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How to Differentiate Generalized Anxiety Disorder from Worry: The Role of Cognitive Strategies

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Abstract

The aim of the current study was to compare adults with generalized anxiety disorder (GAD), high worriers and healthy control adults in terms of cognitive variables. A total of 125 participants, including 32 people with GAD, 43 high worriers and 50 healthy control people, completed questionnaires assessing cognitive avoidance strategies, adaptive and maladaptive cognitive emotion regulation strategies and cognitive fusion. We found that people with GAD and high worriers scored significantly higher on self-blame, rumination, catastrophizing, blaming others, and avoidance of threatening stimuli. They also scored significantly lower on positive refocusing in comparison to the healthy control group. The GAD group significantly scored higher in rumination and avoidance of threatening stimuli and scored significantly lower in positive refocusing, and positive reappraisal in comparison to the high worriers group. These results suggested that individuals with GAD and high worriers, in comparison to healthy control people, and individuals with GAD, in comparison to high worriers, use more maladaptive and less adaptive cognitive strategies. The results of this study could help the researchers better understand some of the cognitive strategies involved in GAD and high worriers and pay more attention to these cognitive variables.

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Acknowledgements

The authors would like to thank Dr Rebecca Sharp for her help with this manuscript and proofreading.

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Authors and Affiliations

  1. Department of Psychology, Faculty of Education Sciences and Psychology, Ferdowsi University of Mashhad, Mashhad, Iran

    Farzad Nasiri, Ali Mashhadi, Imanollah Bigdeli & Ali Ghanaei Chamanabad

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  1. Farzad Nasiri
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  2. Ali Mashhadi
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  3. Imanollah Bigdeli
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  4. Ali Ghanaei Chamanabad
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Correspondence to Ali Mashhadi.

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Ethical approval was granted from the Ethics Committee in Bioresearch of Ferdowsi University of Mashhad (Ethical code: IR MUM FUM REC.1397.047). All procedures performed involving human participants were in accordance with the ethical standards of the institutional and/or national research committee and with the 1964 Helsinki declaration and its later amendments or comparable ethical standards. All participants in this study were informed about the purpose of the study and signed informed consent forms. They also assured that the collected data would be used only for the scope of research.

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Nasiri, F., Mashhadi, A., Bigdeli, I. et al. How to Differentiate Generalized Anxiety Disorder from Worry: The Role of Cognitive Strategies. J Rat-Emo Cognitive-Behav Ther 38, 44–55 (2020). https://doi.org/10.1007/s10942-019-00323-5

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