THE DISRUPTIVE EFFECT OF SELF-OBJECTIFICATION ON PERFORMANCE

Quinn, Diane M.
Kallen, Rachel W.
Twenge, Jean M.
Fredrickson, Barbara L.

Department of Psychology, University of Connecticut (Quinn) (Kallen)
Department of Psychology, San Diego State University (Twenge)
Department of Psychology and Research Center for Group Dynamics, University of Michigan. (Fredrickson)

Address correspondence and reprint requests to: Diane M. Quinn, Department of Psychology, University of Connecticut, 406 Babbidge Road, U-1020, Storrs, CT 06269-1020. E-mail: [email protected]

This research was supported by the Institute for Research on Women and Gender at the University of Michigan. We would like to thank Diane Pisacreta for help with data collection. We are also grateful to V. Bede Agocha, Jeffrey Sanchez-Burks, and Stephenie Chaudoir for helpful comments on earlier versions of this article.

Initial submission: October 6, 2004 Initial acceptance: March 10, 2005 Final acceptance: July 25, 2005

Psychology of Women Quarterly 30(1):p 59-64, March 2006.

Self-objectification is the act of viewing the self, particularly the body, from a third-person perspective. Objectification theory proposes numerous negative consequences for those who self-objectify, including decreased performance through the disruption of focused attention. In the current study, we examined whether women in a state of self-objectification were slower to respond to a basic Stroop color-naming task. Results showed that regardless of the type of word (color words, body words, or neutral words), participants in a state of self-objectification exhibited decreased performance. This study lends further evidence to objectification theory and highlights the negative performance ramifications of state self-objectification.