Attentional bias for pain‐ and period‐related symptom words in healthy women who experienced a recent painful period

Schoth, Daniel E.; Williams, Sarah; Liossi, Christina

doi:10.1002/ejp.597

Cited by 4 publications

(3 citation statements)

References 29 publications

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“…Yet, research has shown that skinrelated disgust plays a role for patients with chronic skin diseases, so a relationship between attention to itch and disgust seems plausible [49] Nevertheless, the cumulative evidence for a preconscious AB towards-or avoidance of threat related stimuli like itch or pain is limited. It has to be taken into account, that the handful of studies on subliminal processing of pain-related stimuli used different stimuli and some also different paradigms which makes drawing conclusions difficult [9][10][11][12]. Beyond the fact that these studies had contradictory findings, two studies measured attentional interference (using a Stroop task) instead of attention towards a location, i.e., orienting towards a stimulus [9,10] which is a different aspect of attention, although related to AB [3,50].…”

Section: Plos Onementioning

confidence: 99%

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No preconscious attentional bias towards itch in healthy individuals

et al. 2022

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Rapidly attending towards potentially harmful stimuli to prevent possible damage to the body is a critical component of adaptive behavior. Research suggests that individuals display an attentional bias, i.e., preferential allocation of attention, for consciously perceived bodily sensations that signal potential threat, like itch or pain. Evidence is not yet clear whether an attentional bias also exists for stimuli that have been presented for such a short duration that they do not enter the stream of consciousness. This study investigated whether a preconscious attentional bias towards itch-related pictures exists in 127 healthy participants and whether this can be influenced by priming with mild itch-related stimuli compared to control stimuli. Mild itch was induced with von Frey monofilaments and scratching sounds, while control stimuli where of matched modalities but neutral. Attentional bias was measured with a subliminal pictorial dot-probe task. Moreover, we investigated how attentional inhibition of irrelevant information and the ability to switch between different tasks, i.e., cognitive flexibility, contribute to the emergence of an attentional bias. Attentional inhibition was measured with a Flanker paradigm and cognitive flexibility was measured with a cued-switching paradigm. Contrary to our expectations, results showed that participants attention was not biased towards the itch-related pictures, in facts, attention was significantly drawn towards the neutral pictures. In addition, no effect of the itch-related priming was observed. Finally, this effect was not influenced by participants’ attentional inhibition and cognitive flexibility. Therefore, we have no evidence for a preconscious attentional bias towards itch stimuli. The role of preconscious attentional bias in patients with chronic itch should be investigated in future studies.

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Section: Plos Onementioning

confidence: 99%

“…These analyses showed significant attentional bias towards pain for conscious processing between 500-1000ms, while there is limited evidence for shorter(<500ms) or longer presentation times (>1000ms) [1,8]. However, this might also be due to a very limited amount of studies, especially in the preconscious processing range [9][10][11][12].…”

Section: Introductionmentioning

confidence: 97%

No preconscious attentional bias towards itch in healthy individuals

et al. 2022

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“…Following this, mean response times will be computed for each participant, with any response >3 SD from their individual mean also removed as outliers. This process ensures extremely quick or slow responses do not unduly bias the results, which are typically removed when cleaning and screening visual-probe data in pain-related research (eg, refs 18 64–67). An attentional bias index will then be computed for each stimulus and presentation time condition using the following equation: (TuPl−TlPl)+(TlPu−TuPu)/2.…”

Section: Methods and Analysismentioning

confidence: 99%

Internet-delivered attentional bias modification training (iABMT) for the management of chronic musculoskeletal pain: a protocol for a randomised controlled trial

et al. 2020

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IntroductionChronic musculoskeletal pain is a complex medical condition that can significantly impact quality of life. Patients with chronic pain demonstrate attentional biases towards pain-related information. The therapeutic benefits of modifying attentional biases by implicitly training attention away from pain-related information towards neutral information have been supported in a small number of published studies. Limited research however has explored the efficacy of modifying pain-related biases via the internet. This protocol describes a randomised, double-blind, internet-delivered attentional bias modification intervention, aimed to evaluate the efficacy of the intervention on reducing pain interference. Secondary outcomes are pain intensity, state and trait anxiety, depression, pain-related fear, and sleep impairment. This study will also explore the effects of training intensity on these outcomes, along with participants’ perceptions about the therapy.Methods and analysisThe study is a double-blind, randomised controlled trial with four arms exploring the efficacy of online attentional bias modification training versus placebo training theorised to offer no specific therapeutic benefit. Participants with chronic musculoskeletal pain will be randomised to one of four groups: (1) 10-session attentional modification group; (2) 10-session placebo training group; (3) 18-session attentional modification group; or (4) 18-session placebo training group. In the attentional modification groups, the probe-classification version of the visual-probe task will be used to implicitly train attention away from threatening information towards neutral information. Following the intervention, participants will complete a short interview exploring their perceptions about the online training. In addition, a subgroup analysis for participants aged 16–24 and 25–60 will be undertaken.Ethics and disseminationThis study has been approved by the University of Southampton Research Ethics Committee. Results will be published in peer-reviewed journals, academic conferences, and in lay reports for pain charities and patient support groups.Trial registration numberNCT02232100.

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