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Rituals, such as gazing at faces, are common in body dysmorphic disorder (BDD) and appear in cognitive-behavioral models as a maintaining factor. Rituals are also common in obsessive-compulsive disorder (OCD). In contrast to OCD, the proposed associations between rituals and intrusive thoughts/appearance preoccupation have not been empirically investigated for BDD. We examined if the assumed effect of gazing rituals on attractiveness ratings exists and if it is associated with dissociation. In an experiment, we asked N = 65 non-clinical females to focus on the nose of a photographed face at pre- and post-test. In between, participants gazed at the nose of either the same (relevant gazing) or another face (irrelevant gazing). We found increasing dissociation after gazing in both conditions and a differentially stronger decrease of attractiveness ratings in the relevant gazing condition. Our findings support the hypothesized effect of gazing rituals on attractiveness evaluation in cognitive-behavioral models for BDD.

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Misophonia is characterized by a preoccupation with and strong emotional and behavioral reactions to certain triggers, mostly sounds related to eating and breathing. We applied functional impairment due to misophonic symptoms as a central criterion to investigate differences between clinical misophonia and normative decreased sound tolerance in a large non-random sample of n = 1,881 individuals from an online survey. We assessed the frequency of self-reported misophonia symptoms across various symptom measures, compared severity, triggers and emotional reactions, general psychopathology, interpersonal emotion regulation, and quality of life between both groups with and without functional impairing misophonia. Individuals with functional impairment due to misophonia (n = 839) revealed significantly higher general psychopathology symptoms, lower interpersonal emotion regulation skills, and lower quality of life than individuals without impairment (n = 1,042). Anxious/distressed and annoyed reactions to triggers were experienced more frequently compared to emotional reactions of disgust and sadness or depression in both groups. Overall, the group differences were primarily quantitative in nature. We discuss practical implications regarding classification and treatment and provide cutoffs for each symptom measure derived from group assignment for functional impairment.

Background Many studies display promising results for interventions that are based on Applied Behavior Analysis (ABA) in the treatment of autism spectrum disorder (ASD). Methods: This meta-analysis assessed the effects of such treatments on developmental outcomes in children with ASD and on parental stress based on 11 studies with 632 participants. Results: Compared to treatment as usual, minimal or no treatment, comprehensive ABA-based interventions showed medium effects for intellectual functioning (standardized mean difference SMD = 0.51, 95% CI [0.09; 0.92]) and adaptive behavior (SMD = 0.37, 95% CI [0.03; 0.70]). Language abilities, symptom severity or parental stress did not improve beyond the improvement in control groups. Moderator analyses indicate that language abilities at intake could influence the effect sizes and the influence of treatment intensity might decrease with older age. Conclusions: Practical implications and limitations are discussed.

Background Interpretation biases are suggested to be transdiagnostic phenomena, but have rarely been compared across different disorders and current concerns. Methods We investigated explicit, decision-based, and more implicit, reaction time-based interpretation bias in individuals with body dysmorphic disorder (BDD; N = 29), social anxiety disorder (SAD; N = 36), generalized anxiety disorder (GAD; N = 22), and non-clinical controls (NC; N = 32), using an adapted Word Sentence Association Paradigm (WSAP). Results Results indicated that interpretation bias occurred transdiagnostically, while content-specific bias patterns varied meaningfully across groups. BDD and SAD shared explicit and, more inconsistently, implicit interpretation biases for appearance-related and social situations. The GAD group exhibited an explicit and implicit negative interpretation bias for general situations, and an additional implicit lack of positive bias. Mechanistic Wiener diffusion model analyses revealed that interpretation bias patterns were mainly driven by speeded information uptake, potentially mirroring disorder-specific associative memory organization. Conclusions These findings have important implications for understanding interpretation biases as both etiological and treatment factors.

Interpretation biases are suggested to be transdiagnostic phenomenona, but have rarely been compared across disorders and current concerns. We investigated explicit, decision-based and implicit, reaction time-based interpretation bias in body dysmorphic disorder (BDD; N = 29), social anxiety disorder (SAD; N = 36), generalized anxiety disorder (GAD; N = 22), and non-clinical controls (NC; N = 32). Results indicated that biased interpretation can be found transdiagnostically, while content-specific bias patterns vary with group status. BDD and SAD shared explicit and implicit interpretation biases for appearance-related and social situations, compared to GAD and NC. The GAD group exhibited a negative interpretation bias for general situations, and showed an implicit lack of positive bias. Wiener diffusion model analysis revealed that implicit interpretation biases were driven by potentially stronger associations in associative memory, mirroring current concerns. These findings have vital implications for the understanding of interpretation biases as both etiological and treatment factors.