厌恶与恐惧情绪习得的性别差异研究:一项ERP研究

采用事件相关电位技术（ERPs）,用条件性习得范式探讨厌恶与恐惧情绪习得的性别差异。行为结果表明,在成功习得厌恶、恐惧和中性情绪之后,男女性在唤醒度维度上,性别差异显著;脑电结果表明,在早期N1和P2成分,厌恶情绪与恐惧情绪的习得无显著性别差异;但男女不同性别在N2成分上差异显著,主要表现为女性在厌恶、恐惧、中性这三类CS的N2成分均差异显著,但男性仅厌恶与中性情绪的CS差异显著。结果表明在负性情绪的习得中,女性比男性更敏感。     

The effects of safety behaviors on the fear of contamination: an experimental investigation

The strategies used by anxious individuals to prevent feared outcomes, known as safety behaviors, are thought to maintain pathological anxiety by preventing the disconfirmation of inaccurate threat beliefs. However, it is possible that safety behaviors might also contribute to the development and exacerbation of anxiety symptoms. The present study tested this notion in a sample of undergraduate participants with either low (n=30) or high (n=26) levels of contamination fear. After a week-long baseline period, participants spent 1 week engaging in a clinically representative array of contamination-related safety behaviors on a daily basis, followed by a second baseline period. Subsequent to the safety behavior manipulation, participants evidenced statistically significant increases in threat overestimation, contamination fear symptoms, and emotional and avoidant responses to three contamination-related behavioral avoidance tasks (BATs). In contrast, anxiety and depressive symptoms remained stable. The magnitude of change in contamination concerns was equivalent among participants in both contamination fear groups. Our findings suggest that contamination-related safety behaviors elicit a modest and specific increase in the fear of contamination. Possible mechanisms for this effect, as well as implications for the role of safety behaviors in the psychopathology of anxiety disorders, are discussed.     

“May I present you: my disgust!” – Declared disgust sensitivity in the presence of attractive models

Disgust sensitivity differs among men and women, and this phenomenon has been observed across numerous cultures. It remains unknown why such sex differences occur, but one of the reasons may relate to differences in self-presentation. We tested that hypothesis in an experiment comprising 299 participants (49% women) randomly allocated into three groups. Each group completed the Three Domains Disgust Scale (TDDS) and rated how disgusting they found olfactory, visual, gustatory, and tactile disgust elicitors either when a male experimenter was present, a female experimenter was present, or no experimenter was present. We hypothesised that male participants in the female experimenter group would declare decreased levels of disgust sensitivity, and female participants in the male experimenter group would declare increased levels of disgust sensitivity. Results showed that despite sex differences in pathogen and sexual disgust, attractive experimenters did not evoke any differences in declared disgust across groups with one exception–both men and women self-presented as more sensitive to sexual disgust in the presence of the female experimenter. We discuss our findings in the light of evolutionary and social theories.     

Multimodal assessment of disgust in contamination-related obsessive-compulsive disorder

The present study utilizes multiple methods to examine the relationship between disgust and contamination-related obsessive-compulsive disorder (OCD) symptoms in an analogue sample. Questionnaire findings revealed that participants with high OCD contamination concerns showed stronger disgust sensitivity than did participants with low OCD contamination symptoms after controlling for negative affect. High OCD participants (N=30) also reported significantly more disgust than did low OCD participants (N=30) when exposed to a disgust-inducing video, whereas no significant between-group differences were detected on other negative emotional dimensions. Results from a series of disgust-specific behavioral avoidance tasks (BATs) revealed that high OCD participants demonstrated both less compliance and less approach behavior. Subsequent analysis also revealed that disgust sensitivity generally mediated avoidance on the BATs among high OCD subjects. High OCD participants also rated the BATs as more fearful and disgusting than did low OCD participants, with disgust generally emerging as the dominant emotional response. The results are consistent with a disgust-based, disease-avoidance approach in understanding contamination-related OCD themes.     

Specificity of disgust sensitivity in the prediction of behavioral avoidance in contamination fear

This study examined the specificity of disgust sensitivity in predicting contamination-related anxiety and behavioral avoidance. Participants high (n=26) and low (n=30) in contamination fear completed self-report measures of disgust sensitivity, contamination cognitions (overestimation of the likelihood and severity of contamination from everyday objects), anxiety, and depression. They then completed three randomly presented contamination-based behavioral avoidance tasks (BATs) that consisted of exposure to a used comb, a cookie on the floor, and a bedpan filled with toilet water. Results indicated that disgust sensitivity was significantly associated with anxious and avoidant responding to the contamination-related BATs. This association remained largely intact after controlling for gender, contamination fear group membership, anxiety, and depression. Contamination cognitions were also significantly related to BAT responses. However, this relationship was fully mediated by disgust sensitivity. These findings indicate that disgust sensitivity has a specific and robust association with contamination concerns commonly observed in obsessive compulsive disorder. The findings are discussed in the context of a disease-avoidance model.     

Shame,Stigma, and Disgust in the Decent Society

Would a just society or government absolutely refrain from shaming or humiliating any of its members? “No,” says this essay. It describes morally acceptable uses of shame, stigma and disgust as tools of social control in a decent (just) society. These uses involve criminal law, tort law, and informal social norms. The standard of moral acceptability proposed for determining the line is a version of perfectionistic prioritarian consequenstialism. From this standpoint, criticism is developed against Martha Nussbaum’s view that to respect the dignity of each person, society absolutely must refrain from certain ways of shaming and humiliating its members and rendering them objects of communal disgust.     

催产素、孕激素和雌激素对厌恶的影响及其神经生理机制

厌恶是人和动物最基本的情绪之一,起源于口腔对苦味(有毒)物质的排斥,常伴有恶心呕吐和远离诱发刺激的强烈愿望,具有回避潜在疾病威胁的功能。大量动物和人类研究表明,催产素、孕激素和雌激素不同程度地影响核心厌恶刺激的感知、核心厌恶情绪的产生与表达、条件性厌恶习得和厌恶表情识别。三种激素主要通过作用于五羟色胺、γ-氨基丁酸、乙酰胆碱和谷氨酸等神经递质受体,调节杏仁核、脑岛、前扣带回、壳核、梨状皮层、额中回等脑区活动,影响厌恶加工。未来研究应当在准确测量激素水平和控制实验任务难度的基础上,探究各激素对不同感觉通道厌恶加工的影响,及其性别的调节作用;同时结合脑成像技术和动物行为学,明确各激素影响厌恶加工的神经内分泌机制。     

Immoral,infectious, or both? How disgust sensitivity predicts judgments of violations against COVID-19 mitigation actions

Violations against mitigation actions to prevent the spreading of the SARS-CoV-2 virus causing COVID-19, such as not wearing a mask or not practicing social distancing, were seen as immoral and could also increase the likelihood of spreading the virus. In two studies (N1 = 318, N2 = 293), we found that moral and pathogen disgust sensitivity differentially predicted perceptions of such COVID-19 violations against mitigation actions, framed as a moral, pathogen, or on a good-bad dimension, albeit in a less specific way than initially hypothesized (e.g., regarding the pathogenic framed violations, not only pathogen but also moral disgust was associated with higher perceptions of infectiousness). These results suggest that individual differences, especially in pathogen disgust (and, more inconsistently, moral disgust), are important when evaluating violations against mitigation actions. Further research on the role of moral disgust is needed.     

Fear and Disgust Responding to Heterogeneous Blood-Injection-Injury Stimuli: Distinctions from Anxiety Symptoms

Discrepancies exist in the literature regarding the unique role of disgust in Blood-Injection-Injury (BII) phobia. The present study attempts to clarify the discrepancy using a sample of analogue BII phobics (n = 40) and nonphobics (n = 40) who completed a series of questionnaires and were exposed to blood, mutilation, and injection pictures. The findings revealed that BII phobics reported greater disgust and contamination fears than nonphobics after controlling for anxious symptoms. When rating phobia-relevant pictures, BII phobics responded with greater fear and disgust than nonphobics after controlling for baseline anxiety scores. Furthermore, disgust was the dominant emotional response for BII phobics for the blood and mutilation stimuli. However, no differences were found between fear and disgust within the BII group when rating injection stimuli. The implications of these findings for better understanding the potential unique role of disgust in the etiology, maintenance, and treatment of BII phobia are discussed.

Specificity of Disgust Domains in the Prediction of Contamination Anxiety and Avoidance: A Multimodal Examination

Although core, animal-reminder, and contamination disgust are viewed as distinct “types” of disgust vulnerabilities, the extent to which individual differences in the three disgust domains uniquely predict contamination-related anxiety and avoidance remains unclear. Three studies were conducted to fill this important gap in the literature. Study 1 was conducted to first determine if the three types of disgust could be replicated in a larger and more heterogeneous sample. Confirmatory factor analysis revealed that a bifactor model consisting of a “general disgust” dimension and the three distinct disgust dimensions yielded a better fit than a one-factor model. Structural equation modeling in Study 2 showed that while latent core, animal-reminder, and contamination disgust factors each uniquely predicted a latent “contamination anxiety” factor above and beyond general disgust, only animal-reminder uniquely predicted a latent “non-contamination anxiety” factor above and beyond general disgust. However, Study 3 found that only contamination disgust uniquely predicted behavioral avoidance in a public restroom where contamination concerns are salient. These findings suggest that although the three disgust domains are associated with contamination anxiety and avoidance, individual differences in contamination disgust sensitivity appear to be most uniquely predictive of contamination-related distress. The implications of these findings for the development and maintenance of anxiety-related disorders marked by excessive contamination concerns are discussed.