Social perception and communication differ between those with and without autism, even when verbal fluency and intellectual ability are equated. Previous work found that observers responded more quickly to an actor's points if the actor had chosen by themselves where to point instead of being directed where to point. Notably, this 'choice-advantage' effect decreased across non-autistic participants as the number of autistic-like traits and tendencies increased (Pesquita et al.
View Article and Find Full Text PDFIt is widely accepted that impaired safety learning to a safe stimulus is a pathological feature of anxiety disorders. Safety learning refers to learning that a stimulus is associated with the absence of threat. Cognitive mechanisms that underlie successful threat and safety learning are, however, poorly understood.
View Article and Find Full Text PDFPrevious research suggests that predictive mechanisms are essential in perceiving social interactions. However, these studies did not isolate (a priori expectations about how partners in an interaction react to one another) from (a posteriori processing of both partner's actions). This study investigated action prediction during social interactions while controlling for integration confounds.
View Article and Find Full Text PDFAlthough behavioral therapies are effective for posttraumatic stress disorder (PTSD), access for patients is limited. Attention-bias modification (ABM), a cognitive-training intervention designed to reduce attention bias for threat, can be broadly disseminated using technology. We remotely tested an ABM mobile app for PTSD.
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