It is well documented that the content of maladaptive cognitions in anxiety tends to be concerned with the prospect of harmful future events (Beck & Clark, 1988; Kendall & Ingram, 1989). Those who are clinically anxious are more likely to have negatively distorted expectations of the future than are non-anxious individuals (e.g., MacLeod, Tata, Kentish, & Jacobsen, 1997; Miranda & Mennin, 2007). Consistent with this focus, an anxiety-linked negative expectancy bias reflects an inflated tendency for anxious individuals to expect an increased probability of negative relative to positive events. This anticipation of a wide range of negative events has been demonstrated not only in individuals who are clinically anxious (e.g., Borkovec, Alcaine, & Behar, 2004; Dugas et al., 1998), but also in non-clinical individuals who are highly trait anxious (e.g., MacLeod & Byrne, 1996; Stober, 2000). Although an anxiety-linked negative expectancy bias has been documented, current paradigms do not illuminate the conditions that give rise to this bias. In this article, two studies are reported that use a paradigm that provides individuals with valenced information, and then evaluates their tendency to expect positive or negative events to occur in the future. This paradigm is used with both highly trait anxious (HTA) and highly anxiety sensitive (HAS) samples. Trait anxiety reflects the propensity to become anxious across many different contexts (Spielberger, 1983), while anxiety sensitivity reflects the fear of symptoms related to anxiety (e.g., bodily sensations, such as a racing heart) and the belief that these sensations have negative physical, social, or psychological consequences (Reiss, 1991; Reiss & McNally, 1985). While the anxiety-linked tendency to anticipate negative future events has been demonstrated using a variety of paradigms, no methodology has revealed the conditions that give rise to this expectancy bias in anxious samples. Specifically, it is unclear whether this bias occurs regardless of the valence of previously presented information, or whether it is moderated by the valence of previously presented information. In this paper, we consider three potential hypotheses regarding conditions that may lead to an expectancy bias. First, it may be that the expectancy bias seen among anxious individuals is pervasive, such that it is shown across situations. Specifically, anxious individuals may have a more negative expectancy bias (relative to non-anxious individuals), regardless of whether current or recent events are emotionally negative, are emotionally positive, or are conflicting in emotional valence (i.e., containing negative and positive elements). This possibility is referred to as the Pervasive Expectancy Bias Hypothesis (Pervasive-EBH). Pervasive in this context refers to the bias occurring irrespective of differently valenced prior information or preceding events; it does not imply that expectancy biases will persist regardless of context. If an anxiety-linked tendency to show a more negative expectancy bias (relative to non-anxious individuals) is found, but it is moderated by the valence of previously presented information, this would refute the validity of the Pervasive-EBH. The Expectancy Task allows us to test two such hypotheses. The Extrapolation Expectancy Bias Hypothesis (Extrapolation-EBH) suggests that the anxiety-linked elevation in expectations of negative future events is moderated by the (negative or positive) valence of previously presented information. Thus, anxious individuals may expect relatively more negative future events because they exhibit biased extrapolation from current events, relative to non-anxious individuals. For example, anxious individuals may be disproportionately inclined to infer that negative current events will lead to negative future events. Should this be observed, then the degree to which anxious (compared to non-anxious) participants inflate the probability of future negative events will be disproportionately greater when the information they are given indicates that these prior events proceeded in a negative manner. A third hypothesis, the Emotional Weighting Expectancy Bias Hypothesis (Emotional Weighting-EBH), refers to the possibility that the anxiety-linked expectancy bias is moderated by whether or not previously presented information is unresolved or mixed with respect to valence. It is hypothesized that, following the presentation of both positive and negative previous information, anxious individuals may be more likely than non-anxious individuals to assign more weight to the negative (rather than positive) information, construing the overall event as relatively more negative. Consequently, following the presentation of both positive and negative previous information, anxious individuals may be more likely to expect negative future events to occur. The current research presents participants with conflicting (negative and positive) information in order to test this hypothesis. In summary, the three hypotheses presented here differ in terms of whether an anxiety-linked expectancy bias is moderated by the valence of previously presented information. Evaluating these hypotheses requires a task that provides information about the manner in which a range of scenarios proceed, and then assesses participants’ expectancies for alternative possible future events that differ in their emotional valence. By manipulating the valence of information initially presented in each scenario, it is possible to investigate the circumstances under which biased expectation for future positive versus negative events will characterize anxious participants. In the current paper, a paradigm that meets these requirements is used with two anxious samples: the Expectancy Task (Cabeleira, Bucks, Teachman, & MacLeod, 2010). Originally introduced and developed by Cabeleira et al. (2010) and further validated by Steinman, Smyth, Bucks, MacLeod, and Teachman (2013), the Expectancy Task presents participants with information about a range of hypothetical scenarios. The scenarios relate to physical or social events, which may be processed differently by people with different types and levels of anxiety. Most importantly, the scenarios vary in valence, and can be negative (including only negative and neutral events), positive (including only positive and neutral events), or conflicting in valence (including an equal number of positive and negative events). After reading and imagining themselves in the scenarios, participants are required to rate the likelihood of three future events occurring next, which can be negative, positive, or neutral in valence, on a scale of 1 (“very unlikely to happen next”) to 4 (“very likely to happen next”). These ratings reveal anxiety-related bias in the relative tendency to expect positive versus negative future events. By examining whether such expectancy bias is influenced by the valence of the information provided in the initial scenarios, the three anxiety-linked expectancy bias hypotheses described above can be tested. In summary, the current studies have two key aims: 1) to determine whether anxious individuals (HTA in Study 1, HAS in Study 2) show an inflated tendency to anticipate relatively more negative future events relative to non-anxious individuals, which we term an anxiety-linked negative expectancy bias; and 2) to test the three hypotheses described above by evaluating whether such a bias is moderated by the valence of previous events.