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Diagnose how Participant 42's reaction aligns with the definition of a pessimistic explanatory style.
Case context: During a memory task in a psychology lab, Participant 42 performs poorly on the first block of trials. The participant immediately tells the researcher, 'I am just inherently stupid. This means I am going to fail all the other blocks today, and it probably means I will not even be able to graduate college.'
Question: Diagnose how Participant 42's reaction aligns with the definition of a pessimistic explanatory style.
Sample answer: Participant 42's reaction perfectly aligns with a pessimistic explanatory style. First, they demonstrate self-blame by attributing the poor performance to being 'inherently stupid.' Second, they expect long-term negative consequences by predicting they will not be able to graduate college based on this single failure. Third, they show a belief that the negative event broadly affects many aspects of their life by assuming failure on a lab task equates to overall academic failure.
Key points:
- Diagnoses the 'inherently stupid' comment as self-blame.
- Diagnoses the 'won't graduate' comment as an expectation of long-term consequences.
- Diagnoses the leap from a lab task to college graduation as an expectation that the event broadly affects many aspects of life.
Rubric: The response must explain how the participant's quote demonstrates self-blame, long-term expectations, and broad life consequences.
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Research Methods in Psychology - 4th American Edition @ KPU
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