Trial reportPloS one2013
Internet-based attention bias modification for social anxiety: a randomised controlled comparison of training towards negative and training towards positive cues.
Trial report in PloS one, 2013. The graph could read no effect estimate from its abstract, so it casts no vote on the map. It is linked to 2 registered trials, which are not on this map. Cited by 35 papers, 6 of them syntheses that pooled it.
What it found
Each row is one number read from the abstract, on the scale the paper reported it, with its interval. Left of the dashed line favours the treatment, right favours the comparator. Under each row is the sentence it came from. New to these charts? A ten-minute tutorial.
The abstract states no effect estimate the extractor could read, or names no intervention and outcome on the map, so this paper lights no cell and moves no belief. It is still indexed, cited and linked below.
The trial behind it
Trials whose registry record cites this paper, or whose number appears in the abstract. A trial that started after this paper was published is citing it as background, not reporting it.
Computerized Attention Bias Modification Training in Social Phobia/Social Anxiety Disorder
Reduction of Social Phobia Symptoms With Internet-Based Cognitive Bias Modification
Who cites it
35 citing papers in PubMed, 6 syntheses or guidelines pooled it, 112 citations in OpenAlex.
- Magnitude of the Digital Placebo Effect and Its Moderators on Generalized Anxiety Symptoms: Systematic Review and Meta-Analysis.Journal of medical Internet research · 2025Pooled it
- Acceptability of Digital Mental Health Interventions for Depression and Anxiety: Systematic Review.Journal of medical Internet research · 2024Pooled it
- Less is more: Patient-level meta-analysis reveals paradoxical dose-response effects of a computer-based social anxiety intervention targeting attentional bias.Depression and anxiety · 2017Pooled it
- Pooled it
- Pooled patient-level meta-analysis of children and adults completing a computer-based anxiety intervention targeting attentional bias.Clinical psychology review · 2016Pooled it
- Pooled it
- Trial
- Effect of internet-based attention bias modification on the anxiety of Japanese workers: A randomized controlled trial.Journal of occupational health · 2021Trial
- A pilot randomized controlled trial of cognitive bias modification to reduce fear of breast cancer recurrence.Cancer · 2017Trial
- Attentional bias modification training for insomnia: A double-blind placebo controlled randomized trial.PloS one · 2017Trial
- Combining attention training with internet-based cognitive-behavioural self-help for social anxiety: a randomised controlled trial.Cognitive behaviour therapy · 2014Trial
- Trial
- Threat-related attentional bias in subjects with different looming cognitive styles: Evidence based on eye-tracking study.World journal of psychiatry · 2025Article
- Harsh Parenting and Problematic Smartphone Use: The Chain Mediating Effects of Attention to Negative Information and Social Anxiety.Child psychiatry and human development · 2025Article
- Home-based cognitive bias modification training for reducing maladaptive fear in patients with suspected acute coronary syndrome: a pilot randomized clinical trial.Pilot and feasibility studies · 2024Article
- Pathological network changes in patients with social anxiety disorder before and after an Internet-based CBT.Internet interventions · 2023Article
- The Effects of Repeated Attachment Security Priming on Social Anxiety and Attention Bias: A Randomized Controlled Trial.Behavioral sciences (Basel, Switzerland) · 2023Article
- Modeling brain dynamics and gaze behavior: Starting point bias and drift rate relate to frontal midline theta oscillations.NeuroImage · 2023Article
- Efficacy of attention bias modification via smartphones in a large population sample.Royal Society open science · 2022Article
- Look at the Audience? A Randomized Controlled Study of Shifting Attention From Self-Focus to Nonsocial vs. Social External Stimuli During Virtual Reality Exposure to Public Speaking in Social Anxiety.Frontiers in psychiatry · 2021Article
Corrections and comments
PubMed lists nothing against this paper. Absence here is not a guarantee, only a check that was made.
Authors and funding
8 authors at 7 institutions in 4 countries.
Funding
Abstract
unlabelledBiases in attention processes are thought to play a crucial role in the aetiology and maintenance of Social Anxiety Disorder (SAD). The goal of the present study was to examine the efficacy of a programme intended to train attention towards positive cues and a programme intended to train attention towards negative cues. In a randomised, controlled, double-blind design, the impact of these two training conditions on both selective attention and social anxiety were compared to that of a control training condition. A modified dot probe task was used, and delivered via the internet. A total of 129 individuals, diagnosed with SAD, were randomly assigned to one of these three conditions and took part in a 14-day programme with daily training/control sessions. Participants in all three groups did not on average display an attentional bias prior to the training. Critically, results on change in attention bias implied that significantly differential change in selective attention to threat was not detected in the three conditions. However, symptoms of social anxiety reduced significantly from pre- to follow-up-assessment in all three conditions (dwithin = 0.63-1.24), with the procedure intended to train attention towards threat cues producing, relative to the control condition, a significantly greater reduction of social fears. There were no significant differences in social anxiety outcome between the training condition intended to induce attentional bias towards positive cues and the control condition. To our knowledge, this is the first RCT where a condition intended to induce attention bias to negative cues yielded greater emotional benefits than a control condition. Intriguingly, changes in symptoms are unlikely to be by the mechanism of change in attention processes since there was no change detected in bias per se. Implications of this finding for future research on attention bias modification in social anxiety are discussed.
trial registrationClinicalTrials.gov NCT01463137.
Indexed as
Identifiers
What OpenQuestion holds
Registered trials
Read under generation 80e0d062 · epoch 390. Bibliography from PubMed, PubMed Central and OpenAlex; grants from NIH RePORTER; trial links from ClinicalTrials.gov; estimates, votes and beliefs from the OpenQuestion graph.