A parallel trial of computerized training programs reportedly suggests that an attention-control training program may help reduce combat veterans’ post-traumatic stress disorder (PTSD) symptoms, according to a news release from the National Institute of Mental Health (NIMH).
On the other hand, the other training program—called attention bias modification—does not help reduce PTSD symptoms, although per the release it has reportedly been proven helpful in treating anxiety disorders.
Daniel Pine, MD, of the NIMH Emotion and Development Branch, Yair Bar-Haim, PhD, School of Psychological Sciences, Tel Aviv University, and colleagues conducted the parallel trial on US and Israeli combat veterans. Their study was recently published in the July 24, 2015 issue of the American Journal of Psychiatry, according to the release.
The release explains that while attention bias modification trains attention either away from or toward a threat, attention-control training implicitly teaches participants that threatening stimuli are irrelevant to performing their task. It requires them to attend equally to threatening and neutral stimuli.
The study therefore determined that attention-control training reduced their PTSD symptoms by reducing their attention bias variability.
Attention-control training balances such moment-to-moment fluctuations in attention bias from threat vigilance to threat avoidance, which correlated with the severity of PTSD symptoms and distinguished PTSD patients from healthy controls and patients with social anxiety or acute stress disorders, the release continues.
[Source(s): National Institute of Mental Health, Science Daily]
