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Components of attentional biases in contamination fear: Evidence for difficulty in disengagement

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Abstract

Attentional bias for threat has been implicated in the contamination fear (CF) subtype of obsessive-compulsive disorder, but the components of the bias (facilitated attention versus difficulty in disengagement) and the stage of processing during which the bias occurs (early versus late stage of processing) remains unclear. Further, it is unclear whether attentional biases in CF are towards fear or disgust-related stimuli. The present study examined attentional biases in a group of individuals selected to have elevated CF (n = 23) and a control group (n = 28) using the spatial cueing task. Stimuli were neutral, disgusting, or frightening pictures presented for either 100 or 500 ms. Results revealed evidence for delayed disengagement from both fear and disgust stimuli in the CF group, but not in the control group. The effect appeared to be greater at 500 ms stimulus presentation, but did not appear to differ between fear and disgust stimuli. The CF group was associated with delayed disengagement from threat even when controlling for generic response slowing. Theoretical and clinical implications are discussed.

Section snippets

Participants

Participants were recruited from introductory psychology courses at a public university based on scores on the contamination subscale of the Padua Inventory (PI, range 0–40; Burns, Keortge, Formea, & Sternberger, 1996). The clinical mean of the contamination subscale is 14, with an SD of 6 (Burns et al., 1996). To ensure that participants in the CF group had sufficiently elevated CF, participants (n = 23; PI M = 25, SD = 4) were recruited for the study if their PI score was 20 or higher (i.e.,

Sample characteristics

Participants in the control group (n = 28; 57% female) had a mean age of 19.56 (SD = 1.25), 89% were Caucasian. Participants in the CF group (n = 23; 91% female) had a mean age of 19.13 (SD = .87), 70% were Caucasian. There were more females in the CF group relative to the control group (χ2 = 7.4, p = .007). There were no other differences between groups (Fs < 1.9, p > .18).

Data preparation

RT data were cleaned by first removing errors, then removing RTs that were 2.5 standard deviations or more above the

Discussion

Previous evidence of attentional biases in CF is limited to two studies (Foa et al., 1993, Tata et al., 1996). The present study not only demonstrates attentional biases, but suggests that attentional biases in CF are comprised of difficulty disengaging attention from threat. There are two explanations for why CF individuals may display difficulty disengaging attention from threat. First, it may be the case that difficulty in disengagement reflects an impaired ability to remove attention from

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