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Definition: anxiety from Dictionary of Psychological Testing, Assessment and Treatment

The term is usually used in the lay sense of the word. Namely, a feeling of profound agitation and of an imminent unpleasant experience, often with accompanying physical symptoms of racing pulse, sweating, breathlessness, etc. Normally, the sensation is experienced as a reaction to anxiety-provoking events (e.g. a trip to the dentist, ‘exam nerves’, etc.), and is relatively quickly dissipated. If the feeling of anxiety is unusually severe or protracted, or arises without apparent reason, then it is usually classified as one of the anxiety disorders.

Anxiety

From Encyclopedia of Health Communication
Anxiety is a powerful emotional state that has potentially profound effects on health and well-being. Some of the more interesting effects of anxiety on health might be mediated by communication with other people and how anxiety affects this communication. Anxiety can also affect the presentation and course of many physical and psychological health ailments. There are few emotional states that influence physiological systems as directly and immediately as anxiety. People who are anxious often experience an accelerated heart rate, increased blood pressure, nausea and gastrointestinal distress, shortness of breath, a dry mouth, sweating, and tension headaches. These symptoms understandably disrupt sleep, appetite, and concentration. In addition to somatic symptoms, anxiety is expressed in apprehensive thoughts or cognitions (e.g., “I bet I look stupid,” or “Is my hair messed up?”), unpleasant subjective feelings (e.g., nervous, tense, hopeless), and avoidant coping behaviors (e.g., the…
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Full text Article ANXIETY

From The Edinburgh International Encyclopaedia of Psychoanalysis
Anxiety is an unpleasant affect accompanied by a myriad of physiologic manifestations (quickened heart beat, gastrointestinal distress, ‘butterflies’ and diarrhoea, a tightening in the chest, tremulousness, sweating, muscle tension) as well as psychological manifestations (a sense of dread and…
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Full text Article Anxiety

From Encyclopedia of Women and Gender: Sex Similarities and Differences and the Impact of Society on Gender
I. Anxiety as a Construct and the Measurement of Anxiety II. Anxiety as a Normal Emotion III. Anxiety as a Symptom IV. The Anxiety Disorders V. Conclusions Glossary Anxiety disorders A group of psychiatric disorders in which the central feature is excessive, unrealistic, and persistent anxiety that…
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Full text Article Anxiety

From The Concise Corsini Encyclopedia of Psychology and Behavioral Science
One of the best definitions of anxiety, put forth over fifteen years ago by Kandel (1983), remains highly apt and appropriate today: ÒAnxiety is a normal inborn response either to threat—to one’s person, attitudes, or self-esteem—or to the absence of people or objects that assure and signify safetyÓ…
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Full text Article Anxiety

From Encyclopedia of the Human Brain
GLOSSARY For more than a century scientists have wondered about the basis of fear and anxiety in the brain; however, only recently have clinicians developed neuroanatomical hypotheses to explain specific anxiety disorders. Although anxiety disorders affect a large portion of the population, …
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Full text Article anxiety

From The Columbia Encyclopedia
anticipatory tension or vague dread persisting in the absence of a specific threat. In contrast to fear, which is a realistic reaction to actual danger, anxiety is generally related to an unconscious threat. Physiological symptoms of anxiety include increases in pulse rate and blood pressure, …
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Full text Article Anxiety

From Encyclopedia of Special Education: A Reference for the Education of Children, Adolescents, and Adults with Disabilities and Other Exceptional Individuals
We live in an “age of anxiety” ( Spielberger & Rickman ,, p. 69). People have become more anxious and worried than ever before ( Twenge ,). In recent years, children and adolescents have reported higher levels of anxiety than individuals in decades past ( Twenge ,). Twenge suggests that a…
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Full text Article Anxiety

From Gale Encyclopedia of Medicine
Anxiety is a multisystem response to a perceived threat or danger. It reflects a combination of biochemical changes in the body, the patient's personal history and memory, and the social situation. It is important to distinguish between anxiety as a feeling or experience, and an anxiety disorder as…
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Full text Article Anxiety

From The Gale Encyclopedia of Senior Health
Prevalence of anxiety disorders in U.S. adults...
Anxiety in humans is variously defined as an emotion or a physiological condition. It can be understood as a complex response to an object or event that arouses apprehension. Anxiety involves biochemical and neuromuscular changes in the body, memories of past events (including personal history), …
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Full text Article Anxiety

From The International Encyclopedia of Depression
Though anxiety and depression are distinguishable, as we discuss in more detail below, they overlap to a considerable degree and share important features. Thus, no consideration of depression would be complete without also addressing anxiety disorders and the relationship between depression and the…
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Full text Article Anxiety

From Encyclopedia of Autism Spectrum Disorders
Fear ; Worry Anxiety is a psychological and physiological state characterized by cognitive (e.g., recurrent or obsessive thoughts), somatic (e.g., headache, dizziness, nausea), affective (e.g., dysphoria or negative mood), and behavioral (e.g., trembling, pacing, or restlessness) responses that…
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