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Introduction
The construct of perseveration reflects the tendency to engage in a behavior even when it is no longer rewarding nor produces the expected consequences (Serpell, Waller, Fearon and Meyer, 2009). Scientific work has found that perseveration is related to numerous types of psychopathology; for example, obsessive-compulsive disorder (OCD) is characterized, in part, by perseverative cognitive (e.g. deficits in executive functioning and cognitive flexibility; Spiro, Feltovich, Jacobson and Coulson, 1992) and behavioral processes (e.g. obsessive thoughts, checking rituals; Frost, Sher and Green, 1986). Similarly, generalized anxiety disorder involves perseverative worry about various life events in the absence of problem-solving oriented behavior (Mennin, Heimberg, Turk and Fresco, 2005; Schut, Castonguay and Borkovec, 2001), and, in certain instances, depression can be maintained by a perseverative rumination about negative mood states (Nolen-Hoeksema, Wisco and Lyubomirsky, 2008; Watkins and Mason, 2002). These types of findings, across the psychopathology literature suggest that various forms of excessive or heightened perseveration are often related to greater degrees of personal distress and human suffering (Martin and Davies, 1998).
Perseveration shares conceptual overlap with personality constructs of perfectionism and persistence (Serpell et al., 2009). Both perfectionism and persistence have also similarly been linked to various forms of psychopathology (Serpell et al., 2009). Serpell and colleagues (2009) have offered a novel, integrative conceptual account that suggests perseveration is distinct from, but related to, perfectionism (a disposition to regard anything short of perfection as unacceptable) and persistence (willingness to engage in a distressing task linked to a reward contingency),
Interestingly, perseveration has not been widely investigated in relation to models of panic psychopathology. It is possible that individuals experiencing acute physical or psychological symptoms of anxiety or panic who have a tendency to perseverate on negative mood states will exacerbate and prolong their emotional symptoms. In this way, perseveration may place certain individuals at greater relative risk for intensifying adverse emotional events (e.g. panic attacks) via heightened attention focused on negative affect and/or physiological states. Related work in the depression literature has, in fact, shown that individuals primed with a negative mood state perseverate on depressive thoughts significantly longer than individuals primed with a positive mood state (Hawksley and Davey, 2010). Perseveration also may be related to the maintenance of...