Abstract
Biases in attention processes are thought to play a crucial role in the aetiology and maintenance of Social Anxiety Disorder (SAD). The goal of the present study was to examine the efficacy of a programme intended to train attention towards positive cues and a programme intended to train attention towards negative cues. In a randomised, controlled, double-blind design, the impact of these two training conditions on both selective attention and social anxiety were compared to that of a control training condition. A modified dot probe task was used, and delivered via the internet. A total of 129 individuals, diagnosed with SAD, were randomly assigned to one of these three conditions and took part in a 14-day programme with daily training/control sessions. Participants in all three groups did not on average display an attentional bias prior to the training. Critically, results on change in attention bias implied that significantly differential change in selective attention to threat was not detected in the three conditions. However, symptoms of social anxiety reduced significantly from pre- to follow-up-assessment in all three conditions (dwithin = 0.63–1.24), with the procedure intended to train attention towards threat cues producing, relative to the control condition, a significantly greater reduction of social fears. There were no significant differences in social anxiety outcome between the training condition intended to induce attentional bias towards positive cues and the control condition. To our knowledge, this is the first RCT where a condition intended to induce attention bias to negative cues yielded greater emotional benefits than a control condition. Intriguingly, changes in symptoms are unlikely to be by the mechanism of change in attention processes since there was no change detected in bias per se. Implications of this finding for future research on attention bias modification in social anxiety are discussed.Trial RegistrationClinicalTrials.gov NCT01463137
Highlights
Cognitive models of Social Anxiety Disorder (SAD) suggest that affected individuals experience social situations in ways that contribute to the maintenance of the disorder [1,2]
Participants were advised that the study aimed at modifying biased attention processes typical for individuals with social anxiety and that attention bias modification programmes had proven effective in previous scientific studies
Limitations While the current study provides the important demonstration that an ‘attend to threat’ attention bias modification (ABM) procedure may attenuate social anxiety in individuals with SAD, it has limitations
Summary
Cognitive models of Social Anxiety Disorder (SAD) suggest that affected individuals experience social situations in ways that contribute to the maintenance of the disorder [1,2]. The cognitive models purport that, in social situations, individuals with SAD focus their attention on information that indicates social failure. This can either be internal threat cues (e.g., the perception of one’s hands trembling), or external threat cues, (e.g., a negative facial expression in the social counterpart). Anxiety-linked attention bias towards social threat cues has been demonstrated by studies applying the dotprobe paradigm. In this paradigm, two stimuli (e.g., one neutral and one social threat word) are simultaneously displayed on a screen for a certain length of time. Two studies using the dot-probe paradigm revealed an attention bias away from threat at 500 ms [8,23] supported by two eye-tracking studies [17,24]
Sign-in/Register to view highlights & summary Sign-in/Register to access full text options 
Talk to us
Join us for a 30 min session where you can share your feedback and ask us any queries you have
Schedule a callDisclaimer: All third-party content on this website/platform is and will remain the property of their respective owners and is provided on "as is" basis without any warranties, express or implied. Use of third-party content does not indicate any affiliation, sponsorship with or endorsement by them. Any references to third-party content is to identify the corresponding services and shall be considered fair use under The CopyrightLaw.
