Attentional bias and spider phobia: Conceptual and clinical issues
Behaviour Research and TherapyPublished 1 January 1993
Edith Lavy, Marcel van den Hout, Arnoud Arntz
Citations171
SJR quartileQ1
SJR score2.01
SNIP1.64
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TL;DR
A replication study was carried out in order to increase the evidence for exposure being the crucial component in reducing attentional bias and the theoretical and clinical implications are discussed.
Abstract
Experimental evidence indicates that anxious subjects show an attentional bias for threat-relevant information. Foa and McNally (1986) (Cognitive Therapy and Research, 10, 477-485) and Watts et al. (1986) (British Journal of Psychology, 77, 97-108) reported that behaviour therapy can eliminate this attentional bias. A replication study was carried out in order to increase the evidence for exposure being the crucial component in reducing attentional bias. Moreover, in this study some conceptual and clinical issues are explored. The theoretical and clinical implications of the results are discussed.
Keywords
Psychology
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The data suggest that a learning approach to the origins of attentional biases in anxious subjects might be fruitful and that these properties compete with the attentional resources needed for an ongoing task.