A Reduced Self-Positive Belief Underpins Greater Sensitivity to Negative Evaluation in Socially Anxious Individuals

Hopkins, Alexandra; Dolan, Raymond J.; Button, Katherine S; Moutoussis, Michael

doi:10.5334/cpsy.57

Cited by 20 publications

(32 citation statements)

References 41 publications

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“…This aligns with ongoing work characterizing the computational underpinnings of aberrant self-relevant learning associated with clinical symptomatology (Will et al, 2017, 2020). For example, depressed individuals learn more from negative feedback relative to healthy controls (Garrett et al, 2014), and socially anxious individuals exhibit greater sensitivity to negative feedback (Hopkins et al, 2021).…”

Section: Discussionmentioning

confidence: 99%

Learning About the Self: Motives for Coherence and Positivity Constrain Learning From Self-Relevant Social Feedback

2022

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People learn about themselves from social feedback, but desires for coherence and positivity constrain how feedback is incorporated into the self-concept. We developed a network-based model of the self-concept and embedded it in a reinforcement-learning framework to provide a computational account of how motivations shape self-learning from feedback. Participants ( N = 46 adult university students) received feedback while evaluating themselves on traits drawn from a causal network of trait semantics. Network-defined communities were assigned different likelihoods of positive feedback. Participants learned from positive feedback but dismissed negative feedback, as reflected by asymmetries in computational parameters that represent the incorporation of positive versus negative outcomes. Furthermore, participants were constrained in how they incorporated feedback: Self-evaluations changed less for traits that have more implications and are thus more important to the coherence of the network. We provide a computational explanation of how motives for coherence and positivity jointly constrain learning about the self from feedback, an explanation that makes testable predictions for future clinical research.

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Section: Discussionmentioning

confidence: 99%

Learning About the Self: Motives for Coherence and Positivity Constrain Learning From Self-Relevant Social Feedback

2022

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“…Additionally, we employed a novel task that was able to integrate self, emotion, and reward processing. We have previously validated the use of this task in individuals experiencing varying levels of depression (Hobbs et al, 2019(Hobbs et al, , 2021 and anxiety (Button et al, 2012(Button et al, , 2015Hopkins et al, 2021).…”

Section: Strengthsmentioning

confidence: 99%

The relationship between change in social evaluation learning and mood in early antidepressant treatment: a prospective cohort study in primary care

Hobbs¹,

Beck²,

Denham³

et al. 2022

Preprint

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Background: It has been proposed that antidepressants operate by increasing sensitivity to positive versus negative information. Increasing positive affective learning within social contexts may play a key role in remediating negative self-schema. We investigated the association between change in biased learning of social evaluations about the self and others, and mood during early antidepressant treatment. Method: Prospective cohort assessing patients recruited from primary care sites in South West England at four timepoints over the first 8 weeks of antidepressant treatment. At each timepoint participants completed self-report measures of depression (BDI-II, PHQ-9), anxiety (GAD-7), and a computerised task measuring learning of social evaluations about the self, a friend, and a stranger. Results: We did not find evidence that learning about the self was associated with a reduction in PHQ-9 (b=0.08, 95%CI:-0.05,0.20, p=0.239) or BDI-II scores (b=0.10, 95%CI:-0.18,0.38, p=0.469). We found some weak evidence that increased positive learning about the friend was associated with a reduction in BDI-II scores (b=0.30, 95%CI:-0.02, 0.62, p=0.069). However, exploratory analyses indicated stronger evidence that increased positive learning about the self (b=0.18, 95% CI:0.07,0.28, p=0.002) and a friend (b=0.22, 95%CI:0.10,0.35, p=0.001) was associated with a reduction in anxiety.Conclusions: Change in social evaluation learning was more reliably associated with a reduction in anxiety rather than depression. Antidepressants may treat anxiety symptoms by remediating negative affective biases towards socially threatening information directed towards the self and close others. However, our findings are based on exploratory analyses within a small sample and require further replication.

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“…Activation of subcortical reward regions in conjunction with midline cortical structures has been proposed to mediate the development of social identity during adolescence (Pfeifer & Berkman, 2018). Recent computational modelling work examining self-relevant learning suggests socially anxious individuals learn more from negative information about self due to a reduction in a baseline positive self-bias present in healthy individuals (Hopkins et al, 2021). In sum, these data from both healthy participants and eating disorder patients suggest a possible neurodevelopmental model in AN through which impaired processing of reward interferes with formation of a stable and positive sense of self-identity during young adulthood.…”

Section: Introductionmentioning

confidence: 99%

Neural processes related to negative self‐concept in adult and adolescent anorexia nervosa

Mendoza

Palka

Pelfrey

et al. 2021

Euro Eating Disorders Rev

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Objective: Negative self-concept is characteristic of anorexia nervosa (AN), but the neural processes mediating this component of AN is unknown. These studies investigated how valence and social perspectives impact neural processing in both adults and adolescents with AN. Method:In an fMRI task, participants evaluated positive and negative adjectives from three social perspectives. Two studies were completed, one in 59 women (healthy, with AN, recovered from AN) and one in 42 adolescents (healthy, with AN). Neural regions of interest (ROIs) related to valence were identified and activations compared across groups and social perspectives.Results: Behaviourally, both adult and adolescent cohorts with AN were less positive during self-evaluations. In the adult study, neural differences related to clinical group and condition were observed in ROIs more responsive to positive social stimuli (medial prefrontal cortex, precuneus, left temporoparietal junction) but not in ROIs more responsive to negative social stimuli. No neural differences in relation to clinical group were observed in the adolescents. Conclusions: Behavioural differences related to negative self-concept are present in both adolescents and adults with AN, and neural differences, selective for positive social stimuli, were also observed in adults. AN may interfere with neurodevelopmental processes involved in positive self-concept.

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A Reduced Self-Positive Belief Underpins Greater Sensitivity to Negative Evaluation in Socially Anxious Individuals

Cited by 20 publications

References 41 publications

Learning About the Self: Motives for Coherence and Positivity Constrain Learning From Self-Relevant Social Feedback

Learning About the Self: Motives for Coherence and Positivity Constrain Learning From Self-Relevant Social Feedback

The relationship between change in social evaluation learning and mood in early antidepressant treatment: a prospective cohort study in primary care

Neural processes related to negative self‐concept in adult and adolescent anorexia nervosa

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