Defensiveness and attempted thought suppression of negative material

Abstract

High and low defensive individuals engaged in attempted thought suppression and nonsuppression after viewing an emotionally stressful piece of film. As a function of suppression and non-suppression instructions, high and low defensive individuals differed from each other in the number of reported film-related thoughts. Suppression instructions had greatest effects on low defensive individuals in reducing the number of reported film-related thoughts. The effects of suppression instructions were not significant in reducing the number of film-related thoughts for high defensive individuals. High defensive individuals also reported more neutral thoughts under the suppression condition compared with the non-suppression condition. Low defensive individuals reported similar numbers of neutral thoughts under the two conditions. Effects of suppression instructions were investigated in a subsequent cognitive task that measured the level of interference produced by attempted suppression. Suppression instructions did not significantly effect the cognitive processing of participants. Theoretical and methodological implications for understanding the possible cognitive structures underlying attempted suppression are discussed in terms of the effects of defensiveness.

The suppressive power of positive thinking: Aiding suppression-induced forgetting in repressive coping

“…In general, continuum methods, like the fourcategory method, have consistently demonstrated that repressors report low anxiety while simultaneously exhibiting high levels of physiological arousal (e.g., Coifman, Bonanno, Ray, & Gross, 2007;Pauls & Stemmler, 2003). On the other hand, Derakshan, Myers, Hansen, and O'Leary (2004) found that defensiveness alone predicted spontaneous, uninstructed suppression of thoughts about an emotionally negative film, regardless of anxiety levels. In short, the combinations of defensiveness, self-reported anxiety, and actual arousal are important considerations in future experiments on suppression-induced forgetting.…”

The importance of the repressive coping style: findings from 30 years of research

“…Briefly, repressors compared to non-repressors: (a) have poorer recall of negative autobiographical memory from childhood and adulthood (e.g., Davis, 1987;Myers & Brewin, 1994;Myers & Derakshan, 2004b, 2009); (b) have worse recall of negative material in both intentional and incidental learning paradigms (Myers & Brewin, 1995;Myers, Brewin, & Power, 1998;Myers & Derakshan, 2004a,c); and (c) use an avoidant style of information processing (Derakshan, Myers, Hansen, & O'Leary, 2004;Fox, 1993;Geraerts, Merckelbach, Jelicic, & Smeets, 2006). However, Geraerts et al (2006) found that repressors were better than all non-repressor groups in suppressing/ avoiding anxious autobiographical memories immediately after the task, seven days later they had the highest number of intrusive autobiographical memories.…”

Repression Versus Sensitization in Response to Media Violence as Predictors of Cognitive Avoidance and Vigilance

“…However, the failure of the violent clip to elicit response differences between repressors and nonrepressors is hard to interpret because no manipulation check was reported to show the extent to which the third clip was perceived as violent. Finally, Derakshan, Myers, Hansen, and O'Leary (2004) used violent segments from the film A Clockwork Orange (Kubrick, 1972) to demonstrate that individuals high on defensiveness, one of the defining dimensions of repression, suppressed film‐related thoughts regardless of whether or not they were explicitly instructed to do so, whereas individuals with low or medium levels of defensiveness suppressed film‐related thoughts only when instructed to do so. Their data suggest that defensive avoidance is a habitual tendency that does not require a special trigger over and above the threatening nature of the situation.…”