Three studies examined the hypothesis that people have subsets of self-knowledge corresponding to their close relationships. Study 1 showed that the degree of positive judgment about one's "self-with-othcr" traits varied depending on who the other was, suggesting that participants referred to various subsets of self-knowledge for making judgments about themselves with different others. Study 1 also suggested that one's knowledge of "self-with-other" has positive values. Therefore it was supposed in Study 2 that visualizing one's father and thereby spreading activation, increased the positive rating of trait judgments about one's own self-with-fathcr. The results showed the predicted pattern, but did not indicate clear evidence for knowledge activation. Study 3 examined whether the visualizing effect would be observable on processing for only that subset information which corresponded to the visualized person. Those who visualized their fathers did not increase their level of positive judgments of their "self-with-other" traits for themselves with a close friend. However, contrary to expectations, those who visualized a close friend had significantly increased positive ratings of trait judgments for themselves with their fathers. The implications of activating the evaluative self-knowledge that corresponds to interpersonal relationships are discussed.

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The purpose of the present study was to examine the relationship between styles of handling interpersonal conflict, personality, and mental health. In study 1, the Handling Interpersonal Conflict Inventory (HICI) was developed to measure five styles of handling interpersonal conflict based on a 2 dimensional, 5-style model of handling interpersonal conflicts : integrating, compromising, avoiding, yielding, and forcing. Factor analysis of data from 520 undergraduate students generated the 2 dimensional, 5-style model. In study 2, 378 undergraduate students completed the Handling Interpersonal Conflict Inventory, the Big Five Scale, the Psychological Stress Response Scale, the UCLA Loneliness Scale, and the Interpersonal Satisfaction Scale. The results suggested that the five styles of handling conflict are better predicted by personality, and also that they are related to mental health.

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On the 27th of May, 1997, an atrocious murder occurred in Kobe's Suma District. The purpose of this study was to analyze eyewitness testimonies in the newspaper and to investigate the relationship between mass media reporting and the formation of criminal images. Eyewitness testimonies, published prior to the arrest of the suspected murderer, were extracted from four daily newspapers (Asahi, Mainichi, Yomiuri, and Kobe), and analyzed by quantitative and qualitative methods. The analysis revealed that the main criminal images of eyewitness testimonies were "the man who carried a black garbage bag" and drove a "black" or "white" car. It was suggested that the factors in the for mation of criminal images were "conformity with schemas and stereotypes, " "amount of reporting, " and "uncertainty of information." It was also argued that mass media played a part in the "theater crime. "

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This study investigated helping effects on helpers, focusing in particular on volunteers' psychological outcomes (e. g . , a feeling of joy or satisfaction, etc. ) . Study 1 was based on (1) 10 months of field work, consisting of participant observation of volunteer work in an institution for the elderly, and (2) one-to-one interviews of 13 volunteers to examine their helping behaviors. These results were developed into four hypotheses about the factors of helping effects on helpers and their influences. The main purpose of Study 2 was to test these hypotheses by examining the helping effects of 257 middle and elderly-aged volunteers through questionnaires. The main results were as follows : (1) volunteers obtained helping effects through volunteering, which can be divided into 3 components : altruism elevation, establishment of new relationships, and an increased appreciation for life. (2) affirmative evaluation of their own helping behaviors provided helping effects for volunteers. (3) helping effects for volunteers determined whether volunteers are motivated to continue volunteer work.

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This study examined the determinants of privileged persons' attribution of responsibility to under-privileged persons for a solution to a predicament. The data was collected from the participants of SIMINSOC (Hirose, 1997). Two hundreds and seventy-three participants randomly assigned to either rich regions (privileged) or poor regions (under-privileged) engaged in various activities in the game and completed a questionnaire. The results indicated that the higher the perception of unfairness by the privileged participants the higher their attribution of their own responsibility to solve the predicament. Furthermore, privileged participants who attributed their efforts to an achievement believed that under-privileged participants should exert more effort to solve the predicament. The discussion considered the implications for promoting privileged persons' supportive attitudes toward the under-privileged.

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he purpose of this study is to examine the effects of the expressive and contextual characteristics of violent videos on affective reactions. Expressive characteristics are concerned with the way by which violence is represented visually, and contextual characteristics are concerned with the story in which violence happens. Fifty undergraduates (male=24, female=26) evaluated their impressions of 20 violent videos and rated their affective reactions to these videos. Two judges evaluated each contextual characteristic. Results showed that although the expressive characteristics influenced viewers' affective reactions, the contextual characteristics did not. The effects of violent videos on aggressive behavior were discussed from two perspectives, one associated with the affective effects of the expressive characteristics on hostile aggression and the other with the learning effects of the contextual characteristics on imitative aggression.

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