Assessment of intrusive cognition in PTSD: Use of the modified Stroop paradigm

McNally, Richard J.; English, George E.; Lipke, Howard

doi:10.1002/jts.2490060105

Cited by 130 publications

(51 citation statements)

References 12 publications

Supporting

Mentioning

Contrasting

Unclassified

Order By: Relevance

“…'body-bag') relative to several categories of control words. Delayed color-naming for trauma-related words was found in several samples of PTSD-patients, including Vietnam veterans (McNally et al, 1993), rape victims (Foa et al, 1991), and motor vehicle accident survivors (Bryant and Harvey, 1997). Since delays in color-naming are involuntary, this indicates that PTSDpatients have an automatic attentional bias to trauma words.…”

Section: Automatic Processing Of Trauma-related Informationmentioning

confidence: 99%

See 1 more Smart Citation

Are the neural substrates of memory the final common pathway in posttraumatic stress disorder (PTSD)?

Elzinga

Bremner

2002

Journal of Affective Disorders

425

277

View full text Add to dashboard Cite

A model for the posttraumatic stress disorder (PTSD) as a disorder of memory is presented drawing both on psychological and neurobiological data. Evidence on intrusive memories and deficits in declarative memory function in PTSD-patients is reviewed in relation to three brain areas that are involved in memory functioning and the stress response: the hippocampus, amygdala, and the prefrontal cortex. Neurobiological studies have shown that the noradrenergic stress-system is involved in enhanced encoding of emotional memories, sensitization, and fear conditioning, by way of its effects on the amygdala. Chronic stress also affects the hippocampus, a brain area involved in declarative memories, suggesting that hippocampal dysfunction may partly account for the deficits in declarative memory in PTSD-patients. Deficits in the medial prefrontal cortex, a structure that normally inhibits the amygdala, may further enhance the effects of the amygdala, thereby increasing the frequency and intensity of the traumatic memories. Thus, by way of its influence on these brain structures, exposure to severe stress may simultaneously result in strong emotional reactions and in difficulties to recall the emotional event. This model is also relevant for understanding the distinction between declarative and non-declarative memoryfunctions in processing trauma-related information in PTSD. Implications of our model are reviewed.

show abstract

Section: Automatic Processing Of Trauma-related Informationmentioning

confidence: 99%

“…Accordingly, PFC dysfunction may also play a role in the interference on Stroop-tasks (e.g. McNally et al, 1990McNally et al, , 1993 and lack of inhibition (Vasterling et al, 1998) of PTSD-patients.…”

Section: The Prefrontal Cortexmentioning

confidence: 99%

Are the neural substrates of memory the final common pathway in posttraumatic stress disorder (PTSD)?

Elzinga

Bremner

2002

Journal of Affective Disorders

425

277

View full text Add to dashboard Cite

show abstract

“…Mismatch between the color and content of the word (e.g., the word "green" printed in red) typically results in a longer response latency, which has been typically regarded as evidence of cognitive interference. Modified versions of Stroop tests presenting emotional threat words have been used to examine attentional biases in numerous conditions, including depression (Klieger & Cordner, 1990;Segal, Truchon, Gemar, & Guirguis, 1995;Segal & Vella, 1990), panic disorder (McNally et al, 1994;McNally, Riemann, & Kim, 1990;McNally, Riemann, Louro, Lukach, & Kim, 1992), obsessive-compulsive disorder (Foa, Ilai, McCarthy, Shoyer, & Murdock, 1993;Lavy, Vanoppen, & Vandenhout, 1994), posttraumatic stress disorder (Foa, Feske, Murdock, Kozak, & Mccarthy, 1991;Kaspi, McNally, & Amir, 1995;McNally, English, & Lipke, 1993), specific phobia (Lavy, Vandenhout, & Arntz, 1993;Mathews & Sebastian, 1993), and SAD (Becker, Rinck, Margraf, & Roth, 2001;Hope, Rapee, Heimberg, & Dombeck, 1990;Lundh & Ost, 1996;Maidenberg, Chen, Craske, Bohn, & Bystritsky, 1996;Mattia, Heimberg, & Hope, 1993;McNeil et al, 1995;Spector, response latencies to threat words in contrast with non-threat words have been deemed to indicate selective attention towards the threat.…”

Section: Emotional Stroop Testmentioning

confidence: 99%

Attentional biases in social anxiety: An investigation using the inattentional blindness paradigm

Lee

Telch

2008

Behaviour Research and Therapy

View full text Add to dashboard Cite

Social anxiety disorder is the third most common mental disorder with the lifetime prevalence rate of 13.3% in the US population. Typically, it causes significant impairment in a wide range of functioning and follows a chronic, unremitting course if untreated. Over the past two decades, there has been a dramatic increase in clinical research aimed at examining underlying mechanisms maintaining social anxiety.One line of research has investigated attentional biases in social anxiety, using various cognitive experiment paradigms, including the emotional Stroop and the modified dotprobe tasks. However, overall findings are equivocal about the nature of attentional biases in social anxiety and several methodological problems limit the interpretability of the data. The present study examined attentional biases associated with social anxiety using a new research paradigm in the field of anxiety disorders: the inattentional blindness paradigm. This paradigm presents a social cue in the absence of the subjects' expectation while they are engaged in a cognitively demanding task, thereby enabling the v more purely attentional aspect of information processing to be examined reducing the influence of potential response biases or effortful strategies. Two independent experiments were conducted using nonclinical student samples consisting of individuals high in social anxiety (HSAs) versus individuals low in social anxiety (LSAs) based on the static and sustained inattentional blindness tasks. Overall, results revealed that HSAs were more likely to detect or identify a socially-threatening cue, relative to LSAs; whereas LSAs were more likely to detect or identify a non-threatening social cue, relative to HSAs. These findings were observed only in the presence of a bogus-speech manipulation. These data suggest the promising utility of the inattentional blindness paradigm in investigating attentional biases in social anxiety and perhaps other psychopathological conditions. Theoretical and clinical implications are discussed.vi

show abstract

“…Previous studies whose researchers used such methods have shown patients with PTSD to be characterized by informationprocessing biases that may be related to intrusive cognitive symptoms. First, an attentional bias favoring the processing of trauma-related information has been repeatedly demonstrated in patients with PTSD but not in controls (e.g., Bryant & Harvey, 1995;Foa, Feske, Murdock, Kozak, & McCarthy, 1991;Kaspi, McNally, & Amir, 1995;McNally, English, & Lipke, 1993;McNally et al, 1987;Thrasher, Dalgleish, & Yule, 1994). For example, Bryant and Harvey ( 1995 ) compared the performance of individuals involved in motor vehicle accidents with PTSD, simple phobia of driving, or low anxiety on an emotional Stroop color-naming paradigm.…”

Section: Cognitive Effects Of Alcohol In Ptsdmentioning

confidence: 99%

“…Some clinical researchers have also advocated the use of cognitive psychology paradigms, such as the emotional Stroop task, as additional clinical assessment tools (e.g., McNally et al, 1993). There are several interviews available for diagnosing PTSD (for a review, see Blake et al, 1995).…”

Section: Assessmentmentioning

confidence: 99%