Use of Safety Behaviors in Exposure Therapy for Arachnophobia

University of Nevada, Reno

Status: Completed

Conditions: Spider Phobia; Arachnophobia; Specific Phobia

Treatments: Behavioral: Exposure without safety behaviors; Behavioral: Exposure with unfaded safety behaviors; Behavioral: Exposure with faded safety behaviors

Study type: Interventional

Funder types: Other

Identifiers

NCT04470882

1330971-1

Details and patient eligibility

About

This study examines the impact of safety behaviors (i.e., unnecessary protective actions) on outcomes of exposure therapy for spider phobia. Researchers will compare exposure therapy with (a) no safety behaviors, (b) safety behaviors faded toward the end of treatment, and (c) unfaded safety behaviors.

Full description

Some studies suggest that safety behaviors might undermine the efficacy of exposure therapy (Powers et al., 2010), whereas other studies suggest that there is no difference in exposure therapy outcomes whether or not safety behaviors are used (Deacon et al., 2010). Mixed findings could be explained by the parameters of safety behaviors use, such as whether they are used throughout the full course of therapy or faded toward the end of therapy. This will be the first study to directly compare the impact of faded and unfaded safety behaviors on exposure therapy outcomes. Specifically, researchers will randomize participants with a fear of spiders to receive exposure therapy (a) without safety behavior use, (b) with faded safety behavior use, and (c) with un-faded safety behavior use. Researchers will compare each condition's impact on fear reduction and on the tolerability/acceptability of treatment.

Enrollment: 59 patients

Sex: All

Ages: 18+ years old

Volunteers: No Healthy Volunteers

Inclusion criteria

• Fluent in English
• Displays sufficiently high fear of spiders, as indicated by responses on (a) a self report questionnaire (the Fear of Spiders Questionnaire) at prescreening, and (b) Behavioral Avoidance Tests at baseline

Exclusion criteria

• younger than 18 years old

Trial design

Primary purpose: Treatment

Allocation: Randomized

Interventional model: Parallel Assignment

Masking: None (Open label)

---

59 participants in 3 patient groups

Exposure with faded safety behaviors

Experimental group

Description:

Exposure therapy will involve three, 10-minute trials in which participants encounter a spider. Participants in this group will wear protective gear during the first two trials, and will remove the protective gear during the last trial.

Treatment:

Behavioral: Exposure with faded safety behaviors

Exposure without safety behaviors

Active Comparator group

Description:

Exposure therapy will involve three, 10-minute trials in which participants encounter a spider. Participants in this group will not wear protective gear during any of the exposure therapy trials.

Treatment:

Behavioral: Exposure without safety behaviors

Exposure with unfaded safety behaviors

Experimental group

Description:

Exposure therapy will involve three, 10-minute trials in which participants encounter a spider. Participants in this group will wear protective gear during all three exposure therapy trials.

Treatment:

Behavioral: Exposure with unfaded safety behaviors