Emotion regulation and tic disorders in children.

Tic disorders (TD) are developmental neuropsychiatric conditions often accompanied by comorbid conditions, and psychosocial hardships for child and family. The etiology of tics is unknown, and is complex and multifactorial. Stress is known to aggravate tic expression as well as associated comorbidities. Consequently, this study focused on possible connections between stress, emotion regulation, tic expression, and related psychopathology. Sixty consecutive admissions were assessed for perceived stress, emotional dysregulation, severity of obsessions and compulsions, anxiety, depression, attention deficit disorder, and tic expression at a TD clinic, in a university affiliated pediatric hospital. The results indicated that stress and emotion dysregulation were significantly related to both tic expression and severity of comorbidities. We discuss the role of emotion regulation dimensions regarding TD and related psychopathology as well as the mediating role of emotion regulation, and how they may contribute to the development of improved therapies for children with TD.

Combat-related posttraumatic stress disorder among second-generation Holocaust survivors: preliminary findings.

The authors assessed the impact of the Nazi Holocaust on the course and symptoms of posttraumatic stress disorder (PTSD) among Israeli combat stress reaction casualties. They examined a sample of 96 such casualties of the 1982 Lebanon War whose parents had gone through the Nazi Holocaust and compared them to casualties who did not have such family history for 3 consecutive years beginning 1 year after their participation in the war. Results showed that 2 and 3 years after their participation in the 1982 Lebanon War, the children of Holocaust survivors, i.e., "second-generation" casualties, had higher rates of PTSD than did the control subjects, as well as a somewhat different clinical picture. Clinical and methodological implications of the findings are discussed.

Posttraumatic stress disorder among frontline soldiers with combat stress reaction: the 1982 Israeli experience.

One year after the 1982 Lebanon War, the authors assessed the prevalence, type, and severity of posttraumatic stress disorder in a large representative sample of Israeli soldiers who had been treated for combat stress reactions. Comparisons were made with a group of soldiers who had fought in the same battles but had not been treated for this reaction. A dramatically higher percentage of soldiers with combat stress reaction (59%) than of soldiers without combat stress reaction (16%) developed posttraumatic stress disorder. Age was significantly associated with posttraumatic stress disorder. The authors discuss the differential quality of posttraumatic stress disorder among both groups as well as the factors facilitating recovery.

Monotonic and rhythmic influences: a challenge for sleep deprivation research.

There are both monotonic and rhythmic factors in the patterns of change seen in physiological, psychological, and performance variables during sleep deprivation. These monotonic and rhythmic factors can be orthogonal, or they may interact with each other, with various task variables, or both. The importance of separating the rhythmic from the monotonic factors and of elucidating their interactions is discussed. Experimental methods and types of analysis appropriate to evaluating these factors are examined, with special emphasis on the complex demodulation time series analysis applied to group or individual subject data. The discussion is accompanied by data illustrations. It is suggested that sleep deprivation research should be designed so as to generate physiological and behavioral data that include information on both monotonic and rhythmic factors, the nature and extent of their interaction, and how they interrelate with systematically manipulated independent variables.

Subjective sleepiness ratings: the effects of sleep deprivation, circadian rhythmicity and cognitive performance.

Computerized self-report sleepiness scales were administered before and after cognitive testing in a 72-hour sleep deprivation study. The cognitive test battery was administered every 2 hours and took approximately 1-1.25 hours. Two computerized measures of subjective sleepiness were used, one a visual analog scale, the other a Hebrew version of the Stanford sleepiness scale. The results indicated that both accumulated sleep loss, circadian and ultradian (2 cycles/day) factors were significant in determining subjective estimates of sleepiness. The extent of the differences between subjective sleepiness ratings before cognitive testing and after testing was dependent upon the phase of the circadian cycle. These differences were greatest at approximately 0200-0600 hours and least around 1000 hours. A second low point occurred at 1800-2000 hours. Analysis by complex demodulation of the individual subjects' sleepiness rating curves indicated that the amount of variance accounted for by the circadian component increased significantly after cognitive testing.

Selected problems of analysis and interpretation of the effects of sleep deprivation on temperature and performance rhythms.

One of the major methodological-analytic problems encountered by researchers in sleep deprivation involves the examination and analysis of the relationship between sleep loss and rhythmic influences on performance. The comparison of performance rhythms with physiological rhythms, e.g., body temperature, generated under the same conditions of sleep deprivation, has become an important means of testing for an endogenous source of the rhythmicity in the data and for clarifying the nature of the proposed oscillator system. Should the data sets be correlated before or after their separation into monotonic and rhythmic parts? Correlating the raw data without separating them into their components can yield negative results, while, in reality, some of the major underlying rhythms may be highly related. The example used in this chapter showed strong cross correlations of the circadian components of temperature and two performance tasks. Sleep deprivation is thus seen to interact with performance rhythms. This interaction is only revealed after the data are analyzed and broken into their component parts. This procedure leads to the conclusion that certain performance rhythms and temperature may share the same generating oscillators.

Thresholds and tolerance of physical pain in suicidal and nonsuicidal adolescents.

It was hypothesized that suicidal inpatient adolescents (n = 38) will exhibit a higher tolerance for physical pain than nonsuicidal inpatients (n = 29) and control participants (n = 34). Participants provided self-reports of hopelessness, dissociation, suicidal tendencies, depression, and anxiety and were administered a series of thermal pain stimuli by means of a Thermal Sensory Analyzer (TSA). The suicidal participants significantly differed from the 2 controls in pain thresholds and tolerance and in most self-report measures, even after controlling for motivation, medication, diagnosis, and length of hospitalization. Significant correlations were found between pain measures and self-report measures. The results were discussed in terms of the role that body experiences play in suicidal behavior.

Self-representation of suicidal adolescents.

This study focused on the self-representations of suicidal adolescent. Twenty-six Israeli suicidal inpatients, 24 nonsuicidal inpatients, and 24 control participants completed scales on suicidal tendencies, the hedonic value of self-representations, the complexity (differentiation, integration) of these self-representations, and the discrepancies among self domains (actual, ideal, ought). Suicidal adolescents showed more negative self-representations, a less differentiated and less integrated organization of self-attributes, and more discrepancies between the 3 assessed domains of the self than did control participants. In addition, compared with psychiatric nonsuicidal participants, suicidal adolescents showed a less complex organization of self-attributes and a higher discrepancy between ideal self and ought self. Results were discussed in terms of the vulnerable self of suicidal adolescents, characterized by uneven processing of positive and negative information, confusion, and simplicity.

Adult attachment style and information processing: individual differences in curiosity and cognitive closure.

Five studies examined the association between adult attachment style and information processing. Studies 1-2 focused on information search (curiosity-related beliefs and behaviors). Studies 3-5 focused on the integration of new information within cognitive structures; namely, the level of cognitive closure and its expressions in social judgements. Secure and anxious-ambivalent persons described themselves as more curious and held more positive attitudes toward curiosity than did avoidant persons. Time competition between information search and social interaction increased information search among avoidant persons, but decreased it among anxious-ambivalent persons. Finally, secure persons reported less preference for cognitive closure and were more likely to rely on new information in making social judgements than avoidant and anxious-ambivalent persons. The theoretical implications of the link between attachment and information processing are discussed.

Attributional processes in the learned helplessness paradigm: behavioral effects of global attributions.

Following the learned helplessness paradigm, I assessed in this study the effects of global and specific attributions for failure on the generalization of performance deficits in a dissimilar situation. Helplessness training consisted of experience with noncontingent failures on four cognitive discrimination problems attributed to either global or specific causes. Experiment 1 found that performance in a dissimilar situation was impaired following exposure to globally attributed failure. Experiment 2 examined the behavioral effects of the interaction between stable and global attributions of failure. Exposure to unsolvable problems resulted in reduced performance in a dissimilar situation only when failure was attributed to global and stable causes. Finally, Experiment 3 found that learned helplessness deficits were a product of the interaction of global and internal attribution. Performance deficits following unsolvable problems were recorded when failure was attributed to global and internal causes. Results were discussed in terms of the reformulated learned helplessness model.

Adult attachment style and individual differences in functional versus dysfunctional experiences of anger.

Three studies examined the association between adult attachment and anger. Study 1 examined attachment-style differences in self-reports of anger-proneness, anger expression, anger goals, and responses to anger. Study 2 assessed attachment style, physiological signs of anger, and attribution of hostile intent. Study 3 used a lexical-decision task for studying attachment-style differences in expected anger outcome. Secure persons scored lower in anger-proneness, endorsed more constructive anger goals, reported more adaptive responses and more positive affect in anger episodes, attributed less hostile intent to others, and expected more positive outcomes than insecure persons. For ambivalent persons, the anger experience also included lack of anger control and anger-in. For avoidant persons, it included high hostility, escapist responses, and lack of awareness of physiological signs of anger. The underlying action of working models is emphasized in the discussion.

Adult attachment style and affect regulation: strategic variations in self-appraisals.

Four studies examined the link between adult attachment style and strategic variations in self-appraisals. Whereas secure persons held a stable positive self-view, Studies 1-2 showed that avoidant persons showed a positive self-view and anxious-ambivalent persons a negative self-view, which were strengthened by distress arousal and weakened by factors that inhibit the activation of regulatory mechanisms. Studies 3-4 indicated that insecure persons' self-views varied in accordance with specific attachment-related concerns and needs. Avoidant persons' positive self-view was related to their attempts to validate their sense of self-reliance, and anxious-ambivalent persons' negative self-view was related to their attempts to win others' compassion and affection. Results are discussed in terms of attachment-related strategies of affect regulation.

Reactance and helplessness following exposure to unsolvable problems: the effects of attributional style.

I assessed the effects of internal-external attributional style and amount of unsolvable problems on subsequent task performance. Undergraduate subjects were divided according to their attributional style for bad events into internal, nondefined, and external attributors and were exposed to either one, four, or no unsolvable problems. Following exposure to a single unsolvable problem, internal attributors exhibited greater frustration and hostility and better performance in a subsequent cognitive task than did external attributors. Following exposure to four unsolvable problems, internal attributors exhibited stronger feelings of incompetence and a decrease in performance compared with external attributors. The results are discussed in terms of Wortman and Brehm's (1975) approach to reactance and helplessness.

Fear of death and the judgment of social transgressions: a multidimensional test of terror management theory.

The purpose of the research was to integrate a multidimensional approach to fear of personal death with terror management theory. In Study 1, 190 students were divided according to the manipulation of death salience and the intrapersonal and interpersonal aspects of fear of death and were asked to judge transgressions that have either intrapersonal or interpersonal consequences. Study 2 was a conceptual replication of Study 1, with the exception that the manipulation of mortality salience included conditions that made salient either intrapersonal or interpersonal aspects of death. Findings indicate that the effects of mortality salience depend on the aspect of death that is made salient, the aspect of death that individuals most fear, and the type of the judged transgression. More severe judgments of transgressions after death salience manipulation were found mainly when there was a fit between these 3 factors. Findings are discussed in light of terror management theory.

Attachment styles and repressive defensiveness: the accessibility and architecture of affective memories.

One hundred and twenty Israeli students were classified into secure, avoidant, and anxious-ambivalent attachment groups. They completed scales that tap the construct of repressive defensiveness and recalled early personal experiences of anger, anxiety, sadness, and happiness. Secure people reported moderate defensiveness and low anxiety and had easy access to negative memories without being overwhelmed by the spreading of the dominant emotional tone to nondominant emotions. Anxious-ambivalent people were unable to repress negative affects, reported high anxiety, had easy access to negative memories, and could not inhibit emotional spreading. Avoidant people reported high levels of defensiveness and anxiety and showed low accessibility to negative memories. The discussion emphasizes the parallel between a person's interaction with the social world and the makeup of his or her inner world.

Symbolic immortality and the management of the terror of death: the moderating role of attachment style.

Three studies were designed to examine the contribution of R. J. Lifton's (1979) symbolic immortality construct to the management of the terror of death and to investigate whether attachment style may underlie this contribution. Using a sample of 420 Israeli students, Study 1 revealed an inverse correlation between self-reports of symbolic immortality and fear of personal death. This finding was validated in Study 2 (N = 120), which found that high symbolic immortality reduced the effects of a death salience manipulation on the level of punishment given to a social transgressor. Study 3 (N = 270) refined the association between symbolic immortality and fear of death. The inverse correlation found in Study 1 was revealed only among securely attached persons. The discussion emphasizes the interconnectedness between personality, symbolic immortality, and the management of the terror of death.

Learned helplessness and the occurrence of depressive-like and paranoid-like responses: the role of attentional focus.

Five experiments were performed to examine different manifestations of depressive- and paranoid-like responses after failure in unsolvable problems. Participants were exposed to no feedback, "universal" failures, or "personal" failures while their attention was focused on either themselves or the experimenter. Then, depressive and paranoid-related states of mind, interfering thoughts, self-schemata, others-schemata, and autobiographical memories were measured. Findings indicated that when attention was focused on the self, personal failure was effective in producing depressive-like reactions. When attention was focused on the threatening agent (experimenter), participants reacted to the exposure to personal failure with paranoid-like responses. Universal failure failed to produce either depressive- or paranoid-like reactions. The discussion focuses on the association between personal learned helplessness and psychopathology and on the role of attentional focus.

Adult attachment style and the perception of others: the role of projective mechanisms.

In 3 reported studies the authors examined attachment-style differences in the perception of others and the hypothesis that projective mechanisms underlie these differences. In these studies, participants reported on their attachment style and generated actual-self-traits and unwanted-self-traits. Then, a 2nd session was conducted, in which impression formation about new persons (Study 1), the ease of retrieval of memories about known persons (Study 2), or memory inferences about learned features of fictional persons (Study 3) were assessed. Findings indicate that whereas anxious-ambivalent persons' impression formation, memory retrieval, and inferences about others reflected the projection of their actual-self-traits, avoidant persons' responses reflected the projection of their unwanted-self-traits. Findings are discussed in terms of the regulatory goals and strategies that characterize the mental representations of each attachment style.

Causal attribution, cognitive interference, and the generalization of learned helplessness.

We assessed the role of off-task cognitions in mediating the performance effects of global and specific attributions for failure. In Experiment 1, subjects were divided into global and specific attributors and were exposed to either no feedback or failure feedback. In Experiment 2, subjects were exposed to no feedback or to unsolvable problems wherein they received attribution for failure to specific or global causes. Experiment 3 added a condition in which subjects were restrained from engaging in off-task cognitions. Results showed that exposure to unsolvable problems deteriorated performance and increased off-task cognitions mainly among subjects who attributed failure to global causes. In addition, the enhancement of off-task cognitions interfered with performance following unsolvable problems. The introduction of instructions that discouraged subjects from engaging in off-task cognitions eliminated the detrimental effects of global attribution. Results are discussed in terms of test anxiety and excuse-making conceptualizations of learned helplessness.

Exploring individual differences in reactions to mortality salience: does attachment style regulate terror management mechanisms?

Five studies examined the contribution of attachment style to mortality salience effects. In Study 1, mortality salience led to more severe judgments of transgressions only among anxious-ambivalent and avoidant persons but not among secure persons. In addition, whereas anxious-ambivalent persons showed immediate and delayed increases in severity judgments, avoidant persons showed this response only after a delay period. In Study 2, anxious-ambivalent persons showed immediate and delayed increases in death-thought accessibility after death reminders. Avoidant and secure persons showed this effect only after a delay period. Study 3 revealed that worldview defense in response to mortality salience reduced death-thought accessibility only among avoidant persons. Studies 4-5 revealed that mortality salience led to an increase in the sense of symbolic immortality as well as in the desire of intimacy only among secure persons, but not among avoidant and anxious-ambivalent persons.