Low Anxiety Trait Research Articles

A learning mechanism shaping risk preferences and a preliminary test of its relationship with psychopathic traits

People tend to avoid risk in the domain of gains but take risks in the domain of losses; this is called the reflection effect. Formal theories of decision-making have provided important perspectives on risk preferences, but how individuals acquire risk preferences through experiences remains unknown. In the present study, we used reinforcement learning (RL) models to examine the learning processes that can shape attitudes toward risk in both domains. In addition, relationships between learning parameters and personality traits were investigated. Fifty-one participants performed a learning task, and we examined learning parameters and risk preference in each domain. Our results revealed that an RL model that included a nonlinear subjective utility parameter and differential learning rates for positive and negative prediction errors exhibited better fit than other models and that these parameters independently predicted risk preferences and the reflection effect. Regarding personality traits, although the sample sizes may be too small to test personality traits, increased primary psychopathy scores could be linked with decreased learning rates for positive prediction error in loss conditions among participants who had low anxiety traits. The present findings not only contribute to understanding how decision-making in risky conditions is influenced by past experiences but also provide insights into certain psychiatric problems.

Cued Fear Conditioning in Carioca High- and Low-Conditioned Freezing Rats.

Anxiety disorders (AD) comprise a broad range of psychiatric conditions, including general anxiety (GAD) and specific phobias. For the last decades, the use of animal models of anxiety has offered important insights into the understanding of the association between these psychopathologies. Here, we investigate whether Carioca high- and low-conditioned freezing rats (CHF and CLF, respectively), a GAD animal model of anxiety, show similar high- and low-freezing behavioral phenotypes for cued auditory fear conditioning. Adult CHF (n = 16), CLF (n = 16) and normal age-matched Wistar rats (control, CTL, n = 16) were tested in a classical auditory-cued fear conditioning paradigm over 3 days (Tone + Shock and Tone only groups, n = 8 per treatment). Freezing responses were measured and used as evidence of fear conditioning. Overall, both CHF and CLF rats, as well as CTL animals displayed fear conditioning to the auditory CS. However, CLF animals showed a rapid extinction to the auditory conditioned stimulus compared to CHF and CTL rats. We discuss these findings in the context of the behavioral and neuronal differences observed in rodent lines of high and low anxiety traits.

Evolutionary medicine perspective on coping style and health outcomes: an exploratory study.

One of the issues within the framework of Darwinian medicine is why individuals develop the specific disease they do. Ethologists have long known that within any given population, there are organisms with the tendency towards higher (Hawks) or lower (Doves) aggressiveness, and since the physiological responses to stressful events are different in Hawks and Doves, it has been suggested that these strategies might be related to health outcomes. The aims of this exploratory study were to determine whether an analogues of Hawks and Doves as basic coping strategies could be defined among chronically ill patients and healthy controls and whether the proportion of Hawks and Doves differs among different groups of patients. Patients from several clinical departments (dermatology, gastroenterology and psychiatry) and a comparable group of healthy participants were recruited (N = 288). Based on their coping style and anxiety trait, they were categorized as either Hawks (low anxiety trait and problem-oriented coping style) or Doves (high anxiety trait and avoidant coping style). We found a significantly larger proportion of Hawks among patients with gastroenterological and dermatologic symptoms, and significantly more Doves among psychiatric patients. The proportion of Hawks and Doves in healthy controls was close to 50:50. This is in accordance with the notion that Hawks and Doves have different allostatic load management, and that the onset of certain diseases might be related to these strategies. However, prospective longitudinal studies are necessary to reach definite conclusions regarding the susceptibility to certain diseases among people with different stress-related behavioral and emotional strategies.

Emotional cues and social anxiety resolve ambiguous perception of biological motion.

Perceptions of ambiguous biological motion are modulated by different individual cognitive abilities (such as inhibition and empathy) and emotional states (such as anxiety). This study explored facing-the-viewer bias (FTV) in perceiving ambiguous directions of biological motion, and investigated whether task-irrelevant simultaneous face emotional cues in the background and the individual social anxiety traits could affect FTV. We found that facial motion cues as background affect sociobiologically relevant scenarios, including biological motion, but not non-biological situations (conveyed through random dot motion). Individuals with high anxiety traits demonstrated a more dominant FTV bias than individuals with low anxiety traits. Ensemble coding-like processing of task-irrelevant multiple emotional cues could magnify the facing-the-viewer bias than did in the single emotional cue. Overall, those findings suggest a correlation between high-level emotional processing and high-level motion perception (subjective to attentional control) contributes to facing-the-viewer bias.

Trait anxiety and goal difficulty on learning to climb the Bachman ladder.

This study examined the effects of trait anxiety and goal setting on learning of the Bachman ladder. It was hypothesized that easy goals would increase learning for individuals with high trait anxiety while hard goals would increase learning for individuals with low trait anxiety. 80 high school students (40 boys, 40 girls; M age = 15 yr., SD = 1.0) filled out the Brazilian State-Trait Anxiety Inventory (STAI) for trait anxiety. The experiment was divided into four phases: acquisition, immediate transfer (after 5 min.), delayed transfer, and retention (after 24 hr.). On the transfer phases, the participants started climbing the ladder with the foot opposite of that used in acquisition. Participants were assigned to one of four experimental groups combining high and low anxiety traits and hard and easy goals. Variances were analyzed with repeated measurements on the last factor of all phases. The results showed the performance increased during the acquisition phase and no effects were observed in any phases.

Impact of high and low anxiety trait on object habituation and discrimination: Evidence from selected lines of Japanese quail

Compared to rodents, the relationship between anxiety and cognitive performances has been less studied in birds. Yet, birds are frequently exposed to stimulations that constitute a potential source of anxiety and can affect their adaptation to their living conditions. The present study was aimed at evaluating, in birds, the relationship between levels of anxiety and object habituation and discrimination with the use of Japanese quail lines divergently selected for a fear response, tonic immobility. Previous studies demonstrated that the selection programme has modified the general anxiety trait of the birds. The task consisted in 4 daily sessions of 8 successive presentations of the same object in the home cage of the quail in order to habituate each bird to the object. The observation that both quail with a high and a low anxiety trait progressively spent more time close to the object indicated that habituation occurred. Dishabituation was assessed during a single session of 8 presentations of a novel object. Only quail with a high anxiety trait exhibited significant discrimination. They spent significantly less time close to the novel object than to the habituated object. It is hypothesised that a high anxiety trait is associated with a more accurate processing of environmental cues or events resulting in better discriminative performances.

Everyday Eating Experiences of Chocolate and Non-Chocolate Snacks Impact Postprandial Anxiety, Energy and Emotional States

Social and psychological stressors are both a part of daily life and are increasingly recognized as contributors to individual susceptibility to develop diseases and metabolic disorders. The present study investigated how snacks differing in sensory properties and presentation can influence ratings of affect in consumers with different levels of dispositional anxiety. This study examines the relationships between a pre-disposition to anxiety and food using a repeated exposures design with three interspersed test days over a period of two weeks. The study was conducted on ninety free-living male (n = 28) and female (n = 62) Dutch participants aged between 18 and 35 years old, with a BMI between 18 and 25 kg/m2 and different anxiety trait levels assessed using State-Trait Anxiety Inventory tests. The study was randomized by age, gender, anxiety trait score, and followed a parallel open design. Three test products: dark chocolate, a milk chocolate snack and crackers with cheese spread (control), which differed in composition, sensory properties and presentation, were evaluated. Changes in self-reported anxiety, emotion, and energetic states were assessed as a function of eating the snacks just after consumption and up to one hour. The repeated exposure design over a period of two weeks enabled the investigations of potential cumulative effects of regular consumption of the food products. The milk chocolate snack resulted in the decrease of anxiety in high anxiety trait subjects, whereas dark chocolate and cheese and crackers respectively improved the anxiety level and the energetic state of low anxiety trait participants. The mood effects were not altered with repeated exposure, and the magnitude of changes was similar on each test day, which illustrates the repeatability of the effects of the food on subjective measures of postprandial wellness.

Early neonatal inflammation affects adult pain reactivity and anxiety related traits in mice: genetic background counts

Protracted or recurrent pain and inflammation in the early neonatal period may cause long-lasting changes in central neural function. However, more research is necessary to better characterize the long-term behavioral sequelae of such exposure in the neonatal period. Objectives: (1) to study whether timing of postnatal exposure to persistent inflammation alters responsiveness to thermal pain in the adult animal; (2) to assess whether animals experiencing early postnatal chronic inflammation display altered anxiety related behavior; (3) to study the importance of genetic background. Newborn mice (outbred strain, CD1 and F1 hybrid strain, B6C3F1) received an injection of Complete Freund's Adjuvant (CFA) or saline on either postnatal day 1 or 14 (PND1; PND14) into the left hind paw. Pain to radiant heat and anxiety were examined in 12-week-old adult animals. Adult baseline PWL was significantly decreased in CD1 mice exposed to CFA on PND 1 and 14 as compared to their saline treated counterparts. B6C3F1 mice exposed to CFA on PND14 showed markedly reduced baseline PWL compared to the PND14 saline group. Persistent inflammation experienced by B6C3F1 mice on PND1 failed to affect baseline adult thermal responsiveness. Adult mice, CD1 and B6C3F1, displayed low anxiety traits only if they had been exposed to persistent inflammation on PND1 and not on PND14. Our research suggests a role for genetic background in modulating long-term behavioral consequences of neonatal persistent inflammation: the data support the hypothesis that pain experienced very early in life differentially affects adult behavioral and emotional responsiveness in outbred (CD1) and hybrid mice (B6C3F1).

Deficient Behavioral Inhibition and Anomalous Selective Attention in a Community Sample of Adolescents with Psychopathic Traits and Low-Anxiety Traits

Socialization is the important process by which individuals learn and then effectively apply the rules of appropriate societal behavior. Response modulation is a psychobiological process theorized to aid in socialization by allowing individuals to utilize contextual information to modify ongoing behavior appropriately. Using Hare's (1991) Psychopathy Checklist and the Welsh (1956) anxiety scale, researchers have identified a relatively specific form of a response modulation deficit in low-anxious, Caucasian psychopaths. Preliminary evidence suggests that the Antisocial Process Screening Device (APSD; Frick & Hare, 2001) may be used to identify children with a similar vulnerability. Using a representative community sample of 308 16-year-olds from the Child Development Project (Dodge, Bates, & Pettit, 1990), we tested and corroborated the hypotheses that participants with relatively low anxiety and high APSD scores would display poorer passive avoidance learning and less interference on a spatially separated, picture-word Stroop task than controls. Consistent with hypotheses, the expected group differences in picture-word Stroop interference were found with male and female participants, whereas predicted differences in passive avoidance were specific to male participants. To the extent that response modulation deficits contributing to poor socialization among psychopathic adult offenders also characterize a subgroup of adolescents with mild conduct problems, clarification of the developmental processes that moderate the expression of this vulnerability could inform early interventions.

Alterations in stress-associated behaviors and neurochemical markers in adult rats after neonatal short-lasting local inflammatory insult

Recently, there has been a growing interest in long-term consequences of neonatal pain because modern neonatal intensive care units routinely employ procedures that cause considerable pain and may be followed by local inflammation and hyperalgesia lasting for several hours or even days. To address this question, we developed a rat model of short lasting (<2 days) early local inflammatory insult produced by a single injection of 0.25% carrageenan (CAR) into the plantar surface of a hindpaw. Previously, we demonstrated that rats receiving this treatment within the first week after birth grow into adults with a global reduction in responsiveness to acute pain. Here, we report that these animals also manifest a low anxiety trait associated with reduced emotional responsiveness to stress. This conclusion is based in the following observations: (a) rats in our model display reduced anxiety on an elevated plus-maze; (b) in the forced swim test, these rats exhibit behavioral characteristics associated with stronger ability for stress coping; and (c) these animals have reduced basal and stress-induced plasma levels of such stress-related neuroendocrine markers as corticotropin-releasing factor, vasopressin, and adrenocorticotrophic hormone. In addition, we used DNA microarray and real-time reverse-transcriptase polymerase chain reaction to profile long-term changes in gene expression in the midbrain periaqueductal gray (PAG; a region involved in both stress and pain modulation) in our animal model. Among the affected genes, serotonergic receptors were particularly well represented. Specifically, we detected increase in the expression of 5-HT1A, 5-HT1D, 5-HT2A, 5-HT2C and 5-HT4 receptors. Several of these receptors are known to be involved in the anxiolytic and analgesic activity of the PAG. Finally, to determine whether neonatal inflammatory insult induces elevation in maternal care, which may play a role in generating long-term behavioral alterations seen in our model, we examined maternal behavior for 3 days following CAR injection. Indeed, we observed a substantial increase in maternal attention to the pups at the time of inflammation, but this increase was not without its cost: a period of significant maternal neglect afterward.

Personality Trait Correlates of Attitudes toward Older People

The objective of this study is to determine whether personality is related to attitudes toward older people. To address this question, a sample of 228 students and gerontology practitioners completed the Aging Opinion Survey, the Cattell 16 Personality Factors Test, and a demographic questionnaire. When the influence of age, sex, education, and social desirability are controlled, a constellation of personality traits remains significantly related to attitudes toward older people. Specific trait-attitude correlations are described, and traits related to positive attitudes toward older people are shown to fit within three personality groupings: low anxiety traits, sensitive-intuition traits, and intellectual ability. These traits combined with demographic variables account for up to 30 percent of the variance in attitudes toward older people. The results of this study indicate that personality traits are clearly related to attitudes toward older people.

EFFECT OF ANXIETY ON GASTRIC EMPTYING IN PREOPERATIVE PATIENTS

On the morning of operation 30 patients awaiting minor gynaecological surgery completed a Spielberger State Trait Anxiety Inventory. Gastric emptying was then measured using paracetamol absorption. Anxiety State scores, which reflected situational anxiety, were unrelated to Anxiety Trait scores, which assessed anxiety proneness. Paracetamol absorption was reduced and delayed in patients with low anxiety trait who developed high anxiety state before surgery, compared with patients whose anxiety state scores were lower than, or similar to, their anxiety trait scores. Therefore, it was concluded that gastric stasis occurred in patients with a low predisposition to anxiety who became apprehensive whilst awaiting surgery.

An Attempt to Measure Intrapartum and Postpartum Anxiety

Summary: This study evaluated anxiety of 23 patients both in labour and four days after delivery. Anxiety was assessed by use of three questionnaires, the anxiety state score (Spielberger), the manifest anxiety scale (Taylor) and an obstetric anxiety factor questionnaire. Anxiety state intrapartum was significantly higher than that found postpartum. High and low anxiety trait patients reacted differently to labour and the postpartum period, this difference being interpreted in relation to threat to self‐esteem and physical wellbeing. The high anxiety state in labour was associated with fear concerning factors which obstetricians and midwives considered cause anxiety in labour. A high anxiety state in labour was not associated with an increase in the length of labour or poor condition of the baby at birth.