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The aim of the current study was to analyze the effect of different types of framing one's own behavior, as in defusion interactions, on performance in several experimental tasks. For this purpose, in Phase 1 (or pretest), 34 participants performed two experimental tasks that induced discomfort. In Phase 2, participants were randomly assigned to one of the three experimental protocols: the Defusion I protocol was basically made up of deictic framing interactions--I/You, Here/There, Now/Then--to promote flexibility in perspective taking of the psychological content; the Defusion II protocol incorporated not only deictic framing but also hierarchical framing to promote a perspective where the psychological content is experienced in a hierarchical relation with the deictic ''I' and several cues to specify the regulatory or augmental function; and the Control protocol did not include any active protocol component. Finally, in Phase 3 (or posttest), participants repeated the two experimental tasks. Results indicate that all participants' performance increased after the intervention. However, the superiority of Defusion II condition was shown. Conclusions of the current study are focused on the type of framing involved in the so-called defusion interactions that ensure its efficacy, supported by the improvement of performance observed. Keywords Defusion * ACT * RFT * Performance * Psychological flexibility, Acceptance and Commitment Therapy (ACT; Hayes, Strosahl, & Wilson, 1999) is a contextual therapy that is becoming the most empirically supported in various clinical areas. The ACT model aims to [...]

This special issue has as its focus the relationship between behavioral science and clinical psychology. Clinical psychology encompasses many schools of thought, one of which is behavioral science. This wing [...]

TORNEKE, N. (2010) Learning RFT: An Introduction to Relational Frame Theory and Its Clinical Application Oakland, CA: New Harbinger Publications 267 pages, ISBN 978-1-57224-906-6 This book establishes a bridge between [...]

This study compared an individual, 4-hr intervention based on acceptance and commitment therapy (ACT) versus a no-contact control condition in improving the performance of international-level chess players. Five participants received the brief ACT protocol, with each matched to another chess player with similar characteristics in the control condition. Experimental participants showed significant reductions in the believability and interference of general, unpleasant private events during competitions as well as reductions in the frequency of the treated counterproductive reactions to private events (FCR). Also, as indicated by an objective chess performance measure (ELO performance), all participants in the experimental condition improved their performance during the 7 months after the ACT protocol in comparison to the 7 months prior; however, none of the control participants improved their chess performance. Pretreatment levels and initial changes in FCR and believability significantly predicted the effect sizes on chess performance in the experimental condition. Key words: acceptance and commitment therapy, chess performance enhancement, experiential avoidance, cognitive fusion, Chess is widely considered to be the sport with the most intellectual content, with decision making being the main aspect of chess play. In addition, competitive chess is demanding, with [...]

This study investigated the impact of defusion on a nonclinical sample (n = 60) in the context of negative (e.g., 'I am a bad person') and positive (e.g., 'I am whole') self-statements Participants were assigned to one of three experimental conditions (Pro-Defusion, Anti-Defusion, and Neutral) that manipulated instructions about the impact of a defusion strategy. Defusion was also manipulated through the visual presentation of the self-statements, with each presented in three formats (Normal, Defused, Abnormal). Participants rated each self-statement for comfort, believability, and willingness. Although the instructions did not affect ratings, negative statements presented in the defused format decreased discomfort and increased willingness and believability relative to the nondefused statements. The findings suggest using defusion strategies in coping with negative psychological content., In acceptance and commitment therapy (ACT: Hayes, Strosahl, & Wilson, 1999), an acceptance-based therapeutic regime, clients are encouraged to make willing contact with aversive psychological content. In order to achieve [...]

The current study compared the effects of an acceptance versus distraction rationale on coping with experimentally induced pain. Eighty participants were randomly assigned to one of five conditions: Full-Acceptance, Full-Distraction, Instruction-only-Acceptance, Instruction-only-Distraction and No-Instructions. Participants completed a simple matching task and were intermittently given the choice either to receive an electric shock and continue, or to avoid the shock and terminate the task. Only the Full-Acceptance strategy (that included experiential exercises and a metaphor) had a significant effect on task tolerance as measured by an increase in the number of shocks delivered post-intervention relative to baseline. In addition, the participants in both of the acceptance conditions showed lower levels of believability in that they were more likely to continue with the task even when reporting more pain. The results support the prediction that acceptance-based interventions work by undermining the behavioural-control functions of pain-related thoughts and feelings, and call for a systematic analysis of how metaphors and exercises work in analogue research. Keywords: Experimental pain; Acceptance; Distraction; Instruction following; Electric shocks

The purpose of the present study was twofold. First, to compare the effect of establishing a motivational context of values on pain tolerance, believability, and reported pain. with three experimental conditions: pain acceptance (ACT condition), pain control (CONT condition), or no values (untrained condition). Second, the study aimed to isolate the impact of adding the corresponding coping strategies to both the ACT and the CONT conditions. Thirty adults were randomly assigned to one of the three experimental conditions. The participants went through the pain task in two occasions (Test I and Test II). In Test I, the effects of the ACT-values protocol (which established pare as part of valued action), the CONT-values protocol (which established high pain as opposed to valued action), and the no-values protocol, were compared. In Test II, the effect of adding the corresponding coping strategy to each condition (defusion for ACT vs. suppression for CONT) was examined. Tesl 1 showed a clear superiority of the ACT-values protocol in increasing tolerance and lowering pain believability. In Test II, the superiority of the ACT protocol was replicated, while the CONT protocol proved useful to reduce reported pain, in accordance with previous studies. Keywords: ACT; Acceptance; Pain; Values; Suppression

Recent research has demonstrated the transfer of induced mood functions through equivalence relations by means of a musical mood-induction procedure. The research described in this article replicated and extended such work, primarily with the inclusion of a baseline and two types of reversal procedures. First, 16 adult participants were trained and tested for the formation of two three-member equivalence classes (A1-B1-C1 and A2-B2-C2). A musical mood-induction procedure was used to induce happy and sad mood states in the presence of the B stimuli, and a transfer of mood functions test was administered to determine whether the corresponding mood functions had transferred via equivalence to the C stimuli. Participants were then exposed to either Reversal 1, in which only the functions attached to the B stimuli were reversed, or to Reversal 2, in which the structure of the equivalence classes was altered. At all stages throughout the experiment, participants were asked to rate their current mood state by using mood and incentive rating scales. The findings of the current study replicated the results of previous research in demonstrating a clear transfer of mood functions via equivalence relations. This outcome is compared with the existing literature about mood induction and the transfer of mood functions., Stimulus equivalence has attracted considerable empirical and theoretical interest among behavioral researchers in the 3 decades since Sidman's seminal study in 1971. In a typical equivalence study, a participant might [...]

In Experiment 1, participants high (n = 15) or low in avoidance (n = 14), as measured by the Acceptance and Action Questionnaire, completed a simple matching task that required them to choose whether or not to look at an aversive visual image. Only the high-avoidance participants took longer to emit a correct response that produced an aversive rather than a neutral picture. Additionally, the high-avoiders reported greater levels of anxiety following the experiment even though they rated the aversive images as less unpleasant and less emotionally arousing than their low-avoidant counterparts. In Experiment 2, three groups, representing high-, mid- and low-avoidance (n = 6 in each) repeated the matching task with the additional recording of event-related potentials (ERPs). The findings of Experiment 1 were replicated in terms of reaction times and subjective ratings. The ERPs confirmed that the participants attended to the content of the images and differentiated between the aversive and neutral image types. The ERPs also showed significantly greater negativity for electrodes over the left hemisphere relative to the midline for only the high-experiential avoidance (EA) group. Given the left hemisphere dominance for language, the data suggest that the high-EA group engaged in verbal strategies to regulate their emotional responses. Keywords: Experiential avoidance; Event-related potentials; International affective picture system; Acceptance and action questionnaire

The motivational function exerted by verbal antecedents has been extensively approached from a theoretical perspective and within the direct conditioning paradigm. However, there is little research concerning the alteration of the motivational function via verbal means. The current study presents 2 consecutive experiments in which the role of the verbal context in the alteration of different motivational states was examined. In the first experiment, a protocol consisting of a story about feeling hot and thirsty was administered individually to 5 children, 6 to 7 years old. After the implementation of the protocol, all children reported feeling thirstier than before the implementation and behaved in accordance with this report. In the second experiment with 5 other children, this effect was replicated with a different motivational state (physical restriction). More importantly, in a second phase with the same children, the effect was prevented when the thirst protocol was presented in a verbal context that was incoherent with feeling thirsty. Several verbal contexts in altering motivational functions, as well as some clinical implications, are discussed., The role of motivational conditions in selecting human behavior is a phenomenon widely accepted although poorly understood. Besides the basic nonverbal conditions of deprivation, satiation, and aversive stimulation, with motivational [...]

This study compares specific acceptance-based strategies and cognitive-control-based strategies for coping with experimentally induced pain. Forty participants were randomly assigned to an acceptance-based protocol (ACT), the goal of which was to disconnect pain-related thoughts and feelings from literal actions, or to a control-based protocol (CONT) that focused on changing or controlling pain-related thoughts and feelings. Participants took part in a nonsense-syllables-matching task that involved successive exposures to increasingly painful shocks. In both conditions, the task involved an overall value-oriented context that encouraged the participants to continue with the task despite the exposure to pain. At times throughout the task, participants were asked to choose to continue with the task and be shocked or stop the task and avoid being shocked. Each choice had specific costs and benefits. Participants performed the task twice, both before and after receiving the assigned experimental protocol. Two measures were obtained at pre- and post-intervention: tolerance of the shocks and self-reports of pain. ACT participants showed significantly higher tolerance to pain and lower believability of experienced pain compared to the CONT condition. Conceptual and clinical implications are discussed.

The purpose of the current experiment was to investigate the role of private verbal behavior on the operant performances of human adults, using a protocol analysis procedure with additional methodological controls (the 'silent dog' method). Twelve subjects were exposed to fixed ratio 8 and differential reinforcement of low rate 3-s schedules. For 6 subjects, verbal self-reports were recorded concurrently during exposure to the reinforcement schedules. Results showed a significant relationship between certain types of rules and task performances, and especially between counting and schedule-sensitive performance. A detailed analysis also suggested that counting facilitated the discrimination of programmed contingencies in the current task. Suggestions are offered for further research involving the use of the protocol analysis methodology., Since the 1960s, a significant number of studies have analyzed the impact of verbal behavior on the performance of human subjects. Some research has focused on the role played by [...]

The present study investigated the transfer of induced happy and sad mood functions through equivalence relations. Sixteen subjects participated in a combined equivalence and mood induction procedure. In Phase 1, [...]