Back to Search Start Over

Variability of attention bias in socially anxious adolescents: differences in fixation duration toward adult and adolescent face stimuli.

Authors :
Wieckowski AT
Capriola-Hall NN
Elias R
Ollendick TH
White SW
Source :
Cognition & emotion [Cogn Emot] 2019 Jun; Vol. 33 (4), pp. 825-831. Date of Electronic Publication: 2018 May 18.
Publication Year :
2019

Abstract

Prior research on attention bias in anxious youth, often utilising a visual dot probe task, has yielded inconsistent findings, which may be due to how bias is assessed and/or variability in the phenomenon. The present study utilises eye gaze tracking to assess attention bias in socially anxious adolescents, and explores several methodological and within-subject factors that may contribute to variability in attention bias. Attention bias to threat was measured in forty-two treatment-seeking adolescents (age 12-16 years) diagnosed with Social Anxiety Disorder. Bias scores toward emotional stimuli (vigilant attention) and bias scores away from emotional stimuli (avoidant attention) were explored. Bias scores changed between vigilance and avoidance within individuals and over the course of stimulus presentation. These differences were not associated with participant characteristics nor with self-reported social anxiety symptoms. However, clinician rated severity of social anxiety, explained a significant proportion of variance in the bias scores for adult, but not the adolescent, stimuli. Variability in attention bias among socially anxious adolescents is common and varies as a function of stimulus duration and type. Results may inform stimulus selection for future research.

Details

Language :
English
ISSN :
1464-0600
Volume :
33
Issue :
4
Database :
MEDLINE
Journal :
Cognition & emotion
Publication Type :
Academic Journal
Accession number :
29774787
Full Text :
https://doi.org/10.1080/02699931.2018.1476322