Studies of Gaze During Induced Conflict in Families with a Hypertensive Father

Abstract

Three modified replications (N = 32, 46, and 32) investigated verbal and nonverbal interactions during role playing of family conflict by family groups of father, mother, and one child. Half the fathers had essential hypertension and half were normotensive. Nonverbal but not verbal behavior differed between families with hypertensive vs. normotensive fathers. Hypertensive fathers and their normotensive wives and children looked at each other less (gaze aversion), both while listening and speaking, than did the members of normotensive families. The difference in duration of gaze aversion occurred more prominently during emotionally negative verbalizations. The results suggest a pattern of conflict avoidance in families with a hypertensive father.

Parental Hypertension, Affect, and Cardiovascular Response to Cognitive Challenge

“…These results indicate that subjects having normotensive parents, albeit less reactive physiologically, worked at a comparable pace and were as "engaged" in the experimental task as sons of hypertensives. On the other hand, the absence of behavioral differences between offspring of hypertensive and normotensive parents is inconsistent with previous findings reported by Baer et al (19,20) and by Jorgensen and Houston (8). Presently, the source of this discrepancy is unclear, though one obvious possibility relates to the differences in experimental procedures among the various studies, in terms of both stimulus intensity (e.g., mental arithmetic vs. shock avoidance) and the personal "relevance" of the laboratory tasks (e.g., performance challenge vs. a role play of family conflict).…”

“…However, behavioral characteristics may also covary with familial risk for hypertension. For example, Baer et al (19,20) have recently reported that families containing a hypertensive father exhibited more negative, nonverbal behaviors (e.g., gaze aversion, failure to respond) than did families having only normotensive parents. Within "hypertensive" families, moreover, the frequency of negative nonverbal behaviors among parents correlated positively with children's systolic blood pressures, as recorded immediately following a role play procedure inducing familial conflict.…”

Effects of Naltrexone on Repressive Coping and Disclosure of Emotional Material: A Test of the Opioid-Peptide Hypothesis of Repression and Hypertension

“…This altered basis of negative stimulus appraisal (10,33) could have profound effects on interpersonal relationships, because hypertensives would be less able to detect negative emotive cues in others (34). The inability to recognize the significance of conflict could lead to a failure to properly rectify conflict in close relationships (81,82). The diminished disclosure evidenced by hypertensives may also have implications for psychotherapy.…”

Similarities within young and middle-aged spouse pairs in behavioral and cardiovascular response to two experimental stressors.

“…Such influences could include dietary influences on cardiovascular reactivity shared by members of families such as caffeine use (11) or perhaps environmentally transmitted personality influences on cardiovascular reactivity (12). However, aside from the evidence previously discussed, there is little data indicating the importance of within-family environmental factors in determining cardiovascular reactivity to stress.…”