Deployment dynamics of hypnotic anger modulation

To understand the role that attention plays in the deployment timeline of hypnotic anger modulation, we composed an Attentional Blink paradigm where the first and second targets were faces, expressing neutral or angry emotions. We then suppressed the salience of angry faces through a “hypnotic numbing” suggestion. We found that hypnotic suggestion only attenuated the emotional salience of the second target (T2). By implementing drift-diffusion decision modelling, we also found that hypnotic suggestion mainly affected decision thresholds. These findings suggest that hypnotic numbing resulted from belated changes in response strategy. Interestingly, a contrast against non-hypnotized participants revealed that the numbing suggestion had the instruction-like feature of incorporating emotional valence into the attentional task-set. Together, our results portray hypnotic anger modulation as a two-tiered process: first, hypnotic suggestion alters the attentional task-set; second, provided processing and response preparation are not interrupted, a hypnotizability-dependent response based on said altered task-set is produced through late cognitive control strategies.     

Experiential avoidance in adolescents with borderline personality disorder: comparison with a non-BPD psychiatric group and healthy controls

ABSTRACT

Previous research has identified experiential avoidance (EA) as related to a host of adolescent internalizing and externalizing problems, as well as borderline personality disorder, suggesting that it is a crosscutting factor for adolescent psychopathology. It remains unclear whether EA differs among adolescents with BPD compared to adolescents with other psychiatric disorders and healthy adolescents. The aims of this study were to 1) examine EA in adolescents with BPD compared to non-BPD inpatient adolescents and healthy adolescents, and 2) to evaluate whether EA has a unique relationship to borderline pathology over and above internalizing and externalizing. Self-report measures of BPD features, EA, and psychopathology were completed by 692 adolescents (64.5% female, M_age= 15.20). This sample included a group of psychiatric inpatient youth (n = 197 BPD; n = 403 non-BPD) and a group of healthy adolescents (n = 92). Results revealed that EA differed significantly across all three groups, with the highest level of EA evidenced in adolescents who had BPD. Furthermore, there was a significant, unique association between BPD symptoms and EA over afnd above internalizing and externalizing pathology. These findings pinpoint EA as an important risk marker and possible target of prevention or intervention for adolescent BPD.     

依恋焦虑对大学生囤积行为的影响:无法忍受不确定性与经验性回避的序列中介作用

为探讨依恋焦虑、无法忍受不确定性、经验性回避与大学生囤积行为的关系，本研究构建了一个序列中介模型。采用问卷法对黑龙江等地高校的610名大学生进行调查研究。结果发现：（1）无法忍受不确定性和经验性回避在依恋焦虑与大学生囤积行为之间均起部分中介作用；（2）无法忍受不确定性和经验性回避在依恋焦虑和大学生囤积行为之间构成序列中介，即依恋焦虑个体通过增强无法忍受不确定性，从而提高经验性回避倾向，进而增加大学生的囤积行为。研究进一步从认知和应对手段角度来考察依恋焦虑对大学生囤积行为的作用机制，对囤积行为的预防和干预具有启示意义。     

一例大学生社交恐惧症的案例分析报告

本文是一例女大学生因怀疑自己口臭、担心肠蠕动的声音像放屁声,因表现为在人多的场所感到紧张、不断地吞口水,回避人多的场所等症状的心理咨询案例。分析了求助者的生物学层面、社会层面和心理层面的相关资料,结合SCL-90、SAS、SDS的测验结果,分别做出了诊断和鉴别诊断。采用认知行为疗法和暴露疗法对来访者做了有效干预和治疗。根据求助者自我评估、咨询师评定、心理测验结果证明本咨询为有效咨询。     

Attentional bias for negative expressions depends on previous target location: replicable effect but unreliable measures

ABSTRACT

Observability of threat-related spatial attentional biases may require previous-trial responses associated with threat-related locations. This carryover effect might affect reliability and correlations. In Study 1, a diagonalized Visual Probe Task was completed online (N=131) with colour, anger, fear and disgust stimuli, with questionnaires on aggression, anxiety, depression and impulsivity. Bias towards negative stimuli was found only following previous targets on the negative location. Study 2 aimed to test an interpretation in terms of cue-evoked attention. Task variants were completed (N=101) with and without removal of the cue when targets appeared. Anger and disgust stimuli and aggression, anxiety and depression scales were used. Carryover was replicated with no interaction with cue offset. Over both tasks, reliability was low and no robust correlations with questionnaires were found. Carryover thus determined whether attentional bias to negative facial expressions was observed, but analyses taking this into account did not improve reliability or reveal correlations.     

The attentional blink unveils the interplay between conscious perception,spatial attention and working memory encoding

Our ability to perceive two events in close temporal succession is severely limited, a phenomenon known as the attentional blink. While the blink has served as a popular tool to prevent conscious perception, there is less research on its causes, and in particular on the role of conscious perception of the first event in triggering it. In three experiments, we disentangled the roles of spatial attention, conscious perception and working memory (WM) in causing the blink. We show that while allocating spatial attention to T1 is neither necessary nor sufficient for eliciting a blink, consciously perceiving it is necessary but not sufficient. When T1 was task irrelevant, consciously perceiving it triggered a blink only when it matched the attentional set for T2. We conclude that consciously perceiving a task-relevant event causes the blink, possibly because it triggers encoding of this event into WM. We discuss the implications of these findings for the relationship between spatial attention, conscious perception and WM, as well as for the distinction between access and phenomenal consciousness.     

Avoidance Behavior Following Terror Event Exposure: Effects of Perceived Life Threat and Jewish Religious Coping

The current research was designed to examine associations of perceived life threat (PLT) and religious coping with the development of avoidance behavior following terror event exposure. Based upon the terror management theory (TMT), we hypothesized that religious coping, through its effect on religious beliefs as a meaning system, would moderate the impact of threat, as expressed in PLT, on an individual's reaction to terror event exposure, as manifested in avoidance behavior. Participants were 591 Israeli Jewish students who were vicariously or directly exposed to a terror event in the past. We report a significant interaction between PLT and negative religious coping. PLT was positively associated with avoidance behavior but this relationship was more profound among persons who reported high negative religious coping. Secular students reported higher rates of avoidance behavior and negative religious coping and were more likely than religious students to report intrapersonal religious conflict. Our findings suggest that terror event exposure is associated with an elevated sense of threat, which is, at least in part, associated with a weakening of prior religious beliefs.     

Attentional disengagement from negative natural sounds for high-anxious individuals

Background and objectives: Previous studies have not consistently concluded whether high-anxious persons exhibit attentional bias towards negative natural auditory stimuli. The present study explores whether auditory negative stimuli could induce attentional bias to negative sounds in real life and investigates the exact nature of these biases using an emotional spatial cueing task.

Design: Experimental study with a mixed factorial design.

Method: We created two groups according to the state-trait anxiety scale, namely high and low trait anxiety. Participants (N?=?68 undergraduate students) were required to respond to an auditory target after receiving a negative (aversive sounds from natural life) or neutral auditory stimuli.

Results: A 2 (Validity: valid/invalid)?×?2 (Cue Valence: negative/neutral)?×?2 (Anxiety Group: LA/HA) repeated-measures ANOVA on reaction times revealed that participants with high trait anxiety exhibited slower reaction times in invalid trials following negative cues than following neutral cues. Higher levels of trait anxiety were associated with more difficult attentional disengagement from negative auditory information.

Conclusions: The results demonstrate that impaired attentional disengagement was one of the mechanisms by which high-anxious participants exhibited auditory attentional bias to natural negative information.     

Mood regulation and relationship quality predict change in homesickness during college

Recent theorizing has implicated affect regulation as central to the experience of homesickness. Conceptualized as grief due to losing social connections with close others when relocating, homesickness is associated with poor emotional and social adjustment. The present study examined how mood regulation and relationship quality – at home and in college – predict homesickness and negative affect among college students (N = 168). We assessed 16 mood regulation strategies as well as relationship quality each week over the first college term. As predicted, time-lagged multilevel analyses demonstrate that avoidance-oriented strategies were helpful in the short term (the following week), but chronic avoidance (across the college term) predicted higher levels of homesickness. Approach-oriented regulatory strategies did not predict homesickness, however. Relationship quality demonstrated differential main effects at the between-person level but did not predict fluctuations in homesickness from week to week. Across the college term, closer ties at home predicted greater homesickness, whereas closer ties in college predicted lower homesickness. Notably, there were distinct effects of mood regulation for homesickness compared to negative affect. The present study is among the first to examine effects of mood regulation on homesickness longitudinally, suggesting it is important to consider the type of regulation strategies being used as well as the time scale.     

Exposure-based cognitive behavior therapy for anxiety related to asthma: A feasibility study with multivariate baseline design

In the presence of asthma, the risk of having an anxiety disorder is increased twofold. The few trials conducted on cognitive behavior therapy (CBT) for anxiety and asthma have mainly targeted panic disorder, and with mixed results. Experimental laboratory research indicates that increased anxiety may lead to hypervigilance toward asthma. Hence, fear and avoidance associated with increased anxiety due to asthma may be an important treatment target. A treatment that learn participants to differentiate between anxiety and asthma through gradual exposure to situations that risk triggering anxiety for asthma may be a possible avenue. As a first step to investigate this issue further, we developed a 10-week exposure-based CBT protocol for anxiety related to asthma and tested it in six participants using multivariate baseline design with repeated assessments throughout treatment. All participants reported satisfaction with treatment, as well as subjective overall improvement after treatment. Visual analysis, using graphs over each individual's trajectory, as well as potential efficacy on group level analyzing standardized mean change, indicated improvements in important outcomes. We conclude that exposure-based CBT is feasible and may improve anxiety related to asthma. Further investigation under randomized controlled trial conditions is warranted.