AbstractThe role of three subject variables in the mediation of reactance to pro‐ and anti‐LSD messages was investigated: sex, authoritarianism, and suspiciousness that the purpose of the experiment was to study persuasion. No reactance effect occurred reliably either overall or in any subgroup of subjects for the anti‐LSD message which supported the initial views of most subjects (evening‐division undergraduates). In the pro‐LSD case, reactance effects occurred among highly suspicious male subjects only. It was suggested that reactance could be a responce to perceived threat from the experimenter rather than, or as well as the communicator, and that male and female subjects responded to such threat in accordance with their culturally prescri