Disorders

Aim: to see if phobia of snakes can be more easily conditioned than phobias of houses or faces.

Method: laboratory experiment, 64 paid volunteers aged 20-30psychology students from uni of Uppsala.Independent design, three conditions electric shocks given after presentation of snakes,faces or houses. fear reaction was measuring skin conductance. wired up to skin conductance machine and given a shock level that was comfortable but not painful to them. pictures were presented for 8 seconds, shocks given as the picture shown.random order of pictures 32 shocked for snakes other 32 half for houses other for faces. 

Findings: participants shown snakes had 0.062 on average compared to 0.048 conductance to the houses and faces.

Conclusions: participants more likely to show fear reactions to snakes than houses or faces.biological preparedness to develop phobias to objects that may cause us danger.genetics explanation people inherit vulnerability to illness.

Aim: to assess whether "excessive worry" is a symptom of general anxiety disorder.

Method: quasi experiment on 3 clinic in USA, independent design patients with or without GAD.patients interviewed twice to assess the reliability of two different standard interviews.they used the anxiety disorder interview schedule or the structured clinical interview. a 5-point rating scale for symptoms  such as sweating, excessive worry, the frequency of them and the percentage through the day they were displayed.

Findings: more patients with GAD reported excessive worry than non-patients.patients with GAD reported excessive worry  59% of the day compared to 41% of non-patients.

Conclusion: excessive worry, which indicated faulty thinking patterns is found in more GAD patients.