Sex differences in expected guilt reactions to hypothetical behaviors of sexual, hostile, and moral substance.

Differences between male and female guilt reactions to hypothetical guilt-inducing situations of a sexual, hostile, and moral nature were investigated. Two independent samples of Ss (56 men, 56 women; and 34 men, 62 women) reported the intensity of their anticipated guilt reactions to 60 hypothetical behavior situations presented in sentence-completion format through the use of scaled response alternatives. Across both samples there were specific behaviors, in which stable sex differences were evidenced, i.e., females' reactions were more intense for those behaviors reflecting sexual transgressions. However, males and females were highly similar in their reactions to hostile and moral guilt-provoking situations. Implications of these results for research on trait-guilt were discussed.

A further test of the inverted-U hypothesis relating achievement anxiety and academic test performance.

The assumption that the inverted-U hypothesis, which shows performance as a function of activation level, mediates the relationship between achievement anxiety and academic test performance was tested by comparing Achievement Anxiety Test scores of 75 male and female college students with a self-report measure of activation taken prior to a classroom examination. Results supported the predicted relationship between achievement anxiety reaction type and academic performance (rho less than .05), but only partially supported the inverted-U hypothesis posited to account for this relationship. Results were further interpreted as suggesting that examinees experience two general types of arousal in the testing situationone type that enhances performance and one that impedes performance. Further implications of the results were discussed.