Turning Pain Into Cues for Goal-Directed Behavior: Implementation Intentions Reduce Escape-Avoidance Behavior on a Painful Task.

Unlabelled: Pain automatically elicits escape-avoidance behavior to avert bodily harm. In patients with chronic pain, long-term escape-avoidance behavior may increase the risk of chronic disability. The aim of the presents study was to examine whether implementation intentions reduce escape-avoidance behavior during painful tasks in healthy individuals.

Comparing Counterconditioning and Extinction as Methods to Reduce Fear of Movement-Related Pain.

Unlabelled: Cognitive-behavioral treatments for chronic pain typically target pain-related fear; exposure in vivo is a common treatment focusing on disconfirming harm expectancy of feared movements. Exposure therapy is tailored on Pavlovian extinction; an alternative fear reduction technique that also alters stimulus valence is counterconditioning. We compared both procedures to reduce pain-related fear using a voluntary joystick movement paradigm.

A content analysis of activity pacing in chronic pain: what are we measuring and why?

Background: Activity pacing is a common intervention for patients with chronic pain. Over the past decade a number of instruments have been developed to measure this construct, but their comparative psychometric properties have not been examined.

Objective: To review the psychometric properties of existing measures of activity pacing, and provide suggestions for future research in this emerging area of pain research.

Mood, stop-rules and task persistence: no mood-as-input effects in the context of pain.

Background And Objectives: Task persistence despite experiencing pain might be a risk factor for development and maintenance of chronic pain. The Mood-as-Input (MAI) model predicts that the impact of mood on individuals' motivation to persist in a task depends on the interpretation of current mood within a certain motivational context. The aim of the current study was to replicate the original MAI study (Martin, Ward, Achee, & Wyer, 1993), but in a context where the task is painful.

Goals, mood and performance duration on cognitive tasks during experimentally induced mechanical pressure pain.

Background: The present study tested the hypothesis that the affective and motivational context influences performance duration in the presence of pain. More specifically, the Mood-as-Input model (MAI) proposes that the interaction between goals and moods affects performance duration. When people adopt achievement goals, negative, as opposed to positive moods, signal that not enough progress has been made leading to task continuance.

Activity pacing in chronic pain: concepts, evidence, and future directions.

Background: Activity pacing (AP) is a concept that is central to many chronic pain theories and treatments, yet there remains confusion regarding its definition and effects.

Objective: To review the current knowledge concerning AP and integrate this knowledge in a manner that allows for a clear definition and useful directions for future research.

Methods: A narrative review of the major theoretical approaches to AP and of the empirical evidence regarding the effects of AP interventions, followed by an integrative discussion.

Effects of responsibility and mood on painful task persistence.

Background And Objectives: Not just avoidance behaviour, but also painful task persistence might be a risk factor for development and maintenance of pain complaints. In seeking to understand these dysfunctional patterns of task performance, it has been suggested that mood influences the individuals' motivation to persist in a task depending on the interpretation of current mood within a certain motivational context. The aim of the present study was to test the effects of a social responsibility context and mood on persistence on a painful finger pressing task.

Pain catastrophizing, threat, and the informational value of mood: task persistence during a painful finger pressing task.

Pain catastrophizing has shown to predict avoidance behavior in acute and chronic pain, but the literature is inconsistent. The present study tested the hypothesis that current mood and threat context moderate the relationship between pain catastrophizing and performance duration. Affective-motivational models postulate that negative and positive moods provide information about whether an activity is respectively threatening or safe.

Goals matter: Both achievement and pain-avoidance goals are associated with pain severity and disability in patients with low back and upper extremity pain.

It has been proposed that goal pursuit plays a role in the development of chronic pain disorders. On the basis of (affective) motivational theories, it was hypothesized that both long-term achievement goals and short-term hedonic goals would be related to increased levels of pain and disability, particularly in patients with high negative affect. Participants with musculoskeletal pain complaints (N=299) completed a battery of questionnaires including a novel goal pursuit questionnaire (GPQ) measuring the extent to which participants preferred hedonic goals (mood-management or pain-avoidance goals) over achievement goals in various situations.

Active avoidance but not activity pacing is associated with disability in fibromyalgia.

Activity pacing has been suggested as a behavioural strategy that may protect patients with fibromyalgia (FM) against activity dysregulation and disability. The aim of the present study was to empirically test whether the construct of activity pacing is distinct from other behavioural strategies assessed with the Chronic Pain Coping Inventory (CPCI), such as guarding, resting, asking for assistance, relaxation, task persistence, exercise/stretch, seeking social support, and coping self-statements. The second objective was to test whether pacing was associated with physical disability when controlling for pain catastrophizing, pain severity and the other behavioural strategies as measured with CPCI.

The role of current mood and stop rules on physical task performance: an experimental investigation in patients with work-related upper extremity pain.

Patients with work-related upper extremity pain (WRUED) experience disability in daily life activities. The factors that influence levels of disability are still unclear. Both excessive avoidance and persistence have been suggested, but the affective and motivational processes that underlie these behaviours have not been scrutinized.

False heart rate feedback and the perception of heart symptoms in patients with congenital heart disease and anxiety.

Background: Little is known about the mechanisms explaining an increased perception of heart symptoms in congenital heart disease (ConHD). In the present study, it was suggested that a combination of high trait anxiety and disease history increases the perception of heart symptoms.

Purpose: It was tested whether false heart cues will result in an increased perception of heart symptoms in patients with ConHD and anxiety.

Interpretation bias for heart sensations in congenital heart disease and its relation to quality of life.

Background: Previous studies have shown that patients with congenital heart disease (ConHD) report a diminished health-related quality of life.

Purpose: This study examines the mechanisms by which ConHD affects health-related quality of life. We hypothesize that (1) the relation between trait anxiety and quality of life is mediated by a negative interpretation bias for heart sensations, specifically in ConHD, and that (2) the relation between trait anxiety and interpretation bias is mediated by state anxiety.

Preattentive processing of heart cues and the perception of heart symptoms in congenital heart disease.

The present study was aimed at clarifying whether preattentive processing of heart cues results in biased perception of heart sensations in patients with congenital heart disease (ConHD) who are also highly trait anxious. Twenty-six patients with ConHD and 22 healthy participants categorized heart-related (heart rate) or neutral sensations (constant vibration) as either heart or neutral. Both sensations were evoked using a bass speaker that was attached on the chest of the participant.

Psychological and cognitive functioning in children and adolescents with congenital heart disease: a meta-analysis.

Objective: Findings in the literature are inconsistent on the impact of congenital heart disease (CHD) on the psychological and cognitive functioning of children and adolescents. The aim of the present study was to systematically review this empirical body of literature.

Methods: We conducted a meta-analysis to review studies on behavior problems and cognitive functioning in CHD.

Stress-induced heart symptoms and perceptual biases in patients with congenital heart disease.

Background: The aim of the present study is to clarify whether biased symptom perception towards heart symptoms may explain a reduced quality of life in patients with congenital heart disease (ConHD). The present study tested the hypothesis that the combination of ConHD and high trait anxiety increases the perception of heart symptoms during acute stress.

Methods: 25 patients and 24 healthy participants completed a stressful computer task.

Heartbeat sensitivity in adults with congenital heart disease.

This study tested the hypothesis that patients with a congenital heart disease are sensitive regarding heartbeat perception, reflected in enhanced attention for heartbeat, estimation of own heart rate, and a vulnerability to become anxious by listening to heartbeat sounds. Twenty adults with a congenital heart disease, and 20 healthy controls conducted 3 experimental tasks: a concentration task during distraction by heartbeat sounds, own heart rate estimation, and exposure to different patterns of heartbeat sounds. The results showed that patients were more distracted by heartbeat, and were also worse at estimating heart rate than controls.

Group cohesion and working alliance: prediction of treatment outcome in cardiac patients receiving cognitive behavioral group psychotherapy.

Background: Various definitions of both group cohesion and working alliance are used in theories on group psychotherapy, making the study of their relative contribution to the treatment outcome difficult. In this study, two different, nonoverlapping questionnaires were used to explore the relationship between group cohesion, working alliance and treatment outcome in a time-limited, structured cognitive behavioral group psychotherapy aiming at the reduction of coronary risk factors.

Methods: After having undergone percutaneous transluminal coronary angioplasty, 42 patients were treated with the aim to reduce exhaustion, anxiety, hostility and depression.