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The current study examined whether the Avoidance and Fusion Questionnaire for Youth (AFQ-Y; L. A. Greco, W. Lambert, & R. A. Baer, 2008), a self-report measure of psychological inflexibility for children and adolescents, might be useful for measuring psychological inflexibility for adults. The psychometric properties of the AFQ-Y were examined using data from a college student sample (N = 387) and a clinical sample of patients with anxiety disorders (N = 115). The AFQ-Y, but not the Acceptance and Action Questionnaire-II (AAQ-II; F. W. Bond et al., in press), demonstrated a reading level at or below the recommended 5th or 6th grade reading level. The AFQ-Y also demonstrated adequate reliability (internal consistency), factorial validity, convergent and discriminant validity, and concurrent validity predicting psychological symptoms. Moreover, the AFQ-Y showed incremental validity over the AAQ-II in predicting several psychological symptom domains. Implications for the assessment of psychological inflexibility are discussed. (Contains 2 tables and 2 footnotes.)

A path model was tested in an ethnically diverse sample of 350 college students in which shyness, sociability, and parental support for the college transition were related to loneliness and friendship quality. Furthermore, friendship quality and loneliness were related to depression and anxiety. High levels of shyness, low levels of sociability, and low levels of parental support were related to high levels of loneliness. High levels of parental support for the college transition were related to more positive friendship quality. Multiple regression analyses suggested that loneliness, but not friendship quality, were related to adolescents' anxiety and depression. In addition, the interaction between shyness and sociability was significantly related to anxiety for African-American adolescents such that adolescents who reported low levels of sociability in combination with high levels of shyness reported the highest levels of anxiety. There was also a significant interaction between sociability and parental support for African-American adolescents such that high levels of sociability in combination with low levels of parental support for the college transition were related to high levels of anxiety. For White adolescents, only loneliness was related to anxiety.

The Body Vigilance Scale (BVS) is a measure developed to assess one's conscious attendance to internal cues. The present report investigated the structure, correlates, and predictive utility of the BVS in nonclinical (N=442) and anxiety (N = 135) disorder samples. The findings of Study 1 suggest that the BVS is 1-dimensional in a nonclinical sample, and Study 2 replicated the factor structure of the BVS in an anxiety disorder sample. Correlations between the BVS and related (i.e., anxiety sensitivity) and unrelated (i.e., social anxiety) variables were consistent with predictions in both studies. Study 2 also showed that body vigilance is primarily elevated in patients with panic disorder relative to other anxiety disorders. Relative elevations in body vigilance were also observed for patients with hypochondriasis and generalized anxiety disorder. The BVS also demonstrated a specific association with medical utilization and health-related safety-seeking behaviors after controlling for related variables in nonclinical and anxiety disorder samples. The implications of our findings for the nature and measurement of body vigilance as a predictor of health concerns in anxiety disorders are considered.

The current study examines the relationships among world assumptions, history of adult sexual assault, depressive symptoms, and fearful attitudes toward relationships. Three hundred and sixty-one female college students completed the Assumptive World Scales and a set of questionnaires to assess their sexual assault history subsequent to age 15, levels of depressive symptoms, sexual aversion, paranoia/self-consciousness, and fear of intimacy. Factor analysis of the Assumptive World Scales items revealed five dimensions that had clear relationships with factors proposed in the initial study. These five Assumptive Worlds dimensions accounted for significant variance in depression. These dimensions also accounted for significant variance in sexual aversion, paranoia/self-consciousness, and fear of intimacy, even when controlling for levels of depressive symptoms and sexual assault severity. The implications of these findings for research on sexual assault, cognitive schema, and interpersonal functioning are discussed.

This study examines predictions derived from Foa and Kozak's theory of emotional processing. We hypothesized that the provision of heart-rate feedback would facilitate emotional processing through a fuller activation of the participant's fear structure, and by focusing participants' attention on information that is incompatible with the fear structure, i.e., the interoceptive pattern of habituation. Nonclinical students (N = 54) showing marked claustrophobic fear received 30 min of self-directed exposure to a claustrophobic chamber. Three exposure conditions (heart-rate feedback, paced-tone control, and exposure only control) were examined across six 5-min exposure trials. Participants receiving heart-rate feedback displayed greater between-trial habituation across treatment trials and lower levels of fear at post-treatment. Treatment process findings failed to support the fear activation hypothesis. Implications of the findings for theories of fear reduction are discussed.

The coping behaviors and posttraumatic stress disorder (PTSD) symptoms of 215 female assault victims (103 rape victims and 112 nonsexual assault victims) were assessed within 2 weeks following the assault (Time 1), and 133 of them (62%) were followed up 3 months later (Time 2). Posttrauma symptom severity significantly decreased during the 3-month study period, but PTSD severity levels at Times 1 and 2 were highly correlated. Three coping scales were constructed on the basis of exploratory factor analyses: Mobilizing Support, Positive Distancing, and Wishful Thinking. Three months postassault, rape victims showed higher levels of wishful thinking and PTSD than nonsexual assault victims. Wishful thinking showed a positive association and positive distancing a negative association with PTSD severity, controlling for assault type, initial levels of PTSD severity, and other coping strategies. The clinical relevance of these findings is discussed.

We tested the hypothesis that the perceived availability of safety resources plays an influential role in fear prediction bias. Claustrophobic Ss (N = 37) completed a claustrophobic challenge under conditions of either low or high proximity to safety. Proximity to safety was operationalized as distance from the exit. We examined the effects of proximity to safety on Ss' predicted fear, actual fear, and discrepancy between predicted and actual fear (prediction bias). Consistent with prediction, the availability of safety resources had a more pronounced effect on Ss' actual fear than Ss' predicted fear. Moreover, subjects displayed a significant underprediction bias when proximity to safety was low and a slight (albeit nonsignificant) overprediction bias when proximity to safety was high. Our results lend further support for the hypothesis that anxious Ss underutilize safety information when confronting perceived threats. Possible mechanisms underlying this tendency are discussed.

The present study tested predictions derived from Rachman's match-mismatch theory of fear. Students (N = 117) displaying claustrophobic fear made predictions of fear, panic and performance prior to exposure to a claustrophobic chamber. Subjects were then classified into groups (i.e. matchers, overpredictors, underpredictors) based on the congruence between their anticipated phobic reactions and their actual reactions during exposure. The effects of match-mismatch status on predictions of fear, panic and performance on a subsequent exposure trial were examined. Results provided further evidence that phobic Ss are frequently inaccurate in predicting their phobic reactions during exposure. Consistent with previous findings, Ss who overpredicted fear, panic or performance tended to lower their predictions on a subsequent exposure trial, whereas Ss who underpredicted fear, panic or performance showed heightened predictions upon subsequent exposure. Contrary to previous findings, Ss were more likely to underpredict rather than overpredict their phobic reactions. Our findings are in accord with those of Rachman indicating that the magnitude of mismatch between predicted and actual fear/panic is more influential in determining subsequent predictions of fear/panic than it is in determining Ss' actual fear/panic. Moreover, this asymmetry was observed when the mismatch paradigm was applied to phobic behavior (i.e. tendency to escape).