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Exploring temporal relationships among worrying, anxiety, and somatic symptoms
R N Groen1, A van Gils1, A C Emerencia2
1University of Groningen, University Medical Center Groningen, Interdisciplinary Center Psychopathology and Emotion regulation, Groningen, The Netherlands.
Journal of Psychosomatic Research
|November 24, 2020
Summary
Anxiety symptoms do not consistently cause somatic symptoms. However, higher functional somatic symptom (FSS) levels predict persistent anxiety and worrying, indicating a complex relationship.
Area of Science:
- Psychiatry
- Psychology
- General Medicine
Background:
- The interplay between anxiety symptoms and functional somatic symptoms (FSS) is not fully understood.
- Somatic symptoms may precede or follow anxiety, suggesting a bidirectional relationship.
Purpose of the Study:
- To explore the within-day interrelationships between worrying, feeling anxious, and somatic symptoms.
- To investigate how these interrelationships associate with the overall level of FSS.
Main Methods:
- A 30-day electronic diary study with 767 participants (83% female, mean age 39) from the Dutch general population.
- Symptoms were recorded thrice daily at 6-hour intervals.
- Multilevel vector autoregressive models analyzed temporal relationships and FSS associations.
Main Results:
- Significant heterogeneity was found in within-person symptom interrelationships.
- Increased somatic symptoms were linked to increased worrying six hours later (B=0.017).
- Higher FSS levels predicted the persistence of anxiety (B=0.230) and worrying carry-over to anxiety (B=0.159) at the between-person level.
Conclusions:
- Contrary to expectations, higher somatic symptom levels over weeks correlated with persistent anxiety and worrying.
- A direct within-person link between anxiety and somatic symptoms over 6 hours was observed in a minority of participants.
- The findings suggest that FSS may influence the persistence of anxiety symptoms rather than being directly caused by them in the general population.
Keywords:
AnxietyEcological momentary assessmentFunctional somatic symptomsMedically unexplained symptomsMore Related Videos
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