Electronic Theses and Dissertations

Date

2022

Document Type

Dissertation

Degree Name

Doctor of Philosophy

Department

Psychology

Committee Chair

Jason Braasch

Committee Member

Helen Sable

Committee Member

Roger Kreuz

Committee Member

Jia Wei Zhang

Abstract

The current work sought to examine how the degree of consistency in texts enhances memory for sources within the context of gossip, a new approach that has not been attempted empirically. Theoretically motivated by models and frameworks that characterize source processing and representation, multiple aspects of source memory were assessed, including memory for connections between the sources and their respective gossip statements, but also memory for pairs that spoke about the same topic. Additionally, the present studies investigated various relationships between individual differences such as attitudes towards gossip, tendency to engage in gossip situations, and interpersonal curiosity and text comprehension. Results demonstrated increased processing time and better memory for sources associated with discrepant information across texts when compared to consistencies. Additionally, errors for source recall were increased for consistent texts. Interesting relationships between individuals’ Attitudes Toward Gossip, Tendency to Gossip, Interpersonal Curiosity, and memory for consistent information emerged. Limitations and future directions are discussed.

Comments

Data is provided by the student.

Library Comment

Dissertation or thesis originally submitted to ProQuest.

Notes

Open access

Download

Share

COinS