Date of Graduation

2003

Document Type

Dissertation/Thesis

Abstract

This study examined various characteristics of 29 (20 females and 9 males) undergraduate participants interested in latent forensic identification. Participants completed a basic demographics questionnaire, information about daily stressors and psychosocial stressors (HPS: Scotti, 1992, 1999), the Sensation Seeking Scale (SSS-V; Zuckerman, Eysenck, & Eysenck, 1978) and Zuckerman-Kuhlman Personality Questionnaire (ZKPQ; Zuckerman, Kuhlman, Joirement, & Kraft, 1993). Salivary cortisol samples and perceived distress were assessed before and during exposure to an acute psychological challenge. Participants self-reported handling daily stressors well and to have had minimal experience with psychosocial stressors. Compared to published normative data on the SSS-V and ZKPQ, males had lower scores on disinhibition, boredom susceptibility, impulsive sensation seeking, aggression-hostility, and sociability. Females had lower scores on the scales of disinhibition, impulsive sensation seeking, and sociability and higher on activity. No significant differences were found between males and females participants on the SSS-V or the ZKPQ, with the exception of the neurotic-anxiety subscale. Assessing salivary cortisol responses, main effects for time and gender but no main effect for sensation seeking or interactional effects were found. Participants had high anticipatory salivary cortisol and lowered salivary cortisol during exposure to the acute psychological challenge. Furthermore, no relation existed between self-reported levels of perceived distress and salivary cortisol responses. Associations with pre-exposure salivary cortisol and experience seeking and exposure salivary cortisol with experience seeking and impulsive sensation seeking were found for males. These findings are a primer for future studies that assess individuals interested in stimulating, novel, and challenging career choices.

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