Behavior as Information; investigating exacerbating effects of safety-seeking behaviors on danger assessment in clinical anxiety patients versus non-clinical controls
This study is a replication of an experiment by Gangemi, Mancini, and van den Hout (2012). It is investigated whether the performance of safety-seeking behaviors, such as hand washing and avoiding crowds, has exacerbating effects on danger perception in anxiety patients, while danger assessment in healthy individuals is mainly based on objective danger information. Three groups of anxiety patients, 30 obsessive-compulsives, 30 panic patients, and 30 social phobics, and a control group of 30 non-clinical participants rated the danger in a series of scripts in which the presence of safety-seeking behaviors (safety-seeking behaviors versus no safetyseeking behaviors) and objective danger information (objective danger versus objective safety) were systematically varied. Contrary to the Gangemi et al. (2012) findings no differences were found between patients and non-patients in the effect of safety-seeking behaviors on danger ratings. Safety-seeking behaviors only marginally affected danger perception in both groups, causing an increase in danger ratings under objectively safe conditions and a decrease in danger ratings under objectively dangerous conditions.