Category: Anxiety

The dorsolateral prefrontal cortex is involved in planning, reasoning and decision-making.

Improving general cognitive functioning could help to reduce anxiety, new research suggests.

This area is highly involved in planning, reasoning and decision-making.

Increasing brain activity in areas related to thinking and problem solving is linked to reduced anxiety, the study found.

People at risk for anxiety were less likely to develop the disorder when they had more activity in brain areas related to complex mental operations.

Memory and brain training, along with psychological therapies could all help to boost activity in critical areas.

Professor Ahmad Hariri, who led the study, said:

“These findings help reinforce a strategy whereby individuals may be able to improve their emotional functioning — their mood, their anxiety, their experience of depression — not only by directly addressing those phenomena, but also by indirectly improving their general cognitive functioning.”

The study focused on an area of the brain called the dorsolateral prefrontal cortex.

This area is highly involved in planning, reasoning and decision-making.

The dorsolateral prefrontal cortex also plays an important role in the emotions.

Professor Hariri said:

“We wanted to address an area of understanding mental illness that has been neglected, and that is the flip side of risk.

We are looking for variables that actually confer resiliency and protect individuals from developing problems.”

For the study 120 people were scanned while carrying out tasks designed to activate specific parts of their brains.

Professor Hariri explained the results:

“We found that if you have a higher functioning dorsolateral prefrontal cortex, the imbalance in these deeper brain structures is not expressed as changes in mood or anxiety.”

Mr Matthew Scult, the study’s first author, said:

“We are hoping to help improve current mental health treatments by first predicting who is most at-risk so that we can intervene earlier, and second, by using these types of approaches to determine who might benefit from a given therapy.”

The study was published in the journal Cerebral Cortex (Scult et al., 2017).

Are you just shy or is it a social anxiety disorder?

The classic sign of a social anxiety disorder is a strong fear of embarrassment or humiliation in social situations, research finds.

Bear in mind that many people are apprehensive in unfamiliar social situations or with those they do not know.

Social anxiety disorder is more than being shy.

To be a social anxiety disorder, the fear should be so great that the social situation can only be born with considerable distress.

Either that or social situations are often avoided — sometimes causing serious personal disadvantage.

Many people with the disorder are reluctant to seek help, precisely because of the embarrassment they feel and/or the potential for humiliation they sense.

• Try Dr Jeremy Dean’s ebook: The Anxiety Plan: 42 Strategies For Worry, Phobias, OCD and Panic

Around 13% of the general population are thought to have a social anxiety disorder.

Dr Kristy L. Dalrymple, the author of the study, said:

“Despite its prevalence, social anxiety disorder has not received the same attention from the public or mainstream media as other disorders, such as obsessive compulsive disorder.

Due to its social and economic impact, it merits further study in order to help researchers and clinicians determine possible causes, and the best treatment.

This isn’t about overcoming shyness.

This is about helping our patients who suffer from a disorder that prevents them from living a happy and healthy life.”

Unfortunately, a social anxiety disorder can significantly affect people’s lives.

Experiencing social anxiety disorder is linked to fewer romantic relationships, greater unemployment and fewer days worked, as well as lower productivity.

Dr Dalrymple said:

“There are many differing opinions about social anxiety disorder and the best treatment.

Should it be treated with medication, behavioral therapy, or both?

The significant increase in the prescription of antidepressant medications (which often are used to treat SAD) over the past several years — an increase of 400 percent — should be considered when determining the best approach.

Are we simply medicating, or are we helping patients to truly improve their quality of life?”

The study was published in the journal Expert Review of Neurotherapeutics (Dalrymple, 2012).

One of the easiest ways to reduce the risk of stress and anxiety.

Eating vegetables daily is linked to a lower chance of anxiety and depression, new research finds.

The study of over 65,000 Australians found that the more vegetables they ate each day, the lower their risk of suffering from anxiety and depression.

Women in particular seemed to be sensitive to vegetable intake.

Vegetables had a stronger protective effect on women than it did on men.

Binh Nguyen, the study’s first author, said:

“We found that fruit and vegetables were more protective for women than men, suggesting that women may benefit more from fruit and vegetables.”

Women who ate 5-7 servings of vegetables each day were 23% less likely to suffer from stress than those who had 0-1 servings per day.

Dr Melody Ding, study co-author, said:

“This study shows that moderate daily fruit and vegetable consumption is associated with lower rates of psychological stress.

It also reveals that moderate daily vegetable intake alone is linked to a lower incidence of psychological stress.

Moderate fruit intake alone appears to confer no significant benefit on people’s psychological stress.”

The study was published in the journal BMJ Open (Nguyen et al., 2017).