Genetic Correlates of Maladaptive Beliefs: COMT VAL158MET and Irrational Cognitions Linked Depending on Distress☆
Section snippets
Biological Underpinnings of Maladaptive Beliefs
It has been speculated that irrational beliefs have a biological basis since the 1970s (Ellis, 1976). For instance, there is preliminary evidence suggesting a connection between the neural mechanisms underlying specific irrational beliefs (Cristea et al., 2011) and self-mentalizing areas of the brain. However, while these studies are important to understand the biological basis (i.e., neural implementation) of irrational beliefs, there is no study that investigates the biological underpinnings
Participants
We recruited 267 Caucasian volunteers (age: M = 23.112 years, SD = 5.040, 81.273 % women).1 Participants had the following genotype frequencies: 0.270, Met/Met (N = 71); 0.440, Val/Met (N = 119); 0.290, Val/Val (N = 77), which were similar to the ones that were reported for Caucasians by Henderson et al.
Procedure
The current study had a cross-sectional design. Its procedure entailed (a) receiving an informed consent, (b) genotyping, and (c) filling in BDI-II and STAI-X2 measures of general emotional distress alongside the ABS-II scale, which assessed general/core rational and irrational beliefs. We focused on context-independent measures of cognitive vulnerability and emotional distress, meaning that no stressor was induced to trigger maladaptive beliefs.
Descriptive Analyses
Table 1 displays the intercorrelations among the dimensional variables. Mean scores for depression and anxiety (i.e., emotional distress), overall rationality, overall irrationality, as well as irrationality subscales are presented in Table 2, split by genotype.
The remaining preliminary analyses are split into demographics and emotional distress categories, as in the following paragraphs.
Discussion
First, the current study aimed to investigate the relationship between COMT Val158Met and overall irrationality. The results supported our hypotheses, in that COMT Val158Met was indeed associated with overall irrationality. This result is in line with speculations regarding biological predispositions to irrational beliefs dating back to 1976 (Ellis, 1976). Similarly, the results relate to the importance allocated by Beck in his generic cognitive model of psychopathology, where he suggests that
Conflict of Interest Statement
The authors declare that there are no conflicts of interest.
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This work was possible due to the financial support of the Sectorial Operational Program for Human Resources Development 2007-2013, co-financed by the European Social Fund, under the project number POSDRU/159/1.5/S/132400, "Young Successful Researchers—Professional Development in an International and Interdisciplinary Environment.” The authors would also like to thank Mirela Mohan for proofreading this paper.