Implicit motives and children's salivary cortisol reactivity to an adapted version of the Trier Social Stress Test for Children (TSST-C)

Abstract

This research addresses the interplay between two implicit motives, that are power (nPow) and affiliation (nAff), and the cortisol reactivity (CR) to a psychosocial stressor (an adaption of the Trier Social Stress Test for Children; TSST-C; Buske-Kirschbaum et al., 1997) in 89 healthy children (45 female; Mage = 7.74, SDAge = 0.46). We assessed implicit motives by a 6-image Picture Story Exercise (PSE) and cortisol by 6 saliva samples. As hypothesized, the procedure triggered a significant cortisol reaction, F(1.44, 127.05Greenhouse-Geisser) = 8.22, p = .002, η2part = 0.09. Contrary to our hypothesis, children high in nPow showed no significant increase in CR (β = 0.06, p = .60). However, our results were in line with the findings of Wegner, Schüler, and Budde (2014) that a high implicit affiliation motive is associated with an attenuated CR (β = −0.21, p = .05). Perspectives for future research on implicit motives and children's CR to psychosocial stress are discussed.