Abstract:

Cognitive bias, the core cognitive characteristic in anxious patients, refers to a processing style that heightened the negative or threatening information. Attentional bias and interpretative bias is the most frequently studied in this area and have been proven to be alterable through the laboratory task. Recently, researchers have shown interest to apply the cognitive bias modification task to the clinical intervention for anxiety patients, and the results were mixed. The present article has reviewed different methods. Researchers attempted to manipulate the cognitive bias in clinical practice, as well as the mixed results including self-reported effect, behavioral and physiological effect, and absent effect studies. The authors also tried to interpret the mixed results from the perspective of demanding effect, participant feature, effect indicators, and other potential parameters. Possible directions for future studies in this promising and disappointing area have been discussed.

Key words: anxiety disorder, attentional bias, interpretation bias, cognitive bias modification