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Abstract
In this study, we examined the relationship between trait-like communication apprehension (CA) and resting alpha range asymmetry in the anterior cortex (AC). Although theory and research in cognitive neuroscience suggest that asymmetry in the AC constitutes a relatively stable, inborn, substrate of emotion, some studies indicate that asymmetry can be increased by experimentally induced transitory anxiety. Transitory anxiety produced by interaction with strangers covaries with trait-like CA, raising questions regarding whether asymmetrical electrical activity in the AC during data collection represents resting levels as assumed in the literature or transitory reactions to dyadic interaction with the experimenter. Because the question if unanswered poses issues for theory and approaches to remediation, we computed correlations among alpha range asymmetry in the AC gathered by electroencephalograph (EEG) while participants were at rest, transitory anxiety scores referring to the participants’ interactions with the experimenter, and CA scores gathered four weeks earlier. Results revealed a partial correlation based on disattenuated correlations, r=.51, p<.05, between CA and EEG scores when the effects of transitory anxiety due to participant-experimenter interaction were removed.
Notes
1. Eysenck (Citation1986) pointed out that aggressiveness in general is a facet of psychoticism, the opposite of which is self-control. Applying Eysenck's model to communication traits, researchers have reported positive correlations in the .5–.6 range between measures of psychoticism and trait verbal aggressiveness (e.g., Valencic, Beatty, Rudd, Dobos, & Heisel, Citation1998), indicating that levels of verbal aggressiveness are higher at the end of the psychoticism continuum representing less self-control. More recently, based on the studies of asymmetry and verbal aggressiveness included in the Pence et al. meta-analysis, Beatty and Pence (Citation2010) and Heisel (Citation2010)discussed the inability to self-regulate and verbal aggressiveness. Although the data do not justify characterizing verbal aggressiveness as primarily a matter of self-control, low self-control is clearly related to verbal aggressiveness.
2. La France, Heisel, and Beatty (Citation2004) reported a negative correlations between the effect size and sample size for a data set in which at least one variable was a coded behavior. In addition, the researchers found a negative correlation between number of coded variables in a study and average effect size reported. La France and associates attributed the negative correlation to coder fatigue, the more coding, the more inaccurate the coding, which in turn, attenuated the effects. Levine, Asada, and Carpenter (Citation2009) examined 51 published meta-analyses and found negative n–r correlations for 80% of them. Levine and colleagues interpreted the pattern as indicative of availability bias. Regardless of which explanation is correct, a negative relationship between effect sizes and sample sizes complicates interpretation of meta-analyses. However, no such biases were detected in the Pence et al. data set. The average correlation for the smallest sample studies (lower third) (mean r=.41, mean n=23.5) was only slightly larger than the correlation for the upper third (mean r=.39, mean n=67.25). Moreover, the middle third was slightly larger than either end of the continuum (mean r = .47, mean n=41). Thus, no negative pattern was evident. Furthermore, the construction of a funnel plot produced a structure consistent with an absence of availability bias (Hunter & Schmidt, Citation2004, pp. 501–503).
3. Inducing anxiety was not the purpose of the experiment. Rather, the purpose of the present study was to measure and remove whatever effects were detected from the asymmetry-PRCA-24 correlation. In that sense, no experimenter induced anxiety whatsoever, which is precisely what is assumed in the literature analyzed by Pence et al., would have been ideal. Therefore, a relatively low level of state anxiety does not indicate a failed experimental induction. It is also worth noting that, unlike trait measures, state measures of anxiety reflect a transitory reaction to the immediate stimulus. The mean for the state measure indicates that on average interacting with the experimenter was not very anxiety producing but the high score was 19, indicating that the experience was anxiety producing for some (a score of 19 translates into an average score of 3.8 per item where a score of 4 indicates agreement). The scale values for the present study are not directly comparable to those reported in previous studies measuring communication state anxiety induced in dyadic contexts (e.g., McCroskey & Beatty, Citation1984) using a 20-item, four-foiled response format. However, comparison of state anxiety scores based on the calculation of a common metric (mean score as proportion of total score possible) indicated that the degree of anxiety induced by the interaction with the experimenter was similar to that reported by McCroskey and Beatty regarding a 45 min get-acquainted interaction with an unfamiliar classmate. Specifically, the mean in the present study (M=12.39) was equal to 49.56% of the total score possible (i.e., 25) and McCroskey and Beatty's (1984) mean (M=34.83) was 43.53% of the total possible score (i.e., 80). Care should be taken not to interpret these means as baselines for the measure. State measures by definition are sensitive to the intensity of the stimuli inherent in the immediate situation. In addition, the correlation between the PRCA and state measure reported in indicated that, as expected from the literature, the state anxiety reported, covaried significantly with participants’ trait-like communication apprehension. Moreover, the uncorrected correlation (r=.47, p<.05) was similar to the overall correlation between trait and state measures of communication anxiety (i.e., r = .45) determined through meta-analysis (Booth-Butterfield, Citation1998).
4. Sex differences have not been reported in the asymmetry literature nor did sex of participant emerge as a moderator in the Pence et al. study, even though some studies included either only males or females. The sample size in the present study was far too small to conduct a meaningful difference test.
5. Studies marked by an asterisk were included in the meta-analysis. In-text citations not included in the meta-analysis are not preceded by an asterisk.