Temporal estimation of threatening stimuli in social anxiety disorder: Investigation of the effects of state anxiety and fearfulness

Background and objectives: Prior studies suggest that particularly negative emotional events tend to be experienced as temporally dilated. Perceptual characteristics of the threat cue (averted or directed angry face), state as well as individual anxiety levels have been shown to contribute to the temporal distortions, but the interplay between these factors is not well understood. The present study investigated the relative contributions of these factors in a first study using clinical sample with social anxiety disorder (SAD) and healthy controls (HC). Methods: Participants performed a temporal bisection task (TBT) before and after a stress provocation phase, which served to induce state anxiety. During the TBT task, angry and neutral faces with averted vs. direct gaze were presented for the length of 600, 800, 1000, 1200, 1400, 1600 ms, and judged regarding their similarity to the standard durations. Results: A temporal overestimation effect for angry vs. neutral facial expressions was evident in both the HC and the SAD groups. An effect of experimentally induced state anxiety was evident solely in the SAD group, reflected in an overall increased temporal overestimation of angry vs. neutral expressions following the mood manipulation. Limitations: The clinical sample may represent a high-functioning group, as the study was conducted on college students. Replication in more heterogeneous SAD samples is needed in order to draw further conclusions. Conclusions: These results may be relevant for the understanding of the etiology and maintenance of SAD and potentially for the development of novel intervention methods. (C) 2014 Elsevier Ltd. All rights reserved.