Person: Mendes, Wendy
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Mendes
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Wendy
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Mendes, Wendy
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Publication Experiencing Discrimination Increases Risk Taking(SAGE Publications, 2012) Jamieson, J; Koslov, K.; Nock, Matthew; Mendes, WendyPrior research has revealed racial disparities in health outcomes and health-compromising behaviors, such as smoking and drug abuse. It has been suggested that discrimination contributes to such disparities, but the mechanisms through which this might occur are not well understood. In the research reported here, we examined whether the experience of discrimination affects acute physiological stress responses and increases risk-taking behavior. Black and White participants each received rejecting feedback from partners who were either of their own race (in-group rejection) or of a different race (out-group rejection, which could be interpreted as discrimination). Physiological (cardiovascular and neuroendocrine) changes, cognition (memory and attentional bias), affect, and risk-taking behavior were assessed. Significant Participant Race × Partner Race interactions were observed. Cross-race rejection, compared with same-race rejection, was associated with lower levels of cortisol, increased cardiac output, decreased vascular resistance, greater anger, increased attentional bias, and more risk-taking behavior. These data suggest that perceived discrimination is associated with distinct profiles of physiological reactivity, affect, cognitive processing, and risk taking, implicating direct and indirect pathways to health disparities.Publication Mind over matter: Reappraising arousal improves cardiovascular and cognitive responses to stress.(American Psychological Association (APA), 2012) Jamieson, J; Nock, Matthew; Mendes, WendyResearchers have theorized that changing the way we think about our bodily responses can improve our physiological and cognitive reactions to stressful events. However, the underlying processes through which mental states improve downstream outcomes are not well-understood. To this end, we examined whether reappraising stress-induced arousal could improve cardiovascular outcomes and decrease attentional bias for emotionally-negative information. Participants were randomly assigned to either a reappraisal condition in which they were instructed to think about their physiological arousal during a stressful task as functional and adaptive, or to one of two control conditions: attention reorientation and no instructions. Relative to controls, participants instructed to reappraise their arousal exhibited more adaptive cardiovascular stress responses – increased cardiac efficiency and lower vascular resistance – and decreased attentional bias. Thus, reappraising arousal shows physiological and cognitive benefits. Implications for health and potential clinical applications are discussed.Publication Weakened Links Between Mind and Body in Older Age: The Case for Maturational Dualism in the Experience of Emotion(SAGE Publications, 2010) Mendes, WendyAs neuroscience methods begin to dominate emotion research it is critical for researchers to remember that peripheral embodiments are critical to understanding emotional experience and emotion–behavior links. Much of modern emotion research assumes reliable mind–body connections that suggest that changes in emotional states influence bodily responses and, vice versa, that somatovisceral information shapes emotional experiences. However, there may be important qualifications to the link between the mind and the (peripheral) body. For example, the ability to sense internal and external bodily states declines in older age as does activation of physiological systems, all of which may contribute to an impairment in emotional experiences and how emotions influence behavior. I describe this phenomenon as maturational dualism and suggest implications of this for emotion in older adults.Publication Cardiovascular and Affective Recovery from Anticipatory Threat(Elsevier, 2010) Waugh, Christian E.; Panage, Sommer; Mendes, Wendy; Gotlib, Ian H.Anticipating a stressor elicits robust cardiovascular and affective responses. Despite the possibility that recovery from these responses may have implications for physical and mental well-being, little research has examined this issue. In this study, participants either gave a public speech or anticipated giving a speech. Compared with speech-givers, participants who anticipated giving a speech, on average, exhibited similar cardiovascular recovery (decreased heart rate [HR] and increased respiratory sinus arrhythmia [RSA]), and reported lower negative affect during recovery. Only in the anticipation condition, however, were cardiovascular recovery and affective recovery associated: poor affective recovery predicted incomplete HR recovery and decreased RSA. These are the first data to compare explicitly recovery from anticipation of a stressor with recovery from the stressor itself. These findings suggest that failing to recover from anticipation has unique physiological costs that, in turn, may contribute to mental and physical illness.Publication Turning the Knots in Your Stomach into Bows: Reappraising Arousal Improves Performance on the GRE(Elsevier, 2010) Jamieson, J; Mendes, Wendy; Blackstock, Erin; Schmader, ToniThis research examined the benefits of interpreting physiological arousal as a challenge response on practice and actual Graduate Record Examination (GRE) scores. Participants who were preparing to take the GRE reported to the laboratory for a practice GRE study. Participants assigned to a reappraisal condition were told arousal improves performance, whereas control participants were not given this information. We collected saliva samples at baseline and after the appraisal manipulation, which were then assayed for salivary alpha amylase (sAA), a measure of sympathetic nervous system activation. Reappraisal participants exhibited a significant increase in sAA and outperformed controls on the GRE-math section. One to three months later, participants returned to the lab and provided their score reports from their actual GRE. Again, reappraisal participants scored higher than controls on the GRE-math section. These findings illuminate the powerful influence appraisal has on physiology and performance both in and out of the laboratory.Publication A Metacognitive Perspective on the Cognitive Deficits Experienced in Intellectually Threatening Environments(SAGE Publications, 2009) Schmader, Toni; Forbes, Chad E.; Zhang, Shen; Mendes, WendyThree studies tested the hypothesis that negative metacognitive interpretations of anxious arousal under stereotype threat create cognitive deficits in intellectually threatening environments. Study 1 showed that among minority and White undergraduates, anxiety about an intelligence test predicted lower working memory when participants were primed with doubt as compared to confidence. Study 2 replicated this pattern with women and showed it to be unique to intellectually threatening environments. Study 3 used emotional reappraisal as an individual difference measure of the tendency to metacognitively reinterpret negative emotions and found that when sympathetic activation was high (indexed by salivary alpha-amylase), women who tended to reappraise negative feelings performed better in math and felt less self-doubt than those low in reappraisal. Overall, findings highlight how metacognitive interpretations of affect can undermine cognitive efficiency under stereotype threat and offer implications for the situational and individual difference variables that buffer people from these effects.Publication Intergroup Contact Facilitates Physiological Recovery following Stressful Intergroup Interactions(Elsevier, 2010) Page-Gould, Elizabeth; Mendes, Wendy; Major, BrendaA growing body of research has demonstrated the importance of intergroup contact in reducing fear, threat and anxiety in intergroup domains. Here we focus on the regulatory benefits of intergroup contact. We hypothesized that past intergroup contact would facilitate recovery from a stressful intergroup evaluation. White and Black participants completed a stressful evaluative task in the presence of two White or two Black interviewers while autonomic nervous system and hormonal responses were assessed. When examining how participants recovered after the stressful task, intergroup contact predicted faster physiological recovery for both autonomic and neuroendocrine reactivity. The importance of recovery from stress for physiological resilience in diverse contexts is discussed.Publication An In-Group Advantage in Detecting Intergroup Anxiety(Blackwell Publishing, 2008) Gray, Heather; Mendes, Wendy; Denny-Brown, CarriganWe examined the possibility of an in-group advantage in detecting intergroup anxiety. Specifically, we videotaped White and Black participants while they engaged in same-race or interrace interactions. Then we asked White and Black observers to view these videotapes (unaware of the racial context) and provide their impressions of participants' anxiety. Two results pointed to an in-group advantage in detecting intergroup anxiety. First, only same-race observers perceived a modulation of participants' anxious behavior as a function of racial context. This held true not only for relatively subjective perceptions of global anxiety, but also for perceptions of single, discrete behaviors tied to anxiety. Second, we found that only same-race observers provided descriptions of anxiety that tracked reliably with participants' cortisol changes during the task. These results suggest that White and Black Americans may have difficulty developing a sense of shared emotional experience.Publication Physiological Arousal, Distress Tolerance, and Social Problem-solving Deficits Among Adolescent Self-injurers(American Psychological Association, 2008) Nock, Matthew; Mendes, WendyIt has been suggested that people engage in nonsuicidal self-injury (NSSI) because they (a) experience heightened physiological arousal following stressful events and use NSSI to regulate experienced distress and (b) have deficits in their social problem-solving skills that interfere with the performance of more adaptive social responses. However, objective physiological and behavioral data supporting this model are lacking. The authors compared adolescent self-injurers (n = 62) with noninjurers (n = 30) and found that self-injurers showed higher physiological reactivity (skin conductance) during a distressing task, a poorer ability to tolerate this distress, and deficits in several social problem-solving abilities. These findings highlight the importance of attending to increased arousal, distress tolerance, and problem-solving skills in the assessment and treatment of NSSI.Publication Cell Aging in Relation to Stress Arousal and Cardiovascular Disease Risk Factors(Elsevier, 2006) Epel, Elissa S.; Lin, Jue; Wilhelm, Frank H.; Wolkowitz, Owen M.; Cawthon, Richard; Adler, Nancy E.; Dolbier, Christyn; Mendes, Wendy; Blackburn, Elizabeth H.We previously reported that psychological stress is linked to and possibly accelerates cellular aging, as reflected by tower PBMC telomerase and shortened tetomeres. Psychological stress is a major risk factor for cardiovascular disease (CVD), with multiple behavioral and physiological mediators. Telomere shortness has been associated with CVD, but the relationship between tow telomerase activity, a potential precursor to telomere shortening, and CVD risk factors has not been examined in humans. Here we examine whether telomere length and telomerase in leukocytes are associated with physiological signs of stress arousal and CVD risk factors in 62 healthy women. Low telomerase activity in Leukocytes was associated with exaggerated autonomic reactivity to acute mentat stress and elevated nocturnal epinephrine. Further, tow telomerase activity was associated with the major risk factors for CVD -smoking, poor lipid profile, high systolic blood pressure, high fasting glucose, greater abdominal adiposity-as well as to a composite Metabolic Syndrome variable. Telomere length was related only to elevated stress hormones (catecholamines and cortisol). Thus, we propose that low leukocyte telomerase constitutes an early marker of CVD risk, possibly preceding shortened telomeres, that results in part from chronic stress arousal. Possible cellular mechanisms by which Low telomerase may link stress and traditional risk factors to CVD are discussed. These findings may implicate telomerase as a novel and important mediator of the effects of psychological stress on physical health and disease.