Anxiety

This article is about the emotion. For the mental illness colloquially known as "anxiety", see generalised anxiety disorder.
"Misgiving" redirects here. For the American metalcore band, see Misgiving (band).
For other uses, see Anxiety (disambiguation).
Anxiety, an 1894 portrait by Edvard Munch
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Emotions

Anxiety is an emotion which is characterised by an unpleasant state of inner turmoil and includes feelings of dread over anticipated events.[1][2][3] Anxiety is different from fear in that fear is defined as the emotional response to a present threat, whereas anxiety is the anticipation of a future one.[4] It is often accompanied by nervous behavior such as pacing back and forth, somatic complaints, and rumination.[5]

Anxiety is a feeling of uneasiness and worry, usually generalized and unfocused as an overreaction to a situation that is only subjectively seen as menacing.[6] It is often accompanied by muscular tension,[7] restlessness, fatigue, inability to catch one's breath, tightness in the abdominal region, nausea, and problems in concentration. Anxiety is closely related to fear,[3] which is a response to a real or perceived immediate threat (fight-or-flight response); anxiety involves the expectation of a future threat including dread.[7] People facing anxiety may withdraw from situations which have provoked anxiety in the past.[8]

The emotion of anxiety can persist beyond the developmentally appropriate time-periods in response to specific events, and thus turning into one of the multiple anxiety disorders (e.g. generalized anxiety disorder, panic disorder).[9][10] The difference between anxiety disorder (as mental disorder) and anxiety (as normal emotion), is that people with an anxiety disorder experience anxiety excessively or persistently during approximately 6 months, or even during shorter time-periods in children.[7] Anxiety disorders are among the most persistent mental problems and often last decades.[11] Anxiety can also be experienced within other mental disorders, e.g., obsessive-compulsive disorder, post-traumatic stress disorder.[12][13]

  1. ^ Davison GC (2008). Abnormal Psychology. Toronto: Veronica Visentin. p. 154. ISBN 978-0-470-84072-6.
  2. ^ Miceli M, Castelfranchi C (2014-11-27). Expectancy and emotion. Oxford: Oxford University Press. ISBN 978-0-19-150927-8. Archived from the original on 2023-01-17. Retrieved 2022-05-09.
  3. ^ a b Chand SP, Marwaha R (2022). "Anxiety". StatPearls. Treasure Island (FL): StatPearls Publishing. PMID 29262212. Archived from the original on 2022-06-21. Retrieved 2022-12-15. Anxiety is linked to fear and manifests as a future-oriented mood state that consists of a complex cognitive, affective, physiological, and behavioral response system associated with preparation for the anticipated events or circumstances perceived as threatening.
  4. ^ Crocq MA (September 2015). "A history of anxiety: from Hippocrates to DSM". Dialogues in Clinical Neuroscience. 17 (3): 319–325. doi:10.31887/DCNS.2015.17.3/macrocq. PMC 4610616. PMID 26487812.
  5. ^ Seligman ME, Walker EF, Rosenhan DL. Abnormal psychology (4th ed.). New York: W.W. Norton & Company.[page needed]
  6. ^ Bouras N, Holt G (2007). Psychiatric and Behavioral Disorders in Intellectual and Developmental Disabilities (2nd ed.). Cambridge University Press. ISBN 978-1-139-46130-6. Archived from the original on 2023-01-17. Retrieved 2018-11-22.[page needed]
  7. ^ a b c American Psychiatric Association (2013). Diagnostic and Statistical Manual of Mental Disorders (5th ed.). Arlington, VA: American Psychiatric Publishing. p. 189. ISBN 978-0-89042-555-8.
  8. ^ Barker P (2003). Psychiatric and Mental Health Nursing: The Craft of Caring. London: Edward Arnold. ISBN 978-0-340-81026-2.[page needed]
  9. ^ Robinson OJ, Pike AC, Cornwell B, Grillon C (December 2019). "The translational neural circuitry of anxiety". Journal of Neurology, Neurosurgery, and Psychiatry. 90 (12). BMJ: 1353–1360. doi:10.1136/jnnp-2019-321400. PMID 31256001. S2CID 195758112. Anxiety is an adaptive response that promotes harm avoidance, but at the same time excessive anxiety constitutes the most common psychiatric complaint.
  10. ^ Evans DL, Foa EB, Gur RE, Hendin H, O'Brien CP, Seligman ME, Walsh BT, eds. (2005). Treating and preventing adolescent mental health disorders: what we know and what we don't know. A research agenda for improving the mental health of our youth. New York: Oxford University Press. doi:10.1093/9780195173642.001.0001. ISBN 978-0-19-517364-2. OCLC 56324679. Archived from the original on 2021-12-16. Retrieved 2021-06-02.
  11. ^ Hovenkamp-Hermelink JH, Jeronimus BF, Myroniuk S, Riese H, Schoevers RA (May 2021). "Predictors of persistence of anxiety disorders across the lifespan: a systematic review" (PDF). The Lancet. Psychiatry. 8 (5): 428–443. doi:10.1016/S2215-0366(20)30433-8. PMID 33581052. S2CID 231919782. Archived (PDF) from the original on 2023-04-05. Retrieved 2023-04-05.
  12. ^ Marras A, Fineberg N, Pallanti S (August 2016). "Obsessive compulsive and related disorders: comparing DSM-5 and ICD-11". CNS Spectrums. 21 (4): 324–333. doi:10.1017/S1092852916000110. PMID 27401060. S2CID 13129793.
  13. ^ World Health Organization (2023). International Classification of Diseases, eleventh revision – ICD-11. Genova – icd.who.int.