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Emotion Division
Director, Matthew T. Tull, Ph.D.
Research within this division focuses upon improving our understanding of the development and maintenance of emotional disorders (broadly defined) and co-occurring substance use disorders (SUD). In particular, this division takes a basic research approach to examining the cognitive (anxiety sensitivity) and emotional (emotional avoidance, emotion dysregulation, distress tolerance) processes that may underlie post-traumatic stress disorder (PTSD), panic disorder, depression and substance use. Research also examines the co-occurrence of these disorders, with a specific focus on the functional relationship between the emotional disorders and substance use, and how certain vulnerability processes may contribute to substance use treatment failure.
Current projects include:
The role of emotion regulation deficits and experiential avoidance in the development and maintenance of PTSD, panic disorder, and related psychopathology
An experimental investigation (using the implicit association task) of the functional relationship between PTSD and SUDs
The relationship between traumatic cue exposure and attentional drug biases among crack/cocaine users with PTSD
Anxiety sensitivity, emotion regulation deficits, and HPA axis dysregulation as mechanisms of substance use treatment failure among inner-city drug users with PTSD
Understanding the relationship between anxiety sensitivity and heroin use, as well as the development of interventions focused on reducing high anxiety sensitivity among heroin users
Development of a behavioral activation treatment for depressed smokers
Development of a delayed discounting task to investigate interoceptive avoidance among panic disorder-vulnerable individuals
Graduate students conducting research within this division include:
Other students involved in research in this division include: