PROOF – Role of fear learning in psychosis
PROOF - Fear acquisition and extinction learning and transition to psychosis
Principal investigator: Prof. Dr. Tania Lincoln
Research associates: M. Sc. Metin Özyagcilar, M. Sc. Nilay Demirdal
Student researchers: Alina Hay, Kieren Snowball
Cooperation partners: Prof. Dr. Tina Lonsdorf, Prof. Dr. Anja Riesel, Prof. Dr. Erik Müller, Prof. Dr. Benno Roozendaal
Associated study centers: Universitätsklinikum Hamburg Eppendorf, Philipps-Universität Marburg, Donders Institut Nijmegen, Justus-Liebig-Universität Gießen
Funding: DFG Funded (as part of the Research Training Group “Emotional Learning and Memory” (GRK / RTG 2753)
Background:
The learning processes of fear are found to be impaired in people with anxiety disorders. This impairment could also be relevant for developing psychotic symptoms, which are associated with high levels of anxiety. Nevertheless, fear conditioning has not been well studied in psychosis. Furthermore, previous studies investigating temporal neural processes in psychosis mostly focused on early sensory components. Little is known about the components occurring at later stages (event related potentials; ERPs, i.e., the late positive potential; LPP) which reflect sustained attention to emotionally salient stimuli. Also, previous fear conditioning studies have exclusively used physically aversive stimulation in their experimental designs. However, it can be assumed that the content of delusions is often not directly linked to real-life experiences, and they might more commonly be induced by imagined threats. Neither (imagery-based) fear conditioning nor its neural correlates have so far been well studied in psychosis research, especially not in individuals with psychotic liability. Investigating the acquisition, extinction, and generalization of fear could further help us to understand the dynamics of associative (fear) learning in individuals with psychotic liability. It could also offer new perspectives for developing (preventive) treatment interventions for psychosis.
Aim:
We aim to identify the unusual patterns of emotionally-relevant neural components as well as behavioral responses during fear acquisition and extinction learning in individuals who are at risk of developing psychosis. We also plan to assess whether alterations in fear learning can predict symptom increases over time.
Method:
We are using an established differential fear conditioning paradigm as well as a novel imagery-based differential fear conditioning paradigm. Our methods include clinical interviews, neuropsychological tasks, a questionnaire battery consisting of various relevant scales, electroencephalography (EEG) and other peripheral and psychophysiological measures.
More details on the project (in German) can be found here.