Biomedical subjects

T Dalgleish

Publications and source records attributed to T Dalgleish.

At least 19 recordsLinked to original sources

PubMed2004

What might not have been: an investigation of the nature of counterfactual thinking in survivors of trauma.

BACKGROUND: Counterfactual thinking (CFT) refers to the process of reflecting on an event and changing aspects of it so as to alter the eventual outcome. Such thinking appears frequent in survivors of trauma (e.g. 'If only I had stayed at home then I wouldn't have had the accident'), but has received little systematic empirical investigation. Four studies examined the nature of CFT in both trauma survivors and non-traumatized controls. METHOD: Participants generated CFT to their own trauma or to written scenarios. RESULTS: Three key findings emerged. Firstly, trauma survivors overwhelmingly produced CFT that mutated aspects of their own behaviour during the traumatic event (self-referent CFT) and that improved the event's outcome (upward CFT; Studies 1 and 2). Secondly, self-referent CFT style in trauma survivors was generalized to non-autobiographical scenarios and was independent of how much control the protagonist in the scenarios had over the outcome. In contrast, never-traumatized controls tended to generate more self-referent CFT to scenarios where the protagonists had some control than to scenarios where the protagonist had little control (Study 3). Thirdly, this self-referent, upward CFT style of trauma survivors was not related to frequency of post-traumatic stress symptoms (Studies 1 and 3) or Posttraumatic Stress Disorder (PTSD) caseness (Study 2). CONCLUSIONS: These results are interpreted in terms of a self-referent, upward CFT style that is normative following trauma for all survivors, regardless of levels of trauma-related distress, and that is applied to any negative events that are encountered.

Adaptation, Psychological↗

PubMed2001

Attentional processing and levels of symptomatology in Seasonal Affective Disorder (SAD): a preliminary longitudinal study.

DESIGN: The ability of performance on the emotional Stroop task to predict subsequent levels of symptomatology was examined within a longitudinal design in a group of individuals with SAD. Participants were tested in the winter when depressed and again in the summer when remitted. RESULTS: There was no change in emotional Stroop performance across the two time points. However, winter performance on the emotional Stroop task predicted symptom levels in the summer, even with winter symptom levels partialled out. The nature of this relationship was that a greater emotional Stroop effect for threat words in the winter was related to more improved mood in the summer. Furthermore, the strength of the relationship between lower winter emotional Stroop performance and more negative winter mood was associated with poorer mood in the summer.

Adolescent↗

PubMed2001

An experimental investigation of hypervigilance for threat in children and adolescents with post-traumatic stress disorder.

BACKGROUND: The present study examined biases in visual attention for emotional material in children and adolescents with post-traumatic stress disorder (PTSD) and healthy controls. METHODS: The participants carried out an attentional deployment task in which probe detection latency data were used to determine the distribution of visual attention for threat-related and depression-related material. RESULTS: The results showed that children and adolescents with PTSD, relative to controls, selectively allocated processing resources towards socially threatening stimuli and away from depression-related stimuli. This attentional avoidance of depression-related information in the PTSD participants declined with age. CONCLUSIONS: The results of the study are interpreted as a consolidation and extension of previous research on attentional bias and emotional disorder in younger participants.

Adolescent↗

PubMed2001

Anxiety and cognitive inhibition.

In 3 experiments, the authors investigated whether anxiety proneness is associated with impaired inhibitory processing. Participants made speeded decisions requiring inhibition of threatening or neutral meanings of ambiguous words, which were inappropriate in their current context. In Experiment 1 there were no differences found in inhibitory processing associated with anxiety. However, in Experiment 2, when the capacity for controlled processing was reduced by imposition of a mental load, anxious individuals showed a response pattern consistent with a general impairment of inhibitory processing. In Experiment 3, a group who had experienced a traumatic event also showed evidence of impaired inhibition, despite the absence of additional load. Thus anxiety proneness is associated with a general deficit of inhibitory processing, but this may be revealed only under conditions that limit the availability of controlled processing resources.

Adult↗

PubMed2000

The Herald of Free Enterprise disaster. Lessons from the first 6 years.

A substantial body of data has been collected on survivors of the Herald of Free Enterprise disaster over the first 6 years. These data show the psychological effects to be considerable, and although they appear to decrease over time, 6 years later there remains a substantial minority that remains highly distressed. Our research has also pointed to those factors that appear to be important in determining the severity and chronicity of symptoms. Levels of crisis support early on seem to be protective. Not everyone has access to supportive others, and these people would seem to be at increased risk of disturbance. But even if crisis support is potentially available from family and friends, not everyone is in a position to draw on these resources. Those individuals who possess negative attitudes toward emotional expression might be less likely to seek out support. Evidence would suggest that modifying such attitudes might be an important component of intervention. A further target for intervention would seem to be the causal attributions made by survivors. It was found that those who perceived the causes of events during the disaster as internal and controllable were at greatest risk of psychological disturbance. The data gathered in the wake of this disaster suggest that intervening early with respect to these three components (crisis support, attitude to emotional expression, and attributional style) is highly likely to mitigate against long-term distress.

Adaptation, Psychological↗

PubMed2000

Lack of attentional bias for emotional information in clinically depressed children and adolescents on the dot probe task.

The present study utilised a cognitive paradigm to investigate attentional biases in clinically depressed children and adolescents. Two groups of children and adolescents--clinically depressed (N = 19) and normal controls (N = 26)--were asked to complete a computerised version of the attentional dot probe paradigm similar to that used by MacLeod, Mathews, and Tata (1986). Results provided no support for an attentional bias, either toward depression-related words or threat words, in the depressed group. This finding is discussed in the context of cognitive theories of anxiety and depression.

Adolescent↗

PubMed2000

Judgements about emotional events in children and adolescents with post-traumatic stress disorder and controls.

Research with clinically anxious adults has revealed that they estimate future negative events as far more likely to occur, relative to healthy controls. In addition, anxious adults estimate that such events are more likely to happen to themselves than to others. Previous research with anxious children and adolescents, in contrast, has revealed no increased probability estimates for negative events, relative to controls, and the events were rated as more likely to happen to others than to the self. The present study followed up these discrepant findings by investigating probability judgements concerning future negative events generated by children and adolescents who had actually experienced an extreme negative event and who met criteria for a diagnosis of Post-traumatic Stress Disorder (PTSD). Control groups comprised a group of healthy participants, and a group of healthy participants whose parents had experienced a trauma and who met criteria for PTSD. The results revealed no overall differences between the clinical group and the controls. However, children and adolescents with PTSD estimated all negative events as significantly more likely to happen to others than to themselves, with this other-referent bias being strongest for events matched to their trauma. In contrast, the two control groups exhibited an other-referent bias for physically threatening events but not for socially threatening ones. Developmental analyses indicated that the strength of the relationship between anxiety and elevated judgements about future negative events declined with age in the control participants but that there was no significant relationship in the groups who had been exposed to trauma. The findings are discussed in the context of the literature on information processing biases and PTSD.

Adolescent↗

PubMed1999

Performance of children and adolescents with PTSD on the Stroop colour-naming task.

BACKGROUND: Investigators have used various experimental paradigms such as the Stroop colour naming test to study how adults with different emotional disorders process emotional information. However, to date, little research has been carried out on younger subjects. METHOD: In the current experiment, children and adolescents with post-traumatic stress disorder (PTSD) and control subjects aged 9-17 years, participated in a modified Stroop colour naming task. RESULTS: The results indicated that the children and adolescents with PTSD showed increased Stroop interference for trauma-related material relative to neutral words and to the performance of the controls. CONCLUSIONS: These findings indicate that attentional bias to trauma-congruent information is a function of PTSD in young age groups. The results are discussed with respect to the literature on information processing in PTSD.

Adolescent↗

PubMed1999

Biases in visual attention in children and adolescents with clinical anxiety and mixed anxiety-depression.

Recent research has indicated that anxious adult and child patients and high trait-anxious adults selectively shift attention toward threatening stimuli. The present study extends this research and investigates the content-specificity of the effects in clinically anxious and mixed anxious-depressed children and adolescents. Twenty four generally anxious patients, aged 9 to 18, 19 mixed anxious-depressed patients, and 24 normal controls were comparable with respect to age, sex, verbal IQ, and vocabulary level. The participants carried out an attentional deployment task in which probe detection latency data were used to determine the distribution of visual attention for threat-related and depression-related material. The results showed that clinically anxious children, relative to controls, selectively allocated processing resources toward threat stimuli. However, mixed anxious-depressed children, relative to controls, did not show any attentional bias towards either threat- or depression-related stimuli. Preliminary data on age and gender differences are also presented. The results of this study are discussed in the light of previous research.

Adolescent↗

PubMed1999

Performance of children of adults with PTSD on the stroop color-naming task: a preliminary study.

Investigators have used various experimental paradigms to study how individuals with different emotional disorders process emotional information. However, little research has been done on relatives of individuals with emotional disorders, despite developments in the area of emotional contagion. In the current experiment, children of adults with posttraumatic stress disorder (PTSD) (n = 18) and control participants (n = 21), ages 9-17 years, participated in a modified Stroop color-naming task. The results indicated that the children of adults with PTSD showed increased Stroop interference for threat-related relative to neutral words and to the performance of the controls. These findings are discussed with respect to the literature on information processing in PTSD and emotional contagion in families.

Adolescent↗

PubMed1999

Everyday memory deficits in children and adolescents with PTSD: performance on the Rivermead Behavioural Memory Test.

Adult post-traumatic stress disorder (PTSD) patients often report a wide range of cognitive problems in memory, concentration, attention, planning, and judgement. Evaluation of these cognitive aspects of PTSD in adults has helped to define the nature of the disorder. However, there is a paucity of such work in younger subjects. This study has employed the Rivermead Behavioural Memory Test (RBMT) to examine cognitive factors in children and adolescents with PTSD. Eighteen child and adolescent patients with PTSD and 22 control subjects completed the test. PTSD subjects showed poorer overall memory performance compared with controls. Specifically, they were worse on the prospective and orientation items of the RBMT. The results are discussed in the light of research on everyday memory in adults with PTSD.

Adolescent↗

PubMed1998

Memory for emotional trait adjectives in clinically depressed youth.

An experiment was conducted to examine memory for emotional trait adjectives in depressed children and adolescents. Two groups of children and adolescents, clinically depressed participants and non-clinical controls, were compared on computerized versions of recall and recognition memory tasks. Three groups of words (positive trait adjectives, negative trait adjectives, and categorized neutral words) were used in the experiment. Results showed that the depressed group recalled significantly more negative adjectives than positive adjectives, whereas the control group recalled the same number of positive and negative adjectives. This effect was predicted by the association between age and level of depression, with the depression-related bias becoming stronger with age. Signal detection analysis revealed that the depressed group did not show any bias in the recognition task. The findings are discussed with respect to cognitive theories of depression with consideration of the developmental implications.

Adolescent↗

PubMed1998

Information processing in recovered depressed children and adolescents.

Previous research into subjective probability estimates for negative events revealed that depressed children estimated events as equally likely to happen to themselves as to other children. In contrast, both controls and anxious children estimated that negative events were more likely to happen to others than to themselves. The present study followed up this finding by investigating the subjective probability judgements concerning future negative events generated by children and adolescents who have recovered from depression. Subjects generated probability estimates either for themselves or for other children for a range of negative events on a visual analogue scale. The results revealed that both recovered depressed and matched control groups estimated negative events as significantly more likely to happen to others than to themselves. It was also found that the recovered depressed subjects estimated that negative events were less likely overall, compared to the controls. These results are discussed in the context of the adult literature.

Adolescent↗

PubMed1997

Information processing in clinically depressed and anxious children and adolescents.

The investigation of cognitive content and processes in childhood anxiety and depression has lagged behind similar research in the adult population. What studies do exist have largely restricted themselves to examining the nature of the thoughts that anxious and depressed children report. There is almost no research examining the ways in which anxious and depressed children perceive, attend to, remember, or think and make judgements about, emotional material. The present study investigated the subjective probability judgements that anxious and depressed children make concerning future negative events. Subjects generated probability estimates either for themselves or for other children for a range of events on a visual analogue scale. Events were either physically-threat-related or socially-threat-related. The results revealed no differences of interest with respect to type of threat but interesting differences between the groups with respect to reference. Depressed subjects estimated that events were equally likely to happen to themselves as to other children whereas both the controls and anxious children estimated that negative events were more likely to happen to others than to themselves, with this effect being stronger in the anxious group. These results are discussed in the context of the adult literature and also the limited literature on emotion-related cognitive processing in children.

Adolescent↗

PubMed1997

Attitudes towards emotional expression and post-traumatic stress in survivors of the Herald of Free Enterprise disaster.

The relationship between self-reported attitudes towards emotional expression, assessed at three years after the accident, and post-traumatic symptoms, assessed at five years after the accident, was investigated in 37 survivors of the Herald of Free Enterprise disaster. It was found that lower scores on the attitudes towards emotional expression scale, indicating more negative attitudes (e.g. 'I think getting emotional is a sign of weakness') were associated with higher symptom scores. This association remained even when retrospectively assessed perceptions of helplessness during the disaster and symptoms assessed at three years were partialled out. Implications for therapeutic intervention are discussed.

Accidents, Traffic↗

PubMed1996

Emotional priming in clinically depressed subjects.

A study is described in which the Emotional Priming Paradigm (Power and Brewin (1990) Cogn. Emotion 4, 39-51) was used with a group of currently depressed patients and a group of nondepressed controls. The results for the depressed patients showed significant facilitation effects on both the speed and rate of endorsement of negative trait adjectives when these were preceded by negative emotional primes. These results contrast with those obtained with the control subjects who failed to show such facilitation effects. The results are discussed in relation to the role of cognitive biases in depression.

Adolescent↗

PubMed1996

Crisis support following the Herald of Free-Enterprise disaster: a longitudinal perspective.

Crisis support was assessed with survivors of the Herald of Free Enterprise ferry sinking at 3 and 6 years postdisaster. It was found that reported levels of support received from family and friends decreased over the first 3 years after the event but increased over the subsequent 3 years. In addition, higher retrospective ratings of crisis support received in the immediate aftermath of the disaster were found to predict lower levels of posttraumatic symptomatology as assessed by the Impact of Event Scale, the Beck Depression Inventory and the State-Trait Anxiety Inventory at a later period. The results replicate earlier findings following the Jupiter Cruise ship disaster and are thought to have implications for the assessment and treatment of survivors at high risk of disturbance.

Adaptation, Psychological↗

PubMed1996

Chronic emotional processing in survivors of the Herald of Free Enterprise disaster: the relationship of intrusion and avoidance at 3 years to distress at 5 years.

Thirty-seven survivors completed the Impact of Event Scale (IES), a measure of intrusive and avoidant activity, at around 3 yr following the Herald of Free Enterprise disaster. The aim of the present study was to examine the relationship between scores on the IES to scores on the Beck Depression Inventory (BDI) and the Spielberger State Anxiety Inventory (STAI-Y1) at around 5 yr subsequent to the event. Higher scores on the IES were able to predict higher scores on the BDI and the STAI-Y1 over and above scores on the 28-item General Health Questionnaire (GHQ-28) which was also administered at around 3 yr on from the event. Implications for cognitive-behaviour therapy are discussed.

Adult↗