Attentional biases to threat in social anxiety disorder: time to focus our attention elsewhere?

Background: Cognitive models propose that attentional biases to threat contribute to the maintenance of social anxiety disorder (SAD). However, the specific characteristics of such biases are still object to debate.

Objectives: The current study aimed to disentangle effects of trait and state social anxiety on attention allocation towards social stimuli.

Methods: Participants with SAD (n?=?67) and healthy controls (n?=?62) completed three visual search tasks while their eye movements were recorded. Half of the participants in each group were randomly assigned to a state anxiety induction.

Results: Contrary to our predictions, neither trait nor state social anxiety was associated with a facilitated attention to or a delayed disengagement from threat. However, participants with SAD did show reduced fixation durations for threatening stimuli, indicating an avoidance of threat. Induction of state anxiety led to an increased distractibility by threat.

Conclusions: We suggest that attention allocation in SAD is characterized by an avoidant rather than a vigilant attentional bias. Accordingly, our results contradict previous results that associate SAD with facilitated attention to threat and existing approaches to modify attentional biases, that aim to decrease attention towards threatening stimuli.     

Searching for certainty: Religious beliefs and intolerance toward value-violating groups

Religiosity has been consistently linked to prejudice toward a variety of outgroups. This article proposes that this is the case only when religiosity reflects a specific aspect of seeking guidance and security in daily practices and complex sociocultural norms. Outgroups that challenge the epistemic certainty that belief in God provides are rejected in an effort to protect this certainty. The results from two studies found that uncertainty avoidance was related to belief in God and this belief mediated the relationship between uncertainty avoidance and intolerance within the context of general human rights (Study 1), and the derogation of value-violating groups (e.g., homosexuals or followers of other religions) but not of groups that pose no threat to religious values (old or poor people) (Study 2). The interpretative dimension of religiosity (i.e., the way in which people process religious content) is not connected to security seeking, as reflected in the lack of a correlation with uncertainty avoidance and with different prejudice measures. The results are discussed in relation to past research on religiosity and prejudice, and suggest that for people who avoid uncertainty, only those types of religious beliefs that provide a sense of certainty are linked with intolerance toward value-violating groups.     

Experiential Avoidance as an Emotion Regulatory Function: An Empirical Analysis of Experiential Avoidance in Relation to Behavioral Avoidance,Cognitive Reappraisal,and Response Suppression

The purpose of the present study was to empirically test the suggestion that experiential avoidance in an emotion regulation context is best understood as an emotion regulatory function of topographically distinct strategies. To do this we examined whether a measure of experiential avoidance could statistically account for the effects of emotion regulation strategies intervening at different points of the emotion-generative process as conceptualized by Gross' (1998) process model of emotion regulation. The strategies under examination were behavioral avoidance, cognitive reappraisal, and response suppression. The specific hypotheses to be tested were (1) that behavioral avoidance, cognitive reappraisal, and response suppression would statistically mediate the differences in measures of psychological well-being between a clinical and nonclinical sample, but that (2) these indirect effects would be reduced to nonsignificant levels when controlling for differences in experiential avoidance. The results provide clear support for the first hypothesis with regard to all the studied strategies. In contrast to the second hypothesis, the results showed the predicted outcome pattern only for the response-focused strategy “response suppression” and not for cognitive reappraisal or behavioral avoidance. The results are interpreted and discussed in relation to theories on experiential avoidance and emotion regulation.     

儿童社交回避行为：成因、测量方式及适应功能

社会退缩行为是指儿童在社会情境中抑制自己参与同伴互动并表现出独处的行为。根据不同的社交动机,社会退缩行为包含多种亚类型,其中社交回避行为这一亚类型指儿童总是表现出主动避免各种社交场合的行为。总体而言,社交回避是目前研究最少的一种,其形成的主要原因可能是由于儿童本身较高的抑郁感所致,而研究者已开始尝试以间接和直接的方式测量其水平。来自以变量为中心和以个体为中心的研究分别表明,社交回避儿童面临着最高的适应风险。鉴于这一研究领域的广泛前景,未来的研究亟需关注社交回避影响儿童适应的过程机制及其年龄发展特点,测量工具的进一步开发,直接的跨文化比较以及社交回避的干预方案开发。     

Consciousness isn’t all-or-none: Evidence for partial awareness during the attentional blink

Alternative views of the nature of consciousness posit that awareness of an object is either an all-or-none phenomenon or that awareness can be partial, occurring independently for different levels of representation. The all-or-none hypothesis predicts that when one feature of an object is identified, all other features should be consciously accessible. The partial awareness hypothesis predicts that one feature may reach consciousness while others do not. These competing predictions were tested in two experiments that presented two targets within a central stream of letters. We used the attentional blink evoked by the first target to assess consciousness for two different features of the second target. The results provide evidence that there can be a severe impairment in conscious access to one feature even when another feature is accurately reported. This behavioral evidence supports the partial awareness hypothesis, showing that consciousness of different features of the same object can be dissociated.     

Attentional cueing induces false memory

The fluency of stimulus processing significantly contributes to recognition memory judgments. We investigated the effect of processing fluency induced by attentional cueing on recognition judgments. Participants performed a Remember/Know recognition test, while their spatial attention was manipulated in the test session. Stimulus location was either predicted (congruent condition) or unpredicted (incongruent condition) using an arrow cue. The results revealed that familiarity-based false recognition increased in the incongruent condition wherein the participants may have attributed part of the perceived disfluency to the attentional cue, and they may have overestimated the fluency for the stimulus, leading to increased false recognition. However, in the congruent condition, the participants may have attributed some parts of the perceived fluency to the attentional cue and underestimated the fluency for the stimulus, leading to decreased false recognition. In sum, stimulus-irrelevant attentional cueing induces unintentional processing about the source of fluency and biases recognition memory.     

情绪图片的效价与唤醒度在注意瞬脱对抗效应中的作用:来自ERP的证据

以情绪图片为材料,在RSVP任务下检验了效价和唤醒度在注意瞬脱对抗效应中的作用。实验发现效价在对抗注意瞬脱中起主要作用,且正性图片的对抗效应优于负性图片,但唤醒度对注意瞬脱的影响不显著,结果支持积极情绪对抗注意瞬脱的观点。ERP结果进一步发现以上效应发生在P3代表的工作记忆巩固阶段。而在P2和N2代表的早期注意阶段,尽管已出现了注意瞬脱和情绪加工,但二者无显著交互作用。     

消费者对犯错品牌评价的时间打折效应及其影响因素

通过研究品牌犯错的时间打折效应,本文试图探讨潜在消费者（未购买者）对犯错品牌评价的心理倾向。实验1研究发现,随着品牌犯错事件时间距离的延伸,消费者对身体性危害-品牌犯错的评价不会改善,即没有出现时间打折效应,而对功能性危害-品牌犯错的评价则逐渐提高,从而表现出时间打折效应。但实验2研究进一步发现,随着品牌犯错事件相关性的增强,功能性危害-品牌犯错的时间打折效应也消失。结论：潜在消费者对犯错品牌评价的心理倾向表现为“消费者防御”,并且身体性危害-品牌犯错启动的消费者防御要强于功能性危害。     

Approach and avoidance relationship goals and couples’ nonverbal communication during conflict

Approach relationship goals are pursued in order to achieve desirable outcomes, whereas avoidance relationship goals are pursued to prevent undesirable outcomes in relationships. We investigated how partners’ approach and avoidance relationship goals are related to their nonverbal communication during conflict. A sequential analysis of observational data from 365 couples (28,470 observations) revealed that individuals with more (vs. fewer) approach goals displayed more positive involvement (e.g., head nods, smiles) and less avoidant withdrawal (e.g., shaking head, folded arms). The reverse pattern emerged for avoidance goals. Furthermore, women (but not men) matched their partner's positive involvement to a greater extent the more approach goals and the fewer avoidance goals they pursued. In contrast, approach/avoidance relationship goals were not associated with how much individuals matched their partner's avoidant withdrawal. Results suggest that relationship goals are related to partners’ nonverbal communication and the extent to which women match their partner's positive involvement during conflict.     

Self-acceptance,resilience, coping and satisfaction of life in people who stutter

PurposeThe purpose of the present study was to evaluate self-acceptance and satisfaction with life with people who stutter and the influence of coping and resilience on the two factors.MethodForty-seven people who stutter (PWS) and 47 people who do not stutter (PWNS) participated in an online survey. Participants completed a survey assessing 6 main areas: (a) background information, (b) satisfaction with life, (c) coping, (d) avoidance, (e) self-acceptance, and resilience.ResultsAvoidant coping and maladaptive coping moderated the association between stuttering and self- acceptance but not satisfaction with life. Resilience was found to moderate the association between stuttering and self-acceptance as well as satisfaction with life.ConclusionStuttering was associated with lower self-acceptance at higher levels of avoidant coping and maladaptive coping. PWS who have lower levels of resilience were more likely to have a lower satisfaction with life indicating that higher levels of resilience could serve as a protective factor for having a greater satisfaction with life. Further, stuttering was associated with lower self-acceptance at lower levels of resilient attitude. Resilience and coping appear to protect against having diminished self-acceptance and satisfaction with life for PWS.