[Induced imagination as a methodologic paradigm in assessing stress perception and stress processing].

The methodological paradigm of the induced imagination has been tested as an alternative diagnostic access to stress and coping. Assumptions on the therapeutic applications of imagery techniques (i.e. Cautela, 1967; Lang, 1978; Leuner, 1980; Wolpe, 1958) have been integrated with cognitive concepts of visual imagery (Kosslyn, 1980; Kosslyn, Brunn, Cave & Wallach, 1984; Paivio, 1971; Steiner, 1980) to deduce a theoretical framework of emotional imagery. An emotionally involving imagery scene is generated when semantic-, spatial- and motoric-relational representations of an imagined scene are constructed and actions are to be performed by the subject. The electrodermal activity (EDA) serves as a physiological indicator of stress. Ten subjects have been tested. The main results are: 1. Stressful imaginations correlate with significantly higher physiological activity than relaxation phases and imagery scenes with agreable content. 2. Different sequences of a stressful imagination can be differentiated psychophysiologically: Parts of imagery appraisals and emotions show higher physiological activity than sequences which consist of descriptions of situational and environmental elements. 3. It could be shown that not the verbalisation itself but different contents of imagery scenes correlate with different physiological activities. These results provide strong support for the hypothesis that verbalisations of stressful events and coping strategies are related to increased physiological activity. The psychophysiological differentiation of stress processes implies the applicability of the induced imagination as a validity criterion for a criterion oriented questionnaire of stress and coping (Reicherts & Perrez, 1986).