No Evidence for Unconscious Attentional Bias in People With Clinically Significant Symptoms of Functional Gastrointestinal Disorders:... 2025 Ejova+

[Andy]

Full title: No Evidence for Unconscious Attentional Bias in People With Clinically Significant Symptoms of Functional Gastrointestinal Disorders: A Study Using the Emerging Electroencephalographic Paradigm of Fast Periodic Visual Stimulation

ABSTRACT​

Background​

Disorders of gut-brain interaction (DGBIs) present a significant burden on global healthcare systems, yet their underlying mechanisms remain poorly understood. Emerging evidence suggests a role for unconscious psychological processes, particularly attention. This study seeks to detect unconscious attention patterns in people meeting DGBI diagnostic criteria using electroencephalographic (EEG) fast periodic visual stimulation (FPVS), a novel passive method offering high temporal resolution.

Methods​

Alongside 20 healthy controls, 22 female psychology students meeting Rome IV criteria for irritable bowel syndrome or functional dyspepsia completed an FPVS task involving symptom-related (oddball), negative (oddball), and neutral (base) nouns, as well as a control condition in which faces were oddballs among reshuffled pixels.

Key Results​

While we detected unconscious discrimination in the control condition, no significant difference in unconscious attention to symptom-related or negative nouns relative to neutral nouns was observed between groups.

Conclusions and Inferences​

In suggesting no basis for unconscious attentional bias in DGBIs, these findings echo research measuring unconscious attention using event-related potentials, but should be replicated using more highly valenced emotional words.

Summary​

• Unconscious attention toward emotionally negative and pain-related concepts has been theorized to contribute to the development and maintenance of functional gastrointestinal symptoms.
• We test this assertion using a novel approach involving the measurement of brain electrical signals (electroencephalography) as negative words (e.g., “pain”) are very briefly presented at regular intervals in streams of neutral words (e.g., “fable”).
• We do not find evidence of heightened unconscious attention towards the negative stimulus words among people with clinically significant functional gastrointestinal symptoms as compared to healthy controls. However, we make some recommendations for further testing the technique using image-based rather than word-based stimuli.

Open access

 

[Sean]

I wonder if the subjects (patients and controls) all being psychology students was a significant uncontrolled variable?

 

[Jonathan Edwards]

The obvious conclusion is that people with DGBI do not in fact have DGBI. Some of them are just ill and some of them are students needing credits.

 

[Sean]

Some of them are just ill and some of them are students needing credits.

The legitimate role of snark in scientific debate.

Discuss.

 

[Hutan]

Discuss.

or just Enjoy.

 

[rvallee]

Emerging evidence suggests a role for unconscious psychological processes, particularly attention

Unconscious attention toward emotionally negative and pain-related concepts has been theorized to contribute to the development

Those are not the same thing, at all. The so-called "evidence" here is literally some people speculating it could be, and/or asserting it must be. And hypothesized would be the correct word, not theorized. This has nothing to do with "evidence suggesting" anything. Evidence does not suggest, people do. As is the case here. And as this awful study also does, suggesting it could still be relevant, because it has been asserted to be.

It must be said, though, that this is a ridiculous way of testing anything, just completely unserious. Makes a mockery of science.