Suppression of neutral and trauma targets: Implications for posttraumatic stress disorder

Abstract

Recent findings suggest that thought suppression may lead to increased intrusive thoughts for trauma survivors, paradoxically increasing symptoms. Participants with trauma history, 31 with posttraumatic stress disorder (PTSD) and 34 without PTSD, engaged in neutral white bear and trauma suppression tasks. A group difference was found for the trauma task and not for the neutral task. For the trauma task, both groups demonstrated an increase of trauma thoughts during suppression, but the PTSD group continued to report trauma thoughts at a higher level than the no-PTSD group post-suppression. These findings suggest that it is not an individual's general suppression ability, but the content of thoughts suppressed that leads to problems with intrusions for those with PTSD.

Attentional interference by threat and post-traumatic stress disorder: The role of thought control strategies

“…Consistent with predictions, thought suppression completely mediated the relationship between attentional interference and reexperiencing symptoms, and was the only significant mediator of this relationship. This is consistent with previous work indicating that thought suppression increases intrusions of trauma-related thoughts in individuals with PTSD (Amstadter & Vernon, 2006; Shipherd & Beck, 1999; 2005). Our findings can also inform a persistent question in the thought suppression literature: If thought suppression increases intrusions, why do people use this ineffective strategy?…”

“…We cannot rule out the possibility that thought control strategies are reactions to reexperiencing and avoidance symptoms, nor that these are associated with other causal factors. We based our theoretical model on prior experimental findings that randomly assigning participants with PTSD to engage in thought suppression increases intrusive memories of trauma-related stimuli (Amstadter & Vernon, 2006; Shipherd & Beck, 2005), and longitudinal studies indicating that worry and thought suppression prospectively predict the maintenance of PTSD symptoms over time (Ehlers et al, 1998; Holeva et al, 2001). The reverse meditational models help to support the proposed direction of effects, as we found no evidence that attentional interference mediates the relationship between thought control and PTSD symptoms.…”

“…Individuals with PTSD report engaging in more thought suppression than individuals without PTSD, and thought suppression prospectively predicts the maintenance of PTSD symptoms over time (Amir et al, 1997; Ehlers, Mayou, & Bryant, 1998). Suppression of trauma-related thoughts is associated with greater rebound effects, or greater occurrence of the suppressed thought after the suppression induction, in individuals with PTSD compared to trauma-exposed control participants (Amstadter & Vernon, 2006; Shipherd & Beck, 1999; 2005). This effect is specific to trauma-related stimuli, with no greater rebound effects found for neutral stimuli (Shipherd & Beck, 2005).…”

Emotional Constriction and Risk for Posttraumatic Stress: The Roles of Trauma History and Gender

“…However, women might lack another socially acceptable means of coping with this emotional distress and instead resort to Downloaded by [University of Chicago Library] at 13:18 26 December 2014 avoidance behaviors (Tolin & Foa, 2002). This could result in intensification of vulnerable emotions (Beck, Gudmundsdottir, Paylo, Miller, & Grant, 2006;Langens & Stucke, 2005;Shipherd & Beck, 2005), as well as paradoxically increase reexperiencing the traumatic event (Amstadter & Vernon, 2006;Shipherd & Beck, 1999;Wegner, 1994) and hyperarousal symptoms (Traue & Pennebaker, 1993), defining the posttraumatic stress syndrome.…”

Childhood Trauma and Active Mental Processes: Dissociation and Metacognition Influence Control of Negative Thoughts

“…The content of thoughts that individuals attempt to control may include negative cognitions and intrusive thoughts related to traumatic experiences (Foa and Kozak 1991). Negative and unwanted thoughts are commonly studied in people with conditions such as post-traumatic stress disorder (PTSD) (Amstadter and Vernon 2006;Feeny and Foa 2006) and obsessive-compulsive disorder (Najmi et al 2010). However, scant research examines the mental processes through which individuals handle unwanted negative thoughts.…”