Journal
BEHAVIOUR RESEARCH AND THERAPY
Volume 46, Issue 10, Pages 1126-1134Publisher
PERGAMON-ELSEVIER SCIENCE LTD
DOI: 10.1016/j.brat.2008.07.002
Keywords
Anxious apprehension; Anticipatory anxiety; Fear-potentiated startle; Threat of shock; Hyperventilation
Categories
Ask authors/readers for more resources
Anticipatory anxiety plays a major role in the etiology of panic disorder. Although anticipatory anxiety elicited by expectation of interoceptive cues is specifically relevant for panic patients, it has rarely been studied. Using a population analogue in high fear of such interoceptive arousal sensations (highly anxiety sensitive persons) we evaluated a new experimental paradigm to assess anticipatory anxiety during anticipation of interoceptive (somatic sensations evoked by hyperventilation) and exteroceptive (electric shock) threat. Symptom reports, autonomic arousal, and defensive response mobilization (startle eye-blink response) were monitored during threat and matched safe conditions in 26 highly anxiety sensitive persons and 22 controls. The anticipation of exteroceptive threat led to a defensive and autonomic mobilization as indexed by a potentiation of the startle response and an increase in skin conductance level in both experimental groups. During interoceptive threat, however, only highly anxiety sensitive persons but not the controls exhibited a startle response potentiation as well as autonomic activation. The anticipation of a hyperventilation procedure thus seems a valid Paradigm to investigate anticipatory anxiety elicited by interoceptive Cues in the clinical context. (c) 2008 Elsevier Ltd. All rights reserved.
Authors
I am an author on this paper
Click your name to claim this paper and add it to your profile.
Reviews
Recommended
No Data Available