Speech anxiety and rapid emotional reactions to angry and happy facial expressions

The aim was to explore whether people high as opposed to low in speech anxiety react with a more pronounced differential facial response when exposed to angry and happy facial stimuli. High and low fear participants were selected based on their scores on a fear of public speaking questionnaire. All participants were exposed to pictures of angry and happy faces while facial electromyographic (EMG) activity from the Corrugator supercilii and the Zygomaticus major muscle regions was recorded. Skin conductance responses (SCR), heart rate (HR) and ratings were also collected. Participants high as opposed to low in speech anxiety displayed a larger differential corrugator responding, indicating a larger negative emotional reaction, between angry and happy faces. They also reacted with a larger differential zygomatic responding, indicating a larger positive emotional reaction, between happy and angry faces. Consistent with the facial reaction patterns, the high fear group rated angry faces as more unpleasant and as expressing more disgust, and further rated happy faces as more pleasant. There were no differences in SCR or HR responding between high and low speech anxiety groups. The present results support the hypothesis that people high in speech anxiety are disposed to show an exaggerated sensitivity and facial responsiveness to social stimuli.     

贵州汉族与少数民族中学生成就动机与成功恐惧比较研究

为了探讨汉族与少数民族中学生在成就动机和成功恐惧方面存在的差异,为教育工作者更好地了解和把握少数民族中学生心理特点,运用成就动机问卷和投射测验比较研究了977名贵州汉族与少数民族中学生的成就动机与成功恐惧。结果表明:汉族与少数民族中学生在成就动机上差异不显著,但重点中学少数民族学生在避免失败的动机上显著高于重点中学汉族学生;男、女中学生均存在成功恐惧,少数民族城市中学生的成功恐惧显著高于汉族城市中学生;少数民族中学生在事业恐惧方面显著高于汉族中学生;成就动机与成功恐惧无显著相关。     

试论伊壁鸠鲁的精神疾患的认知疗法

伊壁鸠鲁创立的哲学在晚期希腊时期的影响甚至超过了斯多亚派,伊壁鸠鲁及其传人卢克莱修的唯物主义哲学其实是面对人类的肉体和精神疾病而进行的治疗活动,其基本原则在两千后演化为精神治疗术中应用广泛、声名著卓的认识疗法。依据伊壁鸠鲁残篇分析了这种古代精神治疗术的基本原理、实施方法及其在思想史上的重要意义。     

Both exposure to a novel context and associative learning induce an upregulation of AKAP150 protein in mouse hippocampus

A-kinase anchoring protein 150 (AKAP150) is a multi-enzyme signaling complex that coordinates the action of PKA, PKC, and PP2B at neuronal membranes and synapses. We measured levels of AKAP150 protein in the hippocampus 6h after training mice in a contextual fear conditioning paradigm. In contextual fear conditioning mice learn to associate a context with a footshock presentation. Mice were divided in four experimental groups with different training protocols: naive, no footshock exposure, immediate footshock exposure, and footshock 3min after exposure to the context. We found that AKAP150 protein levels were increased upon exposing mice to the novel context independent of the training protocol. However, when the animals were habituated to the experimental context, only mice that learned to associate the context with the footshock showed an upregulation of AKAP150. We suggest that upregulated levels of AKAP150 contribute to processing the exposure to a novel context and associative learning.     

Concurrent excitors limit the extinction of conditioned fear in humans

In a human fear conditioning experiment, with on-line expectancy ratings and electrodermal responding as indices of fear, two neutral stimuli (pictures of geometric shapes) were first established as reliable predictors of an electric shock. In the subsequent extinction phase, the two stimuli were repeatedly presented in compound, without the shock. The final test phase consisted of individual stimulus presentations again, which resulted in a strong return of the conditioned responses. This effect was not observed in non-conditioned control stimuli. Hence, behavioral effects of extinction seem highly specific to the stimulus constellation that has gone through the extinction procedure. We argue that pharmacological, behavioral and/or cognitive manipulations that could prevent configural processing of stimulus constellations have direct clinical potential.     

Spider fear and covariation bias in children and adolescents

Covariation bias can be defined as phobic people's tendency to overestimate the association between fear-relevant stimuli and negative outcomes. The current article presents two studies that examined this type of cognitive bias in children and adolescents aged 8-16 years. Study 1 was concerned with a thought experiment during which youths (N=150) were asked to imagine that they participated in an experiment during which they had to view a series of pictures showing spiders, guns, and flowers, that were occasionally followed by a negative outcome (i.e., a mild electric shock). Participants were asked to estimate the relation between each type of picture and the negative outcome. The results indicated that youths with higher levels of spider fear displayed a specific tendency to relate spider pictures to a negative outcome. In Study 2, youths (N=220) actually participated in a computer game during which they were confronted with pictures of spiders, guns, and flowers, each of which was equally often followed by a negative (i.e., losing candy), positive (i.e., winning candy), or neutral outcome. After the game, participants had to estimate the relation between each type of picture and various outcomes. It was found that youths with higher levels of spider fear estimated more negative and less positive outcomes in relation to spider pictures. Taken together, these findings provide support for a fear-related covariation bias in youths. Further developmental analyses indicated that this type of cognitive bias seems to be more consistently present among adolescents than among children.     

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.     

Neuroscientific evidence for defensive avoidance of fear appeals

Previous studies indicate that people respond defensively to threatening health information, especially when the information challenges self‐relevant goals. The authors investigated whether reduced acceptance of self‐relevant health risk information is already visible in early attention allocation processes. In two experimental studies, participants were watching high‐ and low‐threat health commercials, and at the same time had to pay attention to specific odd auditory stimuli in a sequence of frequent auditory stimuli (odd ball paradigm). The amount of attention allocation was measured by recording event‐related brain potentials (i.e., P300 ERPs) and reaction times. Smokers showed larger P300 amplitudes in response to the auditory targets while watching high‐threat instead of low‐threat anti‐smoking commercials. In contrast, non‐smokers showed smaller P300 amplitudes during watching high as opposed to low threat anti‐smoking commercials. In conclusion, the findings provide further neuroscientific support for the hypothesis that threatening health information causes more avoidance responses among those for whom the health threat is self‐relevant.     

Does the courage measure really measure courage? A theoretical and empirical evaluation

Courage has seen an explosion of research in all branches of psychology, and the most popular measure is Norton and Weiss’s the courage measure (CM). Despite widespread use, limited investigations into its psychometric properties and validity have been performed. To ensure the strength of findings drawn from the scale, the current study performs a theoretical, psychometric, and empirical analysis of the CM. The results demonstrate that the CM has theoretical concerns stemming from the operational definition of courage used during its creation, and may not actually measure courage. Also, the CM was shown to consist of two dimensions separated by regular and reverse coding. Next, the scale demonstrated slight concerns with method effects, and its construct validity was analyzed. Together, the results demonstrate that the CM would benefit from the removal of reverse coded items, and may actually gage persistence despite fear rather than courage.     

负面评价恐惧的性别差异:基于内隐和外显测量的比较

从内隐和外显两种角度探讨负面评价恐惧的性别差异。采用简式内隐联系测验(BIAT)和简明负面评价恐惧量表(BFNES)两种测量方法,实验共72名被试,每名被试先进行简式内隐联系测验,再完成简明负面评价恐惧量表,并借鉴不同方法对两种测量结果进行分析。结果发现:(1)被试的内隐负面评价恐惧与外显负面评价恐惧不存在显著相关,结果产生实验性分离;(2)负面评价恐惧不存在显著性别差异;(3)但有趣的是,不同性别被试内隐和外显负面评价恐惧的分离状况存在显著差异,其中男性的外显负面评价恐惧低于内隐负面评价恐惧,而女性的结果刚好相反,其外显负面评价恐惧高于内隐负面评价恐惧。这些结果表明被试的内隐和外显负面评价恐惧虽然不存在显著性别差异,但不同性别被试的内隐负面评价恐惧和外显负面评价恐惧内部存在不同的组合状况。