[Truncated abstract] Attentional and interpretive biases are important dimensions of individual difference that have been implicated in the etiology and maintenance of a range of clinical problems. Yet there has been no systematic investigation into the relationship between these dimensions of individual difference. The current research program tested predictions derived from two competing theoretical accounts of the relationship between attentional and interpretive biases. The Common Mechanism Account proposes that cognitive biases represent concurrent manifestations of a single underlying selective processing mechanism. The Independent Mechanism account proposes that independent mechanisms underlie each bias. . . An apparent contradiction is that the manipulation of one bias served to also modify the other bias, despite the observation that the magnitude of the resulting change in both biases was uncorrelated. Neither the Common Mechanism nor the Independent Pathways accounts can adequately explain this pattern of results. A new account is proposed, in which attentional and interpretive biases are viewed as representing mechanisms that are related but that are not the same. Theoretical and applied implications of these findings are discussed, including the possibility that the two biases each may best predict emotional reactions to quite different stressful events and that training programs designed to attenuate allocation of attentional resources to threat may serve to reduce both attentional and interpretive selectivity in emotionally vulnerable individuals.
| Identifer | oai:union.ndltd.org:ADTP/221309 |
| Date | January 2007 |
| Creators | Raykos, Bronwyn C |
| Publisher | University of Western Australia. School of Psychology |
| Source Sets | Australiasian Digital Theses Program |
| Language | English |
| Detected Language | English |
| Rights | Copyright Bronwyn C. Raykos, http://www.itpo.uwa.edu.au/UWA-Computer-And-Software-Use-Regulations.html |
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