Clinical Psychological Science, Maastricht University, The Netherlands.
J Behav Ther Exp Psychiatry. 2012 Mar;43(1):614-24. doi: 10.1016/j.jbtep.2011.08.006. Epub 2011 Aug 31.
Although extinction is highly effective in reducing a conditioned fear response, return of the fear response (renewal) outside the extinction context often occurs. The present study investigated whether US devaluation, through imagery rescripting during extinction, resulted in less renewal than mere extinction.
Seventy psychology students were subjected to a fear conditioning paradigm. During fear acquisition CS+ was always followed by the US, whereas CS- was never followed by the US. For all groups the acquisition phase took place in context A. During extinction both CS+ and CS- were offered, but no US was presented. For three groups extinction was conducted in a different context, context B (ABA groups). The fourth group received extinction in the acquisition context (AAA group) in order to demonstrate that renewal indeed took place. During extinction, participants received either an imagery rescripting (IR) instruction to devaluate the US (ABAir), a US-unrelated imagination instruction to assess the general influence of imagination (ABAcont), or no instruction at all (ABAno and AAAno). Subsequently, testing occurred for all groups in the acquisition context A.
The results indicated that renewal of the US expectancy ratings was reduced if imagery rescripting (ABAir) was added to mere extinction (ABAno). Next to the reduction in renewal, imagery rescripting (ABAir) also resulted in the devaluation of the US valence, indicating that the mental representation of the US had changed. These findings are not only in line with contemporary conditioning theories, but also suggest that adding imagery rescripting to extinction might be beneficial in the treatment of anxiety problems.
尽管消退在降低条件性恐惧反应方面非常有效，但在消退情境之外，恐惧反应（复燃）常常会恢复。本研究探讨了在消退过程中通过意象重写来使条件性刺激（US）贬值是否会导致比单纯消退更少的复燃。
70 名心理学学生接受了恐惧条件反射范式的训练。在恐惧获得阶段，CS+ 总是伴随着 US，而 CS- 则从未伴随着 US。对于所有组，获得阶段都在 A 情境中进行。在消退阶段，同时呈现 CS+和 CS-，但不呈现 US。对于三个组，消退在不同的情境 B（ABA 组）中进行。第四个组（AAA 组）在获得情境中接受消退，以证明确实发生了复燃。在消退期间，参与者接受了意象重写（IR）指令以贬低 US（ABAir）、与 US 无关的想象指令以评估想象的一般影响（ABAcont），或者根本没有指令（ABAno 和 AAAno）。随后，所有组都在获得情境 A 中进行测试。
结果表明，如果将意象重写（ABAir）添加到单纯消退（ABAno）中，会降低 US 期望评级的复燃。除了复燃的减少，意象重写（ABAir）还导致了 US 效价的贬值，表明 US 的心理表征已经发生了变化。这些发现不仅与当代条件反射理论一致，还表明在消退中添加意象重写可能对焦虑问题的治疗有益。
