Intraindividual variation in the coordination of social perspectives

The focus in the present study was on the relationship between the ability to coordinate social perspectives and levels of anxiety induced by the social context. Following a procedure devised by Feffer, levels of perspective coordination were assessed by having participants construct stories based on pictures of people engaged in some form of social interaction. In addition to an initial story, participants reconstructed stories from the perspectives of each of the pictured figures. The task was administered under 2 experimental conditions, a “neutral” and an “anxious” condition. The quality of the experimental conditions was determined by independent ratings of the nature of social interaction depicted in the stimulus pictures. Results showed a relative failure to coordinate perspectives in the “anxious” compared with the “neutral” condition and were discussed in terms of the social contextual effects on aspects of social cognitive functioning.