Shifts in attention biases in response to acute pain induction: examination of a model of "conversion" among repressors.

Unlike most people, those who are characterized by a repressive coping style report high levels of physical (sensory) pain but low levels of emotional distress (affective pain), which is a discrepancy that may suggest a "conversion" process. In two studies, we tested an attention allocation model, proposing that repressors direct attention away from threatening negative affective information and toward nonthreatening physical pain information during emotionally arousing (painful) situations. In Study 1, 84 participants underwent a cold pressor and then recovered. Repressors reported greater pain during recovery than low- and high-anxious participants, but they reported lower distress than high-anxious participants. Repressors reported significant and large discrepancies between high pain and low distress, whereas these differences were less pronounced for other groups. In Study 2, 77 participants underwent an ischemic pain task while performing a modified dot-probe task with sensory and negative affective pain words as stimuli. Repressors showed increasing biases away from affective pain words and toward sensory pain words as the pain task continued, whereas low- and high-anxious participants did not show these shifts in attention. The results support the notion that conversion among repressors may involve a process by which attention is directed away from emotional distress during noxious stimulation and is focused instead on sensory information from pain.

Interactive effects of catastrophizing and suppression on responses to acute pain: a test of an appraisal x emotion regulation model.

We examined whether people who tend to catastrophize about pain and who also attempt to regulate negative thoughts and feelings through suppression may represent a distinct subgroup of individuals highly susceptible to pain and distress. Ninety-seven healthy normal participants underwent a 4-min ischemic pain task followed by a 2-min recovery period. Self-reported pain and distress was recorded during the task and every 20 s during recovery. Participants completed the Pain Catastrophizing Scale and the White Bear Suppression Inventory. Repeated measures multiple regression analysis (using General Linear Model procedures) revealed significant 3-way interactions such that participants scoring high on the rumination and/or helplessness subscales of the Pain Catastrophizing Scale and who scored high on the predisposition to suppress unwanted thoughts and feelings reported the greatest pain and distress during recovery. Results suggest that pain catastrophizers who attempt to regulate their substantial pain intensity and distress with maladaptive emotion regulation strategies, such as suppression, may be especially prone to experience prolonged recovery from episodes of acute pain. Thus, emotion regulation factors may represent critical variables needed to understand the full impact of catastrophic appraisals on long-term adjustment to pain.

Trait anger management style moderates effects of actual ("state") anger regulation on symptom-specific reactivity and recovery among chronic low back pain patients.

OBJECTIVES: We examined whether "state" anger regulation-inhibition or expression-among chronic low back pain (CLBP) patients would affect lower paraspinal (LP) muscle tension following anger-induction, and whether these effects were moderated by trait anger management style. METHOD: Eighty-four CLBP patients underwent harassment, then they regulated anger under one of two conditions: half expressed anger by telling stories about people depicted in pictures, whereas half inhibited anger by only describing objects appearing in the same pictures. They completed the anger-out and anger-in subscales (AOS; AIS) of the anger expression inventory. RESULTS: General Linear Model procedures were used to test anger regulation condition by AOS/AIS by period interactions for physiological indexes. Significant three-way interactions were found such that: a) high trait anger-out patients in the inhibition condition appeared to show the greatest LP reactivity during the inhibition period followed by the slowest recovery; b) high trait anger-out patients in the expression condition appeared to show the greatest systolic blood pressure (SBP) reactivity during the expression period followed by rapid recovery. CONCLUSIONS: Results implicate LP muscle tension as a potential physiological mechanism that links the actual inhibition of anger following provocation to chronic pain severity among CLBP patients. Results also highlight the importance of mismatch situations for patients who typically regulate anger by expressing it. These CLBP patients may be at particular risk for elevated pain severity if circumstances at work or home regularly dictate that they should inhibit anger expression.

Pain catastrophizing, physiological indexes, and chronic pain severity: tests of mediation and moderation models.

Catastrophizing about pain is related to elevated pain severity and poor adjustment among chronic pain patients, but few physiological mechanisms by which pain catastrophizing maintains and exacerbates pain have been explored. We hypothesized that resting levels of lower paraspinal muscle tension and/or lower paraspinal and cardiovascular reactivity to emotional arousal may: (a) mediate links between pain catastrophizing and chronic pain intensity; (b) moderate these links such that only patients described by certain combinations of pain catastrophizing and physiological indexes would report pronounced chronic pain. Chronic low back pain patients (N = 97) participated in anger recall and sadness recall interviews while lower paraspinal and trapezius EMG and systolic blood pressure (SBP), diastolic blood pressure (DBP) and heart rate (HR) were recorded. Mediation models were not supported. However, pain catastrophizing significantly interacted with resting lower paraspinal muscle tension to predict pain severity such that high catastrophizers with high resting lower paraspinal tension reported the greatest pain. Pain catastrophizing also interacted with SBP, DBP and HR reactivity to affect pain such that high catastrophizers who showed low cardiovascular reactivity to the interviews reported the greatest pain. Results support a multi-variable profile approach to identifying pain catastrophizers at greatest risk for pain severity by virtue of resting muscle tension and cardiovascular stress function.