Skip to main content
SpringerLink
Log in

The Impact of Attention Style on Directed Forgetting Among High Anxiety Sensitive Individuals

  • Original Article
  • Published:
Cognitive Therapy and Research Aims and scope Submit manuscript

Abstract

Results of research investigating the link between anxiety sensitivity (AS) and memory biases toward threat have been inconsistent. There may be subgroups of high AS individuals who differ in their preferred mode of attending to threat-related information, thereby impacting memory. The impact of individual attention style on intentional forgetting of words varying in emotional valence was examined among individuals with varying levels of AS. By incorporating an inhibition of return (IOR) task (to yield a proxy of attentional allocation) within the study phase of the item-method directed forgetting paradigm, we categorized high, moderate, and low AS individuals according to their attention style in response to threat stimuli: ‘threat attenders’ (small IOR effect) and ‘threat avoiders’ (large IOR effect). Among high AS individuals only, ‘threat avoiders’ showed greater intentional forgetting of threat-related words than ‘threat attenders’. High AS ‘threat avoiders’ also had higher levels of anxiety-related psychopathology (AS and health anxiety) than high AS ‘threat attenders’.

This is a preview of subscription content, log in via an institution to check access.

Access this article

Log in via an institution

Price excludes VAT (USA)
Tax calculation will be finalised during checkout.

Instant access to the full article PDF.

Institutional subscriptions

Fig. 1

Similar content being viewed by others

Notes

  1. In addition to “sensitizers” and “repressors”, Krohne’s conceptualization also allowed individuals to be categorized as being high (“high anxiety”) or low (“non-defensives”) on both vigilance and avoidance, respectively.

  2. The processing of threat cues in pathological anxiety has been shown to be automatic in the sense that it occurs involuntarily, but not automatic in the sense that it is not capacity free. See McNally (1995) for a discussion on automaticity and anxiety disorders.

  3. n = cell size.

  4. Given that the positive and neutral word lists differed in overall word length, it is possible that differences in recognition for positive and neutral foils were secondary to differences in overall word length.

  5. Analyses were also conducted using attention style subgroups that were categorized based on the overall median split of the IOR value for threat words for all AS groups combined (Mdn = 19.125, SD = 57.52). Overall, the results remained the same. However, low AS ‘threat attenders’ (n = 14) had a greater magnitude of the directed forgetting effect for threat words than low AS ‘threat avoiders’ (n = 8) (M = 21.38, SD = 11.72; M = 6.80, SD = 17.14, respectively; t (20) = 2.37, p < .05) which could have been due to the small number of low AS ‘threat avoiders’.

  6. Conclusions did not differ when directional one-tailed t tests were conducted.

  7. ANCOVA analyses revealed that the overall directed forgetting results remain the same when ASI scores, HAQ scores and gender are co-varied out.

  8. Conclusions did not differ when non-directional two-tailed t tests were conducted.

  9. Conclusions did not differ when directional one-tailed t tests were conducted.

References

  • American Psychiatric Association. (1987). Diagnostic and statistical manual of mental disorders: DSM-III-R (3rd rev. ed.). Washington, DC: Author.

    Google Scholar 

  • American Psychiatric Association. (2000). Diagnostic and statistical manual of mental disorders: DSM-IV-TR (4th ed., text rev.). Washington, DC: Author.

    Google Scholar 

  • Asmundson, G. J., Sandler, L. S., Wilson, K. G., & Walker, J. R. (1992). Selective attention toward physical threat in patients with panic disorder. Journal of Anxiety Disorders, 61, 295–303.

    Article  Google Scholar 

  • Baddeley, A. D. (2004). The psychology of memory. In A. D. Baddeley, M. D. Kopelman, & B. A. Wilson (Eds.), The essential handbook of memory disorders for clinicians (pp. 1–13). Chichester, UK: Wiley.

    Google Scholar 

  • Beck, A. T., Emery, G., & Greenberg, R. I. (1985). Anxiety disorders and phobias. New York: Basic Books.

    Google Scholar 

  • Beck, J. G., Stanley, M. A., Averill, P. M., Baldwin, L. E., & Deagle, E. A. (1992). Attention and memory for threat in panic disorder. Behaviour Research and Therapy, 30, 619–629.

    Article  PubMed  CAS  Google Scholar 

  • Becker, E., Rinck, M., & Margraf, J. (1994). Memory bias in panic disorder. Journal of Abnormal Psychology, 103, 396–399.

    Article  PubMed  CAS  Google Scholar 

  • Berlucchi, G., Chelazzi, L., & Tassinari, G. (2000). Volitional covert orienting to a peripheral cue does not suppress cue-induced inhibition of return. Journal of Cognitive Neuroscience, 12, 648–663.

    Article  PubMed  CAS  Google Scholar 

  • Bernstein, A., Stickle, T. R., Zvolensky, M. J., Taylor, S., Abramowitz, J., & Stewart, S. (2010). Dimensional, categorical, or dimensional-categories: testing the latent structure of anxiety sensitivity among adults using factor-mixture modeling. Behavior Therapy, 41(4), 515–529.

    Article  PubMed  Google Scholar 

  • Birch, C. D., Stewart, S. H., Wiers, R. W., Klein, R. M., MacLean, A. D., & Berish, M. J. (2008). The mood-induced activation of implicit alcohol cognition in enhancement and coping motivated drinkers. Addictive Behaviors, 33, 565–581.

    Article  PubMed  Google Scholar 

  • Buller, R., Maier, W., & Benkert, O. (1986). Clinical subtypes of panic disorder: Their descriptive and prospective validity. Journal of Affective Disorders, 11, 105–114.

    Article  PubMed  CAS  Google Scholar 

  • Carroll, J. B., Davies, P., & Richman, B. (1971). Word frequency book. Boston, MA: Houghton Mifflin.

    Google Scholar 

  • Chica, A. B. (2008). Differential effects of endogenous and exogenous attention on information processing. Ph.D. dissertation.

  • Chica, A. B., Lupiáñez, J., & Bartolomeo, P. (2006). Dissociating inhibition of return from endogenous orienting of spatial attention: Evidence from detection and discrimination tasks. Cognitive Neuropsychology, 23, 1015–1034.

    Article  PubMed  Google Scholar 

  • Cloitre, M., & Liebowitz, M. R. (1991). Memory bias in panic disorder: An investigation of the cognitive avoidance hypothesis. Cognitive Therapy and Research, 15, 371–386.

    Article  Google Scholar 

  • Cloitre, M., Shear, M. K., Cancienne, J., & Zeitlin, S. B. (1994). Implicit and explicit memory for catastrophic associations to bodily sensations words in panic disorder. Cognitive Therapy and Research, 18, 225–240.

    Article  Google Scholar 

  • Cohen, J. D., MacWhinney, B., Flatt, M., & Provost, J. (1993). PsyScope: An interactive graphic system for designing and controlling experiments in the psychology laboratory using Macintosh computers. Behavior Research Methods, Instruments, and Computers, 25, 257–271.

    Article  Google Scholar 

  • Cowan, N. (1995). Attention and memory: An integrated framework. New York: Oxford University Press.

    Google Scholar 

  • Cox, B. J., Borger, S. C., & Enns, M. W. (1999). Anxiety sensitivity and emotional disorders: Psychometric studies and their theoretical implications. In S. Taylor (Ed.), Anxiety sensitivity: Theory, research and treatment of the fear of anxiety (pp. 115–148). Mahwah, NJ: Erlbaum.

    Google Scholar 

  • Cox, B. J., Norton, G. R., & Swinton, R. P. (1992). The panic attack questionnaire—revised. Unpublished scale, Centre for Addiction and Mental Health, Toronto, Canada.

  • Danziger, S., & Kingstone, A. (1999). Unmasking the inhibition of return phenomenon. Perception and Psychophysics, 61, 1024–1037.

    Article  PubMed  CAS  Google Scholar 

  • De Houwer, J. (2006). What are implicit measures and why are we using them? In R. W. Wiers & A. W. Stacy (Eds.), Handbook of implicit cognition and addiction (pp. 1–8). London, UK: Sage Publications Ltd.

    Google Scholar 

  • Dorris, M. C., Klein, R. M., Everling, S., & Munoz, D. P. (2002). Contribution of the superior colliculus to inhibition of return. Journal of Cognitive Neuroscience, 14, 1256–1263.

    Article  PubMed  Google Scholar 

  • Ehlers, A. (1995). A one-year prospective study of panic attacks: Clinical course and factors associated with maintenance. Journal of Abnormal Psychology, 104, 164–172.

    Article  PubMed  CAS  Google Scholar 

  • Ehlers, A., Margraf, J., Davies, S., & Roth, W. T. (1988). Selective processing of threat cues in participants with panic attacks. Cognition and Emotion, 2, 201–219.

    Article  Google Scholar 

  • Eysenck, M. W., Derakshan, N., Santos, R., & Calvo, M. G. (2007). Anxiety and cognitive performance: Attentional control theory. Emotion, 7, 336–353.

    Article  PubMed  Google Scholar 

  • Foa, E. B., & Kozak, M. J. (1986). Emotional processing of fear: Exposure to corrective information. Psychological Bulletin, 99, 20–35.

    Article  PubMed  CAS  Google Scholar 

  • Golding, J. M., & MacLeod, C. M. (Eds.). (1998). Intentional forgetting: Interdisciplinary approaches. Mahwah, NJ: Erlbaum.

    Google Scholar 

  • Hock, M. (1993). Coping dispositions, attentional direction, and anxiety states. In H. W. Krohne (Ed.), Attention and avoidance: Strategies in coping with aversiveness (pp. 139–169). Toronto, Canada: Hogrefe & Huber.

    Google Scholar 

  • Hunt, C., Keogh, E., & French, C. C. (2006). Anxiety sensitivity: The role of conscious awareness and selective attentional bias to physical threat. Emotion, 6, 418–428.

    Article  PubMed  Google Scholar 

  • Keogh, E., Dillon, C., Georgiou, G., & Hunt, C. (2001). Selective attentional biases for physical threat in physical anxiety sensitivity. Journal of Anxiety Disorders, 15, 299–315.

    Article  PubMed  CAS  Google Scholar 

  • Klein, R. M. (2000). Inhibition of return. Trends in Cognitive Sciences, 4, 138–147.

    Article  PubMed  Google Scholar 

  • Koven, N. S., Heller, W., Banich, M. T., & Miller, G. A. (2003). Relationships of distinctive affective dimensions to performance on an emotional Stroop task. Cognitive Therapy and Research, 27, 671–680.

    Article  Google Scholar 

  • Krohne, H. W. (1989). The concept of coping modes: Relating cognitive person variables to actual coping behavior. Advances in Behaviour Research and Therapy, 11, 235–248.

    Article  Google Scholar 

  • Krohne, H. W. (1993). Vigilance and cognitive avoidance as concepts in coping research. In H. W. Krohne (Ed.), Attention and avoidance: Strategies in coping with aversiveness (pp. 19–50). Toronto, Canada: Hogrefe & Huber.

    Google Scholar 

  • Krohne, H. W., Egloff, B., Varner, L. J., Burns, L. R., Weidner, G., & Ellis, H. C. (2000). The assessment of dispositional vigilance and cognitive avoidance: Factorial structure, psychometric properties, and validity of the Mainz Coping Inventory. Cognitive Therapy and Research, 24, 297–311.

    Article  Google Scholar 

  • Lees, A., Mogg, K., & Bradley, B. P. (2005). Health anxiety, anxiety sensitivity and attentional biases for pictorial and linguistic health-threat cues. Cognition and Emotion, 19, 453–462.

    Article  PubMed  Google Scholar 

  • Lucock, M., & Morley, S. (1996). The health anxiety questionnaire. British Journal of Health Psychology, 1, 137–150.

    Article  Google Scholar 

  • Lupiáñez, J., Decaix, C., Siéroff, E., Chokron, S., Milliken, B., & Bartolomeo, P. (2004). Independent effects of endogenous and exogenous spatial cueing: Inhibition of return at endogenously attended target locations. Experimental Brain Research, 159, 447–457.

    Article  Google Scholar 

  • MacLeod, C. M. (1999). The item and list methods of directed forgetting: Test differences and the role of demand characteristics. Psychonomic Bulletin and Review, 6, 123–129.

    Article  PubMed  CAS  Google Scholar 

  • Maller, R. G., & Reiss, S. (1992). Anxiety sensitivity in 1984 and panic attacks in 1987. Journal of Anxiety Disorders, 6, 241–247.

    Article  Google Scholar 

  • Marcus, D., & Church, S. (2003). Are dysfunctional beliefs about illness unique to hypochondriasis? Journal of Psychosomatic Research, 54, 543–547.

    Article  PubMed  Google Scholar 

  • Mathews, A. (1993). Attention and memory for threat in anxiety. In H. W. Krohne (Ed.), Attention and avoidance: Strategies in coping with aversiveness (pp. 119–135). Toronto, Canada: Hogrefe & Huber.

    Google Scholar 

  • McCabe, R. E. (1999). Implicit and explicit memory for threat words in high- and low-anxiety-sensitive participants. Cognitive Therapy and Research, 23, 21–38.

    Article  Google Scholar 

  • McNally, R. J. (1995). Automaticity and the anxiety disorders. Behaviour Research and Therapy, 33, 747–754.

    Article  PubMed  CAS  Google Scholar 

  • McNally, R. J. (1999). Anxiety sensitivity and information-processing biases for threat. In S. Taylor (Ed.), Anxiety sensitivity: Theory, research, and treatment of the fear of anxiety (pp. 183–197). Mahwah, NJ: Erlbaum.

    Google Scholar 

  • McNally, R. J., Foa, E. B., & Donnell, C. D. (1989). Memory bias for anxiety information in patients with panic disorder. Cognition and Emotion, 3, 27–44.

    Article  Google Scholar 

  • McNally, R. J., Hornig, C. D., Hoffman, E. C., & Han, E. M. (1999a). Anxiety sensitivity and cognitive biases for threat. Behavior Therapy, 30, 51–61.

    Article  Google Scholar 

  • McNally, R. J., & Lorenz, M. (1987). Anxiety sensitivity in agoraphobics. Journal of Behavior Therapy and Experimental Psychiatry, 18, 3–11.

    Article  PubMed  CAS  Google Scholar 

  • McNally, R. J., Otto, M. W., Yap, L., Pollack, M. H., & Hornig, C. D. (1999b). Is panic disorder linked to cognitive avoidance of threatening information? Journal of Anxiety Disorders, 13, 335–348.

    Article  PubMed  CAS  Google Scholar 

  • McNally, R. J., Riemann, B. C., Louro, C. E., Luckach, B. M., & Kim, E. (1992). Cognitive processing of emotional information in panic disorder. Behaviour Research and Therapy, 30, 143–149.

    Article  PubMed  CAS  Google Scholar 

  • Mitte, K. (2008). Memory bias for threatening information in anxiety and anxiety disorders: A meta-analytic review. Psychological Bulletin, 134, 886–911.

    Article  PubMed  Google Scholar 

  • Mogg, K., & Bradley, B. P. (1998). A cognitive-motivational analysis of anxiety. Behaviour Research and Therapy, 36, 809–848.

    Article  PubMed  CAS  Google Scholar 

  • Otto, M. W., Demopulos, C. M., McLean, N. E., Pollack, M. H., & Fava, M. (1998). Additional findings on the association between anxiety sensitivity and hypochondriacal concerns: Examination of patients with major depression. Journal of Anxiety Disorders, 12, 225–232.

    Article  PubMed  CAS  Google Scholar 

  • Otto, M. W., McNally, R. J., Pollack, M. H., Chen, E., & Rosenbaum, J. F. (1994). Hemispheric laterality and memory bias for threat in anxiety disorder. Journal of Abnormal Psychology, 103, 828–831.

    Article  PubMed  CAS  Google Scholar 

  • Peterson, R. A., & Reiss, S. (1992). Anxiety sensitivity index manual (2nd ed.). Worthington, OH: International Diagnostics Systems.

    Google Scholar 

  • Pickles, A. J., & van den Broek, M. D. (1988). Failure to replicate evidence for phobic schemata in agoraphobic patients. British Journal of Clinical Psychology, 27, 271–272.

    Article  PubMed  Google Scholar 

  • Posner, M. I., & Cohen, Y. (1984). Components of visual orienting. In H. Bouma & D. Bouwhuis (Eds.), Attention and performance X (pp. 531–556). London, UK: Erlbaum.

    Google Scholar 

  • Rapee, R. M. (1994). Failure to replicate a memory bias in panic disorder. Journal of Anxiety Disorders, 8, 291–300.

    Article  Google Scholar 

  • Reiss, S. (1991). Expectancy model of fear, anxiety, and panic. Clinical Psychology Review, 11, 141–153.

    Article  Google Scholar 

  • Reiss, S., & McNally, R. J. (1985). Expectancy model of fear. In S. Reiss & R. R. Bootzin (Eds.), Theoretical issues in behavior therapy (pp. 107–121). New York: Academic Press.

    Google Scholar 

  • Reiss, S., Peterson, R. A., Gursky, D. M., & McNally, R. J. (1986). Anxiety sensitivity, anxiety frequency and the prediction of fearfulness. Behaviour Research and Therapy, 24, 1–8.

    Article  PubMed  CAS  Google Scholar 

  • Riemann, B. C., & McNally, R. J. (1995). Cognitive processing of personally relevant information. Cognition and Emotion, 9, 325–340.

    Article  Google Scholar 

  • Ro, T., & Rafal, R. D. (1999). Components of reflexive visual orienting to moving objects. Perception and Psychophysics, 61, 826–836.

    Article  PubMed  CAS  Google Scholar 

  • Schmidt, N. B., Lerew, D. R., & Jackson, R. J. (1997). The role of anxiety sensitivity in the pathogenesis of panic: Prospective evaluation of spontaneous panic attacks during acute stress. Journal of Abnormal Psychology, 106, 355–364.

    Article  PubMed  CAS  Google Scholar 

  • Shostak, B. B., & Peterson, R. A. (1990). Effects of anxiety sensitivity on emotional response to a stress task. Behaviour Research and Therapy, 28, 513–521.

    Article  PubMed  CAS  Google Scholar 

  • Stewart, S. H., Conrod, P. J., Gignac, M. L., & Pihl, R. O. (1998). Selective processing biases in anxiety-sensitive men and women. Cognition and Emotion, 12, 105–133.

    Article  Google Scholar 

  • Stewart, S. H., Taylor, S., & Baker, J. M. (1997). Gender differences in dimensions of anxiety sensitivity. Journal of Anxiety Disorders, 11, 179–200.

    Article  PubMed  CAS  Google Scholar 

  • Stewart, S. H., & Watt, M. C. (2000). Illness attitudes scale dimensions and their associations with anxiety-related constructs in a nonclinical sample. Behaviour Research and Therapy, 38, 83–99.

    Article  PubMed  CAS  Google Scholar 

  • Stewart, S. H., & Watt, M. C. (2001). Assessment of health anxiety. In G. J. G. Asmundson, S. Taylor, & B. J. Cox (Eds.), Health anxiety: Clinical and research perspectives on hypochondriasis and related disorders (pp. 95–131). Sussex, UK: Wiley.

    Google Scholar 

  • Stewart, S. H., Zvolensky, M. J., & Eifert, G. H. (2002). The relationship of anxiety sensitivity, experiential avoidance, and alexithymic coping to young adult’s motivations for drinking. Behavior Modification, 26, 274–296.

    Article  PubMed  Google Scholar 

  • Tabachnick, B. G., & Fidell, L. S. (2001). Using multivariate statistics (4th ed.). Needham Heights, MA: Allyn and Bacon.

    Google Scholar 

  • Taylor, S. (1999). Anxiety sensitivity: Theory, research, and treatment of the fear of anxiety. Mahwah, NJ: Erlbaum.

    Google Scholar 

  • Taylor, T. L. (2005). Inhibition of return following instructions to remember and forget. Quarterly Journal of Experimental Psychology: Human Experimental Psychology, 58A, 613–629.

    Google Scholar 

  • Teachman, B. A. (2005). Information processing and anxiety sensitivity: Cognitive vulnerability to panic reflected in interpretation and memory biases. Cognitive Therapy and Research, 29, 479–499.

    Article  Google Scholar 

  • Teachman, B. A., Smith-Janik, S. B., & Saporito, J. (2007). Information processing biases and panic disorder: Relationships among cognitive and symptom measures. Behaviour Research and Therapy, 45, 1791–1811.

    Article  PubMed  Google Scholar 

  • Tipper, S. P., Rafal, R. D., Reuter-Lorenz, P., Staarveldt, Y., Ro, T., Egly, R., et al. (1997). Object based facilitation and inhibition from visual orienting in the human split-brain. Journal of Experimental Psychology: Human Perception and Performance, 23, 1522–1532.

    Article  PubMed  CAS  Google Scholar 

  • White, K. S., Brown, T. A., Somers, T. J., & Barlow, D. H. (2006). Avoidance behavior in panic disorder: The moderating influence of perceived control. Behaviour Research and Therapy, 44, 147–157.

    Article  PubMed  Google Scholar 

  • Williams, J. M. G., Mathews, A., & MacLeod, C. (1996). The emotional Stroop task and psychopathology. Psychological Bulletin, 120, 3–24.

    Article  PubMed  CAS  Google Scholar 

  • Wilson, K. A., & Hayward, C. (2006). Unique contributions of anxiety sensitivity to avoidance: A prospective study in adolescents. Behaviour Research and Therapy, 44, 601–609.

    Article  PubMed  Google Scholar 

  • Zvolensky, M. J., & Forsyth, J. P. (2002). Anxiety sensitivity dimensions in the prediction of body vigilance and emotional avoidance. Cognitive Therapy and Research, 26, 449–460.

    Article  Google Scholar 

Download references

Acknowledgments

This research was supported by a grant from the Natural Sciences and Engineering Research Council (NSERC) of Canada awarded to Dr. Taylor. Noel was supported by a Canadian Institutes of Health Research (CIHR) CGS Doctoral Research Award, a CIHR Team in Children’s Pain Fellowship, a Nova Scotia Health Research Foundation Doctoral Student Research Award, a Killam Predoctoral Scholarship, and a stipend from the CIHR strategic training initiative on Pain in Child Health at the time this research was conducted. Quinlan was supported by an NSERC Julie Payette scholarship and by a Killam Predoctoral scholarship. Dr. Stewart was supported through a Killam Research Professorship from the Dalhousie University Faculty of Science.

Author information

Authors and Affiliations

  1. Department of Psychology, Dalhousie University, Halifax, NS, B3H 4J1, Canada

    Melanie Noel, Tracy L. Taylor, Chelsea K. Quinlan & Sherry H. Stewart

  2. Departments of Psychiatry, Psychology, and Community Health and Epidemiology, Dalhousie University, Halifax, NS, Canada

    Sherry H. Stewart

Authors
  1. Melanie Noel
    View author publications

    You can also search for this author in PubMed Google Scholar

  2. Tracy L. Taylor
    View author publications

    You can also search for this author in PubMed Google Scholar

  3. Chelsea K. Quinlan
    View author publications

    You can also search for this author in PubMed Google Scholar

  4. Sherry H. Stewart
    View author publications

    You can also search for this author in PubMed Google Scholar

Corresponding author

Correspondence to Melanie Noel.

Appendix

Appendix

See Table 3.

Table 3 Directed forgetting task word list
Full size table

Rights and permissions

Reprints and permissions

About this article

Cite this article

Noel, M., Taylor, T.L., Quinlan, C.K. et al. The Impact of Attention Style on Directed Forgetting Among High Anxiety Sensitive Individuals. Cogn Ther Res 36, 375–389 (2012). https://doi.org/10.1007/s10608-011-9366-y

Download citation

  • Published:

  • Issue Date:

  • DOI: https://doi.org/10.1007/s10608-011-9366-y

Keywords

Search

Navigation