Acceptance and Commitment Therapy is a therapeutic approach that emphasizes the alteration of the relationship one has towards one’s thoughts, rather than attempting to change the content of thoughts. It seeks to promote the awareness of thinking as an ongoing relational process through cognitive defusion techniques. The verbal repetition of thoughts is a technique that has recently been shown in a single-case alternating treatment designs study to significantly reduce the believability and distress associated with self-relevant negative thoughts (Masuda, Hayes, Sackett, & Twohig, 2004). The present study compared the effects of verbal repetition with brief imaginal exposure and no intervention in reducing the believability, distress, and meaningfulness associated with contamination-related thoughts. Individuals with high levels of obsessive-compulsive symptoms identified three distressing contamination-related thoughts and made ratings of belief, distress, and meaningfulness for each thought, using 100-mm visual analogue scales. They were then randomly assigned to receive verbal repetition, imaginal exposure, or no intervention, after which they completed ratings at post-intervention and one-week follow-up. Participants also completed a category membership decision task to determine whether verbal repetition and/or imaginal exposure produces semantic satiation, a temporary loss of the literal meaning of words. Significant reductions in belief, distress, and meaningfulness were observed following verbal repetition at post-intervention and there was some maintenance of these gains one week later. In contrast, no significant reductions were observed at post-intervention following either imaginal exposure or no intervention. However, significant reductions in ratings of belief and distress were observed one week later following imaginal exposure. A semantic satiation effect was observed for only verbal repetition, and although there was no evidence that this effect was associated with reductions in appraisal ratings at post-intervention, there was some indication of a relationship with follow-up appraisal ratings. Implications of these findings are discussed in relation to cognitive-behavioural theories of obsessive-compulsive disorder.

Acceptance and Commitment Therapy is a therapeutic approach that emphasizes the alteration of the relationship one has towards one’s thoughts, rather than attempting to change the content of thoughts. It seeks to promote the awareness of thinking as an ongoing relational process through cognitive defusion techniques. The verbal repetition of thoughts is a technique that has recently been shown in a single-case alternating treatment designs study to significantly reduce the believability and distress associated with self-relevant negative thoughts (Masuda, Hayes, Sackett, & Twohig, 2004). The present study compared the effects of verbal repetition with brief imaginal exposure and no intervention in reducing the believability, distress, and meaningfulness associated with contamination-related thoughts. Individuals with high levels of obsessive-compulsive symptoms identified three distressing contamination-related thoughts and made ratings of belief, distress, and meaningfulness for each thought, using 100-mm visual analogue scales. They were then randomly assigned to receive verbal repetition, imaginal exposure, or no intervention, after which they completed ratings at post-intervention and one-week follow-up. Participants also completed a category membership decision task to determine whether verbal repetition and/or imaginal exposure produces semantic satiation, a temporary loss of the literal meaning of words. Significant reductions in belief, distress, and meaningfulness were observed following verbal repetition at post-intervention and there was some maintenance of these gains one week later. In contrast, no significant reductions were observed at post-intervention following either imaginal exposure or no intervention. However, significant reductions in ratings of belief and distress were observed one week later following imaginal exposure. A semantic satiation effect was observed for only verbal repetition, and although there was no evidence that this effect was associated with reductions in appraisal ratings at post-intervention, there was some indication of a relationship with follow-up appraisal ratings. Implications of these findings are discussed in relation to cognitive-behavioural theories of obsessive-compulsive disorder.

O objetivo desta dissertação é descrever o comportamento de estruturas com repetição verbal em português brasileiro que apresentam características específicas diferentes de outras construções com repetição verbal já estudas no português brasileiro (Bastos 2001/ Bastos-Gee 2009) e no português europeu (Martins 2007). As estruturas em questão são iniciadas com que, sendo que em cada uma delas o constituinte encabeçado por que aparece em posições diferentes na sentença: quando o que está no primeiro bloco, nomeio a estrutura de que-reportativo; quando o que está no segundo bloco, nomeio a estrutura de que-adversativo. Essas construções apresentam similaridades, como a necessidade dos constituintes verbais serem idênticos, mas também apresentam muitas diferenças entre si além da posição do que: ter necessidade de repetir um antecedente discursivo obrigatoriamente, que só ocorre com que-reportativo, e a presença de uma sentença coordenada adversativa implícita, o efeito-mas (Bastos 2001/Bastos-Gee 2009), que também só ocorre com que-reportativo. Através da comparação com outras estruturas de repetição verbal já estudadas no português, mostro que as construções analisadas nesta dissertação possuem comportamentos diferenciados e envolvem tópicos diferentes, a saber, a estrutura com que-reportativo envolve tópico conversacional, enquanto a estrutura com que-adversativo envolve tópico contrastivo. / The goal of this dissertation is to describe the behavior of finite structures with verbal repetition in Brazilian Portuguese, which present different specific characteristics from other verbal repetition constructions previously studied in Brazilian Portuguese (Bastos 2001/ Bastos-Gee 2009) and in European Portuguese (Martins 2007). The structures in question start with que that, but the constituents headed by que occupy different positions in each structure: when que is in the first block of the sentence, I call the structure reportative-que; when que is in the second block of the sentence, I call the structure adversative-que. These structures present similarities, such as the requirement of identical verbal constituents, but also exhibit many differences besides the position where que appears: the requirement to repeat the previous discourse and the presence of an implicit adversative clause - the but-effect (Bastos 2001/ Bastos-Gee 2009) -, for instance, only happens with reportative-que. Through the comparison with other verbal repetition structures already studied in Portuguese, I demonstrate the structures analyzed in this dissertation have a differentiated behavior. I also demonstrate that they are composed by different topics, namely, reportative-que has a conversational topic, while adversative-que has a contrastive topic.

O objetivo desta dissertação é descrever o comportamento de estruturas com repetição verbal em português brasileiro que apresentam características específicas diferentes de outras construções com repetição verbal já estudas no português brasileiro (Bastos 2001/ Bastos-Gee 2009) e no português europeu (Martins 2007). As estruturas em questão são iniciadas com que, sendo que em cada uma delas o constituinte encabeçado por que aparece em posições diferentes na sentença: quando o que está no primeiro bloco, nomeio a estrutura de que-reportativo; quando o que está no segundo bloco, nomeio a estrutura de que-adversativo. Essas construções apresentam similaridades, como a necessidade dos constituintes verbais serem idênticos, mas também apresentam muitas diferenças entre si além da posição do que: ter necessidade de repetir um antecedente discursivo obrigatoriamente, que só ocorre com que-reportativo, e a presença de uma sentença coordenada adversativa implícita, o efeito-mas (Bastos 2001/Bastos-Gee 2009), que também só ocorre com que-reportativo. Através da comparação com outras estruturas de repetição verbal já estudadas no português, mostro que as construções analisadas nesta dissertação possuem comportamentos diferenciados e envolvem tópicos diferentes, a saber, a estrutura com que-reportativo envolve tópico conversacional, enquanto a estrutura com que-adversativo envolve tópico contrastivo. / The goal of this dissertation is to describe the behavior of finite structures with verbal repetition in Brazilian Portuguese, which present different specific characteristics from other verbal repetition constructions previously studied in Brazilian Portuguese (Bastos 2001/ Bastos-Gee 2009) and in European Portuguese (Martins 2007). The structures in question start with que that, but the constituents headed by que occupy different positions in each structure: when que is in the first block of the sentence, I call the structure reportative-que; when que is in the second block of the sentence, I call the structure adversative-que. These structures present similarities, such as the requirement of identical verbal constituents, but also exhibit many differences besides the position where que appears: the requirement to repeat the previous discourse and the presence of an implicit adversative clause - the but-effect (Bastos 2001/ Bastos-Gee 2009) -, for instance, only happens with reportative-que. Through the comparison with other verbal repetition structures already studied in Portuguese, I demonstrate the structures analyzed in this dissertation have a differentiated behavior. I also demonstrate that they are composed by different topics, namely, reportative-que has a conversational topic, while adversative-que has a contrastive topic.