Unconditioned Stimulus Revaluation to Promote Conditioned Fear Extinction in the Memory Reconsolidation Window
نویسندگان
چکیده
The retrieval-extinction paradigm, which disrupts the reconsolidation of fear memories in humans, is a non-invasive technique that can be used to prevent the return of fear in humans. In the present study, unconditioned stimulus revaluation was applied in the retrieval-extinction paradigm to investigate its promotion of conditioned fear extinction in the memory reconsolidation window after participants acquired conditioned fear. This experiment comprised three stages (acquisition, unconditioned stimulus revaluation, retrieval-extinction) and three methods for indexing fear (unconditioned stimulus expectancy, skin conductance response, conditioned stimulus pleasure rating). After the acquisition phase, we decreased the intensity of the unconditioned stimulus in one group (devaluation) and maintained constant for the other group (control). The results indicated that both groups exhibited similar levels of unconditioned stimulus expectancy, but the devaluation group had significantly smaller skin conductance responses and exhibited a growth in conditioned stimulus + pleasure. Thus, our findings indicate unconditioned stimulus revaluation effectively promoted the extinction of conditioned fear within the memory reconsolidation window.
منابع مشابه
Moderate Partially Reduplicated Conditioned Stimuli as Retrieval Cue Can Increase Effect on Preventing Relapse of Fear to Compound Stimuli
The theory of memory reconsolidation argues that consolidated memory is not unchangeable. Once a memory is reactivated it may go back into an unstable state and need new protein synthesis to be consolidated again, which is called "memory reconsolidation". Boundary studies have shown that interfering with reconsolidation through pharmacologic or behavioral intervention can lead to the updating o...
متن کاملLearned together, extinguished apart: reducing fear to complex stimuli.
Pairing a previously neutral conditioned stimulus (CS; e.g., a tone) to an aversive unconditioned stimulus (US; e.g., a footshock) leads to associative learning such that the tone alone comes to elicit a conditioned response (e.g., freezing). We have previously shown that an extinction session that occurs within the reconsolidation window attenuates fear responding and prevents the return of fe...
متن کاملBrain region-specific gene expression activation required for reconsolidation and extinction of contextual fear memory.
During fear conditioning, animals learn an association between a previously neutral or conditioned stimulus (CS) and an aversive or unconditioned stimulus (US). Subsequent reexposure to the CS alone triggers two competing processes. Brief reexposure to the CS initiates reconsolidation processes that serve to stabilize or maintain the original CS-US memory. In contrast, more prolonged reexposure...
متن کاملThe selectivity of aversive memory reconsolidation and extinction processes depends on the initial encoding of the Pavlovian association.
In reconsolidation studies, memories are typically retrieved by an exposure to a single conditioned stimulus (CS). We have previously demonstrated that reconsolidation processes are CS-selective, suggesting that memories retrieved by the CS exposure are discrete and reconsolidate separately. Here, using a compound stimulus in which two distinct CSs are concomitantly paired with the same aversiv...
متن کاملCharacterization of fear memory reconsolidation.
Reactivation of consolidated memories returns them to a protein synthesis-dependent state. One interpretation of these findings is that the memory reconsolidates after use. Two alternative interpretations are that protein synthesis inhibition facilitates extinction and that postreactivation protein synthesis inhibition leads to an inability to retrieve the consolidated memory. First, using two ...
متن کامل