2006) In response to cues associated with threat, a fear respon

2006). In response to cues associated with threat, #Protein Tyrosine Kinase inhibitor randurls[1|1|,|CHEM1|]# a fear response is triggered, which can become debilitating and uncontrollable. Although vigilance for danger cues can be useful in threatening situations, exaggerated selectivity for negatively valenced information may be more distracting and intrusive than useful in nonthreatening situations, as appears to be the case in anxiety disorders (Mathews and MacLeod 1985). Seemingly paradoxically, exposure to threat-related stimuli can lead to habituation of the fear response by gradually diminishing the potency

of feared stimuli (Head and Gross 2003). However, some studies have failed to find habituation during Inhibitors,research,lifescience,medical exposure to negatively valenced stimuli (Smith et al. 2005; Wendt et Inhibitors,research,lifescience,medical al. 2008). Failure to habituate may be due to recruitment of cognitive avoidance strategies, which direct attention away from the threatening aspects of stimuli (Williams et al. 1988). Thus, the process of habituation seems to vary as a function of attentional engagement: directing attention toward negatively valenced stimuli results in habituation, whereas engaging in distraction does not (Telch et Inhibitors,research,lifescience,medical al. 2004). Borkovec and colleagues proposed that worrying provides distraction from the full-blown intensity of fear experienced as a result of engagement in catastrophic, threat-related imagery (Borkovec et al. 2004), and research supports the association

between Inhibitors,research,lifescience,medical worry and failure to habituate (Borkovec and Inz 1990; Thayer et al. 2000). Therefore, worry may serve as a negatively reinforced coping mechanism, because it results in avoidance

of a full fear response by redirecting attention, thus maintaining the fear response over time. Inconsistencies in findings regarding habituation may therefore be due to individual differences in the tendency to employ cognitive avoidance strategies (e.g., worry). These two responses to negatively valenced stimuli (engagement in worry vs. an immediate fear response) are thought to reflect two distinct types of anxiety (Nitschke Inhibitors,research,lifescience,medical et al. 1999). Anxious apprehension, characterized by worry, is the cardinal feature of generalized anxiety these disorder (GAD; Barlow 1986). Anxious arousal, characterized by sympathetic hyperarousal and somatic tension, is an important component of panic disorder. Increased neural activation to negative words in Broca’s area has been associated with anxious apprehension (Engels et al. 2007, 2010), consistent with the role of this area in verbal processes (Zatorre et al. 1996). Increased activation to negative words in right inferior and middle temporal gyri (ITG, MTG) has been associated with anxious arousal (Engels et al. 2007), consistent with the role of this area in the identification of salient and unexpected stimuli (Compton et al. 2003; Corbetta et al. 2008) and theorizing regarding the role of this area in threat response (for review, see Nitschke et al. 2000).

Leave a Reply

Your email address will not be published. Required fields are marked *

*

You may use these HTML tags and attributes: <a href="" title=""> <abbr title=""> <acronym title=""> <b> <blockquote cite=""> <cite> <code> <del datetime=""> <em> <i> <q cite=""> <strike> <strong>