A 328-item checklist, suitable for the self-reporting of responses to any stimulus event, was administered to 107 upper division college students in an attempt to investigate the physiological-cognitive-emotional responses to defense arousing communication and to discover a greater range of the key features of the phenomena of "defensiveness." After being given a core description of "defensiveness" consisting of 66 items, respondents were asked to mark each item in the "true" column that applied to their experience when in a state of defensiveness. (Defensiveness was described as an event aroused by perceived threat and characterized by reports of physiological hyperactivation, tension, discomfort, moving against the other, estrangement, affective preoccupation, and cognitive confusion.) Results suggested that females were more likely than males to report an awareness of inadequacy-related cognitions and sensations in a defense-arousing communication climate, and a greater likelihood of flight-type responses, while males were more likely to report fight-type responses. (HOD)