Personality,Meta-Mood Experience,Life Satisfaction,and Anxiety in Australian versus Singaporean Students

This study explores two issues concerning the relationships between personality, meta-mood experience, life satisfaction, and anxiety. First, it explored the incremental value of Extraversion, Agreeableness, Conscientiousness, Neuroticism, and Openness to Experience in predicting the three components of meta-mood experience (that is, attention to feelings, emotional clarity, clarity of feelings and mood repair), after controlling for demographic variables across Australia and Singapore. Second, it explored the incremental value of the three meta-mood experience components in predicting life satisfaction and anxiety, after controlling for demographic variables and personality variables across the two countries. One hundred and eighty nine tertiary students from Australia and 243 tertiary students from Singapore participated in this study. First, hierarchical regression analyses for both samples suggested that Agreeableness and Neuroticism are the two most important personality predictors of meta-mood experience, emotional attention, and emotional repair. Second, hierarchical regression analyses for both samples suggested that emotional repair was a significant predictor for life satisfaction and anxiety, even after controlling for demographic variables and personality variables. These results have implications for therapeutic interventions with life satisfaction versus anxiety. Funding for this research is facilitated partially by a research grant from the National Institute of Education.     

Trained interpretive bias and anxiety

The relationship between anxiety and interpretive bias has been studied extensively, but the causal direction of this relationship remains largely unexplored. Do negative interpretations cause anxiety or is anxiety the cause of negative interpretations? Or are the two mutually reinforcing? The present study addressed this issue by experimentally inducing either a negative or a positive interpretive bias using Mathews and Mackintosh' [(2002). Induced emotional interpretation bias and anxiety. Journal of Abnormal Psychology, 109, 604-615] training paradigm and then examining its impact on state anxiety and anxiety vulnerability. In addition, it was investigated as to whether the interpretive bias was trained implicitly. Results indicated that style of interpreting could be manipulated. That is, when confronted with ambiguous information after the training, participants (n=118) interpreted this information congruent with their (positive or negative) training condition. Data on the issue of implicitness showed that participants tended to be explicitly aware of the valence of their training stimuli. Effects of trained interpretive bias on anxiety were only marginal and absent on anxiety vulnerability. It appears that interpretive bias can be trained reliably, but its effects on mood and vulnerability require further explanation.     

Identification and explanation of racial differences on contamination measures

Compared with published norms, African Americans endorse significantly more items intended to assess pathological anxiety about contamination on self-report instruments for obsessive–compulsive disorder. The current study suggests that this is not due to greater psychopathology in African Americans, but rather to differences in normal attitudes about cleanliness that also influence responses to items intended to assess anxiety pathology. Contamination items from obsessive–compulsive disorder (OCD) scales including the Padua Inventory [Sanavio E. (1988). Obsessions and compulsions: The Padua Inventory. Behaviour Research and Therapy, 26(2), 169–177] were supplemented with cleanliness attitude items and administered to Black and White participants (N=1483). An exploratory factor analysis suggested a three-factor solution: one factor that encompassed pathological anxiety, and two that expressed attitudes about cleanliness, grooming, and domestic animals. African Americans scored significantly higher on all three factors. A confirmatory factor analysis demonstrated that the difference between Black and White participants on the pathological anxiety factor was eliminated when differences on the attitude factors were controlled statistically.     

Smoking motives in the prediction of affective vulnerability among young adult daily smokers

The primary aim of this study was to examine whether smoking to reduce negative affect was uniquely related to a range of affective vulnerability factors (e.g., anxiety sensitivity, anxious arousal, and negative affectivity) among daily smokers. Participants were 276 young adult daily smokers (124 females; M(age)=25.12, SD=10.37). Partially consistent with prediction, the motivation to smoke to reduce negative affect was significantly related to anxiety sensitivity and negative affectivity, but not anxious arousal; the observed significant effects were above and beyond other theoretically relevant factors (e.g., smoking rate, years smoked, age, gender). In contrast to prediction, habitual smoking motives demonstrated significant incremental associations with anxiety sensitivity and anxious arousal symptoms. These results suggest that there are important associations between certain smoking motives and negative affective states and that such relations are not attributable to other smoking factors (e.g., smoking rate).     

Anxiety sensitivity and intolerance of uncertainty: requisites of the fundamental fears?

Fears related to anxiety sensitivity (AS)-illness/injury sensitivity, fear of negative evaluation, and fear of pain-may have important theoretical associations with intolerance of uncertainty (IU). In separate investigations, AS and IU have been independently related to the same anxiety-related psychopathology. AS and IU seem to share a basis in fearing unknown, potentially harmful consequences; however, their inter-relationship remains uncertain. IU regarding a specific stimulus, a physical sensation for example, may result in a variety of interpretations and responses, including the catastrophic appraisals that characterize AS. The association between AS and IU was examined in a sample of 293 undergraduates. Results of confirmatory factor and correlation analyses suggest the two constructs are related, but nonetheless independent. It appears that IU may be a required component of catastrophic misappraisals while being an important construct related to fear and anxiety in its own right. Future research directions and potential applications are discussed.     

Capturing worry in daily life: are trait questionnaires sufficient?

Worry is crucial in the development and maintenance of anxiety disorders and has been associated with several other adverse health outcomes. Yet, little is known about the frequency and perseveration of worry in daily life, and its predictability by widely used trait questionnaires. In this study 432 students completed the Penn State Worry Questionnaire (PSWQ), the Worry Domains Questionnaire (WDQ) and the State-Trait Anxiety Inventory-Trait version (STAI-T) and kept a log of worry frequency and duration during six consecutive days and nights. The results showed that worry is a very common phenomenon that is predicted by the two trait worry questionnaires, independent of trait anxiety. The often clinically utilized PSWQ predicted worry duration better than the WDQ, and exclusively predicted night-time worry and several other indices of perseverative and potentially pathogenic worry. Although this study provides some support for the predictive validity of the PSWQ and the WDQ, these questionnaires did not account for the larger part of variance in daily worry. Future studies of worry and its associated perseverative processes should consider using momentary assessments.     

A Comparison of Two Measures of Parental Behavior

We compared two common measures of parenting behavior, the Children's Report of Parental Behavior Inventory (CRPBI) and the Parental Bonding Instrument (PBI), evaluating their psychometric properties and predictive ability. One hundred sixty seven college students completed the CRPBI, PBI, and measures of depression and anxiety with 123 participants returning three to six months later for follow-up evaluations. The parenting measures were found to have similar psychometric properties and to be moderately to highly correlated with each other. In addition, both measures were similar in their ability to predict depression and anxiety symptoms, although neither was significantly predictive of actual diagnoses. Given that the PBI is a shorter measure and, based on previous studies, appears to be more stable over time than the CRPBI, there is evidence to suggest that it might be a more useful measure of parenting behavior than the CRPBI.     

Extinction-induced "despair" in the water maze, exploratory behavior and fear: effects of chronic antidepressant treatment

In former studies, we found evidence for the hypothesis that withdrawal of negative reinforcement presents a major source for stress and despair. Specifically, the removal of a hidden platform in the water maze induced extinction of previously reinforced escape behavior and behavioral immobility, indicative of "despair", which also correlated with indices of fear. Here, we tested the effects of antidepressants on extinction in the water maze, and expected that such drugs would attenuate the rate of extinction of a conditioned place preference (CPP) and also any emotionally relevant behavior that is induced by the loss of reinforcement, such as immobility. Adult male Wistar rats were trained to escape onto a hidden platform for 10 days. Daily treatment with desipramine hydrochloride (DMI, 10mg/kg) or fluoxetine (FLX, 10 mg/kg) commenced 1 day before the first of 11 extinction trials without the platform, administered 48 h apart, and continued thereafter, as the rats were tested in an open field and elevated-plus maze. As compared to controls, DMI increased the resistance-to-extinction of CPP, attenuated immobility, and increased wall climbing behavior. In the open field, DMI reduced activity levels, but was without effect on traditional fear parameters in the elevated-plus maze. FLX, by contrast, increased immobility during the extinction trials and fear in the elevated-plus maze. The withdrawal of reinforcement induced "despair" that was alleviated by the noradrenaline reuptake inhibitor DMI. The effects of the selective serotonin reuptake inhibitor FLX on immobility and fear may be explained in terms of its side effect profile.     

A reduction in positive self-judgment bias is uniquely related to the anhedonic symptoms of depression

Identifying patterns of biased cognitive processing specific to depression has proved difficult. The tripartite model of mood disorders [Clark, L. A., & Watson, D. (1991). Tripartite model of anxiety and depression: psychometric evidence and taxonomic implications. Journal of Abnormal Psychology, 100, 316-336] suggests that a clearer processing ‘blueprint’ may emerge if depression is viewed dimensionally rather than categorically and by focusing on variations in the degree of positive, rather than negative, processing bias. To investigate this possibility, the present study examined the extent to which a reduced positive self-judgment bias previously found in depressed individuals relates to depression-specific anhedonic symptoms. Sixty participants with varying levels of anxiety and depression symptoms evaluated their own performance on a working memory task in the absence of external feedback. Overall, participants showed a positive self-judgment bias, overestimating the number of trials they had performed correctly relative to objective criteria. Consistent with the tripartite framework, the extent of this positive self-judgment bias was significantly and uniquely related to depression-specific symptoms, with the positive bias reducing as anhedonia severity increased across three different symptom measures.     

The diagnostic utility of the Screen for Child Anxiety Related Emotional Disorders-71 (SCARED-71)

Objective

This study investigated the diagnostic utility of the 71-item Screen for Child Anxiety Related Emotional Disorders (SCARED-71), as a screening tool for identifying anxiety disorders in youth aged 8-18 years.

Method

The SCARED-71 and the Anxiety Disorder Interview Schedule (ADIS) were administered to clinically referred anxious children (n = 138) and control children (n = 38) as well as their parents.

Results

Results showed that the SCARED-71 differentiated clinically anxious from control children on the total score and on all subscales. Girls generally reported higher levels of anxiety symptoms and there were also significant age effects for various anxiety subscales. Further, reliable cut-off scores were established for the child and parent version of the SCARED-71. The parent version displayed better sensitivity and specificity, and therefore seems to be a more optimal screen for anxiety problems in children and adolescents. Finally, evidence for the predictive validity across anxiety disorders was found.

Conclusion

The SCARED-71 can be used as a screening tool to detect clinically significant anxiety problems in children and adolescents and discriminates reasonably well among specific anxiety disorders.