Projects per year
Abstract
BACKGROUND: Positive self-bias is thought to be protective for mental health. We previously found that the degree of positive bias when learning self-referential social evaluation decreases with increasing social anxiety. It is unclear whether this reduction is driven by differences in state or trait anxiety, as both are elevated in social anxiety; therefore, we examined the effects on the state of anxiety induced by the 7.5% carbon dioxide (CO2) inhalation model of generalised anxiety disorder (GAD) on social evaluation learning.
METHODS: For our study, 48 (24 of female gender) healthy volunteers took two inhalations (medical air and 7.5% CO2, counterbalanced) whilst learning social rules (self-like, self-dislike, other-like and other-dislike) in an instrumental social evaluation learning task. We analysed the outcomes (number of positive responses and errors to criterion) using the random effects Poisson regression.
RESULTS: Participants made fewer and more positive responses when breathing 7.5% CO2 in the other-like and other-dislike rules, respectively (gas × condition × rule interaction p = 0.03). Individuals made fewer errors learning self-like than self-dislike, and this positive self-bias was unaffected by CO2. Breathing 7.5% CO2 increased errors, but only in the other-referential rules (gas × condition × rule interaction p = 0.003).
CONCLUSIONS: Positive self-bias (i.e. fewer errors learning self-like than self-dislike) seemed robust to changes in state anxiety. In contrast, learning other-referential evaluation was impaired as state anxiety increased. This suggested that the previously observed variations in self-bias arise due to trait, rather than state, characteristics.
Original language | English |
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Pages (from-to) | 1036-1046 |
Number of pages | 11 |
Journal | Journal of Psychopharmacology |
Volume | 30 |
Issue number | 10 |
Early online date | 4 Jul 2016 |
DOIs | |
Publication status | Published - Oct 2016 |
Research Groups and Themes
- Brain and Behaviour
- Tobacco and Alcohol
Keywords
- Anxiety
- carbon dioxide inhalation
- carbon dioxide levels
- learning
- negativity
- positivity
- self-perception
- self-referential processing
- social anxiety
- social judgement
- state anxiety
- trait anxiety
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Dive into the research topics of 'Acute anxiety and social inference: An experimental manipulation with 7.5% carbon dioxide inhalation'. Together they form a unique fingerprint.Projects
- 1 Finished
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MRC UoB UNITE Unit - Programme 6
Munafo, M. R. (Principal Investigator) & Munafo, M. R. (Principal Investigator)
1/06/13 → 31/03/18
Project: Research