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Clinical Psychology & Psychotherapy 2023Individuals who experience problems with anger represent a heterogeneous group. Identifying clinically relevant subtypes of anger may advance treatment research. In the...
Individuals who experience problems with anger represent a heterogeneous group. Identifying clinically relevant subtypes of anger may advance treatment research. In the current study, latent profile analysis (LPA) was conducted to explore if distinct subtypes of anger could be identified within a sample of individuals seeking treatment for maladaptive anger (N = 538; 55.4% females; mean age = 39.78, SD = 12.28). Furthermore, the utility of the empirical classification was examined based on differences in usage of emotion regulation strategies (cognitive reappraisal, expressive suppression, mindful emotion awareness and relaxation) across subtypes. Four anger profiles were identified in the best-fitted LPA model: Low Anger (n = 153, 28.4%), Anger In (n = 91, 16.9%), Moderate Anger (n = 193, 35.9%) and High Anger (n = 101, 35.5%). Results from the multinominal regression revealed that the use of emotion regulation differed across all profiles. Participants from the High Anger and Anger In profiles exhibited distinct patterns of dysfunctional emotion regulation. The results add to the increasing amount of evidence demonstrating a link between emotion regulation strategies and maladaptive anger. Clinical implications on how to tailor treatments for individuals with maladaptive anger are discussed.
Topics: Female; Humans; Adult; Male; Emotional Regulation; Anger; Emotions
PubMed: 36607221
DOI: 10.1002/cpp.2821 -
Quality of Life Research : An... Mar 2022Anger and irritability are common and impairing symptoms in children. The PROMIS Anger scales assess self- and parent-reported irritable and angry mood over the past 7...
PURPOSE
Anger and irritability are common and impairing symptoms in children. The PROMIS Anger scales assess self- and parent-reported irritable and angry mood over the past 7 days. The aim of this study was to evaluate the psychometric properties of the German version of the PROMIS Parent Proxy Short Form v1.0-Anger and to provide normative data.
METHODS
To evaluate the psychometric properties, data from the study ADOPT Epidemiology were used. In this study, the PROMIS Anger Scale was administered to a population-based sample of n = 8746 parents of children aged 8-12 years. Psychometric analyses were carried out including the investigation of distribution characteristics, factor structure, model fit, internal consistency, and congruent validity. Normative data were calculated as percentile ranks and T-scores.
RESULTS
The PROMIS Anger Scale demonstrated good psychometric properties, including satisfactory distribution characteristics, unidimensionality, good internal consistency as well as congruent validity. German normative data for the PROMIS Anger Scale are presented.
CONCLUSION
Based on first psychometric analyses, the German version of the PROMIS Anger Scale can be recommended for use in research and practice; however, further investigations using clinical data are needed. The normative data will allow researchers and clinicians an interpretation of the test scores in future applications.
Topics: Anger; Child; Humans; Parents; Psychometrics; Quality of Life; Reproducibility of Results; Surveys and Questionnaires
PubMed: 34586583
DOI: 10.1007/s11136-021-03001-1 -
Journal of Health Communication Aug 2021Narrative messaging research has demonstrated that story outcome (e.g., whether the main character lives or dies) can impact audience behavior, but more research...
Narrative messaging research has demonstrated that story outcome (e.g., whether the main character lives or dies) can impact audience behavior, but more research explicating and testing mechanistic pathways is needed. The current study tests fear, anger, and sadness as mechanisms of persuasion, assessing effects on counterarguing, reading flow, and behavioral intention. The current study utilized a 2 (story outcome: death vs. survivor) × 4 (story character: Marla, Erin, Don, and Ray) between-participants experiment ( = 735) to test the effect of story outcome on behavioral intentions via discrete emotion. Death narratives generated greater fear, anger, and sadness. Fear was related to greater behavioral intention and reading flow and diminished counterarguing. Sadness had the opposite effect. Anger produced a mixed persuasive effect, increasing both counterarguing and reading flow. Results have implications for discrete emotions theorizing and underscore the importance of conceptualizing narrative stimuli along multiple affective dimensions rather than single dimensions.
Topics: Anger; Emotions; Fear; Humans; Narration; Sadness
PubMed: 34569434
DOI: 10.1080/10810730.2021.1981495 -
Developmental Psychobiology Nov 2022Detection of changes in facial emotions is crucial to communicate and to rapidly process threats in the environment. This function develops throughout childhood via...
Detection of changes in facial emotions is crucial to communicate and to rapidly process threats in the environment. This function develops throughout childhood via modulations of the earliest brain responses, such as the P100 and the N170 recorded using electroencephalography. Automatic brain signatures can be measured through expression-related visual mismatch negativity (vMMN), which reflects the processing of unattended changes. While increasing research has investigated vMMN processing in adults, few studies have been conducted on children. Here, a controlled paradigm previously validated was used to disentangle specific responses to emotional deviants (angry face) from that of neutral deviants. Latencies and amplitudes of P100 and N170 both decrease with age, confirming that sensory and face-specific activity is not yet mature in school-aged children. Automatic change detection-related activity is present in children, with a similar vMMN pattern in response to both emotional and neutral deviant stimuli to what previously observed in adults. However, vMMN processing is delayed in children compared to adults and no emotion-specific response is yet observed, suggesting nonmature automatic detection of salient emotional cues. To our knowledge, this is the first study investigating expression-related vMMN in school-aged children, and further investigations are needed to confirm these results.
Topics: Adult; Child; Humans; Emotions; Electroencephalography; Visual Perception; Brain; Anger; Evoked Potentials; Evoked Potentials, Visual
PubMed: 36282743
DOI: 10.1002/dev.22326 -
Child Development Sep 2022Forgiveness education interventions instruct children and adolescents in understanding forgiveness and its role in healthy relationships. In this meta-analytic review,... (Meta-Analysis)
Meta-Analysis Review
Forgiveness education interventions instruct children and adolescents in understanding forgiveness and its role in healthy relationships. In this meta-analytic review, 20 studies involving 1472 youth (51% female; M = 11.66) from 10 countries (studies: 40% North American, 25% East Asian, 20% Middle Eastern, 15% European) were retrieved to determine forgiveness education interventions' effects on youth outcomes. Hedges' g and confidence intervals (CIs) were used to assess treatment effects. Findings suggest that forgiveness education interventions have a significant positive effect on forgiveness (g = 0.54, 95% CI [0.36, 0.73]) and anger (g = 0.29, 95% CI [0.11, 0.47]). Results lend support to the idea that children and adolescents who experience hurt from the unjust actions of others may benefit from learning about the process of forgiveness.
Topics: Adolescent; Anger; Child; Female; Forgiveness; Health Status; Humans; Male
PubMed: 35452524
DOI: 10.1111/cdev.13771 -
Journal of Pediatric Psychology Nov 2020Child pedestrian injuries represent a global public health burden. To date, most research on psychosocial factors affecting children's risk of pedestrian injury focused...
OBJECTIVE
Child pedestrian injuries represent a global public health burden. To date, most research on psychosocial factors affecting children's risk of pedestrian injury focused on cognitive aspects of children's functioning in traffic. Recent evidence suggests, however, that emotional aspects such as temperament-based fear and anger/frustration, as well as executive function-based emotional decision making, may also affect children's safety in traffic. This study examined the role of emotions on children's pedestrian behavior. Three hypotheses were considered: (a) emotion-based temperament factors of fear and anger/frustration will predict children's risky decisions and behaviors; (b) emotional decision making will predict risky pedestrian decisions and behaviors; and (c) children's pedestrian decision making will mediate relations between emotion and risky pedestrian behavior. The role of gender was also considered.
METHODS
In total, 140 6- to 7-year-old children (M = 6.7 years, SD = 0.39; 51% girls) participated. Parent-report subscales of Child Behavior Questionnaire measured temperamental fear and anger/frustration. The Hungry Donkey Task, a modified version of Iowa Gambling Task for children, measured children's emotional decision making, and a mobile virtual reality pedestrian environment measured child pedestrian behavior.
RESULTS
Greater anger/frustration, lesser fear, and more emotional decision making all predicted poorer pedestrian decision making. The mediational model demonstrated that pedestrian decision making, as assessed by delays entering safe traffic gaps, mediated the relation between emotion and risky pedestrian behavior. Analyses stratified by gender showed stronger mediation results for girls than for boys.
CONCLUSIONS
These results support the influence of emotions on child pedestrian behavior and reinforce the need to incorporate emotion regulation training into child pedestrian education programs.
Topics: Accidents, Traffic; Anger; Child; Child Behavior; Decision Making; Emotions; Fear; Female; Humans; Male
PubMed: 32951057
DOI: 10.1093/jpepsy/jsaa076 -
Research on Child and Adolescent... Feb 2022Numerous studies have reported substantive correlations between anger socialization, children's anger regulation, and internalizing/externalizing problems. However,...
Numerous studies have reported substantive correlations between anger socialization, children's anger regulation, and internalizing/externalizing problems. However, substantially less is known about the interplay among these constructs during the developmental stage of adolescence, and longitudinal studies on causal relations (i.e., parent-directed, adolescent-directed, or reciprocal effects) are rare. It is also unclear whether the development of internalizing and externalizing problems have similar causal relations. We collected three waves of longitudinal data (Grade 6, Grade 7, Grade 9) from multiple informants. A sample of N = 634 adolescents (mostly 11-12 years at Time 1; 50.6% male) and their parents (predominantly Caucasian with German nationality) completed questionnaires assessing parents' responses to anger, adolescents' anger regulation, and adolescents' internalizing/externalizing problems at each wave. Comparisons of different cross-lagged models revealed reciprocal rather than unidirectional effects. However, we found more parent-directed effects with respect to the development of internalizing problems, whereas relations regarding externalizing problems were more adolescent-directed, i.e., adolescents' externalizing problems and their anger regulation predicted changes in their parents' responses to anger across time. Adolescent anger regulation was an important maintaining factor of parents' responses to anger in later adolescence. Our findings suggest that assumptions regarding bidirectional relations should be emphasized much more in emotion socialization frameworks, particularly for the period of adolescence. Moreover, our study emphasizes the transdiagnostic importance of parents' responses to anger for both externalizing and internalizing problems and also suggests different underlying mechanisms.
Topics: Adolescent; Anger; Child; Emotions; Female; Humans; Longitudinal Studies; Male; Parents; Socialization
PubMed: 33712990
DOI: 10.1007/s10802-021-00795-z -
BMC Psychiatry Feb 2021There is evidence for the relevance of attachment style and anger expression for the manifestation of social anxiety disorder (SAD).
BACKGROUND
There is evidence for the relevance of attachment style and anger expression for the manifestation of social anxiety disorder (SAD).
METHOD
In a cross-sectional study 321 individuals with social anxiety disorder (41% men, age 38.8 ± 13.9) were compared with 94 healthy controls (37% men, age 35.8 ± 15.1) on several questionnaires (Attachment Styles Questionnaire, State Trait Anger Inventory, Social Phobia Inventory, Beck Depression Inventory).
RESULTS
Individuals with SAD showed moderate-sized reduced levels of secure and large-sized increased levels of fearful and preoccupied attachment style compared to healthy controls (all p < 0.001) as well as small-sized increased levels of trait anger (p = 0.03) and moderate-sized increased levels of anger-in (p < 0.001). Attachment style and anger regulation could predict 21% (R = 0.21, p < 0.001) of the extent of social anxiety (SPIN) in SAD; secure (β = - 0.196, p < 0.01) and preoccupied attachment style (β = 0.117, p < 0.05), as well as anger-in (β = 0.199, p < 0.01) were significant cross-sectional predictors. Further analysis revealed that the relationship between preoccupied attachment and social anxiety is partially mediated by anger-in.
CONCLUSION
Study findings confirm the relevance of preoccupied attachment style and anger suppression for social anxiety. Disentangling the role of anger regulation in early attachment patterns has significant therapeutic implications in SAD.
Topics: Adult; Anger; Anxiety; Cross-Sectional Studies; Fear; Female; Humans; Male; Middle Aged; Object Attachment; Phobia, Social; Psychiatric Status Rating Scales; Surveys and Questionnaires; Young Adult
PubMed: 33618700
DOI: 10.1186/s12888-021-03098-1 -
PloS One 2022Aggression and trait anger have been linked to attentional biases toward angry faces and attribution of hostile intent in ambiguous social situations. Memory and emotion...
Aggression and trait anger have been linked to attentional biases toward angry faces and attribution of hostile intent in ambiguous social situations. Memory and emotion play a crucial role in social-cognitive models of aggression but their mechanisms of influence are not fully understood. Combining a memory task and a visual search task, this study investigated the guidance of attention allocation toward naturalistic face targets during visual search by visual working memory (WM) templates in 113 participants who self-reported having served a custodial sentence. Searches were faster when angry faces were held in working memory regardless of the emotional valence of the visual search target. Higher aggression and trait anger predicted increased working memory modulated attentional bias. These results are consistent with the Social-Information Processing model, demonstrating that internal representations bias attention allocation to threat and that the bias is linked to aggression and trait anger.
Topics: Adult; Aggression; Anger; Attentional Bias; Criminals; Facial Expression; Female; Hostility; Humans; Male; Memory, Short-Term; Middle Aged; Social Perception
PubMed: 34995301
DOI: 10.1371/journal.pone.0261882 -
Journal of the International... Jan 2020Treatment enactment, a final stage of treatment implementation, refers to patients' application of skills and concepts from treatment sessions into everyday life... (Clinical Trial)
Clinical Trial
OBJECTIVES
Treatment enactment, a final stage of treatment implementation, refers to patients' application of skills and concepts from treatment sessions into everyday life situations. We examined treatment enactment in a two-arm, multicenter trial comparing two psychoeducational treatments for persons with chronic moderate to severe traumatic brain injury and problematic anger.
METHODS
Seventy-one of 90 participants from the parent trial underwent a telephone enactment interview at least 2 months (median 97 days, range 64-586 days) after cessation of treatment. Enactment, quantified as average frequency of use across seven core treatment components, was compared across treatment arms: anger self-management training (ASMT) and personal readjustment and education (PRE), a structurally equivalent control. Components were also rated for helpfulness when used. Predictors of, and barriers to, enactment were explored.
RESULTS
More than 80% of participants reported remembering all seven treatment components when queried using a recognition format. Enactment was equivalent across treatments. Most used/most helpful components concerned normalizing anger and general anger management strategies (ASMT), and normalizing traumatic brain injury-related changes while providing hope for improvement (PRE). Higher baseline executive function and IQ were predictive of better enactment, as well as better episodic memory (trend). Poor memory was cited by many participants as a barrier to enactment, as was the reaction of other people to attempted use of strategies.
CONCLUSIONS
Treatment enactment is a neglected component of implementation in neuropsychological clinical trials, but is important both to measure and to help participants achieve sustained carryover of core treatment ingredients and learned material to everyday life.
Topics: Adolescent; Adult; Anger; Anger Management Therapy; Brain Injuries, Traumatic; Chronic Disease; Executive Function; Female; Follow-Up Studies; Humans; Intelligence; Male; Middle Aged; Outcome Assessment, Health Care; Patient Education as Topic; Severity of Illness Index; Young Adult
PubMed: 31983369
DOI: 10.1017/S1355617719000833