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Anxious individuals report disproportionately negative expectations concerning the future, termed the negative expectancy bias. In contrast, ageing is associated with an inflated expectancy for positive future events. A recent study [Steinman, S. A., Smyth, F. L., Bucks, R. S., MacLeod, C., & Teachman, B. A. (2013). Anxiety-linked expectancy bias across the adult lifespan. Cognition and Emotion, 27, 345-355. doi:10.1080/02699931.2012.711743] found using an interpretation bias task, a negative expectancy bias in young adults and positive expectancy bias in older adults with high trait anxiety. Extending this, the current study examined expectancy bias for positive, negative and ambiguously emotionally toned information in younger and older adults with clinical levels of depression and anxiety to community control groups, thus allowing examination of both disorder status and age on biases. Clinical participants reported a pervasive tendency to expect negative events relative to positive regardless of whether the current scenarios were positive, negative or ambiguous. Older adults showed greater expectancy for future positive scenarios when the initial scenario was negative or ambiguous. Age moderated the negative expectancy bias shown by clinical participants for ambiguous scenarios. Clinical disorders in older adults attenuated the positive expectancy bias that was otherwise strong in community participants. These findings provide further evidence for age differences in processing of emotionally toned information, with older adults showing a greater expectancy for positive future events. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Negative interpretation biases have been associated with clinical depression and anxiety. However, ageing is associated with a positivity effect, in which older adults have a positive interpretation bias compared to younger adults. Few studies have compared interpretation biases in younger and older adults and fewer have made this comparison in clinical samples with anxiety and depression. This study conducted a signal detection analysis to assess differences in interpretation biases to ambiguous sentences in a control and a depressed and anxious sample of younger (18-30 years) and older (60+ years) adults. Participants completed an interpretation bias task in which they were presented with unambiguous neutral sentences and ambiguous sentences related to threat. In addition, participants completed a recognition memory task to assess sensitivity and response biases to threat. Clinical anxiety and depression was associated with a negative interpretation bias; however, there were no significant differences in sensitivity or response bias on the recognition memory task. Older age was associated with a positive interpretation bias. Compared to younger adults, older adults showed a positive interpretation bias for ambiguous sentences, and greater sensitivity towards neutral sentences. In contrast, younger adults showed a negative interpretation bias, as well as a response bias towards threatening sentences. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]