Social and Physical Anhedonia and Valence and Arousal Aspects of Emotional Experience

12 Pages·2013·0.16 MB·English

JournalofAbnormalPsychology Copyright2008bytheAmericanPsychologicalAssociation
2008,Vol.117,No.4,735–746 0021-843X/08/$12.00 DOI:10.1037/a0013601
Social and Physical Anhedonia and Valence and Arousal Aspects of
Emotional Experience
John G. Kerns, Anna R. Docherty, and Elizabeth A. Martin
UniversityofMissouri
Twostudiesexaminedwhetherself-reportedanhedoniaisassociatedwith2facetsofemotionalexpe-
rience,valenceandarousal.InStudy1,inmultipleassessmentsofemotionalexperience(e.g.,naturalistic
andlabcontextsandsocialandnonsocialsituations),peoplewithelevatedsocialanhedonia(n!40)
reportedlessintensityofpositiveaffectthanbothcontrols(n!30)andpeoplewithelevatedperceptual
aberration–magical ideation (n ! 29). Social anhedonia was also associated with providing less
emotionalcontentwhendescribingwhatitisliketoexperiencepositivesituations.Incontrast,bothsocial
anhedonia and perceptual aberration–magical ideation were associated with increased frequency of
negativeaffectfortheirdailyexperiences.Moreover,socialanhedoniawasnotassociatedwithadecrease
specifically in high-arousal emotions. In Study 2 (n ! 339), social and physical anhedonia (but not
perceptual aberration–magical ideation) were again associated with decreased self-reported positive
affecttolabstimuli.Inthesestudies,resultswerenotstatisticallyaccountedforbypersonality,current
mood,orcurrentdistress.Overall,resultssuggestanhedoniamaybeassociatedwithageneraldecrease
inself-reportedpositiveaffectintensity.
Keywords:anhedonia,emotionexperience,valence,arousal,positiveaffect
Negative symptoms, such as anhedonia, are an important pre- Althoughthereisnoagreed-ondefinitionofemotion,emotions
dictor of poor outcome in schizophrenia and are an increasingly areoftenthoughttobecomplexreactionstopersonallysignificant
important target for clinical interventions (Kirkpatrick, Fenton, eventsthatincludefeelingsaswellasphysiologicalandbehavioral
Carpenter, & Marder, 2006). Anhedonia refers to a loss of self- changes (VandenBos, 2006). Emotion research involves many
reported pleasure (Meehl, 1962), including for both social and importantquestions,suchaswhatcausesanemotion,whatareits
physicalexperiences(L.J.Chapman,Chapman,&Kwapil,1995), neurobiological correlates, and what are its consequences for in-
anditisaprominentsymptominpeoplewithschizophrenia(e.g., formationprocessingandbehavior(LeDoux,2000;Phelps,2006).
Horan, Green, Kring, & Nuechterlein, 2006). Social anhedonia We specifically examined emotional experience and whether an-
also predicts future schizophrenia-spectrum disorders (Gooding, hedoniaisassociatedwithchangesinthesubjectiveexperienceof
Tallent, & Matts, 2005; Kwapil, 1998). Furthermore, there is emotion.Accordingtoarecentreviewofresearchandtheoretical
evidencethatnegativesymptomslikeanhedoniacanappearinthe views of emotional experience (Barrett, Mesquita, Ochsner, &
prodromal phase even before the emergence of psychotic symp- Gross, 2007), emotional experience involves multiple features.
toms (Hafner & an der Heiden, 2003). Hence, understanding the Onepossiblecorefeatureofemotionalexperienceisvalence,ora
natureofanhedoniamightprovideevidenceaboutthenatureofthe senseofpleasureordispleasure.Anotherverycommonfeatureof
liabilityforschizophrenia(Lenzenweger,1999).Previousresearch emotionalexperienceisarousal,orasenseofactivationordeac-
has suggested a possible diminution of emotional experience in tivation(e.g.,“excited”isahigh-arousalemotion,and“serene”is
anhedonia (e.g., Kerns, 2006). In the current research, we exam- alow-arousalemotion).Atthesametime,itisthoughtthatthese
ined whether anhedonia in people at risk for schizophrenia- features of emotional experience might interact with both the
spectrumdisorderswasassociatedwithadecreaseintwospecific amount of attention given to affective feelings and the depth of
facets of emotional experience, valence and arousal. In addition, conceptualknowledgeusedtoprocessthesefeelings(Barrettetal.,
we examined two possible ways in which emotional experience 2007; Frijda & Sundararajan, 2007; Lambie & Marcel, 2002).
couldbealteredinanhedonia:(a)ageneralizedchangeinemotion Therefore,emotionalexperienceisthoughttoinvolvecertaincore
or (b) a change in the types of emotional situations typically affective features, such as valence and arousal, and how these
experiencedbypeoplewithanhedonia. affectivefeaturesareexperiencedisthoughttodependonattention
andconceptualprocessing.Thecurrentstudyspecificallyfocused
on whether anhedonia is associated with changes in self-reported
JohnG.Kerns,AnnaR.Docherty,andElizabethA.Martin,Department
valenceorarousal.
ofPsychologicalSciences,UniversityofMissouri.
Somepreviousresearchhassuggestedthatanhedoniamightbe
Work on this article was supported by National Institute of Mental
associatedwithchangesintheexperienceofvalenceandarousal.
Health Grant MH072706, National Institute on Drug Abuse Grant
Forvalence,somepreviousresearchhassuggestedthatanhedonia
DA022405,andaMUResearchBoardgrant.
CorrespondenceconcerningthisarticleshouldbeaddressedtoJohnG. might be associated with decreased self-reported positive affect.
Kerns,DepartmentofPsychologicalSciences,UniversityofMissouri,214 For instance, anhedonia has typically been measured using trait
McAlesterHall,Columbia,MO65211.E-mail:[email protected] self-reportmeasureslargelyassessingwhetherpeopletendtofind
735
736 KERNS,DOCHERTY,ANDMARTIN
particularexperiencespleasurable(e.g.,L.J.Chapman,Chapman, shouldvarybythetypeofsituationandalsopossiblybythetype
& Raulin, 1976). Moreover, anhedonia has been associated with ofreportingformat.
decreased trait positive affect (Gooding, Davidson, Putnam, & In the current research, we examined five methodological fac-
Tallent, 2002; including in people with schizophrenia, Horan & torsthatmightrevealthespecifictypesofsituationsandreporting
Blanchard, 2003) and with decreased extraversion (Kerns, 2006; formats in which people with anhedonia might selectively report
Mason, 1995; Ross, Lutz, & Bailey, 2002; with one view of the alteredemotionexperience.Onemethodologicalfactoriswhether
nature of extraversion as largely reflecting trait levels of positive emotionsconcernreactionstodailylifesituationsortolabstimuli.
affect,Lucas&Diener,2001;Watson,Gamez,&Simms,2005). If people with anhedonia report decreased emotion experience
Incontrast,anhedoniahasbeenonlyweaklyassociatedwithneu- becausetheyarelesslikelytoexperienceemotion-elicitingevents,
roticism(Kerns,2006;Mason,1995;Rossetal.,2002).Oneview then they should report decreased emotion for the idiosyncratic
of neuroticism is that it largely reflects trait levels of negative real-world situations they experience, but they should not report
affect (Watson et al., 2005), suggesting that anhedonia might be decreased emotion for lab stimuli because with lab stimuli every
weakly associated with increased negative affect. Hence, some participantrespondstotheexactsamestimulus.Evidenceforthis
previousanhedoniaresearchhassuggestedthatitmightberelated typeofdissociationbetweenreal-worldversuslabstimulihasbeen
toareductioninpositiveaffectandpossiblytoasmallincreasein foundinpeoplewithschizophrenia.Althoughpeoplewithschizo-
negativeaffect.However,althoughanhedoniahasbeenassociated phrenia report decreased positive affect (and increased negative
withtraitmeasuresofaffect,somepreviousemotionresearchhas affect) in their daily lives (e.g., Myin-Germeys, Delespaul, &
foundsomedissociationsbetweenpeople’sbeliefsabouthowthey deVries, 2000), accumulating evidence suggests that people with
typicallyfeelasassessedbytraitmeasuresversushowtheyreport schizophreniadonotreportdecreasedpositiveaffectforlabstim-
feelingincurrentsituations(Robinson&Clore,2002).Hence,we uli (Burbridge & Barch, 2007; Horan et al., 2006; Kring, 1999).
examined whether people with anhedonia would also report Previous research in people at possible risk for schizophrenia
changesinemotionalexperienceforspecificsituations. examiningwhetherphysicalanhedoniaisassociatedwithareduc-
In addition to possible changes in the experience of valence, tion in positive affect for emotional stimuli in lab situations has
some previous research has suggested that anhedonia could be been very mixed (Berenbaum, Snowhite, & Oltmanns, 1987;
related to changes in the experience of emotional arousal (i.e., Ferguson&Katkin,1996;Fiorito&Simons,1994;Fitzgibbons&
senseofactivationordeactivation).Forinstance,ithasbeenfound Simons, 1992; Germans & Kring, 2000), although to our knowl-
thatanhedoniaisassociatedwithanatypicallefthemispherebias edgethishasnotbeenexaminedinsocialanhedonia.
on the chimeric faces task (Luh & Gooding, 1999). The typical Asecondmethodologicalfactoriswhetheremotionsconcernsocial
righthemispherebiasonthistaskisthoughttoreflectrightparietal versus nonsocial situations. For example, people with social anhe-
functioning, with the right parietal area being associated with donia report not enjoying social situations (Eckblad, Chapman,
emotionalarousal(Heller,1994).Atthesametime,anhedoniahas Chapman, & Mishlove, 1982). It is possible that any decrease in
beenassociatedwithdecreasedscoresonaquestionnaireassessing positiveaffectforpeoplewithsocialanhedoniacouldberestricted
traitaffectintensity(Kerns,2006).Itispossiblethatadecreasein to social situations. Moreover, given evidence that people with
trait affect intensity could reflect a decrease in the experience of social anhedonia might have poorer quality social interactions
high-arousal emotions (for both positive emotions, e.g., excited (Collins,Blanchard,&Biondo,2005;possiblybecauseofreduced
and alert, and negative emotions, e.g., stressed and nervous; emotional expression, Aghevli, Blanchard, & Horan, 2003), any
Barrett & Russell, 1999). Therefore, it is possible that anhedonia decrease in positive affect for social situations might be because
might reflect a decreased experience of high-arousal emotions; peoplewithsocialanhedoniahavefewerinteractionswithpeople
however,toourknowledgethishasnotbeenexaminedinprevious whomtheyarecloseto.
research. Athirdmethodologicalfactoriswhetheremotionreportsarefor
Onthebasisofpreviousresearch,weexaminedwhetheranhe- retrospectiveorforcurrentsituations.Previousresearchhasfound
donia was associated with a decrease in positive affect, a small somedissociationsbetweenhowpeoplerememberfeelinginpre-
increase in negative affect, and a decrease in high-arousal emo- vioussituationsversushowtheyactuallyreportfeelinginacurrent
tions. In addition, in the current research we also examined the situation(Robinson&Clore,2002).Forexample,perhapspeople
nature of any change of emotional experience in anhedonia. Al- withanhedoniahaveamemorybiasandrememberpositiveexpe-
though there are many possible ways in which emotional experi- riencesasbeinglesspositivethantheyactuallywere(e.g.,Horan
encecouldbealtered,thecurrentresearchfocusedontwogeneral et al., 2006, with a memory bias possibly developing because of
possibilities for how emotional experience might be changed in experiencing fewer positive situations). In contrast, people with
anhedonia.Onepossibilityisthatpeoplewithanhedoniareporta anhedonia may not differ in current or in-the-moment reports of
generalizedchangeinemotionalexperience.Thesecondpossibil- emotion.
ity is that people with anhedonia differ from other people in the A fourth methodological factor is whether emotion reports are
typesofemotion-elicitingsituationstheytendtoexperience.These for emotion intensity or for emotion frequency (Schimmack &
twopossibilitiesmakedifferentpredictionsregardingwhenreports Diener,1997).Peoplecanvaryinhowintensely(orstrongly)they
of emotion experience should be altered for people with anhedo- experienceemotions(e.g.,tendingtofeelemotionslikeexcitedor
nia. If people with anhedonia have a generalized change in emo- sereneweaklyorstrongly).Atthesametime,peoplecanalsovary
tional experience, then one would expected to find it across situ- in how frequently they experience emotions (e.g., tending to feel
ationsandreportingformats.Incontrast,ifpeoplewithanhedonia emotions like excited or serene rarely or quite often). If people
differ in emotional experience because of the types of situations with anhedonia experience more or less of a certain type of
theytendtoexperience,thenreportsoftheiremotionalexperience emotion-elicitingsituation,itispossiblethatthiscouldbereflected
ANHEDONIAANDEMOTIONEXPERIENCE 737
in a change only in emotion frequency but not in intensity (e.g., Method
experiencing more negative situations and therefore having more
frequentnegativeemotions). Participants
A fifth methodological factor is whether emotion experience is
Participantswerecollegestudentsattendingalargemidwestern
assessedthroughdirectself-reportorisassessedindirectly.Previous
public university who received credit for an Introduction to Psy-
research has found evidence that self-reported emotional experi-
chology course for their participation. They were selected from
encemaynotbecommensuratewithotherindicatorsofemotions.
among a group of students (n ! 4,165) who participated in
Hence, people might report not experiencing an emotion even
departmental mass testing sessions in which they completed 15
whentheybehaviorallyappeartobeemotional(e.g.,Berenbaum&
itemsfromtheRevisedSocialAnhedoniaScale,sevenitemsfrom
Irvin, 1996). Therefore, it would be helpful to assess emotional
thePerceptualAberrationScale,andeightitemsfromtheMagical
experiencewithoutdirectlyaskingparticipantstoreporttheirown
Ideation Scale. Individuals who scored either 2.0 standard devia-
emotions. For example, it has been found that people who on a tions above or 0.5 standard deviations below the mass-testing
questionnairereportreducedtrait-levelaffectintensityalsoreport same-sex gender mean were recruited for an individual testing
lessemotionalcontentandfocuslessonemotionsintheirdescrip- session. At the individual testing session, participants completed
tionsoflifeevents(e.g.,describingwhatitwouldbeliketohave the full versions of these scales, and participants for the current
your house burn down; Larsen, Billings, & Cutler, 1996). How- studywereselectedonthebasisoftheirscoresforthefullversion
ever, if in anhedonia self-report is not an accurate reflection of of the scale, with means and standard deviation cut-offs for the
emotional experience, then it is possible that a decrease in self- scalesbasedondataobtainedfromapreviouslarge-samplestudy
reportedemotionmightnotbeaccompaniedbydecreasedcontent (Kerns&Berenbaum,2000).
intheirdescriptionsofwhatitisliketoexperiencelifeevents. There were 40 people in the social anhedonia (SocAnh) group
Overall, in two studies we examined whether anhedonia was (27 women and 14 mean; mean age ! 18.7, SD ! 1.2; 35
associated with changes in facets of emotional experience. For Caucasian, 3 African American, and 2 Asian American) who
valence, we examined whether anhedonia was associated with scoredatleast1.96standarddeviationsabovethesame-sexmean
ontheRevisedSocialAnhedoniaScale.Therewere30peoplein
decreased positive affect and increased negative affect. For
thecontrolgroup(20womenand10men;meanage!18.6,SD!
arousal,weexaminedwhetheranhedoniawouldbeassociatedwith
1.1; 28 Caucasian, 1 African American, and 1 Asian American)
decreasedhigh-arousalemotions.Inaddition,weusedavarietyof
whoscoredlessthan0.5standarddeviationabovethemeanonthe
methods to characterize the nature of any change of emotional
Revised Social Anhedonia, Perceptual Aberration, and Magical
experience in anhedonia. We examined two possibilities for how
Ideation scales. There were 29 people in the PerMag group (17
emotional experience might be altered in anhedonia. One possi-
womenand13men;meanage!18.6,SD!1.2;26Caucasian,
bilityisthatanhedoniainvolvesageneralizedchangeinemotional
2 African American, and 1 Asian American) who scored at least
experience,whichpredictsthatdifferencesinemotionsshouldbe
1.96standarddeviationabovethesame-sexsamplemeanoneither
found across situations and reporting formats. In contrast, the
thePerceptualAberrationortheMagicalIdeationscaleorwhohad
secondpossibilityisthatanhedoniainvolvesachangeinthetypes
summedstandardizedPerceptualAberrationandMagicalIdeation
of experiences that people tend to have, which should be selec- scoresof3orhigher(L.J.Chapmanetal.,1994).Participants(n!
tivelyreflectedinchangesinemotionalexperienceforoneormore 8)whoscoredhighenoughforboththeSocAnhandthePerMag
ofthefollowing:retrospective(butnotcurrent)emotions,dailylife groupswereexcluded.
(but not lab) situations, social (but not nonsocial) situations, fre-
quency(butnotintensity)ofemotions,anddirectself-reports(but
Psychosis-Proneness and Personality Questionnaires
notverbaldescriptions)ofemotionalexperience.
Psychosis-proneness scales. Participants completed a 118-
itemtrue–falsequestionnairecomposedofarandommixtureofall
Study 1
items of three psychosis-proneness scales—the Revised Social
AnhedoniaScale(Eckbladetal.,1982),thePerceptualAberration
InStudy1,wespecificallyexaminedsocialanhedonia.Wedid
Scale(L.J.Chapman,Chapman,&Raulin,1978),andtheMagical
this because social anhedonia has been found to predict future
Ideation Scale (Eckblad & Chapman, 1983)—as well as the
schizophrenia-spectrum disorders (Gooding et al., 2005; Kwapil,
Chapman Infrequency Scale (L. J. Chapman & Chapman, 1983),
1998) and because to our knowledge few if any studies have
whichmeasurescarelessorinvalidresponses.Followingprevious
examinedself-reportsofemotionalexperienceinsocialanhedonia.
research (e.g., Chmielewski, Fernandes, Yee, & Miller, 1995),
In Study 1, we used an extreme-groups approach (Preacher,
participants who endorsed three or more Chapman Infrequency
Rucker,MacCallum,&Nicewander,2005)thatcomparedpeople
Scale items were excluded. These scales have been used exten-
with elevated social anhedonia with two other groups: a control
sively in previous research (e.g., Edell, 1995; Horan, Blanchard,
group and a group with elevated levels of perceptual aberration Gangstead,&Kwapil,2004;Lenzenweger,1999).Highscorerson
andmagicalideation(PerMag).WeincludedthePerMaggroupto theSocialAnhedoniascaleareatincreasedriskforschizophrenia-
examine whether any changes in emotional experience would be spectrumdisorders(Goodingetal.,2005;Kwapil,1998),andhigh
specific to social anhedonia or would also be found in another scorers on the Perceptual Aberration and Magical Ideation scales
group at increased risk of psychosis (L. J. Chapman, Chapman, havebeenfoundtobeatincreasedriskforfuturepsychosis(L.J.
Kwapil,Eckblad,&Zinser,1994). Chapmanetal.,1994).
738 KERNS,DOCHERTY,ANDMARTIN
Personality traits. To examine whether any changes in emo- frompersontoperson(e.g.,inthisstudy,therangewasfrom5to
tion experience in anhedonia might be related to personality, the 29). The three groups did not differ in the mean number of
personality traits of extraversion and neuroticism were measured episodesontheDRMthattheyrated(p!.60).Inaddition,asthey
using the International Personality Item Pool (Goldberg, 1999), were finishing the DRM, participants rated how typical their
with 10 items for both Extraversion (e.g., “Am the life of the previous day was (from much worse, to typical, to much better).
party”) and Neuroticism (e.g., “Get stressed out easily”). Re- Thegroupsdidnotdiffersignificantlyinhowtypicaltheyratedthe
sponses are made on a 5-point scale indicating amount of agree- previousday(p!.58).
ment. Although we examined whether personality could statisti- In addition to the DRM, participants also completed the situa-
cally account for emotional changes in anhedonia, it is unclear tion rating task. This method has also been recommended by
frompreviousresearchwhetherbroadpersonalitytraitsshouldbe Kahneman et al. (2004) as a one-time assessment of emotional
consideredasthecauseortheresultofaffectivechanges,making experiencethatsharessomeoftheadvantagesofexperiencesam-
ituncertainwhethertheyareasourceofpotentialconfounding(for plingmethods.Participantswerefirstaskedtorememberthelast
methodologicallimitationsofusingstatisticalcontrols,seeMiller time they were in a particular situation (excluding the previous
&Chapman,2001). day). Then, after they remembered a specific occasion, they then
ratedhowtheyfeltinthatsituation.Participantsrated20different
positive, neutral, and negative situations (last time they took an
Emotional Experience
exam,wenttoasportingevent,wenttoamovie,talkedtoafriend
Emotional experience was directly assessed in three different onthephone,wereinthecarformorethan30min,readabook,
ways: the day reconstruction method (DRM), the situation rating watched a TV program you usually like, watched news on TV,
task,andthepictureratingtask.Inallthreeassessments,following wentshopping,talkedtoarelative,talkedtosomeoneyoufound
Barrett and Russell (1999), 16 different emotions were rated, attractive romantically, exercised, ate at a restaurant, went to a
includingpositivehigharousal(happy,excited,alert,andelated), party,attendedclass,wenttothelibrary,wenttoacoffeeshop,had
positive low arousal (relaxed, contented, serene, and calm), neg- a disagreement with a friend, heard a joke, and played with an
ative high arousal (stressed, nervous, upset, and tense), and neg- animal/pet).ComparedwiththeDRM,thesituationratingtaskcan
ativelowarousal(lethargic,fatigued,sad,anddepressed).Hence, involve less recent experiences; hence, it is more susceptible to
thisallowedfortheassessmentofbothemotionalvalence(positive memorybiasesinpeople’sratings.However,oneadvantageofthe
vs. negative) and emotional arousal (high vs. low; in addition, at situationratingtaskisthateachparticipantrateshisorheremotion
theendofthestudy,weusedtheseemotiontermstoassesscurrent overabroadrangeofexperiences.
mood). InadditiontotheDRMandthesituationratingtask,participants
In addition, in all three assessments, to separately assess emo- alsocompletedapicture-ratinglabtask.Onthistask,participants
tionfrequencyandemotionintensity,wefollowedtheprocedures sawapicturefromtheInternationalAffectivePictureSet(IAPS;
usedbySchimmackandDiener(1997).Emotionswereratedona Lang, Bradley, & Cuthbert, 2005) for 10 s. They then rated their
scalerangingfrom0to6.Participantsweretoldthattheyshould emotionalreactiontothepicture.Thepicture-ratinglabtaskcom-
first decide whether they experienced a particular emotion or not plements the DRM and the situation rating task in two ways. On
and that if they did not experience that emotion that they should one hand, this task involves people’s concurrent assessment of
ratetheemotiona0.Hence,themeasureofaffectfrequencyisthe their emotional reactions. Hence, this assessment method elimi-
proportionofallpossibleemotionsnotrated0.Participantswere natesanymemorydistortioninreportingemotionalexperience.On
told that if they had experienced the emotion, they were to rate the other hand, every participant rates his or her emotional reac-
how intensely they experienced that emotion on a scale ranging tionstoidenticalstimuli.Hence,anygroupdifferencescannotbe
from1to6.Hence,themeasureofintensityistheaverageofall becauseofdifferencesintheeventsorstimulithatpeopleexperi-
emotionsthatwereratedbetween1and6. ence. Participants rated 16 different IAPS pictures. The IAPS
The DRM was developed by Kahneman, Krueger, Schkade, pictures used were the same ones selected by Barrett (2004) to
Schwarz,andStone(2004)asaone-timeassessmentofemotional assessarangeofbothemotionalvalenceandemotionalarousal.In
experience that would share the advantages of experience sam- the Results section, we present results for level of positive affect
pling methods (e.g., reduced memory bias, and therefore more reported for positive pictures and for level of negative affect
likelytoreflectactualemotionalexperience).OntheDRM,people reportedfornegativepictures.However,therewerenosignificant
firstreconstructeverythingthathappenedtothemontheprevious between-groupdifferencesforanyoftheotheremotionratings(all
day,fromwhentheywokeupuntilwhentheywenttobed.People ps".45;e.g.,thegroupsdidnotdifferinlevelofpositiveaffect
divide up their day into discrete episodes (e.g., getting ready for fornegativeorneutralpictures).
school,beinginclass,andgoingouttoeat).Afterdividinguptheir
dayintoepisodes,theythenratehowtheyfeltduringeachepisode.
Event Description Questionnaire
In addition, for each episode, people indicate whether they were
withanyoneandwhomtheywerewith(e.g.,afriendorasignif- Emotional experience was indirectly assessed with the Event
icant other). This allows for an assessment of emotion in both Description Questionnaire (EDQ; Larsen et al., 1996; we used
socialandnonsocialsituations.Italsoallowsfortheassessmentof EDQVersion1inthisstudy).OntheEDQ,peoplearegiveneight
emotion when interacting with people the participant is close to, eventsthattheyneedtodescribe,fourpositiveandfournegative,
definedasfriends,significantothers,andfamily.TheDRMtakes with the events varying in how strongly they elicit affect (e.g.,
approximately30-45mintocomplete.OntheDRM,thenumberof having your house burn down or losing your favorite pen). Par-
episodesintowhichparticipantsdividetheirpreviousdaycanvary ticipants are given 90 s to describe each event. They are told to
ANHEDONIAANDEMOTIONEXPERIENCE 739
imagine what each experience is like and then write down a Valence # Group interactions were followed up by ANOVAs
description that would inform another person who has never had including only positive affect and including only negative affect
theexperiencebeforewhatitislike.Tworatingsweremadefrom (i.e.,Arousal#Task#Group).Atthesametime,iftheSocAnh
the EDQ verbal descriptions. One, labeled emotional content group differed from the other groups in reports of emotion expe-
(Larsenetal.,1996),isacountofthenumberofemotion-related rience only for events in their daily lives but not for the picture-
terms within each description. The second, labeled focus on feel- ratinglabtaskinwhichallparticipantssawtheexactsamestimuli,
ings(Larsenetal.,1996),isthedegreetowhichpeopleemphasize thisshouldbereflectedinasignificantTask#Groupinteraction.
feelings versus facts in their description of the event, which is Significant omnibus results were followed up with planned com-
scoredonascalerangingfrom1(extremefocusonfacts;e.g.,for parisonsbetween(a)theSocAnhgroupandtheControlgroupand
having money problems, “Having money problems does not en- (b) the SocAnh group and the PerMag group. To control for the
able you to do very much. You have to rely a lot on what you familywise error rate, for these planned comparisons we used a
already have. You can’t spend any money that you have on Bonferronicorrection,withasignificancelevelofp$.025.
anything that isn’t of important use”) to 7 (extreme focus on Inreportingeffectsizes,weusedpartialeta-squareforomnibus
feelings;e.g.,forhavingmoneyproblems,“Anxiety,worry,thisis tests and point-biserial correlations for all other effect sizes (for
a horrible feeling. It’s a feeling of failure. You worry all of the point-biserialcorrelation,seeRosenthal,1991;notethatr canbe
pb
time about people coming and taking away your possessions”). converted to d, with r ! 0.371, r ! 0.243, and r ! 0.10
pb pb pb
Ratingsweremadebytworesearchassistantswhowereunaware corresponding to large, medium, and small effect sizes, respec-
of the hypotheses and of group membership. Using an intraclass tively). Positive r effect sizes indicate larger effects for the
pb
correlation (Shrout & Fliess, 1979) and treating the raters as SocAnhgroupthanfortheothergroups(orlargerforthePerMag
random effects and the mean of the two raters as the unit of groupthanforthecontrolgroup).
reliability, interrater reliability was .97 for positive emotional
content, .87 for positive focus on feelings, .97 for negative emo- Results
tionalcontent,and.90fornegativefocusonfeelings.Totalscores
foremotionalcontentandfocusonfeelingswerehighlyassociated Intensity of Emotion
with each other (for positive descriptions, r ! .88; for negative
Forintensityofemotionratings,ascanbeseeninTable1,there
description, r ! .94). Hence, a single positive event description
was a significant interaction between valence and group, F(2,
variable and a single negative event description variable were 96)!6.04,p!.003,partial%2!0.118.Theinteractionbetween
created by summing standardized scores. In addition, the groups
group and valence reflects that there was a significant between-
did not differ in the number of words in their descriptions, F(2,
groups difference in an ANOVA for positive affect but not for
96) ! 0.39, p ! .68; for the SocAnh group, M ! 33.5 (SD !
negativeaffect:positiveaffect,F(2,96)!4.45,p!.014,partial
13.7);forthePerMaggroup,M!32.9(SD!16.4);andforthe %2 ! 0.083; negative affect, F(2, 96) ! 0.27, p ! .973, partial
controlgroup,M!35.1(SD!14.9;notealsothatthefocuson %2!0.001.WenextcomparedtheSocAnhgroupwiththeother
feelingsratingsarenotbasedonthenumberofwordsproduced).
two groups on positive affect intensity. The SocAnh group re-
portedsignificantlylessintensepositiveaffectdidthanthecontrol
Procedure and Data Analysis group, t(68) ! 3.51, p ! .0008, r ! &.39, and the PerMag
pb
group,t(67)!2.38,p!.02,r !&.28(notethattheeffectsize
Participants completed the study in the following order: EDQ, pb
DRM,situationratingtask,pictureratingtask,questionnairemea-
sures, and current mood assessment. The EDQ was given first
becausepilottestingindicatedthatprioremotionratings(e.g.,on Table1
the DRM) could inadvertently increase the amount of emotional IntensityofPositiveAffect(PA)andNegativeAffect(NA)by
contentprovidedontheEDQ(notealsothatbecausetheDRMfirst ArousalLevelandbyTaskinStudy1
involves reconstructing one’s previous day, this means that there
Measure SocAnh PerMag Control
wasanapproximately10-to20-mindelaybetweencompletingthe
EDQandmakingemotionratingsontheDRM).Inaddition,note Dayreconstructionmethod
that if current mood assessment is largely influenced by prior PA,higharousal 2.80(0.87) 3.23(0.96) 3.16(0.61)
emotion rating tasks, then (a) between-group results for current PA,lowarousal 2.72(0.82) 2.93(1.09) 3.23(0.80)
NA,higharousal 2.37(0.99) 2.43(0.83) 2.41(0.87)
moodandemotionratingtasksshouldbethesameand(b)current
NA,lowarousal 2.73(0.77) 2.29(0.94) 2.52(0.73)
moodshouldstatisticallyaccountforgroupdifferencesinemotion Situationratingtask
ratingtasks. PA,higharousal 3.54(0.71) 3.90(0.87) 4.04(0.67)
In analyzing the three emotion experience tasks (i.e., DRM, PA,lowarousal 3.25(0.70) 3.48(0.91) 3.71(0.85)
NA,higharousal 2.85(0.77) 2.95(0.77) 2.93(0.76)
situation rating, and picture rating), we used 2 (valence: positive
NA,lowarousal 2.64(0.76) 2.65(0.86) 2.65(0.79)
vs. negative) # 2 (arousal: high vs. low) # 3 (task: DRM vs.
Pictureratingtask
situationratingvs.picturerating)#3(group:SocAnhvs.control PA,higharousal 3.73(0.98) 3.95(0.94) 4.23(0.95)
vs. PerMag) mixed-model (three within-subjects factors and one PA,lowarousal 3.54(0.93) 3.95(0.84) 4.06(1.01)
between-subjects factor) analysis of variance (ANOVA). If the NA,higharousal 3.89(1.10) 4.06(1.22) 3.90(1.12)
NA,lowarousal 3.47(1.01) 3.59(1.12) 3.63(1.14)
SocAnhgroupdifferedfromtheothertwogroupsinpositiveaffect
butnotinnegativeaffect(orviceversa),thisshouldbereflected Note. Standarddeviationsappearinparentheses.SocAnh!socialanhe-
in a significant Valence # Group interaction. Hence, significant doniagroup;PerMag!perceptualaberrationandmagicalideationgroup.
740 KERNS,DOCHERTY,ANDMARTIN
difference between the PerMag group and the control group was arousalpositiveaffectintensity,t(68)!0.24,p!.81,r !.03
pb
&.10). For positive affect intensity, the interaction between task (thecontrolgroup,ascanbeseeninFigure1,reporteddecreased
and group was not significant, F(2, 96) ! 0.18, p ! .84, partial high-arousal positive emotions, such as excited, when they were
%2 ! 0.004 (i.e., the SocAnh group reported decreased positive alonecomparedwithwhentheywerewithothers).Inaddition,the
affect intensity on all three tasks; e.g., comparing SocAnh and groups did not significantly differ in the number of situations in
Controls on positive affect intensity, between-groups effect sizes whichtheywerealone:F(2,96)!0.99,p!.37;fortheSocAnh
forthethreetaskswere&.30,&.33,and&.27).Noothereffects group,M!4.8(SD!3.2);forthePerMaggroup,M!5.4(SD!
involvinggroupweresignificant(allps".35).Forexample,the 3.1);andforthecontrolgroup,M!4.3(SD!2.0).
interaction between group and arousal was not significant, F(2,
96)!1.04,p!.36,partial%2!0.024,astheSocAnhgroupdid
Frequency of Emotion
not selectively report fewer high-arousal emotions than did con-
trols(i.e.,resultsweresimilarforhigh-andlow-arousalemotions; Forfrequencyofemotionratings,ascanbeseeninTable2,there
e.g.,thebetween-groupseffectsizesbetweentheSocAnhandthe wasasignificantinteractionbetweenvalenceandgroup,F(2,96)!
controlgroupsforpositiveaffectwere&.31forhigharousaland 5.30,p!.0066,partial%2!0.103.Theinteractionbetweengroup
&.34forlowarousal;fornegativeaffecttheywere&.02forhigh and valence reflects that there was a significant between-groups
arousaland.01forlowarousal). difference in an ANOVA for negative affect but not for positive
GiventhattheSocAnhgroupreporteddecreasedpositiveaffect affect:negativeaffect,F(2,96)!3.41,p!.037,partial%2!0.067;
intensityforeventsintheirdailylives,onepossibleexplanationfor positiveaffect,F(2,96)!1.21,p!.30,partial%2!0.026.Wenext
this decrease is that the SocAnh group spends less time with comparedtheSocAnhgroupwiththeothertwogroupsonnegative
peopletheyarecloseto.Toattempttoexaminethis,weexamined affectfrequency.TherewasatrendfortheSocAnhgrouptoreport
positive affect intensity ratings on the DRM only for social situ- significantly more frequent negative affect than the control group,
ations in which people were with friends, significant others, or t(68) ! 2.24, p ! .028, r ! .26 (again, Bonferroni corrected
pb
family.Overall,therewasasignificantbetween-groupsdifference significantp$.025).Incontrast,theSocAnhandPerMaggroupsdid
inpositiveaffectintensity,F(2,96)!3.33,p!.04,partial%2! notdiffersignificantlyonnegativeaffectfrequency,t(67)!0.44,p!
0.083, as even for these close relationships the SocAnh group .66, r ! &.05 (note that the effect size difference between the
pb
reported significantly decreased positive affect intensity than did PerMagandcontrolgroupswas.30).Inaddition,fornegativeaffect
thecontrolgroup,t(68)!2.90,p!.005,r !&.33,buttheydid frequency,therewastrendforasignificantinteractionbetweentask
pb
notdiffersignificantlyfromthePerMaggroup,t(67)!1.36,p! andgroup,F(2,96)!0.18,p!.068,partial%2!0.046.Ascanbe
.18,r !&.16.Inaddition,thegroupsdidnotsignificantlydiffer seen in Table 2, this interaction reflects that the SocAnh group
pb
in the number of situations in which they interacted with people differed from controls in negative affect frequency in reporting on
they were close to, F(2, 96) ! 0.83, p ! .44; for the SocAnh emotionsforeventsintheirdailylives,t(68)!2.67,p!.01,r !
pb
group,M!6.2(SD!3.1);forthePerMaggroup,M!6.5(SD! .31(notetheeffectsizeforthedifferencebetweenthePerMagand
3.0);andforthecontrolgroup,M!7.2(SD!3.6). controlgroupswas.35);however,theSocAnhgroupdidnotdiffer
Anotherpossibleexplanationforthedecreaseinpositiveaffect from controls in negative affect frequency on the picture-rating lab
intensity for daily experiences in the SocAnh group is that it is task,t(68)!0.46,p!.65,r !.06(notethattheeffectsizeforthe
pb
limitedtosocialsituations.Iftrue,thiswouldpredictthatthosein differencebetweenthePerMagandcontrolgroupswas.12).Noother
the SocAnh group should not report decreased positive affect effectsinvolvinggroupweresignificant(allps".30).Forexample,
intensity when they are alone. As can be seen in Figure 1, there the interaction between group and arousal was not significant, F(2,
was a trend for a significant Arousal # Group interaction, F(2, 96)!1.03,p!.36,partial%2!0.023,astheSocAnhgroupdidnot
96) ! 2.84, p ! .06, partial %2 ! 0.066. This trend for an appeartoreportselectivelyfewerhigh-arousalemotionsthancontrols
interactionreflectsthatforsituationsinwhichtheywerealone,the (i.e.,resultsweresimilarforhigh-andlow-arousalemotions;e.g.,the
SocAnhandcontrolgroupsdifferedonlow-arousalpositiveaffect between-groupseffectsizesbetweentheSocAnhandcontrolgroups
intensity, t(68) ! 2.41, p ! .019, r ! &.28, but not on high- for positive affect were &.12 for high arousal and &.13 for low
pb
arousal;fornegativeaffect,theywere.22forhigharousaland.24for
lowarousal).
3.75
y
sit 3.5 Verbal Descriptions of Emotional Experience
n
e
ect Int 3.25 SSoocciiaall,, HLoigwh EDTQo,awnealaynzaelyvzeerdbadladtaesucsriipntgioans2o(vfaelmenocteio:np-oesliitciivtiengvse.vneengtastiovne)th#e
e Aff 3 Nonsocial, High 3 (group: SocAnh vs. control vs. PerMag) mixed-model ANOVA.
sitiv 2.75 Nonsocial, Low Overall, there was a significant between-groups difference in the
Po 2.5 amountofemotionalcontent,F(2,96)!3.70,p!.028,partial%2!
.072.AscanbeseeninTable3,thisoverallbetween-groupsdiffer-
2.25 ence reflected that the SocAnh group provided significantly less
Social Anhedonia Control
emotionalcontentandfocusedsignificantlylessonfeelingsthanthe
Figure 1. Positive affect intensity for high-arousal emotions and low- PerMaggroup,t(67)!2.76,p!.007,rpb!&.32,andatrendfor
arousal emotions and for social and nonsocial situations in the social the SocAnh group to report less emotional content than the control
anhedoniaandcontrolgroupsonthedayreconstructionmethodinStudy1. group, t(68) ! 2.04, p ! .045, r ! &.24. Given previous and
pb
ANHEDONIAANDEMOTIONEXPERIENCE 741
Table2 .045,r !&.24,butsignificantlyhighernegativeaffect,t(68)!
pb
FrequencyofPositiveAffect(PA)andNegativeAffect(NA)by 2.41, p ! .019, r ! .28, than the control group. We next
pb
ArousalLevelandbyTaskinStudy1 examinedwhetherpersonalityandcurrentmoodcouldstatistically
account for differences between the SocAnh and the control
Measure SocAnh PerMag Control groupsinpositiveaffectintensity.Forthisanalysis,wecomputed
a single composite positive affect intensity score by averaging
Dayreconstructionmethod
PA,higharousal 0.59(0.23) 0.68(0.18) 0.62(0.25) scores on the three emotion experience tasks. As can be seen in
PA,lowarousal 0.67(0.26) 0.73(0.20) 0.72(0.23) Table 4, in a hierarchical multiple regression, personality and
NA,higharousal 0.47(0.27) 0.51(0.28) 0.34(0.21) current mood were entered first on Step 1. On Step 2, after
NA,lowarousal 0.45(0.25) 0.44(0.27) 0.31(0.24)
statistically accounting for variance shared with personality and
Situationratingtask
current mood, categorical group membership (i.e., SocAnh vs.
PA,higharousal 0.74(0.17) 0.80(0.12) 0.76(0.17)
PA,lowarousal 0.76(0.16) 0.79(0.15) 0.77(0.19) control) still significantly predicted decreased positive affect in-
NA,higharousal 0.47(0.25) 0.50(0.20) 0.33(0.20) tensity (in addition, statistically accounting for variance shared
NA,lowarousal 0.40(0.25) 0.42(0.21) 0.29(0.23) with positive affect frequency did not affect group differences in
Pictureratingtask
positiveaffectintensity).
PA,higharousal 0.72(0.21) 0.79(0.18) 0.73(0.26)
PA,lowarousal 0.78(0.19) 0.83(0.15) 0.79(0.23)
NA,higharousal 0.72(0.22) 0.77(0.25) 0.73(0.24) Study 2
NA,lowarousal 0.52(0.21) 0.53(0.22) 0.49(0.23)
There were five main goals for Study 2. Study 1 found that
Note. Standarddeviationsappearinparentheses.SocAnh!socialanhe- peoplewithelevatedsocialanhedoniareporteddecreasedpositive
doniagroup;PerMag!perceptualaberrationandmagicalideationgroup.
affectintensity.However,inadditiontosocialanhedonia,people
with schizophrenia also report elevated physical anhedonia (L. J.
current evidence that social anhedonia reflects decreased positive Chapmanetal.,1976).OnemaingoalofStudy2wastoexamine,
affect, we explored whether the SocAnh group would differ from inadditiontosocialanhedonia,whetherphysicalanhedoniawould
controls for both positive events and negative events. The SocAnh alsobeassociatedwithdecreasedpositiveaffectintensity.
groupdidprovidelessemotionalcontentandfocusedlessonfeelings A second goal of Study 2 was to examine whether current
than the control group for descriptions of positive events, t(68) ! distresscouldstatisticallyaccountforassociationsbetweenanhe-
2.41, p ! .019, r ! &.28, but not for descriptions of negative donia and positive affect intensity. Previous research has found
pb
events,t(68)!1.02,p!.31,r !&.12. evidencethatself-reportedpleasureisreducedinpeoplecurrently
pb
under stress (e.g., final exam week; Berenbaum & Connelly,
1993).Fromthisview,perhapspeoplewithelevatedanhedoniain
Relationship Between Personality, Current Mood, and
Study 1 reported decreased positive affect intensity because they
Emotion Experience Ratings
were currently under stress. Hence, Study 2 examined whether
As can be seen in Table 3 for personality, compared with the associationsbetweenanhedoniaandpositiveaffectintensitycould
controlgrouptheSocAnhgroupreportedsignificantlylowerlevels beaccountedforbycurrentlevelsofself-reporteddepressionorby
ofextraversion,t(68)!7.51,p!.000001,r !&.67,andhigher reportsofrecentmajororminorstressors.
pb
levels of neuroticism, t(68) ! 2.89, p ! .005, r ! .33. In A third goal of Study 2 was to further examine whether de-
pb
addition,ascanbeseeninTable3forcurrentmood,theSocAnh creasedpositiveaffectintensityinanhedoniawasnotstatistically
group tended to report lower positive affect, t(68) ! 2.04, p ! accounted for by perceptual aberration–magical ideation, person-
ality, or current mood. In Study 1, these other variables did not
Table3
EventDescriptionQuestionnaire,Personality,andCurrent
Table4
MoodinStudy1
SummaryofHierarchicalRegressionAnalysesforVariables
Measure SocAnh PerMag Control PredictingPositiveAffectIntensityinStudy1(N!70)
Eventdescriptionquestionnaire Variable B SEB ’
Positiveemotionalcontent 1.9(0.84) 2.5(1.30) 2.4(1.16)
Positivefocusonfeeling 3.3(1.06) 4.0(1.28) 3.9(1.16) Step1
Positiveeventdescription &0.34(0.83) 0.26(1.15) 0.20(1.01) Extraversion .14 .15 0.16
Negativeemotionalcontent 1.9(0.92) 2.5(0.96) 2.1(1.07) Neuroticism &.11 .13 &0.14
Negativefocusonfeeling 3.4(1.24) 4.2(1.25) 3.7(1.30) Currentpositiveaffect .27 .12 0.28!
Negativeeventdescription &0.26(0.97) 0.37(0.98) &0.02(1.06) Currentnegativeaffect .12 .12 0.15
Personality Step2
Extraversion 2.56(0.86) 3.62(0.91) 3.82(0.46) Extraversion .09 .15 0.07
Neuroticism 3.12(0.88) 3.04(0.76) 2.52(0.83) Neuroticism &.05 .12 &0.04
CurrentMood Currentpositiveaffect .21 .12 0.25!
Positiveaffect 1.7(1.04) 1.9(1.15) 2.2(1.01) Currentnegativeaffect .17 .11 0.20
Negativeaffect 1.9(1.22) 2.1(1.37) 1.3(0.73) Group(socialanhedoniavs.control) &.54 .21 &0.36!!
Note. Standarddeviationsappearinparentheses.SocAnh!socialanhe- Note. R2!.21forStep1,p$.05;(R2!.09forStep2,p$.01.
doniagroup;PerMag!perceptualaberrationandmagicalideationgroup. !p$.05. !!p$.01.
742 KERNS,DOCHERTY,ANDMARTIN
statisticallyaccountfordecreasedpositiveaffectintensityinsocial dimensional designs might allow for a more straightforward ex-
anhedonia.However,somevariablesweremeasuredcategorically, amination of the specificity of the association with a schizotypy
andothervariablesweremeasureddimensionally.Theinfluenceof facetwhenremovingvariancesharedwithothervariables.Atthe
one variable on another could potentially be more clearly exam- same time, previous research has found some similar results for
inedwhentheyareallmeasuredinasimilarway(Kerns,2006).In schizotypy facets whether measured dimensionally or categori-
Study2,weseparatelyanddimensionallymeasuredbothanhedo- cally (e.g., Kerns, 2005, 2006; Kerns & Becker, 2008; Martin &
nia and perceptual aberration–magical ideation to further assess Kerns,2008a,2008c),andwithlargeenoughsamplesdimensional
whether only anhedonia and not psychosis proneness in general designs can still allow for a categorical analysis of data. Perhaps
was associated with decreased positive affect intensity. At the mostimportant,aspreviouslydiscussed,dimensionalstudiespro-
sametime,wefurtherexaminedwhetherdecreasedpositiveaffect vide a less biased measure of effect size (Preacher et al., 2005).
intensityinanhedoniawasnotstatisticallyaccountedforeitherby Overall,usingbothcategoricalanddimensionaldesignsacrossmul-
personalityorbycurrentmood. tiple studies with their complementary strengths might be able to
AfourthgoalofStudy2wastoexaminewhetherinaseparate provideimportantconvergingevidenceaboutschizotypy(Shadish,
set of participants anhedonia would again be associated with Cook,&Campbell,2002).
decreased self-reported positive affect intensity for lab stimuli.
Study 1 found that people with elevated social anhedonia report Method
decreasedintensityofpositiveaffectbothforreportsofreal-world
Participants
experiencesandforresponsestolabstimuli.Incontrast,research
on people with schizophrenia has generally not found decreased Participants were 339 college students (187 women and 152
self-reported positive affect in response to lab stimuli (e.g., men; mean age ! 18.7, SD ! 1.5; 89% Caucasian, 7% African
Burbridge&Barch,2007).Therefore,Study2examinedwhether American,2%Latino/Latina,and2%AsianAmerican)attendinga
the finding of an association between anhedonia and decreased large midwestern public university who received credit for an
positive affect intensity for lab stimuli would replicate in a new IntroductoryPsychologycoursefortheirparticipation.
sample.
A fifth goal of Study 2 was to examine whether anhedonia Questionnaire Measures
wouldbeassociatedwithdecreasedpositiveaffectforlabstimuli
Psychosis-pronenessscales. AsinStudy1,participantscom-
using a dimensional design. An important advantage of dimen-
pleted the Revised Social Anhedonia Scale, the Perceptual Aber-
sional designs is that they provide a less biased estimate of the
rationScale,theMagicalIdeationScale,andtheChapmanInfre-
effect size for the association between two variables than an
quency Scale. In addition, in Study 2 they also completed the
extreme-groupdesignthatselectsgroupsfromtheextremetailsof
Physical Anhedonia scale (L. J. Chapman et al., 1976). Using
the distribution (Preacher et al., 2005). In fact, it is possible that
standardized scores, we created a single anhedonia score (sum-
variation in control group selection could partially account for
minglevelofsocialandphysicalanhedonia)andasinglePerMag
some of the variation in previous research on positive affect in
score (summing level of perceptual aberration and magical ide-
physical anhedonia. Overall, two previous published studies did
ation). However, given that anhedonia scales tend to be only
not find that physical anhedonia is associated with decreased
moderately correlated and have exhibited different associations
positive affect for positive lab stimuli (Berenbaum et al., 1987;
with other variables in some previous research (e.g., Prince &
Germans & Kring, 2000). In contrast, three previous published
Berenbaum,1993),wealsoreportresultsseparatelyforsocialand
studies did find a decrease in physical anhedonia (Ferguson &
physicalanhedonia.
Katkin, 1996; Fiorito & Simons, 1994; Fitzgibbons & Simons,
Personality traits. As in Study 1, the personality traits of
1992). More important, the studies that did find a decrease in
extraversion and neuroticism were measured using the Interna-
physical anhedonia probably selected a more extreme control
tionalPersonalityItemPool(Goldberg,1999).
group than the two studies that did not find a decrease. Hence,
Current distress. Participants completed two measures to as-
variation in whether anhedonia is associated with decreased pos-
sess their current level of distress. One measure was the Beck
itive affect for lab stimuli might be because of variation in the
Depression Inventory—Second Edition (A. T. Beck, Steer, &
selectionofthecontrolgroup.InStudy2,wemeasuredanhedonia
Brown,1996),afrequentlyusedmeasureofcurrentdepressionand
dimensionallyandthereforeprovideanestimateoftheassociation
psychologicaldistress.ThesecondmeasurewastheUndergradu-
betweenanhedoniaandpositiveaffectthatislessbiasedrelativeto
ateStressQuestionnaire(Crandall,Preisler,&Aussprung,1992),
anextreme-groupdesign.
which lists a number of stressors that could be experienced by
In Study 1, social anhedonia was measured categorically in an
undergraduate students ranging from major to minor stressors
extreme-groupsdesign.InStudy2,socialandphysicalanhedonia
(e.g., “death of a family member or friend,” “victim of a crime,”
were measured dimensionally. Each study design has potential
“property stolen,” “had a class presentation,” and “got a traffic
prosandcons.Ononehand,categoricaldesignsmightbeamore
ticket”).Twomeasuresofstresswerecalculated:(a)recentmajor
accurate way of assessing schizotypy facets if they are truly
stress,thefrequencyofmajorstressorsreportedintheprevious2
categorical variables (Horan et al., 2004), some schizotypy mea-
weeks, and (b) recent minor stress, the frequency of minor stres-
sures were initially designed to measure the extreme end of the
sorsreportedintheprevious2weeks.
distribution that is focused on in an extreme-groups design, and
thereispotentiallymuchlessinformationintheliteratureaboutthe
Emotional Experience
relationshipbetweenmeasuresofschizotypywithothervariables
across the entire range of schizotypy scores. On the other hand, Participantscompletedthesamepicture-ratingtaskasinStudy1.
ANHEDONIAANDEMOTIONEXPERIENCE 743
Procedure and Data Analysis mood,andcurrentdistress.Afterthis,wethenenteredanhedonia.
AscanbeseeninTable6,inthisanalysisanhedoniastillsignif-
Participantscompletedthestudyinthefollowingorder:picture
icantlypredicteddecreasedpositiveaffectintensity.
rating,questionnairemeasures,andcurrentmoodassessment(note
that the picture-rating task was the last emotion experience task
Discussion
given in Study 1, but the first in Study 2). In data analysis, our
primary focus was to examine two associations, whether (a) an-
The goal of this research was to examine self-reported emo-
hedoniaor(b)PerMagscoreswouldbeassociatedwithdecreased
tionalexperienceinanhedonia,inparticularthefacetsofvalence
positive affect intensity. In addition, in a hierarchical multiple
andarousal.Inaddition,thisresearchexaminedwhetheranhedo-
regression, we examined whether anhedonia would significantly
nia was associated with a generalized change in emotional expe-
add to the prediction of positive affect intensity after statistically
rience or whether self-reported emotional experience varied by
removing variance shared with other variables associated with
typesofexperiencesorreportingformat.Forvalence,wefoundin
anhedonia.Notethatbecauseuseofextreme-groupsdesigns(asin
twostudiesthatanhedoniawasassociatedwithdecreasedpositive
Study 1) inflates effect sizes (Preacher et al., 2005), estimates of
affect intensity. Moreover, decreased intensity appeared to be
theassociationbetweenanhedoniaandpositiveaffectintensityin
generalized across both situations and reporting formats. For ex-
Study2wereexpectedtobesmallerthaninStudy1.
ample,inStudy1therewasadecreaseofpositiveaffectintensity
in people’s daily lives, consistent with a recent experience sam-
Results pling study (Brown, Silvia, Myin-Germeys, & Kwapil, 2007).
Decreasedintensitywasfoundeveninsituationsinwhichpeople
AscanbeseeninTable5,asfoundinStudy1anhedoniawas
withsocialanhedoniawereinteractingwithpeopletheyareclose
significantlyassociatedwithdecreasedpositiveaffectintensityon
to.Inaddition,evenforsituationsinwhichtheywerealone,people
thepicture-ratingtask(anhedoniawasassociatedwithbothhigh-
with elevated social anhedonia reported decreased positive affect
arousal positive emotions [r ! &.18, p ! .001] and low-arousal
intensity.Atthesametime,inbothstudiestherewasadecreasein
positiveemotions[r!&.16,p!.004]).Atthesametime,both
positiveaffectintensityforlabstimuli.Hence,therewasevidence
socialanhedonia(r!&.14,p!.01)andphysicalanhedonia(r!
of decreased positive affect intensity even when controlling for
&.20, p ! .0002) were significantly associated with decreased
any differences in the types of situations experienced. Further-
positive affect intensity (moreover, if analyzed categorically, 28
more, the decreased intensity was for both retrospective and cur-
peoplehadelevatedanhedonia,andtheyalsodifferedsignificantly
rentreportsofemotion,suggestingthatthedecreasefordailylife
fromcontrolparticipantsinlevelofpositiveaffectintensity,p$
situationsprobablycannotbeentirelyaccountedforbypoormem-
.01).Incontrasttoanhedonia,ascanbeseeninTable5,PerMag
oryforpositiveemotions,whichisconsistentwithwhathasbeen
scores were not associated with positive affect intensity. Instead,
foundinschizophrenia(Horanetal.,2006).ThedecreaseinStudy
PerMagscoresweresignificantlyassociatedwithincreasednega-
1 was for intensity but not for frequency of positive affect, pro-
tiveaffectintensity.
viding some evidence that people with social anhedonia did not
As can also be seen in Table 5, anhedonia was significantly
differ from controls in the number of positive events but in their
associated with personality, current mood, and current levels of
reactionstoevents.Inadditiontoself-reportedemotion,inStudy
distress.Hence,wenextexaminedwhethertheseothervariables,
1anhedoniawasassociatedwithdecreasedemotionalcontentand
plus PerMag scores, could account for the association between
focus on feelings in verbal descriptions of what it is like to
anhedoniaandpositiveaffectintensity.Inahierarchicalmultiple
experience positive emotional events. Therefore, even when peo-
regression, we first entered PerMag scores, personality, current
ple with anhedonia were not directly asked to report their emo-
tions,therewasevidenceofdecreasedpositiveaffectivecontentin
their verbal behavior. Overall, the results of these two studies
Table5
suggestthatanhedoniainpeopleatpossibleriskforschizophrenia-
CorrelationsBetweenPsychosis-PronenessScoresand
spectrumdisordersmightbeassociatedwithageneraldecreasein
IndividualDifferencesinStudy2
theexperienceofpositiveaffectintensity.
Perceptualaberration At the same time, there was evidence that decreased positive
Measure Anhedonia andmagicalideation affectintensitymightbespecificallyrelatedtoanhedonia.Inboth
studies,therewasevidencethatdecreasedpositiveaffectintensity
Pictureratingintensity
was associated with anhedonia but not with a general increased
Positive &.20!! .03
Negative &.08 .11! riskofpsychosisproneness,asperceptualaberration–magicalide-
Personality ation was not associated with positive affect in either study.
Extraversion &.34!! .03 Moreover, in both studies personality and current mood did not
Neuroticism .18!! .24!!
statistically account for the association between anhedonia and
Currentmood
Positive &.16!! .01 decreasedpositiveaffectintensity.
Negative .12! .25!! In contrast to positive affect, for negative affect there was
Currentdistress evidence that anhedonia might be associated with an increased
BeckDepressionInventory .31!! .43!! frequency of experiencing negative emotional situations and not
Recentmajorstress .06 .12!
withageneralizedincreaseintheexperienceofnegativeemotions.
Recentminorstress .09 .41!!
Inbothstudies,anhedoniawasnotassociatedwithnegativeaffect
!p$.05. !!p$.01. intensity. Instead, anhedonia was associated with increased fre-
744 KERNS,DOCHERTY,ANDMARTIN
Table6 decreasedpositiveaffectintensityinanhedoniareflectsdecreased
SummaryofHierarchicalRegressionAnalysesforVariables attentiontoandconceptualprocessingofpositiveaffect.
PredictingPositiveAffectIntensityinStudy2(N!339) Ononehand,adecreaseinthecapacitytoexperiencepositive
affectinanhedoniadoesseemgenerallyconsistentwiththecurrent
Variable B SEB ’ findingofdecreasedpositiveaffectintensityinanhedoniaacrossa
range of situations and reporting formats. On the other hand, a
Step1
Extraversion .11 .05 0.12! decrease in capacity might seem inconsistent with other research
Neuroticism .12 .06 0.12 on positive affect for lab stimuli in people with schizophrenia.
Currentpositiveaffect .25 .05 0.26!! However,overall,previousresearchhasfoundsomeevidenceofa
Currentnegativeaffect .18 .06 0.19!!
decreaseinpositiveaffectinpeoplewithschizophrenia,although
BeckDepressionInventory &.11 .07 &0.11
the decrease may be quite small. For example, in 25 previous
Perceptualaberrationandmagicalideation &.02 .06 &0.02
Step2 studies examining positive affect for lab stimuli, 20 of these
Extraversion .07 .05 0.08 studies reported numerically lower positive mood in people with
Neuroticism .11 .06 0.12 schizophrenia (Cohen & Minor, in press), a difference that
Currentpositiveaffect .23 .05 0.25!!
is significant in a vote-counting meta-analysis using a sign test
Currentnegativeaffect .17 .06 0.18!!
BeckDepressionInventory &.08 .07 &0.08 (p!.004;Rosenthal,1991).However,theeffectsizedifference
Perceptualaberrationandmagicalideation &.01 .06 &0.01 acrossthesestudiesisquitesmall(r "&.16,atleast).However,
pb
Anhedonia &.17 .06 &0.16!! itispossiblethattheeffectsizeinpeoplewithschizophreniamight
beatleastsomewhatlargerifthesestudiesfocusedspecificallyon
Note. R2!.12forStep1,p$.001;(R2!.03forStep2,p$.01.
!p$.05. !!p$.01. people with anhedonia. For example, in the current research Per-
Mag scores were not associated with decreased positive affect,
consistentwiththepossibilitythatpeoplewithschizophreniawho
do not have anhedonia may not report decreased positive affect
quencyofnegativeemotions.However,theincreaseinfrequency afterpositivelabstimuli.
was found only for daily life situations but not for lab stimuli, Although it is possible that people with anhedonia have a
suggestingthattheincreaseinnegativeaffectfrequencymightbe decreasedcapacitytoexperiencepositiveaffect,wethinkamore
relatedtopeoplewithanhedoniaexperiencingmorefrequentneg- likelyinterpretationforthedecreaseinpositiveaffectintensityin
ativedailylifeevents.Atthesametime,theincreaseinnegative thecurrentresearchisthatitreflectsadecreasedattentiontoand
affectfrequencydidnotappeartobespecifictoanhedonia,asthis conceptual processing of positive affect. Hence, from this view,
was also found in perceptual aberration–magical ideation. This although people with anhedonia could experience pleasure to the
suggests that psychosis proneness or risk for psychopathology in sameextentascontrols,theyarelesslikelytopayattentiontoor
general might be associated with increased reports of negative toconceptuallyelaboratetheirfeelingsandarethereforelesslikely
affectindailylifesituations. to experience them as specific positive emotions (Barrett et al.,
Incontrasttovalence,thecurrentresearchdidnotfindevidence 2007; Frijda & Sundararajan, 2007; Lambie & Marcel, 2002). A
thatanhedoniaisassociatedwithaspecificdecreaseintheexpe- decrease in attention to emotions in anhedonia is consistent with
rience of high-arousal emotions. Instead, to the extent that anhe- some previous anhedonia research. For example, anhedonia in
doniawasassociatedwithchangesinhigh-arousalemotions(e.g., people at possible risk for schizophrenia-spectrum disorders has
adecreaseinhigh-arousalpositiveaffectintensity),anhedoniawas beenstronglyassociatedwithdecreasedscoresontheattentionto
similarlyassociatedwithchangesinlow-arousalemotions.Hence, emotionsquestionnaire(Berenbaumetal.,2006;Kerns,2006).At
thisstudydoesnotsupportthehypothesisthatanhedoniareflects thesametime,wehaverecentlyfoundinpeoplewithschizophre-
a decrease specifically in the emotional experience of arousal. nia (n ! 47) that clinically rated anhedonia is also strongly
More important, self-reported emotional arousal is not synony- negatively associated (r ! &.50) with the attention to emotions
mous with either physiological measures of emotion or with self- questionnaire (Becker, Cicero, & Kerns, 2007). More important,
reportsofphysiologicalprocesses(e.g.,detectingheartratechanges; otherresearchontheattentiontoemotionsscalehasfoundthatit
Barrettetal.,2007).Therefore,itispossiblethatanhedoniamight is specifically associated with attention to positive emotions
beassociatedwithsomeotheraspectofemotionalarousal.How- (Gasper & Bramesfeld, 2006). At the same time, in Study 1
ever,thecurrentresearchdidnotfindevidencethatanhedoniawas decreasedpositiveaffectcontentanddecreasedfocusonfeelings
associated with a decrease specifically in the self-report of high- ontheEDQalsoseemsconsistentwithadecreasedattentiontoand
arousalemotions. conceptualprocessingofpositiveemotions.Therefore,itispossi-
Hence,onthebasisofthecurrentresearchexaminingthefacets blethatthecurrentfindingofdecreasedpositiveaffectintensityin
valence and arousal, it appears that anhedonia is associated with anhedonia is related to decreased attention to and conceptual
decreasedpositiveaffectintensity.Asmentionedpreviously,emo- processingofpositiveaffect.
tional experience is thought to involve certain core affective fea- Adecreaseinattentiontoandconceptualprocessingofpositive
tures,suchasvalenceandarousal,andhowtheseaffectivefeatures affect also seems consistent with other research on motivation in
are experienced depends on attention and conceptual processing schizophrenia. There is some evidence that people with schizo-
(Barrett et al., 2007). Therefore, there are at least two possible phrenia report a decreased wanting but not a decreased liking of
explanations for the decrease in positive affect intensity in anhe- stimuli(Gard,Kring,Gard,Horan,&Green,2007).Itispossible
donia. One explanation is that anhedonia reflects a decreased that decreased wanting and anticipation of positive stimuli could
capacitytoexperiencepositiveaffect.Theotherexplanationisthat potentiallycontributetodecreasedattentiontoandthinkingabout