Adaptation of the Scrambled-Sentences Task to Assess "Shattered Assumptions:" Construction of the Test and Investigation of Neural Substrates in an fMRI Study.

Background: Increasing recognition is being given to the importance of cognitions observed in posttraumatic conditions. These cognitions may reflect the activation of negative schemas. The aim of this work was to evaluate the feasibility of the scrambled-sentences task (SST) to assess individual differences in attributions commonly observed after traumas. Originally developed to assess the tendency to activate negative cognitions in individuals predisposed to depression, the SST is a laboratory task the outcome of which has been shown to predict depression relapse and is associated with depressiveness.

Sampling And Methods: We used content from self-rating scales for assessment of the activation of trauma-related schemas to develop a trauma-related SST and evaluated its performance in a behavioral study (n = 43) and a functional neuroimaging study (n = 20).

Results: In the healthy sample in which we tested it, the trauma-related SST was strongly associated with individual differences in negative affect (scores in depressiveness and neuroticism scales) as well as with the scores on trauma-related cognition scales. However, we failed to detect a clear specificity of trauma-related cognitions in correlations with scores on the trauma-related scales in the healthy participants. The neuroimaging data demonstrated activation of a ventral network of areas that included the perisylvian/temporal cortex and the peri-cingular cortex in handling trauma-related relative to neutral material, replicating previous neuroimaging studies of the SST.

Conclusion: The shattered-assumptions SST demonstrated strong associations with individual differences in all of the rating scales used in the study, suggesting its usefulness in capturing aspects of affective psychopathology. The neuroimaging study confirmed the capacity of this task to elicit specific activations. In future studies, evaluation of the conditions in which these neural substrates are active may shed light on the mechanism of schema selection.