Eysenck's P as a modulator of affective and electrodermal responses to violent and comic film

Abstract

High psychoticism (HP) and low psychoticism (LP) subject groups (matched on E, N and gender) received 10 presentations of a violent video segment alternating with a comic video segment. Each video was preceded by a baseline period and followed by an affective rating period. Skin conductance level (SCL) was recorded continuously throughout the study. The HP group showed a strong preference for violence compared with comedy and perceived the violent video as more comical and enjoyable, and the comic video as less comical and enjoyable, than did the LP group. This, and other indications of inhibited affect in the HP group, corresponded with a faster decline in SCL than in the LP group. The psychoticism (P) groups exhibited distinct patterns of electrodermal response to the violent and comic videos consistent with their respective personality profiles and the obtained behavioural data. The HP group produced the largest initial SCL increment to violence followed by rapid habituation, while the LP group exhibited physiological sensitisation, then rapid habituation. Several results showed that the subjects (as a whole) displayed affective and electrodermal desensitisation to the stimulus videos over trials. The findings provide further insight into general response patterns to film violence and suggest that P may be an important modulator of such response patterns.