Dot probe performance in two specific phobias

Objectives. The present study applied MacLeod, Mathews & Tata's (1986) dot probe attentional deployment methodology to individuals with specific phobias. Design. Attentional deployment towards spider‐related, blood‐related, positive, negative, and neutral words was examined. Method. Individuals with either spider phobia ( N = 13) or blood/injury phobia ( N = 14) and non‐anxious controls ( N = 14) completed the dot probe attentional deployment task. Results. Individuals with specific phobias did not demonstrate an attentional bias towards phobia‐related stimuli relevant to their particular fears. Conclusion. Semantic‐based information processing paradigms may not be sufficiently potent to demonstrate biased performance towards threatening stimuli in individuals with mild specific phobias who are otherwise healthy.