The Three Domains of Disgust Scale: factor structure, psychometric properties, and conceptual limitations

This investigation examined the measurement properties of the Three Domains of Disgust Scale (TDDS). Principal components analysis in Study 1 (n = 206) revealed three factors of Pathogen, Sexual, and Moral Disgust that demonstrated excellent reliability, including test-retest over 12 weeks. Confirmatory factor analyses in Study 2 (n = 406) supported the three factors. Supportive evidence for the validity of the Pathogen and Sexual Disgust subscales was found in Study 1 and Study 2 with strong associations with disgust/contamination and weak associations with negative affect. However, the validity of the Moral Disgust subscale was limited. Study 3 (n = 200) showed that the TDDS subscales differentially related to personality traits. Study 4 (n = 47) provided evidence for the validity of the TDDS subscales in relation to multiple indices of disgust/contamination aversion in a select sample. Study 5 (n = 70) further highlighted limitations of the Moral Disgust subscale given the lack of a theoretically consistent association with moral attitudes. Lastly, Study 6 (n = 178) showed that responses on the Moral Disgust scale were more intense when anger was the response option compared with when disgust was the response option. The implications of these findings for the assessment of disgust are discussed.     

Unpacking cognitive reappraisal: goals, tactics, and outcomes

Studies of emotion regulation typically contrast two or more strategies (e.g., reappraisal vs. suppression) and ignore variation within each strategy. To address such variation, we focused on cognitive reappraisal and considered the effects of goals (i.e., what people are trying to achieve) and tactics (i.e., what people actually do) on outcomes (i.e., how affective responses change). To examine goals, we randomly assigned participants to either increase positive emotion or decrease negative emotion to a negative stimulus. To examine tactics, we categorized participants' reports of how they reappraised. To examine reappraisal outcomes, we measured experience and electrodermal responding. Findings indicated that (a) the goal of increasing positive emotion led to greater increases in positive affect and smaller decreases in skin conductance than the goal of decreasing negative emotion, and (b) use of the reality challenge tactic was associated with smaller increases in positive affect during reappraisal. These findings suggest that reappraisal can be implemented in the service of different emotion goals, using different tactics. Such differences are associated with different outcomes, and they should be considered in future research and applied attempts to maximize reappraisal success.     

Critical Transference in a Case of Severe Epilepsy

In this paper, the author presents a summary of a brief treatment with a young woman, suffering from severe epileptic illness, which describes the mutuality of cross-transferences of deep and intense feelings and the unorthodox way to receive, to take in persons affected with critical phenomena. This treatment was deeply influenced by the traumatic triad, borrowed from Ferenczi: "amnesia, anaesthesia, aboulia," the ways of forgetting (or erasing) the past/the present/the future. The investigation led us to clarify, on the one hand, the incestophilic-or perhaps incestuous-source in the family, and on the other, the burdensome and tragic genealogy and history of each parent. At the end of this short treatment, which took place at a frequency of one session a week (with the patient sitting, standing, lying on the floor; with sometimes severe fits, deliria, threats; bringing of letters, texts, drawings; and a few phone calls), there was an alleviation of the critical phenomena and revival.     

Effects of experienced disgust on habituation during repeated exposure to threat-relevant stimuli in blood-injection-injury phobia

Despite growing evidence implicating disgust in the etiology of blood-injection-injury (BII) phobia, the relevance of disgust for exposure-based treatment of BII phobia remains largely unknown. Individuals with BII phobia were randomly assigned to a disgust (view vomit videos) or neutral activation (view waterfall videos) condition. They were then exposed to 14 videotaped blood draws, during which fear and disgust levels were repeatedly assessed. Participants then engaged in a behavioral avoidance test (BAT) consisting of exposure to threat-relevant stimuli. Examination of outcome comparing the identical first and last blood-draw clips revealed that fear and disgust toward blood draws was significantly reduced in both groups. Disgust levels were also found to be more intense for the video stimuli relative to fear levels whereas the opposite was true for BAT stimuli. Contrary to predictions, the disgust induction did not enhance reductions in negative responses to the target video or reduce behavioral avoidance. Growth curve analyses did show that individuals with BII phobia exposed to the disgust induction showed greater initial fear levels during repeated exposure than those in the neutral condition. However, this effect was not consistently observed across different analytic approaches. Changes in fear during exposure were also found to be independent of changes in disgust but not vice versa, and greater initial fear levels during repeated exposure to threat was associated with fear and disgust levels during the BAT. The implications of these findings for conceptualizing the role of disgust in etiology and treatment of BII phobia are discussed.     

Disgust vulnerability and symptoms of contamination-based OCD: descriptive tests of incremental specificity

The present investigation examines the incremental association between disgust propensity and sensitivity and contamination-based obsessive-compulsive disorder (OCD) symptoms. Structural equation modeling in Study 1 indicated that general disgust was related to contamination fear even when controlling for negative affect in a nonclinical sample. Evidence was also found for a model in which the effect of negative affect on contamination fear is mediated by general disgust. Study 1 also showed that both disgust sensitivity and disgust propensity uniquely predicted contamination fear when controlling for negative affect. Growth curve analyses in Study 2 indicated that higher baseline contamination fear is associated with less reduction in contamination fear over a 6-week period as disgust sensitivity increases even when controlling for negative affect. Lastly, disgust propensity was associated with concurrent levels of excessive washing symptoms among patients with OCD in Study 3 when controlling for depression. Implications of these findings from nonclinical, analogue, and clinical samples for future research on the specificity of disgust-related vulnerabilities in the etiology of contamination concerns in OCD are discussed.     

Emotional expressions and visual search efficiency: specificity and effects of anxiety symptoms

Although facial expressions are thought to vary in their functional impact on perceivers, experimental demonstration of the differential effects of facial expressions on behavior are lacking. In the present study, we examined the effects of exposure to facial expressions on visual search efficiency. Participants (n = 31) searched for a target in a 12 location circle array after exposure to an angry, disgusted, fearful, happy, or neutral facial expression for 100 ms or 500 ms. Consistent with predictions, exposure to a fearful expression prior to visual search resulted in faster target identification compared to exposure to other facial expressions. The effects of other facial expressions on visual search did not differ from each other. The fear facilitating effect on visual search efficiency was observed at 500-ms but not at 100-ms presentations, suggesting a specific temporal course of the facilitation. Subsequent analysis also revealed that individual differences in fear of negative evaluation, trait anxiety, and obsessive-compulsive symptoms possess a differential pattern of association with visual search efficiency. The experimental and clinical implications of these findings are discussed.     

Worry and the anxiety disorders: A meta-analytic synthesis of specificity to GAD

Although worry is central to the diagnosis of generalized anxiety disorder (GAD), it is also commonly observed in other anxiety disorders. In this meta-analytic review, we empirically evaluated the extent to which worry is specific to GAD relative to patients with other anxiety disorders, those with other psychiatric disorders, and nonpsychiatric controls. A total of 47 published studies (N = 8,410) were included in the analysis. The results yielded a large effect size indicating greater severity/frequency of worry, meta-worry, and domains of worry among anxiety disorder patients v. nonpsychiatric controls (d = 1.64). In contrast to the many differences emerging from comparisons between anxiety disordered patients and nonpsychiatric controls, when anxiety disordered patients were compared to people with other psychiatric disorders they differed only on severity/frequency and not on meta-worry or domains of worry. A large effect size indicating greater severity/frequency of worry, meta-worry, and domains of worry among patients with GAD v. nonpsychiatric controls was also found (d = 2.05). However, differences between GAD and those with other psychiatric disorders also emerged for severity/frequency of worry. GAD was associated with greater worry difficulties than other anxiety disorders, which generally did not differ from those with other psychiatric disorders and each other. The implications of these findings for conceptualizing worry in GAD and other anxiety disorders, and the potentially moderating effects of age and gender are discussed.     

The role of impulsivity in actual and problematic use of the mobile phone

Several authors have investigated the risks arising from the growth in mobile phone use (e.g. debts incurred by young people). The aims of the present study are (1) to validate a new questionnaire assessing problematic mobile phone use: the Problematic Mobile Phone Use Questionnaire (PMPUQ), and (2) to investigate the relationships between the PMPUQ and the multi‐faceted construct of impulsivity. With these aims, 339 subjects were screened using the PMPUQ and the UPPS Impulsive Behaviour Scale (UPPS) which assesses four distinct components associated with impulsive behaviours (urgency, lack of premeditation, lack of perseverance and sensation seeking). The results showed that the PMPUQ has an acceptable fit and assesses four different dimensions of problematic mobile phone use (prohibited use, dangerous use, dependence, financial problems). While each facet of impulsivity played a specific role in mobile phones use, urgency appeared to be the strongest predictor of problematic use. Copyright © 2008 John Wiley & Sons, Ltd.