Selective affective biasing in recognition memory in the irritable bowel syndrome. Issue 9 (September 1993)

• Record Type: Journal Article
• Authors: Gomborone, J E; Dewsnap, P A; Libby, G W; Farthing, M J
• Is Part Of: Gut. Volume 34:Issue 9(1993)
• Page Start: 1230
• Page End: 1233
• Publication Date: 1993-09
• Subjects: Gastroenterology -- Periodicals; 616.33
• DOI: 10.1136/gut.34.9.1230
• Languages: English
• ISSNs: 0017-5749

Abstract

Abstract : The cognitive model of depression assigns a central role to negatively biased information processing in the pathogenesis of the emotional disorder. The relationship between depression and irritable bowel syndrome (IBS) was explored from a cognitive perspective. A word recognition memory task was constructed: subjects had to memorize and subsequently recognise a set of emotionally loaded stimulus words with either positive, neutral, or negative connotations. Four age matched groups participated--30 IBS patients, 28 depressed patients, 28 patients with organic gastrointestinal disease, and 30 healthy volunteers. The depressed patients, as would be expected, showed a significant bias in favour of emotionally negative words (p < 0.05): the IBS patients showed the same negative bias. In addition the IBS patients made significantly more false-positive type errors in recognising emotionally negative words than either the depressed patients (p < 0.05) or the healthy volunteers (p < 0.01). This suggests that the IBS patients have a peculiar confirmatory bias for negative material. This may have clinical relevance in terms of the IBS patients' evaluation of their own abdominal sensory experience.