Fear and Anxiety
TRUE OR FALSE. Anxiety naturally decreases with exposure
TRUE
Having a panic attack is the same as activating which part of your body's response system?
The HPA Axis
An example of an in vivo exposure target for SAD would be..
- Public speaking, eating in front of others, performing in front of others, social outings, talking to others
When studying the genetic bias of panic disorder, researchers found that twins had a tendency to inherit what?
The view that anxiety symptoms are frightening
Anxiety disorders are associated with what personality trait?
Neuroticism
The mechanism of the fight-or-flight response works through what kind of feedback loop?
People with panic disorder are often said to have a fear of what?
Fear; they are afraid of fear and the bodily sensations that come with it
Which of these are risk factors for social anxiety disorder?
A) Being the youngest child
B) Shyness
C) Emotional dependence on parents
D) Being homeschooled
B
Clark (1988) found evidence for the Cognitive Model of Panic Disorder from...
A) Having participants directly confront their fears; the exposure triggered panic attacks
B) Having participants think really hard about their fears; the thought of exposure triggered panic attacks
C) Having participants look at word pairs; the words drew attention to bodily sensations and triggered panic attacks
D) Having participants hold their breath for a minute; the lack of oxygen caused a panic attack
C
* this was strengthened by De Cord et al (2013) who found the word pairs impacted ppl with panic disorder the most (not just ppl with anxiety disorders in general)
The extent to which you find your internal body sensations stressful is called what? What index do we use to measure it?
Anxiety Sensitivity; Anxiety Sensitivity Index
How is fear evolutionarily adaptive?
What happens in the body?
Fear activates the fight-or-flight response. This activates the physiological resources needed to cope with immediate danger. Blood is diverted to major muscle groups to permit fighting or fleeing.
In the DSM-5 definition of panic disorder, a panic attack must be followed by at least one month of what (3 options)?
SAD is associated with increased vigilance to what?
Social threat cues
As discussed in class, the purpose of Boll et al's study tracking eye movements in people with and without SAD was...
To see whether the gazing behaviour of individuals with and without SAD was different
Spoiler alert: it was, they found more saccades (eye movements) from mouth-eye than others; ppl with SAD fixated more on the eye region
The diathesis-stress model states that...
Psychopathology results from the interaction of internal vulnerability factors and external triggers
When does anxiety turn into anxiety disorder?
Pupil dilation is to the HPA Axis as _____ is to a panic symptom.
Derealization
How does gender minority stress play a part in social anxiety disorder?
Clue. Testa et al (2015)
Repeated exposures to discrimination, victimization, and rejection lead to expectations of future negative experiences.
Nonaffirmation of gender identity -> embarassment, shame, threat -> avoidance of social interactions
Internalized transphobia -> expectation of rejection -> avoidance of social situations
TRUE OR FALSE
Medication is associated to higher relapse rates over time than CBT
Give an example of a reason behind the cognition of someone with an anxiety disorder.
How does avoidance maintain and increase anxiety?
Rapidly increasing anxiety creates the urge to escape cause they think the anxiety will just keep increasing catastrophically. If they escape at peak anxiety, they get short-term relief, but that creates a long-term heightening and generalization of anxiety -> because they think that if they had stayed something there would have happened.
Cognitive Behavioural Model of Panic Disorder
Match the examples with the correct association
1. Trigger Stimulus A. I am afraid2. Perceived Threat B. Twinge in chest
3. Emotional C. Dizziness, chest pain
4. Physiological D. I am going to die
5. Cognitive E. Heart attack
1 - B
2 - E
3 - A
4 - C
5 - D
Give an example of an internal stressor and an external stressor associated with the minority stress theory.
Internal: fear of future discrimination, mistrust of others, internalized negative beliefs about one's identity, and stress of concealment
External stressors: discrimination, rejection, and violence, non-affirmation of gender identity
Which of these do not belong under the category of "fear disorder"
A) specific phobia
B) OCPD
C) Panic disorder
D) OCD
E
B) OCPD
Full list:
Panic disorder, SAD, OCD, agoraphobia, specific phobia
When looking for differences in the brains of people with panic disorders, researchers found a significant difference in what brain structure?
Panic attack duration and severity was worse the smaller the pituitary gland