Mothers' Impact on Their Daughters' Cardiovascular Reactivity in a High-Threat Context: An Immersive Virtual Environment Study

• In Event: New Perspectives in Interpersonal Communication

Abstract

This investigation applied the Entropy Model of Uncertainty, the Biopsychosocial Model of Challenge and Threat, and research on both security priming and confirming communication to examine the impact of mothers’ communication in affecting their adolescent daughters’ cardiovascular reactivity in a high threat situation. Daughters were placed in a virtual world using immersive virtual environment technology that simulated a rapidly approaching wildfire and the mothers’ role therein was varied through the use of an experimental design. Results reveal complexities in the relative benefits of mothers’ communication, specifically, and presence versus absence, more broadly, during high threat situations. Implications of this investigation for our understanding of adolescent responses to threat situations and possibilities associated with this methodological tool are addressed.

Authors

• Walid Afifi, University of Iowa

• Katlyn Elise Gangi, University of California, Santa Barbara

• James Blascovich, U of California - Santa Barbara

• Tamara D. Afifi, U of Iowa

• Jessica Cornick, U of California - Santa Barbara

• Anne Merrill, U of California - Santa Barbara

• Will Ryan, U of California - Santa Barbara

• Kenneth Sterling, U of California - Santa Barbara