Premium
Response Sets and the Semantic Differential
Author(s) -
GIBBINS K.
Publication year - 1968
Publication title -
british journal of social and clinical psychology
Language(s) - English
Resource type - Journals
SCImago Journal Rank - 1.479
H-Index - 92
eISSN - 2044-8260
pISSN - 0007-1293
DOI - 10.1111/j.2044-8260.1968.tb00567.x
Subject(s) - psychology , acquiescence , semantic differential , respondent , generalization , set (abstract data type) , social psychology , population , personality , style (visual arts) , cognitive psychology , response bias , mathematics , mathematical analysis , demography , archaeology , sociology , politics , political science , computer science , law , history , programming language
Two independent response styles were predicted as operating in the Semantic Differential. These were (1) a tendency to use the neutral category with consistent frequency, and (2) a tendency to make evaluations in a given direction. The predictions were confirmed on a population of women students at a college of education. The use of a battery of measuring instruments produced evidence consistent with the hypothesis that the former style was affected by Rundquist's ‘extreme response style’. On the question of whether it was also partly a function of a response set of ‘generalization’ the data are somewhat equivocal. They are consistent with the suggestion that ‘generalization’ is not one but many response sets, depending upon the stimulus material, and that at least one of these is operative in this situation. The hypothesis that the evaluative response style is related to the respondent's optimism in general outlook was supported by its relation to scores on a test developed to measure this. Incidental findings indicate that Pettigrew's Category Width measure is not an effective measure of ‘generalization’ and that scores on the Eysenck Personality Inventory are importantly affected by the response set of Acquiescence.