Cognitive Science/ Cognitive Processes
Nathan M. Hager, M.S.
Graduate Student
Old Dominion University
Norfolk, Virginia
Matt R. Judah, Ph.D.
Assistant Professor
University of Arkansas
Fayetteville, Arkansas
Alicia L. Milam, M.S.
Graduate Student
Old Dominion University
Norfolk, Virginia
Hannah C. Hamrick, B.S.
Graduate Student
University of Arkansas
Fayetteville, Arkansas
Catherine Glenn, Ph.D.
Assistant Professor
Old Dominion University
Norfolk, Virginia
Social anxiety disorder (SAD) and major depressive disorder (MDD) are highly comorbid (Belzer & Schneier, 2004). Cognitive theories suggest that attentional biases contribute to both disorders, such that attention may be biased to focus toward or away from certain types of information (e.g., rejecting or sad images; Clark & McManus, 2002; Lemoult & Gotlib, 2019). Research on attentional biases in these disorders is mixed, but more recent studies suggest findings may be clarified by using neural measures of attentional bias. One such neural measure, an event-related potential called the N2pc, has indicated biases in early attention (200-300 ms) in social anxiety, but little N2pc research has examined depression or co-occurring depression and social anxiety. Further, N2pc studies typically compare emotional faces to neutral faces while failing to examine bias when various types of emotional faces directly compete for attention.
Undergraduates (N = 102) performed a dot-probe task while electroencephalography was measured. In the task, paired images of faces that represent emotional or neutral expressions competed for attention while the participant responded with button presses. Participants completed self-report measures of social anxiety and depression. Hierarchical linear regressions examined the hypotheses that social anxiety would be associated with attentional biases toward both angry and disgust faces and that depression would be associated with biases away from happy faces and toward sad faces. These attentional biases were expected to be attenuated in people with co-occurring social anxiety and depression.
Results (with standardized coefficients) showed that social anxiety was associated with more negative N2pc for (i.e. greater attentional bias toward) happy faces (β = -.32, p < .01) when holding depression constant. Social anxiety was not associated with biases for disgust, angry, sad, or neutral faces (ps > .12). Depression was only marginally associated with bias toward sad faces (β = -.20, p = .09), given average social anxiety, and the interaction of depression and social anxiety marginally predicted less bias toward sad faces (β = .21, p = .08). Depression was not associated with bias for happy, disgust, angry, or neutral faces (ps > .19).
The observed bias toward happy faces in social anxiety supports the fear of positive evaluation theory of social anxiety (Weeks et al., 2008). Socially anxious individuals may rapidly attend to positive evaluation because it signals being pulled further into an anxiety provoking situation. Compared to previous research, the lack of disgust and angry biases in social anxiety highlights the importance of examining a variety of emotional stimuli in direct competition for attention. The relation between depression and bias toward sad faces was marginal but provides some support for the cognitive perspective that attentional vigilance for depressive content may influence negative thoughts and mood. The findings show the importance of investigating the unique and interacting roles of social anxiety and depression. Future research should examine the effect of these biases on subsequent mood and test the impact of interventions such as attentional bias modification.