The phobic brain: Morphometric features correctly classify individuals with small animal phobia.

ABSTRACT: Specific phobia represents an anxiety disorder category characterized by intense fear generated by specific stimuli. Among specific phobias, small animal phobia (SAP) denotes a particular condition that has been poorly investigated in the neuroscientific literature. Moreover, the few previous studies on this topic have mostly employed univariate analyses, with limited and unbalanced samples, leading to inconsistent results. To overcome these limitations, and to characterize the neural underpinnings of SAP, this study aims to develop a classification model of individuals with SAP based on gray matter features, by using a machine learning method known as the binary support vector machine. Moreover, the contribution of specific structural macro-networks, such as the default mode, the salience

SUBMITTER: Scarano A 

PROVIDER: S-EPMC11785541 | biostudies-literature | 2025 Jan

REPOSITORIES: biostudies-literature