Low Anxious Subjects Research Articles

Analysis of the effect of music therapy on psychological anxiety relief based on artificial intelligence recognition

Abstract In order to improve the accuracy and reliability of EEG emotion recognition and avoid the problems of poor decomposition effect and long time consumption caused by manual parameter selection, this paper constructs an EEG emotion recognition model based on optimized variational modal decomposition. Aiming at the modal aliasing problem existing in traditional decomposition methods, the KH algorithm is used to search for the optimal penalty factor and the number of decomposition layers of the VMD, and KH-VMD decomposition is performed on the EEG signals in the DEAP dataset. The time-domain, frequency-domain, and nonlinear features of IMFs under different time windows are extracted, respectively, and the Catboost classifier completes the construction of the EEG emotion recognition model and emotion classification. Considering the two conditions of the complexity of the network structure of the KH-VMD model and the average classification accuracy of different brain regions in different music environments, the WEE features of the target EEG can constitute the optimal classification network by taking the WEE features of the target EEG as the input of the KH-VMD classification model. At this time, the average classification accuracy that can be obtained with differentiated brain regions and differentiated music environments is 0.8314 and 0.8204. After 8 weeks of music therapy, the experimental group’s low anxiety scores of pleasure and arousal on the Negative Picture SAM scale were 3.11 and 3.2, which were significantly lower than those of the control group’s low-anxiety subjects. The experimental group with high anxiety had anxiety scores and sleep quality scores that were 5.23 and 3.01 points lower than before the intervention. Therefore, music therapy can effectively alleviate psychological anxiety and enhance sleep quality.

Anxiety is not the right choice! Individual differences in trait anxiety modulate biases in pseudoneglect.

Pseudoneglect, the tendency to display a leftward perceptual bias, is consistently observed in line bisection tasks. Some studies have shown that pseudoneglect is sensitive to emotions. This emotion-related modulation is likely related to valence-dependent hemispheric lateralization, although the results do not converge. A possible explanation for these inconsistencies could be individual differences in emotional tone. Considering that negative and positive emotions produce different basic activations of the two hemispheres, emotional characteristics of the subjects, such as trait anxiety, could in fact modulate the pseudoneglect phenomenon. To verify this, high- and low-anxiety participants were asked to centrally bisect horizontal lines delimited by neutral or emotional (happy and sad) faces. In line with previous studies, results here showed a decrease in the leftward bisection error in the presence of happy faces, indicating a greater involvement of the left hemisphere in processing positive emotional stimuli. In addition, trait anxiety influenced the magnitude of the visual bias. High-anxiety subjects, compared to low-anxiety subjects, showed a general bias in visual attention toward the left space as a function of emotional valence. Results are discussed within the framework of valence-dependent hemispheric specialization and the relative degree of activation. In sum, our data highlight the relevance of considering emotional individual differences in studying the pseudoneglect phenomenon.

Buildup of implementation intention reduces anticipatory anxiety in a high-anxiety population

Previous research demonstrates that the cue–target paradigm is effective in inducing anticipatory anxiety, whereas the setup of implementation intention is effective in relieving anticipatory anxiety in a healthy sample. However, exploring whether this method can reduce anticipatory anxiety symptoms in high-anxiety individuals is necessary. The response to this question is of importance to clinical application. For this reason, this study applied the cue–target paradigm to induce anticipatory anxiety to potential negative pictures in subjects classified as high- vs. low-anxiety individuals. In addition, subjects were instructed to receive implementation intention or no-regulation instructions to examine the variation in the regulatory effects of implementation intention according to the severity of anxiety. The results demonstrated that high-anxiety participants exhibited increased anticipatory anxiety during uncertain and negative cues compared with those of low-anxiety subjects. In addition, anticipatory anxiety was reduced during implementation intention relative to the control condition. The size of this reduction was similar between the high- and low-anxiety groups. Third, the buildup of implementation intention reduced the anticipatory anxiety of high-anxiety individuals to a level similar to that of low-anxiety individuals in the control condition. These results suggest that setting up implementation intention can effectively down-regulate the symptoms of anticipatory anxiety in a high-anxiety population.

How do you feel during the COVID-19 pandemic? A survey using psychological and linguistic self-report measures, and machine learning to investigate mental health, subjective experience, personality, and behaviour during the COVID-19 pandemic among university students

BackgroundThe WHO has raised concerns about the psychological consequences of the current COVID-19 pandemic, negatively affecting health across societies, cultures and age-groups.MethodsThis online survey study investigated mental health, subjective experience, and behaviour (health, learning/teaching) among university students studying in Egypt or Germany shortly after the first pandemic lockdown in May 2020. Psychological assessment included stable personality traits, self-concept and state-like psychological variables related to (a) mental health (depression, anxiety), (b) pandemic threat perception (feelings during the pandemic, perceived difficulties in describing, identifying, expressing emotions), (c) health (e.g., worries about health, bodily symptoms) and behaviour including perceived difficulties in learning. Assessment methods comprised self-report questions, standardized psychological scales, psychological questionnaires, and linguistic self-report measures. Data analysis comprised descriptive analysis of mental health, linguistic analysis of self-concept, personality and feelings, as well as correlational analysis and machine learning. N = 220 (107 women, 112 men, 1 = other) studying in Egypt or Germany provided answers to all psychological questionnaires and survey items.ResultsMean state and trait anxiety scores were significantly above the cut off scores that distinguish between high versus low anxious subjects. Depressive symptoms were reported by 51.82% of the student sample, the mean score was significantly above the screening cut off score for risk of depression. Worries about health (mental and physical health) and perceived difficulties in identifying feelings, and difficulties in learning behaviour relative to before the pandemic were also significant. No negative self-concept was found in the linguistic descriptions of the participants, whereas linguistic descriptions of feelings during the pandemic revealed a negativity bias in emotion perception. Machine learning (exploratory) predicted personality from the self-report data suggesting relations between personality and subjective experience that were not captured by descriptive or correlative data analytics alone.ConclusionDespite small sample sizes, this multimethod survey provides important insight into mental health of university students studying in Egypt or Germany and how they perceived the first COVID-19 pandemic lockdown in May 2020. The results should be continued with larger samples to help develop psychological interventions that support university students across countries and cultures to stay psychologically resilient during the pandemic.

During vigilance to painful stimuli: slower response rate is related to high trait anxiety, whereas faster response rate is related to high state anxiety.

A pathological increase in vigilance, or hypervigilance, may be related to pain intensity in some clinical pain syndromes and may result from attention bias to salient stimuli mediated by anxiety. During a continuous performance task where subjects discriminated painful target stimuli from painful nontargets, we measured detected targets (hits), nondetected targets (misses), nondetected nontargets (correct rejections), and detected nontargets (false alarms). Using signal detection theory, we calculated response bias, the tendency to endorse a stimulus as a target, and discriminability, the ability to discriminate a target from nontarget. Owing to the relatively slow rate of stimulus presentation, our primary hypothesis was that sustained performance would result in a more conservative response bias reflecting a lower response rate over time on task. We found a more conservative response bias with time on task and no change in discriminability. We predicted that greater state and trait anxiety would lead to a more liberal response bias. A multivariable model provided partial support for our prediction; high trait anxiety related to a more conservative response bias (lower response rate), whereas high state anxiety related to a more liberal bias. This inverse relationship of state and trait anxiety is consistent with reports of effects of state and trait anxiety on reaction times to threatening stimuli. In sum, we report that sustained attention to painful stimuli was associated with a decrease in the tendency of the subject to respond to any stimulus over time on task, whereas the ability to discriminate target from nontarget remains unchanged.NEW & NOTEWORTHY During a series of painful stimuli requiring subjects to respond to targets, we separated response willingness from ability to discriminate targets from nontargets. Response willingness declined during the task, with no change in subjects' ability to discriminate, consistent with previous vigilance studies. High trait anxious subjects were less willing to respond and showed slower reaction times to hits than low anxious subjects. This study reveals an important role of trait anxiety in pain vigilance.

Neurophysiological markers of high anxiety level in man during the process of preparing for a visual recognition

By means of EEG analysis the functional state of subjects with high and low levels of anxiety was studied in different periods preceding a cognitive task - a visual expression recognition. Several conditions were investigated: background/eyes closed; background/eyes opened; listening the instruction for the cognitive task; operative rest (time lapse between listening the instruction and the beginning of the task), as well as short intervals immediately preceding the exposition of target stimuli (stage of preparation) - pairs of faces pictures with identical or different emotional expressions. At all these pre-task stages high-anxiety subjects exhibited much lower amplitude values in alpha and theta bands (as compared with low-anxiety subjects). The most prominent differences were revealed in the phases of instruction listening and operative rest. These data could provide more precise electrophysiological markers of anxiety level in conditions preceeding cognitive task performance.

Cerebral White Matter Changes in Young Healthy Individuals With High Trait Anxiety: A Tract-Based Spatial Statistics Study

Background: Abnormalities in prespecified and empirical white matter tracts in young patients with anxiety-related disorders have been reported in some diffusion tensor imaging (DTI) studies. However, with few literatures examining the association between the integrity of whole brain white matter and trait anxiety levels in the non-clinical populations, whether white matter changes arise in young healthy individuals with high trait anxiety remains unknown.Methods: We examined whole brain white matter alterations in young healthy individuals with high anxiety but without history of neurological or psychiatric disorders via DTI technology. Group comparison of tract-based spatial statistics (TBSS) was performed to investigate the microstructural diffusion alterations in 38 high anxious subjects in comparison with 34 low anxious subjects matched with age, gender, and degree of education. These analyses controlled for depression to establish specificity to trait anxiety.Results: Young healthy subjects with high trait anxiety had significantly decreased fractional anisotropy (FA) values in multiple clusters, including corona radiate (CR), anterior thalamic radiation (ATR), inferior fronto-occipital fasciculus (IFOF), bilaterally, body, genu, and splenium of corpus callosum (CC) and forceps minor, compared with low trait anxious subjects. For the abnormal FA regions, the other diffusion metrics were also altered slightly.Conclusions: Non-clinical individuals with high anxiety already have white matter alterations in the thalamus-cortical circuit and some emotion-related areas that were widely reported in anxiety-related disorders. The altered white matter may be a vulnerability marker in individuals at high risk of clinical anxiety. These findings can deepen our understanding of the pathological mechanism of anxiety and further support the need for preventive interventions in high anxiety individuals.

Styles of coping and the level of dogmatism in utterance texts as an indicator of anxiety in situations of social exposure

Abstract A study was carried out involving persons representing high-anxious, low-anxious and repressor types according to the classification of Weinberger, Davidson & Schwartz (1979), selected using the Marlowe-Crowne Social Desirability Scale and the trait anxiety scale of the Spielberger State-Trait Anxiety Inventory. In seeking indicators of anxiety in repressors and high-anxious groups, the authors decided to analyse the level of dogmatism observed in utterance texts. The research was intended to determine whether styles of coping with threatening stimuli condition the level of dogmatism, which was regarded as a cognitive defence mechanism against anxiety. The method of formal analysis of texts (speeches given by the participants in a situation of social exposure) was used to identify their level of dogmatism, measured using the Dogmatism Quotient developed by Ertel. The highest value of the Dogmatism Quotient was recorded for repressors, and the lowest for the low-anxious subjects; a similar pattern was also observed for certain particular dimensions of dogmatism. Statistically significant differences in the level of dogmatism were found between the repressor and lowanxious groups and between the high-anxious and low-anxious groups. The study confirmed the previously discovered pattern whereby repressors exhibit more similarities to high-anxious than to low-anxious persons.

On the existence of synchrostates in multichannel EEG signals during face-perception tasks

Phase synchronisation in multichannel electroencephalography (EEG) is known as the manifestation of functional brain connectivity. Traditional phase synchronisation studies are mostly based on time average synchrony measures, and hence do not preserve the temporal evolution of the phase difference. Here we propose a new method to show the existence of a small set of unique phase synchronised patterns or ‘states’ in multi-channel EEG recordings, each ‘state’ being stable of the order of ms, from typical and pathological subjects during face perception tasks. The proposed methodology bridges the concepts of EEG microstates and phase synchronisation in the time and frequency domain, respectively. The analysis is reported for four groups of children including typical, autism spectrum disorder, low and high anxiety subjects—a total of 44. In all cases, we observe consistent existence of these states—termed as synchrostates—within specific cognition-related frequency bands (beta and gamma bands), though the topographies of these synchrostates differ for different subject groups with different pathological conditions. The inter-synchrostate switching follows a well-defined sequence capturing the underlying inter-electrode phase relation dynamics in a stimulus- and person-centric manner. Our study is motivated by the well-known EEG microstate exhibiting stable potential maps over the scalp. However, here we report a similar observation of quasi-stable phase synchronised states in multichannel EEG. The existence of the synchrostates coupled with their unique switching sequence characteristics could be considered as a potentially new field over contemporary EEG phase synchronisation studies.

EPA-1711 – The effect of aversive visual stimuli on pain perception: the importance of anxiety

Literature shows a relationship between pain, personal as well as emotional factors. Subjects high in trait anxiety experience more pain than low anxiety subjects (Graffenried, 1977). Furthermore expectations and emotions about aversive events can change the perception of objective identical stimuli. Distinct emotions e.g. fear and anxiety differ in their neuronal and physiological patterns as well as in their behavioral consequences. For this reason they also vary in the direction they modulate pain. Anxiety leads to increased pain whereby fear decreases it (Ploghaus et al. 2003). Thereby one important factor is the subjective estimation of aversive upcoming events. Laux' s research (1981) indicates that people low or high in trait anxiety asses situations differently. People high in trait anxiety are threatened by situations more often. This study examines the impact of trait anxiety on individual pain perception and whether there are differences in pain perception after aversive visual information (AVI) exposition in subjects with high and low anxiety values. 29 subjects divided in two anxiety groups, participated in the study. Measures were the STAI state ratings and pain thresholds before and after experimental manipulation. To determine maximal tolerable pain threshold, subjects receivde electrical stimuli with increasing intensity. After assessment of initial pain thresholds subjects were exposed to AVI. People high in trait anxiety showed a significant increase of pain thresholds after experimental manipulation, Z= −3.185, p

EPA-1673 – Acute effects of transcranial bright light exposure on anxiety symptoms

Bright light therapy acutely reduces anxiety in patients suffering from Seasonal Affective Disorder (SAD) and in low anxious subjects. Further evidence suggests it might also be effective in highly anxious subjects. Transcranial bright light (TBL) seems to alleviate depressive symptoms in SAD patients. Depression and anxiety commonly co-occur, hence TBL might also have anxiolytic effects. To test the acute anxiolytic effects of TBL exposure. Twenty-eight participants (F=19, M=9, mean age ± SD: 44 ± 14 years) with moderate anxiety and depressive symptoms (Beck Anxiety Inventory: mean ± SD: 19 ± 9; Beck Depression Inventory-II: mean ± SD: 21 ± 9) were randomly assigned to either 12 minutes of TBL or sham exposure (double-blind) under laboratory conditions between 9am and 12am. Acute anxiety symptoms were measured using the Spielberger State-Trait Anxiety Inventory (STAI-Y1) 5 minutes prior and 10 minutes after the exposure. Mean anxiety symptoms (STAI-Y1 score) in the TBL group decreased by 12.1 ± 7.3% from 43.7 ± 2.0 to 38.1 ± 1.4 (p<0.001), whereas symptoms in sham-control group reduced non-significantly by 3.7 ± 11.3% from 45.6 ± 2.2 to 43.4 ± 1.7 (p=0.115). P-values for relative and absolute difference between groups regarding mean STAI-Y1 scores were 0.024 and 0.048, respectively. This is the first randomized, sham-controlled study showing that TBL acutely alleviates anxiety symptoms. Further studies on long-term efficacy of TBL therapy for anxiety symptoms are warranted.

DLPFC implication in memory processing of affective information. A look on anxiety trait contribution

Recent studies suggested to approach to the analysis of the emotions and cognition from an integrating point of view rather than investigate the two constructs per se. In line with this research approach, the present study aims to investigate how emotions can affect memory processes and which cerebral areas are involved in this mechanism. We also aim to understand if and how this processing is influenced by specific personality traits, as anxiety trait. Using a rTMS measure, participants were asked to performance a memory task (a retrieval task) composed by verbal material with and without emotional content. Subjects were also assessed for their anxiety trait (high and low anxiety subjects). Our study provided a strong evidence for the influence of the emotional content and personality trait on the memory processes. Secondly, the role of the Left Dorso-Lateral Prefrontal Cortex in emotional memory was pointed out with a specific function of this frontal network in managing the emotional memories.

The role of trait anxiety on static balance performance in control and anxiogenic situations

Recent studies have highlighted interactions between state anxiety, sensory processing involved in motor performance, and personality traits such as trait anxiety. In the present study, we investigated the effects of moderate state anxiety on static balance performance with eyes open and eyes closed in two groups of healthy subjects with contrasting trait anxiety. We found that an anxiogenic condition induces larger and faster body swaying in both groups in the eyes-open test. This suggests that state anxiety could modify the processing of the different sensory inputs involved in balance control whatever the subjects’ trait anxiety level. When vision is absent, precision of static balance control in individuals with intermediate level of trait anxiety – characterized by a higher visual dependence – is more disrupted than in low trait anxiety subjects. Moreover, moderate state anxiety seems to disturb the ability to use vestibular and/or somatosensory inputs in individuals with low anxiety, but not in individuals with intermediate trait anxiety. These results on inter-individual differences provide a first insight into the inter-dependence between trait anxiety, state anxiety and static balance control.

Anxiety Dissociates Dorsal and Ventral Medial Prefrontal Cortex Functional Connectivity with the Amygdala at Rest

Anxiety is linked to compromised interactions between the amygdala and the dorsal and ventral medial prefrontal cortex (mPFC). While numerous task-based neuroimaging studies show that anxiety levels predict amygdala-mPFC connectivity and response magnitude, here we tested the hypothesis that anxiety would predict functional connectivity between these brain regions even during rest. Resting-state functional magnetic resonance imaging scans and self-reported measures of anxiety were acquired from healthy subjects. At rest, individuals with high anxiety were characterized by negatively correlated amygdala-ventral mPFC functional connectivity, while low anxious subjects showed positively correlated activity. Further, high anxious subjects showed amygdala-dorsal mPFC activity that was uncorrelated, while low anxious subjects showed negatively correlated activity. These data show that amygdala-mPFC connectivity at rest indexes normal individual differences in anxiety.

Adding fear to conflict: A general purpose cognitive control network is modulated by trait anxiety

Studies of cognitive control show that the dorsal anterior cingulate cortex (dACC) and dorsolateral prefrontal cortex are involved in the detection and resolution of cognitive conflict. However, the neural and behavioral mechanisms underlying emotional interference effects are less consistent. We used fMRI during emotional and nonemotional versions of a facial Stroop task to investigate the effects of emotional stimuli on cognitive control. In the full group there was limited evidence that different prefrontal circuits manage conflict arising from emotional and nonemotional distractors. However, individual differences in trait anxiety affected both behavioral performance and neural activity during the emotional task. Relative to low-anxiety (LA) subjects, high-anxiety (HA) subjects showed greater amygdala activity to task-relevant emotional information and impaired performance and greater conflict-related activity in the dACC when emotional content was task-irrelevant. Only LA subjects activated rostral ACC during the emotional task. This is consistent with cognitive models of individual differences that hypothesize deficient control of task-irrelevant emotional information in HA subjects. Additional behavioral and fMRI results from this study may be downloaded from http://cabn.psychonomic-journals.org/content/supplemental.

Low Anxiety Males Display Higher Degree of Salt Sensitivity, Increased Autonomic Reactivity, and Higher Defensiveness

Psychological parameters such as heightened anxiety and defensiveness are associated with increased cardiovascular morbidity and mortality. Autonomic dysfunction is considered to be an important pathogenetic pathway. Little research has been done regarding potential links between emotional factors and salt sensitivity. The aim of the present study was to determine whether subjects with different levels of trait anxiety differ in the degree of salt sensitivity and autonomic reactivity to a mental stress task. Seventy-two young normotensive men were phenotyped for salt sensitivity and underwent a standardized mental stress test and psychological assessment. According to their trait anxiety test scores, they were classified as low-, moderate- or high-anxiety subjects. A measure of defensiveness was used to assess self-deceptive tendencies. Low-anxiety subjects displayed a higher degree of salt sensitivity compared to moderate- and high-anxiety subjects (P < 0.001), increased heart rate (HR) and electrodermal responses to the stressor compared to moderate-anxiety subjects (P < 0.01 and P < 0.05 respectively) and elevated levels of self-deception compared to moderate- and high-anxiety subjects (P < 0.001). Low-anxiety subjects were characterized by a higher degree of salt sensitivity and increased autonomic responsiveness. Defensiveness was also shown to be elevated in this group and might be the underlying psychological trait explaining these findings. Future research on the associations of anxiety and cardiovascular risk should implement measurement of defensiveness in order to identify these subjects at potential risk for cardiovascular disease despite self-reports of low anxiety.

Differential impact of anxiety on the processing of fearful and happy faces

Event Abstract Back to Event Differential impact of anxiety on the processing of fearful and happy faces Aurélie Foucher1*, N. George2, S. Morel2 and S. Dubal1 1 CNRS-UMPC UMR 7593, France 2 LENA - CNRS UPR 640, France Emotional stimuli are likely to be preferentially processed at the perceptual level, resulting in a greater saliency. They prompt enhanced cortical activity in secondary visual areas as demonstrated by fMRI and Event Related Potentials (ERPs) studies. In particular, emotional modulation of the ERP’s amplitude in response to expressive faces occurs in the first 100 ms post-stimulus. A few studies proposed that trait anxiety may modulate the processing of emotion. We explored the impact of anxiety on the perceptual facilitation for emotional faces of happy and fearful content. ERPs were recorded in two groups of subjects selected on the basis of their scores on the Spielberger Trait Inventory. Seventeen Low-Anxious subjects and sixteen High-Anxious’ were included in the study. The experiment included a fearful set and a happy set of faces taken from the MacBrain Face Stimulus, with each expressive face associated with the corresponding neutral face. Participants were asked to categorize faces as neutral or emotional. Accuracy was not modulated by anxiety or emotion. Reaction times were significantly shorter for emotional faces than neutral faces, independently of anxiety, in the fearful set as well as in the happy set. There was an interaction between emotion and group in the happy set on the occipital P1 component amplitude. Happy faces elicited higher P1 than neutral faces, in the HA group only. In the fearful set, there was an effect of emotion at frontocentral sites on N1 component. Fearful faces elicited larger N1 than neutral faces, independently of anxiety. Results showed dissociation between responses to fearful and happy faces. Effect of anxiety was evidenced on happy faces only at the level of the P1 component, while fearful stimuli elicited a perceptual facilitation in both groups on the N1 component. Anxiety may impact differentially on the processing of happiness and fear. Conference: 10th International Conference on Cognitive Neuroscience, Bodrum, Turkey, 1 Sep - 5 Sep, 2008. Presentation Type: Poster Presentation Topic: Neuropsychiatric Disorders Citation: Foucher A, George N, Morel S and Dubal S (2008). Differential impact of anxiety on the processing of fearful and happy faces. Conference Abstract: 10th International Conference on Cognitive Neuroscience. doi: 10.3389/conf.neuro.09.2009.01.407 Copyright: The abstracts in this collection have not been subject to any Frontiers peer review or checks, and are not endorsed by Frontiers. They are made available through the Frontiers publishing platform as a service to conference organizers and presenters. The copyright in the individual abstracts is owned by the author of each abstract or his/her employer unless otherwise stated. Each abstract, as well as the collection of abstracts, are published under a Creative Commons CC-BY 4.0 (attribution) licence (https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0/) and may thus be reproduced, translated, adapted and be the subject of derivative works provided the authors and Frontiers are attributed. For Frontiers’ terms and conditions please see https://www.frontiersin.org/legal/terms-and-conditions. Received: 17 Dec 2008; Published Online: 17 Dec 2008. * Correspondence: Aurélie Foucher, CNRS-UMPC UMR 7593, Paris, France, foucher@chups.jussieu.fr Login Required This action requires you to be registered with Frontiers and logged in. To register or login click here. Abstract Info Abstract The Authors in Frontiers Aurélie Foucher N. George S. Morel S. Dubal Google Aurélie Foucher N. George S. Morel S. Dubal Google Scholar Aurélie Foucher N. George S. Morel S. Dubal PubMed Aurélie Foucher N. George S. Morel S. Dubal Related Article in Frontiers Google Scholar PubMed Abstract Close Back to top Javascript is disabled. Please enable Javascript in your browser settings in order to see all the content on this page.

Behavioral and neurochemical consequences of multiple MDMA administrations in the rat: Role of individual differences in anxiety-related behavior

Using the elevated plus-maze (EPM), Wistar rats can be distinguished into high (HA) or low anxiety (LA) subjects. These differences seem to reflect traits, since HA and LA rats vary also in other anxiety-dependent tasks, neurochemical mechanisms, and psychopharmacological reactivity, including lasting consequences after single treatment with 3,4-methylenedioxymethamphetamine (MDMA). Here, we tested whether multiple MDMA treatments also have subject-dependent effects. Based on routine EPM screening, male Wistar rats were divided into HA and LA sub-groups, which received five (i.e. multiple) daily injections of MDMA (5 mg/kg) or saline, followed by a test battery, including a challenge test with MDMA, a retest in the EPM, a novel-object test, and a final neurochemical analysis. Acutely, MDMA led to comparable hyperactivity in HA and LA rats. After multiple MDMA, behavioral sensitization was observed, especially in LA rats. Open arm time during the EPM retest (min0–5) correlated with that of the initial one only in those rats, which had received a single injection of MDMA. Rats with multiple MDMA, especially LA-rats, showed more open-arm time and locomotion during the subsequent 5–10 min of the retest. In a novel-object test, rats with multiple MDMA, again especially LA subjects, showed more exploratory bouts towards the novel object. Neurochemically, multiple MDMA led to moderately lower serotonin in the ventral striatum, and higher dopamine levels in the frontal cortex as compared to single MDMA; these effects were also moderated by subject-dependent factors. Our data show that low-dosed multiple MDMA can lead to behavioral sensitization and outlasting consequences, which affect behavior in the EPM and a novel object task. Detecting such sequels partly requires consideration of individual differences.

Moderate anxiety, whether acute or chronic, is not associated with ovarian suppression in healthy, well‐nourished, Western women

The relationship between psychological stress and reduced fecundity has been a matter of speculation and investigation for decades. Most previous studies have been compromised, however, by a number of problems including ambiguous direction of causation, poorly operationalized variables, and the confounding of psychological with energetic stress. We present a two-part study of the relationship between moderate anxiety, both acute and chronic, and daily measures of ovarian steroid and corticosteroid levels in saliva. Anxiety, as a particular form of psychosocial stress, was measured by the Spielberger Stait-Trait Anxiety Inventory as well as by a self-reported daily stress score. In the first part, 23 college juniors taking the Medical College Admissions Test (MCAT) were studied the month before and the month after the test, and again several months later, and compared at the same time points with 27 controls. In the second part, chronic anxiety levels were assessed in 95 women between 27 and 41 years of age and analyzed in relation to daily levels of salivary ovarian and corticosteroids over one menstrual cycle. The sample sizes are sufficient to allow for confidence in negative results. No statistically significant differences in ovarian or corticosteroid levels were observed whether between the MCAT and control subjects in part one, between the MCAT subjects before and after the MCAT test in part one, or between high and low anxiety subjects in part two. The results indicate that moderate levels of anxiety, whether acute or chronic, are not associated with suppressed ovarian function in healthy women.

Anxiety Moderates the Interplay Between Cognitive and Affective Processing

Evidence suggests that focus of attention and cognitive load may each affect emotional processing and that individual differences in anxiety moderate such effects. We examined (a) fear-potentiated startle (FPS) under threat-focused (TF), low-load/alternative-set (LL/AS), and high-load/alternative-set (HL/AS) conditions and (b) the moderating effect of trait anxiety on FPS across these conditions. As predicted, redirecting attentional focus away from threat cues and increasing cognitive load reduced FPS. However, the moderating effects of anxiety were specific to the LL/AS condition. Whereas FPS was comparable for high-anxiety and low-anxiety subjects in the TF and HL/AS conditions, FPS was significantly greater for high-anxiety than for low-anxiety subjects in the LL/AS condition. These results suggest that affective processing requires attentional resources and that exaggerated threat processing in anxious individuals relates to direction of attention rather than emotional reactivity per se.