Attentional bias to threat in social phobia: facilitated processing of threat or difficulty disengaging attention from threat?

Altered mechanisms of adaptation in social anxiety: differences in adapting to positive versus negative emotional faces

Social anxiety is characterised by fear of negative evaluation and negative perceptual biases; however, the cognitive mechanisms underlying these negative biases are not well understood. We investigated a possible mechanism which could maintain negative biases: altered adaptation to emotional faces. Heightened sensitivity to negative emotions could result from weakened adaptation to negative emotions, strengthened adaptation to positive emotions, or both mechanisms. We measured adaptation from repeated exposure to either positive or negative emotional faces, in individuals high versus low in social anxiety. We quantified adaptation strength by calculating the point of subjective equality (PSE) before and after adaptation for each participant. We hypothesised: (1) weaker adaptation to angry vs happy faces in individuals high in social anxiety, (2) no difference in adaptation to angry vs happy faces in individuals low in social anxiety, and (3) no difference in adaptation to sad vs happy faces in individuals high in social anxiety. Our results revealed a weaker adaptation to angry compared to happy faces in individuals high in social anxiety (Experiment 1), with no such difference in individuals low in social anxiety (Experiment 1), and no difference in adaptation strength to sad vs happy faces in individuals high in social anxiety (Experiment 2).

The effect of working memory load on selective attention to emotional faces for social anxiety individuals

Research has confirmed that individuals with social anxiety (SA) show an attentional bias towards threat-related stimuli. However, the extent to which this attentional bias depends on top-down cognitive control processes remains controversial. The present study investigated the effect of working memory (WM) load on selective attention to emotional faces in both high social anxiety (HSA) and low social anxiety (LSA) groups by manipulating WM load through the inclusion of forward counting in multiples of two (low load) or backward counting in multiples of seven (high load) within a modified flanker task. In the flanker task, emotional faces (angry, happy, or neutral faces) were used as targets and distractors. A total of 70 participants (34 HSA participants; 36 LSA participants) completed the flanker task in the laboratory. The results showed that the HSA individuals performed worse when responding to angry targets. Relative to LSA individuals, HSA individuals showed interference from angry distractors in the flanker task, resulting in significantly lower accuracy in identifying angry targets compared to happy targets. These results were unaffected by the manipulation of WM load. The findings imply HSA individuals have impaired attentional control, and that their threat-related attentional bias relies more on the bottom-up automatic attentional process.

Attentional bias modification in male college smokers: The changes of facilitated attention, difficulty in disengagement and the transfer effects of training

BACKGROUND

Attentional bias modification (ABM) has been used to modify the attentional bias (AB) towards smoking-related cues. Still, the effects of ABM are extensively controversial. The present study aimed to investigate the effects of ABM on AB and its two sub-processes named facilitated attention and difficulty in disengagement at two different stimulus durations, as well as test whether the effects of ABM could transfer to new measures of AB.

METHOD

Forty-six male college smokers were allocated to either ABM group using a modified visual probe task (n = 24), or the corresponding placebo training (PT) group (n = 22). Participants performed three sessions of training in one week. The pre- and post-training AB and its sub-processes were measured using visual probe task. Cue-target task and pictorial Stroop task were used for testing the transfer effects of ABM.

RESULTS

The AB in ABM group was significantly decreased compared with the PT group. Specifically, the facilitated attention was significantly reduced at 200 ms stimulus duration, while the difficulty in disengagement was significantly decreased at 500 ms stimulus duration. The benefit of ABM training could transfer to the cue-target task, but not to the pictorial Stroop task. Meanwhile, no effects of ABM were observed on smoking craving and nicotine dependence.

CONCLUSIONS

These findings suggested that the stimulus duration is a crucial factor for the efficacy of ABM on the facilitated attention and the difficulty in disengagement in male college smokers and detected the transfer effects between different measures of AB to some extent. Future studies need to further explore the influence mechanism in distinct stimulus durations.

Investigating the cognitive processing of tools: Effects of dangerousness and directionality on attentional biases

Research has found a tool-based head-superiority effect (responses are faster to target stimuli that appear at the head than at the handle position). However, these studies did not consider the effects of directionality and dangerousness. This study investigated how directionality and dangerousness influence the head-superiority effect. Subjects were required to respond to the target location in all experiments. Experiment 1 manipulated the directionality, dangerousness and target location. Experiment 2 matched the sharpness of the tool tip in the directed conditions. Experiment 3 shortened the presentation time of the cue stimuli from 800 ms to 200 ms. Experiment 4 selected four tools with different functions to rule out an alternative explanation caused by functional repetition. The results indicate that a head-superiority effect emerges in the directed condition, and that dangerousness modulates the magnitude of this effect during the 800 ms condition. However, the modulation effect of dangerousness diminishes during the 200 ms condition.

Losing control without your smartphone: Anxiety affects the dynamic choice process of impulsive decision-making and purchase

Different interacting contexts influence the decision-making process, as revealed by the computational modeling. Through four studies, we investigated how smartphone addiction and anxiety influenced impulsive behaviors, along with the underlying psychological mechanisms and dynamic decision-making processes. In the first and second studies, we found no significant correlation between smartphone addiction and impulsive behavior. However, in the third study, we found that smartphone separation increased impulsive decision-making and purchases, and state anxiety, but not trait anxiety, mediated this effect. We explored the dynamic decision-making process using a multi-attribute drift diffusion model (DDM). The results showed that anxiety triggered by smartphone separation changed the trade-offs between decision weights for the fundamental components of the dynamic choice process. In the fourth study, we investigated why smartphone addiction led to increased anxiety and found that extended-self was a mediating factor. Our findings show that smartphone addiction was not correlated with impulsive behaviors, but was correlated with state anxiety in the context of smartphone separation. Further, this study shows how emotional states triggered by different interacting contexts affect the dynamic decision-making process and consumer behaviors.

Vigilance or avoidance: How do autistic traits and social anxiety modulate attention to the eyes?

Introduction

Social anxiety disorder (SAD) and autism spectrum disorder (ASD) are highly overlapping in symptoms and have a high rate of comorbidity, posing challenges in diagnosis and intervention for both disorders. Both disorders are linked to abnormal attention to the eyes, yet how they interactively modulate the attentional process to the eyes remains unclear.

Methods

In this study, we explored how autistic traits and social anxiety in college students separately and together affected different temporal stages of attention to the eyes. Participants were instructed to view virtual faces for 10 s and make an emotional judgment, while their eye movements were recorded.

Results

We found that social anxiety and autistic traits affected different temporal stages of eye-looking. Social anxiety only affected the first fixation duration on the eyes, while autistic traits were associated with eye avoidance at several time points in the later stage. More importantly, we found an interactive effect of autistic traits and social anxiety on the initial attention to the eyes: Among people scoring high on autistic traits, social anxiety was related to an early avoidance of the eyes as well as attention maintenance once fixated on the eyes.

Discussion

Our study suggests the separate and interactive roles of social anxiety and autistic traits in attention to the eyes. It contributes to a deeper understanding of the mechanisms of social attention in both SAD and ASD and highlights the application of psychiatric diagnoses using eye-tracking techniques.

Social anxiety does not impair attention inhibition: An emotion anti-saccade task

BACKGROUND AND OBJECTIVES

Attention avoidance and attention vigilance are two typical attentional biases in individuals with social anxiety disorder (SAD). Attention inhibition is a type of attention control, which may be the key factor affecting attention vigilance and attention avoidance. However, previous studies have not examined the difference between the attention inhibition in individuals with SAD and healthy controls.

METHODS

To further explore this question, the current study used the single anti-saccade task with emotional facial stimuli to assess attention inhibition in 27 individuals with SAD and 22 healthy controls.

RESULTS

Regardless of the emotional valence of the facial stimuli, error rates in the social anxiety group were lower than that of the healthy control group, but there was no significant group difference in the saccade latency.

LIMITATIONS

This research only examined the attentional inhibition process highly related to attention avoidance and attention vigilance. Future research may benefit from adopting different research paradigms for more robust and generalizable conclusions.

CONCLUSIONS

Results suggest that individuals with SAD have better attention inhibition abilities than healthy control. Such enhanced attention inhibition may underlie their avoidance of threatening social cues.

Mindfulness-Based Cognitive Therapy: A Preliminary Examination of the (Event-Related) Potential for Modifying Threat-Related Attentional Bias in Anxiety

Objectives

Mindfulness-based cognitive therapy (MBCT) can reduce anxiety and depression symptoms in adults with anxiety disorders, and changes in threat-related attentional bias may be a key mechanism driving the intervention's effects on anxiety symptoms. Event-related potentials (ERPs) can illuminate the physiological mechanism through which MBCT targets threat bias and reduces symptoms of anxiety. This preliminary study examined whether P1 ERP threat-related attentional bias markers in anxious adults change from pre- to post-MBCT delivered in-person or virtually (via Zoom) and investigated the relationship between P1 threat-related attentional bias markers and treatment response.

Methods

Pre- and post-MBCT, participants with moderate to high levels of anxiety (N = 50) completed a dot-probe task with simultaneous EEG recording. Analyses focused on pre- and post-MBCT P1 amplitudes elicited by angry-neutral and happy-neutral face pair cues, probes, and reaction times in the dot-probe task and anxiety and depression symptoms.

Results

Pre- to post-MBCT, there was a significant reduction in P1-Probe amplitudes (d = .23), anxiety (d = .41) and depression (d = .80) symptoms, and reaction times (d = .10). Larger P1-Angry Cue amplitudes, indexing hypervigilance to angry faces, were associated with higher levels of anxiety both pre- and post-MBCT (d = .20). Post-MBCT, anxiety symptoms were lower in the in-person versus virtual group (d = .80).

Conclusions

MBCT may increase processing efficiency and decreases anxiety and depression symptoms in anxious adults. However, changes in threat bias specifically were generally not supported. Replication with a comparison group is needed to clarify whether changes were MBCT-specific.

Clinical Trials Registration

NCT03571386, June 18, 2018.

Supplementary Information

The online version contains supplementary material available at 10.1007/s12671-022-01910-x.

Emotional Information Processing and Assessment of Cognitive Functions in Social Anxiety Disorder: An Event-Related Potential Study

The aim of our study was to determine deficits in cognitive areas, including social cognition such as emotion recognition capacity, theory of mind, and electrophysiological alterations in patients with social anxiety disorder (SAD) and to identify their effects on clinical severity of SAD. Enrolled in our study were 26 patients diagnosed with SAD and 26 healthy volunteers. They were administered the Liebowitz Social Anxiety Scale (LSAS), Reading Mind in the Eyes Test (RMET), and Cambridge Neuropsychological Test Automated Battery. EEG monitoring was performed for electrophsiologic investigation. In the patient group, total reading the mind scores were lower (P = .027) while P300 latencies and emotion recognition latency during the Emotion Recognition Task (ERT) were longer (P = .038 and P = .012, respectively). The false alarm scores in the Rapid Visual Information Processing Task (RVP) were higher in the patient group (P = .038). In a model created using multivariate linear regression analysis, an effect of ERT and RVP scores on LSAS scores was found. Results of our study confirm that particularly impairment of cognitive functions such as sustained attention and emotion recognition may seriously affect the clinical presentation negatively. P300 latency in the parietal region may has the potential to be a biological marker that can be used in monitoring treatment.

Does attention bias modification reduce anxiety in socially anxious college students? An experimental study of potential moderators and considerations for implementation

According to cognitive models, preferential attention to social threat contributes to maintenance of social anxiety. Socially anxious individuals are known to show attention biases to threatening stimuli, although there is inconsistency in the literature with regards to the type of attentional biases they present. This study examines the effect of attention bias modification (ABM) for social anxiety in non-treatment-seeking college students meeting social anxiety disorder criteria, taking into consideration previous mixed results regarding its effectiveness. Attention bias levels and types (i.e. vigilance vs avoidance) at baseline were examined and considered as potential moderators of ABM effects. Sixty-eight socially anxious individuals were randomly allocated to ABM vs placebo groups. A structured interview and self-report assessment were completed at pre-treatment and post-treatment. Results showed half of the participants presented few attention biases at baseline, and the rest presented either vigilance or avoidance. Participants with low attention biases scored higher in social anxiety than those showing avoidance and there was no difference between those showing vigilance vs avoidance. No significant effects from pre to post treatment were observed in attention biases, self-report or structured interview of anxiety in the ABM group. Baseline attention biases did not moderate these effects. Results are discussed with regards to implications for future research towards the creation of more effective protocols, based on the needs of heterogeneous social anxiety sub-groups.

Am I really seeing what's around me? An ERP study on social anxiety under speech induction, uncertainty and social feedback

Cognitive models of social anxiety propose that socially anxious individuals engage in excessive self-focusing attention when entering a social situation. In the present study, speech anxiety was induced to socially anxious and control participants. Event-related potentials were recorded while participants performed a perceptual judgment task using distinct or ambiguous stimuli, before and after social feedback. Disputed feedback led to more revisions and decreased levels of confidence, especially among socially anxious individuals. Prior feedback, greater occipital P1 amplitudes in both groups for ambiguous probes indicated heightened sensory facilitation to ambiguous information, and greater anterior N1 amplitudes for ambiguous stimuli in highly anxious participants suggested anticipation of negative feedback in this group. Post-feedback, P1, N1 and LPP amplitudes were reduced overall among socially anxious individuals indicating a reduction in sensory facilitation of visual information. These results suggest excessive self-focusing among socially anxious individuals, possibly linked to anticipation of an anxiety-provoking social situation.

The Reliability and Validity of Response-Based Measures of Attention Bias

Background

Attention bias to threat is a fundamental transdiagnostic component and potential vulnerability factor for internalizing psychopathologies. However, the measurement of attentional bias, such as traditional scores from the dot-probe paradigm, evidence poor reliability and do not measure intra-individual variation in attentional bias.

Methods

The present study examined, in three independent samples, the psychometric properties of a novel attentional bias (AB) scoring method of the dot-probe task based on responses to individual trials. For six AB scores derived using the response-based approach, we assessed the internal consistency, test-retest reliability, familial associations, and external validity (using Social Anxiety Disorder, a disorder strongly associated with attentional bias to threatening faces).

Results

Compared to traditional AB scores, response-based scores had generally better internal consistency (range of Cronbach's alphas: 0.68-0.92 vs. 0.41-0.71), higher test-retest reliabilities (range of Pearson's correlations: 0.26-0.77 vs. -0.05-0.35), and were more strongly related in family members (range of ICCs: 0.11-0.27 vs. 0-0.05). Furthermore, three response-based scores added incremental validity beyond traditional scores and gender in the external validators of current and lifetime Social Anxiety Disorder.

Conclusions

Findings indicate that response-based AB scores from the dot-probe task have better psychometric properties than traditional scores.

Ethnic differences in behavioral and physiological indicators of sensitivity to threat

The clinical presentation of anxiety may differ between Hispanics/Latinx (H/L) and non-H/L, although findings on ethnic differences in self-reported anxiety symptoms have been mixed. Fewer studies have focused on ethnic differences in quick and relatively automatic laboratory-assessed indicators of anxiety symptoms, which have the potential to be more objective indicators than self-report. Therefore, the present study examined ethnic differences in two laboratory-assessed indicators of threat sensitivity (an important transdiagnostic mechanism of anxiety): attentional bias to threat and electromyography startle reactivity to threat. White H/L (n = 117) and White non-H/L (n = 168) adults who were matched on demographics and lifetime psychopathology (including anxiety) completed a dot-probe task to assess attentional bias to threat and the No-Predictable-Unpredictable threat (NPU) task to assess startle reactivity to threat. Results indicated that H/L displayed less Slow OrientationRB (β = -0.27, p = 0.032, R2β∗ = 0.02), and increased Slow DisengagementRB (β = 0.31, p = 0.016, R2β∗ = 0.02) compared to non-H/L. H/L exhibited blunted overall startle compared to non-H/L (β = -0.30, p = 0.014, R2β∗ = 0.02), but groups did not differ in startle reactivity to either predictable or unpredictable threat. In summary, H/L and non-H/L may differ in their experience and presentation of anxiety symptoms and such differences may vary across indicators of sensitivity to threat.

Attentional processes during emotional face perception in social anxiety disorder: A systematic review and meta-analysis of eye-tracking findings

Background In recent years, a growing body of eye-tracking research has investigated gaze behavior in individuals with social anxiety during the visual perception of emotional stimuli. The aim of this article was to review and synthesize studies examining attention orientation in patients with clinical social anxiety by means of eye-tracking methodology. Methods Through a systematic search, 30 articles were identified, including 11 studies in which single emotional faces were used as stimuli and seven eligible studies in which threatening faces were paired with neutral stimuli. Meta-analyses were conducted to compare prolonged eye-contact behavior and early attentional biases to threats in individuals with social anxiety disorder (SAD) and healthy controls. Results Moderate group differences were revealed for single face viewing studies, with SAD patients showing significantly reduced eye contact with negative (Hedges' g = -0.67) and positive emotional faces (g = -0.49) compared to that of healthy participants. Type of task and duration of stimulus presentation were (marginally) significant moderators of between-study variance in effect size. Small but significant group differences were found for early attentional biases toward angry faces versus neutral stimuli (g = 0.21) but not toward happy faces versus neutral stimuli (g = 0.05). Preliminary evidence for a hyperscanning strategy in SAD patients relative to healthy controls emerged (g = 0.42). Limitations The number of included studies with face pairings was low, and two studies were excluded due to unavailable data. Conclusions Our results suggest that eye contact avoidance with emotional faces is a prominent feature in SAD patients. Patients might benefit from guidance to learn to make adequate eye contact during therapeutic interventions, such as exposure therapy. SAD patients demonstrated slightly heightened attention allocation toward angry faces relative to that of healthy participants during early processing stages. Threat biases can be potential targets for attention modification training as an adjuvant to other treatments. Future research on early attentional processes may benefit from improved arrangements of paired stimuli to increase the psychometric properties of initial attention indices.

A Preliminary Investigation of ERP Components of Attentional Bias in Anxious Adults using Temporospatial Principal Component Analysis

Threat-related attention bias is thought to contribute to the development and maintenance of anxiety disorders. Dot-probe studies using event-related potentials (ERPs) have indicated that several early ERP components are modulated by threatening and emotional stimuli in anxious populations, suggesting enhanced allocation of attention to threat and emotion at earlier stages of processing. However, ERP components selected for examination and analysis in these studies vary widely and remain inconsistent. The present study used temporospatial principal component analysis (PCA) to systematically identify ERP components elicited to face pair cues and probes in a dot-probe task in anxious adults. Cue-locked components sensitive to emotion included an early occipital C1 component enhanced for happy versus angry face pair cues and an early parieto-occipital P1 component enhanced for happy versus angry face pair cues. Probe-locked components sensitive to congruency included a parieto-occipital P2 component enhanced for incongruent probes (probes replacing neutral faces) versus congruent probes (probes replacing emotional faces). Split-half correlations indicated that the mean value around the PCA-derived peaks were reliably measured in the ERP waveforms. These results highlight promising neurophysiological markers for attentional bias research that can be extended to designs comparing anxious and healthy comparison groups. Results from a secondary exploratory PCA analysis investigating the effects of emotional face position and analyses on behavioral reaction time data are also presented.

The roles of disgust sensitivity and anxiety sensitivity in attentional bias in dental anxiety

Individuals with dental anxiety show biased attentional processing of threat- and dental-related information. Disgust sensitivity and anxiety sensitivity are both associated with dental fears and attentional biases. Whereas disgust sensitivity is generally associated with attentional avoidance (Armstrong et al., 2014), anxiety sensitivity may be associated with attentional engagement (Keogh et al., 2001a). Elucidating the role of these constructs in dental anxiety-relevant attentional biases could inform theoretical models and/or intervention recommendations. Participants (N = 51) with high dental anxiety completed a Posner paradigm to assess attentional biases to dental versus neutral stimuli. We examined whether disgust sensitivity and anxiety sensitivity moderated degree of attentional bias. Results indicated that both disgust sensitivity (mutilation subscale) and anxiety sensitivity (physical concerns subscale) statistically moderated degree of attentional bias at trend level, and in opposite directions. Simple effects analyses further indicated that disgust sensitivity regarding mutilation was associated with less attentional bias toward dental relative to neutral stimuli, potentially indicating attentional avoidance, and remained so when adjusting for anxiety sensitivity. In contrast, simple effects analysis indicated that anxiety sensitivity regarding physical concerns was not associated with magnitude of attentional bias. If replicated, findings highlight the potential role of disgust in dental anxiety.

Self-focused attention related to social anxiety during free speaking tasks activates the right frontopolar area

Self-focused attention (SFA) and other-focused attention (OFA) are central maintenance factors of social anxiety. Tomita et al., Cognitive Therapy and Research 44:511–525, 2020 investigated brain activities when manipulating SFA and OFA during speech tasks, after controlling for social anxiety, using near-infrared spectroscopy (NIRS) and eye-tracking. Compared with the control condition, the SFA condition demonstrated greater activity in the right frontopolar area (rFPA) and right dorsolateral prefrontal cortex. In the OFA condition, relative to controls, activity was greater in the left superior temporal gyrus. We investigated whether the activity in these brain areas increased in healthy individuals in proportion to their social anxiety tendency without manipulating SFA and OFA. Thirty-nine participants performed speech tasks under a no attentional manipulation (no-instruction) condition and a control (looking at various places) condition. Brain activity was measured using NIRS (oxy-Hb responses), and eye movements were tracked. We found that higher social anxiety was associated with higher rFPA activity in the no-instruction condition compared to the control condition and that higher subjective SFA during the no-instruction condition with higher social anxiety was associated with increased rFPA between the no-instruction and control conditions. These results suggest that greater activity in the rFPA is a useful objective measure of SFA related to social anxiety during speech tasks.

Dark side of instant messaging: an empirical investigation from technology and society perspective

Purpose

The purpose of this study is to examine the dark side of instant messaging from the technological and societal perspectives.

Design/methodology/approach

With the help of literature review and different theories, a model has been developed conceptually. Later the model has been validated using statistical method. The authors have used 304 responses from the survey method, and this sample has been used to statistically validate the conceptual model.

Findings

This paper has been able to explicitly investigate and identify how different instant messaging platforms such as WhatsApp, WeChat in the form of electronic word of mouth (e-WOM) are contributing toward increase of mob lynching cases. The paper also highlights the important to have effective and enforceable regulation to regulate instant messaging services to the citizens.

Research limitations/implications

The findings cannot be generalized as the data is collected from India only. Moreover, the study is cross-sectional in nature. To get the comprehensive results, a longitudinal study needs to be conducted. This study considered seven constructs with one moderator. Having more predictors with other boundary conditions might have increased the explanative power of the model.

Practical implications

Instant messaging platforms such as WhatsApp, WeChat and so on are disseminating quick unverified information to the common people. This information sometimes is disseminated in inappropriate and exaggerated forms. This makes the instant messaging (WhatsApp) users' sentiment readily heated in some cases. They take such an action as mob lynching. This study determines the predictors of mob lynching along with the moderator impact of instant messaging in the society.

Originality/value

There are only a few studies those have explored the dark side of instant messaging. The proposed theoretical model is a unique model, which shows the predictors of mob lynching along with the negative consequences of the instant messaging (WhatsApp) in the society. From this perspective, this study can be considered as a unique study.

Inhibitory attentional control under cognitive load in social anxiety: An investigation using a novel dual-task paradigm

Research suggests that socially anxious (SA) individuals exhibit poorer attentional inhibition than their non-anxious (NA) counterparts. Attentional control theory presumes that cognitive load worsens the adverse effects of anxiety on attentional inhibition. However, previous studies examined the effects of cognitive load on attentional inhibition in social anxiety yielded inconsistent results. In this study, cognitive load was manipulated by adding a 1-back (low cognitive load) and 2-back task (high cognitive load) to the emotional antisaccade task, investigating the effects of cognitive load on attentional inhibition in the presence of social evaluative stimuli in SA and NA individuals. Results revealed that cognitive load improved the efficiency but impeded the effectiveness of inhibitory attentional control in SA participants. Under high cognitive load, SA participants made more erroneous saccades for threat-related than nonthreat-related faces while NA participants showed no differences in error rates among different face types. Moreover, regardless of cognitive levels, SA participants had shorter saccade latencies for angry faces than happy and neutral faces. NA participants did not show differences in saccade latencies among different face types. Implications of these findings for understanding the role that cognitive load plays in the processes of attentional control and interventions for social anxiety are discussed.

Increased attention allocation to socially threatening faces in social anxiety disorder: A replication study

BACKGROUND

Threat-related attention bias has been implicated in the etiology and maintenance of social anxiety disorder (SAD), with attentional research increasingly using eye-tracking methodology to overcome the poor psychometric properties of response-time-based tasks and measures. Yet, extant eye-tracking research in social anxiety has mostly failed to report on psychometrics and attempts to replicate past results are rare. Therefore, we attempted to replicate a previously published eye-tracking study of gaze patterns in socially anxious and nonanxious participants as they viewed social threatening and neutral faces, while also exploring the psychometric properties of the attentional measures used.

METHODS

Gaze was monitored as participants freely viewed 60 different matrices comprised of eight socially-threatening and eight neutral faces, presented for 6000 ms each. Gaze patterns directed at threat and neutral areas of interest (AOIs) were compared by group. Internal consistency and test-retest reliability were also evaluated.

RESULTS

Relative to healthy controls, socially anxious patients dwelled significantly longer on threat faces, replicating prior findings with the same task. Internal consistency of total dwell time on threat and neutral AOIs was high, and two-week test-retest reliability was acceptable.

LIMITATIONS

Test-retest reliability was only examined for the control group, which had a small sample size.

CONCLUSION

Increased dwell time on socially threatening stimuli is a reliable, stable, and generalizable measure of attentional bias in adults with social anxiety.

Physical Activity as a Treatment for Social Anxiety in Clinical and Non-clinical Populations: A Systematic Review and Three Meta-Analyses for Different Study Designs

The fear of being in the focus of attention in social situations can develop into a social anxiety disorder (SAD). The classical treatment for SAD is cognitive behavioral therapy, which is in many cases accompanied by drug treatments. A promising alternative treatment is physical activity (PA) interventions, because regular PA has been shown to be suitable for reducing anxiety in general. We conducted a pre-registered systematic review and meta-analysis (PROSPERO registration no. CRD42020191181) as well as two additional searches. Our aim was to investigate whether PA interventions are a suitable treatment for SAD and whether PA is suitable for reducing social anxiety (SA) in general. For studies with randomized controlled trial designs, a not statistically significant effect of medium size toward lower general SA symptomatology was found in the PA group in comparison with the control group (d = -0.24, p = 0.377). For studies with longitudinal designs, significantly lower SA symptoms were found after PA treatments (d = -0.22, p = 0.001). The effect of PA on SA was stronger for adults than for children and adolescents (p = 0.003). For cross-sectional studies, a small negative association between SA symptoms and the amount of PA was found, i.e., lower SA was found for people who were more physically active (r = -0.12, p = 0.003). We conclude that PA is a promising means for the (additional) treatment of SAD or to reduce SA in general in non-clinical samples, but more research in which high-quality studies with randomized controlled trial designs are used is needed. Furthermore, open questions with respect to moderating variables (e.g., age, sex, BMI, type of intervention, stress, amount of regular PA before the intervention, and comorbidities) remain still open.

Cockroaches are scarier than snakes and spiders: Validation of an affective standardized set of animal images (ASSAI)

Research on emotional processes has been closely related to the use of emotional stimuli, promoting the development of different standardized sets of images. However, some kinds of images that would be relevant in clinical psychology research are not available, especially for small animal phobias. The aim of the present study is to validate a set of animal images that includes images of cockroaches, which are not present in the current sets of images. Two hundred and forty images depicting five types of animals (cockroaches, spiders, snakes, cats, and butterflies) were collected from online public domains. Four hundred and twenty-four participants (72.9% women) took part in the study rating the images in two affective dimensions (i.e., valence and arousal). Cockroach pictures were rated as significantly more unpleasant than pictures of spiders, snakes, butterflies, and cats. Moreover, results revealed that women rated cockroach, spider, and snake pictures as more negative than men did. Also, women in comparison with men rated cockroach images as more arousing. The results highlight the importance of using images of cockroaches, due to their high negative valence, which even exceeds that of snakes and spiders, the unpleasant animals typically used in phobic research. This set of images can be useful in research on small-animal phobias.

Development of a cognitive bias modification intervention for anxiety disorders in primary care

OBJECTIVES

There is a great need for low-intensity, scalable treatments in primary care, where most anxious patients first present for treatment. We describe Stage IA treatment development and a Stage IB feasibility trial of cognitive bias modification (CBM) for transdiagnostic anxiety in primary care.

METHODS

The online intervention, Mental Habits, comprised eight sessions of a personalized CBM targeting attention and interpretation biases. Coaches assisted patients in using the website, monitored progress via a dashboard, and shared information with primary care providers. We evaluated Mental Habits in an open trial (N = 14) and a randomized controlled trial (RCT) (N = 40) in primary care patients with anxiety disorders.

RESULTS

We compared results to a priori benchmarks of clinically meaningful outcomes. In the open trial, Mental Habits met feasibility, acceptability, and efficacy benchmarks. In the pilot RCT, there was greater dropout at one study site which ultimately closed. In the intent-to-treat analyses, Mental Habits met the benchmark for self-report, but not the interview measure of anxiety. Symptom Tracking did not meet the benchmark for self-report or interview measures of anxiety. In per-protocol analyses, Mental Habits exceeded the benchmark for both self-report and interview measures, whereas Symptom Tracking met the benchmark for self-report. Interpretation bias improved in the Mental Habits group, but not in Symptom Tracking. No effects were observed for attention bias.

CONCLUSION

The online CBM intervention demonstrated good acceptability and, when delivered at a stable primary care clinic, preliminary effectiveness in primary care. A larger RCT is warranted to test effectiveness.

PRACTITIONER POINTS

A personalized, transdiagnostic Cognitive Bias Modification (CBM) intervention for anxiety in primary care is acceptable to primary care patients with social anxiety disorder, generalized anxiety disorder, and/or panic disorder /agoraphobia. With training and supervision from licensed mental health clinicians, bachelor's-level coaches can assist primary care patients to self-administer CBM. Offering a low-intensity, self-directed anxiety intervention in primary care can greatly expand the reach of anxiety treatment, with minimal need for additional resources. Interpretation bias may be an important clinical target for primary care patients with anxiety.

Vigilance-Avoidance Toward Negative Faces in Social Anxiety With and Without Comorbid Depression

Despite the growing evidence for the attentional bias toward emotional related stimuli in patients with social anxiety disorder (SAD), it remains unclear how the attentional bias manifests in normal individuals with SAD and/or depressive traits. To address this question, we recruited three groups of normal participants with different psychiatric traits-individuals with comorbid SAD and depression (SADd, N = 19), individuals with only SAD (SAD, N = 15), and healthy control individuals (HC, N = 19). In a dot-probe paradigm, participants view angry, disgusted, and sad face stimuli with durations ranging from very brief (i.e., 14ms) that renders stimuli completely intangible, to relatively long (i.e., 2000ms) that guarantees image visibility. We find significant early vigilance (i.e., on brief stimuli) and later avoidance (i.e., on long stimuli) toward angry faces in the SADd group. We also find vigilance toward angry and disgusted faces in the SAD group. To our best knowledge, this is the first study to unify both vigilance and avoidance within the same experimental paradigm, providing direct evidence for the "vigilance-avoidance" theory of comorbid SAD and depression. In sum, these results provide evidence for the potential behavioral differences induced by anxiety-depression comorbidity and a single trait in non-clinical populations, but the lack of a depression-only group cannot reveal the effects of high levels of depression on the results. The limitations are discussed.

Self-focused attention vs. negative attentional bias during public speech task in socially anxious individuals

Enhanced self-focused attention (SFA) and negative attentional bias (NAB) towards social cues are characteristic hallmarks of social anxiety. It is essential to investigate these two attentional phenomena under socially relevant situations using comparable stimuli. In the present study, individuals with high social anxiety (HSA, n = 32) and low social anxiety (LSA, n = 29) were compared according to their attention toward self-related stimuli and toward positive, neutral, and negative feedback related stimuli. Video stimuli of moving indicators of self-anxiety-status and positive, neutral, and negative feedback from an audience were presented during an impromptu speech task (high anxiety condition) and a re-watching phase (low anxiety condition). Eye movements in response to the different stimuli served as readouts for attentional preference. An interaction effect suggested that the HSA group directed more attention to self-related stimuli relative to other stimuli and the LSA group only during the high anxiety condition. The LSA group exhibited a general attentional preference toward positive feedback, especially during the low anxiety condition. Meanwhile, only the total duration of fixation on positive feedback negatively correlated with subjective anxiety rating. Our results point to increased SFA rather than NAB in HSA individuals under social threats.

Learning dynamics of electrophysiological brain signals during human fear conditioning

Electrophysiological studies in rodents allow recording neural activity during threats with high temporal and spatial precision. Although fMRI has helped translate insights about the anatomy of underlying brain circuits to humans, the temporal dynamics of neural fear processes remain opaque and require EEG. To date, studies on electrophysiological brain signals in humans have helped to elucidate underlying perceptual and attentional processes, but have widely ignored how fear memory traces evolve over time. The low signal-to-noise ratio of EEG demands aggregations across high numbers of trials, which will wash out transient neurobiological processes that are induced by learning and prone to habituation. Here, our goal was to unravel the plasticity and temporal emergence of EEG responses during fear conditioning. To this end, we developed a new sequential-set fear conditioning paradigm that comprises three successive acquisition and extinction phases, each with a novel CS+/CS- set. Each set consists of two different neutral faces on different background colors which serve as CS+ and CS-, respectively. Thereby, this design provides sufficient trials for EEG analyses while tripling the relative amount of trials that tap into more transient neurobiological processes. Consistent with prior studies on ERP components, data-driven topographic EEG analyses revealed that ERP amplitudes were potentiated during time periods from 33-60 ms, 108-200 ms, and 468-820 ms indicating that fear conditioning prioritizes early sensory processing in the brain, but also facilitates neural responding during later attentional and evaluative stages. Importantly, averaging across the three CS+/CS- sets allowed us to probe the temporal evolution of neural processes: Responses during each of the three time windows gradually increased from early to late fear conditioning, while long-latency (460-730 ms) electrocortical responses diminished throughout fear extinction. Our novel paradigm demonstrates how short-, mid-, and long-latency EEG responses change during fear conditioning and extinction, findings that enlighten the learning curve of neurophysiological responses to threat in humans.

Neural mechanisms underlying heterogeneous expression of threat-related attention in social anxiety

Theoretical frameworks propose that threat-related attention, which is typically assessed using the dot-probe paradigm, plays a key role in social anxiety. Within the dot-probe paradigm, novel computational approaches demonstrate that anxious individuals exhibit multiple patterns of threat-related attention on separate trials. However, no research has leveraged such novel computational methods to delineate the neural substrates of threat-related attention patterns in social anxiety. To address this issue, fifty-three socially anxious adults (22.38 ± 3.12, 33 females) completed an fMRI-based dot-probe paradigm. A novel, response-based computation approach revealed conjoint patterns of vigilant orientation, avoidant orientation, slow disengagement, and fast disengagement, which were masked by standard computation measures. Compared to vigilant orientation and fast disengagement, avoidant orientation and slow disengagement were greater in magnitude, respectively. Mirroring behavioral findings, avoidant orientation and slow disengagement elicited greater deactivation of several regions within the Default Mode Network and stronger connectivity between the right amygdala and superior temporal sulcus. Taken together, these results suggest that distinct neural processes facilitate the heterogeneous expression of threat-related attention in social anxiety.

Temporal trends in attention disengagement from social threat as a function of social anxiety

BACKGROUND AND OBJECTIVES

Difficulty disengaging attention from threat has been observed in some anxious samples, but the evidence to date is mixed. The current study examines temporal trends in attention disengagement and compares this construct across multiple forms of social threat.

METHODS

Participants (85 adults with a principal diagnosis of social anxiety disorder) completed a spatial cueing task with four image categories (angry faces, disapproving faces, neutral faces, neutral objects). Attention disengagement was assessed via reaction time (RT) over 256 trials.

RESULTS

Participants with greater social anxiety exhibited an initial delay in attention disengagement from disapproving faces that habituated over the course of the task. RTs to angry and neutral stimuli did not differ as a function of social anxiety.

LIMITATIONS

The current task only allowed for examining speed of attention disengagement, and thus we were unable to compare our results to trajectories of speed at which participants orient towards threat. Additionally, disapproving facial images were created for this paradigm and may benefit from further validation.

CONCLUSIONS

Findings suggest that social anxiety is associated with an initial delay in attention disengagement from social threat that resolves over the course of repeated exposures to such stimuli. Treatment implications are discussed.

Seeking neutral: A VR-based person-identity-matching task for attentional bias modification - A randomised controlled experiment

BACKGROUND

Attentional bias modification (ABM) aims to reduce anxiety by attenuating bias towards threatening information. The current study incorporated virtual reality (VR) technology and 3-dimensional stimuli with a person-identity-matching (PIM) task to evaluate the effects of a VR-based ABM training on attentional bias and anxiety symptoms.

METHODS

One hundred participants with elevated social anxiety were randomised to four training groups. Attentional bias was assessed at pre- and post-training, and anxiety symptoms were assessed at pre-training, post-training, 1-week follow-up, and 3-month follow-up.

RESULTS

Change in anxiety did not correlate with change in bias (r = -0.08). A repeated-measures ANOVA showed no significant difference in bias from pre- to post-ABM, or between groups. For anxiety symptoms, a linear mixed-effects model analysis revealed a significant effect of time. Participants showed reduction in anxiety score at each successive assessment (p < .001, Nagelkerke's pseudo r ² = 0.65). However, no other significant main effect or interactions were found. A clinically significant change analysis revealed that 4% of participants were classified as 'recovered' at 3-month follow-up.

CONCLUSIONS

A single session of VR-based PIM task did not change attentional bias. The significant reduction in anxiety was not specific to active training, and the majority of participants remained clinically unchanged.

Anxiety sensitivity and bodily kinematics

Anxiety sensitivity (AS) is an individual difference factor reflecting the fear of anxiety-related sensations and is one of the best researched risk factors for psychopathology. Decades of research have focused on exploring the relations between AS and clinical symptoms and disorders, although most of the research has employed self-report or interview-based methodologies to index primary dependent measures. No past research has sought to characterize the explanatory relevance of AS from a body kinematics perspective. The present study explored AS in relation to body kinematics to AS-specific images using a dual-task attentional control paradigm (i.e., approach versus avoidance) that employs AS-specific stimuli and motion-tracking technology. Participants included 108 young adults (58.3% female, M age = 25.3) who took part in a ball catching game to index their measures of behavioral engagement with the AS-specific and neutral stimuli presented at either side of the game environment. After adjusting for age, gender, race, handedness, physical functioning, and negative affectivity, self-reported AS was significantly associated with biokinematically-driven behavioral engagement with the AS-specific stimuli. The present study provides novel empirical evidence that AS is related to anxiety-related bodily kinematics. Future work is needed to extend the current results to clinical samples.

Attentional biases in depression: Relation to disorder severity, rumination, and anhedonia

INTRODUCTION

According to cognitive models of depression, selective attentional biases (ABs) for mood-congruent information are core vulnerability factors of depression maintenance. However, findings concerning the presence of these biases in depression are mixed. This study aims to clarify the presence of these ABs among individuals with clinical and subclinical depression.

METHOD

We compared three groups based on a semi-structured diagnostic interview and a depressive symptoms scale (BDI-II): 34 individuals with major depressive disorder (clinically depressed); 35 with a dysphoric mood but without the criteria of major depressive disorder (i.e., subclinically depressed), and 26 never been depressed individuals. We examined AB for sad and happy materials in three modified versions of the exogenous cueing task using scenes, facial expressions, and words. Brooding, anhedonia, and anxiety were also evaluated.

RESULTS

In contrast to our hypotheses, there were no ABs for negative or positive information, regardless of the task and the groups. Neither the association between AB toward negative information and brooding nor the one between AB away from positive stimuli and anhedonia was significant. Bayes factors analyses revealed that the present pattern of findings does not result from a lack of statistical power.

DISCUSSION

Our results raise questions about how common AB is in depression. From a theoretical point of view, because individuals with depression did not exhibit AB, our results also seemingly challenge the claim that AB figures prominently in the maintenance of depression. We believe the present null results to be particularly useful for future meta-research in the field.

Attentional Bias and Training in Individuals With High Dental Anxiety

Dental anxiety is common and associated with negative outcomes. According to information-processing models, anxiety is maintained by maladaptive patterns of processing threatening information. Furthermore, attention training interventions can reduce anxiety in one session. Fifty-three individuals with high levels of dental anxiety completed a Posner reaction-time task. Participants were randomized to attention training or control using a dot-probe task, and then attentional bias was remeasured using another Posner task. Participants then completed a script-driven imaginal exposure task. Results indicated that individuals high in dental anxiety exhibit threat-relevant attentional bias. There was mixed evidence about the efficacy of attention training. On the one hand, training did not eliminate attentional bias and training condition did not predict distress during the imagery task. On the other hand, cue dependency scores in the control group were higher for dental than neutral cues, but did not differ in the training group. In addition, cue dependency scores for both dental and neutral cues predicted subjective anxiety in anticipation of the imagery task. The mixed results of training are considered in terms of the possibility that it enhanced attentional control, rather than reducing bias.

The altered early components and the decisive later process underlying attention bias modification in social anxiety: evidence from event-related potentials

Attention bias modification (ABM) is a potential intervention in relieving social anxiety symptoms, while its underlying neural mechanisms are not yet understood. The current study included 63 college students with social anxiety. Participants were assigned to the attention modification program (AMP, n = 20), the attention control condition (ACC, n = 20) and the passive waiting group (PW, n = 23). Questionnaires and the emotional Stroop task with EEG recordings were used to assess whether and how the 4-week ABM period affected emotional symptoms and specific emotional processing. Results showed that the two training groups (AMP and ACC) produced comparable emotional improvements and both showed a decrease in negative bias compared with the PW group. The ERP results indicated that despite no significant ERP changes in the PW group, the ACC group exhibited a greater N1, whereas the AMP group exhibited a reduced VPP at the post-test stage compared to the pre-test stage. Besides, both training groups showed a similar late positive potential (LPP) reduction. Notably, the reduction in LPP was positively correlated with behavioral and symptom improvement. Thus, manipulations unique to ABM (face-target contingency) primarily modulate the early attention distribution of material-related stimuli. However, the clinical benefits of attention training may be due to later cognitive-affective mechanisms.

Attentional Bias Modification in Virtual Reality - A VR-Based Dot-Probe Task With 2D and 3D Stimuli

Background

Attentional bias modification (ABM) aims to reduce anxiety by attenuating bias toward threatening information. The current study incorporated virtual reality (VR) technology and three-dimensional stimuli with a dot-probe task to evaluate the effects of a VR-based ABM training on attentional bias and anxiety symptoms.

Methods

A total of 100 participants were randomized to four training groups. Attentional bias was assessed at pre- and post-training, and anxiety symptoms were assessed at pre-training, post-training, 1-week follow-up, and 3-months follow-up.

Results

Change in anxiety did not correlate with change in bias (p = 0.24). A repeated-measures ANOVA showed no significant difference in bias from pre- to post-ABM (p = 0.144), or between groups (p = 0.976). For anxiety symptoms, a linear mixed-effects model analysis revealed a significant effect of time. Participants showed reduction in anxiety score at each successive assessment (p < 0.001). However, no other significant main effect or interactions were found. A clinically significant change analysis revealed that 9% of participants were classified as ‘recovered’ at 3-months follow-up.

Conclusion

A single session of VR-based ABM did not change attentional bias. The significant reduction in anxiety was not specific to active training, and the majority of participants remained clinically unchanged.

The neural chronometry of threat-related attentional bias: Event-related potential (ERP) evidence for early and late stages of selective attentional processing

Rapid and accurate detection of threat is adaptive. Yet, threat-related attentional biases, including hypervigilance, avoidance, and attentional disengagement delays, may contribute to the etiology and maintenance of anxiety disorders. Behavioral measures of attentional bias generally indicate that threat demands more attentional resources; however, indices exploring differential allocation of attention using reaction time fail to clarify the time course by which attention is deployed under threatening circumstances in healthy and anxious populations. In this review, we conduct an interpretive synthesis of 28 attentional bias studies focusing on event-related potentials (ERPs) as a primary outcome to inform an ERP model of the neural chronometry of attentional bias in healthy and anxious populations. The model posits that both healthy and anxious populations display modulations of early ERP components, including the P1, N170, P2, and N2pc, in response to threatening and emotional stimuli, suggesting that both typical and abnormal patterns of attentional bias are characterized by enhanced allocation of attention to threat and emotion at earlier stages of processing. Compared to anxious populations, healthy populations more clearly demonstrate modulations of later components, such as the P3, indexing conscious and evaluative processing of threat and emotion and disengagement difficulties at later stages of processing. Findings from the interpretive synthesis, existing bias models, and extant neural literature on attentional systems are then integrated to inform a conceptual model of the processes and substrates underlying threat appraisal and resource allocation in healthy and anxious populations. To conclude, we discuss therapeutic interventions for attentional bias and future directions.

Body Dissatisfaction Enhances Awareness and Facilitates the Consolidation of Body-Related Words During Rapid Serial Visual Presentation

Attentional biases have received considerable focus in research on cognitive biases and body dissatisfaction (BD). However, most work has focused on spatial allocation of attention. The current two experiments employed a rapid serial visual presentation (RSVP) task to investigate attention bias to body-related words in the temporal domain among young females with high and low BD. During this task, there were two targets presented in the same stimulus stream. The first target was defined as target one (T1) and the second was defined as target 2 (T2). Participants were asked to identify T2 while ignoring T1 in single task mode or identify both targets in the dual task mode. In the current study, Experiment 1 assessed the stimulus-driven attention of body-related stimuli. Participants were required to identify a target of neutral word (T2) as quickly and accurately as possible while ignoring the preceding target (T1) of neutral, fat-, or thin-related words. As expected, we observed spontaneous attentional blink (AB) effects elicited by both fat- and thin-related T1s among participants with high BD, suggesting enhanced awareness of body-related stimuli even when this information does not have to be identified. Such effects did not emerge among participants without BD. Experimental 2 investigated the goal-directed attention of body-related stimuli, during which participants needed to identify both the T1 and neutral T2. Participants with BD showed reduced AB effects after both fat- and thin-related T1, suggesting facilitated consolidation of body-related information in goal-directed attention among participants with BD. These findings have important clinical implications that it provided insight for creating more accurate attention bias modification (ABM) task aiming at reducing and preventing BD among young females.

Sensitivity to the Average and Summative Impact of Multiple Events: When “More is More” and When “More is Less”

How people respond to positive and negative events is a basic question in psychology. Most theoretical accounts assume that the detrimental impact of negative life events is cumulative, resulting in a “more is more” effect. A similar assumption of “more is more” is typically used to predict the influence of multiple positive life events, people’s reactions to evaluative stimuli (e.g., an audience), and their judgments of consumer goods. In this article, we present a model that suggests that these conclusions do not capture the full picture of how people respond to multiple positive or negative events. More specifically, the averaging/summation (A/S) model does not predict that the underpinnings of individuals’ responses to positive or negative events always reflect summative affective impact. Rather, individuals’ responses often reflect the average value of events, as well as their summative value. We review research supporting the model’s predictions and discuss alternative theories and interpretations, such as the conservation of resource model, the peak–end rule, mental accounting, distraction, and assimilation/contrast. In addition, we suggest new avenues for research.

Disentangling the facilitating and hindering effects of threat-related stimuli - A visual search study

Although large body of research has demonstrated the attention-grabbing nature of threat-related stimuli, threat could also facilitate attentional processes. Previous studies suggest a linear relationship between the facilitating effect of the arousal level conveyed by threat and performance on visual search tasks. Due to the temporal competition bias favouring stimuli with higher arousal level, this could be more pronounced for shorter onset times. Here, through two experiments we aimed to disentangle the two effects by using a visual search paradigm that allowed us to separate the emotional stimuli and the cognitive task. We manipulated stimulus onset time and threat intensity. Participants saw neutral and threatening pictures as priming stimuli, and then, they had to find numbers in ascending order in a matrix array. We measured the reaction time for finding the first number, and search time for finding all the numbers. Our results showed that when the priming stimulus is presented, longer threatening pictures produced longer reaction times compared to neutral ones, which was reversed with increase in arousal. We did not find any significant effects for the shorter onset time. Further theoretical and methodological implications are discussed.

Anhedonia following mild traumatic brain injury in rats: A behavioral economic analysis of positive and negative reinforcement

Psychiatric disorders affect nearly 50% of individuals who have experienced a traumatic brain injury (TBI). Anhedonia is a major symptom of numerous psychiatric disorders and is a diagnostic criterion for depression. It has recently been appreciated that reinforcement may be separated into consummatory (hedonic), motivational and decisional components, all of which may be affected differently in disease. Although anhedonia is typically assessed using positive reinforcement, the importance of stress in psychopathology suggests the study of negative reinforcement (removal or avoidance of aversive events) may be equally important. The present study investigated positive and negative reinforcement following a rat model of mild TBI (mTBI) using lateral fluid percussion. Hedonic value and motivation for reinforcement was determined by behavioral economic analyses. Following mTBI, the hedonic value of avoiding foot shock was reduced. In contrast, the hedonic value of escaping foot shock or obtaining a sucrose pellet was not altered by mTBI. Moreover, motivation to avoid or escape foot shock or to acquire sucrose was not altered by mTBI. Our results suggest that individuals experiencing mTBI find avoidance of aversive events less reinforcing, and therefore are less apt to utilize proactive control of stress.

Evidence for altered configural body processing in women at risk of disorders characterized by body image disturbance

Two studies were conducted to assess appearance-related visual processing mechanisms in populations at risk of disorders characterized by body image disturbance. Using inverted stimuli, Experiment 1 assessed visual processing mechanisms associated with body, face, and house viewing in adolescents. Experiment 2 applied the same protocol to assess appearance-related configural processing in high- and low-risk adolescent women, and women recovering from disorders characterized by body image disturbance. Experiment 1 found evidence for typical configural face and body processing, although adolescent women reported higher levels of body image concern (BIC) and self-objectified to a greater extent than adolescent men. In Experiment 2, typical body inversion effects were seen in the low-risk group, whilst there was some evidence to suggest a disruption to the configural processing of body stimuli in high-risk adolescents and in women recovering from body image disorders. Women in recovery were also quicker to respond to all stimuli, whilst high-risk adolescents took longer to respond to bodies than to other stimuli. Configural face processing was intact in all groups, and effects did not directly relate to BIC or self-objectification. These findings have implications for future research looking to inform early interventions and treatment, suggesting that there could be a tendency to visually process individual body parts at the expense of the whole-body form in women at risk of developing body image disorders, as well as those in recovery.

Anxiety-Linked Attentional Bias: Is It Reliable?

There is substantial evidence that heightened anxiety vulnerability is characterized by increased selective attention to threatening information. The reliability of this anxiety-linked attentional bias has become the focus of considerable recent interest. We distinguish between the potential inconsistency of anxiety-linked attentional bias and inconsistency potentially reflecting the psychometric properties of the assessment approaches used to measure it. Though groups with heightened anxiety vulnerability often exhibit, on average, elevated attention to threat, the evidence suggests that individuals are unlikely to each display a stable, invariant attentional bias to threat. Moreover, although existing assessment approaches can differentiate between groups, they do not exhibit the internal consistency or test-retest reliability necessary to classify individuals in terms of their characteristic pattern of attentional responding to threat. We discuss the appropriate uses of existing attentional bias assessment tasks and propose strategies for enhancing classification of individuals in terms of their tendency to display an attentional bias to threat.

The role of excessive reassurance seeking: An eye tracking study of the indirect effect of social anxiety symptoms on attention bias

High social anxiety is associated with increased attentional bias, and difficulties disengaging from relevant threat information, though social anxiety may also be associated with avoidance of threat. Few mechanisms of this relationship have been empirically evaluated, whereas theories and treatment manuals implicate avoidance and/or safety behaviors as significant agents of negative reinforcement for anxiety symptoms and search for threat. The current study sought to investigate one safety behavior, excessive reassurance seeking, as a mediator of the relationship between social anxiety and attention bias to disgust facial stimuli. Support was found for our hypotheses, such that social anxiety symptoms had an indirect effect on attention bias to disgust faces through increased reassurance seeking. These results suggest that reassurance seeking may result in disengagement of attention to threat stimuli. Specifically, social anxiety may result in a decreased threshold for negative social cues and therefore seek out reassurance feedback and avoid threatening stimuli. Future studies should test these directly and utilize a prospective design. The current study suggests that reassurance seeking may be involved in the attention bias process, providing additional data for current cognitive theories of social anxiety and additional support for reinforcement patterns of anxiety symptoms.