TABLE OF CONTENTS

LIST OF FIGURES ………………………………………………………………………………………………………. iiv
LIST OF TABLES ………………………………………………………………………………………………………….. v
ABSTRACT …………………………………………………………………………………………………………………..vi
CHAPTER 1. INTRODUCTION ………………………………………………………………………………………. 1
CHAPTER 2. LITERATURE REVIEW …………………………………………………………………………….. 3
Anxiety and Aggression ……………………………………………………………………………………………….. 4
Cognitive and Emotional Processing………………………………………………………………………………. 7
Attentional Bias and Psychological Wellbeing ………………………………………………………………. 13
Interpretation Biases and Negative Outcomes ……………………………………………………………….. 14
Emotion Dysregulation ……………………………………………………………………………………………….. 15
Understanding Anxiety and Aggression in Emerging Adults …………………………………………… 17
Statement of the Problem ……………………………………………………………………………………………. 18
Hypotheses ……………………………………………………………………………………………………………….. 19
CHAPTER 3. METHODS………………………………………………………………………………………………. 21
Participants ……………………………………………………………………………………………………………….. 21
Measures …………………………………………………………………………………………………………………… 23
Demographics ………………………………………………………………………………………………………… 23
Anxious Symptoms…………………………………………………………………………………………………. 23
Aggression. ……………………………………………………………………………………………………………. 24
Hostile Intent and Negative Emotional Response ……………………………………………………….. 24
Emotion Dysregulation……………………………………………………………………..26
Social Threat Bias…………………………………………………………………………..26
Procedure ………………………………………………………………………………………………………………. 28
CHAPTER 4. RESULTS………………………………………………………………………………………………… 30
Data Preparation and Cleaning …………………………………………………………………………………….. 30
Descriptive Statistics ………………………………………………………………………………………………….. 31
Moderated Serial Mediation Model………………………………………………………………………………. 34
Generalized Anxiety Model……………………………………………………………………………………… 34
Social Interaction Anxiety Model……………………………………………………………………………… 37
Regression Analyses …………………………………………………………………………………………………… 39
CHAPTER 5. DISCUSSION ………………………………………………………………………………………….. 40
Implications ………………………………………………………………………………………………………………. 44
Limitations and Future Directions ………………………………………………………………………………… 45
Conclusion ………………………………………………………………………………………………………………… 47
REFERENCES ……………………………………………………………………………………………………………… 48
APPENDIX. INSTITUTIONAL REVIEW BOARD MEMO……………………..…………….56