Implementing Psychophysiology in Clinical Assessments of Adolescent Social Anxiety: Use of Rater Judgments Based on Graphical Representations of Psychophysiology

Abstract

OBJECTIVE Social stressor tasks induce adolescents’ social distress as indexed by low-cost psychophysiological methods. Unknown is how to incorporate these methods within clinical assessments. Having assessors judge graphical depictions of psychophysiological data may facilitate detections of data patterns that may be difficult to identify using judgments about numerical depictions of psychophysiological data. Specifically, the Chernoff Face method involves graphically representing data using features on the human face (eyes, nose, mouth, and face shape). This method capitalizes on humans’ abilities to discern subtle variations in facial features. Using adolescent heart rate norms and Chernoff Faces, we illustrated a method for implementing psychophysiology within clinical assessments of adolescent social anxiety. METHOD Twenty-two clinic-referred adolescents completed a social anxiety self-report and provided psychophysiological data using wireless heart rate monitors during a social stressor task. We graphically represented participants’ psychophysiological data and normative adolescent heart rates. For each participant, two undergraduate coders made comparative judgments between the dimensions (eyes, nose, mouth, and face shape) of two Chernoff Faces. One Chernoff Face represented a participant’s heart rate within a context (baseline, speech preparation, or speech-giving). The second Chernoff Face represented normative heart rate data matched to the participant’s age. RESULTS Using Chernoff faces, coders reliably and accurately identified contextual variation in participants’ heart rate responses to social stress. Further, adolescents’ self-reported social anxiety symptoms predicted Chernoff Face judgments, and judgments could be differentiated by social stress context. CONCLUSIONS Our findings have important implications for implementing psychophysiology within clinical assessments of adolescent social anxiety.

Toward Developing Laboratory-Based Parent–Adolescent Conflict Discussion Tasks that Consistently Elicit Adolescent Conflict-Related Stress Responses: Support from Physiology and Observed Behavior

“…Throughout the tasks, we took peripheral measures of adolescents’ psychophysiology using ambulatory HR monitors (i.e., Polar Electro RS800CX), consistent with prior work in this age range (e.g., Anderson and Hope 2009; De Los Reyes and Aldao 2015; De Los Reyes et al 2012a, 2015; Thomas et al 2012). The equipment involved a watch worn on the wrist of the non-dominant hand, and an elastic band around their ribcage that is worn underneath their clothes.…”

The validity of the multi-informant approach to assessing child and adolescent mental health.

“…Specifically, individuals experiencing social anxiety vary in that some experience social anxiety in different ways, depending on the context (e.g., Bögels et al, 2010). Direct assessments of physiological arousal may distinguish social anxiety patients' experiences within and across these contexts (e.g., arousal during public speaking vs. arousal in anticipation of public speaking; De Los Reyes, Augenstein et al, 2015). These assessments have great potential as validity indicators to interpret informants' reports (De Los Reyes & Aldao, 2015).…”

Introduction to the Special Issue: Discrepancies in Adolescent–Parent Perceptions of the Family and Adolescent Adjustment

“…Using this approach, researchers gather reports from those involved in family interactions (e.g., parents and adolescents). Multiple informants' reports may also be augmented by data from other sources, such as independent observers' ratings of family interactions (e.g., level of warmth or hostility displayed within a laboratory-based family discussion task; De Los Reyes et al 2015b), or direct assessments of physiological processes as they manifest within relevant contexts (e.g., elevations in arousal or decreased physiological flexibility displayed during computer-based tasks, unstructured home observations, periods of social stress, or a resting period; Aldao and De Los Reyes 2015;De Los Reyes et al 2015a;De Los Reyes and Aldao 2015;Cohen et al 2015;Franklin et al 2015;Leitzke et al 2015;McLaughlin et al 2015;Youngstrom and De Los Reyes 2015). Further, a key focus of this approach involves collecting assessments of psychosocial outcomes commonly linked to family functioning, such as adolescent psychosocial functioning, which may also leverage multi-informant, multi-method measurement approaches (e.g., reports of adolescents' mental health from adolescents, parents, teachers, clinicians, and independent observers).…”