IRAPing Our Way to Psychological Flexibility

1. IRAPing Our Way to Psychological Flexibility Chad E. Drake, Ph.D.

2. Psychological Flexibility • From page 57 of “Understanding Behavior Disorders”: • “…the ability to experience events fully, consciously, and without defense, and to persist in or change behavior in a given situation in the service of chosen values.”

3. Anxiety • The presence of fear, worry, nervousness, etc. • Clinical relevance • Traditional focus = reduction • ACT focus = acceptance

4. Six Core Processes of Psy Flex • Acceptance • Defusion • Present moment awareness • Self-as-context • Values • Committed action

5. Acceptance • Synonyms: openness, willingness, curiosity, receptivity, etc. • Antonyms: rejection, avoidance, control, etc.

6. Our Goals • Use the IRAP to measure anxiety in a similar way as has been done with the IAT • Use the IRAP to measure a willingness to have anxiety vs. a desire to control anxiety

7. Method • Administer questionnaires • AAQ-2, STAI, DTS, DDS, SIAS, etc. • Administer acceptance IRAP and anxiety IRAP • Exclude participants with median latency greater than 2 seconds on either block type

8. Anxiety IRAP Stimuli

9. Anxiety IRAP

10. Acceptance IRAP Stimuli

11. Acceptance IRAP

12. Other Results • Still conducting analyses, but… • No obvious correlations between IRAP and self-reports • But still conducting analyses

13. More Specific Analyses • We divided the sample into roughly equal thirds: high, medium, and low acceptance (AAQ-2 scores) • Results: • No significant differences • Usually high and low acceptance looks similar on the IRAP, an effect seen in other IRAP studies • “other – anxious” trial type was marginally significant – positive D for low acceptance, negative D for high acceptance

14. Concluding Thoughts/Future Directions • Many variables to consider • Stimulus selection • Scoring procedure • Many potential avenues of exploration