John Riskind | George Mason University (original) (raw)

Papers by John Riskind

The Looming Maladaptive Style Questionnaire (LMSQ) is a self-report measure designed to assess th... more The Looming Maladaptive Style Questionnaire (LMSQ) is a self-report measure designed to assess the looming cognitive style, a tendency to interpret threats as rapidly approaching and increasing in magnitude. To date, no systematic evaluation on the psychometric properties of the LMSQ across diverse cultural contexts has been done. In the present research, the measurement invariance of the LMSQ test scores was examined in 10 countries (N = 4,000).

Cognitive Therapy and Research, Mar 31, 1989

A distinctive explanatory style is often assumed for clinical depression, but little research has... more A distinctive explanatory style is often assumed for clinical depression, but little research has directly compared the explanatory patterns in clinical depression with those of other clinical disorders. In the present study, the spontaneous causal explanations of clinically depressed patients for bad life events were compared with those of clinically anxious patients. The spontaneous causal explanations of the patients were extracted from their own dysfunctional thought records using the Content Analysis of Verbatim Explanations (CA VE) technique. All diagnoses were based on a strict consensus rule by two experienced clinicians using a structured diagnostic interview. The patients included stringently diagnosed patients with unipolar major depression, and 12 patients with generalized anxiety disorder comprising a comparison group. The analyses found that unipolar major depression was associated with significantly higher CA VE scores for the attributional style described by the reformulated model of learned helplessness than is generalized anxiety disorder. The results imply that the attributional pattenrs assumed by the reformulated learned helplessness model may have relative specificity to depression.

Journal of Cognitive Psychotherapy, 2007

Although cognitive models of obsessive-compulsive disorder focus on the importance of misinterpre... more Although cognitive models of obsessive-compulsive disorder focus on the importance of misinterpretations of intrusive thoughts, they have given little attention to where intrusive cognitions come from, suggesting that they are merely "flotsam" of the mind. The present study is a preliminary test of an analysis that attempts to examine whether intrusive thoughts might actually have systematic, functional relationships to internal processes and external circumstances. Specifically, we advance and test the hypothesis that intrusive thoughts with aggressive-harming content can arise because current goals or passage to desired goals are blocked or thwarted, eliciting threat or frustration, most often because of the perceived provocative or threatening actions of other people (whether real or imaginary). On this hypothesis, this can instigate the generation of accompanying spontaneous imagined mental scenarios or fantasies about ways to rid oneself of the threat (e.g., remove the persons who are posing the obstruction). These imagined scenarios and images, elicited by provocation conditions, produce intense, distressing cognitions for individuals who are afraid of impulses. The results of a simulated provocation design provided evidence for this hypothesis.

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What makes psychiatrically ill patients or other threat objects fearful and threatening to us? On... more What makes psychiatrically ill patients or other threat objects fearful and threatening to us? One intervening factor has to do with the perception of activity and movement in the objects that might rapidly increase their perceived proximity to us. Two studies using a vignette methodology preferred evidence for the prediction of a "harm-looming" model of fear ) that psychiatrically ill patients are more threatening and elicit more fear to the extent they exhibit cues of activity and rapid movement. Furthermore, the effect that movement had in heightening fears of psychiatrically ill patients was greater than the effect it had on fears of nonthreatening target characters (e.g., ordinary person, a clown). Active characters were generally more feared than inactive ones; this was particularly true for mental patients, who were perceived as more dangerous and more feared than the other target characters overall. Results support the expediency of extending the harm looming model to fears of psychiatrically ill individuals.

International Journal of Cognitive Therapy, Feb 27, 2013

Journal of Personality and Social Psychology, 1987

Recent studies have shown that naturally occurring and experimentally induced affect states enhan... more Recent studies have shown that naturally occurring and experimentally induced affect states enhance the accessibility to retrieval of memories of life experiences that are congruent in valence with the affect state. Previous studies have suggested that this memory bias results from the influence of affective processes on memory retrieval. In our study we manipulated mood state by having subjects read statements expressing positive or negative self-evaluative ideas or describing somatic states that often accompany positive or negative mood states. The somatic and self-evaluative statements had, in general, equally strong effects on mood state. In spite of this, however, the self-evaluative statements had a stronger impact on recall latencies for life experiences than did the somatic statements. Moreover, the impact of the self-evaluative, but not the somatic, statements on recall was found to be independent of the statements' effects on mood state. This suggests that the cognitions accompanying a mood-altering experience may have a substantial effect on the capacity of the mood state to influence memory retrieval.

Archives of Suicide Research Official Journal of the International Academy For Suicide Research, Mar 12, 2014

This study examines the role of social support and positive events as protective factors in suici... more This study examines the role of social support and positive events as protective factors in suicide. Participants (n = 379) were administered measures of social support, life events, depressive symptoms, and suicide ideation. Results indicated that (1) social support had a direct protective effect on suicide ideation, (2) social support and positive events acted as individual buffers in the relationship between negative events and suicide ideation, and (3) social support and positive events synergistically buffered the relationship between negative events and suicide ideation. Our results provide evidence that positive events and social support act as protective factors against suicide individually and synergistically when they co-occur.

Journal of Gambling Studies Co Sponsored By the National Council on Problem Gambling and Institute For the Study of Gambling and Commercial Gaming, Feb 1, 2001

The results of this study support the notion that pathological gamblers drawn from the community ... more The results of this study support the notion that pathological gamblers drawn from the community would score higher on all three scores from the YBOCS than light gamblers. Consistent with hypotheses, pathological gamblers (lottery and scratch ticket) reported more obsessions, compulsions, and avoidance behavior than the light gamblers, and also reported having more urges to engage in injurious behaviors to themselves and others. These findings provide evidence that pathological gambling falls in a spectrum or family of disorders which have obsessive-compulsive disorder at its core. These findings support McElroy, Hudson, Philips, et al.'s (1993) suggestions of similarities between OCD and Impulse Control Disorders, and extend Blaszczynski (1999) findings of overlap between pathological gamblers and OCD in a treatment population. Heavy gamblers also reported significantly more hoarding symptoms and compulsive buying than light gamblers. More research in this area may show further evidence of a spectrum of disorders with obsessive compulsive disorder at its core, and show further links between impulse control disorders (such as pathological gambling) and OCD.

Journal of Social and Clinical Psychology, Mar 1, 2006

Abstract A social–cognitive approach is described that integrates social psychology and cognitive... more Abstract A social–cognitive approach is described that integrates social psychology and cognitive–behavioral approaches to help enrich the ability of applied clinicians to do effective therapeutic work. Therapists can humanize and empower clients by viewing symptoms of mental disorders as variations of everyday social-cognitive processes such as attributional processes or responses to powerful situational factors. Depression, anxiety, or even severe symptoms of schizophrenia—such as delusions and hallucinations—can be ...

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Beck&amp;amp;amp;amp;amp;amp;#x27;s cognitive theory of depression and anxiety suggests t... more Beck&amp;amp;amp;amp;amp;amp;#x27;s cognitive theory of depression and anxiety suggests that there are three major classes of cognitive phenomena associated with affective disturbances: cognitions (or automatic thoughts), schemas, and logical errors. The present studies focused on the properties of “cognitions.” We first tested the hypothesis, drawn from Beck&amp;amp;amp;amp;amp;amp;#x27;s theory, that the cognitions associated with depression would focus on loss, whereas the cognitions associated with anxiety would focus on threat of loss. We found that, as expected, threat ...

General Hospital Psychiatry, May 1, 2007

Objective: Although chronic lymphocytic leukemia (CLL) accounts for 25-30% of leukemia cases, lit... more Objective: Although chronic lymphocytic leukemia (CLL) accounts for 25-30% of leukemia cases, little is known about its psychosocial correlates. This study examines anxiety, depression and quality of life (QOL) in a CLL cohort. Methods: One hundred five patients recruited from a CLL research database were classified into two groups: bwatch and waitQ or active treatment. The patients completed a mail-in battery of depression, anxiety and QOL measures. Results: There was no statistical difference between depression, anxiety and physical/mental QOL in bwatch and waitQ versus activetreatment groups. Patients V 60 years reported more depression ( P = .014) and worse emotional ( P = .0001) and social QOL ( P = .002). They also had more bwatch and waitQ anxiety ( P = .052). Social and emotional QOL were similar in both newly diagnosed patients and those diagnosed N 6 years ago, although physical QOL worsens with time ( P = .05). Conclusion: Depression, anxiety and QOL are remarkably similar in bwatch and waitQ versus actively treated CLL, despite the latter group having, by definition, later stage disease. Patients V 60 years are more depressed and have reduced emotional and social QOL. Younger bwatch and waitQ patients are more anxious. Patients diagnosed for more than 6 years have a worse physical QOL, but their social and emotional QOL are similar to those of newly diagnosed patients. D

Journal of Cognitive Psychotherapy, 2005

Obsessive compulsive disorder (OCD) is associated with some of the worst impairments observed amo... more Obsessive compulsive disorder (OCD) is associated with some of the worst impairments observed among the anxiety disorders and is rated as the tenth leading cause of disability by the World Health Organization (WHO. l996). Recent research advances have increased our understanding of the cognitive phenomenology of OCD, as well as its informationprocessing correlates, and approaches to assessment and treatment. While much research has used correlational data based on questionnaire responses, issues ...

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Experiments using the Velten Mood Induction Procedure (VMIP) have provided support for cognitivel... more Experiments using the Velten Mood Induction Procedure (VMIP) have provided support for cognitively based theories of depression, which assign a major role to self-devaluative cognition in initiating and maintaining a depressed state. Frost, Graf, and Becker (1979), however, claim that self-devaluative components of the VMIP do not lower mood or otherwise mimic depression, but that the elements of the VMIP that suggest depression-related somatic states do. The present study found that both components of the VMIP have ...

Anxiety, stress, and coping, 2014

There is a growing body of evidence that suggests that cognitive vulnerabilities to depression or... more There is a growing body of evidence that suggests that cognitive vulnerabilities to depression or anxiety may lead individuals to generate negative interpersonal life events. However, there has been no study to date that examines the effects of co-occurring vulnerabilities to depression and anxiety. In a sample of 304 participants, we examined the potential interaction of co-occurring negative cognitive style, a vulnerability to depression and looming cognitive style, vulnerability to anxiety. Results indicate that co-occurring cognitive vulnerabilities synergistically predict higher levels of negative interpersonal life events six weeks later, even when controlling for initial levels of stressful life events and symptoms of depression and anxiety. Thus, co-occurring vulnerabilities may have stronger stress generating effects than would be expected from the additive effects of each vulnerability considered separately. This finding highlights the importance of examining cognitive vul...

Journal of gambling studies / co-sponsored by the National Council on Problem Gambling and Institute for the Study of Gambling and Commercial Gaming, 2001

Although considerable research has supported links between disrupted parental bonding, attachment... more Although considerable research has supported links between disrupted parental bonding, attachment insecurity, and psychopathology, few studies have attempted to integrate these findings within a broader cognitive theory of anxiety. Two studies are presented that examine the links between cognitive vulnerability to anxiety (i.e., the Looming Maladaptive Style: LMS) and parental bonding (Study 1) and perceived parental attachment orientations during childhood (Study 2). Results of Study 1 suggest that low levels of maternal overprotection and high levels of paternal overprotection significantly predict LMS scores, beyond the effects of current anxious and depressive symptoms. Results of Study 2 suggest that retrospective reports of maternal attachment insecurity is associated with significantly higher LMS scores, anxious and depressive symptoms, adult romantic attachment insecurity, and potentially high-risk relationship behaviors. These results are interpreted from the perspective of the Looming Vulnerability Model of anxiety and may increase understanding of the linkage between childhood developmental antecedents and cognitive risk for anxiety.