Social Support and Enhanced Fear Extinction

University of California, Los Angeles (UCLA)

Status

Enrolling

Conditions

Fear

Anxiety

Treatments

Behavioral: Social Support

Study type

Interventional

Funder types

Other

NIH

Identifiers

NCT04565041

R21MH125274 (U.S. NIH Grant/Contract)

SSE

Details and patient eligibility

About

University of California, Los Angeles researchers will recruit healthy participants and anxious participants (those diagnosed with social anxiety disorder) age 18-55 years old to participate in a study examining whether the ability of social support figure reminders to enhance the extinction of fear in healthy participants extends to those with anxiety disorders.

After being recruited from the UCLA community (healthy participants, n = 50) or referred by treatment providers at the Anxiety and Depression Research Center at UCLA (anxious participants, n = 50) and undergoing a telephone screening and in-person screening, 100 participants will be enrolled in the study, with an expected recruited 150 to reach this number. During the experiment, all participants will undergo the same procedures: undergoing a fear extinction procedure in which threatening cues--cues that predict electric shock--will be paired with either an image of a social support figure (provided by participants) or an image of a smiling stranger. These pairings will be presented repeatedly in the absence of shock in order for fear extinction to occur. Participants will return for a follow-up test to determine if fear extinction was successful.

Enrollment

100 estimated patients

Sex

All

Ages

18 to 55 years old

Volunteers

Accepts Healthy Volunteers

Inclusion criteria

healthy adults 18 to 55
fluent in English
no history of mental illness (healthy participants: including anxiety, depression, phobia, or any other mental health related disorder diagnosed by a mental health professional)
diagnosis of social anxiety disorder (anxious participants: allowed co-morbid disorders include depression, other anxiety disorders, and PTSD)

Exclusion criteria

pregnant or planning to become pregnant during the experiment period
presence of chronic mental illness (healthy participants: as determined by the report of a past diagnosis of mental illness by a physician or psychologist and/or the prescription of medication related to mental health disorder; including anxiety, depression, phobia, or any other diagnosed psychological disorder)
presence of non-allowed co-morbid disorders (anxious participants: including, bipolar disorder, psychosis, substance use disorder, neurological disorder, and/or obsessive-compulsive disorder)
current and regular use of prescription medications related to mental health disorders