Doctor of Philosophy (PhD), Ohio University, 2013, Experimental Psychology (Arts and Sciences)

There are infinite possibilities when two people meet for the first time. Is uncertainty ever alluring? Are mysterious people more romantically enchanting than well-defined people? There is a great deal of evidence that uncertainty contributes to negative psychological outcomes, however the present research hypothesized that some perceivers would actually feel enhanced initial romantic attraction towards targets imbued with uncertainty. Importantly, target-uncertainty should only increase attraction among perceivers with chronically low levels of aversion to uncertainty--i.e., those with lower personal need for structure (PNS). Conversely, high PNS perceivers should be repelled by uncertain targets, thereby displaying the opposite pattern. Two different research paradigms were consistent with the hypothesized interaction between target-uncertainty and PNS. In both, participants were induced to experience more (less) uncertainty about an opposite-sex stranger whom they would ostensibly be interacting with for a "conversation task." Consistent with expectations, participants with lower PNS were generally more attracted to the target when he was made more uncertain. Contrariwise, higher PNS perceivers reported less attraction to uncertain targets, but more attraction to comparatively well-defined targets. To further investigate, a third study utilized a more self-relevant form of target-uncertainty (i.e., target's degree of attraction to the perceiver). The target-uncertainty by PNS model did not replicate under these circumstances. However, participants' wondering and curiosity about the target's opinion of them predicted attraction later in the experiment, even when controlling for a variety of confounding variables. Collectively, these studies suggest that uncertainty can be positively or negatively related to attraction, though this relationship appears to be quite nuanced. It may depend on PNS in some circumstances. It may also depend on whether uncertainty transl (open full item for complete abstract)

Committee: Keith Markman PhD (Advisor) Subjects: Psychology