In this study, 123 participants (non‐psychology students) who responded to an interpersonal stress situation staged in the laboratory were judged by unacquainted observers in terms of the Big Five dimensions, intelligence and social attractiveness. Coping behaviour appeared to predict personality impressions in a way that mirrors the relations between personality and coping observed in previous research: Overall, higher levels of Extraversion (E), Agreeableness (A), Conscientiousness (C) and Openness to experience (O) (as well as intelligence and social attractiveness) were predicted by problem‐focussed behaviour and cognitive restructuring, whereas higher levels of Neuroticism (N) were predicted by withdrawal/passivity. The interpersonal impact of the particular coping reactions, as indicated by a positive personality impression, were largely inconsistent with their impact on affect following the stress induction. Copyright © 2009 John Wiley & Sons, Ltd.

Expectancies about and the reactions of men and women to a provocation were compared to self-and observer ratings of the actual behaviour in response to the provocation. In Study 1, men and women were provoked by the experimenter during a laboratory task. In Study 2, participants were presented with video clips of the provocation and estimated how a man or a woman would likely react to it. The man was expected to react more aggressively than the woman. In their actual behaviour, however, men were more likely to react with humour or by distancing than were women. The woman was expected to react more submissively than the man, which was inaccurate with respect to both the observer ratings and the selfratings.Empirical findings regarding sex differences in anger-related behaviour are inconsistent (Kring, 2000), as are the theoretical predictions about the behaviour of men and women in response to provocations and other angerinducing events. Anger is typically aroused by aversive stimulation and harm attributed to blameworthy behaviour (e.g.for their help with the data collection. We are very much indebted to Rainer Reisenzein for his many insightful comments on an earlier version of this paper. We are also grateful to Ursula Hess and three anonymous reviewers for their helpful suggestions and comments on an earlier version of this article.

The article presents two studies done with the Anger-Related Reactions and Goals Inventory (ARGI) combining the assessment of functional and dysfunctional anger-related reactions with the goals that people pursue in regulating interpersonal anger. Study 1 (N = 756) corroborated the questionnaire’s psychometric properties and factorial structure. Correlations with indicators for psychosocial well-being, trait anger, and the Big Five dimensions were largely in line with our predictions. Study 2 documented the convergence between self-reports (N = 104) and reports of two knowledgeable informants (N = 188), in particular for the dysfunctional reactions. We conclude that the ARGI is a reliable and valid questionnaire that taps into facets of anger regulation that are of high relevance for research on the consequences of anger for health and well-being.

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