Anxiety reactivity and anxiety perseveration represent dissociable dimensions of trait anxiety

Trait anxiety is an individual-difference variable reflecting variation in state-anxiety elevations resulting from exposure to a stressor. It is usually measured using questionnaire instruments, such as the Spielberger State-Trait Anxiety Inventory (STAI-T). The present research conceptually distinguishes, and independently assesses, two hypothetical dimensions of anxiety vulnerability which, it is argued, could plausibly make independent contributions to variance in trait-anxiety scores. These dimensions are anxiety reactivity, the probability of experiencing an anxiety reaction to a stressor, and anxiety perseveration, the persistence of anxiety symptoms once elicited. Participants were asked three questions about each STAI-T item. The traditional STAI-T question assessed how much of the time this symptom was experienced; the anxiety-reactivity question assessed the probability of experiencing the symptom in response to a stressor; and the anxiety-perseveration question assessed how long the symptom persisted, if elicited. Regression analysis determined that anxiety reactivity and anxiety perseveration scores both accounted for independent variance in trait-anxiety scores. It is argued that models of anxiety vulnerability should seek to differentiate both the causes and the consequences of elevated anxiety reactivity and increased anxiety perseveration. (PsycINFO Database Record (c) 2012 APA, all rights reserved).     

A valence-specific lateral bias for discriminating emotional facial expressions in free field

Findings from subjects with unilateral brain damage, as well as from normal subjects studied with tachistoscopic paradigms, argue that emotion is processed differently by each brain hemisphere. An open question concerns the extent to which such lateralised processing might occur under natural, freeviewing conditions. To explore this issue, we asked 28 normal subjects to discriminate emotions expressed by pairs of faces shown side-by-side, with no time or viewing constraints. Images of neutral expressions were shown paired with morphed images of very faint emotional expressions (happiness, surprise, disgust, fear, anger, or sadness). We found a surprising and robust laterality effect: When discriminating negative emotional expressions, subjects performed significantly better when the emotional face was to the left of the neutral face; conversely, when discriminating positive expressions, subjects performed better when the emotional face was to the right. We interpret this valence-specific laterality effect as consistent with the idea that the right hemisphere is specialised to process negative emotions, whereas the left is specialised to process positive emotions. The findings have important implications for how humans perceive facial emotion under natural conditions.     

Differences in alexithymia and emotional awareness in exhaustion syndrome and chronic fatigue syndrome

Symptoms of Exhaustion Syndrome (ES) and Chronic Fatigue Syndrome (CFS) are overlapping and create difficulties of differential diagnosis. Empirical studies comparing ES and CFS are scarce. This study aims to investigate if there are any emotional differences between ES and CFS. This cross‐sectional study compared self‐reported alexithymia and observer‐rated emotional awareness in patients with ES (n = 31), CFS (n = 38) and healthy controls (HC) (n = 30). Self‐reported alexithymia was measured with the Toronto Alexithymia Scale‐20 (TAS‐20) and emotional awareness with an observer‐rated performance test, the Level of Emotional Awareness Scale (LEAS). Additionally, depression and anxiety were scored by the Hospital Anxiety and Depression Scale (HADS). Results show that patients with ES expressed higher self‐reported alexithymia in the TAS‐20 compared to HC, but had similar emotional awareness capacity in the observer‐rated performance test, the LEAS. Patients with CFS expressed more difficulties in identifying emotions compared to HCs, and performed significantly worse in the LEAS‐total and spent more time completing the LEAS as compared to HC. Correlation and multiple regressions analyses revealed that depression and anxiety positively correlated with and explained part of the variances in alexithymia scores, while age and group explained the major part of the variance in LEAS. Findings of this study indicate that emotional status is different in patients with ES and CFS with respect to both self‐reported alexithymia and observer‐rated emotional awareness. Emotional parameters should be approached both in clinical investigation and psychotherapy for patients with ES and CFS.     

Off-task Behaviours and Outcomes: An Exploratory Investigation of a Neglected Domain in Organisational Behaviour

Bien que les travailleurs s'adonnent à la fois à nombre de tâches formelles et informelles, les recherches centrées sur le comportement organisationnel s'intéressent préférentiellement aux conduites formelles et à leur produit. Quand l'attention se porte sur les comportements informels, c'est généralement pour les atténuer ou les éliminer. On soutient dans cet article que les comportements informels doivent être pris en considération même si c'est la tâche à accomplir qui est l'objet de la problématique. On a, dans deux recherches exploitant des échantillons de 133 et 137 individus, relevé une série de comportements informels et étudié la relation entre leur fréquence d'apparition et la satisfaction. Les implications des comportements informels sont analysées du point de vue de la nature changeante du travail.
Although people at work engage in a number of on-task and off-task behaviours, the preponderance of behavioural research in organisations is directed towards on-task behaviours and the outcomes resulting from them. When attention is paid to off-task behaviours, it is usually directed at decreasing or eliminating such behaviours. The position taken here is that off-task behaviours must be understood even if our concern is with task behaviour. Two studies, with samples of 137 and 133 persons, identified a subset of off-task behaviours and explored the relationship of their reported occurrence to job satisfaction. Implications of off-task behaviour at work are discussed with respect to the changing nature of work.     

Stimulus-Response Compatibility for Vertically Oriented Stimuli and Horizontally Oriented Responses: Evidence for Spatial Coding

It has previously been shown that, when stimuli positioned above or below a central fixation point (“up” and “down” stimuli) are assigned to left and right responses, the stimulus-response mapping up-left/down-right is more compatible than the mapping up-right/down-left for responses executed by the left hand in the left hemispace, but this relation is reversed for responses executed by the right hand in the right hemispace. In Experiment 1, each hand responded at locations in both hemispaces to dissociate the influence of hand identity from response location, and response location was found to be the determinant of relative compatibility. In Experiment 2 responses were made at the sagittal midline, and an inactive response switch was placed to the left or right to induce coding of the active switch as right or left, respectively. This manipulation of relative location had an effect similar to, although of lesser magnitude than, that produced by physically changing location of the response switch in Experiment 1. It is argued that these results are counter to predictions of a movement-preference account and consistent with the view that spatial coding underlies compatibility effects for orthogonally oriented stimulus and response sets.