
ive/papers/Helms_Mandated_Volu
nteering.pdf
Henderson, A., Brown, S. D., Pancer, S.
M., & Ellis-Hale, K. (2007).
Mandated community service in high
school
and
subsequent
civic
engagement: The case of the double
cohort in Ontario, Canada. Journal of
Youth and Adolescence, 36(7), 849860.
Jones, S. R., & Hill, K. E. (2003).
Understanding
patterns
of
commitment: Student motivation for
community service involvement.
Journal of Higher Education, 74(5),
516-539.
Jones, S. R., Segar, T. C., & Gasiorski, A.
L. (2008). A double-edged sword:
mandatory volunteering may not have the

desired effect of increasing civic
engagement. In addition, the study also
highlighted the need to consider the
potential
impact
of
participant
characteristics (e.g., perceived external
control) on volunteering involvement.
Future studies can explore how enhancing
the volunteers experiences may bring about
sustained motivations to volunteer.
College student perceptions of

required high school service-learning.
Michigan Journal of Community
Service Learning, 15(1), 5-17.
Marks, H. M., & Jones, S. R. (2004).
Community service in the transition:
Shifts and continuities in participation
from high school to college. The
Journal of Higher Education, 75(3),
307-339. doi: 10.1353/jhe.2004.0015
National Volunteer and Philanthropy
Centre. (2011). Heart truths: Are we a
giving nation? (Report No. 32).
Retrieved
from
http://www.nvpc.org.sg/Library/Annu
al%20Reports/NVPC%20Annual%20
Report%20%20LR%20%282011%29.pdf
Phua, R. Y., Teo, J. C. M., Ee, F. F. E., &
Ng, W. T. H. (n.d.). Volunteerism: A
comparison of the motivation forces
behind
youth
volunteerism
in
Singapore and Virginia. Retrieved
from
http://www.hci.edu.sg/uploadfile/volu
nteerism.pdf
Planty, M., Bozick, R., & Regnier, M.
(2006). Helping because you have to
or helping because you want to?
Sustaining participation in service
work from adolescence through young
adulthood. Youth Society, 38(2), 177202.
doi:
10.1177/0044118X06287961
Stukas, A. A., Snyder, M., & Clary, E. G.
(1999). The effects of mandatory
41

volunteerism
on
intentions
to
volunteer. American Psychological
Society, 10(1), 59-64.
Warburton, J. R., & Smith, J. L. (2003).
Out of the generosity of your heart:
Are we creating active citizens
through
compulsory
volunteer
programmes for young people in
Australia?
Social
Policy
and
Administration, 37(7), 772-786. doi:
10.1046/j.1467-9515.2003.00371.x
Wee, L. Y. T. (2010, November 22).
Promoting volunteerism through CIP
in
schools.
Retrieved
from
http://www.moe.gov.sg/media/parliam
entary-replies/2010/11/promotingvolunteerism-through.php
Yang, W. (2010). Does compulsory
volunteering
affect
subsequent
behaviour? Evidence from a natural
experiment in Canada. (Doctoral
dissertation, McMaster University,
2010).
Retrieved
from
https://editorialexpress.com/cgibin/conference/download.cgi?db_nam
e=CEA2010&paper_id=648
42

Object-substitution Masking with Motion: Effect of Moving Object within Stationary
Mask
Peh, Chao Xu1, Gillon, Colleen2, Lin, Vincent3, Wong, Kian Foong1 and Makhijani, Rahul4
A0072120@nus.edu.sg
1
National University of Singapore, 2McGill University, 3Boston University, 4Indian Institute
of Technology, Bombay
Object-substitution masking (OSM) occurs when target identification is impaired due to a
sparse, delayed-offset mask. Existing studies with event-related potentials (ERPs) observed that
the mask significantly impairs target identification even though attention was shifted to the
target (Woodman & Luck, 2003). This indicates that although the target and mask were initially
identified by the visual system, there is a bottleneck at re-entrant processing (Enns & Di Lollo,
2000). Using ERP, the present study investigates if OSM occurs when the target moves within
a stationary mask. Behavioural results showed moderate impairments in target identification
with delayed-offset masks. However, ERP results show that attention shift was triggered only
with co-terminating masks, whereas attention shift was attenuated/obliterated with delayedoffset masks. These findings provide new evidence that (1) OSM is possible with motion, and
(2) for complex visual processing, there seems to be an early bottleneck prior to re-entrant
processing.
Keywords: Object-substitution masking, OSM, motion, event-related potentials, ERP, N2pc,
perception, attention
Selective attention is needed to

select important information and filter
irrelevant ones from our visual scene. This
automatic orienting of attention to specific
cues and response inhibition to irrelevant
ones suggest an evolutionary trajectory of
vigilance to potential threats. Specifically,
Di Lollo, Enns and Rensink (2000)
proposed a re-entrant processing model
where extrastriate feedback to the primary
visual cortex (V1) occurs in multiple
iterative loops.
One paradigm used in visual
cognition research is with objectsubstitution masking (OSM). OSM occurs
when target identification is impaired if
surrounded by a sparse, non-overlapping
common-onset mask which persists after
target offset. Enns and Di Lollo (2000)
argue that target identification was not
impaired initially but only when the new
feed-forward mask-only representation
substitutes the initial target-plus-mask
representation during re-entrant updating.
While there appears to be an attentional
bottleneck during the processing (Enns &
Di Lollo, 1997; Goodhew, Visser, Lipp, &

Dux, 2011), ERP investigations suggest that
the initial attention orienting seems to be
rapid enough to escape OSM (Woodman &
Luck, 2003; Prime et al., 2011).
This offers potential to investigate
the evolutionary implications of visual
cognition. Specifically, it suggests an
evolutionary advantage for an organism to
(1) orient attention toward a potential target
location while (2) limiting processing of
irrelevant information that is below a
salience threshold. This is consistent to
findings that the OSM effect is obliterated if
the target is significantly salient (Goodhew
et al., 2011; Enns & Di Lollo, 1997, 2000).
In this perspective, allocation of visuosensory resources can be precise without
compromising vigilance.
However stimuli in real-life are
often complex and rarely stationary. If the
bottleneck in OSM does indeed confer an
evolutionary benefit, then the same
principles should apply under similar low
saliency constrains regardless of factors
such as movement.
Present study
43

Using ERP technique, the present
study builds on existing research on OSM
with apparent motion (Lleras & Moore,
2003; Moore & Lleras, 2005; Kahan &
Lichtman, 2006) to find new evidence
supporting the attentional bottleneck.
We predict that OSM occurs even if
the object moves within a stationary mask.
Specifically, we hypothesize that: (1)
behavioural
target
identification
is
significantly impaired for delayed-offset
trials than co-terminating trials; (2) an N2pc
(N2 posterior contralateral) effect will be
significantly elicited, indicating that
attention is shifted to the unattended target
for both trial-types. However, due to
possible retrograde interference from the
delayed-offset mask, we predict that a
stronger N2pc effect will be observed for
co-termination trials than delayed-offset
trails.
As the N2pc component is an
established neural correlate associated with
the shifting of perceptual-level attention
within an array of distractors (Luck &
Hillyard, 1994), if behavioural performance
is impaired but attention has been shifted to
the target, it would provide evidence for the
evolutionary value of the bottleneck
observed through OSM.
Method
Participants
Ten right-handed volunteers with
normal
or
correct-to-normal
vision
participated in the study.
Stimuli and procedure
An example of the search array and
experiment procedure is shown in Figure 2
and 3 respectively. Stimuli were presented
on a LCD monitor 50cm eyes-to-screen.
Each hemifield contained 10 randomly
distributed distractors (squares) and one
possible target (circle or triangle)
surrounded by a 4-dot mask (each dot
0.2125x0.2125, forming an imaginary
3.0x3.0 square). Apparent motion was
simulated in 4 frames (17ms/frame). Each

shape (1.7x1.7; min. 0.6375 apart)
moved 1.4 vertically within the mask area.
Movement direction was counterbalanced.
A 2x2 within-subjects design with
factors trial type (delayed-offset or coterminating) and target presence (targetpresent or target-absent) was used. For
delayed-offset trials, the masks remained
visible for 600ms after array offset, whereas
for co-termination the target and mask offset simultaneously.
One of 2 possible target shapes was
randomly designated as the target for each
trial block. Participants indicated target
identification with a keyboard response.
After a training block, participants
performed 4 blocks of 112 randomized trials
each.
ERP
Electroencephalogram (EEG) was
recorded from left and right mastoids and 18
International 10/20 sites. Electro-oculogram
(EOG) was used to monitor eye-position
and eye-blinks. EEG channels were
referenced to the average of left and right
mastoids, sampled at 256Hz, 8-bits.
For ERP analysis, an offline filter of
0.1-30Hz was applied. Before ERP
averaging, trials with eye-blinks, eyemovements, and muscle artifacts were
removed using independent component
analysis (ICA). 78.12% trials were used.
The N2pc component was quantified
as the difference between the area-undercurve for scalp sites contralateral and
ipsilateral to target hemifield, between 200375ms post-stimulus (Luck, 2005) relative
to a 200ms pre-stimulus baseline.
Specifically, we focused on lateral-posterior
electrode sites P3/P4 due to its proximity to
the dorsal neuroanatomical pathway
associated with movement (Mishkin,
Ungerleider, & Macko, 1983) and object
recognition (Tapia & Breitmeyer, 2011),
and lateral-occipital electrode sites O1/O2
(Woodman & Luck, 2003).
44
Results
Figure 1 illustrates the results for
both behavioural performance and mean
area-under-curve for ERP waves at
electrode sites O1/O2 and P3/P4. All
statistical analysis were subjected to
Bonferroni
correction
for
multiple
comparisons.
Figure 1. Results for behavioural
performance (top-panel) and mean N2pc
area at electrode sites O1/O2 and P3/P4
(bottom-panel).
Behavioural
Two-way
repeated-measures
ANOVA was used to compare trial-type and
target-presence. Only main effect of trialtype was significant, F(1, 9) = 15.817, p <
.005.
There
were
no
interaction
(p = .660) and no main effect of targetpresence (p = .162). For target-present trials
specifically,
1-way
repeated-measures
ANOVA was used to compare delayedoffset
and
co-termination
trials.
Performance was significantly impaired on
delayed-offset trials, F(1, 9) = 8.895, p =
.015.
ERPs
The mean N2pc areas are presented
in Table 1. Grand average ERP from
electrode sites O1/O2 and P3/P4 are shown
in Figure 2. Taken together, an N2pc
component seems to be elicited as predicted.
Only target-present trials were used for
analysis.
To verify N2pc components
statistically, separate 1-way repeatedmeasures ANOVA were used to compare
the
mean
area-under-curve
for
contralaterality. At O1/O2, no significant
N2pc were observed for delayed-offset (p =
.139) and co-termination (p = .167). At
P3/P4, the N2pc was significant for cotermination, F(1, 9) = 8.596, p = .017; but
not for delayed-offset (p = .682).
To investigate if the N2pc at P3/P4
were significantly different from O1/O2,
2x2 repeated-measures ANOVA was used
to compare electrode-pairs and trial-type. A
significant interaction was found, F(1. 9) =
7.164, p < .05. Post-hoc pairwise
comparisons of simple main effects showed
that the N2pc at O1/O2 was not
significantly different across trial-types (p =
.453); but at P3/P4 it was significantly
larger for delayed-offset than cotermination, t(9) = 4.727, p = .001.
45
Figure 2.
Grand average ERP waves from electrode sites O1/O2 (top-panel) and P3/P4
(bottom-panel) for delayed-offset and co-termination conditions.

Table 1.
Mean N2pc Area comparing Contralaterality at O1/O2 vs. P3/P4 for Delayed-offset and Cotermination. The N2pc component is quantified by the equation [(Electroderight
Electrodeleft)Targetleft + (Electrodeleft Electroderight)Targetright] 2
Delayed-offset
Subject
Epochs
Contralateral
Ipsilateral
83
1256.93
73
4873.67
93
Co-termination
N2pc
Epochs
Contralateral
Ipsilateral
N2pc
1385.14
-64.11
90
2401.84
2500.47
-49.31
4363.79
254.94
70
5532.40
4771.77
380.31
7026.33
7254.61
-114.14
99
7575.08
8718.75
-571.83
80
-1157.51
-833.40
-162.06
56
-1792.93
-1754.15
-19.39
64
5159.28
5593.82
-217.27
51
4549.40
5409.73
-430.16
102
-299.69
-310.38
5.35
106
-1104.50
-859.82
-122.34
66
3337.22
3679.88
-171.33
68
2347.56
2202.30
72.63
110
5467.81
5808.57
-170.38
106
7654.50
7894.78
-120.14
111
1979.21
2204.60
-112.70
109
183.23
555.34
-186.06
10
Grand
Mean
102
-375.16
-441.71
33.27
105
-448.64
-58.05
-195.30
88.4
2726.81
2870.49
-71.84
86
2689.79
2938.11
-124.16
83
2220.80
2011.28
104.76
90
3504.06
3966.56
-231.25
73
4564.29
3611.32
476.48
70
4611.19
4151.08
230.05
93
3202.79
3544.24
-170.73
99
4671.03
5634.76
-481.86
80
1339.02
1832.69
-246.83
56
-190.69
-47.32
-71.68
64
6680.66
7358.61
-338.98
51
5772.78
7023.41
-625.32
102
1341.54
870.29
235.62
106
276.46
582.11
-152.82
66
4935.70
4145.65
395.03
68
3379.86
3365.93
6.97
110
1877.66
1627.21
125.23
106
2947.18
3606.83
-329.82
111
1860.43
2240.37
-189.97
109
-256.46
415.02
-335.74
10
Grand
Mean
102
1463.76
1502.45
-19.34
105
1042.65
1613.06
-285.20
88.4
2948.66
2874.41
37.13
86
2575.81
3031.14
-227.67
O1/O2
P3/P4
Discussion
Using a modified OSM paradigm
with moving objects, the present study
aimed to investigate the implications of
selective attention on visual cognition.
Specifically, the attentional bottleneck
observed in typical OSM paradigms
suggests an evolutionary trajectory in
vigilance. Thus if this bottleneck is indeed
advantageous, then the same principles
should apply for moving stimuli under

similar constrains.
Hypothesis 1 is supported by
behavioural results. Target identification
performance was significantly impaired on
delayed-offset than co-termination trials.
However, trials with no targets also seem to
be affected by OSM. Taken together,
behavioural results show a strong trend
supporting that OSM is possible when
47

objects moved within a stationary mask.
This is consistent to the 2-object hypothesis
proposed by Kahan and Lichtman (2006).
Similar to typical OSM paradigms,
our results provide evidence for the same
processing inhibition. This is supported with
the view that in order to resolve competition
for resource-limited visual cognition,
irrelevant information need to be
suppressed/inhibited while relevant signals
are increased (Serences & Yantis, 2006,
2007).
However for hypothesis 2, results
were unexpected and inconsistent to our
prediction. Statistical analyses on ERP
results showed that N2pc components were
insignificant at occipital sites O1/O2, while
the N2pc at posterior sites P3/P4 was
significant for co-termination but not
delayed-offset trials. This showed that when
moving objects were involved, attention
was significantly attenuated/obliterated at
occipital electrode-sites; and at posterior
sites
there
seemed
to
be
an
attenuation/obliteration of attention shift
due to the delayed-offset mask. The unique
suppression of initial attention shift suggests
that the bottleneck at re-entrant processing
can be earlier than anticipated when
movement is factored. The delayed-offset
mask may actually be capable of masking
attention orienting (cf. Woodman & Luck,
2003; Prime et al., 2011).
How then does the visual system
determine the relevance of peripheral
stimuli if attention shift is not triggered? We
posit that at the feed-forward V1, substantial
preattentive processing has occurred such
that perception could occur without direct
attention. Consequently, we argue that
moving objects may have more information
(movement/spatial cues) available to
facilitate preattentive processing. This
implies that attention shift does not need to
be triggered to non-salient irrelevant
information (target rendered irrelevant
relative to the recency of the delayed-offset
mask).
Finally, we note one design issue

about the mask itself being an indicator of
the target. Thus OSM may be partly due to
attention being focused first on the 4-dot
masks instead of the target object within the
mask. Future studies should consider
separating the target cue with the mask such
as using luminance (see: Lleras & Moore,
2003).
In conclusion, the present study
found exciting new evidence for an early
bottleneck in complex visual processing.
This sensitivity in allocating attention
orienting adds empirical support to an
evolutionary perspective that it may be
advantageous to suppress/inhibit non-salient
stimuli at a preattentive level so as to filter
out irrelevant information without activating
an attention shift.
References
Di Lollo, V., Enns, J.T., & Rensink, R.A.
(2000). Competition for consciousness
among visual events: The psychophysics
of re-entrant visual processes. Journal of
Experimental Psychology: General,
129(4), 481 507. doi: 10.1037/00963445.129.4.481
Enns, J.T., & Di Lollo, V. (1997). Object
substitution: A new form of masking in
unattended
visual
locations.
Psychological Science, 8(2), 135 139.
doi:
10.1111/j.14679280.1997.tb00696.x
Enns, J.T., & Di Lollo, V. (2000). Whats
new in visual masking? Trends in
Cognitive Sciences, 4(9), 345 352.
doi:10.1016/S1364-6613(00)01520-5
Goodhew, S.C., Visser, T.A.W., Lipp, O.V.,
& Dux, P.E. (2011). Competing for
consciousness:
prolonged
mask
exposure reduces object substitution
masking. Journal of Experimental
Psychology: Human Perception and
Performance, 37(2), 588 596. doi:
10.1037/a0018740
Kahan, T.A., & Lichtman, A.S. (2006).
Looking at object-substitution masking
48

in depth and motion: Toward a twoobject theory of object substitution.
Perception & Psychophysics, 68(3), 437
446. doi: 10.3758/BF03193688
Lleras, A., & Moore, C.M. (2003). When
the target becomes the mask: Using
apparent motion to isolate the objectlevel component of object-substitution
masking. Journal of Experimental
Psychology: Human Perception and
Performance, 29(1), 106 120. doi:
10.1037/0096-1523.29.1.106
Luck, S.J., & Hillyard, S.A. (1994). Spatial
filtering during visual search: Evidence
from human electrophysiology. Journal
of Experimental psychology: Human
Perception and Performance, 20(5),
1000 1014. doi: 10.1037/00961523.20.5.1000
Mishkin, M., Ungerleider, L.G., & Macko,
K.A. (1983). Object vision and spatial
vision: Two cortical pathways. Trends in
Neurosciences, 6, 414 417. doi:
10.1016/0166-2236(83)90190-X
Moore, C.M., & Lleras, A. (2005). On the
role of object representations in
substitution masking. Journal of
Experimental
Psychology:
Human
Perception and Performance, 31, 1171
1180. doi: 10.1037/0096-1523.31.6.1171
Prime, D.J., Pluchino, P., Eimer, M.,
Dellacqua, R., & Jolicoeur, P. (2011).
Object-substitution masking modulates

spatial attention deployment and the
encoding of information in visual shortterm memory: Insights from occipitoparietal
ERP
components.
Psychophysiology, 48, 687 696. doi:
10.1111/j.1469-8986.2010.01133.x
Serences, J.T. & Yantis, S. (2006). Selective
visual
attention
and
perceptual
coherence. Trends in Cognitive Sciences,
10,
38-45.
doi:10.1016/j.tics.2005.11.008
Serences, J.T. & Yantis, S. (2007). Spatially
Selective Representations of Voluntary
and Stimulus-Driven Attentional Priority
in Human Occipital, Parietal, and
Frontal Cortex. Cerebral Cortex, 17(2),
284-293. doi:10.1093/cercor/bhj146
Tapia, E., & Breitmeyer, B.G. (2011).
Visual
consciousness
revisited:
magnocellular
and
parvocellular
contributions
to
conscious
and
nonconscious vision. Psychological
Science, 22(7), 934 942. doi:
10.1177/0956797611413471
Woodman, G.F., & Luck, S.J. (2003).
Dissociations
among
attention,
perception, and awareness during objectsubstitution masking. Psychological
Science, 14(6), 605 611. doi:
10.1046/j.0956-7976.2003.psci_1472.x
49

Hear No Evil: Can Music Attenuate the Irrelevant Speech Effect?
Soh Wei Jie
weijiesoh31@gmail.com
This study aims to replicate the irrelevant speech effect (ISE) in a local context and, more
important, investigate if music structure can reduce impairments imposed by the ISE on a serial
word recall task. Thirty-five undergraduates from the National University of Singapore
performed serial recall on 10 word lists. The lists were presented under 5 auditory conditions,
namely: Music-Only, Combined (music with background speech), Scrambled music with
background speech, Background Speech-Only and White Noise conditions. The Scrambled
condition contained the same piece of music as the Combined condition except that it was rearranged in a random fashion; the mission of this condition is to specifically provide a
comparison basis to test if musical structure per se actually attenuates the ISE. A significant
main effect of music conditions was obtained. ISE was successfully replicated, where a
significantly lower percentage of correct words was recalled in the Background Speech-Only
condition compared to all other conditions. ISE was also successfully attenuated, but the data
suggest that musical structure per se was not responsible for the attenuation, since the
Scrambled condition had superior performance than both the Combined and Background
Speech-Only conditions. Novel theoretical models involving changing acoustical features,
selective attention and arousal to account for the present findings were discussed.
Keywords: irrelevant speech effect, music, recall performance
The irrelevant speech effect (ISE) is

the finding that background speech
significantly
impairs
serial
recall
performance, even when the background
speech is irrelevant to the task (Farley,
Neath, Allbritton & Surprenant, 2007). First
demonstrated by Colle and Walsh (1976),
the researchers presented subjects with lists
of eight consonant-items visually together
with a passage read out in German. The
background
speech
was
considered
irrelevant as participants were told to ignore
the passage and that no subsequent recall of
the background speech was required. Serial
recall was significantly impaired in the
irrelevant speech condition compared to the
quiet, control condition. The ISE is found to
be robust and independent of speech
intensity, within the range of 0 to 76 dB
(Ellermeier & Hellbr ck, 1998). The effect
is also significant regardless of whether the
irrelevant speech is presented together with
or after the word list (Miles, Jones &
Madden, 1991), and evident over repeated
trials or sessions (Tremblay & Jones, 1998).
The question of greater interest (and

importance) is whether one could
circumvent the ISE, given the potential
costs on cognitive performance that are
associated with the negative impacts of ISE
under a variety of situations. A possible
candidate to abate irrelevant speech is
instrumental music. The use of music to
modulate work performance is common.
Lesiuk (2010) found that listening to
preferred music led to improvements in
performance within the context of high
cognitive demanding jobs.
The first goal the study is to
replicate the ISE on undergraduates at the
National University of Singapore. The
background speech consists of contents
related to undergraduates, ranging from
modules, bid points, gossip and current
news ensuring that the contents are
distracting enough while trying to
concentrate on learning a word list.
Second and more important, this
study investigates whether instrumental
music, with all its purported positive effects
and benefits on cognitive performance
50

(Nantais
&
Schellenberg,
1999;
Schellenberg & Hallam, 2005), can reduce
the detriments of ISE during a serial word
recall task. This study has been designed to
involve five auditory conditions: 1.)
Instrumental Music-Only, 2.) Combined
(music with background speech), 3.)
Background Speech-Only, 4.) Scrambled
Music with background speech and 5.)
White Noise. The specific hypotheses are
stated below:
Hypothesis 1: Under the Background
Speech-Only condition, participants will
have the worst recall performance compared
to all other conditions, while Instrumental
Music-Only and White Noise conditions will
produce the best performances. This
hypothesis, if supported, would have
replicated the ISE effects in a local context,
further qualifying that instrumental music
and white noise have less detriments on
serial word recall than irrelevant speech

does.
Hypothesis 2:
The Combined
condition is predicted to yield superior
performance in the recall task compared to
the
Background
Speech-Only
and
Scrambled conditions would.
Hypothesis
2
addresses
the
possibility that the instrumental music, with
its harmony and internal structure, may
result in a more stable auditory scene for
selective processing than the changing-state
features of background speech. The
Scrambled condition consists of the same
piece of instrumental music, only
rearranged to disrupt its internal musical
structure. Hence, the Combined condition is
predicted to help in performance compared
to the Scrambled condition and Background
Speech-Only conditions.
Methods
Participants
Thirty-five undergraduates from
psychology classes in National University
of Singapore took part in the study and were
awarded course credits for their
participation. All participants reported
normal hearing.
Serial Word Recall List

Eighty 4-letter English words were
chosen for the 10 word lists (Lim & Yap,
2010) with orthographic neighborhood
density held constant at 3.33 and word
frequency per se effects predicted not to
emerge in this study (Table 1).
Table 1
Means and Standard Deviations of Log-frequency for Low and High Frequency Words
Log-frequency
Conditions
M
SD
Low-frequency
6.61
0.544
High-frequency
11.8
1.230
Stimuli
A total of five auditory conditions
were created: Music-Only, Background
Speech-Only, music with background
speech (Combined condition), Scrambled
music with background speech and White
Noise. The background-speech auditory
track as mentioned above was superimposed
at the same volume on Bachs Italian

Concerto (First Movement) and Haydns
Piano Sonata in E-Flat Major, No. 52. The
superimposed tracks were split into sets of
42 seconds each to match the duration of
each word lists presentation. This is
illustrated in Figure 1.
51
Intact Instrumental Music Track
Word
List 1
Scrambled Music Track
White Noise Track
Word
List 2
Music Only
Condition
Background Speech Track
Word
List 3
Word
List 4
Combined
Condition
Word
List 5
Word Word Word

List 6 List 7 List 8
Scrambled
Condition
Word Word
List 9 List 10
Background
Speech-Only
Condition
White Noise
Condition
Figure 1. Arrangement of Auditory Tracks & Assignment of Word Lists

The same musical track was
randomly split and rearranged to create the
Scrambled condition, therefore maintaining
the same number of musical notes while
disrupting the musical structure. This
prevented differences in number of musical
notes from producing an effect.
Manipulation Check
The manipulation check asked
participants to recall the segments of
conversations to rule out the possibility that
the complete or scrambled music (in the
Combined and Scrambled conditions) is
masking off the background speech track.
Procedure
Participants were presented with the
word lists paired with each of the five
auditory conditions and were instructed to

ignore the background auditory stimuli.
Once the list stops, the auditory stimuli was
paused and the participants were given one
minute to recall the words presented.
Immediate recall was required after every
list using a booklet provided. It was
emphasized that only words recalled in the
correct position would be scored as correct.
Exposing participants to different segments
controlled for habituation and familiarity
effects. In addition, the order of the 5
different
auditory
conditions
was
counterbalanced across the two test
sessions.

Results
Analysis of Manipulation Check
The manipulation check is done in
order to rule out the possibility that the
music or scrambled music can both merely
be masking the speech. Approximately 73%
of the participants recalled more than 2
categories of contents in the background
speech. The high percentage found in recall
of speech contents constituted evidence
suggesting that the music tracks did not
merely mask the background speech.
Analysis of Percentage of Word Recalled
A 5 2 repeated-measures ANOVA
was conducted on the percentage of words
recalled correctly. Two-way interaction is
not significant, F(4, 136) = .653 , p = .626,
MSE = .31 thus data were subsequently
collapsed across word frequency. The main
effect of word frequency did not reach
significance as well, F(1, 34) = 1.57 , p =
.219 , MSE = .031.
A significant main effect for music
conditions was observed, F(4, 136) = 5.25,
p = .001, MSE = .71 . The irrelevant speech
effect is successfully replicated as post hoc
comparisons found that percentage of
correct recall in the Background SpeechOnly condition (M = .554, SD = .280) was

significantly lower than recall in MusicOnly (M = .713, SD = .274), Combined (M
= .664, SD = .241), Scrambled (M = .741,
SD = .259) and White Noise (M = .698, SD
= .275) conditions. This means that the
Background
Speech-Only
is
most
detrimental to serial word recall compared
to all other sound types.
While instrumental music appears
influential in attenuating the ISE, we lacked
sufficient evidence to support the hypothesis
that instrumental music, specifically its
structure, can attenuate ISE as the
Scrambled condition had significantly
higher recall than both the Combined
condition and Background Speech-Only
condition. The Scrambled condition is
superior to both Combined and Background
Speech-Only conditions. The addition of the
instrumental music attenuated ISE but the
data suggest that musical structure per se is
not responsible for this effect. Table 2
showed the means and standard deviations
for recall, Table 3 contains post-hoc
comparisons while Figure 2 presents recall
across conditions.
Table 2
Means and Standard Deviations for Percentage of Correct Recall
Conditions
Music-Only
Combined
Background Speech Only
Scrambled
White Noise
Percentage Serial Recall Scores

M
SD
0.713
0.274
0.664
0.241
0.554
0.279
0.741
0.259
0.698
0.275
53

Table 3
LSD Pair-wise Comparisons for Main Effect.
Comparisons
Music-Only vs. Background-Only
Combined vs. Background-Only
vs. Scrambled
Scrambled vs. Background-Only
White Noise vs Background Only
* p < 0.05
Mean
Difference
0.16*
0.11*
-0.077*
0.187*
0.145*
Std.
Error
0.054
0.039
0.034
0.40
.051
95% CI
Lower
Upper
Bound
Bound
0.048
0.27
0.032
0.19
-0.150
-0.008
0.105
0.270
0.042
0.247
Percentage of Correct Recall
0.8
0.75
0.7
0.65
0.6
0.55
0.5
Music Only
Combined
Background
Speech Only
Scrambled
White Noise
Figure 2. Plots and Error Bars of Mean Percentage Recall Across Music Conditions. Background
Speech Only has the lowest percentage of recall while Combined and Scrambled conditions had
significantly higher recall than Background Speech-Only condition.
54
Discussion
The results suggested that the ISE
was replicated in this study using the new
auditory stimuli created. Recall performance
in Background Speech-Only was the worst
compared to all other auditory conditions.
However, there is inadequate evidence to
support the hypothesis that musical structure
per se can attenuate the ISE in the
Combined condition, given that the
Scrambled condition had better recall scores
than both the Combined and Background
Speech-Only conditions.
Auditory masking is not an adequate
explanation because of the high percentage
of contents recalled (73%), meaning
participants did process the background
speech. A proposed hybrid model of the
attention component from the feature model
by Neath (2000) and the changing-state
accounts from the O-OER model (Jones,
Madden & Miles, 1992) is required to
account for the improvements in recall
performance
under
Combined
and
Scrambled
conditions
compared
to
Background Speech-Only condition.
According to the O-OER model,
these changing state features give rise to
multiple objects, which interfere with serial
processing of the word list compared to a
repeated, steady auditory stream. In this
study, music did not impose additional
processing because it may have less
changing features than the irrelevant speech.
Therefore, the music tracks are preferred
over the irrelevant speech whereby in the
Combined and Scrambled conditions,
attention was diverted away from the
damaging irrelevant speech. Additional
cognitive resources can be allocated for the
serial word recall task. Ahveninen et al.
(2011), using multimodal techniques (PET,
fMRI, MEG and EEG), found that auditory
cortices can selectively deploy attention to
segregate relevant sounds from noise,
thereby mitigating the detrimental influence
of irrelevant speech. In this study, the music
track, with less changing-features, makes
processing easier, delegating more cognitive
resources for the serial word recall task,

thereby explaining superior performances in
Combined and Scrambled conditions.
An alternative explanation could be
that the cumulative presence of the
additional auditory stimuli and irrelevant
speech in this study led to an increase in
distraction
level,
resulting
in
a
compensatory increase in attention to the
serial recall task. Weissman, Warner and
Woldorff (2004) found in their experiment
that as the irrelevant stimulus increases in
distraction level, a compensatory increase in
selective attention follows. Therefore, an
overall increase in distractibility of auditory
stimuli can lead to a compensatory increase
in attention thereby explaining why
performances are better in the Combined or
Scrambled condition.
In summary, these findings represent
active processing by participants where
changing acoustical features of the
irrelevant speech and music tracks were
compared and the steadier latter stream is
preferred. Attention is either selectively
deployed to the less distracting stream or
increased via compensatory mechanisms,
allocating more attentional resources for the
serial recall task. Task performance is then
improved.
However, it is to be highlighted that
the hybrid model makes the assumption that
music has less changing-features than
irrelevant speech does, and would not make
a particular aim to make a distinction
between intact and scrambled music.
Therefore, it does not directly explain the
results of the present study fully, where
scrambled music yielded better recall
performance than did the Combined and
Background Speech-Only conditions.
Another property of music-arousal,
may explain why scrambled music produced
such superior recall performance. The
arousal-mood hypothesis by Thompson,
Schellenberg, and Husain (2001) argues that
the tempo of music is related to arousal
while its mode is linked to mood. Music in a
major mode corresponds to a happier mood
and minor mode as sad (Husain, Thompson

& Schellenberg, 2001). The re-arrangement
of the original Bach and Haydn sonatas
music could, in fact, augment the perceived
tempo in the scrambled track given its now
more staccato-like compared to its original
unscrambled counterpart. With possibly its
perceived faster tempo resulting in a higher
arousal than the Combined condition,
Scrambled condition allowed the allocation
of cognitive resources for performance
compared to the case where unscrambled
music was played.
Limitations and Conclusion
In line with the specific scope of the
current study, the arousal-mood hypothesis
is not tested. The results found that the
Scrambled condition helped recall more
than the Combined condition did. Since
musical structure of the stimuli did not
appear to be responsible for this attenuation,
future research should address acoustical or
References
Ahveninen,
J.,
Hmlinena,
M.,
Jskelinenc, I.P., Ahlforsa, S.P.,
Huang, S., Lina, F.H., Raija, T., Sams,
M., Vasiosa, C.P., & Belliveau, J.P.
(2011). Attention-driven auditory cortex
short-term plasticity helps segregate
relevant sounds from noise. PNAS, 108,
4182-4187.
Baddeley, A. D. (2003b). Working memory:
Looking back and looking forward.
Nature Reviews Neuroscience, 4, 829839.
Colle, H.A., & Welsh, A. (1976) . Acoustic
masking in primary memory. Journal of
Verbal Learning and Verbal Behavior,
15, 17-32.
Ellermeier, W., & Hellbruck, J. (1998). Is
level irrelevant in irrelevant speech?
Effects of loudness, signal-to-noise
ratio, and binaural unmasking. Journal
of Experimental Psychology: Human
Perception & Performance, 24, 14061414.
arousal properties of auditory stimuli that

can reduce ISE.
In conclusion, the present data
suggest that ISE can be attenuated (even in
a local context) but the reason for this
attenuation is not musical structure per se.
Changing acoustical properties and arousal
capabilities of the auditory stimuli may
unveil how we might exactly attenuate the
ISE. For scrambled music, its arousing
properties may potentially attenuate ISE.
Therefore, beyond changing-states and
selective attention, musics arousing
capabilities should be investigated in ISEs
attenuation. It is likely that both changing
acoustical features and arousal capacities
found in music may help attenuate the ISE.
These are exciting predictions would have
brought us closer to answering the longstanding question of just why music is so
capable of providing inoculation against a
harsh auditory environment.
Farley, L.A., Neath, I., Allbritton, D.W. &

Surprenant, A.M. (2007). Irrelevant
speech effects and sequential learning.
Memory & Cognition, 35, 156-165.
Husain,
G., Thompson,
W.F., &
Schellenberg, E.G. (2002). Effects of
musical tempo and mode on arousal,
mood, and spatial abilities. Music
Perception, 20, 151171.
Jones, D. M., Madden, C., & Miles, C.
(1992). Privileged access by irrelevant
speech to short-term memory: The role
of changing state. Quarterly Journal of
Experimental Psychology, 44A, 645669.
Lesiuk, T. (2010). The effect of preferred
music on mood and performance in a
high-cognitive demand occupation.
Journal of Music Therapy, 47, 137-154.
Lim, S. W. H., & Yap, M. J.
(2010). Distributional analyses in visual
lexical
decision:
Orthographic
neighborhood density and word
frequency effects. Poster presentation at
56

the 32nd Annual Conference of the
Cognitive Science Society, Portland,
Oregon, USA; paper published in S.
Ohlsson
&
R.
Catrambone
(Eds.), Proceedings of the 32nd Annual
Conference of the Cognitive Science
Society (pp. 700-705). Austin, TX:
Cognitive Science Society.
Miles, C., Jones, D. M., & Madden, C. A.
(1991). Locus of the irrelevant speech
effect in short-term memory. Journal of
Experimental Psychology: Learning,
Memory, & Cognition, 17, 578-584.
Nantais, K. M., & Schellenberg, E. G.
(1999). The Mozart effect: An artifact
of preference. Psychological Science,
10, 370373.
Neath, I. (2000). Modeling the effects of
irrelevant
speech
on
memory.
Psychonomic Bulletin & Review, 7,

403-423.
Schellenberg, E. G., & Hallam, S. (2005).
Music listening and cognitive abilities
in 10- and 11-year-olds: The Blur
effect. Annals of the New York Academy
of Sciences, 1060, 202209.
Tremblay, S., & Jones, D. M. (1998). Role
of habituation in the irrelevant sound
effect: Evidence from the effects of
token set size and rate of transition.
Learning, Memory, & Cognition, 24,
659-671.
Weissman, D.H., Warner, L.M., &
Woldorff, M.G. (2004). The neural
mechanisms for minimizing crossmodal
distraction.
Journal
of
Neuroscience, 24, 10941-10949.
57

Earmarking and Its Effects on Impulse Buying Reduction
Lee Zhi Qi Glenice, Maxine Wong Rui Shi, Alvin Tay An Ge, Lee Dayang
denise.kristen.natalya@gmail.com; annabellelim40@gmail.com;
msmaxinewong@gmail.com
Temasek Polytechnic
Earmarking is the act of reserving and setting aside an amount of money for different
purposes, which often involves the physical partitioning and labelling of money for
their particular purposes. Previous research (Soman & Cheema, 2008) demonstrated
that earmarking increased savings. In the current study, the effectiveness of earmarking
on reducing impulse purchase tendency was investigated. Impulse purchase was
measured in two different ways: the number of items not planned, and the difference
between budgeted amount and spent amount. Findings supported the hypothesis that
earmarking training helps to lower impulse purchase tendencies. Possible theoretical
explanations for the effectiveness of earmarking to reduce impulse purchase were
discussed. Practical implications of employing earmarking as a tool to reduce impulse
purchases were also explored.
Keywords: Impulse buying, earmarking, buying decisions
Impulse buying is a sudden,

powerful and persistent urge to buy
something immediately, without prior
planning (Rook, 1987), and occurs when the
consumer desires immediate gratification
from a purchase (Hoch & Loewenstein,
1991). Such purchases can create emotional
and cognitive conflicts, as the impulse
forces the consumer to satisfy their desires
immediately, without regard for future
consequences.
One cognitive component deemed to
be highly related to impulse buying is selfcontrol (Hoch & Loewenstein, 1991). Selfcontrol is the ability of the self to change its
own states and responses (Baumeister,
2002), and is needed in situations requiring
the inhibition of immediate gratification
(Hayes, 1989). Self-control is exerted
through a finite pool of ego resources
(Muraven & Baumeister, 2000). Ego
depletion refers to a state of diminished
resources due to the exertion of the ego
resource pool (Baumeister, Vohs & Tice,
2007). This leads to low self-control and
diminishes the willpower to exert effortful
control over immediate gratification
(Baumeister, Sparks, Stillman, & Vohs,

2008), thus leading to a higher tendency of
impulse buying. Godoy et al. (2007)
demonstrated
that
high
self-control
individuals tend to have better financial
outcomes.
Earmarking is the act of reserving
and setting aside an amount of money for
different purposes (Soman & Cheema,
2008). This often involves the physical
partitioning of money and labelling it for
their particular purposes. Soman and
Cheema
(2008)
demonstrated
that
earmarking techniques can be used to
control consumption. When a larger sum of
money is partitioned into smaller parts,
tracking expenditure becomes easier. Each
labelled partition increases the recall
accuracies of an individuals expenditure
needs.
In the current study, we investigate
whether earmarking can be used to reduce
impulse buying. The studys findings will
be pioneer literature in this research area of
earmarking. While Soman and Cheema
(2008) demonstrated that earmarking can
control consumption, it is unknown whether
this extends to impulse buying. There are
58

some reasons to believe that earmarking can
be effective in reducing impulse buying.
First, earmarking regulates expenditure by
creating boundaries, thereby externalising
self-control to minimise ego depletion
(Soman & Cheema, 2008). Hence, the
individual would have sufficient resources
to inhibit immediate gratification. Second,
the physical act of earmarking is
conceptually similar to that of mental
accounting (Thaler, 1999), which is known
to increase an individuals ability to exert
self control. Hence, we hypothesize that
earmarking can potentially reduce impulse
buying tendencies.
Method
Participants
Sixty students from Temasek
Polytechnic (ages 17-20) participated in the
study. The data from four participants were
removed for data analysis due to nonadherence of instructions.
Design
A between-subjects experimental
design was employed. The independent
variable was the type of training the
participants received. The experimental
group undergone earmarking training, while
the control group received no training.
Impulse buying is operationally defined as
the number of unplanned items purchased,
and the difference between budgeted and
spent amount. Thus, the dependent
measurements included the total number of
purchases, the number of purchases that
were not planned, and the difference
between amounts budgeted and spent.
Materials
Tokens. Six types of token bills
were used instead of real money: $1, $5,
$10, $20, $50 and $100. Each participant
was given $1000 worth of bills: 15 $1 bills,
15 $5 bills, 10 $10 bills, 8 $20 bills, 3 $50
bills and 5 $100 bills.
Scenarios. Three common shopping

scenarios that reflected a buying task which
the participant had to complete with $200
were created. The scenarios included: (a)
purchasing of stationeries for the new
semester,
(b)
budgeting
monthly
expenditure as an overseas student, and (c)
purchasing groceries and stationeries for an
entire month. These scenarios reflect
purchasing decisions a typical student has to
make. Participants were asked to create
shopping lists with the estimated prices of
each item.
Procedure
Participants were briefed on the
purpose of the study, and were randomly
assigned to either the experimental or the
control group. The experimental group
received training and instructions on
earmarking, but not the control group. Both
groups were then provided one of the three
scenarios (i.e., chosen at random) requiring
them to make purchases. Participants were
asked to come up with a purchase list based
on the provided scenario. After completing
the purchase list, they performed a filler
task (a survey on prosocial behaviour).
While the participants were engaged
in the filler task, the experimenters
appended the provided purchase list with
additional items. For example, if the
participant listed apples, the researchers
would add in similar items into the
shopping list (i.e., fruits such as oranges,
pears). The additional items simulate
items one would see when one steps into a
store, similar to a real shopping experience.
Items listed by the participants were not
changed and were included in the modified
list.
After participants completed the
filler task, they were handed the appended
list and were instructed that the list contains
items in the shopping environment.
Participants were then asked to decide
which items to purchase from the modified
purchase list with respect to the provided
59

scenario. This procedure was repeated for
all three scenarios. Upon completion of all
the scenarios, participants were debriefed.
Results
In order to assess participants
impulse buying tendencies, the following
dependent measures were totaled up across
the three scenarios and analyzed: (a)
Number of Purchased Items, (b) Number of
Purchased Unplanned Items, and (c)
Difference Between Planned Budget and
Spent Amount. The following dependent
measures were also analyzed to ensure
comparability between the control and
experimental groups: (d) Number of

Planned Items, (e) Number of Unpurchased
Planned Items, (f) Planned Budget, and (g)
Amount Spent.
Table 1 summarizes the means and standard
deviation of the dependent measures for
both the control and experimental groups.
A two-sample t-test was used to analyze
each of the dependent measures. There was
no significant differences for Number of
Planned Items, t(54) = 1.25, p > .21,
Planned Budget, t(54) = 1.30, p > .19,
Amount Spent, t(54) = 0.58, p > .56, and
Number of Unpurchased Planned Items,
t(54) = 0.59, p > .55.
Table 1.
Means of Dependent Measurements for Control and Experimental Groups, with Standard
Deviation in Parenthesis.
Control
Experimental
Number of Planned Items
16.04 (6.58)
13.94 (5.89)
Planned Budget
100.21 (50.14)
118.06 (50.63)
Number of Purchased Items
20.74 (9.15)
16.55 (6.25)
Amount Spent
107.99 (76.17)
117.95 (52.81)
Difference Between Amount Spent and Planned 7.78 (60.74)

Budget
-0.11 (32.37)
Number of Purchased Unplanned Items
6.57 (5.82)
4.03 (3.15)
Number of Unpurchased Planned Items
1.87 (2.12)
1.52 (2.29)
This suggests that both control and

experimental groups were comparable.
For the dependent measures assessing
impulse buying tendencies, there was a
significant difference for Number of
Purchased Items, t(54) = 2.04, p < .05, and
Number of Purchased Unplanned Items,
t(54) = 2.10, p < .04. However, there was no

significant difference for the Difference
Between Amount Spent and Planned
Budget, t(54) = 0.63, p > .53. This suggests
that earmarking training decreases the
number of impulse purchase, but does not
result in less overall spending.
60
Discussion
In the current study, we investigated
whether earmarking can reduce impulse
buying. Participants who were trained in
earmarking were compared to a control
group for their impulse buying tendencies
across three simulated scenarios. Overall,
the findings supported the hypothesis that
earmarking reduces impulse buying, with
participants in the experimental group
purchasing fewer items and unplanned
purchases.
The findings from the current study
can be accounted with the concept of selfcontrol. Human information processing
consists of two levels, a controlled level that
requires ego resources, and an automatic
level that depletes minimal ego resources
(Schmeichel, Vohs, Baumeister, 2003).
Hence, actions that require less mental
processing would deplete minimal ego
resources. The physical action of
earmarking meant that the process of
budgeting is externalized and requires lesser
internal resources. This results in less ego
depletion, and reduces impulse buying.
In the study, additional items were
added to the participants shopping list and
they were asked to decide which items to
purchase, not dissimilar to a real life
shopping situation. Bettman, Johnson and
Payne (1991) stated that the number of
alternatives, the difficulty of processing
alternatives, the ambiguity of alternatives,
and the number of shared features of
alternatives can increase the effort for
References
Baumeister, R. F. (2002). Yielding to
temptation:
Self-control
failure,
impulsive purchasing and consumer
behavior.
Journal
of
Consumer
Research, 28, 670676.
Baumeister, R. F., Sparks, E. A., Stillman,
T. F., & Vohs, K. D. (2008). Free will in
consumer behavior: Self-control, ego
depletion, and choice. Journal of
consumers to make a purchasing decision.

When one tries to make an effortful
decision, ego resources are depleted, and
individuals may have ended up passive
about making subsequent decisions and
judgements (Baumeister et al., 2008). In
such situations, they tend to choose the
default option. For participants who
underwent the earmarking training, the
default option might be more salient
compared to the control group, as more time
was spent on partitioning expenditures into
different categories. Hence, they are more
likely to stick to their planned shopping list
in this situation.
The findings from the current study
suggests that earmarking is effective in
reducing impulse buying tendencies. The
public could be educated on how to use
earmarking to curb impulse purchases.
Furthermore, given the popularity of mobile
applications,
future
research
could
potentially
explore
implementing
earmarking on a mobile platform. However,
given that the current study assessed
impulse buying in simulated shopping
scenarios, we propose replicating the study
in a natural shopping environment before
implementing earmarking on a larger scale.
In conclusion, the current study
provides some evidence that earmarking
might reduce impulse buying tendencies.
However, further research is required before
earmarking can be implemented on a larger
scale to aid the average consumer in
resisting impulse purchase.
Consumer Psychology, 18(1), 4-13.

doi:10.1016/j.jcps.2007.10.002.
Baumeister, R. F., Vohs, K. D., & Tice, D.
M. (2007). The strength model of selfcontrol.
Current
Directions
in
Psychological Science, 16(6), 351-355.
Bettman, J. R., Johnson, E. J., & Payne, J.
W. (1991). Consumer decision making.
Handbook of consumer behavior , 6(2),
50-84. doi: 10.1086/208753
Godoy, R., Reyes-Garcia, V., Huanca, T.,
Leonard, W. R., McDade, T., Tanner, S.,

& Seyfried, C. (2007). On the measure
of
income
and
the
economic
unimportance of social capital: Evidence
from a native Amazonian society of
farmers and foragers. Journal of
Anthropological Research, 63, 239-260.
Hayes, S. C. (1989). Rule-governed
behavior: Cognition, contingencies, and
instructural control, New York: Plenum.
Hoch, S. J., & Loewenstein, G. F. (1991).
Time-inconsistent
preferences
and
consumer self-control. Journal of
Consumer Research, 17, 492-507.
Muraven, M., & Baumeister, R. F. (2000).
Self-regulation and depletion of limited
resources: Does self-control resemble a
muscle? Psychological Bulletin, 126(2),
247-259. doi:
I0.I037//00332909.126.2.247
Rook, D. W. (1987). The buying impulse.

The Journal of Consumer Research,
14(2), 189-199.
Schmeichel, B. J., Vohs, K. D., &
Baumeister, R. F. (2003). Intellectual
performance and ego depletion: Role of
the self in logical reasoning and other
information processing. Journal of
Personality and Social Psychology,
85(1), 33 46. doi: 10.1037/00223514.85.1.33
Soman, D. & Cheema, A. (2008). The effect
of partitions on controlling consumption.
Journal of Marketing Research, 45(6),
665-675. doi: 10.1509/jmkr.45.6.665
Thaler, R. H. (1999). Mental accounting
matters. Journal of Behavioral Decision
Making, 12(3), 183206.
62

The Effects of Normative Evaluation on Buying Intention
Adam Quek Chin Kiat, Jazreel Tan, Sri Nur Idayu Binte Roslan, Hong Dou
1000126A@student.tp.edu.sg
Temasek Polytechnic
Unplanned buying refers to purchases made without prior intention. This study
examines whether normative evaluation strategies (NES) influence unplanned buying
tendencies. 59 participants indicated their initial buying intention (BI) for given
products. Based on their initial BI, they were categorized into high or low initial BI
groups and further randomly assigned to positive or negative NES conditions. In the
positive (vs. negative) NES condition, participants listed three positive (vs. negative)
attributes of the product and described the product using the identified attributes.
Participants then indicated their BI again. A 2 x 2 between-participants ANOVA found
that participants in the negative NES condition indicated a more negative change in BI
than those in the positive NES condition. Participants with higher initial BI also
indicated a more negative change in BI than participants with lower initial BI. No
significant interaction effect was found. The findings suggest that NES influence
unplanned buying tendencies.
Keywords: unplanned buying, normative evaluation strategy, buying intention
Impulsive purchases have been
associated with negative consequences in
ones personal finance, post-purchase
satisfaction, and overall self-esteem (Rook,
1987; Rook & Hoch, 1985). In Singapore
alone, credit card loans have increased from
S$3.8 billion in 2005 to S$5.5 billion in
2008 (Lim, Wong, & Koh, 2009), with
impulse purchases taking up a chunk of
spending
(Bellenger,
Robertson,
&
Hirschman, 1978).
Stern (1962) defined unplanned
buying as purchases that a shopper makes
without prior intention. Researchers have
conceptualized both unplanned and impulse
buying interchangeably. According to Rook
and Fisher (1995), when individuals act on
impulse, likelihood of unplanned buying
increases. The problem arises due to
peoples tendency to overvalue proximate
satisfaction in comparison to more distant
ones (Strotz, 1956). Rook and Hoch (1985)
distinguished five crucial elements to
differentiate impulsive purchases from nonimpulsive purchases. They suggest that
impulsive purchases involve (i) a sudden
and spontaneous desire to act, (ii) an
experience of psychological disequilibrium,

(iii) a psychological conflict and struggle,
(iv) a reduction in their cognitive evaluation
of the product attributes, and (v) a decision
that was made without regard to its
consequences.
Based on the fourth feature of
unplanned buying above, consumers will
typically reduce their cognitive evaluation
of product attributes during the point of
purchase. Weinberg and Gottwald (1982)
suggest that impulse buying is typically
considered automatic and is determined
by high affective activation and low
intellectual control of the buying.
Depending on the consumers motivation or
amount of cognitive resources available to
counter the impulse, cognitive activity may
increase or decrease dramatically as conflict
arises.
Normative Evaluation Strategies
Normative evaluation refers to the
consumers
judgment
about
the
appropriateness of an impulsive purchase in
a particular situation (Rook & Fisher, 1995)
along a continuum of normatively neutral to
either strong disapproval or approval
63

(Herabadi, 2003). A study conducted by
Rook and Fisher (1995) found that using
normative evaluation strategies (NES) could
effectively moderate the relationship
between ones buying impulsiveness trait
and
subsequent
buying
decisions.
Individuals tasked to engage in positive
NES showed an increase in their buying
intention (BI) of the product, while an
opposite effect was found when negative
NES was employed. When a consumer
experiences an impulse to purchase a
product and evaluates the purchase
negatively, ones desire to own or consume
the product may decrease, and individuals
would thus be less likely to act on their
buying impulses (Rook & Fisher, 1995).
Baumeister, Heatherton, and Tice
(1994) argued that unplanned purchases are
more a matter of weak rationalization than
being helpless against strong desires. Thus
in this study, we aim to replicate and extend
Rook and Fishers (1995) findings on a
different
population
specifically
Singapores consumer population.
Based on this line of reasoning, we
hypothesized that the type of NES
employed will influence BI. Specifically, by
employing negative NES, consumers will
have a more negative change in BI
compared to those employing positive NES,
as negative aspects of the purchase become
more salient.
Method
Participants
59
students
from
Temasek
Polytechnic (TP), 22 male and 37 female
with a mean age of 18 years old (SD =
1.13), took part in the study in order to
fulfill requirement for various Psychology
courses they were taking. All participants
provided their written consent before
participating in the study. Refer to
Appendix A for the informed consent form.
Materials
Two
questionnaires
were
administered. The first questionnaire was
intended to measure the participants initial
BI for four chocolate products with

discounted prices stated. Chocolates were
used as they were found to increase the
likelihood to trigger unplanned buying
(Tirmizi, Kashif-Ur-Rahman & Saif, 2009).
Presented with the physical products,
participants answered one question, How
likely are you to buy this product? using a
six-point Likert rating scale for each
product, with 1 being Not at all and 6 being
Very likely.
The second questionnaire required
participants to employ either a positive or
negative NES for the same products. For
each product, they listed three positive (vs.
negative) attributes and wrote a paragraph
(40 to 60 words) with the identified
attributes; to ensure that participants
engaged in careful deliberation in the
evaluation tasks. After each evaluation, they
were asked to rate their BI for the product
again using the same six-point Likert rating
scale. Refer to Appendix B for samples of
both questionnaires.
Procedure
Participants were briefed that the
study was regarding marketing strategies
and were given the first questionnaire. Upon
completing
the
questionnaire,
each
participants initial BI was calculated by
summing up BI scores for the four products.
A cut-off score of 14.5 was adopted for
assigning participants to high (scores above
14.5) vs. low (scores below 14.5) initial BI
conditions, as 14.5 was the middle point
between the possible range of scores (14 to
24) Participants in both groups were then
randomly assigned to either the positive or
negative NES condition and given the
corresponding second questionnaire. Each
NES condition was carried out in a different
classroom. After completing the second
questionnaire participants were then
debriefed on the full nature of the study.
Design
The experiment employed a 2
(Initial BI: high vs. low) x 2 (NES: positive
vs. negative) between-participants factorial
64

design. The dependent variable was the
mean change in BI after implementing the
NES. The rationale for splitting participants
by initial BI and including it as a second
independent variable was to control for
differences in initial BI. This is to ensure
that the hypothesis holds regardless of
whether participants initial BI is high or
low
Results
Change in Buying Intention
A 2 (Initial BI: high vs. low) x 2
(NES: positive vs. negative) randomized
ANOVA was employed to analyze the data.
The dependent variable was the difference
in mean BI scores, which was calculated by
subtracting the total BI score of the second
questionnaire from the total BI score of the
first questionnaire. The descriptive statistics
for each condition are summarized in Table

1.
The main effect of initial BI was
significant, F(1, 55) = 13.88, p < .01, 2 =
.17. As shown in Table 1, participants with
high initial BI had a more negative change
in BI compared to the low initial BI group.
As hypothesized, the main effect of NES
was also significant and there was a more
negative change in BI in the negative NES
condition compared to the positive NES
condition, F(1,55) = 12.13, p < .01, 2 = .15.
The initial BI x NES interaction effect was
not significant, F(1,55) = 1.18, p > .05, 2 =
.01. This confirms that the effect of NES
does not depend on participants levels of
initial BI. The small effect size further
suggests that this is not just due to the small
sample size used.
Table 1.
Mean Change in BI Based on Initial BI and NES Used
High Initial BI
Low Initial BI
Total
Positive NES
-.24
Negative NES
-2.95
Total
-1.67
SD
1.52
2.89
2.68
17
19
36
1.33
-.09
.65
SD
1.92
2.12
2.10
12
11
23
.41
-1.90
-.76
SD
1.84
2.94
2.71
n
29
30
59
Notes. Changes in BI scores were computed by the subtraction of the total BI score in the second
questionnaire from the total BI score in the first questionnaire in each condition.
Discussion
In this study, the effects of NES on
consumers BI for the product were
examined. The present findings extend
Rook and Fishers (1995) results,
supporting the proposition that by
employing a negative NES of the product

before making the decision, in other words
making the negative aspects of the purchase
more salient, a consumer would be less
likely to succumb to the stimulation of
65

desire to engage in the unplanned buying
compared to using a positive NES. To sum
up our findings, our hypothesis was
supported. Positive vs. negative NES
influenced participants BI in the expected
direction, regardless of the participants
initial BI.
Limitations
One of the limitations of this study was that
the items that were used in the survey were
specifically chocolate. Therefore, the results
obtained may not be generalised to all
products in the consumption environment.
Future research could be conducted on a
wider variety of products (e.g. daily
necessities,
high
end
goods
and
technological goods).
Next, there could be a discrepancy between
the consumers BI and their actual buying
behavior as actual buying behavior was not
measured. This could affect the results of
the study as there could be an inconsistency

between the behaviour of the participants
within the simulated classroom environment
and the actual consumption environment.
Future research can consider conducting the
study in an actual consumption environment
and include actual buying behavior as a
dependent variable.
Implication and Conclusion
In conclusion, NES can influence a
consumers BI. Therefore, when one
experiences high BI, a negative NES may
counter unplanned buying. Concurrently,
they can also avoid engaging in positive
NES as it can increase BI. If future research
successfully replicates the current findings
with a variety of products and participant
pool, social programs and even counselors
could utilize NES as a tool to regulate
purchasing habits within the consumption
environment.
Reference
Baumeister, R. F., Heatherton, T. F., &
Tice, D. M. (1994). Losing Control:
How and Why People Fail at SelfRegulation. San Diego: CA: Academic
Press.
Bellenger, D. N., Robertson, D. H., &
Hirschman, E. C. (1978). Impulse
Buying Varies By Product. Journal of
Advertising Research, 18, 15-18.
Herabadi, A. G. (2003). Buying impulses: A
study on impulsive consumption.
Unpublished dissertation. University of
Nijmegen, The Netherlands
Lim, L., Wong, S. N., & Koh, S. T.
Singapore Department of Statistics,
Economic Accounts Division. (2009).
Household sector balance sheet 2008:
recent trends and developments.
Retrieved from Singapore Department of
Statistics
website:
http://www.singstat.gov.sg/pubn/papers/
economy/ssnsep09-pg1-7.pdf
Muhammad Ali Tirmizi, Kashif-UrRahman, M. Iqbal Saif. (2009). An
Empirical Study of Consumer Impulse

Buying Behaviour in Local Markets.
European
Journal
of
Scientific
Research, 28(4), 522-532.
Rook, D. W. (1987). The Buying Impulse.
Journal of Consumer Research, 14, 189199.
Rook, D. W., & Fisher, R. J. (1995).
Normative Influences on Impulsive
Buying Behavior. Journal of Consumer
Research, 22, 305-313.
Rook, D. W., & Hoch, S. J. (1985).
Consuming Impulses. Advances in
Stern, H. (1962). The Significance of
Impulse Buying Today. Journal of
Marketing, 26(2), 59-62.
Strotz, R. (1956). Myopia and Inconsistency
in Dynamic Utility Maximization.
Review of Economic Studies, 23, 165180.
Weinberg, P. and Gottwald, W. (1982),
Impulsive consumer buying as a result
of emotion, Journal of Business
Research, 10(1), pp. 43-57
66
Implementation Intentions & Impulse Buying

Abigail Seng Hui Xin,Lim Joyann, Ng Jing Ying
abigailseng@gmail.com
Temasek Polytechnic
Implementation intentions is a goal setting strategy has been successful in managing health
behaviors. We test implementation intentions efficacy in the consumer domain, specifically as
an intervention strategy to reduce impulse buying. Participants underwent implementation
intentions training in the first session before being led into an impulse buying situation during
the second session after completing a product evaluation survey. Our results suggest that
implementation intentions is ineffective as an intervention to impulse buying. The implications
and limitations are discussed.
Implementation intentions (II) are

If-Then plans involving associating
situational cues with behavioral responses,
and translating goal intentions into specific
actions (e.g., If X occurs, Then I will do Y)
(Gollwitzer, 1999). Individuals engaging II
execute a planned response when they
encounter situational cues identified as goal
attainment barriers, hence increasing goal
attainment rates (Gollwitzer & Sheeran,
2006).
Implementation
intentions
was
found to be effective in shaping behavior in
the health domain, resulting in increased
goal attainment rates (Guillaumie et al,
2012), such as adherence to medication
routine (Brown, Sheeran & Reuber, 2009),
reduction
of
alcohol
consumption
(Armitage, 2009) and pregnancy rates
(Martin et al., 2011). While many studies
demonstrate IIs efficacy in shaping health
behaviors, there are fewer studies
investigating the relation between II and
consumer behavior (Fennis & Stroebe,
2010).
Impulse buying is a spontaneous and

persistent urge to purchase unnecessary
items (Beatty & Ferrell, 1998), which is
difficult to resist due to its hedonic quality
that encourages immediate gratification
(Rook, 1987). There are similarities
between impulse buying and negative health
behaviors, in that both are myopic decisions
that favor immediate gratification (Hoch &
Loewenstein, 1991). Hence, II could
possibly be implemented as a strategy for
managing impulse buying due to its efficacy
in managing health behaviors.
the efficacy of II as an intervention strategy
for managing impulse buying. Participants
were either trained to use II, or to set goals
(i.e., control condition) on a variety of
hypothetical situations, including impulse
buying. Participants were then assessed for
their ability to resist impulse buying during
an enacted impulse buying scenario on a
later date. We predict that participants who
received II training are more likely to resist
impulse buying compared to the control
condition
.
Methods
Participants
Forty-eight participants (26 female,
22 male) from Temasek Polytechnic were
recruited. They were awarded course credit
and received $4.00 remuneration.
Design
The independent variable was the
type of training participants underwent.
Participants were randomly assigned to one
of three training conditions (control, II
reminder, II no reminder). Three
dependent measures were used to assess
impulse buying: (a) willingness of product

purchase; (b) purchase price assignment;
and (c) purchase decision. The first two
measures were embedded within a product
evaluation survey. The last measure was
obtained through an enacted scenario. Vohs
and Faber (2007) argued that purchase price
assignment (i.e., highest price one would
pay for a product) is positively related with
purchase impulsivity, as Carson et al.
(1996) reported a 0.86 mean agreement ratio
between price assignments and actual
expenditure.

Materials
For the first session, participants
were provided a shopping scenario
embedded with a situational cue (i.e., 50%
discount). They were taught how to create
If-Then plans using the shopping
scenario. Participants were next provided a
practice booklet and instructed to apply II to
set goals for three hypothetical scenarios
targeting behaviors from different domains.
For the second session, a product
evaluation survey consisting of four
products chocolate, mug, headphone and a
pair of shades was used. The survey items
consist of six items, including the dependent
measures (i.e., How willing are you to
purchase this product?, How much are
you willing to pay?) on a five-point Likert
scale.
Procedure
Participants were required to attend
two separate study sessions spaced a day
apart. Participants were informed that both
sessions were unrelated and conducted by
different group of researchers.
In the first session, participants
underwent a mass training session. For
participants in the II training with reminder
& II training without reminder conditions,
they were taught to write If-Then plans
using the provided shopping scenario.
Participants in the control group were

trained on goal settings using identical
training materials, without mentioning II.
After the training, participants in all
conditions were instructed to practice what
they were taught with the provided practice
booklet, before they were debriefed.
In the second session, participants
underwent a product evaluation session
using the product evaluation survey.
Participants in the II training with reminder
condition were reminded of their previous
training, as Sheeran, Webb and Gollwitzer
(2005) demonstrated that II was effective
only when a relevant goal had been
activated. Participants in the other two
conditions were not reminded. Participants
were then asked to evaluate products that
were presented to them one at a time. Upon
completion of all product evaluation,
participants received $4.00 remuneration.
At this point, researchers informed
participants that they could purchase the
chocolate at 50% discount (i.e., $2.00). This
enacted scenario is similar to a typical
impulse
buying
situation
because
participants did not plan to purchase the
chocolate in advance, and were now
induced to buy it with the remuneration and
50% offer. Participants are only allowed to
purchase one chocolate bar.
Table 1.
Means of Purchase Willingness score, Price Assignment ratings & Percentage of Chocolate
Purchases across the different conditions. Standard Deviation in Parenthesis.
Condition
Purchase
Purchase Price
Percentage of
Willingness
Assignment
Product
Purchases
Control (n=17)
3.47 (1.11)
$5.13 (4.57)
29%
II no reminder (n=13)
3.92 (0.99)
$3.69 (1.11)
31%
II reminder (n=18)
3.50 (0.86)
$6.00 (6.48)
16%
Results
Three dependent measures were
analyzed: (a) product purchase willingness,
(b) product price assignment of chocolate

and (c) actual product purchase.
Table 1 summarized mean purchase
willingness and purchase price assignment,
68

and product purchase percentages for all
conditions. Data from eight participants
were excluded from analysis because they
reported extreme price assignment values (n
=5) or inconsistent purchase decision (n
=3). A one-way ANOVA was conducted for
the purchase willingness and price
assignment. No significant differences were
found for purchase willingness, F (2, 37) =
.920, p > .05 and purchase price assignment,
F (2, 37) = .231, p > .05. 1
A Chi-Square goodness-of-fit test
was used to analyze number of actual
purchases in the different conditions. No
significant difference was found, 2 (2, N =
40) = 1.53, p >.05. Overall, the data analysis
suggests that training in II did not affect
participants inclination for impulse buying.
Discussion
the efficacy of II as an intervention strategy
to manage impulse buying. Participants
were trained in II, and were then assessed
for their ability to resist impulse buying
during an enacted impulse buying scenario.
We found that II training did not affect
participants willingness to purchase a
product, product price assignment and
actual product purchase. Overall, this
suggests that II might not be effective in
managing impulse buying.
Our findings are inconsistent with
previous studies in health behavior (e.g.,
Armitage, 2009) that demonstrated IIs
effectiveness. One possible explanation for
the inability for IIs efficacy to transfer from
health behaviors to impulse buying is that
both types of behaviors might be
qualitatively different. Compared to impulse
buying, negative health behaviors tend to
result in worse consequence when not
properly managed (e.g., death). The higher
1
The pattern of results remained similar even

without exclusion of data: purchase willingness
scores, F (2, 45) = 1.162, p > .05, product price
assignment, F (2, 45) = .585, p > .05, actual
purchase, 2 (2, N = 48) = 1.07, p >.05.
stakes might result in a stronger intention to

change. Gollwitzer & Oettingen (1998)
demonstrated that strong intentions are
necessary in II for behavioral change.
Hence, the comparatively lower stakes for
habitual impulse buying (i.e., debts) might
result in weaker intentions to change, which
renders II ineffective. This argument is also
supported by the fact that highly motivated
individuals are usually sampled in studies
demonstrating IIs effectiveness for
consumer behavior (e.g., Fennis et al.,
2011), unlike most consumers who are not
motivated when engaging in daily
consumption behaviors (Krugman, 1965).
This suggests that IIs effectiveness as
reported in previous studies might not
necessarily
translate
to
effective
management of real life consumer behavior.
Fennis et al. (2011) demonstrated
the IIs effectiveness in encouraging
consumers to engage
in
purchasing
behavior. However, the current study
investigates
IIs
effectiveness
in
discouraging purchasing behavior. Hence,
the difference in the types of consumer
behavior that II was employed on might
affect its effectiveness. It is possible that II
might only be effective in managing some,
but not all, consumer behaviors.
Methodological Limitations
Webb
and
Sheeran
(2008)
demonstrated that II effectiveness was
mediated by the accessibility of specified
situational cues and by the strength of the
association forged between these cues and
the intended response. Although we tried to
remind some of the participants of their II
training, we cannot be sure if this
sufficiently activated both the situational
cues and the intended responses because no
manipulation
check
was
employed.
Furthermore, the current studys II training
is less intense compared to previous studies
(i.e., twenty minutes compared hours or
weeks). Gollwitzer and Sheeran (2009)
argued that intense training is crucial for
effective formation of II. Due to these
69

methodological limitations, one should be
cautious when interpreting the findings from
the current study.
In conclusion, our current study does
not provide sufficient evidence to suggest
that II can be used to manage impulse
buying. However, further research is
required before a definitive claim could be
made. Future avenues of research could

include a similar study where the intensity
of training is increased, or to investigate
whether II is only effective for certain types
of consumer behaviors. Until such studies
are conducted, we suggest exercising
prudence when considering using II for
managing impulse buying.
References
Personality and Social Psychology, 73,

186-199.
Gollwitzer, P. M., & Oettingen, G. (1998).
The emergence and implementation of
health goals. Psychology & Health, 13,
687-715.
Gollwitzer, P. M., & Sheeran, P. (2006).
Implementation intentions and goal
achievement: A meta-analysis of effects
and processes. In M. P. Zanna (Ed.),
Advances in Experimental Social
Psychology, 38, 69119.
Gollwitzer, P. M., & Sheeran, P. (2009).
Self Regulation of consumer decision
making and behaviour: The role of
implementation intentions. Journal of
Consumer Psychology, 19(4), 593-607.
Guillamumie, L., Godin, G., Manderscheid,
J. C., Spitz, E., & Muller, L. (2012).
The impact of self-efficacy and
implementation
intentions-based
interventions on fruit and vegetable
intake among adults. Psychology &
Health, 1-21.
Hoch, S. J., & Loewenstein, G. F. (1991).
Time-inconsistent Preferences and
Consumer Self-Control, Journal of
Krugman, H. E. (1965). The impact of
television advertising: Learning without
involvement. Public Opinion Quarterly,
29, 349-356.
Martin, J., Sheeran, P., Slade, P., Wright,
A., & Dibble, T. (2011). Durable effects
of implementation intentions: Reduced
rates of confirmed pregnancy at 2
years. Health Psychology, 30(3), 368373.
Armitage, C. J. (2009). Effectiveness of

experimenter-provided
and
selfgenerated implementation intentions to
reduce alcohol consumption in a sample
of the general population: A
randomized exploratory trial. Health
Psychology, 28(5), 545-553.
Beatty, S. E., & Ferrell, M. E. (1998).
Impulse
Buying:
Modelling
Its
Precursors, Journal of Retailing. 74(2),
169-191.
Brown, I., Sheeran, P., & Reuber, M.
(2009). Enhancing anti-epileptic drug
adherence: A randomized controlled
trial. Epilepsy and Behavior, 16(4),
634-639.
Carson, R. T., Flores, N. E., Martin, K. M.,
& Wright, J. L. (1996), Contingent
Valuation and Revealed Preference
Methodologies:
Comparing
the
Estimates for Quasi-Public Goods, Land
Economics 72, 80-99.
Fennis, B. M., & Stroebe, W. (2010). The
psychology of advertising. Hove:
Psychology Press.
Fennis, B. M., Adriaanse, M. A., Stroebe,
W., & Pol, B. (2011). Bridging the
intention behavior gap: Inducing
implementation intentions through
persuasive
appeals,
Journal
of
Consumer Psychology, 21, 302-311.
Gollwitzer, P. M. (1999). Implementation
Intentions: Strong Effects of Simple
Plan. American Psychologist, 54(7),
493-503.
Gollwitzer, P. M., & Brandstatter, V.
(1997). Implementation intentions and
effective goal pursuit. Journal of
70

Rook, D. W. (1987). The Buying Impulse,
Journal of Consumer Research, 14,
189-199.
Sheeran, P., Webb, T. L., & Gollwitzer, P.
M. (2005). The interplay between goal
intentions
and
implementation
intentions. Personality and Social
Psychology Bulletin, 31, 87-98.
Vohs, K. D., & Faber, R. J. (2007). Spent
Resources: Self Regulatory Resource
Availability Affects Impulse Buying,

537-547.
Webb, T. L., & Sheeran, P. (2008).
Mechanisms
of
implementation
intention effects: The role of goal
intentions,
self-efficacy,
and
accessibility of plan components.
British Journal of Social Psychology,
47, 373-395.
71

The Effects of Inoculation and Persuasion Knowledge Training on Resisting Sales
Persuasion
Kho Kian Hao, Mubarak Johari
1004488a@student.tp.edu.sg
Temasek Polytechnic
Consumer decisions can be affected by a number of sales influence tactics. Prior research has
explored several methods which have shown effectiveness in training consumers to generate
counter-arguments against persuasive messages (and hence resist sales influence tactics). In this
current study, the effects of Inoculation treatment and Persuasion Knowledge Training on
consumers ability to generate valid counter-arguments were explored in a 2 (Inoculation: Yes
vs. No) x 2 (Persuasion Knowledge Training: Yes vs. No) factorial design. The only set of
significant results suggests that Inoculation increases ones ability to generate valid counterarguments. The findings are then discussed; before the limitations of the study are highlighted.
The results of this study will be able to help TOTE Board consumers (make better purchase
decisions) by highlighting the utility of Inoculation.
Key words: consumer; counter-argue; influence tactics; inoculation; persuasion knowledge
For2 decades, marketers and sales personnel

have been trained to use a variety of
influence tactics to influence consumers.
Many Singaporeans have fallen prey to such
influence tactics in the contexts of IT fairs,
departmental stores, spas, and salons, and
much more. Sales influence tactics involve
influencing a consumers behaviour in a
particular direction to buy the product
(Hall & Barrett, 2007, para. 3). Examples of
such sales influence tactics might include
lowballing (where an influencer secures
agreement with a request before increasing
the size of that request by revealing hidden
costs) and the thats-not-all technique
(where an inflated request is proposed,
before its apparent size is decreased by
offering a discount or bonus) (Kassin, Fein
& Markus, 2011).
Prior literature has explored ways to
increase the average consumers ability to
make wise purchase decisions independent
of influence tactics. This paper will
specifically explore Inoculation treatment
and Persuasion Knowledge Training to help
consumers counter-argue against sales
agents (hence increasing their resistance to
2
The authors would like to acknowledge the

contribution of He Qixiang and Jane Lim to the
research study and writing of the initial research
report
sales influence tactics; as the ability to

counter-argue can be used as a proxy to
assess ones ability to resist or even counter
sales influence tactics).
Inoculation theory (first introduced
by McGuire in 1964), was developed to
help consumers in the sales industry resist
and counter sales influence tactics. Borchers
(2001) described Inoculation as a rejection
to persuasive communication before actual
persuasion messages are brought up. In
simpler terms, a weakened attack would
be given before an actual attack, to allow
an individual to build up resistance to the
actual attack beforehand.
McGuire (1961a) mentioned that
there are two key factors to the Inoculation
process. The first factor includes
forewarning an individual of the coming
attack, before he or she strengthens his or
her attitudes and increases resistance to the
threat. The second factor includes a set of
specific arguments obtained beforehand,
and used to refute persuasion (Pfau &
Burgoon, 1997). They could be given to or
generated by participants to serve as a
practice session to defend their own
attitudes
through
counter-arguing.
According to a meta-analysis on Inoculation
theory, participants who received an
Inoculation treatment were more resistant to
72

following
influence
messages
than
participants who did not receive any
Inoculation treatment (Pfau et al., 2000).
Hence, it is important to determine if
giving consumers prior weak attacks (for
instance, in terms of the sale of a grossly
overpriced product) would help consumers
build up resistance for future attacks. Thus,
the first hypothesis is:
H1: Inoculation treatment is effective
in helping consumers to better counterargue against sales agents.
The use of persuasion knowledge
might also be useful for consumers in the
sales context. Friestad and Wright (1994)
defined persuasion knowledge as an integral
resource which consumers rely on when
responding to sales agents, and proposed the
Persuasion Knowledge Model (PKM) to
present
how
peoples
persuasion
knowledge influences their responses to
persuasion attempts (p. 1). According to
this model, how people respond as targets of
persuasion is determined by the persuasion
knowledge that they have. Studies have
shown that the activation and trigger of
ones persuasion knowledge will reduce the
effectiveness of sales influence tactics used
against him or her (Brown & Krishna, 2004;
Campbell & Kirmani 2000; Morales 2005).
It would then be important to

determine if giving consumers Persuasion
Knowledge Training (with regards to sales
influence tactics) would help consumers to
enhance their persuasion knowledge (and
hence be better able to counter-argue
against sales agents; since counter-arguing
against sales agents is an important aspect
of resisting sales influence). Thus, the
second hypothesis is:
H2: Persuasion Knowledge Training
is effective in helping consumers to better
counter-argue against sales agents.
Inoculation Treatment and Persuasion
There is reason to expect both
Inoculation Treatment and Persuasion
Knowledge Training to help consumers
better counter-argue against sales agents. In
fact, the two might even combine to have a
multiplier effect on consumers ability to
counter-argue against sales agents. This
paper, therefore, also aims to explore any
possible interaction effect that might occur
when combining Inoculation treatment and
Persuasion Knowledge Training. Thus, the
third hypothesis is:
H3: Inoculation treatment coupled
with Persuasion Knowledge Training will
interact to produce an especially powerful
effect in helping consumers to better
counter-argue against sales agents.
Methods
Participants
A total of 50 polytechnic students
from the Temasek Polytechnic Research
Participants Pool were recruited. They were
compensated with one Research Participant
Credit and five Singapore dollars. Ten
additional polytechnic students were
recruited through verbal requests, and
compensated with five Singapore dollars,
making a total of 60 participants (28 males
and 32 females). Participants provided their
written informed consent prior to
commencing the study.
Materials
A pre-test survey was presented on
paper to all participants to gauge their level
of pre-existing persuasion knowledge, to

ensure that there were equivalent levels of
prior
persuasion
knowledge
across
conditions. For the Inoculation treatment, a
lined counter-argument form was provided
for participants to list down as many
counterarguments as they could as to why
they should not buy the bag presented, in
order to Inoculate them.
For the measurement of participants
ability to generate counter-arguments,
participants were presented a lined counterargument form, with the following
instructions: Generate as many counterarguments as you can as to why you should
73

NOT
purchase
the
Gold-Class
membership. As an additional measure
(not included in data analysis), a 7-point
Likert scale was used to measure how
inclined participants were to purchase the
Gold-Class membership after knowing its
actual price.
Procedure
Participants were divided into four
separate sessions, each making up one
treatment condition. The participants were
firstly briefed, and were told that the study
was commissioned by Golden Village
Singapore to find out more about consumer
knowledge, behaviour, and personality.
Thereafter, participants written informed
consent were obtained. They were also
assured of their confidentiality and their
right to leave at any point during the study
should the need arise. The pre-test
measuring
participants
pre-existing
persuasion
knowledge
was
then
administered. The treatment for each
condition was then administered.
In condition one, participants were
administered Inoculation treatment (a weak
sales persuasion attempt coupled with
practice in generating counter-arguments)
and Persuasion Knowledge Training. Within
the presentation content, unknown to the
participants, the Thats-Not-All technique
would be used in the sales presentation
measuring the dependent variables. In
condition two, participants were given only
the Inoculation treatment. In condition
three, participants were given only
Persuasion Knowledge Training. In
condition four (the control condition), a
filler presentation about personality (of no
relevance to the study) was conducted (refer
to Appendix H for the presentation slides).
Throughout the four sessions and
conditions, the length of time of treatment
Results
Reliability Analysis on the 6-item
Pre-Test scale (measuring participants preexisting persuasion knowledge) revealed
that the scale lacked in internal consistency
or presentation participants were exposed to

was made consistent to meet seven minutes.
After administering the treatment,
participants were then given the actual sales
presentation, where the dependent variable
was measured. In this sales presentation,
participants were told that since the study is
commissioned
by
Golden
Village
Singapore, they also want to take the
opportunity to let all the participants have
priority in signing up for their new GoldClass movie membership card. Hence, a
mini sales presentation was administered;
using the benefits of the card to convince
the participants to sign up for it. Thereafter,
participants ability to counter-argue against
sales agents was measured by means of
getting them to fill in the counter-argument
form, stating why they should not purchase
the movie membership card. Participants
were then debriefed and informed of the
true nature of the study. Most importantly,
participants were also informed that the
study was in fact not commissioned by
Golden
Village
Singapore.
Also,
participants were informed that all
information presented in the study was
fictitious. A copy of the debrief form was
provided for each of the participants.
Design
The first independent variable was
whether the participants went through
Inoculation
treatment.
The
second
independent variable was whether the
participants went through Persuasion
Knowledge Training. This makes a total of
four conditions in a 2 (Persuasion
Knowledge Training: Yes vs. No) X 2
(Inoculation Treatment: Yes vs. No) fully
between-participants design. The dependent
variable is participants ability to counterargue (measured by the percentage of valid
counter-arguments participants were able to
generate against the sales presentation).
reliability, Cronbachs Alpha, = . 2.
Deletion of items did not significantly
increase the scales internal consistency
reliability. All items in the scale were
therefore retained. The responses on the 6
74

items were totalled to form an index of PreTest scores for use in subsequent analyses.
A one-way randomized ANOVA
was conducted to analyse the Pre-Test
scores. There was no significant difference
in the mean Pre-Test scores between
participants of the Inoculation + Persuasion
Knowledge Training condition (M = 28.80,
SD = 5.14), the Inoculation only condition
(M = 27.69, SD = 4.76), the Persuasion
Knowledge Training only condition (M =
26.64, SD = 2.93), and the control condition
(M = 27.07, SD = 3.54), F (3, 56) = .73, p>
.05.
Therefore,
participants
across
conditions did not differ in their pre-existing
persuasion knowledge. Table 1 presents the
means and standard deviations of the
percentage of valid counter-arguments

across the four conditions.
Two independent raters were used in
the ratings of the percentage of valid
counter-arguments generated. Inter-rater
reliability was computed as: Number of
agreements/Total number of possible
agreements. The number of agreements
achieved between the two raters was 38.
The total number of possible agreements
was 60. Hence, an inter-rater reliability of r
= .63 was achieved.
A 2 (Inoculation: Yes vs. No) x 2
(Persuasion Knowledge Training: Yes vs.
No) ANOVA was conducted to analyze the
data for the percentage of valid counterarguments generated.
Table 1
Mean and Standard Deviation of Key Dependent Variables
Condition
Dependent Variable
Mean
79.30
Standard
Deviation
21.03
Inoculation + PK Training
% age of valid counter-arguments
Inoculation Only
71.35
30.73
16
PK Training Only
54.27
14.88
14
Control Condition
40.44
30.84
15
The main effect of Inoculation was

significant and there was a difference in
participants ability to generate valid
counterarguments between the conditions
that did (M = 75.20, SD = 26.40) and did
not (M = 47.12, SD = 25.05) go through
Inoculation, F (1, 56) = 17.94, p < .001.
Hence, hypothesis 1 (Inoculation treatment
is effective in helping consumers to better
counter-argue against sales agents) is
supported.
The main effect of Persuasion
Knowledge Training was not significant and
there was no difference in participants
ability to generate valid counterarguments
between the conditions that did (M = 67.22,
SD = 22.04) and did not (M = 56.40, SD =
15
34.09) go through Persuasion Knowledge

Training, F (1, 56) = 2.72, p > .05. Hence,
hypothesis 2 (Persuasion Knowledge
Training is effective in helping consumers to
better counter-argue against sales agents)
is not supported.
The Inoculation x Persuasion
Knowledge Training interaction effect was
not significant in affecting participants
ability to generate valid counterarguments,
F (1, 56) = .20, p > .05. Hence, hypothesis 3
(Inoculation treatment coupled with
Persuasion Knowledge Training will
interact to produce an especially powerful
effect in helping consumers to better
counter-argue against sales agents) is not
supported.
75
Discussion
The aim of this study was to find out
the effects of Inoculation treatment and
Persuasion Knowledge Training on
consumers ability to generate valid
counter-arguments against sales agents.
Moreover, the study sought to find out if
there are any multiplier effects when these
two methods are used together. As an
overview, the only hypothesis that was
supported is hypothesis 1: Inoculation
treatment is effective in helping consumers
to better counter-argue against sales
agents. The following paragraphs will
discuss and explain the results in detail.
It can be seen that Inoculation on its
own is effective in helping consumers
counter-argue
against
sales
agents.
Theoretically, Cronen and LaFleur (1977)
listed various reasons presented by McGuire
as to why Inoculation is effective. Firstly,
the mention of arguments against an
existing attitude or belief is threatening, and
this threat creates a motivation to defend
these attitudes and beliefs (this might be
why perceived threat is a key factor in the
Inoculation process). Secondly, when one
refutes arguments against his or her own
attitudes and beliefs, he or she receives
guidance to defend these attitudes and
beliefs. Thirdly, the motivation and
guidance (as mentioned) one receives
causes him or her to develop defensive
material to defend the attitudes and beliefs.
Fourthly, because one possesses a
developed system of support for their
attitudes and beliefs, the effects of
Inoculation generalize to arguments against
the attitudes and beliefs that were not
mentioned in the Inoculation process
(Cronen & LaFleur, 1977).
Limitations
A limitation in this study might be
that Persuasion Knowledge Training was
too brief. Kirmani and Campbell (2004)
found support for the contention that older
adults were likely to have better developed
persuasion knowledge than do younger
adults. This means that younger, less
experienced adults had fewer response
strategies to tap on, and hence were less
likely to exercise their rights as consumers.
Coupled with the brief nature of the
Persuasion Knowledge Training, this might
have resulted in the analyses for hypotheses

2 and 3 (involving Persuasion Knowledge
Training) failing to reach statistical
significance
Another limitation could be that the
sales agent used in the current study was too
direct in his persuasion motive. This caused
participants to adopt a prevention-focused
mind-set (Higgins, 1997). People with such
a mind-set tend to be more suspicious
towards sales persons. This could have
resulted in the participants being equally
effective in producing counter-arguments
even when they had not received
Inoculation or Persuasion Knowledge
Training.
Implications
One implication of this study is that
it provides support for past research
advocating the positive effects Inoculation
has on ones ability to counter-argue. As
such, one practical implication of this
finding is that consumers would benefit
from Inoculation treatment before they
actually expose themselves to various
arguments sales agents are using. Through
Inoculation treatment, consumers in
Singapore would then be better armed to
counter-argue against persuasive sales
agents.
Inoculation is useful because, it
works to defend even those attitudes and
beliefs not mentioned in the Inoculation
process. Hence, consumers who are
inoculated are prepared even for new
arguments and attacks sales agents are
trained to use.
Future Research
Beyond addressing the limitations in
the current study, future research can also
take into consideration that since this study
comprised of mainly youth and young
adults, findings in this study might not be
generalizable to consumers of other age
groups. As such, future research might seek
to explore the variables in this study while
using a sample that is more representative of
the population. The external validity of the
study can then be improved.
In conclusion, the current study has
found that Inoculation is effective in helping
consumers to more effectively counterargue against sales agents. Hence,
Inoculation can serve as a useful tool to help

consumers in Singapore make wiser and
more
informed
purchase
decisions
independent of influence by sales agents.
This can be done by strategically designing
programmes to inoculate consumers, so that
the playing field can be levelled to the
advantage of consumers. However, it is
believed that if the limitations (e.g. limited

sampling and utility of measuring
instruments) and suggestions can be taken
into account in future studies, more
interesting and useful findings can be
derived so as to not only aid consumers in
theory, but also at a practical level.
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77

The Impact of Academic Stress on Depressive Tendencies Among
Singaporean Undergraduates
Emily D. Burton
emily.burton@my.jcu.edu.au
James Cook Australia Institute of Higher Learning
A cornerstone in theoretical research is the impact of chronic-stress on depressive tendencies.
Recent empirical studies reported alarmingly high-levels of academic stress among
Singaporean adolescents (Ministry of Community Development, Youth and Sports, [MCYS],
2004). As a result, this study used self-report inventories on 177 Singaporean undergraduates
aged 19 to 25 years old to identify whether academic stress predicted depressive tendencies. It
was hypothesized that (a) greater academic stress predicts increased depressive tendencies in
Singapore young adults, while (b) social support (SS) and coping strategies (CS; emotionfocused and problem-focused) are predicted to mediate this relationship. The results showed
that academic stress predicted depressive tendencies, although no mediation effect (Baron &
Kenny, 1986) for SS and CS was established. These findings may serve as foci for identifying
youths at high-risk of developing depression and prove beneficial to developments of
prevention amongst youths, although larger sample sizes should be explored in future research.
Keywords: Academic stress, depressive tendencies, social support, problem-focused coping,
emotion-focused coping
A3 cornerstone in theoretical
research is the impact of chronic-stress on
depressive episodes. A State of Family
Report (2004) has since conveyed
alarmingly high levels of academic stress
among Singaporean adolescence (MCYS,
2004). Academic stress can refer to the
pressure that arises from expectations of
students
(internal)
and/or
their
parents/teachers (external; Ang & Huan,
2006b; Tan & Yates, 2011). A study
conducted by Wong et al. (2005) showed
that a personal desire to excel academically
and to meet parental expectations amongst
Singaporean adolescents was one major
source of stress. Wong et al.s (2005) also
demonstrated that academic achievement
has been shown as a filial duty and a source
of pride for the family, whilst academic
failure has been associated with familial
shame and subsequent lack of family
support. The concern for academic
achievement of children is often due to the
belief that it can be used to provide wealth,
acquire luxuries, assist in entry into
3
The author would like to thank Diana Tay, Ruth

Woo, and Gen Xueling for their contribution to
research design and data collection.
prestigious schools and eventually establish

an outstanding career (Ho & Yip, 2003;
Isralowitz & Hong, 1990; Lau, Nicholls,
Thorkildsen, & Patashnick, 2000). These
findings are particular to students of Asian
backgrounds as they have shown a greater
level of obligation to meet parental
expectations compared to their Western
counterparts who tend to prioritise peer
recognition higher (Chung & Walkey, 1989;
Salili, Chui & Lai, 2001).
Prior theoretical research (Fauber,
Forehand, Long, Burke & Faust, 1987) has
established a bidirectional relationship
between academic failure and depression. In
particular, Cole (1991) speculated that
constant negative feedback resulting from
academic failure placed individuals at a
greater risk developing negative cognitions
and depressive episodes. Similarly, constant
negative-feedback and high-standards often
result in overgeneralization of self failure
(Carver & Ganellen, 1983). Earlier
theoretical research by Beck, Rush, and
Shaw (1979) further speculated that
negative cognitions trigger automatic
negative thoughts and dysfunctional
attitudes,
thereby
facilitating
the
78

development
and
maintenance
of
well-being (Demaray et al., 2005). Lazarus
depression.
(1993) identified two main types of CS,
Taken together, stress related to
namely, problem-focused (PFC) and
academic expectations can lead to
emotion-focused (EFC), which effectively
psychological and emotional distress, and
define and differentiate between subsequent
the onset of depressive tendencies. This
stress reactions. These conscious efforts
highlights the importance of establishing
(CS), both cognitive and behavioural, are
potential protective factors, which could be
commonly used to tackle stressful life
incorporated into prevention programs to
events (Halamandaris & Power, 1999). PFC
suppress the development of depressive
represents a defined plan or action intended
tendencies in pre-adolescence.
to overcome or change the original stressor.
In terms of countering the adverse
Conversely, EFC is directed towards
effects of life stressors, social support (SS)
managing emotional responses through
and coping strategies (CS) are effective
alteration of interpretations and approach of
mechanisms (i.e., protective factors; Chao,
action (Lazarus, 1993). The biopsychosocial
2011; Demaray, Malecki, Davidson,
model (Engel, 1977) is often used to explain
Hodgson, & Rebus, 2005). In addition, SS
the complexity of such interrelated factors
has been shown to buffer a range of
and their impact on depression (see Figure
stressors and promote overall health and
1).
Figure 1. The framework of the biopsychosocial model of depression (Engel, 1977)
Psychological factors
Biological factors
Social factors
Ones vulnerability to life stress
The development or maintenance of

depression
Research Aims and Benefits
The purpose of this research is to
ascertain whether academic stress increases
depressive tendencies, while determining
whether SS, PFC and/or EFC prevent
depressive tendencies resulting from
academic stress. SS and CS will be
examined as mediator variables for the
relationship between academic stress and
depressive tendencies.
Research Hypotheses Based on prior
extensive research, the current study
predicted that the following finding would

be observed in our sample:
H1. Greater academic stress will
predict increased depressive tendencies (see
Figure 2)
H2. SS and CS (emotion-focused
and problem-focused approaches) will
mediate the relationship between academic
stress and depressive tendencies for
Singaporean young adults (see Figure 3)
Figure 2. A diagram for the predicted impact of academic stress on depressive tendencies.
IV:
Academic stress
DV:
Depressive tendencies
79
MV:
SS, EFC and PFC
IV:
Academic stress
DV:
Depressive tendencies
Figure 3. A diagram for the predicted mediation effect of social support (SS), emotionfocused coping (EFC) and problem-focused coping (PFC) on the relationship between
academic stress and depressive tendencies.
Methodology
Participants
The sample consisted of 177
Singaporean undergraduates from James
Cook Australia Institute of Higher Learning
(JCU). Of these respondents, 52 were males
(29.2%) and 125 were females (70.2%). All
participants were Singaporean citizens, aged
between 18 to 31 years (M= 22.28,
SD=2.03). While 177 participants were
enrolled in the study, only 132 participants
were used in the data analysis.
Materials
Self-report questionnaires included
the demographic (age, ethnicity, race, and
sex), the Brief COPE Questionnaire
(Carver, 1997) using only problem-focused
coping (PFC) and emotion-focused
coping
(EFC)
dimensions,
Multidimensional Scale of Perceived Social
Support (MSPSS; Zimet, Dahlem, Zimet, &
Farley, 1988), Academic Expectation Stress
Inventory (AESI; Ang & Huan, 2006a) and
the Center for Epidemiologic Studies
Depression Scale (CES-D; Radloff, 1977).
In the current study, the Cronbach alpha
coefficients demonstrated acceptable to high
internal reliabilities for the Total Brief
COPE (.87), EFC subscale (.70), PFC
subscale (.78), MSPSS (.89), AESI (.82)
and CES-D (.82).
Procedure
Participants were recruited by one of
four experimenters in the common area in
James Cook Australia Institute of Higher
Learning (JCU) in the Singapore campus or
signed up to the study online using the
SONA system. Measures were completed
either in a laboratory setting or in the
common area at JCU. Completion of all the
questionnaires took approximately 30
minutes and the sequences of self-report
scales were arranged in a round-robin
manner to minimise any carry-over effects.
Results
Multiple Regression
H1. Findings from regression
diagnostics suggested that academic stress
predicted depressive tendencies (see Table
1). Age and gender were entered at Step 1,
explaining only 2.3% of variance in
depressive tendencies. After entry of
academic stress at Step 2, the total variance
explained by the model as a whole was
18.1%, F (3, 128) = 9.42, p < .001.
Academic stress explained an additional
15.8% of variance in depressive tendencies
after controlling for age and gender, R
squared change = .158, F change (1, 128) =
24.70, p < .001. In the final model, only
academic stress was statistically significant
(beta = .41, p <.001).
80
Table 1
Hierarchical Multiple Regression Analysis for Academic Stress and Depressive Tendencies
Variable
R2
F
Step 1
.02
1.50
Age
Gender
Step 2
.18
9.42
Age
Gender
Academic stress
Note. n = 132 for each group, * p < .05. ** p <.01
Additional regression diagnostics
also showed that SS and EFC predicted
depressive tendencies (see Table 2). After
entry of PFC, EFC and SS at Step 2, the
total variance explained by the model was
21.3%, F(5, 126)=6.80, p<.001. PFC, EFC
and SS explained an additional 19% of
variance in depressive tendencies after
controlling for the influence of age and
-.15
.00
.02
-.08
.41
P
.228
.122
.996
.000**
.753
.376
.000**
gender. In the final model, SS was the

greatest predictor of depressive tendencies
( = -.43, t(132)=-5.40, p< 001), followed
by academic stress ( = .40, t (132)=.39,
p<.001) and then and EFC ( = .26,
t(132)=2.30, p<.05). However, PFC was not
a significant predictor of depressive
tendencies ( = -.15, t(132)=-1.30, p=.20).
Table 2
Hierarchical Multiple Regression Analysis for Academic Stress SS, EFC and PFC and
Depressive Tendencies
Variable
R2
F
P
Step 1
.02
1.50
.228
Age
-.15
.122
Gender
.00
.996
Step 2
.21
6.80
.000**
Age
-.06
.495
Gender
-.19
.039
SS
-.48
.000**
EFC
.16
.189
PFC
-.00
.992
Step 3
.36
11.36
.000*
Age
-.03
.694
Gender
-.10
.208
SS
-.43
.000**
EFC
.26
.024*
PFC
-.15
.199
Academic Stress
.40
.000**
Note. n = 132 for each group; * p < .05. ** p <.01
Mediation Analysis
H2. According to Baron and
Kennys mediation model (1986), no
mediation effect was established for SS,
EFC, and PFC on the relationship between
academic stress and depressive tendencies.
The mediation effect was analysed using
Pearson product-movement correlation

coefficients (see Table 3). Results showed
that academic stress did not significantly
correlate with potential mediator variables,
namely SS, r=-.03, p=.715, EFC, r=.03,
p=.727, or PFC, r=.16, p=.064 (see Figure
4). However, depressive tendencies had a

significant correlation with academic stress,
r=.42, n=132, p<.001 and SS, r=-.37,
n=132, p<.001, while SS significantly
correlated with EFC, r=.37, n=132, p<.001

and PFC, r=.35, n=132, p <.001.
Table 3
Pearson Product-Movement Correlation Coefficients between Age, Depressive Tendencies,
Academic Stress, SS, PFC and EFC
Variable
1. Age
-.07
-.13
-.22*
-.18*
-.12
.42**
-.37**
.02
-.03
-.03
.03
.16
.37**
.35**
.75**
2. Depressive Tendencies
3. Academic Stress
4. SS
5. EFC
6. PFC
Note. n = 132 for each group; * p < .05 (2- tailed). ** p <.01 (2- tailed)
T- Test Analyses
An independent-samples t test
showed significant difference in scores for
males and females for SS, such that males,
t(130)=2.08, p=.039, experience less SS
than
females.
Moreover,
males,
t(130)=2.31, p=.023, experience less
Discussion
Key Findings
The study examined the potential
impact of academic stress on depressive
tendencies and the potential mediator effect
of SS and CS amongst academic stress and
H1. Consistent to past studies (Ang
& Huan, 2006b; De Man, 1999; Stewart,
Lam, Betson, & Chung, 1999), the present
academic stress compared to female

counterparts. There was no significant
gender difference between males and
females
for
depressive
tendencies,
t(130)=1.74, p=.085, EFC, t(130)=1.75,
p=.083, or PFC, t(130)=.65, p=.519.
results suggest that academic stress predicts
depressive tendencies among Singaporean
young adults, a relationship which has yet to
be disproven by recent empirical studies.
H2. Contrary to similar empirical
studies (Chao, 2011; Demaray et al., 2005),
a mediation effect (see Baron and Kenny,
1986) was not established. SS and CS (i.e.,
EFC and PFC) did not mediate the
relationship between academic stress and
82

MV:
Social
support
(a)
Path a
(ns)
Path b
(-.37**)
Path c
IV:
Academic
stress
(b)
Path a
(ns)
IV:
Academic
stress
(c)
Path a
(ns)
IV:
Academic
stress
Path c
(.42**)
MV:
Emotionfocused
coping
DV:
Depressive
tendencies
Path b
(ns)
Path c
Path c
(.42**)
MV:
Problemfocused
coping
DV:
Depressive
tendencies
Path b
(ns)
Path c
Path c
(.42**)
DV:
Depressive
tendencies
Figure 4. Path Diagram using Pearson product-movement correlation coefficients for the
mediation analysis of (a) social support, (b) emotion-focused coping, and (c) problemfocused coping on relationship between academic stress and depressive tendencies (n = 132),
p < .001.
Unlike Chaos (2011) study, PFC did not
show any significant association with
depressive tendencies. Of these other
empirical studies, SS and PFC have been
concluded to buffer the relationship between
academic stress and mental well-being.

Unforeseen results may be attributed to the
small sample size (n =132). Future research
should consider a larger sample size to
narrow probability distribution.
83
Predictors of depressive tendencies.

Less SS and greater EFC predicted
increased depressive tendencies. These
results are similar to those by Suldo et al.s
(2009) where family support was heavily
associated with fewer depressive tendencies.
Other empirical studies also established that
EFC strategies increased depressive
tendencies (Chao, 2011). However, contrary
to Sarid, Anson, Yaari, and Margaliths
(2004) results, there was no significant
association between PFC and depressive
tendencies. In short, SS and EFC can
prevent/lower depressive tendencies in both
males and females.
Relationship between SS and
EFC. Sharing similar findings to Chao
(2011), SS was heavily associated with
EFC. These results imply that when SS is
low, Singaporean young adults are more
vulnerable to EFC (e.g., denial or
avoidance). This response can provide
temporary relief from a particular stressful
event when no other emotional comfort or
guidance is available (Chao, 2011). Prior
theoretical research speculated that EFC is
particularly prevalent when one is not in
control of a particular situation (Lazarus,
1993).
Gender differences. Sharing similar
to findings to Dalgard et al. (2006), male
subjects reported lower SS and academic
stress
compared
to
their
female
counterparts. These findings could be
predicted given that females have displayed
higher levels of personal self-disclosure
than males during times of stress (Brewin,
Furnham, & Howes, 1989). These results
reaffirm that women engage in higher levels
of SS compared to males, which in turn
predict fewer depressive tendencies.
Implications
The study provides timely insight
into possible prevention tactics of
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87

Pilot Study of Public Opinions toward Dementia: Awareness, Knowledge and Attitudes
Ng Li Ting
li_ting187@hotmail.com
Ngee Ann Polytechnic
This study assessed public awareness, knowledge and attitudes toward dementia among various
socio-demographics to identify knowledge gaps and misconceptions about dementia. A face-toface survey was conducted with 100 respondents using a self-administered questionnaire. The
findings showed that 85% had heard or read of dementia, 43% knew someone who has
dementia, and 32% were aware of screening for dementia. Older age was associated with better
awareness of dementia. In terms of knowledge, 45% believed that dementia is a normal part of
ageing, and 59% did not know or thought that dementia only affects old people. Females were
associated with better knowledge of dementia than males. The younger age group was found to
have more positive attitudes toward dementia than the middle age. Implications of the findings
include implementing educational interventions to disseminate accurate information on
commonly-held misconceptions and knowledge gaps of dementia, and targeting the younger to
middle aged and males.
Keywords: Dementia, awareness, knowledge, attitudes
Dementia is an umbrella term that

describes a variety of diseases and
conditions that develop when nerve cells in
the brain die or dysfunction, which is
serious enough to interfere with daily life.
The medical, societal and economic impacts
due to dementia are predicted to grow to
epidemic proportions (Thies & Bleiler,
2012). In Singapore, the prevalence of
dementia was 22,000 in 2005 and is
projected to increase to 187,000 by 2050
(Alzheimers Disease Association, 2010).
Research studies had found that lack
of awareness and knowledge about
dementia can hinder recognition, diagnosis
and management of dementia. Poor attitudes
could eventually lead to stigma and
misunderstanding, which is a barrier for
people with dementia to receive necessary
treatment (Alzheimers Society, 2009).
However, of the studies that
investigated community awareness and
understanding of dementia, Adamson
(2001) revealed that general awareness of
dementia was low amongst South Asian and
African/Caribbean. Inaccurate knowledge of
factors of dementia were evident in an
Australian study, where respondents
attributed dementia risk to personal
characteristics like weakness of character

(32%) and laziness (22%) (Low & Anstey,
2009). In a qualitative study using in-depth
interviews conducted
in
Singapore,
prominent issues raised were lack of
understanding of dementia and negative
attitudes towards elderly and demented
individuals (Setia, Islam, Thompson, &
Matchar, 2011).
Despite the high prevalence, there is
limited published data that presented an
assessment of awareness, knowledge and
attitudes towards dementia among general
public in Singapore. Moreover, ethnicity,
nationality and cultural differences could
influence dementia awareness, knowledge
and attitudes. It is therefore important to
investigate the status of awareness,
knowledge and attitudes towards dementia
and evaluate differences between various
socio-demographics in Singapore. This
study also identified knowledge gaps and
misconceptions of dementia. As it has been
proposed that dementia strategies are more
successful if they are based on prior
knowledge base (Park et al., 2008), the
findings could potentially be used for future
educational interventions to target specific
population groups.
88

Method
Approval for this study was obtained
from SingHealth Centralised Institutional
Review Board A (see Appendix A).
Participants
The basic demographic characteristics
of respondents are presented in Table 1.
Table 1
Basic demographic characteristics of respondents (n=100)
Characteristics
Gender
Male
Female
Age groups
21-30
31-40
41-50
51-60
>60
Educational Level *
Lower
Higher
Ethnic Groups
Chinese
Malay
Indian
Others
48
52
21
22
21
23
13
48
52
76
12
7
5
*Classified as lower (No formal qualification, Primary or Secondary) or higher (Junior college,
Polytechnic, Institution of Technical Education, University or Post-Graduate).
Materials
The study entailed administering a 10
minute 20-question questionnaire (see
Appendix B). There were four sections in
the
questionnaire
on
demographic
characteristics (age, educational level,
ethnic groups, gender); awareness of
dementia adapted from a public awareness
questionnaire toward epilepsy (Wong,
Chung, & Wong, 2004); knowledge of
dementia adapted from a public opinion
questionnaire on dementia (Alzheimer
Scotland, 2002); and attitude toward
dementia adapted from the Dementia
Results
The Cronbach alpha coefficient for
awareness, knowledge and attitudes scale
was 0.47, 0.51 and 0.49 respectively.
Attitudes Scale (O Connor & McFadden,

2010).
Procedures
Participants were approached at
Singapore General Hospital premises using
convenience
sampling.
Potential
participants were invited to complete the
questionnaire after signing the participant
information sheet (see Appendix C). For
illiterate
and
non-English
speaking
participants, questions were read and
translated in Mandarin but any suggestion
or hint was strictly avoided.
Awareness of dementia
85% of respondents had ever heard or
read about the disease called dementia,
43% knew someone who has dementia, and
89

32% of respondents were aware of
screening for dementia.
Older age was associated with better
awareness of dementia. There was a
significant effect of age on awareness of
dementia among the general public [F (4,
95) = 5.46, p= 0.001]. Tukey post-hoc test
indicated that age group 61 and above (M=

2.46, SD= 0.78) had better awareness of
dementia compared to those from youngest
age group 21-30 (M=1.19, SD=0.81) and
age group 31-40 (M=1.27, SD=0.99) (see
Figure 1).
Figure 1. Significant differences between age groups on awareness of dementia. Total scores
could range from 0 to 3, with a higher score indicating a greater level of awareness.
Knowledge of dementia
Results on knowledge of dementia are presented in Figure 2.
Knowledge of dementia
Percentage (%)
70
60
50
40
30
20
10
0
Q4.
Q5.
Q6.
Q7.
Q8.
Q9.
Q10.
64
40
40
41
30
53
Correct (%)
61
Wrong (%)
11
45
43
35
17
23
Don't Know (%)
28
33
15
17
24
53
24
Figure 2. The response to knowledge of dementia. Q4. Dementia is generally a word to

describe some physical diseases of the brain. Q5. Alzheimer's is a common form of dementia.
Q6. Dementia is a normal part of growing old. Q7. Dementia is a form of mental illness. Q8.
Dementia only affects old people. Q9. Dementia runs in families. Q10. Most people with
dementia live in residential homes or nursing homes.
90
Females were associated with better

knowledge of dementia than males. An
independent-samples t-test was conducted
to compare knowledge scores for males and
females. There was a significant difference
in scores for females (M=3.69, SD=1.62)
and males [(M=2.88, SD= 1.75; t (98) = 2.43, p=0.02].
Attitudes toward dementia
It was found that younger aged was
associated with more positive attitude
towards dementia than middle aged. There

was a significant effect of age on attitudes
towards dementia among the general public
[F (4, 95) = 2.89, p=0.026]. A Tukey posthoc test showed that people from age group
21-30 (M=41.33, SD= 5.08) had a better
attitude towards dementia than those from
age group 41-50 (M=36.10, SD=4.65) (see
Figure 3).
Age Groups
Figure 3. Significant differences between age groups on attitudes toward dementia. Possible
scores could range from 10 to 60 with higher scores indicating a more positive attitude.
Discussion
This is the first study that
quantitatively assessed dementia awareness,
knowledge and attitudes among the general
population in Singapore. The present study
showed that Singaporeans have generally
good awareness of dementia, with 85%
recognition rate (heard or read about the
disease). This could be due to increasing
media exposure, such as a short film Ah
Kong that was aired on local television to
raise public awareness on dementia. The
present study indicated older age was
associated with better awareness of
dementia. Plausible reason may be because
older age groups are at a higher risk of
getting age-related health issues like
dementia. Thus, more would have
impending fears which led them to pay
attention to such issues (Arai, Arai, & Zarit,
2008).
The present study proposed that
Singaporeans had an overall lack of
dementia knowledge. Arai et al. (2008)
supported the present finding that females

were more knowledgeable than males. This
could be because females tend to be
involved in family caregiving, and gained
greater knowledge about dementia. The
highest incorrect answer rate (45%) was
Dementia is a normal part of growing old.
Similarly, 45.2% respondents in Shanghai
(Li, Fang, Su, Liu, Xiao, & Xiao, 2011) and
54.1% respondents in United States (Jang,
Kim, & Chiriboga, 2010) agreed that
dementia is a normal part of ageing. This
implies that people tend to normalize
dementia than to view it as a medical
condition. This finding is crucial because
such normalization can delay early detection
and utilization of health services (Kane,
2000).
The present study also showed 59%
respondents did not know or agreed that
dementia only affects old people, which was
a wrong answer as dementia is not an illness
related only to old age. This gives cause for
concern, as people may be less likely to

engage in mental stimulation, physical
exercise, social activities and effective
prevention or treatment of cardiovascular
risk factors which may reduce risk of
developing dementia or delay the onset
(Farrow, 2010). The concept in which the
public held greatest knowledge gap (53%)
was whether dementia runs in families.
Currently, there is limited evidence of a
genetic link for dementia, as cases where
Alzheimers disease (AD) does run in
families are rare and tend to be early onset
AD cases (Alzheimer Scotland, 2002). It is
important to address this misconception and
improve understanding of the basic concepts
of dementia. Mass media (TV or radio) has
been found to be the most popular source of
information and knowledge about AD and
mental illness (Park et al., 2008; Ministry of
Health, 2006). Thus, mass media could be
considered as a recommended platform to
address
these
misconceptions
and
knowledge gaps. It would also be
worthwhile to have specific information for
different subgroups of population with
varying levels of prior knowledge base.
In terms of attitudes toward dementia,
the current study showed that younger aged
was associated with more positive attitude
towards dementia than middle aged. Prior
research conducted in Singapore also
underlined a trend of older population
expressing a more negative attitude towards
people with mental health problems (Chong,
Verma, Vaingankar, Chan, Wong, & Heng,
2007). Similarly, it could be reasoned that
the younger generation is more openminded towards mental illness like
dementia. Furthermore, it may be
attributable to older population having less
access to sources of health information on
dementia (Park et al., 2008). Thereafter, the
lack of access can result in lack of
knowledge or misconceptions, which can
References
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understanding
of
dementia
in
African/Caribbean and South Asian
translate to embarrassment and stigma

towards the illness, patient and family (Li et
al., 2011).
Limitations & Future Recommendations
Firstly, a limitation of this study was
the use of convenience sampling.
Participants were recruited within a hospital
setting and may have had an underlying
health interest and therefore, results
obtained may be poorer than that reported in
this study. Secondly, with the small sample
size, the results might not be representative
of the general population in Singapore.
Thirdly, the internal consistencies of the
questionnaire are low, which could be due
to a low number of questions, poor
interrelatedness
between
items
or
heterogeneous constructs.
Further
modification
of
the
questionnaire should be done for future
research to increase the internal consistency.
Further studies could also explore on the
awareness of social services for dementia
and public knowledge of risk factors and
symptoms for dementia.
Conclusion
The current study is one of the few
studies that had investigated the level of
awareness, knowledge and attitudes toward
dementia among the general public. It
revealed that the general public in
Singapore has relatively high recognition of
dementia,
but
is
not
adequately
knowledgeable about dementia. It had
highlighted the importance of improving
general level of understanding of dementia
and emphasized the need for educational
initiatives to address commonly-held
misconceptions and knowledge gaps via the
mass media for the general public and
particularly for younger to middle aged and
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93

Effects of Self-Construal Differences on Cognitive Dissonance Examined by Priming the
Independent and Interdependent Self
Jamie Jia Yan Lee
jiayanjamie.lee@my.jcu.edu.au
James Cook University, Singapore
Prior cross-cultural research on dissonance has relied on cultural stereotypes in assuming that
individuals from Western cultures are individualistic and have independent self-construals
while individuals from Asian cultures are collectivistic and have interdependent self-construals
(e.g., Hoshino-Browne et al., 2005; Kitayama, Snibbe, Markus, & Suzuki, 2004). The current
research made use of priming to avoid relying on cultural stereotypes and examined how
having an independent or interdependent self-construal accounted for differences in dissonance
experienced. A total of 120 participants who were Singapore citizens or permanent residents
were randomly assigned to one of four conditions. Participants received either an independent
or interdependent prime, rated and ranked CDs before and after they made a choice between
closely valued alternatives either for oneself or a close other. Results indicated that
independently primed participants demonstrated significant dissonance when they made
choices for themselves and close others while interdependently primed participants
demonstrated significant dissonance when they made choices for close others but not for
themselves. The studys findings suggest that having either self-construal can account for
differences in dissonance experienced.
Keywords: culture, cultural stereotypes, self-construal, cognitive dissonance, priming
Self-construal can be understood as

how individuals make meaning of, and see
themselves in relation to others (Agrawal &
Maheswaran, 2005; Cross, Hardin, &
Gercek-Swing, 2011).
Markus and Kitayama (1991)
identified two kinds of self-construal
independent and interdependent. They posit
that American and Western European
cultures foster independent self-construals,
where internal attributes such as attitudes
and abilities are significant to the regulation
of behaviour and are perceived as diagnostic
of an individual. Individuals with
independent
self-construals
value
distinctiveness and being the same person in
different situations (Cross et al., 2011;
Markus & Kitayama, 1991). In contrast,
non-Western cultures (e.g., Asian and
African cultures) foster interdependent selfconstruals, where identity is defined by
important interpersonal relationships and
group memberships, while behaviour is
largely regulated by others emotions and
actions (Markus & Kitayama, 1991).
Cross-Cultural Research on Dissonance

Dissonance arises as a result of
inconsistency among a persons cognitions
thereby motivating one to action targeted at
reducing
psychological
inconsistency
(Festinger, 1957). In the standard free
choice paradigm, participants rank a number
of objects (e.g., CDs) before and after
making a choice between closely valued
objects (Brehm, 1956). Following the
choice, dissonance is experienced as a result
of negative aspects of the chosen alternative
and positive aspects of the rejected
alternative that are dissonant with the
decision (Harmon-Jones & Mills, 1999). To
reduce dissonance, individuals justify their
decisions by increasing the desirability of
the chosen object, decreasing the
desirability of the rejected object, or both
(Kitayama, Ishii, Imada, Takemura, &
Ramaswamy, 2006).
Researchers
concluded
that
differences in dissonance findings between
individuals from Western and non-Western
cultures was due to differences in
participants culturally sanctioned self94

construals. For example, Kitayama, Snibbe,
Markus, and Suzuki (2004) examined crosscultural dissonance effects within a free
choice paradigm and found that Japanese
demonstrated dissonance only when the
presence of a social other was made salient
through the priming of social eyes (Study
4) and when they were asked to think of
college students preferences (Study 2)
while European Americans demonstrated
dissonance regardless of whether social cues
were made salient. Similarly, HoshinoBrowne, Zanna, Spencer, Zanna, Kitayama,
and Lackenbauer (2005) found that
European Canadians justified choices for
themselves while Asian Canadians and
Japanese justified choices for close friends
(Hoshino-Browne et al., 2005).
Limitations in Cross-Cultural
Dissonance Research
In
cross-cultural
dissonance
research, cultures are sampled by comparing
individuals from different countries or
ethnic groups (e.g., Americans vs.
Japanese). Notably, prior research has
assumed that individuals from Western
countries are individualistic and have
independent
self-construals
while
individuals from Asian countries are
collectivistic and have interdependent selfconstruals (e.g., Heine & Lehman, 1997;
Hoshino-Browne et al., 2005; Imada &
Kitayama, 2010; Kitayama et al., 2004). As
such, studies purportedly investigating
cultural differences between Westerners and
Asians cannot conclude with certainty that
between-group differences have a cultural
source (Matsumoto, 1999; Matsumoto &
Yoo, 2006). Additionally, any conclusions
drawn
regarding
self-construal
and
dissonance
processes
might
have
confounded with other variables like
socioeconomic, religious, and demographic
variables (Matsumoto, 1999) that differ
between individuals from Western and

Asian samples (Haberstroh, Oyserman,
Schwarz, Khnen, & Ji, 2002).
Present Research
As multiple modes of self-construal
exist in all individuals from any culture
(Brewer & Gardner, 1996), the use of
priming enables temporary access to either
an independent or interdependent selfconstrual, allowing the examination of
either self-construal on behaviour (Cross et
al., 2011).
In the present study, prior research
undertaken by Hoshino-Browne et al.
(2005) was extended by adding the
Similarities and Differences with Family
and Friends (SDFF) priming task
(Oyserman & Lee, 2008; Trafimow,
Triandis, & Goto, 1991) to experimentally
manipulate participants self-construals
prior to their completing the free choice
paradigm. The study was restricted to
Singapore citizens or permanent residents,
so that culture was held constant in order to
investigate self-construal differences.
Based on findings from past
research, the following hypotheses were
formulated:
(1)
Independently
and
interdependently primed participants would
experience
significant
amounts
of
dissonance depending on whether they
make a choice for themselves or close
others.
(2)
Independently
primed
participants would demonstrate significant
dissonance when they make choices for
themselves but not for close others.
(3)
Interdependently
primed
participants would demonstrate significant
dissonance when they make choices for
close others but not for themselves.
95
Method
Participants
Of the 120 participants, 116 were
psychology undergraduates from James
Cook University (34 men, 86 women, Mage
= 21.81, SD = 3.07, age range: 17-37).
Participants were Singapore citizens or
permanent residents.
Design
The current study had a 2(priming
type: independent vs. interdependent) X
2(target person: self vs. other) betweensubjects factorial design. The dependent
variable was the spread of alternatives,
calculated by summing the increase in
rating of the chosen CD and decrease in
rating of the rejected CD between Time 1
and 2.
Apparatus and Procedure
Participants were randomly assigned
to one of four conditions. Before the
experiment began, they were provided with
an information sheet and consent form to
complete.
Priming. Participants were then
primed with the SDFF task (Trafimow et
al.,
1991).
Independently
primed
participants were given the verbal
instructions: For the next two minutes, you
will not need to write anything down, think
of what makes you different from your
family and friends. Interdependently
primed participants were given the verbal
instructions: For the next two minutes, you
will not need to write anything down, think
of what you have in common with your
family and friends. This priming technique
has been found to be effective in priming
independent or interdependent selfconstruals (Oyserman & Lee, 2008).
Time 1 Ranking Task. Participants
chose 10 out of 15 English music CDs.
Those in the self condition ranked CDs
according to personal preferences while
those in the other condition ranked CDs
according to the preferences of a close other
(i.e., close friend, relative, or romantic
partner). Additionally, participants in the
other condition were asked to indicate
whose preferences they were using.
Time 1 Rating Task. Participants
were then provided with rating sheets and
rated the 10 CDs according to personal
preferences or preferences of a close other.
Participants rated each CD on a 7-point

scale (1 = really dont like it and 7 = really
like it).
Decision Making Task. In a
separate area, the researcher viewed
participants responses to identify their fifth
and sixth favourites. Following that,
participants were told a cover story that they
would receive a gift CD in return for their
participation. This was to ensure that a
serious choice would be made between two
CDs, allowing an opportunity for
dissonance. Participants were given two
CDs corresponding to their fifth and sixth
favourites so that they could choose
between closely valued alternatives, as well
as to allow movement in ratings at Time 2.
Depending on the condition they were
assigned to, participants chose a CD for
themselves or for the close other they
thought of earlier. Participants were given
the option of having the gift CD mailed to
them or their close other, thereby increasing
the credibility of the cover story.
Time 2 Ranking Task. Participants
were then provided with a list of CD albums
to aid in their ranking and rating of CDs.
Ranking sheets were provided and
participants ranked the same 10 CDs
according to personal preferences or a close
others preferences.
Time 2 Rating Task. Participants
were then provided with rating sheets that
were identical to those used at Time 1,
except that CD titles were ordered
differently so as to prevent them from
remembering their previous ratings.
Participants then rated the 10 CDs
according to personal preferences or a close
others preferences.
Who Am I? Test. Lastly,
participants completed the Who Am I?
test as a manipulation check which assessed
the self-construal they identified with after
priming. The test was patterned after Kuhn
and
McPartlands
(195 )
Twenty
Statements Test that is a self-report measure
of self-construal. Participants were asked to
provide seven open-ended responses to the
question Who am I?. Their responses
were coded as either independent or
interdependent. Responses that described a
personal attribute, such as an ability or
belief were coded as independent (e.g., I am

intelligent) (Agrawal & Maheswaran, 2005;
Trafimow et al., 1991). Responses that
described a social role (e.g., I am a son),
demographic category (e.g., I am Chinese),
or group membership (e.g., I am from JCU)
were coded as interdependent (Agrawal &
Maheswaran, 2005; Trafimow et al., 1991).
Responses that referred to relationships and
qualities of interdependence such as being
sensitive and responsive to others were also
coded as interdependent (e.g., I am loved by

friends and family, I am someone who helps
my friends) (Trafimow et al., 1991).
Debriefing.
Participants
were
thanked and debriefed. The researcher
apologized for the deception and informed
participants that they would not be receiving
a CD due to limited funding. The
experiment took approximately 40 minutes.
Results
Data from 120 participants was
collected and analysed using SPSS version
18. An alpha level of .05 was used for all
statistical tests.
Analysis of Manipulation Check for SelfConstrual Priming
A two-way mixed ANOVA was
conducted to verify the self-construal
priming manipulation. Proportions of each
type of response were calculated by taking
the
number
of
independent
or
interdependent responses each participant
provided and dividing by the total number
of responses made by the participant
(Trafimow et al., 1991).
Figure 3 shows the proportion of
independent and interdependent responses
participants in each condition provided.
There was a significant interaction between
priming and response type, F(1, 118) =
46.24, p < .001, 2 = .23.
Figure 3. Proportion of independent and interdependent responses of independently

and interdependently primed participants.
Two-tailed independent samples t
tests were conducted to examine the
difference in responses at each level of
priming.
Results
indicated
that
independently primed participants (M =
0.80, SD = 0.24) reported a significantly
greater number of independent responses
than interdependently primed participants
(M = 0.48, SD = 0.30), t(111.19) = 6.44, p <
.001, 95% CI [0.22, 0.42], 2 = .27. In

contrast,
interdependently
primed
participants (M = 0.51, SD = 0.31) reported
a significantly greater number of
interdependent
responses
than
independently primed participants (M =
0.18, SD = 0.20), t(100.67) = -7.12, p <
.001, 95% CI [-0.43, -0.24], 2 = .33.
97
Effects of Priming and Decision Making

on the Spread of Alternatives
A
two-way
between-subjects
ANOVA was undertaken to test the first
hypothesis.
Figure 4 shows the mean spread of
alternatives of independently and
interdependently primed participants. In

support of hypothesis one, results indicated
that the interaction between priming and
target person was significant, F(1, 116) =
8.48, p = .004, 2 = .07.
Figure 4. Mean spread of alternatives of independently and interdependently primed

participants in the self and other conditions.
Two-tailed independent samples t
tests were conducted to explore the
significant interaction effect obtained.
Results indicated that among participants in
the self condition, those who were
independently primed (M = 0.53, SD = 1.20)
had a significantly higher mean spread of
alternatives than those who were
interdependently primed (M = -0.20, SD =
1.24), t(58) = 2.33, p = .02, 95% CI [0.10,

1.36], 2 = .09. Among independently (M =
0.40, SD = 0.86) and interdependently
primed (M = 0.83, SD = 1.06) participants
in the other condition, no significant
difference in mean spread of alternatives
was obtained, t(58) = -1.75, p = .09, 95% CI
[-0.93, 0.06].
Table 1
One Sample t Tests Examining the Spread of Alternatives of Independently Primed and
Interdependently Primed Participants in the Self and Other Conditions
95% CI
M
SD
t(29)
LL
UL
Independent Prime Self

Condition
0.53
1.20
2.44
.02
0.09
0.98
.15
Independent Prime
Other Condition
0.40
0.86
2.56
.02
0.08
0.72
.18
Interdependent Prime
Self Condition
-0.20
1.24
-0.88
.39
-0.66
0.26
.03
Interdependent Prime
Other Condition
0.83
1.05
4.33
< .001
0.44
1.23
.39
Condition
Note. CI = confidence interval; LL = lower limit; UL = upper limit.
Table 1 shows the results of four one

sample t tests against zero that were
conducted to test the second and third
hypotheses.
Contrary to
hypothesis
two,
independently primed participants justified
choices for themselves but also justified

choices for close others. Supporting
hypothesis three, interdependently primed
participants justified choices for close others
but not for themselves.
Discussion
The present study examined how
having
either
an
independent
or
interdependent self-construal affected the
experience of dissonance. Consistent with
prior research (Trafimow et al., 1991;
Ybarra & Trafimow, 1998), a significant
interaction between priming and response
type showed that the priming manipulation
was successful.
Discussion of Hypothesis One
A significant interaction between
priming type and target person supported
the hypothesis that the amount of
dissonance experienced was dependent on
the type of priming received and whether a
choice was made for oneself or a close
other. While individuals from Western and
Asian cultures displayed dissonance
depending on whether a choice was made
for oneself or a close friend (HoshinoBrowne et al., 2005), the present results
corroborated and extended this finding by
providing empirical evidence suggesting
that differences in self-construal accounted
for differences in dissonance experienced.
Discussion of Hypothesis Two
Consistent with prior research
(Hoshino-Browne et al., 2005; Kitayama et
al.,
2004),
independently
primed
participants significantly justified choices
for themselves, partially supporting
hypothesis two. This supports the notion
that for those with independent selfconstruals, self-identity is associated with
inner attributes perceived to be stable and
unchanging across situations (Cross et al.,
2011).
Contrary to
hypothesis
two,
independently
primed
participants
significantly justified choices for close
others. In contrast to an earlier study which
showed that European Canadians (assumed
to have independent self-construals)
justified choices for themselves but not for
close friends (Hoshino-Browne et al., 2005),
the present finding suggests that individuals
with independent self-construals may

experience worry over others approval of
their decisions, and therefore adjusted their
behaviour according to the feelings and
actions of close others (Kitayama et al.,
2004; Markus & Kitayama, 1991).
Discussion of Hypothesis Three
Consistent with prior research
(Hoshino-Browne et al., 2005; Imada &
Kitayama, 2010; Kitayama et al., 2004),
results supported hypothesis three, as
interdependently
primed
participants
significantly justified their choices for close
others but not for themselves.
The present findings indicate that
those with interdependent self-construals
are threatened by the possibility of having
made inconsiderate decisions for close
others but not when decisions are made for
themselves, supporting the theory that social
roles, group memberships and close
relationships encompass important aspects
of self-identity for individuals with
interdependent self-construals (Cross et al.,
2011).
An alternative explanation for
participants justification of choices in the
other condition is that participants used their
own music preferences instead of a close
others. However, participants were asked to
indicate to the researcher who they were
thinking of (i.e., a close friend, relative, or
romantic partner) and as part of the cover
story were given the option of mailing the
gift CD to that close other if they so desired.
Hence, measures were taken to prevent this.
Implications
While research has indicated that
affirming self-relevant values eliminates
dissonance (Steele & Liu, 1983) the present
findings imply that the processes of selfaffirmation and image-maintenance vary for
independent and interdependent selves due
to distinct identity related concerns. For
example, those with independent selfconstruals might find positive feedback
regarding their uniqueness and competency

to be most self-affirming while those with
interdependent
self-construals
might
perceive positive feedback concerning their
abilities to cooperate and fit in to be selfaffirming.
Limitations and Future Directions
Some methodological limitations
include the use of music CDs which are
becoming irrelevant due to improved
technology. CDs are therefore objects of
less value, possibly arousing lower levels of
dissonance in participants.
Additionally, the present research
did not include a control group, where
control participants are not exposed to any
priming manipulation. As such, future
research incorporating a control condition
could have participants in the experimental
conditions complete a self-report measure of

self-construal, such as the Self-Construal
Scale (Singelis, 1994) before responding to
the free choice paradigm, while control
participants respond to the free choice
paradigm before completing the self-report
measure of self-construal.
Conclusion
Although further research is required
with participants from Western and Asian
countries (Matsumoto, 1999), the present
study avoided relying on cultural
stereotypes with the use of priming, and
provided direct evidence demonstrating that
having an independent or interdependent
self-construal accounted for differences in
dissonance experienced.
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101

Association of Adult Attachment Styles and the Big Five Personality Traits
in Southeast Asia
Erny Feberina
ernyfeberina@raffles-elite-club.com
Raffles College of Higher Education
The relationship between attachment styles and personality traits are one of the most
fascinating processes in human developmental progression. This aspect was studied to reassure
the association between the two components under the Southeast Asian basis, which including
Indonesia, Malaysia, and Singapore. 118 adults were recruited with 41 males and 77 females.
Three hypotheses were tested to find the relationship between the two components as well as its
similarities and differences among the three respective nationalities. 77 questions were
categories into three different sections, including the demographic data, Relationship Style
Questionnaire (RSQ), and Big Five Inventory (BFI). Interesting results showed a significant
contribution for the developmental field, specifically in Southeast Asia. In addition there were
no significant differences among the three countries for both attachment styles and personality
traits, except Conscientiousness.
Keywords: adult attachment, Big Five personality, social interaction, close relationship
Attachment is one of the most

essential aspects in the study of human
developmental. It makes one has a natural
tendency to live with other people on a
constant basis, even though one holds on to
the value of independency (Cozolino, 2006).
It also has been found that the component of
attachment stylesthe patterns of close
relationships, might be producing particular
personal characteristics that are summarized
into one general terminology, called
personality (Zuroff & Fitzparticks, 1995).
Thus, it is believed that attachment has
direct influence to personality traits,
particularly Big Five personality traits.
According to Waters, Crowell,
Elliott, Corcoran, and Trenoux (2002),
every individual experiences a transition
from the infant attachment to adult
attachment. It is possible to conclude that
adult attachment style is similar to infant
attachment style (Holmes & Johnson,
2009). Yet, some (Ma, 2006; Ravitz et al.,
2010) analyzed and argued that the
measurement of attachment styles for adults
is different from infants, due to the

measures are indicating and referring the
subject
to
different
perspective
(Bartholomew, 1994).
However, some studies (Gillath,
Sesko, Shaver, & Chun, 2010; Noftle &
Shaver, 2006; Shiota, Keltner, & John,
2006) were violating the original
composition of attachment styles. The
composition of adult attachment is relevant
to the concept of self and others in
relationship (Cantazaro & Wei, 2010)
which called as working models (Shaffer,
2005).
From the figure below, it does
explain that attachment styles are divided
into four dimensions. Precisely, some
(elik, 2004; Wice, 2009) have done
observation to certain scales of adult
attachment style and found that that
Bartholomew and Horowitzs (1991) fourcategory model emerges to be the most
appropriate and beneficial to explain the
adult attachment styles.
102
Figure 1. The two-dimensional Model of Self and Other that form four-categorical
Model of adult attachment (Bartholomew & Horowitz, 1991, p. 227)
Adult Attachment and the Big Five
Personality in Asian Culture
Adult attachment is highly correlated
to the Big Five traits. Secure attachment
emerges to be the most stable and satisfying
relationship with little amount of conflicts
(Shaver, Collins, & Clark, 1996) and brings
the positive effect of personality traits
(Adam, Gunnar, & Tanaka, 2004; Shaver &
Mikulincer, 2007, 2009). In contrast,
attachment
insecurity
(preoccupied,
dismissing, and fearful) emerges to weaken
the relationship satisfaction (Crowell &
Treboux, 1995) and relate to negative
engagement and personality trait which is
neuroticism (Meiji et al., 2006).
Thereafter, it has been found that
cross-cultural study of adult attachment is
still new (Shaver & Mikulincer, 2004; Shi,
2010) and only few studies have explored
ethnic differences in adult attachment
research (You & Malley-Morrison, 2000).
On the contrary, the study of Big Five
Methodology
Participant
Hundred and eighteen respondent
included 41 males (34.7%) and 77 females
(65.3%). Of these respondents, 41 (34.7%)
were Indonesians, 42 (35.6 %) were
Malaysians, and 35 (29.7%) were
Singaporeans from the age of 18 to 35.
personality is widely spread across culture

(McCrae, 2002; McCrae & Costa, 2008)
and traits from the Big Five are universal
yet vary in every country in terms of its
intensity. For instance, McCrae (2002)
argued that higher score of extraversion
were found among Europeans and
Americans than Asians and Africans.
Hence, the following hypotheses are
investigated to determine if various type of
relationship exist between adult attachment
and the Big Five personality across culture.
H1: The adult attachment styles affect the
Big Five personality traits directly.
H2: Secure adult attachment style predicts
extraversion
and
agreeableness
positively, and neuroticism negatively.
H3:
Indonesians,
Malaysians,
and
Singaporeans have no significant
differences in the adult attachment
styles and the Big Five personality
traits.
Measures
Relationship Scale Questionnaire
(RSQ) is chosen (Griffin & Bartholomew,
1994) to measure the state of personal
relationship. Gudenev, Fermanian, and
Bifulco (2010) believed RSQ is a good
psychometric to study adult attachment
considering the factor analysis, the test

retest short time reliability, and the internal
consistency (ICC < 0.70).
Big Five Inventory (BFI) is chosen
(John & Srivastava, 1999) to measure the
strength of each trait in the individual,
which composed in 44-item of Likert scale.
Some (Gosling, Rentfrow, & Swann, 2003;
Rammstedt & John, 2007) reported that BFI
is reliable with high test-retest correlations
(mean r = .80).
Procedure
Convenience sampling and snowballing method are used in the enlargement
of the contemporary research. Recruited
participants were directed to open the online
survey link and found the consent form at
the first page. Upon clicking the continue
sign, participants were believed to
understand the objectives of the study and
entrusted to answer the following
questionnaire.
Table 1
Descriptive statistics for adult attachment dimensions and Big Five personality traits in
ANOVA
Countries
N
Mean
SD
Attachment Secure
Indonesia
41
3.10
0.49
Singapore
35
3.13
0.57
Malaysia
42
3.06
0.47
Preoccupied
Indonesia
41
2.71
0.62
Singapore
35
2.81
0.69
Malaysia
42
2.79
0.61
Dismissing
Indonesia
41
3.48
0.56
Singapore
35
3.43
0.47
Malaysia
42
3.26
0.53
Fearful
Indonesia
41
2.96
0.72
Singapore
35
2.89
0.79
Malaysia
42
2.81
0.66
Personality Extraversion
Indonesia
41
3.35
0.62
Singapore
35
3.19
0.59
Malaysia
42
3.24
0.42
Agreeableness
Indonesia
41
3.59
0.65
Singapore
35
3.50
0.56
Malaysia
42
3.60
0.55
Conscientiousness Indonesia
41
3.50
0.68
Singapore
35
3.02
0.48
Malaysia
42
3.20
0.57
Neuroticism
Indonesia
41
2.85
0.73
Singapore
35
3.00
0.66
Malaysia
42
2.97
0.57
Openness
Indonesia
41
3.57
0.55
Singapore
35
3.62
0.52
Malaysia
42
3.42
0.37
104
Results
A multiple regression analysis
showed that Secure and Preoccupied
attachment predict Neuroticism (R2 = .16
with F(4, 113) = 5.34, p < .005); whereas
Dismissing and Fearful attachment predict
Extraversion (R2 = .12 with F(4, 113) =
3.78), Agreeableness (R2 = .09 with F(4,
113) = 2.89), Conscientiousness (R2 = .10
with F(4, 113) = 3.04) and Openness (R2 =
.10 with F (4, 113) = 3.22).
Meanwhile, one-way ANOVAs
means and standard deviation (SD) of the
adult attachment and Big Five variables of
the three populations are presented in the
Table 1. A Levenes test of homogeneity of
variance establishes prior to the ANOVA
indicate the assumption of homogeneity of
variance is significantly violated for the
Conscientiousness variable (p < .05).
Thereafter, the Welch statistic is ran to
adjust the F statistic, of which the Welch is

more powerful and conservative than the
Brown-Forsyth (Meena, 2011). From the
Welch statistic, it reveals F (2, 72.47) =
6.53, p < .005. This result concludes that the
null hypothesis is rejected, means the study
can continue the comparison of group
means.
Moreover, results show there is no
significant differences among the three
populations, except Conscientiousness (F
(2, 115) = 8.04, p < .005, 2 = .12).
Accordingly, post hoc analysis showed
Conscientiousness is the only significant
variable in the respective comparison, for
Malaysians and Indonesians (M = .30) and
Indonesians and Singaporeans (M = -.49)
are found to all be significant, p < .05;
whereas the differences for Singaporeans
and Malaysians are not significant (p > .01)
with M = .18.
Discussion
According to some researchers
(Belsky, 1996; Hagekull & Bohlin, 2003;
Vaughn & Shin, 2011), secure attachment is
the best predictor of extraversion, openness,
and agreeableness positively, as well as
neuroticism negatively. It was proposed that
secure attachment is especially related to the
positive emotional regulation, behavior, and
low depression (McWilliams & Bailey,
2010;
Thompson,
2011).
Perhaps,
attachment is heritable (Settle, Dawes, &
Fowler, 2009). For instance, if the secure
attachment is possessed within one self, it
will lead the individual to nurture his/ her
children in secure way that may be imitated
by the children and passed throughout the
generations.
Therefore, results show that, indeed
adult attachment styles predict big five
personality traits, which accept the first
hypothesis. In fact, second hypothesis is the
continuation of the first hypothesis, yet the
hypothesis is not fully approved. It is
because results reveal that secure
attachment only significantly predicts
neuroticism negatively. In other words, the
stronger secure attachment within the
person, the weaker Neuroticism will be.
Although results do not show that secure
attachment
significantly
predicts
extraversion and agreeableness, it does not

mean there is no possibility that it will
happen. Some items in RSQ are reversed
meaning and it may result in a great bias
interpretation during the participants
answered the questionnaire (Carver, 1997).
In contrast, insecure attachment
showed much more interesting results than
expected. According to the literature,
preoccupied attachment is significantly
related to the depression, vulnerability, and
neuroticism (Ein-Dor, Mikulincer, &
Shaver, 2011; McCarthy, Boettcher,
Lieberman, Russell, & Mosbacher, 2012).
Thus, the result of this study is consistent
with the literature that preoccupied
attachment
significantly
predicts
neuroticism positively. Additionally, like
secure attachment, preoccupied attachment
among adults close relationship is
developed throughout the child-parents
relationship (Gallo, Smith, & Ruiz, 2003).
Likewise,
avoidant
attachment
(Dismissing and Fearful) shows high
insecurity and significantly predicts the Big
Five personality traits. The result shows
dismissing
attachment
is
positively
predicting Extraversion, Conscientiousness,
and Openness. This outcome is indeed given
a new insight of relationship between
dismissing attachment with the personality

traits. In the previous finding, Noftle and
Shaver (2006) argued that dismissing
attachment
negative
correlate
to
extraversion,
agreeableness,
conscientiousness, and openness; and
positive correlate to neuroticism.
Fearful attachment is also a
significant predictor for Extraversion,
Agreeableness, and Conscientiousness
negatively. This result, therefore, is
consistent with the previous findings (Gallo
et al., 2003; Noftle & Shaver, 2006), which
often emerged due to traumatic event
(Sibcy, 2001). Therefore, Shiota and
colleagues (2006) proposed that person with
fearful attachment demonstrates high level
both on anxiety and avoidant. This kind of
individual tends to be very negative about
him or herself and avoid having close
relationship because fear of rejection

(Becker & Billings, 1997).
At
last
but
not
least,
conscientiousness becomes to be the only
variable that significantly difference across
the three tested countries. According to
Mttus, Allik, and Realo (2010),
conscientiousness is the most controversial
personality traits across cultures. One of the
possible reasons to explain this outcome is
conscientiousness was believed to keep its
development even after individual reaches
the adult stage (McCrae et al., 2004). In
addition, some others (Schmitt, Allik,
McCrae,
&
Benet-Martinez,
2007)
discovered that conscientiousness may vary
due to the differences of norm values in
every country and culture.
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109

Language Background, Non-word Repetition, and Spelling
in Bilingual Singaporean Children
Choo Rui Qi
u0802571@nus.edu.sg
Baddeley et al. (1998) proposed that the phonological loop component of working
memory, operationalised as non-word repetition for monolinguals, functions as a
language-learning device. However, research on English as second language (ESL)
bilingual childrens use of the loop is sparse. In Singapore, Mandarin- and Malay-ESL
children learn English spelling though phonology-orthography mappings of their L1s
are very different, allowing for the study of phonological representations and spelling
acquisition in bilinguals. Mandarin- and Malay-ESL children (18 pairs, 7-8 years) were
matched for English receptive vocabulary, and assessed for non-verbal ability, spelling
and repetition of word plus high and low phonotactic probability (PP) non-word stimuli
(N = 36). Responses were coded in Standard English (SgE) and Singapore Colloquial
English (SCE) pronunciations. There were main effects and interaction of language
background and PP for SCE-coded repetitions. Different patterns of correlations of
variables across groups suggest different cognitive-linguistic factors influence
vocabulary and spelling development.
Keywords: bilinguals, home language, non-word repetition, spelling, vocabulary
Baddeley, Gathercole, and Papagno (1998)
proposed that the phonological loop
component of working memory functions as
a language-learning device, linking stored
representations of words and processing
demands. The loop maintains materials
within the phonological store by subvocal
repetition (Baddeley, 1992). Repeating
sequences of sounds provides temporary
storage of novel phonological material
while permanent memory representations
are constructed (Gathercole & Baddeley,
1993). The loops capacity is typically
operationalised as non-word repetition, a
relatively basic and pure measure of
phonological loop capacity, because
semantic knowledge cannot compensate for
phonological deficits when non-words are
used (Gathercole, 2006).
Research on English monolinguals
suggests that non-word repetition predicts
vocabulary development (e.g. Gathercole &
Baddeley, 1989). Additionally, non-word
repetition ability has clinical implications as
it is used as a marker for identifying
children with specific language impairment
(Bishop & Snowling, 2004), who have been

found to be poor at this task (Gathercole &
Baddeley, 1990).
While non-word repetition is a
supposedly pure measure of phonological
capacity, researchers have found that
knowledge of a languages phonological
structure moderates the relationship
between non-word repetition and word
learning. Vitevitch and Luce (2005) found
an increase in phonotactic probability (PP,
the frequency with which phonological
segments and sequences of segments occur
in words in a language) to facilitate nonword repetition. Research on English
monolinguals has found higher accuracy for
high-PP non-words (e.g. Gathercole et al.,
1992) and this was even stronger for
children with small vocabularies (Edwards,
Beckman & Munson, 2004). Knowledge of
a languages phonotactic probabilities hence
helps support repetition of new sound
patterns.
Research on non-word repetition and
lexical development in bilinguals, including
bilingual-biscriptals in Singapore, is more
110

limited. As bilingual-biscriptals learn two
languages with two different writing
systems, the cross-linguistic effect of their
home language on English as a Second
Language (ESL) is complex. The situation
in Singapore is further complicated as
children are exposed to Standard English
(SgE) and Singapore Colloquial English
(SCE). SCE differs from SgE in
pronunciation and syntactic structure (e.g.
final /k/ is produced as a glottal stop; see
Bao (1998) for review of the pronunciations
of Singapore English).
In Singapore, the method of
instruction for Chinese and Malay differs
due to the inherent nature of the writing
systems. Orthographically deep Chinese is
taught via a whole-character logographic
method (Rickard Liow & Poon, 1998)
whereas Malay literacy programmes
emphasise phonological processing because
of the transparency between the spoken and
written forms (Rumi script) (Rickard Liow
& Lee, 2004). Though phonologyorthography mappings of their respective

first languages are very different, Mandarinand Malay-ESL children learn English
spelling in the same classrooms, enabling
the study of phonological representations
and spelling acquisition in bilinguals.
The aim of this paper is to
investigate whether language background
(LB) of ESL children has an impact on the
correlation between non-word repetition
(coded in local pronunciations) and
vocabulary and spelling abilities. As
Mandarin has possible influences on SCE
(Deterding, 2000), Mandarin-ESL children
are expected to perform better in SCEcoded non-word repetition. Additionally,
assuming that Malay-ESL children are more
familiar with more phonotactically-possible
stimuli since Malay is phonologically
transparent, they are predicted to do better
in high than low-PP non-words.
Method
Participants/Recruitment
Thirty-six
participants
were
recruited from a government-aided primary
school with informed parental consent. All
had equivalent exposure to English in
school but came from two LBs and paired
for receptive vocabulary based on their
Bilingual Language Assessment Battery
scores (BLAB; Rickard Liow & Sze, 2009).
Their mean age was 95.14 months (SD =
7.61) (Mandarin-ESL: M = 94.61, SD =
8.05; Malay-ESL: M = 95.67, SD = 7.35).
Paired-samples t-test show no significant
difference in age t(17) = -.429, p = .673.
Method
Nonverbal
ability.
Ravens
Coloured Progressive Matrices (Raven,
Court, & Raven, 1995) was administered to
check if the nonverbal abilities of the groups

differed.
Non-word repetition. CVC word
plus high- and low-PP non-words adapted
from Gathercole, Frankish, Pickering and
Peaker (1999) and combined to form 36 2-,
3- or 4-syllable non-word stimuli (see
Appendix A) were presented in random
order and the childrens responses
phonetically coded for accuracy with
reference to SgE and SCE pronunciation
norms
(see
Appendix
B).
Spelling. The 75-item spelling test
(see Yeong & Rickard Liow (2011) and
Appendix C) comprised 1-, 2- and 3syllable English words. Target words were
pre-recorded and presented within a
sentence context. Each correct spelling was
given 1 mark (maximum score = 75).
Results
Data analysis comprised a mixed
ANOVA to investigate if there were LB
differences in the underlying processing for
high and low-PP non-words, plus a
correlational analysis aimed at exploring the

relationship between variables across LB
groups. Phonotactic Probability. Table 1
shows the means and standard deviations of
the measures:
111
Table 1: Descriptive statistics of all measures by language groups

Tasks
(maximum score)
Mandarin-ESL (n = 18)
M
27.22
58.04
37.83
6.00
12.67
Ravens CPM (36)

BLAB (100)
Spelling (75)
NWRep (SgE) (36)
NWRep (SCE) (36)
Malay-ESL (n = 18)
SD
3.80
9.57
21.54
3.40
4.23
Referring to Table 1, there were no

group differences in non-verbal, t(17) =
1.20, p = .246, receptive vocabulary, t(17) =
.128, p = .899, or spelling abilities, t(17) = .874, p = .394.
SgE-coded responses. A main
effect of PP was found, high-PP stimuli
were repeated significantly better than lowPP stimuli, F(1, 17) = 12.84, p = .002. Main
effect of LB, [F(1, 17) = .17, p = .682] and
LB PP interaction, F(1, 17) = 1.72, p =
.207, were not found.
SCE-coded responses. There were
main effects of LB, F(1, 17) = 5.37, p =
.033,
Mandarin-ESL
performed
significantly better than Malay-ESL
children; and PP, F(1, 17) = 13.11, p = .002,
M
24.89
57.96
42.06
6.28
10.50
SD
7.58
10.99
17.38
2.14
2.90
high-PP non-words were significantly better

recalled than low-PP ones. Most important,
as predicted, there was an LB PP
interaction such that Mandarin-ESL
performed significantly better for low-PP
non-words than Malay-ESL children, F(1,
17) = 5.68, p = .029. Correlational Analysis.
In order to determine the relationships
among the variables, bivariate correlations
were carried out. Table 2 shows the
correlations for the Mandarin- and MalayESL children.
The different pattern of correlations for
the tasks across LBs supports the idea that
different
cognitive-linguistic
factors
influence
vocabulary
and
spelling
development of the two ESL groups.
Table 2: Bivariate Correlations among Experimental Tasks

Task
CPM
BLAB
Spelling
NWRep
(SgE)
NWRep
(SCE)
CPM
BLAB
Spelling
.226
-.004
.315
.481*
.742**
-.037
.443
.532*
.256
NWRep
(SgE)
.443
.174
.037
-
.048
.210
.388
.566*
NWRep
(SCE)
.085
-.130
.052
.602**
-
Note.
Correlations for Mandarin-ESL children are presented above the diagonal (df = 16);
correlations
for Malay-ESL children are presented below the diagonal (df = 16). BLAB =
Bilingual
Language Assessment Battery; CPM = Ravens Coloured Progressive Matrices.
p
=
.065
(marginally significant) *p < .05 **p < .0.1
Discussion
The purpose of the study was to test
if language background was a factor in the
relationship between non-word repetition
and vocabulary and spelling. The results
confirmed the hypothesis. As predicted, due
to the possible overlap of Mandarin and
SCE (Deterding, 2000), Mandarin-ESL
children performed better in SCE-coded
than SgE-coded responses. Additionally,
Malay-ESL children were significantly
better at repetition of high-PP non-words.

Because
the
Malay
language
is
phonologically shallow, the Malay-ESL
children may have been familiar with the
more phonotactically-possible high-PP than
low-PP non-words which sounded even less
like words. On the other hand, MandarinESL children learn Mandarin in a visual
manner so PP is less important a factor,
hence they performed better at the low-PP
non-words. Furthermore, as seen from Table

2, not only was receptive vocabulary
correlated with spelling like those of the
Malay-ESL children, the Mandarin-ESL
childrens non-verbal score, a measure
which relies on visual manipulation, also
significantly correlated with their receptive
vocabulary and marginally with their
spelling scores. This suggests that
Mandarin-ESL children, but not Malay-ESL
children, rely on visual-orthographic
learning during vocabulary and spelling,

rather than phonological processing
typically reported for monolingual Englishspeaking children.
Conclusion
The study shows that different
cognitive-linguistic
factors
influence
vocabulary and spelling development for
different ESL bilinguals.
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114

Motivation and Decision Making Among Young Adults
Amanda Ong Hui Zhong
amandaong@raffles-psych.com
Raffles College of Higher Education, Singapore
People make decisions everyday and the drive behind making decisions is
motivation. The Causality Orientations Theory is related to how decision-making styles
can vary in people. Age is also considered as another influencing factor, with younger
adults appearing to be more susceptible to risk behaviors and less competent decisions
compared to older adults. 73 individuals participated in this study. 49 (67.1%) were
from ages 18 to 24 years old, while 24 (32.9%) were from ages 25 to 39 years old. The
Melbourne Decision-Making Questionnaire and General Causality Orientations Scale
were used in the survey. It was found out that autonomy orientation was positively
correlated with vigilance; controlled orientation positively correlated with
hypervigilance; and impersonal orientation significantly correlated with
hypervigilance, procrastination, and buck-passing. In addition, results show that
younger adults were more inclined to have maladaptive decision-making styles than
older adults.
Keywords: causality orientations theory, decision making, age
Current available research about
decision-making styles mention more about
its relation or influences with regards to
depressive states (Leykin & DeRubeis,
2010), consumerism (Fan & Xiao, 1998;
Miller, 1981; Sproles & Kendall, 1986) or
previous experiences/knowledge (Juliusson,
Karlsson, & Garling, 2005; Stanovich &
West, 2008). Only a few articles (Brew,
Hesketh, & Taylor, 2000; Brown, Abdallah,
& Ng, 2011; Engin, 2006; Mann et al.,
1997) discuss about decision-making styles
in the context of reliance on self or others.
Therefore the author would like to research
about individuals types of motivation and
its relation towards decision-making.
Competent decision-making was
suggested to be similar to a rational,
unbiased search for relevant information
while maladaptive decision-making refers to
any action that gives off the impression of
avoidance (Gorodetzky, Sahakian, Robbins,
& Ersche, 2010). Working on the possibility
of different decision-making styles, Mann,
Burnett, Radford, and Ford (1997)
established four sub-scales, namely
Vigilance, Hypervigilance, Procrastination,
and Buck-passing, the last three also known
as maladaptive styles. Vigilance refers to an

individual being extremely about details and
consequences of given choices (Lock,
2005). Hypervigilance appears to be related
to making choices in a haphazard and/or
disorganized manner due to certain
conflicting factors (Johnston, Driskell, &
Salas, 1997; Lock, 2005). Procrastination
referred to the postponement of decisions
while buck-passing means avoiding the
assumption of responsibility by diverting
decision-making to others (irin, Bekta, &
Duman, 2011).
Motivation is believed to drive
decision-making (Berridge & Robinson,
2003, cited from Ahn & Picard, n.d.;
Panksepp, 1998, cited from Ahn & Picard,
n.d.). According to Kossowski (2001),
rewards allow motivation to occur, however
different results from situations might cause
an individual to have different motivational
styles. The Causality Orientations Theory
(COT) is related to how people each differ
in their own ways of initiating and
regulating personal actions (Gagn & Deci,
2005), and allows the measurement of both
intrinsic and extrinsic motivations by
focusing on an individuals personal beliefs
115

in the extent of their own actions (Sheldon,
Turban, Brown, Barrick, & Judge, 2005).
Based on COT, Deci and Ryan (1985a;
1985b) developed the General Causality
Orientations Scale and measures selfdetermination
accordingly
to
three
orientations; Autonomy (self initiation and
regulation of behaviours), Controlled
(reliance on external controlling factors e.g.
deadlines or salary), and Impersonal (seeing
own behaviour as outside of own control
and believe themselves as incompetent).
Self-determination itself is linked with
autonomy orientation (people make choices
based on information they get), as
controlled orientation is associated with
behavior
influenced
by
external
remuneration, and impersonal has the
opposite meaning of autonomy (Deci &
Ryan, 1985a).
There are also other factors that can

make a difference in ones decision-making
methods, one of which is a persons age. It
is said that the way adolescents and adults
go about making their decisions are
different, because adolescents appear to
have a contrasting opinion of risks and are
easily compelled by their friends (Scott &
Grisso, 1997). Articles from various
researchers (Arnett, 2000; CDC, 2010;
Charnigo et al. 2012; Nguyen, Rahman,
Emerson, Nguyen, & Zabin, 2012)
generally agree that adolescents and young
adults (15 to 25 years) exhibit lesscompetent
decision-making
styles.
However, young adults age ranges from 18
to below 40 years (Erikson, 1968),
suggesting a possibility of an inadequate
amount of research in decision-making
styles for adults above 25 to below 40 years
old.
Methodology
A total of 73 participants, 27 males
(37%) and 46 females (63%) from ages
between 18 to 39 years old (M = 24.2,
SD = 5.18) based in Singapore, were
surveyed using convenience and
snowball sampling methods. The
participants were split into two age
groups; younger group of young adults
from 18 to 2 years (67.1%), and older
group of young adults from 25 to 39
years (32.9%). The Melbourne Decision

Making
Questionnaire
(MDQM)
developed by Mann, Burnett, Radford,
and Ford (1997), and the 12-vignette
General Causality Orientations Scale
(GCOS) by Deci and Ryan (University of
Rochester, 2008) were consolidated into
one questionnaire, and then disseminated
via two methods; an online survey hosted
on eSurveysPro, and a printed hardcopy
to be done with writing materials.
Results
The first hypothesis states that
motivational factors can affect decisionmaking styles. Pearsons Correlation and
Linear regression results indicate that
Autonomy orientation was positively
correlated with the Vigilance subscale r =
.430, N = 73, p = .000. Controlled
orientation was positively correlated with
Hypervigilance subscale r = .235, N = 73, p
= .045. Impersonal orientation was
significantly correlated with three variables;
with Hypervigilance r = .497, N = 73, p =
.000; with Procrastination r = .565, N = 73,
p = .000; and with Buck-passing r = .470, N
= 73, p = .000. The results of regression

indicate that the two predictors explained
19% of the variance (R = .186, F(1, 71) =
16.25, p < .001). It was found out that
motivation significantly predicted decisionmaking styles ( = .432, p < .001). First
hypothesis was accepted.
The second hypothesis states that
maladaptive
decision-making
styles
(hypervigilance, procrastination, buckpassing) would be found in young adults
age from 25 to 39 years. Table 1 below
shows the total mean and standard deviation
of each decision-making style for the
respective age groups. Young adults from
116

ages 18 to 24 years score higher in three
subscales, compared to young adults from
25 to 39 years; Hypervigilance (M = 5.04;
M = 3.29), Procrastination (M = 4.00; M =
3.04), and Buck-passing (M = 5.78; M =
3.67). Young adults from 25 to 39 years old

scored higher for Vigilance (M = 9.42; M =
9.33), than young adults from 18 to 24 years
old.
Table 1
Descriptive statistics for Decision-making Styles between Age Groups in t-test
Age Group
SD
Vigilance
18 to 24
25 to 39
49
24
9.33
9.42
2.56
2.48
Hypervigilance
18 to 24
25 to 39
49
24
5.04
3.29
2.66
1.97
Procrastination
18 to 24
25 to 39
49
24
4.00
3.04
2.53
1.40
Buck-passing
18 to 24
25 to 39
49
24
5.78
3.67
2.75
2.24
T-test results show that the younger

group of adults age 18 to 24 years old (M =
5.04, SD = 2.66) reported significantly
higher levels of Hypervigilance than the
older group of adults age 25 to 39 years old
(M = 3.29, SD = 1.97), t(71) = 2.856, p =
.006, d = .72. Younger adults age 18 to 24
years old (M = 5.78, SD = 2.75) reported
significantly higher levels of Buck-passing
than the older group of adults age 25 to 39

years old (M = 3.67, SD = 2.24), t(71) =
3.26, p = .002, d = .82. Based on the data
analysis, maladaptive decision-making
styles can be found in the older group of
adults but the results were not significant,
therefore second hypothesis was rejected.
Cohens d showed a medium to large effect
size for the significant values.
Discussion
From the data provided, it can be
inferred that some individuals take the
initiative to learn (autonomy) more about
the alternatives (being vigilant), because
learning was the motivator. Blustein
(1988) also found out that autonomy
orientation was positively related with
self-exploration, similar to being
aware/vigilant of the self. Deci and Ryan
(2008) in their recent article explained
that
besides
monetary
benefits,
controlled orientation also includes
partial
internalized
behaviors
(introjection) motivated by other aspects

such as avoidance of shame and
approval motive, for the maintenance
of self-esteem (Ingledew, Markland, &
Sheppard, 2003). Research has been
done on controlled orientation and
extrinsic motivation, and studies have
found out that people who were higher in
controlled orientation are noted to be
more susceptible to external demands
such as normative behavior and peer
pressure within the social groups
(Neighbors, Lewis, Fossos, & Grossbard,
2007).
117

Inferring from results provided,
impersonal orientated individuals appear
to have lower confidence and have high
dependency on others, it makes sense
that they would have a tendency to be
hypervigilant (disorganized manner of
deciding) and engage more in buckpassing probably because they believe
others to be more capable than them. It
might also result in procrastination, in
that they might prefer to delay either
making or acting on the decisions,
possibly also because they have low
confidence in their abilities. The results
of regression indicate that while
motivation may not be a high predictor
of decision-making styles, it is still a
significant factor.
The second hypothesis was rejected
because results show that there was an age
difference in the decision-making styles,
with the older adults showing an overall
score of being more vigilant. Articles by
two groups of researches, Gardner and
Steinberg (2005), and Paulsen, Platt, Huettel
and Brannon (2011), studied about decisionmaking and risks among children,
adolescents and young adults, and found out
that young adults were more risk aversive
than adolescents. In general, risky decisionmaking decreases with age.
Conclusion
In conclusion, this study has
provided some insights with regards to the
influences that motivation and age might
have over decision-making styles. It was
found out that motivation was a weak but
significant predictor of decision-making
styles and that decision-making styles might
undergo change, as a person gets older.
However the results may be inaccurate due
to small amount of participants, and an
irregular age grouping. Research were also
according to the Western, and not Asian
settings. Furthermore, as there were not
many researches that focused on just
motivation and decision-making, the author
hopes that this study will contribute to the
previous findings made.
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120

Executive Functioning and Early Mathematical Ability
Denise Kristen Ng, Maxine Wong, Annabelle Lim, & Gabrielle Lai
Temasek Polytechnic
{1000125c, 1003599f, 1005295i}@student.tp.edu.sg; gablai@tp.edu.sg
Education is significant in developing self-sustainability for the future, and Singapore
places great importance on early childhood education. Executive functioning (EF)
predicts school readiness and achievement, and our study examines the individual and
collective efforts of EF components on early mathematical ability. We hypothesize that
(1) EF positively correlates with early mathematical ability; (2) one individual EF
component (working memory, response inhibition, cognitive shifting) is more
associated with mathematics than the others. 26 preschoolers between 43 to 54 months
were administered the TEMA-III, and three EF tasks. Results found collective EF to
correlate with early mathematical ability, but individually, only working memory and
cognitive shifting correlated with mathematics. Findings suggest that EF helps develop
certain mathematical skills, and early EF measures may predict both mathematical
achievement and difficulties. There are several implications for further research and the
application of EF skills to education.
Keywords: executive functioning, early mathematical ability, mathematics, education,
working memory, response inhibition, cognitive shifting
In recent years, Singapore has
emphasized the importance of developing
early education (Ng, 2011). This article
examines how executive functioning (EF) is
related to early mathematical ability, the
best
predictor
of
later
academic
achievement (Aubrey, Dahl & Godfrey,
2006). EF refers to goal directed behaviors
that help people ignore automatized
thoughts and responses (Mesulam, 2002). It
is the basis for the development of more
advanced cognitive functions, like decision
making (Steinberg, 2005). EF consists of
three components: working memory,
response inhibition and cognitive shifting;
and a common attentional pool (Miyake et
al., 2000).
Working memory is the ability to
hold and manipulate a representation in
mind (DEsposito, Postle, Ballard & Lease,
1999). At 6 months, the ability to hold
representations develops (Johnson, 2005);
the manipulation of representations
develops at 2 years, continuing throughout
preschool
and
beyond
(Alloway,
Gathercole, Willis, & Adams, 2004).
Response inhibition is restricting a motor
response (Garon, Bryson, & Smith, 2008). It

first develops at 1 year, like when a child
stops playing with a toy at his caregivers
request (Kochanska & Aksan, 1995).
Inhibition involving mental representations
develops considerably during preschool
(Carlson, 2005). Cognitive switching
involves shifting from one mental rule to
another (Garon et al.,2008). It requires: (1)
forming a rule by associating a specific
stimulus with a response; (2)s hifting to a
new rule that conflicts with the first. At 3
years, children can usually follow the first
rule but cannot switch, while at 4 years,
they switch easily (Carlson, 2005). EF
predicts school readiness and later school
achievement
(McClelland,
Acock
&Morrison, 2006), equipping children with
skills necessary for performance (Raver,
Smith,
Donald, Hayes, & Jones, 2005). Its
core components develop from infancy to
preschool, and predict performance in many
skills that children use, like mathematics
and language (Adams, Bourke, & Willis,
1998; McLean & Hitch, 1999). EF also
predicts academic scores from preschool to
121

high school, emphasizing its importance for
academic achievement throughout the
school years (Bull & Scerif, 2001).
Compared to IQ, EF better predicts school
readiness (Blair & Razza, 2007) because it
looks at behavioural regulation rather than
just intellectual ability, which preschool
teachers find more important for school
readiness (Rimm-Kaufman, Pianta, & Cox,
2000). EF is thus crucial in education.
Thus, we hypothesize that EF
correlates positively with mathematical
ability in preschoolers (43-54 months), to
reaffirm
their
already
established
relationship. We will also examine the
associations between the individual EF
components (working memory, response
inhibition,
cognitive
shifting)
and
mathematics. Identifying which component
relates most to achievement has significant
implications for curriculum development.
Method
Participants
26 English-speaking participants
between 43 to 54 months were recruited
throughconvenience sampling. There were
12 males and 14 females.
Procedure
Two sessions were conducted
individually on different days to test early
mathematical mability and EF.
Mathematical ability. The TEMAIII, one of the few standardized tests for
early mathematical ability (suitable for
children from age 3) was administered
(Ginsburg & Baroody, 2003). It measures
informal and formal (school-taught)
concepts and skills such as numbering,
number-comparison,
numeral
literacy,
number facts and calculation.
Executive functioning. EF was
measured through a game-like task for each
component. All three tasks were replicated
from previous researches and chosen for
being developmentally age-appropriate, to
avoid floor or ceiling effects. Task order
was randomized.
Working memory. The digit span

task was employed to measure the
preschoolers
number storage capacity (Daneman
& Carpenter, 1980). Participants had to
repeat a number series which they were
presented, the length of which was
increased when the preschooler repeated at
least 5 of 6 trials correctly.
Response
inhibition.
The
bear/dragon task measured the preschoolers
ability to suppress commanded actions
(Sabbagh, Moses & Shiverick, 2006). Two
puppets were introduced, the bear and
dragon. Preschoolers had to follow the
bears commands but inhibit the dragons.
Cognitive shifting. The Dimensional
Change Card Sort (DCCS) was used
(Zelazo, 2006). Preschoolers sorted a series
of bivalent test cards by one dimension
(shape), then immediately by another
(colour).
Results
26 preschoolers from 43 to 54
months (M = 48.65 , SD = 3.11)
participated in this study.
Performance on the EF tasks
produced measures of working memory,
response inhibition, and cognitive shifting;
their average produced a measure of EF.
Performance on the TEMA-III produced
several measures of early mathematical
ability: (a) Raw score, (b) Math ability, and
(c)
The DCCS and TEMA-III had
excellent internal consistency reliability
(alpha > .90),
while the digit span and bear/dragon
tasks had acceptable internal consistency
reliability (alpha >.70).
Spearman correlation coefficients
were computed to investigate the
hypothesized relationships between the key
variables. A significant positive correlation
was found between
mathematical ability and EF, r(21) =
.62, p < .01. Significant positive correlations
were also found between mathematical
ability and working memory, r(21) = .55, p
122

< .01, along with cognitive shifting, r(21) =
.59, p < .01, but not between mathematical
ability and response inhibition, r(21) = .29,
p > .05.
A
bivariate
correlation
was
conducted to examine the different variables
and
chronological age. A significant
positive correlation was found between
chronological age and response inhibition,
r(21) = .43, p < .02; no other significant
correlations were found.
Discussion
Our study examined how early
mathematical ability relates to EF
collectively and as individual components
(working memory, response inhibition,
cognitive shifting), and our results support
our
hypotheses
significantly.
Early
mathematical ability is positively related to
EF, and most greatly associated with
working memory, followed closely by
cognitive shifting, but is not associated with
response inhibition.
Theoretical
and
Practical
Implications
EF and early mathematical ability.
The significant positive correlation between
EF and mathematical ability replicates and
supports previous research (Adams et al.,
1998; Lehto, 1995; McLean & Hitch, 1999).
This suggests EF aids the development of
certain athematical skills, and may predict
both achievement and difficulties in
mathematics. Children who perform well in
EF tasks, perform similarly on mathematics
tasks (Clark, Pritchard, & Woodward,
2010).
Working memory and early
mathematical ability. Working memory is
significantly related to mathematical ability,
supporting
previous
studies
which
established the relationship between
mathematical disabilities and poor working
memory (Bull & Espy, 2006; Bull &
Scerif,2001). Our study extends this
relationship to the positive end
associating mathematical ability with better
working memory. This has significant

implications for instructional design, where
removing working memory demands of
mathematical tasks may make learning
mathematical concepts easier (Okamoto &
Case, 1996).
Cognitive shifting and early
mathematical ability. Cognitive shifting is
significantly related to early mathematical
ability, replicating previous research where
lower mathematical ability correlated
significantly with cognitive shifting
difficulty (Rourke, 1993). Children who
cannot make cognitive shifts experience
difficulty switching rules (e.g. addition to
subtraction). Training cognitive shifting
may thus improve mathematical ability.
Response inhibition and early
mathematical ability. Response inhibition
did not correlate with mathematical ability.
Most children over 3 years understand the
need for inhibition, but have difficulty
inhibiting prepotent responses due to
immature inhibition mechanisms (Zelazo,
Muller, Frye & Marcovitch, 2003). This
could explain the lack of correlation.
However, further examination found
response inhibition correlated significantly
with mathematical raw score, suggesting it
does relate to mathematics. This supports
previous
research,
where
certain
mathematical errors correlated with
inhibition difficulties (Bull, Johnston, &
Roy, 1999).
Influence of chronological age.
Response inhibition correlated significantly
with chronological age, supporting previous
research (Carlson, 2005; Carlson & Moses,
2001). However, chronological age does not
correlate with working memory, cognitive
shifting and mathematical ability, implying
that chronologically disadvantaged children
can still develop these skills, due to other
factors. Maternal care and directiveness
may influence math ability (Assel, Landry,
Swank, Smith, & Steelman, 2003). Parents
who create a balance between structure and
choice, aid EF development in exercising
123

sequencing and regulating behaviors to
solve problems.
Theory of mind (ToM) and EF are
both interactive processes that facilitate
mental processing and hence share mutual
influences (Carlson & Moses, 2001; Perner
& Lang, 1999).
Parenting styles, particularly high in
warmth and secure attachment (which
induces warmth) and parents mental state
talk (one-sided communication from parent
to child) cultivate better developed ToM
(Meins et al., 2002; Ruffman, Slade &
Crowe, 2002), and may also influence EF.
Limitations and Future Research
Task overlaps. The different EF
tasks may have overlaps. While the DCCS
measures cognitive shifting, it may also
involve inhibition (Bialystok, 1999), where
the first rule established must later be
inhibited. However, all tasks collectively
use EF components to some extent, so
measuring
individual
components
exclusively is difficult.
Digit span task. The digit span task
that measured working memory only
required use of numerical short term
memory (storage), but not complex
processing (Engel de Abreu, Conway &
Gathercole, 2010). Future studies can

measure working memory more holistically
using other span tasks.
Limited to mathematics. This study
focused on mathematics, as it is the best
predictor of later achievement (Duncan et
al., 2007). However, future research can
examine EF and other areas of education,
e.g. language.
Error analysis. Future research can
investigate
the
mistakes
made
(informal/formal;
concrete/pictorial/abstract). Informal skills
are learnt through spontaneous interactions
while formal skills are concrete concepts
learnt in school (Ginsburg & Baroody,
2003). Pictorial and abstract questions
require mental representation mechanisms,
which may not be fully developed.
Conclusion
In conclusion, our study successfully
examines EF and its individual components
in early mathematical ability, provides
significant support for the relationship
between EF and mathematics, and offers
several
theoretical
and
practical
implications, along with many areas for
future research.
References
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124

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126

Understanding the levels of Materialism, Gratitude and Happiness among Asians and
Westerners
Lee Sheue Yee
brendalee@raffles-psych.com
Nuraishikin Begum
nuraishikin@raffles-psych.com
Raffles College of Higher Education
People across the globe have placed considerable value on the acquisition of material objects and over
the past decades, much has been researched on the topic of materialism. Thus, this paper aims to
investigate the effects of materialism on the levels of gratitude and happiness and it also seeks to
understand if cultural differences pose any significant effects on the levels of materialism. Based on
the results that were tabulated from both Asian and Western samples, it was revealed that materialism
was negatively correlated to humanistic values such as gratitude and happiness; materialism with
gratitude r (92) = - .29, p < 0.01 and happiness r (92) = - .41, p < 0.01; while gratitude was found to be
positively correlated to happiness with a coefficient of r (92) = .66, p < 0.01. The results however did
not show the effects of cultural differences being a significant predictor in determining the levels of
materialism.
Keywords: gratitude, materialism, happiness, materialism scale, GQ-6
Ever since the introduction of man

to this planet, materialism has had its grip
on humanity as every culture, country and
generation is plagued with the need for
material goods (Ali, Ramzan, Razi, Khan &
Fatima, 2012). As materialism becomes a
central driving force in modern society
(Ahuvia & Wong, 1995; Halberstam, 1993),
it has emerged as a topic of great interest
amongst
researchers
from
various
disciplines; which in turn has lead this paper
to investigate the impact of materialism on
the levels of gratitude and happiness; and if
cultural differences affect the levels of
materialism.
Materialism
Belk, who was one of the pioneers in
the study of materialism, has conceptualized
materialism in terms of the importance one
attaches to worldly possessions (Belk, 1985;
Belk, 2001). Once, it was widely believed
that a defining characteristic of highly
materialistic individuals would be the
enhancement of ones well-being through
ones relationship with an object (Ahuvia &
Wong, 1995; Burroughs & Rindfleisch,
2002). However, this remains untrue
(Kasser & Ahuvia, 2002; Kasser & Ryan,

1993; Richins & Dawson, 1992).
Gratitude
Emmons (2004) has defined
gratitude as the acknowledgment and
appreciation of an altruistic gift. Fitzgerald
(1998), on the other hand has identified
three main components of gratitude which
includes: 1) a warm sense of appreciation
for something or someone; 2) a sense of
goodwill toward that thing or person; and 3)
a resultant disposition to act positively due
to appreciation and goodwill. Hence,
suggesting that gratitude is a positive
emotion that broadens ones perspective and
builds other positive emotions or attributes
(McCullough, Kilpatrick, Emmons &
Larson, 2001).
Happiness
One of the fundamental goals of
people all around the world is to be happy
and happiness is defined in three distinct
ways, which includes, having positive
emotions, being fully engaged in ones life
and leading a meaningful life (Peterson,
Park & Seligman, 2004).
Relationship among Materialism, Gratitude
and Happiness
127

Materialism has been seen as a
coping mechanism to eliminate the feelings
of insecurity, which in turn has led to lower
levels of gratitude among these individuals
(Froh, Emmons, Card, Bono & Wilson,
2011; Polak & McCullough, 2006) and this
has been supported by a study conducted by
Swinyard, Kau and Phua (2001), where
Singaporean adults were found to be less
happy and more materialistic than those in
the United States. Relatively low levels of
happiness and life satisfaction were also
demonstrated in East Asian countries
(Kang, Shaver, Sue, Min & Jing, 2003; Li,
Patel, Balliet, Tow & Scollon, 2010).
Research Objectives and Hypothesis
Majority of the results were derived
primarily on the consumer practices of
Western samples. Even though in recent

years, several studies have been done on
Asian samples, it is still unclear if
substantial differences exist in both cultures.
Therefore, the research objective
would be to examine the relationship
materialism has on the levels of gratitude
and happiness amongst Asians and
Westerners and also to deduce if Asians or
Westerners are more materialistic. Thus, the
proposed hypotheses would be:
1) Materialism is negatively
correlated to gratitude, happiness; while
gratitude is positively correlated to
happiness.
2) Cultural differences exist among
Asians and Westerners based on the levels
of materialism.
Method
Participants
Through convenience sampling and
snowballing
method,
ninety-two
participants were recruited, of which 39
were males and 53 were females. The
participants which included 58 Asians and
34 Westerners were approached either via
contacts of immediate friends or referred to
friends of friends.
Instruments
The GQ-6 is a short, self-report
measure of the disposition to experience
gratitude. It consists of 6 items with a 6
point Likert-type scale. The scale has a
good internal reliability ranging between .82
and .87 (McCullough, Emmons & Tsang,
2002).
Materialism was measured using Belks
materialism scale which comprises of 24
statements designed to measure three subtraits which includes possessiveness, nongenerosity and envy. The items were scored
using a 5-point Likert scale. The coefficient
alpha estimates for the possessiveness, nongenerosity and envy subscales were 0.68,
0.72 and 0.80, respectively (Belk, 1984) and
the overall summed scale for the 24 items
had an alpha of 0.73 (Bearden, Haws &
Netemeyer,
2010).
The
Subjective
Happiness Scale (SHS) is a 4-item scale of

global subjective happiness (Lyubomirsky
and Lepper, 1999). The SHS has been
validated in 14 studies with a total of 2,732
participants in the United States with high
internal consistency.
Results
Ninety-two
participants
were
recruited and the results were analyzed
using the Statistical Package for the Social
Science (SPSS). To determine the
relationship between materialism, gratitude
and happiness, a bivariate correlation was
used.
Materialism was found to be
negatively correlated to gratitude r (92) = .29, p < 0.01 and happiness r (92) = - .41, p
< 0.01, and it was reported to be highly
significant.
As expected, the relationship
between happiness and gratitude showed in
table 2 was found to be positively correlated
r (92) = .66, p < 0.01.
Discussion
Based on the tabulated data of the
research, it was found that gratitude and
happiness share a positive correlation while
128

materialism is negatively correlated to
gratitude and happiness. The fact that
gratitude is positively correlated to
happiness indicates that gratitude is a
moderately pleasant and activating emotion
(Emmons & McCullough, 2003). Thus, it is
an undeniable fact that ones psychological
well-being is enhanced through gratitude
(Gilman, 2004).
The discovery that materialism is
inversely related to gratitude and happiness
is definitely in line with one of the proposed
hypothesis. Therefore, suggesting that an
excessive focus on the accumulation of
material goods leads to a variety of negative
consequences such as decreased levels of
happiness and gratitude (Belk, 1985;
Burroughs & Rindfleisch, 2002; Richins &
Dawson, 1992). The negative association
between materialism and these humanistic
values is all the more disturbing as
materialistic people are known to incur
substantial costs to pursue their materialistic
aspirations (Richins & Dawson, 1992).
However, the reason for such
significant finding is often attributed to the
fact that materialistic people have lower and
more volatile levels of self-esteem, probably
due to a reliance on extrinsic, rather than
intrinsic, sources of personal fulfillment
(Christopher & Schlenker, 2004; Kasser &
Kasser, 2001; Yurchisin & Johnson, 2004).
Besides, it has also been noted that the
failure to find inner sources of happiness
often leads to external gratification, which
in turn leads to being more materialistic
(Van Boven, 2005; Van Boven & Gilovich,
2003).
Therefore, when these individuals
place a strong emphasis on possessions and
consider them to be a central aspect of their
life, they may appear to do so at a cost to
other pursuits such as personal relationships
or intellectual enrichment (Christopher,
Marek & Carroll, 2004; Richins & Dawson,
1992). Moreover, too much of an emphasis
on possessions have also been found to
undermine the search for happiness and
psychological fulfillment (Kasser & Ahuvia,
2002; Polak & McCullough, 2006), which

in turn, not surprisingly demonstrates that
material possessions is negatively related to
gratitude and happiness (Belk, 1985;
Kashdan & Breen, 2007; Richins &
Dawson, 1992).
Cultural differences among Asians
and Westerners in terms of the levels of
materialism were found to be non-existent.
This could be due to the small sample size
of the participants which were not complete
representation of the whole countrys
population
(Bonita,
Beaglehole
&
Kjellstrom, 2006; Lichtman, 2010).
Besides,
with
the
random
recruitment, the specific culture of each
participant could not be determined.
Theoretically, Asian and Western countries
are considered to be a collectivistic and
individualistic
culture,
respectively
(Oyserman, Coon & Kemmelmeier, 2002).
However, the Filipinos, whom are
considered to be Asians, were found to have
individualistic strikes due to their countrys
colonial history (Pe-Pua & ProtacioMarcelino, 2000). Therefore, it should be
noted that the culture may not necessarily be
the same for all of the European countries.
For instance, Croatia, a post-transition
Eastern Block country has a more
collectivist heritage compared to the United
Kingdom, which has an individualist culture
(Jankovi & Dittmar, 2004).
Summary and Directions for future research
In conclusion, people with higher
materialistic value often have lower levels
of gratitude which in turn leads to lower
levels of happiness as happiness is found to
be in line with gratitude. Therefore, a future
research can be conducted to determine if
gratitude can help to reduce materialistic
tendencies as it is seen as topic of great
interest amongst researchers (Chaplin &
John, 2007; Polak & McCullough, 2006).
Moreover the sample size (n = 92)
recruited in the study were not highly
representative of the total population.
Therefore, more participants could have
been recruited. Besides, the survey
129

instruments used in this paper were derived
study on materialism is relatively young and
based on Western affluence; therefore, the
ever growing as substantial research on the
questions represented on the scales may not
levels of materialism with other humanistic
be applicable for Asian context. Hence, a
values and the significance of cultural
scale more apt for the Asian context could
diversity on materialistic value has yet to be
be adopted.
investigated upon thoroughly.
Even though materialism has been a
part of mankind for the past decades, the
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132

Profile and Perceptions of Asian Patients with Irritable Bowel Syndrome
Noradlin Mohamed Yusof
Lynyusof@yahoo.com
James Cook University
Studies have attempted to describe the psychological profile of patients with Irritable Bowel
Syndrome (IBS) in Western contexts, in order to inform assessment and interventions.
However, less attention has been given to IBS patients in Asian contexts given the absence of
cross cultural studies. To address this gap, the primary aims of this study were to examine the
profile and perceptions of patients with IBS in Singapore. Secondly, the study seeks to
investigate the relationship between psychological factors (dysfunctional cognitions and
psychological distress), perceived quality of life and symptom severity. This study employs a
correlational research design and data was collected through structured interviews and four
standardised measures: Irritable Bowel Syndrome Quality of Life (IBS-QOL; Patrick,
Drossman & Frederick et al., 1998), Hospital Anxiety and Depression Scale (HADS; Zigmond
& Snaith, 1983), Irritable Bowel Syndrome Severity Scoring System (IBS-SSS; Francis, Morris
& Whorwell, 1997) and the Cognitive Scale for Functional Bowel Disorders (CSFBD; Toner,
Stuckless & Ali, et al., 1998b). A total of 30 participants (9 male and 21 female patients, aged
between 18 to 78 years) took part in this study. Data was analysed using independent t-tests,
correlation, one-way analysis of variance and regression analysis. The presence of anxiety (n
=18), depression (n =12), dysfunctional cognition as well as symptom severity strongly
correlated with lower perceived quality of life (p <=.01). Females (n =21) reported significantly
lower perceived quality of life (p =.01) and higher dysfunctional cognitions (p <.01) than
males. With the IBS patient profile detailed in this study and clear associations found between
psychological factors, symptom severity and quality of life, equipping patients and practitioners
of these findings would be a proactive step towards informing appropriate IBS assessments,
interventions and referral to appropriate services.
Key Words: Profile, Perceptions, Irritable Bowel Syndrome
The definition of Irritable Bowel

Syndrome (IBS) has evolved over the past
decade in order to incorporate new
information about this complex disorder. IBS
is one of the most common Functional
Gastrointestinal Disorders (FGIDs), with a
prevalence of between 4-21% based on
population surveys, and depending on the
criteria utilized (Drossman et al., 2000b).
The most common symptoms of IBS
are abdominal pain, bloating, and discomfort.
However, symptoms can vary from person to
person. For example, some people
predominantly suffer from diarrhoea, while
others find constipation a frequent concern.
Some others have alternating symptoms
(fluctuate between diarrhoea and constipation)
(Drossman et al., 2000a). The pathogenesis.
of IBS is postulated to be a disorder of braingut function with altered gastrointestinal
motility, visceral hypersensitivity, and central
dysregulation involving neuroendocrine,
autonomic, attentional and painregulatory

pathways (Drossman, Camilleri, Mayer &
Whitehead, 2002). Symptoms of IBS may
mimic those of colon cancer and other bowel
diseases and infections that include
inflammatory bowel disease (IBD) or coeliac
disease (where an individual is unable to
digest gluten, a substance found in rye, barley,
and wheat) (Lacy, Weiser, & De Lee, 2009).
Interestingly, IBS is often thought to be a
condition that is largely caused by
psychological factors and particularly not
serious in nature (Azpiroz & Whorwell,
2009). However, this view only serves to
reinforce the belief that there is actually
nothing physically wrong with the individual
(Azpiroz & Whorwell, 2009). Hence,
sufferers with more severe symptoms may
feel they are not being taken very seriously.
To sufferers, IBS symptoms are very real. IBS
is now regarded as a condition consisting of a
complex range of symptoms without a single
133

definitive cause (Hayee & Forgacs, 2007).
IBS is now widely recognised as a
biopsychosocial disorder in which various
mechanisms are interrelated consisting of
enhanced visceral (the smooth muscle and
glands in the body) sensation, abnormal
intestinal motility and psychological factors
(Quigley, 2003)
Statement of the Problem
In contrast to the published literature
on quality of life and psychological distress in
patients with IBS globally, there has been
limited published studies
specifically
outlining the profile and psychological state
of Asian IBS patients. Many ideologies on
IBS are derived from Western societies and
their relevance to Asian societies are often not
examined closely (Gwee et al., 2010).
Additionally, the suitability of
applying Western treatment ideologies to
Asian contexts need to be further understood
to ensure appropriate patient management and
care. Hence, additional research on IBS in the
Asian context is warranted to train medical
professionals, nurses and psychologists to
adequately care for this population given the
complexity of this functional gastrointestinal
(GI) disorder and the impact it bears on health
care.
Aims and Purpose of the Study
Firstly, this study is concerned with
examining and understanding the patient
profile and perceptions of Asian patients with
IBS in the local Singapore context.
Understanding the profile of IBS Asian
patients provides a baseline for professionals
when working with these patients in the
course of their assessments and the provision
of appropriate treatments. Secondly, this study
also examines the relationship between
psychological
factors
(dysfunctional
cognitions and psychological distress), patient
perceived quality of life and symptom
severity. Psychological factors comprise of a
whole range of aspects and domains. For the
purpose of this study, cognitions (namely
dysfunctional cognitions) and psychological
distress (namely presence of anxiety or
depression) were examined. Additionally, by
understanding the relationship of the
abovementioned factors and the profile of
patients with IBS, it is hoped that it would

inform practice to help understand how these
psychosocial factors impact patients quality
of life, thus enabling these issues to be
addressed in clinical work. It is hoped that the
results and findings of this study could help
patients, their families, therapists, and
clinicians to understand and address the
interplay of biopsychosocial factors for
patients with IBS.
Specific Research Hypotheses
1. Dysfunctional cognition is expected
to be negatively correlated to perceived
quality of life.
2. Psychological Distress (Anxiety
and/or Depression) is expected to be
negatively correlated with perceived quality
of life.
to be positively correlated with perceived
symptom severity.
4. Psychological Distress (Anxiety
and/or Depression) is expected to be
positively correlated with perceived symptom
severity.
to be positively correlated with psychological
distress (specifically presence of anxiety and
depression).
6.
Psychological
factors
(psychological distress and/or dysfunctional
cognition) is expected to best predict
perceived quality of life.
to best predict presence of psychological
distress.
Theoretical Background It would be
important to link the available knowledge on
IBS and its health related factors (which
includes link between mind and body) to
several main theories that provide further
explanations into the interplay of factors
explained earlier. A wealth of IBS related
research often cite stress and psychosocial
factors as having an modulating effect on IBS
and coping with their illness and symptoms
are key to treatment outcomes (Drossman,
2005).
Stress and Coping Theories
A number of psychological theories
have contributed to understanding the mind-
134

body relationship. These theories have
examined associations between external
demands (stressors) and bodily processes
(experience of stress by the body) (Krohne,
2002). Stress theories are particularly relevant
to IBS because stress has been understood to
be a risk and impacting factor in the
development and maintenance of functional
GI disorders such as IBS (Dancey, et al.,
1998). Selye (1976, p.64) defined systemic
stress as a state manifested by a syndrome
which consists of all the nonspecifically
induced changes in a biologic system.
Overall, Selyes work received much criticism
as it does not take into account coping
mechanisms as important mediators of the
stress-outcome interaction. This argument was
taken into account in Lazaruss theory of
stress which had undergone several revisions
(Lazarus, 1993; Lazarus & Folkman, 1984;
Lazarus & Launier, 1978). The latest version
known as the Transactional Model on Stress
and Coping (Lazarus, 1991) purports that
stress should be viewed as a relationship
(transaction) between individuals and their
Method
Participants
30 adult participants (9 male and 21
female patients, aged between 18 to 78 years)
with a diagnosis of Irritable Bowel Syndrome
(based on ROME III criteria4) seen in the
functional gastroenterology specialist clinic at
National University Hospital Singapore
(NUHS) participated in the study through a
referral from their attending physicians. A
quantitative research method was used to
address the research questions and aims. This
study used a correlational research design
employing quantitative data analysis methods.
Self-rating questionnaires and personal
structured interview (close ended) were used
to elicit responses.
Method
Each participant was given a verbal
explanation (along with the research
4
A set of criteria known as the Rome Criteria

developed by US and European researchers. The
current set is known as the Rome III Criteria
(Longstreth et al., 2006).
environment.
Lazarus
referred
to
psychological stress as a relationship with the
environment that the person appraises as
significant for his or her well-being in which
the demand taxes or exceeds available coping
resources (Lazarus & Folkman, 1984). They
explained that stress disturbs the equilibrium
between the body and a pathogen. This
explanation could possibly best explain the
impact of stress on IBS symptoms (Drossman,
2005).As IBS is a disorder that has no
definitive cause or explained bodily
abnormalities that can be confirmed through
tests, sufferers may perceive that there could
still be damage (harm) in their bodies
explained by the symptoms they experience.
Hence, IBS sufferers with more negative
cognitive appraisals, coupled with poor
coping abilities may experience increased
psychological distress. Therefore, this forms
the basis for the need of a closer examination
of the relationship between negative
cognitions and psychological distress amongst
IBS sufferers.
information letter) about the aims and

objectives of the study. The benefits, risks and
confidentiality aspects of the study were
thoroughly briefed to participants. Participants
were interviewed using a self-designed
structured interview schedule to elicit general
demographic and patient information. Four
standardised measures were used in this study.
The Irritable Bowel Syndrome Quality of Life
(IBS-QOL) instrument consists of 34 items
scored on 8 subscales- dysphoria, interference
with activity, body image, health worry, food
avoidance, social reaction, sexual and
relationship (Patrick, Drossman, Frederick,
Dicesare, & Puder, 1998). The second scale
known as the Hospital Anxiety and
Depression Scale (HADS) is a selfadministered scale which consists of 14 items
for use in medical settings (Zigmond &
Snaith, 1983). As a screening tool, it was
found to be reliable for detecting the presence
of anxiety and/or depression. It provides two
valid subscales: anxiety and depression and
measures severity of each subscale. The third
135

scale, the Irritable Bowel Syndrome Severity
Scoring System (IBS-SSS) (part 1) is a selfadministered questionnaire which measures
the severity of IBS through 5 items (Francis,
Morris & Whorwell, 1997). The Cognitive
Scale for Functional Bowel Disorders
(CSFBD) was the fourth measure used which
assesses cognitions of patients. Higher scores
Results
The majority of the participants
(76.7%) experienced moderate severity of IBS
when asked through the close ended
structured questionnaire. The most common
and most distressing IBS symptom was found
to be abdominal pain (26.6%). More than half
of participants fulfilled the criteria indicating
the presence of anxiety (60%) with less than
half meeting the criteria for depression (40%).
Based on the number of participants grouped
into the three categories based on the IBSSSS, equal proportions were found to fall into
the mild (13) and moderate groups (13).
13.3% of participants fall in the severe group.
Hypothesis 1 was supported with
dysfunctional cognition demonstrating a
strong, negative correlation r = -.84, n = 30, p
< .000, with perceived quality of life. This
suggests that the higher dysfunctional
cognitions experienced by participants, the
poorer quality of life scores were found.
Hypothesis 2 was support with a strong,
negative correlation r = -.61, n = 30, p < .000
(Anxiety) and r = -.59, n = 30, p < .001
(Depression),
with
high
levels
of
psychological distress associated with lower
levels of perceived quality of life. This
suggests that the higher psychological distress
experienced by participants, the poorer quality
of life scores could be found. A strong,
positive correlation between the two
variables, r = .46, n = 30, p = .01, was found
between dysfunctional cognitions and
perceived symptom severity.
This suggests that the higher
dysfunctional cognitions experienced by
participants, the higher perceived symptom
severity score could be found, lending support
Discussion
A clear interrelationship between
dysfunctional
cognition,
anxiety
and
perceived symptom severity was found. The
on the CSFBD reflect elevated problematic

cognitions related to IBS. Permission to
conduct this investigation was approved by
the National University Hospital Domain
Specific Review Board (DSRB) and James
Cook University (Australia) Ethics Review
Committee.
for hypothesis 3.Hypothesis 4 was supported

for patients with high levels of anxiety and
not with high levels of depression on
perceived symptom severity.
The results suggests that the higher
psychological distress (for anxiety only)
experienced by participants, the higher
perceived symptom severity levels could be
found. Hypothesis 5 states that dysfunctional
cognition is expected to be positively
correlated with psychological distress
(presence of anxiety and depression). There
was a strong, positive correlation between the
two variables, r = .51, n = 30, p < .01 (for
anxiety), with high levels of dysfunctional
cognitions associated with higher anxiety
levels.
There was no support for the
association between dysfunctional cognitions
and depression confirming that there is no
statistically significant relationship between
the two variables (r = .33, n = 30, p > .05).
This suggests that the higher psychological
distress (anxiety only) experienced by
participants, the
higher dysfunctional
cognition scores could be found.
This relationship demonstrates a clear
link between dysfunctional cognitions and
anxiety in the study. From the statistical
results, hypothesis 6 was supported only for
Depression (psychological distress) as the best
predictor of perceived quality of life. In terms
of hypothesis 7, the analyses yielded
significant results confirming that perceived
quality of life was the strongest predictor for
Depression (beta = -.16, p=.01), with the
exception of symptom severity.
overall results (tested in hypotheses 1 to 5) in

examining
the
relationship
between
psychological factors, quality of life and
136

symptom severity was also supported by a
wealth of previous research which found that
psychological factors are related to perceived
quality of life and symptom severity (Thijssen
et al., 2011; Gonsalkorale et al., 2004; Guthrie
et al., 1991; Drossman, 1999). In addition, it
was found that there was a clear and strong
positive relationship between anxiety and
dysfunctional cognition. These two factors
were found to influence one another strongly.
Dysfunctional
cognition
is
an
important factor that significantly impact
QOL, psychological distress and perceived
symptom severity as found in this study. The
self-regulation theory is particularly relevant
and useful in the context of IBS. Illness
Conclusion
The main findings of this study
include highlighting the demographic and
IBS-related profile of Asian IBS patients in
the local Singapore context. The IBS patient
profile in this study did not appear to differ
significantly from existing studies in western
contexts. Major findings in this study also
provide some preliminary evidence towards
understanding
the
relationship
of
psychological
factors
(dysfunctional
cognition, anxiety and depression) on QOL
and symptom severity in IBS patients.
In this study, IBS participants
demographic and psychosocial profile was
consistent with available studies in this area.
There were more female participants in this
study which was consistent with numerous
studies which had found the same help
seeking patterns in women. The IBS-QOL
scores of participants in this study were
similar to that of another Asian culture (Japan,
IBS-QOL) and somewhat similar to other
western studies. There were higher numbers
of participants with probable anxiety (60%) in
the sample. Dysfunctional cognition and
psychological
distress
were
strongly
associated with poor quality of life scores.
Symptom severity had a moderate relationship
with quality of life. Dysfunctional cognition
and the presence of anxiety correlated
strongly with symptom severity. This was
further substantiated when dysfunctional
perception (patients beliefs and expectations

about an illness) and IBS dysfunctional
cognitions are key areas for professionals to
assess when working with IBS patients. This
is because how IBS patients perceive their
symptoms may determine their appraisal of
their IBS condition, influence quality of life
and also health behaviors. The implication of
the theory highlights that behaviours can be
triggered as a result of cognitive (related to
dysfunctional cognition) as well as emotional
processes (related to mood disorders and
psychological distress such as depression).
Some IBS patients may perceive their
symptoms as a major threat and this may
exacerbate their IBS symptoms further.
cognition and anxiety scores had strong

correlations with one another.
Depression
and
dysfunctional
cognition (being a stronger predictor)
predicted the outcome of perceived quality of
life on the IBS-QOL. With additional analysis
to understand the impact of factors on
dysfunctional cognition, none of the factors
could statistically predict dysfunctional
cognition. It appears that dysfunctional
cognition is an important contributor to
perceived quality of life and psychological
distress. Dysfunctional cognition seemed to
be able to independently influence these
factors suggesting that it is an important factor
in the relationship between psychological
factors, quality of life and symptom severity.
Therefore, for clinical psychologists
working with IBS patients, it would be critical
to understand an IBS patients condition using
a clear theoretically based clinical formulation
applying the biopsychosocial framework as a
means to assess patient needs and
subsequently intervene. A clear understanding
of perpetuating, precipitating, predisposing
and protective factors surrounding IBS would
be crucial. For example, a clinical
psychologist would need to consider early life
experiences (ascertain presence of trauma,
genetic predispositions) and examine how
factors such a dysfunctional cognition
perpetuate or precipitate the manifestation of
physical symptoms and/or psychological
137

distress. Protective factors such as having
strong social support would also be important
to assess and harness during intervention
work.
Using
a
cognitive-behavioral
framework of working should be considered
in light of the relevance of factors such as
cognition and behavior outcomes found in this
study. One of the limitations to the study is
the small sample size which prompts the need
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