Enhanced association between perceptual stimuli and trauma-related information in individuals with posttraumatic stress disorder symptoms (original) (raw)

Intrusive memories in traumatized individuals are often triggered by stimuli that are perceptually (rather than conceptually) similar to those present just before or during the trauma. The present study examined whether those individuals with high levels of Posttraumatic Stress Disorder (PTSD) symptoms show a memory bias recall to perceptual cues and trauma target words compared to those with low levels of PTSD. The sample consisted of 30 adult participants who were involved in motor-vehicle or work-related accidents; 15 of the participants endorsed clinically elevated symptoms of PTSD, while a comparison group of 15 participants reported low levels of symptoms. Participants performed an associative recognition task with conceptual or perceptual cue words and trauma-related or neutral target words. Participants were tested for their recognition accuracy by reporting the corresponding target when a cue was given. Both groups performed better for the perceptual word pairs than for the...