title: Shifts in attention biases in response to acute pain induction: examination of a model of "conversion" among repressors.
abstract: Unlike most people, those who are characterized by a repressive coping style report high levels of physical (sensory) pain but low levels of emotional distress (affective pain), which is a discrepancy that may suggest a "conversion" process. In two studies, we tested an attention allocation model, proposing that repressors direct attention away from threatening negative affective information and toward nonthreatening physical pain information during emotionally arousing (painful) situations. In Study 1, 84 participants underwent a cold pressor and then recovered. Repressors reported greater pain during recovery than low- and high-anxious participants, but they reported lower distress than high-anxious participants. Repressors reported significant and large discrepancies between high pain and low distress, whereas these differences were less pronounced for other groups. In Study 2, 77 participants underwent an ischemic pain task while performing a modified dot-probe task with sensory and negative affective pain words as stimuli. Repressors showed increasing biases away from affective pain words and toward sensory pain words as the pain task continued, whereas low- and high-anxious participants did not show these shifts in attention. The results support the notion that conversion among repressors may involve a process by which attention is directed away from emotional distress during noxious stimulation and is focused instead on sensory information from pain.
authors.affiliation: Department of Behavioral Sciences, Rush University Medical Center, Chicago, IL 60612, USA. john_burns@rush.edu
authors.forename: John W
authors.initials: JW
authors.lastname: Burns
authors.forename: Phillip J
authors.initials: PJ
authors.lastname: Quartana
authors.forename: Erin
authors.initials: E
authors.lastname: Elfant
authors.forename: Justin
authors.initials: J
authors.lastname: Matsuura
authors.forename: Wesley
authors.initials: W
authors.lastname: Gilliam
authors.forename: Carla
authors.initials: C
authors.lastname: Nappi
authors.forename: Brandy
authors.initials: B
authors.lastname: Wolff
authors.forename: Erika
authors.initials: E
authors.lastname: Gray
mesh_terms: D000293:Adolescent; D001007:Anxiety / Q000523:psychology*; D001288:Attention; D005260:Female; D006801:Humans; D008297:Male; D010146:Pain / Q000523:psychology*; D012660:Semantics; D013315:Stress, Psychological; D013647:Task Performance and Analysis; D055815:Young Adult