Previous efforts to identify risk factors for anxiety have focused on individual differences in the prediction and experience of threatening events. More recently, the looming vulnerability model has emphasized that in order to understand the determinants of anxiety, researchers need to expand their focus on information processing biases to include variability in the tendency to perceive threatening stimuli as rapidly approaching and intensifying (Riskind Behaviour Research and Therapy, 35, 685–702, 1997). This tendency is known as a looming maladaptive style (LMS). We examined the interaction of traditional risk factors with LMS in predicting change in anxiety symptoms over one month. Participants’ tendency to view threatening outcomes as likely was predictive of change in symptoms of anxiety and this predictive relationship was stronger for participants with a greater LMS. Likewise, experiences of threatening events were predictive of change in anxiety and this predictive relationship too was stronger for participants with a greater LMS. Additional analyses suggested that LMS may be particularly important to the course of symptoms of anxiety, as compared to depressive symptoms.
