Timothy R. Ritzert

Longwood University | Longwood · Department of Psychology

Individuals with body dysmorphic disorder (BDD) experience elevated social avoidance, both as a consequence and independent of BDD concerns. To explore how social avoidance relates to the long-term course of functioning for people with BDD, this prospective longitudinal study evaluated the hypothesis that initial social avoidance would predict chan...

Evaluating how, for whom, and under what conditions psychosocial treatments work is an important component of anxiety disorder treatment development. Yet, research regarding mediators and moderators of self-help interventions is sparse. The current project is a secondary analysis of mediators, moderators, and correlates of outcome of a randomized w...

Values are a guiding principle in Acceptance and Commitment Therapy (ACT), and a vital element of both ACT research and clinical assessment. This systematic review aimed to evaluate the current evidence for the utility and efficacy of quantitative survey measures that assess values within an ACT study framework. Online databases were searched using...

Rigorous evaluations of cognitive behavioral self-help books for anxiety in pure self-help contexts are lacking. The present study evaluated the effectiveness of an Acceptance and Commitment Therapy (ACT) self-help workbook for anxiety-related concerns, with no therapist contact, in an international sample. Participants (N = 503; 94% mental health...

Acceptance and Commitment Therapy (ACT) utilizes cognitive defusion strategies to alter the function of unwanted, distressing thoughts so as to reduce their impact and foster greater psychological flexibility. Though defusion is linked to several positive outcomes (e.g., reduced thought believability, improved pain tolerance), it remains unclear wh...

Experiential avoidance (EA), cognitive fusion (CF), and lack of present-moment awareness contribute to the development and maintenance of various forms of psychopathology, principally through their negative impact on value-guided action. However, little research has examined these behavioral processes at the daily level and, as such, the temporal a...

Objective: Evaluate the incremental effects of a computerized values clarification (VC) activity on anxiety symptomology and quality of life over and above establishment of a mindfulness meditation (MM) practice. Method: Anxious participants (N = 120, Female = 86; Mage = 22.26) were randomly assigned to a 2-week, 10-min daily MM practice + contr...

Mindfulness-based interventions (MBIs) are efficacious and effective for a variety of mental and physical health problems. Mindfulness meditation is a primary therapeutic strategy employed within MBIs and is hypothesized to increase mindfulness and, in turn, lead to positive outcomes. However, evidence in support of mindfulness meditation practice...

Research using the Implicit Relational Assessment Procedure (IRAP) suggests that a positive bias toward thinness, rather than a negative bias toward fatness, might underlie implicitly assessed evaluative responding regarding body image. Because these results contrast with reports of widespread anti-fat attitudes, we aimed to clarify the nature of i...

Anxiety disorders are associated with numerous costs and poor quality of life (QOL), and yet are highly treatable. The present study evaluated the relations between putative change processes, anxiety symptom severity, and QOL by employing path analysis to compare two theoretically-derived models of anxious psychopathology in an examination of pre-i...

The tendency for anxious individuals to selectively attend to threatening information is believed to cause and exacerbate anxious emotional responding in a self-perpetuating cycle. The present study sought to examine the relation between differential interoceptive conditioning (IC) using carbon dioxide inhalation as a panicogenic unconditioned stim...