Direct mapping of intervention to thought features: A Bayesian proof-of-concept study.
Behaviour research and therapy April 1, 2025 Nur Hani Zainal, Christian A Webb, Lauren S Hallion
A proof-of-concept study with 40 high-worry adults (80% with an anxiety disorder) tested whether features of worry predict which cognitive strategy works best to regulate it. Participants rated their worries on five dimensions and tried mindful acceptance, focused attention meditation, or thought suppression during brain scanning. The preregistered hypotheses were not supported, but exploratory analyses showed that mindfulness-based strategies were more effective than thought suppression for worries rated as more uncontrollable. The authors call for larger studies with more varied perseverative thoughts.