Rigorous Experiments on Monkey Love: An Account of Harry F. Harlow’s Role in the History of Attachment Theory

On the basis of personal reminiscences an account is given of Harlow’s role in the development of attachment theory and key notions of attachment theory are being discussed. Among other things, it is related how Harlow arrived at his famous research with rhesus monkeys and how this made Harlow a highly relevant figure for attachment theorist Bowlby.

Self-representation in social anxiety disorder: linguistic analysis of autobiographical narratives

Cognitive models of social anxiety disorder (SAD) posit aberrant beliefs about the social self as a key psychological mechanism that maintains fear of negative evaluation in social and performance situations. Consequently, a distorted self-view should be evident when recalling painful autobiographical social memories, as reflected in linguistic expression, negative self-beliefs, and emotion and avoidance. To test this hypothesis, 42 adults diagnosed with SAD and 27 non-psychiatric healthy controls (HC) composed autobiographical narratives of distinct social anxiety related situations, generated negative self-beliefs (NSB), and provided emotion and avoidance ratings. Although narratives were matched for initial emotional intensity and present vividness, linguistic analyses demonstrated that, compared to HC, SAD employed more self-referential, anxiety, and sensory words, and made fewer references to other people. There were no differences in the number of self-referential NSB identified by SAD and HC. Social anxiety symptom severity, however, was associated with greater self-referential NSB in SAD only. SAD reported greater current self-conscious emotions when recalling autobiographical social situations, and greater active avoidance of similar situations than did HC. These findings support cognitive models of SAD, and suggest that autobiographical memory of social situations in SAD may influence current and future thinking, emotion, and behavioral avoidance.     

Modelling relationships between cognitive variables during and following public speaking in participants with social phobia

Cognitive models of social phobia predict that several cognitive processes will mediate the relationship between trait levels of social anxiety and the extent of anxiety experienced in a specific social-evaluative situation. The current study aimed to provide a test of these relationships. Over 200 clinical participants with social phobia completed measures of their general social anxiety and a week later performed a brief impromptu speech. They completed a measure of state anxiety in response to the speech as well as questionnaires assessing several cognitive constructs including focus of perceived attention, perceived performance, and probability and cost of negative evaluation. A week later, they completed measures of negative rumination experienced over the week, as well as a measure of the recollection of their perceived performance. Path analysis provided support for a model in which the cognitive factors mediated between general social anxiety and the degree of anxiety experienced in response to the speech. A second model supported the theory that negative rumination mediated between characteristic social anxiety and negative bias in the recollection of performance.     

Influence of expressed emotion and perceived criticism on cognitive-behavioral therapy for social phobia

This study examined significant others' expressed emotion (EE) and a closely related construct, perceived criticism, as predictors of cognitive-behavioral therapy outcome in a sample of 40 patients with social phobia (social anxiety disorder). Patients enrolled in group therapy for social phobia completed pre- and post-treatment questionnaire measures of perceived criticism and anxious and depressive symptoms. Designated significant others were assessed for the components of high EE (criticism, hostility and emotional overinvolvement) using the Camberwell Family Interview. It was hypothesized that these high-EE components and patients' perceived criticism would be associated with poorer treatment outcome, and results ran counter to these expectations. Controlling for initial social phobia severity, lower levels of perceived criticism predicted treatment dropout. There was also a nonsignificant trend for participants with a significant other rated as high in emotional overinvolvement to show less change on a composite symptom measure. Findings from this study suggest that close relationships impact the outcome of cognitive-behavioral interventions for social phobia.     

Group cohesion in cognitive-behavioral group therapy for social phobia

Cognitive-behavior therapy (CBT) for Social Phobia is effective in both group and individual formats. However, the impact of group processes on treatment efficacy remains relatively unexplored. In this study we examined group cohesion ratings made by individuals at the midpoint and endpoint of CBT groups for social phobia. Symptom measures were also completed at the beginning and end of treatment. We found that cohesion ratings significantly increased over the course of the group and were associated with improvement over time in social anxiety symptoms, as well as improvement on measures of general anxiety, depression, and functional impairment. In conclusion, findings are consistent with the idea that changes in group cohesion are related to social anxiety symptom reduction and, therefore, speak to the importance of nonspecific therapeutic factors in treatment outcome.     

Detection of emotional expressions in rapidly changing facial displays in high- and low-socially anxious women

Facial information and attention to facial displays are distributed over spatial as well as temporal domains. Thus far, research on selective attention to (dis)approving faces in the context of social anxiety has concentrated primarily on the spatial domain. Using a rapid serial visual presentation (RSVP) paradigm, the present study examined the temporal characteristics of visual attention for happy and angry faces in high- (n=16) and low-socially anxious individuals (n=17), to test whether also in the temporal domain socially anxious individuals are characterized by threat-confirming attentional biases. Results indicated that presenting angry faces as the first target (T1) did not aggravate the detection of the emotional expression of the second target (T2). Yet, participants generally showed superior detection of the emotional expression of T2, if T2 was an angry face. Casting doubt on the role of such attenuated attentional blink for angry faces in social anxiety, no evidence emerged to indicate that this effect was relatively strong in high-socially anxious individuals. Finally, the presentation of an angry face as T2 resulted in a relatively hampered identification of a happy-T1. Again, this "backward blink" was not especially pronounced in high-socially anxious individuals. The present anger superiority effects are consistent with evolutionary models stressing the importance of being especially vigilant for signals of dominance. Since the effects were not especially pronounced in high-anxious individuals, the present study adds to previous findings indicating that socially anxious individuals are not characterized by a bias in the (explicit) detection of emotional expressions [Philippot, P., & Douilliez, C. (2005). Social phobics do not misinterpret facial expression of emotion. Behaviour Research and Therapy, 43, 639-652].     

Neuropsychological effects of stress on social phobia with and without comorbid depression

BACKGROUND: The influence of stress on neuropsychological functioning was assessed in socially phobic (SP), comorbid socially phobic/major depression (CM), and asymptomatic control subjects (AC) under baseline and stressor conditions. METHODS: Subjects were 33 clinically diagnosed undergraduates aged 18 to 41 years. Neuropsychological measures included the Trail Making Test, Wisconsin Card Sorting Test (WCST), Spatial Span, and Digit Span administered during a baseline condition and a psychosocial stress condition (videotaping). RESULTS: Spatial Span scores were reduced for SP during stress, improved for AC, and showed no change for CM. TMT B times showed an interaction effect, with completion time improving significantly less for SP than for AC and CM during stress. Analyses of the normative data for WCST total errors indicated that AC and CM improved significantly during stress, while SP performance declined during stress. CONCLUSIONS: The present findings suggest that comorbid depressed versus non-depressed SP subjects respond uniquely to stress in terms of their neuropsychological functioning and self-reported mood and experiences; generalized social phobia may be associated with spatial working memory disturbance during social stress. Therefore, situations involving potential social and personal evaluation (e.g., examinations or presentations) may have a significant impact on the neuropsychological functioning of SP individuals.     

Précis of <Emphasis Type="Italic">A Virtue Epistemology</Emphasis> (Oxford University Press, 2007)

This is a summary of A Virtue Epistemology, the book that is the subject of this book symposium.     

Replies to commentators on <Emphasis Type="Italic">A Virtue Epistemology</Emphasis> (Oxford University Press, 2007)

Paul Boghossian discusses critically my account of intuition as a source of epistemic status. Stewart Cohen takes up my views on skepticism, on dreams, and on epistemic competence and competences and their relation to human knowledge. Hilary Kornblith focuses on my animal/reflective distinction, and, along with Cohen, on my comparison between how dreams might mislead us and how other bad epistemic contexts can do so. In this paper I offer replies to my three critics.