Chapter 27Gender and Media Content, Uses, and ImpactDar.docx

Chapter 27
Gender and Media: Content, Uses, and Impact
Dara N. Greenwood and Julia R. Lippman
Although research offers compelling evidence to suggest that
men and women are far more simi-
lar than they are different across a wide variety of domains, our
perceptions of gender difference
can lead us to believe that men and women do inhabit distinct
gendered universes and can trigger
self-fulfilling prophecies that confirm these expectations. These
perceptions can even guide how aca-
demics choose to interpret the research literature. Hyde’s (2005)
review of 46 meta-analyses supports
a “gender similarities hypothesis,” namely, the magnitude of
gender differences across these studies
as measured by effect size is small or negligible in over three
quarters of the cases assessed. Put
differently, a “small” effect size (i.e., d < 0.35; Hyde, 2005)
means that 85% of the distributions for
women and men overlap. This is not to say that a 15%
difference in distributions is an insignificant
percentage, but it certainly illustrates that emphasizing
difference to the exclusion of similarity paints
an inaccurate picture. Further, where moderate or large gender
differences did emerge, they were
often the product of social context. For example, women are
more likely than men to smile when
they know they are being observed (LaFrance, Hecht, & Paluck,
2003, as cited in Hyde, 2005). The
latter finding suggests that a given social situation may be of

paramount importance in the apparent
differences between men and women.
The social environment can influence the manifestation of
present attitudes and behaviors, but
it is also a powerful shaping force throughout the lifespan. In
their discussion of a social cognitive
approach to gender development, Bussey and Bandura (2004)
suggested that the mass media, in
addition to ongoing input from parents and peers, offer a
“pervasive cultural modeling of gender
roles” (p. 108). It is not just children who assimilate cultural
models, however; research on the
phenomenon of “possible selves” (Markus & Nurius, 1986)
suggests that over the course of our
lives, we continue to draw hoped for as well as feared selves
from “the categories made salient by the
individual’s particular sociocultural and historical context and
from the models, images, and symbols
provided by the media and by the individual’s immediate social
experiences” (p. 954, emphasis
added).
So how does the media environment contribute to our gendered
perceptions and experiences?
With a few exceptions, the basic cognitive and emotional
processes by which media exert an impact
tend to be similar for both men and women. The most robust
gender differences exist at the level
of media representation and content and the selective exposure
patterns that are, in part, a response
to gender-typed content. In order to understand how media
affect women and men, it is crucial first
to understand systematic gender differences in media content, as
well as any gender differences that
emerge with respect to the quality and quantity of media use.

D.N. Greenwood (B)
University of Michigan, Ann Arbor, MI, USA
643J.C. Chrisler, D.R. McCreary (eds.), Handbook of Gender
Research in Psychology,
DOI 10.1007/978-1-4419-1467-5_27, C© Springer
Science+Business Media, LLC 2010
644 D.N. Greenwood and J.R. Lippman
Media Content: Quantity and Quality of Gender Representation
At the most basic level, the mere presence – or lack thereof – of
men and women in various media
tells us something about the existing gender power dynamic.
Because women make up more than
one-half of the actual population, their under- or non-
representation in the symbolic social landscape
of the mass media may reflect and contribute to a cultural
climate in which women are less valued
than men. Indeed, as Gerbner and Gross (1976) famously
articulated, “Representation in the fictional
world signifies social existence; absence means symbolic
annihilation” (p. 182). Although research
suggests that, in terms of sheer numbers, progress has been
made toward equitable representation
(Signorielli & Bacue, 1999), we still have quite a distance to
go. However, the gender disparity in
representation grows or shrinks depending upon which
particular forms of media are investigated.
Research on US media content indicates that men and women
are represented at a ratio of approx-

imately 3:2 in scheduled television programming (Elasmar,
Hasegawa, & Brain, 1999; Glascock,
2001; Greenberg & Worrell, 2007; Harwood & Anderson, 2002;
Lauzen, Dozier, & Cleveland, 2006;
Signorielli & Bacue, 1999; Signorielli & Kahlenberg, 2001) and
commercials (Stern & Mastro,
2004). Similar figures have been obtained in content analyses of
scheduled television programming
in Britain (Coyne & Archer, 2004) and of television
commercials in Korea (Kim & Lowry, 2005) and
New Zealand (Furnham & Farragher, 2000). However, two
separate content analyses of British tele-
vision commercials (Furnham & Farragher, 2000; Nassif &
Gunter, 2008) and one of Saudi Arabian
television commercials (Nassif & Gunter, 2008) showed that
men and women enjoyed roughly equal
representation. The latter finding, in particular, indicates that
numbers represent only part of the
story. A consideration of the qualitative dimensions of
representation is also needed; indeed, the
same study showed that women on Saudi Arabian television
were cast in dependent or stereotypi-
cally feminine roles – and thus reflected the real-life
experiences of Saudi Arabian women – far more
often than men were. Although the studies cited do not even
begin to account for most countries,
they do represent studies conducted on media in countries that
are geographically and politically dis-
parate. More important, they indicate both that the trend of
women’s under-representation is more
than an American peculiarity and that the trend is by no means
universal.
However, these general figures obscure some significant
differences within particular forms of
entertainment media. For example, in the 1990s women were

typically featured in greater num-
bers in comedies than in dramas (Elasmar et al., 1999;
Signorielli & Bacue, 1999). Further, women
appearing in comedies had proportionally greater speaking time
than women appearing in dramas
(Glascock, 2001). Why might this be? In her work on racial
representation in entertainment media,
Coleman (2000) argued that dramas with Black casts have failed
in part because they require (White)
audiences to take Blacks seriously – something that, at least in
the USA, they might not yet have
been prepared to do. By way of imperfect analogy, the data on
women’s representation presented
here are highly suggestive of the same phenomenon. Viewing
audiences may be reluctant to take
women seriously in dramatic roles. Recent programming has
indicated that we are, however, moving
in a progressive direction – there are currently female leads in
highly rated recurring crime dramas
(Medium, The Closer) not to mention the hugely successful so-
called dramedies (Sex and the City,
Desperate Housewives). Given increasing visibility, however, it
becomes increasingly important to
consider and compare the quality of gendered representations,
which we address below.
The general figures presented above also obscure some
significant findings regarding subpopu-
lations. Although the aforementioned studies do not purport to
account for heterosexual characters
specifically, in practice, given the infrequency with which queer
characters appear in the media,
that is what they have, for the most part, done. A content
analysis of 125 major characters in sit-
coms showed that only 3 (2%) were clearly anything other than
heterosexual (Fouts & Inch, 2005).

Although reliable statistics regarding the prevalence of various
sexual orientations are hard to come
27 Gender and Media: Content, Uses, and Impact 645
by, most estimates place the prevalence rate of homosexuality at
considerably higher than 3%.
For example, one study showed that 11.1% of respondents self-
identified as homosexual or bisex-
ual (Bagley & Tremblay, 1998). Thus, gay individuals are
grossly under-represented in the mass
media.
All three of the nonheterosexual sitcom characters identified by
Fouts and Inch (2005) were gay
men (there were no lesbian or bisexual characters). This means
that, as with studies of presumably
heterosexual populations, among homosexuals, men are
represented more frequently than women
are. This disparity may reflect the relative power gay men and
lesbians are afforded. And, although
cable television shows such as the The L Word have increased
the number of lesbian characters on
television of late, scholars have noted that lesbian
representations frequently function to reinforce the
status quo: Same-sex sexual behavior between women is often
depicted as a temporary experimental
departure from their underlying heterosexual “nature” and is
often designed to be titillating to male
viewers (Diamond, 2005).
With regard to the intersection of gender and age representation
in entertainment media, those
over 65 – both men and women – are among the most under-

represented relative to their actual
numbers in the population as measured by US Census data
(Harwood & Anderson, 2002; Signorielli,
2004). However, the “social age” (a measure that determines a
character’s “age” based on what phase
of the life cycle he or she appears to be in) of women in this age
group is much more likely to be
categorized as “elderly” (83% of women vs. 66% of men). By
contrast, one in three men with an
apparent chronological age of over 65 was rated as “middle
aged,” whereas just over one in seven
women were categorized (Signorielli & Bacue, 1999). This
trend continues in the 50–64 age range:
One in four women in this age group was categorized as elderly,
whereas only 1 in 10 men in this
age group was categorized (Signorielli, 2004). In other words,
women are cast in roles that make
them seem older than they are more frequently and at earlier
ages than men are.
Is children’s media any different than media targeted to adults?
Research on violence in the media
suggests that children are more susceptible than adults to media
influence because they are still in the
process of developing social cognitive structures – a learning
process influenced by stimuli observed
in both interpersonal and mediated contexts (Huesmann, Moise-
Titus, Podolski, & Eron, 2003; see
also Dubow, Huesmann, & Greenwood, 2006, for a review of
media socialization moderators, pro-
cesses, and effects). This suggests that the representations to
which children are exposed are of
special concern. M. Larson (2001) found that girls and boys
were represented with near equal fre-
quency in commercials that aired during children’s
programming. However, the figures from a study

on Federal Communications Commission-mandated educational
television are strikingly similar to
those from studies of television targeted to adults (Barner,
1999). And figures from a study of favorite
television programs of first and second graders show that 35.4%
of minor characters and only 29.6%
of major characters were female (Aubrey & Harrison, 2004). As
Aubrey and Harrison noted, chil-
dren might well interpret this imbalance as reflective of the
relative importance of men and women in
society.
If the gender skew in children’s television seems like cause for
alarm, the gender imbalance in
video game characters is even more problematic. In one study of
video games, 72% of the charac-
ters were male, whereas only 14% were female (the remainder
were of an undeterminable gender)
(Beasley & Standley, 2002); in another study, only 15% of
games were found to have at least one
female hero or action character and fully 30% of the games that
had human characters had no female
characters at all (Dietz, 1998). The cultural view of video
games also indicates that they are “still
a man’s game” (Ivory, 2006): In recent studies there were more
than three times more men than
women featured in advertisements for video games (Scharrer,
2004) and more than five times more
men than women pictured in video game magazines (Miller &
Summers, 2007). Online reviews of
video games showed similar patterns: Men and boys were
significantly more likely to be mentioned

at all (75 vs. 42% of reviews) or to be shown in images
associated with the reviews (78 vs. 32% of
reviews; Ivory, 2006).
Statistics on the gender breakdown in various media paint an
incomplete picture, however. Just as
important – if not more so – are the ways the genders are
represented when they are present. When
a group is already under-represented, the characters and
personae that are visible carry an increased
burden of fair representation; however, diverse and equitable
representations tend to go hand in hand
with the quantity of roles available to a particular group
(Mastro & Stern, 2003). Although some of
the literature on media coverage of sports suggests that progress
toward equitable coverage has been
made in recent years (Cunningham, Sagas, Sartore, Amsdern, &
Schellhase, 2004; King, 2007),
research on magazines headlines (Davalos, Davalos, & Layton,
2007) and prime-time television
(Signorielli & Bacue, 1999) indicates that media messages
about gender roles continue to draw on
stereotypical notions of gender.
In the USA, men are more likely than women to be shown in a
paid position of labor (Glascock &
Preston-Schreck, 2004; Signorielli, 2004; Signorielli & Bacue,
1999; Stern & Mastro, 2004). This is
especially true of senior adults: In a content analysis of
television commercials, 40.3% of senior men
were shown as workers, whereas only 2.4% of senior women
were (Stern & Mastro, 2004). However,
the findings are more mixed for studies conducted in countries
other than the USA. Although studies
conducted in Germany (Döring & Pöschl, 2006), Indonesia

(Furnham, Mak, & Tanidjojo, 2000),
and Korea (Kim & Lowry, 2005) indicate that men are shown as
paid laborers more frequently
than women are, a pair of content analyses conducted in Britain
and New Zealand showed a non-
significant gender difference on this measure (Furnham &
Farragher, 2000). Women, on the other
hand, are more likely either not to work or to be in a role that
does not allow their employment
status to be determined (Signorielli & Kahlenberg, 2001; Stern
& Mastro, 2004). Significant gender
differences also emerge for job status: Men are more likely to
be depicted as bosses (Glascock, 2001)
and professionals (Glascock & Preston-Schreck, 2004; Stern &
Mastro, 2004; but see Signorielli &
Kahlenberg, 2001, for non-significant differences), although
women’s representation in the latter
category showed a significant increase between the 1970s and
the 1990s (Signorielli & Bacue, 1999).
In light of these findings, perhaps it should not come as a
surprise that a content analysis of women’s
magazine headlines conducted in the USA showed that only 3–
4% of headlines dealt with “career or
finance” (Davalos et al., 2007).
Whereas men are more likely to be shown engaged in paid
labor, women are far more likely to be
shown engaged in domestic labor (Glascock & Preston-Schreck,
2004; Stern, 2005; Stern & Mastro,
2004). And it is not just women who are doing household
chores: The same pattern was found for
girls in television commercials, who were far more likely than
boys to be shown doing household
labor. This gender difference only increased with age, which
underscores the role that socialization
processes play in the division of labor: By young adulthood,

women were twice as likely as men
to be shown performing domestic chores; by middle adulthood,
women were five times more likely
than men to be shown performing domestic chores (Stern &
Mastro, 2004). Not only are women
far more likely to be shown doing such chores, but when men do
attempt to do housework, they are
often portrayed as incapable of completing the task at hand
without a woman’s assistance (Kaufman,
1999) or else the chore they performed leads to a negative
consequence (Scharrer, Kim, Lin, & Liu,
2006). This not only underscores women’s obligation to take
charge of domestic details but may
reinforce problematic assumptions that women are more
naturally suited to domestic work. Further,
these kinds of gendered messages about the division of
household labor may dissuade men from
participating, for fear of failing at the task.
Just as women’s roles in the (media-represented) home largely
conform to gender-stereotypical
norms, so, too, do their roles in their families. Women are more
likely than men to be portrayed as
married (Glascock, 2001; Glascock & Preston-Schreck, 2004),
and married women are less likely to
be portrayed as working outside the home than are single or
formerly married women (Signorielli &
Kahlenberg, 2001). What’s more, when married women do work
outside the home, they are less
likely than their unmarried counterparts to be in white-collar
positions (Elasmar et al., 1999). Men,

on the other hand, are significantly more likely than women to
be of unknown marital and parental
status (Glascock, 2001), which is important because it suggests
that, unlike women, men can be
defined in ways other than through their associations with their
spouses or children. It is not surpris-
ing that women are generally portrayed as responsible for more
childcare than are men (Glascock,
2001; Glascock & Preston-Schreck, 2004), although men may
participate in some areas such as
teaching, reading to, eating with, and playing with children –
but only with boys (Kaufman, 1999).
However, although the qualified progress media representations
of men have made certainly deserves
recognition, lavishing praise on men for performing some
childcare duties misses the point: It is
still the case that real-world mothers who fail to attend to every
detail of childcare are regarded
as failures (and often come to see themselves as failures), and
this phenomenon may be fueled
by media messages that define parenting as solely a woman’s
responsibility (Douglas & Michaels,
2004).
Whereas home and family have traditionally been considered
women’s domains, sports and ath-
leticism have traditionally been associated with men. However,
there are some indications that there
has been significant progress toward more egalitarian coverage
– progress explicitly noted in both
American (Cunningham et al., 2004) and British (King, 2007)
studies that compared earlier sports
coverage to more recent coverage. Furthermore, non-significant
gender differences have been found
for several indicators of quality of coverage, such as the amount
of space devoted to each story

and the likelihood that photographs associated with stories will
be in color (Crossman, Vincent, &
Speed, 2007; Huffman, Tuggle, & Rosengard, 2004). Despite
this progress, though, men continue to
receive more overall coverage (Billings, Halone, & Denham,
2002; Crossman et al., 2007; Huffman
et al., 2004), and this coverage often expresses a gender bias
that highlights male athletes’ athleti-
cism but emphasizes female athletes’ appearance, personality,
and background (Billings et al., 2002).
Some of this bias may reflect internalized gender stereotypes
being externalized by female journal-
ists. Although sports journalists are still overwhelmingly male
(Billings et al., 2002; Huffman et al.,
2004; King, 2007), female sports broadcasters are more likely
than their male colleagues to comment
on the personality or appearance of female athletes (Billings et
al., 2002). African American men
are especially likely to be portrayed as athletes (Coltrane &
Messineo, 2000) and to be described
as having “natural athletic ability,” whereas their European
American male counterparts are more
likely to be described as having basketball “court smarts”
(Eastman & Billings, 2001; Stone,
Perry, & Darley, 1997).
Perhaps the most well-researched topic on gender differences
has been in the area of physical
appearance. Female characters in US media are consistently
rated as more attractive (Aubrey &
Harrison, 2004; Harwood & Anderson, 2002), thinner (Glascock
& Preston-Schreck, 2004; Klein &
Shiffman, 2005), more sexualized (Plous & Neptune, 1997;
Tanner-Smith, Williams, & Nichols,
2006), less muscular (Baker & Raney, 2007; Miller & Summers,
2007), and younger (Greenberg &

Worrell, 2007; Signorielli, 2004) than their male counterparts.
These asymmetries in gender repre-
sentation are particularly noteworthy because they suggest that
men are more powerful – physically
and psychologically – than women are, a representational bias
that has been documented for decades
(e.g., Goffman, 1979). The consequences and reach of this
symbolically rendered power dynamic
cannot be under-stated: In addition to increasing women’s
tendency to self-objectify (Fredrickson &
Roberts, 1997), and in addition to reflecting and contributing to
a cultural climate of sexual aggres-
sion and harassment (Donnerstein & Berkowitz, 1981; Rudman
& Borgida; 1995), the tendency
for women to be portrayed with a lower face-to-body ratio than
men (known as face-ism) may be
associated with lower perceptions of women’s intelligence and
ambition (Archer, Iritani, Kimes, &
Barrios, 1983). Further, new research shows that female
politicians who represent themselves
(in online photographs) with higher face-to-body ratios have
more pro-feminist voting records
(Konrath & Schwarz, 2007). This suggests that something as
subtle as small distinctions in
face-to-body ratios may reflect important social and political
belief systems.
Women of color tend to incur a double penalty when it comes to
media representation. For
example, Latinas, who are dramatically under-represented in
comparison to their actual population

numbers, are more likely than other ethnic groups to be shown
in sexualized poses or as children in
television commercials (Coltrane & Messineo, 2000; Mastro &
Stern, 2003). Black women, on the
other hand, are less likely than White women to be shown in
sexualized poses but are more likely
than White women to be shown in submissive poses (Millard &
Grant, 2006). Past research has also
indicated that Black women are more likely than White women
to be shown wearing animal prints
within the pages of fashion magazines (Plous & Neptune, 1997),
a trend that may insinuate that
Black women are more primitive and sexually motivated than
White women are.
The association between femininity and physical beauty
manifests itself in entertainment media
in a number of different ways: Women’s magazine headlines
disproportionately make reference to
the importance of physical attractiveness (Davalos et al., 2007),
female cartoon characters are far
more likely to be physically attractive (which, in turn, has
significant positive associations with
happiness, intelligence, and romantic activities and significant
negative correlations with physical
problems, anger, and antisocial behavior) than male characters
(Klein & Shiffman, 2006), and par-
enting magazines send the message that appearance is important
for girls more often than any other
gender-stereotypical message (Spees & Zimmerman, 2002).
These messages, in combination with
research evidence that suggests that women whose looks are
aligned with cultural ideals of beauty
are awarded real socioeconomic benefits, such as increased
likelihood of being hired (Marlowe,
Schneider, & Carnot, 1996) and higher salaries once hired

(Frieze, Olson, & Russell, 1991), can lead
women and girls to internalize the message that nothing is more
important than the way they look
(Fredrickson & Roberts, 1997). In line with this, research shows
that perceived physical attractive-
ness was the sole predictor of young girls’ wishful
identification with a female television character,
but for boys, wishful identification was predicted by perceived
intelligence of a favorite male char-
acter (Hoffner, 1996). Although recent Disney movies depict
more adventurous, less stereotypical
female heroes (e.g., Mulan, Pocahontas), one need only note the
latest “Princess” craze and its shop-
ping mall embodiment (i.e., theme stores in which young girls
can spend the day putting on makeup,
having their hair done, and trying on ball gowns) or catch the
eye of one of the hyper-glamorous and
sexualized “Bratz Dolls” to realize that young girls are still
being taught powerful lessons about the
central role that physical appearance plays in everyday life.
The dominant feature of current media-perpetuated
conceptualizations of female beauty is thin-
ness, as exemplified by the 94% of women’s magazine covers
that display thin models or celebrities
(Malkin, Wornian, & Chrisler, 1999). This message is echoed in
other media formats: 12% of female
characters (of all weights) on prime-time situation comedies are
shown restricting their dietary intake
(Fouts & Burggraf, 1999), perhaps to elicit the positive
feedback from male characters that is pos-
itively correlated with thinness (Fouts & Burggraf, 1999) or to
avoid the negative feedback – 80%
of which is reinforced by audience laughter – with which
thinness is negatively correlated (Fouts &
Burggraf, 2000). When male characters elicit negative

comments from female characters, it is uncor-
related with their actual body size or audience laughter; it is
only male characters’ self-deprecating
jokes about their own weight that is meaningfully related to
their body size and audience response
(Fouts & Vaughn, 2002). This suggests that, when men deviate
from an ideal body size, it is a less
serious social offense and a greater opportunity for good
natured self-parody than is the case for
women.
It is important to note, however, that, although the media
representations of idealized female
beauty and size are ubiquitous and powerful, the emphasis on a
muscular and sexualized male body
has also been increasing in recent decades (Rohlinger, 2002). In
some respects, equating masculinity
with muscularity is no different than equating femininity with
thinness. Both place an emphasis on
the body, both only recognize a single body type as desirable,
and both lead people to unhealthy
extremes in their efforts to obtain the “perfect” body. In both
cases, these unhealthy extremes may
be driven by distortions: Just as women tend to underestimate
the weight men perceive as ideal
(Fallon & Rozin, 1985), men may overestimate the degree to
which high levels of muscularity are
valued by women (Frederick, Fessler, & Hasleton, 2005). Of
course, one way in which the two ideals
do differ is that muscles are part and parcel of a physically
powerful body, which stands in contrast
to the purely visual statement that a thin female physique

makes. However, these images serve to
reinforce the conflation of masculinity with physical
dominance, and men are hardly immune to
the effects of such images. The impact of exposure to idealized
images on both women and men is
discussed later in the chapter.
If the cultural ideal of femininity values and rewards physical
beauty above all else, the cultural
ideal of masculinity prizes physical aggressiveness. And just as
defining femininity narrowly leads to
stereotypical and, ultimately, damaging representations, so, too,
does defining masculinity in narrow
terms. Scharrer (2001) argued that “hypermasculinity” – that is,
“macho” portrayals of masculinity –
is positively correlated with physical aggression. Put another
way, the media teach us that part of
being a “real man” is being physically aggressive. In a similar
vein, Dill and Thill (2007) noted that
nearly one-third of images of male video game characters are
portrayed as both hypermasculine and
aggressive.
Male characters in media content that ranges from British
television (Coyne & Archer, 2004) to
newspaper comics (Glascock & Preston-Schreck, 2004) to film
(Stern, 2005) are typically found
to be higher in physical aggression than female characters. This
finding has held for studies that
used composite or unspecified measures of aggression to
examine children’s educational television
(Barner, 1999), Portugese advertisements aimed at children
(Neto & Furnham, 2005), and video
game magazines (Dill & Thill, 2007). However, researchers who
have separated verbal aggression
from physical aggression have usually found that female

characters are higher in the former, an
effect demonstrated in British television (Coyne & Archer,
2004), American television (Glascock,
2001), advertisements aired during American children’s
television programming (Larson, 2001),
and newspaper comics (Glascock & Preston-Schreck, 2004).
Coyne and Archer (2004) argued
for the importance of studying indirect (or relational)
aggression, which, like verbal aggression,
is exhibited more …
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Gender Differences in Selective Media Use for
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To cite this article: Silvia Knobloch-Westerwick Ph.D. (2007)
Gender Differences in Selective
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Gender Differences in Selective Media
Use for Mood Management and Mood
Adjustment
Silvia Knobloch-Westerwick

Mood management theory has found empirical support but was
chal-
lenged by gender-typed selections and exposure to negative
content.
These challenges are addressed with response style theory and
the
mood adjustment approach. A secondary data analysis and
original ex-
perimental data serve to test hypotheses. As expected, after a
mood-impacting experience, men tend to distract themselves
with ab-
sorbing messages, whereas women tend to ruminate the
experience
and thus prefer messages with low absorption potential. When
antici-
pating a mood-impacting activity, men tend to distract
themselves right
before it by selecting absorbing content, whereas women focus
on it
and prefer less absorbing messages.
Media consumers’ moods play an important role in selections of
media messages,
as ample empirical evidence has shown. Based on mood
management theory
(Zillmann, 1988), many investigators have found affective
states to influence which
media content individuals attend to and which they avoid (for
overviews, see
Knobloch-Westerwick, 2006; Oliver, 2003; Zillmann, 2000).
Experiments,
quasi-experiments, field studies, and surveys have demonstrated
in the United States
and abroad that selections of electronic and broadcasting media
such as TV entertain-

ment genres, popular music, and Internet content in part result
from the current feel-
ing state of media consumers (e.g., Bryant & Zillmann, 1984;
Knobloch, 2002;
Knobloch & Zillmann, 2002; Zillmann, Hezel, & Medoff, 1980).
Mood management
considerations have been supported by amassed evidence but
were also challenged
by some observations. More specifically, both gender
differences in hedonically moti-
vated media selections and the exposure to upsetting, negative
content cannot be ex-
plained with mood management theory. This study aims to
address these challenges
by building (a) on response style theory (Nolen-Hoeksema,
1987, 1990), which con-
ceptualizes gender differences in responses to dysphoric affects,
and (b) on the mood
adjustment approach (Knobloch, 2003), which offers
explanations on why media us-
ers might sometimes be drawn to upsetting content. Hypotheses
derived from these
© 2007 Broadcast Education Association Journal of
Broadcasting & Electronic Media 51(1), 2007, pp. 73–92
73
Journal of Broadcasting & Electronic Media/March 2007
Silvia Knobloch-Westerwick (Ph.D., Institute for Journalism &
Communication Research, University of Music
& Drama, Hanover, Germany) is a faculty member in the School
of Communication, The Ohio State Univer-
sity. Her research addresses media effects and message
selection in entertainment media and news.

theoretical grounds will be tested with two data sets—a
secondary data analysis of a
mood management experiment and original data from a new
mood adjustment study.
The empirical investigation looks at selective music listening,
although the same pat-
terns are likely to apply to selections of other electronic and
broadcasting media as
well.
Mood Management Theory
Mood management theory (Zillmann, 1988) conceptualizes
selections of media
messages as motivated by affect optimization goals. Originally
called the theory of af-
fect-dependent stimulus arrangement (Zillmann & Bryant,
1985), its theoretical
claims pertain to enhancement of both emotions and moods (see
Zillmann, 2003, for
the differentiation), although it became better known as mood
management theory.
This hedonistic objective is served by arousal regulation via
media consumption to
avoid boredom and stress, exposure to positively valenced
content, and avoidance of
messages that are associated with sources of negative affects.
Thus, in states of stress,
calming messages are preferred over stimulating messages to
obtain agreeable
arousal levels. On the other hand, bored individuals favor
arousing messages accord-
ing to the theory. Generally, messages with a tone that is more

positive than the cur-
rent affective state will be sought out, whereas any content with
connections to ori-
gins of disagreeable feelings will be avoided.
As Zillmann (2000) noted, gender differences have emerged
repeatedly in mood
management investigations. In these cases, men failed to
comply with mood manage-
ment predictions, whereas women selected messages in line
with the theory (see
Biswas, Riffe, & Zillmann, 1994; Masters, Ford, & Arend,
1983; Medoff, 1982). For in-
stance, Anderson, Collins, Schmitt, and Jacobvitz (1996) found
in a field study that
men and women differed in their TV choices when under stress:
Stressed women
watched more game shows and variety programs, whereas
stressed men preferred vi-
olent action programs.
In light of psychological research on responses to one’s own
affects, gender-split
patterns of media-based mood regulation are not surprising at
all. In fact, gender has
been referred to as the most important interindividual
characteristic when it comes to
mood regulation (Thayer, Newman, & McClain, 1994).
Although the genders do not
differ in terms of emotional experiences (e.g., Johnson &
Schulman, 1988), ways in
which men and women cope with stress (Tamres, Janicki, &
Helgeson, 2002) or try to
change bad moods (Thayer et al., 1994) have clearly been
shown to diverge.

Response Style Theory
As Nolen-Hoeksema (1987, 1990) postulated in her response
style theory, the over-
arching principle of these gender differences in affect
regulation is that men tend to
seek distraction to overcome a bad mood, whereas women tend
to ruminate on bad
74 Journal of Broadcasting & Electronic Media/March 2007
moods. Ample evidence has corroborated this postulation
(Butler & Nolen-
Hoeksema, 1994; Nolen-Hoeksema, Morrow, & Fredrickson,
1993; Nolen-
Hoeksema, Parker, & Larson, 1994; Thayer et al., 1994).
Rumination “is defined as
thoughts and behaviors that focus the individual’s attention on
the negative mood, the
causes and consequences of this mood, and self-evaluations
related to the mood”
(Rusting & Nolen-Hoeksema, 1998, p. 790). Rumination,
though, does not appear to
be an effective mood-repair strategy because it leads to
prolongation of the negative
feeling state in both men and women, as experiments and field
studies have shown
(Ingram, 1990; Lyubomirsky & Nolen-Hoeksema, 1993, 1994;
Morrow & Nolen-
Hoeksema, 1990; Nolen-Hoeksema & Morrow, 1991, 1993;
Nolen-Hoeksema et al.,
1993; Nolen-Hoeksema et al., 1994). These studies also showed
that distraction, on
the other hand, is an effective mood-enhancement strategy for

both men and women
in negative moods. “Distraction involves focusing attention
away from the mood and
its causes onto pleasant or neutral stimuli that are engaging
enough to prevent the
mind from wandering back to the source of negative affect”
(Rusting & Nolen-
Hoeksema, 1998, p. 790). The fact that women are more likely
to ruminate when in
dysphoric states could explain why they are twice as likely as
men to be depressed
(Ingram, Cruet, Johnson, & Wisnicki, 1988; Nolen-Hoeksema,
Larson, & Grayson,
1999; Nolen-Hoeksema & Morrow, 1991; Nolen-Hoeksema et
al., 1994; Wood,
Saltzberg, Neale, Stone, & Rachmiel, 1990). However, anger
appears to be the excep-
tion to the rule that women ruminate and men distract
themselves from negative af-
fects. As Rusting and Nolen-Hoeksema (1998) showed, women
tend to avoid feelings
of anger with the aid of distraction, instead of focusing on the
anger. These differences
can be explained with gender-specific emotion socialization and
emotion-related
gender stereotypes—expressing anger is socially acceptable for
men but not for
women, whereas the display of sadness, fear, and most other
emotions is more ac-
ceptable for women (see Brody & Hall, 1993; Fischer, 2004, for
reviews).
Mood Management Research in Light
of Response Style Theory
In light of the response style theory, it is surprising that mood

management investi-
gations have not encountered gender differences throughout in
selective exposure to
media stimuli. Although the key assumptions of mood
management, as already cited,
do not explicitly refer to rumination and distraction, Zillmann
(1988) certainly en-
dorsed these approaches as mood-impacting strategies while
explaining the absorp-
tion potential as a stimulus characteristic with relevance for
mood management: “Per-
sons seeking to terminate their moods would do well to expose
themselves to highly
absorbing messages; persons who seek to maintain their states,
in contrast, should
minimize distractions and consume minimally absorbing fare—
or better yet, nothing
at all” (p. 331).
Knobloch-Westerwick/GENDER AND MOOD ADJUSTMENT
75
It is furthermore surprising that, in the case of gender
differences, men instead of
women tended to choose content that was likely to sustain their
negative affects. Ac-
cording to response style theory, women should be avoiding
distracting stimuli,
whereas men should seek them out. The exception, again,
should be anger, where
these patterns should be reversed. Yet only some mood
management investigations
manipulated affects for hedonic differentiation, whereas others
were interested in

arousal management and thus induced states of boredom versus
stress (e.g., Bryant &
Zillmann, 1984). As response style theory does not lend itself to
making predictions
on arousal regulation, it is not puzzling from this perspective
that mood management
research did not reveal gender differences in selective exposure
to calming and stimu-
lating messages for bored versus stressed media users. For the
studies that did exam-
ine effects of moods with different hedonic tones, the
absorption potential (Zillmann,
1988) of media selections was not always clearly differentiated
because the hedonic
valence of the material was more of interest.
Zillmann et al. (1980), for example, placed participants in bad,
neutral, and good
moods by ostensibly testing their social skills and providing
predetermined feedback
that served as mood induction. Then, in a purportedly second
study, respondents
were free to sample from sitcom, action drama, or game show
programs. The absorp-
tion potential of these choices may have been similar or at least
ambiguous, thus it is
plausible that no gender differences were reported. Likewise,
choices of innocuous
and hostile comedy in a study by Medoff (1982) may have
provided similar absorp-
tion levels, but Medoff found that especially frustrated men
favored hostile comedy,
whereas provoked men abstained from media consumption
altogether, probably to
ruminate their anger. On the other hand, frustrated and
provoked women apparently

tried to dissipate their anger by watching positively valenced
comedy. It seems that, in
line with Rusting and Nolen-Hoeksema’s (1998) findings
reported earlier, women dis-
tracted themselves from anger by using material without
“semantic affinity”
(Zillmann, 1988, p. 332) to the source of their anger, whereas
men ruminated their
frustration and anger while watching material with high
semantic affinity or even
nothing at all.
A study by Biswas et al. (1994) used the same mood induction
procedure as
Zillmann et al. (1980) and had respondents then select from
good and bad news, for
which equal ratings for “interesting” had been established in a
pretest. Thus the
choices were probably equally distracting. Biswas et al. (1994)
found that women in
bad moods preferred good news, whereas men in the same mood
state failed to do so.
It is possible that the participants in this study felt angry and
provoked by the experi-
menter’s mood induction, which might explain why men could
have been motivated
to ruminate negative, angry moods for a possible later
retaliation (Knobloch-
Westerwick & Alter, 2006; O’Neal & Taylor, 1989), whereas
women aimed to down-
play their anger (in line with findings from Rusting & Nolen-
Hoeksema, 1998, re-
ported earlier). However, in this situation they could do so only
by selecting messages
with negative or positive valence. Choosing more or less
absorbing messages was not

an option because, as mentioned, the reports had equal levels of
“interesting” ratings.
A mood management study with World Wide Web exposure
(Knobloch, 2002)
used a computerized form of the same mood induction as
Zillmann et al. (1980) and
Biswas et al. (1994), who had employed an experimenter. Thus
anger toward a pro-
voking individual is very unlikely in this situation. Yet the Web
pages provided for se-
lection had also been pretested to ensure equal ratings of
“interesting” while differen-
tiating the hedonic tone. In light of response style theory, again,
it stands to reason that
no gender differences were found because provided media
selections offered about
the same absorption potential.
However, the lack of gender differences in the results from
Knobloch and Zillmann
(2002) are puzzling when considering the research design from
the perspective of re-
sponse style theory. Again, the same mood induction from
Zillmann et al. (1980) was
applied, although also in a computerized format where anger
responses seem un-
likely. In a purportedly different study, participants were free to
choose from a set of
pop songs. The songs, offered via a computerized jukebox, had
been pretested for lev-
els of joyfulness and energy of musical expression—yet

evaluations of these proper-
ties were correlated in the pretest of the top-charts musical
selections. However, the
four songs with high pretest scores in energy and joyfulness
certainly had a higher ab-
sorption potential than the four more slow-paced songs with low
scores on these di-
mensions. Participants who had been placed in a bad mood
spent more time on ab-
sorbing music than those in a mediocre mood, who, in turn, also
dedicated more time
to uplifting music than the respondents in the good-mood
condition. However, no
gender differences or interactions with gender emerged,
although women in a nega-
tive mood should dedicate less time on the distracting,
absorbing music compared to
men in the same feeling state. Given women’s tendency to
ruminate more than men,
according to response style theory, an interaction between
gender and mood state
should be expected but was not found.
Taking a Process Perspective
A possible explanation why this interaction did not materialize
can be drawn from
a psychological study by Trask and Sigmon (1999). These
authors argued that individ-
uals in a bad mood are not likely to engage in just one strategy
of mood regulation and
that combinations should be accounted for. Earlier research had
only studied effects
of one particular strategy, represented in a distraction task or a
rumination task. In
Trask and Sigmon’s (1999) investigation, participants were

placed in depressed
moods and then asked to engage in two tasks. Depending on
experimental group,
participants performed two distraction tasks (Group A), a
distraction task and then a
rumination task (Group B), two rumination tasks (Group C), or
a rumination task and
then a distraction task (Group D). Results showed that Groups A
and B reported lower
levels of depression than after the mood induction in
measurements after the first and
the second task. Furthermore, Group D indicated a depressed
mood after the first task
but a better mood after the second task. Finally, Group C
remained depressed
77
throughout both tasks. Thus immediate distraction leads to
better mood, even if
followed by rumination, whereas bad moods tend to sustain as
long as the individual
ruminates.
If Trask and Sigmon (1999) were correct in assuming that
individuals do not only
apply one mood regulation strategy, then accumulated selective
exposure measures
in mood management investigations might veil that participants
engage in different
behaviors across time. Possibly, men seek to distract themselves
first to overcome a
depressed state, whereas women might initially ruminate before

finally seeking dis-
traction. Such a pattern would comply with response style
theory but can also explain
why accumulated selective exposure patterns do not always
reflect gender differ-
ences in mood-regulation styles.
Mood Adjustment Approach
A study by Knobloch (2003) showed that different mood-
regulating strategies via
media use can indeed be pursued within a relatively brief
period. This investigation
examined the mood adjustment approach (Knobloch, 2003),
which suggests that
often media users do not only aim to optimize their mood, as
original mood man-
agement theory had postulated. Instead, media users frequently
anticipate upcom-
ing situations and activities that may call for specific moods. To
regulate moods ac-
cordingly, individuals may employ media stimuli. In the
empirical study,
participants performed an initial task and were then free to
sample from pop music
during an ostensible waiting period of 7 minutes. The findings
indicated that partic-
ipants allocated the first part of the listening period as mood
management would
predict, apparently pursuing mood optimization goals. However,
as additional ac-
tivities approached toward the end of the listening period,
choices reflected mood
adjustment purposes. Hence, coping with an anticipated task
sets in right before
this task.

The mood adjustment approach was further investigated with a
specific interest
for gender differences by Knobloch-Westerwick and Alter
(2006). It was hypothe-
sized that men and women would employ news choices
differently while anticipat-
ing a social encounter. This study investigated how provoked
men and women ad-
just their moods during media use, either knowing or not
knowing that they get a
chance to retaliate against the provoker. Participants received
only negative feed-
back about a social skills test from a supervisor. Half of the
respondents were led to
believe that they would get to evaluate the supervisor
(retaliation opportunity) after
they had examined a new online newsmagazine. The included
news actually fea-
tured both bad and good news, which had received equal ratings
for “interesting”
in a pretest and thus had about the same absorption potential.
Gender differences
in selective exposure to good and bad news emerged only for
the respondents who
anticipated the retaliation opportunity. As the end of the news-
browsing period ap-
proached, women who anticipated a retaliation opportunity
looked at more good
news, probably to dissipate their anger. At the same time, men
who anticipated a

retaliation opportunity decreased exposure to good news in
favor of bad news, ap-
parently to sustain their anger to get back at the provoker.
Hence, like in the find-
ings from Knobloch (2003), adjustment to an upcoming task or
encounter occurred
pretty much right before this activity and not throughout the
whole media use pe-
riod. Interestingly, women generally spent significantly more
time reading the
news, whereas men allocated more time to the overview page
without actual news
reading. This might also indicate that women tried to rid
themselves of anger by
distraction via news reading.
Furthermore, it is important to note that mood intensity showed
no impact on selec-
tive exposure patterns in this study (Knobloch-Westerwick &
Alter, 2006), in contrast
to the initial mood optimization patterns in the investigation by
Knobloch (2003) de-
scribed earlier. Most likely, the situations in the two studies
differed in terms of rele-
vance for self-perceptions. One employed a comparatively
innocuous task of match-
ing symbols (Knobloch, 2003)—the fact that participants
engaged in some mood
optimization behavior is probably due to low importance of
such an assignment for
self-perceptions. In contrast, there is apparently no room for
mood optimization when
the situation is highly relevant for self-perceptions, as it was in
the study that involved
an alleged test of social skills and related social behaviors
(Knobloch-Westerwick &

Alter, 2006).
Hypotheses
Taking these considerations and findings together, the following
hypotheses can be
proposed. Individuals’ media selections should reflect mood-
enhancement strategies
that depend on media users’ gender. It is expected that gender-
specific mood regula-
tion strategies will occur at different points in time, depending
on whether the source
of a mood has passed or is anticipated to become relevant. In
the first case, men
should engage in distraction and women in rumination right
away. As mood manage-
ment studies have often shown that women actually do employ
media use to enhance
their moods (e.g., Helregel & Weaver, 1989; Meadowcroft &
Zillmann, 1987), it is
likely that they also turn to distraction eventually. Yet when a
stressor is anticipated, a
reversed time pattern should occur, with men engaging in
distraction and women in
rumination as the stressing incident approaches. Finally, as
mood enhancement is
particularly important in negative affective states, these patterns
could be more dis-
tinct when individuals are experiencing negative feelings. On
the other hand, de-
pending on the relevance of the upcoming task for the self, as
discussed earlier, the in-
dividual might focus on mood adjustment and pursue no mood
enhancement per se.
Thus the investigation will differentiate affective states by
hedonic valence—bad,

neutral, and good—in comparative terms, as they are induced by
an experimental
treatment and defined by respondents’ assessments, to explore a
research question
about the importance of mood valence.
79
H1: After a mood-impacting experience, males initially prefer
media content with high
absorption potential and then decrease exposure to absorbing
messages, whereas
females initially prefer media content with low absorption
potential and then in-
crease exposure to absorbing messages.
H2: After a mood-impacting experience and while anticipating
further related activi-
ties, males prefer media content with high absorption potential
as the activity ap-
proaches, whereas females prefer media content with low
absorption potential as
the activity approaches.
RQ1: Are the patterns postulated in H1 and H2 more
pronounced for mood states with
negative valence?
Method
Overview
This investigation employs data from a mood management study

presented by
Knobloch and Zillmann (2002) to address H1 and RQ1 and
furthermore analyzes new
data from a mood adjustment investigation for H2 and RQ1.
Hypotheses were further-
more tested in a 3 × 2 × 2 design with repeated measures, with
mood manipulation
(bad, neutral, and good moods induced through feedback of
different alleged perfor-
mance levels), task anticipation (none vs. anticipated), and
study (mood management
study vs. mood adjustment study) as between factors and
selective exposure to ab-
sorbing music for different listening intervals as the within
factor.
In the mood management study, 116 U.S. respondents
participated in a computer-
ized research session that was ostensibly composed of two
parts. During the first part,
participants performed an emotion recognition test that actually
served to place them
in a bad, neutral, or good mood. In the second part, participants
were free to choose
from top-chart pop songs provided via computer to listen to
whatever they liked dur-
ing a 10-minute period. During the listening period, selective
exposure to each song
was unobtrusively logged, unbeknownst to participants. Finally,
items on the current
mood states and evaluation questions on the music were
presented for closure before
the debriefing.
The pop songs available for immediate listening had been
categorized in a pretest

into four songs that were high on the characteristics “energy”
and “joyfulness” as mu-
sic properties and four songs that were low on these dimensions.
The two groups of
songs offered clearly contrasting absorption levels, as they
differed primarily on the
energy dimension. An analysis of pretest ratings of “energy”
yielded M = 1.4 for low
and M = 7.2 for high on a scale from 0 to 10, F(1, 52) = 448.5,
p < .001, and the dis-
similarity for “joyfulness” was much smaller (M = 5.5 for low
and M = 6.9 for high),
F(1, 52) = 13.74, p = .001. Thus the contrast was 5.8 scale
points for energy and only
1.4 for joyfulness.1 The two sets of songs also differed
objectively in a comparison of
beats per minute (M = 72, range = 63–86, for slow songs; M =
138, range = 116–168,
for fast songs). Several studies have shown that fast, energetic
music hinders concen-
tration, whereas slow, soothing music helps listeners to focus
(e.g., Borling, 1981;
Smith & Morris, 1977; Wakshlag, Reitz, & Zillmann, 1982);
furthermore, fast music is
perceived to be more distracting than slow music (Mayfield &
Moss, 1989). Hence,
four songs featured high absorption potential and four offered
only little absorption.
The procedure employed for the mood adjustment study with 79
German partici-

pants was almost identical to the first one—an ostensible
“emotion recognition test”
served as mood induction before participants could sample from
the same
precategorized pop songs, featuring low versus high absorption
potential. However,
the procedure used here included an announcement before the
music-listening pe-
riod that tasks “similar to the one just performed” would follow.
Hence, participants
were led to form an expectation about upcoming activities.
Furthermore, as the re-
searcher no longer had access to the participant population
employed in first experi-
ment, this data collection was conducted with German students
and with all instruc-
tions in German. Earlier research (Knobloch, 2002) that used
the same mood
induction demonstrated that Germans’ media message selections
were fully in line
with mood management theory predictions; thus no major
differences between sam-
ples are to be expected. It is argued that the personal use of
popular music, when bro-
ken down into simple categories of songs with low versus high
absorption potential,
for mood-regulating purposes is unlikely to differ by country.
Young people in Ger-
many, similar to other countries (Winter, 1985), are typically
exposed to a vast
amount of popular songs originating in the United States
(Deutsches
Musikinformationszentrum, 2005) and are certainly used to
listening to them on a
daily basis.

Respondents
The sample of the mood management study consisted of 116
undergraduate stu-
dents from a large southeastern university in the United States,
recruited from intro-
ductory communication classes for extra credit. Participants
were evenly assigned to
experimental conditions (ns = 39, 37, and 40) with even gender
proportions in these
groups (68% women in total, age M = 20.2, SD = 1.2). An
additional 53 respondents
drawn from the same population had served for a pretest of
musical stimuli.
The sample of the mood adjustment study included 79 student
respondents re-
cruited in a central building on a large German university
campus. They received a
small financial compensation for participation. The average age
was 21.2 years (SD =
2.2) and 54% were women. Participants were randomly assigned
to experimental
conditions (ns = 27, 26, and 26) while balancing for gender
proportions.
Procedures
The procedures of the two studies were almost identical and are
explained in the
following. The instructions for the mood adjustment study were
all German transla-
tions from the first investigation. Any other difference is
indicated in square brackets.

81
General Setting. The data collection was conducted in a
computer laboratory
with 17 …
Running head: STUDY TWO LITERATURE REVIEW 1
PAPER III: LITERATURE REVIEW 9
Instructions for Paper III: Study Two Literature Review (Worth
35 Points)
Ryan J. Winter
Florida International University
Purpose of Paper III: Study Two Literature Review
1). Psychological Purpose
Paper III is intended to help you take your original Facebook
Consensus study one step further by letting you predict how a
second independent variable of your lab’s choosing impacts
participants. In this replication with extension study, you have a
greater role in a). choosing which articles to include in your
follow-up literature review as well as b). identifying how this
new variable influences your hypotheses. The bulk of your
points in Paper III will come from a new paper “literature

review”, but—similar to journal articles you might have read—
this second literature review comes between the discussion from
study one and before the methods for study two. That is, your
Paper III will include your original literature review from study
one (revised based on feedback from Paper I), your study one
methods, results, and discussion (revised based on feedback
from Paper II), and a new literature review that both focuses on
the results of study one but adds in new information and
references for study two.
In other words, Paper III includes:
1). Your original title page (though feel free to change the title)
2). Your revised study one literature review (ending in the study
one hypotheses).
3). Your revised study one methods section.
4). Your revised study one results section.
5). Your revised study one discussion section.
6). Your new study two literature review (ending in the study
two hypotheses).
7). References for all citations in the paper (minimum 10
references required)
8). Your appendices from study one
The largest number of Paper III points are provided for your
new study two literature review. Unlike your study one
literature review, your study two literature review will
essentially pick up after study one. Think of it as a “sequel” of
sorts. It builds on and extends study one’s Facebook Consensus
focus, using two levels of your original independent variable
(either Support vs. Mixed, or Oppose vs. Mixed) and similar
dependent variables (e.g. Cheating impressions etc.) but altering
or extending them into a new study design. The good news here
is that you can refer to study one as you write your study two
literature review. In fact, that is something I encourage. You
can also refer back to your study one literature review sources.
The bulk of this study two literature review concerns a second
independent variable that you and your lab will manipulate

during the second part of the semester. You will need to find up
to five references for this second independent variable,
hopefully finding sources that build a bridge between studies
one and two. In other words, in Paper III you will answer the
following question: “Given our findings in study one, how will
the presence of a second independent variable impact
participant decisions?”
Similar to Paper I, you should end your literature review in
Paper III by noting your specific hypotheses for study two.
Here, you will address both main effects (outcomes associated
with each independent variable alone) and interactions (the
combined impact of your independent variables).
2). APA Formatting Purpose
The second purpose of Paper III: Literature Review is to once
again teach you proper American Psychological Association
(APA) formatting. In the pages below, I will tell you how to
format your paper using APA style. There are a lot of very
specific requirements in APA papers, so pay attention to the
instructions below as well as Chapter 14 in your book!
3). Writing Purpose
Finally, this paper is intended to help you refine your writing.
My hope is that you will use feedback from Paper I and Paper II
to improve your grammar, spelling, and content in Paper III. At
the end of the semester, you will actually use Paper III as the
opening section for your final course paper, so doing a good
writing job Paper III will be very beneficial as you revise your
papers for Paper V. Many students use Paper V as their writing
sample for graduate programs, so make sure you write clearly
and precisely for an educated reader!
Note that the plagiarism limit for Paper III is 50%. This is a bit
higher given the overlap in the Paper II material, but your Paper
I and new literature review in Paper III should be very unique to
you. As usual, references, citations, and the predictions are not
included in the plagiarism limit.

Instructions for Paper III: Study Two Literature Review (Worth
35 Points)
This paper will cover both study one (including the literature
review, methods section, results section, and brief discussion
from that study) and the introduction literature review to study
two. This paper essentially tells the literature oriented story of
your semester long project thus far. Your main job is to justify
your study two predictions, and you do that by both showing
how study one influenced your choice of variables in study two
as well as citing prior research that supports your second
independent variable in study two. At the end of the study two
literature review section, you will provide your own study two
predictions.
The good news is that we are continuing with our topic of the
Facebook Consensus study. You wrote a lot on that already, so
here you simply add to it, noting in a second “literature review”
section how a second independent variable might interact with
the study one Facebook Consensus manipulation. Here are the
components to keep in mind. By now, a lot of this should be
familiar to you, so you’ll see a lot of overlap with the
instructions and checklists from Papers I and II.
1. Title Page: I expect the following format (1 point):
a. This title page is a lot like the title page on your Papers I and
II. See my “Title” page above as an example or reuse your title
page from prior papers (though you may need to modify your
title given your new IVs in this study).
b. You must have a header and page numbers on each page.
i. If you don’t know how to insert headers, ask your instructor
or watch this very helpful video!
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=9pbUoNa5tyY.
ii. The header goes at the top of the paper and it is left justified.
1. Use “Insert Headers” or click on the top of the page to open
the header. Make sure to select the “Different first page” option
so that your title page header will differ from subsequent pages
2. The R in Running head is capitalized but the h is lower case,
followed by a colon and a short title (in ALL CAPS). This short

running head title can be the same one as the rest of your paper
or it can differ – the choice is yours, but it should be no more
than 50 characters including spaces and punctuation
3. Insert a page number as well. While the header is flush left,
the page number is flush right.
iii. Want an example header? Look at the title page of these
instructions! You can use other titles depending on your own
preferences (e.g. SOCIAL MEDIA AND CONSENSUS;
CONFORMITY; JUDGING OTHERS; etc.).
c. Your Title should be midway up the page. Feel free to alter
the title at this point so that it includes a better description of
both study one and study two
d. Include your name (First Last) and the name of your
institution (FIU) beneath the paper title. For this class, only
your own name will go on this paper. Double space everything!
i. You can also refer to Chapter 14 in your textbook
2. Abstract? Again, this is not needed … yet! You’ll include it
later in Paper V.
3. Literature Review Study One (3 points)
a. Make sure to revise the study one literature review from
Paper I based on feedback to that paper. The Paper I
instructions still apply for that second in Paper II, so reread
those instructions if you need a reminder on the requirements
for your study one literature review.
b. For Paper III, you will need ten references total. You already
have five for the study one literature review, so feel free to
keep those same references. You can also add a few or take
away a few from the study one literature review and make-up
the difference in the study two literature review section (#7
below). That is, you can have seven references for study one
and three for study two, or six for study one and four for study
two, etc. My advice – keep your five references from study one
and include five additional references for the study two
literature review.
c. Just remember to revise, revise, revise your study one lit
review. If we made recommendations for improvement and you

don’t change a word, you’ll lose all three points in this section!
4. Methods Study One (3 points)
a. Revise your methods from study one for this section based on
feedback we gave you in Paper II. The Paper II instructions for
methods still apply for this section.
b. Again, revise, revise, revise or risk losing all points in this
section
5. Results Study One (3 points)
a. Revise your results from study one for this section based on
feedback we gave you in Paper II. The Paper II instructions for
the results still apply for this section.
b. Do I need to mention revise?
6. Discussion Study One (1 point)
a. Revise your discussion from study one for this section based
on feedback we gave you in Paper II. The Paper II instructions
for the discussion still apply for this section.
b. One word – revise!
7. Literature Review Study Two (10 points)
a. APA formatting for the first page of your literature review
i. Your study two literature review starts right after the
discussion for study one. There is no page break, so have it
come right after the discussion on the very next line.
b. APA formatted citations for the literature review
i. Between the literature review for study one and the literature
review for study two, you have to have at least ten references
combined. If you have five references in the study one lit
review, you need five more here. If you have seven for study
one, you need three here. In total, at least eight of these ten
references must be based on empirical research reports (that is,
each of these eight cited articles should have a literature
review, a methods section, a results section, a
conclusion/discussion, and references). The remaining two
sources can also be primary sources, but you may also use
secondary sources (books, law reviews, newspaper articles,
etc.). Of course I would recommend sticking with all primary
sources, but the choice is yours for the other two citations.

Note: Internet blogs and Wikipedia are not acceptable as
secondary sources. Here is a bit more to note:
1. As in Paper I, I am not setting a maximum on the number of
citations you can use, but between studies one and two you need
at minimum ten of them! These may overlap among students, so
it is okay to read the same articles as some of your classmates.
You can use all of the articles posted on Canvas for Paper I if
you want, but note that you will need to find some new
references as well (especially ones that focus on your second
independent variable).
a. Referring to your first study does not count as a reference.
2. Proper citations must be made in the paper – give credit
where it is due, and don’t make claims that cannot be validated!
If it sounds like a fact, then you must provide a citation to
support that fact
3. DO NOT plagiarize. You will turn this in on Canvas, and we
can check for plagiarism via turn-it-in. Paraphrasing is okay,
but you must still cite the original author even if you do not use
his or her words verbatim. If you rewrite what they say, it is
still them that had the original idea, and they deserve credit for
it
4. If you directly quote a source, make sure to provide a page
number for where you found that quote. However, I prefer
paraphrasing to direct quotes. I allow three quotes total for the
whole paper (including the two that I allowed in Paper I). If you
quote more than three times you will lose one point for each
additional quote.
c. Content-based requirements for your study two literature
review
i. Your study two literature review should use your study one
results and prior research studies as a jumping off point, once
again starting with a broad theme and then narrowing it down –
think about the hourglass example your instructors have given
you. Now imagine that you have a second hourglass right below
the original one. You can start broadly again with information
about the new study independent variable, and then once again

narrow down as you near your hypotheses for study two.
ii. Think about your study two literature review this way: You
are writing a sequel to study one, so your new story picks up
where that story left off.
1. I want you to pay close attention to your own brief discussion
from study one (Paper II discussion). You drew some
conclusions there, but now is your chance to build on those
conclusions. At the beginning of your new study two story, your
audience knows some of the story from study one, so there is no
need to rewrite what you already presented. Rather, you need to
set the stage for the new sequel storyline. Introduce your new
“character”, or your new independent variable. Talk about this
somewhat in isolation (what does research say about this
variable on its own). Once you define and clarify what this new
variable is and how it has been used in prior research, start to
show how it connects to your own study one.
a. For example, let’s say your new independent variable is “the
effect of warnings on behavior”, with warning versus no
warning as the two levels of the new IV. You would talk about
research on warnings and how it impacts people. THEN you talk
about how warning about Consensus might impact people. So,
step one is to introduce the new concept while step two is to
show how the new concept fits in with your new study.
2. At the end of the story, start to lead the reader to the big
cliffhanger (your study two hypothesis). By now you have
introduced the characters as well as the plot, but then you want
to build some anticipation in your reader – you want them to
wonder what comes next! The last part of the literature review
brings the reader to your study two hypotheses, or that potential
twist ending to your story. That is, “Given what we saw in the
literature, what happens if we do XYZ?” Thus you build your
study to your hypotheses and end on another cliffhanger. The
next chapter (Paper IV Methods, Results, and Discussion)
focuses on the study that you actually did! In other words, at
the end of your study two literature review you should …
a. give a general overview of your research question

b. state your specific predictions / hypotheses given the studies
you talked about in the literature review. This should look at
both main effects and interactions, so you’ll need to address
each IV on its own (main effect for belief perseverance and
main effect for your second IV) and the interaction of the two
IVs as they work together.
d. The literature review for study two must have a minimum of
two (2) full pages of text and a maximum of five (5) pages. This
time, I’ll let you include the hypotheses within that minimum 2
pages (though it would be very tight to get all of that info in
there in such a short lit review section).
8. Citations: I expect the following format (4 points)
a. All in-text citations must be correct (correct APA formatting,
correct dates, if directly quoted must have page numbers, and
uses et al. and & and correctly)
9. References: I expect the following format (5 points):
a. The References section starts on its own page, with the word
References centered. Use proper APA format in this section or
you will lose points.
b. All ten references that you cited in the literature review must
be in this section (there should be more than ten references here
if you cited more than ten articles). However, at least eight must
come from empirical articles
c. For references, make sure you:
i. use alphabetical ordering (start with the last name of the first
author)
ii. use the authors’ last names but only the initials of their
first/middle name
iii. give the date in parentheses – e.g. (2007).
iv. italicize the name of the journal article
v. give the volume number, also in italics
vi. give the page numbers (not italicized) for articles
vii. provide the doi (digital object identifier) if present (not
italicized)
10. Appendices: I expect the following format (1 point)
a. Copy and paste from Paper II. This should be an easy point!

Just make sure the appendices go AFTER the references page
(That is, an appendix “appends” the paper – it goes at the end!)
i. Appendix A: Include your tables for age, gender, and
ethnicity.
ii. Appendix B: Include your tables for your chi square and the
crosstabs
iii. Appendix C: Include your tables for your first scaled DV
iv. Appendix D: Include your tables for you second scaled DV
11. Overall writing quality (4 points)
a. Make sure you check your paper for proper spelling and
grammar. The FIU writing center is available if you want
someone to look over your paper (an extra eye is always good!)
and give you advice. I highly recommend them, as writing
quality will become even more important on future papers.
Other Guidelines for Paper III: Literature Review
1. 1). Pay attention to the page length requirements – 1 page for
the title page, 2-5 pages for the study one lit review, no
minimum page lengths for the study one methods, results, and
discussion sections, 2-5 pages for the study two literature
review, and at least 1 page for the references page. If you are
under the minimum, we will deduct points. If you go over the
maximum, we are a little more flexible (up to a half page or so),
but we want you to try to keep it to the maximum page.
1. 2). Page size is 8 1/2 X 11” with all 4 margins set at 1”. You
must use a 12-point font with Times New Roman font.
EVERYTHING in the paper (including references) is double
spaced
1. 3). When summarizing articles for your lit review and doing
so in your own words, make sure you still cite the original
source. Always use proper referencing procedures, which means
that:
2. If you are inserting a direct quote from any source, it must be
enclosed in quotations and followed by a parenthetical reference
to the source. “Let’s say I am directly quoting this current

sentence and the next. I would then cite it with the author name,
date of publication, and the page number for the direct quote”
(Winter, 2013, p . 5).
0. Note: We will deduct points if you quote more than three
times in the paper, so keep quotes to a minimum. Paraphrase
instead, but make sure you still give the original author credit
for the material by citing it or using the author’s name (“In this
article, Smith noted that …” or “In this article, the authors
noted that…”)
1. 4). PLEASE use a spell checker to avoid unnecessary errors.
Proofread everything you write. I actually recommend reading
some sentences aloud to see if they flow well, or getting family
or friends to read your work. Using Pearson Writer is also
required
The above information is required for your paper, but I wanted
to provide a few tips about writing your study two literature
review as well. Hopefully this will give you some good
directions:
· First, remember that you need ten references total, eight of
which MUST be peer-reviewed
· Second, I don't expect a lengthy discussion for each and every
article that you cite for either study one or study two. You
might spend a page on one study and a sentence or two on
another. The amount of time you spend describing an article you
read should be proportional to how important it is in helping
you defend your hypotheses. If you do a near replication of a
prior study, then I would expect you to spend more time
discussing that prior research since it has a big impact on your
own study. If an article you read simply supports a global idea
that ties into your study but has very different methods (like
"frustrated people get mad!"), you can easily mention it in a
sentence or two without delving into a lot of detail. Tell a good

story in your literature review, but only go into detail about plot
elements that have a direct bearing on your study!
· Third, like Paper I, Paper III is all about supporting your study
two hypotheses. Know what your hypotheses are before you
write the paper, as it will help you determine how much time to
spend on each article you are citing.
· Fourth, make sure to proofread, proofread, proofread! Use the
Pearson Writer for help, but note that their suggestions are just
that – suggestions. It is up to you to make sure the flow of the
paper is easy to understand. Good luck!
· Fifth, please note that a different grader might grade your
Paper III than Paper I or II. As forewarning, the new grader
might mark off for Paper I and II elements that the prior grader
thought was okay. That is, the two graders may not agree with
each other on everything. Unfortunately, this happens, even
when I try to publish a paper in a journal. Two reviewers may
have no problem with my paper while two others nitpick a lot.
The same happens here. Just be aware that graders all use the
same paper checklist and grade rubric. They might emphasize
some elements more than others in those checklists depending
on their personal grading style, but if YOU pay attention to all
checklist elements then grading will not differ much regardless
of who graded! So, USE THE CHECKLISTS! I mark off a point
if the appendix comes before the references. I mark off if
reference article titles use incorrect capital letters. I mark off if
the letters p, F, M, and SD are not in italics. Everything I might
mark off for is included in the checklist, so if your paper passes
the checklist, I won’t have as much to mark off for! Use it (and
look at the example paper and grade rubric as well!)
Your second IV will be Gender. Your first IV will still
be Consensus.
However, to reduce the complexity of design and create a

stronger manipulation, the condition will be only 2 levels—
Supportive vs. Mixed.
This gives us a 2 (Consensus Condition: Supportive v. Mixed) X
2 (Gender Condition: Male v. Female) factorial design. We will
compare all conditions by focusing on two main effects (one
for Consensus Condition and one for Gender Condition) and
one interaction (Consensus X Gender):
Male
Female
Supportive
Condition A
Condition B
Main Effect:
Consensus Condition
Mixed
Condition C
Condition D
Main Effect: Gender Condition
You are expected to generate your own hypotheses for this
paper.
Our recommendation is that you look at PsycInfo and find some
additional references for the new condition.
Read over the Paper III instructions in Canvas to get a better
idea about what the paper entails, but essentially you will be
adding 2 to 3 paragraphs to your existing literature review.
These paragraphs will focus on your new independent variable.
There are a lot of articles you could look at. You can use any
literature that finds an effect of Gender on Consensus or similar
phenomena - your job is to show that Gender yields effects on

our outcomes. If you find one that looks at
both Consensus and Gender, then those are ideal because they
will support your inclusion of both variables in your study and
the interaction.
For Paper III, we need to see a minimum of 7 references. You
should already have a minimum of 5 from Paper I (Study One
Literature Review), so you only need 2 more. Now, if you had
fewer than 5 in Paper I, you will need more in Paper III. In the
same vein, if you had more than 5 in Paper I, then you need
fewer for Paper III. At minimum, you must have 7 references in
the whole Paper III, but you can have more if you would like.
First, you can alter the gender of the Facebook user. What if
you are looking at Adam rather than Abigail? Would support
(versus mixed) for Adam get different ratings compared to
support (versus mixed) for Abigail? (Note that we would have
FOUR conditions in this design: Adam Support vs. Adam Mixed
vs. Abigail Support vs. Abigail Mixed).
Research Study – Florida International University – Spring,
2020
Part I: Imagine you saw the following Facebook Page. Carefully
read EVERYTHING on this page, as we will ask you about your
impressions of Abigail Foster (the Facebook owner) on the next
page of this survey.
Abigail Foster
Part II: Without looking back, please rate your impressions of
Abigail Foster’s test-taking behavior below
Strongly Disagree
Strongly Agree
1

2
3
4
5
6
1. Abigail’s behavior was wrong
2. Abigail’s behavior was understandable
3. Abigail’s behavior was reasonable
4. Abigail’s behavior was unethical
5. Abigail’s behavior was immoral

6. Abigail’s behavior was appropriate
7. Abigail’s behavior was unacceptable
Part III: Without looking back, please rate how YOU would
advise Abigail, rate how YOU would respond if you mistakenly
received the answer key from the professor, and then generally
rate Abigail
Strongly Disagree
Strongly Agree
1
2
3
4
5
6
1. I would advise Abigail to keep silent

2. I would try to comfort Abigail
3. I would give Abigail the same advice that her friends gave
her
4. If I received the answers, I would keep silent
5. If I received the answers, I would confess
6. Abigail seems warm

7. Abigail seems good-natured
8. Abigail seems confident
9. Abigail seems competitive
10. Abigail seems sincere
11. Abigail seems moral

12. Abigail seems competent
Part IV: Please provide the following demographic information.
Note: you can leave blank any question you feel uncomfortable
answering.
1. What is your gender (Mark one with an X)? _____
Male _____ Female
2. What is your age? __________
3. What is your race/ethnicity? (Mark one with an X):
___ Caucasian ___ Hispanic American ____ Native Indian
___ African American
___ Asian American Other: __________________ (Please
Indicate)
4. Is English your first language? (Mark one with an X):
_____ Yes _____ No
If no, what is your first language? __________________
5. Are you a student at FIU (Mark one with an X):
_____ Yes ______ No
6. What is your relationship status? _____ Single / No
Relationship _____ In a relationship
Part V: Without looking back, what general feedback did
Abigail’s friends give her? (Mark one with an X)
___ The feedback supported her behavior ___ The feedback
opposed her behavior ___ Feedback was mixed
SC
1

Running head: SCENARIO MUTABILITY & COGNITION
[Type text] [Type text] [Type text]
21
SCENARIO MUTABILITY & COGNITION
Counterfactual Thinking and Need for Cognition: Appointing
Blame Comment by Ryan Winter: I want to bring your
attention to a slight title change from Papers I and II. This
student added in the phrase “Need for Cognition” to her title
page, since her new papers also assess this new independent
variable. Make sure you switch as well. Make your title
descriptive enough that someone searching on PsycInfo would
stop and read your paper if they are doing a study on a similar
topic
Former Student

Florida International University
Counterfactual Thinking and Need For Cognition: Appointing
Blame Comment by Ryan Winter: Again, the title is identical
to the one on the title page. The phrase “Running head” is
omitted from the header, but the header title (Here, it is
SCENARIO MUTABILITY AND NEED FOR COGNITION) is
the same as on the title page.
As free-willed beings, humans are often the victims of their own
decisions. Imagine accidentally running over a stray cat because
you decided to look away from the road at the exact moment the
cat decided to cross the street. Following the accident, most
people would be plagued with thoughts of how alternative
circumstances or decisions could have prevented such an
unfortunate situation. Every time an individual forms a ‘what if’
scenario in which he or she mentally alters the course of events
occurred, they are participating in a process that is known as
counterfactual thinking (Ruiselová, Prokopčáková, & Kresánek,
2007; Williams, Lees-Haley, & Price 1996). This process allows
individuals to consider the multiple factors at play in a situation
(i.e mutability), and to decide what specific condition was
responsible for the ultimate outcome of the event. The primary
focus of our study is to analyze the extent of culpability people
place on a particular factor depending on the preventability of
the outcome. That is, if it is easy to “undue” an event that ends
in a tragic outcome, will participants find an actor who fails to
engage in that easy behavior more at fault? Comment by
Ryan Winter: This first section in the paper is essentially a
revised version of Paper I. You’ll see a few changes in this
section compared to Paper I that are based on feedback we gave
to this student on that first paper. Look at your own Paper I
feedback and USE IT to make this first section better.
In fact, the first few sections here are based on Papers I and II.
Copy and paste them (but make sure to revise them first!)

To get to the new stuff, jump down to page nine for the new lit
review section for Paper III
The development of counterfactual thoughts relies on the
variability of the situation as well as the knowledge that
different actions could have resulted in alternate outcomes
(Alquist, Ainsworth, Baumeister, Daly, & Stillman, 2015).
According to Alquist et al., situations that are believed to be
highly changeable generate more counterfactual thoughts than
events that seem unavoidable. However, ruminating on every
conceivable alternative of a situation would take an unlimited
amount of time and resources. Instead of allotting so much time
and energy on a cognitive task, people tend to narrow down the
different scenarios that come to mind according to the degree of
controllability of the factors involved (McCloy & Byrne, 2000).
For example, the deliberate decisions individuals make that
ultimately lead to a certain outcome is considered to be a
controllable event, whereas uncontrollable events are
unavoidable circumstances, such as traffic jams or natural
disasters (McCloy & Byrne, 2000). When mentally forming a
scenario different than the one occurred, individuals tend to
change controllable rather than uncontrollable events (2000).
Therefore, events that are within an individual’s jurisdiction
generally receive the brunt of the blame for the resulting
situation.
In a similar light, a study performed by McCloy and Byrne
(2000), discovered that inappropriate events are more often
changed through the process of counterfactual thinking than
appropriate ones, especially when the outcome of these events
was negative. Inappropriate events include the decisions
individuals make that are considered to be ‘socially wrong’,
whereas appropriate events are ‘socially acceptable’ actions.
Due to these results, we can conclude that what McCloy and
Byrne consider to be “inappropriate controllable” events, will
likely be regarded as highly culpable factors in the outcome of a
situation.
Another contributing factor to perceived culpability is the

extent of knowledge of the actors involved in an event, as well
as the intent of their actions (Gilbert, Tenney, Holland, &
Spellman, 2015). For example, in the aforementioned scenario,
had the driver known that looking away from the road would
have caused her to run over the stray cat, the driver would have
been more likely to be perceived guilty, even though the actions
and the outcome of the situation remained the same. This
rationalization is the product of a bottom-up method of thinking
in which individuals are able to generate more counterfactual
thoughts due to the actor’s knowledge of the outcome (Gilbert
et al., 2015). As these authors have noted, the increased
development of counterfactual thoughts will in turn attribute
more responsibility to the actor, which will ultimately increase
perceived blame. But this is not the full picture when it comes
to focusing on the role of counterfactual thoughts in altering
participant responses.
Study One Comment by Ryan Winter: This is a new element
in this first section, but not a radically new feature. If you look
at the example paper for Paper I again, you’ll see that the author
here simply added the words “Study One” before the hypothesis.
This is fine, as the hypothesis paragraph only relates to Study
One.
In pursuance of counterfactual thinking and its relationship to
perceived blame, we have devised a study that analyzed the
extent of culpability people place on a particular factor
depending on the preventability of the outcome. We provided
participants with one of three scenarios, each of which depicted
a variation of the same situation where alternate events lead to
different conclusions. In the changeable condition, an actor
engaged in a behavior that led to an undesirable outcome
(death) that could have been avoided had he acted differently.
In the unchangeable condition, the same actor engaged in a
behavior that once again led to an undesirable outcome, but here
the outcome could not have been avoided if he acted differently.
In the neutral condition, the actor engaged in an alternative
behavior, but the outcome was still undesirable. We predicted

that participants would place more blame on the actor in the
changeable condition where the actor could have avoided the
undesirable outcome had he behaved differently than in both the
unchangeable and neutral conditions, where the actor’s behavior
could not be altered. This is because we expected changeable
participants to generate more counterfactuals (more statements
about how the actor could have behaved) in the changeable
condition.
Methods Study One Comment by Ryan Winter: This is basically
the same methods section from Paper II (with some revisions).
Feel free to use your revised study one methods, too!
Participants
One hundred and twenty six students from Florida
International University were randomly selected to participate
in our study. Of these 126 participants, 37% (n = 47) were male
and 63% (n = 79) were female. Ages ranged from a minimum of
17 to a maximum of 58 with an average of 22.32 years (SD =
6.30). Our sample population consisted of 68.3% Hispanic
Americans (n = 86), 8.7% African Americans (n = 11), 19%
Caucasians (n = 24), 1.6% Asians (n = 2), and 2.4% who did not
specify their ethnicity (n = 3). See Appendix A.
Materials and Procedure
In accordance with the standardized guidelines for
informed consent, prospective participants were notified of the
potential risks and benefits of participating in the study before
being introduced to the research material. If the student verbally
agreed to participate, he or she was given one of three different
documents, each of which consisted of four parts or sections. In
part one of the study, the participant read a short scenario
concerning a paraplegic couple, Tina and Eugene, who
requested a taxi for a night out with friends. Each of the three
documents depicted the same initial situation with alternate
conditions (changeable, unchangeable, or neutral) that
ultimately led to different outcomes of events.
In the changeable condition, the taxi driver arrived to pick

up the couple, only to promptly decline their fare upon seeing
that they were both paraplegic. Without enough time to call for
another taxi, Tina and Eugene decided to take Tina’s car, which
was handicap equipped. In order to reach their destination, they
had to cross a bridge that had been weakened the night before
due to a severe storm. The damaged bridge collapsed mere
minutes before the couple reached it. Unable to see the missing
portion of the bridge in the night, Tina and Eugene drove off the
road, into the river below, and drowned. The taxi driver, who
had left 15 minutes earlier, managed to make it safely across,
before the collapse. In the unchangeable condition, the situation
remained mostly the same with the exception that the taxi driver
arrived at the bridge after it had collapsed and plummeted into
the water as well. He managed to make it out of the car and
swim to safety, but Tina and Eugene drowned. In the neutral
condition, the taxi arrived to pick up the couple but promptly
refused their fare as soon as he realized that they were both
paraplegic. In this condition, the taxi driver did eventually
agree to take Tina and Eugene to their destination downtown,
albeit after much argument. Due to the recently collapsed
bridge, the taxi driver drove his passengers and himself off the
road and into the river below. He barely managed to make it out
of the car before drowning. Tina and Eugene’s outcome
remained the same.
After reading one of the scenarios described above, the
participant continued on to the remainder of the study, which
was composed of a series of open, partially open, and close-
ended questions. In part two, the student participating in the
study was asked to procure as many ‘If Only’ statements as
possible, meaning that they had to list all the factors they could
think of that could have possibly changed the outcome of the
event. In part three, the participant was presented with a series
of questions about their thoughts regarding the specific
situation they read about. After reading each question, the
participant was asked to record his or her response in a scale of
one to nine. These questions included how avoidable they

thought the accident was (1 = not at all avoidable, 9 = very
avoidable), the causal role of the taxi driver in the couple’s
death (1 = not at all causal, 9 = the most important cause), their
thoughts on how much control the taxi driver had (1 = no
control, 9 = complete control), the negligence of the taxi driver
(1 = not at all negligent, 9 = completely negligent), how much
money for damages the taxi driver was responsible for (1 = no
money, 9 = as much as possible), the foreseeability of the
couple’s death (1 = not at all foreseeable, 9 = completely
foreseeable), and how much blame the taxi driver deserved for
the event (1 = no blame at all, 9 = total blame). The last
question of part three was a yes or no question that asked the
participant whether the taxi driver agreed to drive the couple or
not. This final question served as an attention check, which
informed us if the participant was actually attentive to the study
and allowed us to exclude potentially misrepresentative
responses form our data. Part four asked for the participant’s
demographic information, including gender, age, ethnicity, their
first language, and whether they were a student at Florida
International University. Concluding the study, the participant
was debriefed on his or her contribution to the study as well as
our insights on counterfactual thinking and our main hypothesis.
Comment by Ryan Winter: You can see her procedure,
right! Very clear, very step-by-step
Although we had several dependent variables, our primary focus
involved the perceived blameworthiness of the taxi driver, the
number of ‘If Only’ statements the participants could create,
and the manipulation check regarding whether the driver agreed
to take the couple. We hypothesized that participants would find
the taxi driver more blameworthy for the couple’s death in the
changeable condition, since he refused to drive Tina and Eugene
while safely passing over the bridge himself. We also predicted
that the participants in the changeable condition would generate
more counterfactual (‘If Only’) statements than in the
unchangeable or neutral conditions.
Results Study One Comment by Ryan Winter: Similarly, the

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