Recollective experience and recognition memory for threat in clinical anxiety states

Abstract

Recognition memory for threat and nonthreat words was examined in generally anxious patients in relation to normal control subjects. Two types of response in recognition memory (“know” and “remember”) were used to test predictions from Williams, Watts, MacLeod, and Mathews’s (1988) cognitive model of anxiety. The results failed to support the hypothesis that anxiety is associated with an implicit memory bias favoring threat (as measured by “know” responses) and an explicit memory bias against threat (as measured by “remember” responses). The findings are discussed in relation to recent research which suggests that there are two functionally independent systems within implicit memory.