Elsevier

Behaviour Research and Therapy

Volume 109, October 2018, Pages 68-74
Behaviour Research and Therapy

Novelty-facilitated extinction and the reinstatement of conditional human fear

https://doi.org/10.1016/j.brat.2018.08.002Get rights and content

Highlights

  • Novelty enhanced extinction (NFE) training reduces fear reinstatement.

  • Intolerance of uncertainty predicts reinstatement only after standard extinction.

  • NFE training does not affect self reported CS valence.

Abstract

Although contemporary treatments for anxiety disorders are very efficient in reducing anxiety, return of fear after successful treatment is common which signifies a need for interventions that have a more enduring outcome. A recent laboratory study suggested that novelty-facilitated extinction, a simple modification of standard extinction which involves presenting a novel non-aversive stimulus during extinction, prevents spontaneous recovery, one laboratory analogue of return of fear. The current study assessed whether novelty-facilitated extinction can also prevent reinstatement, a second laboratory analogue of return of fear. Following differential fear conditioning, one group of participants underwent standard extinction training whereas the second was presented with a novel tone after the conditional stimulus that previously predicted the aversive unconditional stimulus (US). Three presentations of the USs alone reinstated differential electrodermal fear responses after standard extinction, but not after novelty-facilitated extinction. Moreover, replicating previous findings, the extent of return of fear was correlated with self-reported intolerance of uncertainty after standard extinction, but not after novelty-facilitated extinction. These results support the proposal that novelty-facilitated extinction training can reduce the extent of return of fear.

Section snippets

Participants

Forty-eight university students and community members (mean age: M = 25.60, SD = 10.53, range: 18–62; 29 female) volunteered participation in exchange for course credit or AU$15 and provided informed consent. Participant numbers were based on the sample size used by Dunsmoor et al. (2015) for statistical analyses. Upon arrival at the laboratory participants were allocated to one of two groups, Novelty-Facilitated Extinction (NFE) or standard Extinction (EXT), alternatingly with the proviso of

Preliminary analyses

The two groups did not differ in gender ratio (female:male; NFE: 14:10; EXT: 15:9), number of contingency non-verbalisers (NFE: 5; EXT: 6), age (NFE: M = 26.17 years, SD = 11.87; EXT: M = 25.04 years, SD = 9.22), perceived unpleasantness of the electro-tactile stimulus (NFE: M = 5.83, SD = 1.09; EXT: M = 5.50, SD = 0.98), number of spontaneous SCRs during 3-min baseline (NFE: M = 34.29, SD = 18.60; EXT: M = 30.96, SD = 17.79), and IUS-12 scores (NFE: M = 2.67, SD = 0.87, range: 1.25–4.50; EXT: M

Supplementary analyses

The approach to conceptualize reinstatement used in the current study differs from that employed by Dunsmoor et al. (2015) who subjected responses to CS+ and CS in the early phase of the reinstatement test (the first three trials of the reinstatement test respectively) to a Group × CS ANOVA and calculated a reinstatement index as a ratio of the mean SCR to the first three CS+ presentations during the reinstatement test divided by the largest SCR to a CS+ during acquisition. Like Dunsmoor et

Discussion

The current study aimed to conceptually replicate and extend the findings of Dunsmoor et al. (2015) who reported that return of fear is reduced after extinction training in which the CS+ is paired with a novel, non-aversive tone stimulus, novelty-facilitated extinction. Rather than using spontaneous recovery as an index of return of fear, the current study assessed the effects of novelty-facilitated extinction on reinstatement. Following three unpaired presentations of the unconditional

Acknowledgments

This work was supported by grants number DP120100750 and SR120300015 from the Australian Research Council.

References (31)

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    Citation Excerpt :

    Similar to the context change before extinction training, the return of fear manipulation (i.e., reinstatement) may also produce an unexpected increase of uncertainty about the predictive value of the CSs regarding the occurrence of the US, which decreases fast during re-extinction (Morriss et al., 2021b). Previous studies suggested a modulatory effect of IU on the return of fear as evident in conditioned SCRs (Dunsmoor et al., 2015; Lucas et al., 2018). However, the pattern regarding effects of trait anxiety on the return of fear appears to be less clear (Gazendam et al., 2013; Kindt et al., 2009; Kindt and Soeter, 2013; Martínez et al., 2012; Soeter and Kindt, 2010).

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