Det du inte vet mår du dåligt av: En experimentell studie av uppmärksamhets bias hos ångestindivider

Sammanfattning: The purpose of this study was to examine attentional biases in anxiety. Participants with high self-rated anxiety were predicted to differ in their attention compared to participants with low self-rated anxiety. Participants were predicted to have an implicit memory for the combination of faces that were used in the study. A modified dot probe task was used to examine high and low social and/or trait anxious individuals’ attention when different emotional faces were presented before them. Previous studies have shown results for facilitated attention towards threat in anxiety. This study wanted to examine what kind of effect “unknown information” would have on the participants attention. There were a total of 30 participants, all students, and ages 19-39 years. Several four-way rANOVA were conducted to analyze the results. No significant results were shown for “unknown information”. There were however significant results for facilitated attention towards angry faces in high social anxious individuals.