Effects of anxiety sensitivity on the response to hyperventilation.

We tested the hypothesis that anxiety sensitivity enhances responses to biological challenge by exposing college students who scored either high or low on the Anxiety Sensitivity Index (ASI) to 5 min of voluntary hyperventilation. The ASI is a validated self-report instrument that measures the fear of anxiety symptoms. Following hyperventilation, high-anxiety-sensitivity (HAS) subjects reported more frequent and more intense hyperventilation sensations and a higher level of subjective anxiety than did low-anxiety-sensitivity (LAS) subjects. Analyses of covariance controlling for baseline differences indicated that the magnitude of increase (i.e., reactivity) in hyperventilation symptoms remained greater in the HAS than in the LAS group, whereas the magnitude of increase in anxiety did not. HAS subjects also exhibited a bias for reporting bodily sensations in general. These findings parallel those obtained when panic patients and normal controls are biologically challenged with hyperventilation, lactate infusion, and other anxiogenic agents. Taken together, these results suggest that anxiety sensitivity may also enhance the anxiety responses of panic patients during biological challenge tests. (PsycINFO Database Record (c) 2010 APA, all rights reserved)     

Differential response to hyperventilation in panic disorder and generalized anxiety disorder.

Compared 20 Ss (mean age 37.5 yrs) with panic disorder and 13 Ss (mean age 41.6 yrs) with generalized anxiety disorder on their subjective responses to 90 sec of voluntary hyperventilation and on 3 physiological measures. Findings indicate that Ss with panic disorder reported a markedly greater distress and a greater number of symptoms in response to the voluntary hyperventilation and, in addition, showed a lower resting partial pressure of carbon dioxide and higher resting heart rate than Ss with generalized anxiety disorder. No differences were found on minute respiratory volume. The implications of these findings for a potential role of hyperventilation in panic attacks are discussed. (17 ref) (PsycINFO Database Record (c) 2010 APA, all rights reserved)     

Fear reactivity to bodily sensations among heavy smokers and nonsmokers.

Individuals who smoke are more likely to experience panic attacks and develop panic disorder than those in the general population. One possible explanation is that smokers may experience a heightened fear response to somatic disturbances. To date, few laboratory studies have tested this hypothesis directly. The present study examined 24 adult heavy smokers (10 females) in 12-hr nicotine withdrawal and 24 adult nonsmokers (12 females) on subjective and physiological reactivity to a 4-min carbon dioxide rebreathing challenge. Results indicate that, despite an attenuated acceleration in respiration during the challenge, smokers experienced a significantly greater increase in self-reported panic symptoms than nonsmokers. In addition, smokers reported significantly greater trait levels of suffocation fear prior to the challenge. Findings are discussed with respect to the role of smoking in panic vulnerability. (PsycINFO Database Record (c) 2010 APA, all rights reserved)     

Self-disclosure as a function of state and trait anxiety.

Examined the influence of state and trait anxiety on self-disclosure in 48 male college freshmen rated as debilitative or facilitative test-anxious on the Achievement Anxiety Test. Ss participated in a verbal learning experiment under high and low anxiety conditions; self-disclosure was elicited by a personal information questionnaire. The effectiveness of the manipulations was checked using scores on the Anxiety factor of the Mood Adjective Check List. Ss' responses to the questionnaire items were assessed for breadth or amount of self-disclosure, depth or intimacy of self-disclosure, and positive–negative self-evaluation by content analysis of their statements. Results confirm the hypothesis that individuals experiencing state anxiety disclose less than "normals." Findings are discussed in light of various conceptual approaches to anxiety. (22 ref) (PsycINFO Database Record (c) 2010 APA, all rights reserved)     

State anxiety as a function of trait anxiety and sex in a quasi-clinical situation.

Undergraduates who scored high, medium, or low on a scale of trait (predispositional) anxiety (n = 7 males and 7 females in each group) differed reliably in level of state (situational) anxiety when tested before and after 2 standardized interviews. This relationship held for both male and female Ss, although males manifested consistently higher levels of state anxiety than females. Moreover, first an increase and then a general decline in degree of state anxiety were noted over occasions of testing. Despite these temporary fluctuations in situational anxiety, however, the basic form of the state-trait relationship remained largely unchanged. Findings are interpreted as substantive confirmation of state-trait anxiety theory. (PsycINFO Database Record (c) 2010 APA, all rights reserved)     

Relationship of trait anxiety to career decisiveness.

Administered the State-Trait Anxiety Inventory and a career decisiveness and satisfaction questionnaire to 829 undergraduates. Ss who were completely undecided about a career had significantly higher Trait Anxiety scores than Ss who were definitely decided about a career. There were no significant differences in Trait Anxiety between those who had tentatively decided on a career and those who were definitely decided. Anxiety increased as the level of satisfaction with career decision decreased. (PsycINFO Database Record (c) 2010 APA, all rights reserved)     

Body and sexual esteem as mediators of the physical disability-interpersonal competencies relation.

Objectives: To examine whether body and sexual esteem mediated the associations between sexual satisfaction, perceived disability severity, and social perceptions of the disability and interpersonal competencies. Research Method/Design: Web-based survey with 326 adults with a range of physical disabilities. Main Outcome Measures: Perceived interpersonal competence in initiating relationships and being assertive in negative situations. Results: For men, sexual satisfaction, social perceptions of the disability, and perceived severity of the disability significantly predicted competence with relationship initiation. Sexual satisfaction and social perceptions of the disability predicted competence with negative assertion. For women, social perceptions of the disability predicted both interpersonal competencies, and sexual satisfaction predicted competence with negative assertion. Aspects of body esteem mediated the relations between the predictor variables and the interpersonal competencies. Conclusions: Findings indicate the importance of perceived attractiveness to others in mediating the negative relations between impact of the disability and interpersonal competencies. Findings also suggest important gender differences in variables predictive of interpersonal competencies. (PsycINFO Database Record (c) 2010 APA, all rights reserved)     

Comment on Holloway and McNally's (1987) "Effects of anxiety sensitivity on the response to hyperventilation."

W. Holloway and R. J. McNally (see record 1988-07600-001) found that normals with high scores on the Anxiety Sensitivity Index (ASI), an instrument developed to assess beliefs regarding the adverse consequences of anxiety, reported more anxiety and more frequent and intense somatic sensations following hyperventilation than did normals with low scores on the ASI. They concluded that this result provides support for the construct validity of the ASI and thus for the construct of anxiety sensitivity. Nevertheless, we argue that (a) the developers of the ASI have conflated beliefs regarding the adverse consequences of anxiety with fear of these consequences, (b) the accumulated evidence for the construct validity of the ASI is weak, and (c) Holloway and McNally's design and analyses do not permit them to exclude the more parsimonious explanation that trait anxiety accounts for their findings. Implications for research on anxiety sensitivity are discussed. (PsycINFO Database Record (c) 2010 APA, all rights reserved)     

Attachment and mental and physical health: Self-compassion and mattering as mediators.

Research shows a strong link between adult attachment and mental and physical health, but little is known about the mechanisms that underlie these relationships. The present study examined self-compassion and mattering, two constructs from positive psychology literature, as potential mediators. Using survey data from a sample of 208 college students, relationships among attachment, self-compassion, mattering, and functional health were explored. Correlational analyses indicated that attachment anxiety and avoidance were strongly related to the mental health component of functional health. Mediation analyses indicated that mattering and self-compassion mediated the relationships between attachment orientation (i.e., levels of avoidance and anxiety) and mental health. These findings suggest that individuals' abilities to be kind toward themselves and their sense of belonging and being important to others are pathways through which attachment orientation relates to mental health. (PsycINFO Database Record (c) 2011 APA, all rights reserved)     

Differences in response latency and response variability between high and low anxiety subjects in a flicker-fusion task.

The present research investigated the effect of anxiety on various psychophysical tasks. Ss high in anxiety (HA) and their low anxiety (LA) relatives were presented with a flicker-fusion task. It was predicted that HA Ss would show significantly more difficulty than the LA group at the point of threshold for flicker-fusion. HA Ss showed lower threshold to flicker, more variability and response alternation, therefore, increased difficulty in making decisions at the threshold values. From Psyc Abstracts 36:02:2HK55W. (PsycINFO Database Record (c) 2010 APA, all rights reserved)     

Types of stressful situations and their relation to trait anxiety and sex.

Based on C. D. Spielberger's (see 40:11) proposal that trait anxiety scores reflect a predisposition to respond with heightened state anxiety to situations involving the possibility of failure or loss of self-esteem, it was predicted that Ss who indicated that they were high in A-trait would report anticipating greater fears in these situations and not in situations involving physical pain or danger. 228 undergraduates rated 40 situations according to the degree of apprehension that they thought they might feel if in that situation. The 40 items were intercorrelated and factor analyzed. Of the 4 factors obtained, the 3 factors associated with failure correlated significantly with a measure of trait anxiety, while the 4th factor, involving pain and danger, did not, supporting Spielberger's hypothesis. Sex differences were found only for the pain-danger factor. (25 ref.) (PsycINFO Database Record (c) 2010 APA, all rights reserved)     

Fear and anxiety as separable emotions: An investigation of the revised reinforcement sensitivity theory of personality.

The Gray and McNaughton (2000) theory draws on a wide range of animal data to hypothesize that the emotions of fear and anxiety are separable. The authors tested their hypothesis in two studies. The first study examined associations between scores on questionnaire measures of fear, anxiety, and neuroticism; correlational analysis revealed that fear and anxiety are not interchangeable constructs. The second study examined associations between scores on questionnaire measures of fear/anxiety and performance in a military training setting; regression analysis revealed that fear captured significant variance in performance that was not shared with anxiety. These results imply that hypotheses derived from nonhuman animal data may hold important implications for understanding human emotion and motivation, especially in relation to fear and anxiety. (PsycINFO Database Record (c) 2010 APA, all rights reserved)     

Relation of state and trait anxiety to different components of career indecision.

Several studies have reported evidence that a substantial relation exists between career indecision and anxiety. However, little research has been reported that would explain the relation in empirical terms. This study was designed to determine if state and trait anxiety relate differentially to various components of career indecision. To accomplish this objective, we generated factor scores from the Career Decision Scale (CDS) and correlated them individually with the two measures of anxiety. The results indicated that anxiety correlated with three of the CDS factors but did not correlate with a fourth factor representing multiple interests. We discuss these findings as well as recommendations for continuing research. (PsycINFO Database Record (c) 2010 APA, all rights reserved)     

Self-esteem and trait anxiety in relation to drug misuse in Kuwait

This study was designed to document knowledge about Kuwaiti drug users and to investigate whether or not there is an association between their poor self-concept and high level of anxiety. One hundred and seven incarcerated drug users, 107 individuals serving prison terms for offenses other than drug use, and 107 "normal" individuals were included in this pilot study. The Arabic version of Rosenberg's Self-Esteem Scale and Spielberger's State-Trait Anxiety Inventory were used to measure the subjects' self-esteem and state-trait anxiety, respectively. The results documented revealed that there is a relationship between levels of self-esteem and anxiety in Kuwaiti drug user behavior.     

Emotional imagery in simple and social phobia: Fear versus anxiety.

In a 1st study, 60 phobic volunteer Ss reacted psychophysiologically with greater vigor to imagery of their own phobic content than to other fearful or nonaffective images. Imagery heart rate responses were largest in Ss with multiple phobias. For simple (dental) phobics, cardiac reactivity was positively correlated with reports of imagery vividness and concordant with reports of affective distress; these relationships were not observed for social (speech) phobics. In a 2nd study, these phobic volunteers were shown to be similar on most measures to an outpatient clinically phobic sample. In an analysis of the combined samples, fearful and socially anxious subtypes were defined by questionnaires. Only the fearful subtype showed a significant covariation among physiological responses, imagery vividness, and severity of phobic disorder. This fearful–anxious distinction seems to cut across diagnostic categories, providing a heuristic perspective from which to view anxiety disorders. (PsycINFO Database Record (c) 2010 APA, all rights reserved)     

Prepared for the worst: Readiness to acquire threat bias and susceptibility to elevate trait anxiety.

Although people differ in their susceptibility to elevate trait anxiety in response to extended stress, little is known about the cognitive substrate of this particular individual difference. We report three studies designed to evaluate the hypothesis that individual differences in readiness to acquire an attentional bias toward threat cues, in response to a contingency that makes the acquisition of such a bias adaptive, underlie individual differences in susceptibility to elevate trait anxiety in response to extended stress. Our findings confirm that the ease with which such a threat bias can be transiently evoked by experimental conditions that encourage its acquisition predicts the degree to which trait anxiety later becomes elevated by extended exposure to a mild stressor. Furthermore, this reflects the fact that such early measures of attentional bias plasticity predict the later naturalistic acquisition of attentional bias in response to subsequent stress, which in turn is associated with a consequent increase in trait anxiety level. These findings are consistent with our proposed account of individual differences in susceptibility to elevate trait anxiety in response to stress. (PsycINFO Database Record (c) 2010 APA, all rights reserved)     

Distinguishing between cognitive and somatic trait and state anxiety in children.

Attempted to develop self-report measures of cognitive and somatic trait and state anxiety for children and to evaluate the utility of distinguishing between cognitive and somatic anxiety. 67 4th-grade children anticipated and then performed a mathematics task either in a high- or low-stress condition. While Ss anticipated performing the task, measures of 7 cognitive behaviors were obtained by means of both a "think aloud" procedure and a questionnaire. Results indicate that the trait and state measures of cognitive and somatic anxiety were reliable. The trait measures of cognitive and somatic anxiety were relatively impervious to induced anxiety states. As expected, cognitive trait anxiety but not somatic trait or state anxiety was related to task performance. High cognitive state and/or trait anxiety was associated with more preoccupation and performance denigration as well as taking less of an analytic attitude toward the situation. Somatic trait and state anxiety were associated with preoccupation. Results support the construct validity of the measures developed and the utility of distinguishing between cognitive and somatic anxiety in children. (22 ref) (PsycINFO Database Record (c) 2010 APA, all rights reserved)     

Fitting in and feeling fine: Conformity and coping motives as mediators of the relationship between social anxiety and problematic drinking.

The present research was conducted to clarify the relationships among social anxiety, alcohol consumption, alcohol-related problems, and negative-reinforcement drinking motives among college students. Heavy drinking students (N = 316, 53.80% female) completed self-report measures of social anxiety, alcohol consumption, alcohol-related problems, and drinking motives. Findings indicated that students higher in social anxiety consumed less alcohol but experienced more negative consequences. Moreover, the relationship between social anxiety and negative consequences was mediated by coping and conformity drinking motives in addition to alcohol consumption. In the context of social anxiety, the current research demonstrates the importance of examining problematic drinking as distinct constructs: alcohol consumption and negative consequences. Findings are also discussed in terms of implications for interventions with socially anxious students. (PsycINFO Database Record (c) 2010 APA, all rights reserved)     

Effects of marathon group therapy on trait and state anxiety.

Administered the State-Trait Anxiety Inventory to 84 institutionalized female narcotic drug addicts (mean age 25.6 yrs). Ss then participated in marathon-directive, marathon-nondirective, or no-therapy (control) groups. Combining all groups of Ss, State Anxiety (A-State) declined significantly from pretherapy to posttherapy, with the 2 therapy groups showing a far greater decline than the control group. Trait Anxiety (A-Trait) was unchanged from pre- to posttherapy when the scores for all groups were combined. Ss receiving nondirective therapy declined in A-Trait, directive therapy Ss increased, and control Ss showed virtually no change in A-Trait. Results support C. D. Spielberger's notion that trait anxiety reflects a dispositional tendency to respond with anxiety in ego-threat situations and suggest that personality trait measures may be more relevant outcome indicators than measures of transitory mood states in marathon therapy research. (32 ref) (PsycINFO Database Record (c) 2010 APA, all rights reserved)     

Fear of hypoglycemia: Relationship to physical and psychological symptoms in patients with insulin-dependent diabetes mellitus.

Examined the impact of hypoglycemia on fear in 69 adult patients with insulin-dependent diabetes mellitus. Ss completed the Behavior and Worry subscales of the Hypoglycemia Fear Survey (HFS) of D. Cox et al (1987). Ss also completed the SCL-90 and measures of perceived stress, risk of future hypoglycemic episodes, and glycosylated hemoglobin. Results replicate the Cox et al findings supporting the validity and reliability of the HFS. Behavior and Worry scores were positively related to psychological symptoms, perceived stress, and previous experiences with hypoglycemia. Fear was unrelated to glycosylated hemoglobin but was significantly higher for Ss who had greater variability and lower mean daily blood glucose. (PsycINFO Database Record (c) 2010 APA, all rights reserved)