Voluntarily specifying emotional information: Effects on emotional activation depend on

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Voluntarily specifying emotional information
Effects on emotional activation depend on  how 
and  what  information is processed

• Pierre Philippot
• Together with Céline Baeyens, Céline Douilliez,
  Aurore Neumann Alex Schaefer
• Université de Louvain, Departt of Psychology10,
  Place Mercier B 1348 Louvain-la-Neuve Belgium
• Reprints / Pre-prints w w w.ecsa.ucl.ac.be/pers
  onnel/philippot/

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Specificitya relevant dimension in emotional
information processing

• General thinking about emotion as a coping
  strategy to avoid emotional distress
• Overgenerality bias in emotional memory
  (Williams, 1996)
• Overgenerality in anxious rumination (Stöber
  Borkovec, 2002)

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Evolution of feelings intensity as a function of
specificity of processing
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The emotion processing paradoxe

• Conway Pleydell-Pearce (2000)
• vivid recollection of past experience can be
• adaptive (Bechara, Damasio et al., 1999)
• maladaptive e.g. Flash-back

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Premises

• Two levels of emotion representation
• schematic
• propositional

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Multilevel theories of emotion

• e.g. Brewin, 2001 Dalgleish, 2004 Leventhal,
  1984 Philippot et al., 2004 Teasdale Barnard,
  1993
• Schematic representation
• non declarative
• abstraction of higher order recurrencies
• Propositional representation
• declarative
• contextual and factual information

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Premises

• Two levels of emotion representation
• schematic
• propositional
• Emotional arousal is determined by schematic
  activation

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Premises

• Two levels of emotion representation
• schematic
• propositional
• Emotional arousal is determined by schematic
  activation
• Voluntarily processing emotional information
  implies the activation in working memory of both
  types of representation (schematic and
  propositional)

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Voluntary processing of emotional information...

• requiers effortful  executive  processes to
  merge schematic and propositional information in
  the episodic buffer (Baddeley, 2003)
• generates a particular type of consciousness
   autonoetic consciousness Wheeler, M.A.,
  Stuss, D.A.T., Tulving, E. (1997). Toward a
  theory of episodic memory The frontal lobes and
  autonoetic consciousness. Psychological Bulletin,
  121, 331-354.
• The same processes allow travel in time
• Not only to retrieve past experience
• But also to envision future experience
• And to consciously experience the present moment

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Voluntary processing of emotional information

General AM
Emotional information
Contextual information
Specification
Specific AM
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Hypothesis

• Volontarily specifying emotional episodic
  information should inhibit emotional arousal.

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Study 1

• Priming a specific or an overgeneral processing
  mode before emotion induction

Source Philippot, P., Schaefer, A., Herbette,
G. (2003). Consequences of specific processing
of emotional information Impact of general
versus specific autobiographical memory priming
on emotion elicitation. Emotion, 3, 270-283.
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Study 1 Method

• 45 students
• Procedure
• Relaxation (60)
• Priming (60)
• Specific-AM Condition priming of S-AM
• Overgeneral-AM Condition priming of G-AM
• Control Condition semantic task
• Emotion induction via mental imagery (20)
• Intensity rating of emotion felt during imagery

Source Philippot, P., Schaefer, A., Herbette,
G. (2003). Consequences of specific processing
of emotional information Impact of general
versus specific autobiographical memory priming
on emotion elicitation. Emotion, 3, 270-283.
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Study 1 Method

• 45 students
• Procedure
• Relaxation (60)
• Priming (60)
• Specific-AM Condition priming of S-AM
• Overgeneral-AM Condition priming of G-AM
• Control Condition semantic task
• Emotion induction via mental imagery (20)
• Intensity rating of emotion felt during imagery

Source Philippot, P., Schaefer, A., Herbette,
G. (2003). Consequences of specific processing
of emotional information Impact of general
versus specific autobiographical memory priming
on emotion elicitation. Emotion, 3, 270-283.
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Study 1 Results
EmotionalIntensity
Source Philippot, P., Schaefer, A., Herbette,
G. (2003). Consequences of specific processing
of emotional information Impact of general
versus specific autobiographical memory priming
on emotion elicitation. Emotion, 3, 270-283.
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Study 2

• Manipulating a specific or an overgeneral
  processing mode during emotion induction

Source Schaefer, A., Collette, F., Philippot,
P., Van der Linden, M., Laureys, S., Delfiore,
G., Degueldre, S., Maquet, P., Luxen, A.
Salmon, E. (2003). Neural correlates of hot and
cold emotions A multilevel approach to the
functional anatomy of emotion. Neuroimage, 18,
938-949.
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Study 2 Method

• Design
• Overgeneral vs. specific processing
• Overgeneral mentally repeating metaphoric
  sentences
• Specific mentally repeating specific appraisals
• Emotion (Anger, Sadness, Happiness, Affection,
  Neutral)
• Measures
• Feeling state quality (DES) intensity
• Heart Rate Skin Conductance
• H2150-PET camera

Source Schaefer, A., Collette, F., Philippot,
P., Van der Linden, M., Laureys, S., Delfiore,
G., Degueldre, S., Maquet, P., Luxen, A.
Salmon, E. (2003). Neural correlates of hot and
cold emotions A multilevel approach to the
functional anatomy of emotion. Neuroimage, 18,
938-949.
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Results Feelings Intensity
Condition F(1, 20)161.73, plt.0001 Emotion F(4,
80)80.97, plt.0001 Condition X Emotion F(4,
80)45.08, plt.0001
Source Schaefer, A., Collette, F., Philippot,
P., Van der Linden, M., Laureys, S., Delfiore,
G., Degueldre, S., Maquet, P., Luxen, A.
Salmon, E. (2003). Neural correlates of hot and
cold emotions A multilevel approach to the
functional anatomy of emotion. Neuroimage, 18,
938-949.
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Results Heart Rate Changes
Condition F(1, 18)4.63, plt.05 Emotion F(4,
72)5.28, plt.001 Condition X Emotion F(4,
72)4.21, plt.004
Source Schaefer, A., Collette, F., Philippot,
P., Van der Linden, M., Laureys, S., Delfiore,
G., Degueldre, S., Maquet, P., Luxen, A.
Salmon, E. (2003). Neural correlates of hot and
cold emotions A multilevel approach to the
functional anatomy of emotion. Neuroimage, 18,
938-949.
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Etude 3

• Specific versus General Processing of Anxious
  Predictions

Source Philippot, P., Baeyens, C., Douilliez,
C. (2004, in revision). Specifiying emotional
information  Modulation of Emotional Intensity
via Executive Processes.
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Method

• 60 students
• Induction of anxious apprehension.
• Random assignment in three conditions
• specific processing of anxious information
• general processing of anxious information
• no processing.
• DV DES and STAI before and after the
  manipulation

Source Philippot, P., Baeyens, C., Douilliez,
C. (2004, in revision). Specifiying emotional
information  Modulation of Emotional Intensity
via Executive Processes.
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Anxiety Evolution as a Function of Experimental
Condition
Anxiety Intensity
Interaction F(2,57)28.68, plt.000, h2 .45
Source Philippot, P., Baeyens, C., Douilliez,
C. (2004, in revision). Specifiying emotional
information  Modulation of Emotional Intensity
via Executive Processes.
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Specifying any information?

• Specific activation of emotion representation
  (response propositions) leads to greater
  emotional arousal (Lang, 1993)
• Distinction between
• context specific information
• schema relevant information
• Schaefer, A Philippot, P. (2004, in press.).
  Cognitive determinants of subjective and
  physiological responses during the evocation of a
  past emotional experience. Memory.

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Study 3 Neumann Philippot, In prep.

• Specifying contextually versus emotionally
  relevant information during the evocation of
  emotional memories

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Method

• 54 students
• evocation (mental imagery procedure) of two
  positive and two negative memories (Within-S.
  manipulation).
• Random assignment in three conditions
• Specification of the context relevant information
• Specification of the schema relevant information
  
• General processing

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Between-Ss. manipulation

• Specification of the context relevant
  information
• Questions prompting specification of time,
  location, persons present, etc.
• Specification of the schema relevant information
• Questions prompting specification of perceptual
  and sensory experience, bodily sensation, etc.
• General processing
• Questions prompting general impression, relation
  with generic event, etc.

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Method

• 54 students
• evocation (mental imagery procedure) of two
  positive and two negative memories (Within-S.
  manipulation).
• Random assignment in three conditions
• Specification of the context relevant information
• Specification of the schema relevant information
  
• General processing
• DV Intensity of emotional feelings before and
  after the manipulation (VAS)

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Results
EmotionalIntensity (VAS)
Processing condition F(2, 51) 13.49, p lt
.001, h2 .35
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Summary

• People share a naive theory stating that
  specifying personal information increases
  emotional arousal
• However, manipulating the processing of personal
  information shows that the opposite is true,
  under certain conditions

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Summary

• Voluntarily specifying emotional information
  reduces emotion intensity for present as well as
  for past (AM) or future information
• The type of emotional information specified is
  determinant
• Our interpretation
• Not a change in emotional information content
• A change in processing mode, and more
  specifically in strategic attention allocation

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Clinical implications

• This gap between naive theory and empirical
  evidence might constitute a maintenance factor
  for emotional disorders
• Avoiding to emotionally experience specific
  memories/predictions
• Being deprived of the possibility
• To regulate emotional arousal
• To use problem solving capacities
• To be in touch with ones unique present
  experience

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Clinical applications

• For exposure procedures
• importance of voluntarily raising awareness of
  specific contextual information
• For cognitive restructuring procedures
• targeting not content but processing mode of
  worries and dysfunctional thoughts

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Thank you