Ratings of the intensity of negative emotional experience during passive viewing of aversive or neutral pictures or during the active increase or decrease of emotional experience through self-focused reappraisal while watching aversive images*
| Group; mean ± SD† | |||||
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Condition; rating | SAD | Control | Statistic | p value | Cohen d |
| Intensity of negative emotion | |||||
| No. of patients | 21 | 23 | |||
| PermA | 5.26 ± 0.75 | 4.94 ± 0.82 | t42 = 1.33 | 0.19 | — |
| IncA | 5.77 ± 0.52 | 5.4 ± 0.75 | t42 = 1.88 | 0.07 | 0.58 |
| DistA | 3.28 ± 0.9 | 3.21 ± 0.88 | t42 = 0.27 | 0.79 | — |
| PermN | 2.19 ± 0.73 | 1.41 ± 0.32 | t26.8 = 4.48 | < 0.001 | 1.44 |
| Self-relatedness | |||||
| No. of patients | 20 | 21 | |||
| PermA | 3.69 ± 1.22 | 3.22 ± 0.95 | t39 = 1.37 | 0.18 | — |
| IncA | 3.69 ± 1.22 | 3.15 ± 0.94 | t39 = 1.59 | 0.12 | — |
| DistA | 3.61 ± 1.12 | 3.26 ± 0.98 | t39 = 1.08 | 0.29 | — |
| PermN | 3.58 ± 1.22 | 3.24 ± 1.09 | t39 = 0.94 | 0.35 | — |
DistA = voluntary decrease of emotion to aversive images; IncA = voluntary increase of emotion to aversive images; PermA = passive viewing of aversive images; PermN = passive viewing of neutral images; SAD = social anxiety disorder; SD = standard deviation.
↵* Participants additionally judged all pictures to the degree of self-relatedness. All group comparisons as 2-sided independent t tests, either Student or Welch (in case of unequal variances). Ratings (mean ± SD) were given on a Likert-type scale from 1 (weak) to 7 (strong). See also Figure 1.
↵† Unless otherwise indicated.