Several investigations suggest that the amygdala plays a significant role in behavioral inhibition. Brutkowski, Fonberg and Mempel (1960) reported that bilateral lesions of the amygdaloid complex in dogs severely impaired inhibitory conditioned responses, while excitatory conditioned responses remained unaffected. Bilateral lesions of the amygdala have also been shown to impair the acquisition of the conditioned emotional response (Kellicutt & Schwartzbaum, 1963), and the retention of an auditory frequency discrimination in a bar pressing situation for food (Schwartzbaum, Thompson & Kellicutt, 1964). In the latter study, amygdaloid lesioned rats typically persisted in responses that were no longer adaptive, that is, they increased responding under nonreinforced conditions. [...]

No description available.

The impact of a sustained stress response on psychological and physical health is well established. However, the moderating role in this relationship of coping, and especially maladaptive avoidance coping, has been hampered by psychometric shortcomings in existing coping scales. Some of these shortcomings include generating items based on theory or face-validity alone, the extraction of too many factors, and the absence of confirmatory factor analytic (CFA) evidence for the obtained structure. This thesis describes the development of a new avoidance coping scale, the General and Specific Avoidance Questionnaire (GSAQ), to address these issues in multidimensional avoidance coping scales in particular. In contrast to previous scales, the GSAQ items were derived from a scenario technique which elicits responses from participants' experience. Exploratory factor analysis extracted a three-factor solution comprising General, Emotional, and Conflict Avoidance. The scales showed satisfactory reliability, and the structure was confirmed by CFA in independent English and Spanish samples. Concurrent validation and an exploration of differences between high and low avoiders showed that General Avoidance and Conflict Avoidance related to criterion measures in predictable ways, but Emotional Avoidance showed an unexpected pattern. An analysis of the role of avoidance coping in deliberate self-harm showed no statistically significant effects in a non-clinical university student sample, but the overall trend suggested that self-harmers do, on average, score higher on avoidance coping than non-self-harmers. A subsequent laboratory study introducing research participants to a mild laboratory stressor suggested that individuals who score high on avoidance coping showed greater cardiovascular reactivity compared to low conflict avoiders. The findings reported in this thesis show that the GSAQ is a reliable tool to use for future research on the role of multidimensional avoidance coping in psychological and physical health.

No description available.

Although recent research has demonstrated that intrusive memories of negative autobiographical events are an overlapping cognitive feature of depression and PTSD, there is still a general paucity of research investigating the prevalence and maintenance of these memories in depression. Accordingly, the current thesis represented a much-needed program of empirically-driven research that delineated the cognitive processes that underpin the manifestation, experience, and persistence of intrusive memories in depression. Firstly, Study 1 used descriptive and correlational methodologies to outline the content and features of these memories, and explored whether intrusion characteristics linked to intrusive memories in PTSD are also features of intrusive memories in depression. In accord with studies in PTSD samples, sensory features accounted for unique variance in the prediction of depression severity, over and above that accounted for by intrusion frequency. This commonality raised the possibility that cognitive management strategies linked to the persistence of intrusive memories in PTSD may also play a role in depression. Accordingly, Study 2 utilized a cross-sectional and prospective design to investigate whether negative appraisals and cognitive avoidance strategies, which are key to the persistence of intrusive memories in PTSD, similarly play a role in depression. The results demonstrated that assigning negative appraisals to one???s intrusive memory, and attempts to control the memory, were positively associated with intrusion-related distress, level of depression, and cognitive avoidance mechanisms. Additionally, negative appraisals and the use of cognitive mechanisms were predictive of depression concurrently, but not prospectively. Studies 3, 4, and 5 further investigated avoidant intrusion- response strategies by assessing the role of recall vantage perspective in mediating the effects of intrusion-related distress. Study 3 found that although field memories were not experienced as more distressing than observer memories, the results supported an association between an observer vantage perspective and cognitive avoidance mechanisms. As this study employed a correlational design, Study 4 addressed the question of directionality by experimentally manipulating mode of recall to ascertain whether shifting participants into a converse perspective would have differential effects on the reported experience of their intrusive memory. Results indicated that shifting participants from a field to an observer perspective resulted in decreased experiential ratings; specifically, reduced distress and vividness and increased detachment and observation. Also, as anticipated, the converse shift in perspective (from observer to field) did not lead to a corresponding increase in experiential ratings, but resulted in reduced ratings of observation. Study 5 attempted to investigate the stability of this memory orientation phenomenon by investigating mode of recall vantage perspective prospectively. Attrition of participants across the 12-month study limited analyses to the descriptive level, but illustrated that, at least for some individuals, recall vantage perspective remained stable across assessments periods. Collectively, the findings supported the notion that recall perspective has a functional role in the regulation of intrusion-related distress and represents a cognitive avoidance mechanism. Studies 6 and 7 employed experimental methodologies to investigate whether adopting an abstract/analytical mode of processing following a negative event would result in poor emotional processing, or increased distress associated with intrusive memories. Study 6 found no differences in either intrusion frequency or associated levels of distress across the processing conditions, as hypothesized. The results of Study 6 suggested that the predicted effects of ruminative self-focus on intrusion severity may be dependent upon the self-referential nature of the material being processed. Results of Study 7 indicated that inducing an analytical ruminative mode of processing resulted in participants rating their naturally occurring, self-referential intrusive memories as more negative, more distressing, and evoking a more negative emotional response compared to inducing distraction. Taken together, Studies 6 and 7 suggest the possibility that depressed individuals may get caught up in a ruminative cycle that, due to the documented effects of analytical self-focus, may exacerbate the emotional response elicited by the intrusions and perpetuate biased attentional focus towards them. Finally, Studies 8 and 9 explored suppression as a cognitive avoidance mechanism and addressed some methodological concerns regarding the measurement of this construct. Study 8 investigated the effects of repeated suppression using a method to index the frequency, duration, and associated levels of distress of an experimentally-induced intrusive memory, and assessed whether any observed effects were differentially linked to depressive symptomatology. Results supported a secondary rebound effect in those participants who were most successful at suppressing target intrusions. Study 9 was an investigation of the English version of the TCAQ (Luciano, Algarabel, Tom??s, & Mart??nez, 2005), an index of cognitive control. Study 9 evaluated the association between this measure and performance on a thought suppression task. The results indicated that low TCAQ-20 scorers experienced intrusions of a longer duration and rated these intrusions as more distressing than high TCAQ-20 scorers, supporting the validity of the measure. These findings highlight the role of suppression as a maladaptive mental control strategy and the potential for elevated intrusion-distress to perpetuate its use. Together, the findings of this program of research confirm the importance of intrusive memories in depression, and underscore the need for an empirically-supported model to account for the occurrence and maintenance of these memories.

Thesis (B.Sc.Hons.) -- University of Adelaide, Department of Psychology, 1972.

Thesis (M.A.) -- Memorial University of Newfoundland. / Typescript. Bibliography : leaves 40-47. Also available online.

Thesis (M.A.) -- Memorial University of Newfoundland. / Typescript. Bibliography : leaves 47-50. Also available online.

Thesis (Psy. D.)--University of Hong Kong, 2008. / Includes bibliographical references (p.91-105).

Thesis (Ph. D.)--University of Wisconsin, 1967. / Typescript. Vita. eContent provider-neutral record in process. Description based on print version record. Includes bibliography.