Figure 1.
Schematic depiction of the conditioned-intrusion paradigm.
Panel A: Differential fear conditioning procedure with aversive film scenes as unconditioned stimuli (UCS) and sounds as conditioned stimuli (CS+ and CS−). See text for details. Panel B: Red line: Average skin conductance response to the CS+ and the UCS during the reinforced trials of the acquisition period. Blue line: Average skin conductance response to the CS− during acquisition. The dashed line displays the boundary between CS and UCS presentation. Values are referenced to the respective baseline before CS onset; means and standard errors are displayed. Panel C: Memory triggering task. Neutral soundscape with superimposed CS+ cues (CS+ cue condition), CS− cues (CS− cue condition), or no superimposed sound cues (no-cue condition). See text for details.
Figure 2.
Physiological and behavioral results of the fear conditioning task.
Means and standard errors of skin conductance response (SCR, panel A), valence ratings (panel B), fear ratings (panel C), and unconditioned stimulus (UCS) expectancy ratings (panel D) in response to CS+ and CS− across habituation (Hab), acquisition (Acq), and extinction (Ext) phases. See text for details.
Table 1.
ANOVA effects of the fear conditioning procedure for valence, fear, and unconditioned stimulus (UCS) expectancy ratings as well as skin conductance response (SCR).
Table 2.
Results for aversive memories, state anxiety, and SCL during the memory triggering task.
Figure 3.
Correlations between fear conditionability and aversive memories.
Panel A: Correlation between conditionability as measured by valence and aversive memories during CS+ cue condition of the memory triggering task. Panel B: Correlation between conditionability as measured by valence and ambulatorily assessed aversive memories. Panel C: Correlation between conditionability as measured by skin conductance response (SCR) and ambulatorily assessed aversive memories. Note: Values for aversive memories represent sum scores of the Intrusion Memory Questionnaire (IMQ) in T-scores. Variables did not fulfill bivariate normal distribution criteria and thus non-parametric correlational analyses were used. See text for details.
Table 3.
Correlations between fear conditionability and aversive memories (as assessed by the IMQ) during the memory triggering task and ambulatory assessment.
Table 4.
Ambulatory assessment of aversive memories.