NYU Child Study Center, New York University School of Medicine, New York, NY 10016, USA.
J Am Acad Child Adolesc Psychiatry. 2008 Oct;47(10):1189-96. doi: 10.1097/CHI.0b013e3181825ace.
To examine attention bias toward threat faces in a large sample of anxiety-disordered youths using a well-established visual probe task.
Study participants included 101 children and adolescents (ages 7-18 years) with generalized anxiety disorder, social phobia, and/or separation anxiety disorder enrolled in a multisite anxiety treatment study. Nonanxious youths (n = 51; ages 9-18 years) were recruited separately. Participants were administered a computerized visual probe task that presents pairs of faces portraying threat (angry), positive (happy), and neutral expressions. They pressed a response key to indicate the spatial location of a probe that replaced one of the faces on each trial. Attention bias scores were calculated from response times to probes for each emotional face type.
Compared to healthy youths, anxious participants demonstrated a greater attention bias toward threat faces. This threat bias in anxious patients did not significantly vary across the anxiety disorders. There was no group difference in attention bias toward happy faces.
These results suggest that pediatric anxiety disorders are associated with an attention bias toward threat. Future research may examine the manner in which cognitive bias in anxious youths changes with treatment.
使用一种成熟的视觉探测任务，在大量焦虑障碍青少年样本中研究对威胁面孔的注意偏向。
研究参与者包括 101 名患有广泛性焦虑症、社交恐惧症和/或分离焦虑症的儿童和青少年（年龄 7-18 岁），他们参加了一项多地点焦虑治疗研究。另外招募了 51 名非焦虑青少年（年龄 9-18 岁）。参与者接受了计算机化的视觉探测任务，该任务呈现一对表现出威胁（愤怒）、积极（快乐）和中性表情的面孔。他们按下一个响应键，以指示在每个试验中替换其中一张面孔的探针的空间位置。从对每种情绪面孔类型的探针的反应时间计算注意偏向分数。
与健康青少年相比，焦虑参与者对威胁面孔表现出更大的注意偏向。在焦虑患者中，这种威胁偏见在焦虑障碍之间没有显著差异。对快乐的面孔没有注意偏向的群体差异。
这些结果表明，儿童期焦虑症与对威胁的注意偏向有关。未来的研究可能会检查焦虑青少年的认知偏差随治疗的变化方式。
