The associations of stress, pleasure and emotion to voice-hearing: An ecological momentary assessment study.

BACKGROUND

Negative emotions and stress are theorised to play a role in the onset and maintenance of voice-hearing experiences. However, previous research has not explored these temporal relationships in daily life using differentiated psychological constructs.

AIM: Using ecological momentary assessment, this study examined the moment-to-moment relationships between negative and positive emotion valence and intensity, stressful and pleasurable events, and voice-hearing onset.

MATERIALS &

METHODS

Forty voice-hearers completed seven days of smartphone-based surveys, rating their emotions and their intensity, perceived stress and pleasure of life events, and presence of voice-hearing.

RESULTS

Multilevel modelling showed that stressful events, but not pleasurable events, were significantly predictive of voice-hearing, both concurrently and in the next time point. Neither negative nor positive emotion intensity predicted voice-hearing, nor did they moderate the relationship between voice-hearing onset and stressful or pleasurable events, respectively.

DISCUSSION: These findings suggest that factors which differentiate perception of stressful events from self-reported negative emotions may be useful intervention targets, such as mitigating prolonged external stressors, reducing sensitivity to external stressors and targeting negative perceptions or resistance to these stressors.

CONCLUSION

Clinically, our findings underscore the relevance of stress and a negative perception of externally oriented events, with further research needed to explore useful interventions for targeting these mechanisms.