A-B variable and reactions to nonimmediacy in neurotic and schizoid communications: A longitudinal analogue of psychotherapy

Selected 36 A- and 36 B-type male undergraduates from the scores of 225 Ss on a 19-item version of the A-B scale. Ss responded verbally and therapeutically to neurotic and schizoid videotaped enactments displaying improvement, no change, and deterioration over the course of psychotherapy and exhibiting high and low conditions of verbal nonimmediacy in their communications to the therapist. A types were more immediate with the schizoid, and Bs with the neurotic, communications. Results concerning the longitudinal response to the changing display of nonimmediacy were equivocal, but subjective reaction conformed to expectancies and there was other, indirect support for the longitudinal hypothesis. Substantive conclusions are drawn concerning verbal nonimmediacy in relation to therapist-patient compatability-incompatability and as a potential intrachannel process variable in psychotherapy. The nonimmediacy model is confirmed and extended in a complex, ongoing, dyadic interaction. (24 ref.)