Moderating effects of the valence of social interaction on the dysfunctional consequences of perseverative cognition: an ecological study in major depression and social anxiety disorder

Background and Objectives: Major depression disorder (MDD) and social anxiety disorder (SAD) are characterized by the use of perseverative cognition (PC) as a dysfunctional coping strategy. We sought to investigate the dysfunctional physiological and psychological consequences of PC and how the valence of social interactions moderates such consequences in these psychopathological conditions.

Design/Methods: The study combined 24-hour heart rate variability (HRV) and ecological momentary assessments in 48 individuals with MDD, SAD, and sex-matched controls.

Results: In all participants, PC was associated with mood worsening and reduced ability of the parasympathetic nervous system, mainly the vagus, to inhibit sympathetic arousal (i.e., reduced HRV). Individuals with SAD had the highest frequency of daily PC, while those with MDD reported that PC interfered more with their ongoing activities. In SAD, daily PC was associated with significantly lower HRV after negative social interactions. Individuals with MDD reported higher levels of sadness during PC irrespective of the valence of the preceding social interaction but higher levels of anxiety and efforts to inhibit PC following positive interactions.

Conclusions: Results highlight the need to account for important moderators like the valence of social interaction when looking at the physiological consequences of maladaptive emotion regulation strategies.     

Is emotion regulation associated with cancer-related psychological symptoms?

Objectives: This study examined the cross-sectional and prospective relationships between subjective (cognitive reappraisal, expressive suppression and experiential avoidance) and objective (high-frequency heart rate variability [HF-HRV]) measures of emotion regulation (ER) and a set of psychological symptoms (anxiety, depression, fear of cancer recurrence [FCR], insomnia, fatigue, pain, and cognitive impairments) among women receiving radiation therapy for non-metastatic breast cancer.

Design: Eighty-one participants completed a battery of self-report scales within 10 days before the start of radiotherapy (T1) and within 10 days after its end (T2; approximately 6 weeks after T1). HF-HRV at rest was measured at T1.

Results: Canonical correlation analyses revealed that higher levels of experiential avoidance and expressive suppression were cross-sectionally associated with higher levels of all symptoms, except pain, at T1 and at T2 (both p’s?<?0.0001). Higher levels of suppression and reappraisal at T1 were marginally associated with reduced FCR and with increased depression and fatigue between T1 and T2 (p?=?0.07). HF-HRV was not associated with symptoms cross-sectionally or prospectively.

Conclusions: Although preliminary, these results are consistent with the hypothesis that maladaptive ER strategies, assessed subjectively, may cross-sectionally act as a transdiagnostic mechanism underlying several cancer-related psychological symptoms.     

Prosodic modulations in child-directed language and their impact on word learning

Child-directed language can support language learning, but how? We addressed two questions: (1) how caregivers prosodically modulated their speech as a function of word familiarity (known or unknown to the child) and accessibility of referent (visually present or absent from the immediate environment); (2) whether such modulations affect children's unknown word learning and vocabulary development. We used data from 38 English-speaking caregivers (from the ECOLANG corpus) talking about toys (both known and unknown to their children aged 3–4 years) both when the toys are present and when absent. We analyzed prosodic dimensions (i.e., speaking rate, pitch and intensity) of caregivers’ productions of 6529 toy labels. We found that unknown labels were spoken with significantly slower speaking rate, wider pitch and intensity range than known labels, especially in the first mentions, suggesting that caregivers adjust their prosody based on children's lexical knowledge. Moreover, caregivers used slower speaking rate and larger intensity range to mark the first mentions of toys that were physically absent. After the first mentions, they talked about the referents louder with higher mean pitch when toys were present than when toys were absent. Crucially, caregivers’ mean pitch of unknown words and the degree of mean pitch modulation for unknown words relative to known words (pitch ratio) predicted children's immediate word learning and vocabulary size 1 year later. In conclusion, caregivers modify their prosody when the learning situation is more demanding for children, and these helpful modulations assist children in word learning.

Research Highlights

• In naturalistic interactions, caregivers use slower speaking rate, wider pitch and intensity range when introducing new labels to 3–4-year-old children, especially in first mentions.
• Compared to when toys are present, caregivers speak more slowly with larger intensity range to mark the first mentions of toys that are physically absent.
• Mean pitch to mark word familiarity predicts children's immediate word learning and future vocabulary size.

     

Subjective and physiological responses to the 35% carbon dioxide challenge in healthy and non-clinical control populations: a meta-analysis and systematic review

Background/Rationale: The carbon dioxide (CO₂) challenge has been reliably used in laboratory settings as a panicogen in clinical populations. However, the magnitude of these effects on healthy and non-clinical control populations are not clear. The aim of this meta-analysis and systematic review is to provide quantitative estimates of those effects. Specifically, the current paper will evaluate the relative efficacy of the CO₂ challenge in eliciting both subjective and physiological arousal in healthy and non-clinical control populations.

Method: A total of 16 articles with 35 independent samples were included in the meta-analysis, while 37 studies with 74 independent samples were included in the systematic review.

Results: Both the meta-analysis and systematic review found the CO₂ challenge to elicit an increase in subjective distress via self-reported anxiety and fear. Physiological responses via blood pressure and heart rate were heterogeneous in studies sampled, with no significant changes observed across studies. Moderator analyses revealed the variations in findings may be attributed to participant screening and invasive sampling.

Discussion: Findings highlight the CO₂ challenge as a useful tool in the provocation of subjective distress. Implications for both the use of the CO₂ challenge and its anticipated effects in healthy and non-clinical control populations are discussed.     

The relationship between anomalistic belief,misperception of chance and the base rate fallacy

Abstract

A poor understanding of probability may lead people to misinterpret every day coincidences and form anomalistic (e.g., paranormal) beliefs. We investigated the relationship between anomalistic belief (including type of belief) and misperception of chance and the base rate fallacy across both anomalistic and control (i.e., neutral) contexts. Greater anomalistic belief was associated with poorer performance for both types of items; however there were no significant interactions between belief and context. For misperception of chance items, only experiential (vs. theoretical) anomalistic beliefs predicted more errors. In contrast, overall anomalistic belief was positively related to the base rate fallacy but no specific subtype of anomalistic belief was a significant predictor. The results indicate misperception of chance may lead people to interpret coincidental events as having an anomalistic cause, and a poor understanding of base rates may make people more prone to forming anomalistic beliefs.