Fear learning and extinction predicts anxiety in daily life: a study of Pavlovian conditioning and ecological momentary assessment.

ABSTRACT:

Background

The association between anxious mood and aberrant fear learning mechanisms has not been fully elucidated. Studying how fear conditioning and extinction constructs relate to anxiety symptoms and reactivity to stressful and benign moments in everyday life provides a powerful addition to experimental paradigms.

Method

Fifty-one young adults completed laboratory-based differential conditioning and extinction tasks with (CS + ) and without (CS-) an aversive unconditional stimulus (US). Electrodermal skin conductance responses were measured during each phase, followed by ecological momentary assessment (EMA) tapping anxiety and stressors six times daily for seven days (2, 142 moments).

Results

Conditioned electrodermal reactivity to the CS + and overgeneralisatio

SUBMITTER: Modecki KL 

PROVIDER: S-EPMC10476067 | biostudies-literature | 2023 Aug

REPOSITORIES: biostudies-literature