Longitudinal investigation of shyness and physiological vulnerability: Moderating influences of attention biases to threat and safety

Abstract

Shyness has long been identified as a vulnerability factor to developing psychosocial problems, but there is heterogeneity in these observed outcomes. One potential factor underlying these relations is individual differences in threat sensitivity. Using a longitudinal design, we examined whether attentional biases toward social threat and safety measured during adulthood moderated the association between shyness measured in emerging adulthood (N = 83, n female = 48; M age = 23.56 years, SD age = 1.09 years) and frontal electroencephalogram (EEG) asymmetry at rest, a physiological index of vulnerability to psychopathology, measured nearly a decade later in adulthood (M age = 31.68 years, SD age = 2.27 years). We found that only biases to threat moderated the association between shyness and resting frontal EEG asymmetry longitudinally. In individuals who displayed relative vigilance to social threat, shyness was associated with greater relative right frontal EEG activity at rest (i.e., increased physiological vulnerability). These findings suggest that attentional biases to threat may play a role in understanding the relation between shyness and some known physiological vulnerabilities to psychopathology in adults.

Introduction to the special issue on threat and safety learning

“…The last article is the only contribution to examine threat and safety learning longitudinally in adulthood, the oldest sample in this special issue. Hassan and Schmidt (2021) observed that attentional biases toward social threat in a widely used "dot probe" attentional task moderated the association between shyness in emerging adulthood and resting frontal EEG asymmetry a decade later in adulthood at age Collectively, the papers in this special issue illustrate that individual differences in implicit associative threat learning processes are observable as early as infancy, continue to become fine-tuned during middle childhood, adolescence, and into adulthood, and relate to risk for threat-based disorders such as anxiety. Many of the included studies leverage longitudinal designs, thereby strengthening inferences that variations in caregiving behaviors may impact trajectories of learning over time, particularly related to safety.…”

“…The last article is the only contribution to examine threat and safety learning longitudinally in adulthood, the oldest sample in this special issue. Hassan and Schmidt (2021) observed that attentional biases toward social threat in a widely used “dot probe” attentional task moderated the association between shyness in emerging adulthood and resting frontal EEG asymmetry a decade later in adulthood at age 30–35 years. Frontal EEG asymmetry is considered a neural index of vulnerability to psychopathology, such as anxiety, depression, and emotion dysregulation.…”