The effects of being imitated and awareness on the behavior of introverted and extroverted youth.

Introverted and extroverted preadolescents (N equals 34) were seated at a box with 6 holes in the top surface and presented the following conditions: (a) baseline - the subject dropped marbles 1 at a time in any holes he wished; (b) imitation - the subject and experimenter alternated dropping marbles, with the experimenter imitating the subject if he dropped his marbles at a hole designated a priori for imitation; (c) imitation plus awareness - this was identical to the previous condition except that the subject was told that he was being imitated at the designated hole; and (d) extinction - the experimenter dropped her marbles in a prearranged random order. As predicted, under the imitation-plus-awareness and extinction conditions extroverts responded significantly more at the holes at which they were imitated than did introverts.