Methods

Participants and design. Participants were 32 (25 female and 7 male) psychology students that received research participation credit for an experiment on computer aided personality assessment. Their mean age was M = 22.3 years, with a range from 19 to 29 years. Since the joystick was situated on the right side of the keyboard and was operated with the right hand, we made sure to select only right-handed participants. Due to technical shortcomings of the first joystick that was used, data from 10 participants of the bipolar IAP version and from 7 participants of the unipolar IAP version had to be excluded.

All participants completed (a) self-ratings on bipolar personality-describing items, (b) the bipolar or unipolar shyness IAP, (c) other personality items, (d) the shyness IAT, (e) two social desirability scales, (f) the IAP variant different from (b), and (g) were interviewed about the experiment. The shyness items of the IAPs and the IAT were included as direct ratings in step (a). The application of the unipolar and the bipolar IAP in

step (b) and (f) alternated between participants, such that half of participants completed the bipolar IAP in step (b) and the unipolar IAP in step (f). The other half of participants completed the IAPs in the reverse order.

Direct self-ratings. All direct self-ratings were assessed on the computer and were presented in a fixed random order. In step (a), participants had to rate their shyness on 10 bipolar adjective pairs (e.g., “shy 1-2-3-4-5-6-7 nonshy”) that were mixed with 30 conscientiousness, intellect, and irritability pairs. Step (c) comprised 28 personality-descriptive items on a 5-point scale (1 = not at all true for me, 5 = completely true for me).

Five items referred to shyness and were the same used by Asendorpf et al. (2002). In step (e), participants responded to the 39 items of the social desirability scales from Lück and Timaeus (1969; English version by Crowne & Marlowe, 1960) and Stöber (1999;

without the Item “Have you ever consumed drugs”). These scales contain 16 and 23 items, respectively, and measure socially desirable responding by asking for socially desirable but infrequent or socially undesirable but frequent behaviors on a true-false format. To obtain a score for socially desirable responding items of both scales were aggregated.

Implicit Association Test (IAT). The shyness IAT was identical to Asendorpf et al.’s (2002) studies. Task sequence and stimuli are depicted in Table 3. IAT scores were computed as the difference between mean response latencies in sequence 5 and sequence 3 (see Table 3). These sequences carried out different combinations of the two target categories (Me versus Others) with the two attribute categories (Shy versus Nonshy). Thus, high IAT scores represented quicker associations of Me-Shy and Others-Nonshy as opposed to Me-Nonshy and Others-Shy.

Throughout the five discrimination tasks, category labels assigned to the right or left response key were displayed in the right or left upper screen corner, respectively.

Response keys were the number “5” of the right-side numeric keypad and the letter “a” on the left side of the keyboard. On each trail, a stimulus word was displayed in the center of the screen. Participants were instructed to categorize the stimulus as quickly and accurately as possible. Responses were recorded using ERTS software (Behringer, 1994). After correct responses the interstimulus interval was 300 ms. After incorrect responses, the stimulus was immediately replaced by the word FEHLER (German for error) for 1000 ms, resulting in a 1300 interstimulus interval. Since this study focused on interindividual differences, and I did not want to confound interindividual variance with order variance, the stimulus order was the same for all participants. In the two combined tasks, the stimuli

alternated between target and attribute discrimination. The 10 target and 10 attribute stimuli were randomized in order within 4 blocks of 20 trials. Internal consistency was evaluated across these 4 subtests. Trials with incorrect responses were excluded from analysis, and response latencies above 3000 ms were recoded as 3000 ms. Since the adaptation of the shyness IAP was based on this data reduction procedure (raw instead of log-transformed latencies, inclusion of first two trials of combined blocks), the reported results refer to such procedure.

Table 3

Implicit Association Test for Shyness: Task Sequence and Stimuli

Response key assignment

Sequence N of trials Task Left key Right key

1 40 Target discrimination Me Others

2 40 Attribute discrimination Shy Nonshy

3 80 Initial combined task Me, shy Others, nonshy

4 40 Reversed target discrimination Others Me

5 80 Reversed combined task Others, shy Me, nonshy Stimuli

Me Others Shy Nonshy I they inhibited uninhibited self them insecure secure

My your daring daring

Me you candid candid

Own other open open Note. The original German stimuli can be found in the appendix.

Implicit Association Procedure (IAP). The IAP was based on the Evaluative Movement Assessment (EMA), developed by Brendl, Markman and Messner (2003).

Within Pilot Study 1, two earlier EMA versions were adapted to assess the self-concept of shyness. The two shyness IAP variants were similar to the shyness IAT in that they combined discriminations of Shy versus Nonshy (attribute discrimination) with discriminations of Me versus Notme (target discrimination). Contrary to the IAT, only Me was explicitly shown on the computer screen and no label for alternative targets was given.

Therefore, Notme described the nonself-relevant alternatives better than Others. However, the main difference to the IAT was that participants responded by moving a joystick instead of pressing an answer key. With the joystick stimuli had to be pushed toward or away from the word Me depending on whether the stimuli had to be associated with Me or Notme. In the two IAP variants of Pilot Study 1 the joystick was situated before the participant, on the right side of the keyboard. The word Me was displayed in the center of the screen, whereas stimuli were presented on its right or left side. For stimuli to appear on the right side the joystick had to be pushed to the left, if the stimulus had to be associated with Me, and to the right, if the stimulus had to be associated with Notme. For stimuli to appear on the left side the opposite was true.

A bipolar and an unipolar IAP variant were adapted in Pilot Study 1. The task sequence of both is depicted in Table 4. In the bipolar version, there was a discrimination of Shy and Nonshy but not of Me and Notme words. Participants first had to push Shy words toward Me and Nonshy words away from Me. Then, the answer direction was reversed and Shy words had to be pushed away from Me and Nonshy words toward Me.

The IAP score was computed as the difference in mean latency between both tasks (sequence 2 minus sequence 1, see Table 4). The Shy and Nonshy words were identical to the IAT and were randomized in order within 10 blocks of 10 trials. Internal consistency was evaluated across 5 subtests with 20 trials each. In the unipolar version there were Me, Notme, and Shy but no Nonshy words. First, participants learned to discriminate the target concepts that consisted of three Me (self, my, own) and three Notme (your, them, other) words that were identical to the IAT target stimuli. In the following initial combined tasks, the five Shy words from the bipolar version were added and had to be pushed toward Me.

Finally, the answer direction for the Shy words was reversed. The IAP score was computed as the difference in mean latency between both combined tasks (sequence 3 minus sequence 2, see Table 4). Stimuli were randomized in order within 10 blocks of 11 trials.

Internal consistency was evaluated across 5 subtests with 22 trials each.

As in the IAT, participants were instructed to respond as quickly and accurately as possible. The correct answer directions for the Me words (ME WORDS = TOWARDS ME) and/or the Shy words (SHY WORDS = towards ME or SHY WORDS = AWAY FROM ME) were presented in green color in the middle of the upper screen line. During all trials the word Me (white letters) with a frame around it was displayed in the center of the screen. Trials began by displaying the stimulus mask XXXX (red letters) for an interval

of 500 ms at the right or left side of the Me. Next, a target or attribute word (red letters) was presented in the same place. The stimulus disappeared when participants moved the joystick clearly in one direction, whereas the reaction time was registered immediately at the beginning of the movement. Reaction time was measured as the time passed from the beginning of the stimulus presentation. After correct responses the interstimulus interval was 600 ms. After incorrect responses the stimulus was immediately replaced by (a) the word FEHLER (German for ‘error’) if the joystick was moved in the wrong direction, (b) the words ZU LANGSAM (German for ‘too slow’) if there was no response after 3000 ms, or (c) the words ZU FRÜH BEWEGT (German for ‘moved too early’) if there was any response during the presentation of the stimulus mask. All error announcements were displayed in yellow in the center of the screen for 200 ms and were followed by the 600 ms interstimulus interval. Within both IAP variants stimulus order was not randomized between participants. All trials with incorrect responses were excluded from analysis. As the presentation of the stimulus stopped after 3000 ms, there were no response latencies longer than that.

Table 4

Implicit Association Procedure for Shyness: Task Sequence of the Bipolar and Unipolar Variant (Pilot Study 1)

Joystick direction assignment

Sequence N of trials Task To me Away from me

Bipolar Variant

1 100 Attribute discrimination Shy Nonshy

2 100 Reversed attribute discrimination Nonshy Shy Unipolar Variant

1 24 Target discrimination Me Notme

2 121 Initial combined task Me, shy Notme

3 121 Reversed combined task Me Notme, shy

Interview. Finally, participants were asked to comment on the experiment and whether they had difficulties with the IAT or the IAPs. In addition, they estimated the difficulty of the IAT and the two IAP variants on five-point scales ranging from 1 = easy to 5 = very demanding.