Table 1. Example of one complete thought record from the dataset collected in this study.
| TR Question | Entry Type | Participant Response |
|---|---|---|
| Describe the situation very briefly in your own words. | open text entry field | while walking down the street I see someone I know, wave at them and they don’t acknowledge my wave. |
| How well can you imagine yourself in this situation? | slider from 0 (not at all) to 100 (as good as if you were in the situation at the very moment) | 85 |
| Describe your emotion in this situation in one word. | open text entry field | disappointment |
| How intensely would you be experiencing this emotion? | slider from 0 (a trace) to 100 (the most intense possible) | 45 |
| Which of the following four emotions corresponds best with the emotion that you wrote down above? | multiple choice: sadness, fear, anger, happiness | sadness |
| Which (automatic) thought might have caused you to feel this way in the described situation? | open text entry field | They don’t like me enough to wave back |
| And why would it be upsetting to you if “They don’t like me enough to wave back” were true? What would it mean to you? What would it say about you? | open text entry field | I may be unlikeable. |
| And why would it be upsetting to you if “I may be unlikeable” were true? What would it mean to you? What would it say about you? | open text entry field | I want friends. I will be lonely otherwise. |
| And why would it be upsetting to you if “I want friends so I won’t be lonely.” were true? What would it mean to you? What would it say about you? | open text entry field | If I am unlikeable then I won’t have friends and will be alone all my life. |
| What would you do in the situation, if anything? | open text entry field | I would try to make better impressions on people I meet. |
Steps of the downward arrow technique are presented in cursive font. Three downward arrow steps were completed in this thought record. After each downward arrow step (question + open text entry field), participants were asked the intermediate closed question of whether they wanted to continue with the downward arrow technique or not. Thus, after each step participants indicated that they wanted to continue until the final one, where they indicated that they wanted to stop, thereby completing the downward arrow technique. The intermediate question is omitted here. Following the downward arrow technique, participants completed the entire thought record by describing their behavior in the situation. The scenario description presented to the participant was “You are walking down the street. On the other side of the street you see an acquaintance whom you’ve liked the few times you’ve been in his company. You wave to him, and you get no response.”