A Neuropsychological Characterization of Social Feedback Processing in Social Anxiety

Tel Aviv Sourasky Medical Center

Status: Completed

Conditions: Social Anxiety

Treatments: Behavioral: Emotional reactivity task; Behavioral: Reward vs. punishment task; Behavioral: Social feedback; Behavioral: Self-referential paradigm

Study type: Interventional

Funder types: Other

Identifiers

NCT03547713

TASMC-18-TH-0082-17-TLV-CTIL

Details and patient eligibility

About

The purpose of this study is to characterize neuropsychological mechanisms (positive affect, negative affect and self-evaluation) mediating processing of social feedback in people with different levels of social anxiety, by implementing functional and structural MRI.

Full description

Social anxiety (SA) disorder is a relatively widespread emotional disorder which is associated with considerable impairment in social, educational, and occupational functioning (Kessler et al., 2005). This condition is characterized by a debilitating preoccupation with the evaluation of the self by others, ultimately leading to excessive fear and avoidance of interpersonal encounters. As opposed to healthy individuals who typically process social feedback in a positively biased manner, Individuals with high levels of SA tend to evaluate the feedback conveyed by others negatively. Such biases have a profound contribution to the maintenance of social-related concerns (Clark & Wells, 1995).

Thus, the overreaching goal of this research is to provide a neuropsychological account of biased processing of social feedback evident in SA. To meet this goal, participants varying in their level of SA are asked to deliver a speech and evaluate it before and after receiving social feedback during an fMRI scan. Additional structural and resting-state fMRI scans, as well as physiological and psychological measures, are obtained throughout the experiment in order to explain individual differences in processing of feedback. fMRI tasks probing basic neuropsychological processes include a self-referential paradigm, wherein participants judge if different traits varying in valence and social domain (power vs. affiliation) are descriptive of them; a reward vs. punishment task, in which participants can win or lose money; and an emotional reactivity task, in which participants view faces with different emotional expressions.

The long-term goal of this study is to better delineate both neurobiological and psychological models of SA, as well as to help in directing future neuromodulation-based treatments of mood and anxiety disorders.

Enrollment: 58 patients

Sex: All

Ages: 18 to 60 years old

Volunteers: Accepts Healthy Volunteers

Inclusion criteria

• Healthy participants
• With different levels of social anxiety as measured by the Liebowitz Social Anxiety Scale-Self-Report (LSAS-SR; Fresco et al., 2001)
• Normal or corrected-to-normal vision
• Compatibility with general MRI requirements

Exclusion criteria

• History of neurological or psychiatric diseases

Trial design

Primary purpose: Basic Science

Allocation: N/A

Interventional model: Single Group Assignment

Masking: None (Open label)

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58 participants in 1 patient group

Study group

Experimental group

Description:

social feedback and neuropsychological assessment

Treatment:

Behavioral: Self-referential paradigm

Behavioral: Emotional reactivity task

Behavioral: Reward vs. punishment task

Behavioral: Social feedback