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Rogers ML, Carosa CL, Haliczer LA, Hughes CD, Schofield CA, Armey MF. The Suicide Dot Probe Task: Psychometric properties and validity in relation to suicide-related outcomes. Suicide Life Threat Behav 2023; 53:1010-1024. [PMID: 37702551 DOI: 10.1111/sltb.12999] [Citation(s) in RCA: 0] [Impact Index Per Article: 0] [Reference Citation Analysis] [Abstract] [Key Words] [MESH Headings] [Grants] [Track Full Text] [Journal Information] [Submit a Manuscript] [Subscribe] [Scholar Register] [Received: 03/14/2023] [Revised: 08/11/2023] [Accepted: 08/22/2023] [Indexed: 09/14/2023]
Abstract
BACKGROUND Attentional biases to suicide-related stimuli have been linked to suicide-related outcomes. However, behavioral tasks that have been previously modified to capture suicide-specific attentional biases have demonstrated inconsistent reliability and validity. Adaptation of the Dot Probe Task, a computerized assessment that has been adapted to study a wide variety of biases, may be a promising candidate for assessing suicide-specific biases. METHODS In 280 recently discharged inpatients (51% male; Mage = 40.22 years), we evaluated the psychometric properties of a modified Suicide Dot Probe Task. Participants completed this task and assessments of suicidal thoughts and behaviors at baseline and 6-month follow-up. RESULTS The Suicide Dot Probe Task demonstrated poor-to-moderate internal consistency and poor test-retest reliability, and participant response times were slower to suicide-specific and dysphoric stimuli than positive stimuli. However, there were no differences based on the presence or characteristics of recent or lifetime suicidal ideation or attempts. Participants' suicide-specific biases were not predictive of suicidal ideation or attempts at follow-up. CONCLUSIONS The Suicide Dot Probe Task exhibited questionable reliability, and differences in attentional biases were not associated with suicidal ideation or attempts. This study contributes to a body of research demonstrating the questionable utility of several behavioral tasks to study suicide-specific attentional biases.
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Affiliation(s)
- Megan L Rogers
- Department of Psychology, Texas State University, San Marcos, Texas, USA
| | - Catarina L Carosa
- Department of Psychology and Neuroscience, Duke University, Durham, North Carolina, USA
| | - Lauren A Haliczer
- Massachusetts General Hospital/Harvard Medical School, Boston, Massachusetts, USA
| | - Christopher D Hughes
- Butler Hospital, Providence, Rhode Island, USA
- Alpert Medical School of Brown University, Providence, Rhode Island, USA
| | | | - Michael F Armey
- Butler Hospital, Providence, Rhode Island, USA
- Alpert Medical School of Brown University, Providence, Rhode Island, USA
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2
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Naets T, Vermeiren E, Vervoort L, Van Eyck A, Ysebaert M, Verhulst S, De Winter B, Van Hoorenbeeck K, Bruyndonckx L, Tanghe A, De Guchtenaere A, Verbeken S, Braet C. Self-control training supplementing inpatient multidisciplinary obesity treatment in children and adolescents. Behav Res Ther 2023; 167:104335. [PMID: 37327533 DOI: 10.1016/j.brat.2023.104335] [Citation(s) in RCA: 0] [Impact Index Per Article: 0] [Reference Citation Analysis] [Abstract] [Key Words] [MESH Headings] [Track Full Text] [Journal Information] [Subscribe] [Scholar Register] [Received: 07/14/2022] [Revised: 03/31/2023] [Accepted: 05/15/2023] [Indexed: 06/18/2023]
Abstract
Research points to self-control as a possible mechanism for facilitating health behaviour and weight loss. The dual pathway model underpins the role of strong bottom-up reactivity towards food and weak top-down executive functions in obesity. Despite flourishing lab studies on attention bias modification or inhibition trainings, relatively few focused on training both processes to improve self-control in children and adolescents in inpatient multidisciplinary obesity treatment (MOT). Being part of the WELCOME project, this study investigated the effectiveness of Brain Fitness training (using the Dot Probe and Go/No-Go) as an adjunct to inpatient MOT in 131 Belgian children and adolescents. Changes in self-control (performance-based inhibitory control and attention bias as well as self-reported eating behaviour) in the experimental group were compared to sham training. Multiple Imputation was used to handle missing data. Inhibitory control and external eating improved over time (pre/post/follow-up), but we found no evidence for a significant interaction between time and condition. Future research should pay more attention to the role of individual variability in baseline self-control, sham training, and ecological validity of self-control training to improve real-life health behaviour and treatment perspectives for children and adolescents with weight problems.
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Affiliation(s)
- Tiffany Naets
- Department of Developmental, Personality and Social Psychology, Ghent University, Ghent, Belgium.
| | - Eline Vermeiren
- Lab of Experimental Medicine and Pediatrics, Faculty of Medicine and Health Sciences, University of Antwerp, Antwerp, Belgium
| | - Leentje Vervoort
- Department of Developmental, Personality and Social Psychology, Ghent University, Ghent, Belgium; Department of Developmental Psychology, Radboud University, Nijmegen, the Netherlands
| | - Annelies Van Eyck
- Lab of Experimental Medicine and Pediatrics, Faculty of Medicine and Health Sciences, University of Antwerp, Antwerp, Belgium; Antwerp University Hospital, Antwerp, Belgium
| | | | - Stijn Verhulst
- Lab of Experimental Medicine and Pediatrics, Faculty of Medicine and Health Sciences, University of Antwerp, Antwerp, Belgium; Antwerp University Hospital, Antwerp, Belgium
| | - Benedicte De Winter
- Lab of Experimental Medicine and Pediatrics, Faculty of Medicine and Health Sciences, University of Antwerp, Antwerp, Belgium; Antwerp University Hospital, Antwerp, Belgium
| | - Kim Van Hoorenbeeck
- Lab of Experimental Medicine and Pediatrics, Faculty of Medicine and Health Sciences, University of Antwerp, Antwerp, Belgium; Antwerp University Hospital, Antwerp, Belgium
| | - Luc Bruyndonckx
- Lab of Experimental Medicine and Pediatrics, Faculty of Medicine and Health Sciences, University of Antwerp, Antwerp, Belgium; Antwerp University Hospital, Antwerp, Belgium
| | | | | | - Sandra Verbeken
- Department of Developmental, Personality and Social Psychology, Ghent University, Ghent, Belgium
| | - Caroline Braet
- Department of Developmental, Personality and Social Psychology, Ghent University, Ghent, Belgium
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Sfärlea A, Radix AK, Schulte-Körne G, Legenbauer T, Platt B. Attention Biases for Eating Disorder-Related Stimuli Versus Social Stimuli in Adolescents with Anorexia Nervosa - An Eye-Tracking Study. Res Child Adolesc Psychopathol 2023; 51:541-555. [PMID: 36418631 PMCID: PMC10017650 DOI: 10.1007/s10802-022-00993-3] [Citation(s) in RCA: 0] [Impact Index Per Article: 0] [Reference Citation Analysis] [Abstract] [Key Words] [Track Full Text] [Journal Information] [Subscribe] [Scholar Register] [Accepted: 11/01/2022] [Indexed: 11/25/2022]
Abstract
Anorexia nervosa (AN) is characterized by attention biases for eating disorder-related information as well as altered attentional processing of social information. However, little is known about the interplay between the altered attentional processing of these two types of information. The present study investigates attention biases for eating disorder-related information (pictures of bodies) versus social information (pictures of faces), in adolescents with AN. Attention biases were assessed via eye-tracking during a passive-viewing task in which female bodies and faces were presented simultaneously and thus competed directly for attention. Female adolescents (13-18 years) with AN (n = 28) were compared to a clinical comparison group (adolescents with major depression; n = 20) and a comparison group of adolescents with no mental illness (n = 24). All groups looked longer at bodies than at faces, i.e., showed attention biases for bodies in maintenance of attention. These biases were more pronounced in adolescents with AN than in both comparison groups, particularly for underweight bodies, at the expense of looking less at social stimuli. The results indicate "dual" attention biases in adolescents with AN (i.e., towards bodies and away from emotional faces) which could have a twofold negative impact on eating disorder psychopathology: increased attention to eating disorder-related information might directly influence eating disorder symptoms while less attention to social information might have an indirect influence through the amplification of interpersonal difficulties.
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Affiliation(s)
- Anca Sfärlea
- Department of Child and Adolescent Psychiatry, Psychosomatics and Psychotherapy, University Hospital, LMU Munich, Research Department, Nussbaumstr. 5, 80336, Munich, Germany.
| | - Anne Kathrin Radix
- LWL-University Clinic of the RUB Bochum, Department of Child and Adolescent Psychiatry, Psychotherapy, Psychosomatics, Hamm, Germany
| | - Gerd Schulte-Körne
- Department of Child and Adolescent Psychiatry, Psychosomatics and Psychotherapy, University Hospital, LMU Munich, Research Department, Nussbaumstr. 5, 80336, Munich, Germany
| | - Tanja Legenbauer
- LWL-University Clinic of the RUB Bochum, Department of Child and Adolescent Psychiatry, Psychotherapy, Psychosomatics, Hamm, Germany
| | - Belinda Platt
- Department of Child and Adolescent Psychiatry, Psychosomatics and Psychotherapy, University Hospital, LMU Munich, Research Department, Nussbaumstr. 5, 80336, Munich, Germany
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Machulska A, Kleinke K, Klucken T. Same same, but different: A psychometric examination of three frequently used experimental tasks for cognitive bias assessment in a sample of healthy young adults. Behav Res Methods 2023; 55:1332-1351. [PMID: 35650382 PMCID: PMC10126031 DOI: 10.3758/s13428-022-01804-9] [Citation(s) in RCA: 0] [Impact Index Per Article: 0] [Reference Citation Analysis] [Abstract] [Key Words] [MESH Headings] [Track Full Text] [Journal Information] [Subscribe] [Scholar Register] [Accepted: 01/21/2022] [Indexed: 11/08/2022]
Abstract
Cognitive bias research draws upon the notion that altered information processing is key for understanding psychological functioning and well-being. However, little attention has been paid to the question of whether the frequently used experimental paradigms hold adequate psychometric properties. The present study examined the psychometric properties of three widely used cognitive bias tasks: the Approach-Avoidance Task (AAT), the visual dot-probe-task, and the Implicit Association Test (IAT). Approach, attentional, and association biases towards valenced stimuli were repeatedly measured at five different time points in a sample of 79 healthy young adults. Two different devices were used for assessment: a personal computer (PC) and a touchscreen-based tablet. Reliability estimates included internal consistency and temporal stability. Validity was inferred from convergence across different behavioral tasks and correlations between bias scores and self-reported psychological traits. Reliability ranged widely amongst tasks, assessment devices, and measurement time points. While the dot-probe-task appeared to be completely unreliable, bias scores obtained from the PC-based version of the AAT and both (PC and touchscreen) versions of the IAT showed moderate reliability. Almost no associations were found across information processing tasks or between implicit and explicit measures. Cognitive bias research should adopt a standard practice to routinely estimate and report psychometric properties of experimental paradigms, investigate feasible ways to develop more reliable tools, and use tasks that are suitable to answer the precise research question asked.
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Affiliation(s)
- Alla Machulska
- Department of Clinical Psychology, University of Siegen, Siegen, Germany.
| | - Kristian Kleinke
- Department of Psychology, Adolf-Reichwein-Str. 2a, D-57068 Siegen, Siegen, Germany
| | - Tim Klucken
- Department of Clinical Psychology, University of Siegen, Siegen, Germany
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Carlson JM, Fang L, Coughtry-Carpenter C, Foley J. Reliability of attention bias and attention bias variability to climate change images in the dot-probe task. Front Psychol 2023; 13:1021858. [PMID: 36710831 PMCID: PMC9878553 DOI: 10.3389/fpsyg.2022.1021858] [Citation(s) in RCA: 0] [Impact Index Per Article: 0] [Reference Citation Analysis] [Abstract] [Key Words] [Track Full Text] [Figures] [Journal Information] [Subscribe] [Scholar Register] [Received: 08/17/2022] [Accepted: 12/22/2022] [Indexed: 01/13/2023] Open
Abstract
Climate change is one of the most pressing issues of the 21st century, which is perhaps why information about climate change has been found to capture observers' attention. One of the most common ways of assessing individual differences in attentional processing of climate change information is through the use of reaction time difference scores. However, reaction time-based difference scores have come under scrutiny for their low reliability. Given that a primary goal of the field is to link individual differences in attention processing to participant variables (e.g., environmental attitudes), we assessed the reliability of reaction time-based measures of attention processing of climate change information utilizing an existing dataset with three variations of the dot-probe task. Across all three samples, difference score-based measures of attentional bias were generally uncorrelated across task blocks (r = -0.25 to 0.31). We also assessed the reliability of newer attention bias variability measures that are thought to capture dynamic shifts in attention toward and away from salient information. Although these measures were initially found to be correlated across task blocks (r = 0.17-0.67), they also tended to be highly correlated with general reaction time variability (r = 0.49-0.83). When controlling for general reaction time variability, the correlations across task blocks for attention bias variability were much weaker and generally nonsignificant (r = -0.25 to 0.33). Furthermore, these measures were unrelated to pro-environmental disposition indicating poor predictive validity. In short, reaction time-based measures of attentional processing (including difference score and variability-based approaches) have unacceptably low levels of reliability and are therefore unsuitable for capturing individual differences in attentional bias to climate change information.
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The questionable validity of attention bias variability: Evidence from two conceptually unrelated cognitive tasks. JOURNAL OF AFFECTIVE DISORDERS REPORTS 2022; 10:100411. [PMID: 36684713 PMCID: PMC9851093 DOI: 10.1016/j.jadr.2022.100411] [Citation(s) in RCA: 2] [Impact Index Per Article: 1.0] [Reference Citation Analysis] [Abstract] [Key Words] [Track Full Text] [Download PDF] [Figures] [Journal Information] [Subscribe] [Scholar Register] [Indexed: 01/26/2023] Open
Abstract
Background Attention bias variability is thought to measure fluctuations in attention towards and away from threat-related information and is elevated in affective disorders. However, recent evidence suggests that attention bias variability may quantify general reaction time variability rather than attention bias behavior per se. Methods The current study calculated "attention bias variability" from two conceptually unrelated cognitive tasks: the dot-probe task (measuring attentional bias) and the arrow flanker task (measuring cognitive control). Results Attention bias variability measures were correlated across these unrelated tasks. Yet, when general reaction time variability was controlled, attention bias variability across tasks was no longer correlated. In addition, the reliability of attention bias variability measures decreased when controlling for general reaction time variability. Finally, although attention bias variability calculated from the dot-probe task initially correlated with anxious symptoms, this association was no longer significant when controlling for general reaction time variability. Limitations Our sample was comprised of high trait anxious individuals. Replication in clinical samples is warranted. Conclusions These findings collectively provide strong empirical evidence that attention bias variability is not a valid measure of attention-related behavior, but reflective of general reaction time variability more broadly.
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Yang MJ, Borges AM, Emery NN, Leyro TM. Trial-level bias score versus mean bias score: Comparison of the reliability and external validity using dot-probe task among daily smokers. Addict Behav 2022; 135:107456. [PMID: 35944381 PMCID: PMC10757633 DOI: 10.1016/j.addbeh.2022.107456] [Citation(s) in RCA: 1] [Impact Index Per Article: 0.5] [Reference Citation Analysis] [Abstract] [Key Words] [MESH Headings] [Grants] [Track Full Text] [Journal Information] [Subscribe] [Scholar Register] [Received: 02/08/2022] [Revised: 07/29/2022] [Accepted: 08/01/2022] [Indexed: 01/25/2023]
Abstract
INTRODUCTION Attentional bias (AB) is an individual difference risk factor that represents the extent to which cigarette cues capture one's attention. AB is typically indexed by mean bias score (MBS), theoretically assuming that AB is static. However, poor reliability of MBS has threatened valid interpretation of the results on AB. Based on observed trial-by-trial temporal fluctuation and variability of attentional allocation, trial-level bias score (TLBS) has been introduced as an alternative index with evidence of better psychometric properties in various populations, as compared to MBS. However, such evidence is limited among daily smokers. The current study aimed to replicate and extend extant findings in a sample of daily smokers by hypothesizing that TLBS, as compared to MBS, would demonstrate superior reliability and external validity. METHODS Forty-eight daily smokers completed self-reports, ad-libitum smoking, and a dot-probe task three times, which was comprised of 36 pairs of pictorial stimuli of cigarette and neutral cues, yielding 144 total trials. RESULTS The TLBS demonstrated superior internal (range intra class correlation [ICC] = 0.79-0.95) and test-retest reliability (range ICC = 0.64-0.88) compared to MBS (range ICC = 0.31-0.40 and 0.06-0.16, respectively). However, few significant relations between either the MBS or TLBS and measures of biobehavioral and self-report indices of smoking reinforcement were observed. CONCLUSIONS The current findings demonstrate that TLBS, as compared to MBS, is a more reliable measure of AB among daily smokers, while evidence of its external validity is limited.
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Affiliation(s)
- Min-Jeong Yang
- Department of Psychology, Rutgers University, Piscataway, NJ 08854, USA; Department of Health Outcomes and Behavior, Moffitt Cancer Center, 4115 E. Fowler Ave, Tampa, FL 33617, USA.
| | - Allison M Borges
- Department of Behavioral Health, The Corporal Michael J. Crescenz VA Medical Center, 3900 Woodland Ave, Philadelphia, PA 19104, USA.
| | - Noah N Emery
- Department of Psychology, Colorado State University, 210 Behavioral Sciences Building, 1876, Campus Delivery, Fort Collins, CO 80523-1876, USA.
| | - Teresa M Leyro
- Department of Psychology, Rutgers University, Piscataway, NJ 08854, USA.
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Ciccarelli M, Cosenza M, Nigro G, D'Olimpio F. Does craving increase gambling severity? The role of attentional bias. J Affect Disord 2022; 317:403-408. [PMID: 36029881 DOI: 10.1016/j.jad.2022.08.068] [Citation(s) in RCA: 0] [Impact Index Per Article: 0] [Reference Citation Analysis] [Key Words] [Track Full Text] [Journal Information] [Submit a Manuscript] [Subscribe] [Scholar Register] [Received: 10/27/2021] [Revised: 05/18/2022] [Accepted: 08/21/2022] [Indexed: 10/31/2022]
Affiliation(s)
- Maria Ciccarelli
- Department of Psychology, Università degli studi della Campania "Luigi Vanvitelli", Viale Ellittico, 31, 81100 Caserta, Italy.
| | - Marina Cosenza
- Department of Psychology, Università degli studi della Campania "Luigi Vanvitelli", Viale Ellittico, 31, 81100 Caserta, Italy
| | - Giovanna Nigro
- Department of Psychology, Università degli studi della Campania "Luigi Vanvitelli", Viale Ellittico, 31, 81100 Caserta, Italy
| | - Francesca D'Olimpio
- Department of Psychology, Università degli studi della Campania "Luigi Vanvitelli", Viale Ellittico, 31, 81100 Caserta, Italy
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