title: Physical symptom reporting is associated with a tendency to experience somatosensory distortion.
abstract: OBJECTIVE
  Theory suggests that a tendency to experience distortions in somatosensory awareness is associated with physical symptom reporting (i.e., somatization) but empirical evidence for this is lacking. This article describes research designed to test this hypothesis.
  
  
  METHODS
  Somatosensory distortion was operationalized as the frequency of illusory touch experiences (i.e., false alarm rate) on the Somatic Signal Detection Task. Two studies correlated false alarms on this task with physical symptom reporting on the 15-item Patient Health Questionnaire, the first using a nonclinical sample (n = 35), the second using a clinical sample of endoscopy patients who were identified as having either medically explained (n = 25) or medically unexplained symptoms (n = 30).
  
  
  RESULTS
  Scores on the 15-item Patient Health Questionnaire were positively correlated with false alarm rate in both studies (r = 0.288-0.506), even after controlling for trait anxiety, depression, anxiety (standardized β range = 0.793-0.932, all p < .0001) and (in Study 2) somatosensory amplification and hypochondriacal worry (standardized β range = 0.345-0.375, both p < .05). There was no difference in false alarm rate between patients with medically explained and medically unexplained symptoms (medically explained median range = 6.8 [3.7] to 6.8 [4.0] versus medically unexplained median range = 4.3 [3.9] to 5.6 [3.1], both p > .1).
  
  
  CONCLUSIONS
  There seems to be a robust link between physical symptom reporting and the tendency to experience somatosensory distortion, consistent with recent cognitive theories. It may be possible to reduce the impact of somatization by developing treatments that target this tendency.
authors: School of Psychological Sciences, University of Manchester, Manchester, UK. richard.james.brown@manchester.ac.uk
authors: Richard J
authors: RJ
authors: Brown
authors: Daniel
authors: D
authors: Skehan
authors: Anna
authors: A
authors: Chapman
authors: Ewan P
authors: EP
authors: Perry
authors: Kirsten J
authors: KJ
authors: McKenzie
authors: Donna M
authors: DM
authors: Lloyd
authors: Christopher
authors: C
authors: Babbs
authors: Peter
authors: P
authors: Paine
authors: Ellen
authors: E
authors: Poliakoff
mesh_terms: D000293:Adolescent; D000328:Adult; D000368:Aged; D001007:Anxiety / Q000150:complications*; D001294:Attitude to Health; D003627:Data Interpretation, Statistical; D005260:Female; D006801:Humans; D008297:Male; D008875:Middle Aged; D008960:Models, Psychological; D011569:Psychiatric Status Rating Scales; D015203:Reproducibility of Results; D057566:Self Report; D017603:Signal Detection, Psychological / Q000502:physiology*; D013001:Somatoform Disorders / Q000150:complications* / Q000523:psychology; D020886:Somatosensory Disorders / Q000150:complications* / Q000503:physiopathology; D011795:Surveys and Questionnaires; D055698:Touch Perception / Q000502:physiology; D055815:Young Adult