Constitutional Psychophysiology

Constitutional Psychophysiology: Research in Review is based on the findings of a research project conducted by the psychophysiology research team at the Psychological Institute of the University of Freiburg, West Germany. This book is organized into four parts encompassing 21 chapters that summarize the numerous psychological, physiological, biochemical, and anthropometric measurements in extensive multivariate investigations of large student and cardiocirculatory patient samples. Part I describes first the heredity of morphological, physiological, and psychological characteristics, along with the concepts emphasizing morphological aspects, factor-analytic studies, and single aspects of the body build. This part also discusses the psychomorphological relationships; the relationships between biochemical findings and personality characteristics; the sympathicotonia-vagotonia concept; and the empirical studies on autonomic lability. Part II presents the physiological methods applied in the study, such as blood pressure measurement, physical circulatory analysis, and impedance cardiography. This part also considers the selection of criteria used for data collection, including validity, representativeness, reliability, stability, and objectivity. Part III explores the correlative procedures and classificatory methods. This part specifically tackles the common factor analyses of psychological and physiological variables and the issue of psychophysiological response specificity, which is important for psychosomatic medicine. Part IV discusses the most important conclusions of the study, demonstrating the lack of psychophysiological correlations and the nullity of psychophysiological covariance hypothesis. This book is of great value to research workers and graduate students in the fields of psychophysiology, genetic psychology, personality, and differential psychology, as well as psychosomatic medicine.

Preface to the English Translation Author's Preface List of Abbreviations Introduction 1 Definitions and Models 1. Definitions 1.1. Constitution 1.2. Personality 1.3. Psychosomatic Medicine 1.4. Type 1.5. Psychophysical Reactivity 2. Heredity and Environment 2.1. Methods 2.2. The Inheritance of Morphological Characteristics 2.3. The Inheritance of Physiological Characteristics 2.4. The Inheritance of Personality Characteristics 3. Existing Models in Psychophysiological Constitution Research 3.1. Morphologically Oriented Concepts 3.2. Psychophysiological Theories of Personality 3.3. Concepts of Physiological Orientation 4. Constitution and Disease 2 Methods 1. Selection Criteria Used in the Collection of Data 1.1. Validity 1.2. Representativeness 1.3. Reliability and Stability 1.4. Objectivity 2. Subject Samples 2.1. Students 2.2. Patients 3. Examination Methods 3.1. Standardized Questionnaires 3.2. Life Habits and Anamnestic Data 3.3. Questionnaires Concerning the Experiment, Behavioral Ratings, and Exploration 3.4. Psychological Performance Tests 3.5. Threshold Measurements 3.6. Physical Examination 3.7. Anthropometric Measures 3.8. Biochemical Measures 3.9. Physiological Examinations 4. Collection of Data 4.1. Organization and Technical Requirements 4.2. Marginal Conditions during the Experiments 4.3. Data Collection 4.4. Formation of the Parameters and Data Reduction 5. The Investigation of Reliability and Stability 5.1. Error Coefficients 5.2. Relaxation and Habituation Effects 5.3. First Measurement and Habitual Scores 6. Some Statistical Considerations Regarding Data Analysis 6.1. Level of Scaling 6.2. Normal Distribution and Transformations 6.3. Law of Initial Values 7. Procedures in Statistical Analysis 7.1. Univariate versus Multivariate Analyses 7.2. Analysis of Variance and Factor Analysis 7.3. Automatic Classification Procedures 3 Results 1. Correlations and Factor Analyses of Various Variable Domains as Defined by Content and Method 1.1. Personality Inventories 1.2. Anamnestic Data and Medical Ratings 1.3. Subjective Experience of Strain during the Experiments, Mood, and Subjective Aptitude 1.4. Anthropometric Variables 1.5. Biochemical Variables 1.6. Physiological Variables 2. Psychophysiological Correlations 2.1. Sympathicotonia-Vagotonia 2.2. Physical Fitness 2.3. Psychophysiologic Lability 2.4. Replicated Psychophysiological Correlations 3. Common Factor Analyses of Psychological and Physiological Variables 3.1. Factor Analysis of the First Order 3.2. Factor Analysis of the Second Order 4. Multiple Regressions 5. Psychophysiological Response Specificity 6. The Classificatory Concept 6.1. Classifications Based on Hypotheses 6.2. Automatic Classification 4 Discussion and Perspectives 1. The Null Hypothesis of Psychophysical Covariation 2. The Relevance of Personal Constructs 3. Hypothetical Genesis of the General Psychophysiologic Syndrome 4. Perspectives for Clinical Application 5. Perspectives for Future ResearchAppendix I Statistics Appendix II Programs References Author Index Subject Index