Experimental findings to date have supported this view, demonstrating that attentional biases toward negative information are associated with clinical and subclinical anxiety using a range of stimuli including words, faces, and pictures (for reviews, see Bar-Haim et al., 2007 Mathews & MacLeod, 1994 Yiend, 2010). This cognitive pattern is assumed to lead to exaggerated negative perceptions and evaluations, which helps maintain anxiety, establishing a vicious cycle of cause and effect ( Mathews, 1990). Individuals with anxiety (clinically disordered and subclinically anxious) typically prioritize processing of threatening information in the visual environment in preference to benign or positive information (see Bar-Haim, Lamy, Pergamin, Bakermans-Kranenburg, & van Ijzendoorn, 2007, for meta-analysis of visual-spatial attentional “probe” tasks). One example is biased attentional processing of emotional information, which is particularly implicated in the anxiety disorders ( Yiend, 2010). Successful cognitive therapies involve identifying and challenging these dysfunctional cognitions. We suggest a decisive two-stage experiment identifying stimuli of primary salience in GAD, then using these to reexamine orienting mechanisms across groups.Įxperimental research suggests that dysfunctional forms of cognitive processing help to cause and maintain emotional disorders ( Clark & Beck, 2010 Williams, Watts, MacLeod, & Mathews, 1997). Together these data challenge current assumptions that we can generalize, to those with GAD, the pattern of selective attentional orienting to threat found in subclinical groups.
Across two experiments we found faster disengagement from negative (angry and fearful) faces in GAD groups, an effect opposite to that expected on the basis of the subclinical literature. We therefore investigated individuals with diagnosed generalized anxiety disorder (GAD), healthy volunteers, and individuals with high trait anxiety (but not meeting GAD diagnostic criteria).
However, conclusions to date have relied heavily on experimental work from subclinical samples. These mechanisms are thought to contribute to the onset and maintenance of anxiety disorders. A well-established literature has identified different selective attentional orienting mechanisms underlying anxiety-related attentional bias, such as engagement and disengagement of attention.
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