Current work
We expected that the effect of heat on hostile cognition and behavior would depend on an interaction between the situation (whether someone has just been rejected) and the person (his or her level of fear of negative evaluation). In two experiments, we tested hypothesized interactions among rejection, fear of negative evaluation, and the experience of heat. In each experiment, participants underwent a commonly used rejection manipulation in which they were led to believe that they had been rejected by another participant (or a control condition involving no rejection) and then were exposed to a heat prime (or a neutral temperature control). We collected measures de- signed to test whether, following rejection, heat would promote aggres- sive cognitions (Experiment 1) and aggressive behavior (Experiment 2). We expected high FNE participants primed with heat (as compared to neutral temperatures) to display high levels of aggressive cognition and behavior after being rejected; these responses to heat were not expected in a neutral (non-rejection) social context or for low FNE participants.
Our theoretical framework implies that effects of heat are caused by the psychological association between heat and hostility, rather than merely by physical discomfort or negative affect produced by heat. Therefore, we also included measures of physical comfort (Experiment 1) and affect (Experiment 2) to control for the possibility that participants' hostility was driven merely by changes in affect or physical discomfort.