Psychological Reports, 1982, 50, 95-98. @ Psychological Reports 1982 EVALUATION OF EXPERIMENTER AS A METHOD OF REDUCING VASCULAR STRESS KEVIN T. LARKIN University of Richmond' Summary.-To validate a verbal measure of aggression, a replication of a study by Hokanson and Burgess (1962b) was conducted. 32 introductory psy- chology students were frustrated during a timed mental task by the experimenter. Systolic blood-pressure measurements indicated a significant elevation following the frustration. 16 subjects who completed a questionnaire evaluating the ex- perimenter following the frustration were able to reduce vascular elevations to bascline readings. 16 control subjects, who completed a self-evaluation ques- tionnaire instead of the experimenter-evaluation instrument, maintained signifi- cantly higher systolic blood-pressures. Previous studies (Hokanson & Burgess, 1962a, 1962b) have shown the equivalence of physical and verbal modes of expressing aggression in the reduc- tion of vascular stress. Hokanson and Burgess (1962b) found that a frustrated subject, given the opportunity to aggress physically (shock) or verbdy (ques- tionnaire deriding the experimenter), manifested significantly lower systolic blood-pressure than subjecrs given no opportunity to aggress. Upon closer in- spection, a very important issue was left unaddressed which then questioned the validity of the study. Quantitative measures of aggression were ignored in the analysis. With respect to the verbal mode, there was no evidence that a valid standardized measurement was utilized. Attempts to obtain the measure of verbal aggression indicated that it was not retrievable. The present study was an effort to develop such an instrument. To attain a valid measure of aggression in the verbal mode, the Experi- menter Evaluation Form was devel~ped.~ The form was composed of 15 se- mantic differential scales from sets of balanced personality traits developed by Peabody ( 1967). Items were selected on the basis of content, ease of compre- hension, and contribution to the variance of the primary factor determined through a principal components factor analysis with varimax- rotation. Ratings of 40 judges served as the measurement of intensity of aggressive response (Pea- body, 1967). 'This study was conducted in completion of the thesis requirement at the University of Richmond. Re~rints of the article ate available from the author. Correswndence concerning the artiile should be addressed to Kevin T. Larkin, 9201 Patterson live., ~ ~ t . 37, Richmond, VA 23229. T h e Experimenter Evaluation Form is on file with Microfiche Publications and can be retrieved by those who are interested in conducting further research. Remit $4.00 for fiche or $8.95 for photocopy of Document NAPS-03927 to Microfiche Publications, P.O. Box 3513, Grand Central Station, New York, NY 10017.