Effect of exposure to a model receiving evaluative feedback upon subsequent behavior in an interview

Studied the effects of exposing Os to a live problem-discussing model who received either encouraging, discouraging, or neutral feedback from a 3rd person. An unstructured interview was used as the task setting in which imitative verbal behavior was assessed. 32 male undergraduates were assigned either to 1 of the 3 vicarious feedback conditions or to a control group in which there was no exposure to the model. It was found that the neutral feedback condition (and the encouraging condition, to a lesser extent) produced significantly more problem statements, based on change scores between pre- and postmodel interviews, in comparison to the negative feedback or control groups. Results are interpreted in terms of using a model's behavior to reduce response uncertainty for individuals faced with an ambiguous task. (22 ref.)