Abstract
Stimuli associated with sources of stress have been shown to interfere with cognition. The authors hypothesized that women with the stress of having a family history of breast cancer (FH+) would exhibit greater interference on a task with cancer-related stimuli than women without cancer in the family (FH-). The authors developed a modified Stroop color-naming task to test this hypothesis in a sample of FH+ (n = 72) and FH- (n = 96) women. Consistent with the hypotheses, FH+ women had longer color-naming times and more errors (ps < .01) on a cancer word list relative to noncancer lists. This biased processing was not mediated by the significantly higher perceived risk, general distress, or cancer-specific distress in FH+ women. Maladaptive alterations in processing cancer stimuli may have important clinical implications, as these women must process complex cancer-related information critical to their health (e.g., options for chemoprevention, screening).
Original language | English (US) |
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Pages (from-to) | 235-244 |
Number of pages | 10 |
Journal | Health Psychology |
Volume | 22 |
Issue number | 3 |
DOIs | |
State | Published - May 2003 |
Keywords
- Breast cancer
- Cognitive bias
- Family history
- Psychological distress
- Stroop
ASJC Scopus subject areas
- Applied Psychology
- Psychiatry and Mental health