Melbourne School of Psychological Sciences - Theses
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ItemThe assessment and treatment of concerns and anxiety in patients undergoing pre-surgical monitoring for epilepsy( 2006)The aim of the present study was to investigate the efficacy of an information package on reducing pre-surgical anxiety and concerns in patients with intractable epilepsy. Adverse psychological and social effects of temporal lobe epilepsy (TLE) are instrumental in anxiety and distress in these patients. This is brought into the hospital setting and exacerbated by the monitoring process and concomitant possibility of surgery where many patients prematurely curtailed the process at cost to themselves and the hospital.
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ItemThe relationship between anxiety vulnerability and stress in the cognitive processing of threat-related information( 2000-03)In order to clarify the relationship between anxiety vulnerability and clinical anxiety, information-processing models have been employed to examine the cognitive biases of anxious individuals for threat-related information. At the core of these models are research findings indicating that anxiety-linked attentional biases render high trait anxious individuals disproportionately vulnerable to the effects of stress. The current research, following the model of Williams, Watts, MacLeod, and Matthews (1988), tested the hypothesis that attention to threat-related information is due to the interaction of trait anxiety and state anxiety. Five comparable studies employed emotional Stroop and probe-detection paradigms to assess the attentional biases of high and low trait anxious individuals to threat-related words in response to elevations of stress. Four of the studies assessed the preconscious and conscious attentional biases of adults and one study investigated the attentional biases of children. This focus allowed developmental comparisons that had not been undertaken previously. The studies were comparable to each other and to previous research. The studies sought to clarify the effects of different forms of stress on the anxiety-linked attentional biases and to assess the effects of these stressors on domain-specific stimuli. The hypotheses were that, in response to elevations in state anxiety, high trait anxious individuals show increased attention to threat and low trait anxious individuals show avoidance of threat. It was expected that these threat-related attentional biases are identified at both preconscious and conscious levels of processing, and more when the stimuli are related to the individuals’ domain of concern. Contrary to expectations, only one study found the predicted pattern and this result occurred at a conscious level of processing. In addition to the lack of support for the hypotheses, a counter-intuitive alternative pattern that was the converse of predictions was identified in four of the five studies. In this pattern, in response to elevated stress, there was a trend for high trait anxious individuals to show decreased attention to threat and low trait anxious individuals to show increased attention to threat. The pattern was identified, in various studies, at conscious and preconscious levels of processing, and more in response to domain-specific stimuli. Adults and children showed similar levels and types of attentional biases. The results of the current studies show some convergence with previous research. The findings are discussed in the context of a proposed model that incorporated aspects of Williams et al’s theories (1988; Williams, Watts, MacLeod, & Mathews, 1977) and Mogg and Bradley’s (1988) theory. This model suggests that high and low trait anxious individuals’ patterns of threat-related attentional biases vary according to their different levels of reactivity to stress, which affects their threat threshold. Due to differences in this threat threshold, high and low trait anxious individuals show divergent attentional responses under the same level of external stress. The model incorporates the avoidance effects identified in previous research and theory. This model may explain both the current counter-intuitive findings and past inconsistencies in the literature. It may also clarify how individuals with different levels of anxiety vulnerability show divergent attentional responses to stress elevations. It is suggested that inclusion of the notion of subjective stimulus threat value into the cognitive processing paradigm may clarify some of the unresolved issues raised in this research.
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ItemThe role of self-focused attention, self-discrepancies, and self-efficacy, in anxiety and depression( 2000)The purpose of this thesis was to investigate the relationship between the following aspects of self: self-focused attention, Higgin's (1987) notion of self-discrepancies, and Bandura's (1977) concept of self-efficacy, and participants' emotional experiences of anxiety and depression. These variables were assessed in relation to Duval and Wicklund's (1972) theory of objective self-awareness, and Carver and Scheier's (1981) control theory. The existence of mediating and/or moderating relationships was expected. One hundred and eighty-five University of Melbourne students participated in the study. Four questionnaires were administered: the self-consciousness scale (Fenigstein, Scheier, & Buss, 1975), a measure of self-discrepancies (Donaghue & Boldero, 1996), including measures of specific self-efficacy, the self-efficacy scale (Sherer, Maddux, Mercandante, Prentice-Dunn, Jacobs, & Rogers, 1982), and the neo personality inventory (Costa & McCrae, 1985). Contrary to expectations, both private and public self-focused attention were predictors of both anxiety and depression. Actual-ideal self-discrepancy magnitude predicted both anxiety and depression, while actual-ought self-discrepancy magnitude only predicted anxiety when the variance accounted for by public self-focused attention was partialled from the regression equation. Self-efficacy was a predictor of both anxiety and depression, although self-efficacy specific to reducing self-discrepancies was only predictive of anxiety. No mediating or moderating relationships were found. The role of these different aspects of self as contributors to the experience of anxiety and depression is discussed with reference to current models and the implications for therapeutic management of these syndromes.