The present research examines whether forming implementation intentions can help people with social anxiety to control their attention and make more realistic appraisals of their performance. In Experiment 1, socially anxious participants (relative to less anxious participants) exhibited an attentional bias toward social threat words in a Visual Dot Probe task. However, socially anxious participants who formed implementation intentions designed to control attention did not exhibit this bias. Using a spatial cuing task, Experiment 2 showed that forming implementation intentions also promoted rapid disengagement from threatening stimuli. Experiment 3 ruled out the possibility that implementation intentions were effective merely because they provided additional goalrelevant information. In Experiment 4, participants gave a speech and subsequently rated their performance. Forming implementation intentions prevented the underestimation of performance that characterises socially anxious individuals. Together, the findings suggest that forming implementation intentions may provide an effective means of handling selfregulatory problems in social anxiety.Word count: 150 (max. 150) KEYWORDS: Self-regulation, implementation intentions, social anxiety, attention Implementation intentions and social anxiety 3 Using Implementation Intentions to Overcome the Effects of Social Anxiety on Attention and Appraisals of PerformanceNumerous theories suggest that differences in attentional responses to threat-related stimuli are an important feature of anxiety disorders (for a review, see Bar-Haim, Lamy, Pergamin, Bakermans-Kranenburg, & van Ijzendoorn, 2007). For example, the cognitive model of social phobia (Clark & Wells, 1995) suggests that the primary fear among socially anxious individuals' is negative evaluation and, as such, they are vigilant for signs that they are being evaluated. Once these evaluative cues are detected (e.g., the person observes a colleague looking at them), Clark and Wells argue that attention is directed toward interoceptive information such as physiological cues that are indicative of anxiety (e.g., an increased heart rate, feelings of blushing, sweating, or dizziness). People with social anxiety then use this interoceptive information to infer how they appear to others (e.g., "I am blushing, so my colleague will think that I am stupid").In an illustrative experiment, Musa, Lepine, Clark, Mansell, and Ehlers (2003) asked participants with social phobia to undertake a variant of the Visual Dot Probe task (VDP; MacLeod, Mathews, & Tata, 1986). Two words were presented simultaneously on a computer screen and one was replaced by either the letter 'E' or the letter 'F'. Participants' task was to indicate which letter was presented. Some words represented social threat (e.g., stupid, pathetic) whereas others were neutral words matched for length and frequency. A measure of attention to social threat was derived by comparing reaction times to probes that replaced social threat versus neutral words, ...

This study investigated the nature of pre-attentive and conscious attentional processing to different categories of threatening words in a non-clinical socially anxious sample. Individuals high (n = 41) and low (n = 41) in social avoidance and distress, as measured by the Social Avoidance and Distress Scale (SAD), performed a visual dotprobe task which included four word groups; negative evaluation, social situations, somatic sensation and physical threat. Participants completed masked trials (14 ms + masking for 486 ms), followed by unmasked trials (500 ms/no mask), under conditions of either social-evaluation or non-evaluation. The results showed that in the social-evaluation condition, high socially anxious individuals, in comparison to the low socially anxious, demonstrated an attentional bias towards masked physical threat words. There were no further attentional processing differences between the social anxiety groups to masked or unmasked stimuli, in either experimental condition. The results suggest that theories of social anxiety might need to accommodate biases to physical threat cues.

Practicing compassion has shown to reduce distress and increase emotional well-being in clinical and non-clinical populations. The existing research is primarily focused on Western populations although the concepts of compassion are heavily influenced by Asian Buddhist views. There is a dearth of compassion research conducted particularly in the Asian context. Therefore, this study aimed to explore the views and lived experiences of compassion in Sri Lankan students, to understand whether compassion is a socially embraced construct in Sri Lanka, considering that Sri Lanka is a Buddhist influenced society. Participants’ views and lived experiences of compassion towards themselves and to/from others were also investigated, with a specific focus on their perceived inhibitors and facilitators of compassion. Aims were set to identify whether Western compassion-based practices could be successfully applied to Asian societies such as Sri Lanka. An Interpretative Phenomenological Analysis approach was used to obtain and analyse qualitative data from a convenience sample of 10 Sri Lankan students, recruited from a Psychology course. The phenomenological analysis of the semi-structured face-to-face interviews elicited three predominant themes: What compassion means to me, what I make of it, and compassion through facilitators and inhibitors. The findings suggested that participants shared a similar understanding of the concept of compassion as reflected in the Western definitions. Experiences and views of compassion were shaped by several factors including religion, culture, society, and upbringing. In general, this study revealed that participants were well aware of the concept of compassion as well as its impact on their psychological well-being. Despite this, inhibitors existed in experiencing compassion. The religious and collectivistic-cultural influences need to be further explored and taken into account when implementing Western compassion-based practices to non-Western contexts such as Sri Lanka.

This evaluation explored first year clinical psychology trainees’ and assessors’ experiences of Observed Structured Clinical Examination (OSCE). Changes to the OSCE based on their feedback helped reduce trainees’ anxiety, promoted trainees’ favourability of the OSCE and increased preparedness for placements.

Background Practising compassion has shown to increase well-being and reduce distress in people across cultures. However, very little research has explored cultural differences in different facets of compassion with a dearth of research evident especially in the Asian context. Several inhibitors and facilitators of compassion have been identified although the nuances of cultural differences of these remain unexploited. This study aimed to discover cross-cultural similarities and differences of the levels of compassion, facilitators and inhibitors of compassion between Sri Lankan and UK people. Methods A cross-sectional, questionnaire-based quantitative research was conducted among 149 Sri Lankan and 300 UK participants. Individual predictors (such as fears of compassion, self-reassurance, external shame, social safeness and pleasure, depression and anxiety) were also explored in relation to compassion, compassion to others, and compassion from others in each group. Results The results indicated that Sri Lankan participants were more self-reassured and self-compassionate and self-identifying as a Buddhist predicted higher self-compassion, when compared to UK participants. However, Sri Lankan participants reported higher levels of external shame and fear of compassion not just towards themselves, but also towards and from others, indicating difficulty in engaging compassionately with others. In contrast, UK participants reported higher social safeness, indicating that they were more likely to feel safe and soothed by the society than the Sri Lankan participants. Conclusions Society plays a pivotal role in shaping one's experiences of compassion. This study suggests that specific cultural and social factors should be considered when implementing Western compassionate approaches to non-Western settings.