Though disgust is a universal emotion, little is known about how it emerges. It is assumed that disgust primarily helps us avoid contaminants and diseases. However, disgust responses are not always adaptive. For example, people with a phobia may experience extremely high levels of disgust.
Negative attentional biases have been linked to depression. The “find the smiling face task” has been shown to reduce these dysfunctional attentional biases. To further validate the task, Thole Hoppen and two fellow students investigated whether the “find the smiling face task” changes attentional biases when people are in sad mood.
Distressing mental images can severely disrupt a person’s daily life. A psychotherapeutic technique called Imagery Rescripting can reduce the impact of traumatic memories in individuals diagnosed with depression or post-traumatic stress disorder, and it may also work when people visualize a stressful future.
People with eating problems seem to perceive their environment and themselves differently from people without eating problems. Their thoughts are constantly occupied with eating, body-shape and weight-related themes. Thus, getting through to them to treat their condition can be difficult.
‘I am not crazy, just help me get rid of my neighbors. They are constantly on my back!’ Something along these lines represents a common assistance request by people with psychotic disorders. Insight is impaired in a majority of patients with psychotic disorders.
Scholars try to understand and predict crimes to make society safer. Some expect that investigations of the nervous system will provide us with new solutions. Although this seems promising, it may distract us from other important sources of knowledge.
What are the clinical implications of a less functional interplay between sexual arousal and disgust? If sexual arousal is low, then perhaps the disgusting properties of relevant stimuli for pleasurable sex, and the hesitation to approach these stimuli, are not suppressed. This can give rise to sexual problems.
It seems so easy – we do it every day: thinking about our own thoughts and feelings. But is it as simple as it seems?
Sexual stimuli are among the strongest elicitors of disgust. So how do people succeed in having pleasurable sex? We tested the idea that perhaps sexual arousal can temporarily reduce the aversive properties of otherwise disgusting stimuli, thereby lowering the threshold for engaging in ‘‘disgusting sex.’’
You may know an irritable person. But if he becomes friendlier towards you, then you will become friendlier towards him, right? In other words, positive changes in how people interact with others are ultimately good for them, too. This idea underlies a new theory on how antidepressants work.