EFFECTS OF ANXIETY ON EMOTIONAL REACTIVITY, PERFORMANCE AND VIGILANCE, IN HEALTHY-VOLUNTEERS

Citation
C. Garcia et al., EFFECTS OF ANXIETY ON EMOTIONAL REACTIVITY, PERFORMANCE AND VIGILANCE, IN HEALTHY-VOLUNTEERS, Therapie, 53(3), 1998, pp. 301-308
Citations number
38
Categorie Soggetti
Pharmacology & Pharmacy
Journal title
ISSN journal
00405957
Volume
53
Issue
3
Year of publication
1998
Pages
301 - 308
Database
ISI
SICI code
0040-5957(1998)53:3<301:EOAOER>2.0.ZU;2-#
Abstract
Healthy volunteers who participate in clinical trials usually present a specific personality profile characterized by high extroversion and low anxiety traits. Herein, we examined whether anxiety traits influen ce performance and vigilance, as well as reactivity for six emotions ( fear, anger, disgust, sadness, happiness and a neutral state), the lat ter being induced by the presentation of six film excerpts. Sixty-four healthy volunteers were stratified into high and low anxiety groups o n the basis of their score on the Cattell and Hamilton Anxiety Scales. They were assessed on the Digit Symbol Substitution Scale (DSST), Cho ice Reaction Time (CRT) and Visual Analogue Scales (VAS). Their emotio nal reactivity was evaluated before and after each film excerpt, on re sponses to the Differential Emotions Scale (Izard DES). Prior to emoti onal induction, high-anxious subjects presented a pattern of low posit ive emotions and high negative emotions. After each film excerpt, emot ional reactivity was more pronounced for high-anxious subjects compare d with low-anxious subjects. However, there were no significant intera ctions between anxiety level and the values of DSST, CRT or VAS. The p resent findings raise the question of the relevance of selecting healt hy volunteers according to their personality traits. In future studies , anxiety level will be further investigated as a factor of response v ariability to drugs, by examining differences in response to psychotro pic drugs as a function of this factor.