Joint Doctoral Program of San Diego State University/University of California, San Diego, CA 92120-4913, United States.
J Anxiety Disord. 2010 Mar;24(2):178-82. doi: 10.1016/j.janxdis.2009.10.005. Epub 2009 Oct 27.
Research suggests that individuals with social anxiety interpret ambiguous social information negatively (e.g., Amir, Foa, & Coles, 1998) and that much negative interpretation bias may share a common mechanism with other information processing biases (e.g., Mathews, Mackintosh, & Fulcher, 1997). In the current study, we examined effectiveness of an Interpretation Modification Program in changing attention biases in socially anxious individuals. Participants were randomly assigned to either an Interpretation Modification Program (IMP) that guided them to make benign interpretations of ambiguous social scenarios or an Interpretation Control Condition (ICC) that did not guide participants' interpretation in either direction. Results revealed that individuals in the IMP group demonstrated greater ability to disengage attention from threat stimuli after completing the program, while individuals in the ICC did not. These results are consistent with the hypothesis that information processing biases in anxious individuals may share a common mechanism that may contribute to the maintenance of anxiety.
研究表明，社交焦虑个体对模糊的社交信息做出消极的解释（例如，Amir、Foa 和 Coles，1998），而且许多消极的解释偏差可能与其他信息处理偏差共享一个共同的机制（例如，Mathews、Mackintosh 和 Fulcher，1997）。在本研究中，我们考察了解释修正程序在改变社交焦虑个体注意偏差方面的有效性。参与者被随机分配到解释修正程序（IMP）组或解释控制条件（ICC）组。IMP 组指导他们对模糊的社交场景做出良性解释，而 ICC 组则不指导参与者向任何方向做出解释。结果表明，完成程序后，IMP 组的个体表现出更大的能力从威胁刺激中转移注意力，而 ICC 组的个体则没有。这些结果与信息处理偏差在焦虑个体中可能共享一个共同机制的假设一致，该机制可能有助于焦虑的维持。
