Anxiety-mediated facilitation of behavioral inhibition: Threat processing and defensive reactivity during a go/no-go task.

Grillon, Christian; Robinson, Oliver J.; Krimsky, Marissa; O’Connell, Katherine; Alvarez, Gabriella; Ernst, Monique

doi:10.1037/emo0000214

Cited by 21 publications

(20 citation statements)

References 39 publications

(75 reference statements)

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“…Specifically, individuals with mood and anxiety disorders may show avoidance in the face of threats because they inhibit their action tendencies when faced with a perceived negative outcome. This is consistent with prior work demonstrating increased behavioral inhibition under stress ( 13 , 14 ), in pathological anxiety ( 15 ), and in high (nonpathological) trait anxiety ( 22 ) [although see ( 23 )]. Over time, however, individuals may be ultimately able to learn to overcome this bias (i.e., promote instrumental override of pavlovian bias parameters) if they are given the opportunity to experience outcomes (i.e., NGW go probability is lower at the end than go to win reward here).…”

Section: Discussionsupporting

confidence: 91%

“…This is known as pavlovian-instrumental transfer ( 12 ), and we harness it here to measure the degree to which individuals rely on their prepotent avoidance biases. Given that both induced stress ( 13 , 14 ) and pathological anxiety have been associated with increased inhibitory control, it seems plausible that a combination of stress and anxiety will increase reliance on pavlovian inhibitory avoidance biases ( 15 ) [in contrast with depression alone, which might plausibly be associated with reduced reliance on pavlovian approach biases ( 16 )].…”

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confidence: 99%

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Modeling Avoidance in Mood and Anxiety Disorders Using Reinforcement Learning

Mkrtchian

Aylward

Dayan

et al. 2017

Biological Psychiatry

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BackgroundSerious and debilitating symptoms of anxiety are the most common mental health problem worldwide, accounting for around 5% of all adult years lived with disability in the developed world. Avoidance behavior—avoiding social situations for fear of embarrassment, for instance—is a core feature of such anxiety. However, as for many other psychiatric symptoms the biological mechanisms underlying avoidance remain unclear.MethodsReinforcement learning models provide formal and testable characterizations of the mechanisms of decision making; here, we examine avoidance in these terms. A total of 101 healthy participants and individuals with mood and anxiety disorders completed an approach-avoidance go/no-go task under stress induced by threat of unpredictable shock.ResultsWe show an increased reliance in the mood and anxiety group on a parameter of our reinforcement learning model that characterizes a prepotent (pavlovian) bias to withhold responding in the face of negative outcomes. This was particularly the case when the mood and anxiety group was under stress.ConclusionsThis formal description of avoidance within the reinforcement learning framework provides a new means of linking clinical symptoms with biophysically plausible models of neural circuitry and, as such, takes us closer to a mechanistic understanding of mood and anxiety disorders.

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Section: Discussionsupporting

confidence: 91%

mentioning

confidence: 99%

Modeling Avoidance in Mood and Anxiety Disorders Using Reinforcement Learning

Mkrtchian

Aylward

Dayan

et al. 2017

Biological Psychiatry

Self Cite

123

131

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“…it reduced nogo commission errors (failure to inhibit the pre-potent response) without affecting go response time (Robinson et al 2013 a ). We also found, in a recent replication and extension of this finding, a positive correlation between state anxiety and go omission errors; individuals with the highest elevation in state anxiety showed improved nogo accuracy but also impaired go accuracy (Grillon et al 2016). These results suggest that high state anxiety is associated with an overall inhibition of motor responding, a hypothesis that was confirmed in a subsequent reanalysis of these data using signal detection theory to quantify changes in response bias (Snodgrass & Corwin, 1988; McVay & Kane, 2009).…”

Section: Introductionsupporting

confidence: 73%

“…We used a procedure modeled after one of our previous studies (Grillon et al 2016), as described in Fig. 1.…”

Section: Methodsmentioning

confidence: 99%

Clinical anxiety promotes excessive response inhibition

et al. 2016

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Background. Laboratory tasks to delineate anxiety disorder features are used to refine classification and inform our understanding of etiological mechanisms. The present study examines laboratory measures of response inhibition, specifically the inhibition of a pre-potent motor response, in clinical anxiety. Data on associations between anxiety and response inhibition remain inconsistent, perhaps because of dissociable effects of clinical anxiety and experimentally manipulated state anxiety. Few studies directly assess the independent and interacting effects of these two anxiety types (state v. disorder) on response inhibition. The current study accomplished this goal, by manipulating state anxiety in healthy and clinically anxious individuals while they complete a response inhibition task. Method. The study employs the threat-of-shock paradigm, one of the best-established manipulations for robustly increasing state anxiety. Participants included 82 adults (41 healthy; 41 patients with an anxiety disorder). A go/nogo task with highly frequent go trials was administered during alternating periods of safety and shock threat. Signal detection theory was used to quantify response bias and signal-detection sensitivity. Results. There were independent effects of anxiety and clinical anxiety on response inhibition. In both groups, heightened anxiety facilitated response inhibition, leading to reduced nogo commission errors. Compared with the healthy group, clinical anxiety was associated with excessive response inhibition and increased go omission errors in both the safe and threat conditions. Conclusions. Response inhibition and its impact on go omission errors appear to be a promising behavioral marker of clinical anxiety. These results have implications for a dimensional view of clinical anxiety.

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“…On the surface, the fact that attenuation of the startle reflex is only found when viewing pleasant pictures in an anticipatory context seems to support recent studies finding that threat of shock may facilitate response inhibition (e.g., Grillon et al, 2017a, 2017b). In these studies, infrequent NO-GO signals (interspersed among frequent GO signals) showed fewer errors when participants were under threat of shock (i.e., better able to inhibit responses), suggesting that stress facilitates response inhibition, which the researchers note could also be mediated by enhanced sensory processing.…”

Section: Discussionsupporting

confidence: 74%

Startle reflex modulation during threat of shock and “threat” of reward

2017

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During threat of shock, the startle reflex is potentiated, suggesting modulation by defensive mobilization. To determine whether startle potentiation is specific to aversive anticipation, startle reflexes were measured in the context of either aversive or appetitive anticipation in a between-subject study. Participants wore a device on the wrist that could deliver electrical shock (n = 49), or vibrotactile stimulation indicating monetary reward (n = 48). Cues signaling "threat" or "safe" periods were presented alone, or accompanied by presentation of affective and neutral pictures on half of the trials. Results indicated that the startle reflex was significantly potentiated when anticipating either shock or reward, compared to safe periods, both when no picture was presented, as well as during picture viewing. The difference between threat and safety in both reflex magnitude and skin conductance changes was larger for those anticipating shock, suggesting that the aversive context was more motivationally engaging. The pattern of reflex modulation as a function of picture valence varied under threat and safety, but was identical in the shock and reward groups, consistent with a hypothesis that anticipation of either aversive or appetitive events prompts heightened perceptual vigilance, potentiating the acoustic startle reflex.

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Anxiety-mediated facilitation of behavioral inhibition: Threat processing and defensive reactivity during a go/no-go task.

Cited by 21 publications

References 39 publications

Modeling Avoidance in Mood and Anxiety Disorders Using Reinforcement Learning

Modeling Avoidance in Mood and Anxiety Disorders Using Reinforcement Learning

Clinical anxiety promotes excessive response inhibition

Startle reflex modulation during threat of shock and “threat” of reward

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