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Anhedonia and emotional responses to affect evoking stimuli

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  09 July 2009

Howard Berenbaum ,
Rebecca Snowhite  and
Thomas F. Oltmanns
Howard Berenbaum
Affiliation:
Department of Psychology, Indiana University, Indiana, USA
Rebecca Snowhite
Affiliation:
Department of Psychology, Indiana University, Indiana, USA
Thomas F. Oltmanns*
Affiliation:
Department of Psychology, Indiana University, Indiana, USA
*
*Address for Correspondence: Dr Thomas F. Oltmanns, Department of Psychology, Gilmer Hall, University of Virginia. Charlottesville, VA 22903–2477, USA
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Synopsis

The purpose of the present study was to determine whether individuals with unusually high scores on the Scale for Physical Anhedonia (Chapman et al. 1976) would differ from average scorers in their emotional responses to affect-evoking stimuli. Ten male and ten female anhedonics, well as ten male and ten female control subjects, were each shown brief filmclips that were expected to elicit emotional responses. The subjects' facial expressions were videotaped while they watched the filmclips, and they also completed adjective checklists describing how they felt while watching them. The anhedonics and nonanhedonics did not differ in their self-reports of emotional experience, nor did they differ in their facial expressions of emotion while viewing the filmclips. Compared to men, women reported experiencing more emotion, and their facial expressions also indicated greater responsiveness.

Type
Research Article
Information
Psychological Medicine , Volume 17 , Issue 3 , August 1987 , pp. 677 - 684
Copyright
Copyright © Cambridge University Press 1987

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