Anxiety symptom interpretation and performance expectations in high-anxious,low-anxious,defensive high-anxious and repressor individuals

To date, no research has investigated score predictions and anxiety interpretation in high-anxious, low-anxious, defensive high-anxious and repressor individuals. This study examined Eysenck’s (1997) predictions for cognitive biases on future performance expectations in all four groups. This study was conducted in an ecologically-valid sporting environment. Competitive shooters completed the Marlowe–Crowne Social Desirability Scale and the Sport Anxiety Scale prior to a major competition. Percentile splits identified the four defensiveness/anxiety groups. The modified Competitive Sport Anxiety Inventory-2 was used to assess the intensity and direction of anxiety prior to competition. Participants predicted their expected shooting score. The hypothesis that repressors would interpret their anxiety as more facilitative to performance compared to low-anxious individuals was partially supported. Repressors were more optimistic in their performance prediction in contrast to defensive high-anxious performers who, in turn, were more pessimistic compared to the other two groupings. High-anxious performers, contrary to predictions, demonstrated optimism in their future performance. The findings of this study corroborate the theoretical predictions and the evidence from previous studies with sport performers. Future research should continue to investigate the influence of cognitive biases on performance predictions in sporting environments using Weinberger et al.’s classifications.     

Cognitive deficits of executive functions and decision‐making in obsessive‐compulsive disorder

The nature of cognitive deficits in obsessive‐compulsive disorder (OCD) is characterized by contradictory findings in terms of specific neuropsychological deficits. Selective impairments have been suggested to involve visuospatial memory, set shifting, decision‐making and response inhibition. The aim of this study was to investigate cognitive deficits in decision‐making and executive functioning in OCD. It was hypothesized that the OCD patients would be less accurate in their responses compared to the healthy controls in rational decision‐making on a version of the Cambridge gambling task (CGT) and on the color‐word interference test and on a version of the Tower of Hanoi test (tower test) of executive functioning. Thirteen participants with OCD were compared to a group of healthy controls (n = 13) matched for age, gender, education and verbal IQ. Results revealed significant differences between the OCD group and the healthy control group on quality of decision‐making on the CGT and for achievement score on the tower test. On these two tasks the OCD group performed worse than the healthy control group. The symptom‐dimension analysis revealed performance differences where safety checking patients were impaired on the tower test compared to contamination patients. Results are discussed in the framework of cognition and emotion processing and findings implicate that OCD models should address, specifically, the interaction between cognition and emotion. Here the emotional disruption hypothesis is forwarded to account for the dysfunctional behaviors in OCD. Further implications regarding methodological and inhibitory factors affecting cognitive information processing are highlighted.     

Dream and loss—on triangulation and its implication on the capacity for self-reflection in psychoanalytic work

This paper takes as its starting point Freud's idea that the loss of the object and its inner restoration is an on-going process, which has a crucial influence on the facing of reality. The author's aim is to illustrate that it is by working through the loss of the object that an inner triangulation may be experienced. The idea of triangulation is based on Ronald Brittens definition of it as the image of a mental space in which subjective experiencing can be combined with observing. Via a clinical material, where the distinction between self and object may be endured only with difficulties, the author discusses how phantasizing may serve as an evasion of a notion of an inner catastrophe and how a collapsed triangular space can be restored. In this discussion, the differentiating aspect by negation is touched upon. In connection to another clinical case, the author discusses how the analysand creates what the author calls an illusion about the mutual inter-changeability of the objects. This is used to protect the analysand from experiencing feelings of Oedipal competition, and through that, mourn the illusion of an exclusive place in the Oedipal triad. The conclusion is that the capacity to create meaning comprises the idea of the possibility of together with the subjective experience, internalizing the perspective of ?the other”. Further, that the working through of the Oedipal situation stabilizes the capacity for an observing thinking, since it places the person in a triangular position where he/she is able both to identify with the parties in the Oedipal arena and to observe hislher own contribution to the Oedipal interplay.     

The influence of external stimulation on airflow detection by children with asthma

Abstract

The relevance and significance of the concept of a ‘competition of cues’ for the understanding of symptom perception in childhood asthma was investigated during detection of externally applied resistive loads on breathing. The concept predicts that subjects would respond less frequently and less accurately during external stimulation. The sample consisted of 36 children with and 36 without asthma, aged 7-18 years. Detection of airflow was measured in a neutral and in an external stimulation condition. The children breathed through a facemask and responded to changes in airflow by pressing a button. The stimulus presented and withdrawn was analogous to a decrease in lung function (Forced Expiratory Volume in one second) of 39%. Accuracy of detection of airflow was defined as correct minus false positive responses to load stimuli.

The results showed that children with and without asthma responded significantly less frequently during external stimulation than in the neutral condition. However, the accuracy of detection among non-asthmatics was not affected by external stimulation. Children with asthma responded significantly more accurately during external stimulation. The results are discussed in the light of children's accuracy to perceive actual airways obstruction.     

Autism spectrum conditions among children and adolescents: A new profiling tool

There is considerable debate about the sociocognitive features of autism spectrum conditions (ASC), and a tool for profiling the sociocognitive profiles of children and adolescents with ASC is needed. The aim of this research was to evaluate the psychometric properties of a new questionnaire—The Australian Scale for Autism Spectrum Conditions (ASASC). Three hundred twenty‐two parents of children on the ASC spectrum, including autistic disorder (n = 76), Asperger's disorder (n = 188), and pervasive developmental disorder not otherwise specified (n = 21), and a clinical group of children with subclinical ASC features and no ASC diagnosis (n = 37). Measures include an initial scale measuring eight potential dimensions of ASC, a related screening tool for autism, and two previously validated social skills questionnaires. The questionnaires were administered online. The ASASC was factor‐analysed, internal and test–retest reliabilities (for a randomly selected 84 parents) were calculated, and preliminary tests of convergent and divergent validity were conducted. The resulting measure (44 items) contained five coherent and reliable dimensions: understand and express emotion, fact orientation, sensory sensitivity, social communication, and rigidity. The questionnaire had good test–retest reliability and convergent/divergent validity. The ASASC enables profiles of ASC symptomatology that should be useful in adjusting interventions to individual needs.     

PTSD Symptom Patterns Following Traumatic and Nontraumatic Events

This study extends research examining posttraumatic stress disorder symptoms following different types of potentially traumatic events. Specifically, the study examined and compared the symptom patterns observed in those who suffered a major accident, the unexpected death of a loved one, or sexual assault. Based on recent findings, this project also examines those who reported nontraumatic (but stressful) events, as well as comparing symptom patterns across gender. Findings suggest different types of traumas might be associated with differences in severity and patterns of symptoms for women (but not for men), suggesting symptom patterns manifest differently in men and women. Results also call into question the assumption that traumatic events demonstrate different symptom patterns than other types of events.     

Ambivalence over emotional expression and symptom attribution are associated with self‐reported somatic symptoms in Singaporean school adolescents

Although somatization is common across cultures, its meanings may differ as culture shapes emotional experience. Thus, instead of treating somatization as a form of psychopathology, it is more useful to conceptualize it as an idiom of distress, and how complaints of somatic symptoms are related to social relationships, patterns of emotional expression and symptom attribution in a cultural context. This study seeks to explore whether ambivalence over emotional expression and causal attribution would shed light on the meanings of somatization among Asian adolescents. Three hundred secondary school adolescents in Singapore participated in this study. The main results show that emotional ambivalence, biomedical and Traditional Chinese Medicinal causal beliefs, and magical attribution contributed to additional variance in somatic symptoms over and above the variance explained by emotional distress. These findings are discussed from both psychological and cultural perspectives.     

The impact of event vividness,event severity,and prior paranormal belief on attributions towards a depicted remarkable coincidence experience: Two studies examining the misattribution hypothesis

Two studies examine the impact event vividness, event severity, and prior paranormal belief has on causal attributions for a depicted remarkable coincidence experience. In Study 1, respondents (n = 179) read a hypothetical vignette in which a fictional character accurately predicts a plane crash 1 day before it occurs. The crash was described in either vivid or pallid terms with the final outcome being either severe (fatal) or non‐severe (non‐fatal). Respondents completed 29 causal attribution items, one attribution confidence item, nine scenario perception items, a popular paranormal belief scale, and a standard demographics questionnaire. Principal axis factoring reduced the 29 attribution items to four attribution factors which were then subjected to a 2 (event vividness) × 2 (event severity) × 2 (paranormal belief) MANCOVA controlling for respondent gender. As expected, paranormal believers attributed the accurate crash prediction less to coincidence and more to both paranormal and transcendental knowing than did paranormal sceptics. Furthermore, paranormal (psychokinesis) believers deemed the prediction more reflective of paranormal knowing to both (1) a vivid/non‐fatal and (2) a pallid/fatal crash depiction. Vividness, severity, and paranormal belief types had no impact on attribution confidence. In Study 2, respondents (also n = 179) generated data that were a moderately good fit to the previous factor structure and replicated several differences across attributional pairings albeit for paranormal non‐believers only. Corresponding effects for event severity and paranormal belief were not replicated. Findings are discussed in terms of their support for the paranormal misattribution hypothesis and the impact of availability biases in the form of both vividness and severity effects. Methodological issues and future research ideas are also discussed.     

Health anxiety and hypochondriasis in the light of DSM-5

Background: In the DSM-5, the diagnosis of hypochondriasis was replaced by two new diagnositic entities: somatic symptom disorder (SSD) and illness anxiety disorder (IAD). Both diagnoses share high health anxiety as a common criterion, but additonal somatic symptoms are only required for SSD but not IAD. Design: Our aim was to provide empirical evidence for the validity of these new diagnoses using data from a case–control study of highly health-anxious (n = 96), depressed (n = 52), and healthy (n = 52) individuals. Results: The individuals originally diagnosed as DSM-IV hypochondriasis predominantly met criteria for SSD (74%) and rarely for IAD (26%). Individuals with SSD were more impaired, had more often comorbid panic and generalized anxiety disorders, and had more medical consultations as those with IAD. Yet, no significant differences were found between SSD and IAD with regard to levels of health anxiety, other hypochondriacial characteristics, illness behavior, somatic symptom attributions, and physical concerns, whereas both groups differed significantly from clinical and healthy controls in all of these variables. Conclusion: These results do not support the proposed splitting of health anxiety/hypochondriasis into two diagnoses. Further validation studies with larger samples and additional control groups are warranted to prove the validity of the new diagnoses.