"With its emphasis on practical and conceptual aspects, rather than mathematics or formulas, this accessible book has established itself as the go-to resource on confirmatory factor analysis (CFA). Detailed, worked-through examples drawn from psychology, management, and sociology studies illustrate the procedures, pitfalls, and extensions of CFA methodology. The text shows how to formulate, program, and interpret CFA models using popular latent variable software packages (LISREL, Mplus, EQS, SAS/CALIS); understand the similarities and differences between CFA and exploratory factor analysis (EFA); and report results from a CFA study. It is filled with useful advice and tables that outline the procedures. The companion website offers data and program syntax files for most of the research examples, as well as links to CFA-related resources. New to This Edition *Updated throughout to incorporate important developments in latent variable modeling. *Chapter on Bayesian CFA and multilevel measurement models. *Addresses new topics (with examples): exploratory structural equation modeling, bifactor analysis, measurement invariance evaluation with categorical indicators, and a new method for scaling latent variables. *Utilizes the latest versions of major latent variable software packages"--

/pdf/confirmatory-factor-analysis-for-applied-research-4crbcxiv74.pdf

Confirmatory Factor Analysis for Applied Research

Given recent attention to emotion regulation as a potentially unifying function of diverse symptom presentations, there is a need for comprehensive measures that adequately assess difficulties in emotion regulation among adults. This paper (a) proposes an integrative conceptualization of emotion regulation as involving not just the modulation of emotional arousal, but also the awareness, understanding, and acceptance of emotions, and the ability to act in desired ways regardless of emotional state; and (b) begins to explore the factor structure and psychometric properties of a new measure, the Difficulties in Emotion Regulation Scale (DERS). Two samples of undergraduate students completed questionnaire packets. Preliminary findings suggest that the DERS has high internal consistency, good test–retest reliability, and adequate construct and predictive validity.

/pdf/multidimensional-assessment-of-emotion-regulation-and-xwrpw05nqr.pdf

Multidimensional Assessment of Emotion Regulation and Dysregulation: Development, Factor Structure, and Initial Validation of the Difficulties in Emotion Regulation Scale

Cultivation of mindfulness, the nonjudgmental awareness of experiences in the present moment, produces beneficial effects on well-being and ameliorates psychiatric and stress-related symptoms. Mindfulness meditation has therefore increasingly been incorporated into psychotherapeutic interventions. Although the number of publications in the field has sharply increased over the last two decades, there is a paucity of theoretical reviews that integrate the existing literature into a comprehensive theoretical framework. In this article, we explore several components through which mindfulness meditation exerts its effects: (a) attention regulation, (b) body awareness, (c) emotion regulation (including reappraisal and exposure, extinction, and reconsolidation), and (d) change in perspective on the self. Recent empirical research, including practitioners’ self-reports and experimental data, provides evidence supporting these mechanisms. Functional and structural neuroimaging studies have begun to explore the neuroscientific processes underlying these components. Evidence suggests that mindfulness practice is associated with neuroplastic changes in the anterior cingulate cortex, insula, temporo-parietal junction, fronto-limbic network, and default mode network structures. The authors suggest that the mechanisms described here work synergistically, establishing a process of enhanced self-regulation. Differentiating between these components seems useful to guide future basic research and to specifically target areas of development in the treatment of psychological disorders.

How Does Mindfulness Meditation Work? Proposing Mechanisms of Action From a Conceptual and Neural Perspective

A review of recent research on cognitive processing indicates that biases in attention, memory, and interpretation, as well as repetitive negative thoughts, are common across emotional disorders, although they vary in form according to type of disorder. Current cognitive models emphasize specific forms of biased processing, such as variations in the focus of attention or habitual interpretative styles that contribute to the risk of developing particular disorders. As well as predicting risk of emotional disorders, new studies haveprovided evidence of a causal relationship between processing bias and vulnerability. Beyond merely demonstrating the existence of biased processing, research is thus beginning to explore the cognitive causes of emotional vulnerability, and their modification.

Cognitive Vulnerability to Emotional Disorders

The author reviews research showing that repetitive thought (RT) can have constructive or unconstructive consequences. The main unconstructive consequences of RT are (a) depression, (b) anxiety, and (c) difficulties in physical health. The main constructive consequences of RT are (a) recovery from upsetting and traumatic events, (b) adaptive preparation and anticipatory planning, (c) recovery from depression, and (d) uptake of health-promoting behaviors. Several potential principles accounting for these distinct consequences of RT are identified within this review: (a) the valence of thought content, (b) the intrapersonal and situational context in which RT occurs, and (c) the level of construal (abstract vs. concrete processing) adopted during RT. Of the existing models of RT, it is proposed that an elaborated version of the control theory account provides the best theoretical framework to account for its distinct

/pdf/constructive-and-unconstructive-repetitive-thought-1cx5otpxi0.pdf

Constructive and Unconstructive Repetitive Thought.

http://www.gruberpeplab.com/teaching/psych3131_spring2015/documents/12.1_Mennin(2005)_PreliminaryEvidenceForAnEmotionDysregulationModel.pdf

Preliminary evidence for an emotion dysregulation model of generalized anxiety disorder.

I: Generalized Anxiety Disorder in the Clinic and in the Community 1. Clinical Presentation and Diagnostic Features, Douglas S. Mennin, Richard G. Heimberg, and Cynthia L. Turk 2. Epidemiology, Ronald C. Kessler, Ellen E. Walters, and Hans-Ulrich Wittchen 3. From Anxious Temperament to Disorder: An Etiological Model, Jennifer L. Hudson and Ronald M. Rapee II: Theoretical and Empirical Approaches 4. Avoidance Theory of Worry, Thomas D. Borkovec, Oscar M. Alcaine, and Evelyn Behar 5. Information-Processing Approaches: Assessing the Selective Functioning of Attention, Interpretation, and Retrieval, Colin MacLeod and Elizabeth Rutherford 6. The Role of Intolerance of Uncertainty in Etiology and Maintenance, Michel J. Dugas, Kristin Buhr, and Robert Ladouceur 7. A Cognitive Model of GAD: Metacognitions and Pathological Worry, Adrian Wells 8. Neurobiology, Smit S. Sinha, Jan Mohlman, and Jack M. Gorman III: Assessment and Treatment 9. Assessment, Cynthia L. Turk, Richard G. Heimberg, and Douglas S. Mennin 10. A Meta-Analytic Review of Cognitive-Behavioral Treatments, Robert A. Gould, Steven A. Safren, David O'Neill Washington, and Michael W. Otto 11.Cognitive-Behavioral Therapy, Robert Leahy 12. Supportive-Expressive Psychodynamic Therapy, Paul Crits-Christoph, Mary Beth Connolly Gibbons, and Katherine Crits-Christoph 13. Integrative Psychotherapy, Michele G. Newman, Louis G. Castonguay, Thomas D. Borkovec, and Christine Molnar 14. Pharmacological Treatment, R. Bruce Lydiard and Jeannine Monnier IV: Special Populations 15. Children and Adolescents, Anne Marie Albano and Sabine Hack 16.Older Adults, J. Gayle Beck and Patricia M. Averill

Generalized anxiety disorder: Advances in research and practice.

Worry and rumination are cognitive processes, often represented as verbal or linguistic activities. Despite similarities in definition and description, worry has been most closely examined in relation to anxiety whereas rumination has traditionally been related to depression. This distinction remains in spite of high rates of comorbidity between anxiety and depression. This study sought to better understand the distinct and overlapping features of worry and rumination as well as their relationship to anxiety and depression. Seven hundred eighty-four unselected college students completed self-report measures of worry, rumination, anxiety, and depression. Items from the respective worry and rumination scales were submitted to factor analysis, which revealed a four-factor solution comprised of 2 worry factors and 2 rumination factors. A Worry Engagement factor as well as a Dwelling on the Negative factor emerged as distilled measures of worry and rumination, respectively. Scores on these factors were highly correlated with each other and demonstrated equally strong relationships to both anxiety and depression. Findings from this study suggest that worry and rumination represent related but distinct cognitive processes that are similarly related to anxiety and depression.

/pdf/distinct-and-overlapping-features-of-rumination-and-worry-4h16attz0q.pdf

Distinct and Overlapping Features of Rumination and Worry: The Relationship of Cognitive Production to Negative Affective States

Integrative conceptualizations like that proposed byRoemer and Orsillo provide exciting new directions forunderstanding and treating generalized anxiety disorder(GAD). However, these approaches may be furtherstrengthened by adoption of an emotion regulationperspective. Persons with GAD may have difﬁculty un-derstanding their emotional experience and may pos-sess few skills to modulate their emotions. They mayexperience emotions as subjectively aversive and useworry and maladaptive interpersonal behaviors as de-fensive strategies to control, avoid, or blunt emotionalexperience. An emotion regulation perspective suggestsadding treatment components to help clients becomemore comfortable with arousing emotional experience,more able to access and utilize emotional informationin adaptive problem solving, and better able to modu-late emotional experience and expression according tocontextual demands.Key words: emotion regulation, generalized anxietydisorder. [Clin Psychol Sci Prac 9:85–90, 2002]

/pdf/applying-an-emotion-regulation-framework-to-integrative-c3nd4qlmxk.pdf

Applying an Emotion Regulation Framework to Integrative Approaches to Generalized Anxiety Disorder

From an emotion regulation framework, generalized anxiety disorder (GAD) can be conceptualized as a syndrome involving heightened intensity of subjective emotional experience, poor understanding of emotion, negative reactivity to emotional experience, and the use of maladaptive emotion management strategies (including over-reliance on cognitive control strategies such as worry). The current study sought to replicate previous findings of emotion dysregulation among individuals with GAD and delineate which aspects of emotion dysregulation are specific to GAD or common to GAD and another mental disorder (social anxiety disorder). Individuals with GAD reported greater emotion intensity and fear of the experience of depression than persons with social anxiety disorder and nonanxious control participants. Individuals with social anxiety disorder indicated being less expressive of positive emotions, paying less attention to their emotions, and having more difficulty describing their emotions than either persons with GAD or controls. Measures of emotion differentiated GAD, social anxiety disorder, and normal control groups with good accuracy in a discriminant function analysis. Findings are discussed in light of theoretical and treatment implications for both disorders.

/pdf/emotion-dysregulation-in-generalized-anxiety-disorder-a-4wehfcjzwe.pdf

Cynthia L. Turk

Papers

Preliminary evidence for an emotion dysregulation model of generalized anxiety disorder.

Generalized anxiety disorder: Advances in research and practice.

Distinct and Overlapping Features of Rumination and Worry: The Relationship of Cognitive Production to Negative Affective States

Applying an Emotion Regulation Framework to Integrative Approaches to Generalized Anxiety Disorder

Emotion Dysregulation in Generalized Anxiety Disorder: A Comparison with Social Anxiety Disorder