Specificity and modifiability of cognitive biases in hypochondriasis

Journal of Consulting and Clinical Psychology
Maria GropalisMichael Witthöft

Abstract

According to cognitive-behavioral models of hypochondriasis (HYP), biased attentional and memory processes related to health threat stimuli are crucial for the development and maintenance of severe health anxiety. Little is known about the specificity, temporal stability, and modifiability of these biases via psychotherapy. In an emotional Stroop and subsequent recognition task, the authors compared attention and memory processes for health-related words (illnesses, bodily complaints, and panic-related words) in patients with HYP (n = 32), other somatoform disorders (SFD; n = 27), and panic disorder (PD; n = 25). A control group consisted of 31 healthy participants (CG). All patients were reexamined after 4 months of cognitive-behavioral therapy (CBT). Patients with HYP showed a significant attentional bias toward all 3 target word categories. Evidence for a specific bias was found only for the PD group. General recognition performance for health threat and neutral words was best in the HYP group. After therapy, attentional bias had clearly decreased in the HYP and SFD patients. Patients with HYP can be characterized by attentional bias and more elaborate verbal processing. These irregularities tend to disappear after psychothe...Continue Reading

Citations

Dec 3, 2014·Clinical Psychology Review·Lee Pergamin-HightYair Bar-Haim
Jul 24, 2015·Journal of Behavior Therapy and Experimental Psychiatry·Franziska SchreiberFlorian Weck
Aug 16, 2014·Journal of Anxiety Disorders·Franziska SchreiberFlorian Weck
Jul 23, 2013·Journal of Behavior Therapy and Experimental Psychiatry·Amar KaurLouise Sharpe
Jul 20, 2014·Biological Psychology·Manuela SchaeferMichael Witthöft
Jul 8, 2016·Harvard Review of Psychiatry·Nicholas KontosOliver Freudenreich
Oct 4, 2017·Frontiers in Psychology·Maksymilian BieleckiGrzegorz Sedek
Jun 5, 2020·Cognitive and Behavioral Neurology : Official Journal of the Society for Behavioral and Cognitive Neurology·Priyanka R AlluriDavid L Perez
Nov 19, 2021·Journal of Medical Internet Research·Sandra K SchenkelMichael Witthöft

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