An examination of hypervigilance for external threat in individuals with generalized anxiety disorder and individuals with persecutory delusions using visual scan paths

One account of generalized anxiety disorder (GAD) is that it results from hypervigilance, manifest as excessive scanning of the external environment and preferential attention to threat. However, for individuals with GAD, there has been no direct study of scanning, and evidence for preferential attention to threat has only been found for threat-words. We therefore devised a new measure of hypervigilance. Visual scan paths were recorded of individuals with GAD (N=12) and people without a psychiatric illness (N=12) viewing complex pictures that varied in threat content. People with persecutory beliefs (N=11) also participated in the study to test the hypothesis that anxiety, via such hypervigilant cognitive processes, may contribute to the maintenance of delusions. Compared with the control group, the anxious individuals were not found either to scan excessively for or to look at threat. The anxiety group was therefore not hypervigilant for external threat, which is inconsistent with the hypervigilance model. As a consequence, the hypothesis that anxiety maintains delusions was not tested. However, additional support was found for the hypothesis that people with delusions form rapid judgements on the basis of less data-gathering than control groups who are either anxious or have no psychiatric illness.     

Behavioral and emotional problems among Chinese and American children: Parent and teacher reports for ages 6 to 13

This study compared behavioral and emotional problems reported by parents and teachers in Chinese urban and rural samples and demographically similar American samples. Parents of 469 6-to-13-year-old children of each nationality completed the Child Behavior Checklist (CBCL). Teachers completed the Teacher's Report Form (TRF). Cross-cultural differences were generally modest in magnitude. Chinese children scored higher on TRF Delinquent Behavior and Anxious/Depressed syndromes, and on Internalizing. American children scored higher on CBCL Aggressive Behavior and TRF Attention Problems syndromes. Boys exhibited more externalizing behaviors across both cultures. The mean correlation between parent and teacher ratings was .36 in the Chinese sample and .29 in the American sample, a nonsignificant difference. Findings indicate considerable similarity between problems reported for children in very different societies.This work was supported by NIMH grant MH40305 and by University Associates in Psychiatry, a nonprofit health service and research corporation of the University of Vermont Department of Psychiatry.The authors are grateful to David Jacobowitz and Catherine Howell for their help in the analyses.     

The association of assimilation and an increase in visibility in perceptual grouping

Subjects performed a series of forced-choice discriminations to determine whether both group-assimilation and group-visibility associations could be obtained from nearly identical strong and weak group patterns. The discrimination between the context+target and the context was better than between the target^– and background, as was the case for^—, whose context and target components were its left and right halves, but not for^—. and^— produced a better performance when their lines (halves) were the same in color, and a poorer performance when their lines were different in color, but produced the reverse. Likewise, only and^— produced a better performance when closed, and a poorer performance when open. These context+target etc., same-different, and closure results argue that and^— produced a greater increase in visibility of their component^–, more assimilation among their parts, and a stronger group than did . This evidence of a group-assimilation-visibility association cannot be attributed to the fortuitous occurrence of an increase in visibility with one object, assimilation with a second, and closure with a third, unlike previous evidence. This association cannot be explained by feature-based theories. Therefore, a superordinate unit is the cause of this association.     

On the Strength of the Local Attachment Preference

This paper investigates the strength of the local attachment preference in syntactic ambiguity resolution, based on a study of a novel ambiguity for which the predictions of local attachment contrast with the predictions of a wide range of other ambiguity resolution principles. In sentences of the form Because Rose praised the recipe I made ... we show that the ambiguous clause I made is preferentially attached as a relative clause under some circumstances, as predicted by local attachment, and preferentially attached as a matrix clause under other circumstances. The implications for accounts of locality in parsing are discussed.     

Do people aggress to improve their mood? Catharsis beliefs, affect regulation opportunity, and aggressive responding

Do people aggress to make themselves feel better? We adapted a procedure used by G. K. Manucia, D. J. Baumann, and R. B. Cialdini (1984), in which some participants are given a bogus mood-freezing pill that makes affect regulation efforts ineffective. In Study 1, people who had been induced to believe in the value of catharsis and venting anger responded more aggressively than did control participants to insulting criticism, but this aggression was eliminated by the mood-freezing pill. Study 2 showed similar results among people with high anger-out (i.e., expressing and venting anger) tendencies. Studies 3 and 4 provided questionnaire data consistent with these interpretations, and Study 5 replicated the findings of Studies 1 and 2 using measures more directly concerned with affect regulation. Taken together, these results suggest that many people may engage in aggression to regulate (improve) their own affective states.     

Counselors Within the Chronic Care Model: Supporting Weight Management

The Chronic Care Model developed for the multidisciplinary management of chronic diseases provides a blueprint for the integrated role of mental health counselors supporting clients with obesity seeking weight management treatment. Counselors can support clients and the team of health care professionals treating obesity within each of the 6 components of the model: (a) health care organization, (b) delivery‐system design, (c) clinical information systems, (d) decision support, (e) client self‐management support, and (f) community resources.     

It's better to give than to receive: Psychological need satisfaction mediating links between wasta (favouritism) and individuals' psychological distress

Wasta (i.e. the distribution of favours among family, friends and tribe; favouritism; nepotism) permeates numerous Middle Eastern cultures, representing a method of strengthening social ties and showing loyalty/generosity, but also representing one of the largest sources of corruption in Middle East. The current study investigated links between wasta and psychological distress in a survey of 1088 educators from Saudi Arabia. Drawing from the self‐determination theory (SDT) conceptual framework, Structural Equation Modeling analyses suggested that benefitting from wasta was linked to higher levels of psychological distress and those links were explained in part (i.e. mediated) by lower levels of autonomy, competency and relatedness. In contrast, providing wasta was associated with higher levels of need satisfaction and correspondingly lower levels of distress. Implications are discussed in terms of the SDT, discrimination and helping behaviour literatures.     

Severity of anxiety moderates the association between neural circuits and maternal behaviors in the postpartum period

Neuroimaging research has suggested that activity in the amygdala, center of the socioemotional network, and functional connectivity between the amygdala and cortical regions are associated with caregiving behaviors in postpartum mothers. Anxiety is common in the early postpartum period, with severity ranging from healthy maternal preoccupation to clinical disorder. However, little is known about the influence of anxiety on the neural correlates of early caregiving. We examined these relationships in a community cohort of 75 postpartum women (ages 18–22; predominantly low-SES, minority race) who listened to infant cry sounds while undergoing an fMRI assessment. Maternal self-reported symptoms of anxiety were mostly within the subclinical range. Positive and negative caregiving behaviors during filmed face-to-face mother–infant interactions were coded by independent observers. The results from whole-brain analyses showed that anxiety severity moderated the brain–maternal behavior relationships. Specifically, our results showed that the higher a mother’s anxiety, the stronger the association between positive caregiving (i.e., maternal warmth and involvement) and amygdala–right posterior superior temporal sulcus (amygdala–RpSTS) functional connectivity. These results remained significant when we controlled for symptoms of depression and contextual variables. These findings suggest that functional connectivity between the amygdala and a social perception region (RpSTS) plays a particularly important role for anxious mothers in facilitating their positive parenting. These findings extend our understanding of the specific neural circuits that support positive maternal caregiving in the context of maternal anxiety, and they may help inform the future design of personalized and effective interventions.