International journal of psychophysiology : official journal of the International Organization of Psychophysiology
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The present experiment was a test of a new six-system model of anxiety, which includes physiological, behavioral, cognitive, affective, trait, and state components of anxiety and also differentiates between direct and mediated responses. The State-Trait Anxiety Inventory was used to screen 795 undergraduates at the University of Maryland. Of the 52 subjects chosen, half were high trait anxious and half low. ⋯ It was found that the most influential factor in resultant arousal was situational stress. Trait anxiety, state anxiety, and cognitive vs. affective sensitivity also significantly influenced both direct and mediated physiological and subjective anxiety responses. In addition, rather than leading to increased arousal, as hypothesized, the presence of trait and state anxiety reduced arousal under certain conditions.