340 W. E. SNELL JR. AND M. H. DAVIS
IMAGINATION, COGNITION AND PERSONALITY, Vol. 6(4),1986-87
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Direct reprint requests to:
William E. Snell, Jr.
Department of Psychology
404 Scully Building
Southeast Missouri State University
Cape Girardeau, MO 63701
MOMENTS OF AFFECTIVE INSIGHT:
THEIR PHE OMENOLOGY AND
RELATIONS TO SELECTED
INDIVIDUAL DIFFERENCES*
DON KUIKEN
ROBERT CAREY
TORE NIELSEN
University of Alberta, Edmonton
ABSTRACT
Affective insight was defined as a subjective event occurring during intensive
self-reflection. To study affective insight, seventy-nine individuals were presented
instructions designed to encourage intensive self-reflection. Subsequently, they
completed an open-ended questionnaire and a seventy-two-item true-false
questionnaire describing their experience during self-reflection. Q-type factor analysis
of the seventy-two-item questionnaire revealed four different types of reactions
during the instructions: underdistancing, overdistancing, intellectual self-control,
and apprehensive insight. An eight-item Affective Insight Scale (AIS) was developed
which was independent of social desirability, which differentiated these four groups
of participants, and which correlated positively with a judge's ratings of affective
insight as indicated in responses to the open-ended questionnaire. Using the AIS,
there was support for the hypothesis that affective insight is associated with imagery
involvement, as measured by the Creative Imagination Scale, the Absorption Scale,
and Rorschach M responses. There was also some support for the hypothesis that
affective insight is associated with a preference for novel imagery, as measured
by the Barron-Welsch Art Scale. Other trait measures predicted reactions which were
conceptually and empiricaUy independent of affective insight (e.g., intellectual
self-control), indicating the importance of simultaneously studying different
reactions during intensive self-reflection.
• This research was supported by a grant from the Alberta Mental Health Advisory
Council to the first author.
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© 1987, Baywood Publishing Co., Inc.