THE EFFECT OF HIGH AND LOW TRAIT ANXIETY ON IMPLICIT AND EXPLICIT MEMORY TASKS

Two experiments were conducted assessing the presence of explicit and implicit memory biases for threatening material in high and low trait anxious college students. No implicit memory bias for threat words was found in either experiment. Futher, an explicit free recall bias for threat words in anxious subjects was found in Experiment 1, but was no t replicated in Experiment 2. The inconsistent research literature on memory biases in anxious individuals is discussed and directions for f uture research are highlighted.